The Irish Times – Tuesday, November 22, 2011

ÁINE RYAN

SHELL HAS announced the appointment of a new managing director at the Corrib gas project.

The communique came as local protest groups yesterday declined an invitation to contribute to a joint Oireachtas committee hearing on offshore resources and their exploration.

Michael Crothers is a Canadian native, born to Irish parents, and takes the helm as Shell prepares for the final phase of the operation. This involves construction of the longest sub-sea raw gas pipeline in western Europe.

Challenges by An Taisce and local residents to key consents for this final phase were settled in the High Court recently.

Mr Crothers takes over from Terry Nolan on December 1st next. Mr Nolan, who held the position for four years, announced his intention to retire some weeks ago and said he was “hugely proud” of the “many collective achievements” attained by partners and contractors at Corrib. “I would also like to thank the people of Erris for their welcome and support and for the many challenges they have raised,” Mr Nolan said.

Mr Crothers has worked around the world in the oil and gas industry over a 28-year period, 24 of which have been with Shell.

His most recent post was as general manager of Expansion Operations for Shell’s upstream business in the Americas. He has also worked in London as vice-president of health, safety, environment and sustainable development for Shell’s downstream business. He will divide his time between Dublin and Erris.

Meanwhile, local community group Pobal Chill Chomáin has strongly criticised the decision of An Taisce to make a settlement on judicial reviews of the project, removing one the final obstacles to the project. The group claims the project is now in a legal limbo.

The group also wrote to Andrew Doyle TD, chairman of the Joint Oireachtas Committee for Communications, Natural Resources and Agriculture, declining an invitation to participate in a session to be held next week on November 29th. Pobal chairman Vincent McGrath states in the letter that the group’s key concerns for the “health and safety of the community” had not been addressed in a multitude of forums and settings.

“No integrated, cumulative risk assessment has ever been conducted on this project. Laws have been changed, standards amended, European rules ignored in order to advance the project,” Mr McGrath wrote.

He also said he wished to “to highlight the State’s facilitation of the project at every level, the criminalisation of our legitimate protests and the resultant human rights violations . . . We have been consistently excluded from having these issues properly and fully addressed.”

Maura Harrington of Shell to Sea also said they would not contribute either. Pro-Gas Mayo also received an invite to the meeting.

SOURCE ARTICLE

SHELL TO SEA SUPPORTER MICHAEL D. HIGGINS (RIGHT) BECOMES PRESIDENT AS  CAMPAIGN MARKS ANNIVERSARY OF GARDA BATON CHARGE AT SHELL’S REFINERY SITE

10 November 2011

– Michael D. Higgins: ‘The people of Erris deserve protection from any company that seeks to trample over their rights. No company should be outside the law’ –

As Shell to Sea supporter Michael D. Higgins prepares to be sworn in as President of Ireland tomorrow (Friday Nov 11th), hundreds of campaigners will gather in north Mayo to mark the fifth anniversary of the infamous Garda baton charge at Shell’s refinery site.

In February 2010, Michael D Higgins said of the Corrib project: “Agencies of the State got involved on the side of the developer, rather than on the side of the community. Given that alternative models were available in other countries, it was scandalous that we proceeded as we did.” [1]

Speaking at a protest at the gates of Shell’s refinery site on November 6th, 2006, Mr Higgins said: “The issue is the right of the people of Erris to have security and safety. They want to be able to live their lives in peace. They deserve protection from any company that seeks to trample over their rights. What is important are issues of justice and no company should be outside the law.”

He continued: “The resources of this planet need to be used responsibly for the people of the planet. The resources of Ireland belong to the people of Ireland.”

On the morning of Higgins’ inauguration as President, local residents and their supporters will gather at 10am at the gates of Shell’s inland refinery. From there they will walk to Bellanaboy Bridge to commemorate a baton charge by Gardaí on November 10th, 2006. The baton charge resulted in numerous injuries to campaigners and is one of the low points of the 11-year struggle against the inland refinery and high pressure pipeline.

They will also be marking the 16th anniversary of the execution of nine activists in Ogoniland, Nigeria. Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others were hanged by the Nigerian government on November 10th, 2005 for their opposition to Shell’s environmental destruction in the Niger delta.

