Tiaki Wai spending to be independently scrutinised

Wellingtonians will get independent scrutiny of how Tiaki Wai spends their money, with the Government imposing tougher regulation on the region's water services provider, Local Government Minister Simon Watts and Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Cameron Brewer say. The Government has accepted a Commerce Commission recommendation to impose performance requirement regulation on Tiaki Wai for the next 10 years - the first time this tool has been used on a water services provider in New Zealand. "Wellingtonians are being asked to pay a great deal, and they are entitled to know exactly what they are getting for it," Mr Watts says. "Decades of local underinvestment have left this region with water networks that are not up to standard, and the cost of fixing them is now landing directly on households. Given the scale of investment required, strong accountability is essential. "The Government will be watching Tiaki Wai very closely. I have a low threshold for considering further intervention if we do not see clear and sustained performance improvements," Mr Watts says. "This is about restoring confidence that the money being collected is delivering the infrastructure and services peo