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Water and Sewerage Services (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Northern Ireland) Order 2006

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, and my noble friend Lady Blood for raising the issues and giving us a chance to put some information on the record. We are committed long term to widespread domestic metering. The intention is that as soon as possible every household will be able to choose whether a metered tariff is best for it, but that will take between five and 10 years. In the short term, the availability of domestic metering will be targeted on pension households who request an installation. The noble Lord, Lord Trimble, made a highly relevant point. I do not have the figures with me. He is quite right to say that there was a hike in the rates; that was the 19 per cent figure. We were very mindful of that when planning the two-year Budget. The commitment was that the water rates should have started this year. That is why the Treasury made the assumption it did and we had a £50 million gap in the Budget. That caused us a little difficulty. The plan is for the water rates to start from next year, and it will be phased in. It is not intended that that large increase in domestic rates will be repeated, simply because if it was, and you brought in water rates on top, you have a recipe for a bit of a problem. We do not accept that people are paying twice. Everywhere I turned on a tap, water came out; basically that was Stormont and Hillsborough. I did not turn taps on anywhere else. The Water Service in Northern Ireland, with the best will in the world to the people working in it, is, compared to the rest of the UK, a rubbish service. That is the reality. You have to put it as boldly as that. There are areas in Northern Ireland where people turn on the taps and water does not come out. That is, in a way, because of the funding arrangements. I am not saying there is a magic solution to this, as has been said twice in Question Time in the past week. The Water Service is currently funded out of general taxation. It would take almost the entire Northern Ireland rate to fund the water and sewerage services, so one can see how much extra money is required. Therefore, we have a dilemma; Northern Ireland has the highest rate of public spending per head and the lowest levels of revenue in the UK. Something has got to give. The short answer is that Northern Ireland households are not contributing enough to sustain investment in public services. I know that averages can be very misleading, but I have global figures for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. They show that in Northern Ireland the average level of household taxation—that is property charge per household as well as water rates—is £668. For England and Wales, it is £1,337 and Scotland it is just over £1,200. There is a substantial difference there. There is not a figure for water; the water is not being paid for to the amount that it should be even out of local charges. This will be a bone of contention, but the prize is getting a decent water service, which will require a good level of investment. It is on target for the economic level of leakage for next year. The Northern Ireland water company will be subject to full normalised environmental regulation; it will not benefit from Crown immunity as the Water Service currently does, which is basically how it has got away with providing a less than good service. Over the five-year period up to 2007-08, over £1 billion in capital investment will have been made available to upgrade the water and sewerage infrastructure. The water reform is about enabling that investment to be sustained, which we will not be able to do unless we can find other streams of income; doing it out of general taxation will not work. On the rate of increase, of those entitled to the affordability tariff 80 per cent are entitled to full housing benefit and do not therefore pay rates. We have developed a unique affordability tariff to assist those households with water charges, so there is an important element of changing over. Also, we are hoping to do it automatically, because when people have to apply for something, you always find people who do not apply and then lose out. At the end of the day, in terms of paying for what you get, metering is the long-term objective, to answer the noble Baroness. There must be a vastly improved Water Service. When people are paying more, they must see a much better service; but we need more resources for that. On Question, Motion agreed to.