Esat Digifone is seeking planning permission for 18 more mobile phone masts at Garda stations in 11 counties, with a further 62 applications expected to follow within weeks.
The company confirmed yesterday that the 18 applications it had already advertised were the first tranche of a total of 80 masts, most of which were intended for installation at smaller, rural Garda stations.
They include Quin, Kilkee and Scarriff, in Co Clare; Ahascragh, Co Galway; Ballintra, Co Donegal; Castlebellingham and Dunleer, Co Louth; Navan and Oldcastle, Co Meath; Kilcullen, Co Kildare; Ferbane, Co Offaly; Cloughjordan, Co Tipperary; Oola, Co Limerick; and Ballylongford and Ballyferriter, Co Kerry.
Mr Declan Drummond, of Esat Digifone, said most of these stations had a single antenna on the roof or a pole in the backyard and therefore were not covered by the planning exemption which the company enjoyed as a result of its deal with the Garda Siochana.
The exemption from planning control applies only where Esat is erecting one of its antennae on an existing Garda communications mast. More than 200 Garda stations already have such masts, but this has not prevented protests at the proposed additions.
The advantage to the Garda from this "win-win" arrangement, as Mr Drummond described it, was that it wanted to upgrade its communications network from analog to digital so that all Garda stations could transmit data and pictures as well as having access to a central computer.
He said if the Garda had had to rely on funding from the Department of Finance there would probably have been a lengthy delay in achieving these changes. However, the arrangement with Esat meant that the telecommunications masts required were being provided by the private sector.
Asked about the continuing public controversy over the erection of mobile phone masts, Mr Drummond said the case taken by locals in Easkey, Co Sligo, had been dismissed recently by the High Court.
"The strange thing is that a lot of the opposition seems to be centred in the north-west, in Sligo, Donegal and Mayo, and we see a correlation between this and the campaign against MMDS. The chances are that where they're objecting to MMDS, they're objecting to us, too."
He said Esat found the controversy "very frustrating". He warned that if it failed to win approval for the latest masts, they would be put up by the Garda under an exemption from planning control.
