Minister for the Environment, John Gormley, this morning, announced that the government wanted to take a billion euro a year from householders in water charges. This could mean an average of €900 a year for each household. This would simply be an intolerable burden on working people, already hit by levies and wage cuts.

Mr. Gormley’s announcement comes days after the revelation that developers got an extra tax break bonanza, netting them €800m during the construction boom – that is on top of the slashing of capital gains tax from 40% to 20%.

Many of the arguments advanced for the installation of water meters and charging for water are based on false premises. The fact is that there has been a chronic under-investment in water infrastructure and a total failure by consecutive governments to insist on the installation of water conservation measures in new homes in the last 12 years, when up to half the housing stock was built. Rather than require developers to make such water saving changes, they were allowed simply to profiteer obscenely. Now it is ordinary working people and their families who are being asked to foot the bill. The government will meet massive resistance from them.

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