Water bosses have landed themselves in hot water with councillors for treating Sheppey differently to Sittingbourne.

At a Swale council meeting on Wednesday, Southern Water was first congratulated for splashing out £700,000 compensation automatically to Sittingbourne families left without water after last month's snow.

But then it was attacked for not doing the same when the Island was cut off two years ago after an 18-inch water main alongside the A249 burst and left 9,700 homes and five schools without water.

During the recent bad weather 5,000 Sittingbourne homes were left without water for 18 hours and some schools were forced to close.

Four days later Southern Water announced it would pay £25 to those left without water for up to 12 hours, £50 for more than 12 hours and £75 for more than 24 hours. It also promised to pay £2,000 to every school which had to shut and offered to send one of its engineers to give pupils a free lesson about water.

But Cllr Cameron Beart (Halfway and Queenborough, Con) asked: "Why didn't this happen when Sheppey was cut off for five days in 2016? The entire Island had to rely on water bottles ferried in. But residents were told every case had to be dealt with separately and everyone had to lodge their own claim. Southern Water said there was nothing it could do."

He called for water bosses to face a grilling from the council's scrutiny committee.

Cllr James Hunt (The Meads, Con) highlighted another leak, which poured water into the Swale beneath the Kingsferry Bridge, and called for an urgent meeting with Southern Water.

Cllr Angela Harrison (Sheerness, Lab) said: "One utility company has renewed all its pipes on Sheppey but Southern Water just patches holes - and its pipes are even older. It doesn't seem it has any plans to renew its network."

Council leader Cllr Andrew Bowles (Boughton and Courtenay) said: "The water infrastructure for Swale is diabolical. And I don't understand the logic of treating one group differently from another. Even we had to shut our offices because we had no water although some staff continued to work from home.

"I agree this is a matter for scrutiny. Swale has been let down badly."

Southern Water spokesman Nicola Crichton said: "We apologise to customers impacted by the recent unprecedented freeze and rapid thaw.

"We work with the local resilience forums including local authorities, the fire brigade and police to ensure we are as prepared as possible for adverse weather.

"This includes making sure we have alternative water supplies available.

"The event was both large in scale and technically complex to resolve. While it is impossible to predict which pipes will burst and where on our 13,000km of network, we had additional crews across our region on standby.

"We are also investing £1.8 billion in upgrading and replacing the network and adding a further £2 million this year to fix leaks between customers front doors and our water mains for free.

"Southern Water already spends £14 million a year finding and fixing leaks and the company has almost 100 dedicated teams searching for leaks 24/7.

"We’ve already started a lessons-learned review and will be taking feedback from stakeholders and partners. We are fully participating in Ofwat’s review."

Commenting on the Sheppey compensation claims, she insisted the company took "the same approach."

In last year's accounts, Southern Water posted an income of £809.7 million and a profit of £258.9 million.