Irish Water delegation accused of failing to meet islanders during visit

Islanders on Inis Oírr experiencing chronic water shortages and drought discovered by accident that an Irish Water delegation had flown out to the island last month, but failed to meet island representatives.

Inis Oírr co-op manager Paddy Crowe told The Irish Times that it had made a series of requests to meet Irish Water over its ongoing problems, with no response.

“We then learned that a delegation from Irish Water had flown to all three Aran islands on September 12th, but didn’t even bother to talk to us directly, or notify us in advance” he said.

Freephone number

“We had never managed to get past the 1800 freephone number, and we have tried reaching it through

Galway

West TDs.”

The island, which has a population of more than 260 people, has no water between the hours of 6pm and 10am due to its low supply.

Shipments of water had to be delivered during the summer, when its population doubled due to Irish language students and tourists.

The most southerly of the three Aran islands faces regular summer droughts due to relative low rainfall, and the difficulty of drilling wells that are not contaminated by seawater.

Its co-op has run rainwater harvesting courses for residents, but has made many appeals for a long-term solution.

Response

Irish Water said in response that its representatives “regularly travel over to the Aran islands in order to assess the situation and ensure that the water supply there is maintained”.

"Water supply on the islands is monitored on a daily basis," it said, and "as part of this ongoing work a number of Irish Water representatives and Galway County Council staff working on behalf of Irish Water made a trip to each of the three islands on September 12th".

“The purpose of the trip was to visit the treatment plants and reservoir sites on each of the islands and to witness at first hand the current position with each of the islands,” it said.

“A review of emergency tankering plans was also conducted,” it said.

It made no reference to requests by the co-op to meet it.