Deputy Ivan Yates gave me notice of his intention to raise on the Adjournment the subject matter of coastal erosion at Rosslare Harbour. The Deputy has some 20 minutes at his disposal and the Minister of State has some ten minutes to reply.
Adjournment Debate. - Rosslare Coastal Erosion.
First, I thank you sincerely, a Cheann Comhairle, for recognising the gravity of this matter in allowing it to be taken tonight. I ask your permission that, with the agreement of the other Wexford Deputies, I share my time. Perhaps you would apply a certain amount of flexibility in that regard.
That is in order.
It is a pity that something so serious should have to take up the time of this House. This is the first time in the past 30 years that any Government have decided to suspend the programme of beach nourishment to maintain the very last line of defence against the seas and preserve our facilities at Rosslare Strand. I should say at the outset that Rosslare Strand is one of our most scenic and beautiful tourist assets, creating tourism revenue of well over £1 million per annum and involves splendid facilities by way of hotels, restaurants, all-weather facilities, golf and so on. It is very much a national asset and a national responsibility to protect.
Wexford County Council received a letter in mid-December last from the Office of Public Works and the Minister of State at the Department of Finance outlining that the Government would no longer give money for the provision of essential maintenance provided each year for the past 30 years by beach nourishment and planting and so on. Last week, the council sought to meet the Minister of State and for almost two hours last night asked that the Government rescind their decision to suspend that coastal protection programme and ensure that adequate funding be made available to ensure the preservation of this national asset. Unfortunately, as I said at that meeting, it was dialogue for the deaf. We reiterated our case time out of number and the urgency of the situation which can only be vindicated by the fact that as I speak there are most serious storms ravaging that beach. Let us hope, by the grace of God, that our worst fears are not realised. We can be under no illusion that the Minister of State at the Department of Finance will be directly responsible for any breach on that beach.
Wexford County Council have consistently discharged their obligations and responsibility in this regard. Last Monday they met to consider the serious dilemma arising out of the Minister's constant refusal to allocate funds towards this beach nourishment. We have decided to take legal advice because we cannot enter into new responsibilities willy-nilly should the work we do not be adequate. What is needed now is that the men who were sacked by the Government be reinstated. What is needed now is a recognition that the money legally spent over the past 30 years was rightly spent and that it would be wasted if no further money is spent. I ask the Minister to go back to the Government, specifically to the Minister for Finance, and obtain the necessary funding. If he talks to his Fianna Fáil colleagues they will tell him of the serious concern felt in County Wexford about this matter. Obviously, he has not been listening. It is important that he realise he cannot indefinitely wash his hands of the issue. It will not go away.
The engineers of Wexford County Council do not have the expertise to carry out this work. Empty platitudes from the Minister about awaiting a proposal from Wexford County Council when the council have an overdraft and debt of over £30 million and neither the competence nor the resources to solve the problem do not help. There is no doubt that Wexford County Council and local interests, community and business, will play their part in any proposal of the Minister's
CIE also have obligations and responsibilities on this issue. It has been proved that the development of Rosslare Harbour and different changes have had an effect on coastal erosion. I hope their role in this will not be forgotten. I am sure that the Ceann Comhairle has seen this very scenic area many times. There is imminent danger to Rosslare should there be a breach. The effects could go all the way to Wexford town, given the particular geography and physical lay out of the land. To make matters worse, I have seen photographs of parts of the coastline in Rosslare that are now submerged. Are we to hand over to the next generation the same legacy of neglect because the Minister of State is doing a Pontius Pilate act, saying that he is no longer responsible?
I ask the Minister to go immediately to Cabinet to get the necessary funds for beach nourishment this year. I ask him to waive the £400,000 debt of Wexford County Council in lieu of the money they will pay as a contribution for work the Government will carry out if this decision is rescinded. I ask the Minister to ensure the necessary survey as part of the capital scheme, the long-time solution of this problem, is given the go-ahead. If the Minister makes his best endeavours and explains to his Government colleagues the seriousness and the imminent danger, I have no doubt that we in Wexford can get on with developing a national asset, ensuring the growth of tourism revenue in that area.
I have great pleasure in joining my parliamentary colleagues from Wexford in speaking on this issue, to present to the Minister of State a cross-party line. The fears of the people of Wexford are reflected in all-party unanimity on this subject. It is significant that we are speaking tonight in the teeth of one of the worst storms experienced in decades. No doubt, each hour of this night further damage is being done to Rosslare beach.
