Just read in the daily mail today that the government has given away more licences to oil companies with the same controversial conditions it gave away the corrib field (albeit before it was discovered). They will be allowed to search for oil in irish waters in an area as large as Northern Ireland (25,000 square km). Basically they collect no royalties from any potential discoveries. The only amount paid is corporation taxes of 20% on profits made from exploiting any discovery and they will be able to write off any costs entailed in prospecting before they pay any tax. They are not even obliged to sell the oil even at market prices to ireland and can load it onto tankers and sell it to who ever they like. Noel Dempsey promised that the procedure for issuing licences would be reviewed. However this seems to have been rushed through with no press release. It just appeared on the department website at 6am on saturday morning. This is just a summary of what I read today in the daily mail. No western democracy imposes less conditions on oil companies prospecting for oil than ireland...