Deborah Harding 💙

Find me linkedin.com/in/deborah-har… & @debsharding.bsky.social

This is just another example of how the water outages in Tunbridge Wells are affecting lives. Portaloos are being ordered by a school to ensure children can sit their exams.

@ThreshedThought @ThreshedThought you have been a beacon of proactive, thoughtful and compassionate leadership in this shocking situation. Thank you.

Update 2100 Wed 14 Jan Practical Stuff Today, I welcomed the Secretary of State for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs to Tunbridge Wells so that she could see for herself what our town has been going through during the crisis. She spoke to affected residents while helping to distribute water and was deeply touched and concerned. I briefed her on the situation, and we’ve been pushing South East Water hard to implement a recovery plan for our town immediately and bring an end to the constant on-and-off water supply, which has meant that no one has been able to plan their lives. South East Water will now be implementing a plan that will allow them to refill the storage tank to a much higher level. This means there will be no water supply for the 6,500 affected households until Friday morning (the next 36 hours). This is so South East Water can work to increase the levels to a point where customers can have a consistent water supply. The rest of Tunbridge Wells will remain on-supply (barring any other issues). I have been very clear that South East Water must therefore deliver bottled water to every affected household. They were able to deliver to 7,000 households on the priority register before Christmas, so they definitely have the resources to do this. South East Water has said that it will deliver bottled drinking water and greywater toilet flushing bags to each property from Wednesday evening, overnight, and into Thursday. Please do not drink the water from the bags. They will be delivered and can be refilled with non-drinking water from external sources like ponds or water butts. Pour the water into the toilet bowl or cistern to flush! Customers do not need to be in to receive their delivery; SE Water teams will leave it on the front doorstep. If they can’t access the front door, including at blocks of flats or gated communities, they will leave it in the safest accessible place. If you need support carrying bottled water into your home, please call SE Water’s Customer Care team on 0800 952 4000, or email my office at mike.martin.mp@parliament.uk. Bottled water stations will remain open at the following places between 09:00 am and 10:00 pm: Tunbridge Wells Rugby Football Club, Frant Road, TN2 5LS. Odeon Cinema car park, Knights Way, TN2 3UW. All affected customers will receive compensation for this, but that will only be sorted out once this whole crisis is over. Unfortunately, in formulating this plan, South East Water forgot about the schools, and so there will be four schools closed tomorrow and more on Friday. “Absolutely seething” doesn’t begin to describe how I feel about their ineptness and carelessness towards our children – especially when they were told earlier this week by the Minister for Water to review their plans with us first (they didn’t do this and decided on their own). As ever, your child’s school will be in touch if they are closing. Political stuff Today, Lib Dem leader Ed Davey called for South East Water’s licence to be revoked at PMQs. I repeated these calls to the Environment Secretary when she visited us and was pleased to see that she will ask Ofwat to review whether South East Water has breached its licence (it clearly has). This is extremely rare. This move will also encourage shareholders and owners, like Natwest, to act. SE Water’s owners must demonstrate that they are accountable and willing to intervene to stop the water company from failing. This must begin with a change of leadership. I will continue banging on the door of the shareholders to get them to take responsibility. As always, I’ll be working with the Government and local authorities to make sure the end of this week runs the best it can. Best wishes, Mike

I was going to be tweeting about the jaw-dropping hearing of the EFRA Select Committee, where Dave Hinton got totally exposed, but … We have another major outage in South Tunbridge Wells (around Forest Rd). I am on the phones and will update shortly.

"Two hospitals, a kidney treatment centre, 15 schools, 19 care homes and 29 nurseries in Tunbridge Wells and the surrounding areas were left without water for two weeks before Christmas." Just think about that for a second, just think about that. ft.com/content/5d358a…

@Feargal_Sharkey Yes. It’s a growing public health crisis. Will it take a coroner attributing a cause of death to water supply failure to see meaningful action? Akin to identifying pollution levels as cause of death, e.g. @EllaRobertaFdn

⁦⁦@BBCr4today⁩ well done ⁦getting a response from ⁦@sewateruk⁩ but online for its #tunbridgewells customers the news is less positive than the statement from @sewateruk just read out by ⁦⁦@amolrajan⁩

@Feargal_Sharkey @sewateruk inexcusable failure exposing true awfulness of unpicking privatisation when investors include things like pension funds. Vested interests which doubtless make governments hesitant about robust interventions creating politically toxic collateral fallout?@ThreshedThought

Everything you need to know about South East Water and the water industry in a single sentence. Between 2020 - 2022 South East Water spent more on paying dividends and debt interest that they invested in infrastructure like pipes and water treatment works.

@nick_pope I’m not even sure a coroner citing lack of water as a contributing factor would bring home what a public health failure this is. Shameful.

Is it time to put South East Water into Special Administration and remove its licence? #tunbridgewells #southeastwater #SEW pwc.co.uk/services/busin….

@andybourke83 @ThreshedThought In answer to how .. drive past Pembury Treatment works and you will see something that appears to have been subject to serial neglect.

@ThreshedThought @ThreshedThought what is the latest from SEW? The issues are getting beyond a joke now and are impacting many more areas of Kent and Sussex. How can almost all other towns in the UK still hsve water when they have experienced much worse weather?!

@kentishsal If the @sewateruk CEO’s evidence to the uk parliamentary is correct, this must be where there are the highest numbers of people working from home 🤔

It's getting worse, spreading further across Tunbridge Wells and into areas that have never been affected before (supposedly because they get their water from a different storage facility).

@ThreshedThought Thank you @ThreshedThought for your continued updates ahead of @sewateruk who’s #CEO has an opportunity to do better than 6 or 8 out of 10 and speak directly to his customers this time.

Water likely to be intermittent today and so bottled water stations will remain open.

