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

I thank all the Senators who contributed, as well as the proposers of the motion. I welcome the fact that so many Senators have chosen to stay. Unfortunately, all of the Opposition Senators have left, which probably says a lot about their interest in this topic.

I welcome the opportunity to address this House on flooding matters and thank Senators for raising this important issue. The motion covers many issues and I will try to address as many of them as I can in the time that has been allocated.

The Government has a strong record in managing flood risk. The OPW is the lead agency for co-ordinating the delivery of flood risk management policy. It chairs the interdepartmental flood rick policy co-ordination group, which takes a whole-of-government approach to the issue of flood policy. I agree with some of the previous speakers. As anyone who has stood in the house of a flood victim or a shop and seen the scourge of flooding will know, such scenes drive me on in terms of my job and I know that it drives on the staff of the OPW whom I will discuss in a while.

The co-ordination group comprises representatives from eight Departments, two offices and the local authority sector. The OPW carries out this role by co-ordinating the implementation of the flood risk management policy and measures across three strategic areas. The first is prevention. This is achieved by avoiding construction in flood prone areas, which has been referred to by a number of Senators. Examples include the statutory planning system and the flood risk management guidelines that were issued by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage in 2009, and the once-off voluntary homeowners relocation scheme, which is operated by the OPW.

Local authorities are required to have regard to planning guidelines, which set out a rigorous approach to flood risk assessment, when considering the development of plans and assessing planning applications. The OPW has continued to review forward-planning documents to help ensure the 2009 guidelines are implemented to promote sustainable development. These documents have included the regional spatial and economic strategies as well as development and local area plans.

The second area is protection. This is brought about by taking feasible measures to protect areas against flooding, including the implementation of major flood relief schemes that I will elaborate on later. In addition, the OPW's minor flood mitigation works and coastal protection scheme, which have been referred to by Senator Murphy and others, also provides 90% of funding to local authorities to address local flooding issues to a cost of €750,000.Since the establishment of the scheme in 2009 to the end of 2020, in excess of €55 million has been approved for more than 828 projects across all local authorities. Completed schemes, to the end of 2020, are providing protection to in excess of 7,325 properties, which makes a massive difference in local communities as Senators will be aware. The OPW’s arterial drainage maintenance channel maintenance programme of 11,500 km of channel and 800 km of embankments protects 77 towns and villages, and 242,000 ha of agricultural lands.

I was disturbed, as I am sure Senators, councillors and farmers were, to hear the commentary a while ago on the Arterial Drainage Act. I am sure that many councillors and farmers will be disturbed to hear the unprovoked attack that was made on the Act. I am sure that many of the farmers whose lands have been protected from flooding and benefited as a result of the Act will be particularly perturbed, as will many Sinn Féin councillors, by the attack that was launched on the Arterial Drainage Act by Senator Boylan.

The third area is preparedness. This is by planning and responding to reduce the impacts of flood events, including through the establishment of the national flood forecasting and warning service, the national emergency framework for emergency management to develop national and community resilience. I must especially thank our colleagues in Met Éireann.

It is this flood policy that has led to the development and implementation of the catchment flood risk assessment and management, CFRAM, programme. The CFRAM is an evidence-based study that informs the Government’s approach to managing the programme of €1.3 billion investment in flood risk management under the National Development Plan 2021-2030.

In response to the initial comments made by Senator Garvey, CFRAM is a whole-of-river solution. The programme takes in all of the catchment area not only areas around the mouth of rivers. The OPW, together with our partners in local authorities, conducts a flood risk study on the entire catchment area from the gestation to the completion of the programme. The national CFRAM study followed best international practice and was the largest study ever undertaken of our risk from significant flood events, including potential impacts of climate change.Detailed engineering assessment of communities looked at how neighbouring rivers and seas respond during a significant flood or storm events and mapped for each community the extent, nature and impact of such floods. Many Members of this House are former local authority members and would have fed information into CFRAM as representatives of local communities, as I did when I was a councillor. CFRAM has been very much a bottom-up approach, with total and absolute community engagement.

The 29 flood risk management plans published in 2018 are the output from the CFRAM programme that gives us not only the evidence of how these 300 communities will be affected from a once-in-100-year flood but also the evidence of how to address flood risk nationally by targeting that risk where the impact is greatest. This includes a significant investment in approximately 150 flood relief schemes in addition to the 50 major flood relief schemes already completed. These completed schemes are already protecting more than 10,000 properties and an estimated €1.8 billion of damage is being avoided. That is not insignificant.

