Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent)

The sale of State assets has been likened in many circles to the sale of the family silverware. It more closely equates to selling off the kitchen. State assets can be used as the driving force for the economy and must be maintained in State ownership. This is at the crux of the issue. The Government's agenda on the sale of State assets is being driven by the Fine Gael Party. The Labour Party has done a U-turn on the issue. It is interesting to note, however, that the process is being driven by a Labour Party Minister who is pursuing the policies the Fine Gael Party insisted on having inserted in the programme for Government. In its election manifesto the Labour Party stated:

Labour is committed to the concept of public enterprise, and is determined to ensure that semi-state companies play a full role in the recovery of the Irish economy. Labour is opposed to the short-termist privatisation of key state assets, such as Coillte or the energy networks.

Despite these commitments, we have short-termist proposals to privatise State assets for short-term gain. If the full value of the assets in question was realised, the national debt would be reduced by 1% and if we were lucky, we would be able to provide €1 billion for labour market stimulation measures. We would have great difficulty in realising the full value or achieving the €1 billion figure.

Recent privatisations have been disastrous. When we sold off Telecom Éireann in the late 1990s, the quality of our telecommunications infrastructure collapsed. Another Labour Party Minister recently concluded a broadband review in his Department and we will probably be given a mishmash of proposals in the coming months on how to roll out next generation broadband nationwide. We had an asset in our control which could have been used as a vehicle for achieving this objective and driving economic regeneration across the county by providing fibre broadband in every area.

We are told the sale of Coillte will not entail selling off land. That is hardly a big deal, given that it is proposed to sell the rights to land held by Coillte for 90 years, effectively ceding ownership of it to whoever purchases the rights. When I was a member of a local authority, a 99 year lease implied full ownership for the person who acquired the lease. We are handing over control and ownership of our forests which should be a vital national resource. In the years ahead our wood biomass resource should be a crucial element in efforts to develop alternative energy sources and industries. Instead, it will be handed over to private sector interests and profit takers who will use it for their own ends, thus removing its benefits from citizens.

We should retain ownership of public enterprises. There are many models worldwide of public utilities working for the benefit of the public rather than private sector interests. We should use public utilities to drive forward the economy and develop new industries such as wave power, offshore wind and wood biomass projects. These are the areas we should target for future economic regeneration.

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