Cr Tony Quinn put forward a motion on Wednesday that Albury Council take over the Villages Water Supply Scheme from December.

“I’m really concerned about the cost of water on the scheme,” he said.

“Currently, the villages scheme has an access to water fee of $85 a quarter and Albury has a fee of $37.50.

“If it was engrossed into Albury scheme, that’s another 1350 connections which wouldn’t make any difference to the management of the Albury scheme.”

Cr Quinn had engaged Riverina Water in talks about the possibility of their organisation taking over the supply, but said handing it over to Albury instead would cost less and be more practical.

A number of councillors were opposed to engaging Albury Council in the partnership without further investigating both options, including Cr Denise Osborne.

“I don’t believe we should be asking Albury to be investigating … I believe Greater Hume should make inquiries,” she said.

“The motion doesn’t have any due diligence or business plan … I’d hate to see us not do any investigation at all.”

Cr Doug Meyer did not oppose the motion but put forward an amendment that council continue discussions with Riverina Water and request Albury Council compile a report by December 31 on the feasibility of taking over the scheme.

“There have been four meetings to date between this council and Riverina Water and it seems inappropriate to me we would divest ourselves of those discussions,” he said.

Cr Quinn, with Cr Matt Hicks, voted against the amended motion and said it was time “to get on with it”.

“If you want to suggest that Albury City do not have due diligence on their own water scheme, you’re just not on the planet,” he said.

“I introduced a few months ago that we look at Riverina Water purely because I knew there was no other way of getting this action up … let’s get on with the job.”