Cash-strapped households should not be hit with the costs of fixing strained water infrastructure as users in Sydney and surrounds face a possible 50 percent price hike, the New South Wales (NSW) opposition said.
State-owned utility Sydney Water has reportedly submitted that water prices should rise by 18 percent from July 2025, then by seven percent every year for four years.
The price hike, if adopted by the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal, could see water bills rise by hundreds of dollars each year in Sydney and the Hawkesbury.
The tribunal periodically reviews pricing for all water corporations as they are government-owned monopolies.
NSW shadow treasurer Damien Tudehope said Sydney’s Water claim showed $16.6 billion (US$10.9 billion) in new water infrastructure, most in Sydney’s west, was needed to keep pace with population.
Families already struggling with rising costs for energy, groceries, and other essentials “shouldn’t be forced to shoulder the additional burden of funding infrastructure” due to “the Albanese Labor government’s failed immigration policies,” he said.
Australia’s surging population growth has recently fuelled attacks from the federal coalition, with migration policy central to its campaign at the next election due in 2025.
Tudehope urged NSW Premier Chris Minns to seek Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s help to rein in immigration to help keep a lid on prices.
“You can’t ignore that fact that if you want to deliver housing targets then you’ve got to deliver the infrastructure,” Tudehope told reporters in Sydney.
“That’s the problem that we’re faced with at the moment, the link between housing targets and immigration.”
State Water Minister Rose Jackson said Minns had written to the pricing tribunal, outlining the state government’s focus on the cost of living.
But she said the agency was independent of government and conceded more water infrastructure was “desperately needed” to support housing.
“It’s important that they (the tribunal) go through the process of assessing these applications,” Jackson told reporters in the town of Griffith.
A decision on the tribunal’s pricing review is expected in March.
Water price increases over the next five years would be critical to support more housing, the industry group Property Council NSW said.
“We understand the impact these increases may have on residents and businesses alike, but it’s an essential step to secure long-term, high-quality water services for our city,” executive director Katie Stevenson said.
“These increases will service growth right across western Sydney over the next decade in key growth areas including the south and northwest growth areas, greater Macarthur, greater Penrith to Eastern Creek, and Mamre Road and the Aerotropolis.”
As part of national housing accords, NSW has pledged to deliver 377,000 new homes by 2029, with more than 150,000 of them to be located in Sydney’s west and southwest.
