Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise the issue of investment in our sewerage infrastructure. I have raised this issue previously, but I encountered two new cases of it while campaigning in the local elections, one in Alderwood Grove and the other in Glenview Park, both of which are in Tallaght. I presume there are hundreds of such cases across the country whereby people have raw sewage coming out through manholes in their back gardens because the system is such that there is a private pipe from houses to the public sewerage line and, if there is a blockage further up the road or, as in Glenview Park’s case, too many new housing developments have been connected to one pipe, the house at the bottom of the line suffers raw sewage flooding up into its back garden when there is a great deal of rain or usage. The issue in all of these cases is that they cannot get to the bottom of who is responsible and who will deal with the problem.

They go to the council and it says that it is a private matter and that it is nothing to do with it. They go to Irish Water and it says again that it is not to do with it. These people are not capable of dealing with the problem. The problem exists off their property, outside of their sewerage line. It is up the line where either too many properties have been connected or a neighbour up the road is putting in items such as nappies, wipes or whatever, in the toilet, should not be doing so, which is then causing a blockage. This is a serious problem and it is being exacerbated by the kind of offloading of the responsibility mostly from the council to Irish Water. A situation now exists in every one of these circumstances where each one points to the other and no one takes responsibility.

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