This article is from page 8 of the 2014-12-16 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 8 JPG
THE MAJORITY of councillors are set to boycott a meeting with Irish Water due to take place this Wednesday – with the utility company refusing to host the meeting in public.
The one-to-one meetings were due to take place, behind closed doors, from 10am to 12 noon this Wednesday, however, it now appears that only a handful of councillors plan to attend.
The original format for the meeting would have seen each councillor given just four minutes and 18 seconds to discuss issues with the Irish Wa- ter representatives – and the media banned from attending.
The council last week passed a resolution asking Irish Water to abandon the private meeting and instead come before Clare County Council in a full meeting that could be attended by the public and the media.
This request was declined by Irish Water – and a number of councillors have now decided to boycott the meeting.
“The upshot of all of this is that they [Irish Water] are refusing to meets us in the council chambers and because of that I will be boycotting that meeting,” said Cllr Cathal Crowe (FF).
“It [one-to-one meetings] is a point- less exercise and is completely non democratic. There are a lot of macro issues involving Irish Water that concern Clare County Council, staff ng