Steve Reed has conceded that the bulk of the £104bn of water industry investment which he boasts Labour has attracted since coming to office will come from bill payers.

In an interview with Sky News, the environment secretary sought to blame the previous Tory government for a string of high profile investors walking away from the sector over the last year.

Mr Reed does not accept claims that further threats to jail water bosses and promises to curb price rises have deterred investment.

Instead, he told Sky News that “by bringing in the £104bn of private sector investment that we secured at the end of last year, we can make sure that the investment is going in to support” the industry.

When challenged that the £104bn was total expenditure not total investment, and that bill payers would pay back this expenditure over the coming decades, Mr Reed conceded this was right – and the money ultimately is coming from bill payers.

“The money comes in from investors up front so we can do that spending straight away,” he said.

“Over decades, the investors got a modest return from the bills that customers are paying. That’s how investment works.”

Some investors have warned they do not think it viable to fund the UK water sector because of the hostile political tone of ministers and lack of certainty.

Ministers have said the government does not want to renationalise water as it would mean years of legal wrangling and cost a lot of money.

Labour has launched a record 81 criminal investigations into water companies over sewage dumping since winning the election last year.

Water company bosses could be jailed for up to five years and the companies fined hundreds of millions of pounds if they are found guilty.

Mr Reed committed to not interfering with those prosecutions, saying it would be “highly inappropriate” for any minister to do so.

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He rejected suggestions ministers will be pressured to ensure water bosses do not serve jail time as this will deter investors.

“It’s a judicial process, it would be highly inappropriate for any ministerial interference in the process,” Mr Reed said.

“They will work their way through the court system, as they should do, and ministers will decide on sanctions after.”

Nigel Farage has said violent UK offenders could be jailed overseas under his plans to cut crime by half.

The Reform UK leader named El Salvador as a likely destination, though he said he has not held conversations with officials there and “multiple” partners would be considered.

El Salvador is home to a notorious mega-prison, the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).

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In a speech on law and order on Monday, Mr Farage said: “It is quite astonishing that to keep a prisoner in a British prison it costs nearly £52,000 a year.

“You could send a child Eton for that price.

“So we can send some of our worst violent criminals overseas to serve their terms. If that means Ian Huntley goes to El Salvador. Well, our attitude is ‘so be it’.”

Huntley is serving a life term for the murders of two 10-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, in Soham, Cambridgeshire, in 2002.

Asked if he had spoken to any members of the El Salvadoran government about his plans, Mr Farage said he had not but “we do know they’re quite happy to take American violent offenders”.

In March, the Trump administration deported more than 130 alleged Venezuelan gang members to the CECOT while the US president has also spoken of sending “homegrown criminals” to the super max facility.

Reform UK said it wanted to create 10,000 “dynamic” prison places overall by renting cells in third party countries, at a cost of £250m per year. This would involve “multiple partners including El Salvador”, according to a document outlining the plan in further detail.

This will come alongside a number of policies aimed at cutting crime by half if Mr Farage’s party wins the next election.

The Clacton MP wants to hire another 30,000 police officers, put stop and search in every area where knife crime is prevalent and implement a zero-tolerance policy to shoplifting so every offence “however small” is prosecuted.

Mr Farage also said he would free up to 10,000 more prison places by deporting foreign criminals to their country of origin, saying he has already spoken to Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama about this.

He said he would take back British offenders who are incarcerated overseas in return but if countries are still reluctant “we’ll make it very straightforward. We’ll just end travel”.

Mr Farage did not say how much the plans would cost or how they would be funded in his speech, which marks the start of a six week “lawless Britain” campaign.

However, in response to questions from media he said the plans would cost £17.4bn over a five-year parliament.

He said the cost of crime is far greater than that so “it isn’t really a question of can we afford to do this, it’s really a question of we can’t afford not to do this”.

He insisted he would not have to raise taxes, saying the money would come from “huge cuts” to public spending including axing HS2 and net zero policies and reducing the size of the state.

Mr Farage claimed his plans are necessary because parts of Britain are facing “nothing short of societal collapse” due to spiralling crime rates.

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Sir Keir Starmer has made halving serious violent crime one of the missions of his government, but the pledge has been somewhat overshadowed by his controversial early prison release scheme, aimed at freeing up prison capacity due to overcrowding.

A spokesperson for the prime minister said he is already deporting foreign national offenders, adding that Mr Farage’s plans are “unfunded and lack detail” and that “we are getting on with it”.

The spokesperson ruled out moving prisoners overseas, saying the government is “focused on investing and fixing prisons here”.

He added: “In the last 14 years we saw only 500 places added to prison estate and since then we have been going further to free up space in our prisons.”