Sir, - Hidden away amidst the blandishments of Partnership 2000, under the heading of "Environment", are several apparently innocuous aspirations which, when implemented, will once again lead to a further erosion of the basic rights and freedoms of individuals and communities to oppose the establishment of dirty industry or suspect projects in their local areas.
Paragraph 6.21 of Partnership 2000 states that "accelerated procedures (planning) will also be introduced for major projects involving significant employment and added value". In effect, the old notion of industrial sacrifice zones is being resurrected in order to ensure the swift establishment of dirty industries, by curtailing further the already minimal opportunities for ordinary citizens to appeal planning decisions.
Following directly on from the changes in planning appeals introduced in the 1992 Planning and Development Act, the separation of planning decisions from the environmental licensing in the EPA Act and the lack of an independent procedure for appeals against the granting of pollution licences, this latest use of euphemisms such as "streamlining the system", "minimise delays and uncertainties" should leave no one under any illusion as to what the real intentions of our so-called social partners are towards the environment.
It may be just a coincidence, but wouldn't these proposals suit ESA Digifone (The Irish Times, June 22nd)? When implemented, ESAT can dump its structures on any hillock in the country which has thus far managed to remain un-scarred from telecommunication blight, and the bolshie natives will be powerless.
Paragraph 6.22 complains that the Integrated Pollution Control (IPC) licensing system, operated by the Environmental Protection Agency, is an environmental cost which is critical for competitiveness and contends that it must be balanced by "reasonable achievable standards". Following the pollution licensing debacle involving the go-ahead for a dangerous toxic waste incinerator at Clarecastle sanctioned by the Environmental "Pollution" Agency, it seems that already low environmental standards may have to be further reduced to satisfy the balance sheets of multinationals.
The leaders of the trade-union movement and the farming bodies, if they did contribute in, any way to framing the section on the environment in Partnership 2000 (as it must have been written by IBEC), should hang their heads in shame. More often than not in the past it is their very own members, the ordinary workers, residents and farmers who have had to endure the consequences of bad planning decisions and the direct effects of dirty industry on their lands, in their workplaces and in their communities. Yours, etc.,
Cork Environmental Alliance, 34 Princes Street, Cork.