Source: Radio New Zealand
Mahurangi Oysters owner Jim Aitken. Nick Monro
A group of North Auckland oyster farmers are calling for more transparency on how Watercare came to its final calculation on compensation over a sewage spill into the Mahurangi River last year, that contaminated tens of thousands of oysters during the businesses’ peak season.
Wastewater poured into the Mahurangi River for over 17 hours, after a power surge tripped up the pumps at Watercare’s Warkworth Street wastewater plant in late October.
Reviews found that a faulty surge protection component at the plant meant the pumps could not restart, and a critical overflow alarm that was not working had delayed the discovery of the overflow.
Watercare estimated that half of the 1200 cubic metres of overflow went into the Mahurangi River, while the remaining was contained to the plant.
It announced on Thursday its last tranche of compensation payment – $750,000 – for Mahurangi oyster famers and the wider aquaculture industry, which came on top of the $2 million already paid to eight affected oyster farms.
It said part of the $750,000 was for a ninth oyster farmer who made a subsequent claim, and part of it would go towards Aquaculture New Zealand (AQNZ) for it to distribute to all impacted oyster farmers.
AQNZ, representing the affected farmers, said the “full and final settlement” did not cover lost income, cancelled sales, reputational harm and ongoing disruption to production.
An AQNZ spokesperson said the organisation was offered half a million in the final round of compensation, but had not accepted the money yet, as it felt Watercare had not made it clear how that money should be used.
Its CEO Teena Hale-Pennington said in a statement that farmers needed to see how Watercare assessed the losses and reached those final figures.
“At this stage, neither AQNZ nor individual farmers have received the independent assessment findings for their farms, nor information outlining the assumptions used in Watercare’s assessment.
“Without access to this material, farmers are unable to fully understand how assessments were undertaken or how conclusions were reached,” she said.
Meanwhile, Watercare maintained that its processes were robust.
“We commissioned an independent loss assessment to understand the financial impact of the October event on oyster farmers, resulting in the farms being shut down by MPI (Ministry for Primary Industries) during a critical part of their harvesting season.
“This process has informed Watercare’s approach to resolving the claims,” said its chief operating officer Mark Bourne, who added that the total compensation covered the losses attributed to the event.
Watercare chief operating officer Mark Bourne. Jessie Chiang
Hale-Pennington said it was frustrating that Watercare’s decision had been described as final, without the agreement of those most affected.
Tim Aitken, whose family business – Mahurangi Oysters – lost a large portion of its 80,000 dozen of oysters following the event, said they had been treated “like muppets” by Watercare.
“They haven’t entered into the conversation in a transparent way, they’ve treated us quite badly, I believe,” he said.
Aitken said he and other oyster farmers have handed Watercare five years’ worth of income and expenditure, in the hope of entering into a transparent negotiation.
Aitken said none of Watercare’s assessors had chatted with him in person about how they came to those compensation figures.
He said the $200,000 he received in compensation was just enough to cover staff wages.
Aitken said the reputational damage and ongoing impacts such as the loss of clients, were not being factored into the compensation.
“We sell weekly to chefs, and we sell fresh oysters, so everytime we get closed we lose a chef, we lose a restaurant because we can’t guarantee supply.
“Our business right now is hanging on, but only just,” he said.
Aitken said these days, they were struggling to sell oysters due to the lost trust by their clients.
“People now talk to us and say ‘we don’t wanna buy your oysters, they’re the ones that are in the shit harbour’.”
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
