At the end of last year, the company collaborated with thinktank Demos on a report which recommended resurrecting the National Council for Water and creating a dedicated water minister role as well as calling for grey water reuse and greater ambition to curb consumption.
The report builds on Affinity’s long-running Save our Streams campaign, which has seen 300,000 customers sign up to use less water with the focus of protecting beloved waterways. Research has revealed that many consumers (55%) do not associate water in the environment with what comes out of their taps. Affinity’s campaign is designed to strengthen people’s understanding of how their habits impact rivers brought to life through social media campaigns with household names like Sarah Beeny and stand-up comics getting involved.
The Flowing Forward report highlights the need for compulsory metering and Haslett is adamant that smart metering in water needs to reach a point of being on-par with the energy sector to influence consumer behaviour and protect the environment.
“If we address some of that, then we’re able to dial down some of the really big engineering projects that would otherwise be needed to fix the deficit long term,” he says. “No one wants desalination or high energy technology, because it goes against the grain of what we’re trying to achieve with net zero. Compulsory metering and producing less water has to be at the forefront of our thought process.”
Haslett insists that getting water scarcity “front and centre” of government policy is essential to protect the fresh water environment.
“A dedicated minister for water could pull together the different government bodies alongside the water companies. Putting back in place a national water council to have that formal environment would be really important going forward.”
At present, the parliamentary undersecretary of state for environment’s brief covers water and rural growth, which Demos suggests restructuring with a dedicated role for water.
Half of Brits (48%) feel the government is failing to meet its responsibilities to maintain water access, the report shows, and only 15% think government is doing enough to tackle the issue.
Until 1983, a national council for water existed, which Demos recommended should be resurrected to bring together experts from stakeholders, water companies, regulators to collaborate on water resilience.
The report says the council should develop a shared and coherent framework with clear responsibilities for each stakeholder in reducing water demand. Demos said raising public awareness around saving water could be the remit of the council.
Haslett explains Affinity became involved with the Flowing Forward report to use its position as the largest water-only company to progress work on demand management in a sustained way.
“We’re in a good position as a large water-only company to help drive this forwards on behalf of the sector. We can do a huge amount in this space as a water company, but we do need help.”
He points to policy changes to promote the use of grey water reuse and efficiency measures in homebuilding in a sustainable, long term way.
The Demos report also calls for: alternative charging structures to be explored that incentivise water conservation; a 100l per capita consumption (PCC) target to new build homes in water-stressed areas; ensure plumbers and installers of water-using devices are properly trained to achieve maximum water efficiency.
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