Michael McDowell’s Poolbeg promise is ‘election gimmick’
Green Party Chairman and Dublin South East TD John Gormley has accused Michael McDowell of opportunism on the issue of the proposed incinerator at Poolbeg.
Deputy Gormley said: “This latest election promise is a pathetic last gasp effort to regain credibility on the issue. People should see through this election gimmick. Stopping the incinerator was a central plank of Michael McDowell’s election campaign in 2002. He told voters that he would be best placed of all the candidates to stop the project as he would be sitting at the cabinet table and could change government policy. Once elected however, Minister McDowell forgot about that promise
“The record shows that the government voted down a Green Party motion to stop the incinerator. We have been very clear that in government this incinerator will not go ahead.
“I believe that the planning case against this incinerator is unanswerable. The site selection process was flawed, the traffic impact would be disastrous and, most importantly, there is no need for this massive facility. However, in the past we have seen cases where the An Bord Pleanála’s inspector recommended against the project on planning grounds, only to have this decision overturned by the Bord on the basis of ‘government policy’. This is what happened with the incinerator at Ringaskiddy, and more recently with the redevelopment of Lansdowne Road stadium.
“A recent independent report on waste management in Ireland found that our reliance on incineration is in fact a major impediment to meeting our targets under the EU Landfill Directive. This report, by leading European environmental consultants Eunomia, found that alternatives to incineration could be put in place more quickly and at less cost. We urgently need a change in Government policy, otherwise we will be lumbered with a collection of massive incinerators, which, in the words of Dr Dominic Hogg, the author of the Eunomia report, will ‘crowd out recycling options’.