On Saturday up to 80,000 people marched through the streets of Dublin.

It was 20,000.

They came from every constituency with a clear message, "Scrap the water charges or call a general election." What was the Labour Party's response? One of its Ministers of State said it did not matter how many people marched, the Government was not for turning - what arrogance. This week the Government has shown its true colours by threatening hundreds of thousand of families who simply cannot pay the water charge. The Labour Party, it seems, is to become Irish Water's debt collector, sticking its hands into the pockets of families who are struggling to provide for their children or pay their mortgage or rent. The party sends in the Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, Portroe's own Paulie Walnuts, to put the squeeze on families with nothing left to give. Is this how the party responds to the will of the people? Is this how it helps cash-strapped families? Is this its way? My questions to the Tánaiste are very simple. Does she support the proposal of the Minister to raid people's wages, social welfare and pension payments? Does she support his proposal to hike council rents and force landlords to retain deposits? Since when is it the role of the Labour Party to be Irish Water's and Fine Gael's bagman?

The Deputy's party leader, Deputy Gerry Adams, could be described as Uncle Junior in "The Sopranos". More than 1 million people have signed up with Irish Water. What is Deputy Mary Lou McDonald saying to them, people who want to see a proper water system in Ireland and an end to the scandal of more than 40 rivers and lakes being polluted by raw sewage?

The Tánaiste needs to change the record.

My priority is the people who want to see safe and healthy water. The people who marched on Saturday have a democratic right to do so, but according to Garda reports, there were between 25,000 and 30,000 in attendance.

That is rubbish.

It is wishful thinking.

It is a sizeable number of people, but does Sinn Féin want to deny the will of the 1 million people who want to see a proper water system in this country?

We want to see a proper water system, paid for by a progressive tax.

Sinn Féin has tricked and tracked on this issue. At one point it was strongly and prominently in favour of a well managed water utility which would supply safe drinking water. As it is on the record of this House, Deputies opposite need not shake their heads. They have been doing a U-turn on this issue so much that at times they must be dizzy. They were going to pay the charge at one point, but then they thought about it and thought perhaps they would not. Perhaps they will, perhaps they will not - we do not know yet.

I will say something else.

The Tánaiste might answer the question. That would be a novel approach.

The Deputy's interest is only in the next general election, but my interest is in the next generation. I want our children and grandchildren to have a clean supply of water for their health, the development of the economy and tourism and agriculture. Only a party in denial such as Sinn Féin, for which the future of the country matters less than its electoral future, would suggest there was no need for a major capital investment programme in the next ten to 20 years to build the water system about which I have spoken.

The Government has spent €500 million.

There is a major capital cost involved in achieving the goal. I do not want to see Sinn Féin ducking and diving, as it has been on the issue of water charges.

It is easy to be populist but it is harder to look after the future of our country and the future of our children and our grandchildren. I support the work of the Minister, Deputy Kelly, in bringing forward a proper plan and structure for water development in this country.

Pickpocketing.

It is not a proper plan.

We as a country should have started this about 30 years ago.

Sure the Tánaiste's party was campaigning against it for the 30 years.

We have 34 separate local authorities. We know already in Dublin that Irish Water by changing-----

So the Tánaiste was wrong for 30 years.

-----the work on the Ringsend treatment system will make a saving for the taxpayer of €70 million to €80 million and produce a better water treatment system for Dublin.

It could have been achieved by the council.

It is a big undertaking-----

It is a big U-turn as well.

-----to set up a new utility.

It is the change in technology that will bring the savings, not Irish Water.

I understand that any payments people have to make can be difficult to make but this year I am happy to say that in regard to people on average industrial earnings we have been able to improve their after-tax income by up to €30 a month and in regard to-----

Which is wiped out with the water charges.

-----people in receipt of social welfare, we have been able to have modest improvements for them and to improve their standard of living. The assessment of the budget shows-----

While the Government was throwing them out of their homes.

-----that this has benefited the average family, including in particular people on social welfare, to an amount of roughly, on average, €6 a week, and that is a very significant achievement-----

Six whole euro.

-----from where we have come.

Thank you, Tánaiste.

We need the investment in Irish Water-----

You have a shower every day.

-----we need a proper water system and I want to hear Sinn Féin commit to clean water for the whole country, including the Border areas.

Every time this issue arises here and every time the Tánaiste, in particular, gets to her feet to do a tour around the world, in verbal terms, she confirms yet again just how distant she and her colleagues are from the realities of life for so many people on the ground, certainly the people that I represent. The persons to whom she referred are the net beneficiaries of six whole euro and what she is effectively doing is rendering that null and void. She knows that people in receipt of the €6 are struggling so badly that very many of them are in debt, some of them to debt collectors, and they are in really bad circumstances. Is there a part of the collective brain of the Labour Party that just does not get that or that has forgotten that?

