06.20.07
Galway
forgot to post Sunday’s column earlier..
Galway City Council set last Friday as a deadline to receive sufficient water from the Luimnagh Water Treatment Plant to supply the city and bring Galway citizens a step closer to having the “Boil Water” notice lifted. The deadline passed without the target being reached and so Galway enters the festival season without safe water in many parts of the city and county. Anyone following the saga of the poisonous water supply, which so far has made at least 236 people extremely ill, won’t be surprised that the deadline was missed. Why should they when the council themselves labelled the target of June 15th as “ambitious”? That’s code for “not a hope in hell but if we set a date it’ll keep people quiet for a while”.
How on earth are people coping in Galway? How do you have a shower and not inhale the water? How do you bath toddlers and babies? How do the old and the infirm manage? What effect will it have on tourism? It must be a nightmare. It’s been going on since the 14th March and will continue for some months to come.
Dick Roche, the ex-Minister for the Environment ran a pretty effective campaign for the last few months in which he unequivocally blamed the council for failing to draw down €21.5m from the Department which had been allocated to build a new water treatment plant. I didn’t believe him for two reasons. Firstly, the former Minister proved his greatest talent in office was for talking absolute rubbish. He seemed genuinely upset in an interview with Tom McGurk on Friday over the loss of his job, and I felt sorry for him. But his expertise at bluster, however well-meaning, drove me to distraction.
Secondly, Galway isn’t the only county with water problems. Polluted water supplies in Ireland are so common that just a few weeks ago the EU sent the Irish government a final written warning that their continued failure to provide clean water to its citizens will result in them facing daily fines. The EU identified “lack of or inadequate treatment of the urban wastewater discharges of towns and villages” as one of the main causes of surface water pollution in Ireland. Just last week the Environmental Protection Agency reported that one third of our water supplies are contaminated.
Even if the ex-Minister was right and Galway City Council is at fault that doesn’t explain why almost every other county in Ireland has contaminated water. There are only two explanations for the long term mismanagement of water supplies throughout the country. One is that our local government is staffed by a bunch of incompetents. The other is that the Department of the Environment has systematically starved local government of the funds and personnel required to provide safe water. Or maybe it’s a bit of both. One thing that is absolutely certain is that no civil or public servant will be fired, demoted, shifted sideways or have their benchmarked pay rises stopped despite the almost criminal ineptitude involved. The chief characteristic of our executive is the complete lack of accountability for mistakes, large and small. No one is ever to blame.
Let’s take a quick look at the story in Galway to see if it sheds any light on where accountability lies.
The €21.5m was allocated in 2001. At the time, Galway City Council was in the middle of constructing the new waste water treatment plant at Mutton Island and a major sewage scheme at Knocknacarra. The engineering staff at the council were working full time on these and other projects. Now “allocating” money does not mean that the Department of the Environment sends down a cheque for €21.5m to Galway City Council. It simply means that they will set aside these funds and make them available when the project is underway. Before the council sees a cent, they have to prepare and submit detailed plans which require departmental approval. They can’t prepare the plans if they don’t have the staff. Galway City Council asked for extra engineers and were refused so the €21.5m stayed in the bank.
Around 2004 the Mutton Island and Knocknacarra projects were nearing completion and staff were freed up to prepare plans for the new water treatment plant. According to local Fine Gael councillor Padraig Conneelly, when Galway city officials approached the Department they were told to hold off until new procedures for public procurement were finalised. From then until March 2007 it is believed that some kind of lily-livered memo-swapping exercise took place between the city and the department. We don’t know exactly what was said in the correspondence because despite Cllr Conneelly’s many requests, the City Manager Joe McGrath has failed to provide him with the paper trail.
All we do know is that nothing happened. Why do staff at council and departmental level write letters to each other for three years and not act even though money is available? Why do people not do the jobs for which they are paid?
People work hard at their job for three reasons. The first and best reason is that they are empowered to do their job. If an employee sees a problem, tries to fix it and is thwarted by bureaucratic delays, pretty soon they’ll stop trying. The second motivator is fear. If you spot a problem and know that you, personally, will be in deep trouble unless it’s sorted out, you won’t leave the office until a solution is found. Finally, there is money. If financial rewards or penalties are linked to productivity, it’s amazing what people will do to keep the money rolling in.
