Water charges committee may face deadlock over report

The Oireachtas committee tasked with examining the question of water charges could end up deadlocked if Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael disagree on the final report and its recommendations.

Six of the 20 members of the Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services come from Fine Gael, while five are Fianna Fáil members.

The all-party committee, chaired by Independent Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh, has been given three months to report back to the Oireachtas with recommendations on how water services should be funded.

It will hold its first formal meeting on Tuesday afternoon, where it will be briefed by Kevin Duffy, the chairman of the expert group commissioned by the Government to examine funding.

Mr Ó Céidigh said he saw his role as a facilitator and conducting the meetings in the best positive way. He said that those who gave evidence to the committee would not be going over ground already covered by the expert committee but would be adding something new.

He said the committee was charged with producing one report. If members of the committee wanted to produce their own report at the end of the process that would be up to them.

“Everybody does not have to agree on everything. I am allowing for dissent. Quite frankly, I will be doing my best to ensure there is some form of majority there for most things,” he said.

“If it is split down 50-50 on most things, if there’s absolute stalemate, I will then have to report that to the Oireachtas . . . I hope that that would not happen. I want the report to be decisive. People deserve clarity on this issue.”

Fit for purpose

In its submission to the expert group, Fianna Fáil implied it would oppose any domestic charges for water use until such time as water services and infrastructure were fit for purpose.

There have been some conflicting messages from individual Fianna Fáil TDs about the desirability of charges. Party leader Micheál Martin has urged his party colleagues to keep an open mind during the committee’s deliberations.

Fine Gael has made clear that its preference is to charge households, especially where there is excessive water use. Its six members would garner support for that position from the Labour Party representative Jan O’Sullivan and from Green Party Senator Grace O’Sullivan.

If that position were to be supported by two of the four Independent members it would leave the committee deadlocked, 10 against 10.

Five of the committee members are trenchantly opposed to charges in any circumstances: Paul Murphy of the Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit (AAA-PBP) alliance; Sinn Féin members Eoin Ó Broin and Jonathan O’Brien, and Independents Séamus Healy and Thomas Pringle.

Fianna Fáil Senator Lorraine Clifford-Lee said her party’s position should not be assumed.

“We will hear the submissions and the evidence. If we go in with preordained ideas there’s no point to it. It is incumbent on us to have an open mind,” she said.

Mr Pringle said he did not agree with any rationale for charging for water. He said the existing Water Services Act dating from 2001 had adequate provisions for dealing with households which waste water.

The expert group recommended that the bulk of water services be funded from general taxation but did add that those households with wasteful usage of water should be levied additional charges. No specific method was recommended for measuring wasteful usage, nor was there any recommendation made on whether the water metering programme should be continued.

All committee members have been supplied with the report of the expert group as well as copies of the 70 submissions made.