Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The mass movement against water charges is set to score two victories in a week. It is forcing the Government to reverse a scandalous effort by private waste companies to hike in charges to extortionate levels, and later in the week the Government will be forced to climb down in its effort to inflict water charges on people. The movement against water charges was a child of the movement against waste charges. Many of the people who formed the core of the groups in communities, towns and villages throughout the country were the very same people who fought against bin charges ten or more years ago.

When we fought bin charges we said they would lead to prices going through the roof, privatisation, a deterioration in conditions for workers in waste collection and increased damage to the environment in the form of fly-tipping, and would be followed by water charges. We were right on every single count. The worst thing about the old politics is that Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil knew we were right and that all these things would happen.

As Deputy Coppinger has suggested, the level of dishonesty is extraordinary. I heard it echoed by the Minister, Deputy Varadkar, earlier, and it was repeated endlessly by the Labour Party. The lie is that those of us who fought against bin charges were responsible for privatisation, when in fact the majority of waste charges waste collection services in this country were privatised before our campaigns against bin charges even began.

Most of the waste charges in this country were privatised in the 1990s. Our campaign only began in 2000 in Dún Laoghaire and in 2001 in Dublin city. The last places in which waste collection was privatised were Dublin city and Dún Laoghaire where there were fights.

They were privatised everywhere beforehand, just as we had predicted, by the racketeering bandits. What a shower of bandits these guys are. The Minister has said the Government is responding to the concerns raised.

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