I welcome the opportunity to provide an update to the House on the progress being made on the Dundalk, Blackrock south and Ardee flood relief scheme. As the Senator knows, I visited County Louth to learn more about the flooding in the county and the plans the Office of Public Works has to manage the risk. I am aware of the impact of flooding on homeowners, businesses and communities in the area. Through the catchment flood risk assessment and management, CFRAM, flood programme, a detailed engineering analysis asses…

It is important to point out that as part of the scheme, Louth County Council intends to integrate in a comprehensive and planned manner to consider the construction of a greenway that will form part of the proposed greenway link from Belfast to Dublin that is often referred to as the great eastern greenway. It will enable walkers and cyclists to travel off-road between Belfast and Dublin. As Minister of State with responsibility for the Office of Public Works, I have been keen to progress the usage of embankments …

The rent being paid by the Commissioners of Public Works in respect of the offices at Block 1, Miesian Plaza, is in accordance with the terms of the lease. However, the Office of Public Works, OPW, has previously acknowledged in reply to parliamentary questions that an issue arose on which they should have engaged with the landlord and sought to recalibrate the rental rate as a result of the new measurement standard, international property management standard 3, IPMS 3, introduced in early 2016. This should not hav…

The Deputy will appreciate that I am not getting involved in a commercial negotiation on the floor of the Dáil. The Deputy has served as a Minister in the Government so she will know it would not be appropriate for me to do that. I have said in my reply today and in previous replies that the Deputy is correct that the OPW regrets that the issue arose in the first place. The OPW never attempted at any stage to conceal it and admitted from the very start that an error was made. The Deputy is correct that the impact t…

I cannot do that and the Deputy knows that. I cannot negotiate on the floor of the Dáil on a commercially sensitive matter.

Excuse me, I am replying to the Deputy. I cannot do what she has asked. Three meetings were held on 3 June, 24 August and 23 September. Another will take place and if subsequent meetings have to take place, the OPW will do that in a constructive fashion. We will do that on the basis that we want to get resolution to this matter. While this has been investigated by the Committee of Public Accounts, I wish to put on the record that the OPW has engaged not only with the Committee of Public Accounts but also with other…

I thank the Deputy. Through the CFRAM, programme, detailed engineering analysis, assessment and extensive public consultation was undertaken for 300 communities throughout the country, including 90 coastal areas, that were identified as the most likely to be impacted by future coastal and fluvial flooding. One key output of the CFRAM programme is the flood risk management plans, FRMPs, that contain proposed flood relief measures informed by preliminary costs, benefits and environmental factors to address the flood …

I can provide a more comprehensive answer to the Deputy in writing. I was in County Louth last year, shortly after I was appointed, and met the Louth county manager. I fully appreciate the concerns that exist. The Deputy is correct. The counties of Louth, Meath, Dublin, Wexford, Wicklow and down into Waterford and east Cork are particularly exposed. The speed at which we are responding will have to increase significantly. As I have stated in this Chamber previously, as well as in that awful place down on the quays …

The short answer is "No". For instance, what we will require in Dundalk are hard defences, flood embankments, walls, rock armour, coastal protection, demountable barriers, road raising, sluice gates, tanking, channel conveyancing improvements and road changes. There is a massive amount of work to be done in Dundalk alone, not to mention Drogheda, Baltray and Greenore. These are massive civil engineering projects. It is not possible to just magic away the volume of water that is coming. That is before even getting i…

I thank the Deputy for her question. I hope to visit Galway in the next couple of weeks. I know there is a significant amount of anxiety in respect of the situation there. The OPW has developed a climate change sectoral adaptation plan for flood risk management that was approved by the Government in October 2019. The plan identifies on a national scale how climate change could impact on flooding, flood risk and flood risk management, and prioritises these impacts in terms of urgency of action and degree of impact. …

I do not disagree with the Deputy for one minute. While this issue has not fallen on the OPW, the OPW is gladly taking on this responsibility because it is our bread and butter. We require the input of other Departments to ensure that everybody plays a responsible role in this, because the issue of how our coast will change is a societal problem. As the Deputy quite rightly said, our coast will change. It will require all Departments to come to the table. We must ensure we put forward a cohesive plan that takes int…

I do not think it is one of the most urgent issues; it is the most urgent issue, in my book, because of the number of people who live on our coast. Our largest urban centres - Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford - are all coastal. We also have a relationship with Northern Ireland, and Belfast and Derry are coastal. We are an island and the sea is rising around us. If we are threatened by anything, we are threatened by the sea in this country. The sea is our greatest risk at the moment.

The only commitment that I can give the Deputy is that from my perspective, for the last year this is the issue that has preoccupied me most in the OPW, in terms of exercising my Government colleagues to ensure that it is raised. While a lot of air, hot and cold, was spewed at COP23, COP24, COP25 and COP26, the issue of how Ireland is going to deal with its coastal defences and the communities of the Spanish Arch, King's Island and every other island community around the coast is going to be absolutely critical for…

The OPW submitted Crossmolina flood relief scheme documentation to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform for statutory confirmation under the Arterial Drainage Acts 1945 and 1995 on 28 September 2020. As part of this process, stakeholders were afforded a formal opportunity to provide comments on the environmental element of the proposed works. Following this consultation, independent consultants appointed by Department of Public Expenditure and Reform carried out a review of the scheme documentation. Follo…

As was the case when another Deputy asked a question, I will respond in the same light. The OPW is at the mercy of a planning process and we have to adhere to it. We are the same as anybody who is applying for permission. In this case, we are applying for permission under the Arterial Drainage Acts and we have to go through a consent process. If we do not go through that process and have due regard to it, there can be objections, judicial reviews can be taken against us and we may end up in court. In this case, May…

As is the case with confirmation processes we have recently been through, for example, in Blackpool in Cork, a small urban village in an old part of Cork city, which my colleague, the Minister, will be familiar with, just when we thought everything was ready to go, we were taken into a judicial review process at the last minute. None of us knows the length of time it will take to get through it. That is very frustrating, particularly for old people living in old communities. Many of these towns, villages and urban …

I am deputising for the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, who is unavailable tonight. It is clear that Deputies on all sides of the House are committed to improving transport infrastructure in regional and rural Ireland. I think it is clear we are all committed to improving transport infrastructure in rural and regional Ireland. Nobody has a monopoly on this issue. It is clear this Government is committed to improving transport infrastructure across the country. That commitment is evidenced in the national planning fram…

I apologise for my colleague, the Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Deputy English, who is unfortunately unable to attend the Seanad this morning. He asked me to reply on his behalf and indicated he will facilitate a discussion with the Senator to go through the issues he has raised. He also thanks the Senator for having raising them in the House. The employment permits system is designed to facilitate the entry of appropriately skilled non-European Economic Area nationals to …

The Government’s policy is that employment opportunities which arise in the country should, in the first instance, be offered to suitably skilled Irish nationals and then to EEA nationals, and should only be offered to non-EEA nationals where no suitable candidate emerges from within the EEA to fill the vacancy. The last sentence of my initial contribution is the most important in that the sector needs to provide more evidence of recruitment efforts undertaken and to show engagement with the Department of Social Pr…

The Deputy will be aware from my visit to Crossmolina that this issue has been progressed by both the OPW and Mayo County Council. He is correct that it is awaiting final approval from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The Minister, Deputy McGrath, and I both hope this issue can be resolved in the not-too-distant future. There is a lot of talk about climate change; this is a climate change mitigation measure for the people of Crossmolina and the wider community. It is one of a number of projects the …