Pylons controversy - Figures offer a ray of hope to opponents

Last month’s establishment of a commission to consider if the grim prospect of super-sized pylons strung across our attractive countryside might be averted by burying 440kV power lines seemed as good a kick to touch as anything contrived by the splendid Johnny Sexton at the Aviva stadium on Saturday.

It seemed an all too predicable Irish solution to an Irish disagreement and appeared as if another inquiry might stand in the way in the way of development and economic progress. It was another reminder that we don’t always deliver large scale public projects — a children’s hospital, the Poolbeg incinerator, Dublin’s disconnected light rail system, water systems that don’t leak, or flood barriers nearly anywhere you care to mention — with the kind of efficiency to which we should aspire.

The commission was also established to counteract the corporate hubris that characterises some organisations — the semi-state EirGrid in this instance — that assume they are free to relegate the concerns of affected communities to a secondary position.