Power dispute - ESB at risk of alienating public

THERE will be little public sympathy for ESB staff, counted among the highest paid workers, if they stage nationwide blackouts in their dispute with Government over the company’s future.

Doubtless, they have the power to disrupt electricity supplies and, with a general election looming, the opportunity to embarrass the Government.

But it would be highly irresponsible of ESB unions to force a series of power cuts which would wreak havoc on the public and on industry, putting thousands of jobs at risk.

As things stand, there is a real danger that the workers and Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources Noel Dempsey will paint themselves into a corner over the proposed break-up of the State-owned monopoly, leaving generation and transmission with the ESB and giving the transmission lines to Airgrid.

Common sense and compromise are preferable to confrontation and conflict.