Well said Tova O'Brien - Three waters Fallout

[king1]

Have to agree with her, I think the blame for the $1.2B wasted lies with both parties equally...
Although one could argue that labour's share was a failing in hindsight whereas National does seem a bit spiteful in undoing all this when their plan seems to have a lot of similarities with labour?

Eye watering wasteful spending that both the last Labour and current National governments take a share of the blame for.

Labour, for advancing contentious legislation without properly communicating it to the public and therefore failing to bring people with them or make amendments before the damage was well and truly done.

National, for repealing for the sake of repealing without finding a way to capitalise on what had already been spent or redirect funds to build on what Labour had started.

And both parties are to blame for choosing politics over consensus, for lacking foresight, for failing to put the needs of their constituents first.

All political parties agree there needs to be greater cross-party consensus across major infrastructure works - to stop the endless, time consuming, money wasting cycle of announce, repeal, announce, repeal that comes with every change of government.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/3501767...s-blow-out

[Olive]

I pretty much agree with Tova.   Labour's initial communications about the 3 waters proposal were absolutely hopeless, and although I wanted to support 3 waters and persuade others to do so, I could not honestly say that I understood the proposals enough to do so.

By the time Labour's ambitions were clarified the information gap had been enthusiastically filled by ACT, National and other Atlas supporters and there was no going back.   Bigots all over Aotearoa were victorious.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

An awful lot of the uproar was because it was never fully understood by those who were major stakeholders.

Mind you, bringing that lot along with the proposal might have been a Sisyphean task for any leadership.

[Lilith7]

Yep, agreed. They really need to learn to work together, preferably for the good of us all - which would make a nice change if nothing else.

[harm_less]

I've got a friend who is on the Master Plumbers Association who has no doubts that most local councils don't have the finances or political courage to maintain the water infrastructures in their management. Between his comments and the knowledge that my late father installed much of New Plymouth's water, stormwater and sewer pipework back in the 1960's which is still in service. Typically those water mains are asbestos cement as was the norm back then so not a cheap procedure to replace them now.

What National have done by ditching 3 Waters is to push a huge upcoming infrastructure back onto the councils so expect significant rates rises coming to your town soon.

[king1]

I suppose also the discussion in the other thread about context can be applied to three waters also - the $1.2B suggested as "wasteful spending", is only a fraction of the overall cost of this project estimated at what $185 Billion?

But now we can add in fragmentation of purchasing and the smaller scale from multiple councils, time delays in implementing because of lack of resourcing - I imagine the cost is also going to blowout significantly from the original cost...

But I also wonder how much of that $1.2B could actually be leveraged going forward?

[Lilith7]

That isn't likely to increase their popularity at all...interesting times ahead.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

I've got a friend who is on the Master Plumbers Association who has no doubts that most local councils don't have the finances or political courage to maintain the water infrastructures in their management. Between his comments and the knowledge that my late father installed much of New Plymouth's water, stormwater and sewer pipework back in the 1960's which is still in service. Typically those water mains are asbestos cement as was the norm back then so not a cheap procedure to replace them now.

What National have done by ditching 3 Waters is to push a huge upcoming infrastructure back onto the councils so expect significant rates rises coming to your town soon.

It is like real estate though. The cheapest time to do it is now, if yesterday was not an option.

The silly thing is, these organisations can borrow at rates home buyers could only dream of. So why are they not investing? Because they value their roles more than those they were elected to serve.

Wait and see... Any minute now China will come along with this great offer...

[harm_less]

It is like real estate though. The cheapest time to do it is now, if yesterday was not an option.

The silly thing is, these organisations can borrow at rates home buyers could only dream of. So why are they not investing? Because they value their roles more than those they were elected to serve.

Wait and see... Any minute now China will come along with this great offer...

And so many of these councillors have adopted an electioneering platform of reducing excessive rating levels, and then they get elected and realise (if they are intelligent enough to) that rates actually struggle to finance all those modern expectations of potable water, environmentally sound waste water processes and stormwater systems that can cope with every increasing peak rainfall intensities, apart from all the other frills that councils are expected to provide for their ratepayers. Suddenly those idealists hit reality head on and they're treading water politically trying to ensure their long term survival in local body politics.

[Lilith7]

I've got a friend who is on the Master Plumbers Association who has no doubts that most local councils don't have the finances or political courage to maintain the water infrastructures in their management. Between his comments and the knowledge that my late father installed much of New Plymouth's water, stormwater and sewer pipework back in the 1960's which is still in service. Typically those water mains are asbestos cement as was the norm back then so not a cheap procedure to replace them now.

What National have done by ditching 3 Waters is to push a huge upcoming infrastructure back onto the councils so expect significant rates rises coming to your town soon.

It is like real estate though. The cheapest time to do it is now, if yesterday was not an option.

The silly thing is, these organisations can borrow at rates home buyers could only dream of. So why are they not investing? Because they value their roles more than those they were elected to serve.

Wait and see... Any minute now China will come along with this great offer...

They might, at that.

It just makes sense to do whatever's needed now rather than waiting till the need is nigh on desperate & its going to cost a king's ransom; putting it off even longer will increase frustration (to the extent that some may well move away) as well as cost.

[nzoomed]

I suppose also the discussion in the other thread about context can be applied to three waters also - the $1.2B suggested as "wasteful spending", is only a fraction of the overall cost of this project estimated at what $185 Billion?

But now we can add in fragmentation of purchasing and the smaller scale from multiple councils, time delays in implementing because of lack of resourcing - I imagine the cost is also going to blowout significantly from the original cost...

But I also wonder how much of that $1.2B could actually be leveraged going forward?

The 1.2 billion dollars spent on 3 waters could have gone a long way to councils in need, sounds like a drop in the bucket going forward on what was planned to be spent. 
I think central government has a role to oversee how water infrastructure is managed however.

A better funding model would be where councils in need apply for central govt funding as necessary, but appoint a minister in charge of the oversight on how the money is spent, etc.

And if fragmentation of spending is an issue, that's a key role that the government could take, where they buy the supplies on behalf of councils to cut costs down. I could see that working well and would make economic sense.

It is a bit ironic that Wellington of all places has had some of the worst managed water infrastructure in the country.

[Lilith7]

I suppose also the discussion in the other thread about context can be applied to three waters also - the $1.2B suggested as "wasteful spending", is only a fraction of the overall cost of this project estimated at what $185 Billion?

But now we can add in fragmentation of purchasing and the smaller scale from multiple councils, time delays in implementing because of lack of resourcing - I imagine the cost is also going to blowout significantly from the original cost...

But I also wonder how much of that $1.2B could actually be leveraged going forward?

The 1.2 billion dollars spent on 3 waters could have gone a long way to councils in need, sounds like a drop in the bucket going forward on what was planned to be spent. 
I think central government has a role to oversee how water infrastructure is managed however.

A better funding model would be where councils in need apply for central govt funding as necessary, but appoint a minister in charge of the oversight on how the money is spent, etc.

And if fragmentation of spending is an issue, that's a key role that the government could take, where they buy the supplies on behalf of councils to cut costs down. I could see that working well and would make economic sense.

It is a bit ironic that Wellington of all places has had some of the worst managed water infrastructure in the country.

That could likely work quite well & makes good sense...probably why it hasn't happened as yet.