Some life selections are made whereas not fully sober: Las Vegas weddings, shopping for a ship, becoming a member of a fitness center. And someplace on that listing of economic self-harm sits the second you declare: “You already know what I would like? A home with a swimming pool.”
For some, it’s a shimmering rectangle of liquid remorse. It begins with noble intentions: afternoons of leisure, a plastic of fizz in hand (get used to uttering the chorus “no glass close to the pool!”), solar gently warming your shoulders, youngsters laughing, canines frolicking, neighbours consumed with envy. In concept.
In observe? When you don’t carry on prime of it, nor have an costly cowl, it might probably change into a festering pit of gull and duck droppings, drowned beetles, a rat or two doing the backstroke, and sufficient algae to benefit a cameo in The Blue Planet.
I’ve written earlier than about how a lot I love my pool. However that was earlier than the water corporations got here knocking for further money. These bastions of public belief. Those cheerily dumping uncooked sewage into our rivers whereas paying investor dividends and themselves bonuses as rewards for failure.
Water UK, which represents the 16 water and waste water corporations in England and Wales, is now proposing that in the event you personal a pool or, heaven forbid, a big backyard, you should pay more for your water. And it’s not nearly putting in water meters, which I have already got. It’s about rising what they cost folks in my place for the water we use.
The justification for bumping up costs is much less clear. I had initially suspected it was as a result of they have been holding my pool personally answerable for each drought for the reason that industrial revolution. Nonetheless, in accordance with the Met Workplace, rainfall between October 2022 and March 2024 was the best quantity recorded for any 18-month interval since information began being collected in 1836.
Our water infrastructure is in dire want of upgrading, that’s for certain — and England’s privatised water corporations have patently failed to take a position adequately: the final reservoir constructed on this nation was the Carsington Reservoir in Derbyshire, accomplished in 1992, since when the UK’s inhabitants has grown by about 10mn.
And within the 34 years since privatisation, England’s water corporations have
paid out £83bn in dividends, and incurred £74bn in debt; all whereas paying
themselves vital salaries and bonuses. Within the 2023-24 tax 12 months, water firm executives in England and Wales acquired a complete of £9.1mn in bonuses, a slight enhance on the £9.01mn doled out the 12 months earlier than.
At Anglian Water, my native supplier, prices for patrons are anticipated to rise by 15.5 per cent in actual phrases by 2030. Its new chief government, Mark Thurston, has a base wage of £504,000, plus advantages and bonus — the earlier incumbent’s whole pay package deal diverse between £1.3mn and £2.3mn a 12 months throughout his decade-long tenure.
Nonetheless, irrespective of: in the event you’ve dared to put in something thirstier than a birdbath, put together for monetary punishment.
It wouldn’t be so dangerous if proudly owning a swimming pool didn’t already really feel like a second job.
It’s not only a gap full of water like an infinite bathtub. You want pumps, filters, skimmers, heaters, timers, floaty issues, inflatable unicorns, chemical substances with names that sound like rejected Bond villains (trichlor, or stabiliser).
Then there’s the upkeep. When you don’t preserve it spotless, it goes cloudy. Add an excessive amount of chlorine, your eyes soften and swimming shorts go yellow. Not sufficient and immediately it’s micro organism bingo. The canine falls in, your pals’ youngsters drop a Cornetto within the deep finish, and inside minutes you’ve unintentionally created a brand new ecosystem.
Is it even price having a pool in Britain? Some use it as soon as in June, when temperatures contact 23°C. And once more in August, when, 5 drinks deep at a barbecue, somebody dares you to leap in absolutely clothed. Which, in the event you’re over 50, actually shouldn’t occur.
The remainder of the time? It’s a high-maintenance water function, a house for suicidal squirrels and a really costly method to retailer rainwater.
The tools will without end demand consideration and cash. The alligator electrodes will corrode and the pool vacuum will disintegrate. The filter sand will want changing. The pipework leaks. The pool home rots. You’ll have to improve the electrics as a result of moist sockets and excessive voltage will not be, because it seems, nice mates. After which it’s important to pay to warmth the factor to a usable temperature (28°C, thanks). However no less than the power prices are utilized pretty: the extra you utilize, the extra you pay. Now the water corporations need to swoop in and cost those that use further extra for each drop.
It’s a canny piece of misdirection on their behalf, I suppose. After years of mismanagement they want more cash, so why not extract it from someplace the place it can elicit the least public sympathy? After all, in the event you can afford a pool, you may afford to be punished. Maybe this logic will probably be utilized elsewhere? Pay greater gasoline costs since you personal a Curler? Pay extra to your underwear since you put on a Rolex? It’s simply the most recent space in life the place we appear to be drifting from regulation into retribution.
That, or somebody at Water UK has a grudge as a result of they by no means bought invited to one among my pool events. They’re fairly good, to be truthful.
James Max is a broadcaster on TV and radio and a property skilled. The views expressed are private. X, Instagram and Threads @thejamesmax
