Water (Special Measures) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb and Duke of Wellington

Report stage
Wednesday 20th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

In that case, the noble Lord’s amendment is not radical enough for me, but I hope it passes anyway.

[The Duke of Wellington (CB)]

I speak to Amendment 41 in my name. It makes a simple point that I hope will find sympathy with the Minister and other Members.

I well remember, as other Members may, that during the passage of the Environment Act three years ago, there was a major spill by Thames Water somewhere in the London area. The excuse given at the time was a power failure. I remember thinking that that really was not a very good excuse. Those in charge of any infrastructure installation surely should have sufficient emergency generator capacity in place and maintained so that, should there be a power failure for an essential activity, it can be covered for a while. Clearly, if the power failure lasts for a day or two, the generator capacity will probably not have sufficient fuel to run that long—I understand that. Nevertheless, it seems too easy a let-out for a sewerage undertaker to be able to excuse an emergency discharge of any sort simply on account of a power failure.

I have therefore put down this amendment and hope that the Minister can assure me that water companies are required to have sufficient generator capacity in place and to keep it maintained so that they cannot simply say that there was a power failure and the generator did not work. That is just not good enough. I hope to get reassurance from the Minister about this; it is an important point, because otherwise we are giving too easy a let-out to the water companies.