Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Gillian Blythe: Water New Zealand Chief Executive, Local Water Done Well to cost $9 billion more than previously estimated

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Gillian Blythe: Water New Zealand Chief Executive, Local Water Done Well to cost $9 billion more than previously estimated · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So local water done well is going to cost nine
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: billion dollars more than previously estimated. The total investment will
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: come to forty seven point nine billion dollars. The local
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: government Minister Simon What says, this just shows that water
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: projects have been underfunded. They can't wait any longer. We
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: have to spend the money. So the Water New Zealand
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Chief executive Officer is Gillian Blythe that she joins me
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: this morning. Good morning to you, Jillian, good morning. Why
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: is it blown out?
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: Why is it blown out? Because over the last two
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: to three decades across the country, councils have been trying
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: to juggle their many demands on their budgets and investment
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: and water infrastructure has not kept pace with what was required.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: So they haven't been as enough renewals of the pets
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: and they haven't been as much required in terms of
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: looking out of the treatment plan. So it's brutal.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: So it's brutal evidence that we have had decades of
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: under investment in water infrastructure and eventually you have to
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: pay the bill.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: You're absolutely right that what what The challenge that was
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: provided to councils through this through this reform process was
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: to submit a water service delivery plan that would show
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: that they were financially sustainable, that they were going to
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: meet regulatory compliance, that they would be able to deliver
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: on the housing growth and the urban developments that were
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: required in their neighborhoods. And so that's what's seens across
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: you know, detailed you know, financials for the ten year period,
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: and then it's some extra information for the next thirty
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: that is seen from all councils providing what they need
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: to spend on the murals, what they need to spend
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: on growth, and what we need to across drinking water,
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: wastewater and stormwater.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Have you seen the plan and does it look good?
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: And will we notice a difference so all of.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: The plans, Well, let me just go. So you've got
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: sixty seven councils that have submitted I think the last
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: time I went and looked at the website, they were
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: about fifty four that are on the website. We've got
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: more visibility now about the state of water infrastructure than
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: we've had probably ever. We will be able. I mean,
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: I've got people that are doing analysis of the plans
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: at the moment such that you can you know, you'll
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: be able to say, you know, what's happening in the
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: lowest sept what's happening in the you know, the top
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: of the north, et cetera, to be able to look
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: at what's what's going to be required.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, so look, the basic model is actually similar to
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: three waters, but it had a voluntary aspect of no
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: centralization and of course no co governance. And we were
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: always told that local water done well will be cheaper
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: than the big monster that was going to be three waters.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: Can you compare the two Is it still cheaper than
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: three waters would have been, even though it has burned
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: out by nine billion dollars and the whole thing is
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: forty seven point nine billion.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: I think, you know, as always is the case with this,
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: you know, you would be carefully comparing an apple with
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: an apple. Some of the figures that you saw under
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: the labor proposals, where you know, some of the big
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: headline figures were sort of one hundred and twenty one
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: hundred and eighty billion, but that was over thirty years.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: This was over that. The figures of forties seven point
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: nine billion or forty eight billion are over the first
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: ten years. You know, we're going to want the wants
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: the you know, in some cases the nineteen council controlled
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: organizations sort have come together either a single councils or
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: multi councils that have come together, are rather than going
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: to be looking at what it means for those districts
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: as for the in house business units. So we're going
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: to discover what's actually required, and then we've got to
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: come together and see whether we can continue to find
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: more efficiencies and more ways of leveraging the strengths that
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: exists across different councils provisions.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: At the moment, Yeah, when I saw some articles and
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: some news wild back comparing the ten year plan versus
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: the thirty year plan and the forty seven point nine
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: million if you expand that over three and they started
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: looking at the cost of it all, and they started saying, well,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: it looks like local water done well as going to
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: cost even more than three waters. But is that because
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: the infrastructure is more expensive.
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: I think the more you you know, just in the
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: same way as you look at your own house, you know,
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: the more you look at it, the more you realize
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: that you've got to spend a bit of money on
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: you know, painting that window or fixing that roos. What
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: what's happened is that there has been a real focus
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: on ensuring regulatory compliants. We've got wastewater treatment plants across
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: the country, you know, many who are We've got trends
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: and duty that are council owned, many of which are
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: on expired consents and needing upgrades. And so once you
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: start looking at those sorts of things, you've got to
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: work out, you know, right, you know, is there amodular solution,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: is there technologies?
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: And all I get that, I get that it is
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: only going to get more and more expensive. And I
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: thank you so much for your time today. That is
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: the Water in New Zealand Chief executive Jillian Blythe. For
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: more from Earlily Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live to
• 4:55
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