Felicity Ogilvie reported this story on Thursday, June 18, 2015 18:40:00

MARK COLVIN: Lead is a poison, and ingesting or breathing it in significant quantities lowers the average IQ of babies and young children. So you can imagine the worry of residents of Pioneer in north-east Tasmania at the news that lead is contaminating their drinking water supply.



The supplier has failed to ease their concerns. TasWater is telling people in Pioneer that installing water tanks at their houses will deal with the contamination problem.



But they're not convinced because TasWater's own independent review said that the lead might be leaching from household plumbing.



Felicity Ogilvie reports from Hobart.



FELICITY OGILVIE: For most people in Australia access to clean drinking water is taken for granted. But the small rural town of Pioneer in north-east Tasmania is a place where residents can't turn on the tap and drink safe water because it is contaminated with lead and other heavy metals.



Local Jenny Bellinger says getting drinking water involves an arduous daily trip to the community water tank that has been placed in the middle of the town.



JENNY BELLINGER: We have to take a plastic bottle, fill it up and take it back, and now two and a half years, over two and a half years, that we've had to do this. We're very, very sick of it.



FELICITY OGILVIE: At a community meeting last night the locals were told that their water supplier, TasWater, would be installing water tanks at every household.



But Ms Bellinger says the tanks should have been installed in a matter of weeks when the water was declared unsafe back in November 2012. And she's angry that they are still paying for the contaminated water.



JENNY BELLINGER: They tell us last night that they're going to have our town water decommissioned.



We're still paying $320 a year for filthy, dirty water that is not - you cannot shower in it in the summer time, people hate using camp showers and using, washing out of a bowl after they've carried the water, because the water is filthy.



That is now three summers that we've had to endure this.



FELICITY OGILVIE: Research from Macquarie University found the lead is coming from pipes and infrastructure in town as well as pipes in people's houses.



An independent review of that research commissioned by TasWater says the lead could be coming from a variety of sources, including the Pioneer Dam, distribution pipes and household plumbing.



Professor Mark Taylor from Macquarie University did the original study and he says TasWater still hasn't addressed the issue that the lead is potentially leaching from the plumbing inside people's houses.



MARK TAYLOR: I think it was a waste of money reviewing our study. It would have been better to put that money that they spent on the review, and I don't know how much they spent on it, on a study like this: understanding what the nature and extent of the risk is from people's domestic water supply.



And this is particularly a problem in older houses. So communities like Pioneer are composed largely of older properties and that is where the risk is greatest. And we've seen this elsewhere when we've done studies in New South Wales, previous researchers have seen a similar sort of situation.



FELICITY OGILVIE: Mark Taylor says people, particularly those who live in old houses with old plumbing, should be letting their taps run for at least two minutes.



MARK TAYLOR: It's well known that standing water, if it's acidic, can be quite aggressive on the fittings and on solder within those pipes, and that's what leaches lead and that's what could get into your kettle on the first draw in the morning.



So we've already demonstrated that in Pioneer, on several, you know, there were several lots of samples that showed that and it's quite clear that the lead was elevated in the first flush. So if you fill your kettle first thing in the morning that will be elevated in lead, whereas if you let the tap run for a couple of minutes, the water is good to use.



MARK COLVIN: Professor Mark Taylor from Macquarie University ending Felicity Ogilvie's report.