Deputy Liam Kavanagh has been given permission to raise on the Adjournment the question of Ardmore Film Studios.
Adjournment Debate. - National Film Studios.
It may seem strange that we are here again talking to two Ministers who have been involved in the decision about the closing of Ardmore Studios. On 28 April we discussed on the Adjournment the closure of Ardmore Studios which had occurred a few days beforehand. A Labour Party motion which I moved on 15 June 1982 stated:
That, having regard to the preservation of essential skills for servicing the film industry in Ireland, Dáil Éireann requests the Government to take whatever steps are necessary to maintain and develop the studio facilities at the National Film Studios of Ireland, Ardmore, Bray, County Wicklow.
On the first day of the Private Members' motion the Minister for the Gaeltacht, Deputy Flynn, in place of the Minister for Industry and Energy who was unavailable for that debate on either of the two days, moved an amendment. I am glad that tonight the Minister has come in and I hope will tell us something good, not me personally but the people of Bray and the people of the film industry in Ireland. Nevertheless, I think we must pursue the Minister here to see that a motion which was accepted by his Government, accepted unanimously by the House is put into effect because the amendment was.
To delete all words after "industry" and substitute the following:
"and the proposed disposal of the National Film Studios of Ireland Ltd. by the liquidator, Dáil Éireann requests the Government to take all reasonable steps to maintain the studio facilities at Ardmore, Bray, County Wicklow."
The Minister knows that in his absence a great deal of effort was put into getting me to accept that amendment. The Minister of State and the Whip and myself had discussions to see if the amendment could be altered in any way to secure a favourable result to the motion. I was not able to accept the changes proposed by the Minister of State, nor was he able to accept my motion. On the following day when it was quite clear that the motion was going to be carried against the Government and that Independent Deputies and The Workers' Party Deputies who had maintained and are maintaining the Government in office were probably going to support my motion, the Government saw that the best way out was to accept the motion which was carried unanimously.
On the following Sunday the Minister arrived back from America and was available practically off the plane to go into the RTE studios and tell them that it did not matter about a motion being passed in the House — a motion that said the Government were going to take whatever steps were necessary to maintain and develop studio facilities at Ardmore — he would go ahead and sell the studio. Accepting our motion, he said, had no bearing on the decisions that were to be taken by his Department. In fact the motion itself lent some weight to the decision that he was already discussing with unnamed people. There were discussions with a view to selling the studio to some American buyer — we are not sure who it was.
I cannot accept that approach because when one looks at the fine print of the Government amendment and looks at the motion in the Labour Party's name there is a very important difference. Had I accepted the amendment two important words would have been omitted from the Labour Party motion. The original motion said "...having regard to the preservation of essential skills for servicing the film industry in Ireland...". Nowhere in the Minister's amendment are the words "in Ireland" included. It was therefore obvious that the preservation of the skills and the servicing of the film industry in Ireland were not of importance to the Minister since he had left those words out. It means that the motion which was accepted by the Government binds the Government to maintain those skills, the experience and the knowledge gained over many years in this country in making films and specifically the skills that are present and available now, the technical expertise, the equipment and all that is available at Ardmore Studios.
There was a subtle but very important difference. If the Minister was in the middle of a deal with some buyer, those words "in Ireland" would mean difficulty. He had already suggested to the Ardmore workers that a covenant to the effect that the skills would be maintained would be useless in any contract. It is not much use to us tonight to be told that some covenant will be included in any deal providing that these skills will be kept in Ireland. We want more guarantees than that. The arrangement must be stronger and sounder and it must ensure what we understood to be the position after the Dáil vote. I left the Minister for the Gaeltacht who was standing in for the Minister for Industry and Energy in no doubt as to what my motion meant. I quote from column 214 of the Official Report of 15 June 1982, when I said:
I am pleading with the Minister to reverse his decision, to think again about what he has done to County Wicklow, to think again what he has done to the industry, to consider that there is another way of going about this, that there is an Irish film industry which can operate from this studio. If it is possible at this stage, will the Minister remove the liquidator and appoint a receiver? A liquidator is put into a premises to liquidate an asset, to liquidate a company such as the National Film Studios. Is it not possible to put in a receiver who will manage the studios while some new arrangement can be arrived at? If that is not possible can the liquidator not appoint a manager to run this studio for a period while there is a re-think of Government policy on it?
I know this decision was taken in haste and that there was not enough thinking behind it. I know there has been a considerable backlash against the Government because of this very thoughtless act. I suggest to the Minister that the studio should remain under Irish control. I agree with Sinn Fein's——
I should have said The Workers' Party
amendment that public ownership is the best solution to control the film industry in Ireland.
I suggested that the Film Board, the IDA and RTE take shares in the new company and control the film studios at Ardmore. There was no doubt in my mind and neither should there have been any doubt in the Minister's mind as to what was involved in the acceptance of the amendment. Later when the Minister came in he simply rejected that motion and went ahead and proposed his own amendment. He would not have done so had the motion been acceptable to him at that time but faced with the situation of the following day when I could not see that his amendment meant the same as my amendment and where those important words, ‘maintaining the film industry in Ireland" were being left out, I could not accept that. The Minister realising that the Government would be beaten on the motion, accepted in toto what we had been proposing. Afterwards he came back but refused to accept what had been done in the House and only last evening in the Evening Herald we read that what we had been proposing could happen, that these studios could be made to work and to make money.
