Dáil sketch: Rabbitte reluctantly in headlights as opposition members pile on pressure

Minister for Energy Pat Rabbitte was clearly not in the best of humour after having had the political carpet pulled from under him this week by Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Fine Gael backbenchers.

The Minister had appointed an expert panel to review the overhead versus underground option for Eirgrid’s Grid Link and Grid West electricity cabelling projects. He must have felt it was all going reasonably well until Kenny asked him to also include the North-South interconnector following a meeting with concerned backbenchers

Coincidentally, Rabbitte was scheduled to take ministerial questions yesterday and the Opposition used the opportunity to pile on the pressure. Fianna Fáil's Michael Moynihan and Joe Higgins of the Socialist Party wanted to know the scope of the proposed review of the North-South interconnector, given the Minister was scheduled to meet the expert panel's chairwoman, former Supreme Court judge Catherine McGuinness, today.

Rabbitte replied that he would ask McGuinness to consider what work, “if any’’, the panel might usefully undertake to establish whether or not there was “parity of treatment’’ .

It all seemed a little vague. And there appeared to be a lack of enthusiasm on the Minister’s part for a major overhaul of the North-South project. Putting it underground would cost at least three times more than overhead cables, he said.

No ringing endorsement
"The North-South transmission line is a critical and strategically urgent transmission reinforcement and is of critical importance in the broader North-South context,'' he added. It was hardly a ringing endorsement of the kind of review sought from the Taoiseach by backbenchers.

He said he entirely accepted that it was imperative that EirGrid was sensitive to concerns raised by community groups and citizens. “I also accept that some people are never happy unless they are unhappy,’’ he added.

So who was he referring to ? Fine Gael backbenchers ?

Higgins asked him to identify the unhappy who were happy. Rabbitte said sharply he was referring to Higgins, “and the people who think like him’’.

Higgins, with economists John FitzGerald and Colm McCarthy in mind, had referred to members of the expert panel who were driven by “right wing neo-liberal philosophies’’. It clearly annoyed the Minister.

Later Rabbitte hit out at those "talking nonsense'' on TV3's Tonight with Vincent Browne without bothering to inform themselves on energy issues.

And he told Independent Catherine Murphy that he would "lie down in a dark room for some time'' if she praised his policies. It would be one way of escaping the Taoiseach and his backbenchers.