Nationalising the water industry in England would undo years of
improvements and risks losing essential funding for the future,
according to Water UK Chief Executive Michael Roberts. He was
speaking during a debate with Labour’s Shadow Water Minister
, whose party recently set out
more details about their plans to nationalise the industry if they
win power. Speaking during the event, which was co-hosted by Water
UK and the New Statesman magazine on Tuesday 9th October, and
titled ‘Public vs Private: Is the water industry working for
consumers and the environment?’, Mr Roberts said:
“Nothing we have heard so far on the proposals
for nationalisation In England give any clue about how the
environment would be protected, how water quality would be
maintained and improved, how leakage would be cut or how the big
challenges of climate change and population growth on the future
supply of water would be dealt with. Instead of building on
nearly 30 years of improvements, made possible by bringing in
billions of pounds of private investment to undo the problems
created by nationalisation, there’s a real danger that we go
backwards to a world where decisions are driven by political
short-termism rather than the needs of customers and the
environment.
“Putting water back in the same constrained
public sector funding pot as health, education, housing, defence,
transport, policing and the rest would relegate water companies
to taking part in an annual competition for the Chancellor’s
support, hoping they would somehow be higher up the list of
priorities for taxpayers’ cash than other issues which might be
more attractive to Ministers. It’s what happened before when
companies in England were publicly-owned and it’s an issue today
in Northern Ireland where, due to current public expenditure
constraints, there’s a big gap between the money Northern Ireland
Water needs for vital new water mains and upgraded wastewater
treatment plants, and the money they get from government. The
bottom line is that water companies, private or public sector,
need the confidence that they will be adequately funded. There is
a fundamental risk that nationalising the water industry in
England would potentially cause far greater problems than any it
is supposed to solve.”
