Tipperary TD tells Irish Water to improve its public communications

Tipperary TD Martin Browne has called on Irish Water to improve their public communications following the lack of awareness leading up to the widespread interruption to the water supply in a significant part of Clonmel recently.

The Sinn Féin TD made the call after enquiries made by him indicate that the utility company’s level of engagement with the community fell far below what he was led to believe that day.

“When I and my colleague Dean McGrath (Sinn Féin representative for Clonmel) were contacted by local residents and businesses who were caught unaware by the interruption to their supply, I immediately contacted Irish Water, who claimed that they had adequately informed the locality of the planned outage,” Deputy Browne stated.

“However, such was the level of inconvenience caused, I followed up with Irish Water about how well the local community was informed ahead of the interruption.

“I have now found that the level of communication was far less than I was initially led to believe.

“In a response from Irish Water, I was told that vulnerable customers who have registered with Irish Water receive direct communications if outages are expected to last more than four hours, while Tipperary University Hospital, Clonmel was notified.

"This is hardly sufficient when an outage of this scale is planned. The lack of engagement with the residences or the businesses who were to be affected is an intolerable oversight.

“Nobody gets up in the morning to check Irish Water’s social media channels for planned outages before they go about their day’s business,” he stated.

“I have now written to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage to express my dissatisfaction; and I have called on him to demand that Irish Water issue written notice to customers when an outage of this scale is planned, and to inform all local media", he added.