Dr. Paul McGowan:

Good morning. I thank the Chair and committee members for the opportunity to give evidence.

I have been appointed recently by the Minister as chair of the Water Advisory Body. I am currently a commissioner and chairperson of the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, CRU. I am joined by the other two members of the Water Advisory Body, also recently appointed by the Minister. They are Mr. Darragh Page, programme manager with the office of environmental enforcement at the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, and Ms Sharon Kennedy, senior executive officer with An Fóram Uisce. We have been appointed to the Water Advisory Body for a five-year term with an end date of May 2023. The remaining two members of the advisory body will be appointed through the Public Appointments Service. The advertisement for the two positions was published on 22 August 2018 on stateboards.ie. The closing date for submission of expressions of interest is today, 19 September 2018. I am hopeful that these appointments will be made in October of this year. We look forward to the appointment of the remaining two members in order that the Water Advisory Body can consider and submit its first report to the Oireachtas committee.

We are conscious that the Water Advisory Body has been established to provide a level of assurance to the Oireachtas and members of the public on the transparency, accountability and performance of Irish Water. Specifically, the advisory body has a legal function to advise the Minister on measures needed to improve the transparency and accountability of Irish Water and to provide an annual report to the Minister on the performance of the Water Advisory Body’s functions during the period since its establishment.

The Water Advisory Body will also furnish a quarterly report to the joint committee on the performance of Irish Water in the implementation of its business plan with particular regard to the following areas: infrastructure delivery and leakage reductions; cost reduction and efficiency improvements; improvements in water quality, including the elimination of "boil water" notices; procurement, remuneration and staffing policies; and responsiveness to the needs of communities and enterprise.

I will briefly outline progress to date. The Water Advisory Body has met on two occasions, 13 July and 31 August 2018. Early discussions have focused on several matters, including governance, rules of procedure and terms of reference for the advisory body, as well as the establishment of a website and identity to facilitate the transparency of our work. We have also commenced discussion on the content and format of quarterly reports to the joint committee. With specific reference to our reports, we have considered the sources of information which will feed into these reports and the frequency with which that information is available.

We are keen to ensure that the reports we prepare provide meaningful information about Irish Water’s performance in the key areas identified in the legislation. Our aim is to focus on what is important and explain why that is the case. We aim to identify and draw together a set of key performance metrics from various sources. These will include various CRU and EPA reports and data and information from other sources, including An Fóram Uisce and Irish Water. Our aim is for this set of metrics to help to demonstrate how Irish Water is performing against these headings over time.

Over the next few months, we will continue to develop our report structures and content sources, identify these metrics and determine how often they are updated. We will also explore how we might use each quarterly report to explore particular aspects of Irish Water’s performance in more detail. As soon as the remaining two members of the advisory body are appointed, the members will finalise the reporting structure and content and prepare the first formal report for submission to the joint committee. We look forward to meeting the committee regularly in the future to discuss our findings.