Martin Conway (Fine Gael)

I also welcome the Minister of State. I worked closely with his brother on the issue of the undocumented Irish in America.

Water is a finite and precious resource. Good quality water is an even more precious resource and precious resources do not come cheap. I have always been an advocate of fair and equitable water charges and the proposals of the Minister and the Minister of State are exactly that. People in some parts of the country did not have any water last Christmas and they would have paid any amount of money to get it. The crisis made us realise that we took it for granted, that water was precious and that we needed to respect it. When I was a young lad, I heard an old saying that wilful waste could lead to woeful want. In recent decades there has been a complete waste of water, with no respect for the fact that at some stage somebody will have to pay for it. Ultimately, the taxpayer has ended up paying for it. Unfortunately, even in the good days, we did not have the resources to put in place the infrastructural measures necessary to ensure a supply of top quality water and throughout the country there are pockets where the water supply is particularly bad. With water charges, there must be an investment to upgrade water facilities throughout the country.

I hope the Minister and the Minister of State will consider households with children with disabilities as they use more water to bathe and care for them. I suggest cognisance be taken of this when the process is being framed and the quantity of free water allowed should be far more generous for families with children with severe disabilities.

I will give the rest of my time to Senator Rónán Mullen as I know he has a number of interesting points to make.