Fears of delay in fixing village’s water supply

There are fears that a village suffering from a severe water supply problem may have to wait far longer than anticipated to have it rectified.

Over the last few months the mains have been breaking on a once and sometimes twice-weekly basis in the north Cork village of Kildorrery.

The problem got so bad some villagers were forced to travel for miles to get showers at relatives’ homes.

Meanwhile, some businesses were forced to close their doors on a number of occasions and others had to tanker in water.

Cork County Council officials said the only way of rectifying the problem was to seek emergency funding from the Department of Environment to replace the aging mains and upgrade the village’s concrete reservoir, which also has leaks in it.

However, Cllr Kevin O’Keeffe (FF) said that up to Oct 15, the council still hadn’t made the application for emergency funding.

He discovered this after Niall Collins TD asked what progress had been made on the Kildorrery issue in a Dáil question to Environment Minister Phil Hogan.

Mr O’Keeffe was told by council officials the application would land on the minister’s desk “shortly”.

Assistant county manager Moira Murrell said Irish Water would take over the running of all water supply schemes nationally on Jan 1 and the council would also submit an application to it for the scheme in case the department didn’t approve emergency funding.

“I’m concerned that we’ve missed the boat this year. This (water disruption) has been going for the last three to four months and an application should have been given to the Government well before the budget was announced,” Mr O’Keeffe said.

He said he was seriously concerned to hear Ms Murrell say that funding might now not be forthcoming from the department. “Now we will probably have to reapply to Irish Water which will take even longer.”

Cllr Noel McCarthy (Lab) said he hoped there would be no further delays.

Cllr Tom Sheahan (FG) said there had been less breaks in the aging mains in recent weeks. But he said this was because the council had turned down the pressure in the pipes and as a result customers were getting the minimum supply.