Cable inquiry ploughs a lonely furrow

It was ploughing day at the rail signalling inquiry. "Ploughing" is the technical term for laying underground cable. And the question of why Esat ploughed millions of pounds worth of the stuff into CI╔ lines before CI╔ had legal permission to operate the system left a deep furrow in the collective brow of the Oireachtas committee.

Experienced diggers themselves, the committee members thought it was a case of putting the plough before the horse. But CI╔ denied it had been in any way precipitate, while Esat implied that this was the first time anyone had accused the transport company of moving too fast. On the contrary, former Esat director Leslie Buckley described his frustrated attempts to speed the plough after it fell behind targets in 1998.

Former CI╔ chairman Brian Joyce described his own frustrations with the State company. Rejecting suggestions that he had snubbed the group solicitor by not replying to a letter congratulating him on his appointment as chairman, he said he had replied to none of the many letters he received at the time, most of them "in commiseration". As to the suggestion that CI╔ acted without statutory authority in allowing Esat to plough its cable, he said such authority was necessary only before the system was activated.

All this digging made for thirsty work. Pat Rabbitte was driven to drink in an effort to illustrate the committee's unease. Pointing to Mr Joyce's chairmanship of the Educational Building Society, he presumed the society was not currently allowed to operate "as a pub". But if it wanted to provide such a service to customers, would it install the beer barrels and pipes first before seeking a change in the articles of association? The analogy was "absolutely off the wall", said Mr Joyce. And soon he took his leave of the inquiry on an even more sober note, hoping he wouldn't hear anything about CI╔ ever again.

The committee then questioned other CI╔ board members. There would be no time for lunch, not even a ploughman's lunch. The afternoon was a harrowing experience for everyone concerned.