Sir Keir Starmer has been urged to use the army to respond to an outage that has left thousands of homes without a proper water supply.
A major incident was declared on Monday as 30,000 properties in Kent and Sussex were affected by problems with their water supply. South East Water (SEW) blamed the situation, across 11 postcode areas, on Storm Goretti and cold weather causing burst pipes and power cuts.
People in Tunbridge Wells, East Grinstead, Maidstone, Whitstable, Canterbury and the surrounding areas faced issues with supply, with thousands of homes still experiencing problems on Tuesday. This is the second time in two months that outages have occurred, with 24,000 people in Tunbridge Wells affected in December 2025.
SEW said teams are working “around the clock” and has apologised for the outage, as bottled water has been handed out to residents. In an update on Tuesday morning, the water company said around 25,000 customers in Kent and Sussex remain affected by no water or intermittent supplies.
It said that water supplies are returning to Loose in Maidstone, Blean near Canterbury, Headcorn, West Kingsdown and parts of Tunbridge Wells.
Dry Wells Action, a community group set up in Tunbridge Wells to respond to the shortages, has called for the army to be sent into their town to deal with the logistics of restoring water.
SEW has set up a number of bottled water stations around the region and said in its update that the network “takes time to refill and build pressure”, with tankers being used to pump water into it.
Jonathan Hawker, running the campaign from Tunbridge Wells, told The Independent: “In terms of the short-term fix, what we really need is the government to intervene and bring outside help in from people with logistics nous and resources to ensure that the top-up after the pumping station and the reservoir is conducted, despite the inability of South East Water to do this themselves.
“We would welcome the professionals of the army, who are experts in logistics, giving guidance to South East Water on how to do their job.”
Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead has brought a water tanker onsite to keep its supply running until the situation is resolved, while a number of schools around Maidstone remained closed on Tuesday as a result of the ongoing problems.
On Monday, residents in affected areas told The Independent they face water shortages on a regular basis.
Joanne Lee, 53 and from Ulcombe in Kent, explained that the issues are so frequent she has been forced to change her routine and does not leave her home without filling up water bottles.
“Sometimes it can be for a couple of hours, sometimes it’s for days. I’ve never lived anywhere like it,” she said.
“I’ve got into the routine of filling up my bath, so I can use that to flush the toilet. It has become an everyday routine because the water supply is so intermittent, and that shouldn’t [be] normal for the UK.
“I never leave my house without a full kettle, my fridge water filled up, I always leave my house with everything full just in case when I come home I’ve got no water.”
Mr Hawker said more needed to be done to improve the water supply in Tunbridge Wells, beyond the short-term fix ongoing at the moment.
He said: “What we need as a second phase is an independent assessment by an expert appointed by government to explore the flaws within the infrastructure that SEW has to serve this town and what needs to be done to modernise it, so there is some resilience in the system. We simply don’t trust SEW doing it themselves.”
Multiple MPs from across the impacted area called for the government to remove the company’s chief executive, David Hinton, from his post.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Helen Whately said around 5,000 properties in her Faversham and Mid Kent constituency had been impacted.
She said: “It is not for the first time the chief executive of South East Water has shown us he is not up to the job. Can I urge the honourable lady to use any power she has to move him on?”
Mims Davies, Conservative MP for East Grinstead, Uckfield and the villages, said: “With multiple and repeated South East Water serious failings in just the last five years, does the minister agree with me this water company needs urgent new leadership capable of properly addressing emergency situations?”
Water minister Emma Hardy did not offer any support for SEW’s chief executive, saying the situation at the company “beggars belief”.
The Independent has approached SEW for further comment, as well as the government.
An Ofwat spokesperson said on Monday: “We are concerned that residents in Kent and Sussex are without water again, and are working closely with the Drinking Water Inspectorate, which is the lead regulator for this latest supply interruption, to ensure that regulation and enforcement is aligned.
“Ofwat already has an active investigation into South East Water related to its supply resilience, and we have met with the company to discuss these latest incidents as part of that investigation.
“We will review all of the evidence before taking a decision on what further action may be required into whether the company has met its legal obligations set out in its licence relating to customer care, including with further potential enforcement action.”
South East Water incident manager Steve Andrews apologised to customers and said the company’s focus was on “returning supplies to our customers as soon as possible”.
