Rishi Sunak must seize control of Thames Water as early as this afternoon as Britain’s biggest supplier teeters on the brink of collapse, the campaigner Feargal Sharkey has said. 

Mr Sharkey, who is also a music industry executive and former frontman of The Undertones, said the Government should issue an enforcement order to take control of suppliers, rather than renationalising the water industry.

He said: “There is another solution and it’s a power that government has at their disposal. This afternoon they can simply issue enforcement orders… effectively the Government would take control of the management of those companies while leaving them in the private sector and detail exactly what investment needs to be paid down, what debts need to be paid, what investment needs to be made in infrastructure, what executive pay, dividends should be.

“This may cause a lot of pain to the shareholders who put very little money into these companies. It may take five or ten years. But here’s the thing, the outcome of it all [is that] you will end up with debt free, forward looking, profitable businesses.”

He said this would provide a solution to an industry which is currently “very financially fragile”. The water sector has built up a debt pile of £60bn, having taken advantage of years of lower interest rates.