Water Committee’s many unanswered questions

October 26, 2017

by James Quigley

In my last article I asked should the chairman of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water, Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh have ensured that each session of the committee was included in all committee reports. I said that that question was put to him and that we did not receive a reply from him. It turns out my article wasn't wholly accurate.

Michael Mooney, Communities for Ireland’s 9.4 reminded me that he wrote twice to Mr Ó Céidigh in August this year and he received not one but two replies. Neither reply, however, was directly from the chairman himself. Rather they were sent indirectly through the committee secretary, Tom Sheridan. (see all letter below)

Michael pointed out that in a second email he informed the secretary that he was annoyed that Mr Ó Céidigh did not reply personally, in the first place. Hence the secretary's second reply.

However, apart from the etiquette question, what Mr Sheridan's replies in fact does is point out that both he and the Chairman Mr Ó Céidigh are in agreement.

This answer speaks for itself. The responsibility is now laid squarely on the members themselves and puts the onus on them to give us an explanation, firstly whether they agree with the committee secretary or not and secondly, If they agree and it would be amazing if they didn’t, then, they have to explain why they did not include any mention of February 15th session and in particular the 9.4 Exemption in any report. Did they replace the 9.4 Exemption or Ireland's ‘Established Practice’ with excessive charges and metering?

One of the reasons we dwell on this is because we have not got an adequate explanation to date from anyone. We have to determine who was responsible for setting the agenda for any of the committee’s reports. This is a highly significant line of questioning. Depending on the Oireachtas member's explanation, their answer will shed light on procedures and in particular why there was a total omission of what we believe to be the central and most significant session of the whole committee, namely February 15th session.

Not only does it question the bona fides of those who professed to be acting in the interest of the majority of Irish people opposing Irish Water, water charges and metering but it has the potential to question the administration of the committee itself and by extension the farcical end result. This by the way includes Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin, Solidarity/PBP, Independents and Senators.

Original query from Michael Mooney

Dear Mr O’Ceidigh,

I am aware that you were appointed independent Chairman of the Oireachtas Comittee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water in Ireland which is now disbanded. I followed this with great interest but it ended with some disillusionment.

I understood that it would be an independent chairman’s responsibility to record and report on all significant contributions to the committee and as a result of this I have a query.

During the meetings which were both held in private and public you obtained input from senior counsels. These were Matthias Kelly and Conleth Bradley who are regarded as experts in European Environmental Law. You permitted their input, as you believed or stated that it would be of the ‘utmost importance’ following some objection from Colm Brophy TD. These people were invited by Sinn Fein and Fianna Fail to contribute their legal opinion on Ireland’s compliance with the European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD). Their contribution extended over at least one full session around mid-February 2017. In their legal opinion, they confirmed that Ireland was in compliance due to a practice already established of paying for water. This established practice forms an exemption which leaves Ireland in compliance with the EU WFD via Section 9, item 4 or as commonly referred to Exemption 9.4. This is a significant piece of information and my query is;

“Why was this omitted from the confidential draft report that you furnished?

I look forward to an urgent reply on this matter. Please confirm receipt of this upon arrival and advise if you can reply within 7 days and maximum 14 days.

First letter from Oireachtas secretary

25 August, 2017

Dear Mr Mooney,

I refer to your recent message to Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh regarding the Report of the Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services.

In the course of its deliberations, the Joint Committee considered extensive information from a large number of stakeholders (received both in writing and in oral evidence at meetings), regarding a range of matters relating to its brief. Transcripts of the meetings of the Joint Committee along with a large amount of other information are available on the webpage of the Joint Committee at the website of the Houses of the Oireachtas (www.oireachtas.ie).

It was not the objective of the Report of the Joint Committee to re-produce all of the information that was considered. The content of the Report, which is mainly comprised of the Joint Committee’s recommendations, was agreed in detail by the Members over a number of meetings and approved by them in the normal manner.

The Joint Committee ceased to exist following the conclusion of its work at its final meeting on 11 April of this year, and the subsequent submission of its Report.

Yours sincerely,

Tom Sheridan
Committee Secretariat

Second letter from Oireachtas secretary

28 August, 2017

Dear Mr Mooney,

Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services

I refer to your message to Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh dated 20 August regarding the above matter, to my reply of 25 August, and to your subsequent message.

I replied to your message to Senator Ó Céidigh as the person who was the Clerk to the Joint Committee during its deliberations. This is consistent with normal practice.

