The futility of hoping Sinn Féin will fix Northern Ireland’s water system was laid bare in the Assembly on Monday.

Liz Kimmins, the party’s infrastructure minister, ruled out a proposal from a coalition of business and construction industry groups to add a small levy to domestic rates – the North’s household property tax. This would “represent a form of water charging”, Kimmins said, so it was out of the question, a point she repeated at the urging of party colleagues.

The rates are Stormont’s only serious revenue-raising power. If they are not to be used to fund water there must be cuts elsewhere, but that is also out of the question. Instead, Kimmins demanded more money from “the British Treasury” to address “years of underinvestment by successive British governments”.

The last time this complaint might have been valid was 1989, when Northern Ireland missed out on investment and debt write-offs to fatten up water utilities in England and Wales for privatisation. Otherwise, there has always been plenty of money.

Stormont receives enough from London to provide public services to the same standard as in England, including an allowance for Northern Ireland’s higher and more complex needs – that is the assessment of........

© The Irish Times