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

It will be through in the morning.

This is quite an important amendment. It speaks to how seriously we take the question of conservation and who we think can help inform a policy or a conscientious approach towards the management, conservation and protection of our water resources.

I made the point already that the first answer to that question lies with those who work in water services in the local authorities. These are the people who know and they need to be very strongly represented. It is worth pointing out that year in, year out, the workers in local authority water departments told elected councillors in local authorities that they needed more investment in water infrastructure. It was political decisions by councils, dominated by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, not to put investment into water infrastructure. It was a political failure by the very same political parties who wanted to introduce water charges. It was not the fault of the workers.

If we had listened to the workers and the directors of services and so on, in the local authorities, the investment would have happened. It was not regarded as politically useful or expedient or a priority for Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil and when the time came to cut things in 2008, that is where they started and we are suffering a bitter price as a result. Having workers and trade union representatives in substantial numbers to represent those workers on the water forum is a good idea.

The other part is to have local community representatives. If one wants real buy-in from the community on how we manage, protect and conserve our water resources, then one will facilitate significant representation from communities in a water forum which will overlook things such as seeing if we are implementing EU water directives, as this Bill says this forum is supposed to do. Are the customers being looked after? I hate the phraseology of "customers". The corporate-speak gives away what Irish Water is really about, rather than referring to citizens who have rights. However, that is the wording in the legislation. We should have real community involvement in the management, oversight and protection of our water resources. These are very reasonable, sensible amendments.

On the advisory body, it is critical that we have representatives of the trade unions because they will be dealing with issues relating to industrial relations such as pay and conditions of those working in water services. It is particularly important since another impact of the setting up of Irish Water in the longer term will be an attempt to undermine the conditions of those working in water services as we move to a more privatised, commercially focused model in Irish Water. It is the other side of the coin; the running down of staff numbers in proper pensionable jobs.

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