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

That is what was going on. It was only because of the mass movement of resistance on the streets that the plan was scuppered. In so far as anybody played a role in here, it was only those who participated in the Right2Water campaign. I am proud that some of the political forces in the Dáil were involved in that. Some of the early organising meetings of Right2Water took place here when we met the trade unions and set out a plan to establish a mass movement. That mass movement would have been nothing were it not for the mass involvement of ordinary people boycotting the charges, opposing the installation of meters, moving onto the streets in unprecedented numbers and shaking the political establishment.

The lesson of all of that is that people power can bring massive change. We often hear about the need to be in political power and in office to bring change. It is a common truism that if one stays in Opposition, one can achieve nothing. The truth is the big political achievements that have taken place over the past six or seven years have not been achieved by those in power. They have been achieved against the resistance of those in power by ordinary people on the streets fighting for change. That did not just include the campaign to defeat domestic water charges. It was preceded by the campaign to stop the agreed plan of Fine Gael and the Labour Party, and before that of Fianna Fáil, to sell off the harvesting rights to Coillte. That was also defeated by a mass movement of resistance. They wanted to sell the water and the forests and were frustrated in their attempts because of the-----

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