asked the Minister for Tourism and Transport if he will make a statement regarding the continuation of the Swansea-Cork Ferry Company which has caused grave disquiet in tourist circles in the south of Ireland.
15.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Swansea-Cork Ferry Service.
9.
asked the Minister for Tourism and Transport whether the ferry link between Cork and Swansea will be maintained.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 9 and 15 together.
My position in relation to Swansea-Cork Ferries has not changed since my replies to questions on 16 and 22 November and the statement of the Minister of State at my Department in the Adjournment Debate on 29 November, 1988.
As I have indicated, the Government would be prepared to consider an Exchequer grant of £500,000 to assist the company in promoting and marketing a service for the summer season of 1989, subject to the condition that the company would submit to me proposals for viable operation in 1989.
I understand that efforts are being made in the Cork-Kerry area to raise the necessary finance to support the ferry service. I wish these efforts well. I hope the company will be able to come back to me with fresh proposals.
Will the Minister justify to the House why £43 million was given to B & I in the last few years, subsidising every passenger to the tune of £20 a head and yet the Minister deliberately ignored that 30,000 cars and 130,000 people were coming into the Cork-Kerry region and for the sake of £1½ million he is prepared to close down this ferry?
I reject the Deputy's suggestion that there is in my Department any lack of consideration for this service. The decision by Government to make £500,000 available was an improvement on what was available to them last year. Secondly, I reject the suggestion that this House has voted subsidy money ever to B & I. It is a State-owned company and the company have been provided with equity in the normal course of a commercial arrangement. We asked them to put their house in order, to become commercially viable in the quickest possible time. They actually produced a plan which they are working on. It has been very successful this year. There was no unfair competition. They had to deal with competition——
Cut-throat competition.
(Interruptions.)
Let us hear the Minister's reply.
The Minister is spoofing.
The Deputy knows me long enough, enough to know that I will not be intimidated.
You are spoofing, Minister.
Between 500 and 600 people had to be laid off in that company. The Government and I, as Minister for Transport, and my colleague, the Minister of State in my Department, have given more time and study to this problem than ever was given to it by anybody else.
You sold us down the Swanee. You should be ashamed of yourself.
(Interruptions.)
Cheap jibes and solaces from Deputy Begley will not divert me from my course.
(Interruptions.)
Deputy Begley must restrain himself.
If you were living in Kerry——
Deputy Begley, please.
——and the people there were depending on tourism——
The Deputy has asked a question of the Minister. The Minister is giving him a reply. He should please be good enough to listen to it.
It is a stupid reply — an insulting reply.
As Minister for Tourism I appreciate what Swansea-Cork Ferries have done in bringing people into the Cork and Kerry areas.
Show your appreciation.
I showed my appreciation by persuading the Government to make that provision. I am now awaiting some word from the Cork-Kerry area where I understand moves are afoot to provide some finance to enable us to continue with this operation.
This is a sick joke.
(Interruptions.)
I would remind the Deputy that his own county council felt it a worthy cause to support in the past——
They did, with £100,000.
I would appreciate any financial aid that can be raised in that area.
On a point of order, the Minister is misleading the House.
(Interruptions.)
The Minister is a fraud.
That is not a point of order.
(Interruptions.)
The Deputy should be very careful in alleging that any Minister or Member is deceiving the House.
I can prove it.
Please, Deputy, resume your seat.
A group of people have been waiting for five days to meet with the Minister and they have not been able to yet.
(Interruptions.)
If we cannot deal with this matter in an orderly way I will move on to the next question.
(Interruptions.)
That is not fair.
I have a supplementary question to ask.
I have a question down on this issue.
Let us have order. Let us deal with this in an orderly fashion.
Without getting into the issue of B & I, I am merely stating for the Official Report that there was an investment of £43 million over four years in B & I and whether one calls the money being asked for in relation to the Swansea-Cork Ferries a subsidy or an investment a rose by any other name is still a rose. We do not mind what the Minister calls it. He can call it an investment if he wishes. That is not the issue. The issue is that £43 million were given to B & I, and the Minister is not prepared to respond to the request for an investment of £1.5 million to secure the future of this ferry. That is the background to my question.
We must proceed by way of question.
In the light of that does the Minister accept that the failure by the Government to make the necessary investment will spell the end of the ferry and that it will be a savage blow to tourist hopes for the region? Secondly, does the Minister accept the value to the region and to the Exchequer of the operations of this ferry for the last two years?
These questions are too long. Let us have brevity and relevance.
Thirdly, the Minister has said that there is no change in the position that he previously outlined in the event of a proposal of some local investment, what is the reaction of the Minister? Is the Minister sticking to the £500,000 which the Minister knows full well——
The Deputy has made his point.