@ThreshedThought Once again it seems the only trustworthy updates are from @ThreshedThought with searches on @sewateruk proving inaccurate and unreliable.

Water should now be starting to return to High Brooms / St John’s areas

@ThreshedThought Supply lost at Kingswood GP surgery when I was there 90mins ago and my 88y old Dad in TN2 has just lost his supply again.

The basic cause of the issue at the moment is that the unforeseeable winter is causing burst pipes and this is draining the reservoir faster than it can be filled. The treatment works are working fine I am told and there are lots of tankers going into the reservoir in support. Obviously I am in the process of verifying SEW’s info with other authorities.

@kentishsal We’ve probably all been rinsing with not dissimilar quality water for months 🤔

Unthinkingly rinsed toothpaste out with water straight from the tap. Was nice knowing you all.

@ThreshedThought Is anyone else wondering if this water we have to boil is identical to the water we’ve been drinking for months but without being told about the poor quality and the risks 🤔 Is there an independent expert who could test the water and tell customers exactly why it needs boiling?

Another car crash interview with SE Water. Excellent journalism. As ever - follow my messaging or SE Water Boil notice FAQs for information.

@BBCRadioKent No risk to health? People with health conditions who ordinarily could self manage but need free access to water to prevent them turning up in A&E? Days without flushing a loo in households which would never other have worried about being well? This is a red flag @DHSCgovuk

'We've had the outages to protect [public] health.' South East Water's Supply Director has spoken to our Environment Correspondent, Fiona Irving, over failures at the Pembury water treatment works. More here: bbc.in/3Y8azEy

Water plant that caused Tunbridge Wells supply failure was given risk notice in 2024 Watchdog investigating South East Water contamination issue had previously warned of potential health danger via @guardian theguardian.com/environment/20…

Thanks Mike Martin MP @ThreshedThought - clearly outlined extent of ongoing impact of @sewateruk supply failures with @amolrajan @BBCr4today who are also unable to get CEO David Hinton comment. ++Economic & public health concerns see NHS guidance includes not bathing children

@ThreshedThought What an incredibly authentic human and leadership role model you are being for your constituents and the wider community. This happened here but is a red flag for every constituency. Hope you are also getting some down time to recoup and to be there for your own precious humans.

Update 2130 Thu 4th Dec Good evening. I wanted to update you with the latest on the water crisis in Tunbridge Wells. By now, almost everyone should have their water back on (I got mine back a hour ago - yay!). If you have been affected by the water crisis - through low pressure or no water at any point - then you need to boil your water.  SE Water have issued a boil notes and very good FAQs which I encourage you to read in full, carefully. Here it is: southeastwater.co.uk/help/works-and… As yet there is no timeline for when drinking water will be back on (i.e. the boil notice is lifted) - you should continue to boil until further notice if you are affected.  I want to make two points very clearly before I move on to practical details, and an update on what I have been doing.  Disinformation: Social media is awash with disinformation and rumours. As someone who is intimately involved in coordinating the crisis response, I can assure you that the rumours and scaremongering on social media are completely untrue. The single source of truth is the SE Water boil web page link above - and as questions come in about particular situations, the FAQs on that page are updated (which is why you sometimes see new information on the page). Please, please don't share disinformation - you are just harming other people who might become scared or anxious.  Abuse of South East Water Staff: It has come to my attention that some SEW technical staff out on the streets working on burst mains or airlocks in the system are getting abuse from members of the public. Obviously this is completely unacceptable - they are working as hard as anyone to get the water back on, and those members of staff that are being abused are not responsible for the situations that we find ourselves in. If this continues, SEW will have to withdraw their staff for their own safety - and they will have my support in doing so - and this will massively slow down the crisis response. I know we are all frustrated and angry, but don't abuse people who are helping us. Practical Information - Water Stations Bottled water stations are open until 10pm tonight at:  Tunbridge Wells Sports Centre, St John's Rd, Royal Tunbridge Wells, TN4 9TX  Odeon car park, Knights Way, TN2 3UW  B&M Store with Garden Centre, Linden Park Road, Kent TN2 5QL  Water used for young babies must be boiled, regardless of whether it comes from the tap or a bottle. Some bottled water types may not be suitable for infant formula due to high salt levels (preferable sodium chloride concentrations are less than 20mg/l, and not more than 200 mg/l). Contact your midwife for further advice. Vulnerable Customers SEW customer care team and Water Direct are continuing to deliver bottled water to care homes, and to customers registered on our Priority Services Register. Customers can sign up for SEW’s PSR by visiting southeastwater.co.uk/psr or calling 0333 000 0365. Two things I have been doing today (amongst many!) Today, my team has been working with SEW, the schools, and TWBC to enable as many schools as possible to open tomorrow (i.e. arranging water deliveries etc.). Parents should look for communications from their respective schools. Since the beginning of the crisis, I have been in contact with businesses who have lost tens of thousands of pounds worth of business. Having previously mentioned it to her, I have followed up with the Minster for Water on a covid-style £18.5m continuity and recovery package for businesses that have had to close - many of which may not survive without support. I will be chasing this up with her in the following days.  I would like specifically to single out for praise Cllr Martin Brice. He spent today, his 72nd birthday, cycling round the water distribution sites to check on water stocks and queues. An extraordinary level of service to his community.  I will continue to update you all as and when I can.  Mike

I am aware of the water outage in Tunbridge Wells - indeed I am without water myself. I am onto the CEO of South East Water and will post updates here as I get them. Mike

@ThreshedThought Surely a festive beard 🤔

I’ve finally got my water back on. Hurrah! Shall I have a shave or carry on with the stubble?

Welcome sight. Slow flow returned about 21:30 in TN1 Thanks to @ThreshedThought for your commitment and keeping the pressure on to resolve it