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Indymedia Ireland is a volunteer-run non-commercial open publishing website for local and international news, opinion & analysis, press releases and events. Its main objective is to enable the public to participate in reporting and analysis of the news and other important events and aspects of our daily lives and thereby give a voice to people.

offsite link Army Sergeant Travis Decker Murdered His Three Children After Being Denied Mental Health Care at JBL... Sat Jun 07, 2025 04:52 | JBLM Whistleblowers
A corrupt military police force and incompetent Commander who denied emergency mental health care and crisis counseling to an American service member resulted in the murder of the sergeant's three young daughters

offsite link Gaza doctor grieves her nine children killed in Israeli strike Sun May 25, 2025 20:00 | imc
Israeli regime continues it's slaughter
'The children were completely charred'

Paediatrician Alaa al-Najjar was treating victims of Israeli attacks when her children were killed by an Israeli strike on their home

offsite link British doctors working in Gaza describe territory as a ?slaughterhouse? Sat May 24, 2025 00:23 | imc
There?s no food getting in so people are starving,? surgeon Tom Potokar says
British doctors working in Gaza have described the territory as a ?slaughterhouse,? where the patients they are treating are severely malnourished.

Plastic surgeons and orthopedic specialists from the UK are based at the Amal and Nasser hospitals in Khan Younis in the south of the territory.

Dr. Tom Potokar, a plastic surgeon specializing in burn injuries, has worked in Gaza 16 times but said this mission had revealed a level of destruction far greater than his last visit in 2023,

offsite link It is time to talk about the Out of Control Immigration. Mon Mar 31, 2025 22:12 | imc
For the last few years since the CV19 scamdemic undocumented immigration into Ireland has surged. No one is allowed discuss it because they do not want any rational debate about it. If you do you are labelled an extremist. However this out of control immigration is fully facilitated by the Irish government and the EU and the shady figure behind the Neo Con movement pushing for endless war, wokeism and globalist agenda.

offsite link [Dublin] National Demonstration for Palestine: End Israeli Apartheid & Genocide Thu Mar 06, 2025 22:35 | ipsc
Sat, 22 March 2025, 13:00 Assemble at the Garden of Remembrance, Parnell Square, Dublin 1
The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, supported by over 150 Irish civil society organisations, has called another National Demonstration for Palestine on Saturday 22nd March.

The march will begin at the Garden of Remembrance at 1pm and finish outside the D?il on Molesworth Street/Kildare Street to bring our demands to the Irish government?s doorstep.

The Saker >>

Public Inquiry
Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

offsite link RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail?supporter? Anthony

offsite link Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony

offsite link Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony

offsite link RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony

offsite link Waiting for SIPO Anthony

Public Inquiry >>

Human Rights in Ireland
Promoting Human Rights in Ireland

Human Rights in Ireland >>

Lockdown Skeptics

The Daily Sceptic

offsite link The Trials of Generation Z Tue Jul 15, 2025 19:00 | Sallust
The Telegraph has published an expos? of the privations to which young people are subjected today, including having to get a taxi to the station. Sallust is sure this will resonate with people born in the 1950s.
The post The Trials of Generation Z appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link John Torode Sacked From MasterChef After Complaint About ?Racist Comment? Seven Years Ago Tue Jul 15, 2025 17:55 | Will Jones
John Torode has been sacked from MasterChef after a complaint that he?used racist language on one occasion in 2018 or 2019, first made in 2024, was upheld.
The post John Torode Sacked From MasterChef After Complaint About ‘Racist Comment’ Seven Years Ago appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Labour to Reintroduce Grants for Electric Cars to ?Bribe? Motorists Tue Jul 15, 2025 15:00 | Will Jones
Labour will?give out new grants for electric cars, the Department for Transport has confirmed,?despite a previous 'bribe' scheme that failed to spark enthusiasm for EVs being scrapped three years ago.
The post Labour to Reintroduce Grants for Electric Cars to ‘Bribe’ Motorists appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link A School Excluding a 12 Year-Old Girl for Wearing a Union Jack Dress Must be a Wake-Up Call Tue Jul 15, 2025 13:19 | C.J. Strachan
A school excluding a 12 year-old girl for wearing a Union Jack dress must be a wake-up call over the untrammelled influence of divisive far-Left politics in our schools and institutions, says C.J. Strachan.
The post A School Excluding a 12 Year-Old Girl for Wearing a Union Jack Dress Must be a Wake-Up Call appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link University Staff Face Punishment if They Breach Labour?s Islamophobia Definition Tue Jul 15, 2025 11:00 | Will Jones
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The post University Staff Face Punishment if They Breach Labour’s Islamophobia Definition appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Irish Water: Killing off conservation and the real agenda behind water charges

category national | bin tax / household tax / water tax | other press author Monday January 18, 2016 12:03author by 1 of Indymedia - Mandate Trade Union and Right2Water/Right2Chang Report this post to the editors

