Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of ending the automatic right of new housing developments to connect to the sewage system.

The Water Industry Act 1991 permits owners of premises or of private sewers to connect to the public sewer and to discharge into it foul and surface water. A sewerage company may, however, refuse this connection if it appears that the construction or condition of the connecting drain or sewer does not reasonably satisfy the standards it reasonably requires or if the connection would be prejudicial to its own sewerage system. Where there are questions or disputes about reasonableness, the regulator - Ofwat - would make the final determination.