Water proposals - Plan ends some of the confusion

The Government is, by its own hand, mired in a communications disaster approaching something like Cowenesque darkness.

The entirely avoidable, amateur blundering around the residential property tax, the needless climb-down on sceptic tanks, and, in recent days, pointless, credibility-squandering confusion about how water charges will be introduced, administered or levied, suggest that this comedy of errors could quickly turn to tragedy.

The same applies to the turf-cutting farce where the Government almost pretends that the EU legislation might go away or, in some new saints-and-scholars way, eventually be circumvented and the destruction of our remaining bogs — for private gain — continues unchecked.