Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

I accept and respect the Minister's view but I tabled my amendment having due regard to certain occurrences. I will give some examples. The country was in financial crisis in 1981 and measures had to be taken to ensure the international monetary people did not start to run the country. Decisions had to be taken that were subject to conditions prevailing at the time. Had they not been taken, we would have had a serious problem.

In 1987, when there was a need to curtail public expenditure, a direction was given by several Ministers to dispose of assets, including assets of the IDA and Iarnród Éireann. Conditions prevailing at the time were such that a major industrial site in my constituency had been earmarked for disposal. It disappeared from the agenda and I remember creating a terrible row about it, as one normally does in such circumstances. It was restored to the agenda by none other than the current Minister's former colleague, John Bruton, who was the Minister with responsibility for this area at the time. Intel is now located on the site in question. The conditions appertaining in 1987 were such that we knew it was only a matter of time before a major company would locate on the site. If the property had been disposed of, account would not have been taken of the prevailing conditions, which were known locally but perhaps not at a higher level.

A direction was made to dispose of assets of Iarnród Éireann. Given that we were trying to develop the commuter rail service in my area, it was felt locally that it was totally counter-productive to sell them. However, all the land owned by Iarnród Éireann in my home town of Maynooth was sold for housing, thus leaving insufficient car parking space for present requirements. We knew that if all the conditions pertaining at the time had been taken into account, there could have been no sale of assets. Perhaps a limited amount could have been sold but a significant amount of the car parking space would have been retained. Such car parking space is required not only at Maynooth station but also at every other station in the commuter belt, including counties Kildare, Meath and Dublin. The whole area is affected in a similar way.

I am not at all attempting to stymy the ability of the National Oil Reserves Agency or to question the integrity of the Minister's decisions. I am really saying that, in certain cases, circumstances pertaining at a particular time, if taken into account, might change the view of the Minister or make it unnecessary to make a decisions of the kind to which I referred.

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