The standards generally include wide safety margins. A new European Community Directive has been agreed. It contains a few more stringent and some new standards. New regulations will be made by the end of the year 2000 to implement the Directive and most new standards will have to be met by the end of the year 2003. The Inspectorate has agreed the improvements to be made by each water company to meet these standards.
Drinking water is of a very high quality.
This is better than in 1997 and a considerable improvement on 1992. The charts overleaf show the percentages of tests which passed the standards and also the figures for tests which failed to meet the standards. Other failures will be put right by improvements already being carried out by water companies - these involve treatment works and distribution systems and altogether cost many hundreds of millions of pounds. Any remaining failures will be addressed by us requiring water companies to carry out further improvements quickly. The Inspectorate has a duty to require water companies to take any necessary action.