Second Stage?
Bula Limited (Acquisition of Shares) Bill, 1977: Order for Second Stage (Resumed).
Debate resumed on the following motion:
That the Second Stage be taken on Tuesday next.
—(Minister for Industry and Commerce).
Next Tuesday.
In the Minister's absence yesterday I requested a copy of the agreement which is referred to five or six times in this otherwise rather short and innocuous Bill and without which the Bill is entirely meaningless. It would be impossible to debate the Bill or what lies under it without this agreement. Not alone should one get the agreement, which is the first necessity, but one should get all the submissions which were made to the arbitrators, in order that a full and meaningful debate on this very important issue could be held in the House. I am sure the Minister has been made aware of my frequent requests for the agreement in this House yesterday and on the telephone to his private secretary on two or three occasions over the past few days. I would have expected that this morning the Minister would have made the position regarding the agreement and its availability clear. I would ask him, in view of his failure to do that already, to do so now.
What the Opposition spokesman is requesting is a complete breach with all the accepted traditions, practice and the legal position that have obtained in this House in regard to agreements between the Government and private commercial companies. Deputy O'Malley was never left in any doubt that we did not intend to provide this agreement. I do not propose to treat an Irish company differently from a large range of international companies, some in mining, some in other areas of national resources, some in industry. I do not propose to breach a practice which was very largely, in regard to the legislation and the operation of it, established by the Opposition, and which I think is a reasonable practice and one I propose to continue. I was not, under existing legislation, obliged to bring this matter to the Dáil. I did so because I want a full debate. I will introduce the Second Stage very fully, and I will reply to the Second Stage as fully as it is in the interest of the Irish mining industry and the Irish people to do. However, I am not prepared to breach what has been the accepted practice down the years, and I am not prepared to differentiate against one particular company. It would be disadvantageous to the development not just of mining but of the whole of our commercial and industrial practice.
This is an incredible situation, which is without precedent in the history of this House. The Minister has purported on the 11th December, 1975, to enter into an agreement to purchase shares from a private limited company in this country in circumstances that we can only guess at, even though we are asked in this House by legislation to ratify that agreement. No Parliament should be put in this degrading position. We have to approve, on behalf of the people and on behalf of the Exchequer, of something we have never seen. The Members of this House have never been asked to approve of something they never saw, and I suggest that no Parliament in any civilised country has ever been asked to approve of something it never saw. It should be remembered that this is not just a refusal as of this morning by the Minister for Industry and Commerce to publish this agreement to the Members of the House. This refusal this morning should be seen in the context of a threat by the Secretary of the Department of Industry and Commerce last month, on the instructions of the Minister, to a newspaper——
Officials should not be brought into the matter. The Minister is responsible. Officials should not be blamed.
Yes, the Minister is responsible. A threat, on the instructions of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, to a newspaper in this city that if it published certain facts or information about the arrangements between the Minister and the company concerned, the Official Secrets Act would be invoked to prevent any further publication and to prosecute the newspaper concerned.
I am sure the Deputy is aware that the only matter before the House at present is the fixing of the date for Second Stage.
I am aware——
I have given some latitude on this matter yesterday morning and again this morning, but there can be no debate on the merits of the Bill now. We must await Second Stage.
I am not debating the merits of the Bill now, nor can I or anyone else in this House debate the merits of the Bill next week, if it is ordered for next week, unless we have the agreement, which is referred to in six places in what is otherwise a short and innocuous Bill. It is pointless ordering this Bill for next Tuesday or, indeed, for next year unless the agreement is forthcoming in order that some reasonable and worthwhile debate can take place in relation to it. An agreement between the Minister and the company for the purchase of shares in the company could be a huge, complex, technical document which could contain dozens of covenants and conditions on the part of the Minister which would be very onerous and which might well cause this House to reject the agreement and not give it its approval. As things stand, we do not know what is in the agreement, and it is monstrous that we are placed in this position by the Minister, that he has the incredible cheek to ask us as representatives of the Irish people to approve of something that he himself is ashamed to publish. In the circumstances, one is entitled to ask what he is hiding.
The monstrous and incredible cheek ——
(Interruptions.)
Order. The Minister to conclude on this subject.
