Water and waste services take biggest hit in €1.3m cut

Basic services such as water, waste, housing, and roads will bear the brunt of €1.3m in government cuts to Kerry County Council.

The Government continues to blame the decreases on the non-payment of the controversial household charge. Kerry has a 68% compliance level (about 41,000 of 59,000 households), the fourth highest in the country.

Yesterday, county councillors narrowly agreed to the cuts sought by county manager Tom Curran.

He confirmed they would affect water and environment services, housing, roads, IT upgrading and other regular programmes.

Mr Curran had warned that if elected members did not agree to the cuts, the council would be in deficit next year which was going to be “extremely difficult” in any case.

“I looked at areas where we can make savings with minimal impact on day-to-day services. Some of the savings are made up of cost deferrals to 2013,” said Mr Curran.

People in the county, he said, are continuing to pay the charge on a daily basis with 200 in the past week.

Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin strongly opposed the cuts and only one government party councillor, Labour’s Gillian Wharton Slattery, voted against.

After an 11-11 tie, the cuts were adopted on Labour mayor Terry O’Brien’s casting vote.

After protests from several councillors about the poor state of roads, Mr Curran agreed not to go ahead with a €90,000 cut on non-national road maintenance.