Water ownership...It hasn't gone away you know.

Cookie_Monster

VonZan wrote: »

I don't think water will ever fall into the hands of private operators in this country. Any attempt to privatise will be meet with huge resistance.

There are already private companies controlling a lot of water production in Ireland, just the bottled kind currently. Maybe the royalties / rates received make it feasible, I'm not sure, but I doubt they are paying the real cost to the country of all the extraction.

It's a major issue here in NZ, numerous Chinese owned companies trying to bottle water for export, taking it from groundwater supplies for tiny royalties and over stressing the aquifers. Only a matter of time before similar happens in Ireland, it's got the same clean green image.

Eric Cartman

VonZan wrote: »

I don't think water will ever fall into the hands of private operators in this country. Any attempt to privatise will be meet with huge resistance. No political party will touch it.

Irish Rail and An Post are still owned and operated by the state as statutory corporations.

and look at what a mess they are...

Group water schemes and private wells have worked rather well in this country so in a sense its something we have lived with.

Everyone in Ireland lives in this weird middle of the fence where we all know that our state provided services are terribly run, terribly managed and overpriced , but somebody says the word privatisation and they all have a heart attack like its going to end up with US healthcare.

oscarBravo

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

There are already private companies controlling a lot of water production in Ireland, just the bottled kind currently. Maybe the royalties / rates received make it feasible, I'm not sure, but I doubt they are paying the real cost to the country of all the extraction.

It's a major issue here in NZ, numerous Chinese owned companies trying to bottle water for export, taking it from groundwater supplies for tiny royalties and over stressing the aquifers. Only a matter of time before similar happens in Ireland, it's got the same clean green image.

That's another potential unintended consequence: would we be forced to nationalise Ballygowan?

Edward M

oscarBravo wrote: »

That's another potential unintended consequence: would we be forced to nationalise Ballygowan?

No we wouldn't. All we'd be nationalising is the current state water and waste water system.
It's not rocket science either.
Anyone with their own supply or treatment system continues as before.

oscarBravo

oscarBravo wrote: »

The electricity grid has an order of magnitude more importance to me than the public water supply.

An interesting observation. Which one is necessary in order to live I wonder........?

Cookie_Monster

Deleted User wrote: »

An interesting observation. Which one is necessary in order to live I wonder........?

neither sets of infrastructure are. However it is much easier to gather water on an individual basis then it is to generate power, it does after all fall from the sky on a regular basis directly onto your property, or simply go to the shop and buy it along with your groceries or order a tanker full. Therefore I would agree with oscarBravo that the electricity infrastructure is far more important.

Chips Lovell

Matt Barrett wrote: »

It's because FG can't be trusted that legislation is required.

It's clear they can't be trusted alright. I mean, they promised to introduce water charges and they reneged on it.

But if we were to introduce constitutional amendments to prohibit politicians from going back on previous undertakings, then it would be littered with all sorts of bits and bobs.

blanch152

Edward M wrote: »

No we wouldn't. All we'd be nationalising is the current state water and waste water system.
It's not rocket science either.
Anyone with their own supply or treatment system continues as before.

Well Matt's proposed amendment would require the nationalisation of Ballygowan. I suppose he will have to add another lengthy clause to it along with all of the other clauses necessary thanks to the other flaws.

oscarBravo

Deleted User wrote: »

An interesting observation. Which one is necessary in order to live I wonder........?

Lots of things are necessary in order to live. How many of them are in the Constitution?

oscarBravo

oscarBravo wrote: »

Lots of things are necessary in order to live. How many of them are in the Constitution?

I wasn't saying you were wrong or anything, its just a point I've heard before that water is necessary for life, so people were taking more of a principled stand based on this suggestion as opposed to the provision of electricity, natural gas, broadband etc. which aren't actually necessary for life, but a lack of them would be pretty detrimental to a society such as ours no doubt. As to the question should it be in the constitution, I'm not sure as to why this couldn't be addressed by having sufficently robust leglislation enacted by the Oireachtas.

oscarBravo

Deleted User wrote: »

I wasn't saying you were wrong or anything, its just a point I've heard before that water is necessary for life, so people were taking more of a principled stand based on this suggestion...

