Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the Minister of State reading the extract into the record because it was news to me when I received the presentation last week. The Minister of State said, essentially, that they were undervalued up to now and that is why they have a high percentage increase in value. The representatives make the point that they are paying a much higher amount in terms of their output relative to megawatts of electricity produced by gas or coal or some other heavy use of carbon. Referring to the logic the Minister of State has used against me all along, it is not really about the business output or the profitability of a business. A part of the essence of the argument made was the cost of it relative to the net profit. The Minister of State has said to me that business profits go up and down and that this should not be the yardstick, but he has said he will look at it again. There is no commitment from the Minister of State to bring forward an amendment. At this stage, I ask the Minister of State to study it further. I will wait and see what comes out of this process. I understand that if this were passed today, by the time we get to Report Stage we would probably have every other group in the country making representations to us. I understand the situation is complex and that this legislation was not intended to make changes for specific industries. We will raise the issue again on Report Stage and I will wait for the Minister of State to report then.