To Affinity and beyond

Ruth Williams

Published 17 January 2024

Bookmark

Standard content for Members only

To continue reading this article, please login to your Utility Week account, Start 14 day trial or Become a member.

If your organisation already has a corporate membership and you haven’t activated it simply follow the register link below. Check here.

Become a member

Start 14 day trial

A year after taking the helm at Affinity Water, Keith Haslett talks to Ruth Williams about the challenges of rebuilding trust in the sector and changing behaviours around water use. He explains why we need a dedicated water minister role and the resurrection of the National Council for Water to avoid the need for heavy engineering projects, such as desalination plants.

When Keith Haslett left Northumbrian Water to take the reigns at water-only company Affinity a year ago this week, he surely breathed a sigh of relief at being able to leave behind the media maelstrom surrounding sewage in waterways?

On the contrary, he tells Utility Week that every company has a role to play in rebuilding trust damaged by the backlash over the use of combined sewer overflows.

“I’ve been in the industry for 25 years, and seen every corner of a water company – and the challenges that come with that,” Haslett says. “To be honest, we’re all in it together.”

Having served as Northumbrian’s water director, following stints focused on wastewater at United Utilities and water procurement at Northern Ireland Water, Haslett is well-versed in the challenges facing the sector.

These extend to Affinity, which has faced its share of public scrutiny, with environmental groups campaigning to protect chalk streams across the region. Improving quality of waterways while reducing abstraction to protect the environment is central to the company’s plans in the short, medium and long-term.

Haslett explains how he sees Affinity’s position and how it can to contribute to nation-wide improvements to industry-wide issues of water scarcity and quality.

“We’re the largest water-only company by some way, so we can make a difference by really focusing on the drinking water side of the eco system,” he says. “We have the ability to be a lot more focused on resilience, and where we are geographically wise and in the north London area there’s a lot of real challenges with that.”

To this end, Haslett is calling for water scarcity to be pushed up the political agenda and into the national consciousness.

Flowing forward

At the end of last year, the company collaborated with thinktank Demos on a report which recommended resurrecting the National Council for Water and creating a dedicated water minister role as well as calling for grey water reuse and greater ambition to curb consumption.

The report builds on Affinity’s long-running Save our Streams campaign, which has seen 300,000 customers sign up to use less water with the focus of protecting beloved waterways. Research has revealed that many consumers (55%) do not associate water in the environment with what comes out of their taps. Affinity’s campaign is designed to strengthen people’s understanding of how their habits impact rivers brought to life through social media campaigns with household names like Sarah Beeny and stand-up comics getting involved.

The Flowing Forward report highlights the need for compulsory metering and Haslett is adamant that smart metering in water needs to reach a point of being on-par with the energy sector to influence consumer behaviour and protect the environment.

“If we address some of that, then we’re able to dial down some of the really big engineering projects that would otherwise be needed to fix the deficit long term,” he says. “No one wants desalination or high energy technology, because it goes against the grain of what we’re trying to achieve with net zero. Compulsory metering and producing less water has to be at the forefront of our thought process.”

Haslett insists that getting water scarcity “front and centre” of government policy is essential to protect the fresh water environment.

“A dedicated minister for water could pull together the different government bodies alongside the water companies. Putting back in place a national water council to have that formal environment would be really important going forward.”

At present, the parliamentary undersecretary of state for environment’s brief covers water and rural growth, which Demos suggests restructuring with a dedicated role for water.

Half of Brits (48%) feel the government is failing to meet its responsibilities to maintain water access, the report shows, and only 15% think government is doing enough to tackle the issue.

Until 1983, a national council for water existed, which Demos recommended should be resurrected to bring together experts from stakeholders, water companies, regulators to collaborate on water resilience.

The report says the council should develop a shared and coherent framework with clear responsibilities for each stakeholder in reducing water demand. Demos said raising public awareness around saving water could be the remit of the council.

Haslett explains Affinity became involved with the Flowing Forward report to use its position as the largest water-only company to progress work on demand management in a sustained way.

“We’re in a good position as a large water-only company to help drive this forwards on behalf of the sector. We can do a huge amount in this space as a water company, but we do need help.”

He points to policy changes to promote the use of grey water reuse and efficiency measures in homebuilding in a sustainable, long term way.

The Demos report also calls for: alternative charging structures to be explored that incentivise water conservation; a 100l per capita consumption (PCC) target to new build homes in water-stressed areas; ensure plumbers and installers of water-using devices are properly trained to achieve maximum water efficiency.

To continue reading this article, click here to access the Digital Weekly issue where it was first published.