Fears for future of Mayo group water schemes

Edwin McGreal

The older age profile of many organisers of group water schemes in the county has led to fears for the future of such schemes.
The concern was raised by Achill-based Cllr Paul McNamara (FF) at the December meeting of the West Mayo Municipal District, and his fears were echoed by Iarla Moran, the Head of Water Services at Mayo County Council. “Particularly in Achill but in a lot of rural areas, there are a lot of group water schemes and they do take a lot of running,” said Cllr McNamara.
“They are run voluntarily. My fear is that group water schemes are being looked after by people who are reaching an elderly age and an awful lot of the young people never, ever got involved in them. As you know, in rural Ireland, a lot of young people are gone. I fear for a good few of those group schemes if they are not taken over fairly quickly. Who will be around to man them?” he asked.
He praised the council for the support it provides to group water schemes when difficulties arise but asked for the process of schemes being taken over to be much quicker than it currently is.
“At the moment I know in Achill we’ve seven or eight of them and my fear is they will all start giving trouble at once and that’s when it will become a major problem,” he said.
Iarla Moran had previously told the meeting the Dugort Group Water Scheme in Achill will be taken over in the early part of next year, as would the Cahir scheme in Louisburgh and four group schemes in Belmullet. He did share Cllr McNamara’s fears too.
“The age profile is a concern in a lot of group schemes. One of the ways is to have it taken over but some of them are not suitable to be taken over because they are private sources or whatever else.
“But we do subsidise group schemes in their operations and if a number of them came together, they could maybe employ someone to manage those schemes on a more professional basis or a part-time basis and there is funding available for that so there are options there.
“In terms of speeding up the process ... the process is fairly involved in getting schemes up to a standard that Irish Water will accept, and there is quite a lot of work that has to be done in relation to mapping and so on and it all does take time. We are working with the Department and Irish Water on taking over small schemes and trying to have maybe a less-arduous process for that. That’s happening a little bit around the county, we’ve had some success with that,” said Mr Moran.