It’s pretty obvious that in Galway, and throughout our civil service none of these motivating factors are present. No one gets fired, everyone gets their benchmarking raises and most dispiriting of all, any government employee I ever spoke to feels utterly powerless in the face of systemic lethargy.
The source of this collective unwillingness of the central and local government to perform their jobs urgently and diligently lies squarely with its political leaders. It is unacceptable for Ministers to preside over government departments and disassociate themselves from the long term paralysis that afflicts the administration.
More powerful is the culture that the Minister of the day imbeds in his department. Do they exert pressure and make demands or do they sit back at meetings and accept excuses and obfuscation for inaction? Does the Minister accept responsibility for mistakes under his watch or does he pass the buck? If the Minister won’t accept responsibility then why should a City Manager or an area engineer?
More importantly, do the voters demand that Ministers generate results in their departments? Since Fianna Fail have been in government for 18 of the last 20 years and supplied all the poll toppers in the various Galway constituencies, then the answer to that question is clearly “no.” The Fianna Fail tent at the Galway Races will be sold out but the occupants won’t care because they’ll be drinking champagne while the citizens boil water so they can wash their teeth. The people truly get the government they deserve.
The Crewser said,
June 20, 2007 at 8:42 pm
More of the same old anti FF rubbish Sarah Carey.The Sunday Times would do well to seek out someone with a little less bias when they want a columnist. Perhaps I may even offer myself to them.
Gerry said,
June 20, 2007 at 9:19 pm
crewser, the one trick is really tired. Great column Sarah, you are on much better ground in the political than the domestic. It’s good the ST are letting you write about it.
joseph said,
June 20, 2007 at 10:40 pm
Tel the truth the crewser is really Noel Dempsey smarting from the Q and A session.
liam said,
June 20, 2007 at 10:54 pm
Crewser, do you not think that, as one of the wealthiest countries in the EU, we should be collectively outraged that the “EU sent the Irish government a final written warning that their continued failure to provide clean water to its citizens will result in them facing daily fines”? Do you not think it’s shocking that raw sewage is entering into our water supply and are you not angry that the “Environmental Protection Agency reported that one third of our water supplies are contaminated?”
Do you not feel some shame? This is not begrudgery or whinging or negative stuff, this is appalling.
Leave aside your party political bias for the moment as we know where both you and sarah stand. Instead, if you disagree with Sarah’s column, please engage with her blog and offer your counter-argument. Enlighten us!
aday said,
June 21, 2007 at 5:25 pm
“More of the same old anti FF rubbish Sarah Carey. The Sunday Times would do well to seek out someone with a little less bias when they want a columnist. Perhaps I may even offer myself to them.”
Kettle. Pot. Black.
The Crewser said,
June 21, 2007 at 5:44 pm
Now you’ve t it aday. A little balance would then be struck.
omaniblog said,
June 21, 2007 at 9:40 pm
I think Sarah has written a great piece. I only wish I’d bought the Sunday Times to see it in situ. We, meaning the Irish public, need this sort of strongly argued anger directed against the status quo.
I can understand supporters of the status quo protesting that her voice is too loud or too strong. I can also understand such defenders of the status quo being reluctant to argue against her: they are, after all, the very people who have conspired to achieve “one third of our water supplies are contaminated”.
But I take issue with Sarah’s identification of government ministers as the correct target for the anger. In my view, the ministers are merely politicians whose main interest is in re-election. It is the people who are lazy, deliberately blind and silent. It is the local people in Galway who let their local politicians and council employees get away with it all. There was enough in the public arena. The full story of what went on behind the scenes isn’t out yet, but locals knew the water was turning bad. I bet they even smelt it.
I saw the newspaper report about “one third of our water supplies are contaminated.” I also noticed precious little protest.
Outsourcing the responsibility to politicians, and especially government ministers, project the responsibility on to others, is a very limited identification of those who are responsible for the water disgrace.
