This Is Guernsey

By James Varley

DAMAGING information about Alderney’s tidal power deal is being kept from the public, according to former States member Frank Dean.

‘The tip has been released, but the piece that would have done the damage has not. I have made it very clear to the other members that I won’t disclose what we all know. I have returned all the tidal power information I had in my possession to the States. The information I have will stay with me.’

A retired engineer, Mr Dean (pictured) was the only member to vote against every tidal power proposal at last week’s hastily-arranged States meeting. He resigned at the end of it.

Initially he said that was because proper political procedures had not been followed, but he has now said that Alderney States and the Alderney Commission for Renewable Energy were hiding information from the public.

‘I could not abandon other principles that I have and I could not ignore all the hidden information. I could also not ignore the consequences that are likely,’ he said.

‘There’s a huge amount of information in there and the whole thing has been shrouded in the all-enveloping phrase of “commercial confidence”.

‘It would have been easy for me to sit back and abstain or make a few muted comments and continue, but that’s not Frank Dean.’

He said there was no reason for the project to have been hurried through and altered so significantly.

‘The project, which was rushed through 10 minutes before we entered the Chamber, was nowhere near the project we started with at the beginning of October.

‘I found it odd that Acre and the promoting members could be so adamant about the quality of this particular project and see it change so drastically over a month.’

Alderney States chief executive David Jeremiah said: ‘All States members had the same information. They were entitled to form differing conclusions based on this.’

The States agreed, by six votes to four, to bring the tidal energy project forward by two years. In doing so, it has allowed developer Alderney Renewable Energy to sign a contract to supply French company RTE.

The contract was signed on Friday – the deadline imposed by the French forced the States to sit more than a week early.

The main change is the scrapping of a pilot project that would have supplied power to Alderney. ARE will instead pay Acre £200,000 a year.

Article posted on 19th November, 2008 - 2.29pm