Anne Rabbitte (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I welcome the opportunity to have a few moments to speak on this very important issue. I will be very focused on housing, wastewater and disability. In my remarks on housing I will focus on Galway County Council, which has only 66 acres of land zoned for housing. At Monday’s meeting of the local authority, the director of services informed the councillors that 70% of the 66 acres cannot be built on because it does not have infrastructure and if the council did build on it, it would cost €76 million. There are 3,000 people waiting on a housing list and the director of services is saying that 70% of the 66 acres cannot be built on. This is not a shortage. They should know that this €76 million in infrastructure funding is required. The councillors were not expecting that response. It is something that we as a Government need to address, particularly at the moment as county development plans are going back out. We need to ensure that this issue is addressed.

Turning to wastewater, I again raise the issue of Galway County Council. Two and a half years ago, it was awarded €10 million for Clarinbridge and Craughwell to upgrade the sewage treatment plant. In July, Uisce Éireann wrote to the local authority to say that it would have to make a contribution of 15%. Between the VAT and the cost of the contribution, Uisce Éireann is looking for €5 million from the local authority. We talk about value for money or trying to be progressive but, two and a half years on, nothing has happened. It is at a standstill. I do not fault the Department by any means but it is giving €2 billion to Uisce Éireann for it to write a letter in July when there has been dialogue with the Department and we need an intervention at the level of the Minister of State to assist the process.

Turning to disability, I am delighted the Minister of State is in front of me on this because she will clearly understand what I am going to talk about, namely, Stewarts Care in her constituency. It does wonderful work with horse therapy in Kilcloon. Sometimes agencies do not inform Departments on really good value for money. Maybe they do not collect and quantify the detail the way they should. When children go to equine therapy, it is a therapeutic intervention, not just fun. It is fun but it has a value. It is hard to believe that in Liskennett in County Limerick, on the Cork border, 1,000 hours of therapeutic intervention is done weekly but not recorded and nor is a value placed on it. The HSE is not gathering that piece of information. The same goes for Kilcloon in the Minister of State’s constituency. The reason I mention this is that we can do pragmatic alternative therapies. When you have one OT, six horses and six healthcare assistants, you are delivering a therapeutic intervention times six with one qualified therapist. It is the best value for money going. This can have a regional spread, particularly in a growing area. There is Stewarts Care in the Minister of State’s constituency, while St. Joseph’s Foundation has Liskennett and I think Kanturk is coming on stream. These are phenomenal interventions. Clondalkin also has the opportunity with primary care to do equine therapy. We also need to look at Toghermore, which will cover where Senator Scahill and I are based as well as Mayo as a regional hub for equine therapy.