The National Consumer Council is urging restaurants to offer customers tap water over bottled mineral water.

The National Consumer Council (NCC) has called on all restaurants to offer free tap water after a survey revealed that one in five people are ‘too scared’ to ask for it.

The recently released survey by the organisation found that 90% of restaurants push customers to buy bottled water and fail to offer tap water as an alternative.

Around 70% of customers surveyed thought that the price of mineral water in restaurants is ‘too expensive’. According to the NCC’s research, tap water costs as little as 1p for 10 litres – and only 1% of restaurants in London and North West England always offer it over bottled water.

Carl Belgrove, NCC’s Senior Policy Advocate, explained: “Some restaurants are willing to offer tap water to their customers, but the majority push mineral water just to make a quick profit. It’s no surprise that most people (92%) say they should have the right to free tap water. NCC is now calling on restaurants to start serving free tap water.”

The organisation also stated that offering tap water would be good for the environment – 93% of mineral water comes in plastic bottles, and so the offer of free tap water instead of bottled could be popular with environmentally-friendly customers.