Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Under this deal, Ireland will, in time, become like Scotland, utterly ignored by IAG through British Airways, which is purely interested in growing out of Heathrow.

As stated by Senator Sean D. Barrett last night, "We are trying to develop this country, yet we are handing over the national airline to an airline whose track record is not to provide services from Belfast, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham or any other region of the UK to North America". What hope has Cork, Shannon or other regional airports in that environment? We have been able to utilise Aer Lingus to support regional airports and the economies surrounding them. This will no longer be the case under IAG and these communities will suffer for it. The chambers of commerce and other bodies from these areas voiced grave concerns over the IAG bid at the Oireachtas committee.

I want now to deal with the plan by this Government to maintain a 1% share in Aer Lingus, which would provide it with certain rights over decisions. While this appears to be a good way of maintaining the voice of the Irish state at Aer Lingus it is faulty for two reasons. This proposal is known as a "golden share", which has been shown to be illegal under international and European laws governing business. In Britain, the Government retained a "golden share" in BAA, the UK airports authority which operates Heathrow. This was ruled illegal by European courts in 2003. It was deemed contradictory to the principle of free circulation of capital within the EU. The European Court of Justice also ruled Portugal's golden shares in Energias de Portugal as contrary to EU law as it presented an unjustified restriction on free movement of capital. Spain’s golden shares in Telefónica, Repsol YPF, Endesa, Argentaria and Tabacalera were also ruled illegal, as were many others. IAG operating out of Heathrow and controlling former Spanish airline, Iberia, would know all too well the problems associated with golden shares but would see this as the Government’s problem. In a poll by The Irish Timesthe majority of respondents, 54%, stated they were opposed to the sell-off of Aer Lingus. This 54% was twice that of those who supported the sale. The people know that the future of Aer Lingus is best placed in Ireland, with the State maintaining its interest and arguing for Ireland's needs. This deal is also faulty as the real decisions for Aer Lingus will no longer be made at the company but at the IAG board.

Turning to the issue of the deferred members of the IASS who worked for Aer Lingus, these workers are going to be forced to take a 40% cut to their pension entitlements, facilitated by Government legislation. During an interview on radio this morning Deputy Costello mentioned this issue and said that he would be seeking money in this regard from the sale even though he well knows that the Minister has ruled this out. When I put a similar question to Mr. Walsh at the transport committee his response was that the matter was outside of his remit. The deferred pensioners were left out of the expert panel and out of the conclusion and are now to be left out in the cold by this deal. The Government also opposed amendments to the Social Welfare and Pensions Bill which would have helped these workers, who have been so unfairly treated.

This is a cheap sell-off of a vital State asset as an election looms. Let there be no mistake about it, this is a bad deal for Ireland, Aer Lingus and its workers. It will usher in seven years of uncertainty and struggle for the State to maintain connectivity. It will mean seven years of industrial strife and hardship for workers who will be left on the scrap heap, leaving us in seven years time with an island dependent on the crumbs of a major multinational to provide the much-needed connectivity we have come to depend on.

The Labour Party will see the cost of its cowardice when it is too late, just as Fianna Fáil may today see the cost of its agenda in selling off Aer Lingus in the first instance. It is clear that Aer Lingus had plans to expand its services, create additional jobs and open up new routes. The so-called guarantees have been welcomed by Deputies John Lyons, Seán Kenny and Joe Costello and Ministers of State, Deputy Jed Nash and Deputy Aodhán Ó Ríordáin. They have capitulated.

I ask all north side Labour Party Deputies, never mind those in Cork and Shannon or Fine Gael Deputies, with large numbers of Aer Lingus employees in their constituencies, if this deal will do any more than the previous one? The same principle applies - Aer Lingus is a going concern and profitable, with plans for expansion, leading to the creation of more than the predicted 150 jobs by the end of 2016. It would rival the so-called 635 net new jobs to be created by 2020, without the loss of the jobs mentioned by the Minister. At the press conference the other day he said that in the region of 50 jobs would be lost, but he was a little vague and unsure about who would be affected. This makes it obvious that the Government did not negotiate hard on that issue.

Job guarantees and promises of no compulsory redundancies are of little consolation to the workforce. What about the future? Is it all right that future employees will have less favourable employment conditions and wages? Will outsourcing take place? With profits of almost €80 million, excluding some one-off loans that will be repaid, and passenger numbers at an all-time high of almost 12 million, why should we sell a going concern that is delivering? The Government has admitted that tourism has been one of the good news stories of recent years; why, therefore, would it jeopardise what is working and delivering in the past few hard years? The Heathrow Airport slots are vital to the maintenance and expansion of activity on this island and to overseas destinations.

