Keeping Water and Sewerage Local Will Benefit Residents
In a submission to the Inquiry into Water Supply and Sewerage Services, Glen Innes Severn Council has argued that it is in residents' best interests to maintain its current model of delivering water and wastewater services.
On 12 October 2007, the Hon. Nathan Rees, NSW Minister for Water Utilities and Emergency Services, announced an inquiry into water supply and sewerage services in regional NSW.
In Council's submission to the inquiry, General Manager, Hein Basson, wrote that Glen Innes Severn Council should retain control of local water and sewerage services. "Glen Innes Severn Council is ideally placed and committed to pursuing an holistic, sustainable, long-term planning approach - with a particular focus on achieving economic, whole-of-community outcomes through the proper integration of all the organisation's planning and management activities," he stated.
Council has identified that cooperative engineering arrangements within the Local Government Industry already exist. "The establishment of another Water Utility (e.g. a County Council as an additional governance structure) will add unnecessary cost for local communities," Mr Basson explained. "Local communities losing their water and wastewater functions will suffer significant negative socio-economic effects. Both the Council's Water and Sewerage Funds are healthy and sustainable in their own right. These facts clearly indicate that there is no need for Glen Innes Severn Local Water Utilities to be restructured."
Mr Basson explained that Council does not share its water sources and supplies with any other local government area. "It has a separate water catchment area, and is isolated from its neighbouring Council areas by the physical distance," he wrote. "No water-sharing, operational or community benefits will be gained in not leaving it to continue to manage and further improve its water utilities into the future."
Mr Basson argued that loss of the water utility would disrupt the economies of scale within the local area. "There is nothing to be gained by incorporating the Glen Innes Severn Council's water and wastewater functions into a larger organization, given that its management of the water supply and sewerage services already meets the requirements for Best Practice issued by the Department of Water and Energy," he said. "It is therefore strongly submitted that the status quo remains for the Glen Innes Severn Council".
Council representatives will attend the Water Inquiry Hearing at Inverell on Monday 12 May, to reiterate the case for retaining control of water and wastewater services.
The complete submission can be viewed by clicking here.
Contact details
Catherine McBride
cmcbride@gisc.nsw.gov.au
