Brian Ó Domhnaill (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I second the motion. During his contribution, Senator MacSharry outlined the debacle which has transpired from the fallout of Irish Water. He identified the money which has been spent and effectively wasted, and which will be wasted over the next four years. If the Government were to step back from where it is at the moment with a clean sheet, I do not think it would do what it has done. The establishment of Irish Water was structurally wrong and it was wrong from strategic, economic, fairness, equality and governance points of view. The Minister of State, Deputy Coffey, could do the State some service today by acknowledging that. Whatever way this is dressed up or justified, the structural manner in which Irish Water was established - on an ad hocbasis with various U-turns as are identified in the motion - showed a complete lack of strategic planning by the Government and by the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. It is a failed entity and a failed piece of work and it is a bad day in office for the Government which will haunt this country and the generations to come long into the future.
The OECD maintains that if meters are installed, for every 1% increase in price there is a 0.4% saving on water consumption. What this Government has done is an unholy mess. First of all it went forward with a plan to install meters, spending €540 million as Senator MacSharry has said. The meters will cost an additional €60 million to upgrade in future years. Then the Government decided it was not going to actually use the meters until at least 2019, so what is the purpose behind an expenditure of €540 million up-front? This investment plan has 500,000 meters installed with a contract to install an additional 500,000 meters using Siteserv, a company that was awarded the contract by the then Minister, former Deputy Phil Hogan. What is the purpose of that investment? By 2019, taking the 500,000 meters that are currently in the ground, a third of those meters' lifespan will be expended but they will not have served any purpose. Can the Minister of State outline how that represents value for money to the taxpayer? Who, in his view, is going to pay for it? We know that the National Pensions Reserve Fund is paying for it, but that is borrowed money.

Who is paying for it? The Minister is not paying for it, Fine Gael is not paying for it and the Labour Party is not paying for it but they have asked the citizens to pay for it. Bad economic planning and bad strategy by the Government have resulted in the consumer having to pay money just to fund the installation of meters that will not be used until 2019. How does that fulfil criteria for water conservation and water pricing? It does not fulfil either of those basic criteria.

The basic rules of value for money within the Irish public service have been thrown out the window. Value for money is determined by using efficiency, effectiveness and economy of scale in the public sector. It is difficult to examine and measure but in this case value for money was simply thrown out the window. There is no value for money. It is an unholy mess to spend €750 million of taxpayers' money on a quango which will deliver nothing, and on pipes that will rust in the ground until such time as Government policy is changed to allow them to be used. That is not strategic planning or good governance. If a school board of management operated in such a manner the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government or the Minister for Education and Skills would step in and take control. Maybe it is time someone else took control of the mess this Government has created in regards to Irish Water. It is an absolute disgrace that future generations are expected to pay for the mess made by the Department and Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government.

The expenditure of €2.3 billion identified by Senator MacSharry has not been addressed because no extra money is being expended on infrastructure. In fact, since the Government took office in 2011, over €400 million has been spent on the improvement of water network infrastructure. In 2014, €296 million was expended on infrastructural improvements of our water network. How is that progress? It is not progress.

Serious questions must be answered here. I appreciate that changes have been made but they have not gone far enough. Irish Water needs to be disbanded as it is not fit for purpose. The money has been squandered so one must cut one's losses. The project established is an absolute disgrace and fulfils no economic value for money as defined in any textbook that I am aware of.