From 7am, campaigners will carry out mass actions at Shell facilities.

Shell to Sea spokesperson Terence Conway said: “For 11 years this community has been resisting the combined force of a corrupt State and arrogant multinationals. Shell’s experimental inland refinery in this bog is a monument to corruption and we will continue to resist it. ”

ENDS

NOTES:

1. Mr Higgins was speaking in the Dáil on Wednesday, 3rd February 2010, during a debate on the Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed)

*This figure is based on the estimate, issued by the Department of Communications, Energy & Natural Resources (DCENR) in 2006, that the amount of recoverable oil and gas in the Rockall and Porcupine basins, off Ireland’s west coast, is 10 BBOE (billion barrels of oil equivalent). Based on the average price of a barrel of oil for 2010 of $79, this works out at $790 billion, or €580 billion. This does not take account of further oil and gas reserves off Ireland’s south & east coasts or inland. The total volume of oil and gas which rightfully belongs to Ireland could be significantly higher. Also, as the global price of oil rises in the coming years, the value of these Irish natural resources will rise further.

The Irish Times – Monday, October 31, 2011

LORNA SIGGINS, Western Correspondent

THE IRISH Federation of University Teachers has expressed serious concern about a warning of possible prosecution issued to an academic at NUI Maynooth by the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission.

The warning relates to alleged “obstruction” of the Garda Ombudsman’s continuing inquiry into taped comments made by gardaí after a Corrib gas protest on March 31st last.

The federation’s general secretary Mike Jennings says that the Garda Ombudsman’s approach “illustrates the lack of protection for both bona fide researchers and journalists” in protecting sources.

It also “runs against any principle of open inquiry and transparency in a democratic society”, Mr Jennings said.

The warning was issued verbally by the Garda Ombudsman to NUIM lecturer Dr Bríd Connolly, following a decision by her to supervise deletion of material from a video camera which was sought by Garda Ombudsman officers investigating the Corrib tape incident. The academics at the centre of the case say the material was unrelated to the inquiry.

The video camera was university property, and had been on loan to postgraduate student Jerrie Ann Sullivan, who was one of two women arrested by gardaí at Glengad on March 31st last.

The video camera was confiscated by gardaí travelling in a separate car to that transporting the two women to Belmullet Garda station. They discovered taped material after the camcorder was returned to them on their release.

An interim Garda Ombudsman report into the incident, published on July 28th by Minister for Justice Alan Shatter, said that the investigations’ transcript from the camcorder upholds the allegations the camera, still switched on, recorded gardaí joking about raping the women if they refused to give their name and address.

It also recorded them talking of “deporting” one of the women who was believed to be an American citizen, “enlisting the support of the Garda National Immigration Bureau to harass them and [making] other comments of an inappropriate nature”, the report said.

The interim report found no evidence of a criminal offence having been committed by any of the five gardaí subsequently interviewed, and no evidence of any breach of discipline by three of the gardaí.

It said that disciplinary issues “may arise in the case of two Garda members”, who were confined to desk duties after the investigation was initiated on April 5th last as a matter of public interest.

NUIM sociology lecturer Dr Laurence Cox, one of four university staff interviewed by the Garda Ombudsman, said that he was concerned about the situation where those who were victims in this case were now being “treated as perpetrators”.

Postgraduate student Ms Sullivan had been questioned for 4½ hours, he noted. Dr Connolly, who could not comment yesterday, was interviewed under caution.

Deletion of unrelated material only came about after two separate offers were made by the university to the Garda Ombudsman to agree on deletion by a neutral third party, Dr Cox said.

Ms Sullivan and her supervisors had a duty to abide by the university’s own research ethics principles and the ethical code of the Sociological Association of Ireland, he pointed out.

The Garda Ombudsman said it would not comment beyond confirming that the investigation was ongoing, and it was moving “as speedily as we can to a conclusion”.

