Water charges must be universal

We received at home a bill for excess water charges recently. It amounted to $26.88. We had been a bit nervous about how high it might be as we have a large site with expansive gardens including vegetables growing profusely.

Many houses aren’t being sent water charges because they have no water meters. This is just poor public policy and unfair. However, we should not assume that water is a free commodity. It’s an essential resource for our lives. Everybody should receive a bill to show whether they are managing their water supply equitably.

Here’s the link to the CCC webpage on the background to the charges https://www.ccc.govt.nz/services/water-and-drainage/water-supply/water-reporter/

In the Press recently a group of residents were moaning about their water bills. In the article there was a photo of a woman watering her garden and under it were the words:

Heather Law and her husband Randal are refusing to pay their water bill and plan to invoice the council $45.06 for their contribution to promoting the Garden City through their garden and an Airbnb on their property.

What a load of rot. We live in the garden city and we all have to play our part. I know the charges aren’t fair right now. But we all have to play our part.

The article highlighted that the account for excess water could highlight broken pipes on the site. I remember years ago we were informed by CCC that we were in the top 10% of the city with our water usage. With that information we set about checking our property and found we had a broken pipe, which we didn’t know about. We had this pipe replaced and our usage dropped right down.

In a city ravaged by earthquakes many properties will have broken pipes unbeknown to householders. Sending these bills out will motivate most people to remedy a problem they didn’t realise they had.