THOUSANDS of people across Co Donegal, perhaps as many as 75% of householders, have just 36 hours to pay the Household Charge.
Across the country 71% of people still hadn’t paid by yesterday – 1,132,164 householders.
The €100 tax has to be paid by midnight on Saturday at council offices, by post or online. Donegal County Council will open eight offices on Saturday in a last ditch attempt to take payments.
Campaigners told us two days ago they plan to picket some of the offices.
But donegaldaily.com has been inundated with more complaints about the online system not working.
We even tried it ourselves (just to see) and we were hit with ‘error’ messages on no less than 20 occasions.
“It’s a shambles,” said one reader in Milford, “I went to pay online a few times and it just wouldn’t work.
“I then went to the public services centre but because I hadn’t my PPS number with me, and I couldn’t remember it, I couldn’t pay there either.”
Environment Minister Phil Hogan, under fire from opponents over his handling of the charge and some of the language he has used, insisted he was happy with the figures and that he believed people would pay at the last minute.
Donegal South West TD Thomas Pringle, who has opposed the charges, said “people power” was rising up against the State.
“People have had enough and they are voting by not paying,” he said.
After Saturday’s deadline passes people will face fines for late payment.
Meanwhile a survey by Red C for Paddy Power shows four in ten people liable for the household charge will not pay it.
Just 61pc say they will settle the bill.
Older voters are more likely to have paid while almost half of householders aged between 18 and 54 years stated they will not pay the controversial €100 charge.
Incredibly 23% of Fine Gael supporters – almost a quarter – said they would not pay the charge.
That compared to 72% of Sinn Fein supporters who said they wouldn’t pay.
Almost two thirds of voters believe the household charge is unfair, according to the random telephone survey of 1,009 adults between March 26 and 28.
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