UK Water Sector Legal & Decision Intelligence Wiki

A reference resource cataloguing UK water-sector case law, analysed against strategic outcomes and themes.

Overview

This wiki catalogues case law relevant to the regulated water and wastewater industry in England and Wales. Cases are analysed against 12 strategic outcomes drawn from government policy and the regulatory framework, and grouped into 6 thematic areas covering the key legal domains affecting the sector.

This project is a fork of the DIR Case Study Wiki, adapted from infrastructure resilience research to water-sector legal decision intelligence. Upstream improvements to the DIRwiki framework can be merged into this project.

Features

• Data-driven architecture: Cases, outcomes, and themes stored as JSON, rendered client-side with vanilla JS
• Multi-dimensional filtering: Filter cases by strategic outcome, theme, court, era, and water company
• Strategic Outcomes: 12 outcomes linking case law to water-sector policy goals
• Themes: 6 thematic areas grouping cases by subject matter
• Ontology tagging: Structured metadata (assets, processes, hazards, impacts, governance, legal basis)
• Full case studies: Detailed pages with background, legal issues, holdings, and decision-maker takeaways
• Glossary: Water + legal terms reference

Getting Started

Using Jekyll locally:

bundle install
bundle exec jekyll serve

Then navigate to http://localhost:4000/legalai/

Data Structure

• /data/cases.json — 15 cases with structured metadata
• /data/outcomes.json — 12 strategic outcomes with source references
• /data/themes.json — 6 thematic areas

Strategic Outcomes

1. Resilient water supply for people and economy
2. Clean rivers, seas and groundwater
3. Storm overflows only operate as intended
4. Transparent, comparable data and assurance
5. Fair returns for customers and communities
6. Affordable bills and value for money
7. Long-term infrastructure investment
8. Strong governance and accountability
9. Environmental compliance and stewardship
10. Competition and innovation in the sector
11. Climate resilience and adaptation
12. Public health and safety

Syncing with Upstream (DIRwiki)

This repo is forked from visioninglab/DIRwiki. To pull in upstream improvements:

git fetch upstream
git merge upstream/master

Contributing

We welcome contributions of case data, additional analysis, corrections, and suggestions. Please open an issue or submit a pull request.

Disclaimer

This wiki provides educational information about legal cases and is not a substitute for legal advice. Always consult with a qualified solicitor or barrister for legal matters.

Last Updated

February 2026