While I've Retaliated Against The Hosepipe Ban With A Gravity Powered Irrigation System.

https://news.sky.com/story/gatwick-airport-suffers-major-water-outage-with-people-unable-to-flush-toilets-13567089

Which absolutely, definitely isn't a fancy way of saying; "An old school 50L plastic trash can, with a *ahem* 'Pete Hegseth' in it."

Generally I take a laissez faire attitude to nature. 

So I'm not going to go to the trouble of digging up my lawns to overlay the soil with gravel. In order to protect the soil from desertification and allow whatever scarce rainwater there is to percolate into drinking water.

However, by the same token, if my lawns are going to turn into barren, rocky wastelands. Then I'm not going to waste good drinking water in a futile effort to try and stop them.

As a result quite a few of my lawns have quite a few bare patches in them.

This also the result of Global Warming, but not the effect you're thinking of. In what we call Winter these days there's still not enough sunlight for grass to grow. However there is still enough moisture and warmth for Moss to grow. As a result the moss is able to suffocate and kill the grass.

About two weeks ago though I decided to tackle a couple of these bare patches through re-seeding. In the full knowledge that the Water Industry Act (1991) provides a 28 day exemption to hosepipe bans for re-seeded areas.

Although, for some reason, Thames Water have invoked their option to limit that exemption only to areas re-seeded by a properly VAT-registered "business."

https://twitterwithbraincells.blogspot.com/2026/07/i-have-taken-to-watering-grass-recently.html

But yes. My monthly water bill has suddenly dropped by £20, now my neighbouring property's supply pipe has been more accurately routed.

Of course if Thames Water believe that an multi-year offence of abstraction has taken place it is their responsibility to report said offence to the Crown.

It is then the Crown's duty to prosecute the offence, impose victim surcharges etc.