The Irish Parliament has voted by 96 votes to 48 this week for water services in Ireland to be publicly funded and the Government to be collectively responsible for the protection, management and maintenance of the public water system.

The Dáil were voting to accept the recommendations of a report published by the Committee on the Future Funding of Water Services on 12^th April 2017 which also called for the Government to “ensure in the public interest that this resource remains in public ownership and management."

The new arrangements mean that about 92% of customers will pay nothing for their water services and householders who have already paid water charges will be refunded.

The Joint Committee has also proposed a referendum on the issue of water services continuing in public ownership, saying it “believes that public ownership should be enshrined in the Constitution as an extra measure of protection against any privatisation.”

The Report says that while existing legislation already provides a statutory prohibition on the privatisation of Irish Water, legislation should be further strengthened with the inclusion of the following clause:

"The Government shall be collectively responsible for the protection, management and maintenance of the public water system. The Government shall ensure in the public interest that this resource remains in public ownership and managemeThe Committee have also called for the “wilful wastage of water”  to be curbed and should be monitored utilising district water meters, existing infrastructure and modern technology in order to explicitly and progressively target wilful wastage of water. The report defines

The Committee has recommended that the CER should determine average consumption levels setting the threshold level  for excessive useat 1.7 times the average household use, with also appropriate allowances for exceptional circumstances such as medical conditions and above average household size.

The Report says that an approach based on incentives, levies and other measures proposed will address excessive water use in order to dissuadef wastage.

The Report has also highlighted that one of the most urgent tasks of water conservation is reducing water lost in the public system, with the Committee recommending that “adequate resources are invested to reduce these leaks in the shortest possible timeframe.”

Introducing the Report, Committee Chairman Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh said:

“It is fair to say that, for a variety of reasons, as a State we have neglected our public water services over many years. This can be seen, for example, in terms of the lack of a proper level of funding of those services over the years, and the lack of reliability and poor performance of parts of the services.   It is clear that we require a vastly improved approach to how we finance, manage and use our water services in a sustainable way over the medium and long-term.”

“The task before the Joint Committee was challenging given the strong opinions that issues relating to the organisation and funding of our water services had generated in recent years. The Members of the Committee represented the full spectrum of views in this regard. The Report of the Expert Commission on Domestic Water Services highlighted the scale of the shortcomings of our current services and the steps that need to be taken to address them. “