Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I welcome the Minister to the House, although I wish he came here more often. I do not disagree with all of the many important things which are happening in transport. Although I am a critic of the Minister, I am not a constant critic of his. I like to give a balanced view of issues. I disagree fundamentally with the Minister on this legislation, but that does not mean I disagree with everything he has done in every other area. It would be helpful to have more regular debates with the Minister to allow us to elaborate on such issues. I ask the Minister to consider that such debates would be useful in the future. I listened earlier to Senator Dooley's comments about the construction of a railway line to Shannon Airport, an issue about which I am concerned because I would like to see it happen. I have heard the Minister's views on the matter and I support them. It is not all negative.

Perhaps this Bill is a great idea, but I cannot see it. I have not found anyone who can convince me that it is a good idea. Nobody can tell me what the plan is, what the outcome is likely to be or what levels of risk are involved. I am utterly bemused by the proposal for that reason. I listened to a small portion of the Dáil debate on the Bill, but it turned into a slagging match about ideologies. My criticism of the Bill and the Minister's proposals does not relate to ideology or issues such as privatisation and public ownership.

I do not think any other transport Minister in Europe could have heard the president of the largest union — SIPTU, in this case — on the morning radio news saying he would not rule out privatisation. He was talking about Aer Lingus in the instance to which I refer. I think half of the transport Ministers in Europe would like to be in the Minister's position of dealing with a trade union movement that is willing to sit down and listen, to argue the toss and to be tough and awkward. The union in question is prepared to examine any possibility if it is clear that it is the best idea, from the point of view of everybody.

I do not know about the consultation that took place before the Bill was published. There has been a great deal of talk and chat. Whatever about the quantity of consultation, the quality of consultation has not been good. Trust and confidence are the real problems. What is the objective? Where will all this go? What will be the position of Cork and Shannon Airports at the end of the day? I have huge worries in that regard. I hope the lock-keeper's son from County Kildare, who happens to be the Minister for money, will say "Sorry, Séamus" because he does not think it will work. That is the stage we have reached. I would not rule it out because there is a strong possibility that the Minister will say the plan is not working. The trouble with such a decision would be that it would not solve the problem. I have raised such issues during the week.

I am concerned about loans, borrowings and Aer Rianta's various bilateral financial arrangements. I apologise for not being present for the Minister's introductory speech, but I have read it carefully. I do not think he addressed this issue. I asked the Leader some days ago if she could check whether the Attorney General or his officials have examined the legal aspects of the conditions, risks and liabilities attaching to the current loan arrangement. Perhaps the Minister will respond in his reply. Is there a liability to the taxpayer? I have examined various legal summaries of the issue and I think there is a liability. I do not think we should always follow legal advice, as we often have to take a political decision that over-rides the legal view. Lawyers are not speaking on that issue alone, but I am interested in what they are saying.

We should examine the points we agree on. We agree that Aer Rianta is in hock to the tune of €484 million as a result of a variety of arrangements, many of which have various conditions and restrictions attached to them. One of the principal conditions — I am talking about the core of the Bill before the House — relates to the running-down of business at Cork and Shannon Airports, or pulling out of the airports. Such a move would trigger a default, in effect. The Minister does not think there is any indication that people will begin to close on the company at this stage, or that people are being kept informed. He dealt with the matter in a very soft way in his speech, which did not deal with it at all. It certainly does not give me any succour whatever. Certain people may not like it. I am not talking about AIB and Bank of Ireland but about faceless grey men in Switzerland and other places in Europe where people have investments. Such people will want their money back if there is any doubt about it. They will close on it eventually. If they do so, we will be faced with a bill. Somebody said to me that perhaps Aer Rianta International, from which the Government is making approximately €20 million annually, could be sold in order to pay a debt of €484 million. That is not on.

The Minister for Transport is right to shake his head. It is unlikely that an event of default, accelerative repayments and a subsequent demand for money would be triggered because at that stage the Minister would be forced into a corner whereby he would have to maintain some sort of quasi-Aer Rianta as it is currently structured. This is similar to what is stipulated in this Bill whereby ownership and control over the property of Cork and Shannon Airports is retained in order to secure the loans and to allow the lenders, note holders and guarantors to lean on them. This would leave us with the worst of all worlds because it would then be impossible to deal either with the loan or with the companies and both Cork and Shannon Airports would have neither autonomy nor the resources available to them in their current situation. That is what will happen and there is a precedent for it. We will be left with a shadowy type of company similar to Network Rail in the UK, a not-for-profit overseeing entity that would effectively have no teeth and would draw its power from Cork and Shannon Airports. The Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, can take strong and inflexible positions, as the Minister for Transport is aware, and I hope he does so in this matter. If Deputy McCreevy refuses to sign on the dotted line next June, the Minister for Transport will have already established a system which will be akin to Network Rail in that it can make neither profits nor decisions.

