Wellington Moa Point sewage plant failure: Government investigation launched

The Government has appointed a team to investigate Wellington’s disastrous sewage plant failure.

Local Government Minister Simon Watts today announced the four-person Crown review team to probe what went wrong when the Moa Point facility catastrophically failed more than a month ago.

Former Watercare chief executive and current Water Services Authority chairman, Raveen Jaduram, will lead the team, alongside senior infrastructure engineer Garry Macdonald and lawyers Helen Atkins and Michael Weatherall.

“The review team’s work will provide that certainty by investigating what led to the failure and what must change to prevent it from happening again,” Watts said.

The team has been appointed to Wellington City Council as the facility’s owner and Wellington Water as the operator.

The review will run until the end of August, with the minister saying the team will produce its final report before then.

An interim report will be published before new water entity Tiaki Wai is established on July 1.

Watts will take the report’s final recommendations to Cabinet.

“My intention is to publicly release the findings as soon as possible while managing any risk of prejudicing the investigation or any enforcement action by Greater Wellington Regional Council or any commercial or legal action or claims,” he said.

Wellington Mayor Andrew Little said he was “pleased to see such a high-powered team is carrying out the review”.

Former Watercare chief executive Raveen Jaduram will head up the Government's probe. Photo / Greg Bowker

“I look forward to a comprehensive report,” Little said.

Raw sewage continues to be pumped out to Cook Strait from the Moa Point plant’s long outfall pipe near the mouth of Lyall Bay.

Beaches are back open at swimmers’ discretion, with officials advising beachgoers to check the conditions at lawa.org.nz.

So far, the public has not been told what could have led to the failure, with officials tight-lipped on what is known.

Wellington Water chief executive Pat Dougherty earlier said he was concerned the organisation had missed signs of problems at the plant.

“Over the last three or four months, I think there’s been a couple of incidents that I suspect may have been early warning signs that we missed,” Dougherty said in an interview.

After that interview, Dougherty would not be interviewed or comment on what those warning signs might have been.

Ethan Manera is a Wellington-based journalist covering Wellington issues, local politics and business in the capital. He can be emailed at ethan.manera@nzme.co.nz.