On October 15, at about 2.10pm, the power in our factory failed. Everything went dark and we had to pack up and go home as power was only restored about four hours later. All machinery would just drop dead and the damage to plant and work in progress is indescribable. Nobody cares!

This year alone we had no fewer than 20 power cuts, costing the company over €80,000 in damage to electronic equipment. This excludes the cost of wages, damaged work and non-delivery to customers.

While ARMS Ltd insists on its pound of flesh and imposes interest over every single euro it is owed, every utility company is immune to any claim for damage. The only solution is a UPS, costing at least some €100,000.

Trying to come up with a reason for what is taking place, I would in a way accept that a boiler trips (although sometimes it is a question of lack of preventive maintenance) but that irresponsible people handling cranes and diggers are allowed to cause havoc in this country is unthinkable. Indeed, 90 per cent of power cuts are caused in this way.

Are we a Third World country? The responsible ministry must come up as from today with a solution. Operators of cranes and diggers must be held to account.

We have had enough and more than we need!

Yes, the relevant authorities know and acknowledge what this kind of damage does to the economy. In these hard economic times, the last thing entrepreneurs would want to experience is this kind of damage.

One strives very hard to attract as many clients, tourists and work as possible to one’s enterprise and, yet, the tools to realise all this hard work are seriously threatened by power failures.

Maybe somebody will be bothered to take the bull by the horns and do something about it once and for all.