Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator. I have a meeting with Cork County Council arranged for tomorrow. I will be meeting the engineering staff regarding what happened not only last August but also, coincidentally, last week. We will be discussing Bantry, Bandon, Skibbereen, Clonakilty, Fermoy, Mallow and other towns with schemes in the pipeline, such as Midleton. The Senator's colleague Senator Dooley will know from places such as Clonlara that the OPW often receives objections to schemes from people who live many miles away. When the scheme comes to fruition in Bantry, we could receive objections from people in Wicklow, for instance. I hope that does not happen because a solution is needed for the people in Bantry who are looking out at Victorian culverts which in many cases have collapsed under the street and which cannot take the volume of water involved. The solution will have to be an engineered one. Trees will not hold back the water coming down from the hills around Bantry, and neither will they hold back the tide. A hard-engineered solution is needed. The OPW will build the infrastructure. We will require the support of the people of Bantry, which I know will be forthcoming. We hope the scheme will not be objected to but, I hesitate to say, it probably will be. As a result, I cannot give a timeframe for the works. We have the money and commitment, however, and we will have the support of Cork County Council. We will have the goodwill of the people of Bantry. I hope that the people who routinely object to schemes such as those proposed for places like Bantry do not do so in this case because the people of Bantry deserve to have their town protected.