Yes, I've heard that argument before. Given that food is also necessary for life, and nobody's arguing that the provision of food should be nationalised and enshrined in the Constitution, I'm inclined to the belief that the "principled stand" is more of a convenient cover story for opposition to water charges.

FreudianSlippers

Deleted User wrote: »

I wasn't saying you were wrong or anything, its just a point I've heard before that water is necessary for life, so people were taking more of a principled stand based on this suggestion as opposed to the provision of electricity, natural gas, broadband etc. which aren't actually necessary for life, but a lack of them would be pretty detrimental to a society such as ours no doubt. As to the question should it be in the constitution, I'm not sure as to why this couldn't be addressed by having sufficently robust leglislation enacted by the Oireachtas.

Water is there: Article 10.

charlie14

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

It's clear they can't be trusted alright. I mean, they promised to introduce water charges and they reneged on it.

But if we were to introduce constitutional amendments to prohibit politicians from going back on previous undertakings, then it would be littered with all sorts of bits and bobs.

Labour certainly did renege on their commitment not to introduce water charges in their 2011 manifesto which got them into government.
FG also reneged on theirs that there would be no water charges until we had a world class service.

The simple facts that some choose, (and seemingly still do) to ignore is that both Labour and FG lied through their teeth. Lies that resulted in the omnishambles of Irish Water where 1 Billion euro of tax payers money was waste on offices, billing centers, jobs for the boys, dodgy contracts, bonuses, laughing yoga classes, "conservation grants", water meters buried for no discernible benefit and plans to spend another 500 Million euro on more water meters. All that ruled over by an entity that until the fiasco was halted didn`t generate enough revenue to pay it`s own office overheads let alone provide a single red cent to the improvement of water or waste water services.

Before it was all halted the apologists for the clusterf**k slightly irritated me on here, when along with not only backing it to the hilt at every turn, they could not even bring themselves to see that their were genuine reasons for people believing that it was being set up for privitisation.
Now it just amuses me to see many of the same people again still fighting, attempting to stop a piece of legislation to ensure public water services are never privatised. If it didn`t amuse me and I was off a suspicious mind I would probably wonder on their past records why that might be.

James Brown

Captain Obvious wrote: »

You can believe the sky is going to fall down but it doesn't mean the government should make provisions for it. The repeal of the eighth should have made people aware of the dangers of ill thought out amendments to our constitution. And the fact that people are having difficulty putting a wording to it should be an indicator of how easily it could go wrong. And that's leaving aside the fact that Article 10 already covers natural resource management and would have to be amended in a way that doesn't cause havoc.

Just because FG and their PR machine have made the wording being difficult a supposed reason to funnily enough easily find the wording to make it about the entity of Irish Water and not the natural resource and state owned infrastructure doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. The idea that writing it down would be too hard is preposterous in the extreme.

Captain Obvious wrote: »

No you didn't. You thought you'd have a go at a person by insulting their profession with an unrelated comment.

I wasn't insulting you I was making light of the organisations capabilities. You brought it to them giving water bottles at the Pope's visit of something in your pursuit to belittle the very idea of this proposed legislation. Also it was fair comment IMO. Do they not have a bad reputation in regard of contracts, there not being one? I've no interest in discussing the organisation in this thread.

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

It's clear they can't be trusted alright. I mean, they promised to introduce water charges and they reneged on it.

But if we were to introduce constitutional amendments to prohibit politicians from going back on previous undertakings, then it would be littered with all sorts of bits and bobs.

No you're wrong. They tried too many sweet deals and jobs for their own and got called on it and had to change their plans.

Again, we need secure things like water so politicians can't railroad through policies, meet people for several dinners, conduct sweet deals, dole out jobs 'for our own' or conduct inappropriate behaviour in regard to water.

Corporations are buying up water the world over can anyone genuinely not see some greasy FF/FG politicians wanting in on that?

Chips Lovell

If the problem is that people don't trust FF or FG, would it be OK if were Sinn Fein, Labour, the Green Party, or AAA/PBP overseeing the introduction of water charges? Would they support them then? Or would they find some other reason for opposing them?

James Brown

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

If the problem is that people don't trust FF or FG, would it be OK if were Sinn Fein, Labour, the Green Party, or AAA/PBP overseeing the introduction of water charges? Would they support them then? Or would they find some other reason for opposing them?

