Mr. Garrett Blaney:

I wish to share with the committee the fact that we still have a decision to make, as Mr. Melvin mentioned. We have a consultation process and have received responses on the future particularly of electric vehicles and EV infrastructure.

I wish to refer to some of the developments at European level. The committee met in February to talk about the Clean Energy for All Europeans package. There is a specific reference in Article 33 of the package to the treatment of electricity infrastructure for electric vehicles. It states the European Commission does not see it as fitting in with the regulatory asset bases, as Mr. Melvin explained, and that it should only be done on a very exceptional basis. We will have to keep this in mind. I also refer to the transport policy issued by both Departments but particularly the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport which states it should be done on a commercial basis. This is a decision we have yet to make, but I am trying to explain to the committee and share with it our current thinking. It was clear in the responses we had received that there was a range of views from the owners and that they clearly wanted to make sure a proper mechanism was in place for continuing to charge vehicles on a reasonable basis. Views were split on whether the assets should form part of the asset base - clearly not foreseen at a European level - or whether ownership should be on a commercial basis by ESB eCars. There was also a clear view from the respondents in the consultation process that there should be continuing support for the maintenance of existing assets. We can understand why there is this view.

Regarding the CER's primary objective, as set out in legislation, it is also clear that our job is to protect the distribution system and set the cost for it. We need to be very careful that there is no cross-subsidisation of one specific user of the electricity distribution system for the overall distribution system users. I wish to share with the committee our current thinking, that we do not see a basis in legislation for us to continue to pay for what is a research and development project, as Mr. Melvin set out, that has achieved its objectives and the results of which have been published, but I cannot foresee our decision until we have made it. We will work closely with the Departments to ensure as much as possible that whatever our decision is, we will not frustrate but support Government policy.