Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to help implement United Utilities' proposed North-South water pipeline alongside the currently proposed High Speed 2 route.

United Utilities did not approach the Department to discuss such a project during the preparations for its water resources management plan, 2015 – 2040, and did not include it in the final submission to the Secretary of State before publishing its final plan.

Defra and the Environment Agency are now working with all water companies to ensure that they consider the range of options for balancing future supply and demand in their next update to their plans to be published in 2019. This includes looking at bulk transfers between companies.