B

Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 3 September 2026

Debate

Summer Drought: Future Supply Disruption

Contribution

I am sure noble Lords are aware that the Government have pledged to build nine new large reservoirs to ensure sufficient water supply for the future. At the same time, we need to protect and enhance the environment and we are looking at how best to do that. We changed some of the planning rules to enable this to happen more quickly. At the moment, we are looking at how we co-ordinate the delivery programme. We have the Water Delivery Taskforce, which is bringing together officials from Defra, the Environment Agency, Natural England and other government departments as necessary to make sure that we have a good, co-ordinated delivery plan. The current timelines are that the reservoirs would come into service from 2035 and in 2031 Havant Thicket would become the first large water supply reservoir completed in 30 years.

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