My family of three’s bill for water is €100 a year
Member of rural scheme pays HALF what Irish Water will charge
GROUP water schemes supplying rural communities charge roughly half what Irish Water is expected to bill its customers from October.
Irish Water revealed last week that an ordinary household can expect to pay about €240 per year – but the not-for-profit group schemes can supply the average family for less than €140.
James O’Brien and his family are members of the Tullyallen group scheme outside Drogheda. They say they would struggle to pay Irish Water’s prices.
The Tullyallen scheme, one of the oldest in the country, delivers water to 172 people, with the average family paying €100 per year.
Mr O’Brien, a 67-year-old retired secondary school teacher, said he
‘I wouldn’t like to pay
Irish Water prices’
wouldn’t fancy having to rely on Irish Water because it would cost more than twice as much.
‘I wouldn’t like to be paying the prices Irish Water are charging. I wouldn’t like to be paying it.
‘They are saying the average will be €240. I think it’s too much money,’ he said.
Mr O’Brien pointed out that one of the problems for Irish Water is the amount of wastage caused by leaking pipes.
This cost is then passed on to the customer, resulting in higher bills.
‘We have meters everywhere. We meter the water going into our reservoirs, we meter it coming out. We meter the water again at strategic places and again going into the houses, meaning we have almost no leakage,’ he said.
‘We’re not pumping into a black hole. When we take water from the reservoirs, that water goes to the consumer.’
The scheme has three price bands – €50 a year up to 50,000 litres, €60 up to 100,000 litres and €100 up to 230,000 litres. After that, it’s €1.05 per 1,000 litres.
‘The average household is using under 150,000 litres, which means they pay €100,’ Mr O’Brien said.
‘We use about 130,000 litres per year. We have two parents and one adult child but we also have two visiting adult children as well. Our bill is €100,’ he explained. It costs €2,000 to be connected to the Tullyallen scheme but Mr O’Brien said the State paid a third of the cost in grants and subsidies.
Tullyallen is one of about 350 private group schemes across the country.
However, there are up to 1,500 public group water schemes that buy their water from local authorities before pumping it to roughly 100,000 homes that are not connected to a municipal supply.
The future of these schemes is now in doubt because they don’t know how much Irish Water will charge them for water when it takes over in October.
The National Federation of Group Water Schemes says there is huge
‘Hundreds of schemes
will walk away’
concern among its members.
Brian MacDonald of the NFGWS said: ‘The group schemes are holding their annual meetings to set the price for members but in October they could find out that the price is totally inadequate to cover costs.
‘If they do not get a preferential price from Irish Water, the bill for members will be significantly more because they will be paying Irish Water and will still have the distribution and maintenance cost.
‘There would be many, many hundreds of schemes walking away from it,’ he added.
A Department of the Environment spokesman said: ‘Talks on this with the NFGWS will begin shortly.’