Water tax – Government tries to stem tide against Labour local election washout

» John Hedges

An Phoblacht Editor

Labour is under pressure in the opinion polls and commentators are predicting an election washout for leader Eamon Gilmore’s party from Labour voters angry at broken election promises

GOVERNMENT claims about the true cost of the water tax won’t be known until August, Sinn Féin TD Brian Stanley said – “conveniently, after the local elections”.

He accused Fine Gael of merely moving figures around to protect its Labour Party partner in Government ahead of the local elections.

Labour is under pressure in the opinion polls and commentators are predicting an election washout for leader Eamon Gilmore’s party from Labour voters angry at broken election promises.

Deputy Stanley, Sinn Féin’s Environment spokesperson, said:

“Sinn Féin is entirely opposed to the introduction of domestic water charges. It is unjust, unfair and simply another cost to Irish taxpayers who have been burdened with the responsibility of paying back billions of euro of banking debt.

“People will in effect be paying three times for their water.

“Not only are water charges being levied but the Local Property Tax is going to provide €486million in subvention to Irish Water instead of supporting local services as it was claimed.

“On top of that, a considerable amount of money has already been given to the new entity from the Central Exchequer. This is outrageous.”

He said he does not believe that the €240 average charge estimated by the Government is plausible. “It is suspiciously close to the €238 average charge that was contained in the Fine Gael manifesto – and opposed at the time by Labour.

“I do not believe that it takes account of the actual costs of establishing and running the new entity.”

He pointed out that Fianna Fáil was to have introduced an average charge of between €400 and €500. That was arrived at by the troika and was based on the costs of administering the Irish water service and the EU Water Directive which insists that all of the costs of water supply are recovered through charges.

“How then can the Government assure us that the average cost will be €240, including exemptions and allowances? Have they been granted a further derogation from the EU Directive?

“It is very likely that the waiver scheme will disappear after a few years just like it did with the bin charges. Workers on low incomes and the unemployed are among the categories of people who will not benefit from it.”

• Below: Eamon Gilmore boasting of abolishing the water tax – before he became leader of the Labour Party