I was appalled by Minister Austin Gatt's statement in The Times yesterday that the situation about subsidies and utility rates are due to "sky-high oil"! I quote yesterday's New York Times: "The Dow Jones industrial average rose 401.35 points or 4.6 percent on Thursday and the broader Standard & Poor's 500-stock index jumped 4.2 per cent as oil prices declined. Once again, the markets spent the day in search of direction with the Dow trading in a range of about 800 points. Crude oil prices closed down $4.70 to $69.84."

Oil has never been cheaper! Who is missing the wood for the trees here? Not only has the government ignored the warnings of economists, columnists, ecologists and the informed public to seek alternative sources of energy for years and years but now we are also expected to pay for the government's folly of the kind that spends millions of euros on a huge new hospital and does not install solar power in it as a matter of course!

The procrastination with regard to "bridging the reality gap" has merely led to the "easiest way out" solution; asking us to pay for it! As Onslow says: "How nice"!