Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Phil Hogan TD, has said the transfer of statutory responsibility for water and wastewater services to Irish Water from local authorities marks "a momentous event for water services delivery in Ireland".

Irish Water has become the national water services authority and is responsible for delivering water and wastewater services to homes and businesses. It is regulated by the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER) and the EPA.

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Minister Hogan commented: "After extensive work and planning by a range of stakeholders, Irish Water begins work as the national water utility. This major reform will drive improvements in water services and provide security of water supply for the public and economy in the coming years and decades.

"Through these reforms we are also creating jobs, through the domestic metering programme and the establishment of Irish Water's customer contact call centre. Security of supply will only exist if we increase investment in infrastructure and create a sustainable funding model for water services. These will happen as part of reform.

"Security of supply will position Ireland's economy well to attract water-intensive industries such as ICT, pharma-chem and agri-food in the years ahead as other countries face increasing water deficits."

(CD)