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Speaker 1: Now I was telling you earlier that Wellington Water has

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Speaker 1: released a list of all of its contractors and turns

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Speaker 1: out they've spent some money is some pretty interesting places

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Speaker 1: on skincare, mindfulness and nutritionists. Pat Doherty is the chief

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Speaker 1: executive of Wellington Water. Hypat why are you guys spending

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Speaker 1: money on skincare and nutritionists?

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Speaker 2: Look, that's about the wellbeing, health and well being of

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Speaker 2: our staff. It's all part of being a good employer

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Speaker 2: and looking after them, is it? And look, yes it is.

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Speaker 2: I mean a good employer these days, good staff are

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Speaker 2: hard to find. You want to attract them and keep them. Look,

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Speaker 2: we can't afford to pay compete with some of the

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Speaker 2: high playing contractors to consultants, so it's important that we

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Speaker 2: show that we're a caring employer. And sometimes these sorts

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Speaker 2: of initiatives spread across the number of staff. We have

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Speaker 2: a cheap at the price I.

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Speaker 1: Could just run me through it. So what exactly are

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Speaker 1: you spending the money on? At the skincare clinic.

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Speaker 2: That was skin checks for checking for skin cancer. I

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Speaker 2: mean a lot of our staff work outside, so that's

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Speaker 2: just about the welfare of us.

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Speaker 1: Stuff okay, And the nutritionists.

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Speaker 2: That was a series of workshops for our off staff

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Speaker 2: and our depot staff about healthy.

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Speaker 1: Eating okay, and the mindfulness is just like you just

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Speaker 1: get the mind for fullness people and to relax your stuff,

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Speaker 1: do you?

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Speaker 2: That was a conference workshop fee for some of our

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Speaker 2: people to go to a mental health awareness as part

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Speaker 2: of a mental health awareness week. It was a workshop

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Speaker 2: on it. I mean to put this in context, the

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Speaker 2: full list of suppliers last year we spent just done

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Speaker 2: four hundred and sixty six million dollars and the ones

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Speaker 2: that are attracting attention here we spent a total of

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Speaker 2: thirty five thousand dollars. I mean, one that was highlighted

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Speaker 2: was Diving Ski Limited. What are we spending the money

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Speaker 2: there for? Well, that's for swapping up the chlorin bottles.

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Speaker 2: Are the oxygen bottles? Are operating apparatus that we use

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Speaker 2: when we're swapping up chlorine drums and our treatment plants.

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Speaker 2: Not too sixty at all?

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Speaker 1: Really, Okay, thirty five thousand for how many staff.

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Speaker 2: Four hundred and fifty.

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Speaker 1: I'm just getting out my calculated I'm not going to

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Speaker 1: pretend that I can do that in my brain because

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Speaker 1: it's about seventy eight bucks per per staff being there.

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Speaker 1: Look pat for your explanation. Obviously washes and it sounds fine,

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Speaker 1: But given that you guys are asking for so much

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Speaker 1: money from rate payers, do you reckon? Rate payers are

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Speaker 1: going to be thrilled that this is what the money

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Speaker 1: is being spent on, not on fixing the pipes.

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Speaker 2: Look, it's frustrating that we should have released these numbers

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Speaker 2: right from the start and probably wouldn't have atracked for

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Speaker 2: so much attention. That was an error and they'll be

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Speaker 2: released very soon. But we have we have been painfully

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Speaker 2: transparent and our shareholders over the last five or six

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Speaker 2: months acknowledging that we're not getting value for money, but

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Speaker 2: we'reness savings out that we had is in the money

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Speaker 2: we spent with our contractors, our consultants and improving our

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Speaker 2: financial control.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, now listen, speaking at speaking of transparency, how on

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Speaker 1: earth did you guys lose a report that warned you

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Speaker 1: four years ago that you had financial troubles.

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Speaker 2: Well, you appreciate quite a change at the top in

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Speaker 2: the last last few months. So it was a report that,

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Speaker 2: to be honest, I didn't know about but have only

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Speaker 2: been there five or six months.

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Speaker 1: But the change just happened in the last few months.

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Speaker 1: This thing was lost for years.

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Speaker 2: Look that I can't explain. I wasn't there then. But

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Speaker 2: good thing was some of our stuff pointed it out

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Speaker 2: to us, and we decided that to be completely transparent,

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Speaker 2: we would talk about that as well. I mean, that's

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Speaker 2: what we're trying to do, is here our souls. I

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Speaker 2: can tell you it's not pleasant.

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Speaker 1: I can imagine. Pet. Thank you, I really appreciate it.

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Speaker 1: Pat Doherty, Wellington Water chief Executive. For more from Hither

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Speaker 1: Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news talks. It'd be

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