Three members of the Householders Against Service Charges campaign will begin three-day jail sentences at Cork Prison this morning over their refusal to pay annual refuse charges.
The campaign to oppose the service charges started in 1983. In 1991 four people were jailed for refusing to pay them.
The president of the Cork Council of Trade Unions, Mr Joe Moore, and Mr James McBarron and Mr Michael Joyce, must present themselves to the prison today because of their refusal to pay. Tomorrow two other campaigners, Mr Paddy Mulcahy and Mr Ted Tynan, will appear at Cork District Court on the same charges. Mr Mulcahy and Mr Tynan were among those jailed in 1991.
The public row between householders opposing service charges and the corporation reached a new high last July when the corporation issued wheelie-bins.
The bins were distributed only to householders whose service charge payments were up to date. Homeowners who had bins without a corporation sticker found their refuse remained uncollected.
In response, members of the group tied their refuse neatly in black plastic bags and began to deposit them on the steps of City Hall in Cork each Monday evening, just before the weekly meeting of the corporation began.
Cork Corporation countered by having litter wardens on duty outside the building and between July and August several £50 on-the-spot fines were issued. These were ignored by the campaign members, and on February 15th matters came to a head at Cork District Court.
The three men who will go to jail today conducted their own defence during the hearing and said their rubbish, which had not been taken by the corporation, had merely been presented at its doors for collection. They were guilty of no criminal activity, they argued, and their protest was peaceful.
The District Court judge fined each of the three protesters £90, allowed 28 days for payment and in default imposed a three-day jail sentence.
Mr Moore said yesterday he didn't relish going to jail but he and others in the campaign were determined to continue fighting the £140 annual service charge on the grounds that it amounted to a double taxation.
Mr Michael Crowley, the Workers Party representative in Cork North Central, said the jailings "would ignite a spark of workers' protest which the Government would do well to heed. Once again, this Government is sending out a very clear message that there is one law for the rich and well connected and another for the workers of this country and their families."
The Cork city manager, Mr Joe Gavin, last night said the corporation was disappointed that anyone should be sent to prison but people had made their own choice.
"The corporation has a duty to enforce the litter laws and if they are broken, then it becomes a matter for the courts. The people going to jail have made their own choice in this matter," he added.