I move:
That Seanad Éireann approves the following Regulations in draft:
Freedom of Information Act 1997 (Prescribed Bodies) Regulations 2014.
copies of which were laid in draft form before Seanad Éireann on 24th January, 2014.".
Freedom of Information Act 1997 (Prescribed Bodies) Regulations 2014: Motion
I welcome the opportunity to support this motion in the House. This will permit the making of regulations to enable the application of the provision of the freedom of information legislation to Irish Water, Uisce Éireann. The measure is being introduced in line with the procedures set out in the existing FOI legislation but will, of course, continue in force once the new FOI legislation has completed its passage through the Houses and is enacted.
Recent developments have highlighted the importance of a high degree of openness and transparency in helping to underpin public confidence and trust in Irish Water, in the light of the critical role and responsibilities of that body in regard to what is one of our most valuable natural resources.
In these circumstances and given the very significant impact that the operation of Irish Water will have on all households and businesses in the State, there is a broad consensus, shared by the Government, that the activities of Irish Water should be undertaken in an appropriately open, transparent and accountable manner in order that the public can be assured that it is being operated as effectively and efficiently as possible. The application of freedom of information provisions is one of several mechanisms for ensuring this will be the case.
As the House will be aware, during the Committee Stage debate on the Freedom of Information Bill in the other House in November last, I indicated that I would take steps to make Irish Water subject to freedom of information provisions following the enactment of the new legislation and once the entity as up and running. Following the recent public debate on the establishment costs of Irish Water, the meetings of the relevant Oireachtas committees attended by the management of Irish Water and taking into account the expected timetable for the enactment of the Freedom of Information Bill - it was originally hoped to have it enacted by the end of last year - I indicated to the Dáil on 22 January that it was my intention to take the necessary steps now to ensure that Irish Water is brought within the freedom of information legislation as early as possible.
Section 3 of the Freedom of Information Act of 1997 provides that regulations may be made to extend the coverage of the Act. In such cases, section 3(3) of the Act provides that a resolution approving these regulations in draft form must be passed by the Dáil and Seanad Éireann before the regulations can come into effect, following their signing into law by me, with the consent of the line Minister. The normal practice is to give a period of six months to public bodies to put in place the necessary administrative arrangements which can be quite demanding to enable them to respond to freedom of information requests in an efficient manner. It is reasonable that Irish Water be allowed some time to make such administrative arrangements, but I believe 30 working days would be an appropriate timeframe to enable the body to make such preparations. Accordingly, I am here to ask the House to support the motion to extend the provisions of freedom of information to Irish Water with effect from its legal date of establishment, which was 17 July 2013. In addition, records held by the Departments of the Environment, Community and Local Government, Communications, Energy and Natural Resources and the local authorities relating to the establishment of Irish Water and any dealings with Irish Water since its establishment are and will continue to be covered under the Freedom of Information Act, subject to the normal operations of that Act. I am calling for the support of the House for the motion to enable Irish Water to be brought under the Freedom of Information Act with effect from 17 July 2013, within 30 working days of the signing of the necessary orders.
This is the correct decision, but the Minister is, in some respects, coming in here with his tail between his legs. There was a Fianna Fáil amendment in the Dáil which sought to make Irish Water subject to the Freedom of Information Act, as amended, but the Government argued that it was not needed and that was not done. The establishment process was kept secret and that culture of secrecy was allowed to fester, with the results we have seen. This is not enough. The whole culture in Irish Water must change. There are many issues of concern surrounding its establishment but the argument about commercial confidentiality is not tenable. This is a public utility managing a public resource and, therefore, does not have commercial considerations. It is about time the Labour Party stood up to Fine Gael which seems to want to privatise water provision. There are a number of issues of concern regarding Irish Water that have been debated over and over again but the inclusion of the body under the freedom of information legislation could have been done a long time ago. There seems to be a determination to keep things private.
What have we seen so far? We have seen a bonus culture return; wasteful spending; the recruitment of more than double the staff required; and suggestions that certain individuals were favoured in the context of office leases. It has been a farce from start to finish. There seems to have been a shocking waste of public resources, coupled with a determination on the part of the Government to keep that secret in the start-up phase. The intention was to set it up before the local elections and get it out of the way, with freedom of information provisions only applying next year.
The Minister has backdated the application of the freedom of information legislation but only because of political pressure. He has done it in advance of the local elections, which is not what the Government wanted. I look forward to journalists, politicians and political parties submitting freedom of information requests and getting the information they seek. One of the key issues that is annoying people is that the Government promised last year that the moneys raised through the local property tax would be spent in local communities. That did not happen and the money was spent, predominantly, on the establishment of Irish Water.
