Mr. John Mullins:

Chairman, I will deal with Deputy McLoughlin's questions first. As Deputies will know, I live in the small east Cork village of Castlemartyr and know all about rural Ireland. There is a wastewater treatment works located about 50 yards away from the back of my house. I am as exercised about what is happening with Irish Water as anybody else in rural Ireland.

The group water schemes are not within our remit, unless they want to be. If they do, they must be connected to the public mains. That is the real divider between ourselves and the group water schemes. Such schemes exist because they are not connected to the local authority system. In the past, some private schemes have been connected to the public mains and in the event that more schemes choose to do so, then they will have the opportunity to come under our remit. However, we are not looking to create a kingdom of group water schemes within Irish Water. That is not the intention. If it is appropriate for certain schemes to be connected, that can be done. If it is not appropriate, it will not be done.

It is absolutely our intention to work with local authorities. As it stands, we work with local authorities right across the country and have good relationships with them. We have to open up roads on a regular basis and we fully understand the concept of consultation, as a company and as a national utility. We will have to do exactly the same, on a larger scale, as a water company. We have 11 agricultural liaison officers across the Republic dealing with way-leaves across farms and liaising with landowners on a wide range of issues. We have a deep legacy of dealing with local stakeholders, county councillors and city and county managers all over the country.

From a regional perspective, our intention, before the announcements on local government reform, was to use the eight regions that currently exist. Clearly, that is now moving towards three in the context of local government reform, but under the Water Framework Directive we must move towards a river basin approach, which is well documented by the EPA. Under the river basin approach, the Deputy's own constituency, for example, would be in the Shannon basin but would also be part of the Connacht region. In that context, therefore, changes will have to be made as we go forward.

There will be quite an amount of consultation. We have discussed among ourselves the appropriateness of a dedicated interaction between the company and local councillors so that there will be people available to local councillors for advice. If there is an issue of operational maintenance, it will be dealt with regionally and will not be dealt with in Dublin. I fully understand the point the Deputy was making. Such issues will be dealt with by regional offices and we would hope that the people who are the experts, according to the Deputy, will remain the experts within that regional structure. That is certainly the intention we have. We understand fully the points being made by the Deputy.

I cannot say where the contact centre will be because that is a matter for open tender but I expect that tenders will be forthcoming from all over the country, including places such as Sligo, Galway, Limerick, Waterford, Dublin, and Cork, as well as several county towns. We have heard that there are a number of tenders being prepared at present in various locations.