Anglian Water has defended its performance after Liz Truss, the frontrunner in the race to be the next prime minister, criticised its service in her Norfolk constituency.

Ms Truss said water companies had not been doing enough to fix leaking pipes and said she had "a lot of issues with my water company in Norfolk".

But Anglian Water, which is responsible for supplies in her South West Norfolk constituency, hit back at the criticism and defended its work in fixing problems with its infrastructure.

Ms Truss made the comments in an interview with the Daily Express, in a discussion about the threat of hosepipe bans being introduced across the country, in response to the ongoing dry, hot weather.

She said such bans "should be a last resort".

She said: “My view is that we should be tougher on the water companies and that there hasn’t been enough action to deal with these leaky pipes which have been there for years.

“I have a lot of issues with my water company in Norfolk, which is a particularly dry area of the country, and those companies need to be held to account.”

She did not name the company, but Anglian Water is the only one operating in her constituency. She also did not specify what "issues" she was referring to.

However, the firm has been in the headlines recently for a number of reasons, including several burst mains around the county.

One major incident saw thousands of homes left without supply in North and South Wootton, near King's Lynn

An Anglian Water spokesman said its leakage rates were half the industry average, despite it having the biggest geographical region of any water company.

He added: "Last year we delivered our best ever performance, surpassing the incredibly stretching target set by our regulators Ofwat, and delivering the equivalent of five years’ worth of reduction in a single year.”

On Monday, the water company insisted it was not planning on introducing a hosepipe ban, despite restrictions being introduced in other areas of the country.

However, the firm is encouraging customers to abide by various measures to preserve supplies - like taking shorter showers and using watering cans rather than sprinklers.