Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There is one certainty in the subject matter of this debate and that is that Irish Water has lost the confidence of the public. Deputy Fergus O'Dowd, who as then Minister of State pioneered the legislation in the House almost 12 months ago, has termed the establishment of Irish Water an unmitigated disaster. Any major public utility must have the confidence of the public, its customers and consumers to do its job properly and provide the service it has been established to provide. Such confidence is absolutely essential, but it is lacking with regard to Irish Water.

It has been almost 12 months since the Government rammed the Water Services Act through the House. Ministers continually refer to the mammoth task of establishing Irish Water, yet they were prepared to give the House less than three hours to debate the necessary legislative measures. At that time, the Government and its constituent parties flatly refused to accept the idea of an ability-to-pay clause or that the Irish Water model would be much too big and cumbersome and would end up saddling the taxpayer with substantial expenditure on which there would be no direct return to consumers and customers. Why could there not have been a proper and adequate debate more than 12 months ago in relation to this major change of policy, particularly when service level agreements were being put in place with local authorities to enable them to deliver the service and carry out the infrastructure works for the following two decades?

Earlier this year there was an announcement by the Government, with great fanfare, that the Commission for Energy Regulation would set the charges. What are its responsibilities today? What message was sent out to young, qualified people who are unfortunately unemployed when they learned that people who had retired from the public service were being recruited by Irish Water on large remuneration? In many instances, the recruits brought their gratuities with them. Week after week, legitimate questions were asked in the House, but the answers were far from adequate. Over a period of time, how many different responses were given to the same questions?

The Tánaiste acknowledged this morning in the House that there was substantial investment by the Fianna Fáil party in government - in excess of €5 billion - in the water services programme in the decade prior to the Government's taking office. A vast amount of new infrastructure was put in place and existing infrastructure upgraded.

Our water system needs ongoing investment and maintenance and new infrastructure to replace that which is outdated.

Government Members have made some erroneous comments over the past few days. It was incorrectly suggested that public water supplies never transcended county boundaries. Aughawillan group water scheme in south County Leitrim supplies houses in my county, Cavan. The Castlerahan Mountnugent Munterconnacht group water scheme in County Cavan supplies houses in the Oldcastle area of County Meath. Not alone do services cross county boundaries, but they also cross jurisdiction boundaries. There is a link between Cavan County Council and Fermanagh District Council in the provision of water to the villages of Belcoo and Blacklion, which receive water from the same sources. The group water schemes, in which there was major investment from 1997 to the late 2000s, have been an example of great partnership between local communities, local authorities and the National Federation of Group Water Schemes, which the then Minister, Noel Dempsey, established. My county, which is a rural county with a small population, received investment of €160 million in less than a decade. It was a huge investment in upgrading the water infrastructure and providing new infrastructure, and I am very glad that every inch of County Cavan is covered by group water schemes. It is similar in County Monaghan, where the local communities worked in partnership with the councils, the National Federation of Group Water Schemes and many enlightened officials in the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. They worked together, group water schemes were merged and there was a fabulous level of investment in upgrading or extending and providing new group water schemes. The model could have been built upon to ensure we did not establish a quango with much cost and no return to the Exchequer. Given that 99.999% of houses have a running water supply, it was laughable to hear the Tánaiste say the project of establishing Irish Water had been the largest since rural electrification. We need continued investment in the water system and upgrading to build on the progress that has been achieved. Much more progress is needed to ensure all our citizens have access to a proper supply of high-quality water.

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