60 jobs at risk in Tipperary because of town's poor water supply

A business that employs 60 people is considering moving out of Clonmel because of the ongoing problems with the water supply in the town.

The Mayor, Pat English, told a meeting of Clonmel Borough District that it would be a disaster if that happened.

He was responding to comments made by Cllr Siobhán Ambrose, who said that it wasn’t good enough that businesses, schools and householders are left without water because of the number of frequent outages in the town.

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“This is 2025 and there’s absolutely no excuse for it”.

She said that the number of outages was “just inexcusable. Clonmel, without doubt, has to be the worst area”.

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She said she was also very annoyed that the turnaround times for when Uisce Éireann stated that the supply would be restored didn’t tally, and she was critical of the company’s lack of communication. There was no notification when the supply would return.

She said that there wasn’t enough maintenance being carried out on the system 24/7. When the council had responsibility for the water supply they had staff available around the clock, so that any issues could be sorted out. Maintenance crews from the council were deployed immediately and were on standby whenever there was a storm, which they all knew would affect the supply.

It appeared that Uisce Éireann only carried out maintenance five days a week, because problems seemed to arise at the weekend.

Cllr Ambrose said she had received calls recently from cafés, hairdressers, pubs and restaurants about interruptions to the water supply. Schools had also come under pressure, as had householders.

“We’re in a really critical place and there doesn’t seem to be anything changing,” she said.

Clonmel is the biggest town in the county with large industries, and they were looking to attract more industry.

Every single facet of society was under pressure because of a lack of an adequate service, she said.

“Every single water source in Clonmel is causing people hardship,” she stated.

Cllr Ambrose requested that a representative from Uisce Éireann would attend a meeting of the Borough District.
She also acknowledged the huge investment that the company was carrying out to upgrade the different supplies, such as Poulavanogue and in Ardfinnan.

The Mayor, Pat English, said that the lack of maintenance at the water plants seemed to be an issue. Problems normally arose at the weekend and it appeared that nobody was available until Monday to resolve them.

Businesses had been left without water at the weekend recently, a time when most of them relied on weekend trade to keep themselves afloat.

Cllr English said that they needed to meet with senior management in Uisce Éireann, sit down with these people and put serious pressure on them.

Cllr Tom Acheson said that the frequency of boil water notices in Clonmel is “off the scale”.

The follow-up service when the supply was interrupted was so poor, and people were left in limbo about when the supply would be restored.