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Water Supply

My Lords, my noble friend has said that he would not wish to roll out a full national system of water metering, despite the fact that at the moment water metering operates in only a quarter of the country. In qualification, he said that in stress areas one could have drought orders, which would enable water metering to be introduced, but that is a short-term measure. Drought orders and stress-area orders are short-term measures. This occurs not just occasionally but seemingly every few years. We want a long-term measure, which I believe is water metering, so that there is an incentive to be cautious in the use of water. At present, there is no need for three-quarters of the population to be cautious or modest in their use of water. Naturally, I entirely agree with the Minister that there will have to be subsidies and special arrangements for vulnerable and large families that are poor, but that does not alter my general point that at the moment the incentives go all the wrong way.