Water as a human right petition launched
Photo: Chris Sant Fournier
The General Workers’ Union and the Anti-Poverty Forum have joined forces to promote a petition launched by the European Public Service Union, which the GWU forms part of, calling on the EU to put water as a human right on its agenda.
The petition is a European Citizen’s initiative and one million signatures from the 27 EU states are required.
It states:
“We invite the European Commission to propose legislation implementing the human right to water and sanitation as recognised by the United Nations, and promoting the provision of water and sanitation as essential public services for all. The EU legislation should require governments to ensure and to provide all citizens with sufficient and clean drinking water and sanitation. We urge that:
“The EU institutions and Member States be obliged to ensure that all inhabitants enjoy the right to water and sanitation.
“Water supply and management of water resources not be subject to ‘internal market rules’ and that water services are excluded from liberalisation.
“The EU increases its efforts to achieve universal access to water and sanitation.”
In Malta it can be signed at the Millennium Chapel or the GWU headquarters up to the end of November. It can also be signed online up to the end of August next year.
The petition was announced during a conference “Water is a human right” organised by the GWU and the Anti-Poverty Forum.
Hydrologist Marco Cremona called for an autonomous regulator, independent from a ministry and answerable to Parliament with strong executive and enforcement powers to ensure sustainability of water resources to ensure there was enough water for a right to water.
Malta, he pointed out, lacked the essential infrastructure to keep rainwater from going to the sea.
At the same time the country was taking water from the sea and using reverse osmosis to change it into usable water.
While before the 1980s all water used in Malta used to come from the aquifer, 35 per cent now came through RO, 25 per from the aquifer, the rest from private boreholes.
Biodiversity expert Alfred Baldacchino said that although water was taken for granted it had an economic, ecologic and social value. Future wars, he said, would not revolve around oil or territory but water resources. Water conflicts already existed in north Africa.
Mr Baldacchino noted that the lack of access to water in Malta had discouraged the knights from wanting to come. But once here they built an infrastructure including wells and canals, which were neglected after they left and went downhill over the past 50 years.
He noted that Malta was not enforcing the well rule.
Claudia Taylor East from SOS Malta said the EU should be on the alert about the precarious situation all over Europe.
Over the past 10 years, she said, SOS Malta focused on the collection of rain water in under developed countries through simple inexpensive systems, but this water was being lost in Europe. If Malta did not have water in the next 15 years, it would end up like these least developed countries.
The participants of the conference walked to St George’s Square in Valletta where they launched and signed the petition.
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12 Comments
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Malcolm Seychell
Sep 14th 2012, 19:22
Just what we need in Malta. More regulators.... We can use reverse osmosis if we would need more water.
Jeremy J Camilleri
Sep 14th 2012, 20:13
Malcolm Seychell, with all die respect, you do not kow what you are talking about. Reverse Osmosis consumes a high amount of energy. Tp be exact, 5 % of Malta's electricity is used up by Osmosis plants.
Relying more heavily on Reverse Osmosis would mean our becoming ever more dependent on a dwindling supply of oil. Bar that, in a country that has an ever increasing difficulty in keeping a steady power supply, were a disaster to put our already beleageured power station out of order, our water supply would not last more than 2 days.
Can you even begin to imagine what that would mean?
Malcolm Seychell
Sep 15th 2012, 13:59
@ Jeremy J Camilleri -
I think the government should make sure to have a state of the art power station and working properly.
Jeremy J Camilleri
Sep 17th 2012, 16:58
Doesn't reduce the cost of fuel malcolm.
Alfred Mangion
Sep 14th 2012, 19:12
May I ask a simple question to which a simple "yes" or a "no" will suffice? Would the GWU have signed this petition with such pomp (or even without any pomp at all) had this petition been presented during the Malta Labour Party years of the early 80s?
Joseph P. Borg
Sep 14th 2012, 19:10
Water as a Human right. Best joke I have heard .
Could anybody who signed the petition let me know when this right originated.
Since the creation of man, water was always made available for free in accordance with the intentions of the Creator. However , we rarely care to store it properly for when needs arise.
What happened to the house wells which was a legal obligation to construct ?. Why did successive governments avoided to provide reservoirs to contain the roof water from govt blocks. ?
It is so easy to claim that one has a right to receive water from taps at convenient places in our households, and this at a subsided price.
salvatore mallia
Sep 14th 2012, 16:54
Help me understand how in Naxxar a visible drainage pipe was allowed to be passed through a rain water
culvert which leads to a main reservoir which is connected to the old village core
Marco Cremona
Sep 14th 2012, 16:05
During the conference I also put the following question to the audience:
In view of the fact that PRIVATE boreholes today extract more water than the public (i.e. WSC's) groundwater production sources, haven't our water reserves already been 'privatised'?
The fact of the matter is that the people who today do not extract groundwater (and therefore purchase mains water) are indirectly paying for the water being pumped from private boreholes at a rate of 40,000 litres per minute 24/7, 365 days a year, FOR FREE.
How's that for social justice?
I also pointed out that to date, there is no specific law in Malta which says that our water resources are PUBLIC - which should be the first step in curbing the abuse. Moreover the country has no legislation regulating water rights. This country allows you to register a borehole but then does not give you a license to use the borehole.
A. Mifsud
Sep 15th 2012, 06:56
@Marco Cremona.
To me your comments are always a source of knowledge on the subject, and I do admire the fact that you're always straight to the point.
If I can add one comment to your statement I feel it to be a great injustice and abusive for bottling companies in particular (and also water bowser distibutors) to exploit unlimited water resources free of charge to generate massive profits for themselves whilst us the public pay through our noses to have the mimimum necessary to live. I understand that most agricultural water extracting for farming crops is mostly returned to the aquafiers. However abuse for commercial uses remains lampant and should be addressed instantly.
Alex Ellul
Sep 14th 2012, 15:48
There is no superman or super infrastructure that can top rainwater from naturally reaching its natural destination, the oceans and seas. The problem is that we human beings are an arrogant lot, thinking that we can control nature. First we build our houses at the bottom of valleys such as Msida, Qormi and B'Kara and then we pretend that some superGonzi or superJoseph spends our hard-earned euros in the order of millions to try to do the impossible and stop the rain from rolling out of the hills and down the valleys into and disturb our lives. Our valleys had been designed by nature eons ago for water to get through when it rains and no human being can stop it. One has to be a megalomaniac to believe that we can stop the flood.
Regarding the right for water and other nice political talk, I have an opinion. After all is said and done after this petition metamorphoses into a political decision, the price of water will shoot up. Same as energy. When this was declared as a climate changer, the price of energy went through the roof and today many people in the EU cannot afford to pay their electricity bill (300,000 in Germany alone had their supply suspended last winter. Next is water. But water is actually a self regenerating commodity. Water evaporates from the oceans transforms into water vapour then into clouds, rain that falls on our land and perculates down tot he acquifer from where we pump it up. That is evrybody's water and the gov has only the duty to control it's use wisely, but still it belongs to us people, for free except for the running costs and the payback of the infrastructural investment. There should not be any profit made.
RO water is a completely different story. The lunatic rise in the cost of energy has caused havoc around the world.
Carmelo Aquilina
Sep 14th 2012, 14:40
" although water was taken for granted it had an economic, ecologic and social value" so it is subject to 'internal market rules' i.e. you pay for what you use otherwise there will be waste an inefficiency will not be penalised
Mark. Galea
Sep 14th 2012, 14:18
Agree with the petition.
Also, suggest that price of water is lowered more for the first limited number of units, and increased for the units thereafter. Min jahli, ihallas.
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