Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

For several months I have asked the Tánaiste to explain how families who have bourne the brunt of the Government's austerity policies can pay the unjust and unfair water tax. I have asked her directly which daily necessities she proposes they forgo to prop up the discredited entity that is Irish Water. She has never once given me a straight answer. We now know the reason for her reticence.

All along she was planning legislation to pickpocket people's wages, pensions and social welfare payments. The proposal is low, sneaky and a cowardly proposition in the face of mass public opposition to her water tax. That such a Thatcherite policy is being introduced by Labour Party Ministers makes it all the more despicable. It illustrates the contempt with which Fine Gael and the Labour Party now view all of those on low incomes, the working poor, the unemployed and the vulnerable. It is an attitude best encapsulated by her colleague, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, who commented on unemployed citizens being, in his mind, allergic to work.

The Government is now seeking to turn private landlords into debt collectors for Irish Water, a position they greatly resent. As a result, landlords have speculated that they may have to triple tenants' deposits. The plan to raid people's wages, pensions and welfare payments will include thresholds to ensure people are not pushed into poverty. Those who cannot pay, and many of those who will not pay, already live in poverty. Is the Tánaiste not aware of that? They are barely able to make ends meet, but she just does not get it.

The Government now proposes to raid wages, welfare or pensions. In a double whammy, it also proposes to make private rented accommodation even more unaffordable for those with low incomes. Perhaps this time the Tánaiste will answer. What advice does she have for those people? What daily necessity does she propose they forgo to pay the water tax?

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