Topic: Cost of Birmingham's allotments

[:(]

But like Digeroo says, can you confirm with Lisa what she says about the water bill being 4x the rental revenue, because I reckon your site generates £2300 revenue, and no way is its water bill going to be £9200 for the year, £1075 more like.

This what Lisa said

Currently, the water bill for allotments is approx 4 x higher than rent collected and is currenty heavily subsidised by council tax payers.

so she wasnt talking about this one site. If there are a lot os plots in Birmingahm with low rents and lots of discounts its possible overall that water charges exceed net rent income.

[Unwashed]

Thanks Betty, I do enjoy it actually.

From your breakdown then I guestimate you have 967 poles total and I'd budget for an annual water bill of £1500 which allows useage at 1m³ per pole and costs £1.55 per pole, though it looks like your bill for the year might well come in under that, and contrast that with your effective pole rate of £2.26 per pole and you see the water bill takes two thirds of the revenue.

But like Digeroo says, can you confirm with Lisa what she says about the water bill being 4x the rental revenue, because I reckon your site generates £2300 revenue, and no way is its water bill going to be £9200 for the year, £1075 more like.

This what Lisa said

Currently, the water bill for allotments is approx 4 x higher than rent collected and is currenty heavily subsidised by council tax payers.

so she wasnt talking about this one site. If there are a lot os plots in Birmingahm with low rents and lots of discounts its possible overall that water charges exceed net rent income.

I don't see that Betty's site is going to be so very different because 50% retired seems pretty average, and from analysis of sites without hosepipe bans water use at 1m³ per pole seems pretty typical so I don't see that there's a mechanism for water rates being anything like 4x revenue, not once it's averaged out over 120 sites, unless there are sites with a significant leak, and in that eventuality I wouldn't expect that to factor into a substantial rent increase, rather I'd expect someone from the council to spot the anomaly and fix the leak.  There's enough here to convince me that someone has to look carefully at what's being spent where because it's not impossible that someone's made a bit of a mistake.

[Trevor_D]

We have 825 poles - well, perhaps a bit more as we have starter plots not in the calculation - so at £447 a year that gives about 50p per pole per annum. (I think I've worked that out correctly?)

[Chrispy]

The price looks very unfair to me....
Only £6 difference between a half and a full plot.
A pensioner on a full plot is only paying £2 more than those on a quarter plot.
Taking the cost of water into account, those on a quarter plot seem to be paying a fair rent, while at the other end, a pensioner on a full plot is in effect, paying nothing.
The new rates seem to do little, if anything at all to improve this.

If BCC want to give 50% discount to pensioners, then fine, it is their allotments and we have the same here, but why should they get 50% off the water bill?
The water companies are not giving a discount, so this means all the other plot holders are paying for other peoples water.

I don't think it is a rent rise that is needed, more of a rent restructure.

As to saving water, have you considered printing and sticking up posters of water saving tips.
It would cost very little and even if the tips do not save much water directly it would help put a more positive angle on the need to save water.

[Squash64]

The price looks very unfair to me....
Only £6 difference between a half and a full plot.
A pensioner on a full plot is only paying £2 more than those on a quarter plot.
Taking the cost of water into account, those on a quarter plot seem to be paying a fair rent, while at the other end, a pensioner on a full plot is in effect, paying nothing.
The new rates seem to do little, if anything at all to improve this.

If BCC want to give 50% discount to pensioners, then fine, it is their allotments and we have the same here, but why should they get 50% off the water bill?
The water companies are not giving a discount, so this means all the other plot holders are paying for other peoples water.

I don't think it is a rent rise that is needed, more of a rent restructure.

As to saving water, have you considered printing and sticking up posters of water saving tips.
It would cost very little and even if the tips do not save much water directly it would help put a more positive angle on the need to save water.

I've never looked at it like that before, but I agree that the difference in price between different size plots does seem wrong. To my knowledge none of our tenants have ever questioned it though.  When people enquire about a plot with us and I tell them the cost of a full plot, some of them have thought it was £28 a month and been pleasantly surprised that it was for a year.

It's a good idea about printing water saving tips.  What we have at the moment is a copy of the water usage rules at each standpipe but as you say, tips would give a more positive angle, thanks. :)

[shirlton]

We have got a notice on our gate that tells us that we can have 1000 litre butts and we can also fit a hose onto the tap and drip feed.I will get you a copy of this today when we go to the plot.
We think this is stupidity cos if we were to stay there all day we could just move the hose around whilst we were working and I'm quite sure that we would empty the butt by the end of the day.This is not saving water in my opinion.

[Trevor_D]

The problem seems to me to be the standpipes. If you've got a standpipe, you can attach a hose to it. So - if hoses are banned - why are there still standpipes? We have water tanks, operated by a ball valve. You can't attach a hosepipe to that.

