Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I welcome John McGrath, Louise Green and Eilis Ferguson from the Department for Regional Development. John, are you leading off?

Mr John McGrath (Department for Regional Development): Yes, Chair. We welcome the opportunity to talk to the Committee about the recent Water Bill policy consultation. The consultation closed in August, and 61 responses were received. Many of the consultees welcomed the proposals. However, on some aspects, opposition was expressed, particularly by the construction industry. The Minister sees the proposed legislation as being vital in securing the provision of water and sewerage services for everyone in Northern Ireland. Critically, as you will be aware, the Department's power to pay a subsidy to Northern Ireland Water in lieu of domestic charges expires in March 2016, and new primary legislation needs to be in place to enable the Department to continue to pay the subsidy for the final year of this Assembly mandate.

I also want to highlight the importance of the other proposals that we consulted on. Members will recall from the briefing in June that there were options for addressing issues with private sewerage infrastructure to help to protect homeowners and to take account of recommendations that the Committee made at the end of 2012 following the inquiry into unadopted roads. Although quite a few consultees objected to the proposed requirements that residential sewers to be connected to the sewerage network should be constructed to a standard that would allow NI Water to adopt them, the Minister believes that legislation is necessary to prevent future homebuyers from being left with responsibility for incomplete or unsatisfactory private sewerage. The legislation also seeks to make developers consider the use of sustainable drainage systems (SUDS) when undertaking residential or non-residential development. There are still some issues to address, and more information is needed, but the legislation would remove the automatic right to connect surface water drainage to the combined sewerage system and would represent a strong step forward.

The Minister is keen to take action on private supply pipes. Those pipes are not the responsibility of NI Water, but there are still issues that legislation can help to address for leakage and lead such as, for example, taking a power to make grants available to support homeowners to repair or replace the private supply pipes.

Chair, if you are happy enough, I will now hand over to Louise and Eilis to take you through the detail of the presentation.

Ms Louise Green (Department for Regional Development): Thank you, Mr Chairperson. We appreciate the chance to speak to you about the outcome of the recent Water Bill consultation. You should all have received the presentation.

You will recall that we briefed the Committee at the beginning of June on the proposed consultation, which took place over the summer between June and August. We had 61 responses, which is quite substantial. Quite a few of those came from the construction industry, and you will appreciate that it is interested in this area and the impact that it will have. We have had a look at all the responses, and all the information has been drawn together to facilitate a final proposed policy for the Minister to consider. That is what we bring to you this morning.

I will give a quick recap of the consultation proposals. John mentioned the first one, which is the subsidy extension. You will be aware that the Department's current power to pay a subsidy to Northern Ireland Water expires in March 2016, which gives us a tight deadline to work within and to have legislation in place by. The presentation sets out the number of responses from those 61 that commented on each of the more detailed areas. The consultation also considered the option to require the Utility Regulator to abide by the strategic directions that the Minister will issue rather than, as is current practice, issue social and environmental guidance to the regulator. A third measure was considered on water resource management and drought planning. Northern Ireland Water has to go through that substantial work regularly. Water resource management plans need to be made at least every five years, and drought plans need to be made every three years. Those periods do not align, and a lot of red tape is involved, so the Minister proposed to draw those together to make it a smoother process.

There was a lot of interest from consultees in private sewerage systems. You will be aware of the issues that have been highlighted in the past with private sewerage infrastructure. The Committee's inquiry in 2012 into those issues has certainly been the driver for a lot of the proposals that were considered.

I will move on to surface water drainage and new connections. When officials briefed the Committee a couple of weeks ago, I know that you expressed interest in sustainable drainage schemes. This Bill will be used to bring those forward.

Private supply pipes also require consideration and were consulted on in the exercise. That will be a suite of measures, some of which will require legislation and others that will not. Given that it is one topic area, we took the opportunity to consult on all the measures at the one time and consider consultees' views.

I will go through each of those policy proposals in more detail. The Minister had proposed to extend the current subsidy-paying power by one year until March 2017 and also to take an enabling power in the legislation for a subsidy to be paid in the future by way of subordinate legislation, if necessary. A majority of respondents were in favour of that proposal, and it is ultimately the Minister's preferred policy option to go ahead and extend the power in that way.

