Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This section is not about the merits and demerits of separating Cork Airport. At a time in the future, when Cork Airport is stronger, when its operating costs match its income and when a solution has been found to the terminal debt, it may well be possible to separate Cork Airport. While this may make sense at that time, it must also make sense in terms of the Dublin Airport Authority's balance sheet. This section is about dissolving the Cork Airport Authority plc, which is a company that has existed for quite some time but which has no assets and no real power. It really is merely an edifice and I see little point in continuing that. Even for the directors who served on it, many of whom were excellent directors, it simply did not make sense for them either to have in place this shadow company that did not actually have an airport to run. This section dissolves that company but allows for its re-establishment at a point further down the road when it is for real. The purpose of this section is to get rid of the pretence but it does not preclude the re-establishment of the Cork Airport Authority if and when the time is right to opt for the separation of Cork.

However, on an administrative basis what I can do is to change the title of section 31 from "Dissolution of Cork Airport Authority" to "Cork Airport Authority", just for clarity. I believe Senator Barrett had proposed something along those lines previously. However, I can discern no case in keeping in operation a shadow company with no airport to run and doing nothing. Until the Government figures out what to do with Cork, it makes sense to close it now and then re-establish it at a later point when there is a clear plan.