What concerns every man, woman and child in Wexford is the fact that since it has been recognised that the beach is vulnerable and that because of that vulnerability a special ongoing scheme must be provided to give it protection. That scheme has been in place for over 30 years and work has been carried out, week in week out. From 1 January 1988 the scheme has been discontinued and the employees of the Office of Public Works have been summarily dismissed and the beach at Rosslare abandoned. The fears expressed by Oireachtas Members from Wexford, and especially those expressed by the residents of Rosslare, are genuine. They are fearful that a breach — and this happened in the past when we lost the fort at Rosslare — could occur after one bad storm and decimate valuable property and threaten lives. I do not think it is too alarmist to say that. It would indeed open the town of Wexford itself to the sea and make flooding an inevitability in the capital town of the County of Wexford.
Much consideration has gone into providing a permanent solution. Indeed the Minister's immediate predecessor announced work on a capital scheme which would, in the long term, provide a permanent solution at a cost of some £5 million. A survey was carried out and £50,000 was expended on that. Another survey is required and I hope the Minister of State will find the resources to allow that permanent scheme to go ahead in the fullness of time.
In the interim,it is imperative that the on-going beach protection work that has been necessary since 1957 be maintained in 1988. To abandon it, without regard to the consequences, is irresponsibility of the highest order.
The Minister of State met a deputation last week; my colleague, Deputy Ivan Yates, described it as the dialogue of the deaf. I felt sorry for the Minister of State on that occasion, because he said that he was in sympathy with the cause, that he understood the immediacy and the urgency of the problem, but that there had been a Government decision that there would be no subhead for coast protection in the Estimates for 1988, and consequently he was debarred, by Government order, from providing this on-going essential maintenance work.
I appeal to the Minister of State to do something. There is an emergency in Rosslare. It is a situation that demands immediate remedial action. If a Government decision is needed to reverse the decision not to carry out this work, then such a decision must be made, and the Minister of State has a bounden responsibility to go to the Minister for Finance and request a reversal of policy and an exception to be made in this case.
Wexford County Council is not in a position to carry out this work. We have neither the financial resources nor the expertise nor, indeed, the statutory responsibility. We cannot carry out the work. The Minister's Department has been responsible for 30 years for doing the work. I appeal to him now to give us an undertaking, in the teeth of this hurricane that is going on tonight, to go back to his senior colleague, the Minister for Finance, to request an immediate reversal of Government policy in this area.
Through the Minister of State, the incumbent in the office I held this time last year, I accuse the Government of being wilfully negligent in relation to the decision that has been made to remove the Office of Public Works from Rosslare beach. The irresponsibility of this move will be obvious, unfortunately, as the months unfold. Both Deputy Yates and Deputy Howlin have outlined what will happen as a result of the Government's decision to withdraw a service that Rosslare beach has needed for over 30 years. Is it possible that any arm of state, any Government Department, will spend hundreds of thousands of pounds over 30 years in providing a service which at the time they considered absolutely necessary, and then just suddenly withdraw and wash their hands saying it is no longer their statutory responsibility to continue? If it was not the Government's responsibility, and if they did not consider that enormous amount of taxpayers' money to be absolutely essential when they spent it, I am afraid they must now answer to the Comptroller and Auditor General and to the general taxpayers of Ireland for the money that was obviously mis-spent.
The Minister's Department should have realised from winding down the operation in the late sixties when the beach in Rosslare had developed to such an extent — thanks to the good maintenance and care of the Office of Public Works — that this would be a mistake. With the best intentions, the office of public Works thought they could withdraw and wind down their service because the beach had been put back to its original condition. A few short years surely taught the Office of Public Works a lesson. Today we have still not reached the level we were at in the late sixties on the beach because of the severe vertical erosion that ensued, despite hundreds of thousands of pounds more being spent. In fact the last Government spent £0.75 million on the beach in four short years. Despite the fact that CIE, under some severe pressure, did contribute and provide some off-beach nourishment for the strand, it is still not in the condition it was. Did the Office of Public Works and the Government learn nothing from withdrawing in the sixties with the consequent appalling results of that move? In fact, I was advised when I was sitting in the Minister's seat, that marine engineering is a specialised aspect of civil engineering; that coast protection engineering is a specialised branch of marine engineering requiring, in effect, specialisation in one area of an already specialised field; that the Office of Public Works has a central pool of the required expertise, and usually local authorities do not.
