This question is for the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. For months now I have been working with communities from Ceathrú Thaidhg, Porturlin, Srahataggle and Portacloy in north Mayo who are all desperate to avail of a new community water connection. It is hard to believe that in 2022, rural dwellers in County Mayo are still without a piped water supply. This is severely impacting their living standards and quality of life. Hundreds of signatures have been gathered from local residents allowing Mayo County Council engineers to assess the proposed scheme for inclusion in the future multi-annual rural water programme, benefitting these four rural Mayo communities. A pre-water connection was submitted to Irish Water for this new community water scheme, which was deemed to be feasible. My concern is that Mayo County Council and many local authorities have yet to receive the framework for the submission process from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage to submit their funding bids for the new four-year cycle. I would appreciate an update on this and when local authorities will be allowed to submit.

I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue. I am completely in agreement on the importance of the community water connections under the upcoming multi-annual rural water programme that runs to 2025. To give the Deputy an idea for timeframes, the working group is currently finalising a report due. That should be with me in the coming weeks to make recommendations. I will not be delaying upon it. Coincidentally, I was in the constituency of my colleague, the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, on Friday. We were looking at another rural water scheme there which is very successful. The Government supports this and I thank the Deputy for raising it. We want the process to move on now. Once I receive the report which I expect in the coming weeks, I will revert to the Deputy and inform the House.