Batt O'Keeffe (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

Many areas will also benefit from improved water supplies from the major upgrade planned for the Clareville water treatment plant, improvements to the Shannon Estuary water supply scheme and extensions of the County Limerick trunk water mains. In total, almost €143 million is being invested under the water services investment programme in County Limerick.

I am glad to be able to confirm that part of this funding has been set aside for the Shanagolden sewerage scheme. The scheme is being advanced as a grouped project in conjunction with the Athea, Askeaton, and Foynes sewerage schemes and it is also proposed to now include Glin sewerage scheme in this group.

The project is a major infrastructural undertaking that envisages a combination of upgraded, extended and newly built wastewater treatment infrastructure and sewage collection networks as required in each location. It will play a major role in allowing each of these communities to develop their residential and commercial sectors. The scheme has been assigned construction status by my Department in the water services investment programme and the council will be able to prepare contract documents once it has submitted and received approval from my Department for the preliminary report for each of the locations encompassed by the project.

The position with regard to the preliminary reports is that my Department approved Limerick County Council's brief for the appointment of consultants to produce preliminary reports for Askeaton, Athea, Foynes and Shanagolden in 2002. We subsequently authorised the fees for the consultants selected by the council. That would ordinarily have cleared the way for work to start on the preliminary reports. However, later in 2003, the council submitted substantially increased fee proposals based on significantly higher scheme costs.

Approval for a further increase in the consultants' fees was sought in 2004, when it was decided to incorporate the Glin sewerage scheme into the group. It has not been possible for the Department to approve these fee increases, which result from an upward revision in the projected cost of the overall scheme from €17.5 million to €28 million.

Following correspondence and consultations between the council and the Department, further information was requested from the council last month to enable the scheme to move forward. The council has been asked to produce an economic justification for the increased costs along with details of the existing housing and projected future residential development the scheme is intended to service. These additional data are required to allow my Department to determine a preliminary budget for the scheme and to respond to the council's submission on the increased fee proposals.

I assure the Deputy that I have taken note of what he has said about the need to get this project moving and that the council's response will receive urgent consideration in my Department when it comes to hand.

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