The Labour Party has called for a Dáil inquiry into the contamination of Galway's water supply.
The call was made by Labour's environment spokesman Eamon Gilmore yesterday as party president Michael D Higgins launched his general election campaign for Galway West.
He also criticised the Government for its delay in implementing the EU Water Framework Directive.
"Minister for the Environment Dick Roche should spend a little more time in finding a solution to this shocking problem, and a little less time in trying to shift the blame," Mr Gilmore said. The Minister seemed to be attaching "greater priority" to "finding somebody to blame" than to resolution of the issue, he said.
The number of cases of the cryptosporidiosis gastrointestinal illness in Galway still stands at 186, according to the Health Service Executive (HSE) West.
The boil water notice issued on March 15th remains in place for affected areas of Galway city and county, as far as Tuam, Moycullen and Athenry.
Local authority officials are due to meet counterparts from the Department of the Environment within the next fortnight over plans for a new water treatment plant. Short-term measures to supplement the city supply with water from the Tuam treatment system - itself already over-extended - are expected to be in place by mid-June.
Mr Gilmore said: "The immediate priority must be to restore clean drinking water in Galway. Minister Roche's first and urgent duty must be to send in the engineers and the water scientists to get safe, clean drinking water back into the taps. His second duty must be to accelerate the upgrading of water treatment plants, so that this problem will never recur."
Mr Gilmore said that Labour wants a Dáil inquiry into "how a modern city of 90,000 people has been left with no clean drinking water for five weeks".
"All relevant council officials, departmental staff, Ministers and councillors should be required to appear before the inquiry, which would be carried out by the Dáil Committee on the Environment, to establish the full facts that led to the Galway crisis and to make recommendations to ensure that it can never happen again."
