TV review Pity the poor staff as Thames Water invites in the cameras

Why would Thames Water invite in TV cameras for a fly-on-the-wall documentary? "Nobody comes to work to put shit in rivers," says the company's communications director near the start of Thames Water: Inside the Crisis. "At the end of the day, it is about helping people not to totally hate us."

- Nils Pratley

Are we helped? Certainly, frustrated frontline staff emerge as victims of the financial meltdown at Britain's largest water company. At the giant Mogden sewage plant in west London – a site normally off limits because it is classed as critical national infrastructure – employees struggle with old equipment to keep "the beast", as they call it, from spilling its guts whenever the heavens open. Veterans of 30 years bemoan the lack of investment and staffing cuts over many years.