Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his time today. Over many years many people in housing estates throughout the county have raised this and it does not seem to be unique to County Clare. We have private housing estates built by developers and construction companies that went bust. The housing estates have been left to their own devices. In particular I want to ask what is being done for housing estates such as Westcoast View, Annagh, County Clare. The people there have been waiting many years for the estate to be taken in charge. At this stage they have been waiting nine years. It has its own wastewater treatment plant and the position of Irish Water is that it is not responsible for taking in charge of developer-provided water services infrastructure. Clare County Council can no longer legally take a private wastewater treatment plant, WWTP, in charge as it is no longer a water services authority. How will we remedy this situation? From doing lots of research and from many emails over and back it seems a number of estates in west Clare are in the same predicament, as they also have their own wastewater treatment plants. They seem to be falling between two stools. There is a disconnect in the legislation and private developments with developer-provided wastewater infrastructure cannot be taken in charge unless the legislation is changed to fund or legislate or both for Irish Water or local authorities to take the infrastructure in charge.

There are more layers to this with the bond companies. There seems to be a bond for estates when they are abandoned by a developer or construction company. Often it takes years for the bond to be released to the local authority to use the money to do the work. Often the bond is a fraction of the costs needed. We have to wait years to get the bond for the local authorities to have the money to do the work and when they finally get it, perhaps eight or ten years later, it is a fraction of the costs needed. This is very frustrating for me and I am the least of those involved. There are the people living in the estates and the local authorities themselves. The county council would like to be doing what it needs to do for these houses but it is not its responsibility and nor is it the responsibility of Irish Water. It remains to be seen how the taking-in-charge issue will be resolved. As there are other counties with similar to ourselves so maybe this issue will be addressed. The matter needs to be addressed nationally. What will be done? It seems we are in limbo because we have changed the powers of local authorities and given the powers they had to Irish Water, but nobody takes responsibility for these housing estates.