I will move on to the strategic social and environmental directions option. A majority of respondents were not in favour of making that guidance a mandatory requirement. They certainly expressed concerns about interfering with the regulator's independence and were not keen for that to happen. Those consultees' views have been taken on board, and the Minister has identified that we should not proceed to make that guidance a mandatory requirement.

The third matter that we want to speak to you about is the water resource management plans and drought plans. The Minister's focus is on reducing red tape and bureaucracy and the cost to Northern Ireland Water of having to prepare those two separate plans. The Minister is of the view that that money, time and effort would be much better spent on drawing together two similar subject areas into one plan and making the process more streamlined and straightforward. The public consultation supported that view.

I will move on to the private sewerage infrastructure proposals. Those proposals are more to do with the environmental aspects of the Bill as opposed to the procedural or governance proposals. There were three individual proposals on private sewerage infrastructure. The first proposal is to make it a requirement for developers to enter into a sewer adoption agreement if they want to connect to the public sewerage network, and those agreements should also incorporate a bond. At present, there is no requirement for developers to enter into a sewer adoption agreement. As you will be aware, the Committee picked up on that issue in its inquiry into unadopted roads a couple of years ago, and the Minister will certainly be keen to close that loophole. A lot of the consultees were not in favour of that approach. To be honest, a lot of them were from the construction industry. It obviously places more requirements on them to construct private sewers to an adoptable standard. That is where a lot of the disagreement came from in the consultation response. However, bearing in mind the need to protect homeowners who in the past were left with unsatisfactory or incomplete private sewerage, the Minister believes that it is more important to introduce the legislation and close the loophole to protect those homeowners in the future.

The second of the private sewerage infrastructure proposals is the option to link it again with private streets adoption. In the past, prior to the 2006 Water and Sewerage Services Order, which we currently operate within, it was a requirement for developers to enter into a private streets adoption agreement, which incorporated sewer bonds and sewer adoption as part of that process. However, having considered the responses from consultees, the Minister feels that it would be more appropriate to go in favour of the original proposal, which was simply to make the sewer adoption agreement a requirement, as opposed to linking it with the private streets adoption process. There are issues there, in that if the sewer adoption agreement was not entered into, it would delay the private streets adoption. So, homeowners might be in a doubly bad situation in that they would not have their streets adopted in developments. The Minister felt that that was too much at this stage.

The third aspect of the private sewerage infrastructure proposals is around the level of the sewer bond, which, at the moment, is 40% for gravity sewers and 50% for pumping stations. The consultation feedback was quite high on this issue. The construction industry had strong views about the current level of sewer bond. As you will appreciate, it wanted it to be lowered as opposed to increased. However, the issue needs to be looked into, and the Minister is keen that we look into it and carry out a review of the sewer bond issue. I am conscious of time, so I will try to rush through this a bit more quickly for you. The sewer bond review would be a process that would sit outside the legislative process. Primary legislation is not required to effect the level of the sewer bond. Officials would be keen to progress that separately from the Bill. The Minister has supported that approach and has asked us to do that.

Moving on to surface water drainage and new connections, the initial proposals had been that, for non-residential sites, surface water drainage into the combined sewer system should be absolutely outlawed. For residential areas, the proposal was that it should be severely restricted. That was in an effort to promote sustainable drainage schemes, which we have spoken to the Committee about before. Having considered all the responses received from consultees, the Minister's preferred policy approach is to reverse the current presumption, which is in favour of allowing a surface water connection into the combined sewer, so that developers would then have to consider SuDS. So, it is trying to increase the focus on SuDS and those sustainable drainage systems.

Again, quite a few consultees were not in favour of the proposal, but the Committee will be aware of the issues that come with the volume of unnecessary water in the combined sewerage system, such as increasing flood risk, environmental issues and the cost of treating and pumping surface water that does not need to be in the combined sewer. That was the Minister's thinking behind that proposal.

Finally, on the surface water proposals, another option, which would be non-legislative, would be to consider using the reasonable cost allowance, which is currently paid for sewer requisitions, as another means of encouraging sustainable drainage systems. The Minister's final proposed policy would be to go ahead and do that. I accept that more information and details will be required on that, and more work will need to be done on that, but that is the proposal at present on the consultation outcome.

