Madam, - I am the author of the report on EU environmental law referred to in Mary Raftery's article "Not a record to boast of" (July 1st). I wish to congratulate Ms Raftery on her article in highlighting Ireland's record on the application of EU environmental law, an issue which seldom makes it into the national press.
My report referred to 118 environmental infringement cases over the period 1998-2002. This was a cumulative figure. Statistics constantly change. The fact remains, however, that Ireland has the highest number of complaints per head of population on environmental issues and the third-highest number of environmental infringement cases behind Italy and Spain. Most of these cases concerning Ireland relate to the "bad" (mauvais) application of environmental law.
It is increasingly common practice within the Commission to amalgamate as many as ten complaints into a single environmental infringement case. It is also common to amalgamate cases at further stages, so that many letters of formal notice to Ireland are grouped together into one Reasoned Opinion. In other words, the numbers can appear to be falling, while the number of actual problems remains the same.
The European Commission has recently made a number of decisions in relation to environmental infringement cases, and will be issuing press releases on these over the next few days. I look forward to continued Irish Times coverage of this important issue. - Yours etc.,
SHIRLEY CLERKIN, Castle Heights, Dundalk, Co Louth.