Water Act 1989

The Director General of Water Services and the customer service committees

5 The Director General of Water Services

(1) The Secretary of State shall appoint an officer to be known as the Director General of Water Services (in this Act referred to as “the Director”) for the purpose of carrying out the functions assigned or transferred to him under this Act.

(2) An appointment of a person to hold office as the Director shall be for a term not exceeding five years; but previous appointment to that office shall not affect eligibility for re-appointment.

(3) The Director may at any time resign his office as the Director by notice addressed to the Secretary of State; and the Secretary of State may remove any person from that office on the ground of incapacity or misbehaviour.

(4) Subject to subsections (2) and (3) above, the Director shall hold and vacate office as such in accordance with the terms of his appointment.

(5) The provisions of Schedule 3 to this Act shall have effect with respect to the Director.

6 Customer service committees

(1) The Director shall allocate every company holding an appointment under Chapter I of Part II of this Act to a committee established and maintained by him for the purpose, in relation to such companies as may be allocated to it, of carrying out—

(a) the functions assigned by this Act to such a committee; and

(b) such other functions as the committees established and maintained under this section may be required to carry out by the Director.

(2) The committees established and maintained under this section shall be known as customer service committees.

(3) There shall not at any time be more than ten customer service committees, but it shall be the duty of the Director so to exercise his powers under this section to establish and maintain customer service committees and to allocate companies to those committees as to secure—

(a) that such customer service committees are established, as soon as practicable after the transfer date, as he considers appropriate for the purpose of making allocations under subsection (1) above in respect of every company whose appointment under Chapter I of Part II of this Act comes into force on that date; and

(b) that at all times after that date such customer service committees are maintained, and such allocations under subsection (1) above are in force, as he considers appropriate for ensuring that the interests of the customers and potential customers of the companies for the time being holding appointments under that Chapter are effectively represented.

(4) A customer service committee shall consist of—

(a) a chairman appointed by the Director after consultation with the Secretary of State; and

(b) such number (not less than ten nor more than twenty) of other members appointed by the Director as the Director may determine.

(5) In appointing persons to be members of a customer service committee the Director shall have regard to—

(a) the desirability of the persons appointed being persons who have experience of, and have shown capacity in, some matter relevant to the functions of a water undertaker or sewerage undertaker or to the carrying out of those functions in relation to any area by a company which the Director has allocated, or is proposing to allocate, to that committee; and

(b) the desirability—

(i) of the committee including one or more persons with experience of work among, and the special needs of, disabled persons; and

(ii) of persons appointed by virtue of this paragraph including disabled persons.

(6) An appointment of a person to hold office as the chairman of a customer service committee shall be for a term not exceeding four years.

(7) Subject to subsection (6) above, the chairman and other members of a customer service committee shall hold and vacate office in accordance with the terms of their appointments and, notwithstanding that subsection, shall on ceasing to hold office be eligible for re-appointment.

(8) The provisions of Schedule 4 to this Act shall have effect with respect to customer service committees.