Another issue will immediately arise in this scenario. Under the provisions of the Bill, the chief executive of the Dublin Airport authority will effectively also be the boss of the Cork and Shannon Airport authorities for at least the first nine months and possibly for a period beyond that. That chief executive is legally bound to do the best for Dublin Airport as a company. What happens in the event of a conflict between what is good for Shannon and Dublin Airports respectively? An airline such as Ryanair or EasyJet, for example, may want to do a deal with Shannon Airport which the chief executive feels is detrimental to the business of Dublin Airport. Despite the fine words of Senator Ormonde in her desire to see some business transferred from Dublin to Cork Airport, it is not the first time that somebody has thought of that. In those situations where a conflict of interest arises, what is the legal responsibility of the chief executive of the Dublin Airport authority? Must he or she be responsible for making a decision that will undermine Dublin Airport and on what basis must such decisions be made? There is a clear issue regarding corporate governance and responsibility and the demands we make of our company leaderships in these situations and the overseeing role of the chief executive presents a problem in this regard.

Shannon Airport cannot currently do deals but will it be able to do so under the provisions of this Bill? This is one of the issues I wish to discuss with the Minister of State. There were good ideas in the conception of this Bill but they seem to have been lost along the way. We wanted a level of autonomy for the State airports which would allow them to be competitive but the Bill provides for control by the Dublin Airport authority. We have heard a lot about decentralisation but this represents the worst of all worlds for Cork and Shannon Airports, which will be run for the first nine months and possibly longer by people who have no commitment to those airports and do not represent the views of the people in those areas. This situation cannot be good for competition and for Cork and Shannon Airports in particular.

The legislation does not even attain the Minister for Transport's own purpose as he set forth in his speech. All of us agree on what we want to achieve and we must consider the various interest groups, the users of the airports, the communities around the airports, the employees and the State as an interest-holder. We must look at the situation from every point of view, consider how each of those interests is best represented and identify the coincidence of objectives so that we can incrementally achieve a package that best meets the needs of all. This process is not happening and the Bill contains an extraordinary all-encompassing objective whereby the Minister for Transport or the Dublin Airport authority can take any appropriate action in order to achieve the objective of restructuring. This is not the way legislation is generally passed and a stipulation such as this would normally be examined in minute detail with exhaustive amendments proposed to ensure that its meaning and possible interpretation were satisfactory. It is a whole new way of doing things to include the stipulation that a State body or a Minister can do whatever is necessary in a specific situation. I am not insinuating that the Minister for Transport or any of his successors would not do the right thing but this type of provision leaves it wide open for the wrong thing to be done.

There is no hope given to the airports through this provision about which the Minister for Transport has fallen out with almost everybody. The Minister must tell us why it is a good idea. He may feel I have a closed mind on this matter but I dispute that and he has failed to convince me of the merits of this legislation. He has failed to convinced members and representatives of his own party, the board of Aer Rianta and the interests in Cork and Shannon and that must trigger warning bells. Perhaps those of us who have expressed opposition are entirely wrong and the Minister will have the last laugh but it does not look like it will turn out that way. He has not won the argument on this matter and as the political head of a Department he must feel some responsibility to convince the rest of us of the merits of his strategy. He seemed to take the view in his debates with the Opposition in the Dáil that he was dealing with closed minds. I am an Independent Senator rather than a member of the Opposition and I support the Government or the Opposition according to the issues at hand and I do my best with them.

The Minister has not won the argument and we are all worried about that. We are looking at a liability of €500 million and I do not see how that can be repaid. The conditions attached to it are there in black and white and they are dependent on the ownership of Cork and Shannon Airports. If one must keep the debt one must also keep the guarantee, which is to do with the ownership of Cork and Shannon Airports. If the guarantee is not kept, those airports cannot go anywhere; if it is kept the conditions will have to be re-negotiated. The latter will not be impossible to achieve but one must consider the charges levied by multinational banking and financial institutions for the re-negotiation of the restrictions and conditions attaching to major loans and bonds. The cost is extraordinary because one is at their mercy at that time and they look for their pound of flesh as well as their pint of blood. We are travelling down a dangerous road. The Minister has failed to convince us regarding his intentions for the future of Aer Rianta, an issue which is very important to us.

I will conclude on a positive note. I welcome the point the Minister made about the tactical and strategic importance to the State of owning its own airports. I am glad he made that point because it is crucially important. Whatever arguments are made about privatisation, we are talking about something different on this occasion. I oppose the Bill.