Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-05
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Simon Harris (FG), Wicklow

I acknowledge that this is an issue that the Deputy has raised a lot in this House. It relates to Uisce Éireann, how it functions and, perhaps almost as importantly, how it answers to and engages with the Government, the Oireachtas and communities as well.
To be honest, I expect a bit better in relation to this too. I can assure the Deputy that it is not just an issue on his side of the House. On this side of the House, many of my colleagues point out the need for better community engagement and better engagement with public representatives. I spoke to the Minister for housing, Deputy Browne about this in recent days and to the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, who is due to meet Uisce Éireann shortly.
We need to have a conversation. I saw a debate in the Dáil, I think it was last week, about how Uisce Éireann even answers to Oireachtas Members and that it is not included in parliamentary questions and the like. We need to look at getting a better information flow because, at the end of the day, we have to answer to our bosses, who are the people of Ireland and the people in our constituencies. We need that information and that regular and respectful engagement. The Government has an open mind on how to improve that flow of information in terms of accountability and the likes. We will engage on that with Irish Water as well.
I want to make a broader point. It is, of course, answerable to quite a number of bodies. There is extensive oversight and regulatory control of Uisce Éireann as well. It is commercially audited in accordance with the Companies Act. It is subject to an audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General. It is subject to the Code of Practice for the Governance of State Bodies. It is accountable to Oireachtas committees, including the public accounts committee, which is always a body that focuses the mind. The Commission for the Regulation of Utilities is responsible for the independent economic regulation of Uisce Éireann and that ensures that it operates efficiently as well.
The Minister, Deputy Browne, has emphasised the importance of better and improved communication with elected representatives and with communities. He made that point when he met Uisce Éireann. He received assurances that it will be back to them with proposals on that. We want to see them urgently because this is an important issue in many communities right across our country.
To be balanced in our comments, I want to point to some significant successes we have seen since the establishment of Uisce Éireann. For the first time we have a single public water utility organisation. We have seen the investment in infrastructure grow from just €300 million in 2014 to €1.4 billion as part of the budget that we agreed in this House last year. We have also seen significant improvement in the provision of water services in many areas. Hundreds of water and wastewater treatment plants have been upgraded. Thousands of kilometres of new or rehabilitated water mains have been installed. The national leakage rate is still too high but has been reduced, and, overall, the quality of drinking water does remain very high as well.
One of the things I am most eager about is the developer-led infrastructure delivery. We had a frank conversation with Irish Water and I do not mind sharing it here. We have significantly increased the amount of taxpayer funding to that organisation. In return, we want to see developer-led infrastructure where relatively small-scale developers can deliver the infrastructure to an Irish Water standard, but they can deliver it. We also want to see an improvement in connection rates and a direct correlation between the extra investment we are giving to Uisce Éireann and the delivery of housing supply.
I take the Deputy's point about engagement and accountability and I will be back to him on it.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-05/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:36+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-05