Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The schemes that have been carried out in my constituency impacted big centres of population. We are talking about towns here. I cannot commend highly enough the work that was done by the local authority in bringing the schemes to a point where it was almost designing the solution. Then the cost-benefit analysis is looked at in terms of prioritisation. Every time there is a big flood and people's homes or businesses are flooded, there is a humanitarian response. In the case of Midleton, businesses received up to €100,000. The cost is not just the cost we are talking about here; there are those added costs as well. Then there is the question of people not getting insurance and the whole issue of whether people should reinvest in a building that has been flooded if it is going to be flooded again. There is all of that to consider. We all know this well from our own areas. It strikes me that given the profile of climate change, there needs to be a sea change in how we deal with this issue. It will be the OPW, under the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, that deals with it. There should be some level of in-house expertise. Why are we putting the work out to expensive consultancies?