A FRUSTRATED councillor has called on communities affected by persistent water outages to put pressure on Uisce Éireann to find a resolution.

The plea comes after another bout of interruption to water supply in west Donegal on Thursday.

A burst water main at the water treatment plant on the outskirts of Falcarragh caused widespread disruptions and forced local businesses in the area to close their doors yet again.

“It’s impacting the businesses in the town greatly,” said Cllr Michael McClafferty.

“The shops, the coffee shops, the barbers, the butchers… all who can’t function without water.”

Cllr McClafferty stressed the knock on affects the outages have across the whole community, from elderly people receiving home support services to parents sterilising bottles for young babies.

“Each and every individual in the parish needs to lift the phone or email Irish Water themselves and raise their concerns,” stressed Cllr McClafferty.

“The politicians of the day, including myself, can ring and email all we want, but as an Irish Water representative told me years ago, ‘I know you’re doing your damnedest for the Cloughaneely area, but you have one problem – the public are not rowing in behind you and making noise as well.’”

He said this level of public engagement is common in other counties: “In other counties, when the water goes off, the TDs, senators and county councillors contact Uisce Éireann, but they also have hundreds of phone calls coming in from those impacted.

“We don’t have that here,” he said.

“Whether you are in Falcarragh or any other town in the wider Glenties area, if your water goes off, you need to report it.”

Cllr McClafferty warned that a lack of public pressure could have consequences when it comes to securing future funding to improve water infrastructure.

“They are going to look at the counties that are the most vocal, where the most emails and phone calls are coming from,” he said.

He stressed that this carries much more weight than elected representatives raising the issue alone.

“People power can make a difference here, providing they start to interact with Irish Water. If they don’t, then we will be overlooked when funding comes,” he said.

Cllr McClafferty said he fears other counties will be more successful than Donegal because they make more noise.

“Whoever makes the most noise gets the funding. That’s the bottom line.”