South East Water have said they will be imposing a temporary hosepipe and sprinklers ban across Kent and Sussex, which will be enforced on 18th July. This notice period will give plenty of customers time to water their gardens or fill up paddling pools, which does seem to be a bit stupid!
South East Water announced the ban on Friday 11th July which will affect more than 1.4 million residents. The company said demand for drinking water has “reached record levels” since May due to the extended spell of warm and dry weather.
The ban, prohibits the use of a hosepipe for activities such as watering the garden, washing the car or filling a paddling pool. Anyone flouting the restriction could be fined up to £1,000, which is not that high considering the number of people who will ignore it.
South East Water has not indicated when the ban will be lifted, but it will “continue to monitor the weather forecast and will review the decision on a regular basis”.
Chief executive David Hinton said “Despite asking for customers’ help to use water for essential uses only, we’ve been left with no choice but to introduce this temporary restriction.”
Operations director for South East Water, Douglas Whitfield, urged residents to be mindful of water usage, particularly this warm weekend.
He said “We are seeing wetter winters followed by longer, drier periods of heatwaves in the summer. In the long term we are putting more infrastructure to deal with those changes. Water supply resources have been significantly stretched, but we are pleased so far we have been able to largely meet customer demands.”
