Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Undeterred by my failure at verbal communication, I sent an e-mail and got a response back late last night that stated, "The PPS numbers have to be submitted to ensure that correct water allowances are allocated to the correct recipients". That is a very interesting answer because it tells us that Irish Water is starting from the premise that the entirety - or almost the entirety - of the population are shysters, fraudsters and gangsters who will deliberately submit false returns and poor old Irish Water will give 5 million allowances to 1.5 million houses.

The Revenue Commissioners, who collect tax in this country, take people on trust. A person fills out a tax return outlining his or her circumstances. In most cases that will not be examined as they take people on trust. There is a spot-check, and anybody caught cheating the system will be dealt with very severely and properly so. I cannot understand why Irish Water cannot do something similar.

The Minister ought to be aware of a court case in the past three weeks where two people were successfully prosecuted and convicted for obtaining information from the Department of Social Protection - namely people's addresses - by giving the Department of Social Protection PPS numbers which they had got from credit unions. That should illustrate, if illustration was needed, the danger of people's most confidential information - their PPS numbers - getting into the hands of a third party.

I have received no coherent explanation from Irish Water as to why I, as a citizen, should submit my PPS number and I have absolutely no intention of doing so. At the end of the day, when I get my water bill I will pay it, but I will deduct the allowance to which I am legally entitled. At that point Irish Water with its serried armies of consultants laden down with taxpayers' largesse, employees laden down with bonuses and directors, who regard their responsibility as of such importance that it is only secondary to driving the Minister's car, can all come after me if they wish.

In addition I made a further effort to get information on this by tabling a parliamentary question to the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Kelly, who is sitting across from us now looking pensive. I asked him what my constituents - and constituents of very other Member of this House - are asking. Why do people have to submit their PPS numbers? I was not alone; in fairness, Deputies Clare Daly and Catherine Murphy tabled similar questions. I had to laugh out loud at the sheer irony of the Taoiseach's statement this morning that the real problem here was that there was not enough communication. What sort of communication did we get from the Minister, Deputy Kelly? We got a one-line arrogant reply stating that the situation was unchanged and outlining Irish Water's telephone number with a recommendation to use it. That is some example of communication.

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