Brooks calls for water services performance audit
Gosford West council election candidate Mr Kevin Brooks has written to the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal calling for a performance audit of Central Coast Council's water services.
He has reminded the agency that it promised a performance audit after two years when it approved Central Coast Council's application for a massive water rate increase in May 2022.
"Since IPART approved Council's application, water rates have increased 51 per cent with a typical water bill now 28 per cent more expensive than Sydney and 12.5 per cent more expensive that Hunter.
"But the promised performance improvements have not materialised with many performance measures going backwards."
Mr Brooks said IPART's July Water Utility Customer Satisfaction Report showed "another deterioration in customer satisfaction with Central Coast across all four categories".
"Central Coast Water also remains well behind all the other comparison water utilities in the survey.
"Public satisfaction with Central Coast is still lower than three years ago before it applied for the recent series of water rate hikes."
Mr Brooks said the report showed Overall Satisfaction down from 5.8 last quarter (Feb 2024) to 5.6 this quarter (May 2024).
"It was 6.0 three years ago in April 2021."
"Value for Money is down from 5.5 last quarter to 5.4 this quarter.
"It was 5.7 three years ago.
"Trust is down from 5.7 last quarter to 5.6 this quarter.
"It was 5.8 three years ago.
"Reputation is down from 5.3 last quarter to 5.1 this quarter.
"It was 5.4 three years ago."
Mr Brooks said: "Water rates have increased 51 per cent in three years, but we've not seen the promised performance improvements in return.
He said Central Coast was also well behind results achieved by Sydney and Hunter when they were included in the survey 12 months ago.
Sydney and Hunter's average overall satisfaction was 7.1 and 6.9 respectively, compared with Central Coast typically ranging between 5.5 and 6.0 and currently sitting at 5.6.
Mr Brooks said it was naive to expect improved performance simply by throwing more ratepayers money at a poorly-managed Council.
Instead, there needed to be reforms within Council to improve management, efficiency, productivity and culture.
"IPART should now honour the commitment it gave when approving Council's application for these massive price hikes by carrying out a performance audit.
"This performance audit should be independent and focus on management performance, efficiency and culture."
SOURCE:
Media release, 14 Jul 2024
Kevin Brooks, Ratepayers Choice