No-one will be safe from water charges if we don't stand and fight

by anon Sun Oct 12, 2014 00:48

This from Right2Water.ie ....

By Kathleen Lynch, Professor of Equality, UCD School of Social Justice

A tax on water is an indirect tax. It is deeply inegalitarian and unjust because it has to be paid regardless of income or capability, and because it is a tax on a ‘good’ that people must use to maintain life itself. It is a tax that people cannot avoid.

While those who are on low incomes can avoid some indirect taxes (alcohol, tobacco) they cannot avoid using water as they need it to live. Moreover, as a certain quantity of water is necessary for consumption and sanitation, it is not possible to radically reduce your consumption. Indeed if you are at home a great deal (unemployed, elderly, ill), it will cost you more than if you have a job, can afford to go to the gym, sports club etc. where you can use sanitation and shower facilities.

Water taxes are also unjust as they are a form of taxation that impact disproportionately on those with the lowest income. Recent research, based on CSO data (Collins, 2014: 17), shows that the lowest income group in Ireland (lowest 10%) spend 28% of their entire income in taxation, almost all of it on indirect taxes. This is only 1% less than the richest 10% who spend 29% of their income on taxes, mostly in direct taxation in their case.

So, no other social group spends as much of their income on taxation as the lowest income group apart from the top income group. This is mainly due to the extensive use of indirect taxes to collect taxes from the poorest people in Irish society.

Water charges are indirect taxes that will further propel the poorest into greater poverty. They are not just an attack on those on low incomes, however, the introduction of the individualisation of payment, through a market relationship with a provider, compromises every citizen’s right to water. Your individual ability to pay is what determines your right.

There is a need to set up a National Water Monitoring Body to oversee the protection of water as a human right in Ireland. Without an independent, non-commercial, non-party-political oversight body, there is a very real danger the human right to water in Ireland will be reneged upon in a few years, or whenever the next financial crisis arises.

by rua Mon Oct 13, 2014 09:40

I wholeheartedly agree,this is an unjust tax,on everyone rich or poor,but mainly poor,those who are in the workingclass bracket with kids or the unemployed will be mercilessly hit.

If they cannot pay up the full amount the water will be cut off,what is more inhumane than that we need water to sustain our life.

If you cannot pay - you don't live.

How did the government become so cruel and callous?

Watch out for the next big thing - it will be selling off our natural water assets to private companies who will charge us three times the amount!

by growingresistence Mon Oct 13, 2014 22:14

Just after being reported on thejournal.ie -
http://www.thejournal.ie/cork-man-hunger-strike-water-c...2014/
Gary Coleman started the hunger strike at around 5pm outside Cork City Hall and is calling on people in Cork to join the protest planned in Cork city on 25 October and wants them to match the number of people who marched in Dublin last Saturday.