This morning
At the North Circular Road to Dorset Street [Dublin].
Tag Archives: Irish Water
Scenes of Irish Water workers and protesters at Stoneybatter, Dublin 7 this morning.
From top: Oxmantown, Ben Eadair and Arklow Streets.
Via Stoneybatter Against The Water Tax (Facebook)
Previously: Meanwhile, In Stoneybatter
The Fiach?
atFiach Mac Conghail now on his feet in the #Seanad. Having voted with Govt procedurally this morning, he’s fiercely critical of it now…
— Gavan Reilly (@gavreilly) December 18, 2014
Mac Conghail hints he’ll vote in favour. Passing Bill won’t undo incompetence, he says, but it will offer more certainty to public #seanad — Gavan Reilly (@gavreilly) December 18, 2014
Get off the stage.
Meanwhile…
Water Bill passes by 81 to 58 votes amid claim TDs would ‘privatise their mother’ (irish Times)
Why are you marching about water.
When you could be marching for other things.
Fergus Finlay writes:
“Who will march for Ivy McGinty? Or Mary Garvan? Or Mary Maloney? Or the hundreds of other Ivys and Marys who live lives of seclusion, trapped in a system in which they have no rights, no voice, nobody to speak for them? Or march for them?”
“How is it possible that up to 100,000 of us are willing to protest about a tiny charge to fix a broken water system, but nobody can be bothered to march for the most defenceless people in Ireland? How can we get so angry over things that aren’t going to destroy anyone’s life, and yet we can watch frail, elderly women being pushed and verbally abused in a public service and not march on Dáil Éireann? How can we be so triumphant about bringing the Government to its knees over water, and yet there are no banners for Ivy or the two Marys?”
Meanwhile…
FIGHT!
Previously: ‘You Could See Her Cowering In The Chair’
Pic: Random Irish Photo
Independent TD Stephen Donnelly in the Dáil last Thursday evening and then Friday morning, when Ceann Comhairle Sean Barrett accused Deputy Donnelly of filibuster
HOW much?
On Thursday evening, Independent TD Stephen Donnelly, among other Opposition TDs, asked Environment Minister Alan Kelly if the water charges would lead to a net income or deficit for the State.
Specifically, there was confusion over whether the €100 water conservation grant will cost the State €130million or €166million – as it wasn’t clear how many households will receive it.
During the debate Mr Donnelly, and other Opposition TDs, repeatedly requested that the Committee stage of the bill be adjourned to allow for Mr Kelly to obtain the correct figures.
As the debate drew to a close, there was this exchange:
Stephen Donnelly: “As of now, the people of Ireland will pay €271 million for their water and the benefit to the State at best will be €37 million and may be negative. This case, irrespective of whether there is a net benefit or cost to the State of charging people for water, is fundamental to this legislation. Can we please, in the interests of good parliamentary and legislative work on all sides, adjourn and come up with the figures? We have an independent expert…”
Alan Kelly: We have the figures.”
Sandra McLellan: “They are wrong.”
Stephen Donnelly: “We have an independent expert which can study the figures, the CER. It already has an opinion paper on this. Let us come back next week with figures everyone can agree on, please.”
The debate resumed on Friday morning and the confusion over Irish Water’s costs remained with Independent TD Róisín Shortall later getting suspended from the Dáil.
Before her suspension happened, the following exchange took place.
Róisín Shortall: “One of the most important roles we have, as Members of this House, is to scrutinise legislation. That is what Members on this side of the House were doing last night. They asked very straightforward, pertinent questions on the financing model of Irish Water. Regrettably, the Minister was not able to answer those straightforward, fundamental questions about his proposal. Overnight, we thought the Minister would check out the position…”
An Ceann Comhairle (Sean Barrett): “I am sorry but we are now dealing with section 7, which is about the setting up of a forum. Deputy Shortall should please speak to the section.”
Shortall: “I appreciate that. We expected the Minister to be in a position to answer those very basic questions this morning. It is a matter of extreme regret, a Cheann Comhairle, that when you came into the Chamber this morning, you came with the intention of shutting down the debate.”
Barrett: “I certainly did no such thing. Deputy Shortall should not make such a charge against the Chair.”
Shortall: “A Cheann Comhairle, your role is not to protect the Minister and silence the Dáil.”
