FAQs

The Havelock North drinking water incident in 2016 was a major trigger for this work, when around 5,500 people fell ill and four people died after drinking contaminated water.  This event exposed serious issues with New Zealand’s water infrastructure, safety standards, and the need for stricter regulation. It highlighted the risk of poorly maintained water systems, prompting the government to push for legislation changes to ensure safe drinking water nationwide. 

While we've made some good investment decisions about our three waters in the past, under LWDW is it expected everyone everywhere will need to invest more and pay more for water services to meet the new rules and regulations from the Government.   

We have done some preliminary financial work on indicative future costs to enable us to compare different delivery models for feedback.  

Under the proposal for a new multi-council-owned water organisation, Wellington Water would be disestablished following transition of staff, operations, work in progress, facilities, plant and equipment, and contracts to the new water organisation. 

Wellington Water is not responsible for the establishment of the new water organisation – they do however have an integral role supporting and advising councils with the development of the water services delivery plan and would support with the establishment of the proposed water organisation. 

Under the Local Water Done Well legislation, the available delivery model options are clearly defined, with specific guidelines on their development within the new water services delivery plans. Councils are obligated to engage with their communities by consulting on at least two options for providing water services. 

The legislation provides alternative arrangements where Council must include an option for the current arrangements or status quo (how we currently do things) – noting any future delivery model must meet new planning, regulatory and accountability requirements under Local Water Done Well. Councils must consider a second option to set up a new water organisation owned by one or more councils to deliver water services (Council’s preferred option). 

Wellington’s five partner councils have determined that the preferred option is best placed to deliver the long-term outcomes needed – a safe, reliable and affordable water network. You can read more about how we got to this stage on our Local Water Done Well webpage under ‘What’s happened so far’. 

Much of New Zealand has significantly underinvested in water infrastructure and water services over several decades. Councils around the country now face stark challenges to meet the investment needed to ensure safe and reliable drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater infrastructure. 

The level of investment required to improve the water network is high. For the Wellington region, we set up Wellington Water Ltd to run the region’s water networks. This hasn’t worked as well as it could have because the organisation is not able to make investment decisions, which are instead set by the shareholding Councils. Another model is now proposed that provides a financial model that helps to address decades of underinvestment.  

Greater Wellington and the Councils for Lower Hutt, Wellington, Upper Hutt and Porirua are consulting on Local Water Done Well reform options around the same time. These five councils have each identified a multi-council-owned water organisation as the preferred option for how water services are delivered.  

Government legislation requires each council to consult with their communities on the planned changes to water services delivery. It is critical that consultation is carried out in line with legislated requirements to ensure the Government’s key date of 3 September 2025 can be achieved. 

Currently, each council owns the infrastructure (pipes and other facilities) within their city or area. For example, Hutt City Council owns the pipes underneath Lower Hutt, and shares ownership of Seaview Wastewater Treatment Plant with Upper Hutt City Council.  

Each council is also responsible for funding the maintenance and development of water infrastructure and does this by collecting rates through council. They are also responsible for the debt taken on to fund maintenance and improvement of the water network. 

Service delivery (the actual work of maintaining the pipes, supplying drinking water, treating wastewater, managing stormwater, and improving the water network), is managed by Wellington Water Ltd, an organisation jointly owned and funded by six councils (Hutt City Council, Wellington City Council, Porirua City Council, Upper Hutt City Council, Greater Wellington, and South Wairarapa District Council). Wellington Water Ltd receives funding from each council, but that funding is to be spent only on that council's own pipes, rather than across the whole water system in the region. 

Because Wellington Water relies on money from councils, their work programme is restricted by how much they receive and the most immediate needs of each area, making them more reactive than proactive. Also, because money from each council must be spent only in that council’s area, Wellington Water is constrained in being able to plan a work programme that enables efficient and effective management and improvement of the whole system.  

While Wellington Water Ltd manages the day-to-day water supply on behalf of shareholding councils, Greater Wellington is still ultimately responsible for collecting, treating and distributing safe and healthy drinking water across the region.  

Greater Wellington owns the assets associated with supplying this water – that’s 187 km of distribution pipework, four treatment plants, 9km of tunnels, three water storage dams, 15 pump stations, 45km of roads and tracks, 2,688 raw water intakes and wells, 18 aquifer wells, plus all the catchment lands (land where water collects and drains into bodies of water like rivers). The water provided by Greater Wellington goes to reservoirs owned by each city. From there, the water moves from the reservoir to local homes and businesses through council-owned pipes. 

