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Part-Time Workers (Maternity Rights)
Mr. Elfyn Llwyd accordingly presented a Bill to extend maternity rights to part-time workers; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 12 July 1996 and to be printed. [Bill 125.]
Orders of the Day
Opposition Day
[11th Allotted Day]
Water Supplies
Madam Speaker: I have selected the amendment standing in the name of the Prime Minister.
3.45 pm
Mr. Frank Dobson (Holborn and St. Pancras): I beg to move,
- That this House deplores the long-term failure of the Government and the privatised water companies to reduce leaks from company pipes and to take other measures to reduce the threat to water supplies this coming summer and notes that they must mend their ways if they are to restore the confidence of consumers without whose co-operation measures to maintain supplies in some parts of the country may fail if there is a prolonged spell of hot dry weather.
If we have average weather this summer, five water companies will be able to maintain supplies only if they extend existing drought measures or take additional action. Those companies are Yorkshire Water, North West Water, South West Water, Southern Water and South East Water. If the summer is hot and dry, 12 companies will need new hosepipe bans and new or additional drought orders to maintain supplies. Those companies are Essex and Suffolk Water, Folkestone and Dover Water, Yorkshire Water, South West Water, North West Water, Severn Trent Water, Southern Water, South East Water, Three Valleys Water, Chester Water, Mid Kent Water and East Surrey and Sutton Water. All of them say that they will not need rota cuts, standpipes or tankering. We all hope that they are right.
The situation that the country faces comes after a very wet winter in 1994-95, a dry summer in 1995 and a dry winter in 1995-96. It is also the product of a complacent Government, a slack system of regulation and the fact that the senior management of the privatised water companies have their minds on other subjects, such as their pay, perks and profits, speculative ventures at home and abroad and a series of takeovers, either proposed, opposed or carried through. No wonder that they have not had the time or the energy to concentrate on their core business of providing a reliable water and sewerage service in the areas in which the Government have given them a monopoly.
Mr. Michael Fabricant (Mid-Staffordshire):
Is it not the case that since privatisation some £15 billion has been spent on renewing pipes and so on? How much would have been spent by a nationalised industry? The hon. Gentleman mentioned the bosses who are supposed to have earned so much. Precisely what percentage is their income of the total investment of £15 billion that has been spent on new pipes and infrastructure?
Mr. Dobson:
The relationship of the bosses' pay to investment is irrelevant to the public's perception of the way in which they have lined their pockets, although they are doing exactly the same jobs as before.
When I say that the Government have given a monopoly to the companies, I mean "given". The new private owners of the privatised water companies paid a total of £5 billion for the shares. In exchange, they got a green dowry of £1.5 billion and a debt write-off totalling £5 billion. That is £6.5 billion, for those who cannot add up. They also got the assets of the water and sewerage industry and a guaranteed income stream as the monopoly suppliers of water, which no human being, animal, plant, business or charity can do without.
One of the assets that the new owners acquired when they took over was the enormous good will of local people, who respected the people who worked for their local water company and who responded readily to appeals for the sensible use of water and for restraint if supplies were short during dry periods. The new owners have squandered that reservoir of public good will and co-operation, just as much as they have squandered water from their reservoirs and pipes.
The reason is easy to see. The public have seen the new water bosses line their pockets at the expense of the customers. They have seen company bosses, encouraged by the Secretary of State, putting more effort into investing in supermarkets at home and various speculative adventures abroad than in ensuring that local people receive a secure supply of water. People in Yorkshire remember that, when concern was expressed about an enormous pay increase for Yorkshire Water bosses, the company's official response was to say, "That's the way it is now."
Consumers have also noted the extraordinary ineptitude of Yorkshire Water's former bosses, the people who claim to be going without a bath. They are the people who propose rota cuts without having thought out how to maintain supplies to the fire brigade. They have not considered how food companies can be expected to clean thousands of gallons by boiling it, when their factories were designed to use clean and safe water straight from the tap.
The public have seen Yorkshire Water's chief executive retired early. It was a case of moving from no bath to an early bath. During the past week, they have seen the torch of aquatic lunacy pass from Yorkshire Water to Severn Trent Water, which has startled many innocent people by advising them to save water by concreting or paving over their lawns. That was advice that the chairman was not intending to follow, as the Daily Express discovered when he refused to allow its representatives to concrete over his lawn for free when they turned up with a cement lorry and offered to do the job for him.
We read nearly every day that someone is talking about a water company takeover. The British people are not fools. They know that the last consideration that enters the minds of the takeover movers and shakers is the interests of the customers, the security of water supply, the cleanliness of rivers or beaches and the protection of the environment. The public see water prices increasing. At the same time, they see water companies making record profits, reducing their investment, investing abroad, paying next to no corporation tax, investing in supermarkets, becoming involved in takeovers, getting rid of staff and giving themselves record levels of pay and perks.
The public hear the self-same water companies asking customers to make sacrifices, to exercise restraint and to behave responsibly. People do not like what they hear and
see. Their views about the water industry have been ignored for far too long and they can be ignored no longer. That is because the ability of the water companies to maintain supplies this summer will depend on the co-operation of the customers they have insulted.
Greed, sleaze and incompetence have characterised the privatised water industry. As a result, the co-operation that the public used to give the industry will have to be earned all over again. Public co-operation will come about only if customers have respect for those who are asking for sacrifices and co-operation. That co-operation will be forthcoming only if the industry, the regulator and the Government all put their own houses in order, all accept responsibility for what has gone wrong, and stop trying to blame customers, the victims of the crisis, and asking them to shoulder the burden of putting things right.
It will be no use asking customers to exercise individual responsibility and restraint if the companies and their ministerial apologists do not show responsibility and restraint themselves. They must show that they have mended their ways. For a start, the companies should draw in the horns of their diversification programmes, which have diverted so much management time and effort from the core business.
If anyone doubts what I say, he need only read the recent public statements of Thames Water, which has had to write off £95 million, a sum which was lost because of what was described as "ill-fated diversification". That diversification took up so much of the managing director's time that, now that it has been cut, there is no longer a job for him.
Despite the £95 million write-off on diversification and the pay-off to the managing director, Thames Water's profits went up yet again, reaching yet higher--record--levels. Those profits do not come from the diversification; they come from the captive customers of the core business, water and sewerage, which the managing director had been neglecting. Despite the shambles of Yorkshire Water--no one can deny that Yorkshire Water has been a shambles over the past year: so much so that the chairman and chief executive have been dumped--the company's profits still went up. Yorkshire people feel that that cannot be right, and who can blame them? It is not right. If a company is run as incompetently as Yorkshire Water was and still makes record profits, there is something wrong.
Sir Kenneth Carlisle (Lincoln):
If the hon. Gentleman's party should gain office, will he take specific steps to stop water companies becoming involved in diversification?
Mr. Dobson:
We will certainly use the powers that the Secretary of State currently possesses, under water industry legislation passed by the present Government, to ensure that the water companies discharge their duties to provide efficient and secure water supplies and to look after the environment. The Secretary of State can take direct action to do that.
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