LOCAL authorities will no longer charge group schemes for the supply of domestic water as part of an £18 million package of measures announced yesterday by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Howlin.
The development comes four weeks after the abolition of domestic water charges. It brings to an end the dissatisfaction among rural householders about having to pay domestic water charges while their urban counterparts did not.
However local authorities will continue to charge groups for non-domestic water such as supplies for farm or commercial use.
Outlining the new measures, Mr Howlin said they would "not only spread the benefits of the abolition of water charges through the community but will also bring about a major improvement in the quality of water supplies in small towns, villages and rural areas".
Under the proposals, a special financial provision of £5 million a year will be made available to local authorities to take over existing water and sewerage schemes.
A new system of capital block grants, amounting to £15 million this year, will now be introduced to allow local authorities to conduct their own programmes for small water and sewerage schemes, - including group schemes - in their areas.
Approximately 5,500 group water schemes have been carried out since the inception of the grant scheme. Some of these have been taken over by local authorities and are now effectively public schemes.
It is estimated that more than half of the 150,000 rural households currently dependent on group water schemes receive supplies from local authority networks. The decision that local authorities should no longer charge for domestic water supplies will also apply to group schemes from public sources. As a result, groups are expected to pass on the saving to their members.
The remaining group schemes that do not take their supplies from the public network use a range of private sources. The Department says that these sources are "vulnerable to pollution" may not have appropriate chlorination or disinfection procedures in place.