State of the Industry Report released

TasWater welcomes the Economic Regulator’s report on the State of the Industry (2016-17). It is a credible, independent assessment of TasWater’s progress as a business. It highlights both areas where TasWater meets community expectations and our key challenges.
The State of the Industry Report indicates that 99.4 per cent of our more than 200,000 customers now receive water which meets Australian Drinking Water Guidelines.
TasWater CEO Michael Brewster says this is up from 99.2 per cent the previous year with TasWater on track to meet our commitment to remove all health alerts by the end of August this year.
“Already 10 communities across the state have had their Boil Water or Do Not Consume health alerts lifted in the last 12 months.”
“It will be a milestone, enabling 100 per cent of our customers to drink their water straight from the tap.”
TasWater is also able to confirm that customers will soon have access to monthly water quality data specific to their area, in a move to provide more regular reporting to the public than seen before in Tasmania.
“TasWater is leading the way towards greater transparency and improved access to comprehensive water quality data.”
“The report further highlights our focus on customers with 89 per cent of calls to our Customer Service Centre answered within 30 seconds, the best performance of any water utility in the country. This demonstrates TasWater’s commitment to the Tasmanian community – we are a 24/7 service with TasWater crews working 365 days of the year.”
Michael Brewster says the report shows TasWater is getting on with the job of improving water and sewage systems across the state while maintaining the some of the lowest water charges on a litre-for-litre basis of any comparable utility in Australia with customers in Tasmania paying on average $150 a year less than householders interstate.
”Environmental performance is on the up. Of particular note is that overall sewage compliance is now at close to 86 per cent with the state’s largest treatment plant, Macquarie Point in Hobart, achieving 94 per cent compliance.”
“Our agreement with the Environmental Protection Authority to concentrate on improving the performance of thirteen key sewage treatment plants which treat the largest volumes of waste water is continuing to produce results.”
“However improvement in Environmental Compliance remains a priority and a key to achieving this is the management of trade waste, not only from large industrial organisations but also small business.”
“TasWater recognizes this is a difficult area for many of our small business customers and having listened to their concerns will soon announce a plan to assist them to achieve compliance.”
Again, TasWater does not shy away from our challenges. We know there remains a lot of work to do but we are making strong progress and have a fully funded, sustainable and achievable plan set down for the future.
TasWater