Siptu wants ‘waste tariff’

Siptu has called on the Government to redesignate Irish Water as a non-commercial semi-state company which would supply enough water to meet domestic needs and use meters to impose a “tariff on waste”.

In his opening speech to delegates at the union’s biennial delegate conference in Cork’s City Hall last night, the union’s president, Jack O’Connor said the water charges campaign “is not and it has never been simply about how we pay for our public water supply”.

“However, insofar as it is actually about that, our primary concern is with ensuring that this most vital of all public goods remains in public ownership and that it attracts the dramatically increased levels of investment that are required,” he said.