Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)

In reply to a priority question of mine on 5 April, the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Rabbitte, stated the Irish offshore is relatively unexplored. While it would be true to say it is relatively underdeveloped, it is not quite accurate to use the word "unexplored", in that we have a fair idea of what lies off our coast. The generally accepted estimate is the one we cite in the motion and that came from the Minister's own Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, as it was then, in 2006. According to the estimate, there were approximately 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent off our western coast, composed of 6.5 billion barrels of oil and 20 trillion cu. ft. of gas. At current oil prices, this equates to a value of approximately €700 billion.

While it is true that the actual amount of oil and gas brought ashore has been small, those reserves exist. Not only this, but the international companies have been active in acquiring licences for the areas in which the reserves are to be found. While there are undoubted difficulties and high costs involved in bringing the oil and gas on shore, one thing is certain, namely, in a world where finite energy supplies are an ever more central concern, the oil and gas off our shores will become increasingly important and valuable and, therefore, there will be a significant incentive to ensure they are brought on stream.

For this reason, the issues and proposals contained in our motion are important. The Minister may attempt to dismiss in an off handed manner, as he has done recently, the policy of Sinn Féin and others, a policy to which his former party, Sinn Féin The Workers' Party, was strongly committed, by stating that a 25% or 55% share of nothing is still nothing, but we are not discussing nothing. Indeed, some of that "nothing" from the Corrib field will be brought ashore in the not too distant future. The key issue is how it is utilised to the best benefit of the Irish people.

Nor are the proposals we are making exclusive to the parties of the left. This is what the three parties that defend the current taxation and licensing scheme, one of which claims to be on the left itself for sentimental reasons, would like people to believe. According to a recent article in The Irish Times by Ronan McGreevy, having the quantity of oil and gas that is estimated to lie off our shores is "a bit like a man whose home is about to be repossessed who cannot find his winning lottery ticket down the back of the sofa". It is there, but how do we cash it in? He was obviously making that comparison with the current situation, whereby the State has committed to a vast and unpayable debt consequent on bailing out the banks and the bondholders and submitting to an IMF-EU drafted austerity programme. This comparison is relevant, given that the Minister and others claim the State could not afford what would be a significant capital investment in oil and gas exploration and, in the next breath, justify the pouring of God only knows how many billions of euro into the black hole of the bank debt.

If the State were to take a more proactive role in oil and gas exploration, we would need to invest money, but it would pay a considerable dividend once the oil and gas came on stream. It is a choice between mortgaging the State for decades on behalf of private unproductive interests and investing in something we know would pay a handsome reward. Having a proper State stake in oil and gas finds and imposing the sort of tax and royalties that we propose would provide us with the same sort of bonanza that has accrued to other states where the state has refused to provide the generous terms which this State does to the multinational companies. Contrary to the myth being spread in the House, states that have imposed such terms are not necessarily radical or even on the left, nor is a proper tax rate a disincentive. If the companies are happy to pay a tax rate of 78% in Norway and an average international rate of 68%, surely they would be happy to pay a tax rate of 50% here and to concede the State share.

Professor Ray Kinsella of the Smurfit Graduate Business School also referred to our natural resources in a piece he wrote for the Irish Examiner on Monday. He made the point that the State is almost completely constrained by the terms of the IMF-EU programme. The Minister himself referred to it as a straitjacket prior to the election when he was obviously preparing the ground for what he knew would be his party's acceptance of the basic parameters of that deal. It is a straitjacket, but it is one that we are not forced to keep on like the inmates of some institution for the deluded. We can if we wish throw it off and Professor Kinsella proposes we do so.

The real issue facing us is whether we as a people and we as the representatives chosen by the people have the courage and vision to embark on an alternative path to the disastrous one we have set out on as a consequence of bailing out the banks and accepting the dubious favours of the EU and the IMF. According to Professor Kinsella, fundamental to this would be our having a credible set of initiatives to maximise the use of all our natural resources. He was not referring specifically or exclusively to our oil and gas, but they would be a key part.

This is the aim of our motion. In it, we set out the vision that my party and many others have of how our oil and gas resources - it could be expanded to include our fisheries, forestry and wind and wave energy - ought to be used to bring about a revival of enterprise and spirit among our people. This is our alternative to the politics and pessimism of austerity. We included the words of the Democratic Programme, which are actually a quotation from Padraig Pearse, to remind the House of the founding vision of the Republic. It is a vision that we need to bring to the fore again.

I also noted in the Minister's reply to me two weeks ago that he quoted from a 2007 departmental review conducted by his current Department. This is slightly ironic and even a bit disturbing, as it indicates that, within a short time of taking office, the Minister has shown himself to be willing to adopt the same stance on this matter as his Green Party and Fianna Fáil predecessors. This stance is different from that taken by the late Justin Keating when he was the Labour Party Minister with responsibility for this area in the mid-1970s. It also contrasts with the commitment given in the Labour Party's election manifesto to extend the current royalty regime to the Corrib consortium as part of a promised review of the terms and conditions governing oil and gas exploration. In his 5 April reply, the Minister stated he would "keep the licensing terms, both fiscal and non-fiscal, under review", but he did not indicate when the promised review would take place. Basing his reply on the 2007 review and the general tenor of his remarks indicate that no review will take place in the spirit in which the manifesto commitment was intended.

I referred to the resources protection campaign in which the Minister's former party, Sinn Féin The Workers' Party, was involved in the 1970s. I did not do so in any attempt to embarrass him, but rather to point out that much of what the party stated regarding mineral, oil and gas resources was spot on. My party and others were making similar statements at the time. Interestingly, a 1975 pamphlet published by the resources protection campaign, which the Minister would know well, referred to the fact that the excuse given for the generous terms afforded to Marathon Oil, for example, was that the incentives would ensure the State would experience an oil and gas boom similar to the one occurring in the North Sea at the time. Almost 40 years later, we are still being told it is necessary to be charitable to indigent companies like Shell. The fact is that, apart from the generous taxation terms and the write-offs provided, the licences allow the companies to sit on their claims for long periods before commencing operations. In conjunction with the fact that we do not even know what the companies have discovered in the process of exploratory drilling, most of the oil and gas off our coast forms part of the companies' long-term reserves, which they will bring on stream when they believe market conditions are right. While this may be in the best interests of the companies concerned, it is certainly not in the best interests of the State and its citizens. As the Corrib project illustrates, when the gas comes on shore, Bord Gáis, assuming it has not been broken up and sold off by then, will need to buy the gas back at whatever is the market rate.

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