Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I concur. Contrary to what the public was led to believe, the proceeds from the property tax are not staying in the local authority system; they are not being spent within the local authority system in its entirety. That was the case last year and will be the case next year. It remains to be seen what will be the case in the year after.

With regard to the funding that has been taken from the local authority fund and given to Irish Water, only one legislative measure has been passed by the House relating to Irish Water and that was legislation to give effect to its establishment and configuration. There has been no legislation dealing with the transfer of assets currently in the ownership of local authorities to Irish Water. There is also no legislation to give effect to the type of billing system we can expect to see in place in the future, yet we are being asked to agree to €500 million being taken from the central Government allocation and given to Irish Water. I understand part of this sum will come back to local authorities in the form of service level agreements, but that is duplicity.