I raised certain issues in connection with this Bill last week, and it was my intention at that time, if possible, to draft several amendments to it; but in going through the Bill I came to the conclusion that it was practically impossible to prepare any amendments that would be in any way acceptable. That was due to the fact that, in my opinion, an entirely different Bill to what is before the House would be required to ensure sewerage and water supply schemes. It is my opinion that this Bill will not achieve the purpose for which it was obviously drafted. My feeling is that county councils will not co-operate in the necessary enactments for rates so as to make the Bill a practical proposition for the country. I think we are all agreed that sewerage and water supply schemes are very necessary in practically every county in Ireland, and we are agreed that there is a great deal of work to be done in this respect.
The peculiar circumstances existing in each county, where rates will have to be struck for areas at a great distance from other points within the county, will in my opinion tend to render the Bill practically inoperative. I feel another line of action might have been taken. Rightly or wrongly, my conception is that if the county councils are going to have the responsibility of imposing taxation for the carrying out of sewerage and water supply schemes, the only method likely to achieve that purpose will be for each county council to adopt a series of systems and to schedule these on a county basis. Then an equitable rate could be struck. When we come to the question of the equitable rate, the area deriving greatest benefit should be taxed to the greatest extent. A small tax should be imposed upon the areas not immediately benefiting and the balance could be made up by a contribution from the State. Let us take any county in the Free State and I am sure we will find a disinclination to strike a rate for an area twenty or thirty miles away from the location of most of the ratepayers. My feeling is that this Bill, drafted as it is, will not be workable, and the result will be that sewerage and water supply schemes will not be developed in the way we would like to develop them.
When I have made that explanation Senators will readily see that from my point of view it was practically impossible to get an amendment drafted that would in any sense amend this Bill or one that would be acceptable to the Ministry. I feel that in this Bill the Minister could have justified imposing compulsion on the counties. We know that in other directions and in other circumstances the Government have been quite keen in enforcing their will. Surely this is one instance where the welfare of the whole country might have led the Ministry to exercise a certain amount of compulsion in insisting on the execution of necessary sewerage and water schemes? While I am opposed generally to the principle of compulsion on county councils, I feel that here is one case that is infinitely more important than the many other cases in which compulsion has been applied. It is one case where, on reasonable terms, the Minister might have exercised a certain amount of compulsion. The outcome of that, with a State contribution, might have helped to solve the problem, a problem that I am satisfied is not going to be solved by this Bill. On that basis I am going to vote against the Final Stage of the Bill.
