Sir, – While I very much agree with the spirit of Fintan O'Toole's suggestion about using the refundable water charges for the general good (Opinion, July 25th), I am somewhat wary of the notion that such a scheme should be left to the "management" of the State. It seems to me the resource would seep away into the usual slough of administrative desolation and leave us with a pittance to be applied to the purpose for which it was ostensibly intended.
It might be better if those of us who can afford it should accept the refund and then indulge in acts of personal generosity by donating all or part of the refund to one of the many charities which manage to do so much with so little.
There is hardly a single State service, funded up to its teeth, that can compete with the decency, efficiency and compassion of many of these voluntary bodies.
Yes, there have been scandals, and, given the stuff of which we are made, there will be others. But we should not use such failures as a pretext to deny ourselves the occasional pleasure of being generous. – Yours, etc,
PETER KENNY,
Dublin 14.
Sir, – I would waive my water charges refund. €170,000,000 would build a lot of houses. Let us please see something constructive emerge from this embarrassing debacle. What a shambles! – Yours, etc,
EAMONN MAGEE,
Sandycove, Co Dublin.
A chara, – I am one of the 190,000 who claimed the conservation grant but did not pay the water charge.
It may not be possible to have your cake and eat it but you can certainly drink it. – Is mise,
WALTER GOE,
Dublin 6.
Sir, – Fintan O'Toole doesn't want his water charges back and nor do I. He suspects that most people would be happier seeing this money doing some good and I don't doubt that he's right. There are any number of issues raised in that very day's Irish Times newspaper, which could be alleviated with a fraction of the €178 million already collected.
Your front page, for example, carries an image of people queuing for potable water after crumbling pipes burst in Drogheda. Perhaps we could put the €178 million towards a State body tasked with repairing this and similar decaying infrastructure across the island? We could call it Irish Water and . . . Oh, hang on. We tried that. The pub it is, then. – Yours, etc,
SIMON O’NEILL,
Dublin 3.
Sir, – Fintan O’Toole took the words right out of my mouth but framed them far more eloquently.
I had been thinking of how that tidy sum could be more usefully spent if most or all of the payers were agreeable. It would be fantastic to find a way to redirect the water charge refunds to one or several projects. Improving the process time of those applying for asylum status could be a win-win project. One of many possibilities. – Yours, etc,
MARY BARTON,
Co Dublin.
Sir, – In the light of the Drogheda water supply failure, it is worthwhile marking the water meter debacle by estimating its cost and placing this in context.
The total cost could hit €714 million covering meters (€574 million), conservation grant (€90 million) and related administration for billing, grants and refunds (say €50 million). This “sunk cost” equates to 13 per cent of Irish Water’s capital expenditure plan for 2014-21 and ignores the recurring benefits that would have accrued if the same amount had been invested in productive leak-prevention or supply-security projects.
The €714 million can be compared with about €200 million expended on the HSE’s Ppars computer system and €54 million lost on e-voting machines, to name just two recent financially-challenged projects. – Yours, etc,
BRIAN FLANAGAN,
Blackrock, Co Dublin.
Sir, – Irish Water must have records of the names and addresses of people who paid water charges and the amount paid. This information was essential to the running of the company. In many cases, it would also have relevant bank and/or credit card details. It should be a relatively simple matter to extract this information from its database and refund each person without incurring significant costs.
Irish Water should be required to explain if this is not the case. – Yours, etc,
CYRIL McNAMEE
Greystones, Co Wicklow.