Again, FF/FG get prime mention because they have/are been in power. I know their records on such things aren't the best but sorry, they're all we have to go by. What would Gerry Do? Doesn't cut it as an argument IMO.
Water needs to be put out of the reach of some no mark politician meeting the CEO of Nestle for a few dinners while the Dáil debates privatisation.

Chips Lovell

Water should remain in public hands. Not arguing with you on that point at all. And I'll probably (with some embarrassment) vote yes, if only to end all the privatisation talk.

James Brown

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

Water should remain in public hands. Not arguing with you on that point at all. And I'll probably (with some embarrassment) vote yes, if only to end all the privatisation talk.

I think it should indeed be a given, but however unlikely some may genuinely believe privatisation may be, It's a safeguard. And to be fair the entire IW/metering debacle is why it's being raised as an issue.
Water is and will be more so a very valuable commodity in the coming years. We cannot allow Nestle or whomever take over water distribution under the guise of some PPP, they'll give us the infrastructure if we give them licencing/rights. I can honestly see that or something similar happening. The concern goes beyond some cowboy politician and whatever excuse for a party he or she may be affiliated with.

blanch152

Matt Barrett wrote: »

Just because FG and their PR machine have made the wording being difficult a supposed reason to funnily enough easily find the wording to make it about the entity of Irish Water and not the natural resource and state owned infrastructure doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. The idea that writing it down would be too hard is preposterous in the extreme.

No, it isn't preposterous in the extreme to suggest that it is close to impossible to write a constitutional amendment. In fact, the opposite is more likely to be case, that it is preposterous for someone without any legal training to suggest that it is straight-forward enough to write an amendment.

charlie14

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

If the problem is that people don't trust FF or FG, would it be OK if were Sinn Fein, Labour, the Green Party, or AAA/PBP overseeing the introduction of water charges? Would they support them then? Or would they find some other reason for opposing them?

I don`t know why you included Labour in that list. They have already proven that in relation to water charges they are not to be trusted.
But seeing as you did should any other party even dream of introducing water charges the 2016 electoral punishment of Labour will be a salutary reminder.

charlie14

blanch152 wrote: »

No, it isn't preposterous in the extreme to suggest that it is close to impossible to write a constitutional amendment. In fact, the opposite is more likely to be case, that it is preposterous for someone without any legal training to suggest that it is straight-forward enough to write an amendment.

You have been arguing that for a long time now.

Yet like all the other points you made as to how and why water charges would carry on in their merry way, here we are.
A FG government drafting an amendment.

blanch152

charlie14 wrote: »

You have been arguing that for a long time now.

Yet like all the other points you made as to how and why water charges would carry on in their merry way, here we are.
A FG government drafting an amendment.

What FG do matters not to me, a constitutional amendment on water is nuts, whoever is proposing it. What happens doesn't take away from what it correct. FG's record on climate change and environmental issues is taking some of the sheen away from their good record in many other areas.

This whole situation is giving me eerie parallels with 1983.

A weak FG government lacking support in the Dail, with an opportunistic opposition picking a populist topic to support, caved in and agreed against their better judgment to the 8th Amendment. We have been paying for that cave-in ever since when it comes to women's rights. Garret Fitzgerald was ultimately afraid to take on that opportunistic opposition and we got a stupid amendment.

Let us hope that Varadkar isn't so stupid, but I am not confident of that. History does tend to repeat itself.

In the meantime, the various play attempts at drafting amendments can keep me amused. Unfortunately, while the Attorney General will do a better job than Matt who managed to nationalise Ballygowan with his, I cannot see how any amendment will work. It is impossible to draft an amendment that on the one hand protects the water supply the way the populists want and on the other hand prevents unintended consequences.

Either it will have loopholes that will reignite the paranoid conspiracy theories or some poor farmer will have his wells taken off him. I hope it is the latter because at least I won't have to read some of the risible nonsense on here.



P.S. The bills will start arriving in the doors next year for excessive use of water charges. Won't be much longer before the usage limit goes down to deal with water shortages.

charlie14

blanch152 wrote: »

What FG do matters not to me, a constitutional amendment on water is nuts, whoever is proposing it. What happens doesn't take away from what it correct. FG's record on climate change and environmental issues is taking some of the sheen away from their good record in many other areas.

