This article is from page 3 of the 2006-02-21 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 3 JPG
JUST a fortnight after meeting the Minister for the Environment in Ennis, the Cross Clare Clean Water Alliance protested outside the Ógra Conference at the slow delivery of sewerage schemes for parts of the county.
Speaking from the picket line, Robert Creech said the group were particularly worried about the raw sewage seeping on to the beach in Quilty.
Various governments said they would put a system in place and failed to do so, according to the Quilty man.
He said the water pricing policy had held everything up and accused the Minister of moving the goalposts when it came to providing the much needed schemes.
The protestors said the delay with the sewerage scheme was having a negative impact on development in the area and on tourism.
The current discharge of sewage into the sea had dissuaded tourists from returning and is a health concern, they maintain.
On his arrival, Minister Roche said, “I haven’t changed any goalposts, in fact quiet the opposite. I have tried to get rid of as much bureaucracy as I possibly can. I announced just before Christmas that schemes which were operating under the five million mark (and) which were cleared once by my department . . . would become the responsibility of the council to deliver.”
Last September, the Department of the Marine approved the granting of a licence to facilitate the Quilty Feakle Scariff scheme.
Having got the green light, the scheme was held up at the Department of the Environment over costing issues relating to the Government’s “water pricing policy”.
Terms of the licence are adding an extra cost to the scheme which is to be located in a SAC area.
“I am prepared to sit down with the county manager and with the councils and resolve the issues, because I want to see the money spent,” the Minister said.
He has asked council officials to carry out an internal examination on “how they will bring schemes back within the financial parameters” set by the department.
He has vowed to be flexible when dealing with water and sewerage schemes.