Opponents of water charges are promising major rallies in the New Year, with tens of thousands of people.

They're rejecting plans to charge households for wasteful water use - arguing that they are "the thin end of the wedge".

Organisers say the public has already made it clear that it will not accept water charges in any format, and that the report of the expert group on the subject does not go far enough.

Meanwhile the government has been attacked in the Dáil, after promising to pursue people who have so far refused to pay.

Housing minister Simon Coveney says that while the issue must also be thrashed out by the Oireachtas committee examining the issue, he will advocate that unpaid bills must be pursued.

That idea was ridiculed in the Dáil - with others arguing that previous bills should be refunded, and saying it would be "fanciful" to pursue hundreds of thousands of unpaid bills.

Our political correspondent Gavan Reilly reports: