Cork residents’ wait for flood repair repayment ‘outrageous’, says councillor 

It has been described as “outrageous” that residents in a Co Cork housing estate still have not been reimbursed for the €7,752 they spent rebuilding a protective wall which collapsed during major flooding caused by Storm Babet in October 2023.

Despite alleged promises that the Government would foot the bill, the residents of Willowbank estate in Midleton have not received one cent and two government ministers have also refused to cough up.

Cork County Council is now demanding that the Office of Public Works (OPW), which is overseeing the development of a €58m-plus plan to protect the town from further flooding, foot the bill which has been described as “mere peanuts” in the overall scale of things.

Fine Gael councillor Rory Cocking told a recent meeting of the East Cork Municipal District Council that on behalf of the residents he had personally written to two government ministers urging them to reimburse the money spent by Willowbank householders.

He claimed that both OPW minister Kevin ‘Boxer’ Moran and housing minister James Browne failed to make payments to the residents, which he described as “outrageous”. 

Breeched by flood waters 

Within a matter of days of the devastating flooding of the Owenacurra river, the residents paid for repairs made to the damaged section of the wall breeched by flood waters.

Mr Moran wrote: “There is no emergency response funding mechanism available in the OPW that would see emergency response actions such as those undertaken by citizens in Willowbank being refunded by my office.”

Fianna Fáil councillor Ann Marie Ahern said it was an exemplary residents’ association which rarely if ever called upon the council to come to its aid, even during such emergencies, and simply got on with things. “I feel they have been given the runaround. The estate is very well maintained by them and I feel they are being wronged,” she said.

Ms Ahern also wrote to Mr Browne on the matter and got the same negative reply.

Councillors were not satisfied with the responses from the two ministers and have written to the OPW demanding that it find the money to pay the Willowbank estate residents.