Michael Colreavy (Sligo-North Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Water is not a commodity. It is essential for every living thing on this planet. Without it, there would be no life on this earth. Access to water has been fundamental to how our societies have been organised since prehistoric times. The growth of our cities, indeed that of this very city, was centred on access to water.

8 o’clock

The privatisation of water would be a betrayal of the Irish people. Not only is water necessary to every person in this country, it is a fundamental right. The notion that the water in this State, to which everybody should have free access, could be sold off is a sure sign of a State in disorder. The privatisation of water would go against the global trend of remunicipalisation, whereby countries and localities have transferred water out of private control and back into the hands of citizens through their governments. The path this Government is taking is more akin to countries in the developing world which rely heavily on international loans for finance and are obligated to privatise water supplies to stay on-side with their lenders.

We should not forget that Irish Governments have a history of privatising State assets and utility companies. I remind the House of Eircom and, more recently, the Gas Regulation Bill 2013, which resulted in the sale of Bord Gáis Energy, a semi-State business established in 1975. The Government claims that the sale of the company was part of the deal with the troika but it is also part of a wider liberalisation and privatisation agenda that continues to sweep Europe. Energy companies often fall victim to privatisation, with consequences for the consumer and the State. The sale of Bord Gáis Energy to a multinational consortium had an important impact on the economy due to the fact that profits were transferred out of the company. When the energy supplier is domestically owned, some of the profits are transferred back to the consumer in the form of dividends. Conversely, when the energy supply is owned by a foreign multinational, those profits are usually moved out of the country.

The privatisation of electricity networks has a direct correlation with increasing energy costs for consumers. An example of this can be seen in the recent attempts in Germany to take the electricity grid serving Berlin back into public ownership. The grid network was fully privatised in 2009 and was sold to a multinational company, with the result that electricity bills for consumers in the state of Berlin increased by 21%. In Britain, an oligopoly of the six biggest private energy companies, which are known as the big six, dominate the market. This has resulted in tacit co-ordination between the companies to ensure the savings they make are not passed onto the consumer. The intensity of competition between the big six decreased and price announcements were subsequently aligned so that energy prices far outweighed the cost to the supplier. In Britain, where the energy market is fully privatised, energy retail profits increased from €223 million in 2009 to €1.1 billion in 2012, with no clear evidence of suppliers becoming more efficient in reducing their own costs. Moreover, average dual fuel, that is, electricity and gas prices, increased by 24% between 2009 and 2013, nearly double the inflation rate of 13.8%. It is not without worry that I note Irish Water is under the auspices of Ervia, which was formerly known as Bord Gáis. What is to say that the current Government or some future Government will not take a fancy to privatising Irish Water in the same way as it privatised Bord Gáis? Energy would be a means of raining cash. What if the Government's EU or IMF paymasters insist on this? The Government says "trust us, this will never happen" but when Sinn Féin proposed that the Water Services Bill incorporate a section that would ensure public ownership of water, it refused to accept the proposal because it has every intention of leaving water services open to privatisation. I may be dismissed as being cynical or politically motivated in making that suggestion. The problem for the Government, however, is that the public also believes it to be true.

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