Fianna Fáil and Independents criticise water charge amendments

The Government has been accused of trying to ram through “draconian laws forcing people to pay their water charges”.

Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly has introduced 33 pages of amendments to the Environment Miscellaneous Provisions Bill.

It contains a number of changes, including the setting up of a database for the water conservation grant and provisions to ensure a house can’t be sold until the charges are paid. The Bill also obliges local authority tenants to pay their water charges.

Fianna Fáil TD Seán Fleming criticised the approach taken by the Government.

Mr Fleming said the original Bill was just 29 pages and was aimed at dealing with air and water pollution. There are now 33 pages of amendments.

“The Government is using one Bill as a Trojan horse to avoid further debate on its own water legislation amendments,” he said.

Scrutiny

“It is introducing a series of amendments at the latest possible stage in the Dáil to a Bill that has nothing to do with water charges in order to avoid facing real scrutiny on it. However they have been caught red-handed.”

Fianna Fáil said it is to contact Ceann Comhairle Sean Barrett about the “underhanded playacting by Minister Kelly”. “People should not be hoodwinked by this dishonest politics. If he believes in the water charge system he has helped create then he should not be afraid to openly debate it in the Dáil,” he said. “Instead he is trying to make changes under the cover of parliamentary darkness.”

A spokesman for Mr Kelly insisted that the majority of changes had been flagged from November last year.

He said it was normal procedure to introduce amendments at report stage and insisted there would be plenty of time for debate.

He added: “The water-related provisions of this Bill were flagged last November and again in May. There will be full debate in the Dáil next week.”

Independent TD Catherine Murphy said the process “circumvents the normal democratic processes of the Dáil”.

She added: “Why couldn’t the water service amendments be a standalone Bill and go through usual scrutiny?”

People before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett has now called for a protest outside the Dáil on Wednesday.

He said the laws were “desperate, devious and discriminatory”and were aimed at undermining the national movement against water charges.