Demonstrations after water protesters jailed

The jailing of five water charge protesters sparked demonstrations last night with supporters bringing a part of Dublin city centre to a rush hour standstill following the High Court’s decision.

Four men and a woman were given sentences of between 28 and 56 days after being found to be in contempt of an earlier court order prohibiting them from blocking the installation of water meters.

Following the ruling, supporters of the jailed people staged protests in Dublin, blocking traffic for a time. An estimated 200 people then marched from O’Connell St to Mountjoy Prison before dispersing before 8pm.

The Right2Water Campaign said it was shocked at the jailings which it described as “unnecessary and provocative”.

“The ultimate responsibility for these incarcerations lies with the Government who have made a political choice to impose water charges on communities.”

The jailings came shortly after plans were announced for a rally in Dublin tomorrow in protest at what some campaigners claimed was “political policing”. Right2Water last week announced a national day of demonstrations on March 21.

Tomorrow’s rally is organised by some of the 29 people arrested over the past 10 days in connection with the Jobstown water protest last November when Tánaiste Joan Burton was trapped in her car for over two hours.

But Anti-Austerity Alliance TD Paul Murphy said the event should become a major united protest by all groups opposed to water charges. “The jailing of five protesters today is an even more serious attack on the right to protest than the arrests in the last two weeks,” he said.

The five people, all from Dublin, were found to be in breach of a court order granted on the application of GMC Sierra, one of the companies contracted by Irish Water to install water meters, that prohibited them from coming within 20 metres of installation works.

The High Court heard evidence earlier this week that the order, granted last November, had since been breached by Bernie Hughes, Derek Byrne, and Michael Batty, all of whom were sent to prison for 28 days, and by Damien O’Neill and Paul Moore, who were sentenced to 56 days.