Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this evening's debate on the Private Members' Bill put forward by Sinn Féin, which proposes to call a referendum to seek the enshrining in the Constitution of the right to a water service. I fully support the Bill, and the Government should not oppose it. We should go further and amend Article 10 rather than Article 40 of the Constitution so as to enshrine the right of the Irish people to retain ownership of all our natural resources, including minerals or water.

The Government has stated that it is listening to what the people want, and it is making much of the package to be announced tomorrow. It believes it will help the issue go away. The news for the Minister of State and his colleagues is that it will not go away and whatever the Government does tomorrow will not satisfy the Irish people. If the government was serious about trying to allay the fears of Irish people, it would accept the Bill and have a referendum on the protection of water services for citizens. It is a small step in helping the Irish people come to terms with the Government's goals. It is not interested in that course of action as, ultimately, it wants to privatise the water service. There is no doubt about it.

The Taoiseach and the Minister of State today made much of the fact that section 46 of the Water Services (No. 2) Act 2013 ensures that privatisation cannot happen. It would be the simplest thing in the world for a future Minister for the environment to table a very short amending Bill to change that section of the 2013 and use a majority in the House to ensure it went through. That will happen, although it will not happen now or in the next year. It will happen before 2025, when the service level agreements with local authorities start to run out. The Government has assigned ComReg to deal with billings and it was established with the sole aim of liberalising the electricity market in the country. It did so and opened it for privatisation. When ComReg looks to renew service level agreements, it will demand that the sector be opened to competition and the local authorities will have to compete with the likes of Veolia, Severn Trent Water and Celtic Anglian Water for the right to provide water services. That is the type of legislation that will be unleashed on the Irish people.

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