asked the Minister for Transport if he will give a guarantee that the McKinsey report on CIE will be examined and discussed with all the interested parties before any recommendation in the report is implemented.
12.
Ceisteanna — Questions. Oral Answers. - McKinsey Report on CIE.
8.
asked the Minister for Transport if he will list all the persons and organisations to whom the McKinsey Report on CIE has been circulated; when will it be discussed by the Government; and when it is expected that a Government decision on the report's recommendations will be made.
With the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, I propose to take Questions Nos. 8 and 12 together.
The McKinsey Report entitled The Transport Challenge was published on 5 February 1981.
The Government have indicated that, because of the fundamental importance and significance of the matters dealt with in the report, it should be the subject of public debate and consultation with interested parties before decisions are taken. Copies of the McKinsey report were circulated to the leaders of the Fine Gael Party and the Labour Party, the Opposition spokesmen on transport from both parties, the Chairman and General Manager of CIE, ICTU and CIE's group of trade unions.
The Minister stated publicly that the report will be acted upon —if it is to be acted upon—in September next approximately. Does he consider this an unnecessarily long period? Could the report not be dealt with in a more expeditious manner?
I should like to correct the Deputy. The Minister did not say the report would be dealt with in September. I referred to a recommendation in the report in relation to road freight and sundries. At the moment Professor McCormack and the transport consultative commission are carrying out an investigation into the operations of road freight haulage. In my view it would be inappropriate to deal with that section of the report before I received the report which I expect to receive in August or September.
On a point of information, could the Minister indicate to me the qualifications of the members of the McKinsey team so that I can assess the substance and the credibility of that report. I am reliably informed that one member is an anthropologist and another is a professor of oriental languages. I should like the Minister to make some statement on that.
That is a separate question. If the Deputy puts down a question I will be glad to give him that information.
I presume that in addition to anthropology and oriental languages they know something about the railways.
A question, Deputy, please.
Could the Minister confirm that? Do I take it that the Minister has no knowledge of the expertise of the team?
I said that is a separate question. If the Deputy puts down a question I will give him the full qualifications.
It is a fairly substantial question to CIE and the people involved. That is not a satisfactory answer.
It is separate from the question on the Order Paper.
It is not a satisfactory answer.