If the required change of culture is to take effect, I hope Ministers will also answer questions relating to Irish Water and will not just pass the buck. The parliamentary questions that have been answered in recent weeks were first put as early as June 2011 and were also put in the Dáil in November 2013. It is unacceptable that what was effectively a slip-up by the CEO during a radio interview led to the release of this information.
While we support this motion, despite it being late, it is not enough. A whole change of culture in the organisation is required. Irish Water is there to serve the people, to manage a precious resource and to manage the financial resources of the people who are paying it.
I welcome the Minister to the Chamber and the regulations to extend the provisions of the freedom of information legislation to Irish Water. The freedom of information legislation will bring transparency, accountability and, I hope, responsibility to the actions of Irish Water, which is such an important entity. Making Irish Water subject to that legislation will ensure a greater level of confidence in a company which has had considerable teething problems. When we are dealing with taxpayer's money, openness, transparency and accountability must be foremost in our minds. Allowing the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act to be extended to Irish Water will go some way towards ensuring we can rebuild trust in that entity.
During the Committee Stage debate on the Freedom of Information Bill in November last, the Minister indicated that he would make Irish Water subject to the legislation once it was up and running. I accept that one has to allow a period of six months to public bodies to put the necessary administrative arrangements in place to enable them to respond to freedom of information requests in an efficient manner. It is reasonable that Irish Water be allowed some time to make such administrative arrangements. I welcome the motion and support the Minister on same.
I welcome the Minister and, like others, the inclusion of Irish Water in the schedule of bodies covered by the Freedom of Information Act. However, it should not have taken the ongoing controversy surrounding the State utility to force the Government into doing this. I accept that the Minister made commitments during the Committee Stage debate on the Freedom of Information Bill, but it seems that Government decision-making is increasingly happening on the hoof.
Sinn Féin has argued in the past that commercial semi-States be brought into the schedule of bodies covered by the freedom of information legislation. My party colleague, Deputy Mary Lou McDonald, has argued that legislative protection can be provided in the context of commercial sensitivities to ensure a level playing field for those companies operating in a competitive environment.
As Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, is Deputy Brendan Howlin concerned at the manner in which public moneys are being spent by Irish Water? Does he believe the scale of spending thus far, without any money having been spent on infrastructure, can be justified? The Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Pat Rabbitte, recently claimed that the troika had imposed too short a turnaround time for the setting up of the company. In that context, does the Minister believe this means that the utility, as set up, is not actually fit for purpose?
As I said, Sinn Féin welcomes the inclusion of Irish Water in the schedule of bodies covered by the Freedom of Information Act but it should not have taken the recent controversy to speed up its inclusion.
I welcome the Minister who has been dedicated and has come to this House himself every time we discuss issues of reform, as promised in the programme for Government. That reform, as the Minister and others have said, is needed in order to restore public confidence in politics and the Government. I laugh - laughing is probably not appropriate-----
I am laughing at the Labour Party which has been railroaded by Fine Gael into this policy.
-----at the mere idea of a member of Fianna Fáil describing the Minister as having his tail between his legs when it was a Fianna Fáil Government which introduced the constraints to the Freedom of Information Act in 2003, which this Government has overturned, as Senator Thomas Byrne well knows. I am not going to cite chapter and verse-----
What has that got to do with Irish Water?
If the Senator allows me to finish, I will tell him. Of course, he also knows that the reform of the freedom of information legislation is still in train. The Bill is only on Report Stage. The Minister is still progressing the legislation through the House.
The Minister is being asked to do something he cannot do.
There was a vote, "Yes" or "No", on this matter. The Labour Party voted "No".
The record will show the Minister knew and understood Irish Water should be included in the freedom of information legislation. Now, at the end of January we are including it. Evidently, the Senator does not know much about how government works if he thinks it is going to be forced to introduce such legislation because of a conversation on the radio. Irish Water was always going to be included in the freedom of information legislation and I support this motion.
Freedom of information is only one tool to get information as there are other methods such as parliamentary questions. All semi-State bodies must follow rules on corporate governance as set down by the Department of Finance. These will apply to Irish Water, too. There has been much discussion about what Irish Water has been doing so far. People will now see the Government, which agreed in 2011 to put this body together, introducing openness and accountability to it.
I welcome the motion.
I welcome the Minister, as well as his amendment to the freedom of information legislation. Irish Water which has had a dreadful start needs to be brought under the freedom of information legislation. It should also come within the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General as to how it spends money. I must commend the Chairman of the Oireachtas environment committee, Deputy Michael McCarthy, for how he conducted the recent hearings with Irish Water.