Barrett: “It is not Deputy Shortall’s role to make a charge against the Chair which is totally and utterly untrue.”
Shortall: “Your role, a Cheann Comhairle, is to uphold the rights of Members of this Dáil.”
Further to this, Fine Gael junior environment minister Paudie Coffey and Fianna Fáil TD and environment spokesman Barry Cowen spoke to Cathal MacCoille on Morning Ireland this morning about the matter.
Cathal MacCoille: “Minister Alan Kelly said that this so-called Water Conservation grant, this cash payment to everyone who signs up for water charges, whether they pay them or not, would at one point 1.3million households in the State cost €130million in a full year and yet it was pointed out immediately to him, from the Opposition, that there are 1.6million households and therefore the cost would not be €130million but €160million-plus. Can you explain the confusion for us?”
Paudie Coffey: “Well, first of all, I want to state clearly and, as has already been stated in the Dáil that the €130million allocation is a budget allocation for a demand-led scheme. That it’s not possible for anybody to know how many will actually register at this particular time. So the budget is allocated at €130million. I want to make it also clear that it’s not part of Irish Water, and this is where the Opposition have been trying to…
Talk over each other.
MacCoille: “Let’s just stick to the figures. There are 1.66million households in the State. Are you saying that the Government is working on the basis that not all of them will claim and that therefore it will cost not €166million but €130million. Is that the basis of your calculations?”
Coffey: “Any demand-led scheme that has been operated in the past by any Government or indeed this government has never had 100% take-up, for various reasons. Some of it might be non-compliance and some of it might be just that people don’t register. So it’s a Budget allocation. But the important point here is, if the demand exceeds the Budget allocation, additional resources are then provided. But the important, and most important point here, is the €130million conservation grant is not part of the Irish Water expenditure funding model. And this is where the Opposition are trying to, I suppose, stitch it into it, to try and create obstruction and confusion. But the most important point, I would like to make is this legislation that’s now being passed is for three reasons. One: it’s to cap the charges to make it more affordable, it’s to remove the power of Irish Water to turn off or turn down water in the event of non-payment, which incidentally Fianna Fail opposed, and also it’s to provide a €100 grant for every household…”
Later
MacCoille: “Have you any idea how much this [the water conservation grant] is going to cost and whether extra staff will be needed?”
Coffey: “Well, first of all, can I say that this is typical of the hypocrisy of Fianna Fáil who, in their national recovery plan, had committed to raising €500million per annum from water charges by 2013. What the Government is doing under the current Irish Water funding model, which I have to say, has been subject to full independence, financial and economic analysis by the Commission for Energy Regulation and that is there for all to see on the commission’s website, fully published and fully analysed…”
MacCoille: “Do you know how much the water conservation grant as you call it…”
Talk over each other.
Coffey: “..separating the water conservation grant from the Irish Water funding model because Opposition are bringing this onto the pitch to try and say that Irish Water’s funding model is not sustainable.”
Talk over each other.
Coffey: “We need to raise [inaudible] euros per annum for Irish Water to leverage and additional €600m off balance sheet. The Opposition have no alternative for that cost.”
MacCoille: “Will the water conservation grant cost, do you know how much it will cost and will it need extra staff?”
Coffey: “The water conservation grant will be administered by the Department of Social Protection from its existing structures. There will be some additional operations, logistical and IT resources needed but not anything like the Opposition are trying to say.”
MacCoille: “Well, have you a bill?”
Coffey: “It will be done for a relatively cheap cost.”
Right so.
Listen back here
Dáil transcripts via Oireachtas.ie
A two pipe mystery.
Further to the hit and run in Dublin during irish Water demonstration on Wednesday.
So many questions.
Martin C writes:
Just wondering if you knew any update on the hit and run? a workmate made a complaint to the guards about it last night but he said they were a bit dismissive
it got a mention on that 104 phoneshow and I know it’s been in the Examiner but given it’s nature things have gone suspiciously quiet….finding it hard to believe nobody has the full reg number for this Jeep Grand Cherokee yet, its a rare enough beast….don’t think there’s traffic cams on Butt Bridge but still and all you can almost make the reg out from the footage that lad caught, someone must have a still..
