Water bill hike long overdue

CITY residents who exceed the 15 kilolitres per day limit will now literally pay the price when they receive their monthly municipal accounts.

This should come as no surprise to anyone, given the vast number of articles and warnings about the dire state of dams, rivers and reservoirs in the region.

We are now at Level 4 restrictions – almost at the top of the scale – and predictions indicate late moderate summer rains ahead.

However, nothing short of another Cyclone Demoina will fill our dams and lakes to the point where restrictions can be lifted.

The latest actions may in any event be classed as ‘too little, too late’.

The fact of the matter (against a background of South Africa being an arid country at the best of times) is that this drought was predicted years ago… and little was done until the water shortage began reaching serious proportions.

Perhaps the authorities hoped and prayed for the best: that the heavens would open and the lands be flooded?

While a spirit of optimism may be useful at times, it was certainly not so in this case.

Instead of early precautionary measures being taken, people sat on the problem; now they are scrambling for quick fixes to something that just won’t go away.

Even the warnings issued were not followed by action, giving residents a false security and distrust of authorities’ apparent ‘exaggerations’.

For example, it was published on two occasions that water to all suburbs would be cut off during the night hours.
This has not happened, and could be interpreted as a scare tactic.

In the light of these mixed messages, it is not unreasonable for people to believe the warnings were of the ‘cry wolf’ nature, and that the problem is not really as great as is being portrayed.

This false sense of security is exacerbated by the fact that good rains are being received from time to time (but not in the catchment areas).

So now we play catch-up: people only react when it hits their pockets.

Yes, those who use beyond the allotted 15Kl will pay heavily.

But while it might motivate some to reduce their consumption, and it will increase revenue (an important necessity), it won’t add any more water into the system.

On a final note: the 15Kl per household is an arbitrary and unfair figure.

It places a family of two in a small flat on the same restriction level as a family of eight in a large house.

A fairer method would have been to look at the historic record of each consumer, and reduce their accounts by the same percentage.

A simple computer programme would provide the necessary figures.