| Previous Section | Back to Table of Contents | Lords Hansard Home Page |
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I rise only to offer my profound apologies to your Lordships for not being in my place when this debate began. My explanation is a mistake for which I alone was responsible and I apologise again to your Lordships. I thank everyone who has taken part in the debate so far—and, indeed, those who are to speak afterwards—but particularly my noble friend Lady Byford for rising to move the Motion on my behalf a little while ago. I am most grateful to the Minister for replying and to all of your Lordships who are taking part in the debate. I look forward to hearing the Minister's reply.
12.35 pm
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, on securing this debate. In doing so, he has had the same effect as I noticed I had when I last put down a Starred Question on the subject. Once the time comes for that question or debate to be taken, a certain amount of heavy rain seems to be induced where there has been none before. We are probably all grateful for that. I also congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, on introducing the debate on what is an incredibly important subject.
There are many parallels with the recent debates in your Lordships' House on energy, in that there is no one solution. The Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management makes the very good
30 Mar 2006 : Column 877
point that building our way out of the problem with reservoirs or a national grid is much less practical and cost-effective than managing demand and leaks. Although we may start looking, out of necessity, into creating new reservoirs—it would be a foolish Government who excluded that possibility—they offer a very long-term solution that comes with its own high costs, not least in terms of human displacement. Given the long-term nature of that part of the solution, we need to look at more short-term solutions.
I share the reservations of the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard of Northwold, about a national grid for water. I will not repeat them, but she is absolutely right to have so many reservations about energy use. Coming from the opposite end of the country, in the south-west, I believe that those areas from where it might be believed that water would be derived for the national grid might have a fair few comments. Water is becoming generally scarcer and we face drier winters and harder, shorter rains, even in areas such as the south-west. That was well illustrated from the Welsh perspective when the noble Lord, Lord St John of Bletso, said that a spring in his area of south Wales had dried up. As it is quite apparent that every area of the country faces having far less, and far less reliable, rainfall than it has been used to, I am not sure that a national grid will offer many solutions in any case.
Therefore, we need to look in a far more focused way at demand management. One of my questions is: why wait for scarcity before acting to curb demand? That question came into our debates on the Water Act 2003, and I still fail to understand why the situation is so. It seems a strange way to deal with the problem, when we know that supplies are likely to diminish and that climate change means that we will be less able to rely on predictable weather patterns. Yet it still seems to be the case that water must actually be scarce—a drought situation, almost—before a water company may even apply for compulsory metering or before the Government take definite measures.
Elliot Morley, the environment Minister, announced plans earlier this month to make water efficiency measures such as dual-flush lavatories and low-flow shower heads mandatory for new homes—surely, a necessary move. He said that the Government might introduce regulations so that owners of existing homes refitting a bathroom or a lavatory would have to introduce similar water-saving appliances. Why is that not compulsory? Why are the Government not making such regulations? If we accept that water is in short supply and that bathroom appliances and lavatories last for 10 to 20 years, surely the time to act is now, before water becomes scarce.
There are many examples of very good practice. Every year the Environment Agency runs its annual Water Efficiency Awards, which I have twice been privileged to attend. Some of the good practice shown by industry and commerce at those awards could be further rolled out in encouraging similar businesses to adopt the measures we have seen.
30 Mar 2006 : Column 878
Noble Lords have mentioned the agri-sector as a big water user. It needs the water to produce the crops, but the projected increase in use—partly due to climate change, because drier summers mean more water will be needed—is some 2 per cent to 3 per cent a year. Over a decade that is about a third as much again.
Does Defra have plans to encourage more on-farm reservoirs? If you take the train through France, it is very striking to see the number of on-farm bassins, as the French call them—or small reservoirs. There are dramatically more in France than there are here. The winter rains that run off can be captured for summer use. It is a very effective way of gaining water for irrigation and takes some of the pressure off groundwater. Abstraction is a possibility, but Southern Television, I think, did some underground filming down in the groundwater supply, showing where the levels were eight years ago and where they are now. They are still dropping, and it is quite impossible to envisage how those supplies will ever be replenished up to 100 per cent. It is a question of using every possible measure available.
The Consumer Council for Water, one of the bodies set up by the Water Act 2003, is a strong voice for consumers. It is a very necessary body, because as water comes under pressure and we discuss moving towards compulsory metering, what about the vulnerable groups? There is still a slightly arcane system whereby the water companies create trusts that pay out for vulnerable groups such as those on income support, large families and those with chronic illnesses, who need to use large amounts of water.
We may, over time, believe it is a good idea to move to compulsory metering because it will limit demand, but that is not a given. Some studies have shown that as soon as metering is introduced, it creates something of a drop in demand, which then rises again. Does the Minister believe that metering reduces demand overall or that educational and technological measures such as better appliances are more effective? As there may be moves towards compulsory metering, we need a very strong Consumer Council for Water, but I believe that the Government may have plans to combine it with a consumer council for other utilities. That would be an unhelpful move. Will the Minister say whether that is part of the Government's plans? We do not believe that it would be a good idea at all.
One of the very surprising statistics that I discovered when researching for this debate concerned water use per head in the UK. My source was the Food and Agriculture Organisation. If we had a very high usage per head compared with other EU countries, we would know that there was lots of room for improvement and, in one sense, less room for worry. But the graph shows that, in water usage per head, the UK is slightly above Malta, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, below every other EU country and substantially below Germany, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Spain and Portugal. So there may not be that much room for improvement in water consumption by individuals.
Water consumption by industry could be improved by measures such as water sharing. One industry's heavy use of water, resulting in grey water, could then
30 Mar 2006 : Column 879
be used by another, downstream industry. I do not have time to talk about this now, but the Environment Agency gives examples of this and of leakages, which many noble Lords have mentioned.
The water framework directive offers unparalleled opportunities for every sphere of society, whether consumers, industry, commerce or planners, to take part in river basin planning, together with the statutory agencies such as the Environment Agency, and to come up with solutions not only for water saving but for water quality and everything to do with the hydrological cycle. I believe that those opportunities are being missed. Defra closed its consultation on the river basin management planning element of the water framework directive on 7 March. It envisages very big areas—each river basin is the equivalent of an entire region. Obviously, the stakeholder engagement—the planning—has to happen at a much more local, regional level and involve all the players. I gather that the Environment Agency does not believe that it has sufficient powers to get that engagement going and I would be pleased if the Minister refuted that.
The issue needs to move out beyond the Environment Agency, although I accept that it is the competent authority. The water framework directive offers the tools for everyone to become engaged in this argument. Indeed, it envisages that the public would play a big part, as they need to. The Government have failed to engage in this matter with the public. There is a gap, during the next five years, when river basin planning could, rightly, involve everybody. We need to discuss how we use water, how we capture it, who pays for its pollution and clean-up, and all the other issues that we must become much more engaged with if we are to succeed in coming up with a solution.
12.48 pm
| Next Section | Back to Table of Contents | Lords Hansard Home Page |