Water and sewerage bills will increase by about $62 each year for 1.6 million South East Queensland residents, despite the state government freezing bulk water charges. <\/p>\n
Urban Utilities revealed its typical household water and sewerage bill would increase from July 1 by about the same amount the government this week claimed Queenslanders would save.<\/p>\n
The water provider revealed on Wednesday its water and sewerage charges would increase 5.5 per cent, or about $62 each year. <\/p>\n
The water and sewerage bill increase comes after Premier David Crisafulli announced on Sunday households would save $65 each year over two years through the government\u2019s freezing of the bulk water charge.<\/p>\n
He argued it was a key cost of living measure in the LNP\u2019s second budget.<\/p>\n
Urban Utilities said the bill increase was due to rising operational costs.<\/p>\n
Water Minister Ann Leahy issued a swift smackdown of the government-owned water corporation. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis move to increase Urban Utilities rates by 5.5 per cent is unacceptable after we did our bit to freeze bulk water prices,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cUrban Utilities need to walk back their price hike and freeze prices for customers. We expect Unity Water to do the same. <\/p>\n
\u201cIf they don\u2019t freeze prices, we will examine legislative options to force them to.<\/p>\n
\u201cQueenslanders will not accept continuing to pay some of the most expensive water bills in the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Usage costs up to 822L will rise from 98c to $1.19 per kilolitre. <\/p>\n
The sewerage service charge rises from $1.96 to $2.15 per dwelling, per day. <\/p>\n
A typical annual household water bill was $1667.45 in 2025. <\/p>\n
Urban Utilities provides water to 1.6 million residents across the Brisbane, Ipswich, Lockyer Valley, Scenic Rim and Somerset local government areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cPricing decisions are made by our independent board, balancing bill affordability with the need to continue to invest in and maintain the essential infrastructure required to deliver safe and reliable water and wastewater services to the community,\u201d a spokeswoman said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe welcome the Queensland Government\u2019s decision to freeze the State Bulk Water Charge which has helped minimise the increase for customers. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe remainder of the bill reflects the cost of operating, maintaining and upgrading Urban Utilities\u2019 water and wastewater network, including investing in essential infrastructure needed for South East Queensland\u2019s growth.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opposition Leader Steven Miles said Mr Crisafulli\u2019s budget promises had collapsed in less than a day. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe Premier\u2019s budget has failed to provide cost of living relief and its Queenslanders who are paying more,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Premier has now admitted power prices were going up and now it\u2019s been confirmed water prices are increasing too.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Water and sewerage bills will increase by about $62 each year for 1.6 million South East Queensland residents,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":769614,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,75,128],"class_list":["post-769613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=769613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/769614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=769613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=769613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=769613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}