Irish Water debacle: Veto vote is the price for water tax

Any sober assessment of the water debacle, any assessment of our response to the sharpening imperative to change how we regard this essential but finite gift, any assessment of whose needs prevailed during the establishment of the feather-bedded monopoly, or any assessment of the economics of water provision in 2014 must cause any rational person to wonder if we are capable of honest self-appraisal.

What should have been a benchmark project, a proud standard-bearer for a new and up-to-speed, post-Celtic Tiger Ireland has instead become a Darby O’Gill farce. One that even if it is not populated by O’Gill’s Little People is tragically characterised by small, short-term thinking on all sides.

It is hard to know which side of the debate provokes the greater despair. The Government parties railroaded through a project with the tender touch of its chief architect — Phil Hogan, who, in a very Irish way, now enjoys what can only be described as a pat-on-the-back trophy job in Brussels as if he had delivered an efficient entity we can all admire. That commissioner Hogan’s model is being completely remade asks a lot of pretty obvious questions that will never be answered, especially by those who, like Darby O’Gill’s Little People, nodded approvingly as Mr Hogan insisted that his way was the best — and only — way to equitably fund secure water provision.