No reservoirs built since Privatisation

What we really need is industry oversight, with authority, and operated under the public sector ie elected government sets the agenda and ensures compliance.

Supply and demand .Cut the supply increase the demand .Bingo

Governments have let 10 million in without increasing the supply of owt, except benefits.

Water bills have gone up on average nationwide by 57% in the last 5 years, doesn't look like a lot to show for those rises.

Just like council tax, and domestic fuel, not everyone has to pay it. Those that do however, subsidise those that don't.

But wasn't it always thus though?^ It doesn't explain the rise on people and what has been done with it the 'extra' as they are in the same boat as 5 years ago and it is the same product.

Everywhere you look, there are huge incentives to do the wrong thing. Go to uni for example, and rack up £60K 'debt' for a three year party. However get yourself on PIP and UC, you'll never have to pay a penny of that 'debt'. And both PIP and UC are tax free!

Cider you come across as an advocate of restricting education to ordinary people, a bit like the taliban, they are more right wing than any of your reformers.
I bet you love the eton
And harrow boys. Like princes of royal family, I hope you are a billionaire because if not you are a serious fool.

I paid a £contribution to his degree, he didn't pay for it, he got it for free, now he's moaning about people who pay for their own.

Typical woke right.

Sep 1, 2026 -- 10:56PM, MALAY wrote:

Cider you come across as an advocate of restricting education to ordinary people, a bit like the taliban, they are more right wing than any of your reformers.I bet you love the etonAnd harrow boys. Like princes of royal family, I hope you are a billionaire because if not you are a serious fool.

Nope.

Only the academically gifted should go to uni, where the education they'd get is invaluable, and put to good use within a proper profession. As I've said many times in the past, I have managed hundreds of so called graduates over my career, I can absolutely guarantee that the vast majority of them learned much more from me and my staff much than they ever did whilst partying and allegedly attending uni.

The entire industry has morphed into a huge racket where most people go to uni to avoid working for as long as possible. Once the uni gravy train has ran out of track, the next step is UC and PIP. Meantime the university sector are pulling £billions straight from the taxpayer.

The academically gifted, ie those professions that require university level education shouldn't pay any fees as long as they graduate. 

Most people will not benefit from university education.

Fully agree Cider, these Mickey Mouse degrees are not worth the paper they are written on and the student is in dept. We have a Grandson with a degree doing a job he could have done at 17 when he left school.

I tend to agree too, seems to me very average people almost trying to buy one. It is past its sell by date as was worth something 30 or so years ago as a different calibre of person.

Imagine doing a full time job aged 18-21 and living with your folks. Even paying your folks reasonable keep, and enjoying a decent social life, you could still be in a position to save up £40K or so to be able to leave your parents by the time peers are leaving uni with a meaningless qualification. And as long as you have a proper work ethic, and don't operate like the world owes you a leaving, you'll likely have gained valuable experience working with actual field experts and likely have made some internal progression.

I'll never be a parent, so probably easy for me to say! But it seems to me now that parents have their priorities wrong and they all want little Jack or Lilly to go to uni, even if they aren't academic and will be in a worse position for life after the three years. A sort of entitlement. I'm sure it's appealing to an 18 year old to avoid having to work for another three years and be handed lots of cash to party with. Most definitely the system needs to change to make it less than appealing, and student debt should be made recoverable from all income, including benefits.

Everybody should have the chance to go to university.

One of my mates failed his A levels, probably because we messed around at school.

He couldn't get in, and parents wouldn't support him to do a resit.

We found him a job to apply for, with day release to uni.

He worked hard, got his degree, met his wife
on the course.

He went on to get doctorate, and lectures all around the world, he's thinking about
retiring.

Far fewer opportunities to do this these days, but university really is a great chance for improvement and opens doors to better jobs, and better life chances.

Pretty sure you can get benefits at 18 without going to uni, and a degree doesnt
increase benefit tariff, but does open up salary.

Unlucky for graduates getting right wing nutters showing them the ropes, but they'll soon fly off to better jobs.

I guess you are talking years ago and he got a degree worth something and built on it. As i said most degrees now are not worth the paper they are written on.

----you-have-to-laugh--- • September 2, 2026 3:17 PM BST
Everybody should have the chance to go to university.

Semantics maybe but I would say opportunity rather than chance and
university should not be seen as some sort of benchmark.

Other options like vocational training, apprenticeships or just entering the work
place as a young person must be seen as equally valid and not a barrier
to progression.

I went to uni but learned way more in my first year of working than i did in
4 years of "studying."

I certainly agree that it's not for everybody. Apprenticeships should be
available, or should that be more widely available, and young people helped to
make good choices.

Depending on your career path, the learning
may begin again after uni, but the skills you gained or helped develop at uni, should help that relearning.

Even those graduating with say medicine or law degrees are not the finished article and
will have much to learn if they stay in medicine or law as a career.

Equally, somebody doing say a plumbing apprenticeship will continue to learn about
plumbing after finishing an apprenticeship

There will hopefully also remain chances for
folk to change career if they desire, and for mature students to go back into education should they desire.

Tough to retrain as a plumber at 35 with a family to support... But the opportunity should exist..