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6.44 pm
The Minister for Construction, Planning and Energy Efficiency (Mr. Robert B. Jones): My hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir J. Spicer) said that he had come into the Chamber expecting a good debate, and he implied that he was somewhat disappointed. My hon. Friend was uncharacteristically ill informed, because he obviously did not know that the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) was to open for the Labour party. Had he known that, he would have expected at least the beginning of the debate to get off to a poor start.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Staffordshire (Mr. Fabricant) said, the speech of the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras was a content-free zone. That does not surprise many of us who have listened to rent-a-rant from the hon. Gentleman, on many occasions and on many subjects. The phraseology used is exactly the same, only the subject changes, and certainly no constructive arguments are made. I do not happen to think that that poor start was reflected in the speeches of Back-Bench Labour and Liberal Members, and the speeches of my right hon. and hon. Friends.
I thought it would be interesting to look at the debate that we had on the water industry almost exactly five years ago on 18 June 1991. Speaking from the Back Benches, I said:
Nothing changes, and today the Labour party has acted in exactly the same way. It makes promises, but it cannot justify them by reference to where it would get the necessary resources.
A number of themes have run through the debate. The first and most obvious was hon. Members' attempts to place the issue in a national context--what some called a national strategy. The NRA published a national water resources strategy in March 1994, entitled "Water: Nature's Precious Resource". It was founded on the notion of sustainable development, the precautionary principle, and demand management. I should like to refer to each of those principles.
Sustainable development, which was rightly flagged up by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, but not even mentioned by the Opposition spokesman, is the background against which we must view the subject. That was reinforced by the contributions of my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Sir K. Carlisle) and the hon. Member for Truro (Mr. Taylor). Questions must be posed not just about the location of development in the United Kingdom, but about our life styles and the demands we make on all the scarce resources around us. In that regard, water is no different from anything else.
I am not as widely travelled as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, but when I meet politicians from other countries, they make the same point: they cannot understand how the Labour party in the United Kingdom is so far adrift from the policies of all democratic parties in mainland Europe and in the rest of the world. It is a disgrace, and the hon. Gentleman should be ashamed.
The precautionary principle is another key element. The hon. Member for Truro referred to abstractions and drought orders. It is Environment Agency policy to refuse abstractions unless it is demonstrated that leakage is under control. The number of drought orders has fallen quite substantially. I welcome the fact that Yorkshire Water has made it clear that it does not want to resort to a drought order for the River Derwent.
Mr. Matthew Taylor:
I requested that there always be environmental impact assessments. There should be pre-planning: the plans should be laid, and the assessments completed.
Mr. Jones:
If the hon. Gentleman had allowed me to continue, I had intended to say that, when the inspector inquires into a proposed drought order, the National Rivers Authority's environmental impact assessment is made available to him. That is an important point.
A third key element in the national strategy is demand management. I do not think that it is possible to separate demand management from voluntary metering. The hon. Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell) at least had the decency to accept that it has solved some people's problems and it certainly has an impact on water usage.
The hon. Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough(Mrs. Jackson) made a similar point in a different context, when she referred to people in posh Manchester suburbs who use unlimited amounts of water in sprinklers, for filling their swimming pools, washing their cars and so on. Some water companies have approached that problem by introducing water metering for that sort of usage. I think that one can make a perfectly reasonable case for
compulsory metering of that sort of water usage, as opposed to water that is used for ordinary domestic purposes.
Mr. Jones:
No--I must continue, or we will lose time for the next debate.
Demand management must be viewed in the context of the comparison that has been made often today between the 1976 drought and recent droughts. One of the main differences is that water consumption was 14,000 megalitres per day in 1976. It has now increased to 17,000 megalitres per day. That means that we are putting more strain on scarce water resources; that point must be considered in the context of demand management.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House referred to leakage, and some hon. Members argued for mandatory targets. I have always agreed with the American slogan: "Waste reduction always pays", or WRAP. It may be a rather extreme application of it in these circumstances, but most water companies should begin to tackle their leakage problems. That is also the view of the Government and of Ofwat. If voluntary targets are not adhered to, the Director General of Ofwat must look at the case for imposing mandatory targets.
I am pleased that some hon. Members, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Sir J. Spicer), saw fit to praise their local water companies for their many real achievements in that area. The hon. Member for Cambridge mentioned Anglian Water, and I would not want the debate to pass without mentioning my local water company, Three Valleys, which has also done extremely well in that regard.
A number of measures have been introduced to help reduce water wastage. For example, some companies offer free home repair services, and others are likely to follow suit as part of their duties under the Environment Act 1995, which obliges companies to offer free water efficiency advice. I believe that those measures will help.
Yorkshire has had specific water problems, to which the hon. Members for Bradford, South (Mr. Sutcliffe) and for Hillsborough referred. The hon. Lady said, very graciously, that she did not want to bash Yorkshire Water yet again. It is appropriate to rehearse what Yorkshire Water is doing as a result of its past experiences. I too welcome Dr. Kevin Bond's approach, and the humility that he has shown in view of past events.
A programme worth £100 million, which is now virtually complete, involves the installation of a series of new pipelines and pumping stations in north and east Yorkshire that will bring water into west and south Yorkshire for treatment and distribution. In view of the very low rainfall this winter--about 50 per cent. of the long-term average--in the reservoir catchment area serving Kirklees, the company recently announced a further £31 million investment to boost stocks and for additional pipelines to link the reservoirs with existing sources. Completion of the project is expected by August.
As insurance against the possibility of a summer that is even drier than last year's, the company is to start work on a £40 million river transfer scheme--subject to the appropriate application procedures--which will bring
water into the region from the River Tees. That is supported by the Kielder reservoir. Yorkshire Water has also commissioned an independent inquiry into water supplies in its area. It has stated that it will consider the inquiry report when it is published, in order to determine how it will influence the company's future water supply plans.
"Indeed, I thought that Labour Members had a brass neck to select this subject for debate. As the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey said, their record in office was absolutely deplorable. Not only did Labour Members cut investment significantly then, but they are now proposing to renationalise the water industry, and the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor), who speaks on water issues for the Labour party, did not have the decency earlier to give me a straight answer to my question about how that would be funded. We must know how Labour Members would fund investment in the water industry if they would also take a tough line on prices.
It is obvious that Labour gives the water industry a low priority in its plans. That reflects what happened when Labour was last in office."--[Official Report, 18 June 1991; Vol. 193, c. 182.]
8 May 1996 : Column 288
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