Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

I am grateful to the Taoiseach for his lengthy reply. The 2001 report referred to a number of bottlenecks in physical infrastructure, such as housing, transportation and environmental services, which it said were responsible for fuelling inflation. Is it not true that these bottlenecks still exist and are a contributing cause of rising inflation?

The ESB and Bord Gáis are part of a regulated sector. The Government commissioned an expensive report from Deloitte & Touche, which recommended the break-up of the grid and the generation section of the ESB. The Government rejected this recommendation. Would the Taoiseach not consider that competition and separateness would have been valuable, while both would still have been owned by the State? Has he examined the position in which the regulators find themselves? For example, they have given a 34% increase in gas prices, which affects hundred of thousands of people, and a 20% price increase will be allowed to the ESB later in the year. The regulators approved those increases based on information which is no longer pertinent. For example, in Britain gas sells at a minus price and the price of crude oil is below €60 per barrel.

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