If the report in that paper is correct and if the Minister has not denied it, it appears that an American group who were travelling to Ireland in order to learn the skills of the industry were being told not to come because the industry was being sold. The threat of a £1 million action against the Government resulted in their reversing that decision and I am glad to say that those young people are coming here to learn the skills of the film trade. They maintain that Ardmore is the best studio in Europe for this purpose.
I hope the Minister will regard what I am proposing as being the best way forward for our film industry and that he will take note of the other points I raised about County Wicklow. There is the over-all employment situation, the fact that more than 150,000 people are out of work but in Wicklow the unemployment figures are higher than average. Again, unfortunately, the Minister refused to meet a deputation from Arklow who wished to tell him about their unemployment problems. I appeal to him now to give the people of Bray some hope, to give some hope to the people who work in the studios. The sacking of the chief executive of the studios after the motion had been passed here was very disappointing to everybody concerned but now that we have raised the problem here again I look forward to some assurance from the Minister that there has been a change of heart and that something is being done to maintain the film industry in Ireland.
I wish to thank my constituency colleague for allowing me some of his time so that I might intervene in this debate. This is the second Adjournment motion about the Ardmore studios, the first having been on 29 April. Since that date there has been a great change. Obviously, the most significant change has been as a result of the motion agreed by the Government on 15 June. If the Dáil and its deliberations mean anything, the agreement of the Government to that motion must have changed significantly this whole issue. When the Minister for the Gaeltacht spoke during the first session of that Private Members' motion, he indicated the Government's awareness of the significance of the motion. He said the Government had proposed an amendment to the motion because they could not accept in any circumstances the Labour Party motion. What he said was that after arriving carefully at the exact opposite position as the Labour Party motion, the Government could not accept it as the appropriate conclusion because it would be both inconsistent and seriously wrong.
Therefore, the Minister for the Gaeltacht, representing the Government on that evening, made it clear that the Government saw the significance of the wording of the Labour Party motion, a motion which this party supported. The following evening the Government, as Deputy Kavanagh has pointed out, having consulted with the mover of the motion and with myself decided to withdraw their own amendment. So far as we were concerned this changed everything.
I have no wish to reiterate the arguments that have been made so often in the House on this matter. Suffice it to say that, as I made clear on the last occasion on which I spoke here on this question, I did not see a situation in which the studios would continue exactly as before. There was no question of that. Basically, the position my party took on this issue was that it was important that the studio facility be retained, if necessary only on a four-walls basis for the moment so that it would not be lost for the development of the Irish film industry and so that the basic corps of technicians who are vital to the running of the studios would be retained in this country and in the studios. For a variety of reasons relative to the artistic, technical and economic future of an Irish film industry it is necessary to keep those studios. It is important to point out that the chief executive and members of the Irish Film Board are in no doubt as to the necessity of maintaining the studio facilities at Ardmore. I am sure the Minister has listened very carefully to his own film board.
It is clear that the range of protests and demands surprised many people who had not really considered the Ardmore studios until the announcement of the decision to close. The workers' propositions have been researched carefully and thoroughly and I should like very much if the heat could be taken out of the debate and if the sort of hypocrisy charges that were made against me on 29 April could be left out also so that we might examine the whole question calmly and clearly in the light of developments since then. I am not interested in victories, moral or otherwise, but I am interested in the retention of an asset which so many people, having substantial expert knowledge in this area, consider to be absolutely essential to the Irish film industry.
I am prepared to acknowledge that all steps were not taken in the past to put everything right at Ardmore and I would not consider it right to stand here and demand that money be poured into some bottomless pit but I am here to request a re-think of the whole question so that what is necessary in the public interest will be achieved and the studio facilities developed and maintained in accordance with the wishes of the Dáil as expressed here on 15 June.
I do not suppose that any issue has brought me into this House as often as has the one before us. At the outset I must say that I am amazed at the totally dishonest presentation of the various facts. Deputy Hussey comes here trying to make a case for the retention of the studios despite the fact that when her party were in Government they did nothing about the situation. Now the Deputy is trying to be all things to all men. However, after the way Fine Gael voted on the Fieldcrest motion last week, I would not be surprised at anything they would do. Deputy Kavanagh says he agreed with The Workers' Party motion but is it not reasonable, then, to ask the Deputy why he did not support that party's motion, a motion which specified clearly what the position was, what I believed they agreed with on the night. However, because of political dishonesty they were not prepared to take their courage in their hands and take the road they felt in their hearts and souls that they should have taken. Now they are trying to play with words.
You cannot nationalise a nationalised industry.
The Government's acceptance of the motion put down by the Labour Party and adopted by the Dáil on 16 June does not represent any departure from the action already being taken to dispose of the studios to a purchaser who is prepared to maintain and develop film making facilities there. This has been my objective since I first announced the Government's intentions regarding the future of the studios back in April.
