This is a subscriber-only article
IFA president Joe Healy
“As a report it covers areas in relation to towns and villages, but there has been nothing there for farmers and rural dwellers and that’s the constituency that the IFA represents. It’s imperative that farmers don’t suffer this year what they have suffered on numerous occasions over the last few years.
‘‘In 2009, they were told that it was a once in 100-year happening. At the moment, water levels are way higher than they were last year. What the people want to see is action and no more reports or surveys.
‘‘There are rooms filled with millions of euro worth of paper; what we want to see now is action. There’s no surprise that there’s such anger. In fairness to Minister Canny and Boxer Moran, they have the best interest at heart, so we want to ensure they get the support that they need.”
Tom Cleary
“I am chair of the Shannon system flood alliance and, along with the IFA, we decided to hold a protest because we are not happy with what’s been done about flooding. The CFRAM report seems to be aimed at urban areas, we can’t accept that. There are people who have been living by the Shannon trying to make a living there.
‘‘In the report, it did mention some dredging, but they’re against it at the same time. Environmentally, it’s not viable, alas the environment is once again being put before the people. We are sick of the government spending millions and saying what they should do rather than going out and doing the work.
‘‘The torture of flooding; I cannot describe it, we should not have to go through this again. We’d ask the Government to give executive powers to the OPW to manage the Shannon so they can go out and do work, because work has to start now, let it be dredging or whatever. If the Government is not going to do something about it, the farmers are going to come together and do it themselves.
‘‘The farmers have protected wildlife all their life but it’s time to put the people – families – first.”
John Nolan, Mayor of Athlone
“The flood defences around the area of Athlone are welcomed in one sense but really there’s no proposed solution for the rural areas. We know from experience of last year’s flood that when we did defend the town of Athlone, it resulted in higher floods in rural areas because of displacement of water.
‘‘My view is, and always has been, that a targeted dredging programme could help mitigate flooding. In the last CFRAM public consultation, one of the proposed solutions involved a dredging programme costing €100m. Now that sounds like a lot of money, but from my experience on the council, in the last flooding event we spent €3m repairing roads and €1.4m on directs costs running pumps and on sandbags just for Westmeath. If you add up the costs from the local authorities down the Shannon, you’d be very quick to get to €100m. Before the last flood event, the Shannon was at its lowest in years and we’ve still seen unbelievable flood levels.”
Listen to farmer views from the protest in our podcast below:
Eugene Shine, farmer from Clonown, Co Roscommon
“We were promised that there was going to be work done but at the moment there has been nothing. If we get the same amount of rainfall that we have been getting, we’re heading into a lot bigger problem than last year.
‘‘We used to have a lot of corncrakes in our area along the Shannon callows in the 1990s. However they’re all gone. If the Shannon levels were kept 1m lower, there would be a lot less problems in the Shannon. We were always able to farm with normal levels of flooding. We don’t mind winter flooding but it’s the higher floods that are making life on the callows unbearable.”
Padraig Joyce, IFA flood project chair
“There’s nothing in it for farmers or rural dwellers. There’s potential for more flooding if the height of the Shannon has not gone down. There’s too many bodies involved in it. We would be hoping that we could get one body to control the Shannon. We need someone to take control over it. There are too many with interest in it; you have Waterways Ireland, National Parks and Wildlife and others that all want to have their say. If there’s no maintenance of the Shannon, we’re facing into the same floods going into 2017.”
Andrew McHugh
"Essentially, the flooding issue has been there for donkey’s years. In Longford, flooding is affecting farmers and their land. The CFRAM report is a bit of an absolute disaster, farmers have been considered to have no worth in it. People’s livelihoods are equally as important as the navigation. It’s very disappointing that dredging is not considered economically or environmentally viable by Jacobs in the CFRAM report. We are being considered worthless in it.”
Victor Ryder, farmer affected by Castlebeg turlough in Co Longford
“Thirty acres of my land remains flooded with floods only receding on parts of it. The grass is useless and not worth reseeding as the winter floods will only ruin it again. For eight to nine weeks, we couldn’t get out of the house without the tractor and all of the people in our area were housebound. We feel there’s nothing being done. There have been a lot of meetings alright, but no action. We would like to see a drainage system and dredging to get it sorted out; we are all very frustrated.”
Eamonn Leonard, farmer affected by the turlough at Lough Funshinagh
“I had to make a 16km round trip to get to the sheds I had cows calving in, and I had to do that four or five times a day. There was six or seven feet water outside the gate. I had silage the far side of the shed and I had to drive 25 minutes to get from one side of the shed to the other to feed the sheep and cattle.
‘‘Elderly people around me had to walk 500m across a field to get out of their houses from December to April. If they wanted a litre of milk, they had to get someone to bring it in across the field or go out themselves. Another couple ran out of kerosene, so the neighbours had to carry 25l drums in to fill the tank so they could get heat.”
SHARING OPTIONS: