2,000 low-income city families to lose bin waiver

Around 2,100 low-income households in the city are facing an unhappy start to the New Year as the bin waiver is scrapped.

The waiver on domestic waste charges will be binned from December 31, and the city’s most vulnerable strata of society will be charged ‘full whack’ for waste disposal next year.

The scrapping of the subsidy means that from January 1 2016, low-income pensioners and those on social welfare and disability will have to fork out for bins.

It is estimated the additional financial burden they face is between €160 and €229 per annum.

“People are already broke in January, and now they are going to be hit with an extra charge, on top of all the other charges including water charges, property tax, rising rents and higher utility bills,” said Sinn Féin City Councillor, Mairéad Farrell.

The waiver dates back to times when Galway City Council provided a domestic waste disposal service. Two years ago, when the local authority ceased this service and it was sold to the private sector, City Councillors voted to keep in place a waiver system for the most vulnerable for two years.

The Council reaped €511,000 from the sale of its waste service and it negotiated a two-year waiver as a condition of sale.

Prior to the sale of the service, the Council said the waiver scheme was costing it some €500,000 a year. Back then there were about 2,400 on the waiver and the Council has confirmed that some 2,139 were in reciept of a waiver on December 3, 2014.

Letters advising households that the waiver will be scrapped come January have been arriving through letterboxes in recent weeks.

Cllr Farrell says she has been inundated with calls from residents who are “extremely concerned about the impact the loss of the waiver will have on their already threadbare finances.”

The Mervue-based public representative said that the most vulnerable have been thrown to the mercy of private waste collection companies who, “prioritise profit over providing a good quality public service.”

“The beginning of a New Year should be an enjoyable time for families and individuals as they celebrate over the festive period and set out on a new journey. The last few years, however, have seen numerous austerity budgets mean that people face in to a New Year of despair and worry.

“Despite this Government’s rhetoric about ‘recovery’ and the final budget of their term in office, for most people this much talked-up recovery will amount to nothing. Especially for the 2,400 people in Galway City who are set to lose the waiver,” said Cllr Farrell.