Water Bill

Debate between Earl of Selborne and Earl Cathcart

Thursday 6th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Selborne]

My Lords, I am sure that the Minister will help my noble friend Lord Cathcart, but the short answer is that, unless a water company is operating in an area of water stress, it needs the Secretary of State’s permission to introduce a universal metering programme. As the noble Lord, Lord Oxburgh, has pointed out, that is an unhelpful provision. I am sure that we all agree that, if we could move faster on metering, we would see some of the long-term objectives of the Bill delivered much more quickly.

The White Paper, Water for Life, to which we referred so much at Second Reading, gave one every encouragement that the Government would be promoting universal metering. It points out how universal metering changes our attitude to water, as the noble Lord, Lord Curry, has reminded us. Metering helps you determine where the leaks are, particularly when they are within your property—you suddenly take a great deal of interest when it is going to be reflected in your bill as opposed to that of society as a whole. It allows you, without in any way raising the spectre of de-averaging, to introduce all sorts of innovative incentivisation such as summer schemes, where you pay more on a summer tariff than on a winter tariff, and water reduction devices.

All these measures can and have been achieved once universal metering programmes have been introduced. In the Southern Water area, because we are a water-stressed area, these measures have been introduced and the water industry is looking with a great deal of interest at a number of the lessons which have been learnt from this programme. It is clearly correct that water use goes down. That is the first and most important message, but as the probing amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Oxburgh, points out, there are many other societal benefits. It is a no-brainer and we need to go for it.

[Earl Cathcart]

I thank my noble friend for correcting my wrong conclusion that the power lies with Ofwat. I should probably change my question to ask what the Secretary of State is going to do to change his attitude in this regard.