Having considered both of your messages, Senator Ó Céidigh does not wish to add anything to my earlier reply.

Please contact me if you have any further queries regarding this matter.

Yours sincerely,
Tom Sheridan, Clerk

Freedom of Information appeal on Oireachtas Water Committee secret sessions turned down

October 21, 2017

by James Quigley

I know it’s not the most sensational story out there but it is worth recording and it's important that people know the truth, the whole truth and not just the titbits that are thrown at you. Our initial Freedom of Information (FOI) request for details of over 30 private sessions of the Oireachtas Committee on Funding Domestic Water was turned down on Sept 18th. Now our appeal of that decision has also been refused.

Committee Chairman Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh. Read Clouds of Suspicion over omission of 9.4 Exemption from Oireachtas reports.

The ironic thing about the refusal to allow public access to the secret records of this public body comprising 20 TDs and Senators is that they are all public representatives, in a public body, dealing with a public mater and supposedly representing the public and there was not one thing that they were discussing that was of a sensitive nature.

Part of their remit was to ensure the public are fully engaged in the process. Yet they conducted business in over 30 secret session thus refusing access to the public to the most important part of their business, the nitty gritty of the deals and voting of the members.

According to the committee secretary, Thomas Sheridan, the Oireachtas Committee members themselves agree what was or wasn’t to go into committee reports.

In the end when the committee finally emerged from their last seven secret sessions in April 2017 the public had to endure the spectacle of claims and false claims from various committee members. We were subjected to various reports none of which included any mention of the February 15th session, Ireland's 9.4 Exemption, the River Basin Management Plan. Instead the reports included excessive charges, a pitiful water allowance, metering and acceptance of Irish Water. All couched in vague language and subject to the whims of future government interpretation.

To this day the claims and counter claims are still going on. Especially in the last two weeks when the Water Services Bill 2017 was being discussed in Dáil Éireann. This Bill apparently is basedon the controversial recommendations of the special Oireachtas Committee on Funding Domestic Water. It has now gone through it’s second stage in the Dáil.

What happened to the February 15th Session is like the Bermuda Triangle. It vanished into thin air sucked up into the vortex of Dáil Éireann. That full day of rhetoric, legal opinions from Senior Counsels, threats and claims from EU Commissioners, lofty arguments from questionable R2W representatives and Barry McCowen, that warrior of Fál, when he said in response to EU Commissioner Vella, "I rest my case"

Was it all hot air, a mirage perhaps?

And what happened to the responsibility of it’s chairman, Senator Pádraig Ó Céidigh? Should he have made sure that each session of the committee was included in all committee reports for consideration when voting. This was a question we put to him in an email. However, we have not yet received a reply.

Presumably all of the twenty members on the water committee, that is, if they were present at the time and not sleeping, know exactly what went on. Presumably all parties, that the twenty members represented were thoroughly kept up to date and know exactly what went on.

Yet the public who have by their opposition and mandate brought it about is kept out of the loop, not entitled to an explanation.

Once again we are, as we have always been the subject of political shenanigans.

As you can see from the FOI refusal (see below), the officials and by default the Government and all those committee members who have not been particularly honest, are hiding behind a bureaucratic loophole in section 127 of the House of the Oireachtas (Inquiries, Privileges and Procedures) Act 2013 that states that ″ Freedom of Information Act 1997 and 2003 does not apply to a record relating to a Part 2 inquiries and other committee business″.

In other words they will only divulge what they want you to know. Even though there was nothing of a sensitive nature in the Oireachtas Committee on Future Funding of Domestic Water other than the members themselves, what they agreed on and what they voted for.

We will of course appeal this decision and will relate the outcome in due course. Isn’t the public entitled to the truth.

Platitudes and bromide in Ireland's political scene

October 6, 2017

In this article Enda Craig reponds to Deputy Paul Murphy’s , short but altogether, unsatisfactory explanation on facebook yesterday that Solidarity did not support the removal of the 9.4 Exemption from the Oireachtas Water Committee’s report.

by Enda Craig

Deputy Murphy’s response together with the lack of a credible explanation from those who we were led to believe were the ‘good guys’ like Solidarity, People Before Profit, Sinn Féin and Independents, to my serious accusations in Buncrana Together, When the Dust Settles where I accused representatives of doing deals in the Oireachtas Water Committee and selling out the anti water charges movement, brings up thoughts of just what these Irish politicians mean when they talk about ‘Peoples’ Power’, ‘Mass Movement’ or ‘Grass Roots’.

