Good afternoon.
The Drinking Water Regulations state that where the compliance of drinking water from the mains is suspected, the operator must immediately inform users and provide appropriate recommendations in cases where the use of drinking water is restricted or prohibited.
Today, notification is still carried out in an extremely old-fashioned analogue way (local notice board at the bus stop, local radio with a questionable listenership, corner notice board at the municipal administration, the network operator's website, maybe a pigeon scribe, word of mouth from a neighbour), half of the operators do not have the possibility of electronic mass notification (e-mail or SMS), some do not even have websites. It is safe to say that the speed of getting this type of information to the target audience is clearly poor. Only half of the operators have electronic notification capabilities, and even then it is often questionable what all is covered by this notification.
I propose to amend the Water Regulation to require that by 2025 at the latest, all drinking water providers should provide the possibility to subscribe to newsletters free of charge electronically (with the option to explicitly choose only "notification of incidents on the drinking water network"), whereby the individual user can also specify the intake (one or more) from which he receives his drinking water. For each confirmed subscription, the recipient receives an auto-responder with a confirmation of the subscription established. Operators are required to publish and maintain a map of water wells and associated networks on their websites, which simplifies the subscription process for users. If necessary, the Regulation could be complemented by an obligation for all food business operators to subscribe to such newsletters (either as a company headquarters or as an individual food business) and to be able to demonstrate this in the event of an inspection. Best regards.