Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. I never suggested that we should not have an all-Ireland electricity market - far from it - and I have always advocated that we develop an all-Ireland economy. I am saying that we have been fed a diet of suggestions that the lights will go out in Northern Ireland in 2019 if the North-South interconnector is not built. The most recent report shows that there will be a surplus of electricity, even under present structures, as opposed to the deficit that we were told would result for a long time. I have many quotes from EirGrid and SONI, their counterparts and other affiliated bodies, stating that the lights would go out if the North-South interconnector was not built.

I am sure that the Minister is fully aware of the grave concern in communities in Monaghan, Cavan and his home county of Meath about the actions of EirGrid and the bullying manner in which this project has been proposed all along. We had the farce of an oral hearing with An Bord Pleanála where all of us in this House, regardless of political parties, and local public representatives made detailed oral presentations at those hearings but we might as well have been talking to ourselves at home because the report did not even have the courtesy to refer to the concerns outlined by Ministers, Senators, Deputies and councillors from Cavan, Monaghan and Meath.

I am sure that the Minister is fully aware that the communities in Meath, Cavan and Monaghan do not accept the proposal as it stands to have these transmission cables overground should that project ever proceed.

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