[1066]

interesting reading! One thing I would check would be for leaks. If your water bills are high because consumption is high, then I'd do a check for water leaks. I know our site did and fixed a few problems, and the bills are back down

1066

[Squash64]

We have got a notice on our gate that tells us that we can have 1000 litre butts and we can also fit a hose onto the tap and drip feed.I will get you a copy of this today when we go to the plot.
We think this is stupidity cos if we were to stay there all day we could just move the hose around whilst we were working and I'm quite sure that we would empty the butt by the end of the day.This is not saving water in my opinion.

I don't think this is allowed Shirl.  Using a drip hose is the same as watering with a hose, only slower.  I think maybe your committee need to check this out with the Allotments Dept. - they might have a bit of a shock!

[Squash64]

The problem seems to me to be the standpipes. If you've got a standpipe, you can attach a hose to it. So - if hoses are banned - why are there still standpipes? We have water tanks, operated by a ball valve. You can't attach a hosepipe to that.

It isn't that hoses are banned Trevor, it's that using a hose to directly water your plot is banned. 

Almost every plot has water butts, many of them next to sheds or greenhouses collecting rainwater, but they often need topping up in dry spells.  And of course, not everyone has a shed or greenhouse on their plot. 

We are allowed to use the hose to fill the water butts, or a watering can, but not for anything else.

[Squash64]

interesting reading! One thing I would check would be for leaks. If your water bills are high because consumption is high, then I'd do a check for water leaks. I know our site did and fixed a few problems, and the bills are back down

1066

That is something we must do, thanks.

[Trevor_D]

Betty, if every plot has a water butt, why aren't they plumbed in to the mains? Then no-one would need a hose to fill their butt, so therefore no-one could use their hose for anything illegal....

Everyone on our site checks for leaks constantly and reports any problem, which is dealt with immediately. And when we fitted a timer to turn the water off every night, our bill went down considerably.

[Squash64]

Betty, if every plot has a water butt, why aren't they plumbed in to the mains? Then no-one would need a hose to fill their butt, so therefore no-one could use their hose for anything illegal....

Everyone on our site checks for leaks constantly and reports any problem, which is dealt with immediately. And when we fitted a timer to turn the water off every night, our bill went down considerably.

I think there is an answer to the question of plumbing-in water butts but my brain can't function well enough to see it at the moment!  It does sort of make sense but apart from the cost, there must be a reason why it wouldn't work.

We really must do the checking for leaks and also get the plotholders involved in looking out for them too.  Thanks for that suggestion.  I've never thought of fitting a timer, thanks for that too!

[Lisa-BDAC]

Re@ x4 for the water bill, this is the figure that has been bandied around at our BDAC meetings, I will ask my other half (who keeps the minutes) to look through and see what the actual quoted figure is and get back to you but I seem to recall a figure in excess of £300k.

With regard to paying rent quarterly, this option has been discussed at BDAC meetings and used as a bargaining tool with the council. We know, as well as they do, that rent could be paid quarterly, or even monthly. They don't want to do this, simply because they do not have the man-power to cope with it.  Currently, the Allotment Section consists of one manager, 2 officers and one liasion officer.  Having said that, we have said that if this makes an allotment more affordable, wouldn't this be the better option? Apart from lack of council staff (which is not our main concern), we have to take into consideration the committees on the allotment sites. any secretary, treasurer etc will tell you how difficult rent period is, imagine doing it 4 times a year??? And for that reason, we vetoed the idea.  So, why not pay direct debit directly to the council? Again, this would affect associations as they would lose their 9% commission from the rent.  

[Lisa-BDAC]

With reference to using drip hoses off water butts, I think the council would not allow that but, you can use a hosepipe off a water butt!!

[Squash64]

With reference to using drip hoses off water butts, I think the council would not allow that but, you can use a hosepipe off a water butt!!

But not while you are filling the butt at the same time!  :o

[Lisa-BDAC]

oh no!! ;D

[Unwashed]

Apart from lack of council staff (which is not our main concern), we have to take into consideration the committees on the allotment sites. any secretary, treasurer etc will tell you how difficult rent period is, imagine doing it 4 times a year??? And for that reason, we vetoed the idea.

The tenant has a statutory right to pay quartetly, you can't contract out of the right.  I can understand how quarterly payment can be less convenient for association and council, but it can make all the difference to allotmenteers on limited means.

[Lisa-BDAC]

when I was secretary of my old site, I offered a payment plan to the plot holders (we had quite a few who were unemployed), so that they could pay a bit every so often, and by rent time they could have their rent already paid (or the bulk of it), but no one took it on. I reckon they would now though.

[shirlton]

I have borrowed this to scan for you. To my mind this is not conserving water.If the butt was totally filled with rain water it would be a different matter, but the lack of rainfall this year would make that impossible. Like I said you could leave it running all day. I prefer to use a dipping butt. Far quicker and I can look at the plants while I'm watering