Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will begin by paying tribute to the Chairman of the Oireachtas committee, Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh. In his foreword to the report he talks about the importance of water for us as human beings and the environment, as well as in protecting the country in not polluting rivers and streams. It is important that we include these issues in this debate. This is not about political point scoring but about an essential commodity that we all need. It costs a lot of money to treat water and remove wastewater. The European Commission and the Water Framework Directive are not in place to impose a penalty on the Irish people but to ensure we look after our water resource and do not pollute the environment. It is important to set the debate in that context.

I am not sure how much we have done in the committee to further this debate, having read the report of the Duffy Commission and the clear recommendations read out by the Minister. It is stated at the end, for example, that excessive or wasteful use of water should be paid for directly by the user by tariffs determined by the Commission for Energy Regulation, CER. Excessive or wasteful use of water will be discouraged by charging for such use and is, therefore, consistent with the polluter pays principle. The report the committee has come up with has, unfortunately, taken us backwards rather than forwards in addressing this issue. I wish the Minister well on the road he is going to have to take. In effect, in setting up the Duffy Commission and then the committee another can has been kicked down the road, where they are now sitting and waiting for somebody to set up an incinerator. The difference between the other cans and this one is that the Minister is obliged to take this one down a very perilous legislative route in complying with the Water Framework Directive and being fair to taxpayers and those who are careful in their use of water.

One would think from the debate so far that somehow or other no one is going to have to pay for water. If it is paid for through general taxation, it will be in competition with other items such as housing, to which Deputy Eoin Ó Broin referred, hospitals, schools and so on. I know that we said in the report that such funding should be ring-fenced, but it will be paid for by the ordinary taxpayer. The Labour Party agrees that there should be a free allowance for normal use in households. We do not agree that the taxpayer should pay for the excessive and wasteful use of water. We believe it should be paid for by those who are wasting it. Nor do we believe the 2007 Act is the way to do it. That is why we voted against the report. We do not believe it should be done through the criminal law but through straightforward charges, as recommended by the Duffy Commission and the European Commission, as well as by Professor Gavin Barrett, the Jean Monnet chair of European constitutional and economic law at UCD. He has also stated very clearly that there is a need for metering and that we do need to charge for excessive use. In the written advice he gave to the committee he said it should be noted that political difficulties concerning the acceptability of metering would not be an acceptable defence in such a prosecution under Article 258. The man is an expert on European law.

There is no point in pretending that what exists does not exist. There is no point in pretending that water is free. It has to be paid for through taxation. We have heard different interpretations of the same wording used in the report from different speakers. That is why I call it a fudge. People can read into it what they want. I wish the Minister well in trying to produce legislation from it.

I want to refer to Deputy Barry Cowen's contribution. He has gone back to the past, although I thought we were to focus on the future. He clearly decided to have a go again. I remind him that the first reference to introducing water charges in recent times was when the Government of which his party was part told the troika that it was going to introduce charges and at a much higher rate than was subsequently proposed. Cabinet papers recently published under the new freedom of information laws which my party also introduced in government with Fine Gael make it very clear that the then Fianna Fáil Government signalled its intention to introduce charges. That was when we lost the derogation.

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