Irish Water rejects claim that staff received bonus payments

Irish Water has rejected a suggestion by Fianna Fáil that performance-related payments or bonuses were paid to its staff this year.

Fianna Fáil public expenditure spokesman Seán Fleming yesterday said a letter he had received from Ervia showed the number of staff receiving such payments had increased by almost 400 between 2013 and 2014.

Bord Gáis Éireann, the parent company of Irish Water, was renamed Ervia earlier this year.

The letter stated that 545 staff of Ervia had received these payments, totalling €3.7 million, in 2013 but said that figure had increased to 940 staff this year, with a total of €5.1 million paid out to date in 2014 on performance related pay.

Mr Fleming suggested this information might challenge Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s insistence no bonuses have been paid to anyone in Irish Water.

“Are we really expected to believe that this does not include any bonuses being paid to staff at Irish Water?” he asked.

A spokeswoman for Irish Water dismissed the contention, saying the payments were confined to Bord Gáis and its energy and networks businesses. Irish Water was not part of that, she said.

Noting that there is a pay freeze in operation in Irish Water until 2016, she said the reason more employees were added by Ervia was because it was a new model for pay-related performance and more employees had been added to it this year.

Separately, it is understood that the Department of Environment is looking into letters issued by Wicklow County Council to tenants in rental accommodation schemes who received correspondence stating that non-payment of water charges could result in eviction. The issue was raised by Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald.

Earlier, speaking at a conference in Dublin, Tánaiste Joan Burton expressed concern that Irish Water was not dealing with customer queries “efficiently, reliably and in a timely way” after concerns were raised by a number of Government backbenchers.

“When members of the public contact the LoCall number that Irish Water gives out, you can end up waiting in the line for quite a long time to get a response and after that you can spend a lot longer getting a more detailed response,” she said.

"Utility companies, whether it's ESB or gas, is all about being face-to-face, customer orientated companies, which can deal with customers efficiently, reliably and in timely way."

Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin said later he did not approve a bonus payments system for Irish Water staff.

He said the Government does not have control over pay determination in commercial State companies, with the exception of the remuneration of chief executives.

“We have always allowed the ESBs and Bord na Mónas to do their business in a commercial way. That, I think, is the way to go.”

“There was never approval given by me or my department for the regime of pay that applies in the commercial semi- State sector. That is a matter for themselves.”

The Minister said commercial semi-State companies should ultimately operate like commercial companies. “Where there is high performance, where there are targets set and achieved, then obviously then that is remunerated in the appropriate way.”

Mr Howlin said the Government was looking carefully at everything that had happened since the establishment of Irish Water.