Waterford Workers’ Party Councillor Davy Walsh has said that Public Expenditure Minister Brendan Howlin is in
denial if he thinks that the lack of a bill is the reason so many people have not paid the Household Charge.
Cllr. Walsh said that the Labour Party minister’s claim that people hadn’t paid in larger numbers because
they hadn’t received a formal bill for the Household Charge was astounding, and showed that the Minister was blind to
the mass campaign of resistance that was going on all around him, including many thousands of people in the South East.
“The reason so few people are paying”, said Cllr. Walsh, “is not because they haven’t been sent
a bill by the minister’s colleague Phil Hogan, but because they are utterly opposed to this new tax because it is unfair
and is another attempt to make ordinary people pay for the bank bailouts and the corruption that has destroyed this country”.
The
Workers’ Party councillor said that the government can send out all the bills it likes but that is not going to force
people to pay the Household Charge. “If this was about the non-issuing
of bills”, said Cllr. Walsh, “then the government would not be going about forcing council workers to knock on
doors or issuing dire warnings to non-payers. This is about justice and
people are not-going to be bullied or fooled by Minister Howlin’s red herring statements” said Davy Walsh.
Issued
Tuesday, 27th March 2012