Compulsory water metering

[Andy Hall]

... and of course there were no rail accidents during the years of nationalisation?

[Doctor Drivel]

Matt, same place.

[F]

Yes. The water board asked a few questions and came up with an estimate that showed a decent saving. Can't remember exactly how much, but it must have been enough to persuade me to fit the meter.

Don't forget that whether or not you'll save depends, in part, on your property's 'rateable value'.

[Doctor Drivel]

Lord Hall, there isn't any mines left, you dribble away. I only saw ever mines in Nottinghamshire and Kent.

[nightjar]

The national grid was planned as an entity from the beginning. It came into being as a result of the 1925 Weir Report and the Electricity Supply Act

1926 set up the Central Electricity Board specifically to create and run that grid, the last pylon of which was erected in 1933.

That was primarily because the 1919 Electricty Supply Act had failed to make Joint Electricty Boards compulsory and because the 1926 Act did not give the CEB powers over the generation of electricity, beyond standardisation of voltage and frequency. Until power generation could be centralised into a relatively small number of large generating stations, there was no need for anything better than the 132kV grid.

Colin Bignell

[Adam]

What I don't understand is why this is a news story at all in 2006. My water company, Thames Water, installed a water meter at my house about 8 years ago. I had no choice in this, which in my view means that compulsory water metering is not exactly new. Strangely enough, on the very same day I got the letter from them telling me I had to have my water metered whether I liked it or not, their Chief Executive was interviewed on BBC Radio 4 about water metering and gave a categorical assurance that no-one would have to have water metering if they didn't want it. I phoned the Chief Executive's office to ask about this apparent inconsistency, and was told that "I was using a very restrictive definition of the word 'no-one'".

Perhaps this is the first time the policy has been tested in court, but it's certainly not the first time water metering has been compulsory.

Adam

[Adam]

What I don't understand is why this is a news story at all in 2006. My water company, Thames Water, installed a water meter at my house about 8 years ago. I had no choice in this, which in my view means that compulsory water metering is not exactly new.

Strangely enough, on the very same day I got the letter from them telling me I had to have my water metered whether I liked it or not, their Chief Executive was interviewed on BBC Radio 4 about water metering and gave a categorical assurance that no-one would have to have water metering if they didn't want it. I phoned the Chief Executive's office to ask about this apparent inconsistency, and was told that "I was using a very restrictive definition of the word 'no-one'".

Perhaps this is the first time the policy has been tested in court, but it's certainly not the first time water metering has been compulsory.

Adam

PS Apologies if this post appears twice. I think my first attempt to post it vanished into the aether, but I guess it may have just been delayed.

[Kev]

An arguement that I have never understood. On the one hand the South East is overcrowded and we must have congestion charging and water metering and the like and on the other there are skill shortages and we have to have immigration. Hang on, I thought that you just said that we were overcrowded.

Kevin

[Bob Martin]

It would be a good thing for me (we don't use a lot of water) were it not for the fact that we get our water from one company and pay another to take the sewage away. The latter costs more than twice as much as the former.

Has anyone invented a sewage meter?

[manatbandq]

We had a free meter fitted with the promise we could switch back to normal billing after a year if we weren't happy. Anyone buying the house from us would have to be billed based on the meter. In the end we saved so much we stayed on the metered tariff.

MBQ

[Andy Hall]

That's a classic.....

A very unique statement in fact.... :-)

[Andy Hall]

No it's in Bracknell.

[Tiddy Ogg]

And it's worked all that time? Flow meters are not exactly the most reliable of items.

Tiddy Ogg.

[Phil Young]

You need to bear in mind that Myra's posts boil down to letting us know that she is on a higher moral plane than us poor mortals. Except the ones that remind us that 'wasps are great'.

I think my favorite was when she claimed that she wouldn't mind her car being vandalised because it would provide amusement for the vandals and 'people are more important than things'. That is nicely self contained. I was hoping to make an appointment.

'Windows is better than Linux/BSD/RiscOS because it is more popular' only achieves greatness in contrast to 'supermarkets are rubbish, I only use small shops and knit my own free-range meusli'

[:::Jerry::::]

track and signalling.

[Stickems.]

Water meters have been compulsory for new builds for a long time.

[Nick]

Is that right? The four smallest wheels of my water meter go round OK when someone has a shower, but the ones that measure whole cubic metres don't go round any more. So my usage is zero every time the water company reads it. They don't seem to have noticed. I expect someone will come around and have a look one day. What is going to really confuse them is that the house next door has been removed and has correctly had a zero reading for a year. Now building has started, and I have allowed the builders to use an old outhouse toilet and handbasin on my property, using a water pipe over the fence from their metered supply. The water company are going to assume wrongly that the builder's pipe supplies my whole house, and that's why my reading is zero. I may be able to get away with no water bills for another year (apart from a low supply charge)!

[Doctor Drivel]

Matt, all the same place.

[Doctor Drivel]

What they did was plan meters and notify customers. Most were ignorant that they could refuse, so let the water companies do it. Say 5% refused, they still get a load of meters in.

[Andy Hall]

It does, however, illustrate the point that nationalisation is not the panacea for all ills. It substitutes political control for market control and both are short term in nature.