“The report on Tuesday by the UREGNI into SONI governance must be a wake-up call to the Minister of Economy. There have been far too many disastrous decisions made on Northern Irelands Energy systems, none more than handing the control of our grid, energy strategy and pricing to a foreign government owned company. As the Regulator himself states in his report: 

“There must be no risk that SONI might be, or be perceived to be, directed or unduly influenced by EirGrid in its pursuit of its objectives and policy of government in the Republic of Ireland”.  

“The report provides a litany of conclusions that shows that far from being an ‘independent’ system operator, it is directly managed and controlled by EirGrid – not to the betterment of the consumers of Northern Ireland, but to its parent company’s main interests. These clearly are not in the interests of either the domestic or commercial users of electricity here. Decisions made by the parent company directly affect our security of supply, access of renewables to the system, and pricing arrangements. 

“Furthermore, these decisions made in Dublin are at best, opaque, to our Regulator; it is more likely that information is probably withheld as a matter of that company’s policy to prevent proper oversight to be conducted. These are very far from satisfactory ‘governance’ arrangements.  

“While our Party has, for many years, been highlighting that NI’s energy system is too fragile and dependent on Irish Republic state owned utilities.  It now must be readily apparent to all that the current arrangements do not work.  

“That there has been little comment on this from Gordon Lyons may be an oversight, however, the stewardship of our vital energy systems by the DUP over the years has been abysmal.  Now is the time to help fix that and for the Minister to call for the very necessary and urgent reform, outlined by the UREGNI, that is needed by SONI.  This must be coupled with a fundamental and far-reaching review of our energy security and supply”