MP Calls For £18million Fund

The MP for Tunbridge Wells, Mike Martin, has written to the Water Minister calling for Covid-style emergency cash for local businesses who've suffered through the town's water crisis.

Mike Martin MP wants a fund of £18.5 million pounds.

He says: "Our business and shops have suffered horrendously through this crisis - many may go out of business as a result."

He says he awaits a response to this "urgent" request.

Meanwhile, South East Water is still completing the job of restoring a non-purified supply to homes fed by the Pembury reservoir.  It's instruction to boil water remains.

Here is an audio round up of the Local News of the past week including the main water crisis developments broadcast on West Kent Radio this morning.  Listen here:

The latest update from South East Water is here:
https://aqualerter.southeastwater.co.uk/interruption/138030

Read and hear more from our write up on Thursday.
https://www.westkentradio.co.uk/news/west-kent-news/thursday-water-crisis-latest/

This is Mike Martin MP's Thursday night letter to the water minister:

Thank you for all of your support and leadership during the water supply crisis, as yet still ongoing, in Tunbridge Wells. I am also grateful to the Prime Minister for his attention to this matter and particularly his characterisation of the crisis here as "shocking" and as having "really serious
consequences" - thus demonstrating a true understanding of the scale of the crisis.

Yesterday, on the Strategic Response Group call, I raised with you the issue of business continuity and support in Tunbridge Wells. This outage is occurring over what should be the busiest period of the year. I asked this because of the very real chance that this crisis will see businesses go under, as many did the last time this happened in 2022.

I, and I am sure you and the Prime Minster, will want to do everything possible t o make sure that this doesn't happen again, causing further anguish in our community a n d a loss of revenue to the Exchequer. The people of Tunbridge Wells have suffered enough already without them also losing
their livelihoods.

In summary, I am asking you, on behalf of businesses in Tunbridge Wells, to support our request for up to £18.5m to be immediately released to, and administered by, Tunbridge Wells Borough Council (TWBC) in order to support business continuity and recovery. I would be grateful if you
could take this to your Secretary of State and to the Chancellor.

Background
This is the third time in three years that businesses have been impacted by extreme water outages caused by South East Water (SEW). Two of those incidents have been in the run-up to Christmas and both those events have had a duration of (a minimum of) six days. As you know the current crisis is still ongoing.

Christmas a crucial time for local businesses. Businesses (and TWBC) invest heavily in this period and for many, it represents a significant proportion of their turnover. For some, it makes the difference between survival and going under in the fallow months after the new year.

Businesses have been impacted in a number of ways - many have been forced to close for public health reasons, others have suffered from massively reduced footfall or other issues (such as school closures, meaning staff have been unable to work).

Whilst some businesses will have business interruption (BI) cover, this is often subject to significant excesses and any claims will result in increased premiums in future years. In any case, a number of businesses have indicated to me that they are suffering from cash flow issues now, and so will be shuttered before any BI payments arrive.

There is also a potential issue in that some businesses may not have pre-notified insurance companies (a requirement of cover in many cases) given the repeated false assurances by SEW that the disruption would be of short duration and the constantly shifting sands. I am particularly grateful to the Prime Minister for calling this out at PMQs this week.

It is usually the case that businesses face an uphill battle to demonstrate the exceptional impact of outages at Christmas. In this case, the impact has been exacerbated by significant failings in communications and updates from SEW and a constant tendency to over promise and underdeliver.
There is ample evidence that footfall has been significantly lower compared with previous years. I am happy to provide this evidence should you require it.

Outline Financial Request - IMMEDIATE
The Treasury to provide a n immediate S31 Grant of £4.4m/£18.1m (see below) to put in place a replica of the scheme we set up under Covid. NB: TWBC needs this money immediately as it does not have surplus cash.

TWBC have already identified the number of businesses within the affected area and the scheme would enable them to pay £10k to each of the 438 retail, hospitality and leisure premises within the affected area that have a Rateable Value (RV) of under £15k (this is the category that is classed as
Small Business and receive Small Business Rates Relief).

Extending the scheme to the 548 business with an RV over £15k and giving a grant of £25,000 to each, in line with the Covid scheme, would cost an additional £13.7m (£18.1m in total).

An additional £350,000 (to be given to the Tunbridge Wells Business Improvement District via TWBC) to be used for town-wide promotional efforts to counter the imposed fear of coming into town created by the SEW water crisis. This would help bring people back to spending with local businesses for Christmas and in the subsequent Spring months (bringing it to approx. £18.5m).

Ideally, the Treasury would then pursue a claim/fine against SEW to recover what we actually paid out.

Examples:
In respect to the figures above, we offer these real examples from Tunbridge Wells:
• Basil café: losses in week to 7/12/25 c.£20,000. Should closure extend during entire 10-day boil notice, losses will be c. £50,000.
• Businesses are not eligible for bottled water supplies and have incurred significant costs sourcing it themselves. One example is a charitable steam railway company that has had to purchase 28,000 bottles of water to fill their steam engines to keep their schedule of
Christmas attractions (and thus not lose all their income).
• Hospice in the Weald charity shops: actual losses £8,000 to date. This is the equivalent of two whole days of inpatient care - the nurses, healthcare assistants, doctors, and paramedics providing 24/7 end of life care to the community here in Tunbridge Wells, and beyond.

C o n s i d e r a t i o n s :
TWBC has extensive experience of managing grants a n d assuring that they are being spent effectively and appropriately. They did this during Covid and put strong and effective controls in place.

TWBC has strong links with local businesses. It is o n e of only three authorities in Kent with a Business Improvement District that is strongly engaged with and attuned to the needs of business.

A possible source of funding for the package of support might be from any fines levied on SEW. It is clear that they have (repeatedly) failed to maintain supply and breached their obligations in respect of maintaining supply.

Practical Support - POST-CRISIS
Beyond this, and in slightly slower time, we would be looking for practical support in two particular areas:
Insurance claims:
Working with local businesses and industry groups (including the Association of British Insurers) to explore how we can streamline the claims process for businesses.
Business rates
Businesses can be eligible for Business Rate Relief if they are affected by local disruption as has been the case in Tunbridge Wells. Our experience in previous incidents has been that this process is slow and laborious to activate. We would be keen to explore whether we can devise a 'class application' whereby we can provide a single set of evidence to apply on a blanket basis to businesses within the
affected area.