Water Management

Julia Buckley Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Hardy)]

I genuinely thank the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington (Gideon Amos) for securing the debate. I really enjoyed listening to his speech. There was so much agreement from the Government side of the House on pretty much everything he said. He described what I would refer to as “pre-pipe”, which I am really interested in. It is about, exactly as he described, looking at how we stop rainwater ending up in our sewerage system and often contributing to pollution incidents—the system becomes overwhelmed —when, as it is rainwater, it could be elsewhere.

The hon. Gentleman touches on one of my favourite things to talk about: nature-based solutions—how we can use nature more, create soakaway areas and create sustainable urban drainage. That is absolutely correct. I am passionate about thinking about how we manage water. We often talk about how to solve problems around pollution, but if we better manage rainwater that falls from the sky, we can help to deal with pollution, as well as many other things. Reservoirs are hugely important, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Peter Swallow) pointed out, and we should absolutely be using them, but they are part of the wider system—collecting the rainfall and putting it where we want it, rather than it ending up where we do not.

It is obviously for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to talk about building standards, but I can tell the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington, because I asked MHCLG ahead of this debate, that it is reviewing water efficiency standards in the building regulations for new homes, and considering how to enable water reuse systems, including rainwater and grey-water systems, where those are safe, practical and cost effective.

I have mentioned this issue a few times, and I share the hon. Gentleman’s concern—“astonishment” may be going a bit too far—that we use drinking water to flush our toilets. To give the other side of the argument, which I have had played back to me, the rules mean that the water supplied to domestic properties has to be drinking water quality. I hope that I am not telling the House things I should not, but we are exploring how we can guarantee that we do not mix up the water pipes that go into homes and therefore cause problems that way. This always has to be safety first. That is why the only water that can enter a property—unless a private individual has set up their own system—has to be drinking water quality.

[Julia Buckley (Shrewsbury) (Lab)]

Does the Minister agree that much progress has been made in regard to rainwater harvesting, not just by MHCLG but by the Minister’s Department—not least the landmark report, published this March, by the Drinking Water Inspectorate? The report exactly explored a potential governance framework that sets out standards for non-potable water in domestic settings, and talks about accreditation and standards, to ensure that these systems, when we are ready to bring them in, are safe and will be properly maintained.

[Emma Hardy]

I thank my hon. Friend; I was trying remember what the report was, so I very much appreciate the intervention. She is absolutely right. We have some of the best drinking water in the whole world; we have incredibly high standards for the health of our drinking water. The report by the Drinking Water Inspectorate looks at how we can do this in a safe way, and I am keen to explore that. We are going to be short of drinking water if we continue at this scale in the future. Thinking about where we are using it, rather than using it to flush our toilets, feels like a way forward. There is a huge amount of cross-party thinking on how we can do that. This comes back to the topic of how we manage water. How do we think about water? Where is it falling?