by Alan Jacques
OVER 150 people turned out to the Mid-West Right to Water’s inaugural meeting in Limerick last week when the call rang out for water charges and Irish Water to be “consigned to the dustbin of history”.
Speakers at the meeting included Sinn Féin councillor Maurice Quinlivan, Billy Wall of UNITE trade union and Right2Water national chairperson Brendan Ogle who warned that Irish people will not put up with this “ideologically driven extra tax”. He claimed the government was unwilling to publicly acknowledge growing opposition to the water charges, but is “terrified” behind closed doors.
He also believes the majority of the population will refuse to pay this tax.
“They thought they had gotten away with socialising €65 billion of private debt, with a vicious five year austerity agenda. Now the people have had enough and the government know it,” he declared.
Sinn Féin leader of Limerick City and County Council, Cllr Maurice Quinlivan, described the water charges debacle as a “key battle to further extend austerity and tollbooth economics here in Ireland, to make ordinary people pay for the crisis that corporate Ireland and their political bedfellows in Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael created”.
“Within 12 months, politicians will have to come to our doors seeking votes. Let’s send them a message that they needn’t come calling at all unless they have dismantled Irish Water, and water charges,” said Cllr Quinlivan.
“We need to put the cause over and above our own individual party ambitions, and forge a broad Left alternative that can challenge the ideologies of austerity and privatisation that have wreaked havoc on our economy and our communities. Let this message go out loud and clear. Water Charges and Irish Water must be consigned to the dustbin of history,” he said.
