43 thoughts on “‘Enough To Fill Five Swimming Pools’

  1. Hector Ramirez

    Whoever goes to fix it will get a bonus… Or they can leave it as it is and get a bonus. Hmmm?

    1. Panty Christ

      You were supposed to apply through your local TD and your CV would be have been placed in a large rotating drum where it may have been drawn at random by a consultant from Accenture.

    2. Kill The Poor

      They took them from the County Council pool who were already doing these jobs.

      As they were taking over the water supply from the county council system does this seem wise Lisa ?
      Or would you prefer them to advertise for all the jobs and then train up new people as the exchequer pays for the trained county council staff to be made redundant ?

      1. Lisa

        Um do I expect a PRIVATE company to advertise for its jobs? Eh yes, yes I do. And in Europe lots of people would have the relevant experience. Considering the council are still the people who are responsible for the water SYSTEM then why would the council staff who are doing that already be made redundant. Stop being contrary.

        1. Kill The Poor

          How am I being contrary ?
          Firstly its not a PRIVATE company.
          Secondly this ‘half their people’ as you say are on secondment from the public sector and arent employed directly by Irish Water.
          Of the many things they did wrong this wasnt one of them.

          BTW nice work picking on the point about staff the Irish Indo are giving out about, classic misdirection .
          Get the plebs angry about the worng thing and maybe we’ll forget about Denis OBriens links to FG and the way a compnay he picked up for half nothing got the meter contract.

          Keep on shouting at the wind LISA

        2. Don Pidgeoni

          Silly Lisa, wanting transparency in your public services. What are you, some kind of communist?

          1. CousinJack

            Or even a capitalist
            Our current system is elitist+cronyist
            Happen to be a neighbour of the Enda, on a board
            be an incompetent public official, heres a new state utility to run
            Thanks 1916

        3. Mick Flavin

          Irish Water isn’t a private body (yet, at any rate) though, is it? Or am missing something here?

        4. Tim

          Would be nuts to make wholesale changes of people who are doing the job day in day out. Makes no sense whatsoever. Firstly these are the people that have the current knowledge of operating our system and secondly it is totally unfair that a person who is doing nothing wrong doing essential work finds themselves out of a job because of this. Now if theirs restructuring and job losses for operational means, that sometimes happens in changes like this, they can also review peoples jobs as you go and make decisions upon replacing them. Advertising for jobs where all the positions are currently filled is mad. If Bus Eireann was privatised you don’t sack all the bus drivers and advertise their jobs. Wrong as a business plan and wrong morally. Cuckoo land.

          1. CousinJack

            It would make no sense to change the people doing the job in the first place, if they were doing a GOOD job. Otherwise there are plenty of highly skilled people across the EU who could have taken these jobs and given Ireland a first rate service, although with the failed managers and consultants these people would be undermined at a senior level

          2. Nigel

            No, that makes perfect sense! Of course what happened was lots of managers retired with big bonuses and then were hired on with generous salaries and workers were given a staggeringly, ridiculously lucrative contract. All legal and locked in, but the kind of cure hoorism that is going to cheerfully cost billions before a single leak is patched.

          3. realPolithicks

            Your right, it makes no sense to replace the guys who installed a water meter (that leaks 2 liters per minute) 11 weeks ago and have yet to come and fix it. Makes no sense at all.

    3. Wayne.F

      Well considering most of them were legacy staff, who previously maintained and operated the network for local authorities, most of your outrage is unfounded

  2. Walter Ego

    Irish Water, the biggest con job ever tried on the Irish people. Resist it and don’t pay your bills. We already pay for our water. If you’re opposed to this rip-off, join our march (if you can) this Saturday at the Garden of Remembrance, Dublin at 2pm.

    1. Kill The Poor

      Really Walter ?

      What about the bank bail out ? wasnt that a bigger con job, did you march against that too ?

      Were you out marching against the water when it was proposed by the troica ? agreed to by FF & put before the dail by FG ? or just at the last minute as the van arrived outside your gaff with a meter ?

