Service Provision
At the local level, commercialisation and corporatisation of many Australian urban water businesses has led to management responsibilities being vested in commercial utilities, in contrast to earlier arrangements where services were provided directly by an arm of government. The role of the utility's board members is to provide commercial skill and focus, as well as to buffer the organisation from arbitrary political interference. The private sector is involved primarily through Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) contracts for major treatment plants, including desalination plants.
The institutional arrangements for service provision vary among States and Territories. In parts of Queensland and in Tasmania, for example, local government is responsible for the provision of water services. In other states and territories, different arrangements have evolved. In New South Wales, Victoria and Southeast Queensland, there are separate municipal retail service providers and state bulk service providers that cover large parts of each state. In other states, such as South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territories integrated state-level water utilities are in charge of both bulk water supply and retail distribution.
South East Queensland has reformed its water sector in 2008. Under the new structure four state-owned authorities (Seqwater, LinkWater and the SEQ Water Grid Manager) are in charge of bulk water supply:
- Seqwater supplies water from conventional sources such as dams, weirs and treatment plants as well as water from non-conventional sources such as the Gold Coast Desalination Plant and the Western Corridor Recycled Water Project.
- LinkWater owns the transport infrastructure, and
- the SEQ Water Grid Manager operates the transport infrastructure.
There are three retail utilities, each owned by a group of local governments:
- Queensland Urban Utilities, which distributes water in five council regions (Brisbane, Ipswich, Lockyer Valley, Scenic Rim and Somerset).
- Unity Water serving the Sunshine Coast and Moreton Bay,
- and Allconnex serves Logan.
In Sydney, New South Wales, a catchment authority (Sydney Catchment Authority) has been established to supply water in bulk to the retail water and wastewater utility Sydney Water, a statutory State owned corporation, wholly owned by the New South Wales Government.
In Melbourne, Victoria, three government-owned companies (City West Water Ltd., South East Water Ltd., and Yarra Valley Water Ltd.) are the retailers and the wholesaler is a government-owned corporation, Melbourne Water. The wholesaler also controls the catchment for most of its supply.
In Adelaide, South Australia (SA), water and sanitation services are provided by SA Water. In 1996 the SA Government awarded French-owned United Water a 15-year contract to manage and operate the metropolitan Adelaide water and wastewater systems on behalf of SA Water. SA Water retains ownership of all infrastructure, sets service standards, and implements the government’s pricing policy. SA Water also maintains control of all asset investment decisions, billing and revenue collection. When the contract expired in 2011 SA Water decided not to short-list United Water for the follow-up contract. The South Australian government had accused the company of overcharging. In January 2011 the follow-up operation and maintenance contract with a duration of 6 years, plus another 6 years based on the performance during the first 6 years, was won by Allwater, a consortium consisting of Degremont and Suez Environnement from France as well as the Australian company Transfield Services.
In Western Australia the Water Corporation, a government-owned corporation, provides urban water services.
In Canberra, and the Australian Capital Territory generally, a public-private multi-utility partnership (ActewAGL), of which 50% is owned by the state-owned asset-holding company ACTEW, provides services electricity, gas, water and wastewater services since 2000.
A government-owned multi-utility, the Power and Water Corporation, provides services to the larger and less remote communities in the Northern Territory, including Alice Springs and Darwin.
Most organisations providing urban water services in Australia have experienced some degree of organisational reform in the 1990s, which has clarified accountabilities by separating policy, regulatory and commercial (operational) functions. The accepted wisdom is that this separation provides urban water businesses with clear commercial goals of customer service, while safeguarding public health and achieving environmental compliance in a sound business operation, free of other conflicting objectives.
For a brief profile of each of the 33 of the largest water companies in Australia see: WSAA Members
Read more about this topic: Water Supply And Sanitation In Australia, Responsibility For Water Supply and Sanitation
Famous quotes containing the words service and/or provision:
“The general who advances without coveting fame and retreats without fearing disgrace, whose only thought is to protect his country and do good service for his sovereign, is the jewel of the kingdom.”
—Sun Tzu (6th–5th century B.C.)
“Why should the generations overlap one another at all? Why cannot we be buried as eggs in neat little cells with ten or twenty thousand pounds each wrapped round us in Bank of England notes, and wake up, as the Sphinx wasp does, to find that its papa and mamma have not only left ample provision at its elbow but have been eaten by sparrows some weeks before we began to live consciously on our own accounts?”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)