Nothing is free

There seems little wonder that we are greatly disturbed at the mushrooming sewage problem in our country; but where has the planning over the years been? Instead we have seen salaries and bonuses rocket. It is not sufficient to point to increasing rainfall without questioning the link between vast housing increases and the accompanying demand on sewage treatment.

There are questions to be asked: Is a planning application only approved where satisfactory sewage arrangements are clearly stated? Who pays for upgrading sewage to meet increasing demand – surely the purchase price of new housing should include an element for providing satisfactory “new” sewage arrangements, unless absorbed by the builders. I would suggest that the importance of water companies to our living standards demands that their costs should not include excessive profits and inflated salaries and bonuses.

As a society we must throw out the concept of things “free”; they are subsidised by someone – usually the taxpayer or ratepayer. Having brought up my own family at my expense until school age, I am now being asked to subsidise others to do the same, through “free” nursery places – so that they can earn an additional family income denied my generation.

Perhaps it is also time to review our ever-increasing living standards, often paid for by dubious mortgage standards, with two salaries being allowed instead of the one from my day. During Covid we lauded the move away from foreign holidays, thus reducing the impact on climate change; but no more – as we demand holidays in the sun which also have an impact on our smaller holiday “resorts”.

James Watson Dunbar, East Lothian