Mr. Seán Hogan:

The Chairman was talking about cuts in funding in Met Éireann and difficulties, and there is also the issue of why we do not act more on forecast information. I am afraid I cannot speak for Met Éireann and the budgets. I know it is a 24-hour organisation and under the same pressures as every other section of government has had over the past number of years. I am the recipient of its forecasts and I can say how we work as the lead department in response to flooding. At this time of year we get a 30-day forecast. It is a developing science but it gives us a look-out for approximately four weeks as to where things are. Generally, one can see a pattern of where things are coming from. At approximately ten days out, the position starts to become fairly definite as to what is going to happen. With the five-day forecast, the people are pretty sure. I have developed a fairly close working relationship over the past five or six years with Mr. Gerald Fleming, and I know when the service can say it is not sure which way a storm will go. We might get down to 48 hours beforehand before it can say for sure what will happen, although we know an event is coming.

The question can then arise as to what can be done with that information. The warnings are distributed through the system, including the Office of Public Works, local authorities and everybody else. Our decision relates to when an event is significant enough to go national. For example, on 3 December last year we would have been aware that Storm Desmond was coming and the likely impact. We convened the national emergency co-ordination group two days out and it was the first severe weather event of the year, so we ensured that everybody at a national level was up to the piece. We also contacted the local authorities. That is how we use the current system. Mr. Jim Casey of the OPW would have been in and there would have been details from the European Flood Awareness System, EFAS, along with Met Éireann and the ESB. We share the information in order to get a picture; we give it to local authorities and try to use it for our basis of development.

There are plans to develop a national flood forecasting and warning service but that is flagged as a long-term project. One might need five years to calibrate the system. Each catchment, for example, would need to be calibrated before we could say we are expecting a flood in an area. There is an interim system. It is part of the job I do.