NUI Maynooth referred yesterday to its statement of July 29th last when it acknowledged that deletion of college research material was “inadvisable”, but the “individuals concerned” were “acting out of concern” for student welfare, confidentiality of a research record, and a “genuine belief that the particular material deleted was not relevant to the inquiry”.

SOURCE ARTICLE

The project is currently 10 years behind schedule, projected costs have risen from $800 million to $2.5billion, Statoil has had to sell off its retail outlets in Ireland because of the damage to its reputation and internationally the reputation of Statoil has suffered due to its partnership in the Corrib field.

CORRIB GAS PROJECT

The award winning documentary film about the controversial Corrib Gas pipeline – ‘The Pipe’ – will have its Norwegian premiere this Monday in Oslo at the Cinemateket presented by the Neptune Network:
http://www.neptunenetwork.org/.

Attendees will include people from industry, politics, media and academia, who will participate in a post screening discussion with director of the film Risteard Ó Domhnaill and County Mayo fisherman Patrick O’Donnell

(see photo right, courtesy of John Monaghan).

http://www.neptunenetwork.org/profiles/blogs/cinemateket-statoils-overgrep-mot-irsk-befolkning-vises-frem-i-pr

http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Pipe-The-Film/270493470810

Staoil has a 36,5 per cent interest in the Corrib gas field north-west of Ireland. The Corrib field development is operated by Shell and has been marred by controversy since 5 local landowners were jailed in 2005 for 94 days for opposing the laying of an onshore high pressure raw gas pipeline through their land to the proposed refinery 9km inland.

The project is currently 10 years behind schedule, projected costs have risen from $800 million to $2.5billion, Statoil has had to sell off its retail outlets in Ireland because of the damage to its reputation and internationally the reputation of Statoil has suffered due to its partnership in the Corrib field.

http://www.statoil.com/en/About/Worldwide/Ireland/Pages/default.aspx

The Pipe – Synopsis

In a remote corner of the West of Ireland sits Broadhaven Bay. It is the perfect picture postcard, where the high cliffs of Erris Head and the Stags of Broadhaven stand sentry at the mouth of the bay against the mighty Atlantic, as if protecting the delicate golden sands of Glengad beach and the tiny village of Rossport, which nestles behind the dunes. However, this peaceful tranquility belies the turmoil that lies beneath, and the unique nature of the coastline which has sustained generations of farmers and fishermen, has also delivered to Shell and Statoil the perfect landfall for the Corrib Gas Pipeline.

In the most dramatic clash of cultures in modern Ireland, the rights of farmers over their fields, and of fishermen to their fishing grounds, has come in direct conflict with one of the worlds most powerful oil companies. When the citizens look to their state to protect their rights, they find that the state has put Shell and Statoil’s right to lay a pipeline over their own.

The Pipe is a story of a community tragically divided, and how they deal with a pipe that could bring economic prosperity or destruction of a way of life shared for generations.

press images:

www.thepipethefilm.com/press/
username: press
Password:  pipe1

Trailer and links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMSLuxuf_iE

www.cbc.ca/video/#/News/Featured_Videos/ID=1590885523

www.thepipethefilm.com

www.facebook.com/pages/The-Pipe-The-Film

www.thepipethefilm.com/main-sect/review-in-variety-magazine/

Friday, 07 October 2011

Liamy MacNally

The days are getting shorter and the lawyers are tripping over themselves in the noontime darkness.  Their cathedral minds are busy.  The Four Courts silver spoon still shines with looming cases.  The law does not always bring justice, even if the ladder of law has no top or no bottom!

A High Court judicial review of permissions granted for ongoing work on the Corrib Gas project is due to be heard on October 11.  The judicial review was sought by An Taisce and some local residents into permissions granted by An Bord Pleanála and the then acting Minister for Communications, Energy & Natural Resources, Pat Carey, for the pipeline and the Plan of Development.  The outcome could have serious implications for the Corrib project.

More legalese: “Strong rumours here in Erris, Co Mayo (beside Corrib gas development) that the project will grind to a halt following an up-and-coming court case involving a local contractor, Shell and the local police force (Garda).”