John C writes:
On the evening of the 10th,this story was widely reported. When first reported, Gardaí, who said investigations were ongoing, were explicitly able to say the SUV did not mount the kerb. Fast forward one day and footage emerges of the SUV clearly mounting the kerb….
Hmm.
UPDATE: The Blurry Reg Of Shame
Previously: SUV Hit Frame By Frame
RTÉ journalist Fran McNulty speaking with an Irish Water protester in Phibsborough, Dublin 7, after she and other protesters discovered he was secretly filming them on Tuesday
Last night, RTÉ journalist Fran McNulty did a report for Prime Time on the Irish Water protest on Wednesday and a general piece on the protesters.
During his segment he spoke to two meter installers, without identifying them, the contractor they work for or where they’ve been installing meters.
He also travelled to Mullingar where he met a so-called ‘water meter fairy’ – a person who removes water meters for those who don’t wish to have them, for free.
This man was also not identified.
As for the secret footage of the protesters in Dublin 7, Mr McNulty reported that he witnessed no intimidation of the water meter installers by the protesters.
From last night’s show…
“It’s so unpredictable when you get somebody who comes out with a knife, starts waving it in front of you, golf clubs, baseball bats, a hatchet, you know, swinging these things, breaking windows, slashing tyres, you’re on edge, kind of, you’re kind of more conscious of what you do and where you go, even to the shop, going home at night, you’re kind of watching your back…One particular time, at the traffic lights, a car pulled up beside me and they just asked me to roll down the window, I thought they were looking for directions and they spat into my face. There’s a different element in these protests right now and it seems to be organised and a small group that you continuously see during these protests that they, in turn, the people that do that [makes a gun gesture by pointing this two fingers to his head] to your head and tell you, ‘get out of town’ you know, that they’ll recognise you. And it could potentially get worse you know…It’s my job like, I’ve a wife and a child and a mortgage. I need the job so, you know, work isn’t that plenty.”
– A water meter installer
“Oh, they come in groups, maybe two or three together in groups and they come in in a car and they knock on all those doors and they come ahead of us, maybe knocking on doors, and then they get everybody else standing out behind them and then they get, then they get people standing out in front of us and then they pull barriers down and if there’s a young people they say they’ll get them also to pull everything down and, by the time the gardai comes then, the whole thing is in disarray.”
– A water meter installer
Water Meter’Fairy’: “I’ve been doing quite a few around Mullingar, Edenderry and places like that, Kinnegad and a few places. Mostly from people who are concerned because the meters can be removed so easily. In the last three or four weeks, [he had] about 60 [call outs]..I’m totally aware of the Water Services Act and that I can go to jail for removing them but I also feel that the way the meters are installed, they’re a danger to the Government.”
Fran McNulty: “What’s the difference between what you’re doing, you’re taking out a meter which is screwed into the water pipe and you’re just screwing in a blank cap, there’s no difference, you’re not improving safety.”
‘Fairy’: “Am I not, there’s a huge difference. It means that if somebody comes along here at 3 o’clock in the morning, to this lady’s home, they will have to have a two-foot bar like you have seen.”
McNulty: “But sure you could buy that in any hardware store, you’re not massively improving safety here.”
‘Fairy’: “I’m improving it by 50% but it’s to highlight the issue here and we’re hoping that Irish Water will do something and put it back to being a sealed unit, find some other way of doing their metering.”
Previously: Meanwhile, In Stoneybatter
Watch back in full here
Fine Gael TD Joe O'Reilly says the amount some protestors spent getting to Dublin cost more than an annual water bill.
— Sarah Bardon (@SarahBardon) December 11, 2014
Splash! Thud!
An SUV mounts the pavement and strikes an Irish Water charge protester and speeds off with another person on the bonnet at Tara Street Bridge, Dublin yesterday afternoon.
Anyone?
Via FM 104
Thanks Carl Fogarty
How Many?
at
This afternoon.
John Gallagher writes:
This is a fraction of today’s Right2Water march. Second shot taken at corner of Merrion Square looking toward Merrion Street. March backed all the way Nassau Street…Garda say 30K. More like 100K on Wednesday at 2.00pm.
FIGHT!
Update:
Jonny Pardoe tweetz:
All the way from College Green to Merrion Square. Count that!