Vol. 540 No. 1
78 Mr. Deenihan asked the Minister for the Environment and Local Government if he will provide necessary funding to extend the Listowel sewerage scheme to include Dirha East, Listowel; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [19938/01]
The proposal to extend the Listowel sewerage scheme to serve the Dirha area has a high unit cost and has not been afforded a high priority by Kerry County Council.
The scheme was twenty-sixth on the list of 35 water and sewerage schemes submitted by the council in response to my Department's request to local authorities to undertake fresh assessments of the needs for capital works in their areas and to prioritise their proposals on the basis of the assessments. The priority lists were taken into account in the framing of the Water Services Investment Programme 2000-2002, announced last July. Given the ranking afforded to the scheme by the council, the level of competing demand and the funding available, it was not possible to include it in the programme at that time.
The current programme is the first phase of a rolling programme that will be advanced on an annual basis up to the end of the National Development Plan in 2006. The status of this scheme will be reviewed in light of any changes in priorities notified to my Department by the council in the meantime. Alternatively, it would be open to the council to consider advancing the scheme under the devolved small schemes programme.