The monstrous and incredible cheek lies in the insistence of the Opposition that we treat an Irish company worse than we treat shadowy foreign multi-national companies and that we breach a precedent established on every occasion the IDA take shares in an Irish company or a foreign company. There is such an agreement and the request that it be brought to the Dáil has never before been raised. The special piece of effrontery——
(Interruptions.)
Order.
——and monstrous cheek is to prostitute an Opposition at the behest of international or multi-national companies and to try to disadvantage Irish companies and to make requests that have never been made before about international companies. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. What is the normal practice and correct procedure down through the years is the normal practice and correct procedure here. Bills and Estimates could be discussed year after year without the publication of agreements. I am not going to introduce an unique practice to specifically disadvantage an Irish company in this context to the advantage of their commercial opponents. Requesting me to do it is a monstrous and incredible cheek.
(Interruptions.)
The insinuation that I am making this request at the behest of what the Minister describes as multi-national companies is untrue and the Minister knows it is untrue.
The Opposition gave away our resources for nothing.
Question put: "That the Second Stage of this Bill be taken on Tuesday next."
The Dáil divided: Tá, 61; Níl, 36.
Tá
- Barry, Peter.
- Barry, Richard.
- Begley, Michael.
- Belton, Luke.
- Belton, Paddy.
- Bermingham, Joseph.
- Burke, Joan T.
- Burke, Liam.
- Byrne, Hugh.
- Clinton, Mark A.
- Cluskey, Frank.
- Conlan, John F.
- Coogan, Fintan.
- Cooney, Patrick M.
- Corish, Brendan.
- Cosgrave, Liam.
- Costello, Declan.
- Coughlan, Stephen.
- Creed, Donal.
- Crotty, Kieran.
- Cruise-O'Brien, Conor.
- Desmond, Eileen.
- Dockrell, Henry P.
- Dockrell, Maurice.
- Donnellan, John.
- Dunne, Thomas.
- Enright, Thomas.
- Esmonde, John G.
- Finn, Martin.
- FitzGerald, Garret.
- Fitzpatrick, Tom (Cavan).
- Gilhawley, Eugene.
- Griffin, Brendan.
- Halligan, Brendan.
- Harte, Patrick D.
- Hegarty, Patrick.
- Hogan O'Higgins, Brigid.
- Jones, Denis F.
- Kavanagh, Liam.
- Keating, Justin.
- Kelly, John.
- Kenny, Enda.
- Kyne, Thomas A.
- L'Estrange, Gerald.
- Lynch, Gerard.
- McDonald, Charles B.
- McLaughlin, Joseph.
- McMahon, Larry.
- Malone, Patrick.
- Murphy, Michael P.
- O'Brien, Fergus.
- O'Donnell, Tom.
- O'Leary, Michael.
- Reynolds, Patrick J.
- Ryan, John J.
- Ryan, Richie.
- Staunton, Myles.
- Taylor, Frank.
- Timmins, Godfrey.
- Toal, Brendan.
- Tully, James.
Níl
- Barrett, Sylvester.
- Brady, Philip A.
- Brennan, Joseph.
- Briscoe, Ben.
- Browne, Seán.
- Brugha, Ruairí.
- Burke, Raphael P.
- Callanan, John.
- Fitzgerald, Gene.
- Fitzpatrick, Tom (Dublin Central).
- Geoghegan-Quinn, Máire.
- Gibbons, James.
- Haughey, Charles.
- Healy, Augustine A.
- Kenneally, William.
- Kitt, Michael P.
- Lalor, Patrick J.
- Leonard, James.
- Calleary, Seán.
- Collins, Gerard.
- Cronin, Jerry.
- Daly, Brendan.
- de Valera, Vivion.
- Dowling, Joe.
- Farrell, Joseph.
- Faulkner, Pádraig.
- Moore, Seán.
- Murphy, Ciarán.
- Nolan, Thomas.
- Noonan, Michael.
- O'Leary, John.
- O'Malley, Desmond.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Timmons, Eugene.
- Walsh, Seán.
- Wyse, Pearse.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies Kelly and Coughlan; Níl, Deputies Lalor and Browne.
Question declared carried.