I can assure the Minister that Wexford County Council does not and cannot be expected to have this expertise which is far removed from that deriving from their normal engineering activities relating to roads, bridges, sanitary services, etc. We are all agreed on that. Yet the Government have washed their hands, as my colleagues have said, and said to Wexford Country Council "it is yours, regardless of what has happened". The Office of Public Works have all of this very carefully documented and the valuation on the property down there is a very conservative estimation of what it might realise on the open market. If damage is done by a breach or several breaches — hopefully we are not talking of a cataclysmic effect — our advice as members of Wexford local authority as well as Oireachtas members is that the Office of Public Works, in effect, will be responsible. They have been there for 30 years. They considered it sufficiently important to spend thousands and thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money. They have now run from the scene and are reneging on their responsibility and handing it over to a local authority, in itself much under-funded for years.
Pontius Pilate.
The Government have abandoned Wexford in every aspect.
There is no point in coming down when a disaster occurs or a breach occurs on the beach. The Government have considered that a possibility for over 30 years. There is no point in coming down if such a disaster occurs and finding the money somehow to shore up the damage that has been done. It is not a question of "see you in court" as far as Wexford County Council is concerned. It is fairly and squarely the responsibility of the Office of Public Works. Let the Minister not quote to me the Coast Protection Act, 1963, or tell us that the Office of Public Works is just enabled to do the work the Government have been doing there for the last 30 years. We have heard it all. No arm of State would spend millions if they were not empowered to do so and if they did not think it was absolutely necessary to do so.
Finally, I say to the Minister of State, and through him to the Minister for Finance who carries the cudgels on this one, that Rosslare beach is the centre of perhaps one of the busiest home holiday markets in our country. Generations of children from Dublin and elsewhere have spent many a summer's day on our lovely beach down there. It does not belong to the people of Wexford. There is no way, even if Wexford County Council had the finance and the funding, that they should be held responsible for what is, after all, a national asset. We do not charge the people from the midland counties or Dublin or anywhere else for using our beach, we are so delighted to have them come to Wexford and spend their holidays with us. It is a matter for the central Exchequer to fund coastal protection in any part of this State. The shame is that we have not had moneys from Europe and the Regional Fund to help resolve this problem altogether and that we are still only at section 6 of the Coast Protection Act and there are 23 sections in all to be gone through, a laboriously painful procedure which needs immediate updating and rationalising.
We may use strong words and neither myself nor my two colleagues are mincing words with the Minister this evening. He has heard it before. We are accusing him and, through him, the Minister for Finance and the Fianna Fáil Government, of being wilfully negligent in relation to their responsibility to Rosslare and therefore the people of Wexford and to one of the greatest natural assets of this country.
I want to thank the Chair for giving me the opportunity to respond to the allegations of the Deputies across the House. The Deputies who are directly concerned with the position of Rosslare Strand know that I am fully aware of the serious situation that exists there.
We want to know what the Minister is going to do about it.
Let us hear the Minister reply without interruption.
I wish to respond to what has been said and I do not want to be interrupted. We should have some courtesy in this House. I know the Deputy is not too long here but he should show some courtesy.
I intend to be here a long time.
We will see about that. As recently as last Thursday I met with all the Dáil Deputies, Seanad representatives and council representatives as well as officials for the area and listened to what each of them had to say. I can claim therefore that I am in full possession of the up-to-date facts in relation to coastal erosion at Rosslare Strand.
Where are the Minister's Fianna Fáil colleagues tonight? They were invited to join us here.
The Minister has about ten minutes to reply. The Deputies had a good hearing; let us have the same courteous hearing for the Minister. His time is very limited.
There should be no need for me to remind Deputies of the necessity in present circumstances to curtail Government expenditure in order to bring the finances of the State under control. Coast protection is just one of the many areas in which the Commissioners of Public Works have been directed by the Government to effect savings but no funds have been allocated for coastal protection in 1988. The Government decision was to suspend coastal works for 1988 and I want to repeat the word "suspend". Even before my meeting with the public representatives last week I had been considering what options were available to me in coming to some solution to the problem of continued maintenance at Rosslare. I have been consistently fully briefed on this matter by my party colleagues in the last few months.
To what effect?