When it comes to platitudes from the left in Ireland be it Solidarity, PBP or those in the somewhat more hazy left or right category, Sinn Féin, it baffles me what they mean. Especially when I believe that the ‘grass roots’ are looking for some honest answers. After all when it comes to people's power, honesty and information is the key.

You know, to my mind, this is not far away from the bromide one hears, all too often, from the mainstream parties such as Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil when they say they are working hard on behalf of the nation, or constituents or to quote an often Sinn Féin cliché, ‘we have a mandate’. Euphemisms like these are really for keeping the masses in the dark, clichés to give people the impressing that their opinions count and platitudes to hide what they really want or are doing, like the opposite, acting in their own self interest. But the masses, so long as they are controlled, are needed every so often to march up and down O’Connell Street or every four years at election time. It is condescending.

Murphy’s reply

″Solidarity did not support the removal of the reference to 9.4 in the Water committee report. We opposed the Water Committee report for various reasons, including the charging for 'excessive use' and the retention of Irish Water as a commercial entity. Our position was well explained on the Committee and in the ongoing Dáil debate on the legislation. Regardless of the legal situation, we believe that if people organise to oppose the imposition of charges in the future, it can be defeated and the law turned into a dead letter, just as it has been for the last 3 years″

This is an answer Sinn Féin could just as easily come up with. Even Fianna Fáil on the face of it were against Irish Water and Water Charges but behind the scenes both conjured up ‘excessive charges’, metering and the establishment of Irish Water.

What Mr Murphy or indeed any of the Right2Water TDs did not answer was to explain in detail why subsequent to the Oireachtas Committee debate on January 15th, 2017, in which two Senior Councils advocated the retention of the 9.4 Irish Domestic Water Exemption, that no mention of this can be found in any report, especially the ‘Confidential Draft Final Report’.

This is the report Solidary and R2W TDs fully accepted and supported when Deputies Paul Murphy, Richard Boyd-Barrett, Brid Smith and Mich Barry spoke on video on the night of April 5th 2017 when they rushed to be the first to announce to the world a ‘victory’ for the Anti-Water Charges campaign.

Solidarity and People Before Profit speaking outside Dáil April 5th 2017

Mr Murphy might care to explain his enthusiastic comments on the video that ‘there will be no excessive usage charge’. I would think we deserve an answer to that especially in light of their failure to explain Sinn Féin’s behind the scenes deals with regard to ‘Excessive Charges’’ or indeed Right2Water Unions agreeing with them in the Oireachtas Committee.

In relation to his comment that″Solidarity did not support the removal of the reference to the 9.4 Exemption in the committee’s report″, I am not aware of anyone making that specific accusation. My contention was that the 9.4 was never included in the report in the first place and no one complained about it. An altogether serious reality.

I would like Mr Murphy to show me detailed evidence that he fought tooth and nail, subsequent to the legal debate on January 15th , to have the 9.4 Exemption included in any Committee report. A bland statement like ″our position was well explained on the Committee and in the ongoing Dáil debate on the legislation″ does nothing to clarify his actions in relation to accepting a report with proposed progressive charges in the place of the 9.4 Exemption. The details of his attempts to retain the 9.4 and to have it included in the committee’s report are now required to justify his so far unsubstantiated claims that he did fight for them. Murphy’s claim regarding his position to the 9.4 is not documented anywhere, as far as I am aware. I would like to be proved wrong.

Just to be precise the time-frame I am referring to is subsequent to the January15th session and up to when the Committee’s Confidential Final Report was published on the 5th of April.

I spoke to the Oireachtas Committee secretary, Mr Thomas Sheridan, on the phone and his reply was confirmed in writing to Michael Mooney that after each session the Committee members would meet in private session and decide and agree which parts of that session would be included in the Oireachtas Committee report.

The most critical of all decision to drop the 9.4 Exemption and any mention of the January 15 debate and replace it with 'progressive charges' was made at that point. It is not unreasonable to think that if there was a deal done behind their backs, Mr Murphy or any of the R2W TDs should have raised hell at that point. They should have explained to the anti water movement what was happening during all those private sessions. And they should now explain why the 9.4 Exemption to water charges was left out of any report. After all how can you have an 'Exemption to Water Charges' and all that it entails and what we now have 'progressive water charges' at the same time. That is a contradiction.