Johannesburg — HOW much free water can the City of Johannesburg be reasonably expected to provide for poor people?

This was one of the issues argued at the Constitutional Court yesterday, where Lindiwe Mazibuko and four other residents of Phiri, Soweto challenged the decision of Johannesburg Water and the City of Johannesburg to provide their homes with only 6kl of free water per household.

The city already provides 6kl , or 6000l , of free water per month to every household -- the minimum amount they must provide according to national legislation.

In Johannesburg, the average number of people per household on "multiple household stands" is 10, giving people about 20l of free water per day. A five minuter shower uses a total of 25l.

The Phiri residents say the legislated amount it is not nearly enough and have asked the court to order that they get 50l per person daily.

Since the case was first argued, the city's free water allocation policy has changed. Now, poor people can register in terms of an "expanded social package", which would give them access to more free water, the amount depending on a variety of factors but it can be up to 50l per person per day.

But the Phiri residents say the new policy is still flawed because it is dependent on registration. Previous attempts to register people who were poor were unsuccessful.

Their counsel, Wim Trengove, said that the nationally prescribed minimum, is the "floor" instead of the "ceiling" of what should be provided. He said there was also a duty on the city to provide more than that -- where it was reasonable to do so.

He said the city had never argued that it could not afford to provide more. I t clearly could since it had already changed its policy to provide more free water in certain circumstances.

But counsel for the city, Gilbert Marcus, argued what was reasonable should be calculated from the starting point of what was legislated and that Trengove's argument ignored the fact that the city had various priorities.

He said in Johannesburg 100000 households had no access to water at all within 200m of their homes and 190000 who had no access to basic sanitation. When a court dealt with socioeconomic rights, "the first obligation must be directed to those whose needs are greatest", he said.

Marcus said SA had been lauded worldwide for its free water policy. The court should not make an order that quantified a minimum and rather leave it to the city to adapt its policies .