Warnings in place for heavy rain as Coveney confirms increased flood-relief support
Several counties face the risk of localised flooding on Monday after last week's storm devastated areas in the south of the country.
Met Éireann has put Kilkenny, Wexford and Waterford under a status-orange rain warning until 1am on Tuesday, with a yellow alert for Carlow, Kildare, Laois, Longford, Offaly, Westmeath, Wicklow and Roscommon running at the same time.
A further status-yellow warning for Clare, Limerick, Cork, Kerry, Tipperary and Galway will remain in place until 6pm on Monday.
The forecaster said heavy and persistent rain with thundery downpours will likely bring flooding, poor visibility and dangerous travel conditions.
Cork County Council said it was monitoring the current warnings following “consistent and steady” rainfall overnight in the county.
“We are continuing to monitor our groundwater levels and river levels across the county and we are particularly conscious of higher tides later on this morning. So we have crews on the ground. We have arrangements in place to deliver sandbags and so forth, if it came to that,” Niall Healy, director of services, told RTÉ's Morning Ireland.
At this point in time there did not seem to be any significant risk of property flooding, he said. “Certainly nothing like what we experienced last week. It's mainly flooding on the roads, standing water on the roads, things like that. That's our assessment of the situation right now.
“We're hopeful that it won't be an issue today and that there won't be anything in the way of any significant flooding. There may be localised or the topping of the river bank in certain locations that might flood some roads, but we don't see any properties are at risk at this point in time, and that's a positive.”
The warnings come as towns and villages in the southeast recover from the effects of Storm Babet, where unusually heavy rainfall led to homes and businesses being flooded.
Met Éireann has defended its warning system in the wake of the flooding, and the Government has promised to offer increased support for businesses affected.
Minister for Enterprise Simon Coveney is working on a proposal to bring to Cabinet on Tuesday, which would see two schemes on offer to businesses affected by the floods.
The first is the scheme currently in place and offers an initial €5,000 and further support of up to €20,000 based on the scale of damage to businesses.
Mr Coveney told RTÉ radio on Monday that this would be for places which had been affected by flooding, but not badly.
He said those amounts were not “appropriate” for badly-hit businesses, and a second scheme would offer around double the initial payment and “multiples” of the €20,000 after that – possibly more than €70,000.
Householders can access relief through the Humanitarian Assistance Programme, administered by the Department of Social Protection.
Mr Coveney said that Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys would bring a proposal to Cabinet on Tuesday to increase the threshold in order to qualify for the means-tested scheme.
Tánaiste Micheál Martin said “it’s clear that something significantly extra is required here now to enable the households to get back into their homes – many are in hotels at the moment – and to enable businesses get off the ground and their employees back working”.
“This was a climate event of a huge scale, which has really devastated the businesses in Midleton, community facilities in Glanmire, sporting facilities and households, in particular. Many people who just bought their houses, having them destroyed,” he said in Luxembourg.
“So there’ll be two schemes, the one for households and one for businesses. We’re looking at revising the existing schemes, we don’t believe they’re fit for purpose, and I think the interventions will have to be on a scale that we haven’t seen before.” – Additional reporting: PA