25.— (1) A water services authority and any other person prescribed shall, as soon as may be after the commencement of this section, establish and maintain a register for the purposes of this Act, and shall enter in the register the entries and additions as may, from time to time, be prescribed.

(2) A register under this section shall be kept at the principal office of the water services authority concerned, or any other person prescribed, and shall be made available for inspection by any person during office hours.

(3) Where a request is made to a water services authority, or any other person prescribed, for a copy of an entry in the register maintained by it or him or her under this section, the water services authority, or other person prescribed, shall issue such a copy to the applicant on, if so required, the payment by the applicant of a fee of such an amount (not exceeding the reasonable cost of making the copy) as may be determined.

(4) Every document purporting to be a copy of an entry in a register maintained under this section by a water services authority, or other person prescribed, and purporting to be certified by an officer of the water services authority, or other person prescribed, to be a true copy of the entry shall, without proof of the signature of the person purporting so to certify or that he or she was that officer, be received in evidence in any legal proceedings and shall, until the contrary is proved, be deemed to be a true copy of the entry and to be evidence of the terms of the entry.

(5) Evidence of an entry in a register under this section may be given by production of a copy of it certified under this section and it shall not be necessary to produce the register itself.

(6) A water services authority, or other person prescribed shall notify the Minister, or other person prescribed, in such manner and at such times as may be prescribed, of such particulars entered in a register maintained under this section as may be prescribed.

(7) (a) A water services authority or other person prescribed may keep a register under this section otherwise than in legible form so that the register is capable of being used to make a legible copy or reproduction of any entry in the register.

(b) References in this section to a copy of an entry in a register under this section shall be construed as including references to such a legible copy or reproduction.

(8) The Minister may make regulations to impose a requirement to record specified information for the purposes of this section and may prescribe the format of those records.