I have had meetings with them. Even during Christmas week Senator Cullimore was on the phone to me regarding this matter.
We can see their influence.
I will be referring to the Deputy's influence shortly. I have put it to the local representatives that if Wexford Country Council were to undertake maintenance work in 1988 I would be prepared to consider, in consultation with the Minister for Finance, scheduling the repayment of moneys owed by Wexford County Council to the Office of Public Works for coast protection and maintenance work already carried out, in such a way as to facilitate the county council in carrying out whatever maintenance work they consider necessary in 1988. At present Wexford County Council owe close to £500,000 to the Office of Public Works——
That is a red herring.
——for the coastal protection work that has been carried out. I am prepared to give full consideration to allowing Wexford County Council put proposals before my Department and if those proposals are reasonable I will put them to my colleague, the Minister for Finance.
They do not have the expertise.
I met three people from across the House last week as part of a deputation and they were very bereft of ideas. They had not one proposal to put forward except to say, "change the decision".
We are not going to do your dirty work for you.
That was the only contribution they could make.
You are the Minister.
I am satisfied that this is a very reasonable offer which will prove helpful in resolving the present difficulties.
Wexford County Council are owed £2 million in rates relief.
I understand that Wexford County Council have discussed this whole matter——
I must insist on the Minister continuing.
——and are considering their position with a view to contacting me again at a future date. Various allegations have been made here. Deputy Yates initiated this debate, for what reason one can only judge.
Genuine concern.
He has stated that Wexford County Council will play their part in any proposal I may come up with. I put forward two proposals last week and I await the response of Wexford County Council. I hope the three Deputies here will be positively in favour of the suggestions put forward by my party colleagues, Deputies Byrne and Browne and Senator Cullimore to ensuring that we can utilise the proposals that I put forward in cooperation with a statutory body and a State agency, in the best interest of the people of Rosslare and the people of Wexford.
The Minister is waffling.
Deputy Howlin referred to the fact that his colleague, Deputy Doyle, my immediate predecessor, announced work on a major capital scheme of £5 million. I should tell the Deputy that it was £5.25 million. That project had not got Government approval, neither had it the approval of the Department of Finance or of her colleague, the then Minister for Finance. I appreciate the efforts Deputy Doyle made. She provided an insufficient sum for a survey on the beach——
She did a lot more than you did.
It is now up to me——
I accepted £50,000 for the survey. The Minister should not try that political waffle with us tonight. It does not become a Minister to descend to that level of political guttersnipery in this House.
The Minister, without interruption, please.
The facts remain, Deputy Doyle——
I accepted £50,000 and £50,000 was spent.
Deputy Doyle was heard without interruption.
It is the Deputy who is throwing the gutter.
I did not——
Deputy Doyle must desist from interrupting. If this continues I shall adjourn the House.
Deputy Doyle also referred to the fact that pressure was put on CIE. I have studied this file very deeply and for a long time and as far as I am concerned whatever pressure was put on CIE no change took place in the attitude of CIE. I would remind the House that there are several other beaches which need nourishment also and they are victims of the same decision that has been made. If this problem is so serious and was so serious I cannot understand how the three Deputies across the House, whose parties were part of a Government for five years, were not in a position to conclude the surveys to provide the capital resources——
We kept the work going.
Please, Deputy Howlin.
I can assure the House that that programme would have been put into effect if the scheme was sanctioned, if the survey was concluded and if the moneys were made available.
The Office of Public Works spent money on Rosslare beach.
The matter did not seem to be too serious for five years and all of a sudden it is very serious.
The Minister is dodging the matter. We did not run away from the problem.
If Deputy Doyle continues I shall bring this debate to a very speedy end.
We did what was necessary and we spent money.
With regard to the possibility of carrying out a major capital scheme in the future a survey of offshore banks has been carried out to determine the suitability of material as nourishment for the beach. A report on this survey will shortly be forwarded to the Department of Finance. It will be necessary to commence another survey in order to prove conclusively whether there is suitable material there for the nourishment of this beach. I, in the discharge of my duties and my responsibilities to this House, will co-operate fully with the Members of the House and with the members and officials of Wexford County Council, as will the officials of my Department, to ensure that whatever can be done in 1988 through proper cooperation will be done to maintain Rosslare Strand as the beautiful strand it is.
That is waffle.
The people of Wexford will not be fooled by that speech.
The Dáil adjourned at 9 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 10 February 1988.