Finally, I will move on to the private supply pipes proposals. This was the suite of measures that I mentioned, some of which require legislation and some of which do not. Effectively, the Committee might like to think of it in terms of an escalating scale of measures that could be used to address issues with leakage and the risk of lead in private supply pipes. One of those would be for an information campaign to be run, similar to "Don't wait. Insulate." or "Bag it and Bin it", to educate homeowners and property owners about the risk of lead in private supply pipes. Consultees were in favour of that approach.

A further option would be for Northern Ireland Water to be permitted to enter people's private property and to replace or repair private supply pipes with the owner's consent. We understand that there may be economies of scale if Northern Ireland Water was already carrying out works in the street — it could be done more cheaply or more efficiently if Northern Ireland Water was already there and homeowners were content to allow them on to their property.

The next issue was the possibility of a grant scheme. That would require primary legislation for the Department to be able to support people to have leaking or lead private supply pipes replaced. Again, consultees were very much in favour of that proposal.

The fourth area that the consultation was carried out on related to the housing market. There are a couple of parts within that. One was that, if someone was selling or leasing a property, it could be introduced as a requirement that they have to declare whether there is any lead in private supply pipes, or an alternative and stronger option would have been to make them replace the lead. The consultation responses have been considered. People tended to be in favour of the declaration but, perhaps understandably, not the requirement to replace the supply pipes. However, the Minister has decided that the more appropriate policy would be to consider non-legislative means rather than legislating at this stage to incorporate a requirement for a lead declaration. There are other non-legislative ways in which that might be achieved, which would do away with the need for legislation. We do not want to legislate unnecessarily. So, the Minister has asked us to proceed on that basis at the moment.

Finally, I will draw to a close quickly on this point. The final private supply pipes option was to allow Northern Ireland Water to enter commercial property generally to address burst pipes and issues of the likes of the freeze/thaw a number of years ago. The Minister is keen that the current legislative powers be clarified, so that everyone understands what Northern Ireland Water is entitled to do, and to strengthen those powers if necessary.

That is a very quick run through the consultation outcome, which, I hope, has been helpful. I welcome questions in due course.

With the Committee's agreement, we would hope to publish the post-consultation report as soon as we can. If the Committee is content, we would be keen to bring the matter to the Executive as well. I have set out the timetable at the end of the presentation. As I mentioned, the draftsman will be preparing the Bill in the next few months, with the Committee and the Executive's consent. If all goes to plan, we hope that the Committee Stage could happen in advance of next summer and, hopefully, Royal Assent would be attained in February 2016, which is tight for our deadline, but the subsidy extension will be required to be in place by the end of March 2016. So, we are conscious of time pressures.

Thank you for your time. We are happy to answer any questions that you have at this stage.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Thank you, Louise; that was a very full presentation. That is the first sight that we have had of the slides that you brought today. I suppose that it is a bit like the paper; we have had no time to read into them, John. That is just a wee marker for you. However, it has been useful. While we went through it, we saw some questions that may have needed asking. However, in your presentation, you answered some of those as you went along, which I found useful. We are pre-emptive in that we have had the discussion about how busy the Minister is. As John Dallat said earlier, the Department's shutters come down in June, but it is interesting to see that you are going to keep us busy from June to October next year. We will do our best to work with you, of course. It is interesting that you are trying to work out our forward work programme for us.

Reading through your presentation and listening to your responses, Louise, I think that this is a real, good opportunity to address some of the historical problems that we have in Northern Ireland. I do not get where the Department is coming from in relation to the private streets and not making the adoption of those sewers a prerequisite. All sorts of problems with unadopted roads come under DRD with the Private Streets Order. You cited that the Minister was concerned that it may leave people in a difficult position. Louise, there are people out there in a difficult position today because of the Private Streets Order in that they cannot get their road surfaced. The conveyancing is not flagging that up for the people in those developments. There is an opportunity now with the sewerage system, and the last thing that we want is to leave them behind and at a disadvantage. Unfortunately, some of the legal people out there seem to be keen to sell houses and have conveyance, but the people who are buying them on the private streets are not fully au fait with what they are signing up to. I think that this was a golden opportunity to fix that. I am intrigued about your response. Maybe you could say more about that.

