Mr. Shane Herlihy:

I would just like to add one final point. The question of how Ireland's water quality fares compared with that of other European member states did not really feature at all in the discussion with the EPA. When we look at how things are reported to Europe and among all the different member states, Ireland's water quality is very good, particularly in comparison with other countries. Germany in particular has lots of nitrate problems in groundwater compared with Ireland. I would argue that we do not really have a significant nitrate groundwater problem, particularly when we consider that drinking water levels are set in legislation at 50 mg/l and we have a groundwater threshold value, which is a conservative 75% of the drinking water level. That is how that is set. Only 5% to 6% of the samples come in higher than that. I would argue that our water quality, particularly when compared with Europe, is high.

In some respects, we are talking ourselves down. That is not a good position from a policy perspective when we are talking about nitrates derogation.