Barry Cowen (Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This country has spent €500 million on individual metering but Scottish Water has spent €600,000 on 600 of them. What has it spent on district metering? Conservation, or the lack of it, is a matter for a policy decision but that is the beauty of this committee - it has the potential to determine what the policy will be on water conservation into the future, what methods to use and how to make savings in this regard for the customer. That was not the case before the committee came into being, when the public were told to pay the charges and that the only method of conservation was through their metered bills.

That has not proved to be successful. The opportunity we have is to recognise that district metering has a role in acknowledging leakage and in identifying excessive or abusive use. It is a question for us thereafter as to how we use this information to ensure we have conservation rather than assuming conservation will come as a result of water charges. Could Mr. Jones tell us how much district metering cost?