The rivers and streams may be flowing freely and communities near rivers are on amber flood warnings but there is no end in sight for the hosepipe ban for families living in the Thames Water area that includes Marlborough and Swindon.

On April 8 Thames Water introduced its hosepipe ban for hundreds of thousands of homes in an area including 14 counties stretching from Gloucestershire through parts of Wiltshire to the South Coast and as far east as Kent.

The water company’s media manager Simon Evans joked this week that it was the hosepipe ban that precipitated one of the wettest Aprils on record bringing floods to many area.

“The irony of having introduced a hosepipe ban as the heavens opened has not passed us by,” said Mr Evans who a month ago was photographed standing in the dry bed of the River Kennet at Overton where this week the river is in full spate.

“Although April’s rain has got not us out of jail you could say it has slightly loosened the locks.”

“The rain over recent weeks has reduced the likelihood of Thames Water having to apply for further restrictions later in the year when the next step would have been to seek a drought order.

“Remember it has taken us two dry years to get into the situation we are now in and it will take more than a month of rain to get out of it.”

He said that although the River Kennet and the River Pang which flows through Berkshire, both tributaries to the River Thames, were flowing again the recent rainfall had not had time to percolate down through the ground to the underground aquifers that store water and from which supplies are drawn with millions of litres pumped daily from boreholes in places like Clatford and Axford to keep taps running in Swindon and London.

Mr Evans said: “We need the rainfall to soak down in the ground and top up the water tables before we can say we are out of trouble.”

He said that over the last two years the region had 417mm (almost 18 inches) less rainfall than normal and it would take many more months of rain to replenish the water table.

“The hose pipe ban is likely to stay in place for the rest of this year at least,” he said.