I heard the representative of Failte Ireland on Newstalk106 with George Hook. She said the problem was almost sorted and, anyway all the hotels have filters… I heard her minimise the issue because it was her job to spin the situation so as to encourage tourist to go to Galway’s festivals. As Sarah says there is code spoken.
I hope Sarah will become more provocative, at least on this blog. I would like her to give up supporting Fine Gael and move to supporting the Irish people. She has a powerful voice, unusually articulate and coherent when she avoids party politics. Her voice is too good to be open to the charge that she is simply striving to elect Enda & co.
Even though I have differed from her point of view, and said that she puts too much emphasis on political personalities, I am so glad she has a professional interest in fighting for a better environment. And I thank her for the challenge she has made to the status quo.
The last thing you need in a disgraceful crisis is balance, pleaded for pathetically.
Sarah said,
June 22, 2007 at 5:03 pm
Crewser, I am only deleting your comments now to bug you
I love debate, I know I get it wrong plenty of times, mostly I demand that comments are either informative or entertaining. But you are just a troll….
The Crewser said,
June 22, 2007 at 6:37 pm
Sometimes Sarah, I feel like a fox in the hen house on this site. Everyone is against me, everyone hates my guts and most people think I am doing something I shouldn’t be doing by responding to your carefully crafted writings. But answer me this Sarah, why shouldn’t I respond to them. The only reason you dont find my responses informative or entertaining is that you dont agree with them. So what. I dont find a lot of what appears very entertaining either.
Sarah said,
June 22, 2007 at 8:40 pm
Crewser, regular readers of this site will know that vehement debate is par for the course here. You are just posting in order to annoy people and I am having great crack deleting your comments just to annoy you. Honestly, them minute you manage to be funny or useful, your comments can stay. xxxxx Sarah
gp said,
June 24, 2007 at 10:29 pm
>>I am doing something I shouldn’t be doing by responding to your carefully crafted writings.
Were comments where you posted anything more substantive than “la la la – you are just a FF-hater” removed from this page???
The Crewser said,
June 25, 2007 at 8:39 pm
The answer to that, gp is a very definite yes.
The Crewser said,
June 25, 2007 at 8:43 pm
For the benefit of gp I am reposting what was most recently deleted. Plenty to debate in this piece but I am not really surprised that the regular visitors as Sarah might describe them would be prepared to acknowledge that.
Here it is gp
Sarah, the only people who are being annoyed are those who only want to hear one side of the story. I am unashamedly giving them the other side, sometimes with a few barbs attached
Anyway good to see Beverley Flynn has settled up her costs issue with RTE.
This was something which never should have arisen in the first instance and I hope NIB or Danske Bank as they now call themselves did the right thing in the end. No employeee, whether they have gone into poblic life or not afterwards should be held responsible for the actions of their employers as Bev was in this case. The fact that RTE did a hatchet job on her was quite appalling and she was perfectly right to attempt to clear her name. Shame on Charlie Bird and George Lee.
Lets hope that the tightening of the laws on invasion of privacy which Michael McDowell had on his ajenda will be brought onto the Statute Books by the new Government.
The stability of the said Government will certainly be increased no end by the news that Bevs case is now settled.
Iwo Jimmy said,
June 26, 2007 at 9:49 am
It’s strange to have this turn into an FG vs FF debate when both parties agree on the same policies that caused the situation in the first place.
Um, so what are those policies? Well there’s the policy of opposition to the EU implementation of the nitrates directive and the one that encvourages people to live in remote fields and store their poo in porous boxes in the front garden.
The first policy is there to scab votes from farmers by encouraging them to soil the water supply for everyone else to save themselves a few shillings. The second policy is there to allow farmers to convert agricultural land into cash for building sites, so that land use continues in a pattern that is utterly dependent on cars and that sucks the life out of towns and villages.
FG is merely a weak mirror of FF. There is no clean water in Galway because the local farmers and one-off residents soiled their own supply with animal and human pee and poo. Not rocket science.
Sarah is right that the rest of the country suffers similar problems. It was funny at the count in Arklow where Cock Roache was re-elected, they had another of their frequent boil water alerts that night.
