The best-laid plans...

IF Mary O’Leary ever runs short of reasons to be cynical about the planning system, she casts her mind back to January 2004 to restock.

As chairwoman of CHASE, the Cork Harbour Alliance for a Safe Environment, she had her ears peeled for a phone call on the evening of January 15, when she was due to hear the outcome of the group's appeal to An Bord Pleanála against Indaver Ireland's plans for a waste incinerator at Ringaskiddy. No call came.

The following morning, she was up with the lark, reassuring herself that the board's deliberations must have run too late the night before for them to call. But still the phone stayed silent.