Mr. John Horgan:

There are more than 2,000 employees in Bord na Móna, depending on seasonal factors, and there are 600 pensioners. The financial state of the company is very sound and it has been profitable in the last number of years, as it needs to be in order to be able to borrow and invest in new projects, particularly wind farms. The results for this year have not yet been finalised, but when they are published in July they will be favourable and in line with last year.

I will ask Mr. Mike Quinn to talk about unregulated imports. The problem with private fuels is not that they are there; it is that it is not a level playing field, as a lot of the private fuel business is not subject to VAT and carbon tax is not collected, for whatever reason. I am not talking about people cutting down their own trees or harvesting their own peat but about stuff that is sold.

I do not have all the details required to answer the question about the pension scheme. However, the trustees of the pension scheme and the company have been in negotiations in the past few years and this year a scheme was submitted to the Pensions Authority, which has now been approved. It has the approval of the Department and the Minister, so the changes will be put into effect. It took a long time and it was very difficult to get the agreement of the trustees to it, but we have succeeded. All of the company's pension schemes now have in place funding schemes approved by the Pensions Authority.

I did not prepare to answer questions on pensions but, as far as I know, there is no levy on pensioners.