Mr. John McCusker:

Deputy Colreavy, who has now left the meeting, asked me a couple of questions. In regard to the slogan about keeping the lights on, EirGrid's public relations mantra is rehearsed on every occasion its representatives speak on the national airwaves or in consultation sessions. Ireland has a strong national grid. The issue is that memorandums of agreement have been signed between certain EU member states. France and England are decommissioning a number of nuclear power plants and England is also decommissioning fossil fuel plants. This decommissioning process will be completed between 2020 and 2025. The Grid Link project involves the construction of interconnectors to supply renewable energy, which we welcome, across people's houses to Europe.

That is the sole purpose of this project and EirGrid needs to be honest with the people. It is not about keeping the lights on. Deputy Colreavy said one would pay less for a house if it were near a pylon or line. That is incorrect. One would not buy the house. One does not need to be an estate agent or pay an expert commission hundreds of thousands of euro for that answer. Would anybody here buy a house with a pylon or overhead line within 25 m of it. I do not see too many hands up. They would not because they know in their hearts and souls that it is just not right.

On the consultation, I have here the grid link brochure produced for our area. There is not one mention of pylon or overhead line in the text of this brochure. We see lovely pylons in flat, open hay fields and corn fields. We see no house, mountain or scenic area of national importance. EirGrid's consultation process is issued based on the fact that this is an overhead line project. That is the prerequisite to commencing consultation. The consultation is not based on undergrounding, overgrounding and all the other arguments. Any submission is based on the prerequisite that it is an overhead project.

Deputy Coffey raised the cost-benefit analysis issue. Nobody has seen it and it is not there. We have put in our submission 18 points where cost-benefit analysis should apply. I will discuss one of them. Ireland is in the middle of a very deep recession and we have a fledgling construction industry. This project is valued at €500 billion. That is clearly stated, but as one of our colleagues asked earlier, how can they value it at €500 billion when they have not costed it? I got that answer, that none of these routes has been costed. I find it amazing that a Government Department is undertaking a project and at various milestone stages it has not costed it.

In Ireland we are very good at construction and road building. We have lots of groundwork contractors and machines lying idle or being shipped across the world because there is no work for them. If we were to consider an undergrounding option, local construction by local workers is one of the issues that would have to be fed into the cost-benefit analysis. People in the local communities where the undergrounding would take place would get work. Something positive would come out of it for them. There would be trenching, excavation, general ground works, and demand for suppliers of quarry stone, backfill products, sand and gravel, tarmacadam, cable-laying crews, fencing contractors and local agriculture contractors who would make the land good and re-seed it afterwards.

The full benefits to the Exchequer of all those little issues would need to be analysed in a cost-benefit analysis in terms of VAT, corporation tax, income tax, PRSI, universal social charges and all the other levys that are applied. In addition, there would be a reduction in social welfare costs to construction workers. None of those simple issues is analysed by EirGrid or any body we are aware of. That is point 8 in our submission. This is the committee's opportunity. I have four young children and am trying to do a day's work here trying to represent my local community. The members are elected representatives and have the power to bring this project to a stop and reassess and re-evaluate it. This is an 80 to 100 year play to the people of Ireland.