Mr. Niall Gleeson:

Taking the Deputy's first question, our plans include building the water supply project and continuing to invest countrywide. We would be working with our supply chain, the Department and the Departments of Finance and public expenditure on ring-fencing the money for WSC.

That is our approach. We do not see us sacrificing other areas to build that project.

We are working to get our supply chain into a position to be able to continue to deliver the level of investment we have in the country at the moment and build a water supply. How that money is divided up is very much up to the Exchequer and State. We will work with the committee to make sure we get that spread of funding. I will pass over to Ms Ryan to answer the second question and provide background on how we have planned for this and done research.

I will steal one quote from Ms Ryan. The project will deliver about 300 megalitres per day and about 200 megalitres of that will go into what we call the east coast GDA. The other 100 megalitres will go to the eastern midlands. There will also be water freed up, as I said in the opening statement. Water that is currently going into Dublin from the likes of Carlow, Drogheda and Louth can flow upwards. It may not benefit Limerick, but it will certainly benefit growth in other regions.