We were all a little bit disappointed last week that the Tánaiste was not here to answer questions on the dramatic departure of the former Minister for Justice and Equality only hours after his ringing endorsement of him. Having listened to his response to Deputy McDonald the idea that he is almost taking pride in his total lack of involvement or supposed knowledge of one of the biggest crises in the history of An Garda Síochána is, to me, absolutely astounding, but we will deal with this later when discussing the Guerin report.

I wish to raise an issue which affects every citizen in the State, and one on which the Tánaiste made his political name through his opposition to water charges. The Tánaiste is no doubt aware that last week Irish Water issued an instruction to all of its contractors to withdraw from the installation of water meters in working class estates and to retreat to the more affluent suburbs where they were less likely to meet resistance, a resistance which was growing and active in Cork and Dublin, no doubt in a vain hope the electorate would forget about this issue. When the canvassers are gone, the posters are taken down and the recycling bins have been emptied of all of the leaflets homeowners will be faced with another bill when they cannot even meet the ones they have in the first place. Not just this, but they face the obscenity of footpaths continuing to be dug up to install water meters against the backdrop of a 40% reduction and leakage of expensive treated water, when the same crews, with extra people, could dig up the same streets to repair the network. This is nothing short of high order environmental vandalism.

When the Tánaiste's colleague, the Minister, Deputy Howlin, was Minister with responsibility for the environment in the 1990s he brought out a KPMG report on the financing of local government in Ireland. It is a good read and I have it here. It made the point that domestic water metering was an uneconomic proposition and that water should be funded from central taxation, and so it was decided that local authorities could keep the funds from the motor tax, a source of revenue which has increased four times. We kept paying it but the Government decided to pilfer the account to pay the national debt. To add insult to injury this is being dressed up as a conservation measure. Is it not the case that water charges have nothing to do with the funding of water services but are in fact another toll on public services to pay for the national debt?

To answer the first part of the question, I am proud of the decisions the Government has taken to introduce major reforms in the governance of the Garda for the first time since the 1920s. The establishment of an independent Garda authority which will be drawn from a broad swathe of Irish society, the extension of the whistleblowers legislation to include gardaí and the ability of gardaí to go directly to GSOC if they have complaints are major reforms in the way in which gardaí are managed. When all of this episode is over these reforms will certainly stand the test of time.

With regard to the second part of the Deputy's question, charging for water is precisely to fund water services and ensure funding is available to deal with the problem of leakages, as we have approximately 40% leakage from the system, the difficulties of boil water notices and the danger that major urban areas including Dublin will find themselves without an adequate supply of water because of the lack of investment in the water system over many years.

In introducing the charges we were very mindful to introduce them in a way that is fair and reasonable. There will be no fixed charge. There will be no standing charge. There will be a free household water allowance and an additional allowance of 38,000 litres for each child. There will also be a household package available to pensioners, carers, those with disabilities and those who qualify for the household benefit package, which will be €100 a year. There will be a cap on the payment for people who have medical conditions and require the use of additional water. Charging for water will be on a metered basis, so it will be on a usage basis, which has the double advantage of encouraging conservation of water in the first instance and enabling households to reduce their water bill.

Those households which are not metered by the time the charging system comes into effect will have the opportunity of getting a rebate of the charges paid if they are over the amount they have used once the metering system has come into effect. The charges concerned will be used to provide the funding that Irish water needs to ensure the people of this country have an adequate and safe supply of water for the years ahead. In addition to this the Government is providing a subsidy to Irish Water of €537 million.

I remind all concerned that only one topic is allowed on Leaders' Questions.

I want to refer to the Tánaiste's point in which he addressed the-----

No, we will not refer to two topics. The Deputy caught me offside. I will not be caught a second time. It is like a good footballer who gets caught offside.

We will take it up in the discussion on the Guerin report because the Tánaiste has some neck to talk about reform when he staunchly opposed it last year.

No, we will not deal with this now. The Deputy cannot have two bites of the cherry. She raised the issue of water and must stick to it.

It is one rule for one and the other-----

No it is not. The same rule applies to everybody in the House.