The royaldutchshellplc.com website had this on its home page last Friday.  This website, subtitled, ‘News and information on Royal Dutch Shell Plc’ has nothing whatever to do with the said company.  A disclaimer states: “This is not a Shell website nor is it officially endorsed by or affiliated with Shell in any way.”  The site was founded by 94 year-old Alfred Donovan, the former Chairman of the Shell Corporate Conscience Pressure Group.  He is assisted by, among others, his son, John, who has been involved in the gasoline retailing industry for over 40 years.  John is best known for his long association with the Royal Dutch Shell Group, firstly for devising marketing campaigns on an international basis and more recently as a long-term Shell shareholder and critic of Shell senior management.  The site is a mine of information on Shell’s activities worldwide.

Less than a year ago, Éamon Gilmore promised an immediate review of oil and gas licensing terms if elected to Government.  Speaking in June 2011 Minister Pat Rabbitte stated: “To successfully attract a greater share of mobile international exploration investment to Ireland, we need a number of basic requirements.  Firstly, we must maintain a realistic tax regime that reflects our relative attractiveness as a place to invest in petroleum exploration.

Secondly, we need an approach to licensing that is designed to attract new companies to Ireland and to encourage those companies already here to increase their activity levels.  The 2011 Atlantic Margin Licensing Round, which closed yesterday, is an initiative designed to achieve this.  While it is very early days in terms of evaluating the applications received under the Round, I welcome the fact that a total of 15 applications have been received.

The country is bust yet there is little recognition of its natural resources assets. Where are last year’s opposition voices?  Former politicians (none of whom is facing charges in court) reap huge pensions while cutbacks affect workers and non-workers.  More and more, life in Ireland is demanding a moral response from Government.  Maybe Government is really about the survival of the richest…

SOURCE ARTICLE

Corrib gas objectors denied entry to Oireachtas hearing

The Irish Times – Wednesday, September 28, 2011

PAUL CULLEN

SECURITY STAFF at the Houses of the Oireachtas yesterday refused entry to a group of opponents of the Corrib gas terminal who had travelled from Co Mayo to attend an Oireachtas committee.

The group of 15 Shell to Sea supporters travelled to Dublin at the invitation of Fianna Fáil deputy leader Éamon Ó Cuív to attend a hearing of the Oireachtas Committee on Communications, Natural Resources and Agriculture about offshore exploration licences.

An Oireachtas spokeswoman said the group was turned away on foot of a long-standing rule that forbids access to anyone demonstrating outside the gates of Leinster House on a particular day.

However, while campaigners against the gas terminal mounted a small protest outside Leinster House, members of the group said they had not participated in this picket.

Spokeswoman Maura Harrington said the group met Mr Ó Cuív in a hotel across the road and then walked over to Leinster House, where they learned they would not be admitted. “We came 200 miles in good faith but once again, our good faith has been thrown back at us.”

At the committee, officials of the Department of Energy and Natural Resources defended the licensing regime.

Principal officer Ciarán Ó hObain acknowledged that companies that make discoveries tended to do well under the Irish regime. But he said the chances of making a find were low, so overall it was a relatively high-risk investment for the companies involved.

Out of 132 wells drilled in Irish waters, only four have resulted in a commercial discovery. The cost of drilling a well ranges from $30 million (€22 million) to $120 million depending on location.

Petroleum specialist Noel Murphy said there was a huge lack of data about deep water areas. Ireland would need to be drilling five wells a year in order to have a good chance of finding oil. At the moment, an average of only one well a year is being drilled.

Successive reviews of the tax regime for offshore discoveries have seen corporation tax rates halved and royalties abolished. Tax is payable on profits after exploration costs have been written off.

Mr Ó hObain said it was wrong to compare Ireland with major producers like Norway, where the tax take is 78 per cent. No new commercial discoveries have been made in Irish waters since 2007.

SOURCE ARTICLE

Update from our sources…

“Strong rumours here in Erris, Co Mayo (beside Corrib gas development) that the project will grind to a halt following an up-and-coming court case involving a local contractor, Shell and the local police force (Garda). The word is that the CEO and others are heading for the exit over this matter.”

