Mr. John McCarthy:

I will ask my colleague to comment on the matter but, as I understand it, largely and in effect the local authority sites would have operated pre the introduction of the waste licensing regime under the Environmental Protection Agency.

In effect local authority sites operated before the introduction of the waste licensing regime under the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA. As part of the process of licensing the sites there would have been a requirement, under the licences, to do certain capital and other works to bring them into line with the terms of the licence. In some respects it was a case of the licensing system catching up with and regularising those that were already operating. The local authorities would have contributed to those costs, apart from the €41.35 million given by the State. The State recognised that these were significant additional capital requirements for the local authorities.