Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-05
============================================================

Simon Harris (FG), Wicklow

The only reason I am smiling is I thought it was a very good way of sticking in the name of the Deputy's by-election candidate. We will select our by-election candidate on 22 February for Galway West.
The point the Deputy made is a very serious one. I take his support for the developer-led infrastructure. It is important. It is particularly important in rural communities where even forgetting developers, local authorities and public representatives say to us they could deliver 15 homes here or 20 or 30 homes there. If that is added up across the country, it is quite a lot of homes but we need to have the ability to put in the water infrastructure. Yes, this was done badly in the past but that is not a reason to not go back and do it properly this time. We did not have an Irish Water in the past to oversee it but we do now. I expect progress on that by the end of this month and we are engaging closely on that.
In relation to Adrigole, which the Deputy referenced, I am told that a case for mains rehabilitation works is currently under consideration by Uisce Éireann. I ask that it would assess that quickly because I know this is causing a significant challenge for the Deputy's constituents as well. Ultimately, CEOs of all semi-State agencies need to be judged on the basis of their performance. We have resourced Uisce Éireann. It has a good leadership team, we have resourced it well and now it needs to get on with the job.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

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