THE DEPARTMENT OF Housing has said it is “not giving consideration at this time” to bringing in excessive water usage charges.

There had been reports today that Uisce Éireann was planning on introducing “excess” water charges on households with water usage levels far larger than the average.

The move was first proposed in 2017, when the government announced plans to introduce an “excessive charging regime” in 2018.

Households deemed by Uisce Éireann to be using a “wasteful amount of water above the excessive amount” were to be given a six-month notice to reduce their use.

If this wasn’t achieved, they would then be charged for excessive wasteful use.

An Oireachtas committee at the time said that excessive usage should be based on 1.7 times the average household usage. 

This charge wasn’t implemented in 2017 but was today reported to be back on the cards.

In its water charges plan for 2024, Uisce Éireann said that the default annual allowance is 213,000 litres for all dwellings.

An additional allowance of 25,000 litres per person is available for households of more than four people, as well as an exemption from excess charges on some medical grounds.

However, a Department of Housing spokesperson today said that while Minister James Brown “is aware that work began under the previous government on draft regulations for excessive water use charges, this was undertaken as part of the commitment under the previous programme for government”.

“The Minister is not giving consideration at this time to bringing in such charges,” said the spokesperson.

The spokesperson added that “no proposal has been brought to the Minister in this regard and charges do not form part of the current programme for government”. 

‘Domestic water charges by the back door’

Sinn Féin TD Eoin Ó Broin had described reports about the move as the “introduction of domestic water charges by the back door”.

He said that the “real intention” was to “introduce the principle of charging for domestic water services as the first step in water charges being applied to all households”.

Ó Broin is a former member of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Future Funding of Water Services and remarked that “domestic water charges do not reduce water consumption over time”.

“Rather they cause water poverty for those on low incomes who are unable to afford the inevitable increasing charges,” said Ó Broin.

“Pensioners living in older properties are particularly vulnerable to the risk of water poverty if any form of charge is introduced.”

He added that many households that have above average water usage levels “are not actually consuming more”, but rather “their homes are older or have building defects causing significant leakages”. 

“If they don’t have the funds to undertake what can be very significant structural upgrades or repairs or if they are renters, is the government seriously saying they are going to punish them with a so-called excessive use charge?” asked Ó Broin.

He also cautioned that any such scheme would “cost more to administer than it will raise, making their entire exercise pointless”.

Ó Broin also called on Uisce Éireann to “accelerate their own leakage reduction programme, which is the single biggest cause of water loss in the domestic water system”.

‘Trojan horse’

Meanwhile, People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy described the reports as a “Trojan Horse for the full re-introduction of charges”.

“Despite being defeated by the water charges movement, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have never given up on their intention to charge for water,” said Murphy.

He said that average water usage in Ireland is low by international standards and that “we do not have widespread excessive usage of water”.

“And where excess usage exists,” said Murphy, “it is overwhelmingly due to the fact that there are leaks.”

Murphy added that when the charge was previously proposed, it was clear that four-person households “would be hit particularly hard as they would have exactly the same allowance as a one-person household”.

“These families would face charges, not when they use 70% more than average, but when they use 20% more than average,” said Murphy.

“If the government manages to impose ‘excess usage’ water charges they will then reduce the ‘normal usage’ allowance over time until everyone is paying for water,” said Murphy.

“No one should be under any illusion about the intention here.”

He warned that the government would face “mass opposition from people who, after waging a successful campaign of non-payment and mass protest to defeat water charges, won’t accept them being brought in through the backdoor”.