21 February 2011 | Tierney Smith
Water, Europe

 

‘Water poverty’ will become a strain on UK households as scarcity of supply pushes up bills, according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

Josh Stott, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Programme Manager said, “Climate change and how we adapt to it will impact upon disadvantaged groups in different ways. This report highlights the need for policy makers and agencies to consider these social justice issues when preparing and building resilience to climate change."

The report ‘Vulnerability to heatwaves and drought: adaptation to climate change’ published today (21 February), found that affordability could lead some households to fall into ‘water poverty’, where more than 3 per cent of earnings go on water bills.

The report, by a team from environmental consultancy firm AEA and the University of Surrey, found consumer demand, drier conditions and climate change, would put increasing pressure on water supplies.

Around four million homes are already feeling the strain from water bills; according to the report and with prices set to go up by 5 per cent a year this is will increase.

To combat increasing inefficiency of water use, companies are moving away from flat rates to schemes favouring meter, with bills based upon consumption, something the foundation believe could hit more vulnerable households.

Magnus Benzie, lead report author from AEA said: “We currently waste a lot of water, so on one level it makes sense to encourage greater efficiency by charging people depending on how much water they use. But some tariffs can put unfair pressure on households that cannot reduce their water consumption.”

The report looked at the Southwest specifically, where water bills are on average 43 per cent higher than the rest of the country. South West Water is already trialling a tiered scheme.

The region is already the UK’s fastest growing in terms of population, and this, along with tourism in the area has placed a real strain on water resources. The scheme in place uses three levels of pricing to set bills against the amount of water used.

However, the foundation believes that low-income houses that cannot reduce water, whether because of household size, health problems, or lack of water efficient appliances, are more vulnerable, and schemes to help are not eligible for all and have high dropout rates.

The report also found failures of governments anticipate droughts and heatwaves, a relatively new threat, despite the Department of Health’s Heatwave Plan. It used the 2003 heat wave, which lead about 30,000 deaths as an example of how fatal this can be and say more proactive planning is needed.

The authors concluded that ‘affordable water efficiency’ was needed, and point towards a national cross-sectoral approach to the problem.

 

Image: Redvers | flickr

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