Water campaign shelved

A PROPOSED $200,000-plus fighting fund to campaign against the intended takeover of TasWater has been shelved after less than half of local councils contributed.

Local Government Association of Tasmania chief executive Katrena Stephenson yesterday said the association “pulled the plug’’ last month on its cash request to councils to fund a central campaign against the proposed State Government takeover.

The decision was made about a month after LGAT president Doug Chipman wrote to the 23 councils opposing the takeover to contribute “at least the equivalent of 1 per cent’’ of their annual dividend from the council-owned water authority.

Some councils, such as Brighton Council, have instead decided to fund and run their own campaigns while others, perhaps because of their size, only made small contributions, including West Coast Council, which offered LGAT $400.

Dr Stephenson said the $200,000 was not needed at this stage while the legality of the proposed takeover, being LGAT’s main focus, was in limbo.

“We only heard back from about a third of councils before we pulled the plug,’’ Dr Stephenson said.

She said she wasn’t aware how much money had been pledged before the central funding campaign plan was axed.

“Some of them [councils] had gone above the 1 per cent and others were around the 1 per cent [of annual dividend returned by TasWater],’’ Dr Stephenson said.

“At the time we wrote to them, we had not formed a committee to work out what we were going to do.

“We don’t think that’s value for money at this stage.

“We advised members we might come back to them.

“We will measure that as required. Given that we don’t believe the Government takeover is lawful, the focus is on whether the legislation can be passed.’’

Treasurer Peter Gutwein said most ratepayers supported the takeover.

“I’m glad councils have abandoned their plans to waste ratepayers’ money campaigning against something that ratepayers actually want,’’ Mr Gutwein said. “Councils and LGAT have clearly realised that our proposal has enormous community support.’’

The Mercury revealed last month the Department of Premier and Cabinet spent $27,698 from taxpayers advertising the Government’s water and sewerage policy last financial year.

Earlier this year, LGAT spent $65,000 on a general television advertising campaign titled Better Councils, Better Communities.

In his May letter to councils, Ald Chipman noted LGAT needed additional resourcing given the “nature and scale’’ of the takeover fight.