Seanad Éireann debate -
Thursday, 8 Feb 2001

Vol. 165 No. 2

Adjournment Matters. - Water and Sewerage Schemes.

Mr. Caffrey

As the Minister of State will be aware, there were terrible problems in Ballina in the last few months as a result of a shortage of water. It is not acceptable in this day and age that a town like Ballina should run dry, particularly in the middle of winter. There was a lot of hardship for older people who had not sufficient water to make a cup of tea. I ask the Minister of State to approve the plans that are in the Department for the last 20 years.

The irony of the situation in Ballina is that there is not a shortage of water as such; in fact, the best supply in Ireland is piped from Lough Conn, which is a 12,000 acre fresh water lake adjacent to the town. That supply was put into Asahi in the 1970s when the joint manufacturing Japanese operation opened in the town. Unfortunately, Asahi closed two years ago and Ballina subsequently got another major industry, Coca Cola, which also needed vast quantities of water for its operation and which it is using very successfully.

One of the great ironies of the water problem in Ballina is that while there is an abundance of water on the periphery of the town, sections of the town are running dry, not because of a lack of water but because of Victorian, clapped out metal piping. The local urban council recently put on display what it took up from a section of the town, that is, the old metal piping which was put in place at the turn of the century and needs to be replaced. There is only an eight hour reserve supply in the reservoir which caters for the town. An eight hour reserve supply is not sufficient or acceptable for a town such as Ballina which continues to develop. Ballina is not short of water but there is not a system to distribute it throughout the town. It is unfortunate that the system to replace the metal pipes which began in the 1970s was abandoned and has not been attended to since. That is a 20 year gap from beginning the replacement of the entire system within the town to the present time.

I ask the Minister of State to expedite the approval of this scheme because the people living in the section of the town which is suffering badly do not want to face another winter, or indeed a summer, with this inadequate supply of water. It is not a question of non-availability of water; the water is there but we need a pipe to carry the water and a new reservoir which will have sufficient reserve capacity to carry us over periods of major leakages or other accidental problems which occur in any water system. We do not have the reserve capacity in the present system, which is one of the major reasons for the serious shortfall in the water supply. There is a serious shortfall in the water supply to Ballina.

I emphasise the importance and seriousness of this issue for sections of Ballina town.

Minister of State at the Department of the Environment and Local Government (Mr. D. Wallace)

I thank the Senator for raising this issue. The Minister, Deputy Dempsey, cannot be in the House this evening to respond to this matter and has asked me to do so on his behalf.

Total planned investment in water and sewerage schemes over the period of the National Development Plan 2000-06 is almost £3 billion, of which more than £2.4 billion is earmarked for major public schemes. This investment is focusing on providing water and waste water services needed to support economic and social development, employment generation, maintenance of high growth rates and the achievement of high environmental standards.

Last July the Minister announced a new water services investment programme to cover the period from 2000-02. It includes 529 schemes with a total value of £2.1 billion. The schemes that went into the programme were drawn from local authority assessments of needs completed by them during 1999. The main purpose of the assessments was to develop an overall strategic investment plan for each county for the medium to long term and to set out a programme of works to meet the identified needs.

I am pleased to say that the Senator's county is a significant beneficiary under the 2000-02 programme. It includes 23 schemes for Mayo worth almost £120 million. Among the bigger ones are Claremorris sewerage costing £7.3 million, Lough Mask regional water supply – Knock-Ballyhaunis – costing over £16 million, Westport sewerage scheme costing over £26 million and Castlebar environs sewerage scheme costing more than £15 million. Funding has also been provided under the serviced land initiative to bring additional serviced residential sites on stream as rapidly as possible to meet housing needs at a variety of locations throughout the county. It is clear that Mayo is getting a fair share of available funding and that the schemes that have been approved will greatly contribute to removing development constraints and to creating the infrastructure needed to support and expand tourism, commercial, industrial and housing activity in the county.

With regard to the Ballina water supply scheme, stage 3, Ballina town, the position is that contract documents were submitted to the Department by Ballina UDC in the 1980s but were not approved. The scheme, estimated to cost £3.5 million, was twelfth on the priority list of water schemes submitted by Mayo County Council as part of its recent assessment of needs. As I have already indicated, these priority lists were taken into account in the framing of the water services investment programme 2000-02. Given the priority rating afforded to this scheme by the council, the level of competing demands and the funding available, it was not possible to include it in the programme at that time.

The three year programme for 2000 to 2002 is only the first phase of a rolling programme that will continue up to the end of the national development plan in 2006. Further schemes will be added to it on an annual basis during that period. The Ballina scheme will be considered when the next round of approvals is being finalised. I understand that these further approvals are likely to be announced in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I understand that Mayo County Council is formulating a proposal which it hopes will provide an interim solution to the water problems in Ballina. This proposal will be examined urgently in the Department when it is submitted for approval.

The Senator can be assured that I have listened carefully and with interest to his comments and that the Minister will bear them in mind when the question of releasing further schemes is being considered.