Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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41. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the level of funding provided to local authorities in 2022 and in 2023 for minor flood mitigation works; the level of funding provided for 2024; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29488/24]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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Very useful work has been carried out under the minor flood mitigation works scheme, which deals particularly with localised flooding. It is small-scale funding provided at national level and has made a difference to householders and local communities. However, the criteria are restrictive and I hope the Minister would be in a position to have the criteria and conditions pertaining to the scheme loosened or improved. It could make a huge difference to many householders, particularly in rural communities where there is not sufficient weighting in favour of dispersed populations and roads with relatively low volumes of traffic.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The minor flood mitigation works and coastal protection scheme was introduced by the OPW on an administrative, non-statutory basis in 2009. The purpose of this demand-driven scheme is to provide funding to local authorities to undertake minor flood mitigation works or studies to address localised fluvial flooding and coastal protection problems within their administrative areas. Since 2009, the OPW has approved €66 million across some 900 unique local flood relief projects that protect some 7,900 properties through this scheme.

Applications for funding from local authorities are considered for flood relief and erosion-protection measures costing up to €750,000 in each instance. Funding of up to 90% of the cost is available for approved projects. Applications are assessed by the OPW having regard to the specific economic, social and environmental criteria of the scheme, including a cost-benefit ratio, and to the availability of funding for flood risk management. Full details of this scheme are available on the OPW’s flood information website, www.floodinfo.ie.

A review of the scheme to ensure that it continues to support the local authorities in their work to address localised fluvial flooding and coastal protection issues is under way and will be finalised shortly. The OPW welcomes applications for funding under this scheme and is happy to engage with local authorities in this regard. Funding approved under this scheme to local authorities in the years requested is as follows.

In 2022, funding of €2.9 million was approved for 26 projects, in 2023, funding of €3.3 million was provided for 24 projects and up to 4 July this year, funding of €1.8 million has been provided for 13 projects. To go back to the review and the core point the Deputy makes, a review of the administrative arrangements for the scheme was completed in June 2017. A further review of the scheme to ensure that it can continue to support the local authorities in their work to address localised fluvial flooding and coastal protection issues has been under way and will be finalised shortly. I am looking at this at the moment and at the work my officials have done and am giving consideration to updating the scheme.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister of State for his answer and I sincerely hope the review can be completed shortly. Obviously, when the Department is disbursing public money, there has to be a cost-benefit ratio but one thing that concerns me is that in assessing the merit of flood relief schemes, not enough consideration is given to sparsely populated areas and to roads and arterial routes that may have relatively low levels of traffic. We may have a local road but that is the motorway for the local community. I know criteria must be laid down in regard to public expenditure and we all understand that. However, one criterion of this scheme is that there has been flooding over a considerable period of time. I know from talking to engineers, farmers and people living in the countryside that a flood that rises quickly can be very dangerous. That same flood may also decrease or go down very quickly but that type of flooding does not meet the criteria of the Department's scheme at present. I am familiar with certain rural roads, as are all of us who are out late at night, coming and going to meetings and so on, where at times after heavy rainfall, with water coming down from mountains or high hills, there is flash flooding and very dangerous conditions. Unfortunately, there have been fatalities over the years and serious accidents. I appeal to the Minister of State to ask his officials to amend that particular part of the criteria. I also ask him to take into account roads that have lesser volumes of traffic.

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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Deputy Durkan has a supplementary question.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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I will make a quick intervention in support of my colleague, Deputy Smith. It is important to recognise that strategic flood alleviation has to be undertaken on an ongoing basis. The emphasis has been on flood plains and so forth but the whole country should not have to become a flood plain. When roads become flooded, they disintegrate. Their foundations become soft and they cannot carry traffic without potholing. In County Roscommon, in the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach's own constituency, flooding has threatened people's livelihoods and homes and it continues, to the best of my knowledge.. It is something that should be dealt with radically, quickly and directly, without having to wait until it gets worse. The same goes for the coastal erosion along the east coast, which I am more familiar with than along some of the other coasts.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I take on board the points made by Deputy Smith and in my consideration of the review of the scheme, I will take those factors into account. I note the points he makes and I also note the points made by Deputy Durkan. In terms of the review of the scheme, I will take everything in the round. My officials are the professionals in the area but I am a practising politician like the Deputies and I always build into what is happening on the ground.

It might interest Deputy Smith to note in relation to applications from Cavan and Monaghan that since 2009, the OPW has approved funding under the minor flood mitigation works and coastal protection scheme of €463,302 for ten projects in County Cavan and approximately €2.5 million for 27 projects in County Monaghan. Interestingly, there have been no applications under the scheme from the local authorities in Cavan or Monaghan since 2022. I do not have any information to hand in respect of Kildare.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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It is ongoing.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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Yes, it is ongoing and the Deputy's points are duly noted.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister of State. I ask that council officials would engage with officials from the OPW to see if it is worthwhile submitting an application for the projects they had in mind. The restrictive nature of the scheme is preventing applications from being submitted. I am sure every one of us can identify projects that we think would be suitable.

In considering how to deal with flood relief, officials at local and national level should always talk to local communities. The best informed people in regard to dealing with flooding issues are the farming community in particular. They have seen and experienced over the years what causes flooding. If I travel through west Cavan, on roads in Glangevlin, Dowra, Blacklion, under the Cuilcagh mountain range and along the Border, I can be certain that on a bad night I will run into a flood. I have to divert and take a different route from a safety point of view but the local community are being hit with that on a constant basis.

I will expand the question, if I may. I have also tabled a question related to the Arterial Drainage Act 1945 and implore the Minister of State to ensure that the OPW has ongoing and more detailed contact with its counterparts in the Department for Infrastructure in Northern Ireland, the former Rivers Agency. A lot of the flooding in my area is common to both Fermanagh and Cavan. When the Erne catchment area water levels rise, we are all in trouble. We need a greater intensification of co-operation on a cross-Border and all-Ireland basis in regard to flooding problems.

Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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On the point about local communities, I come from a constituency which has lived with flooding for many years. The local community, including local farmers, have a knowledge base that is really invaluable. I know from dealing with the local authority in Limerick that it very much values the input of the local community.

On cross-Border co-operation, that continues but if the Deputy wishes to raise flooding issues specific to the Border area that he represents, I ask him to make direct contact with me and the OPW and we will follow up on it.