This large network of water collection areas, treatment plants, pumping stations and pipelines that supply drinking water is referred to as bulk water supply. Providing the water to the city councils involves managing a network of infrastructure, ensuring safe, high-quality, secure, and reliable water sources, and ensuring that our freshwater is sustainable. The councils fund Greater Wellington’s supply of these water services through a charge (called the bulk water levy) which is calculated based on each city or district’s water usage. 

Greater Wellington also wants to hear from the region’s residents – find their survey at gw.govt.nz 

Whatever option is agreed, it will operate in a much more regulated environment due to new government legislation, which will provide a strong focus on assurance, quality, delivery and value for money. The primary relationship of the organisation will be with its customers, not its shareholders (or owners).  

Council direction and oversight would be less than under the current Wellington Water model, giving the new organisation the independence and accountability to deliver. The new organisation will have an increased ability to borrow money, compared to a Council, and it will be able to deliver their investment programme more efficiently, to achieve the Government’s new financial sustainability requirement. 

Financial sustainability means water services revenue is sufficient to meet the costs of delivering water services. The costs of delivering water services include meeting all regulatory standards, and long-term investment in water services.   

How councils approach achieving financial sustainability can be different depending on local circumstances and require councils to consider the balance between three key factors.   

These factors are:   

Water meters are highly likely under all possible future models of water services delivery as they are already being investigated by councils and Wellington Water Ltd. Water meters are critical to helping identify where water loss is occurring.   

The government has signaled, via proposed legislation, that in future, water charges will have to be based on levels of use rather than being based on property values (as they generally are now) and water meters help to identify usage. 

The approach for the proposed new organisation has been developed jointly by the five councils working in partnership with Iwi.   

Iwi have advised that a joint council-owned water organisation is their preferred option. The primary drivers for this are that water sources across Wellington are connected and for Māori are considered as one, from the water source of Te Awa Kairangi / Hutt River through to Te Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington Harbour, Te Awarua-o-Porirua Harbour and the south coast. 

The water organisation will have a range of relationships with Iwi which will be confirmed through foundational documents such as the constitution and shareholders’ agreement. The Board would also need to have suitable competencies and skills in relation to te ao Māori and the Treaty of Waitangi. 

If, following public consultation, a council does not adopt the currently preferred service delivery option, the remaining councils will continue to work towards a joint Water Services Delivery Plan. This would require recalculation of a range of things, including of the levels of investment needed to ensure a financially sustainable plan.  

Because our region has a connected water network, the exit of one council would also require the development of arrangements and agreements around shared or interconnected infrastructure. 

It would require a significant reworking of the Water Services Delivery Plan, and it is highly likely the remaining councils would need to seek an extension from the Government for submitting the joint plan. It would also likely delay the establishment of the proposed water organisation. 

For Upper Hutt, there are two key reasons why we prefer a new multi-council-owned water organization: 

The new legislation is proposing that the shareholding councils will be able to influence the direction of the new water organisation through a statement of expectations and the ability to comment on and potentially modify the water services strategy that the water organisation prepares. 

The councils’ preferred option involves transferring ownership of the councils’ water supply, wastewater and stormwater network assets to the water organisation. Council has identified these assets as strategic assets in its Significance and Engagement Policy. 

The statement of expectations will inform the water organisation’s long-term water services strategy (prepared every three years), which will outline how they plan to deliver on these expectations and priorities, and their intended approach to pricing and charging consumers. 

The water organisation will be required to provide an annual report to the shareholding councils. The shareholding councils will have the power to require the organisation to provide additional reports such as an asset management plan or quarterly reports, if they wish. The shareholding councils will appoint directors to the board of the water organisation and will be able to remove directors or decide not to renew their appointments. 

Councils will need to introduce ways to kōrero with communities on water needs and concerns, so that can be fed into the statement of expectations. 

At a minimum, the new water organisation will be required to prepare an annual budget and performance report to the owning councils. It is highly likely that the owning councils will require more frequent performance reporting to ensure a strong focus on quality customer service, delivery and management of assets. 

Water meters are expected to be introduced across the region over the coming years. Until that happens, the new water organisation is likely to charge a fixed amount for water services regardless of usage or whether the property is occupied or not. The landlord (property owner) would be directly responsible for paying those charges. 

If charges for volumetric water use are introduced in future (how much you use) are introduced in future (via water meters), landlords will be able to require those costs to be met by tenants. 

No. Under Local Water Done Well, the Government has committed that water services will remain in public ownership. Councils and water organisations will not be able to privatise water services. The Local Government (Water Services) Bill states that a water organisation must be owned by a council (or councils) and/or a consumer trust. 

Additionally, the Bill introduces a range of restrictions against privatisation. For example, it is proposed that a water service provider may not use water assets as security on a loan. 

The proposed law, (Local Government (Water Services) Bill) provides a new approach to the management of stormwater services.