A dedicated funding mechanism needs to be put in place to ensure villages in Clare have adequate, up-to-date sewerage systems, one of the county’s Oireachtas members have said.
Up to 52 towns and villages in Clare are currently not deemed as having adequate wastewater infrastructure and are thus hindered from development.
Presently, Irish Water’s capital investment programme is focused on larger population centres meaning that many of the villages around the country are left with aged infrastructure that cannot meet the demands of the community.
Clare TD, Cathal Crowe (FF) detailed that he has been in contact with Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Darragh O’Brien (FF) and his staff urging them to use the National Development Plan review as a mechanism within which to make a new funding provision for installing sewerage infrastructure in small villages.
Deputy Crowe stated, “At the moment, far too many villages in Clare and throughout Ireland fall between the stools in that they are too small to be funded under Irish Water’s capital works programme. In a lot of these cases, homes are connected to septic tanks but there are instances in Clare where there is no sewerage infrastructure whatsoever connected to homes meaning that sewerage flushed down the toilet goes into the local drainage system.
“In the 21st century this is unacceptable, when one considers that this raw sewerage could be leaking into nearby water supplies that is ultimately consumed by people,” the Meelick native.
Projects can be bumped up the list as part of the review, he believed. “I am urging Minister O’Brien to provide a new funding mechanism for sewerage facilities in small villages. There are a number of villages in Clare which could potentially avail of such a scheme including Broadford, Cooraclare, Carrigaholt and Doolin.
“If a scheme is devised on a pilot basis it’s most likely that Broadford would be among the first to be considered given that it is shovel ready and land for a pump station and treatment unit have already been purchased. I will be strongly making this point to the Minister and I look forward to positive engagement with him on this matter,” Crowe concluded.
