Mr. Seán Laffey:

The small towns and villages issue is very prevalent in places such as Cork, Kerry and all up along the west coast because the populations are more distributed than they are on the east coast and in the midlands. As regards capacity in the main towns, Waterford is okay, Cork is fine and Limerick is okay. We are doing a large upgrade there on the Bunlicky wastewater treatment plant. Galway is okay from a point of view of water and wastewater. We are looking at expanding the treatment plant for drinking water for Galway but it is at a very early stage.

We prioritise on the basis of the need; we do not actually prioritise on the basis of the location. As a result, people get annoyed with us because a certain county is not getting a certain thing in a certain year. We have our mechanisms and those mechanisms have to go through the Commission for Regulation of Utilities and we have to make sure the money we are spending is making the greatest impact.