Increases in Refuse Charges on the way

national | miscellaneous | news report

Thursday January 30, 2003 16:49

by Flanagan - Labour Party

head_office at labour dot ie

Ely Place, Dublin 2

67484700

Labour's spokesperson on Environment, Eamon Gilmore predicts that The Protection of the Environment Bill, published today, will empower County Managers to impose increased refuse charges of €600 per household.

NEW BILL MAY INCREASE REFUSE CHARGES TO €600 PER HOUSEHOLD claims Eamon Gilmore

The Protection of the Environment Bill, published today, will empower County Managers to impose increased refuse charges of €600 per household.

The Bill proposes to transfer to City and County Managers the ‘power to make charges for waste services’. Up to now, this power belonged to the elected
local authorities.

At the Dail Environment Committee today, I questioned the Minister in detail about the Bill. The Minister stated that the Bill was based on the ‘polluter pays principle’. He bemoaned the fact that the local authorities wre not charging the full cost of collection and he revealed that the average household cost per collection is €11.

This means that a household whose refuse is collected once per week will face an annual charge of €11 x 52, which equals €572. In addition, they will have to pay the cost of the Green Bin collection, where this is available, bringing the total average cost per household to between €600 and €700 per year.

By giving the power to make the charges to City and County Managers, the Minister is avoiding the political resistance that would result if the power were left to elected Councils.

By further introducing a measure which will make it legal for Local Authorities to refuse collections to households which have not paid, Minister Cullen is introducing a compulsory bin tax which will cost the average household €600 per year.

The Labour Party will oppose this new compulsory bin tax. We are opposed to back door taxation.