Mr. Ted O'Reilly:

I thank the Senator for his questions. I will start by taking some of the questions relating to Uisce Éireann, particularly those in respect of wastewater. First, I will address the connection inquiries and the key performance indicators, KPIs. The Senator asked how long it takes. We are working to two KPI metrics where we are measured on the time it takes to respond to these connection inquiries. All the teams that work on these inquiries internally also have our internal metrics that we work to. That is absolutely information we can provide to the committee on how we are meeting those KPIs, which we also report to our regulator.

The Senator referred to rural villages, including Allenwood, and the water issue. I will pass that across to Mr. Joyce in a moment. Timolin is wastewater issue, which is part of the small towns and villages growth programme. That project is progressing. We will come back with details of where it is currently. I believe it is in stage 2, which means we are looking at the viable options and conducting feasibility studies to bring it to stage 3, which is detailed design, planning and tendering. The project is progressing.

The Senator also asked about septic tanks. As he mentioned, the issue of septic tanks across the country is not within our remit. Approximately 25% of the population of Ireland is served by individual units such as septic tanks. Uisce Éireann is responsible for wastewater for about 75% of the population. We are engaging quite a bit with the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, and with the local authority waters programme office, LAWPRO, from a water quality perspective. The urban wastewater system, which is the category Uisce Éireann is responsible for, has been identified as having significant pressure on it. It is now 197 water bodies, and we know that domestic units are also having pressure in the context of a number of water bodies. I do not have the number to hand but certainly we were putting in a huge amount of investment on the urban wastewater side to address these pressures on the receiving waters. We have a plan for that, which we are including in the basin management plan being published by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

Any work that is done by the other stakeholders that is also impacting on receiving waters has to be welcomed. We believe that the best opportunity is when we bring the different stakeholders together to address the pressures that are on particular water bodies. Uisce Éireann can spend any amount money on addressing wastewater issues relating to a particular water body, but if the other stakeholders are not involved, then the state of that water body will not necessarily improve. If there is additional grant funding for septic tanks it has to be welcomed. I will now pass over to my colleague on Allenwood and the water.