Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

The question partially relates to an earlier question and also follows on from the Minister's response. Has he carried out any serious assessment of whether bringing in private capital into the strategic infrastructural investment programmes is effective and will lead to higher levels of investment, job creation and growth? The ICTU and UNITE, among others, which studied those matters are strongly opposed to the Minister's plans to privatise in part or in whole companies such as the ESB. They indicate that where State enterprises are privatised elsewhere in Europe once private capital gets involved the level of investment falls because giving a return to shareholders starts to take priority. Has the Minister carried out an assessment in that regard and how can he guard against that likelihood? Do we not have our own history of Eircom and broadband to bear out that fact that once the private sector gets involved, investment in developing infrastructure falls rather than increases which defeats the whole purpose?

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