Open Water winds down

Open Water Markets Limited (OWML) will be wound down by the end of this year, with the programme to open the water market to competition for non-domestic customers by 2017 taken back into Ofwat from January 2015.

Under proposals published today Ofwat said OWML will be mothballed, with the potential to be revived later in the process.

The decision to wind down OWML was prompted by the government’s classification of it as a public body, Ofwat said.

Before it winds down at the end of the year, it would oversee the creation of a new advisory panel to work with Ofwat on the market design. This will include the election of industry representatives.

OWML had been searching for a permanent chief executive since February, when Keith Fowler stood down, but Ofwat will now recruit for an internal programme director, reporting to chief regulation officer Sonia Brown.