Ms Green: Yes, of course, Mr Chairman. I appreciate that there are lots of people in Northern Ireland who have suffered at the hands of the issues regarding lack of adoption. I read the Committee's very full inquiry into the unadopted roads issue, which incorporated a lot of private sewerage issues. From a water and sewerage perspective, the priority would be for people not to be living in homes that are not connected to the public sewerage network. The proposal is to make sure that any developers who are building residential developments construct their sewers to an appropriate standard that would allow Northern Ireland Water to adopt them, and that that sewer adoption agreement would be protected by a bond of an appropriate level.

With regard to your point about the private streets legislation, prior to 2006, the systems were more aligned. However, 2006 is now quite a long time ago, and the processes have become quite distinct as a result. Certainly, if a developer did not enter into a sewer adoption agreement, there would be the risk that that would delay the adoption of the street if the two systems were linked. Therefore, from a water and sewerage perspective, the Minister's proposal is to address the sewerage aspects and make sure that any developers who want to connect to the public sewerage system are constructing their sewers to an appropriate standard, that they are adopted by Northern Ireland Water and that homeowners are protected.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Is there not an opportunity here? I was interested when I read your responses, and you indicated in your presentation, that many of the developers are against some of these proposals. Obviously, that is ultimately because it will cost them more money. However, when developers are designing schemes, they are designing them in such a way that a lot of our developments have private streets. To my mind, if they are not protected, that disadvantages homeowners who buy houses on private streets. So why are the sewerage system and the bond not included as a prerequisite for private streets? I think that that would be a greater protection. You referred to 2006 and the fact that there has been some problem. The problem could be fixed, and now would be a golden opportunity to protect people on private streets. Really, this is saying that we are going to abandon them further. That is what it says to me.

Ms Green: No. If that is the impression that I gave, I apologise; it was not my intention. Certainly, the private streets process continues and is organised and run by colleagues in Transport Northern Ireland. Our concern today is around the sewerage. We want to make sure that people are not stuck with private sewerage that is not of adoptable standard, leaving residents with responsibility for that.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Are you saying that no bond will be necessary for a private street, but there is for — or am I getting this in reverse?

Ms Green: No, the private streets process continues. A bond is still required for private streets and ultimately roads adoption.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): So what difference are you drawing between the two?

Ms Green: I am saying that there are two separate systems. There is a sewer adoption system and a private streets adoption system. Prior to 2006, those were one system rather than two. So, the private streets adoption process does and will continue. The proposal had been to again link the sewer adoption agreement with that private streets adoption process, which would mean that, ultimately, the private street could not be adopted if the developer had not entered into a sewer adoption agreement. We are saying that the legislation would require the developer to enter into a sewer adoption agreement anyway, so there should not be any net disbenefit there.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): OK. I had misunderstood that, sorry.

Mr Lynch: Thanks, Louise. There was a lot of information in that to digest in a short period. It is to be welcomed because our inquiry, last year or the year before, showed up major problems, particularly when the downturn came in the building industry. I am not surprised that the developers were resistant to any major changes here in bonds or that. I think that it is right that change is needed to prevent these problems arising again.

You made a couple of wee remarks, Louise. You said that officials would progress the issue of the level of sewer bonds separately from the Bill. What do you mean by that?

Ms Green: At the moment, the level of the sewer bond is not set out in primary legislation. The proposal is to look separately at the level of the sewer bonds, consider all the evidence and perhaps benchmark against companies in England and Wales. A significant scoping exercise has to be done to look at how that sewer bond review would be carried out. When the evidence is collected and considered, officials will put proposals to the Minister. I cannot foresee what the outcome may be. Perhaps the bond level may go up or down, but we need to look at all the available information.

You also mentioned the construction industry. It is worth saying — I probably should have mentioned it in my presentation — that, separately from this legislation exercise that we are going with at the moment, we have regularly been meeting the Construction Employers Federation. I hope that we are establishing a relationship with its members, and we are certainly aware of their concerns. They do have concerns about some of the proposals, but I hope that, moving forward, we will have a more open relationship with them. We are engaging with them on issues and will welcome their evidence in the sewer bond review, whichever way it may go.

Mr Lynch: That is fine. You indicated that SuDS would be cheaper but without giving an amount. How much would the costs for SuDS be and who would maintain them?

