Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman for chairing this marathon session and the delegates for their thoroughness in answering the questions posed.

Does Mr. Tierney accept how bad it looks in putting all of this very useful information that we are getting today into the public domain after the Bill has passed? In his presentation he said the approach taken by Irish Water was in line with a modern, new utility, but the information I have suggests that is not necessarily the case. We are talking about value for money and I would like Mr. Tierney to defend some of the utility's actions. Irish Water is using drive-by meters, for example. Why, when the rest of the world is migrating away from such meters to smart meters, is Irish Water installing an older, out-of-date system at huge cost? Mr. Tierney has said that in July 2013 a letter from the Department gave Irish Water consent on a figure of €250 million for the metering project. Is that the total cost? How can he defend the decision to install an older, out-of-date system when countries such as Malta, which was praised by IBM, are using a smart metering system? Why was this decision made? What consultant recommended this course of action? Was it recommended by a consultant?

We have been back and forth on the issue of the expertise Bord Gáis had over and above that of Bord na Móna, which is why it won the contract. Mr. O'Donoghue said Bord Gáis could not possibly have all of the required expertise in-house, which I accept. That has been verified elsewhere and Mr. O'Donoghue has said Irish Water needed so-called "global nomads" with expertise. Did Irish Water consider secondments, as was done in Northern Ireland? I heard the CEO of Northern Ireland Water who retired recently speak about that issue recently. He made the point that hiring permanent staff would have been too costly and that hiring consultants would have been very costly, too. In that context, considering secondments was the wisest choice. Why was it not considered, or was it? That approach is used in Government Departments all of the time.

I ask the delegates to clarify an issue reported in some newspapers today that four contracts were awarded without going through the public procurement process, even though they had met an EU regulation guideline. Is that true? What will the overall spend on consultants be by April 2015?

My final question relates to those consumers who are members of group water schemes and those who have their own wells. Will they have any relationship with Irish Water? Will they have to pay any charges to it?