BRITAIN is not looking its best this summer. It was the sixth driest spring for the past 200 years, and the earth is parched for lack of rainfall. The science is complex, but the Met Office recently said that it expected the UK to experience increasingly dry summers as the world got warmer. And it is not all due to the weather: water supply and its usage are crucial. On the basis of current usage, England can expect a daily shortfall of five billion litres of water by 2050. Ten more reservoirs are needed to avoid this. Not one new reservoir has been created in the past 30 years.

Last week, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) published a damning report on the water companies’ performance. If the necessary work to replace the ageing mains continues at the present rate, it will take 700 years. The regulators have been “missing in action”, failing to hold the industry to account for its repeated failures to improve the crumbling infrastructure, the PAC says. Incidents of serious pollution have risen by 60 per cent in the past year. Twenty per cent of householders are struggling to afford their water bills, and prices are set to keep going up. This is all the more scandalous, given dividends and executive pay in the industry (Southern Water, for example, recently announced that it had doubled the pay of its CEO to £1.4 million) (Comment, 9 June 2023). Meanwhile, ten water companies were unable to generate enough income last year to cover their interest payments, and insolvency looms for Thames Water. Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, who chairs the PAC, described the scale of the work needed as “monumental” and “rivalled only in difficulty by the efforts needed to repair customers’ faith in the sector”.

This is a dismal mess, in need of an urgent clean-up. It is no great surprise that the Government has argued that it inherited a broken water system. Last October, it set up the Independent Water Commission, under Sir Jon Cunliffe, which released its report on Monday. Among the 88 recommendations are the scrapping of the regulator, Ofwat, and a complete overhaul of more than 100 water laws affecting England and Wales. After a consultation this autumn, the Government says that it will bring a Water Bill to Parliament next year. While Sir Jon has presented his proposals as a once-in-a-generation programme to turn things around, campaigners complain that the he hasn’t gone further. Surfers Against Sewage described his report as “like putting lipstick on a pig”. For one thing, the terms of reference precluded even consideration of renationalisation.

No one is pretending that there are quick fixes available, but only legislative substance is likely to succeed in providing a water system fit for the demands of the 21st century and restore the water in our natural environment to health. If the Government fails, we will all suffer.