Today, Tiaki Wai takes responsibility for water networks across Porirua, Hutt Valley and Wellington and around 155,000 homes and businesses will start to see the direct impact of their investment on improving water services.

“We’re a new and different organisation in some important ways,” says Michael Brewster, Chief Executive of Tiaki Wai. “Our ability to borrow moves us forward from having to seek year-by-year funding from councils and lets us plan long-term to deliver the network renewals and maintenance our region needs.

This coming year will see Tiaki Wai spending around $800 million. About half will go into replacing and upgrading aging pipes and other critical assets, and foundational technology systems. The rest goes to delivering services across the region; that is, keeping water coming out of the taps and safely managing wastewater and stormwater.

“It’s no secret that there’s some big issues to face as we get going, and the numbers associated with those issues are big too, but we have to face up to the reality of the network we’re inheriting and get on with the job,” says Mr Brewster.

Home owners will now be billed direct for water services – drinking water supply, wastewater and stormwater – instead of through their rates. This will amount to about half of Tiaki Wai funding for the first year. The other half comes mainly from new borrowing, with some from development contributions and other sources.

Board Chair Will Peet says that major failures like Moa Point, and big risks such as the state of the Seaview outfall pipe, have proved the need for change in the way water services are delivered.

“The ability to have a direct relationship with the people we’re serving, to be able to engage communities as we grapple with big decisions about when and how we spend customer money, will be important,” says Will.

“We know we’re facing massive problems under our feet, on our coastlines and in our towns and cities. From today, we can get on with the job of dealing with a range of long-standing issues as well as planning a path forward.”

Michael Brewster says that as Tiaki Wai builds a new organisation, bringing together new management and existing knowledge and expertise, there is a lot to do behind the scenes.

“We’re taking over from a system where there’s been underinvestment in not only the infrastructure but also the systems and tools to manage that infrastructure effectively. We have to make sure our back-office is right, that our systems are right, and that all the things we need are in place so we can function in a cost-effective way and meet expectations.”

Tiaki Wai is Council-owned, and governed by a Partnerships Committee that includes Council representatives and Mana Whenua.

A “thank you” to Tiaki Wai for sending this article to The Upper Hutt Connection.

01/07/26