Declan Breathnach (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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I represent the constituency of Louth. I welcome the comments of the officials and I am conscious of the role of the EPA. I am tempted to say one does not miss the water until the well runs dry. I am a former schoolteacher and recall a child being asked to make a sentence using the word "uisce" and coming up with "Uisce inár saol: cosanta" or, in English, "Water in our environment: protect it". That is the premise we must start from. I was secretary of a group water scheme for 21 years and know the difficulties associated with large and small plants. Information is critical.

Dr. Ryan referred to 99% or 99.6% of water being of perfect drinking quality after treatment, which is good news. I am more concerned about whether the quality of water in our rivers and lakes is continuing to deteriorate, as I believe it is, and their role in that regard. It has been suggested that flooding caused the problem in the Leixlip plant. There has always been flooding. When the officials from Irish Water appear before the committee, I will deal with a similar situation involving Irish Water in County Louth, where people have been on a boil water notice for 105 days. Two reports issued by the EPA specifically deal with the Tallanstown group scheme. I am sorry to widen the discussion, but this issue does not just affect the 600,000 people impacted by the problem in Leixlip. It is just as important for the 600 people affected elsewhere or the 92,000 who were on boil water notices last year. As the EPA officials pointed out, that figure increased from 21,000 the previous year.

My first question relates to the quality of drinking water. Does the EPA have confidence that when it carries out an examination and reports to Irish Water and local authorities, those bodies take action on issues arising? My experience is that one can tell the bodies what needs to be done, but no action is being taken. I will deal with that at a later stage. How effective is the reporting of those bodies to the EPA regarding its recommendations?

One may think I am naive but that is not the case. I refer to two drinking water audit reports in my local authority area. It is alarming that it took 12 days for a boil water notice to be issued when the water was known to be contaminated. This issue is as important to the people I represent as the members who are concerned about the issues in Leixlip. I ask the officials to address that point. It goes back to the point raised by Senator Boyhan regarding action in terms of legal responsibility and the remedial action list. I would like the committee to be provided with that information. More important, I ask that the EPA officials meet representatives of each local authority and Irish Water twice a year to keep people informed. I was not informed by the EPA or Irish Water that the two reports to which I referred were available. They were not mentioned to me in my myriad communications on the matter or to any other public representative for County Louth. I am not blaming the officials for that, but I want to know how effective are their recommendations regarding what action is needed in the interests of protecting public water supplies.