Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I would be happy to share with the Deputy the information I have.

The question of privatisation does not, will not, cannot and is not arising. The next legislation in this area will make that absolutely clear. The existing legislation does not allow for privatisation. The legislation in the course of preparation will make that as crystal clear as is possible and I would be confident that will happen.

On the question of the start date, I would expect that there will be an announcement in the next few days on the awarding of the contracts and the names of the companies involved. There will be total transparency about that. It is not a matter for the Department but for Irish Water, Uisce Éireann. That announcement is imminent. In terms of clarity, there are some 159 approved subcontractors who are pre-qualified outside the eight different contracts and Irish Water is on the record as saying that the number of companies that will get those eight contracts is three. It is up to it to clarify that issue but there are other pre-qualified local contractors who are available to be used by the regional contractors.

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