PE1793, on alleviation of water poverty, was lodged by Gordon Walker. The petition calls on the Scottish Government to remove water and sewerage charges from all households in Scotland that are on a low income or on benefits. Since our last consideration of the petition in September 2020, the committee has received written submissions from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, Citizens Advice Scotland and the petitioner, which are summarised in our meeting papers.
It is an interesting petition and we got interesting responses, particularly from Citizens Advice Scotland. There is a lack of awareness of the disconnect between the council tax and water and sewerage charges, about which people can be unaware when planning their budgets. With bills due to increase over the next period, that is clearly of concern. I am interested in members views.
This issue came up in the years when I was a councillor on Argyll and Bute council. Citizens Advice Scotland raised very interesting points in relation to communications and the separation of water and sewerage charges, amending the legislation, and the basic financial support for low-income households. At this stage, we need to gather some more information.
COSLA has had consultations, and we know that councils respond sympathetically. I know from experience that they go quite far to help constituents in certain circumstances. Nevertheless, we should write to the Scottish Government to seek its views on the points that Citizens Advice Scotland raised in its submission. We should take it from there before we come to a final conclusion.
I would agree with Maurice Corry. The evidence that we have received in advance of this meeting has given us a lot more clarity about what is payable and what is discountable. It was good to see in the evidence that, during the past month, councils have been exercising case-by-case discretion over the deferring of council tax and water charges. Maurice Corry is absolutely right: we need to write to the Scottish Government, and I think that the Citizens Advice Scotland proposals need a further airing. I would agree with that course of action.
I agree with my colleagues. We need information from the Scottish Government on the matter. There is always confusion about water services and general public misunderstanding about what is a benefit and what is not. It is very confusing, so we need to write to the Scottish Government to seek more information.
Again, there is clearly a consensus. We recognise that there is an issue and we would want to see the Scottish Government’s response to the series of points that Citizens Advice Scotland made. There is certainly an interesting question around local authorities, whose funding is going to be under phenomenal pressure, with regard to the programme of increased water charges. How will that be managed and how do we make sure that people who are in need are supported in the way that has been identified?
The committee agrees that we are going to write to the Scottish Government and ask for its response to the Citizens Advice Scotland submission. I think that there was a suggestion that we might want to write to COSLA, but I will check that. We might want to flag up the petition to COSLA again. Certainly, in the first instance, we will write to Scottish Government.
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