Ulick Burke (Galway East, Fine Gael)

I welcome the fact that the Minister has put the OPW, Office of Public Works, as the lead agency with regard to works to be co-ordinated and carried out. However, I was absolutely disappointed at the meeting yesterday of the Joint Committee on the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, at which seven or eight agencies made presentations with regard to flooding on the Shannon and how it might be alleviated. Each agency, one after the other, declared on their importance and patch. Unless some real effort is put in by the Minister of State, these agencies will not be willing to relinquish any power they have. In south Galway, a vast area of land is still flooded. Some three months later nothing has happened to indicate progress. Will the Minister of State provide the list of places where the works might be carried out and when this might happen at the earliest possible convenience?

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