Farm organisations have reacted angrily to the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) recently published report on urban wastewater treatment, saying the scale of pollution from public systems exposes glaring double standards in how water quality is managed in Ireland.

The EPA's Urban Wastewater Treatment in 2024 report shows that 59pc of Uisce Éireann's treatment plants did not consistently meet the environmental standards required under their licences.

Almost half of those failures, the agency said, were due to poor operational management rather than lack of infrastructure.

While the EPA said investment at priority sites has led to progress, including halving the volume of raw sewage discharges since early 2024, it warned that delays in upgrading many more plants are "prolonging negative impacts" on water quality across rivers, estuaries and coastal waters.

But farm leaders say it highlights the government's failure to tackle its own pollution problems while continuing to penalise farmers over water quality.

IFA environment chair John Murphy said the scale of preventable discharges from public wastewater systems was "completely unacceptable" and undermined the efforts being made by farmers to protect rivers and lakes.

"It is clear that far too many treatment plants remain poorly managed, posing unacceptable risks to water quality and public health," he said. "This level of discharge reflects the increased reporting and videos we've seen of wastewater flowing into water bodies.

"It's not good enough that public systems are failing on such a scale."

Mr Murphy acknowledged progress made by Uisce Éireann in ending raw sewage discharges in towns such as Arklow and Kilrush, but said operational failures could and should be fixed immediately.

"Farmers are under huge pressure to deliver improvements on their side. The same urgency must apply to the public system if we want a fair and effective approach to improving water quality," he said.

ICMSA president Denis Drennan accused the State of hypocrisy and said farmers were "reading the EPA's report in stunned astonishment".

"For decades, farmers have been made the whipping boys for falling water quality - inspected, fined and prosecuted - while another arm of the State is directly responsible for discharging inadequately treated sewage into rivers and beaches," he said.

"Have their summons got lost in the post?"

Mr Drennan said it was "a classic case of 'physician, heal thyself,'" arguing that the State cannot demand strict compliance from farmers while excusing its own breaches.

"We can't have two standards of water regulation - one for farmers and one for State agencies. And we can't have two time-lines, where farmers must upgrade immediately but the State can take its sweet time," he said.

With the future of Ireland's Nitrates Derogation hanging in the balance, Mr Drennan warned that inconsistent enforcement risked undermining farmers' confidence in the regulatory system.

"Farmers have invested massively through schemes like TAMS and are making measurable progress," he said. "But there's no point in the State holding a whip over farmers' heads while the State itself is busy polluting the rivers it's testing."

The EPA said it will continue enforcement action against Uisce Éireann, which it has already prosecuted 28 times for wastewater failures. But for farm leaders, patience with official promises of reform appears to be wearing thin.

Farmers slam State wastewater failures shown in EPA report