Niall Collins (Limerick, Fianna Fail)

The trend of failure from this Government has grown steadily week by week. At the centre of the storm is the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, who has now completed a perfect hat-trick of disasters. The Government debacle in implementing water charges shows that it has failed to learn any lessons from the household charge and septic tank fiascos. A lack of detail about how much metering will cost the consumer, outdated numbers, uncertainty for current employees, a rushed decision making process bypassing the Oireachtas and confusion in the Cabinet over the costs involved all point to another Government disaster. The Government is rushing ahead with the creation of Irish water and rolling out water meters without clearly considering the costs involved to consumers. Ultimately, householders will be left to pay the price for Government ineptitude. We are calling on the Government to stop before it goes further down the disastrous road chosen.

Over the past few months the Customs House has become ground zero for a litany of Government mistakes, botched implementations, hasty decisions and poor communication. At a time when the Government should be focused on a critical referendum on the country's future, its energies are spent on deflecting attention from escalating problems in the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. A sense of arrogance has characterised the Government's approach to new charges. Consultation with the public has been replaced with dictation from the Minister. The abysmally low compliance rate with the household charge and protests over the septic tank tax on rural Ireland bears testament to the kind of approach taken by the Government. This high-handed attitude by the Government is quickly becoming its trademark and now appears to be dominating the strategy to impose water charges.

The establishment of Irish Water and the rolling out of water meters and charges by 2014 has been characterised by a lack of detail, ineptitude in communication and a critical failure to appreciate the scale of the challenge at hand. Households have been hit with a raft of contradictory messages and numbers from the Government. During a period when consumer confidence is at a low ebb, the Government appears to be committed to sapping any potential for future improvements in sentiment.

The roll out of metering was initially touted as an upfront charge, only to be replaced by a €800 standing charge over 20 years. It is an excessively expensive exercise. Amidst the Tánaiste and the Taoiseach directly contradicting each other, the ordinary householder is left trying to figure out the cost. The price of meters can range from €60 to €150 with labour and additional cost depending on the location and work involved yet the Government indicated metering would cost €160 per meter with the remaining €640 going towards installation costs. In these straitened times, it is difficult to see companies vying for the tendering process with such exorbitantly high labour costs.

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