Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The story this morning that there is some kind of a second tier of charging for families with children has no basis. No decision has been made in regard to the levels of charges that will be applied and how they are going to be applied, other than the policy the Government has taken, which is that the charging for water will be on the basis of a metered regime and there will be a free allowance for households, with charging to be above and beyond that. The process which has to be followed for that to be established is that the regulator must set out what kind of charging on an economic basis is to be pursued, and then, based on what the regulator has said, the Government will make a decision as to what the level of the free water allowance will be and what the charging above and beyond that will be. That is the approach we are going to take.

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