Ireland facing EU fines over environmental failures

IRELAND is facing multi-million euro fines from the European Union from this autumn for a raft of environmental failures such as contaminated water.

Environment Minister John Gormley has met European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas in Brussels to discuss eight outstanding court judgements against Ireland and 30 other pending problems.

The most urgent issue is that of contaminated water, where the European Court of Justice ruled against Ireland almost five years ago over water being infected with e-coli from sewage and slurry.