Toxic Incinerator Bord Pleanala farce in Cork

cork | environment | news report Wednesday September 24, 2003 00:34 by jamesy

The appeal by Indaver Ireland against the county councils denial of permission for their toxic waste incinerator in Ringaskiddy has degenerated into high farce.

For my pains as an activist I attended the opening day of Indaver Irelands appeal against Cork County Councils refusal to grant planning permission for their incinerator in Ringaskiddy in Cork Harbour.

After a good rally of over three hundred outside the venue, Neptune Stadium, Cork, we all spilled into the hall. A grossly inadequate PA led to the abandonment of the hearing for an hour to allow repairs or reorganisation. The Bords man chairing the proceedings had sought to blame the people in the audience for not listening carefully enough, not being quiet enough etc. before the open anger of the large crowd forced him to back down.

He had already said that he was only taking a report which would then be adjudicated on by the faceless ones in a dark room in Dublin. This is democracy in action. 20,000 objectors will received scant attention in that room. Most of the rest of day one was taken up with housekeeping, listing what order the whole thing would proceed in, who would speak when etc. a few arguments over facilities eg why the council and company got favoured over the objectors getting a tiny section of tables and mikes relative to the opposition.

Another bombshell was that not information or submissions on pollution, health ,risks etc would be considered relevant. Only nonsense about infrastructure roads etc.

The whole process is a farce. The people of Cork have spoken loud and clear "No toxic waste incinerator". This is irrelevant to the Bord, the government and the company. In the end it may well come down to people being willing to take direct action to stop the incinerator. watch this space.