Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail)

I am slow to intervene because it is clear Senator O'Donovan will have a great deal more to say on this in the coming days and possibly weeks. I want to refer to the situation in Fenit for fear that our silence in that respect indicates that we are happy in Kerry. I share the views of Senator O'Donovan in all he has said in regard to Bantry, particularly with regard to prior consultation. Neither of the two ports that it is envisaged will merge, Fenit Port and Shannon-Foynes Port, the board of which I was director for 16 years, asked for this marriage and neither welcomes it. I was contacted as late as two hours ago by the chairman and directors of the board of Fenit Port, whom we will meet very soon in Leinster House.

I can speak authoritatively about Shannon-Foynes because I was a director when this proposal was first put to us. Struggling as we were with very serious difficulties on that port, with which I am sure the Minister of State and his Department will be aware — matters of a legal and human resources nature — and at the same time trying to focus on being one of the biggest bulk handling ports in Europe with all the attendant problems, we were aghast to be asked to consider running a port which was entirely different from our operation.

Shannon-Foynes Port and Fenit Port are in no way homogenous. The Fenit operation is almost entirely based on fishing or leisure craft. There is one niche industrial client, Liebherr Container Cranes of Killarney, which has a long association with Fenit and has a rapport with the directors of the board. It is more than business, it is personal and almost family. The Liebherr family have been exceptionally good to Kerry down through the years. Were the future of the management of Fenit to be brought into question, I would be very surprised if the Liebherr concern did not look to alternative methods of port use, and the business would not fall to Shannon-Foynes.