John Whelan (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will be as prompt as I can. I welcome Mr. O'Connor to the meeting. I hope he is aware that my opposition to his appointment is not any personal matter. I have no doubts about his personal and professional integrity and his credentials. I am totally uncomfortable, however, because I believe that there is a conflict of interests. I do not mean a personal one whereby he would take personal advantage for personal gain. That is where we are losing sight of the point. The dictionary definition that he read out at the start is probably in keeping with the Minister’s definition of no conflict of interest. The Minister categorised my concerns in that regard as woolly-headed nonsense. I am not too woolly-headed, as Mr. O’Connor can see, and I will try not to be too nonsensical.

As Mr. O’Connor is aware from his work in the planning sector, we have to take into account the cumulative effect of what is proposed in planning terms. He comes on board as someone who knows the workings and machinations of Eirgrid inside out and has great expertise and knowledge gained over a long period. He is not the only person in play in this fundamental and strategic planning process that now exercises virtually the entire country. There are also former senior executives at the highest level. Out of respect for the Chairman of the committee I will not name people who are not here to defend themselves but I could easily do so because it is a statement of fact and I would gladly do so outside, but out of respect for due process I will not. Senior executives who have recently retired from Eirgrid have moved onto the boards of private wind farm development companies. The Chairman of another State agency, Sustainable Energy Ireland, which advises Government on energy policy is on the board of another private wind farm development company.

The public is losing confidence in a process where it feels that the deck is already stacked against it with what it sees as the convergence of an old boys’ network, an inner circle and circle of friends which individually may not amount to a personal conflict of interest but whose cumulative effect is that there are people who have worked hand-in-hand and hand-in-glove with each other over a long period. I recently attended a Bord Pleanála Eirgrid hearing in Portlaoise which went on for six days where the ordinary residents of Ratheniska and Timahoe - housewives, farmers and rural residents - were ranged against 21 members of a legal team and technical experts all with the resources of the State at their backs. Now the former Chairman of An Bord Pleanála is joining that team against housewives and farmers who already have good grounds to doubt the integrity of the consultation process.

I began engaging with Eirgrid approximately three years ago. I was defending the development of the local infrastructure and the fact that we had to invest in order to create jobs and sustain economic growth but I cannot believe the manner in which I was deceived. The consultation process amounts to a grand deception without any integrity. I was personally misled on several significant points to the extent that the goodwill and reputation that the ESB had built up with the rural communities over decades is now squandered. I would not believe the Lord’s Prayer from an Eirgrid senior management official. That is not hearsay. I am speaking from my own direct personal experience. I was misled in a grand way. I asked specific questions about why we needed to build what Eirgrid called the Ratheniska sub-station at Culnabacky, which is on the site where the National Ploughing Championships took place this year. It told me that it was to strengthen the grid to the south east and that this was required for jobs. It tried to suggest that Glanbia would run out of power if it was not done but it did not tell me that Glanbia is not even on the grid. Glanbia supplies electricity to the grid and does not take any power from it. It also suggested that Waterford, Kilkenny and Carlow would not experience economic growth and job investment if the line from Laois to Kilkenny, the so-called Laois-Kilkenny reinforcement line, is not built. It did not tell me about the new line that it is bringing up through the middle of Carlow-Kilkenny. It drip feeds piecemeal information which wrong-foots those concerned about what is happening.

No one has explained adequately to me why the Ratheniska super-hub has the capacity for 17 lines while the station into which it runs in Ballyragget has the capacity for only one. Eirgrid insists that this has nothing to do with wind energy or the development of wind farms in the midlands. There is a conflict of interest, not necessarily in respect of Mr. O’Connor but with all these senior executives swapping chairs and positions on related bodies that ultimately have the decision-making capacity to drive this forward, and with access to the Minister and the Department to do so.