SCOTTISH Water has underlined its track record of delivering cheaper water and services to households in Scotland compared with average prices in England and Wales, while highlighting its continuing investment in major infrastructure projects.
Unveiling its latest annual report, the Scottish Government-owned utility notes that its household charges are among the lowest in Great Britain.
The most recent price rise from Scottish Water, a 1.6% increase all council tax bands announced in February, means the average household bill in Scotland will be £363 for 2018/19. According to the Dunfermline-based utility, this is £42 lower than the average £405 charged in England and Wales.
Asked to comment on the price differential, chief executive Douglas Millican said geographical factors mean water bills vary across all parts of the UK, with coastal, hilly and rural areas generally more expensive than densely populated towns and cities.
“Inherently, Scotland is quite a high-cost to save territory,” he said.
However, Mr Millican noted that Scottish Water does benefit from shared billing with local authorities in Scotland.
“We’ve worked pretty hard over time to improve the efficiency of our operations,” he said. “We’ve got a very efficient way in which we charge and bill our customers.
“Because we link it to council tax, effectively that is a shared billing operation with the local authorities, and we don’t have the expense of installing, maintaining and reading meters. A lot of houses in England have meters so that is a big saving.”
Mr Millican also highlighted the benefit of Scottish Water’s status as public body which borrows money from the Scottish Government, meaning it “does not have any dividends going out to shareholders”. As of March 31, Government loans to the utility totalled £3.5 billion, up from £3.4bn.
“It’s really making public ownership work for us,” Mr Millican added.
The utility said it invested £647 million in its water and waste water infrastructure over the period. Up from £626.7m, it was the highest level of investment it has made in seven years.
The expenditure was made as part of plans to deliver more than £3.5bn of capital investment between 2015 and 2021.
The report said the utility is currently working on 2,600 large and small projects across Scotland.
Last year it completed the construction of the 3.1-mile Shieldhall Tunnel in Glasgow, which after it becomes operational later this year is expected to improve water quality in the River Clyde and reduce flooding risk in a number of areas. It marks an investment of £120m.
Other projects included the installation of around 30 miles of new water mains, connecting the system in Ayrshire with the Greater Glasgow network, with work to be completed in 2020. Construction of the new Tullich Water Treatment Work in Oban was delayed due to “various unforeseen difficulties”. It is now expected to be finished in the summer.
Mr Millican said investment levels will rise even further beyond 2021, noting that the main driver is the “huge amount of replacement work to do on our infrastructure”.
Scottish Water said it continued to supply water of a high quality throughout the period, despite challenges brought by the Beast from the East in February and March. The utility, which said it supplies 2.5 million households and 153,000 businesses with 1.38 billion litres of drinking water every day, said 99.9% of all tests taken at customers’ taps comply with strict standards.
Scottish Water’s group surplus before tax had fallen to £71.8m by March 31, down from £94.2m last year.
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