I wish the time allocated today to what might purport to be an agricultural debate could be directed towards serious agricultural issues and to resolving some of the serious problems we face in this field. Alas, that is not the case.
The incompetence and mishandling of this entire episode by the Minister for Agriculture is now characterised as "Sugargate" in the media and it underlines the Taoiseach's lack of judgment of character when one of the most vital portfolios as we face into the Single Market of 1993 could still remain in Minister O'Kennedy's hands.
This debate has little to do with agriculture and economics. It has everything to do with parish pump politics, low standards in high places and the abuse of power. For any Minister to try to exert undue influence on the chairman and members of a commercial State-sponsored body is an abuse of power. To deny his action subsequently and mislead Dáil Éireann is a tragic example of low standards in high places. I say "tragic" because as politicians we are all tarred to some extent by the non-discerning public and the political process so essential to the proper order of this country is tarnished yet again.
Even the local newspaper in the Minister's constituency, the Tipperary Star in an editorial on 5 December 1987, stated:
The ball will ultimately land in the court of the Minister for Agriculture, Michael O'Kennedy, whose position in relation to Thurles is clouded by statements which to say the least are difficult to reconcile and do not inspire confidence or give assurance.
That was very serious stuff from the local newspaper in the Minister's constituency.
As with all State-sponsored bodies, Siúicre Éireann are required to submit a five year plan to their parent Department, the Department of Agriculture and Food. The plans of Siúicre Éireann for the period 1987 to 1992 or 1993 were submitted to the Department of Agriculture and Food in December 1987 following the November 1987 board meeting at which they were approved, and at which there was a unanimous decision by all present, including the worker directors, to seek an alternative industry for Thurles in view of the social implications of closure. In December 1987 the fate of Thurles was sealed. It was to close as soon as an alternative industry was found. That decision was taken in line with the recommendations of the five year plan, one full year before this latest saga erupted.
I must say that the wording of the resolution that accompanied the adoption of the plan by the board at that meeting in November 1987 was somewhat disingenuous. Perhaps a lot of the ambiguity and the sheltering the Minister has done behind this resolution has resulted from that wording. The resolution states:
The Board is concerned about the future viability of sugar processing in Thurles in the long term.
In the light of the consequent threat to employment caused by the potential nonviability of the plant, the Board decided to secure an alternative industry for Thurles.
When this industry is identified the Board will then decide on the future of the Thurles Sugar factory.
That is a quotation from the resolution which accompanied the acceptance of the five year plan by the board in November 1987. That five year plan contained a number of main features, the third of which was that the Carlow and Mallow factories were to be expanded to cater for 7,000 tonnes of beet per day by 1989, in other words, the two factory configuration was accepted by the board in November 1987. The fourth feature of the plan was that the company were committed to major investment in an alternative industry in Thurles and the fifth feature was that the objective was to establish Thurles as a major food processing centre for the group with as many as possible of the existing workforce being retrained for employment in the new activity. We laud and support that objective and hope it will turn out to be true.
Above all else in this saga as we bicker and hurl insults across the floor of this House at one another and dig into political history some 20 years old there is a workforce in Thurles who as yet do not know what the future holds for them. They are the people about whom all of us should be concerned instead of spending our time hurling abuse at one another across the floor of the House. The point I am trying to make is that when the board in November 1987 accepted the five year plan, the closure of Thurles was firmly ensconced within that plan. That plan was accepted and I have a copy of it in my hand along with a copy of the resolution I quoted from. I think the wording of that resolution has led to many of the problems and misconceptions, along with the attempts to mislead, that have evolved since.
As promised, the board of the Sugar Company have found an alternative industry so as to protect jobs in the area. The Minister for Agriculture and Food was sure at that time that that would not be the case. In fact following a meeting held on 25 September 1987 between the Minister and the Sugar Company, a memo of which the Minister got a copy, cific issues raised at that meeting. This memo, of which the Minister got a copy, deals with the background and rationale of the proposal to close the Thurles sugar factory and it details the company's commitment to the development of the new agricultural related industry in Thurles. The memo of September 1987 states and I quote:
The decision to cease sugar production at Thurles was reached after detailed and careful analysis of the economic parameters determining present and future profitability of sugar production in Ireland. The proposal is not a new one. It was first highlighted in the review and rationalisation plan submitted to the Department in June 1982.
