Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)

Today is a day of shame and betrayal by the Fianna Fáil Party, especially the Fianna Fáil representatives of Dublin's north side, and the Progressive Democrats Party. We north side representatives in the Labour Party are used to those empty seats in Dublin Airport at various meetings that have been called when none of the Fianna Fáil north side Deputies has had the courage to come and explain why they believed in selling the workforce of Aer Lingus down the river into a privatised, ruthless world of capitalism and ensuring, perhaps, that the great economic driver of the region may well be sacrificed in the future and become a regional airport served by regional airlines to a hub at London.

Those Deputies' names should be noted at the outset — we have one in the House at least, Deputy Glennon; Deputy Wright, Dublin North; Minister of State, Deputy Noel Ahern and Deputy Carey, Dublin North-West; Deputies Haughey and Callely, Dublin North-Central; Deputies Martin Brady and Woods, Dublin North-East, my own constituency; Minister of State, Deputy Brian Lenihan, Dublin West; and the 11th member of this shameful team, the Taoiseach, Dublin Central. Those 11 Members have refused to stand up for the economic interests of our region and have betrayed it. I hope the workforce of Aer Lingus, the former Aer Rianta and now the Dublin Airport Authority, and the 40,000 or 50,000 workers who depend on that region will remember this eight or nine months hence and will ensure those seats are filled by representatives who will truly represent the people.

The three page document with which we were presented, which is uninformed and hides behind the scam of "we cannot talk", or "we cannot give you this or that information because of the legal requirements of security", and this disgraceful speech leave us no wiser on the future of our great company, Aer Lingus, and its workforce. In some ways, this contribution by the Minister for Transport, Deputy Cullen, is laughable and ludicrous in regard to the slots. It appears we will have to seek a new hub airport outside of Heathrow. This is the Minister's solution. Effectively we are going to leave Heathrow. The Minister has admitted we are going to Dubai and, perhaps, we will have the Fianna Fáil tent at the Nations Cup in the years ahead. There is no solution to the possible loss of these slots. There is no reference to slot busting which is an important issue for airlines at every airport throughout the world.

There is nothing for workers in this. There is nothing in terms of their pension entitlements. They are being sold a pig in a poke and are being told that, down the road, there will be negotiations and that something will be done. There is nothing on dilution.

We are aware that following the privatisation of Eircom there have been five sales. Eircom workers and its trade union, the Communication Workers Union, have desperately had to retrench, weave and bob in the financial markets to try to hold on to their percentage, as they have done successfully in the latest sale. There have been five sales and Eircom workers have had a very uncertain future.

The major turnaround in recent years in Aer Lingus, which came about because of the ferocious hard work and commitment of the workforce, which was halved in size from what it was a few years ago, is what has created a bright future for our State airline. Since I became a Member in 1992, it has been their work and sacrifices that have created a platform and now the Minister has the cheek to come into the House and present this nonsense and lack of detail.

I am delighted to have the opportunity to reiterate my bitter opposition to the privatisation of our national airline, which I enunciated on the second day after I became a Member. As an island people, a key part of our infrastructure must be at least one airline that will service the national strategic interest. We have before us the recent history of many state airlines that have been privatised. There have been the remarkable cases of countries similar to Ireland, in particular, New Zealand, which had to buy back the company, Air New Zealand, many years after privatisation. We have also had the experience of the Eircom privatisation. Throughout the history of the Government there has been the disastrous handling of the sale of strategic national assets to the private sector.

I commend and salute the Aer Lingus workforce. It has been promised a pay increase of3%, lump sum payments of up to €4,400 and a 7.5% profit sharing scheme to be transferred to the employee share ownership trust. That is supposed to prevent their share being diluted from 14.9%. According to the Minister's speech and his perspective, the workforce members are being sold a pig in a poke. Privatisation of state airlines was a device concocted by right-wing parties, such as the Minister's and the party from which he was sprung, the Progressive Democrats Party. It is a device to which the Minister has always adhered——

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