This whole situation is giving me eerie parallels with 1983.

A weak FG government lacking support in the Dail, with an opportunistic opposition picking a populist topic to support, caved in and agreed against their better judgment to the 8th Amendment. We have been paying for that cave-in ever since when it comes to women's rights. Garret Fitzgerald was ultimately afraid to take on that opportunistic opposition and we got a stupid amendment.

Let us hope that Varadkar isn't so stupid, but I am not confident of that. History does tend to repeat itself.

In the meantime, the various play attempts at drafting amendments can keep me amused. Unfortunately, while the Attorney General will do a better job than Matt who managed to nationalise Ballygowan with his, I cannot see how any amendment will work. It is impossible to draft an amendment that on the one hand protects the water supply the way the populists want and on the other hand prevents unintended consequences.

Either it will have loopholes that will reignite the paranoid conspiracy theories or some poor farmer will have his wells taken off him. I hope it is the latter because at least I won't have to read some of the risible nonsense on here.



P.S. The bills will start arriving in the doors next year for excessive use of water charges. Won't be much longer before the usage limit goes down to deal with water shortages.

All legislation has the possibility of future legal loopholes being exposed. In the past when these were exposed as being a threat to the fundamental principle they were dealt with. I would not see any reason to believe, should it occur, it would be otherwise in ensuring that public water services are never privatised.


The Irish Water metering "free" household allowance was 30,000 liters per annum. It is now 213,000 liters per annum.

As we are one of the lowest per capita users of domestic water in the OECD, then it is going to be quite some time, if ever, on those figures before the twain shall meet.
If those with swimming pools or large acreage of lawns wish to exceed that 213,000 limit, then I have no problem with them being charged for excessive use.



From what I recall you had quite a few thesis relating to water charges in the past which in reality came to nothing more than scaremongering.
A bit late in the game now to be attempting the same on nothing other than conjecture based of farmers wells imho.

oscarBravo

charlie14 wrote: »

All legislation has the possibility of future legal loopholes being exposed. In the past when these were exposed as being a threat to the fundamental principle they were dealt with.

But we're not talking about legislation; we're talking about vandalising the Constitution. The only way to deal with loopholes in the Constitution is to amend it again.

I've still yet to see a compelling argument for this proposed amendment.

Captain Obvious

Edward M wrote: »

No we wouldn't. All we'd be nationalising is the current state water and waste water system.
It's not rocket science either.
Anyone with their own supply or treatment system continues as before.

If it's so simple what is the amendment you would introduce?

Matt Barrett wrote: »

Just because FG and their PR machine have made the wording being difficult a supposed reason to funnily enough easily find the wording to make it about the entity of Irish Water and not the natural resource and state owned infrastructure doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. The idea that writing it down would be too hard is preposterous in the extreme.

The idea that the potential consequences of poor wording should be ignored is more so. It's nothing to do with PR. Is that really your only answer to legal arguments? Insults and conspiracy?

charlie14

oscarBravo wrote: »

But we're not talking about legislation; we're talking about vandalising the Constitution. The only way to deal with loopholes in the Constitution is to amend it again.

I've still yet to see a compelling argument for this proposed amendment.

If they get it right first time then there would be no need to amend and no vandalisation. Just a constitutional amendment that ensures the public water supply is never privatised. I really do not see what the problem is with some other than perhaps without the possibility of future privatisation then their realisation that their dream of attempting to re-introducing metered water charges at some stage is dead and buried.


You may not see a compelling arguement for this amendment but many do. Including a special Oireachtas committee on water charges.

Edward M

Captain Obvious wrote: »

If it's so simple what is the amendment you would introduce?





The idea that the potential consequences of poor wording should be ignored is more so. It's nothing to do with PR. Is that really your only answer to legal arguments? Insults and conspiracy?

How about, The company, Irish water and all the infrastructure it owns and the service it supplies and any infrastructure and any service it adds to the existing water supply and waste water treatment system shall be owned by the state and shall not be sold off to any private person or consortium.
I'm not getting huge money for coming up with actual legal wording that could be constitunalised, but that's a rough idea of what might cover it.

James Brown

Captain Obvious wrote: »

If it's so simple what is the amendment you would introduce?