We get it all right.

With the greatest of respect to the Tánaiste, and it is all the one to me, but all those families do not appreciate her condescending rhetoric suggesting that somehow they do not understand the value of a clean water supply-----

The Deputy does not.

-----or suggesting, as some of her other colleagues have, that those who cannot pay are nothing more than scroungers. That is quite something coming from the Labour Party-----

People like the Deputy are the scroungers.

----and it is not lost on the people.

Last November, I asked the Tánaiste to confirm whether she was planning to come the heavy with those unable to pay the water charges. She might remember that occasion. She bumbled and blustered and, as usual, she did not answer the question-----

A question, please, Deputy.

-----but even then she knew what the plan was. She knew and she knows today as we speak that despite all her talk about putting money back in people's pockets that her real intention is to take it straight back out again with attachment orders, council rent increases and deposit retention. That is the reality.

When the Tánaiste takes to her feet, in addition to, no doubt, a very elongated exposition of something, could she do me a favour-----

This is an elongated question as well.

-----and answer, in the clearest of terms, that yes, she supports the Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, in his enterprise to pickpocket wages, social welfare and pensions?

Thank you.

Can the Tánaiste confirm that is the case, that it is her position and the position of the Labour Party?

Thank you. We are on supplementary questions now.

That was quite a "Wanderly Wagon" trip, was it not?

The Deputy was trying to catch up with the Tánaiste.

I do not know what exactly she had in mind-----

Answer the question put for once.

-----but just let me repeat the facts, and I know facts are often awkward for the Deputy to deal with.

No, they are not.

The Deputy just ignores them.

In the budget for this year we had a social welfare package which provided for, first, an increase in child benefit - that is a fact - and I presume the Deputy noticed it-----

Net of the cuts-----

-----second, an increase in the living alone allowance and, third, we reinstated, on a partial basis, the Christmas bonus, all of which were strongly welcomed by the people of Dublin Central. Among the 1 million people who have signed up to Irish Water, there are people who live in every part of the country, including in the Deputy's constituency and my constituency. I am sure that has not escaped her attention. What she is suggesting is that there would be one law for Sinn Féin-----

No.

----and one law for everybody else.

That is exactly what the Deputy opposite is saying.

The people who have signed up want to and are willing to pay for investing in a future clean water supply, and we have to finance it, as-----

They have paid.

-----there is not a fairy pot of gold for this country in regard to investment.

That is the Deputy's economic policy.

We have to provide-----

Tax cuts for the rich.

-----a pattern of investment in this country. Deputy McDonald's party is addressing that issue in the North at the moment where it is going to let thousands of civil servants go in order to meet the financial requirements of her party being in government in the North and addressing the financial issues of the North, so we have to address the financial reality. More than 1 million households have signed up to Irish Water.

Pickpocketing

Have they paid?

Just let me say-----

So the people who are struggling are misleading us, are they? That is not true.

-----that those people at work, for instance, received reductions in the universal social charge, USC, which I think the Deputy supports, so she must have read about that, and reductions in regard to income tax, so, yes as a country we are in recovery. Last year and this year we will have an extra thousand people - some 40,000 people - at work and that will provide more resources to fund the vital services of the country, but for water we need to invest over a long period of time.

It is not happening.

If Deputy McDonald is asking me again-----

I asked about the attachment orders.

-----do I support the work that the Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, has done to bring in affordable charges of a net of €60 a year for a single individual and a net of €160 for a family of two adults plus children-----

I know the Tánaiste would say it is only €3 and what is the big deal.

-----and the work he has achieved in reframing-----

Does the Tánaiste support his attachment orders? Answer "Yes" or "No" to that.

The Minister is making it up as he goes along.

-----the charges for Irish Water, yes, I strongly support that.

Thank you, Tánaiste. I call Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan.

A Leas-Cheann Comhairle, on a point of order-----

There will be repercussions----

There are no points of order on Leaders' Questions.

We went through this drama last November, I hope we do not have to go through it again.

Have a sit-in.

I just wish the Tánaiste-----

Yes, a sit-in.

She can stay here because they have nothing on the agenda anyway.

Deputies, please.

-----to answer "Yes or "No". Does she support the plan for attachment orders-----

On the Deputy's salary, yes.

-----to wages, social welfare and pensions?

That is not a point of order.

The Deputy can afford it on her salary.

She can afford it.

The Tánaiste might take to her feet and answer that.

The Deputy can pay the costs as well.

And first class trips around the world.

You are an absolute disgrace. You are a wimp.

Deputy, please. Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan has the floor. I call the Deputy and I would like to have some order. Could we have order please for Deputy O'Sullivan?