Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to talk about this. It is great to hear that a load of money will be spent, but there has to be a little bit of accountability as to how this money is spent. The Minister can throw figures out there, but if the money is wasted at the end of the day, that is not much use to anyone.

I know of a situation in Athleague, County Roscommon, whereby a successful application was made by the council for €270,000 in funding, but it did not spend the money on what it was meant to spend it on, and there seemed to be no problem with that. The council was meant to spend the funding on doing something with flooding in the Athleague area, and from the estimates I received from various contractors, it could have done it for about €25,000. Trying to find out what happened to the rest of it seems to be impossible.

Will someone learn a lesson from this experience? The next time the Department throws money at the flooding issue, it should ensure it is spent on the purpose for which it is intended.

We may have had a tough time when the British were running the country but they knew how to keep the water flowing. As regards the €270,000 that was meant to be spent in Athleague, if those who are wondering why the water does not flow had stepped down from the bridge, they would have seen that four of the channels had been closed by experts on Roscommon County Council. When one places one's hand over the nozzle of a hosepipe, the water does not come out quickly when one turns it on. Instead, pressure is created which results in damage when the water eventually bursts out. Why would one address this problem if one can continue to waste money without being held unaccountable for doing so?

Deputy Stanley stated that €350 million has been spent on flood prevention over the years. I wonder how much of this was spent properly. Fine Gael is purportedly a right-wing party. Flawed and all as the right-wing philosophy is, one element of it is that one should not waste money. The Government should concentrate on that part of its philosophy.

The bigger issue arising on the River Shannon is governance. Who really runs the country and who is the boss of the National Parks and Wildlife Service? It appears the NPWS is its own boss and it decides what happens. Does it come as a surprise that the problem of flooding has worsened when the National Parks and Wildlife Service is engaged in a wilderness project? Bord na Móna's briquette-making activities have produced a large amount of silt deposits in the River Shannon, which are beginning to form islands that slow the flow of the water. When the National Parks and Wildlife Service or Office of Public Works are asked to remove these deposits, the former responds that these islands are very important habitats. As more of these habitats form, the human animal living in the area will eventually be forced to move away. That is the direction in which we are heading.

My argument is not that the River Shannon should be drained but that we must use the resources available to us, including the many bored unemployed people who would love something to do, to remove these deposits. While this will not completely solve the problem as flooding is inevitable on a slow-moving river, the deposits are exacerbating the problem. In certain cases where silt has been removed, a hit squad from the National Parks and Wildlife Service subsequently arrived with microscopes and teaspoons and minutely examined the silt to ascertain what exactly was in it. This is ridiculous.

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