Council has no confidence in South East Water

South East Water has imposed a hosepipe ban on domestic customers

Lewes District councillors unanimously backed a motion to declare a vote of no confidence in South East Water following recent water outages and hosepipe bans.

The motion also called on the council to declare a "water emergency" and to appoint a councillor champion to monitor the performance of both Southern and South East Water.

The motion was passed at a council meeting on Monday.

South East Water said it understood the councillors' frustration and was currently drawing up a new business plan.

Green councillor and council leader Zoe Nicholson said: “I do think it is worth reminding ourselves in the 30 years since our water companies have been privatised £65bn has spent and given out as dividends.

“Whilst I really accept colleagues saying this is in part about climate change, our systems need to be resilient for that and they are not, they are simply not.

"Our residents, frankly, expect water to come out of their taps. They don’t expect for low levels of water to be a regular occurrence in parts of our community.”

Households were kept supplied with bottled water during recent supply problems

In June the hosepipe ban was introduced, while homes across West Kent and East Sussex faced shortages when a pipe burst in Tunbridge Wells.

A spokesman for South East Water said: "We understand and appreciate the frustration being expressed by councillors.

“As several councillors highlighted, climate change is having a real and profound impact across all of Europe. 

“After the heatwave last summer, the freeze/thaw last winter and this year seeing the hottest June since 1976, our network has seen unprecedented tests of resilience and capacity that have breached our most cautious planning models from our last business plan, which was agreed with Ofwat in 2019. 

“However, we recognise this and are addressing this in our latest business plan.”

The spokesman went on to say that the company was in the process of drawing up a new business plan with a "large focus on resilience".