Shane Ross (Dublin South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Government itself has acknowledged that this is the Bill of an Administration in fast retreat. There is no doubt that when it says so unconvincingly that it has listened to the people, it is really saying it never listened to them before, but that it will listen now as they are up in arms. It has provoked well over 100,000 people, perhaps 150,000, to come out onto the streets. Irish people are not natural protestors, as we have seen, and it has taken a great deal to bring them onto the streets. The Bill has been the final straw in a large number of impositions, including on working class people, middle class people and people who are quite prosperous. People from all backgrounds are marching and in revolt against the Government's measures.

The Government is fearful that it has successfully made the nation pretty well ungovernable. This particular document is a white flag raised by the Government in response to those who are marching. It is a desperate plea to reduce next week the numbers to something pitiful, but that is unlikely to happen. Next week we will see a large number of people protesting not so much against water charges but against everything. They will protest against the Government and everything that has been done by way of impositions on their backs. They will protest at the way the Government has been running the country for three and a half years. The Government is now so out of touch that it knows it cannot govern properly.

The consent of the people is required to govern. The appalling vista that confronts the Government is that a large number of people are about to indulge in civil disobedience and it can do nothing about it. How this vista has come to pass is apparent to everybody - the Government has governed while being completely out of touch with citizens.

While I do not approve of non-compliance with the law, the Government has provoked non-compliance, not only among legislators but also among people. People were provoked into non-compliance, not out of pig iron or obstinacy but because they cannot pay what the Government is asking them to pay.

The reversals that are so apparent in the legislation are not enough. The reversal on the use of personal public service, PPS, numbers is a statement by the Government that it did not realise its proposal was so provocative. It was a Big Brother measure that was totally unacceptable from day one, but for some extraordinary reason, neither Irish Water nor the Government realised this. At this stage, no one will feel compensated or consoled by the proposed water conservation grant or lower charges. Furthermore, the idea that the Government is a convert to the idea of holding plebiscites on issues such as this is utterly unconvincing.

This Bill is a final throw of the dice by a Government that is desperate. I tend to agree with Deputies on this side who argue it will not be enough to stop people coming onto the streets next week. As far as I can gather, the only people trying to stop people from coming onto the streets are the leadership of the SIPTU trade union. May I, from a somewhat unusual position in this House, make a plea to SIPTU to encourage its members to take to the streets? What has happened to the leadership of this great trade union that it is asking people not to go on the streets next week? It is so conservative and so strongly embedded in the Labour Party that it cannot give its members the type of leadership it should have given them from the start. The Labour Party has been reduced to the position that its great ally and leader of working people, the trade union movement, is asking people to pay the water charge and avoid taking to the streets. This is an extraordinary turnaround.

Irish Water is emblematic of what is wrong with this country. I am not convinced by the protestations from the Government parties that they will introduce a new appointments system under which, for the first time in the history of the State, people will be appointed to semi-state bodies on merit. Irish Water is a State monopoly with a little camouflage. Notwithstanding the camouflage that applies to appointments to its board, these appointments will be made by a Minister. All Ministers have proven themselves to be utterly unsuited to making board appointments because they put their cronies in charge, and the board of Irish Water will not be an exception. No more than one or two experts will be appointed to it and the bonus culture will continue, despite what we have been told.

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