Mayo county manager Peter Hynes told the July meeting of the council this week that the polluter pays principle is not sustainable at the current time. Mr Hynes was responding to a question from Sinn Féin councillor Rose Conway Walsh about the possibility of any major project coming on stream in Mayo, such as the Belmullet sewerage scheme, with the expected reduction in the councils capital budget next year, and the polluter pays principle contribution the council would have to make.
Mr Hynes told the meeting: “Polluter pays is an ongoing debate, polluter pays is not sustainable in the current times, it can’t be. Some other local authorities have made progress on it, but we hope to make some more on it ourselves.”
With the expected drop in the funding for capital projects in the county to continue next year, Mr Hynes told the meeting that things will be tougher again next year. The county manager went on to say that: “There are going to be a lot of harsh and hard decisions made in the last three months of this year.”
