Sir, – Your article (News, November 5th) quotes Irish Water and Fingal County Council blaming the latest fiasco on "heavy rain and turbidity"! Apart from the latter word covering a multitude of excuses, what is going to happen if we continue to have bad weather? – Yours, etc,
TADHG McCARTHY,
Bray,
Co Wicklow.
Sir, – At the height of the water charges protest, Irish Water repeatedly issued dire warnings about falling supply due to lack of rainfall. As recently as last year, restrictions were imposed “in order to protect our homes and businesses from outages later on”. Now we have “boil-water” notices being issued to 600,000 homes, and the reason given for the problem is “heavy rainfall” which is overwhelming equipment.
Given the absurdity of the contention that Ireland is water-stressed, are we witnessing a change in tack to more plausible-sounding scare tactics to make water charges palatable? – Yours, etc,
JIM O’SULLIVAN,
Rathedmond,
Sligo.
Sir, – In 2006 I had the pleasure of serving on a military mission in the African Union Headquarters in Addis Ababa, capital of Ethiopia.
The city council were rightly proud of the fact that all of that fine city’s water supply was potable at all times of the year.
In Ireland, the second boil-water notice concerning my local reservoir at Leixlip has just been announced, to my genuine surprise.
Which of our great nations is truly in the so-called developed world? – Yours, etc,
KEVIN BYRNE,
(Lieut-Col, Retired),
Celbridge,
Co Kildare.
Sir, – The current recommendation to boil water reminds me of the late WC Fields’s proclamation, “I never drink water. Fish do the most disgusting things in it.” – Yours, etc,
DAVID LOWTHER,
Harold’s Cross,
Dublin 6W.