Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)

Gabhaim buíochas leis na Teachtaí Neamhspleácha as ucht a gcuid ama a roinnt. The proposal to privatise Aer Lingus, the national airline, arises for one reason only, from the right-wing, neo-liberal economic policy of this Fianna Fáil and Progressive Democrats Government. The Government is fully in tune in this sense with the EU Commission which would like to destroy every vestige of public ownership of services and industry within the European Union. There is no other economic reason for the proposed privatisation. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Cowen, speaking for the Government last night, made that clear indirectly when he tied himself up in contradictions:

Over its history Aer Lingus has had its share of crises and has come close to failure. However, the Minister for Transport wants to end these crisis cycles where every few years a crisis is followed by survival followed by stagnation and back to crisis again.

How does the Minister for Transport propose to prevent crises by abandoning Aer Lingus to sharks in the international aviation business? The opposite is the case because far more crises will be created for the national airline by doing this. In 2001, when the two unprecedented events of foot and mouth disease in this State and the twin towers atrocity in the United States occurred, it was inevitable there would be significant difficulties in international aviation. What would big business, as represented by the international sharks and the players of the casino economy, do if there was a more sustained period of crisis in international aviation arising from events such as these? They would shut down the airline, throw the workers to the wolves and move onto the next profit-making opportunity. The Minister for Finance makes no sense and should explain his reasoning.

He went on to argue that Aer Lingus should have the same funding flexibility as its competitors. Why does it not have funding flexibility? The Minister gives one reason. In one particular instance the National Pensions Reserves Fund cannot invest in Aer Lingus. This is because the Government makes rules that stop it from doing so. The Government prohibits investment in an entity such as Aer Lingus——

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