Here is a question and reply by Joe Higgins on Joe’s stand against the bin and water charges, and his position on waste management. This is an issue of real importance, given that it seems the government may try again to introduce water charges in the not so distant future. Joe Higgins has an unrivalled record of fighting these unjust double taxes.
When Labour & Fine Gael in government who tried to implement water charges in the 1990s, Joe led a campaign which defeated them. And when the government brought in bin charges, Joe not just condemned them in words, but led the anti-bin tax campaign, going to jail himself rather than sell out his community.
Question from Naoise Dolan
Hi Joe,
Great work, Joe, the Labour Party make me sick and I´m definitely voting Socialist after I turn 18. However, I´m ambiguous on your policy regarding the bin tax. I see the principle of it — taxing people for something that they´re already being taxed for, and flooding government policy with yet more capitalist measures, is never a good thing. But it seems common sense to me that you should only pay for the collection of what you actually put out there, and it´s preferable to burdening people with a universal tax, regardless of circumstances, like the pension levy. People have control over how much bin tax they pay, at least. On the other hand, I do regard refuse collection as a right, not a privilege to be bought with dirty money. So my question is, how do you propose to provide an incentive to recycle and consume less packaging in place of the capitalist principle of paying by the wheely bin?
- Naoise Dolan
Reply from Joe Higgins
Dear Naoise
Thanks for your letter and query on the bin tax. The bin tax is primarily seen by the Government and Council officials as a revenue gathering exercise rather than an environment measure. That is why in Fingal, for example, as well as a bin tag, householders now also have a yearly charge for recycling and composting. There is now a big push to bring back water charges on the ground of water conservation. This is utter hypocrisy. In the last twelve years hundreds of thousands of new houses have been built without such simple measures for water conservation as dual flush toilets and rainwater tanks being included because the Department of the Environment and Councils did not include such measures in building regulations. Yet they preach that families must pay water charges to ´help conserve water´.
When we fought and defeated water charges in Dublin in 1994, ´95, ´96, we called back then for such measures to conserve treated water. They did not listen or act. The economic burden that water charges would be on ordinary people was shown when Minister Mary Hanafin said a year ago that if we hadn’t forced their abolition, every household would now be paying between €700 and €800 per year! Lastly with regard to reducing waste and recycling, we believe that most people are very willing got do this out of a sense of responsibility to the environment. People were doing this before they started to charge. In case there was a minority which didn’t give a damn we would have Bye Laws requiring people to separate their waste and having sanctions if anybody didn’t do so. But the biggest changes would be made in manufacturing and retail where we would oblige by law a massive reduction on packaging which is only there to try and make products look better than other products in competition. Hope all this is of some interest and thanks again. Look in my Euro website joehiggins.eu and also the Socialist Party website for more of our ideas.
All the best,
Joe Higgins
This question was submitted and answered via Candidate Watch – a way for voters to ask questions of their candidates.
Joe intends to answer all the many questions he has been asked through Candidate Watch, email etc. If you asked a question which hasn’t been responded to yet, please be patient and send Joe a reminder on info <at> joehiggins <dot> eu.
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