      1. mucker

        Yeah Walter. Everybody knows that you can’t protest against something unless you’ve protested about it before or you’ve protested about other things.

      2. Walter Ego

        As a matter of fact I’ve protested outside the Dail about the Bailout and Austerity measures that are imposed on the less well off in our society at The National Convention centre for the Fine Gael Love-In and I protested with thousands of others at Labours Centenary Farce in Galway. Tell me, what Government rip off party do you support?

        1. Kill The Poor

          @mucker @Walter Ego Sorry for original comment , I was very cranky this morning after getting to work wet and some of these ‘Water People’ really get to me.

          I / we should encourage all protesting in out passive little country !
          Well done @Walter Ego for protesting all those things we need more like you.

          For my shame I was a life long labour voter ……….what is left for me now !

          1. Walter Ego

            No problem @Kill the poor. And for my shame I was also a Labour voter. Never again I tell you. Never again.

          2. Papa P

            These may just be the greatest posts ever on the internet.

            Can you teach youtube commenters some manners?

      3. deliverancecountry

        You were right the first time EatTheRich, it was all part of the IMF thingy. Also, metering etc. bloody right and about time. You can use a rainbarrell to water your garden or flush the jacks, drinking water is expensive.
        We should only pay for usage and for servicing waste water and the infrastructure managed from the profits. This €400 standing charge is a just a tax and should be in income tax. We have paid upfront for the meters and the database to manage them etc.

    2. ReproBertie

      We already pay for our schools through taxation but have to pay more to use them.

      We already pay for our health service through taxation but have to pay more every time we go to hospital.

      We already pay for our water system but it’s leaking and grossly inadequate. I have no problem with water charges. I do have a problem with the way Irish Water has been set up and the money wasted as a by product of setting it up. I also have a problem with simplistic arguments and empty slogans.

      1. El Cuno

        I am also in favour of water charges if it were a means to encourage water conservation. Let the councils run it as normal, install a meter, let it run for 6 months, give the household an allowance of 80% of their normal usage (or a standard allowance if you think they’re taking the piss) and charge for anything more than that. If you don’t waste water, you don’t pay. YOu don’t pay anything till a meter has been installed.
        Of course, as it has been set up, it is a complete con job – maximise revenue, create another quango, waste more money…

    3. Nigel

      It’s not the biggest con job by any means, it’s just, depressingly, unbelievably, business as usual. It’s probably not even properly a con because as far as I can make out no-one is being taken in, they’re not really trying to hide what they’re doing and yet they’re going ahead and doing it in full sight and with everyone saying they shouldn’t be doing it this way, and their only response is that they might have flubbed the PR a bit. There’s probably a name for t, but for the moment let’s think of it as all money under the bridge.

  3. Liam from Lixnaw

    A FINA regulation pool would take 2500000 litres to fill, so not sure what paddling pool this chap is filling

  4. Mark

    A house in Artane has had a flooded garden since April because they broke the pipe when installing the meter. The house is abandoned so no one cares. The garden is now a swamp and the wall is beginning to fall as the foundations are undermined. No one cares.

    I contacted Irish Water and the council months ago and no one did anything.

  5. nellyb

    This issue must go to relevant Ombudsman and all the posters here should send the picture it on to their respective TD’s for investigation and fact checking.
    On a side note: German and French economies are idling, 2015 will the birth of Aer Eireann. RUN!

  6. Michael

    Water regulator has decided that Irish Water must do a first fix for leaks on household side that are revealed when meter is installed – which is what seems to have happened here. Decision poster today here http://www.cer.ie/docs/000979/CER14452%20WCP%20Domestic%20Response%20and%20Decision%20Paper.pdf.
    IW and regulator in discussions about how this will work with January 1 being deadline. I presume there may be discussion about what level of leak qualifies – this one obviously does but other much smaller leaks may not be economic to fix. The leak tha has been identified here may well have been happening for a long time.

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