Denis O'Donovan (Fianna Fail)

The optics are confusing me a bit. This is a letter written to me in 2002 by the then Minister, Deputy Frank Fahey. It is a short letter dealing with consultation and what action can be taken about Bantry: "I am writing to inform you that I will approve Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners' application for 33.3% grant aid for a new pier development." The important fact is the figure of 33.3%. The letter goes on to say that negotiations were to take place to deal with the development of Bantry harbour. I will need to revisit many of those issues because I have a ream of paper to read into the record of the House when I come to speak on my own amendments. There are only seven or eight reports but I must do it because this is an issue that goes to the bottom of my heart and I wear my heart on my sleeve when I am talking about Bantry harbour.

I know the Minister of State may wish to reply but I may have to contribute again. If the consultation as promised in this letter, which was written in 2004, only three or four years' ago, had taken place, if the commitment by Ministers and Ministers of State, who were probably my own people, in the past seven to eight years had been honoured, and if the consultation, with Cork Port especially, had taken place, and some individuals have said privately that they did not want to be the dominant partner and would rather work with Bantry, we might not be at this stage now. Consultation should have applied also to local Oireachtas Members because there are only four or five of us in Cork South West. Although some of us probably would have had a greater interest than others, that aside, they should all have been notified.

I will not name the individuals but a clear commitment was given to me by at least three Ministers or Ministers of State when they told me that not one thing could happen with Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners. We all knew something was in the pipeline without the Minister of State, the harbour board, the town council or Cork County Council, who are all players in this situation, being consulted. It would be a funny set-up if Cork Port were to try to do something on Bantry pier which is owned by Cork County Council. The old railway pier from the time when we had a train going into Bantry was owned by the town council and it passed it on in good faith to the harbour commissioners saying it would be in a position to help them out if they wanted to do something with it.

That consultation and the commitments given to me were not politically honoured. I have great respect for the Minister of State, Deputy Noel Ahern, but he has inherited this particular situation. I am not saying that Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners and the town council did not make mistakes. I was a member of the harbour board for many years and it was the unanimous agreement of the representatives of the town council, the county council, the trade unions and the chamber of commerce, and of the Minister's appointees that whatever was to happen Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners, they did not wish to entertain a scenario whereby Cork Port would be their governing body.

This is about consultation, which is dealt with in section 18. That consultation process, if it existed at all, was negligible and at the fringes, and that is wrong. If I understand it correctly, the 1996 Act or one of the Acts refers to the consent and imprimatur of the Minister and the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. I should not mention the Department because I must be careful in how I phrase this in case people say I am having a go at officials which is not my job and is not proper to do. The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the Minister for Transport can, under the existing legislation, with the stroke of a pen and without consulting any Oireachtas Members or the Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners, lump us in with Cork County Council and put it in charge. If the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the Minister for Transport can do that, it is a unilateral, non-consultative process. This power is in the Act as I understand it. This has its merits and demerits.

On the question of consultation, in case it is thought that the Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners sat back and decided to do nothing, it had difficult meetings with the then manager of west Cork whom I will not name but whom Senator McCarthy will know and who is a decent man. He attended some meetings and we looked at the options at my request when I was a member of the board. We asked what the consultation process would be if Cork County Council were to take over the board. The council was concerned not to take over a harbour board where many things remained to be done and where it and, ultimately, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, would end up spending money on extending the pier, dredging and other important infrastructural works in the inner harbour. This is all to do with consultation and the consultation process was engaged in.

To be fair to members of the Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners or the Bantry board — whatever one wants to call them — following from the letter I read into the record, which was sent in September 2004, they met and had informal chats with Cork port as to how or if they could move on this process. They were cordial meetings and there was no abrasion. The Bantry representatives did not say, "Hands off. How dare you?" and, to the best of my knowledge, there was no attempt by the Cork port representatives to say, "We are here. We do not particularly want you but we are going to swallow you up. We will take what we can from Bantry Bay and we will invest little or nothing."

I thought "due diligence" — that famous term — had been concluded. I was under the impression that this would proceed once the legal problems holding up the purchase of the foreshore rights were sorted out and the registration of the title was complete, which I believe it is. The Department, its officials and the Attorney General's office, or perhaps the Chief State Solicitor's office, were involved in trying to speed up that process. There were difficulties but these were legal and were not the fault of the Bantry harbour board or its solicitors.