Why was this deal not placed before the Joint Committee on Transport and Communications for scrutiny, as requested by Deputies in all parties? How have shareholders benefited from this? What will senior managers, directors and board members get? We have not seen details of the remuneration that will be paid to some individuals as a result of this sale. What will happen to the board of Aer Lingus? The Minister said it would continue to act independently, but for how long? Will it last into perpetuity? I doubt it. How will having a 1% share allow a Minister to have a veto into perpetuity? Will the Minister stand up at a board or shareholder meeting seven years down the road and say, "I am the Minister for Finance; you cannot sell off these slots or cannot do this"? Anybody put in that position would end up a laughing stock.

Fine Gael's ideology is behind this sale. Fine Gael supports the idea of monopolies and big business. Anything the State owns or part owns is bad in its mind. Aer Lingus survived through the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s and then through some of the most difficult and worst times the country has ever seen. This is a rich country, although we may not be using our resources in the right way. Therefore, there is no reason this company should be sold.

The Minister mentioned three areas in terms of how he gauged this deal. He mentioned a cyclical airline industry with ups and downs. Any company must take into account the fact that business can go bad and engineer its finances in order that it can address a problem if or when business is bad. That is a function of any company. We can expect cycles in business and this is not the only time we will see issues in an industry that has ups and downs when times are hard.

The Minister also mentioned that the European airline industry was fragmented in comparison with that in the United States. Must we base our judgment on everything the United States does? There are some brilliant airlines in Europe, but they may not all be linked like those in the United States. However, that is no way to gauge whether an airline should be sold.

The Minister mentioned that Aer Lingus was no longer the national flag carrier because we only owned 25% of it. That is true; I wish we owned the other 75% and were not in our current position. However, this does not take from the people's vision that it is our airline. They have said they do not support the sale of Aer Lingus. The majority do not support its sale, but the Government has not taken this into account.

The Minister mentioned setting up a connectivity fund. He said the moneys would be put into the strategic investment fund and could be used for building or other works on harbours, roads or airports. Will the funds be put into bus services, the ones the Minister plans to privatise? Will we see any of this funding? Will the Minister elaborate on where the funds will go and what they will be used for?

What will happen if, for some reason, IAG ends up selling parts of the company or merges with other companies? We are all aware that takeovers can happen. In such cases, any deal done will go by the wayside. We have seen this happen in the case of the Government. We saw it happen in the case of commitments made on bin charges in the case of Dublin City Council, when Fine Gael and Labour Party councillors made a deal promising that waivers would be provided for old age pensioners and others. That commitment went by the wayside and the service was privatised under Fine Gael and Labour Party councillors.

Aer Lingus has survived many difficulties, but this deal is a nail in its coffin. The Minister should be defending the State's assets, not selling them. No Government should have the right to sell the State's assets. It should be up to the people to decide and it should be for them to make the decision. This company has been hard won by the people and the workers. Many years of hard work have gone into building the company, but it can all change at the whim of the Government. Every time the Government changes or each time we change from Tweedledum to Tweedledee political parties, power is taken and some company is privatised. Another Government takes power and privatises another. That is what has happened in this state in the past while. This has damaged society enormously. We have seen this happen in the cutbacks made to local services across the board. Services are being cut left, right and centre. The Government has stated it is addressing the housing crisis and social issues, yet we heard from Focus Ireland the other day that 70 new families a month were becoming homeless. Since the death of Jonathan Corrie and all the talk about what it was going to do, the Government has spun what it is going to do with its €3.8 billion so many times that I have lost count. Some of the sums announced were totally ridiculous.

The sale of Aer Lingus is one of the worst things that could happen, as is the selling of State assets that people have worked hard to build. Aer Lingus belongs to the State, not the Minister or the Government, Fine Gael or the Labour Party, yet the Government has taken the decision to do this and can push the sale through. However, I am sure it will come back to haunt us because IAG, Mr. Willie Walsh and people like him have no interest in the connectivity of this country. They have at heart their own interests and those of shareholders, but the people who matter in this country are the ordinary people. They are the ones who care, but the Government is going against their wishes. That is how I see it.

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