The first water meter getting installed in Maynooth, Co Kildare on August 8, 2013

Irish Water should stop installing water meters in homes, the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER) has declared, warning that the cost of completion will cripple efforts to improve water quality and supply.

In a submission to an Oireachtas committee which is investigating options, the CER – Ireland’s water regulator – said finishing the programme was not a priority.

So far 58 per cent of households have had meters put in place – the installation efforts have been strongly opposed in some places – but several hundred thousand properties remain to be linked. No money has been put in Irish Water’s 2017/18 capital budget to finish the work.

Meanwhile…

You may recall the publication of the Report on the Funding of Domestic Public Water Services in Ireland by the Expert Commission on Water Charges in November.

Further to this.

Today, at 2pm, the report will be discussed at a meeting of the Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services.

Representatives of the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, Irish Water, and the Commission for Energy Regulation will attend the meeting.

Watch the meeting live, from 2pm, here.

Regulator says Irish Water should not proceed with metering (Sarah Bardon, Irish Times)

Previously: Denis O’Brien, Fine Gael And The Water Meter Deal

Rollingnews

UPDATE:

At the meeting of the Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services…

Paul McGowan, of the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER), said it is not calling for the installation of water meters to be abandoned completely.

In response to a series of questions from Fine Gael TD Kate O’Connell – in which she queried the CER commenting on water meters and asked why the CER thinks it’s appropriate for the project, which, she said, is 75 per cent finished, to be abandoned…

There was the following exchange:

Paul McGowan: “Specifically, in relation to metering, we were asked the committee a number of questions in relation to metering and that was the basis on which we offered ideas and views in relation to the future of metering, at the committee’s request. So, that was the genesis of those answers.”

“Metering is a regulatory matter, I would say. It forms the basis in utility regulation for a large element of charging regimes, right across energy, water and other utilities. We recognise that the first phase of the metering was a decision that was taken by Government and that was [inaudible] so to speak to Irish Water, and to us, as a decision. And future consideration of further roll-out of metering.

“For example, to apartment buildings and those houses, or customers, who haven’t been metered in the first place was always going to be something that we would be looking at, in due course, in the overall cost-benefit, the cost of doing it and what would the benefits be.

“And that ultimately we would have worked with Irish Water to determine what’s the most efficient approach to close out the metering programme. So it is, it is something that a regulator would have a very close interest in.”

Kate O’Connell: “So, would you say, sorry, I probably phrased it incorrectly at the start. What you’re saying is that abandoning, or not abandoning it, stopping it, it’s to do with areas that there’s challenges about the metering, it’s not overall metering?”

McGowan: “Well to come back to that..”

O’Connell: “Yeah, I need you to clarify your statement essentially.”

McGowan: “To be very clear, we did not say that we should abandon…”

O’Connell: “Right, okay.”

McGowan: “To be absolutely clear. What we said was that, at this time, to proceed with another major programme of metering investment, given that the, as we see it, the proposal from the expert commission, was that the vast majority of water should be paid by the State and that only excessive use charged to customers. In that context, we said that, at this time, there are other priorities for capital investment but that we can come back and look at whether there was a case for further metering in due course.”

“But in the meantime, there were other options that could be looked at. And that was the context within which we replied to the committee. We did not boldly state that metering should be abandoned. We just said, at this time…”

O’Connell: “Park it.”

McGowan: “Yes…”

Watch the meeting live here

UPDATE:

Ervia chief executive Michael McNicholas says Irish Water did not spend €73m on consultants, rather they were ‘internatioanl experts’.

— Philip Ryan (@Philip_Ryan) January 12, 2017

And Water Committee hears the cost of billing is €25 million – a year!

— Páraic Gallagher (@paraicgallagher) January 12, 2017

Speaking about costs…

Mr McGowan said:

“Irish Water, at this stage of its evolution, is a high-cost utility. We would expect that because it has inherited 34 different water authorities but our analysis would indicate that they’re up to twice the cost of an efficient utility so what we will be doing over this revenue control, and the following revenue controls, is ensuring that they deliver the efficiencies to get down to the level of efficient operation, a level of cost of an efficient operation.”