I am worried with regard to consultation, on which Senator Donohoe put down an amendment. That process has failed the Bantry harbour board. As I said earlier in the debate, and not in a flippant manner because it is not comparing like with like, there were years of consultation and negotiation behind the scenes with regard to the situation in Northern Ireland. That did not happen in this case.

It galls me to note that this Bill is enabling legislation — Senator McCarthy may agree or disagree. Under the Bill, the Minister has another string to his bow so that, whether it is 2009, 2010, 2011 or another time, with the stroke of a pen he can decide to take over and manage Bantry harbour. This will include its assets and its not too great liabilities — Bantry Bay is valued nationally and billions of euro would not pay for it. If that bay were in the United States, South America or Saudi Arabia, a value could not be put on it. From an ecological perspective, Bantry Bay, which is 23 miles long and eight miles wide, is the second finest bay in the world.

If the Bill is passed, we are hostages to fortune and consultation will be gone out the window as far as Bantry is concerned. While the Minister of State may correct me on this, the position in the existing Act of 1996 is that if the Minister for Transport and the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government come together, they can decide at the stroke of a pen that Cork County Council will take over Bantry. If this happens, we will be a lame duck. We will be like a dodo — we will not be able to fly and we will become extinct.

If the Bill is enacted and we do not want Cork County Council to take control, but it is decided that Cork port would take us over, where do we go? In May 2002, we came within hours of becoming a corporate identity — it may be phrased differently in the Bill — in order that we could manage our own affairs. All sorts of reports were drawn up by PricewaterhouseCoopers and KPMG, as well as private reports by Mr. Raymond Burke and two other reports, all explaining what is right and what is not right. When this arose, I said we should wait because if the port has a stand-alone corporate identity and does not make enough money — unfortunately, we are somewhat hamstrung in that the main funding source is the harbour dues paid by Conoco Phillips — we could not go begging to the Department because it would say, "Hold on, you went down that road, you can stand on your own and we will not give you a penny, one way or another".

I referred on Second Stage to bodies such as Cork County Council, which owns the pier, and to the harbour commissioners. We all sometimes look down on local authorities, harbour boards and so on but they have a role and are a means of contact with the local people. We must not forget Bantry inner harbour is unique. Were the 20 or so Whiddy Island people still left on the island consulted, and if not, why not? They have rights and traditions. I am sure if a constitutional point were made, those people would ask whether they were consulted. Whether going to town to shop, to go to church or to go to national or secondary school, they must come to the mainland. Have they been consulted about what is happening? Unfortunately, they have not been, which is regrettable.

They are a small island group I admire but who sometimes live in difficult circumstances. We have beauty in west Cork, with seven inhabited islands, as Senator McCarthy noted. Were the people of Whiddy Island consulted? Of course, they were not consulted the night of the famous explosion, when they ran, some of them in their underwear, and fled from the island fearing that the whole place was going to blow up around them. I would not blame them for that. They ran and sought shelter.

Have the shrimp, oyster and mussel fishermen in Bantry been consulted in this process? These are small operators — poor shadow lads. I accept the number of Cork port directors is being reduced from 11 to eight, with possibly one from Bantry. With all due respect, politicians, whether councillors or otherwise, will no longer have a say. Cork County Council will have two or three directors on the board and Cork City Council will have three or four. The board is gone but who in Cork port will come down and serve?

I do not know why we have all these overlapping Departments. What will we do with these fellows with their oyster beds? A group of islanders have aquaculture licences to fish for scallop and other species from most of the islands and Bantry is the capital of line-grown mussels. Have these fishermen been consulted? I have written to the two companies that export mussels and to some of the people harvesting them. This is all on my back although I do not know why I should be doing all this. I had a meeting with the Irish Shellfish Association, a national association which has a major interest in parts of Waterford and other counties, and covers all kinds of shellfish, not just mussels, but oysters, clams, periwinkles and other shellfish. It has not been consulted.

