Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I join other Deputies and Ministers in welcoming the announcements made by the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government. The past several months have been extremely frustrating for the people I represent, irrespective of whether they agree with water charges, and for me as a representative. This Government lifted the country out of the ashes and brought it back to life. We are beginning to see a recovery. The only way a country can recover is by getting people back to work and bringing money back into the system. As a Government, we have created 70,000 new and sustainable jobs since coming to power. We will have created 100,000 jobs by the end of our term and this year we saw the most positive budget in six years. Despite this, we have been speaking about water for the last two months. That is very frustrating for people.

I welcome the clarifications on how much we are going to pay, when we will have to pay, how Irish Water will operate, where its money will go and how people can lower their bills by conserving water. The issue of PPS numbers has been addressed. unless the Opposition has plans in the background, privatisation is certainly not on the agenda for Fine Gael or the Labour Party. I have spoken with a considerable number of people about these issues over the last several months. The majority are willing to pay but they want a fair and affordable system which offers a return for their investment. They want the leaks to be fixed and people taken off boil water notices. They do not want raw sewage going into our rivers. In order to fix these problems, we need to invest money. I ask Sinn Féin, the socialists, the Independent Members and Fianna Fáil, which signed us up for domestic water charges, where the money will be found. They speak about progressive tax systems when we already have such a system in Ireland. We are spending more than €1 billion per year on a system that does not work. I am sure the Ceann Comhairle is blue in the face listening to us speak about the figures and facts but 40% of our water is going down the drain. We cannot continue to throw money away and unless we invest now it will cost more in the long run. The Minister for Finance gave the analogy of a car with a leaky fuel tank. If I fill that car with diesel tonight and find that 40% has leaked away by tomorrow morning, I will not drive the car or refill the tank without first fixing the leak. That is what we need to do.

I understand why people are feeling worried about the lack of information. That is our fault but when there is a lack of information, there is a vacuum that tends to be filled with hot air and misinformation. For clarity, charges for a single adult household will be capped at €160 and for any other type of household they will be capped at €260. After taking away the conservation grant of €100, the charges will be €60 and €160 respectively, or between €1 and €3 per week. If I purchase a bottle of water, I would not get much change out of €3 because water is not cheap to produce. Ireland will have the cheapest rates on the entire Continent. The charge is €603 in France, €340 in Spain, €792 in Germany and €646 in the UK. We are trying to make this as affordable as possible.

Everybody has the right to be heard. People's voices have been heard clearly through peaceful protests and, as public representatives, we have listened. We are owning up to our mistakes and we are trying to fix them but I do not think we should be bullied. The events in Jobstown last week and in Sligo on Monday night were disgraceful. The Tánaiste, who was democratically elected by the people of Ireland, was forced to walk through a hostile crowd and endure a water balloon being thrown at her. She must have been terrified because nobody can know what is being thrown. Any Deputy who encourages such activity should take a long, hard look at why he or she got into politics. If Deputies are going to treat people in that manner, perhaps they need to rethink things.

The Opposition wants jobs and for everything to be quicker. I learned recently that Intel, which brings considerable employment to this country, uses as much water in one day as the entire city of Kilkenny. If we want to attract business and get people back to work, we need to fix our infrastructure for companies who want to come to Ireland.

See this speech in context