Council pours cold water on toilet water rebate

CLARE County Council has poured cold water over a proposed rebate on water rates for community and voluntary bodies who made their toilet facilities available in places where the authority wasn’t in a position to provide public toilets.
Councillor Martin Conway made this request at a council meeting on Monday where he presented a case to allow businesses in towns where no public toilets were available to receive a small reduction in water rates once people could use their toilets.
The Ennistymon Councillor explained there were towns and villages that were not serviced by public toilets where hotels, shops and other businesses made their facilities available to the public.
“I know in Ennistymon there would be 50 people a day coming to a facility in different establishments. I think the council should examine the possibility of providing a small rebate to businesses where it can be proven beyond all doubt that they are making their premises available to the public.
“The council needs to develop a partnership approach with business. The first locations to be considered would be community facilities.
“I don’t think it is the money, it is a goodwill gesture and I think they would have no problem in putting a sign telling the public that their toilets are available to be used if this was the case,” he said.
The Fine Gael Councillor was supported by Councillor Richard Nagle, while Councillor Joe Arkins stressed there would have to be a sign outside any premises indicating toilet facilities were being made available once they received the rebate.
“I think we could get value for money on a project like this. The council could put a superloo in a place like Ennistymon and it might be paying €20,000 a year to run a facility which only receives just one offering a week,” he said.
However, finance director of services, Noleen Fitgerald told councillors such a scheme would be extremely difficult to administer as it would be very hard to identify one premises over another when it came to selecting a suitable location for the scheme.
“Under Article 9 of the EU Water Framework directive and the Government’s Water Pricing Policy, Clare County Council is required to charge the non-domestic sector the full cost recovery of water services.
“This recovery is based on the non-domestic charge per cubic meter and the volume of water used by a premises whether occupied by a voluntary group or business. The council would not be in a position to determine what volumes of water would be used in the instances referred to above and in what premises and overriding this would be our requirements under the Government’s Water Pricing Policy.
“In order to reduce water usage and thus water costs, businesses should consider reviewing their business processes to reduce water usage or recycle water or using grey water systems for toilets etc. Advice on same can be got from the Council’s water conservation department or on www.taptips.ie,” she said.