Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

That is fine, but I still cannot find anything in what the Minister has said that is not to do with commercial sensitivity. The only thing the Minister has added to commercially sensitive information is third party data, but Government Departments have third party data from companies and they clearly know how to deal with it. I do not think commercially sensitive information should be released to competitors. We agree on this. However, the legislation already covers issues of commercial sensitivity. Unless there is something else that is not covered by the section the Minister referenced on commercial sensitivity, why does this list exist? I cannot hear any reason other than commercial sensitivity.

As an aside, I have a philosophical question which is not relevant to the information. State companies were not established to compete. They were established because the private sector did not establish them. Bodies such as the ESB and Irish Water were not established to compete; they were established for very good reasons. The State is not in the business of establishing companies to compete with the private sector. The State is in the business of establishing organisations that would not be established by the private sector on its own, and we have a bunch of these. With respect, these bodies do not compete on a level playing field. Dublin Bus does not compete on a level playing field with private operators because Dublin Bus has a State guarantee. If the private operators run out of money they will go out of business, but none of the State agencies will ever go out of business.

If commercial sensitivity is already guaranteed for any agency, what is special about this list that is not already covered by commercial sensitivity? I have heard about nothing other than commercial sensitivity, which I accept and which is dealt with elsewhere in the Bill.