Many happy returns for tomorrow David 
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And from me too. You don’t seem “old” when you are talking about your life on here - far from it. 
Thank you both, I let that slip without thinking, now it seems like a pathetic effort to get greetings. 
I can assure you it wasn’t. As far as not seeming ‘old’ is concerned I must admit I am a bit surprised by it myself, but when you realise that you can’t even crawl under a sink to replace a simple pipe connection, then it hits you. Quite apart from getting down on the floor to get those pictures, getting back up again was much harder. 
Happy birthday for tomorrow, hope you find someone to fix the leak.
Yes, cheers @Wozza , no replies yet, looks like I might be throwing myself on the ‘pitiful oldie’ sympathies of the young (well she is at least 20 years younger than me) Christine in the morning.
Remember your knee pads David, if the leak is your 2nd photo there should be a washer that goes between the male and female parts. Happy birthday for tomorrow, what a better way to spend it than plumbing. 
I have a pile of old shirts here that an enthusiastic aide threw out when going through my wife’s wardrobes. All ones that I had donated to her over the years as they obviously ‘shrank’ overtime. Some have been good enough for her to wear now but it comes back to bite me as it is me who has to do all the buttoning, and I can’t get the hang of doing it the ‘wrong’ way round. 
So, I have plenty of soft tissue to kneel on or mop up with.
Last Wednesday I finally got a plumber to talk to me, well an instant email anyway. He is English and is about 40 kms away. He was very sympathetic and said that he was snowed under at the moment but could probably get to us in a couple of weeks.
Believe it or not this is very good news, the best we have had so far. Until he honours that promise though we are still boiling the kettle multiple times.
The builder, who replied very quickly in the first instance to say that we had frozen pipes (untrue) and that the insurance company would send an emergency plumber (also untrue), has since been silent regarding my further request that he visit to inspect the damage revealed by the leak. That is that the tiles he laid are lifting and cracking. He may well simply blame it on the leak, if he ever replies (doubtful), but as he was supposed to lay waterproof tiles on a waterproof base (his words in the devis) I think he should be called on to take some responsability for the repairs.
So, first we wait for the plumber to repair the leak, then I will contact the builder insisting on an inspection visit and, failing that (following Fabien’s advice above), ask him for contact details of his decennale insurer.
The insurance company have already said that, although the leak repair is at our expense, it will pay for any resulting damage caused. But we do need to know what the extent of that damage is.