Southern Water customers will face a 53% increase in bills over the next five years.

Residents have been queuing for up to two hours to get bottled water as thousands of homes in Hampshire are still without supplies following a “technical issue”.

The disruption comes as households served by Southern Water discovered their bills would see the highest increase in the country.

Homes in Southampton, Romsey, Eastleigh, Totton, and parts of the New Forest have experienced a loss of water or low pressure – and more than 30 schools will remain closed on Thursday.

It is understood that water supplies are not expected to return to houses until later on Thursday and into Friday morning.

Tankers were deployed on Wednesday to supply water for Southampton General Hospital.

The issue began on Wednesday morning after Southern Water issued an update confirming there was a technical problem at the Testwood water supply works preventing water from leaving the site.

The company said in a statement on Thursday morning that the issue had been solved and customers will start to be reconnected later in the day.

It came as regulator Ofwat announced that Southern Water customers will face a 53% increase in bills over the next five years – significantly higher than the average bill increase of 36% across England and Wales.

Residents have described queuing for up to two hours to reach one of three bottle distribution centres at the Asda supermarket in Totton.

Long queues of cars could be seen causing congestion in the surrounding streets, while some had walked for up to three miles to collect their allocation of water.

Richard Hallett told the PA news agency: “I’m........

© Shropshire Star