Ms Green: To be honest, this is one of the areas that, I think, has really delayed the implementation of SuDS, not only in Northern Ireland but in the UK and more widespread than that. There are questions over the maintenance of and responsibility for the schemes. I know that, at the last Committee meeting that officials attended, you were quite supportive of the idea of SuDS and highlighted that these had been on the go for quite a number of years, and so they have. However, these issues remain. So, certainly, what needs to happen is that officials need to look at all the information that is available and what is happening in England and Wales, for example, where they are also grappling with similar issues. We envisage that the power would be included in the primary legislation to allow for subordinate legislation, which could be made to incorporate more detail as it emerges. I appreciate that it is not an ideal position at the moment, but we do not want to miss the opportunity of primary legislation to, at least, reverse the tide a little on surface water connections.

Mr Lynch: Finally, where would the money come from for replacing the lead pipes?

Ms Green: Well, that is a difficult question to answer in the current climate. We cannot say at this stage, I am afraid.

Mr Dallat: I have just a general question. Did enough people respond to the consultation to give you the confidence that it is a true and accurate reflection of opinion? It seems to me that, in particular, in the kind of responses that have been given by developers, for example, they have absolutely got the upper hand. Understandably, their first priority is not the environment: it is the cost of providing the unit of housing and so on. Is there not disappointment that the response has been so poor?

Ms Green: I suppose that perhaps water and sewerage proposals are not headline grabbing, much as officials would like them to be. I take your point that a lot of the responses came from the construction industry. However, officials and the Minister certainly look at the responses in the round, and, yes, we take account of what people have said, but they do have to be weighed against each other. You will see, for example, that the private sewerage responses were quite heavily weighted by the construction industry. However, the Minister's proposal and intention is still to go ahead and make the sewer adoption agreement a requirement, in spite of the fact that the majority of respondents, admittedly from the construction industry, were against that proposal.

Mr Dallat: Chairperson, I totally respect Louise's extremely honest answer to the question. Is there not a need for some kind of firewall against responses being very badly distorted?

Mr McGrath: We do our best. We go out to consultation. It is up to the general public to respond. I take Mr Dallat's point entirely: there will be some responses that reflect vested interests — and I do not mean that in any negative way.

Mr Dallat: You are exactly right.

Mr McGrath: And you are right on that, but, equally, a response to a consultation is not a vote. In the clear light of day, we will recognise that particular interests will seek to protect their own interests. You have to say, "Well, that is fine and dandy". Developers might like, for example, bond levels to be low, but the entire point of having a bond is to give some protection and, if it is too low, it defeats the purpose. I think that it is our job to look in the clear light of day, reflect to the Minister our assessment of responses and take account of what are genuine, open vested interests. I take your point, though, that some people will be quicker to respond because their business is affected, whereas the man on the street will not. The basic issue about water and sewerage is that if it works all right, it does not excite people. It only does that when something goes wrong. They are not going to rush out and respond to this as they would to some more upfront issue that affects them day to day.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I think that is a given.

Louise, just before I call in Declan, can I bring you back to the issue of private streets? I am a wee bit confused. You are saying that a private street is five or more houses. Is it not usually five or fewer?

Ms Green: This is one of the areas where the two systems differ because how Transport NI would proceed with road adoption is different from how Northern Ireland Water would. There are different considerations if you are dealing with a road or a sewer. Northern Ireland Water tends not to adopt private sewerage unless the system is serving more than two houses or more than five if a pumping station is required. That is one of the disparities. Also, if we were to link the two processes —

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): You are saying more than two, but, in the consultation, you are talking about more than five. Across Northern Ireland in the last couple of years, developers have unfortunately suffered due to the recession and have gone into receivership. There are developments right across Northern Ireland with private streets. Private streets are normally not more than five. I am just curious about whether this captures them. In reading that, I see that it always refers to more than five.

Ms Green: The proposal that the Minister is keen to proceed with is, as I mentioned, solely in relation to the requirement for the sewerage option agreement. I accept that the position is probably different in relation to private streets. I am not a private streets expert. I am not in Transport NI, so I cannot give you really detailed information about that process.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Rather than putting you on the spot, can you come back to me on that?

Ms Green: Surely.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): That was the point that I was trying to make earlier. Like the two Johns have just said about the consultees, it will affect a lot of the developers, and they are going to respond. It alarms me slightly. Developers have been quite cute in the past in how they develop to get that extra unit in. They do not have to bring it up to the same standards as the private streets. This document is talking about five or more. I am concerned about the people living in private streets of four or five properties. Maybe you could just come back to us on that one rather than me putting you on the spot today.