The closure of Thurles was first mooted in June 1982 when the Minister's own party were last in Government and effectively the governing decision to close Thurles when an alternative industry was found was taken on 25 November 1987, by a unanimous decision of all present, including the worker directors of the Sugar Company.
When subsequently the Minister was proved wrong and an alternative industry was found — the Moulinex-Glen Dimplex joint venture with the Sugar Company — involving 300 jobs in two phases he then resorted to the tactics he had alluded to in his personal election manifesto. I have a copy of it in my hand and it reads "Statement of Michael O'Kennedy, T.D., Fianna Fáil Spokesman on Finance, Thurles, February 9th, 1987." This statement contains categoric promises. It is no wonder the people of Thurles are demanding that he deliver on what he promised. I do not know how many votes he would have got on the basis of those promises but it behoves all of us as politicians and would-be politicians to be honest with the electorate. Of course, we all must look after our own constituencies, in particular the employment prospects and problems within our constituencies, but if we give categoric promises, put them in print and put them through letter boxes during a three-week election campaign, it should be demanded by those constituents that the promises be delivered on. If any of us fails to deliver on categoric promises, we should be called to book, which is what is happening here.
"You change the Government", Deputy O'Kennedy declared in his election manifesto in February 1987 as Fianna Fáil spokesman with aspirations to be Minister for Finance, "and we will change the Board". In other words, if the members of the board could not be trusted to put political considerations before economic ones they would be axed at the first possible opportunity and replaced. It did not work out, did it, Minister? The decision of the board in December 1988 was lost on the casting vote of the Chair. The vote was 6-6 and not 8-4 as he had expected, having fiddled around with the political representation of the board at the first opportunity he got.
One of the questions which my Ceannaire, Deputy Dukes, wished to ask last week but which was disallowed was if the Minister would outline the events leading to the non-appointment of IFA representative, Billy Maher, to the Board of Siúicre Éireann. The Minister had told him that he had appointed him but later failed, in his own words, to "acquire the Cabinet approval". What happened? Who put forward McGuickian? None of these questions have been answered but let us remind ourselves that in his election manifesto the Minister promised that if he did not get his own way with the board of the Sugar Company, he would change the board. That is in print.
Bad and all as those tactics were, the Minister then had the audacity to mislead the House by indicating that he did not know the matter was to be considered by the board at their meeting last December. In fact at the chairman's own request, the chairman of the board had met the Minister the evening before. The meeting was to have taken place at 6 p.m. and was put back at the Minister's request to 4 p.m. What more precise details than that do you need? At 4 p.m. on the eve of the board meeting at the chairman's request the Minister was fully briefed and handed documents to be dealt with next day on the agenda. The Minister, Deputy O'Kennedy, then rang around and canvassed personally as Minister for Agriculture and Food those members of the board of the Sugar Company he felt he could influence. He still had the audacity to feign surprise and ignorance of the agenda when questioned. All we are asking for is honesty, not any denial that the Minister wanted to look after interests in Thurles. He denied he was even trying to act in the best interests of his constituents in Thurles. He misled this House — low standards in high places, very low standards.
Unlike others, and to be as balanced and fair as possible, I can almost forgive the Minister, Deputy O'Kennedy, for the misinformation contained in the answer to Deputy Pat O'Malley's parliamentary question of 20 October last. Perhaps it is naivéte, but I will try to be fair and balanced. I have been fairly critical. I will put another possible scenario. I could almost forgive him for that answer on the basis that civil servants prepare the answers to parliamentary questions some days in advance. Subsequently the Minister has admitted to discussions on the evening of 19 October with Larry Goodman and Finn Sugar. Under our written PQ system it is conceiveable that the information concerning those discussions was not up to date as the PQ was answered the next day and the discussions were held the night previous. Perhaps that is a reasonable explanation. I am trying to be magnanimous here. However, regarding the further PQ some weeks later, I am afraid I cannot be generous in accepting the Minister's explanation. He misled this House. He denied he had discussions and that there were any proposals. There had been, he had discussions. On Finn Sugar's own words as stated here this morning, on four occasions in their letter they referred to proposals in different contexts.