The Minister should note the Seanad had scores of amendments tabled on the water services legislation but the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, not the Minister of State, Deputy Fergus O’Dowd, did not want to listen to or debate them. We asked for the National Consumer Agency and the Competition Authority to be involved in an attempt to regulate a monopoly. In the past two years we have failed to even get a figure for the average water bill and the free allowance.
They have not yet been determined.
We tried to have the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform’s guidelines for capital projects included in the legislation. However, we ran into the proverbial brick wall.
Why is an energy regulator regulating water? Is it not a specialised field? Water engineers in the United Kingdom wanted to spend €27.4 billion between 2000 and 2015 on water services which was cut back to €19.1 billion in the end. That is what engineers will do with their pet projects. We must be careful that the engineers here do not double the national debt. That is why the Minister’s project appraisal mechanisms have my support. The UK industry wanted a return of 4.3% on its investment, but the regulator put it back to 3.85%.
There is an awful lot more that we need to find out about Irish Water. I welcomed the Minister’s first instalment on freedom of information at the time. This extension of the legislation is very necessary with Parliament asserting itself. It is necessary because Sir Humphrey is not a natural democrat; therefore, we must teach him this. I support the Minister in his endeavours in this regard.
I thank Senators from all sides of the House for their support for the motion.
Fianna Fáil’s record on freedom of information is inglorious and we will take no lectures from the party on it. There is a certain populist tone coming from Senator Thomas Byrne when he speaks about a bonus culture and so forth. That runs well in a newspaper headline. However, practices have been bedded down by Bord Gáis Energy, for example, to save considerable moneys with a move away from an incremental pay arrangement to a performance-based one, a model towards which all commercial semi-State bodies and, ultimately, State agencies, should work.
There is a broader view, which Senator Kathryn Reilly expressed, that we need freedom of information and a range of other impositions on commercial semi-State bodies but that do not apply to their commercial rivals. That would make it impossible for commercial semi-State bodies to operate in the marketplace. I know there are some of the view it would be good to kill off the commercial semi-State sector, a view not shared by my party or me. There is a case, however, to be made for extending freedom of information to semi-State bodies which are monopolies. Accordingly, I was always going to apply freedom of information to Irish Water once it was up and running and the legislation was enacted. In fact, I actually fast-tracked it, even though the legislation is still on Report Stage in the Dáil.
When a Minister listens and accepts arguments and motions, it should not be labelled by Members as a U-turn or coming in with one’s tail between one’s legs. Do they want Ministers to say “No” repeatedly? Is that the way Parliament should operate?
It would suit many people.
I want to hear reasoned arguments and if they are reasonable, I will accept them. I am not surrendering or U-turning because I hear wise counsel on a rare occasion.
Fair play to Seán O'Rourke.
Senator Sean D. Barrett inquired about Irish Water coming under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General. That office has the distinct role of monitoring voted expenditure. It cannot oversee expenditure in a commercial company. We vote moneys for a purpose; the Comptroller and Auditor General’s job is to ensure it is spent accordingly. Is he to judge the commercial decisions of a company? That is not the Comptroller and Auditor General’s job. Commercial companies are subject to company law, as well as corporate governance and other oversight mechanisms that apply in this sector. If we want Irish Water to be a commercial semi-State body, we have to allow it operate on the same terms and conditions that apply for privately owned commercial companies.
There is a difference when it comes to-----
Water companies.
No, monopoly companies. Irish Rail is another example. We can debate what a monopoly is and what it is not when I return with freedom of information legislation.
Senators asked if the setting up of Irish Water was rushed. The establishment of Irish Water was a troika commitment entered into by the previous Government that we inherited. It is a move that I support and it must be remembered I abolished water charges in the mid-1990s when I was Minister for the Environment. However, to secure the provision of safe and abundant water supplies for citizens and business into the future, it makes sense to have one integrated entity which operates on scale.
There is a compelling article in the Irish Independent today, penned by the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, rebutting in some detail some of the generalisms put out by Mr. FitzGerald of the ESRI. We need rational argument and open debate on these issues. Everybody's point of view needs to be tested and not simply headlined.
As to why we are using the energy regulator, the idea is to have economies of scale and that where we have regulators we integrate them. Part of the recommendations of the McCarthy report is to consolidate and co-ordinate oversight and regulation rather than to establish new bodies for everything we want to do. I hope to see more of it. When I introduced the lottery legislation in the House, I indicated that in my judgment the regulator for the lottery should become a regulator for gambling in due course so we do not duplicate a new body every time we have a new purpose.
I thank Senators for their support and look forward to returning for a broader debate on the issue of freedom of information when the Bill presents itself from the other House.
Question put and agreed to.
Sitting suspended at 2.05 p.m. and resumed at 3 p.m.