Water Services
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-28
============================================================

Fiona O'Loughlin (FF), Administrative Panel

I thank the Minister of State. I appreciate that he and the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, have responsibility for this but their voices are very strong in terms of the messages they can bring from the floor of this House to bodies such as Uisce Éireann. I beseech the Minister of State to use his voice, as I know he will. There is a very clear explanation for Hillsborough, which I accept.
The Minister of State said there are a range of measures in place to address the challenges and referred specifically to the Allenwood reservoir. It serves the Allenwood area, but is not a reservoir in Allenwood; it is actually in Allen, which is a different place. The pressure management and network reconfiguration measures being implemented are not giving me any peace of mind. I have written to Uisce Éireann and will do so again.
On what the Minister of State said about communication, Councillor Daragh Fitzpatrick told me yesterday that he put three CRMs over the previous three days into Uisce Éireann and did not get a response to one of them. When our public representatives, who are doing such a good job, are not getting any communication, that is a problem. I ask that the message go out loud and clear that we want honest and time-bound information, as well as a resolution to the issue itself.
Part of the Minister of State's area of responsibility is the National Parks and Wildlife Service. He does an excellent job in that regard and I admire the work he does. The Curragh Plains is something we have spoken about. We have discussed the possibility of the land being transferred from the Department of Defence to the Minister of State's Department. I hope we will get an update on that at some point.

---

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/seanad/2026-05-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:01+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-28