Exmouth sewage pollution claim

Exmouth Beach is often called the “gateway to UNESCO’s World Heritage Jurassic Coast.” It is the prized asset of Exmouth and is of vital importance,much of the town’s economy revolves around the tourism the beach attracts. 

According to both South West Water’s WaterFit website and the Environment Agency’s SwimFo website, South West Water repeatedly discharges large amounts of untreated sewage into the River Exe and Exmouth and Budleigh’s bathing waters, which is having a detrimental impact on Exmouth Beach, Budleigh Beach and the surrounding area. 

The impact of these discharges is acknowledged by both the Environment Agency and South West Water, with the Environment Agency having issued numerous “Advice Against Bathing” warnings in recent years and South West Water regularly stating on its website that discharges may affect the condition of the bathing water. 

Paul Arnott, the East Devon District Council leader, declared a state of “ongoing civil emergency” due to beaches having to be closed repeatedly, from Seaton to Sidmouth, because of sewage discharges.  

South West Water’s discharges of sewage have, among other things, meant the community has, at times, been advised against using the beach waters, where sewage creates a health hazard. For example, during the August 2024 Bank Holiday weekend, and the following week, the local council put up Red Flag warnings on Exmouth Beach to prevent people from entering the water after a sewage discharge at Maer Road sewage pumping station rising main to Maer Road Sewage Treatment Works burst flooding into Littleham stream.  

South West Water’s sewage discharges do not just impact those wishing to swim, but also those who rely on the water and beaches either for recreational use or to attract customers to their businesses. Anyone who has been impacted by the sewage discharge in the Exmouth and Budleigh area can join the claim at this stage.  

Leigh Day is aware that South West Water has continued to pollute despite an Environment Agency investigation, customer complaints, and many other efforts to curb the harm the company allegedly causes. The group legal claim is being brought as a last resort to hold South West Water accountable, seek compensation for the harm the community has allegedly suffered, and try to achieve a real, long-term solution to the issue.  

Generally, only the polluters themselves can be liable in a civil nuisance case such as this one.  

Regulators such as Ofwat are not normally liable in private or civil law for failing to prevent private companies from causing damage. This private law action will seek to hold South West Water directly accountable for the harm it has allegedly caused to the environment and the surrounding community.  

If there were any shortfall in the expenses recovered from the Defendant(s), that shortfall would need to be shared amongst all the successful Claimants. This means that you would only be liable to pay your individual share of the shortfall, which would be a small percentage of the total because you are bringing your claim with many thousands of others in a group, and you benefit from being able to share the shortfall with the group. 

We would first seek to recover all these costs from the Defendant(s) under the general rule that the loser pays the winner’s costs. Under this principle, generally speaking, the Defendant(s) will be liable for most of the expenses, as long as they were reasonably incurred. 

If in the unlikely circumstance that after the expenses are divided between all claimants, these expenses are still greater than your remaining compensation, we would not charge you any more than the compensation that you are awarded. 

Please see the example below to better understand how costs would work: 

If the expenses shortfall were £100,000 in total and there were 10,000 Claimants in the group, each would be responsible for paying £10. If you do not win your case, you do not have to pay us anything, as long as you abide by our funding agreement.  

We have provided a worked example below to illustrate how instructing us under a DBA works where we are acting under a DBA on the same terms we are offering you in this case. 

Client enters into DBA for 30% of damages + VAT + expenses. Client wins their case and receives £10,000 in compensation. We also recover from the Defendant £2,000 towards our time costs and expenses. 

In the above example, the client will only pay £2,600 from the £10,000 damages / compensation received i.e., only 26%, which includes all monies due to Leigh Day (the DBA payment, VAT and expenses). 

The DBA payment will never be more than 30% of your damages (excluding VAT), irrespective of the number of claimants within the group. There will also be an insurance premium payable if your claim is successful to protect you from having to pay any adverse costs to the Defendant if the claim is unsuccessful, but payment of this will be included in the DBA payment of 30% of your damages (excluding VAT and expenses). 

Once you have checked that you are eligible to bring a claim, we will ask you to read through our funding agreement and sign the same. You will then be a client of the firm. 

Please note £10,000 is a hypothetical compensation figure purely for the purpose of illustrating how a DBA payment works in principle.  

As explained above, this community-led group claim is being brought to try and reduce serious pollution incidents in Exmouth and Budleigh and compensate the local community for losses allegedly caused by the pollution.  

As part of the claim, the claimants may seek an injunction from the courts to make a legally enforceable order for South West Water to act to stop the alleged pollution. Injunctions can also be used to oblige companies to clean up their pollution, in this case, compelling South West Water to help restore Exmouth Beach and Budleigh Beach to what it used to be.  

If a court decides that an injunction is not an appropriate remedy, it may grant damages for future loss in place of an injunction, which would further deter South West Water.  

The compensation you can claim is difficult to estimate without seeing evidence of your losses or fully investigating your claim. As a guide, we estimate that:   

A spokesperson for South West Water has publicly stated that they are investing up to £38 million in the Exmouth area by 2030, including in making upgrades to pumping stations and treatment works.  

Unfortunately, South West Water has made several statements regarding investments in the sewerage systems in Exmouth and the East Devon area; local reports suggest that many of these promises to invest in their infrastructure have been subsequently reduced or have not materialised.  

A community-led legal action such as the one you might pursue with Leigh Day helps hold companies such as South West Water to account. Any amount a court awarded, including any sums awarded for cleaning up the area, would be legally enforceable - South West Water would have to act.

