Beverley Flynn (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome an opportunity to raise this matter. Last Monday in County Mayo I spent five hours going around looking at the serious damage caused by a flood. This happened as a result of exceptional rainfall which occurred on the evening of 2 July. Information provided by the Met Office indicated that 60 millimetres of rain fell in the Newport area alone between 5 p.m. and 9 p.m., and during the most intense period a total of 41.6 millimetres fell in one 60 minute period. This is extremely unusual and I gather it has an annual exceedence probability of one in 150 and therefore is very rare.

The resulting flash floods caused extensive damage in several areas. Newport, Furnace, Keenagh, Glenisland and parts of Tourmakeady were severely damaged as a result of the floods. There were landslides in both of those areas and a great deal of damage done to roads, bridges, land, livestock and even a group water scheme. The Buckagh group water scheme in the Newport area servicing 34 houses was put out of action. Some houses are still waiting to be reconnected to their water supply and when their sole source of water is a mountain stream, one can imagine the quality of the water they have currently.

In the Newport, Furnace and Keenagh areas in particular, the Yellow River Bridge was damaged and Treanlaur Lodge had damage to the road. The Buckagh road had extensive damage. Treenbeg Road had a lot of damage. The Leena and Glendavoolagh Roads, Newport town, Glenhest Road and Quay Road all proved impassible on the night in question.

Mayo County Council and the fire services were mobilised and they put into place a temporary measure to make the roads passable, and by Friday and Saturday of last weekend most of the roads were passable.

In the Newport area alone, costings have been done for the damage that has occurred to bridges in the area and it has been costed at €400,000. In the Glenisland area we would be looking at costings of a similar amount but as yet they have not established if some of the bridges will remain stable. It may take another week to establish that so further costings will be made.

In the past I approached the Minister for emergency funding following flooding in the Ballinrobe area and he was good enough to provide €200,000 this year under a miscellaneous provision to assist with that. What happened in this area last weekend is very unusual and, having been accompanied on my trip by the county council engineers, Ann Sweeney and Shane O'Donnell, and by local farmers, Seamus O'Donnell and Gerard Nolan, I saw that the extent of the damage was unbelievable. Roads were ripped up, there were craters in the road and the amount of repair work that will have to be done is extensive.

The Minister will also be aware that the council budget for this type of work this year has been trimmed to the minimum. When the full costings are made available to him I ask the Minister to consider providing emergency funding, as an exceptional item, to Mayo County Council to deal with this job. I will talk also to the Minister's colleague, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, to ask him to provide assistance to the farmers who lost extensive fencing and livestock. Many sheep were lost and a huge amount of damage was done to land and private property generally.

I welcome the opportunity to raise this issue and I ask the Minister to engage with the county council to discuss the possibility of his Department providing some assistance. If some of the bridges prove to be unstable, as I believe they will, the council will not have the necessary funds to carry out repair work this year. All of these bridges are on roads which service rural communities. Many of the families have been cut off and major work will be required in the near future. I ask the Minister to give careful consideration to this matter.

Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this matter. I also take the opportunity to express my sympathy to all those who have been affected by the recent flooding in County Mayo, outlined by Deputy Flynn.

In September 2004, the Government confirmed the Office of Public Works as the State's lead agency in flooding, to be tasked with delivering an integrated, multifaceted programme aimed at mitigating future flood risk and impact.

As regards flooding of roads, the improvement and maintenance of regional and local roads is a matter for the relevant local authority, to be funded from its own resources supplemented by State road grants paid by my Department. The initial selection of works to be funded from these grants is also a matter for the local authority. Funding of national roads is a matter for the National Roads Authority.

When road grants for regional and local roads are allocated each year, my Department does not hold back a reserve allocation at central level to deal with weather contingencies. Such an arrangement would mean a reduction across all local authorities in the road grant allocations to them at the beginning of each year. Instead, the allocation made to local authorities is inclusive of the weather risk factor. Local authorities are expressly advised that they should set aside contingency sums from their overall regional and local roads resources to finance necessary weather related works. That stipulation is contained clearly in the circular letter sent with the allocations.

In 2009, grants totalling €22.316 million were allocated to Mayo County Council for works on regional and local roads. This included a discretionary maintenance grant of €1.952 million and a discretionary improvement grant of €826,000, which are available at the discretion of Mayo County Council to fund contingency works arising from weather conditions. My Department would also be prepared to consider sympathetically any request from Mayo County Council to adjust its multi-annual restoration programmes in order to prioritise work necessitated by severe weather conditions. In 2009, Mayo County Council was allocated a restoration improvement grant of €7.638 million and a restoration maintenance grant of €5.614 million.

It should also be noted that Mayo County Council's own resources expenditure on regional and local roads in 2008 amounted to €5.4 million, which represented only 15% of the total expenditure on regional and local roads in the county, with the other 85% funded by State road grants. The expenditure of €5.4 million in 2008 is also €1.95 million less than the council spent from its own resources in 2007. Mayo County Council needs to address this issue with a view to assigning more of its own resources to the regional and local road network.