We are talking about a consultation process. If Cork port took us over, perhaps the Minister would tell me that has nothing to do with him. With all due respect, it has. One cannot take over Bantry Bay and then cherry pick and say Whiddy Island will make money for Cork port because it will give an annual income and that the chances are, with the uncertainty of the world oil markets, it will be increasingly used. We are told that in 50 years' time oil will be replaced by some other means, whether nuclear power, wind power or another type of energy. Although I have no guarantee, I hope with the Lord's help to fight two or three more elections and that I will get another 20 or 25 years out of it, if He spares me. In my lifetime, I hope I will see a use and a purpose for Whiddy Island. It is like contra proferentem regius in the days of Magna Carta. It is against the wishes of the people who make a living from or have a duty or responsibility to Bantry Bay if they are not consulted on this. Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners have had several run-ins with the local mussel, lobster and shrimp fishermen on where aquaculture licences and fishing lines should go to keep shipping lanes open. There is no provision in the Bill to ensure the Port of Cork Authority will do the same job. I do not think it will, and it would be a dereliction of my duty and responsibility as the area's representative not to say so. These guys are the hewers of wood and drawers of water, serfs of the soil but decent people. I am here as their voice.

Has any thought being given to the Costello tribunal report on the Whiddy Island disaster in Bantry Bay in 1979? The report criticised the Department, the then Minister in a subtle way, and the lack of powers vested in the Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners. They subsequently received the powers but in the mid-1990s it was decided to get rid of them. There must be local control of Bantry Bay, whether it is Whiddy Island or Garinish Island. What if the Cork port authority decided to charge boat dues on tourists going to Garinish Island? I presume the Department with responsibility for the islands would get a few bob as well.

Unfortunately, there is a possibility that owing to interference by another State agency and to a toxin related issue, the mussel industry and other types of fish processing in Bantry Bay may collapse. The fish and shellfish harvested in Bantry Bay are the same as those from Chile, the Bay of Biscay and Holland. The threat of toxins in fisheries is the same the world over but because of over-diligence on our side in monitoring our own — we are great Europeans in that respect — if an incident occurred, who would pay the compensation? Due to the amount invested in Bantry Bay in mussel lines and onshore facilities, and with the decommissioning of fishing vessels, those who could be affected would want €50 million plus in compensation for the loss of their industry. Will the Cork port authority pay or will the Department of Transport?

Consultation is important. I will never buy into the notion that this is an enabling Act to give possible powers and, once enacted, there will be all manner of consultation. The passing of this Bill will sound the death knell for Bantry Bay.

I hope the Minister of State will respond to all the points I have made. I do not want to be putting the gun to his head because we have only another two hours for this debate. The Bantry Bay Harbour Commissioners were castigated by the Department because they did not consult with it or made mistakes. They put their hands up but were told to stand outside the classroom like bold boys in school until they learned their lesson. Consultation with the commissioners did not occur. This legislation is proposing a shotgun marriage where Bantry Bay, lock stock and barrel, will be handed over to the Port of Cork Authority.

Was Conoco Phillips consulted? It is a major player which owns the terminal at Whiddy Island and built a replacement jetty that cost millions of euro. In the past eight years, it has spent over €50 million on upgrading and ensuring safety standards at the Whiddy Island facilities. Up to 40 people have been directly employed with another 20 as subcontractors. As it will have to pay harbour dues, has it been consulted on this legislation? I did not consult it but it is an important player.

There has always been a debate in Bantry as to what is the most important industry to the town. In the 1960s some felt the oil terminal was the only industry to sustain the town. Like other multinationals, however, the oil industry left, leaving a terrible legacy of 50 deaths on 8 January 1979. With the emergence of the mussel, crayfish, oyster, prawn and inshore fisheries, the fishing industry was then considered important. However, the tourism industry was also considered. I recall a Belgian businessman who wanted to build holiday homes on Whiddy Island but could not because the terminal did not make the spot attractive. I always believed, as a public representative, that each of the industries should live and let live and consult each other. There has to be respect for the ongoing maintenance and sustenance of fishing, whether it be fish farming, aquaculture, trawling, potting or whatever.

