The nightmare begins

Our water crisis first raised its head on Sunday, 7 January 2006, when the OH turned on the kitchen tap and no water came out. At first, we thought there was an electrical problem with the pump as it’s quite old and has had problems before.

However, an inspection of the borehole revealed the awful truth - it was dry. So there we were, on a Sunday, with six pigs and 17 chickens to water, a pile of laundry to wash, two small boys who needed a bath, food to cook, toilet to flush and hands to wash after working with the animals.

Setting aside the issue of what to do about the borehole, the immediate issue was to find some water and quickly so that we could at least have some to drink and for our animals. So the OH nipped off to the village shop to buy up their stocks of bottled water while I contacted Scottish Water and the real nightmare began.

First, you have to understand that Scotland has a privatised water supply and the water is “owned” by Scottish Water. The company has no legal responsibility to provide people off the mains supply with water - even in an emergency - and, like all private companies, exists to make a profit for its shareholders.

No problem, I thought, I just wanted to buy a load of water and I knew from living in England that many of the English water companies do sell water by the bowser load.

So, I got on the phone to Scottish Water’s emergency hotline, explained the situation and asked if I could buy some water.

“That is not a service we provide”, was the response.

I tried again, pointing out that I wanted to buy water from the company. Again, I was told it was not a service provided by Scottish Water. I asked the call centre rep to check with their supervisor and after a few minutes, was not only told that it was not a service they provide but that the company had no responsibility for us.

Where else to get water? I decided to try Aberdeenshire Council, our local authority, and finally got through to an emergency contact in Environmental Services. However, it turned out that she was only there to field calls from council tenants and, while she have me a couple of contact numbers, her advice was to try Scottish Water. Back to the start again.

What to do next? Clearly I couldn’t get too much water from our immediate neighbours as they have boreholes as well, but two have family on mains supplies and so a little neighbourly begging got us two jerrycans of water to see us over until Monday.

After that, it would be time to hit the phones again, but first I emailed Nora Radcliffe, the Gordon MSP (Member of the Scottish Parliament) who helped us when BT took six weeks to re-instate the phone lines after a storm last year. To the amazement of the OH and myself, she responded very quickly to say she would see what she could do.