Cost recovery is an important part of maintaining good water planning and management practices across our state.
In managing Western Australia’s water resources, the Department of Water provides many services.
These range from drainage assessments for new suburban developments to issuing licences to commercial water users to enable them take water.
The Economic Regulation Authority (ERA) is undertaking an inquiry into possible water resource management and planning charges.
The Treasurer of Western Australia set the terms of reference for the inquiry.
The inquiry is looking at the possibility of charging for our services.
As part of the inquiry we provide information on our business functions, activities, and costs to the ERA.
Our activities throughout the inquiry were as follows:
| June 2009 |
responded to the ERA's issues paper |
| August 2009 |
participated in the ERA's roundtable discussion |
| August 2009 |
responded to the ERA's principles paper |
| October 2009 |
responded to the ERA's draft report |
| January 2010 |
participated in the government response to the final report |
Our comprehensive submissions are available on our website under 'Publications' and from the ERA website www.erawa.com.au.
The ERA has provided two draft reports.
The first draft report provided draft recommendations for water resource management and planning charges.
The second draft report provided a set of proposed fees and charges that would recover a proportion of our costs (those that have been justified as being efficiently incurred).
The proposed charges were developed on the basis of advice from PricewaterhouseCoopers who reviewed the effectiveness and efficiency of our water resource management and planning activities and our costs.
Issues papers and draft reports developed throughout the inquiry include:
- June 2009 response to the ERA's issues paper
- August 2009 participation in the ERA's roundtable discussion
- August 2009 response to the ERA's principles paper
- October 2009 response to the ERA's draft report
- January 2010 participation in the government response to the final report
The appropriate government and parliamentary approval processes will be required to give us the statutory authority to implement the cost recovery.
Next steps
Once the ERA has completed its final report, the government will make a decision as to what extent, and how, cost recovery will be implemented.
We do not have the statutory authority to implement cost recovery without the appropriate government and parliamentary approval processes.
For more information on the ERA and the inquiry, see www.erawa.com.au.
If you would like to be on our mailing list to receive updates on our progress with the above please email costrecovery@water.wa.gov.au.