Belco's shareholders ? not the general public ? should cover the costs of new safety measures recommended in the wake of the July fire at the power plant, a former Cabinet Minister said yesterday.

Mr. Edness, who called for an independent inquiry after the fire and Island-wide blackout, said Belco should cut its dividend to shareholders to pay for any additional expenses.

"Belco is putting the recommendations in place, they should pay for it out of their reserves without hiking rates toward consumers," Mr. Edness said. "It's not our fault. This is not like increases in the price of oil. I don't think we should suffer for the failure of its directors, executive and engineering staff."

But the former politician said Belco's engineering staff got off lightly. "I suppose who pays the piper calls the tune," Mr. Edness said. "Who would have thought with all the things to go wrong someone would have to take responsibility."

He said the engineering staff must have known about the fault in the fire suppression system in the switch room but nothing was done about it.

Waiting for parts to arrive was no excuse, he said, as they should have known it would take a long time.

He said EA Technologies investigator Dr. Dawn Miller should have asked why the fire suppressers did not work properly.

And in response to chairman J. Michael Collier's comment that protection systems that could and should have minimised the fire, Mr. Edness asked ? "Why did these systems fail in the first place?"

"The engineers can't sit there and say their hands are clean. So many instances point to engineering deficiencies," he said. "The point is what is going to happen now? Is it business as usual? I know there was human error involved but they are not going to deal with anyone who had responsibility for that.

"You can't run a monopoly like that, particularly not one that provides electricity to the Island. It's not good enough," he said.

Belco CEO Garry Madeiros admitted to the media on Thursday that Belco knew there was a problem with life threatening carbon dioxide being intermittently released inside the switch room by faulty fire suppressers.

However, Mr. Edness said this explanation was not good enough and they were not being as truthful as they ought to be.

In relation to disengagement of maintenance in the switch room being more of a routine than anything else, Mr. Edness said he could not believe someone in charge of any company would know about such disengagement and do nothing about it.

"It's fixed. It's not gone into the human error in detail. Bermuda should not have to take that. There are so many question marks. Their own comments about the system has raised the issues," he said. "They are not saying if anyone is getting fired or was incompetent."

EA Technologies recommended a swathe of reforms as a result of a catastrophic fire on July 14 that plunged parts of the Island into darkness for two days.

Belco is the Island's only electricity manufacturer and was officially 99-year-old on Thursday.

Belco released a letter to shareholders yesterday, quoting Mr. Madeiros to say each share's market price was $40.25.

He said a temporary switch room should be installed by November 30 and Belco was continuing to reconfigure the power system for maximum security from its currently compromised system, which remained more sensitive than normal to any minor system events.