Government: ‘Pay water bill or welfare will be cut’
The Cabinet was due to discuss the measures last night as well as plans to deduct earnings and tenants’ deposits for not paying small bills in general, including water charges.
Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the new debt enforcement measures to push households to pay their water bills were targeted at people who won’t pay their water charge bills as opposed to those who can’t.
.@EndaKennyTD says compliance regime (Cabinet to discuss later) will differentiate between those who can't & those who won't pay #irishwater
— Juno McEnroe (@Junomaco) May 6, 2015
He noted gas and electricity companies could cut off people’s supplies, but the Government had agreed that Irish Water would not reduce water supplies if people did not pay their bills.
The new measures also mean that the threat of imprisonment will be abolished where people do not pay debts or bills in general.
“It is grossly unfair to expect one neighbour to pay while the other neighbour takes the view that he or she should not pay. I distinguish between those who can pay but will not and those who cannot pay,” he told the Dáil.
Gas can be cut off, but water can't under what Government agreed, says @EndaKennyTD #irishwater
— Juno McEnroe (@Junomaco) May 6, 2015
'where it can be paid, it will be paid'
The Coalition was last night scheduled to discuss its Civil Debt Enforcement Bill, which will allow Irish Water to use attachment orders to deduct unpaid bills from welfare payments or earnings as well as prevent people from selling their homes if the owners have an outstanding debt.
But it remains unclear how and if courts will deal with this. Similar powers were granted to Revenue to go after people who did not pay property taxes. This has resulted in Revenue deducting the taxes from the pensions and pay of thousands of homeowners with unpaid bills. Separately, Environment Minister Alan Kelly was expected to brief his Cabinet colleagues on proposals to make tenants liable for water bills and for parts of their deposits to be withheld if debts are not paid.
The new debt enforcement measures are based on a Law Reform Commission report in 2010 which recommended removing imprisonment for unpaid debts and recovering money by other means, specifically through a collection office.
Free legal aid advisers backed the debt reform plans last night but expressed concern that welfare claimants could be targeted. Flac director general Noeline Blackwell told RTÉ’s Six One News the current laws for those who owed debt were “inefficient” and “unfair”.
“When you take it that welfare payments in Ireland tend to be on the basis that it’s the minimum needed for someone to live on, then it’s hard to see how money will be available for debt payment from somebody like that. The other thing that has to happen is that there has to be a cut-off point, that after a period of years if the debt hasn’t been recovered, that it’s recognised that it can never be paid.”
Sinn Féin’s Gerry Adams said: “You [the Coalition] are prepared to bring in this unprecedented pocket-picking legislation against citizens, workers, pensioners and welfare recipients but you refuse to legislate to protect citizens against the banks or to safeguard taxpayers.
.@GerryAdamsSF now raising new water charge compliance measures proposed by Coalition to deduct unpaid bills from pay or dole #watercharges
— Juno McEnroe (@Junomaco) May 6, 2015
“The Government’s latest plan, concocted by a Labour minister who is greatly concerned about his own legacy, also sets a very dangerous precedent. IfIrish Water can take money from people’s private bank accounts, where will this end? Will this legislation apply to Bord Gáis, to ESB, to Eircom?”
Fianna Fáil said the measures were designed to “shore up” Irish Water. Justice spokesman Niall Collins said: “They [the Coalition] talk about a recovery, an uplift in the economy. Yet they decide to go after people’s social welfare.”
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