Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules

Overview

The Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules (the Rules) set out the requirements a drinking water supplier must comply with to help ensure the drinking water they provide is safe. The Rules are ‘compliance rules’ for the purposes of the Water Services Act 2021.

To address the large variations across different kinds of drinking water supplies, the Rules are categorised into different drinking water supply types. These have different modules and complexities assigned to them.

Detailed Summary

Taumata Arowai is conducting a public consultation on Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules for Aotearoa; that will be made under the Water Services Act 2021. 

Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules set out the requirements that a drinking water supplier must comply with to demonstrate that the water they provide is safe to drink. Compliance with the Quality Assurance Rules minimises the risk that drinking water might exceed the maximum acceptable values (MAVs) of determinands, or water properties, as set out in the Drinking Water Standards.   

Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules is a technical document. 

We recommend that you read the following papers before responding to the consultation: 

Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules - Summary (188 KB, PDF)

Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules - Proposed changes (163 KB, PDF)

Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules (972 KB, PDF)

Guidance to determine water supply populations (194 KB, PDF) 

Description of Drinking Water Supply Types (143 KB, PDF)

Please note that Taumata Arowai is also consulting on:

• Drinking Water Standards
• Drinking Water Aesthetic Values
• Drinking Water Acceptable Solution for Rural Agricultural Water Supplies
• Drinking Water Acceptable Solution for Roof Water Supplies
• Drinking Water Acceptable Solution for Spring and Bore Supplies
• Drinking Water Network Environmental Performance

Why your views matter

Your feedback will help to inform decisions on developing Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules for Aotearoa.  

You can have your say by reviewing the papers identified above and answering the questions relating to the proposed Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules or providing additional comments (see link below).

Submissions are open from 17 January to 28 March 2022. You can submit:

1. by completing the online survey (link below) on this website
2. by emailing your submission to korero@taumataarowai.govt.nz, or
3. by posting your submission to:

                 Taumata Arowai, 
                 PO Box 628, Wellington 6140, 
                 New Zealand.

You do not need to answer all the questions if you are only interested in some aspects of the consultation.

Publishing submissions and Official Information Act 1982 requests

Publishing your submission

We intend to proactively publish the submissions made as part of this consultation on our website, but only if we are given permission to do so.

We may publish a summary of submissions. The summary will be aggregated to a level so that individual submissions cannot be identified.

Official Information Act requests

Your submission may be subject to requests made under the Official Information Act 1982 (even if it has not been published). We must make your submission available in response to such a request, unless we have a good reason or other administrative grounds for withholding it.

Personal details can be withheld under the Official Information Act 1982, including your name and address. If you do not want any information you provide to be released, please indicate this clearly and explain why. For example, you may wish for some information to be kept confidential because it is sensitive personal information. Taumata Arowai will take your views into account when responding to such requests.

Privacy Act 2020

The Privacy Act 2020 governs how Taumata Arowai collects, holds, uses, and discloses personal information about you and the information you provide. You have the right to access and correct your personal information.