A Galway city councillor has called for an independent investigation into breaches of planning conditions at a quarry which has been compared to "the Grand Canyon without protection".
Galway City Council informed councillors late last week that it has initiated legal proceedings against Lackagh Quarries over a breach in the water table at its Coolough/Ballindooley site.
A separate enforcement notice was issued to the company on March 23rd, obliging it to comply with all planning conditions, including blasting and lorry movements to and from the site inside specified hours. The city council has also referred councillors' concerns about safety issues to the Health and Safety Authority.
Galway city councillors voted unanimously last month to halt all works at the company's Coolough site, several miles from the city centre, and the latest action by the council is due to be discussed tonight by the council.
A report circulated to councillors by the local authority late last week said that the company had quarried to a depth of 2.48m (10ft) below the 15-metre Ordnum Datum levels approved in the planning conditions.
However, Labour councillor Catherine Connolly said that an "horrific" situation involving documented safety and environmental breaches and alleged intimidation of local residents must be investigated independently, as Lackagh Quarries supplies materials to the local authority. Green Party councillor Niall Ó Brolcháin has called for the quarry to be closed down.
Cllr Connolly says it is "ironic" that Lackagh Quarries was a member of the National Institute of Quarrying - a body based in Galway with Lackagh Group directors listed on its board - which sought to close down a number of quarries in Connemara for environmental breaches. One of the quarries secured a tender to supply rock to the Department of the Marine.
Cllr Connolly has questioned the closing of smaller quarries, and has asked the city council to explain why it has taken five years to enforce planning conditions which were to have been applied in 2001.
The Health and Safety Authority has said that the quarry owner is erecting a protective fence around cliff faces which it is "satisfied with", although it is aware that the fence does not comply with that stipulated in the planning conditions.
The Irish Times contacted the office of Lackagh Quarries on several occasions in the last week. On each occasion the newspaper was informed that a representative of the company would return the call. To date there has been no response from the company.
The Irish Concrete Federation says that its members have signed up to a voluntary environmental code of practice which was drawn up in association with the Department of the Environment and the Environmental Protection Agency, and updated in October 2005. It would be "disappointed" if any members were not abiding by the code, but says it has received no complaint in relation to Lackagh.
Galway City Council told The Irish Times that it could not respond to a series of questions before Monday's report to the full council. However, a spokesman said that the local authority did not have any "sweetheart deal" with Lackagh Quarries, and all contracts for materials were subject to full public procurement proceedings.
