Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)

This is certainly a public health issue and is possibly the most significant one that has arisen in the State in a long time, if not ever. When the story broke last week, it presented an opportunity for the Minister to show some leadership. Instead of showing leadership, he engaged in a blame game and blamed the local newspaper that broke the story. He blamed the contractor and also political parties. There were two specific responses. The newspaper that broke the story, the Irish Examiner, summed up the Minister's response in its editorial last Friday when it stated "His was an amateur, half-cocked attempt to undermine the messenger, and amount to no more than a momentary diversion in a scandal that has run unchecked for nearly a decade". As Deputy Stanton indicated this morning, there are genuine concerns in the area and the residents are rightly concerned. That no action has been taken on the many reports on this matter is of concern. Verbal assurance on the part of a Minister is not enough because the people living in the area in question know the worth of verbal assurances.

Last Thursday, given that the Minister was in Cork and attending to Green Party business, among other matters, he should have got into his ministerial car and travelled to the site, phoned the county manager, met the chief executive officer of the Environmental Protection Agency and begun to work on an action plan. He should not enter the House a week later and state that steps are beginning to be taken.

We are still at a loss regarding the Minister's communication with the county manger or the Environmental Protection Agency. Are all the reports of all the agencies on the Minister's table or are there others he has not seen and which are not available to the public?

I welcome the fact that the Minister met residents last night but his duty of care is far greater than that which would have him meet a residents' association. First, he is accountable to this House. Last week, the town council in Cobh and the county council requested a meeting with him but he has not yet agreed on a date to meet. Further matters arise with regard to accountability.

What plan has the Minister to offer assurance to the local community? Assessment reports have been carried out and further ones have been indicated this morning. What is the correlation between what we are now finding out and what was known originally? How accurate were the assessment reports produced in 2004?

Last year, before the general election, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Micheál Martin, was running around telling people he was to build a hotel and jetty on the site. In light of the risk assessment reports, can he state what his plan was based upon? Is the plan still active? Last week the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government stated he had difficulty obtaining information from various agencies and Departments. This is an utter nonsense in that he, as Minister, should experience no blockage in obtaining any such information.

Some 80,000 tonnes of material were removed from the site in 2004 and 500,000 tonnes remain to be removed. If one wanted to visualise the remainder of the waste material, one should visualise a tonne, multiply it by 100,000 and then by five. This indicates the extent of the difficulty. The residents need clear indications as to what will happen. I understand some of the material removed from the site was used as underlay in roadworks. Can the Minister clarify this?

In his response today, the Minister stated that work will begin soon. It was indicated to me this morning that the contractor is to resume work on Monday morning. If so, given the Department's concern that the work was being carried out in a piecemeal manner, what will be done differently next week? The contractor is on record as saying that no surface work can be done on the site because, as soon as one goes near the surface, further serious problems arise. I wish to know what the contractor intends to do next week. I also wish to know what timeframe is envisaged by the Minister in this regard and what costs will arise. What price will the Minister pay? As this issue is examined more closely, only one conclusion can be reached, namely, that the Haulbowline site must be dealt with in its totality.

While I believe two air monitors are operating at Haulbowline, I understand there may have been a third, which has been removed. The Minister should clarify what are the specifications of such air monitors. Given that staff returned to work last Friday morning without any assurances as to their personal safety, are the monitors modified or do their specifications enable them to detect the materials disclosed in the Irish Examiner last week? In respect of the workers' day-to-day safety, such monitors provide their only assurances, by indicating they are working in a safe environment.

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