Cllrs say they’re ‘fed up’ with Irish Water’s ‘waste of time’ meetings

FRUSTRATED councillors said they are fed up with the Irish Water ‘clinics’ because they are not ‘functional’ and are a waste of time.

The matter arose at a recent meeting in relation to correspondence from Irish Water. It was a topic that obviously touched a nerve with several councillors who spoke of their frustration in dealing with the utility company.

County mayor Danny Collins said he had an issue in Bantry just before Christmas and he couldn’t get through to Irish Water. He said councillors are wasting their time even replying to them.

Cllr John Paul O’Shea (FG) said he is an avid attendee of the Irish Water clinics, but has noticed recently that the Irish Water staff at the clinic don’t know about the submissions that he sends in beforehand, and therefore have no answers ready for him.

‘The last clinic we had was three months ago when they used to be held monthly, and I still haven’t got responses from them from that meeting three months ago,’ said Cllr O’Shea.

‘It’s not functional and is of no benefit to councillors. It certainly needs to be changed. The communication there is not good enough.’

Cllr Kevin Murphy (FG) said that it put the County Development Plan in a ‘quandary’ as it says we should be moving into our towns and villages where the services are available.

‘However, these services are not available and Irish Water won’t give permission – they will stall every single application going on in a village or town. It’s an absolute, complete total contradiction and puts our plan in limbo,’ said Cllr Murphy

Cllr Seamus McGrath (FF) said they are all ‘totally dissatisfied’ at the manner in which Irish Water engages with them as elected public representatives.

‘It’s not acceptable and not good enough. Many of us have given up on those clinics because they are effectively useless as they don’t deal with our enquiries in a timely way,’ said Cllr McGrath.

‘We need some liaison officers in place for our given areas, so that we can at least speak to the same person. That’s part of the problem now.’