Watercare Growth Cost 15 year Recovery: 15 October 2024
Something is just not right: Watercare (Auckland) currently recovering costs from new homes over a 15 year recovery period, mortgages are over a greater time period than this.
Some of what I have recently learned is a wee bit over my head so please note that.
When London had the ‘Great Stink’ and upgraded their sewer system (Joseph Bazalgette 1858) they did it with government bonds, likely over 50 years or longer.
Auckland charges just their new builds for anything over 65m2 $30,000 per new water installation. They recover the full cost of the asset over 15 years, this seems horribly short to me.
One site that is 800 m2 may have 10 small houses on it, they pay $300,000 collectively for each house (say 20 bedrooms). If four large houses (say 20 bedrooms) are built, collectively the cost will be $120,000. Clearly not fair or equitable as the small houses will use a considerable less amount of water. Not fair, nor equitable.
Worse to me, is that the cost recover is over 15 years. It seems that this is due to the limited access to funds that the local council’s have. These costs are not the small local lines but the big facilities, all funded by new builds only and dependent on house building and city growth.
It looks like it is being addressed, councils have large asset infrastructures but they need access to reasonable and fair money.
We just can’t build in some areas anymore, this pressures the cost of housing in the areas that remain. It also encourages a lot more Greenfield development creating even more infrastructure demand (trains, roads, extended pipes).
Does NZ have a 100 year infrastructure plan?
See a link to today’s Business Desk article — worth reading.
