Multiple perspectives aired at water hui

The chief executives of the Hawke's Bay District Health Board, Hawke's Bay Regional Council and Hastings District Council have all reaffirmed their commitment to work together to protect the region's water.

Yesterday about 80 people attended the second day of a two-day water symposium in Havelock North, which proffered multiple perspectives on the state of play with water in the region, and considerations for the future.

DHB chief executive Kevin Snee said having taken into account lessons learned from the Havelock North water contamination, a key focus for the DHB would be on the role of drinking water assessors.

He said he had proposed to the Government that assessors - currently contracted to DHBs - be brought under the auspices of DHBs to improve the flow of information and communication.

In this and other respects, he said Stage 2 of the Havelock North water inquiry would have profound implications on how agencies worked together to protect water.

"We have to have a different mindset - it will be hard but that will happen when we work together as a community."

Hastings District Council chief executive Ross McLeod iterated his desire to work collaboratively, and after expressing accountability for some of the failings that led to the gastro outbreak he posed the question of whether thinking around water needed to be broader.

"This country has grown on the back of farming and rural production but how are we going to manage the conflicting values that come from these activities?"

He said that since the Havelock North event this had become a matter of national interest, and water safety issues were being experienced across the country.

"We need to make sure the lessons from Havelock North are applied across the industry. Water is precious - we have seen what can happen when things go wrong - we need to look at the values of how we are operating.

"Do we need to change? Technical fixes are one thing but it might be about values and behaviours."

Hawke's Bay Regional Council group manager strategic development James Palmer said that overall the Heretaunga aquifer was in a healthy state although there were issues in some places, particularly near where municipal supplies were being extracted, and areas where the aquifer was shallow.

Moving forward, he said the regional council was conducting an audit of all registered drinking water bore supplies in the region as well as all private bores within 2000m of those.

In addition the council was reviewing its State of the Environment monitoring, as well as undertaking risk assessments on bores supplying drinking water.

Within the TANK (Tutaekuri, Ahuriri, Ngaruroro and Karamu catchments) plan change process he said agencies would also be considering whether grazing animals should be a permitted activity in the Brookvale area going forward.

The importance of water to the region was highlighted by Economic Solutions economist Sean Bevin, who cited a 2012 consultancy report commissioned by Ngati Kahungunu which calculated that all water bodies in the Hawke's Bay area, providing for household, irrigation and other industry use, had a value to the region of $311 million.

He said water was a vital community and economic resource for the region and further growth in water demand was likely.

As such, there would be a need for high quality management and the implications for possibly charging for water use would need to be thought through carefully in the future.