Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge the events that have happened and the huge amount of work done by all the emergency services. I wish to raise the difficulty in getting water. In south Leitrim we have practically had no water for the past four days. The headline in the Leitrim Observerthis week states that there will be job losses in the Food Hub in Carrick-on-Shannon, which employs almost 80 people. Many of those businesses cannot survive without water. This is really down to the fact that the facilities have been under-resourced. We do not have enough people on the ground. Leitrim County Council, like every other county council, has been on a service contract with Irish Water. The same people are providing the service as before, but no extra money has been forthcoming to provide it. In south Sligo, the whole area near Lough Talt has been on a boil water notice for almost a month now. Some 13,000 people, in the towns of Tubbercurry and Ballymote and all across that area, have been on a boil water notice for over a month, but there is no sign of a solution to that problem. We need to put adequate funding and resources in place to ensure that someone, be it Irish Water, the local authorities or whoever, gets out there and ensures that people are provided with water.

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