Vol. 474 No. 2
60 Mr. Dempsey asked the Minister for the Environment if he will give an estimate of the costs to local authorities of his recent announcement regarding the takeover, improvement and maintenance of group water schemes. [2704/97]
A special capital provision of £5 million is being made available in 1997 and subsequent years to establish a new multi-annual programme of works to enable local authorities to take over existing group water and sewerage schemes, thus remedying substandard schemes and eliminating domestic water and sewerage charges for the group scheme members concerned. It is not possible, at this stage, to state the total cost of the programme or the number of schemes that may be involved. It will be a matter for each local authority to decide their own programme for the takeover of schemes in their area, having regard to the wishes of the groups, the standard of supply, etc. As already indicated, the additional current costs incurred by local authorities in the implementation of this and associated measures will be among the factors to be taken into account in determining distributions from the equalisation fund being established this year.
