Need for competition in freight

Madam, - You have been kind enough to publish recently letters concerning the deplorable decline and neglect of railway freight…

Madam, - You have been kind enough to publish recently letters concerning the deplorable decline and neglect of railway freight in Ireland. Your readers may therefore be interested to know that in a leading periodical of the rail industry, Modern Railways(November 2008), an article was published with the title "Ireland needs a dose of competition". The article comes from the rail freight group.

At present both the Republic and Northern Ireland have a derogation from the European Commission from the rigours of competition and so from the beneficial provisions of the first railway package. The rail freight group has now, as the article reveals, written to the commission opposing any extension of the derogation, which is due to cease in March 2009.

It is vital, for political, economic and environmental reasons, that politicians (including Greens) and monopolistic railway functionaries in Ireland be stopped from securing a continuation of the present paralysis in railway freight operations. - Yours, etc,

Prof G.L. HUXLEY, Trinity College, Dublin 2.