The position in this case is that a judgment against Ireland was made by the European Court of Justice on 14 November 2002 in relation to the quality of over 1600 public and group scheme drinking water supplies. Since then, my Department has put in place an extensive programme of remediation measures for both the public schemes and the group water schemes cited in the judgment and has reported regularly to the Commission on progress under this programme and on the monitoring results for those schemes.
An Article 228 Reasoned Opinion regarding this case was issued by the Commission in March 2007 and a response issued to the Commission in May 2007. There is ongoing consultation between my officials and the Commission in relation to this case and it is one of the infringement cases that I discussed at my meeting with Commissioner Dimas in July, shortly after taking up office.
In relation to the transposition of the Directive, the European Communities (Drinking Water) (No. 2) Regulations 2007 (S.I. No. 278 of 2007) were made on 12 June 2007. These Regulations apply to both public drinking water supplies and group water scheme supplies. Following formal notification to the Commission by my Department of the making of these Regulations, the Commission has indicated that it is satisfied that the Drinking Water Directive 98/83/EEC (which replaced the Drinking Water Directive 80/778/EEC) has been fully transposed into Irish law.