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WELCOME
A message from our Chairman and Managing Director November 2020
Terry Lawler AO
Darren Cleary
The past year has been unlike any other in our long and proud history. As a region, we have experienced one of the worst droughts on record, with Hunter Water storages falling to 52 per cent capacity in early February 2020, necessitating the introduction of Level 2 water restrictions for the first time in 40 years. In late 2019, our region, state and nation experienced the devastation of the Black Summer bushfires, and since then the global community has experienced a worldwide pandemic and the largest economic contraction since the Great Depression. Our focus throughout has been how we at Hunter Water can best support our community to continue to be resilient to such challenges. We must commend our people - employees and contractors - who have shown resilience and innovation, responding quickly and effectively to the demands of these crises, helping to meet the needs of our customers and region. Our corporate values of Leading, Wellbeing, Trust, Inclusion and Learning have very much been on display over the last year. Our first priority in responding to COVID-19 has been to adapt the way we work to ensure the safety of the community and our people whilst delivering essential water and wastewater services. In March and April 2020, our operational and maintenance staff rapidly adjusted their work practices to ensure that they could meet all relevant health and social distancing guidelines. Since March, the majority of our office-based staff have been working remotely. The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been felt by our community and we have focused on how we can support and assist those customers who are experiencing financial hardship. Our customers and communities must be commended for their response to drought. They have embraced Love Water and helped us to conserve our most precious resource. Together, homes and businesses used 15 per cent less water than forecast, saving the equivalent of the consumption of 52,000 homes. Our community’s commitment was matched by Hunter Water’s continued efforts to reduce water loss across our network. During the year, we reduced water leakage by a further 13 per cent, taking cumulative savings to 34 per cent over the last three years. We also surveyed more than 100 per cent of our network for leaks and breaks, implemented innovative technologies, and increased recycled water schemes and dual reticulation – switching on a new recycled water scheme at East Maitland. Rightfully, this annual report documents the year in review, transparently sharing with our community Hunter Water’s key achievements and overall business performance from July 2019 to June 2020. Financially we continue to perform well. The most significant impact to Hunter Water’s financial performance was drought and related activities, which resulted in lower revenue from water usage at the same time as increasing operating expenditure across the year. As this report confirms, total revenue for the year was $368.4m, down $7.2m from 2018-19. Total expenses were $297.2m (up $17.9m, primarily due to drought-related costs including operation of the Tomago sandbeds, water
LOVE WAT E R | ALL IN THIS TOGETHER
