Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)

I rise in support of the motion tabled by my colleague, Deputy Gilmore. Anyone with an ear for accents and who listens to me will have no doubt as to where I am from; I am from Cork city. We do not distinguish between constituencies in Cork city except where we have to, and in this case I have to distinguish, I represent Cork North-Central. I suppose there is no-one in the country who does not know that Cork is designated European Capital of Culture for 2005. That is an honour of which the rest of the country should be proud and of which we in Cork are justifiably proud. We put much work into ensuring the city looked its best for the start of its year as European Capital of Culture. One can imagine our surprise when on 17 January, after discussions about illegal dumping and how we would manage to keep the city clean, a new regime — it is a regime — was introduced without consultation with councillors and without warning by a manager who does not have to stand for election and who does not have a great deal of contact with the ordinary Joe Soap in the street. He seems more content to meet the business community. I have to hand it to him. Cork is looking extremely well. What passed us by for years, the sort of development the rest of the country had, is beginning to happen in Cork.

On 17 January, the manager in Cork introduced a new regime. From that day people were obliged to pay a flat waste collection charge of €255 and after that a tag price of €3, €5 or €7 per lift. That seems fairly reasonable until one considers that up to 17 January the charge was €355 per year, which took in everything and included a very generous waiver scheme. That scheme was generous because councillors were in charge. They set the charge and determined the waiver scheme. Now it is set by someone who has very little contact with the ordinary public and who does not have to stand for election. As my colleague Deputy Gilmore said, he was given that power under legislation which was rushed through this House.

From 17 January, bins were all of a sudden not being collected. The following week, rubbish from a household where the bin was not collected was simply put out beside the bin, and so it continued until there was a pyramid of rubbish. That occurred on virtually every street corner and worst of all right in front of Shandon. By means of the Internet and advertising around the world, Shandon is the symbol of the European Capital of Culture for 2005, yet that pyramid of rubbish was right in front of it. That was the photograph taken.

There are people in Cork, as elsewhere in the country, who cannot afford the annual flat charge of €255 plus the additional weekly tagging. The manager in Cork has decided that an old age pensioner on €171 weekly will have the flat charge waived. However, a person perhaps next door, on disability benefit, less money than the old age pensioner gets, does not have the charge waived. That is why it is essential we have a national waiver scheme. In other areas of the country such as Naas, rubbish collection has been privatised by a council controlled by Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats. In that case the manager has decided that because the scheme is privatised, there is no waiver scheme, nor will there be, even for pensioners, those on disability or people with big families and very low incomes. We cannot continue to say we have a policy on waste collection and waste management if at the same time we allow unelected members to introduce mechanisms which will ensure we will have continued uncollected dumping.

Last week and the week before I got legal advice on the manager's responsibility, an issue I raised at a committee meeting with the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. I asked if, under the Waste Management Act, the manager was obliged to collect rubbish left for a period of time, and it seems he or she is not obliged to do so because of changes made in 2003 as a result of a Supreme Court decision. Under the Litter Act, however, the manager must collect that rubbish and pursue those who litter.

I am convinced that when the Cork council manger finishes sifting through rubbish to find evidence of who left it, and a case eventually comes to court, the manager will find that most of the rubbish was put out for collection by people who could not afford either the flat fee or the tags. That is what we will find when such cases come to court. What position will the manager be in then, when the judge says certain people cannot afford to pay the charges, and the manger must collect the litter? The only solution to this problem is a national waiver scheme. I hope the Minister will listen to what we are saying and introduce such a scheme as a matter of urgency.

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