Compulsory water metering

[Pete C]

Good or bad?

cheers, Pete.

[Kev]

With our gas and electricity going uo 25% it was only a question of time before the water companies got in on the act. Add to that a doubling of council tax in the last 10 years will any of us having any spare spending money in 5 years time.

Kevin

[curious]

Up until now water companies didn't want you to be on a meter so I knew (in 1986) that it would be a good idea. I have saved money ever since

- not a fortune since you will find that most of your bill is still for the standing charge i.e. to maintain the water mains and the sewerage system. However I would guess that a household of say one male and three females would probably notice very little difference in the size of the bills. Any occupancy less than that should probably give a saving and any more would probably cost more with metering. One upside is that with metering you pay for what you use so you can still use hosepipes - ban of no ban!! Good Luck Curious

[Sponix]

AFAIK, the current hosepipe bans apply also to people who are metered.

Strange how New Labour were strongly against metering before they came

to power. Now that they need more money they are for it!

In addition they are pressurising Councils to build more houses in the South East, but not providing money to build the infrastructure to support such developments.

Two faced w*nkers, the lot of them.

sponix

[Mary Fisher]

Good.

Mary

[manatbandq]

"Announcing the move, Environment Minister Elliot Morley said: "Water is a precious resource which we can no longer simply take for granted." "

Bollocks. We've built more and more houses and invested zilch in the collection and distribution of an abundantly available resource.

We (2 adults, 3 kids) saved 50% by voluntarily switching to a meter when they were being fitted free in our area.

MBQ

[Sponix]

Exactly.

The public seem to think that water is a limited resource like oil and it's about to run out. It isn't.

The UK has more than enough water, it's just in the wrong places. It doesn't help that the Government seem hell bent on building even more houses in the wrong areas.

Why can't the Government build the houses in more sensible areas? Do we really need more houses anyway? A recent report says that the UK birth rate has plummeted sharply in recent years.

The water industry should invest a little more in improved infrastructure and give smaller dividends to the shareholders. However, that'll never happen due to greed.

sponix

[Chris Cowley]

I wonder how they'd deal with a property like ours - the water supply to our house is shared, it comes in via 15mm copper through a party wall. If the neighbour turns their internal stop-c*ck off, our supply is also cut off.

They'd presumably either have to give us our own water supply from the street, or subtract our meter reading from the neighbour's.

There must be properties in Kent set up like this too, I'd have thought. Thames Water told me it wasn't an entirely uncommon setup in Victorian terraces. It must also be fairly common in flats.

[:::Jerry::::]

Yes but not for the reasons you think! They should re nationalise the water industry[1], and then embark on a programme of building a 'national grid' of water distribution pipes, there is no water shortage in the UK - the problem is that the water is in the wrong places, something that the private sector has failed to dealt with the over the last 20 years...

I would also advocate that there should not be any compensation either, the money saved can be put towards the problems that the private sector has failed to deal with over the last 20 years, preferring to line their own pockets in bonuses and dividends etc.

[1] water is essential for life, it is also essential for health, it should not be and should never have been allowed to be a profit making business.

[:::Jerry::::]

supply to

A water meter does not need to be outside a property.

[Richard Conway]

Yes, but if all his water comes through his neighbours supply then his neighbour would end up being billed for all his water usage.

[Chris Cowley]

Yes, but I don't think there is anywhere they could put a water meter in our neighbour's property that would prevent our water usage appearing on their meter, IYSWIM. The (lead) mains pipe goes from the street into the neighbour's house, where has branches to their kitchen and bathroom, and the pipework then continues on through the wall into our property.

I think perhaps the neighbouring property would have to be partially re-plumbed if we were both to have meters, unless the water company is prepared to subtract our usage from the neighbour's (which sounds like a recipe for billing errors to me!)

[Tony Bryer]

Anyone would think that nationalisation was a golden age. It was precisely when industries like this were nationalised that investment fell by the wayside. What needs to be done is not a national grid, but fixing all the leaks in the existing infrastructure and bringing in compulsory metering.

[Matt]

Good in that It will stop non metered customers subsidising metered ones as they have done since metering was introduced.

[Doctor Drivel]

A hosepipe ban is a hosepipe ban, meter or no meter.

>

[:::Jerry::::]

investment

Err, wasn't the National electricity grid built during (effectively) a nationalised period, wasn't the British Gas distribution system built during a nationalised period, wasn't the railways (1950's) modernisation during nationalisation? You are being far to simplistic, it was not the fact that the industries were nationalised but the lack of political will to make difficult (electoral unpopular) decisions that was the problem.

What needs to be done is not a national grid,

bringing

Perhaps, but the private companies can't even do that, when they do 'modernise' they do not do so out of profits but increase the charges to customers - I know of no other industry that is allowed to do that or gets away with doing it - but what does one expect when one is dealing with a monopolistic industry that we all need if we want to stay alive?....

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Perhaps you'd tell how the income from a private company goes to 'New Labour'? Of course their profits are taxed, but that goes to the government regardless of colour.

[Matt]

No it's in the right places, so bugger off we are keeping our water to ourselves, and to the hordes thinking of moving north forget it because you are not welcome.

Bloody Southerners, about time the North declared independence.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

The 'government' doesn't build houses. And there's little point in building houses in areas where people don't want to live - for whatever reason. Houses are already available in those areas for peanuts anyway.

[nightjar]

I worked in a nationalised industry - the electricity supply industry. We planned for up to 60 years ahead when making investments (planning periods were 20, 40 and 60 years, depending upon what we were building), allowed generous reserves of capacity against unforseen future growth and still sometimes had to cut tariffs to keep within the 2% profit that we were capped at.

It would be a very sensible idea to have one. Personally, despite the problems it would cause with evaporation losses, I would like to see one built as a combined water distribution and canal network. A properly designed and modern canal system could take some transport, particularly bulk goods, off our roads. However, that sort of thing requires an holistic approach to government, which I doubt we would ever see.

Virtually impossible, even if you replaced all the old pipes, which would probably cost more than a national grid.

I'm really not sure what that will do, apart from distribute the costs around differently. If people use less water as a result of being metered (which I haven't, as metered water has cost me less than I paid in water rates before), the companies will either have to increase prices to maintain the same income or invest even less in the system.

Colin Bignell