European election candidate, Ciaran Mullooly, has hit out at the unfair treatment of farmers when it comes to water quality.The Independent Ireland candidate and former RTE journalist, who is running in the five-seat Midlands North-West constituency, which spans fifteen counties, says he fully recognises the challenges farmers are facing in this regard.
“Farmers are experiencing difficulties with climate change regulations coming from Europe and in relation to derogation and water quality issues,” Mullooly said.“These are of major significance and will have a huge impact on the economic well-being of both farmers and rural communities across the country.
“But while nobody denies that water quality is essential for everyone, and should be a priority, the majority of the scrutiny for water quality falls on to the agriculture sector. It is the sector that comes in for most criticism,” Mr Mullooly said, “and this is very frustrating for farmers.
He said that there are many other contributors to water quality in Ireland, and they don’t seem to face the same level of scrutiny. “Local authority sewage treatment works, for example, contribute millions of gallons of treated water, but these were never designed for the volumes going through them with the increase in population of the towns they serve, and they are not able to cope. It is widely believed that many of these may be discharging large quantities of untreated, or incorrectly treated sewage or water into the countryside. This is going to have major impact on everyone. When the water is discharged from these sewage treatment plants, it is monitored at rivers and watercourses.
“If it fails to meet the required standard, the spotlight comes immediately back on farmers. This is unfair and must be addressed.“Industry too, is a major contributor to effluent discharge.“In both of these cases, there is a corporate body responsible. They have staff and management in abundance. Yet they aren’t always successful in their management of discharges from their plants, and these plants haven’t been upgraded to meet new demand. In the case of agriculture, most farmers are sole traders. It is down to an individual farmer. Yet when it comes to blame, the farmer is the easy target.“
