06/11/2008 Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
Strasbourg, 06.11.2008 – “Proper water governance that offers sustainable access to water and sanitation is not possible without legislation. In this connection, parliamentarians have a key role to play in making governments understand the need for legislation at national and international level so as to ensure the right to water, in other words, the right to life”, said Alan Meale (United Kingdom, SOC), Chair of the PACE Committee on the Environment, Agriculture and Local and Regional Affairs, in Strasbourg today at the opening of the Parliamentary Process Preparatory Conference for the 5th World Water Forum to be held in Istanbul from 16 to 22 March 2009. “There is an urgent need to advance our cause in legislative terms, as the challenges to be tackled are numerous: chronic water shortages in the south, floods in the north and water management problems in central Europe,” he added.
“The international water community and politicians must guarantee the right to sufficient quantities of high-quality water that is easily accessible for all population groups. Parliamentarians are central to the policy arrangements for access to water; they must act as advocates of the right to water and sanitation, while enshrining the right in constitutions like the right to health and setting it out in national legislation. The cause of water is a cause for humankind as a whole and a democratic guarantee for the future,” said Loïc Fauchon, President of the World Water Council.
“There is an urgent need to address water issues and try to find fair, realistic and integrated solutions for those who have no access to water,” emphasised Ahmet Mete Saatçi, Vice-Secretary General of the 5th World Water Forum, adding that “this is precisely the objective of the Istanbul Forum in March 2009, which will be a real platform for dialogue that brings together scientists, experts and politicians to ‘bridge divides for water’ in both technical and political terms.”