Public representatives across Tipperary have been inundated with calls from the public over the Bank Holiday weekend due to continued issues with water supplies in the county.
A number of boil water notices are in place while the dispute involving members of the Unite trade union led to outages on a number of supplies, particularly in the south of the county.
Cashel based Sinn Féin TD Martin Browne says the lack of clarity from Uisce Éireann is totally unacceptable.
He was in touch with them four times last Thursday and got four different answers as to when water supplies would be restored.
“The first one was the problems in the reservoir had been fixed, the water was being turned back on at 1 o’clock and everyone should have water that evening. But by the fourth message at 9 o’clock that night it was ‘no, serious problems’. It was going to be Sunday, Monday, Tuesday by the time water gets back.
“Now that’s unacceptable from any company never mind a semi-state body like Irish Water. Someone needs to hold their hands up and start giving out proper information both over the phone and on their web page because it’s a nightmare to deal with them.”
Speaking on Tipp Today Martin Browne accused Uisce Éireann of trying to get water charges reintroduced.
The Sinn Féin Deputy thinks the utility is not trying very hard to provide a satisfactory service.
“If you want to be cynical about it I actually think it’s being done deliberately to wear people down to try and get back to where we were a couple of years ago with water charges being brought back in.
“We did not have these problems when the council had control. And when you had a problem you could ring someone locally and within a couple of hours someone was able to come out. They knew where you were living – in Donaskeigh or Annacarty or above in Garrykennedy. Someone knew where the problem was and were able to fix it in a couple of hours.”
