Council Chair gets phone service back

November 1983

Mr Jimmy Curtis, Chairman of Wexford Count Council, now has his telephone service back, after making a stand against poor service by refusing to pay his bill.

However, he says the service itself is still no better than before.

It may be remembered that he withheld payment of his bill because of the poor quality of the service. The P&T reaction was to cut off the connection – leading Jimmy to discover then that even a poor service was better than none at all.

Jimmy’s decision not to pay his bill was born out of frustration. ‘I have been on to the P&T people, I have been on to the TDs and even to Ministers over the years, but my telephone service continues to be diabolical. When the connection was restored last week, I had no line. I went up the road and found that the wires were caught up. I fixed them myself. I have since been unable to get people I want to talk to on the phone. It is a terrible service,’ he said.

Even as this reporter spoke to him by phone about the problem, the connection broke down, and then after calling back, an ‘engaged’ sound played over what the Council Chairman’s voice.

Jimmy says he is encouraged by the number of people who have been in contact with him since it became known he had refused to pay his telephone bill, but that aspect is offset by the dissatisfaction he encounters.

He is now considering calling a public meeting, with the object of forming an association of people who have similar difficulties to the ones he has been experiencing over the past five years. He intends to invite the TDs and the P&T people to attend the meeting.