Ms Green: Yes, of course.

Mr McAleer: I just want to pick up on the same point. For clarity, I am just looking at your final policy, which effectively separates the adoption of private streets from the sewerage adoption. I want to get it clear. With that policy, could you have a situation where the private street or development was adopted but the sewer was not? It could happen. As public representatives, we deal with many horrors stories of sewers that have not been adopted, creating public health issues. Is that still the situation where a developer cannot complete a development? We have seen that the bond system has failed many households where perhaps a developer has gone bust or the cost of completing the development exceeds the bond, so, effectively, it is left incomplete. Is it still the situation that they can just move to another development because there is no restraint, even though they have not completed the previous one?

Ms Green: A lot of the bond providers control how the bond is handled and serviced to a degree, in that, for example — I do not have the figures to mind immediately — they would be constrained by the amount of bond that they have already provided. Once an amount was released, the bond provider would allow them to take more on, so it would be in their interest to complete the sewerage option and have their bonds released. The onus is on them to complete them.

Mr McAleer: But in situations where the cost of completion exceeds the bond, there is nothing prohibiting them from just moving on, or in situations —

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Sorry, Declan, I think we are in danger of crossing over to a Transport NI issue as opposed to sewerage. That is where I think there is confusion with the document as well. That is where we need the joined-up approach. We are straying into the bond for the road as opposed to the bond for the sewer.

Mr McAleer: We received a presentation the other week from NILGA, which had been carrying out the audit. Its representatives said that they experienced great difficulties with some of the information sets provided. Can you say anything from your perspective about how that happened or how it might be resolved?

Ms Green: I think the difficulty is that NILGA was trying to draw data from three different sources. It had data from Northern Ireland Water, data from Transport NI, formerly Roads Service, and data from councils. I think it was a case of, "Never the twain shall meet". It was quite difficult because they did not entirely match, so they had quite an exercise, as I understand it, trying to sort out what the complete version of the data was.

Mr Byrne: I welcome the presentation. There is a lot of technical detail as well as policy issues. How big is the water policy unit? Are you the only person in the unit? Who is in charge?

Ms Green: The Bill team is made up of me, Eilis and another colleague. We look after the legislation side of things. As a division, we are quite small. There is something like 20 staff. I would need to count them, but it is around that number.

Mr Byrne: OK. In the consultation, have written submissions only been received from these participants or have you had any informed stakeholder events?

Ms Green: We held a couple of events. You will be aware that the long-term water strategy consultation has recently closed. We held an event to discuss the concerns that we believed that the Construction Employers Federation has; we met with it a couple of times, and we met with the National House-Building Council. We also met the Confederation of British Industry. I know that I am straying from the Water Bill a bit, but we also held an environmental event with Northern Ireland Environment Link in relation to the strategy. As I said, I am straying between the two. It is an overarching policy area, and it is difficult to separate them, but we have engaged with stakeholders.

Mr Byrne: I appreciate your answer. Do professional bodies like the Institute of Architects, the Institution of Civil Engineers and the Institution of Chartered Engineers have some technical competence and advice that they could provide in this regard?

Ms Green: Absolutely. The Department holds a central list of stakeholders. The consultation documents are made available and, quite frequently, those documents are made available electronically rather than vast reams of paperwork being sent out. There was an exercise, and all those people on our central list were contacted and provided with a link to the consultation documents.

Mr Byrne: Lastly, in relation to people who have purchased a house in a private development, the one thing that they cannot understand is that, within a week of moving in, they get their rates bill, even though no adoption of roads or sewers has taken place. In the Republic, there was a recent court case where no local authority can charge for property tax until there is adoption of the roads and sewers. I think that the same should apply here. It would quicken the whole pace of the process between DRD and the district council to make sure —

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I think, Joe, that it is a problem, but is more for Land and Property Services. The sooner it addresses that issue the better. Maybe we could get our developments brought up to —

It is an unfair question for Louise.

Mr Hussey: Thank you for your presentation. John mentioned a firewall. For some residents in Coalisland, the sewerage system did not exist, and we have one in Gortin where there are problems at the minute. I am surprised that people like that did not reply to your consultation to say, "This is what it is like, unless there is something done to resolve this". That is a major issue. We are aware of those situations. So, we should have those in our report, even though those people did not respond. You made the point that people are given the opportunity to respond, but we cannot make them respond. Those who are in the public eye are the ones that we should be wary of.

