Committed to Tillegra?
Phil Costa, Minister for Water says he is committed to building Tillegra Dam because he believes its necessary and hasn’t had any information to change that belief.
It seems he is the only person who hasn’t heard that the Central Coast has solved its water needs for now and the future without the need for Tillegra Dam, and refuses to pay a cent towards it.
He hasn’t heard that respected independant water experts are agreed that Tillegra Dam is completely unnecessary, and he doesn’t know this was also the view expressed in Hunter Water documents right up until the Government made its unexpected announcement to build it.
He hasn’t heard that the 10 percent decrease in rainfall used by Hunter Water in its revised ad hoc storage simulation is completely at odds with the Government’s own Department of Environment and Climate Change predictions. Their detailed regional analysis shows that Hunter Water’s catchment will “more likely than not have a slight increase in annual run-off.”
He hasn’t heard that there is a world wide economic crisis and that already in the 2007-2008 financial year Hunter Water had to place 12,930 customers on payment plans and thousands of Hunter home owners narrowly avoided losing their properties because of unpaid council rates.
He hasn’t heard the estimated cost to build the dam has increased from $300 million to over $400 million since it was announced, a 33% increase in just in 2 years – and the design is still yet to be released.
He hasn’t heard the concerns of the NSW Water and Energy Ombudsman about the inability of people to afford these essential services because of rising costs.
The only thing he has heard is the complaints of the developers (benefitting from the supposed increased security of service) who were to pay for 60 percent of the cost of the dam. The Government vetoed that and said they won’t have to pay, leaving a $251 million shortfall that Hunter Water wants to pass onto existing customers.
This is the same Government that put NSW on the road to ruin with its other infrastructure decisions, such as the Cross City Tunnel bankrupt after 16 months and they are now paying over a million dollars a week to the Sydney Harbour Tunnel owners so they don’t go broke. The Auditor- General expects that to steadily rise over the next 5 years to 2 million dollars a week.
Will someone please tell the Minister to stop spending our money on this Tillegra Sham. We have better ways to spend our money and smarter ways to guarantee our water security.