Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I do not know if the Minister is getting any lessons or if he is in the slow class because today we have seen the report on the children's hospital. Some time ago I submitted a parliamentary question to the Minister seeking information on the proposed and projected cost of this pipeline to bring water through Tipperary to Dublin. I was told the Minister had no responsibility for this matter and that it was a matter for Irish Water, yet last February he asked the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities, CRU, to carry out a review of the eastern and midlands water supply project under section 40 of the Water Services Act 2013. At that time he said he was doing this to enable the Department to have full consent for all the commitments for the capital expenditure above a certain threshold. On the one hand, the Minister seems to have no oversight of this project, and on the other, he needs to get the CRU to sign off on projects like this. Which is it? Cén scéal? I remind the Minister of another massive capital expenditure project that another Minister entrusted to the responsibility of another board, the national children's hospital. We know where that is.

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