To consider any questions or statements received from members of the public:

Mr D Russell has requested to speak and pay tribute to two former NNDC councillors who have recently passed away:  Mr Phillip Kemp and Mr Des Hewitt.

The Chairman said that there were two statements from members of the public. She invited Mr D Russell to address members. Mr Russell said that he was a former elected member and former Chairman of the Council and he thanked members for allowing him to speak. He then spoke about two former councillors, Phillip Kemp and Des Hewitt, who had both recently passed away. He asked Members to join him in a minutes silence in their memory.

The Chairman thanked Mr Russell for attending the meeting. She then read out the following statement from Elaine Addison, which was in support of Agenda Item 16, Motion 2:

‘I have been appalled by the reckless and near total disregard for water safety by the privatised water companies in England, and successive government failure to enforce investment in water infrastructure.  Coupled with the disastrous cut to the funding of the Environment Agency by two-thirds since 2010, it seems the electorate are being taken for mugs, whilst water company shareholders are creaming off profits. To note that more than 70% of England’s water industry is owned by foreign ‘investors’ Anglian Water is owned by a consortium of international investment funds. These include Colonial First State Global Asset Management (Australia) IFM Investors (Australia) and 3i (UK). Over 30% of the company is owned by the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board, a pension fund owned by the Canadian state.

Of course, we need to protect rivers, the Norfolk Broads and coastal waters for recreational swimming, water sports and to protect the wildlife reliant on the clean environment.  However, I was also interested to read a report in yesterday’s Observer newspaper, and wondered how Anglian Water’s approach is affecting our seafood industry in North Norfolk? It seems that e-coli in our drinking water has increased recently across the South East, which is suspected to be caused by a failure in the water cleaning process. This put simply is untreated sewage flowing into our rivers. We have also seen cases of norovirus increasing during the summer months, quite out of season. Whilst it is difficult to pinpoint the source of norovirus, it should be noted than norovirus can ‘live’ in water for months. This is an extremely unpleasant virus, but it could also be catastrophic for our seafood industry. The Observer includes a report from an oyster company in the South East, stating that norovirus incidents had recently occurred after eating oysters. This resulted in Public Health England closing the company down, until they had put in place testing for norovirus and e-coli.

I certainly support NNDC’s engagement with Anglian Water, but would also support NNDC in urging our government to tighten up restrictions and bring forward tougher legislation.  I’m afraid the fines are cheaper than investment in infrastructure. Government agencies such as the EA, and DEFRA are no match for these companies in their present form, and privatised water companies have no incentive to go further than the absolute minimum required by law.  Investment in infrastructure must be part of their service level agreement.

Having written to Duncan Baker MP several times on this matter, it seems that government are going to await water companies reports on future plans before they make any further decisions, kicking the can down the road, on such an important matter.

Thank you for your time and consideration.’

Cllr Seward thanked Ms Addison for her comments and said that he hoped that the issues she had raised would be addressed when the motion was debated later in the meeting.