Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE) has welcomed a European Court of Justice ruling against Ireland under the EU Drinking Water Directive.
Referring to contaminated group water schemes in rural areas, the court said: "The argument that Ireland has taken steps to improve the quality of its water intended for human consumption cannot be accepted."
After more than four years of argument in a case brought by FIE, it ruled that 145,000 rural houses with group water schemes would now benefit by the protection of the directive, including 55,000 households who sourced their own water. "Ireland's attempts to exclude all group water schemes from the jurisdiction of the directive was conclusively rejected," an FIE spokesman said, adding that the Government should now "move swiftly to clean up rural drinking water supplies".