Politics. Bottled Water Scandal: Senate Inquiry Deplores State "Cover-Up"

The case of illicit treatments used for certain mineral waters, ultimately revealed by the press in early 2024, was the subject of a "cover-up by the State" as part of "a deliberate strategy", believes the Senate commission of inquiry into the practices of bottled water manufacturers.

“Transparency is still not achieved”

"In addition to Nestlé Waters' lack of transparency, it is important to highlight the State's lack of transparency, both vis-à-vis local and European authorities and vis-à-vis the French people (...) This concealment is part of a deliberate strategy, addressed at the first interministerial meeting on natural mineral waters on October 14, 2021. Nearly four years later, transparency has still not been achieved," underlines the commission's report, made public on Monday after six months of work and more than 70 hearings.

Nestlé Waters, whose management claims to have discovered the use of prohibited treatments for mineral water at its Perrier, Hépar and Contrex sites at the end of 2020, had approached the government on this subject in mid-2021, and then the Élysée Palace.

Eighteen months later, a plan to transform the sites was approved by the public authorities, replacing the banned treatments with fine microfiltration, which is also controversial because it can strip the mineral water of its characteristics. "Despite the consumer fraud that water disinfection represents, the authorities are not taking legal action on these revelations" from 2021, the report emphasizes.

The senators deplore a "reversal of the relationship between the State and manufacturers in terms of setting the standard": "Nestlé Waters is adopting a transactional attitude, explicitly making the authorization of microfiltration at 0.2 microns a condition for stopping treatments that are nevertheless illegal."

“Working in silos”

The report blames "the failures of the interministerial", "working in silos", the Ministries of Consumer Affairs and Ecological Transition being sidelined... "Ultimately, it was at the highest level of the State that the decision to authorise microfiltration below the threshold of 0.8 microns was taken", following an "interministerial consultation", "in line with the decisions taken by the office of the Prime Minister, Élisabeth Borne , but without the latter appearing to be informed", notes the report.

"For its part, the Presidency of the Republic, far from being an impregnable fortress with regard to Nestlé's lobbying, has followed the case closely," adds the commission, which is based on "documents collected by it": it "knew, at least since 2022, that Nestlé had been cheating for years."

As a consequence, the manufacturer was able to continue marketing its water under the lucrative label of natural mineral water. At the same time, to date, there have been "no comprehensive checks to ensure the absence of prohibited treatments at all packaged water production sites," the report notes.

The commission, among 28 recommendations, advocates qualitative monitoring of groundwater, "effective control of the level of extraction carried out by mineral producers", and better labelling for consumers.