Since the launch of the flood risk management plans in 2018, the Office of Public Works, OPW, has almost trebled from 33 to 90 the number of OPW flood relief schemes currently under design and construction in partnership with local authorities. Evidence from the CFRAM study highlights that when all these schemes are complete, 95% of at-risk properties can be protected.

Our flood risk strategy and approach to flood risk management have been benchmarked by Dutch experts. Many people have said we should look at what is happening internationally, and this is exactly what we are doing. People say God made the world and the Dutch made the Netherlands, so who better to consult than the Dutch? It is important to reassure the House that the engineering development and design of flood relief schemes is undertaken by expert consultants specialising in hydrology, hydraulic modelling and flood risk management, as alluded to in the motion. Detailed hydrological and hydraulic analyses ensure that the full catchment is understood. I know Senators are anxious that this be the case. It would be pointless otherwise. The proposed flood relief solutions will provide appropriate protections to communities without creating additional flood risk for areas nearby, upstream or downstream. Some Senators mentioned that in some cases the problem may be moved downstream, but that is absolutely not the case.

On the question of nature-based catchment management measures, whereas hard defences are necessary in some areas, as Senator Cummins mentioned, the OPW has been following developments and supporting research in the field of and nature-based catchment measures. I will be opening a scheme this week in Clonakilty where a nature base is an integral part of the design. The suitability and effectiveness of these types of measures is very much dependent on local geography and the nature and degree of flood risk. This is because every scheme is not the same. Nature-based catchment measures can reduce the hazard of more frequent low-intensity floods. However, the risk associated with these types of floods is lower than that posed by extreme floods. We have seen in Benelux countries and in Germany during the summer, as we did in my home town of Newcastle West in 2008, that when there is a monsoon effect and a cloud dumps four months of rain in four hours, nothing other than a hard-based and engineered solution will stop it. In some cases, even that is not enough. There are limits in the capacity of nature-based catchment measures to reduce risk. The OPW focuses on protecting against extreme floods, such as the once in 100 years event, as this gives the greatest benefit for capital invested.

Pilot and demonstration projects have indicated that nature-based catchment measures can provide benefits in reducing flood flows in small catchments, but there is very limited international evidence that they would provide significant benefits in large-scale catchments. I agree with Senator Boylan's comment that we do not have the data. The OPW acknowledges the calls for increasing the use of soft engineering flood mitigation, such as riparian native woodlands, swales and ponds. We are integrating those into our schemes. The OPW is very proactive about developing policy and supporting nature-based measures, with a number of initiatives such as all new flood relief scheme designs being procured now embedding a specific requirement to assess options for natural water retention based on the Scottish natural flood management methodology and the co-funding, with the EPA, of a major research project entitled SLOWWATERS to examine the effectiveness of soft engineering. We have also provided funding to the Inishowen Rivers Trust in Donegal to investigate the use of such measures to reduce flood risk and provide co-benefits and co-chairing, with the EPA, the working group on natural water retention measures that is intended to identify approaches that could be used to develop integrated catchment management measures to provide benefits to multiple sectors, such as biodiversity, water quality, sediment control, as well as for flood risk reduction.

On the question of flood risk management and the impact of climate change, the OPW prepared a climate change sectoral adaptation plan for flood risk management for the period 2019 to 2024 in line with the requirements of the national adaptation framework and the Climate Action Plan 2019. The plan was approved by the Government in October 2019.

The sectoral adaptation plan sets out a long-term goal for adaptation in flood risk management to promote sustainable communities and support our environment through the effective management of the potential impacts of climate change on flooding and flood risk. It includes a range of actions to meet the objectives of enhancing our knowledge and understanding of the potential impacts of climate change for flooding and flood risk management through ongoing research and assessment with partners, adapting our flood risk management practice to effectively manage the potential impacts of climate change on future flood risk and aligning adaptation with regards to flood risk across sectors and wider Government policy, including planning and development.

Key actions in the plan focus on the ongoing assessment of the risks from climate change, the inclusion of adaptation in flood relief schemes and the consideration of potential future flood scenarios in planning and development management. Good progress is already being made on implementing some of the actions set out in the plan. For example, maps of future flood extents under climate change scenarios have been published through our web portal, floodinfo.ie. I beg to differ with the opinion that everything we do is like the third secret of Fatima. The OPW is providing funding to the eastern and midlands climate action regional office for research to further improve our understanding of the potential impacts of changing rainfall patterns. Senator Murphy referred to the differences between the east and west coasts.

