UK business minister says Thames Water must survive; Bank of England governor understands criticism over rate hike – as it happened

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news, as government begins drawing up contingency plans for the collapse of Thames Water

• Contingency plans reportedly being drawn up for Thames Water collapse
• Thames Water boss steps down amid backlash over environmental record
• Jeremy Hunt to ask UK regulators to investigate firms exploiting price rises

Accounting professor Prem Sikka tweets:

Estimates that UK water bills could rise by 40% are probably not unrealistic", according to Sir John Armitt, the chair of the National Infrastructure Commission.

So as you can see, we're talking about very large sums of money to restore and enable our water infrastructure and our sewage infrastructure to be fit for purpose.