Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The manner in which Fine Gael and the Labour Party have handled the management of this issue in the past couple of weeks has been a cause of great concern to families who are financially constrained in terms of their household budgets. As the Minister of State is aware, these families are living in fear of the imminent charge and how they are going to manage to pay it. The squabbles between Fine Gael and the Labour Party over the past couple of weeks in regard to how this money is to be taken from them has made this more difficult. The resolution is to take the same amount of money from families but in a different manner. What is being given to them in swings is being taken from them on the roundabout. This is the same type of approach taken by the Government to the recently introduced property tax.

The Labour Party now has the audacity to try to gain credit with the electorate by promising a 15% reduction in water charges if people vote for Labour councillors. On the one hand Labour supports Fine Gael in the introduction of water charges and on the other hand it is promising a reduction of 15% if its councillors are elected. The public is supposed to be grateful for this. However, the public knows well the value of these types of promises. What has been announced in the past few days is very much with the local elections in mind. Despite protestations to the contrary, the public knows that this is not where it ends and expects water charges to be increased further by this Government during the remainder of its term in office.

The introduction of water charges comes on the back of the most expensive establishment of a quango in the history of this State. Flying in the face of the bonfire of the quangos promised by the parties in government, we have seen €60 million of taxpayers' money spent on consultancy fees. Deputy Cowen tabled many parliamentary questions to the Minister seeking the amount spent on consultancy fees. While the Minister repeatedly refused to answer, he eventually had to come clean and admit the level of money sunk into this organisation while not 1% of the 40% leakage in our water network across the country has been repaired.

Rather than applying additional financial pressure on families across this country this Government should be seeking, by way of improving the network and addressing the need to supply more than 40% more water because of the leakage in the system, to ensure a reduction in the cost of water supply nationally. While I acknowledge we are in difficult times financially research has shown that investment in our public network would result in savings to the Exchequer. Despite the Government's statement that flat charges will not be introduced and that charges will be meter and usage-based, it now proposes to impose charges on everyone despite the fact meters have been installed in only one third of households across the State.

I commend the motion to the House. I reiterate again that this Government's mishandling of this issue is causing great difficulty for families across the country, which I am sure is what the Minister of State, Deputy O'Dowd, is hearing on the doorsteps daily.

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