Construction sector wants Northern Ireland Water mutualised
Northern Ireland’s construction sector wants publicly-owned Northern Ireland Water to be mutualised. It argued such a move was preferable to improving its finances by introducing domestic water charges as currently under consideration by the UK government and Stormont.
Mutualisation is effectively the process of changing the business model from part-government-owned to a structure where stockholders or customers own a majority of shares, and where the organisations can raise funds.
According to a report from the Construction Employers Federation (CEF), NI Water’s capital expenditure budget is being eaten away by unprecedented inflationary challenges which will erode the annual figure of £600m needed to meet upcoming price controls.
The CEF argued that NI Water needs a defined income stream. “We do not believe that this requires the introduction of individual household billed water charging nor, indeed, any uplift in the existing rate bills paid for by domestic consumers. Rather, from existing rate bills, a directly hypothecated income stream to NI Water could be created thus, along with additional legislation in respect of their governance model, enabling them to borrow against their assets.”
The report concluded : “Short of this type of fundamental reform, we fail to see how the NI Executive can, sustainably, fund NI Water’s capex needs given their crucial need to fund wider economic activity such as homebuilding.”
The Northern Ireland Utility Regulator has published for consultation its draft Forward Work Plan (FWP) which lists the projects that it proposes for 2024/20245.
The watchdog said it would "particularly welcome views on:
whether we have prioritised the right projects;
any objections to our proposed projects; and
any other comments."
It has described most of the projects as "major pieces of work which will span the business planning year (and in some cases will take more than one year to complete).
Comments should be sent to NIUR by 1 March 2024 at the latest to: barbara.brown@uregni.gov.uk.
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