Europhile politicians such as Michael Noonan are citing the EU water services directive as dictating the next government cannot exercise its clear democratic mandate to abolish Irish Water and charges.
Whatever his motivation, this is a dangerous tactic.
I cannot think of anything more likely to pour oil on anti-EU flames than a perception the EU is forcing us into a regime of water charges, opposition to which is a totem for a people not prepared to simply take lectures from the political class any longer.
Have we just had an election where we can decide on personalities and parties alone but not on policies?
If that was the case our relationship with the EU is in need of review. Thankfully it is not the case.
Right2Water has been co-operating with European water movements and has visited the European Commission and spoken to commissioners.
It has been made clear to us that our Government has all the autonomy it needs to decide our water policy. We are the only country in the OECD with "zero water poverty" because we pay for it through progressive general taxation. This is increasingly envied not only in Europe, but across the world.
Water as human right
On February 13th,
Maude Barlow
, the foremost campaigner for the protection of water in the world, author of 17 books on the subject, national chairman of the Council of Canadians and the person who successfully spearheaded the campaign which saw the UN designate water a human right, addressed a conference in the Mansion House.
There she spoke about the battle against the corporate theft of the world’s water and urged the Irish people to continue to fight to maintain our water and sanitation in public ownership paid for through progressive taxation.
For the national debate on Irish Water to be taking place in any other context than the theft of the world’s water for profit is uniquely Irish and sadly ignorant. There is a clear water privatisation agenda globally, and now here too.
Right2Water is a massive campaign, the biggest single-issue mobilisation of citizens in the State’s history. It has brought 600,000 citizens out in peaceful protest on seven days since October 2014.
The campaign has a three-step policy to be implemented by the next government and which, if it is, will be a portent for a much-more hopeful and participative democracy.
Wasted resources
This policy calls for the abolition of Irish Water within 100 days of the government taking office and for its replacement by a single national water and sanitation board.
This board would stop wasting money collected on bills in the collection process itself and would invest a ringfenced €6-7 billion in system upgrades.
This would secure investment and jobs without wasting resources on billing, water meters and meter maintenance, advertising and even threatened legal actions against law-abiding citizens who, on water, have said enough is enough.
Finally the Right2Water policy would see citizens given a vote on a referendum to enshrine public ownership of water and sanitation services as an executive function in our Constitution.
EU and Irish Water figures show households here use just 10 per cent of our water while business and agriculture use 90 per cent. The figures show the defeated government’s policy was to pass 78 per cent of the costs on to the households.
Furthermore, there is no research anywhere to show that meters help conservation. In Ireland, unmetered, households used 54,000 litres per annum, 20 per cent less than the 68,000 litres used in the UK, which have has had meters since the late 1980s.
Most TDs just elected pledged to abolish Irish Water. There is a more sustainable way to deal with our water and sanitation needs.
Could the next government do something novel and begin by keeping a promise and meeting the demand of the electorate?
Brendan Ogle is education officer at Unite trade union and a co-ordinator of Right2Water and Right2Change