Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

I have a lot of questions, but I will begin by asking why the CER accepted the low usage figures provided by Irish Water. A comprehensive study of water usage was commissioned by Dublin City Council and carried out by Veolia Water UK and RPS in 2008 - I assume the CER accepts that the source for the study is reliable. The study found that average usage in 2007 for an individual was 148 litres per day. I will pass this information to committee members because they also need to explain why they are accepting the usage figures from Irish Water. The typical household usage figure the CER has accepted is way below the one in the Dublin City Council study, which means that when the meters start to tick, people will receive much higher bills than the CER has indicated, once the nine month cap has beem lifted.

Let us take as an example a two adult household. Irish Water calculates average usage of 66,000 litres for the first adult in the household and 21,000 for the second.

For a two-adult household, Irish Water calculates an average usage of 66,000 litres for the first adult in a household and 21,000 for the next. Are they sharing the bath or what? Where is the evidence that a second adult uses a third of the water used by a first adult? I would love to hear a little bit more on that. We must be going back to the days when we were all thrown into the bath on a Saturday night. This would give 87,000 litres per year for a two-person household, or 119 litres per person per day, which is way less than the 148 litres that seems to be the average usage that was accepted in the greater Dublin area. Why is the Commission for Energy Regulation accepting those figures? For a typical household, as broken down by the commission itself, it would be much higher.

For a three-adult household, Irish Water calculations give 108,000 litres per year equating to 98 litres per day, so that is even lower than the other ones. A four-adult household is 129,000 litres per year equating to 88 litres per day. The more people in a family, the less water each individual will have to consume according to this. Those figures are based on the most recent studies.