Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, has published a report on urban wastewater treatment. Raw sewage is being discharged from 34 towns and villages. We are told construction will start on 14 locations this year and eight in 2022. A third of these towns and villages will continue to release raw sewage after 2024. The report identifies a number of locations specifically in Cork. Cobh, thankfully, is to be resolved this year, but Ballycotton, Whitegate, Aghada and Mitchelstown are planned for later in the decade, as is Inchigeelagh. The EPA's concern is that repeated plans over the years have not been acted upon.

This is not just an ecological and environmental issue. The lack of these facilities is also impacting on the housing crisis. For many young people with mortgage approval in towns like Mitchelstown where there are capacity constraints who wish to see houses built and where builders with sites are ready to go, the EPA report makes for very grim reading. I ask the Taoiseach to give this his priority.

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