John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

One of the reasons I want to speak on the Water Services (No. 2) Bill is I recently travelled to Ethiopia with Irish Aid to visit projects there. One of the places we visited was Tigray, the northernmost province of Ethiopia, where we saw the water projects in which Irish Aid had been involved for many years. They remember the Minister of State, Deputy Joe Costello, fondly. Farming in parts of Tigray has been transformed by these projects. To deal with the problem of a scarce water supply, Irish Aid has engaged local farmers in watershed management. This involves building water collectors, small dams and terraces and planting trees, all of which help to keep water in the soil. The work takes place across whole valleys or watersheds, raising the level of moisture captured in the soil for these communities. The projects have made a real difference to the lives of poor farmers, not only in improving their incomes but in helping them to cope with the changes brought about by climate change. Having witnessed the infrastructure in place and listened to the people there, the watershed rehabilitation programmes have had profound effects in a province that was the worst affected by the drought and famine that hit Ethiopia in 1984 to 1986. The value the people we met put on the water projects cannot be overestimated. For the people we met, a clean and plentiful supply of water has radically changed their lives. What Irish Aid pioneered in Tigray has been replicated by the Ethiopian Government throughout the country and the World Bank has used it as a model throughout the world for similar projects.

I am not trying to make any grand statements on or comparisons between the systems in Ethiopia and Ireland, but it is worth remembering how vital a good and adequate water supply is. The objectives behind the establishment of a new water utility here are to improve the quality and supply of water. This is worth paying for if necessary. We do not need the EU-IMF to impose these water charges. I understand that in 2009 the Commission on Taxation recommended that domestic water charges be phased in and that those charges be based on usage. We should have acted on that recommendation, regardless of what the IMF said.

Ireland's domestic water consumption of approximately 150 litres per person per day is one of the highest in Europe, but it is anticipated that the national roll-out of water meters and the introduction of domestic water charges here will reduce consumption. I was reminded at the Committee of Public Accounts of the problems we face as a country when it comes to funding water services. There is a huge gap between the revenue generated from local authority charges and the cost of water provision. It cost over €1.2 billion to run our water services in 2010.

Last year, the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government stated that our capacity to fund future capital investment requirements from the Exchequer was severely constrained and that meeting investment needs and rising operational costs within the current funding model was unsustainable. It pointed to the fact that increased operational costs could be offset to an extent by efficiency gains from moving to a new organisational form. The Minister of State, Deputy Costello, mentioned Scottish Water, which transitioned from a local to a regional and then a national organisation for water services and achieved operational savings of 40% over a five-year period.

Our water infrastructure has repeatedly been described as poor or under severe pressure. In Dublin for example, some 28% of treated drinking water is unaccounted for or lost. The percentage of unaccounted-for water is a lot higher in other parts of the country. In the most recent water services investment programme, €321 million was allocated nationally for the replacement or rehabilitation of defective or leaking water mains. I believe the plan is to rehabilitate the public water services infrastructure with the revenue collected from the introduction of domestic water charges.

We cannot take water services and a clean water supply for granted. We need to raise revenue, not just from commercial entities, to pay for new infrastructure. This legislation is unavoidable. Nobody wants to levy additional charges on people, but there is a clear rationale as to why it is necessary.

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