I came home from posting my payment to Metrowater to find only a trickle of water from my kitchen tap. I had had my water "restricted" for non-payment of my account. I should tell out-of Aucklanders that Metrowater charges for water it supplies as well as for wastewater. My bill was $150 for three months.

I rang Metrowater and arranged to courier another payment plus $50 fine to its office. The debts officer promised to turn the water back on within two hours. Two hours passed and I still had no water. The courier company confirmed my cheque had been delivered. When I checked with Metrowater, it seemed it had got stuck in the system. I was promised my water within minutes.

When I queried how this would be achieved I was told there were people in my area who could be diverted. Within minutes a car pulled up and a man got out and attended to my water meter, while his female partner talked on a cell phone in the car.

By this time I was intrigued. It seemed Metrowater has an industry turning people's water off, each time collecting a fee. Cars cruise city streets, ever ready to switch tardy payers off and on.

So I exercised my right as a citizen and wrote to Metrowater under the Official Information Act and asked a number of questions, such as, what was Metrowater's policy and had it done a social impact report? After all, there are potential health hazards in leaving households unable to flush toilets, bathe or wash dishes and clothes. I asked how many properties had it disconnected in the last six months, and how much money did it make out of fines?

Last week I got the reply. The gist was the "policy" is entirely about numbers of days to pay up. No social impact report has been prepared. Contractors were used for disconnections. Beyond that Metrowater was not prepared to answer my questions. "Please understand," said the acting customer support manager, "that as a company (under the Companies Act) the Official Information Act does not apply."

To rub salt in the wound, she sent a booklet emblazoned with the slogan "Metrowater. It's yours. And we'll run it better."

So how can Metrowater be "mine" and yet I cannot access information about how the company is run? Metrowater is a company wholly owned by the Auckland City Council.

I had had the same experience when I tried to find out the role played by Enterprise Waitakere in the promotion of the proposed luxury Aman Resort on protected land at Piha. Enterprise Waitakere is a trust created by Waitakere City Council. The council appoints the trust board - mostly economists and business people - and pays nearly half its budget. Government funds the other half.

Enterprise Waitakere has various functions, prominent among which are to promote employment, attract investment, work with developers and promote tourism. The annual report says it aims to make Waitakere City "the 'green' business capital of New Zealand". Back came the reply from the CEO of Enterprise Waitakere. Communications with investors were "strictly privileged for reasons of commercial sensitivity". I could not be told anything.

So here was a body largely funded by ratepayer money, which would not come clean about its role in a project which had attracted a great deal of public interest.

In both these cases the Ombudsman's Office told me the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act does not apply.

When local authority trading enterprises were set up as part of the New Right ideology that "business does it better", the act was not made applicable to them, even though the 1990 State Owned Enterprises (Ombudsman and Official Information Acts) Select Committee recommended this be done. When the Law Commission reviewed the Official Information Act last year, it reinforced this recommendation.

As it stands, these bodies are beyond reach. In the case of Metrowater, the council is the shareholder, not ratepayers. Enterprise Waitakere is even further removed. MY failure to access information of public interest is a direct consequence of the privatisation of public amenities and services.

As more former public services are privatised - health will be the next to go - citizens' ability to hold to account bodies they finance is rapidly disappearing. Privatisation removes these public services from public scrutiny and accountability, rights that are vital to democratic functioning.

The postscript to this story is that having banked my first cheque, against my instructions, Metrowater sent back my second one and now I owe them $50. No wonder protesters in some parts of the city are concreting over their water main taps.

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