Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Níl aon amhras ach go bhfuil brú faoi leith ar mhuintir na tíre go háirithe i gCorcaigh agus i bPort Láirge de bharr an méid báistí a thit inné. Bhí sé uafásach ar fad agus tá daoine ag fulaingt dá dheasca sin. Táimid ag déanamh gach aon iarracht chun cabhair agus tacaíocht a thabhairt do mhuintir na dúiche, i Mainistir na Corann ach go háirithe, agus i nGleann Maghair agus i lár chathair Chorcaí. I thank the Deputy for raising this very important issue. Our immediate thoughts are with the households and businesses affected by the fierce flooding yesterday, particularly in County Cork, Cork city and west Waterford. It has been very distressing for many people. We are deeply concerned about what has transpired and I thank all the volunteers, the Civil Defence, the local authorities and the Defence Forces personnel who were deployed from mid-afternoon yesterday to the locations and particularly to Midleton, for the work they did. I also thank Sarsfields GAA club, which incidentally won the county final last Sunday against Midleton, for opening up their pitch to save a housing estate from flooding. We will make sure we work with the club to help it in any way possible because that is the kind of intervention that makes a huge difference to a community. It was quick decision-making and we applaud that action. Sarsfields is the club of the late Teddy McCarthy and has an outstanding tradition of serving its community.

The humanitarian assistance scheme is available to provide support to those living in properties directly affected by the flooding. A fund of €10 million is already in place for this scheme. It prevents hardship by providing support to people whose homes are damaged by severe weather. We will work with the local community on this and the Department of Social Protection is liaising on the ground with the people affected to make sure they have access to the help they need. If any home owner affected by Storm Babet needs to access these supports, they can contact community welfare service by phone. We will outline the numbers and so forth. The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment has an emergency humanitarian flooding scheme, administered by the Irish Red Cross, which is available to small businesses with up to 20 employees, for community, voluntary and sporting bodies. The Taoiseach is going down today and the Minister for Finance is also visiting, as is the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donovan, with special responsibility for the Office of Public Works, OPW. We will examine the situation, assess it, and the Government will meet next week to see what additional work it can do to support the community.

The Deputy referenced the flood relief schemes. To be fair, the Government is in office three years. Deputy Pádraig O'Sullivan prioritised the flood relief scheme for Glanmire and worked with the then Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy McGrath, at the time to get it onto the agenda. There are many flood schemes out there. Construction began in July this year. There is a lot of design stuff and so forth. That flood relief scheme is to protect approximately 103 properties from flooding from the Glashaboy river and will take 32 months to complete. The OPW is also working on a scheme in Blackpool to protect 293 properties. The total project budget is some €21 million. Again, that was approved in March 2021 and the decision was challenged by Save Our Bride Otters, an organisation which wanted to protect the otter population there, and that has resulted in further information being requested from the OPW in support of requests for consent under the Act. The city's flood relief scheme has been delayed for a considerable length of time by civil society groups which have different views, notwithstanding all of the submissions and so on.

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