Dublin Council of Trade Unions calls for release of Mayo Shell protestors.

by Smidín Céille Sat Jul 16, 2005 06:20

I don't doubt that there is some industry support behind you, or alternatively that there are many portions of the proverbial fries on shoulders, as you seem to be very angry about this issue.

A couple of points need to be made here:
(1) How do you know that "In those 30 years dozens of oil companies had drilled hundreds of wells and found nothing". Can you please qualify and quantify your statements? Do you not know that any information in regard to oil/gas discoveries off our coasts comes directly from those in whose interest it is to keep that information quiet, i.e. the gas/oil companies themselves? With most offshore work being handled from stations outside our territory, there is no way that Irish people can verify exactly how much, or indeed, how little, energy reserves there are under our territorial waters. So, an argument based on the assumption that we are quickly running out of oil and gas can be immediately negated, as we don't know that for a fact. This has never been verified. This applies also to your statement that "The reality is that Irish offshore waters are not full of oil and gas".

(2) One of the problems that has been put forward with having a gas refinery offshore has been the adverse weather conditions off the Mayo shore. It's very windy, apparentlly, off the Erris coast, and this could pose a danger to workers on the rigs. My God, am I a genius or what - why not harness that energy and generate a few old watts of wind power?????? You can now sleep easy at night as we will not be left without charge for our mobile phones or without a bit of energy for the kettle as there's plenty of wind in us yet.

(3) "There is a world oil shortage." See point (1) above.

(4) "Ireland produces not a drop of oil." So what? See point (2) above.

(5) "Ireland is infinitely more dependent on Shell to sell it oil than Shell is on Ireland. If you close down Shell Ireland tomorrow morning, they could withdraw from Ireland tomorrow afternoon without the slightest impact on their global profits."

I refute your statement that we are dependent on Shell to sell oil to us. If we run out of oil or gas, we will have to put our contracts out to tender, and the Government will have to decide on which party provides the best value, i.e. the Caspian gas may prove cheaper than the Corrib gas, or gas from Venezuala might be cheaper than oil from Nigeria. In terms of a dependable energy supply, there is no such thing in a global economy, as I'm sure you know. To be honest I don't know where you're going with this argument. You have moved from trying to insult the people of Erris because they have an opinion which differs from your own (and I respect your opinion) by referring to them as "unemployed Mayo farmers", to trying to boggle us with your unqualified, but very well-articulated statements (never a question or an opinion; always represented as fact) on the economies of the global energy situation.

(6)"Or perhaps they want to set up one from scratch, recruiting the engineers from unemployed Mayo farmers. Someone explain to these people that extracting gas from beneath the sea isn't like digging for peat."
One of the arguments put forth by SEPIL, and indeed, by some politicians in Ireland, in favour of this gas project, is that this would bring employment to the area of Erris and would be of huge benefit to the local economy. In arguing in favour of Shell etc, you have just put your foot in it. Clearly, as a proponent of this project, you cannot imagine that an engineer could possibly be recruited locally as we are nothing more than "unemployed Mayo farmers". Thank you for clarifying the issue. You have confirmed that here will be no significant benefits for the local people in terms of employment. I'm so relieved that I didn't hand in my notice in Dublin today to dash back to get a "real job" at home. Your use of the phrase "these people" haunts me like the words of Minister Dempsey on RTE's "Morning Ireland" programme yesterday when he repeated the expression "some people" in regard to opposition to this pipeline and terminal. Sorry, but we've all been to secondary school (just about, of course). We know how language works. Back off and stop being so insulting.
Furthermore, your comment about "digging for peat" further exposes your ignorance of the sophistication of the work of saving turf etc. Erris is an area which still preserves the traditions of saving turf by hand, where people have an intimate, symbiotic relationship with the land. Do you know what stage we should be at in saving turf now, in mid-July? I'm sure you don't, and I'm sure it's actually of no interest to you. The difference is that we know when turf needs to be spread and when "grogáns" have to be made and when we have to get a "meitheal" together to bring the turf home (sorry again, but the altruism of a "meitheal" I cannot measure in financial terms for you). While city dwellers buy camomile teabags to show us their sophistication (myself included), they wouldn't recognise the plant as it grew outside their doors. The extraction of gas may be a known quantity, but the bringing it ashore as currently propsed is not. Standard codes are being quoted, but upon examination, any fool can see that the terms and conditions of those very codes are actually not being applied.

