Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State back to the House and thank him for all his replies this afternoon. There are concerns about section 55, which provides that the appropriate Minister may issue guarantees or indemnities regarding public-private partnerships, PPPs. One misgiving is the issue of letters of comfort, which we discussed with the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, earlier. Another is indemnities. Is it not time that the risks in PPPs were shared? That is the purpose of my opposition to the section. I would like to see some risk sharing. Is the State always the loser in PPPs, as in some of the motorway projects for which the contracts are so legally watertight they cannot be revisited. The former Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Varadkar, examined them. Can we have protection against the State always bearing the losses and the private partner walking away without bearing some risk? I thought the purpose of PPPs was that private companies would take some risk on board. This is the last amendment I will propose today and I thank the Minister for his responses to all the others.