——will not answer the problem? Is there a possibility of movement by the Minister?
Please, Deputy O'Keeffe, we cannot debate this matter now.
It is a very important issue.
(Interruptions.)
I understand that there was a very constructive meeting which Deputy O'Keeffe attended in Cork. I presume the last part of the Deputy's question comes from that. I put it on the official record already that from my understanding of efforts being made in the Cork-Kerry region to raise finance, I want to meet the people who have achieved this and my door is open to them.
Is your pocket or your purse open?
I wish them well in their efforts and I hope the company will be able to come back to me with fresh proposals.
(Interruptions.)
The Minister is a hypocrite.
If money is raised, is the Minister prepared to respond and indicate to the region that he is prepared to put more money on the table? That is the bottom line.
We are having repetition.
Can I have an answer to that?
There are a lot of Deputies offering.
Could I have a "yes" or "no" to that question? Is the Minister prepared to put more money on the table in the event of a fresh proposal being put before him?
The Deputy is a member for West Cork and he never bought a pig in a poke no more than I did. I am saying that people are trying to put finances together and that when they have done so my door is open to them for discussions.
Have you any money for them?
(Interruptions.)
I am calling Deputy Bernard Allen and Deputy Máirin Quill.
(Interruptions.)
Let us not get the notion that we can debate this matter now. That is out of the question. I will take a brief supplementary—and I mean a brief and relevant supplementary — and one also from Deputy Quill, and I will facilitate Deputy Sherlock.
Who has been called?
You have.
Is the Minister aware that doomsday is approaching and that within a matter of days there will have to be decisions from the Minister on the ferry service? Will the Minister meet a group of people consisting of the people who have already invested money in the ferry, the local authorities and the business and tourist industry from the Cork area, as soon as possible, to discuss the problems? Also, will money be available from the Department——
I thought we were going to have brief questions.
——if moneys are forthcoming from the Cork-Kerry region?
Deputy Allen, please.
We do not want people to be fooling themselves around Cork and Kerry if no money is to be available from the Department.
The Deputy told me that he would co-operate with me.
Will the Minister meet the group and will money be made available?
The Deputy was on a deputation which I already met on this matter and he knows very well that my door is open in regard to this issue.
Is the Minister's pocket open?
The door I would like to open is the door to a group which came up with investment proposals for the Swansea-Cork Ferry.
(Interruptions.)
Deputy Begley seems to ignore the Chair.
Yes, this is a very emotional issue in Cork. The Minister is a fraud so far as this issue is concerned.
The Deputy is a Kerryman.
There is no Kerryman about it. If he was living in Kerry he would know all about it.
I have called Deputy Quill.
The Minister would then know the feelings of the people down there. He is a cute Cavan man on this issue.
Thank God that I am.
I hesitate to say what I am going to say but it seems that Deputy Begley may wish to compel me to take some drastic action.
The Deputy would like that.
I call Deputy Quill.
In the light of all that has been said today and during the last ten days, I ask if the Minister accepts that there is a very serious problem with capital in the south west region for this very vital service. As Ireland stands to be the only island nation in the European Community of nations when the channel tunnel becomes operative, would the Minister not think that the time has come when he and the Government ought to be seeking funds from EC sources to help to provide capital for this most necessary service to a region which will shortly become one of the areas furthest distant from the centre of the European Community?
The Deputy's supplementary question is an important one. My Department are fully conscious of the new situation that arises as a result of the channel tunnel. We have had in-depth studies, including international conferences on that specific point. Secondly, through research done in my Department in the Kerry and Cork regions, we are aware of the substantial benefit that the Swansea-Cork Ferries provide for that region. The original allocation of £500,000 was made as a once off payment out of the tourist fund. I managed last year to get £300,000. This year, as against operations in 1989 at the end of the year, I succeeded in getting £500,000 as an earnest of my commitment for tourist reasons. That money——
(Limerick East): The widow's mite.
That is peanuts.
To the Deputy in Dingle that is peanuts, of course.
The Minister knows that that will do nothing.
We are talking about a most disadvantaged region.
I think that it is a substantial sum of money.
The Minister does not care.
I call Deputy Sherlock.
I missed the first part of the Minister's reply. At present, as stated at a meeting of Cork County Council to the Taoiseach by his own party, is it still possible, as a result of deliberations on representations being made to him, that the funds which are sought will be granted? Secondly, will the Minister not consider allocating funds for tourism, as the whole thing is very tourist orientated, specifically to the Cork-Swansea car ferry?
The Deputy has a positive approach to it. The latter part of my reply is relevant to his question. I would hope that the area would be able to put up funds and I will then meet the people concerned and have discussions with them.
God help us.
Deputy O'Keeffe knows the story. He was there. The other Deputies were not.