A new water efficiency pricing model will be introduced to protect the State’s most precious resource for the long term.
The changes will deliver lower than expected water fees for everyday Western Australians, halving the forecast fixed water service charge increase from six per cent to three per cent.
Under the pricing model, water charges for the representative household were due to increase by six per cent in 2018-19. Instead the increase will be 5.5 per cent.
A large component of households’ water bills is the fixed service charge, which does not reflect the amount of water a household uses. By halving the fixed service charge increase, households with lower water usage will benefit.
To offset this reduction, WA’s biggest water users will receive an average increase to their water bills of about 16 per cent for metropolitan customers and about 10 per cent for regional customers.
The biggest users in Perth and country north areas use more than 500KL, and those in country south areas use more than 300KL. In total, less than seven per cent of Perth households use 17 per cent of Perth’s residential water use.
The representative household uses 240KL of water per annum, which equates to 1,041 wheelie bins full of water.