The future management of water in England and Wales : a report by the Central Advisory Water Committee.

  • Great Britain. Central Advisory Water Committee.
Date:
1971
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: The future management of water in England and Wales : a report by the Central Advisory Water Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    14/124 (page 2)
    the Growing Demand for Water (the Proudman Committee) drew attention to two factors. One was the increasing demand for water for all purposes. Demand has continued to increase roughly in line with the Committee’s predictions and is expected to double by the end of the century. The other factor was the diversity of interests concerned with water. The Proudman Committee concluded that without overall planning it would be impossible to meet the increased demand. The present situation as regards water services is in several respects both more difficult and more complex than it was in 1962, and we therefore felt that it was necessary for us to examine in detail the structure and the deficiencies of the present system of organisa- tion before we could proceed further. It gradually emerged that, although considerable advances have been made in overall planning, there is no effective mechanism for ensuring that plans are implemented. In other words there was an essential element missing from the Redcliffe-Maud recom- mendations, and we found that we had to examine much more far-reaching proposals. 8. We understand that the government agree with the Redcliffe-Maud Commission on the need for the reorganisation of local government, and with much of the analysis in its report of the problems arising from the present structure, but that they do not favour the new pattern of local authorities the Commission recommended. The government’s own proposals for the new pattern of local authorities in England and Wales have not been published at the time of writing, and we have not therefore been in a position to relate our conclusions to them. However, the issues of principle involved in the proper organisation of water services will be easily apparent from our report. The further tasks of, for example, drawing detailed boundaries in the event of its being decided that local authorities should or should not retain responsibilities for water supply and sewage disposal would involve detailed investigation and consultation at the local level, something which in any case we were not qualified to undertake. 9. The structure of our report is as follows. In chapter 1, we describe in some detail the various types of body mentioned in our terms of reference. In chapter 2, we discuss the case for, and the present arrangements for, overall planning. In chapter 3, we describe the conflicts of interest which at the moment hinder the implementation of plans. Chapter 4 is devoted to setting out the kind of planning and co-ordination we consider to be necessary in future. Chapter 5 describes the different systems of organisation that might be set up to achieve this planning and co-ordination. In chapter 6, we discuss the role we envisage will be played in future by a national water authority. Chapter 7 deals with the position of Wales. For reasons which we give in chapter 8 we have been unable to reach a unanimous view as to which of the systems of organisation described in chapter 5 should be adopted. We have therefore devoted chapter 8 to setting out the main factors which ought to be taken into account in choosing between them. Chapter 9 is a summary of conclusions and recommendations. 10. In presenting our report, we wish to emphasise the urgency of the 1 Central Advisory Water Committee, Sub-Committee on the Growing Demand for Water. Final Report. HMSO, 1962. 4