Hosepipe Ban
Wednesday 8th June 2011
GMB CONGRESS TOLD THAT PARTS
OF MIDLANDS WILL
SEE HOSEPIPE BAN IN WEEKS UNLESS THERE IS
PERSISTENT RAIN DUE TO
MISMANAGEMENT OF WATER RESOURCES IN REGION
The management will blame the weather
and will seek to divert attention from their own mismanagement that
will lead to a hosepipe ban in 2 weeks unless we get heavy
rain.
GMB Congress was told today that households in
parts of the East and West Midlands, supplied by Severn Trent,
would face a hosepipe ban n two weeks unless there is sustained
heavy rain in the meantime. The parts of the region facing the
hosepipe ban in two weeks are Staffordshire, Nottinghamshire,
Derbyshire and Leicestershire.
The Congress was told that the mismanagement
of the water resources in the region by the senior management that
was primarily to blame for the shortage of water. The introduction,
by the Chief Executive Tony Wray of a new computer system called
SAP (System, Application, Products) at a cost of £70millon had led
to complete confusion in the scheduling of repair work and dealing
with leaks has led to massive losses of water from the reservoirs
since last June when it was introduced. On Monday 6th
June senior management had to introduce a work around/ bypass to
SAP system in order to address water leak repair lead times
currently running at approximately 30 days against the target of 3
days.
The mismanagement has led to fines for delays
in repairing dug up roads, under the Traffic Management Act,
increasing by 25 times on the level before the system came in.
Severn Trent has failed to meet the OFWAT target for interruption
of supply. Over 80,000 customers lost supply for up to 6 hours in
2010/11. Often water pressure has been reduced to the bare minimum
rather than the company finding and fixing the significant
leaks.
The Congress was told that it would take 4
weeks of persistent rain to get the reservoirs back to where they
were this time last year. Severn Trent supplies 3.7m households and
businesses in West and East Midlands and Mid Wales.
Gary Smith GMB national secretary said
“Introducing the SAP
system has led to water draining out of the reservoirs as
the delay in fixing the leaks stretched out to 30 days compared
with the target of 3 days. The management will blame the weather
and will seek to divert attention from their own mismanagement that
will lead to a hosepipe ban in 2 weeks unless we get heavy
rain.
The morale of the 6,000 workers
at Severn Trent
is an all-time low due this mismanagement. A recent survey
showed that only 38% of the employees think the senior managers are
providing effective leadership.
The workers have co-operated with
significant management led changes despite being getting rises
below inflation for the past three years. Now the management want
to close the final salary pension scheme on the grounds that they
cannot afford it. What a blow to a loyal workforce in this monopoly
service transferred to the private sector where the executives and
shareholders have gouged themselves at the expense of their
customers and workers.
Mismanagement and greed are a poor
combination when running vital services for the public. They take
us for “Saps”.
Ends
Contact: Gary Smith, GMB
National Secretary on 07710 618909 or Russell Farrington, GMB
Organiser on 07957 266519 or GMB Press Office: Steve Pryle on 07921
289880 or Rose Conroy on 07974 251823.