Reposted from Right2Water by D. Gibney, Mandate Trade Union and Right2Water/Right2Chang

This article by David Gibney from the Right2Water website has been republished here in light of the upcoming water charges protest on this Sat 23rd Jan in advance of the election due in the next few weeks. It highlights the scam and lies around Irish Water and how it is fully intended to privatise it. If and when the TIPP agreement is signed between the EU and USA, privatisation will be unstoppable not just for our water but for all services right across the board.

THERE are three obvious agendas behind the imposition of domestic water charges. If you were to believe the government spin, you’d think it was about conservation.

But the three real reasons are:

  1. Shifting the burden of paying for water from commercial enterprises to households;
  2. Giving tax breaks to the wealthy while imposing water charges on everyone else; and
  3. Lining up the future privatisation of our water industry.

There are a number of ways we can prove the conservation argument is a farce. The first and most obvious is through direct comparison with other countries that already have domestic water charges in place.
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THERE are three obvious agendas behind the imposition of domestic water charges. If you were to believe the government spin, you’d think it was about conservation.

But the three real reasons are:


  1. Shifting the burden of paying for water from commercial enterprises to households;
  2. Giving tax breaks to the wealthy while imposing water charges on everyone else; and
  3. Lining up the future privatisation of our water industry.

There are a number of ways we can prove the conservation argument is a farce. The first and most obvious is through direct comparison with other countries that already have domestic water charges in place.

According to the UK water supply boards, where they have had domestic water charges in place since the 1980s, the average end user uses 68,405 litres of water per year. Yet, according to Irish Water, that figure in Ireland is 54,750 litres. So the evidence shows that water charges actually increase water consumption by up to 20%.

A SIPTU report from 2011 flagged up the results of international research into the issue. It found that installing domestic water meters was unlikely to make any real difference to the amount of water used by families.

The report stated: “In the UK, Germany, and the Netherlands it has been found that metering each home makes little difference to the amount of water used by families. Researchers have found that while consumption dropped initially following the installation of meters, after a relatively short time, this was more or less reversed with families returning to the pre-metered level of consumption.”

Senior Executive Engineer for Water, Gerry Concannon, estimated that the costs of metering – involving installation, maintenance, administration and replacement – would double our spend on water in the medium term.

That figure has now trebled, and yet the professional body Engineers Ireland stated: “The proposed expenditure on water metering would mean spending more than €1 billion which we don’t have on something we don’t need!"

So if conservation is not the real motivation behind water charges, and we’re spending so much money on a phenomenally-expensive metering programme, what is the real motivation behind water charges?

1. Shift the burden from corporations to households

The EU says that households account for only 10% of all water usage. The biggest users of water are agriculture and commercial companies, using 90% of all water. Yet, a quick look at the breakdown of the new water billing structure shows that householders will initially be expected to pay up to 78% of all costs, and that figure will no doubt rise in the immediate future.

Commercial companies will be expected to pay 22% of the costs for using 90% of the product, yet at this point in time, evidence shows they already have a non-compliance rate of 37% and €50m in water debt has been written off for them.

2. Give tax breaks to the wealthy while imposing water charges on everyone else

In the 2015 Budget, the Government gave a €405m tax break to the top 17% of earners. In the most recent Budget they gave further tax cuts disproportionately benefiting the highest earners. Those political decisions widened the wealth gap by €1,003 in two short years.

At the same time, Minister Alan Kelly has said he expects households to pay €271m in water charges. This is simply a transfer of wealth from the poorest in our society to the wealthiest. The unemployed, underemployed, disabled and pensioners all spend more of their time in the home than those who are lucky enough to be in full-time employment. This means they’ll use more water and when the cap on charges of €260 per year ends in 2019, their water bills will spiral out of control.

3. Lining up the future privatisation of our water industry

Water is one of the most profitable industries in the world. In 2013, in Britain, private water companies made profits of €2.81bn and paid €2.55bn to shareholders while paying only €101m in taxes. Seven water companies paid no corporation tax at all.