Sarah said,
June 26, 2007 at 1:38 pm
well I know the farmers are easy to knock but remember, the EU identified that URBAN waste water treatment (or lack thereof) is the principal cause of contamination and in Galway it was their own untreated sewage from the urban area that was going into Lough Corrib.
And also remember that modern one-off houses don’t have septic tanks anymore which can overflow. They have sealed waste water treatment systems. The waste can’t escape. Its the council’s own sewage systems which are polluting in many, not all, cases.
Ricky The Saint said,
June 26, 2007 at 3:45 pm
Sarah, you are wrong, modern waste water treatment plants (WWTPs) like spetic tranks discharge via percolation systems to the ground and need regular maintenance, in most case annual, to work effectively. The actual rate of emptying septic tanks and maintenance of WWTPs is way of being annual fo most households and it would be commonplace for these systems never to get a look after installation. Also, the ground conditions across much of the midlands and west of ireland are unsuitable for percolation of waste water. It is feasible that septic tanks or or onsite waste water treatment system effluents are the source of the Galway contamination.
Similarly, agricultural spreading of farm, industrial (e.g. abatoir) and sewage sludge could be a source.
Urban WWTP and farm spreading are regulated to some extent, whereas once of domestic WWTPs receive no regulation other than cursory planning approval for which most local authorities have limit expertise.
However, local authorities tend to have pitiful knowledge of their environmental responsibilities and have no desire to enforce the regulations on themselves and others. Hence the pitiful quality of water in ireland with regards to microbial contamination.
I won’t be surprised if the tourist that visit here worry about drink irish water in the same way that irish tourists worried about Spainish or Greek water quality in the 70 and 80s. This another result of government clientelism damaging the environment and the viablility of tourism in rural areas.
Sarah said,
June 26, 2007 at 5:10 pm
well, I can only speak for Co. Meath but when I applied for planning permission we had to do extensive tests for percolation and then submit to the council our signed contract and receipt of money with the WWT company. And like clockwork the guys have shown up 3 times (and we are only here 2.5 years) to service the system.
If that works here, and so simply, then why not elsewhere? So on what evidence do you say that overflowing unregulated septic tanks are “common place”? Btw, the WWTC that supplies us begs us not to use bleach or biological detergents and we don’t (though the biological detergents got the heave ho for other reasons too). My urban friends use these products cheerfully – a significant source of pollution causing nitrates.
And remember the EU identified the council’s OWN urban WW as the source of pollution (and I don’t have time to find the source here but I am pretty sure the source of the cryptothingy in Galway is the councils own sewage treatment plant). I am not saying there isn’t a problem with old septic tanks and farmers, but this easy little consensus on the identity of the scapegoats doesn’t square with what my experience or the EU’s report.
Ricky The Saint said,
June 27, 2007 at 2:18 pm
Yes, some counties have good management of new WWTPS through the planning process, however there are problems, see link
http://www.galway.ie/en/Services/Planning/PlanningNews/PlanningSeminar/Difficultsitesdifficultdecisions/TheFile,630,en.pdf
yes, some people are responsible in the management of their domestic WWTPs, is this commonly the case? I think we all know its not.
It is least costly to blame the CoCo treatment works politically and financially,
to admit that farmers are the source would mean restricting herd numbers, grazing areas, slurry spreading, right across sensitive areas, and undoubtedly compensation
to blame household WWTPs would mean revising development plans to restrict development and where permitted the placement of onerous maintence and monitoring conditions,
If memory serves me right, in Galway the type of Crypto present was DNA typed to a human source, but this could relate to many sources given that corrib receives untreated sewage from several villages, undertreated effluent from towns, raw sewerage from pleasure boats and the effluent from poorly sited/maintained domestic WWTPs. Of course, this would be less significant if Galways drinking water treatment plant was operated properly.
leon said,
July 25, 2007 at 10:02 am
I saw this and thought of this thread, the woes of the west, farming, agricultutre, overdevelopment and one-off housing
http://www.wrbd.ie/PDF/Water%20Matters%20booklet%20PDF.pdf