Mr. Daryl Kennedy:

With regard to balanced debate, from the first community meeting I attended in April - I believe the Deputy was there - I extended a welcome by e-mail and telephone to developers, but they did not come along. We took particular care and pride in the fact that we had balanced and factual information. Part of the objective was to cut through the spin we were seeing and ensure we could get the balanced information out there. By the time we got to our next community meeting in June, we believed there was a track record in balanced and open information, but when we again extended a welcome, the developers did not want to come; they stated it was not the kind of forum with which they wanted to engage.

I will comment on existing guidelines to answer a question from Deputy Stanley. With regard to the bond, guidelines currently state that the cost of decommissioning could be covered by the cost of scrap metal. Ms Fagan is clear that the contracts stipulate that the turbines remain the assets of the development company. Some kind of index-linked bond should be put in place to cover decommissioning.

Subsidies are being threatened with removal or reduction every week and technology is being upgraded all the time.

We do not know where we will be a decade from now and it is quite likely there could be considerable redundancy. The question of whether they will remain on lands will arise.

With regard to cabling, the energy companies state in their issued pamphlets that the cabling will go underground. None the less, their lobby group, the IWEA, made a specific submission on the county development plan asking the county council not to prescribe that cabling be put underground. That demonstrates a real lack of trust. Another example from Westmeath concerns another submission on the county development plan. I presume what I describe obtains across the country. The IWEA states the density of residential developments should not be a factor in the assessment of a planning application. That is truly unacceptable.