Ex-Ofwat director calls for national body to oversee water resource planning

A former Ofwat director has called for a national planning body to oversee water resource planning.

Trevor Bishop’s review of national water resource planning concludes that the sector is dogged with challenges that could hamper efforts to close the gap between demand and supply.

In particular, Bishop’s review – commissioned by Ofwat – flags areas for improvement including planning frameworks, governance, leadership, and oversight.

His report found an overreliance on emerging processes, technologies and innovations to add new resources or encourage water efficiency; overly prescriptive guidelines for plans that have grown in complexity over the years; and a need to overhaul the culture around water resource management planning.

Water companies produce statutory water resource management plans (WRMPs) every five years. For the first time, non-statutory regional water resource management planning has created five plans in acknowledgement that water resources have impacts across multiple companies’ boundaries.

The case for a centralised, national water resources planning function “is becoming increasingly compelling”, Bishop’s review concludes.

This, he claims, could provide coordinated oversight as well as making planning more effective and objective by aligning investment decisions with policy and regulatory priorities.

His review also calls for a national system planning function with clear, effective leadership that could improve the sequencing of planning and the guidance around it.

Bishop, who recently moved from Water Resources South East to West Country Water Resources, suggests adding a nominal cut-off for any changes being made to policy or guidance to give clarity for those writing plans.

Another recommendation was to give earlier regulatory clarity on whether a scheme or options are feasible.

The need for long-term planning, which will involve more engagement with consumers and their cooperation to use less water, comes at a time when public perceptions of the sector are at an all-time low.

This impacts not only the likelihood of customer buy-in to plans, but also the morale of those working in water resource planning

His report adds: “The culture of water resources planning is a concern and may not be conducive to suitably high-quality plans, people retention and skill development. Passive-aggressive behaviours are not uncommon and a general preoccupation with process over outcomes.

“The quality of draft WRMPs submitted in 2023 were a significant cause for concern and ways of working are likely to have been a factor.”

The report adds that the current culture could hamper the quality of future plans.

Bishop’s report adds that the morale of many people in the water resource planning community is a concern.

It adds: “Many are under considerable stress as a result of multiple factors, including culture, lack of management support and the regulatory process.

“Water resource planners have a range of transferable skills and may decide to use these elsewhere.”

He also questioned whether the pipeline of new, additional staff would be sufficient to maintain standards and meet increasing workloads.

Currently, the interplay between statutory individual company WRMPs and the non-statutory regional, national level planning creates duplication of work and may be confusing or off-putting for stakeholders.

Bishop said there was poor interrelationships and interdependencies between water resources and planning in other areas such as drainage or flooding. This could mean opportunities to collaborate are being overlooked.

“To reduce the risk of making suboptimal investment choices, the water resources planning community will need to think and act differently. Barriers to change will need to be overcome with leadership and culture being key to success.”