In addition, tourism is critical to the region. Leaving out Garnish Island, we have Sheep's Head, the Beara Way and other attractions. Tourism, as my colleague Senator McCarthy will confirm, is a major issue for people in the area. We had to have consultation. With regard to the control and operation of the harbour in Bantry, people seem to forget that in the 1970s we had some major oil spills which were national and environmental disasters. This is why the harbour board was set up from day one. In addition to the tragedy in which the Betelgeuse blew up in Bantry Bay, there were major disasters including one in 1974 in which several million barrels of crude oil were spilled. If it happened nowadays, with Sky and CNN and the way in which stories are promulgated by the media internationally, there would be war. There would be multi-million euro claims from fishermen, salmon farmers, mussel line farmers and so on.

In those days nobody wanted to know Bantry. With due respect, the man responsible was from the other side of the House — the then Minister for Transport and Power, former Deputy Peter Barry. A song was made about it, although I had better not recite it. It was along the lines that Peter Barry would feel quite sorry he was Minister for power. Mr. Barry came down and intervened, stating that all the spillages could not go on. He was the catalyst for putting a harbour board in Bantry. When it was set up first it was a lame duck as it had no powers, and now that it has powers they are trying to trip us up again.

If consultation is taking place it is not transparent or open. This concerns the area of consultation. I compliment Senator Donohoe on raising this when he was last here because arising from the Betelgeuse tragedy in Bantry, which resulted in a public inquiry, came the Costello report. I urge any of my colleagues to read it, or at least read the conclusion and the synopsis. It was a damning indictment of lack of control in Bantry. There was a lack of response. It was lucky that more were not killed on the night of the disaster. Controls had to be brought in. What Peter Barry was doing at the time perhaps involved no consultation. The company involved was Gulf Oil, which was a big international company. Its operations were controlled in the United States but when it came to Bantry Bay its controls were on a "take it as it comes" basis. It made up the rules as it went along. That is why a board was set up in Bantry.

I have no doubt that Cork Port in many ways has expertise that we probably lack in Bantry. The reason, if I am to be frank, is that the Department, through the Minister, is saying for political reasons that it placed Bantry Port, without any consultation, under the remit of Cork County Council. That is stated in the 1996 Act as far as I know. The Minister might respond to that. However, if Cork Port has additional power and, perhaps, greater experience and professionalism with regard to issues such as pilotage, I can name 20 other areas of relevance to Bantry Bay in which it has no experience — perhaps it does not want it — and no professional expertise.

On the issue of consultation — this is something on which I will elaborate in detail later — has there been consultation about the pier extension? There were two announcements in this regard. On 14 June 2000 the then Minister, Deputy Frank Fahey, arrived in Bantry and we had a big night out. I was supposed to go to the Killarney races that evening and I cancelled everything. We were told we were getting £1.5 million, in punts. We went into a hostelry to celebrate and we thanked the Minister. We said before he left that maybe £1.5 million would not be enough and that we might need a bit more. This equated to €1.9 million. It could not be spent at the time because it was putting the cart before the horse. There was planning to be done, and then the harbour commissioners, against my better judgment, went in a different direction and planned something else. In the heel of the hunt, with all this consultation, we have no pier. In breach of the recommendations in the Costello report, we do not have a facility in Bantry to allow a fire brigade or ambulance to reach the site of an emergency if one were to occur at Whiddy. When one is dealing with combustibles such as bunker fuel, diesel oil and gasoline, fire is likely.

Let us be realistic. In half tides and low water — I am not talking about full tides — most decent vessels take 1 to 2 metres of water. These are small vessels. Some of the ocean-going tugboats that used to come in to the pier when I was a young fellow had a draft of 5 metres. With all that, we still have a situation in which, if a fisherman wants to go out at 8 o'clock in very low water he must go down at five minutes to eight to pull out the boat because if he goes down at eight he cannot go fishing. This still pertains in 2008. Where is the consultation?

There was a lovely gentleman who was Tánaiste back in 1989-90, although I do not have the precise dates. He is now gone to the terminal ward. I refer to former Deputy John Wilson, who was a great Member of the other House. He came down to see the harbour and he was appalled at the set-up. He saw it at low water when the islanders were coming in to go to mass, and they had to climb across other boats along a length similar to that between here and the monitor. People were being lifted up and down. He could not understand why we did not have a pier extension and why we had not carried out dredging. We did not have the basic facilities. I can never forget these visions when I take a walk down the harbour in Bantry at low water. I look out and the boats are all dry. I am a small man — about 172 cm.