by John Fri Jul 15, 2005 16:50

Utter nonsense. We're talking about Shell pulling out AFTER they've been shut down (as advocated in the earlier post) by the DCTU in support of a protest by anti-capitalist anti-oil-industry left-wing environmentalists against a pipeline which is designed to the most modern technical specifications and which will be as safe as any pipeline in the world. In such circumstances, to suggest that Shell would be criticised for its action beyond the confines of loony left environmentalists in Ireland is stretching things a bit far. A more likely reaction would be 'Well done, Shell, for teaching these clowns a lesson'. That's why the call for the DCTU to close down Shell is a bluff. The workers in the Irish oil industry know the facts of life, even if you don't. Therefore, you can huff and puff as much as you like, there will no national action against Shell by the DCTU or anyone else. It would be national economic suicide if it took place, and therefore it won't. Period.

by R. Isible Fri Jul 15, 2005 00:55

John writes: If you close down Shell Ireland tomorrow morning, they could withdraw from Ireland tomorrow afternoon without the slightest impact on their global profits

The same argument that you make about the Irish Govt. needing to be seen globally as a reliable partner applies to Shell and all other multinational companies too. If Shell are seen internationally to hold sovereign nations to ransom by the threat of pull out when they are not allowed to put the lives of citizens of those countries at risk then the reluctance of other nations to allow them anything more than a portion of the control of oil supplies will increase.

Shell is on a hiding to nothing on this one as is anyone in government connected with it in any way at all.

by seedot Fri Jul 15, 2005 00:22

Hey John, do you reckon all them oil guys stick together and none of them would go for the quick profit in solving that hypothetical oil shortage in Ireland.

You believe in the free market. If Shell got driven / left in a fit of pique it would hardly be a meltdown of life as we know it, would it. The market would fix it.

If we nationalised the lot - that might be a dfferent story.

by John Thu Jul 14, 2005 23:45

Don't be so daft. Don't you read the papers? There is a world oil shortage. Prices are sky-high. Ireland produces not a drop of oil. Ireland is infinitely more dependent on Shell to sell it oil than Shell is on Ireland. If you close down Shell Ireland tomorrow morning, they could withdraw from Ireland tomorrow afternoon without the slightest impact on their global profits. Every drop of oil they previously sold in Ireland would be snapped up elsewhere, while Ireland would suffer a severe oil shortage that resulted in mass lay-offs, power cuts etc. Why are socialists so dumb when it comes to understanding these things? I

by Bureaucrat watch Thu Jul 14, 2005 20:25

DCTU call for the release etc, but what will the unions actually do? Will you shut down Shell? Will you organise solidarity strike action? The union bureacrats in DCTU etc are completely ineffective and will only go as far as making the odd statement.

by John Wed Jul 13, 2005 18:11

There is no comparison between electricity generation and oil/gas exploration. With electricity generation, you build the power station and, hey presto, the electricity is there. With oil/gas exploration, you can drill a hundred wells costing tens of billions and find nothing. The Corrib discovery was the first off Ireland for almost 30 years. In those 30 years dozens of oil companies had drilled hundreds of wells and found nothing. If a publicly-owned taxpayer-financed exploration company had been doing all that exploration, Ireland would be bankrupt by now. When exploration got under way in Irish waters in the early 1970s there were hopes that the Celtic Sea and the Atlantic would be another North Sea. That has not turned out to be the case. The reality is that Irish offshore waters are not full of oil and gas. At best a few relatively small fields are present in Irish waters, of which Corrib is one. And it IS a very small field by North Sea standards. One strategy, of course, is to let multi-national oil companies bear all the expense of exploration and then when they make a small discovery, after 30 years in which they found nothing at a cost of billions, simply change the rules and stop them developing it. That seems to be what the DCTU have in mind. Its a clever strategy, but alas it can only be employed once since, after it was employed, no oil company in its right mind would have anything to do with exploring Irish waters. Try and use some business common sense in these matters and not socialist emotion.

by seedot Wed Jul 13, 2005 17:47

Surely the same arguments could have been used against the establishment of the ESB in 1927 - or was all that just some socialist plot?

As for Telecom Eireann - despite Alberts good work in giving us a state of the art telephone system through a state company, the entire system was asset stripped once the private sector got involved. Again though - just some communist plot as all those phones didn't really work.

Us Irish are just too stupid to do anything like this.

by John Wed Jul 13, 2005 16:42

"Council further calls for the development of Ireland's gas fields by a publicly owned industry ". This is the dumbest comment ever. Can they name one publicly owned industry in Ireland that has the slightest knowledge of or experience in extracting gas from beneath the sea? Or perhaps they want to set up one from scratch, recruiting the engineers from unemployed Mayo farmers. Someone explain to these people that extracting gas from beneath the sea isn't like digging for peat. It requires the most advanced technology, billions of euros investment and engineering skills which are so scarce that even countries fifty times the size of Ireland require the expertise of multi-national companies like Shell.