Opening address

It gives me great pleasure to be here to open World Water '83.

Firstly because it enables me to welcome to Britain and to London so many visitors from overseas to take part in this congress.

Secondly, because it allows me to greet - for the first time since my appointment as Secretary of State for the Environment - members of the British water industry - from the public sector water authorities, from the water companies, and from the many firms and organisations which make up the private sector.

But chiefly I was glad to be asked to speak because of the theme of the conference. It does not require a great effort of imagination to recognise the importance of water in the human predicament; nor its significance to the countless millions of the world's people who look to your expertise to help to save them from disease, hunger and squalor.