Our draft report deals with two proposed Community measures on this subject. They are instruments of some importance for this country both for environmental and economic reasons. Most of you are familiar with the contents of these proposals. I shall be pleased to answer any questions which any Members who have not participated in the work of the sub-committee concerned with this draft report would like to ask.
Briefly, the Community is anxious to ensure that we all live in a cleaner and more healthy atmosphere. I am sure we all agree with that laudable objective. In this context we are reasonably fortunate in this country in that we have not a very high level of pollution from sulphur dioxide in the atmosphere. Therefore, in so far as the provisions of the draft Directive are concerned in regard to monitoring and so on, we are quite happy about the situation and they do not present any major problems. However, the aspect of the second draft Directive which proposes that certain institutions must use low sulphur oils causes problems for us. As the draft report points out, the people mainly concerned in Ireland are the ESB. They are resisting very strongly the proposals in the draft Directive because they say it would increase their costs very heavily. It is for the Committee to decide whether to recommend that the draft Directive be fully implemented in which case the consumer would have to face up to very considerable increases in electricity charges. That is really the crunch of the draft Directive. Air pollution in this country is much less acute than it is in other member states and therefore from our point of view the need to adopt the draft Directive is quite minimal.
