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EU Support Crucial to make Irish Towns Flood Resilient – Minister Kelly

Minister for the Environment, Community & Local Government, Alan Kelly has today (Wednesday 20th January, 2016) met with the EU Environment Commissioner Vella in Brussels to brief him on the Irish Government’s response to the recent flooding events in Ireland.

The Minister relayed how the recent floods have left many Irish towns and communities feeling unprotected and that work needs to progress over the short and medium term to address this given the nature of climate change and how it is likely to affect Ireland.

Commissioner Vella expressed the Commission’s support as regards the Government’s actions in addressing both the humanitarian aspects of the recent flooding events and taking the steps necessary to avoid recurrences into the future.
Both the Commissioner and Minister Kelly agreed to closely co-operate on sharing of information and good practice on application of EU Environmental legislation – including matters relating to alleviating flood risks where the Commission has legitimate interests from a water management, wildlife or environmental perspective.
Ensuring good quality information and assessments will also speed up projects that may require approval on the grounds of overriding public interest. Minister Kelly highlighted that he was satisfied that, taking the proper steps, Ireland can quickly and effectively learn from recent events and take the actions needed where they are needed in the light of impacts on local communities.

Minister Kelly said:
“Now that the floods have somewhat subsided, it is time to put in place the measures to make communities feel protected and its hugely important to have the Commissioner’s support for our actions. It is quite likely that we will be seeking to use the public interest grounds to advance key projects in protecting our town’s and hopefully this new process will allow for that,”

“The meeting was a further opportunity to brief the Commission on our recent experiences and to get support for what needs to be done. It is not a case of EU laws not allowing us to do what we need, but where there are legitimate river basin issues as there are on the Shannon, early engagement with and support from the EU will make our flood response run much smoother.”