<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/d3b5f28f-580a-4116-b9ca-d15008da2fba/97B4C569-5750-4A62-B29F-22A5C0A981C9/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.nenews.com.au/Stories/chStory03n.htm" href="http://www.nenews.com.au/Stories/chStory03n.htm" style="font-size: 11px;">www.nenews.com.au</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.nenews.com.au/Stories/chStory03n.htm"><P>AVERAGE water bills are projected to increase by up to 50 per cent over the next five years for North East Water (NEW) customers.</p> <P>Under the authority’s new pricing regime, tentatively agreed upon by Victoria’s regulator last week, customers with an average annual consumption of 304 kilolitres will see their bill of $640 this year increase to $964 by 2012/13.</p> <P>The increases will fund a $100 million capital works program, much of which has been borne by the need to secure supplies in the wake of bushfires and climate change pressures.</p> <P>But in a major shift away from most other water authorities, customers will have greater ability to cut their bills as NEW significantly shifts the ratio of fixed service charges and volumetric charges.</p> <P>"<B>At present fixed service charges are about 60 per cent and volume (water used) is 40 per cent, but that will reverse to a ratio of 40/60 over the next five years,</B>" said NEW chief executive officer, Jim Martin.</P></blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/97B4C569-5750-4A62-B29F-22A5C0A981C9/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content8.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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