Ms Aoife MacEvilly:

I agree with Mr Blaney. It is, ultimately, the customer who owns the data.

If we take what might be very granular data such as the half-hourly data, the Data Protection Commissioner and ourselves would view that as personal data and, therefore, the GDPR, would apply. On the other hand, data are coming from our meters already and that is necessary for billing. We want to make sure we get the right balance between still being able to extract a level of data from the meters to enable billing and better information to customers but nothing that would be construed as personal data without the customer's opt-in acceptance of that. If they allow it to be given to ESB Networks or their supplier, the supplier does not have the right to simply pass that on. The customer has the right all the time. That is an important point.