If you have been impacted by the waste service tankers, you may be eligible to claim in private and/or public nuisance. Waste service tankers are large trucks used by a water company to carry sewage wastewater, sludge and effluent in the management and removal of waste from various sources, including combined sewage overflow pumping stations, such as the Maer Lane sewage pumping station in Exmouth.  

At the start of 2024, 240 truckloads of sewage per day were sent to the overflowing pumping station in Maer Road due to a burst pipe and subsequent sewage overflow. The tankers, as reported by the community, have continued to “plough through Exmouth” following another burst sewage pipe.   

The waste service tankers have been described by the community as a continuous disruption because they allegedly block traffic, cause damage to roads and garden verges, increase pollution, create smells, generate brake dust and generate significant noise.   

Homeowners and renters have a legal right to enjoy their property rights without major interference from another party. For example, if you own or rent property on the tankers’ route to and from the pumping station, you may have a claim in private nuisance.  

Additionally, if you own a business and you can prove that your business has suffered a loss of income due to the disruption from the tankers, you may also be able to claim in nuisance

Where you have been impacted by sewage pollution over and above the way an ordinary member of the public has been impacted, or your property has been impacted, you may have a basis for bringing a claim. Relevant impacts include:  

Generally, claims brought based on nuisance must be commenced within six years of the date on which the claimant suffered the loss, or if they only found out about the loss more than six years after the start of the nuisance, the date on which they became aware of the loss and its cause. This is known as limitation and if a legal claim is not commenced before limitation expires, it generally may not proceed.  

Please note that this summary of the limitation rules is very general; an assessment of your individual position depends on the facts of your case. Please use the online “join the claim” form to sign up. Unfortunately, we cannot provide individual advice during the sign-up process.

We will bring these claims on a ‘No Win, No Fee’ basis under a Damages Based Agreement (‘DBA’). You will pay no upfront money for Leigh Day to represent you in your claim. If you lose, you will not pay for Leigh Day’s services, provided you have complied with the terms of the agreement you sign with us.  

If you win, you will pay us 30% of your compensation (excluding VAT).  

For example, if you receive £10,000 in compensation, we will take 30% (£3,000) plus VAT (£600), so £3,600 in total.   

We are required by law to charge expenses separately, though the sum you would pay is likely to be small. Expenses include things like court fees and experts’ fees.  

For example, if expenses were £100,000 (and we could not recover them from the defendant) and there were 10,000 Claimants in the group, each would be responsible for paying £10 plus VAT (£2), so £12 in total. 

The DBA fee plus expenses outlined above is the maximum you would have to pay us – it could be less because we can offset some of what we are able to recover from the defendant against the sum you have to pay us.   

You should always read the full terms of our DBA and the Client Care Letter to make sure you are happy with your agreement with us.

Please carefully review the retainer agreement documents downloadable during the sign-up process and circulated to all clients by email, in particular your client care letter, for details of the terms on which we will represent you.   

In litigation, the losing party is typically required to pay the opponent’s costs. It is for this reason that we will arrange insurance to protect you against the risk of losing and having to pay the defendant’s (or defendants’) legal costs.  The insurance is called After the Event insurance (‘ATE insurance’) and we would not start court proceedings without it.  

So long as you comply with the terms of your agreement with us, and any ATE agreement, it is highly unlikely you would ever be liable to pay any costs. There does remain a small risk that you would still be personally liable if, for example, you breach the terms of the insurance by acting dishonestly. 

We will meet the cost of insurance out of the Damages Based Agreement percentage you pay if you win, so the cost of insurance is included in the 30% success fee mentioned above.  

We are committed to doing everything possible to ensure you have good ATE insurance, however, if you have any questions about the small risk to you, please email exmouthsewage@leighday.co.uk and one of our team members will respond. Alternatively, you can call us at 0207 650 1111.

So long as you act honestly and comply with your responsibilities related to the claim, South West Water would be unlikely to have any claim against you personally.  

For example, if you are required to disclose documents about the claim, you must do so. We will keep our clients updated of all their obligations during the claim and you would of course be able to contact us with any concerns you have.

It is difficult to say at the early stages of an English litigation how long the claims might take. The length of claims depends on several factors which are often outside our control, including the approach that South West Water (and any other defendant that may potentially be added to this claim in future) will take in the litigation.  

In our experience, group claims of this type may take three to five years to take all the way to trial. The length of time the claim takes will depend on any complexities arising within the litigation and whether settlement can be achieved at an earlier stage.   

If South West Water defends the claims and we need to commence court proceedings, there are mechanisms available to help efficiently progress large group actions involving a large number of related claims.  

In particular, it is possible to ask the Court to grant a Group Litigation Order, which allows for claims with common/related issues to be heard and managed together rather than on an individual basis.  

While we will not hesitate to initiate court proceedings when appropriate to achieve our clients’ aims, we will also explore all possible ways of achieving your objectives, including mediation or some other alternative dispute resolution procedure, if appropriate and where your opponents agree to engage.   

We will update you regularly with more information on the timescale of your case, particularly in relation to the timescale for next steps, which can usually be predicted more accurately. For example, at the point where a Letter Before Action is sent to a defendant, we would be in a better position to tell you when we would be likely to issue your claim with the court.

We are at a very early stage of the claim, where we are still gathering information and evidence.   

At this stage, it is too early to say definitely what documents you may need to provide in support of your claim. It is likely that some key issues can be dealt with on a group basis with the assistance of appropriate expert evidence.   

However, among others, we may request your documents that evidence any losses you claim to have suffered. This may include, for example:   

We will provide all our clients with regular updates, particularly around significant milestones in your claim.   

If you have any questions regarding the agreement you would make with Leigh Day, please email exmouthsewage@leighday.co.uk and one of our team members will respond. Alternatively, you can call us at 0207 650 1111.