I want to ask two questions. One is in relation to bonds. Do we know how many cases in which we have said, "OK, we want this bond cashed"? The second one relates to the lead piping. Do we know how much lead piping we are talking about? Is it going to be miles upon miles, which will cost us a fortune in the long term?

Ms Green: To deal with your first question about the problematic sites and people who live there: Northern Ireland Water provided the Department with information about sites that were of particular concern, and the consultation document was issued to those developments. A few responses came back, but not very many, as you indicated. However, I think it is also worthwhile pointing out that these proposals are to try to help people in the future, but you still have sites left that are not resolved at the moment. The Minister is very conscious of that and is concerned about it. The social and environmental guidance, which was issued to the Utility Regulator, certainly includes a priority that Northern Ireland Water should carry out a prioritisation and an upgrade of those sites as funds and time allow over the PC15 period.

Your second point was in relation to private sewerage. Since the new system came into effect, whereby the private streets and the sewer adoption processes were separated, 800 sewer adoption agreements have been entered into. That is since 2007. That is probably worth highlighting in itself, in that the legislation currently does not require developers to enter into those, so those have been voluntarily entered into, if you like.

Mr Hussey: Can I interrupt you there?

Ms Green: Yes.

Mr Hussey: They have voluntarily agreed to that because their fear was that you were going to cash the bond. Had you done that, they would have been snookered for the future.

Ms Green: Well, there would not have been a bond without the sewer adoption agreement. You cannot have one without the other.

Mr Hussey: Yes.

Ms Green: So, out of those 800 agreements, 231 have been successfully adopted. There are 569 cases where the agreement is in place but the process has not been finalised and no final certificate has been issued.

Mr Hussey: Are those 569 under constant review?

Ms Green: Yes. The last information that we had from Northern Ireland Water was that there are in the order of 18 being considered for enforcement.

Your third point was in relation to lead pipes. As you will appreciate, it is quite difficult to gauge the level of lead piping. Certainly, within the public network, there has been a long-standing rehabilitation programme that Northern Ireland Water has carried out, and certainly a lot of lead has already been removed from the system. However, as you say, a lot of the issue is now with the private supply side as opposed to the public network. At a rough guess or estimate, it looks as though there are something in the order of 80,000 to 100,000 homes in Northern Ireland — maybe one in seven — that might have lead in their private supply pipes. I should also point out that what we are talking about here are the external private supply pipes, not the internal plumbing. That is the nature of the problem at the moment.

Mr Hussey: There are 569 still being dealt with, and only 18 have been enforced. That concerns me. If we are going to have a bond system, I believe that it has to be effective and we have to make sure that, if it is there and people try to renege on it, we enforce it.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I agree wholeheartedly. Something else came out in that that alarms me as well. There are 80,000 homes in Northern Ireland with lead pipes. Given the link between lead and some medical conditions, I think that the Department should be more proactive, and should have been so historically, in addressing that. I have written to the Department on some occasions on my own, but the Department has been reluctant to do anything.

Mr Hussey: Can we get clarification? There are 80,000 homes where the pipe from the street to the house is lead, and it is their responsibility as opposed to that of the water service.

Ms Green: Yes.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Some of those homes are social housing, and it is also inside the properties.

Mr Lyttle: As it stands, the Northern Ireland Executive subsidises NI Water on behalf of households in order to avoid water charges in Northern Ireland. One of the most significant aspects of the Bill is to extend that policy until at least March 2017. What is the scale of the current subsidy per year?

Ms Eilis Ferguson (Department for Regional Development): It is £260 million.

Mr Lyttle: Quite a number of comments been made in relation to the waste water infrastructure being insufficient to meet future requirements. The problem is most acute in Belfast. The scale of the investment needed is in the region of £2·8 billion across Northern Ireland and £750 million in Belfast. Is the current policy funding model adequate to meet those requirements?