The dividends paid out to UK water companies are double that of your average non-financial company. As a result, there is almost no retained profit which is usually used to upgrade infrastructure future.

More than half of all water companies in the UK are owned by Private Equity Consortiums – a group of High Net Worth Individuals who pool their money to strip profits from any industry they can get their hands on. The impact is that for every £100 spent on a water bill in the UK, between £20 and £30 goes directly to the companies.

Anyone who still believes that Irish Water is about conservation should ask themselves why the Irish Government is steadfastly refusing to hold a referendum which would enshrine ownership in the hands of the public. This simple referendum could save the Labour Party and many of the seats for Fine Gael and yet they still stubbornly refuse.

When the Troika visited Portugal and Greece, their bailout terms included the privatisation of water services. That was because they had already metered, meaning there was a revenue stream in place. In Ireland we hadn’t put in place a revenue stream so the Troika played the long game and forced the metering programme into our Memorandum of Understanding first. Next step, full privatisation.

Without a referendum, there will be nothing a future government can do to prevent this.

In lining up this policy, the last two governments have cut spending on water by 65% and then have the neck to complain about the need for further investment after the infrastructure falls apart.

As Noam Chomsky said: “That's the standard technique of privatisation: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.”

That’s why water will continue to be the single most important issue for the upcoming general election. This one policy exposes the priorities for political parties and politicians.

Some are happy to lift the burden on employers, who already benefit from one of the lowest corporation tax rates and lowest employers’ PRSI rates in Europe, and impose that burden on low and middle income households.

They are happy to transfer wealth from some of the poorest in our society to the wealthiest. And they’re happy to line up our water services for future privatisation. They do this unashamedly hiding behind a bogus conservation argument.

It’s our job to hold them accountable, and we can do this by joining and supporting the Right2Change campaign as the election looms. Go to http://www.right2change.ie for more.

Right2Water has also announced another set of local demonstrations to take place across the country on Saturday, January 23rd. Please join and share the Facebook event page with all of your friends by clicking here https://www.facebook.com/events/1091492234218102/

Refs:
1. http://www.moneyguideireland.com/average-water-usage-fi....html
2. http://www.water.ie/news/tapping-into-the-water-us/
3. http://www.siptu.ie/media/media_15349_en.pdf
4. http://cityindicators.org/IndicatorsDescriptions/447272...n.pdf

Related Link: http://www.right2water.ie/blog/irish-water-killing-conservation-and-real-agenda-behind-water-charges

water_consumption_levels.png

water_usage.png

author by Pearse Monnetpublication date Mon Feb 08, 2016 12:07author address author phone Report this post to the editors

The introduction of water charges (aka the Rain Tax) is another enclosure of the commons.

author by Hibernian Scribe - Freelancepublication date Wed Feb 10, 2016 09:57author address author phone Report this post to the editors

I reside on Gorumna Island, Lettermore, Co Galway.

The reservoir lake, Loch Illauntrasna, is replete with algae and one septic tank is located in this lake another five septic tanks are located above the same lake and empty into it daily. The algae in the lake is complemented by five barrels of chlorine added at bizarre intervals (it is not measured) to the water exiting this lake for human consumption which results in a toxic water supply which everyone boils or filters. Algal water plus chlorine generates a carcinogen which causes bladder cancer. I have the specific references, however, I expect you will disregard all scientific evidence.

I do not use the water from Loch Illauntrasna, Gorumna Island, Co Galway. I harvest rain water and I buy water from Galway Water, Headford Road, Galway every two weeks. I retain the receipts. The electricity supply was interrupted 35 times in the 7 years I have lived here which automatically reduces the water flow, this is important. The amount of leaks from the water pipes within 1 and 2 km of Loch Illauntrasna is alarming. The road surfaces are poorly repaired and are re-visited by local operatives to dig up and fill in with comic regularity. The complete shut off of the water supply irregularly for many hours makes me feel so very welcome to Lettermore! Irish Water will inherit this serious public health issue.

I remind you that you seek submissions prior to May 16, 2014. I wrote to all of the Galway TDs. I received an excellent written reply in response to a question in Dail Eireann to an Taoiseach as to the future water supply in this area from Casla, Co Galway.

I do not now provide or ever will provide permission for Irish Water to install a water meter. Irish Water are in contravention of the 1995 Consumer Protection Law on this lack of consent issue alone. Irish Water have no right to impose water meters installed on public land and charge private owners of land for water which falls freely from the air.

I expect nothing from the Commission for Energy Regulation thus and therefore I will not be disappointed.

 
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