Thames Water, the UK's largest water company, has returned to a full-year profit after hiking customer bills by 40% last year. The firm reported post-tax income of £113m for the 12 months to the end of March, swinging from a £1.51bn post-tax loss the previous year. Progress! Unless you look at the debt, which swelled to £18.5bn from £16.8bn, because apparently turning the company around requires borrowing more than some nations' entire economies.

Chief executive Chris Weston said: "The progress we have made in turning the company around has meant we are now performing better." Customers who saw their bills rise by 40% might have a different definition of "better." The results come after the government rejected a proposed rescue deal in June, under which lenders wanted leniency from future pollution fines in exchange for writing off £9.4bn of debt and investing new money. Pollution incidents fell by 18%, but the firm hit just over half of its performance targets. Customer complaints jumped 77% year-on-year, with bill complaints making up over three quarters of the total. Because of course.

The company admitted that money from customer bills isn't enough to fund the massive upgrades needed for its aging infrastructure, so it needs to borrow more. It has enough debt funding to keep going "through to Q4 2026." Weston told investors they "want to see what the new Burnham government thinks before providing more funding." Labour MP Andy Burnham, expected to become Prime Minister on Monday, has previously called for Thames Water to be nationalised. So the company is essentially waiting to see if the government will bail them out or take over. Either way, customers get the bill.