Mr. John McCarthy:

On the septic tanks case, I think we had some discussion on this back in February. In effect, there were two cases where we found ourselves at the receiving end of fines for non-implementation. To put it in context, going back to 2010 or 2011, we were at that stage managing in excess of 30 live infringements of EU environmental legislation. Going back to what I said earlier about the legacy we were dealing with in regard to waste, these were similar legacy issues. We have put in a huge effort during the past three or four years, both from a transposition and a practical implementation point of view, to try to deal with that. The remaining number of cases we are managing, I think, from memory, is six, so they have been significantly reduced. One of those is a very large waste case which is tied into some of the issues we discussed earlier and which we expect the Commission will close later this year because of the progress made. Unfortunately, there were two cases where by the time the work associated with completing transposition and implementation was finished, the court had completed its work and had given a judgment against us. One of them was, as the Deputy said, in the application of the environmental impact assessment directive - a particular part of it. By the time it came to levying the fine, we had our house in order, so that was a lump sum fine. There was no ongoing daily fine. That was €1.5 million.

On the septic tanks fine, similarly, we were almost there, so the lump sum element of it was, from memory, €2 million and the ongoing daily fine was just shy of €650,000. One issue was still outstanding, so there was a daily fine applied for a period of about three months. We have no other cases at this stage that are at a fines stage before the European Court of Justice. From an environmental compliance and a quality of environment point of view, it is critical that we are not in that space but, equally, from a financial point of view, it is critical that we are not in that space. If we consider the experience of other member states before the European Court of Justice in that short while, in one case in Italy alone a lump sum fine of €40 million was imposed-----