Added 4 October 2011:

A small local company was asked by Shell to carry out favours for interested parties. *Court case seems to be about local company not getting paid. Seemingly the details in the legal papers are dynamite for Shell and some locals and could indeed halt the project. Not quite sure what the Gardai (local police) involvement is but they seem to be implicated in some way.

WARNING: These are rumors…

Attention Royal Dutch Shell Plc: If you confirm by email that any information printed under this headline is categorically untrue, it will be removed immediately.

*(We are trying to obtain the relevant legal papers)

We hear from our sources…

“Strong rumours here in Erris, Co Mayo (beside Corrib gas development) that the project will grind to a halt following an up-and-coming court case involving a local contractor, Shell and the local police force (Garda). The word is that the CEO and others are heading for the exit over this matter.”

WARNING: These are rumors…

Attention Royal Dutch Shell Plc: If you confirm by email that any information printed under this headline is categorically untrue, it will be removed immediately.

As well as an investigation of his complaint, Mr Murphy said a public inquiry should be held into the entire policing operation around the Shell project and the working relationship between Shell’s private security contractors and the Garda.

CONOR LALLY, Crime Correspondent

DUBLIN SOCIALIST Party MEP Paul Murphy has lodged a formal complaint with the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission over alleged mistreatment by gardaí policing a protest in Co Mayo.

Mr Murphy claims he was subjected to excessive force by gardaí during the protest over Shell’s Corrib gas project last Thursday.

He said he was left with bruising and was unable to chew properly for a number of days after gardaí used “pressure point” techniques on him when removing him and other protesters.

He has submitted photographs of himself, taken by others, while being removed from a sit-down protest on a roadway. Some of the photos show small bruises, which Mr Murphy said he sustained when being subjected to the techniques.

These tactics are used by the Garda and prison officers to subdue prisoners or people who pose a public order risk. They involve using fingers to apply pressure to certain areas of the body, including behind the ear, aimed at physically subduing a person for a short period to allow their arrest or removal from a public order incident.

Mr Murphy’s complaint is that the force used against him and others was excessive and disproportionate to any risk posed by the protest on the day. He described the actions of some gardaí as “outrageous”.

“Garda brutality has been a persistent feature of the situation in Rossport since the end of 2006, when the area was effectively militarised with hundreds of gardaí coming into the area,” he said.

“At that time, protesters including myself were subjected to serious assaults by the gardaí, including being thrown into ditches, beaten with batons and deliberately punched.”

He said that during the incident last Thursday he was one of a group that sat on a roadway to block gardaí from driving a cherrypicker into a location at Erris near Aughoose. Gardaí were trying to remove a protester who had climbed onto the roof of a Shell lorry at one of the company’s sites.

The works were part of a construction project to lay a pipeline that will carry sludge with gas from the seashore to Shell’s onshore plant for refining into gas.

Mr Murphy, who travelled to Mayo as part of a Socialist Party delegation, claims gardaí were aggressive when they moved in, and made no attempt to use any approach apart from an extreme one.

He says he was picked up by four or five gardaí, had the area behind his ear and his left jaw pressed hard and also suffered blows to his ribs and head, while having his ears twisted with some force.

He was among a group of between 15 and 20 protesters removed from the road by gardaí and put behind Garda lines, though they were not arrested.

Mr Murphy lodged his complaint yesterday afternoon at the offices in Dublin of the Garda ombudsman. He said he had no confidence his complaint would progress in any meaningful fashion, pointing out that of the 111 complaints lodged in relation to the policing of the Shell to Sea protests, 78 were deemed inadmissible by the ombudsman and seven were sent to the DPP.

“Most strikingly, only one file was sent to the Garda Commissioner’s office calling for disciplinary procedures. To date, no disciplinary action has been taken.”

A spokesman for the ombudsman said it did not comment on individual cases.

As well as an investigation of his complaint, Mr Murphy said a public inquiry should be held into the entire policing operation around the Shell project and the working relationship between Shell’s private security contractors and the Garda.

He said the working relationship between the Garda and Shell security guards was too close and went “well beyond” the co-operation between the Garda and private security firms at events such as concerts and sporting fixtures.

SOURCE ARTICLE