---

Water Strategy

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to initiate this debate, although I would probably be more pleased if I had not initiated rather a lot of similar debates over the past 20-odd years. In a sense, this feels like a return to old ground, but as I speak I think that it will become clear that I am not looking simply to repeat what has been said before. There are some immediate issues to address, particularly given that Ofwat is in the middle of a consultation on its review of water charges and pricing—PR09—and that the Government have just released their strategy, ““Future Water””. Over the next year, we will set the agenda for the future of the water industry, and that will not be just for the five years that Ofwat has traditionally considered in its reviews—potentially, we could be talking about a 20-year horizon. The debate is therefore extremely timely, and I hope that things will move on in a way that they have not always done in the past. I am not sure whether I should declare an interest, but my wife has been very involved in the issue. She formerly ran Surfers Against Sewage and wrote a response for it on these matters, and she has done some work for South West Water. If that is an interest, then I have it—my wife is certainly interested in this debate, if I can put it like that. I have returned to the subject more often than any other during my career in the House of Commons. I warned the Conservative Government that their privatisation of the water industry would cut off the potential to secure the public and European moneys necessary to clean up our beaches and that people in the south-west, who are on some of the lowest incomes in the country, would be left to foot the bill. They proceeded regardless, and left only £1.5 billion for a clean-up programme that actually cost £6 billion—four times the amount that they had assumed. That is why South West Water customers continue to pick up the tab to this day. Much of what I have to say will be relevant in the national context, but I must first focus on the situation in the south-west. Households with water meters account for two thirds of users—there is a very high penetration of water meters in the south-west because of the high bills—and can expect to pay an average of £397 in 2008-09, which is up 5.6 per cent. on last year. Many of the remaining, unmetered users are unable to switch to meters because their properties do not allow it. They do not necessarily use large amounts of water or choose to avoid installing a meter in the hope of saving money. Many of them are poor, and the problem has been of concern to the Minister, who has spoken about it publicly in the past few days. Such users face an even bigger rise of 8.7 per cent. and will pay £686 on average. That figure will go up all the time because the more people switch to meters, the higher the charge for those who are still unmetered.