Far North District Council to join Northland waters CCO

Far North District Council decided today to join Whangarei and Kaipara district councils in setting up an organisation to deliver drinking water and wastewater services across Northland.

During an Extraordinary Council Meeting held yesterday (20 May), it was decided that the council would become an equal shareholder in Northland Waters Limited (NWL), the final step in setting up a Northland-wide council-controlled organisation that will take over drinking water and wastewater services on behalf of all three councils next year.

The decision is a response to the Coalition Government’s Local Water Done Well reforms, which aim to address New Zealand's long-standing drinking, wastewater and stormwater challenges.

In supporting the proposal, Mayor Moko Tepania told the meeting that setting up and joining Northland Waters Done Well would likely be the biggest decision elected members would ever make for council. He acknowledged there remained some misgivings over establishing a regional organisation but said he was comfortable with the work and steps taken to make the decision.

Those steps included adoption of a joint Water Services Delivery Plan by all three Northland district councils in August 2025, which was approved by the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) in early October. In September 2025, chief executives of each council signed a commitment to work together to establish the council-controlled organisation (CCO), and in April 2026 each council re-committed to forming the CCO with an ‘in principle’ decision to proceed.

Today’s decision also approved a shareholders' agreement for Northland Waters Limited, its constitution and a transition agreement.

Details on the next steps forming the new CCO will be announced jointly in coming weeks.

You can find out more about this work on our Northland Water Done Well project page.

Northland Waters promises to provide Northland with:

• improved customer outcomes through more consistent, transparent and region-wide services
• better value through improved operational efficiency, reduced duplication and leveraging regional scale
• improved price certainty through consistent regional planning and financial management
• enhanced compliance performance by building region-wide capability to meet increasing regulatory requirements
• acceleration of future growth by unlocking greater borrowing capacity
• retention of local ownership while enabling a dedicated regional entity to operate more independently and effectively
• reduced water wastage through consistent, region-wide approaches to monitoring and network management
• establishment of clear, consistent performance targets and reporting expectations, improving transparency and accountability
• greater transformation and innovation through coordinated procurement, modern data management and improved delivery approaches
• coordinated region-wide planning and investment to water services delivery, aligned with catchment needs and shared regional priorities
• standardised data, systems and compliance processes to deliver clearer reporting and more reliable decision-making
• strengthened workforce capability by combining expertise, resources and career pathways across the region
• freeing up councils to focus on wider community priorities by shifting water service delivery to a specialised provider.