Mr. Kevin Murray:

I will try and pick up on some of these points. On the design life question that was asked, the tender documents sought a design life of 50 years. That was specifically requested. We also considered if grade B or grade C surface boxes would be required. As a result, our tender document asked for both grade B and grade C tender boxes to be provided. The nature of this particular contract was a little different from what one might expect in that we arranged a framework of products. We went to the market and asked suppliers to provide us with a framework of boundary boxes. Then we separately went to the market and engaged contractors through a tendering process. We told them that they had to select the products from our framework. In response to the question about how contractors could know what complied and what did not, that did not apply in this case because we were providing them with a product that we had preselected according to our procurement process. I hope that deals with the issue. I would be happy to take supplementary questions on it.

We were also asked about the automatic meter reading. Clearly, we considered automatic meter reading. We also carried out a tender for suppliers to provide us with the water meters that go into the boxes and we laid down requirements for their radio signal to be capable of being picked up at a certain distance, at a certain speed of travel and with the meter in the boundary box to a certain depth. The suppliers of those meters had to take into account a number of factors, not least that the boundary box could have a plastic or metal cover. They also had to take into account the environment. The radio signal will pass through the metal cover. The issue is to what distance it will travel and to what extent it will be impeded by the density of a metal cover. However, it can also be impeded by many other factors, such as walls that might be between the van and the cover. Perhaps somebody might have parked a car in the vicinity. These factors can all degrade the distance the signal can travel. We have witnessed signals being picked up over 100 m away from boundary boxes in some very good circumstances.

However, the performance to date has been such that we have not seen a discernible impact from the use of metal covers as opposed to plastic covers in the small number of cases we have used them. That is probably testament to the quality of workmanship and the products used. I hope that addresses that question.

I believe Mr. Grant has answered the question on stopcocks. There are many examples of broken stopcock covers around the country. Unfortunately, what tends to happen is that the customer or whoever else will open the stopcock cover. The Deputy will be familiar with its horseshoe shape. When it is opened, sometimes somebody can accidentally give it a kick, the hinge breaks and the stopcock cover becomes loose and then disappears. That is a problem and an indication that, in a variation of an té nach bhfuil laidir cathfaidh sé a bheith glic, something can be stronger but not necessarily as clever. We believe our products meet requirements very well.