Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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898. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government the reason his Department proceeded with plans for water metering when advised against taking this course of action by Bord Gáis Éireann; if his Department received further advice on the use of water meters; from whom his Department received this advice; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49732/14]

Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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899. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if his Department will publish the minutes of all meetings between Bord Gáis Éireann and officials from his Department with regard to the decision to introduce water metering; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49733/14]

Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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900. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if an investigation will take place to establish the reason minutes were not taken at meetings between him and senior representatives from Bord Gáis Éireann when the issue of water meters was being discussed; if this is accepted practice in his Department; if it was agreed not to take minutes at these meetings; the action that will be as a result of this revelation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49734/14]

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 898 to 900, inclusive, together.

The programme for Governmentsets out a commitment to the introduction of water charges based on usage. The Government decided that charging based on usage is the fairest way to charge for water and, therefore, decided that water meters should be installed in households connected to public water supplies. While Bord Gáís Éireann (BGE) had suggested at an early meeting with my Department that water charges were not dependent on metering and other forms of charging could be considered, BGE were informed that the Government’s policy involved the installation of meters to facilitate a fair and equitable system of charges and to promote the conservation of water resources. T he decision to install water meters was a decision taken by the Government, and not one taken in consultation with BGE, and it isrecorded in the papers prepared for Government on these matters. Therefore the question of publication of minutes of meetings with BGE on the decision on metering does not arise.

Following the Government decisions to establish Irish Water as a subsidiary of BGE and for Irish Water to implement the domestic metering programme, there were regular meetings between my Department and Irish Water and indeed other stakeholders. As part of this process there were also regular “checkpoint meetings” between the Department and BGE. In most cases, minutes or a note of a meeting would be recorded. However, if a meeting was simply a briefing on issues there may simply be a record of the meeting having taken place with progress on the various issues being pursued through separate working arrangements, for example through the development and exchange of documents and recording in programme management tracking records. In light of this, I do not believe there is any requirement for an investigation into a situation where minutes were not kept for a meeting.