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S. E. A. Statements

SF, DUP renege on water charges pledge

Speech by Eamonn McCann at meeting of the Socialist Environmental Alliance, Derry, Monday, May 14th

Monday May 14th. 2007

Statements from Ministers Conor Murphy and Peter Robinson show the need to keep up the campaign for non-payment of water charges.

Last weekÕs near-identical comments by the Sinn Fein Regional Development Minister and the DUP Finance Minister will alarm anybody who thought that the water charges issue was sorted.

The first meeting of the Executive decided on a ÒreviewÓ of Òall issuesÓ relating to water and sewerage. ÒAll issuesÓ means that charges have not been ruled out.

Conor Murphy referred to Òpeople in domestic situations who had been paying for water up until 1998 through their regional rate.Ó This is a misrepresentation. People have not been paying for water through their rates Òup until 1998,Ó but up until now.

The misrepresentation was repeated by Peter Robinson. The DUP man said that, "All of us went into the election campaign consistently saying that there was an injustice in the present charging system where people regarded themselves rightly in our view to have until 1998 to be paying for their water through their regional rate and that they shouldnÕt be asked to pay twice."

But, again, people were not saying that they had paid for water through the rates Òuntil 1998.Ó They were saying, rightly, that they were still paying through the rates.

The idea that people here paid for water through the rates only until 1998 was a key part of the propaganda for water charges put out by Peter Hain and the NIO. It was comprehensively refuted time and time again by Communities Against the Water Tax, the trade union movement, the We WonÕt Pay group and others.

Yet, this propaganda spin is now being repeated by Sinn Fein and the DUP.

It is difficult to believe that itÕs just a coincidence that Conor Murphy and Peter Robinson came up independently with exactly the same misrepresentation. The suspicion must be that this was a deliberate, two-pronged effort to set people up for paying water charges.

What changed in 1998 was not that people stopped paying for water through their rates but that rates bills were changed so as to remove any mention of the proportion of the rates which went to water. It was a scam to hide the truth and to prepare people for paying twice.

Now parties which just a few weeks ago were promising to ditch the whole notion of water charges are spinning the same line.

The Executive has the authority to rule out water charges, full stop. This is what they told the people they would do. We call on rank and file members of Sinn Fein and the DUP to tell their leaderships now to deliver on this pledge.

They can rest assured that the SEA and non-payment groups across the North will resist the introduction of water charges by the Executive with just as much determination as was shown against the Direct Rulers.





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