Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

From my perspective, and I am on the record of the House as making the point, when the State, through the Exchequer and the taxpayers, puts large sums of money into protecting communities from flooding, whether in Mallow, Fermoy or elsewhere in County Cork, in Clonmel in County Tipperary or in any other town in the country, and these investments are proven to work, there is a reciprocal expectation that Insurance Ireland will pony up and allow those communities to get on with their lives. I have raised this issue with the Minister of State, Deputy Fleming, through the interdepartmental working group on flooding. I know it is an issue that he is equally concerned about. We need to get to a landing place where local authorities and the OPW, through the Exchequer, make massive investments - worth hundreds of millions of euro - in communities where flood defences are put in and they work-----

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