Sage Eugenie: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSage Eugenie: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 02 July 2013. Volume:691;Page:11560. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]11.EUGENIE SAGE (Green)to theAssociate Minister of Health: Is the Minister concerned that in 2011/12 92000 New Zealanders relied on drinking water supplies with an excessive number of E. coli breaches which are a marker of faecal contamination and if not why not?Hon JO GOODHEW (Associate Minister of Health):Tēnā koe e te Mana Whakawā. Yes I am. However in the majority of cases where contamination was identified water suppliers took immediate remedial action. I am not satisfied that the response was quick enough in a small number of cases covering 0.4 percent of the survey population. But I have been assured that these suppliers were followed up with district health board assessors immediately. The good news is that the Institute of Environmental Science and Research Ltd has advised me that there were no outbreaks of disease reported as a result of these breaches.Eugenie Sage: Is the Minister concerned that the number of people reliant on water supplies with an excessive number of E. coli breaches increased by 20000 between 2009-10 and 2011-12?Hon JO GOODHEW: What the report does show is that although there were some breaches in fact we are achieving some quite remarkable results. I point to the most remarkable side of this; we are looking at chemical breaches bacterial breaches and protozoal breaches. The most important improvement is the 79.1 percent of protozoal standards improved to 79.8 percent. They are the most expensive to treat and the most difficult to treat. And it is also in protozoal prevention that we actually have to spend the most money which we do through our subsidies to the drinking-water schemes.Eugenie Sage: Does the Minister agree with the Ministry of Health that the most important way to manage drinking-water supply is to protect the source of the supply; if not why not?Hon JO GOODHEW: What I do understand is that each supplier that is covered in the drinking-water scheme will receive very good advice from the Ministry of Health about either having protection for their scheme—that might be chemical protection—or in fact that they will have a public health risk management plan. That will mean that they have to give effect to understanding where the water supply is coming from and that there will be enough testing so that they immediately detect if either chemical protozoal or bacterial breaches occur so that they can protect the population concerned.Eugenie Sage: Why has her Government cut funding for small communities to upgrade their drinking-water supplies by $16.3 million in Budget 2012 while allocating more than $80 million to subsidise irrigation when agricultural intensification is a major cause of water pollution?Hon JO GOODHEW: The first thing I would like to actually deal with is that this report this annual review of drinking-water quality does not find any causes of these particular breaches. So if the member feels that she read that in the report she is quite wrong. It is not there. Secondly I want to tell the member that in fact we changed theway that the subsidy scheme was actually delivered. What there is is still 3 years of $10 million per year of subsidies to deprivation index seven to 10. We have spent $66 million already actually providing 171 suppliers with fully upgraded water supplies. There are 72 projects under way. In fact this is targeting the areas of the country that most need the money—something this Government is far better at than the previous Government.Eugenie Sage: Why is the last round of funding for the drinking-water subsidy scheme in February 2015 when the ministerial advisory committee on drinking water compliance is concerned that 48 percent of medium-sized schemes do not comply with the New Zealand drinking-water standard for protozoa which of course include giardia and cryptosporidium and when that same committee is concerned with the low level of compliance by small and medium sized schemes; so why is the scheme ending in February 2015?Hon JO GOODHEW: What I am able to tell the member is that the applications that we are receiving from the water schemes all around the country are receiving the subsidies that they require. The $10 million has not been fully subscribed so therefore no schemes are missing out on the subsidies they are actually applying for. We have structured this so that the schemes come in on a rolling basis during a period of time when this Government has taken into account that territorial local authorities need to plan for the future in a reasonable way not in fact going holus-bolus and going broke in the process. This Government is very mindful of clean drinking-water for New Zealand’s population.