Water Industry (Financial Assistance) Bill

Speaking in an entirely personal capacity, and looking at sustainable development and flood prevention, the one thing we could do today is to stop building on floodplains. Perhaps the House would like to unite around that and an amendment could be tabled to a future water Bill. There are things that we can do now. There has been lots in the papers recently about water stress and scarcity, and drought. That will inevitably have an impact on homes. There is a risk of subsidence and there are reports of roads cracking. That obviously has insurance implications for householders and business properties, but also for highways. Again in a personal capacity, I challenge the Minister on how we will pay in those mostly rural areas for roads that are cracking now because of drought rather than the flood damage that occurred in the previous two years. I welcome the fact that our report discusses the new responsibilities of the upper-tier authorities for flood and water management, and that funds are available. The Government response talks about providing the funding to lead local flood authorities through direct grants and says that that is expected to fund fully their new responsibilities under the Act. However, my local authority tells me that those moneys are not ring-fenced. If that is the case, and we are reducing, because of austerity, the money for the core tasks of the upper-tier authorities—county and unitary—that will pose real difficulty for them, and I put that to the Minister. My hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) mentioned affordability. The Minister and others have been challenged about that in many forums, not only the Select Committee, but all-party groups. It is right that the Bill focuses on affordability for the south-west region. [Hon. Members: ““Hear, hear.””] I have no connection with the south-west, other than hoping that I have many friends on both sides of the House who represent the region extremely ably. However, there is a particular issue in that the population is small and there is a heavy emphasis on fixed and lower incomes. As I said, the application of the EU drinking water directive, and especially the bathing water directive, posed enormous problems to the south-west. I therefore welcome the fact that the Bill addresses affordability. I hope that when the House has ample time—I am sorry if it will not be this year; we keep hearing that something will happen in the coming weeks or the coming months—and the draft Bill is before us, we can address some of the other affordability problems and also a social tariff.