Council to seek Minister's help

Last week The Sentinel reported how, despite examining every avenue available to them, local and central government agencies had been unable to unearth any way to prevent the continuing exploration of the tunnel system under Pump Street by Brian McCarthy and his associates.

A high-powered brain-storming session was convened on March 16, at which the Housing Executive, Fire Service, Building Control, Heritage and Museum Services, the Road Service and the NIEA Built Heritage, held discussions on how to stop Mr McCarthy, but they soon discovered they could do nothing to bring his activities to an end.

That meeting followed a meeting in February between planners, the Roads Service and PSNI, who were also unable to identify any remit that would allow them to stop Mr McCarthy and his friends.

At a recent planning services committee meeting and at last week's environment services meeting it was decided to take the issue to Asembly level and appeal to the Environment Minister for a change in legislation.

At Thursday's meeting concern was expressed about the safety issues involved, and some committee members hit out at the nature of some reporting in the media.

The SDLP's Shaun Gallagher said he was concerned if nothing was done to stop Mr McCarthy that it would set a precedent for others to start digging down to the subterranean networks under the City or under houses.

Grave danger

Warning that there could be a serious accident and ratepayers were going to have to pick up the bill, Mr Gallagher said: "This exercise is a grave danger to him and to others, and more importantly, no one knows or is aware of where the tunnels are going, or how much digging he is doing. "At the end of the day if we have to go the Assembly to get the gentleman to stop then so be it."

"If someone told him there was gold under Foyleside and he wanted to tunnel under there, there is nothing to stop him," he said during the meeting.

Agreeing with Mr Gallagher's comments, committee chairman, Gerry MacLochlainn, said a number of issues flowed from the explorations underground including that some authority was needed to stop such activity and he would be quite happy to see the Council obtain the remit for imposing the legislation.

"You cannot allow people to go digging under the City. If you tunnel under something you need to get a licence. You cannot dig under the City willy-nilly without some kind of licence."

Meanwhile, Philip O'Doherty the Environmental Health Officer said the tunnels were three feet in diameter and made with brick and mortar, and therefore were not Medieval or Siege tunnels.

The DUP's Joe Miller commented: "We have to get to the bottom of it".