Noel Harrington (Cork South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak this evening on the flooding that has hit this country extremely hard in recent months. I compliment the response of the State agencies, the Department, the Defence Forces, the local authorities, the Civil Defence and the countless volunteers throughout the country in towns and in the countryside who have worked to tackle what has been a national emergency. I look forward to the flood relief schemes confirmation process for towns such as Bandon and Skibbereen. Later on we will see the same for Clonakilty. In looking at the confirmation process for these schemes, it is worth recognising that many of the areas and houses which flooded this time are not part of urban flood relief schemes. In many cases, the schemes are concerned with multiannual routine maintenance of our rivers and waterways. Local authorities, the OPW and agencies such as Inland Fisheries Ireland engage in a statutory process to allow routine multiannual maintenance of our rivers. That is critical.

A small flood occurred in the Owvane River near Bantry in west Cork. It flooded five properties. It may seem small in the scheme of things but it was extremely significant for those affected badly.

During the course of some media discussions and local authority debates, it has transpired that under emergency legislation from 1949, local authorities can invoke an emergency request through Inland Fisheries Ireland and the OPW to carry out maintenance on some of these rivers. There is a lack of co-ordinated communication between some of these agencies. More needs to be done to co-ordinate the work. For example, if an emergency request is invoked under the 1949 Act, often it is done at a time of flood. Then, when the flood subsides, the emergency is over and often the request is denied. That is not in the spirit of the legislation. The matter needs to be examined, updated and reviewed.

I am keen to highlight the great work that the OPW has done on the CFRAM studies. Many local authority development plans have adopted the CFRAM or flood risk assessment maps in draft form in their development plans. Now, they will have to adopt CFRAM maps in formulating their development plans. I offer a word of warning. This is a political issue. The CFRAM or flood risk assessment maps will be sterilising land. Often, they will be sterilising zoned or development land. In this chamber in future we will see consequential issues. They will be replicated in local authority chambers throughout the country. We will see efforts to try to undermine the CFRAM maps. I predict that in the coming five or ten years as development plans are being formulated, Members will be supporting the dilution of these CFRAM maps. I am keen to warn against that. We have seen the risk and we have seen the trouble it has caused.

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