andMr. Keaveney asked the Minister for Local Government the present position with regard to the proposed water scheme for Lettermacaward, County Donegal.

No proposals for this scheme have been submitted to my Department to date.

Is the Minister satisfied that there are no proposals before him now and that there have not been in the past nine years?

A preliminary report on the scheme will be placed before Donegal County Council on 14th March, 1977, and, therefore, it will not come before me for quite some time. I understand the scheme has been ranked No. 14 in the local authority priority list of water and sewerage schemes, so I would not hold out a lot of hope for it even after it has been submitted to the Department unless the county council move it up in the priority list.

This scheme has been advanced considerably as a group scheme. More than £65 per person has been collected and the general belief in the area has been that it is the Department of Local Government who have held it up.

I am glad to be able to set the record straight.

Just to get the record straight, is the Minister aware or will he try to find out whether there is any basis for the suggestion, which appears to have come from the local authority, that it rests with the Department, and if it does not will the Minister try to get the council to get a move on to do something about the money that has been collected—£65 per house in respect of 200 houses? This is all apart from the great need for water there.

I am a great believer in dealing with such matters in a democratic way. I have given the Deputy the fact that there are no schemes before the Department and that this will not come for a preliminary debate by the county council until 14th March next. In view of the fact that it will be coming before the county council, who are apparently now taking an interest in it, the councillors are the people who should put the necessary pressure on to have it moved in the direction of the Custom House. I could not possibly intervene at this stage.

Surely the Minister must be concerned about a scheme which has been nine years on the list and in respect of which 200 householders have contributed £65 each? Surely this is not something the Minister can laugh his way through and refer to the democratic process.

If Deputy Blaney is as powerful as I think he is in Donegal, why has he allowed this to go on for nine years? It has not gone outside the county. Neither I nor my officials are responsible—this must be settled in Donegal before it comes to the Department. When it does we will have a look at it.

Does the Minister think that this whole idea of local autonomy is any answer for the 200 people who are awaiting a water supply to which they have already contributed £65 each in the name of a Department of Local Government group scheme? If it has been hanging around as long as it has been, is not the Minister to be blamed?

I have been here for four years. Somebody must be blamed for the five years before that.

It is not a question of blaming Ministers. If the Minister would get off this thing about democratic procedures and do something about it there might be a decision. That is what the Minister for Local Government is there for.

If Deputy Blaney would think about getting something done instead of trying to get a few headlines, which may appear more important to him than getting water to those people, we might get somewhere.

I started the scheme and the Minister has made a damn poor job of it.

What we need are a few good public representatives in Donegal.

5.