Australian Water Management Review Vol. 1 2014 | Page 7

foreword

The future of the urban water industry
In the last issue of this magazine I set out the industry
vision of WSAA members to 2030 – customer driven,
enriching life – and the outcomes we want to achieve.
This vision reflects both the efforts of the urban water
industry to ensure the customer is at the centre of all our
activities and the vital role water plays in all our lives.
The industry is entering a new era of greater
engagement with, and focus on meeting our customers’
needs. This is possible due to the solid foundations
that have been built over many years to ensure the
urban areas of Australia have resilient, diversified and
high quality water supply.
The time is right and the opportunity beckons: the
ongoing climate change in Perth and the recent dry
hot spells and emerging predictions of an El Niño
for next summer should be constant reminders that
managing out urban water systems is always a priority,
not when drought is the here and now. We have a gift
in Australia of professional water managers, top notch
researchers and a pent up demand for innovation. All
of us: associations, industry (private and public) and
research and business have a responsibility to drive
reform and implement change. We can’t expect, nor
should we, the governments of the day to carry the
reform challenge.
However, they should do their part. It is also the right
time to consider what governments – local, state and
national – must to do to address the challenges facing
the urban water industry. For example:

1. There is a need to better manage the ongoing
tension between affordability and the long term
viability of the industry. Financial viability is not an
end in itself, but is necessary for water businesses
to continue to provide a secure water supply and
reliable services to customers.
2. Establishing the preconditions to ensure customers
benefit from increased private sector involvement,
including privatisation of parts of the industry and the
entry of new players to increase competition. WSAA
supports greater private involvement and capital
recycling where it preserves and enhances the public
and private value delivered by water utilities.

Adam Lovell, Executive
Director, Water Services
Association of Australia

3. Addressing the challenges related to urban growth,
and developing increased liveability of our cities
and towns.
In WSAA’s views all these issues coalesce around the
need for a national approach and a new national water
initiative.
The immediate priority is to improve economic
regulation across Australia. The initiative should bind
state governments to implement a regulatory framework
which has clear objectives, is customer-centric, provides
for broader costs and benefits can be incorporated
into investment decisions for the full range of services
across water cycle, includes appropriate risk sharing
mechanisms, has strong incentives for efficiency and
innovation and contains an appeal mechanism.
In addition there is a requirement to develop the institutional
frameworks at the state level to ensure that greater private
involvement in the urban water industry directs benefits to
where they are really meant to go – to customers.

Australian wat e r m a n a g e m e nt r e vie w 1