Mr McGrath: Well, the Executive's policy is to not have domestic water charges. That means that, because the subsidy goes to NIW, NIW is classified as an NDPB. Therefore, any borrowings or expenditure count as PE. Therefore, basically, government capital would have to meet the infrastructure needs under that model at the minute. There are clearly not as many constraints on capital at the minute as there are on resource, but the amount of capital that is likely to be available is not going to go anywhere near the sort of sums that you are talking about. We are looking at an indicative capital allocation next year of about £320 million. That is to cover the roads and the water, and some other issues. That is about £160 million, so it is slightly less than even NIW expected over the next price control period. The way it is worked out at the minute, it is difficult to see how the taxpayer would be able to make available the amount of capital that would be needed to address the significant strategic infrastructure issues on which the Committee has been briefed.

Mr Lyttle: What are some of the consequences of not meeting future requirements?

Mr McGrath: We highlighted significant issues, particularly in the Belfast area, and significant risks around infraction. The wider issue is that the inability to modernise the infrastructure could prove to be an inhibitor on basic economic development. Again, it is the sort of thing that, when water is there, it is all right, and sewerage is all right, and people do not think about it in terms of economic development. But if the infrastructure does not keep pace with it, in our view, before too long, it will become an inhibitor on economic development, housing development and industrial development.

Mr Lyttle: On that particular aspect of the Bill, the presentation given today said that the public response was that 15 responses were received. Am I reading that correctly?

Ms Green: There were 61 responses received in total for the consultation. Consultees tended to respond on the areas that were of particular interest to them, and that was an area where there were 15 people who commented.

Mr Lyttle: I think that there is a wider challenge in relation to consultation and some of the issues that John and Declan raised. I do not think it is adequate for the Executive, the Departments or us as MLAs to say that this is not of interest to the public and you will get organisations responding in a more organised way. Ross has alluded to this as well: we have to be proactive in making people in Coalisland, east Belfast or wherever aware of the significant policy proposals in the Bill and in finding a way to seek their input. Perhaps when the Bill is introduced in the Assembly and goes through Committee Stage we can try to be more proactive, but to have 15 responses in relation to something as significant as that for a public departmental consultation is a bit of a concern.

I appreciate the presentation and the remarks. Thank you.

Mr McGrath: I take the point, but this was not a consultation about whether to have water charges. It is in the context of the Executive's policy to not have water charging. This is simply to provide the legislative enablement of that.

Mr Lyttle: Absolutely. In addition to that, it is not just about the extension of not charging for water. It is about the adoption of sewers, and it is about other issues that are absolutely of relevance to residents across Northern Ireland.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I think the point, Chris, is that this consultation is no different from many others. People generally do not respond. I do not know how you are supposed to make people respond to something that they do not want to get involved in. To a degree, I think and hope that there is a level of trust from people in taking that forward. Certainly, I have been here since 2007 and seen many consultation processes, but the responses to many of them have been pretty poor.

Mr Lyttle: Chair —

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): To finish my point, take local government, where they are talking about the transfer of car parks, and only six of the 11 councils, which are going to be directly affected, took time to respond. It says more about them than about the wider public, because again they have entrusted people to actually make decisions on their behalf.

Mr Lyttle: I think it is a communications issue. How are we informing the public about the opportunity to respond to the consultation? In what way are we packaging it? Are we packaging it as responding to the x, y and z of the Water Bill? Are we giving out information that this is about the adoption of sewers and about things of interest to people. It is not easy. Government need to get a wee bit more creative about how they involve people in decision-making processes like this.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): I reckon that, if you did a personal consultation on the introduction of water charges, you would get a fair few responses, possibly more than the 15 that this one got.

Mr Lyttle: News items suggest that there is a large degree of interest in that.

Mr Byrne: And on his head be it.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): And on your head be it. We will leave that one to you and your party.

Mr Ó hOisín: I apologise for missing a small part of the presentation. I ask this question more in hope than expectation, because it affects a small number of cases. It is regarding proposal 6·5 about right of entry. A very small number of cases are still in a hiatus over issues about NI Water access and the compensation thereof. Was any consideration given to that small number of cases with outstanding compensation issues?

Ms Green: In a word no. I am afraid that there was not. The idea behind the proposal was to try to clarify and confirm the existing powers for the future. If any compensation issues are outstanding, I do not have the detail on them. I can come back to you if necessary.

Mr Ó hOisín: OK.

The Chairperson (Mr Clarke): Thank you, John, Eilis and Louise for the presentation.