The idea that the potential consequences of poor wording should be ignored is more so. It's nothing to do with PR. Is that really your only answer to legal arguments? Insults and conspiracy?

A nonsense attempt at fudging and diverting. If any of us said we needed legislation on something you agreed with would you be asking us how we'd word it in some absurd attempt at arguing against it?

Legislation needs to be worded carefully. Trying to make the call for something to legislate that state owned water concerns, utilities, water is never privatised should come down to this complete farce of a nonsense line about wording smacks of a desperate fumbling to make an argument nobody is interested in having. I don't pen legislation. Should we have none because you or I can't pen it right here online in this discussion forum? You're being ridiculous quite frankly.
You are throwing all kinds of garbage now. What insults? I made light of the Garda having a poor record with paperwork. Get over it.
Conspiracy? No, farce. People want legislation to ensure no privatisation and because it's difficult to word or I and others won't draft it now online it means what?
Is the conspiracy the commenting on facts that go against your own fantasy? Corporations are buying up water rights. That's a fact. The belief that nobody would be interested in privatising our water is naivety beyond reason.

Captain Obvious

Edward M wrote: »

How about, The company, Irish water and all the infrastructure it owns and the service it supplies and any infrastructure and any service it adds to the existing water supply and waste water treatment system shall be owned by the state and shall not be sold off to any private person or consortium.
I'm not getting huge money for coming up with actual legal wording that could be constitunalised, but that's a rough idea of what might cover it.

You want the actual company enshrined in the constitution?

Matt Barrett wrote: »

A nonsense attempt at fudging and diverting. If any of us said we needed legislation on something you agreed with would you be asking us how we'd word it in some absurd attempt at arguing against it?

Legislation needs to be worded carefully. Trying to make the call for something to legislate that state owned water concerns, utilities, water is never privatised should come down to this complete farce of a nonsense line about wording smacks of a desperate fumbling to make an argument nobody is interested in having. I don't pen legislation. Should we have none because you or I can't pen it right here online in this discussion forum? You're being ridiculous quite frankly.
You are throwing all kinds of garbage now. What insults? I made light of the Garda having a poor record with paperwork. Get over it.
Conspiracy? No, farce. People want legislation to ensure no privatisation and because it's difficult to word or I and others won't draft it now online it means what?
Is the conspiracy the commenting on facts that go against your own fantasy? Corporations are buying up water rights. That's a fact. The belief that nobody would be interested in privatising our water is naivety beyond reason.

You're getting angry because people are pointing out the inherent flaws and dangers, as well as the difficulty, in trying to enshrine something like this in the constitution. Although it now seems you've swapped to legislation. Ownership of our natural resources is already enshrined in the constitution. We already can, and do, control them with legislation. What is it exactly you are worried will happen that you think we need to prevent?

blanch152

Matt Barrett wrote: »

A nonsense attempt at fudging and diverting. If any of us said we needed legislation on something you agreed with would you be asking us how we'd word it in some absurd attempt at arguing against it?

Legislation needs to be worded carefully. Trying to make the call for something to legislate that state owned water concerns, utilities, water is never privatised should come down to this complete farce of a nonsense line about wording smacks of a desperate fumbling to make an argument nobody is interested in having. I don't pen legislation. Should we have none because you or I can't pen it right here online in this discussion forum? You're being ridiculous quite frankly.
You are throwing all kinds of garbage now. What insults? I made light of the Garda having a poor record with paperwork. Get over it.
Conspiracy? No, farce. People want legislation to ensure no privatisation and because it's difficult to word or I and others won't draft it now online it means what?
Is the conspiracy the commenting on facts that go against your own fantasy? Corporations are buying up water rights. That's a fact. The belief that nobody would be interested in privatising our water is naivety beyond reason.

Do you understand the difference between legislation and constitutional amendments? Because this latest post of yours seems to suggest you think they are one and the same.

Legislation is constantly amended when things go wrong.

The Finance Act is amended every year, ditto the Social Welfare Act, some of the amendments relate to policy changes, but a lot of them are to close loopholes that have emerged.

Constitutional provisions aren't as easy to amend when things go wrong, the 8th Amendment was a lesson hard learned.

Nobody is asking you to word legislation, they are just asking you to word a constitutional provision that apparently is the easiest thing in the world to do.