An analysis of the private water provision in Great Britain. In 1989 England and Wales transferred their public provision of water to the private sector. This was the largest public to private water transfer ever to have happened in the Western World. The main objective of this study is to determine if there has been a positive or negative impact on provision due to this privatisation and whether this provision can be called effective. In order to ascertain the effective nature of the provision and to determine whether there has been an improvement or deterioration, six key performance criteria have been devised from the most critical areas in the provision of water. Various forms of information were gathered which include statistics from regulators, corporate providers and secondary sources. In addition a series of elite interviews were carried out which included a variety of stakeholders including; corporate providers, quasiautonomous non-regulatory organisations, charities and consumer bodies. This study shows that although the systems in England and Wales have areas which need to be improved, all six of the key performance criteria have improved since privatisation and that the current system of private provision is effective.