Abstract
Safe, good quality drinking water is a foundation of public health. The first, and most significant, barrier against drinking water contamination and illness is the protection of source water. Source water refers to the bodies of water (groundwater, rivers, lakes, springs, reservoirs) from which we take our drinking water.
However, as a Canterbury community found last year when they were notified that their drinking water source breached the health standard for nitrate, the protection of communities’ source waters has been neglected and its importance too frequently downplayed by those in charge of land and water use.
In the wake of the Havelock North outbreak, new valuable legislative and policy reforms were made but the Waimate breach reveals there are still weaknesses in responsibility and accountability for the protection of water sources.
This Briefing describes how Waimate’s water came to be contaminated; identifies that the regional council was aware of the risk but didn’t take adequate action to prevent it; and makes recommendations for how the government can strengthen responsibility and accountability in Aotearoa’s drinking water supply system to ensure community health is prioritised and future contamination events prevented.