Robert Dowds (Dublin Mid West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Alan Kelly, was right to apologise to the people when he introduced his new proposals for dealing with the water issue because no party in this Dáil has covered itself in glory on this issue. We have all, in different ways, let the public down. At the same time the Minister was right to continue with his proposal because it is essential to deal with the issues around water. We need huge investment in water services because almost 50% of our supply is leaking into the ground. There is a need to replace pipes and get rid of lead piping. The meters are needed to help people to know how much water they are using and to identify leaks. There is enough water leaking from 22 houses to supply the town of Gorey. There are 22,000 people who cannot drink the water from their taps. I understand this problem is being sorted out in Roscommon. There are 42 towns from which raw sewage is going into rivers or the sea. This has to stop. Some of these are tourist venues such as Youghal, as well as some towns in County Clare. The biggest problem is that the Dublin water supply is on a knife edge. We must organise a new supply of water for Dublin in the next eight years or so, on top of the remedial work that needs to be done. If we do not do this, people will have a short supply of water which will affect our ability to attract industry to the country. It is essential to make this investment. No matter how it is done, it will be costly, but we must invest in it, just as our ancestors made a huge investment in the reservoir at Poulaphouca in order that Dublin city and the greater Dublin area would be supplied with water.

It is welcome that the Minister has made the payments system simple and straightforward. Everybody knows that when the conservation grant is taken into consideration, the payment for a person living alone will be €1.15 per week and for households with two or more people, it will be marginally over €3 per week. The previous proposals were not simple and led to a great deal of fear, which was one of the things that fuelled the huge protest on the streets. They were not just about water, but that was the final straw. It is important to have this bedded down.

I welcome, too, the provision in the Bill for the holding of a plebiscite if there is any move towards privatising the water system. The ultimate decision will rest with the public. I am in favour of keeping the water service as a public utility. I also welcome the provision on the establishment of a public water forum. It is important that there be interaction between Irish Water and the public.

I would appreciate it if the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Paudie Coffey, passed on the message to his senior Minister that it is really important for people when they have a problem such as a leak to be able to contact somebody locally. Irish Water should have somebody based in the local council to deal quickly with issues as they arise. For example, the water meter of one of my constituents in Palmerston showed that his household was apparently using 450,000 litres of water over a four week period, whereas his next door neighbour was using approximately 37,000 litres in the same period. The trouble to get Irish Water to deal with that issue was immense. It has been dealt with, but it took approximately three months to do so and it should not have. I had to embarrass the chief executive of Irish Water about it and to go to the media. It has to be fit for purpose. That is one of the big problems confronting us.

Overall, it is important to take this initiative because we must continue to ensure the public has a decent supply of water. Every party is in one way responsible for the bad handling of this issue. I acknowledge this in the case of my own party, but it also true in different ways of all the other parties in this Chamber. Our primary duty is to ensure the people have an adequate supply of safe drinking water.

In addition, we must ensure there is sufficient supply for industry and we must deal adequately with sewerage problems, especially where raw sewage is going into rivers and the sea. It is vital that we develop a system of which we can all be proud, in the same way we are proud of ESB, for example.

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