WATER PRICE TO PAY

The Department of Regional Development is currently seeking information regarding private water supplies.

The DRD is carrying out a review of its policy on providing financial assistance for older homes without mains water.

The Department, in a letter to Moyle Council, said: ‘As part of this review we undertook an extensive exercise to assess the number of homes without a mains water supply and the number of householders who want to have one.

‘We issued a questionnaire to 3,800 domestic properties whose connection status was unknown.

‘Information about over 1,600 properties was obtained and this identified approximately 650 as not being served by a water main.

‘We believe that a further 550 from which no reply was received might also not be served.

‘This gives an upper limit of around 1,200 properties where we believe a water main would need to be laid in order to serve them with mains water. We are considering the feasibility of various policy options for the provision of financial assistance to these properties to do this.

‘Given the rurality and the isolated nature of many of the properties involved, we are also considering whether there are other options for providing financial assistance to secure a supply of wholesome water for these properties,’ said the DRD letter.

Under the Water Order it is the duty of Northern Ireland Water to provide a public water main for domestic properties if required to so by the owner or occupier of premises in the locality but whoever requests the main will be required to make a contribution towards the cost of providing it.

The DRD say at present NIW provides a ‘reasonable cost allowance of around 2,000 per property’ which contributes towards the cost of requisitioning a water main.

In the case of an existing (pre-2000) property the Department supplements that allowance so that the total contribution per property is 10,000, which increased from 6,500 in 2009).

The DRD adds: ‘The total cost of the requisition will be reduced by the total reasonable cost allowances for all properties served by the scheme - in some cases the reduction is sufficient to cover the full cost of the scheme.

‘When a water main is laid Northern Ireland Water will provide a service pipe from the public water main to the boundary between the public road and private property.

‘It has no duty to construct private service pipes beyond that point. A service pipe is a pipe serving a single property. Construction of a private service pipe should be arranged and paid for by each individual property owner.

‘The requisitioning procedure takes time and may by costly if a long water main is necessary and there are few properties to be connected.

‘For example, in the majority of cases the installation of a main costs between 60 and 100 per metre. The provision of a main about one mile in length could cost approximately 160,000. If it is a hilly area and water pressure is low there could be the additional cost of pumping equipment,’ said the DRD.

Cllr McMullan said it could cost over 100,000 to put in water mains to some homes in the Glens and it could cost individual householders a lot of money.

Independent councillor Randal McDonnell said it is not hard to get “good water” in a hilly area rather than have mains water.

And he said there is danger that if mains water is put in people might then say it is not as “nice” to drink as spring water.