Operational performance

“With a commendable and ever improving environmental performance in place, it is, however, Northumbrian’s extremely impressive social and economic initiatives which elevate it to the status of sector leaders.

“A diverse suite of programmes have been implemented, encompassing local procurement, strong apprenticeship programmes, individual up skilling and the continuous leverage of their spending power, employment and wider economic presence to ensure maximum benefit for local communities.

“Northumbrian’s driving commitment to sustainability governance provides an example and benchmark across sectors, demonstrating that strong leadership and ambition can make a tangible difference to communities both local and more widely.”

NWL was also named ‘Utility Company of the Year’ at the Utility Week Awards in December 2008. Steve Hobson, the Editor said:

“Last year for the first time we asked our panel of eminent judges to nominate and vote for the utility they felt deserved the accolade ‘Utility Company of the Year’. The aim was to open this top category to companies that deserve such recognition but often don’t enter awards for various reasons.

“Northumbrian Water was a worthy winner for the way it builds its business around customers and the community, principles that usually do not make headlines but show that a successful utility really does put customers at the heart of its business.”

In addition to the awards outlined above we were:

• members of the FTSE4GoodIndex again;
• ranked by Business in the Community (BITC) as one of the top 100 ‘Companies for corporate responsibility’ and as a Platinum ranked company. It also awarded the company its Big Tick award for its impact on society and for being a healthy workplace;
• leading water company in Britain’s Most Admired Companies survey;
• North East Call Centre of the Year in the 2008 contact centre awards;
• the employee engagement winner at the North East of England Chartered Institute of Personnel Development HR&D awards; and
• the category winner of Culture for Success Large Employer Award for employee development, customer service, business growth and the contribution we have made to the community.

Over many years, we have donated at least 1% of our pre-tax profits (through cash, employee time and expertise, or use of our facilities) to projects which benefit the communities we serve. We reported this publicly as part of BITC’s Per Cent Club standard and, although this ended in October 2007, NWG has maintained this commitment.

The Group made charitable donations totalling £134,415 during the year.

Community support

Employees and volunteering

Currently 22% of employees participate in the ‘Just an hour’ volunteering scheme and last year gave over 6,500 hours to the community. Over 500 different organisations were given financial and in-kind support during the year. The ‘Care for safety’ scheme, which encourages employees to reduce accidents and associated lost time, has triggered payments totalling £52,655 for our nominated charities (Great North Air Ambulance Service, Mencap’s Dilston College, RNLI, St Teresa’s Hospice and East Anglia’s Children’s Hospices). Since it began over £250,000 has been raised for charity.

Education

Further to the launch of the ‘Northumbrian Water GLOBE’ programme, which saw us link up with the international environmental education initiative set up by Al Gore in 1996, we donated 85 fully automated weather stations and associated training to schools throughout the northern region, to collect weather data in areas where Meteorological Office coverage is poor. This data is now helping to increase understanding of the impact of climate change, and is a valuable curriculum tool.