Steven Matthews (Wicklow, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

For the record, I was asked if I wished to wait for someone from the Department of Transport to deal with this matter. It is so urgent, however, I decided to proceed. I thank the Minister of State for coming in to take it.

I am concerned with regard to how we are going to protect the east coast rail line from coastal flooding events into the future. We saw what happened in the south west this week and the events in east Cork where people lost their businesses and properties. It is only right to acknowledge the huge effort and work put in by local authorities and emergency services to assist those people and the way communities came together to help. We are going to see more of this, however. We will see greater intensity of flooding and greater frequency of these types of events. There will be situations such as exist now whereby, even though we have just come through the summer, the water table is extremely high and the ground is saturated. There is nowhere for surface water to go. When we have these fluvial events where rivers over-top, there just is nowhere for the water to go.

The east coast did not escape Storm Babet. There is an area in my constituency in Wicklow called the Murrough. It is a really well-loved coastal walking route which brings one from Wicklow up towards Newcastle. Coastal storm surges over the weekend washed away part of the pathway. We are now very close to the railway. It is probably about 5 m or 6 m from the railway at its closest point. We will see more of these storm events and we have been losing sections of the walkway for years. We know the rate at which erosion is happening. Thankfully, Irish Rail and Wicklow County Council have stepped up. Irish Rail in the main has stepped up each time and put in interim coastal protection, a kind of rock amour, to try to slow the erosion. Ultimately, however, what is required is a much longer term solution. That is the east coast railway infrastructure protection projects, ECRIPP. I was still a member of Wicklow County Council when it received its first presentation on this initiative. It is a large-scale and absolutely needed investment along the east coast. It is not just to protect Wicklow but also parts of Dublin through the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown constituency and down through Wicklow. There are a number of places where the railway and the coastline are vulnerable, but that railway is a strategic transport channel down the east coast. It runs from Belfast to Dublin to Rosslare. We know the importance of Rosslare since Brexit. We are also taking measures now to reopen the west coast with Limerick across through Waterford through Rosslare Strand and into Rosslare Europort. It is important that we protect the rail line. It is strategic.

Are plans in place? Is funding being secured? Is it a priority for the Government - I hope it is - to protect the east coast rail line? I hope the Minister of State can provide me with some answers.

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