Irish Water: where it all went wrong

‘That in respect of each and every sections undisposed of, the section is hereby agreed in Committee, The Title is hereby agreed in Committee, the Bill is accordingly reported to the House without amendment, Fourth Stage is hereby completed and the Bill is hereby passed.”

That’s what a parliamentary guillotine sounds like. That’s how the official Dáil record recounts the imposition of the guillotine on the Water Services (No.2) Bill 2013.

This is the piece of legislation that handed our water system to Irish Water. In fact it is a guillotine upon a guillotine: the impact of these words was to both end the committee stage of the legislation and ensure there would be no report stage at all.

Large pieces of legislation are usually dealt with in the Dáil over weeks or months to allow time for adequate consideration and to enable amendments to be drafted and introduced where weaknesses are identified. However, the Water Service (No.2) Bill 2013 was rushed through all stages in the Dáil over four hours on December 19th last.

When minister Ruairí Quinn, standing in for the Taoiseach and Tánaiste, proposed this truncated timetable for the legislation at the Order of Business that morning there wasn't just the usual pro forma resistance from the Opposition; their was genuine anger at the pace at which this important legislation was to be rammed through.

Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin told the Ceann Comhairle that “given the fundamental disrespect for parliamentary democracy”, his party had no intention of “participating in the charade” and he led his TDs out of the House. Sinn Féin and most of the Independents also absented themselves from the debate.

Some derided the Opposition on the day for grandstanding but it is now clear they had a point.

Minister Phil Hogan did not take the Dáil debate on the Bill, leaving it to his Minister of State, Fergus O’Dowd.

The Dáil debate on the legislation that day, although short and lopsided, makes for interesting reading now 10 months later when so much of what is in the Bill (or what was left out of the Bill) has come back to bite the Government.

The only voices left to challenge the Government line on the legislation in the chamber were the Reform Alliance Deputies Denis Naughton and Billy Timmins and a single independent-minded Labour Deputy, Michael McNamara. The exchanges between these three and Minister of State O’Dowd at the short committee stage were particularly interesting, focusing on amendments the Deputies proposed which would have made Irish Water more accountable to the Oireachtas, to local government members and to the public. These are the very issues being raised about Irish Water at Fine Gael and Labour parliamentary parties this week.

Centralising control

The Deputies were concerned that centralising control for our water system to a national semi-State conglomerate would, among other things, break the link which local populations and local politicians had with the water supply through their dealings with county council officials.

McNamara said there was no provision in the legislation for Irish Water to provide answers to questions from local or national representatives if, for example, the water supply broke down in a particular area. At the same time as people were being asked to pay for a service as basic as water the legislation was providing less accountability from the service provider.

O’ Dowd said Irish Water would establish “local contact points”, would make an annual report to the Oireachtas, and that officials from Irish Water would come to Oireachtas committees.

McNamara asked O’Dowd to “cut out the bluff and bluster”.

“Laying reports before the House was all well and good but it does not equate to democratic accountability.”

O’Dowd went on to express himself “absolutely satisfied” “that Uisce Éireann has in place an absolute commitment to answer basic questions ... there is no belief, either on my behalf or in the department, that Irish Water will not be accountable”.

Naughton said the Minister of State could not even tell the House whether people who cannot drink their water would be exempt from charges or whether an allowance would be given to everyone to meet basic water needs.

Timmins, with some prescience, warned: “This legislation is going to cause difficulty and hardship.” It was “deeply flawed, and symptomatic of the flaws in the Dáil and the democratic process itself”.

When seeking to excuse the guillotining of the legislation that morning Ruairí Quinn claimed the Government would review the legislation “and ensure that if there are problems associated with it in its operation, rather than in theory, we will correct them”.

Quinn and Hogan are no longer in ministerial office.

O’Dowd has been demoted and has recently emerged as one of Irish Water’s most trenchant critics.

There has been no review or rewrite of the rushed legislation.