A/HRC/30/39 74. Participatory budgeting is increasingly common in municipalities across the world, enabling residents to agree on the budget priorities of local government. Such processes have often contributed to improving basic service provision, including water and sanitation.43 V. Regulation and monitoring 75. The discussion on ensuring affordability has repeatedly pointed out the crucial role of regulation and monitoring. A. Regulating service provision for affordability 76. Ensuring the affordability of water and sanitation services requires an effective legal and policy framework, which includes a strong regulatory system. The International Water Association Lisbon Charter recognizes the importance of regulation, recommending that regulators “supervise tariff schemes to ensure they are fair, sustainable and fit for purpose; promoting efficiency and affordability”. 44 77. Once a tariff system that meets affordability standards has been developed, the body responsible for regulating service providers should be able to ensure both that the tariff system is correctly applied, and that it is having the desired impact on affordability levels for all users. Likewise, a regulatory body, in collaboration with the relevant government department, can ensure that public financing is adequately targeted. Complaints mechanisms, put into place by service providers or regulators, can support these processes. 78. Particular challenges arise for regulation in the context of small-scale and informal provision, as governments often do not have any control over the operation of these providers. Governments may formalize the informal sector while keeping the small-scale nature of the provision through effective regulation, such that the small-scale providers serve as contractors to the government. This is the strategy that is being initiated in Nairobi, Kenya, where water kiosks in informal settlements are supplied by and registered with the utility, and the tariff is fixed by the regulatory body. However, this tariff is not always complied with.45 Where households rely on informal service provision, governments should also provide support in terms of management and technical support to increase the quality and affordability of their services. A similar approach is taken in Maputo, Mozambique, where the regulator supports informal service provision in the absence of the capacity of the utility, in the short-to-medium term, to deliver services to all residents. 46 79. Above all, regulation of informal and small-scale service provision should assist in increasing access to water and sanitation for poor and marginalized households, and not 43 44 45 46 Participatory Wealth Ranking in Rural South Africa”, World Development, vol. 35, No. 2 (February 2007), pp. 212–229. Yves Cabannes, “Contribution of Participatory Budgeting to provision and management of basic services: Municipal practices and evidence from the field”, Environment and Urbanization, vol. 27(1) (September 2014) pp. 257–284. International Water Association, The Lisbon Charter: Guiding the Public Policy and Regulation of Drinking Water Supply, Sanitation and Wastewater Management Services, art. 4.2. See “Statement by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the human right to water and sanitation (Visit to Kenya, 22-28 July 2014)”, available from http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=14912&LangID=E. Catarina de Albuquerque, Realising the human rights to water and sanitation: A handbook by the UN Special Rapporteur, booklet 4 (Portugal, 2014), p. 49. 19