By HILARY GAVIN
(UPDATE: Wednesday, August 13th, 2025, 10.22am)
Dear readers, I’m updating this blog after receiving a reply to an email I sent to Woody Wilcock, a Flood Resilience Engagement Advisor and manager, at the Environment Agency about possible erosion to my stopcock from leaking engine oil in cars parked in my road which I sent earlier this month. As you can see, Mr Wilcock’s reply was very informative and helpful and he agreed with me that I could share the contents on my WordPress site. His reply is self-explanatory and it would seem that I should seek the reassurances I need to put my mind at ease about this matter from the Environmental Health team at CDC. Here’s Mr Wilcock’s reply to me with his job title and the regional Environment Agency’s postal address at the end of his message to me. Hilary Gavin
Dear Hilary Gavin,
Thank you for your email and your question.
From your email, I understand you are concerned about potential contamination of your water supply and erosion damage to your water supply stopcock from engine oil, originating from your neighbours’ parked cars. We are unable to comment on possible health risks or likelihood of contamination of your water supply. For this you will need to speak to your local Environmental Health department within the Council or to the water company that supplies your water. The water company will be able to discuss the issue of potential damage to your stopcock.
Regarding the possible ground contamination, by oil and other substances, I have consulted with our Groundwater and Contaminated Land team and checked our GIS mapping system for groundwater vulnerability in your location. There are no groundwater source protection zones in your immediate area. Generally, this type of situation has a very low environmental risk and there can be microbial breakdown of contaminants in the top layers of soil that will further reduce risk of potential environmental impacts. Modern commercially available weedkillers are now mostly glyphosate free which further reduces possible environmental impacts from this source.
I hope you find answers from Local Environmental Health team and the Water Company that help allay your concerns further.
Kind regards,
Woody Wilcock
Edward Wilcock (He, Him, His – why is this here?)
Flood Resilience Engagement Advisor / CIO(C) Delivery Lead / TLO
Environment Agency | Solent & South Downs (SSD)
Worthing Office | Teville Gate House, Teville Rd, Worthing, West Sussex BN11 1UR
(Update: Thursday, July 24th, 2025 – 11.50am)
I’M writing an update to this blog post after two plumbing experts reassured me that it was very unlikely that contaminated water would get into my mains supply via my stopcock pipework.
I’ve also received some very practical and useful advice below from Louise Barnetson, who is the Water Champion – Parishes and Communities at Western Sussex Rivers Trust / Downs to the Sea.
Louise emailed to say I could share this advice with my readers on this blog:
As she says: “Any concerns about potential contamination of drinking water should be directed to your water supply company, in our area that is Portsmouth Water. Drinking water is unlikely to be contaminated by surface water from the road unless there is serious damaged to the pipes. The water that enters stormwater drains on the road (surface water) and wastewater that leaves your house via the sewer network is the responsibility of Southern Water. Southover Way does not have roadside drains (stormwater drains) so any surface water will likely enter the storm drains at the bottom of the road on the B2145. From here it will either enter the wastewater network, or go directly into a watercourse, depending on how the systems is configured. The Rivers Trust encourage people to be responsible about their usage of storm drains – they are only designed for rainwater, and so chemicals should never be allowed to enter them. Driveway cleaning using jet-washers could potentially contaminate waterways if chemicals are used in the jet-washer, although usually only high-pressure water is used. If the driveway had pollutants on it such as engine oil or weedkiller then this could get washed into the storm drain, so that is a potential cause of pollution. Jet-washers also use large amounts of water – please keep usage to an occasional basis as we should all be using less water!”
Louise also added: “I am doing talks for community groups about how we can all make small changes in our everyday lives that can help improve the health of our waterways. If there is a local group that would like to receive a talk then do please let me know.”
Louise Barnetson
Water Champion – Parishes and Communities
07421127331
Western Sussex Rivers Trust / Downs to the Sea
By HILARY GAVIN
IN OUR modern society we take safe drinking water for granted in our homes across Britain so I am inviting you to view my footage of yesterday’s Hunston Parish Council Meeting where I raise concerns about possible contamination issues in my un-adopted road.
I’m afraid I’m not the world’s best best orator, and I don’t work in the construction industries, so unfortunately I got into a bit of a muddle over my terminology when I raised my concerns about my Portsmouth Water stopcock outside my house.
My stopcock controls the flow of clean drinking water to my taps in my kitchen inside my house, so I can turn it on and off if I open the Portsmouth Water mains water cover at the end of my drive in my un-adopted road in Southover Way in Hunston, West Sussex (see pic below).
Historically, the mains water along our terrace row in my road was controlled by one stopcock in front of one of my neighbour’s house where they were able to turn off the water valve for all our terrace houses in case of emergencies.
I’m not sure when Portsmouth Water installed individual stopcocks in Southover Way, so we could control our own water flow in our homes, but the mains water pipe runs from our road into our houses across our front drives.
As you can see from the footage of yesterday’s Hunston Parish Council meeting at the Annexe in the village hall, I raised my concerns after a neighbour had her front drive doused down with an unknown effluent that seeped into my stopcock cover.
Thankfully, I know my neighbour is eco-aware so I asked the young man who was using a water spray to wash her driveway to reassure me that the unknown liquid didn’t contain harmful or toxic weedkiller that could get into the road’s mains water pipe supply and contaminate our homes through cracks etc.
Of course, this would be a major public health hazard because the mains water pipe flows into my neighbouring houses so it could potentially put other residents’ health at risk – especially vulnerable young and old people.
As you can see two of the three parish councillors who attended yesterday’s meeting suggested I consult Portsmouth Water to ascertain the situation but I’m not sure if I also need to contact the relevant authorities about my worries.
Earlier this year a Portsmouth Water engineer told me that our main water stopcocks are the utilities company’s responsibility as they installed them but – as you can see from the parish Chair’s comments – individual homeowners would appear to be responsible for their section of the road outside the front.
Unfortunately, Southover Way does not have a road committee at present so I wouldn’t know how to consult my neighbours of any risks to our water supply and whether I would need to advise the Environment Agency.
Anyhow, I hope you find my footage of last night’s Hunston Parish Council meeting informative and interesting and I should say that it nearly didn’t take place because the clerk Carol Smith wasn’t sure they would have the prerequisite quorum of three councillors in attendance directly beforehand.
However, as you can see, it would appear that the Chair Wendy Gray was able to assist Cllr Becky Davis to get along to the meeting and Cllr Benedict Targett arrived there on his own steam. This meant the councillors could vote for the contractors Whaleback to undertake studies on whether our village needs a new hall or not.
If you are interested in this issue, I would invite you to view my Youtube footage here on my WordPress site and on my Facebook, LinkedIn and Substack social media sites so you can discover what was said at yesterday’s parish council.
At the same time, you can get a detailed update on local government devolution from WSCC and CDC councillor Sarah Sharp who sat in the “public gallery” to brief parish councillors on this rather complex political debate.
I am going to be out today, but I might well revisit this blog post later this week once I have consulted my notes in further detail. However, I should say that I, for one, am considering answering the call from the Western Sussex Rivers Trust to volunteer to monitor the safety of the water courses in Hunston (see footage).
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