Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Beidh mé ag roinnt mo chuid ama leis an Teachta Colm Burke. Having listened to the previous speaker, the Minister of State is probably going to become an expert in water and water quality. Deputy Burke and I wish to speak about the issues relating to Carrignavar wastewater treatment plant, which is just 10 km north of Cork city. We could probably name a dozen villages in the greater Cork area affected by this issue, but the specific issue at Carrignavar deserves scrutiny, given that its potential for development in the coming years is limited as a result of the difficulties with its wastewater treatment plant. Knockraha, Cloheen and Kerry Pike are just a few villages that are experiencing wastewater treatment issues, not to mention bigger towns such as Midleton, or Ballyvolane on the north side of Cork city, where the issue has been resolved recently.

As I stated, Carrignavar is 10 km from Cork city centre. It is a village of approximately 600 or 700 people, with probably another 1,000 people in its wider hinterland, and it has significant potential for growth in the coming years as it is so close to the city and is on the new BusConnects route. It is well set up for development into the future. The difficulty in respect of Carrignavar, as Deputy Burke will also summarise, is that the wastewater treatment plant has been at capacity and overloaded since I became a councillor in 2014. I refer to various reports by Irish Water through the years. An environmental report published in 2019 states the plant is non-compliant, which is no surprise to us. It has failed every aspect of its effluent monitoring report each year because it is overloaded. The current organic loading is more than double the organic capacity of the plant.

An Bord Pleanála recently decided on the application for a replacement school for Scoil an Athar Tadhg in the village. Unfortunately, one of the conditions on the planning permission for the school is that it cannot increase its student population. The school is indefinitely restricted to a student population of 338 pupils, along with 62 staff. The student intake is restricted. Not only that, the difficulty for the school is that it has a significant population of students with special needs. There are difficulties there. We are trying to encourage the school to grow and take on more students with special educational needs but it is restricted from doing so because of the indefinite plans relating to the wastewater treatment plant. Does Irish Water have plans to upgrade the plant in the short term?

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