The House is already aware that the Government took the decision to dispose of the studios in the knowledge of the substantial losses that had been incurred by them in the past and because there was no reasonable prospect that these escalating losses could be eliminated by the National Film Studios of Ireland, Ltd. The amount of losses incurred by the National Film Studios and the level of State support which the company received since their establishment in 1975 is already on record. So I see no point in repeating these now. However, I would like to stress once again that the studios' continuing and increasing losses were being financed by bank borrowings which had to be guaranteed by me as Minister for Industry and Energy. As the legal limit set to my powers to guarantee loans in this case had virtually been reached, and as no moneys were provided in the 1982 Estimates to aid the company, the Government had no option but to take the decision to dispose of the studios otherwise their future could have been taken out of the State's hands, if any of the company's creditors put in a receiver. That is a matter of record. That is a matter of fact. The outgoing Government knew exactly what the position was and were not prepared to do anything about it.
As I have said on previous occasions, it is the view of all sides of the House, as expressed by the Public Accounts Committee, in their report of November 1979 that:
It appears to the Committee that public moneys are being spent on keeping alive a business which simply would not survive in the private commercial field. Furthermore, since it is commonly known that studios of this kind throughout the world are closing down, what is being done in this case could possibly be regarded as more in the nature of a public relations operation than the creation of a viable industry. The question which therefore concerns the Committee is the extent to which public moneys should continue to be spent on prestige and status and it feels therefore that because of the grave doubts as to the viability of NFSI, a speedy decision must be made as to the future involvement on the State in this enterprise.
The present action of the Government is a natural sequel to such an opinion and the Estimates decision of the previous Government not to provide funds for NFSI in 1982. The Labour Party motion asked for necessary action to maintain and develop the facilities in question. It did not ask that such action should be done in the context of public ownership. If it had intended that, I can only presume that the motion would have been worded accordingly.
In fact, it was The Workers' Party which proposed an amendment which would have required maintenance and development under public ownership and this amendment was lost through lack of support. Therefore, I am right in my assurance that the Dáil has not expressed support for public ownership of the studios.
The liquidator, I understand, is negotiating with interested parties who are clearly intending, if successful in purchasing the studios, to preserve the film making facilities there. I am hopeful that it will be possible to conclude a successful deal with one of them.
When this happens we will have studios which are owned by people who have suitable business commitments for them and whose interest in business will represent an assurance that the facilities and, therefore, the skills of the film workers will be used. This will be a solid advance over the position which existed up to this when activity at the studios was, for the last year or so, almost nil. I consider that in an industry such as the film industry, private enterprise is an indispensible motive force.
What I have said illustrates quite clearly, I think, what my plans for Ardmore Studios are. In brief, they are that they will be sold to a purchaser who will be obliged under covenant, in the contract for sale, to maintain film making facilities there. I believe that this objective can be achieved more certainly through private enterprise on the part of persons who have had valuable entrepreneurial experience in the industry, in the areas of procuring financial backing for their ideas and also in the distribution field. Such ownership should, without doubt, give results from the points of view of both the workers and the State, far better than those of the NFSI over the past seven years.
Finally, I would once again emphasise that my decision is totally consistent with the views expressed by the board of NFSI as set out in the chairman's letter of 29 March 1982 to me. That letter confirmed the board's view and mine that the Exchequer should not continue to subvent the continuing substantial costs of the company and that even capitalisation in full will not solve the company's problems.
They are the people charged with responsibility and they said that any money spent in the area of the National Film Studios should be spent by the National Film Board. It is not true to say that the Irish film industry stands or falls on the filming facilities available out there. They are a contributory factor and will be maintained as such. That is precisely what I have stated here tonight. There is a bigger factor in the development of film making in Ireland, the development of a film industry in Ireland, to which neither Deputy referred. I will reserve my comments on it. It is a question of policy in the responsibility of another Minister which has a major contribution to make to the development of film making in this country.
Deputies should not try to be all things to all men. If they do not know where they are going they can take any road. This is a political exercise in hypocrisy, and there are no better disciples of that policy than the people over there. Last week they voted for Fieldcrest. They lecture the Government about financial rectitude and how public money should be spent. They are asking the Government to provide money for an operation which they know is not viable. In Government their own parties were not prepared to provide money in the Estimate for this operation. They knew exactly what the position was and they were not prepared to do anything about it. They repeated this exercise last week on the Fieldcrest question.
They want us to pour more and more public money into an area which is not viable. They should tell the people the facts. I am prepared to do that and I will continue to do it. To suggest that at a meeting with the workers I said they would be retained indefinitely in Bray is not in accordance with the facts. They recognised the position. They knew how bad the situation was for many years. The Opposition were not prepared to listen to them. I listened to them and I took action. They are interested in the development of the film industry in Ireland. So am I. We are all on the one road and the Opposition must realise that, while they may cod some of the people some of the time, they cannot cod all of the people all of the time.
The Dáil adjourned at 9 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 7 July 1982.