Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I support Deputy O’Callaghan in this amendment. We fought a long campaign to prevent water being privatised. Some hundreds of thousands of people came on to the street. This issue does not seem to be on the Government’s agenda but there is still a concern there among people I speak to that until we have the referendum and until right to water issue is enshrined in the Constitution, a Government at some future stage might try to revisit this issue and privatise water and the water infrastructure in this State. That is why we need a commitment and a timeline from the Government to know that this will not happen. With the cost of living, in housing and in health; these are the number one issues. There is still a fear factor there in the back of people’s minds, however, about this privatisation agenda which Fine Gael has driven for the past 12 years.

I would appreciate, therefore, if the Minister of State could give that commitment because at least people would know then and it would help to ease their minds because at this moment in time, this issue is still a serious concern for many people.