Who are the players fixing Wellington’s water woes?

Wednesday, 31 July 2024

Wellington Water grabs all the headlines but as Nicholas Boyack reports, there are a lot of players involved in the provision of water services.

When what is now Wellington Water was set up more than 20 years ago, it sounded like a great idea.

Much of the initial impetus for a council-owned organisation, looking after water on behalf of the councils across the region, came from a Hutt City Council officer Stephen Garlick, who questioned the need for each council to have its own team of engineers and workers looking after pipes and treatment plants.

Initially, only Wellington City joined Hutt City in what was then called Capacity. Eventually, the other councils came on board and today Wellington Water is owned by Hutt City, Porirua, Upper Hutt and Wellington City councils, the South Wairarapa District Council and Greater Wellington Regional Council.

Wellington Water is responsible to a board of directors, headed by Nick Leggett. There are, however, other players involved. The councils and iwi have representatives on the Wellington Water Committee and its role to “provide governance and leadership”.

Greater Wellington also has a role, supplying bulk water to the region. There is also Taumata Arowai, the water services regulator. It has increasingly become more involved in monitoring Wellington Water, as it seeks to ensure that Wellington does not run out of water every summer.

The main players

Tonia Haskell: With a background in commercial law, Tonia Haskell has been the chief executive of Wellington Water since May 2023. She has held numerous jobs in infrastructure roles and public transport. Her Linkedin profile describes her as a “gregarious and values driven person who enjoys thinking at a strategic level and driving operational excellence through powerful leadership”. Haskell is an approachable chief executive, who is willing to engage with the media.

Nick Leggett: A former Porirua mayor, who also stood for the Wellington mayoralty, Leggett is the chairperson of the Wellington Water Board. Politically, he has been linked to both Labour and National. Currently the chief executive of Infrastructure New Zealand, he has also held roles with the New Zealand Alcohol Beverage Council and Road Transport Forum. Leggett has front-footed the issues faced by Wellington Water and as board chair, he accepted responsibility for the $51m blunder and apologised publicly.

Campbell Barry: The Hutt City mayor chairs the Wellington Water Committee, made up of representatives from all the councils and iwi. He has tried to work positively with Wellington Water but must be frustrated with the most recent report, which showed a dysfunctional culture and ongoing reluctance to admit to its mistakes.

Not all the mayors, notably Upper Hutt’s Wayne Guppy and Wellington’s Tory Whanau, are as supportive of Wellington Water.

Vanessa MacFarlane: Hers is a name most readers will not have heard of. MacFarlane has the challenging role of heading communications at Wellington Water. Her approach has been to proactively raise awareness of the magnitude of the challenges confronting the water entity. Many organisations facing such financial and operational headaches would retreat behind a wall of no comment. Instead, she has facilitated the supply of information, making sure the media understand why the region needs to spend $1 billion a year for 30 years on water infrastructure.

The organisations

Wellington Water: Wellington Water describes itself as “Wellington region’s professional water services provider.” Its job is to manage the infrastructure and deliver water services to our communities.

“Our purpose is to create excellence in three water services so our communities can prosper. ” it says on its website. To do that, it relies on council funding and that is where things have gone badly awry. Instead of investing in regular pipe renewals, councils like Wellington and Hutt City have done what is called “sweating the pipes”, a nice way of saying the councils have let the pipes reach the end of their life without making any provision for replacement. Wellington Water’s task is to clean up a mess it did not create.

Water Board: Wellington Water is governed by a board of directors made up of the chairperson Leggett and five independent directors. Water is a public asset and the supply of water services is central to the Wellington economy. In other words people care about water and unlike a board for a private company, the water board is much more visible. Of the other directors, the most influential appears to be Pat Dougherty, a senior consultant with Tregaskis Brown. He fills in for Leggett and has experience as a council chief executive and water engineer.

Wellington Water Committee: This is where things get confusing. All four metropolitan mayors are on the committee, as well as a representative from the regional council. Its terms of reference suggests that the committee and not the board is responsible for governance.

Upper Hutt mayor Wayne Guppy uses the committee to criticise Wellington Water, earlier this week calling it incompetent. Greater Wellington representative Ros Connelly is more reserved in her remarks and regularly uses the committee to ask probing questions and challenge the way Wellington Water is run.

Taumata Arowai: The water service regulator is likely to play a more prominent role in coming years. Wellington Water has said that there is an increasing risk of running out of water over summers. In May, Taumata Arowai said it would “actively monitor” the efforts of Wellington Water and councils to reduce the likelihood of acute water shortages. Wellington Water submitted a plan to Taumata Arowai, setting out how it would reduce water loss and increase storage.