Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Section 7 provides for the establishment of a public water forum by the commission. It represents the interests of the customers of Irish Water. It is proposed it could be 12 to 60 and that is done deliberately. The detail as regards the regulations was not going to be put into this Bill - it was never the intention to do so. I have already said I will draft regulations, send them to the joint committee, give the committee a reasonable period and let it come back to me. We will then have the forum reviewing various issues on Irish Water.

The forum can discuss any issue relating to the performance of Irish Water and particularly its investment. Not alone am I setting out the regulations, but the regulations as a component will give an opinion as to the volume of people. If the joint committee says something different on this I will take that on board and change it. I will set out the qualifications and types of individuals we need and I certainly got something from today's debate on that. I hold my hands up and say there were certainly aspects of the debate today that were very helpful and will format my thinking on the matter. The discussion on the profiles of the different types of organisations that need to be represented was also helpful. I will certainly bear those organisations and people in mind as a result of the very good debate we had today.

This section is responsible in statute for customer issues and we have that all very clear. This forum will give feedback to the Commission for Energy Regulation across all the issues it discusses. As the commission is servicing the forum it will have to take on board the comments, recommendations, issues and priorities laid before the forum by the members. I will set regulations ensuring that those who are participating in the forum have their travel expenses to and from the forum covered and everything else like that.

The forum can deal with any issue that is of concern to customers. It can deal with customer experience, response times to issues and customer queries, the type of customer queries and how they are categorised and dealt with and whether they are dealt with in a satisfactory manner, whether communications are dealt with appropriately, all of that. It can also deal with the whole issue of billing and the process by which billing is done, and can investigate whether that can be improved, because when utilities are set up the process by which billing is done can often be improved. The forum will also deal with issues around facilitating communications, as well as conservation and how it can be dealt with.

Not alone will the forum publish various documents but, for instance, it will discuss investment plans and prioritisation of investment plans. I believe that will be a critical component of the forum. It will help to ensure there is balance as regards potential investment and so on. Broadly speaking, that is what the forum will be about. I will not be too prescriptive on the matter because there may be other relevant aspects. I cannot say, hand on heart, that I have thought of every issue. There may be other aspects on which the joint Oireachtas committee will come back to me and I will take on board what the joint committee says directly. I will very much be driven by the joint Oireachtas committee in this regard and I have said as much straight out. There there will be a wider forum of people within the committee and once they come back to me they will be able to give their thoughts on the matter. I do not have a pure monopoly on knowledge on the matter. I am looking forward to drafting the first set of regulations and we will do so subsequent to passage of this Bill. I will send it to the joint committee as quickly as possible. I do not intend for the committee to take forever on the matter. I will not set six or eight months or anything like that. That would be far too long.

I compliment Senators on their contributions. There were some very good and thought provoking contributions. I took some points from the debate which will formulate how I deliver the regulations and set them down. I look forward to the joint Oireachtas committee coming back and we will go from there. The forum is an excellent idea. The concept is used by other utilities, including water utilities, in Europe and throughout the world and it is something we can embrace here as well.

We may start off with a certain membership of the forum. I am not suggesting that as things improve in the coming years and decades it will always have to be a given amount of people. This is why the membership is set between 12 and 60 and the number could change during that period.