Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

The Labour Party joins in deploring the grisly murder yesterday and offers the Taoiseach support in his efforts tomorrow to get the Northern Ireland institutions back up and running.

I want to raise with the Taoiseach the decision his Cabinet made yesterday to sell off a strategic State asset, the most important decision since the Eircom sale. Is the Taoiseach resolved on this course irrespective? I know there is one view abroad, as there currently is on many issues. There was one view abroad on the sale of Eircom, and the sale turned out an unmitigated national disaster, a decision which set back the telecommunications infrastructure in this country by at least a decade. There was also one view taken in most sections of the media and by most of the commentators, not to mention the advisers and consultants who got €70 million for advising on the sale.

The Taoiseach proceeded with the Aer Lingus decision yesterday and has proceeded to build up anticipation and to sell the company on the basis of two deceptions. The first is that the Minister for Transport and the Taoiseach's spokespersons have put abroad the word that because of EU rules, the State was prevented from investing in Aer Lingus. That is not so, which fact has been established by the commission set up by the European Court of Justice, so it is perfectly permissible for a State company to invest for normal commercial reasons in a company, just as a private investor can.

It is interesting to look at the Goldman Sachs report of November 2004 in which that company made it quite clear that it was asked to advise on Aer Lingus, subject to the over-riding stipulation as follows:

The current policy of the State is to provide no further equity funding to the company. The State will not provide further capital to the company either to fund expansion or in the event of a financial crisis.

Goldman Sachs made it plain this restriction was a matter of Government policy, not an EU restriction.

The second deception relates to the pretence that the Minister for Transport is retaining a golden share. The Minister and the Taoiseach know the European Court of Justice rejected as illegal the ownership of a minority golden share which would protect strategic interests. In the case of the UK Government's golden share in the airport operator, BAA, it was ruled illegal under EU law in May 2003. The golden share had special voting rights attached to it and sought to give Ministers the final say in major decisions such as selling the airport. The European Court of Justice ruled on this matter that it is illegal to use the golden share for protection of strategic interests. The Taoiseach is so confident about the decision made, but it is a surprise to most people that the Progressive Democrats has pushed Fianna Fáil so far to the right — it would be unthinkable even a decade ago that Fianna Fáil would have sold off the national airline in a country that has the strategic requirements of an island nation. The Taoiseach nonetheless proceeded. If he is as confident as that of his decision——

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