Council submission on pipe
Tipperary Co Council has appointed consultants to help prepare a submission on the controversial plan to pipe Shannon water to the Eastern & Midlands region.
Uisce Éireann lodged its long-awaited planning application for the Water Supply Project – Eastern & Midlands Region last month. Submissions on the project can now be made to an Coimisiún Pleanála.
It was confirmed this week that Tipperary Co Council will be making a submission amid criticism from some councillors that the local authority has not taken a stand against the project. Director of Services Brian Beck told this week’s meeting of the council that February 25 is the closing date for submissions for individuals and community groups, but that local authorities would have until March 30 to make a submission. The council has appointed consultants to examine the planning application and help the council to draft its submission.
Mr Beck said the council has also requested Uisce Éireann to attend a meeting on the project as soon as possible.
“We’re not doing nothing,” Mr Beck said, affirming that the council is involved in the statutory process.
‘STOP IT’
He was responding to a charge from Cllr Séamie Morris that the council had not challenged the pipe plan, in particular Uisce Éireann’s assurance that no more than two percent of the average flow of the Shannon would be abstracted. Noting how the greatest amount of time at Monday’s meeting was spent talking about tourism, Cllr Morris said that tourism is “under threat from a project that’s not needed”. Limerick Co Council had called an emergency meeting on the matter.
“We’re doing nothing about it,” Cllr Morris exclaimed. He believed the council should put an expert team together to go through the planning application, and mentioned that he is already working with a group of people, including ecologists, legal professionals and philanthropists.
The council’s aim, Cllr Morris said, should be “not only object to it but to stop it, because if you don’t, I will.”
‘FOBBED OFF’
Cllr Phyll Bugler said people are “extremely worried” about the pipe plan. A particular concern is that there would be no control over what volume of water is taken from the Shannon. It does not make sense for the water to be piped to Dublin where nearly 40 percent of it would be lost to leakage, she said.
Cllr Bugler was of the view that industry should be brought to this part of the country, rather than using Shannon water to support the further development of the capital. But she said local concerns are being “fobbed off” and she called for an emergency meeting on the matter between the councils of Tipperary, Limerick and Clare.
Cllr Fiona Bonfield pointed out that the members of Nenagh Municipal District are united in their opposition to the plan. A formal objection to the planning application would be the only way of making their voices heard.
NO WATER IN RATHCABBIN
Cllr Michael O’Meara said around 1,500 homes in the Rathcabbin area have been without water since before Christmas due to a “Third World water supply” in the area. Planning to pipe water away to Dublin at a time when water cannot be supplied in the local area is “absolutely crazy”, he fumed.
“We seem to be just rolling over and allowing this to happen,” said Cllr O’Meara, who also hit out at Uisce Éireann using social media to communicate updates about the Rathcabbin situation to local people, many of whom are elderly and do not use such media.
Cathaoirleach Cllr John Carroll also voiced dissatisfaction with the Water Supply Project, saying he had never in his 30 years a public representative seen as much “arrogance and dismissiveness” as he had from Uisce Éireann, conduct that had turned many people against the project.
Several councillors from other parts of the county joined in speaking against the project, including Cllr Máirín McGrath, who said her experience left her with the view that “you can’t always take what Uisce Éireann say at face value; I take it with a pinch of salt.”
Cllr David Dunne was of the opinion that Uisce Éireann could not run a bath.
NENAGH MEETING
Cllr Morris welcomed the council’s effort to arrange a meeting with Uisce Éireann and said this meeting should take place in Nenagh. He also wanted councillors’ questions to be sent to the utility in advance of the meeting, saying there were questions left unanswered at previous meetings because the Uisce Éireann representatives did not have the information to hand.
Cllr Morris said there are many concerned people, from anglers to ecologists, who should be given the opportunity to meet with the council’s consultants. Pointing out that it is almost 20 years since the pipe plan was proposed, Cllr Morris criticised the short timeframe given for people to study the planning application before submissions can be made. “It’s set up for us not to do our due diligence,” he observed.