Jury is out on whether the EU will pursue Ireland over water charges

A FLOOD of conflicting information on water charges has been pouring in from Brussels this week.

Many in the EU are baffled by Irish people’s reluctance to pay for what is an unarguably scarce resource, and would like to see water charges maintained.

EU rules say countries must bring in a “cost recovery” policy for water by 2010 that takes account of the environmental and supply costs and the idea that the “polluter pays”.

In answer to a parliamentary question by Sinn Fein MEP Lynn Boylan ( pictured below), the Commission said a country is in breach of EU rules if it opts out of water charging when the “established practice” is to charge.

The response was checked by Commission lawyers and run by the private office of President Jean-Claude Juncker, as with all parliamentary replies, so one can assume it’s an official position.

But the EU has not taken a position on Ireland’s specific case, and it is still unclear whether it will pursue the government in court over the issue.

That is because what constitutes “established practice” is still up for debate. Independent MEP Marian Harkin put the question to the EU executive way back in 2010, after the then-government was warned by Brussels over its tardiness in submitting a river basin management plan, where countries set out their water conservation and flooding strategies. Then-environment commissioner, Janez Potocnik, told Harkin that “established practice” meant the regime in place at the time the EU’s water framework directive was adopted. For Ireland, that means 2003, before water charges were even a twinkle in any minister’s eye. “I don’t disagree with water charges,” Harkin told this newspaper, “but I’d be concerned if the Commission followed Ireland for the full costs of water,” she said. “We’d have anarchy.” Fine Gael MEP Mairead McGuinness says the EU executive will be sensitive to the debate in Ireland, but not if the government moves to abolish charges altogether. “They will be mindful of what’s happening in Ireland, where we have a suspension, not an abolition — there is a major difference between these two verbs,” she said.