Water firm Veolia has no plans to relax the hosepipe ban for householders in Barnet, despite torrential rain over the past week.

But the ban has been lifted for businesses whose income depends solely on cleaning private cars, walls, windows or paths.

The firm’s stance comes after Thames Water revealed it would lift its ban sooner than first expected yesterday.

The ban means that watering gardens, plants, cleaning cars, walls or leisure boats using a hosepipe is not permitted.

A statement from Veolia Water said although recent rainfall has been “welcome”, there has still been a very small top of up groundwater since the ban was imposed on April 5.

It added: “The rainfall has been sufficient to allow for a limited relaxation of the exceptions affected by drought, but unfortunately at present we cannot relax the temporary use ban further.

“We will need prolonged substantial rainfall between October and March to restore groundwater to normal levels and move us out of a drought situation.”