David Cullinane (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. I expect the House will discuss the Bill for some time today and on Monday and I hope we will have constructive debates on the amendments and sections.

While I accept that the fault does not lie with the Government, it is still outrageous that a number of amendments on the section have been ruled out of order and that Senators must confine their remarks to Senator Barrett's amendment. All amendments tabled by Senators Craughwell, Zappone, Mary Ann O'Brien, James Heffernan, Healy Eames, Ó Clochartaigh, Reilly and me, which provided for a constitutional amendment, have been ruled out of order. While Senators are precluded from tabling proposals that provide for a constitutional amendment, the Government has the right to initiate a constitutional amendment on this issue. Instead of exercising that right, as it should have done, it chose to provide, in section 2, for the possibility of holding a plebiscite on the ownership of Irish Water. As Senators pointed out in the Second Stage debate yesterday, the plebiscite promised by the Government is not worth the paper on which it is written. The previous two water services Acts are being amended by this legislation, making it the third Bill on water services. If a Government decides in future that it wants to privatise or sell off parts of Irish Water - full privatisation is not necessary, as we can see from the ESB case - it need only introduce amending legislation to delete section 2. The promise that has bought off some Independent Senators would then vanish.

The position is comparable to that of a Government promising to insert in legislation a provision that it will not reduce child benefit. All it would have to do to break its promise is specify a child benefit rate in a social welfare Bill and produce amending legislation the following year to reduce the rate. These types of commitment are not worth the paper they are written on, and the commitment to hold a plebiscite on Irish Water is a charade. The Government and a number of Independent Senators are engaged in a little choreography on this issue.

I support the amendment and would like the Government to hold a constitutional referendum on the issue. Why is the Minister preventing such a referendum? Why is the Government refusing to let people have their say now? What is the difficulty with holding a constitutional referendum? I remind all the Independent and Labour Party Senators that, not so long ago, they voted for a Seanad motion that called specifically for a constitutional referendum on the ownership of water. That motion has not been vindicated in the Bill and, as such, the logic of their position does not stack up. If they wanted to be true to the motion passed by the House, they would vote against section 2.

As the Minister is aware, there are a range of opinions on Irish Water and water charges. I accept that some people do not mind paying for water and believe it is good to do so. I also expect the Minister to accept that some people have difficulty with the idea of paying for water twice and the charges element of water provision. As the Leader has stated on the Order of Business on several occasions, all political parties are against the privatisation of the water service. Fine Gael, the Labour Party, Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin have all expressed opposition to privatisation.

I am not sure whether any of the Independent Senators have. I hope most, or all, of them are against the privatisation of water. If the political system, in its entirety, is at one on this issue, why can we not have a conditional referendum?

We will have a number of them in May next year. We could also have one on this issue. Nothing is stopping the Minister or Government from doing that. It adds to the confusion for people. Why is the Government not committing to that? Why are we simply putting something in a Bill which, the Minister would have to concede, can be reversed, deleted, amended, taken out or dispensed with if a Government was minded to privatise water services?

The Government also said it has no intention of privatising water. People have experience of other public services, which were once paid for through progressive taxation, as water was, and were delivered as a right. One paid ones taxes and one's water was provided. We are now changing that to a system of water charges and the so-called "polluter pays" principle.

We had the same arguments about waste collection. When bin charges were first introduced in Waterford, it was nothing to do with privatisation. Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and other councillors all said it was about improving the service. The argument was made that a body cannot be a regulator of a service as well as a provider. The charges which were introduced started at a very low base and in most areas were £30, but they increased every year. At a certain point the service was privatised, local authorities left and I do not think a single local authority in the State now provides waste collection services.

It is quite obvious that once the concept of charges is introduced, water is commodified and water services are commercialised, it will inevitably lead to privatisation. People have experience of bin charges and the health service, where they have been forced to take out private health insurance. Once the concept of charges is introduced, inevitably private operators and profiteers come in, and services like water become commodities rather than a public or human right, which is what I believe water to be.

Can the Minister explain why water will be any different? We know, because it is anchored in European policy, that what Europe wants is for the full cost of water to be recovered. People will end up paying more. Once they are paying higher charges, things become easier for profiteers and it becomes profitable for companies to buy up our water infrastructure or for the State to get out. Will we then hear the same arguments that we cannot be a regulator as well as a provider of our water services?

I cannot understand why the Government is so fearful of a constitutional referendum on this issue and allowing the people to have their say. If all of the parties in the House and the State are genuinely committed to ensuring that we do not have privatisation, then they should have no difficulty whatsoever in supporting a constitutional referendum on this issue. Ruling out amendments is not the fault of the Minister or Government, but refusing to hold a referendum on the issue is clearly the responsibility of the Minister and Government.

I have more to say on this issue, but others wish to contribute. I would also like to hear the response of the Minister. I ask him to answer some direct questions. Can he confirm that if a future Government wanted to privatise water services and not hold a plebiscite, all it would need to do would be to introduce a water services (amendment) Bill that would delete the relevant section? That would negate the need for a plebiscite. Can the Minister be honest with people and say that is all it would require?

Can the Minister explain why he will not hold a referendum on the issue? Of what is he fearful? What is the problem with it? People want to have their say on this issue. Why would we fear the people and a referendum?