Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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1546. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of inspections carried out each year since the introduction of mandatory registration of single house wastewater systems in 2012 and 2013, by local authority; the number of these that resulted in work having to be carried out on the system; the number of grants approved; the total cost of the grants by year and local authority area in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15570/18]

Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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The Water Services (Amendment) Act 2012 assigns responsibility to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to make a National Inspection Plan (NIP) for domestic wastewater treatment systems and neither I, nor my Department, has any direct role in monitoring the implementation of the plan by the local authorities.

The EPA was the supervisory body for the purposes of the National Inspection Plan 2013: Domestic Waste Water Treatment Systems, which was adopted and published by the EPA in February 2013. The EPA has conducted a review of the implementation of the Plan for the period from 1 July 2013 to 30 June 2014. The report contains a breakdown by county of inspections that have taken place and includes details relating to non-compliant treatment systems and advisory notices. It is available on the Agency’s website at the following link:

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A further NIP Inspection Data Report 1st July 2013 - 31st December 2014 provided an update to the previous review and included data from inspections carried out in the period 1st July 2013 to 31st December 2014. This is available at: .

The National Inspection Plan 2015 to 2017: Domestic Waste Water Treatment Systems was adopted and published by the EPA in 2015. The Plan provides for a minimum of 1,000 inspections to be carried out by the water services authorities (which are the 31 county, city, and county and city councils) on an annual basis up to December 2017. Details of the minimum number of inspections to be carried out in each county are included in the Plan. This plan is also available on the Agency’s website at:

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The Agency has published the third National Inspection Plan for the period 2018 to 2021: Domestic Waste Water Treatment Systems Draft for Consultation, which closed on 26 January 2018. The draft plan is available on the Agency's website at the following link: .

The following table gives details of grants paid in accordance with the requirements of the Water Services (Amendment) Act 2012 by local authorities for domestic waste water treatment systems from 2014 to date in 2018.

Domestic Wastewater Treatment Systems (including Septic tanks) - Recoupments by Dept of Housing, Planning & Local Government to Local Authorities to cover costs of grants paid by Local authorities.