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In his article Water as with power, Tim Watkins draws a connection between Britain’s water and electricity difficulties. He argues that political short-termism and inadequate infrastructure planning have left essential services vulnerable. His broader warning is that announcements and financial arrangements cannot substitute for the physical capacity to deliver.

This raises a question central to localism. What happens when the systems on which everyday life depends become too expensive, unreliable or difficult to maintain?

The answer will not be a sudden national decision to become localist. It is more likely to emerge through thousands of practical responses by households, businesses and communities.

Maintaining essentials in a shrinking economy

From the perspective of a shrinking economy, the challenge extends beyond correcting past mistakes. We must consider how much infrastructure society can afford to operate, repair and eventually replace.

Every network carries continuing obligations. Pipes, pumps, treatment works, cables and substations need materials, energy and skilled people. Borrowing can finance their purchase, but it cannot remove those physical requirements.

As the resources available for discretionary consumption diminish, protecting essentials becomes increasingly important. Yet essential services themselves must become affordable within the smaller economy.

The sensible starting point is to maintain useful existing systems, reduce unnecessary demands and develop local provision where it offers a practical advantage.

Water begins with the locality

A localist approach would start by understanding the water available in each locality and the demands placed upon it.

Where does rain fall? Where does it run off? What can be retained for dry periods? How much water is needed for households, food growing and other essential work?

Possible responses include collecting roof water for gardens, improving soils so they retain moisture, and providing suitable storage for growers. These are proposals to assess against local conditions. They are not substitutes for a dependable drinking-water supply.

Nor does localism mean assuming that a nearby spring or well is safe. Drinking water requires proper protection, treatment where necessary, testing and competent management. Local provision must carry those responsibilities with it.

The purpose is to reduce avoidable dependence while preserving public health.

Electricity requires practical choices

The corresponding question for electricity is what a locality needs to keep working.

Water supplies, refrigeration, communications and care may deserve priority over uses that can be postponed. Local generation and storage could contribute, but their value should be judged against essential demand, maintenance requirements and eventual replacement costs.

Localism should not promise that every household can purchase complete independence. That would leave those with the least money most exposed.

Shared arrangements deserve consideration. A dependable supply serving an essential community facility may offer greater benefit than numerous expensive household systems. The appropriate arrangement will vary between localities.

The guiding question should be simple: what can we sustain with the resources and skills available?

A continuing national role

There remains a strong case for maintaining wider networks. Connections between places allow resources to be shared and provide support when local provision fails.

The localist future I envisage therefore has two levels. A national core maintains functions that require coordination and scale. Alongside it, localities develop more of their own capacity to meet everyday needs.

Government would have an essential responsibility to protect minimum standards and prevent poorer places from being abandoned. Local initiative cannot compensate for every inequality in water, land, infrastructure or wealth.

Equally, national policy should make room for workable local arrangements instead of assuming that all provision must continually become larger and more centralised.

Localism grows through useful work

This is where localism becomes more than an argument about government.

Someone repairs a neglected water store. A grower adapts production to the water available. Neighbours organise help for vulnerable households during interruptions. A local enterprise develops the skills to maintain essential equipment.

As discretionary employment contracts, such work could become a larger part of the local economy. Its value lies in what it enables people to do: eat, keep warm, remain clean and care for one another.

Watkins’s article provides a reason to examine our dependence. Localism develops the next question: how can each locality strengthen its ability to provide the essentials of life?

The aim is not to reproduce the entire industrial economy in miniature. It is to build a more manageable relationship between local needs, available resources and the wider systems we can continue to sustain.