'Arrogance and BS' of OPW slammed by Mayo councillors

Multiple Mayo councillors have voiced their dissent after the Office of Public Works declined to accept a recent request to attend a Municipal District meeting.

At a recent meeting of the Swinford-Claremorris Municipal District, a request was made for a representative of the body that manages the state's property portfolio, national heritage sites, and flood risk engineering to answer questions.

Councillors wished to discuss a number of topics, chief amongst them issues in waterways around Cong.

However, following an invitation to Wednesday’s meeting, the request wasn’t granted, sparking displeasure from around the table.

First to offer his musings on the subject was Cllr Damien Ryan.

“That's an insult, and I take grave exception to it,” the Fianna Fáil member stated. “Everybody has a boss, and I'm not going to put up with that.

“There's a number of things that are key to our work and our public waterways department, and the OPW is a public body paid for by the public purse.

“The main reason I wanted them in for September was that you can walk on the rivers in Cong at the moment, with the water levels so low. That won't be the case in six weeks' time.”

Cllr Patsy O’Brien expressed similar sentiments.

“It seems like if it's not in the Midlands it doesn't really matter. But it does matter because it's hugely important.

“We have several interlinked turloughs in the south and north, several interlinked toilets, and that has an impact before it meets the Corrib or the Mask. It's their duty.”

Cllr Michael Burke voiced frustrations about the difficulty of sourcing prompt responses from public bodies such as the OPW and ESB via email.

Last to broach the subject was Councillor Neil Cruise of Fine Gael.

“We've invited different people into this room here, we had people in here today, admittedly County Council people, but I've never seen anyone shot in here.

“We're not asking them for their left hand, we're not asking them for their right hand. Come in and meet us and cut out that bloody nonsense. There's too much of this arrogance and BS going on, ‘send me an email’ or this sort of nonsense.

“Something can be sorted out in five minutes in this room, but you could be emailing half a year and no one paying one bit of heed of us. So it's a reasonable request.”

Cllr Cruise also backed up calls that Taoiseach Micheál Martin, Tánaiste Simon Harris, and the Minister presiding over the OPW, Kevin ‘Boxer’ Moran, should all be written to in relation to the situation at hand.

“If they want to come down out of their ivory towers and meet us, we'd much appreciate it. I think it's a fair request. The request has always been put to them mannerly..

“We've used a nice approach now. It's time to get them to sit up now and realise we're not just auld Micks down on the West of Ireland.”

Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.