SEAN RUSH: In defence of Tamatha Paul

Recent coverage of Wellington’s wastewater issues has revived debate about decisions made during the city’s 2021-2031 Long‑Term Plan (LTP). At the time I was the portfolio lead for water and worked constructively with all Councillors to secure a record $678 million capital investment in the network over the ten-year plan, with more for a new sewage plant at Moa Point to minimise sludge. Public discussion has recently focused on two elements of that process: the option to significantly accelerate three‑waters investment, and the option to accelerate the cycling network programme. These two matters are now being linked in ways that imply one decision caused the other. That is not the case – I doubt any councillor of any political persuasion would support that claim. Tamatha Paul, now a Green party MP, has been singled out for particular criticism, unfairly in my view. She led the amendment to the LTP. Now the allegation is that she took funding from pipes to build cycleways and the result is the failure at Moa Point. It’s not. Here I set out what each decision actually involved and how they related — or did not relate — to one another.

During LTP deliberations, councillors considered several investment pathways for the city’s water infrastructure. There was the ‘maintain’ Option 1; Option 2 of enhanced capital investment of $678 million – the recommended option, and a third Option 3 of an accelerated three waters investment which involved a $1.5 billion capital investment with a rates increase of 5.85%.

Affordability was not the main consideration between the options. Wellington Water raised questions about deliverability. Option 3 was large enough that it risked exceeding realistic implementation capacity. Councillors needed confidence that any chosen programme could actually be executed. Officers couldn’t give it but Moa Point wasn’t the focus anyway. Half the funding focused on growth: population growth that was, at the time speculative, and hasn’t since materialised. The other half for network renewals — the underground pipes that transport wastewater and stormwater — but not the Moa Point treatment plant. Major investment for a new sewage plant at Moa Point was being committed to separately through the Sludge Minimisation Facility.

The LTP also required councillors to choose a preferred option for the city’s cycling network. Public consultation at the time showed strong support for “Option 4,” an enhanced programme that expanded the scale and speed of delivery compared with the more conservative “Option 3.” The financial implications of Option 4 were much smaller than those of the accelerated three waters investment option. Option 4 was expected to cost around $226 million over ten years, translating to a rates impact of about 1.31 percent, a change of just over half a percent.

Tamatha had a solution for funding. Council officers had identified approximately $100 million of insurance‑related savings across the ten‑year period. This was recommended to be applied as additional debt headroom to maintain balance‑sheet resilience. However, Tamatha with support from Labour/Green councillors and responding to community feedback, drafted an amendment to instead apply it to fund Option 4. The amendment did not remove funding from the wastewater network; the wastewater options were evaluated, consulted on, and costed independently. The decision to support the Option 4 cycleway was financially and procedurally separate from the choice not to adopt the Option 3 accelerated three waters investment programme (which did not involve Moa Point anyway).

Recent commentary suggests that choosing a different wastewater option during the LTP could have prevented the recent issues at Moa Point and affecting the “south coast.” But the accelerated three water investment option did not involve Moa Point. For the LTP the wastewater overflows affecting the “south coast” referred to the Karori treatment plant which overflows to Owhiro Bay, rather than failures linked to Moa Point and the overflow into Lyall Bay.

At this stage, the cause of the most recent failure has not been fully established. Flooding, mechanical malfunction, power systems, and safeguard protocols are all within the scope of the forthcoming investigation. Without knowing which factor or combination of factors was responsible, it is not possible to claim that selecting a different LTP wastewater investment option would have changed the outcome. That is pure mischief making. The LTP programme shapes long‑term renewal trajectories; it does not determine day‑to‑day operational reliability or emergency response performance.

Given these uncertainties, it is understandable that Wellingtonians are seeking clarity. But let’s leave the politics out. The city deserves transparent, evidence‑based explanations of what failed, why safeguards did not prevent the event, and whether the current investment pathway remains adequate. But until those findings are available, drawing direct causal links between LTP decisions made years earlier and the specific circumstances of this incident, risks creating confusion.

Sean Rush is an energy and infrastructure lawyer. He was an independent Wellington City Councillor from 2019 to 2022 with portfolio responsibility for water. This article was first published at The Post