Assessments have begun into the adaptability of flood relief schemes currently under design and those already completed, which is very important, as some of those must change as well. The design brief for future schemes includes a requirement to consider and plan for adaptation needs. There is also work towards the establishment of a national flood forecasting and warning service, as I referred to a while ago, through Met Éireann.

Coastal change is a significant issue and the OPW has been to the forefront in leading the debate for a national strategy to be put in place to address the impact of rising sea levels, increasing storm events in our coastal areas. The OPW is co-chairing the interdepartmental group on national coastal change management strategy with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. The membership of this group includes a wide representation from across Departments. This group is to bring forward options and recommendations for consideration by the Government to deal with coastal change and the development of a national coastal change policy.

My colleagues, the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, and the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, recently commenced a public consultation on the draft river basin management plan for Ireland 2022 to 2027. There are a number of features of the draft plan and measures proposed that are relevant to the issues raised in the motion before us tonight. The core themes include an increased level of ambition reflecting the high level of environmental ambitions contained in the programme for Government; continuing and strengthening the integrated catchment planning approach nationally, covering all 46 hydrometric catchments; further improvements in the level of co-ordination and collaboration by all implementing bodies; and the delivery of multiple benefits. Many of the measures needed to protect and improve water quality, including the water framework directive, can also deliver benefits.

Nature-based solutions, such as green and blue infrastructure, are recognised in the draft river basin management plan as having significant potential to contribute to mitigating pollutants, as Senator Burke referred to, in inputs to waters in rural areas but also in addressing many of the complex environmental challenges that are associated with balancing urban development and its impact on the environment. The programme for Government includes a commitment that the Government will undertake a national land use review, including farmland, forests, and peatlands, so that optimal land use options inform all Government decisions.

I will conclude by assuring Senators that the Government and I are working extremely hard to ensure that the greatest possible progress is being made on the delivery of a very ambitious programme of work for flood defences nationally. The biggest frustration I have was referred to by Senators Kyne and Cummins and others. It is the speed at which we are able to deliver to communities. Senator Kyne asked if anything can be done to make my job easier and the greatest level of difficulty we have is around the process. It is not around the delivery of engineering in schemes at all. Most of the work in delivering the scheme in Galway, for example, will not be at the site at the Claddagh.It will be spent in offices, the courts and judicial reviews. No more than on the television programme, there comes a point in this country where we have to ask if the public good is being served in the courts or on the quayside in the Claddagh. As legislators, we have to ask ourselves whether we are doing the public good by continually having a "Wanderly Wagon" circuit of Ireland where people can go in and out of court without, in my estimation, any real locus standi, to object to, frustrate and prevent ordinary decent citizens from having access to a night's sleep. That is what they want - a night's sleep. They are agonised in their beds at night because they do not know when the sea or the River Suir will come in because somebody 300 km or 400 km away can object in the name of a bullrush, a weed or something. That has to stop.

This House and the Dáil are failing people throughout Ireland. I have to admit that we are failing people all over this country. This process is going on in Cork city for 14 years and for 19 years in Enniscorthy. The Senator's city will probably go on for ten years, as will Senator Malcolm Byrne's. How long before enough is enough, when the Atlantic will rise by a metre at the same time? We have to ask ourselves at what point will enough be enough and at what stage the public good is served ahead of another good. The rights and hierarchies in this country have to be ultimately established as to where the balance of rights is and whose rights outweigh those of others.

I could be in this Chamber again in another six months' time, talking about the Claddagh, Dunmore East, King's Island and the Shannon Callows. We can talk about it until the cows come home, but the greatest level of frustration I have is with what the OPW cannot do. When I hear people saying we are openly breaking the law, on behalf of the men and women who work for the OPW, I have to take offence at that. I take offence not only on behalf of the men and the women who work for the OPW, and the Senator is not here now, but on behalf of those who work for the local authorities. Nobody that I know in a council or in the OPW actively goes out in the morning to break the law. If that Senator has detailed knowledge of somebody who works in the OPW who intentionally broke the law, she should come to the Chamber and give me the details of it.

My frustration stems from the fact that all I want to be able to do is look someone in the eye in the Claddagh, Ballinasloe or Roscommon and say that that person can sleep in his or her bed tonight because the water will not come in. This country is failing those people because of a legislative basis that rates something other than people's right to sleep in their houses at night, and to keep out the water, behind something else. We have failed those people and until we as legislators grapple with that, we are only codding ourselves about how I will not be able to spend that money.