Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

When the Taoiseach set out months ago to implement water charges and to burden people with the super quango that is Irish Water, the one stated aim was to turn citizens into customers. It was not disguised and we all recall the Irish Water communications strategy, with six steps to take the person from the citizen mindset to the obedient customer. The Taoiseach has not achieved this despite the thousands of taxpayers' euros spent on PR and propaganda. The Taoiseach has not managed to brainwash Irish people and they do not accept that they will be customers of the Irish Water quango. Originally, this was passed off as a conservation exercise but the attempts to sell it as conservation can be dispensed with. The leaks coming from the Cabinet make it clear it is intended to be a flat charge for many years. How can the Taoiseach talk about a flat charge and conservation in the one sentence? At least we have clarity on that one thing. It is a revenue raising exercise.

People have not undergone the desired transformation and are not fools. They will see the backpedalling for what it is, an attempt to pacify, soothe and buy time to coerce people into submission. People can see the obvious future, with charges being raised, a dwindling State subvention and the new borrowing for which customers of Irish Water will be on the hook. The cost of Irish Water will not have changed because of the announcements today. The metering programme will still cost more than €1 billion and the consultants and experts will have been paid €80 million. The quango will still exist.

Instead of treating citizens like petulant children who need more time to accept things, will the Taoiseach hear the actual message rather than what he wants to hear? The message is not that we need more time but that we will not pay for an inflated super quango and we do not want to be Irish Water customers. We will not pay for Irish Water. Will the Taoiseach hear that message and does he accept that it is not about conservation but about raising revenue?

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