“Such an increase is not normal”: in Figeac, the new price of water sends a chill

Washing your hands, taking a shower, filling a saucepan… These everyday actions will soon cost more for the inhabitants of Figeac (Lot). On January 1, 2025, the price of a cubic meter of water will increase by 8.5% and the annual subscription will increase to 58 euros, compared to 32 euros currently. A hard blow for the residents met by our team in the news report visible above.

Magalie has done her math: if her consumption is the same, her bill will rise to 300 euros next year, an increase of around 50 euros. “We are very careful. I have my daughter who has left, so I should be reducing my consumption, underlines this single mother. But I don’t see how to reduce it more than that. As with electricity and gas, we will check”.

This unprecedented increase also dismays this couple strolling in the city center: “It is not normal that there is such an increase, of the order of 70 to 80%. We are losing every year and more and more.” “I am a small pensioner, with a small pension and if this continues, we will no longer be able to afford water or anything”fears a woman for his part.

First victims of this inflation: restaurateurs. Alain Beaumont, manager of a traditional restaurant in the south of the city, will have to pay 100 euros more per year. When diving, he already tries to limit his consumption. “We rinse the plates to prevent the plates from being too dirty in the machine, to avoid changing the water in the machine too much.” But if that is not enough, he says he is ready to reduce his margin so as not to increase his prices. “From the moment we have increases, we are not the type to pass them on to the customer. They are not there to pay for the extra water we use”assures the restaurateur.

Water pollution control is becoming more and more expensive

For its part, the town hall says it has no choice, because operating the network is costing it more and more, particularly to clean up the water. “For several years, we had noticed that there were residual pollutants, that is to say that after water treatment, there were still pesticide residues. When we add that to the increase in the cost of energy, this increase in the cost of treatments is very notable”explains André Mellinger, the mayor (PS) of Figeac. Last year, the municipality was obliged to advance 100,000 euros to complete the budget, a sum which it now hopes to be able to recover.

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Figeac is in reality not an isolated case. According to experts, we should expect a widespread increase throughout France in the coming years. “Simply because water is becoming more and more rare, it needs to be treated more and we also have to do maintenance, of course. We know that we lose a lot of water through our networks and It takes a lot of money.”underlines Esther Crauser-Delbourg, water economist, to TF1. For example, the cities of Orléans (Loiret) and Le Mans (Sarthe) also intend to increase their prices on January 1.