Timmy Dooley (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the presentations from both sides. I have been on this committee for some time. I have seen Departments slowly come from a position of doing what they were doing to now recognising the importance of climate change. It is clear from the presentations today that there is a much greater level of engagement and work being done, which has to be welcomed.

The EPA has come before the committee and the witnesses have reflected on the issues it identified as posing the greatest threat to water quality. We spoke about agriculture, forestry, local authorities and urban discharges. On the forestry side, how close is the Department to having a land map of the right crop in the right place in order to meet the expectations of farmers? For a long time, we put an emphasis on the agricultural community. We told people that if they had a bit of land that was not great, they should plant it and would get some environmental and financial benefit from that.

Obviously, that is going to change because of the impact on water quality. Will Mr. Callanan tell us where his thinking is on that?

To Mr. Towey, the wastewater side is a big issue in the county I come from where responsibility is left with Uisce Éireann. Uisce Éireann has an enormous challenge in terms of the work it has to do to a very tight timeline. Does Mr. Towey think it is equipped well enough, both financially and in terms of capability and capacity, to meet the needs? I look at somewhere like Lahinch, which has reached capacity. It is restricting the development of housing that is needed for the local community, particularly with the significant demand that is now there because of migration that is taking place into the north Clare area. I look at places like Doolin, which does not have appropriate wastewater treatment at all. I look at Cooraclare and Broadford, which it is to be hoped are advancing. These are villages and small towns that do not have any water infrastructure, that do not have any Uisce Éireann infrastructure, and Uisce Éireann is saying it has so much to do on the other hand that it will not touch those. I take at face value Mr. Towey's statement that the intention is to intervene in every location where there are potential pollutants. We have villages in Clare, and I suspect it is the same in every county, where raw sewage is effectively being pumped into the little drains at the backs of the houses. It is having a detrimental impact on the ecology there in the first instance. It might not be at a scale where it is causing a massive pollution catastrophe, but it is a big problem for a local area and for aquatic life. I would like to hear the witnesses' thinking on all that.