I gave the Minister the benefit of the doubt on the first PQ but not on the catalogue of clouded and misleading statements, bad judgment, incompetence, political interference, abuse of power and low standards in his important office that pre-dated 20 October 1988, not to mention the saga that has developed since then. The Minister's release to his backbenchers in each constitutency last autumn of confidential information concerning the farm improvement grants programme to individual farmers pales into insignificance.
I have concentrated on the earlier period because, firstly, it has not been developed during this debate or in the debate of the last few weeks to any extent. Secondly, the board decision that sealed the fate of Thurles was taken as far back as 25 November 1987. Thirdly, since October 1988 the events have been well chronicled. As a non-executive director of FII Deputy Liam Lawlor's possible conflict of interest became apparent as soon as the news of FII's interest in the Sugar Company's affairs became public on 17 January this year. With the wisdom of hindsight and what has been revealed since, I say there was an apparent conflict of interests since the Minister's "chit chat" with Larry Goodman in October last year. Deputy Lawlor subsequently resigned — others prefer to suggest he was pushed by the Taoiseach — as chairman of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Commercial State-Sponsored Bodies which happened to be in the process of investigating the affairs of the Sugar Company. Many questions are still not answered. I hope today's debate will not be used as an excuse to suppress the answers, as the Irish public and this House are entitled to the truth.
There is no doubt that a Sugar Company with Thurles closed would have an increased net value of £50 million. Any information concerning proposals on Thurles' future would be of great commercial value to parties with an eye on a partial or complete takeover of the company, and this would not just be a matter of political sensitivity as Deputy Lawlor has suggested. The Sugar Company were also of this view and their chairman stated in their covering letter to Deputy Liam Lawlor dated 17 November 1988 when the chairman and his board responded to questions raised by the joint committee during their visit to Mallow on 3 November last:
We must be mindful of the sensitivity of the Thurles issue and we are concerned that the information being forwarded might be mistakenly perceived and used to political advantage.
The information referred to was being forwarded to the committee. We have established beyond doubt that it was politically sensitive but surely it was also of considerable commercial value. I contend that the information the Sugar Company were responding with to the Joint Committee was of extreme commercial value.
We await the outcome of the investigation of the Joint Committee on Commercial State-Sponsored Bodies into this affair and I hope what it reveals will put to an end once and for all this appalling debacle which has tarnished most of all the Minister for Agriculture and Food and the Government, and also all of us as politicians to some extent, because the less discerning public do not differentiate between us as much as I would like.
Ultimately the future profitability of sugar production in Ireland will depend on EC quota considerations, EC pricing policies, competition from imports and other sweeteners, cost reduction policies and the most economic factory structure possible in this country to produce Ireland's full quota allocation of 200,200 tonnes, which the Minister for Energy, Deputy Smith, has said is unlikely to be increased. Regrettably, I must concur with him as that appears to be the position.
The EC is self-sufficient in the production of sugar, and production worldwide has exceeded consumption each year in the eighties with the exception of 1985 and 1987. Human consumption has fallen each year for the last ten years and sugar prices in the EC are much higher than world prices which have fallen by half since 1979, and with cutback on agricultural subsidies there is little prospect of increasing our sugar quotas. Sugar is a capital intensive industry which benefits from economies of scale. The European sugar industry is highly modernised and since 1970 the number of factories in Europe has been reduced from 262 to 188. Average throughput per factory has increased from 3,260 tonnes of beet per day to 6,300 tonnes of beet per day in Europe. In the same period our throughput increased from 3,000 to 4,000 tonnes per day. Europe is now looking at figures of up to 10,000 tonnes per day throughput of beet. That has to be our target ultimately.
We ignore at our peril what is happening in Europe with the advent of the internal market if we want to ensure a future for commercial production of sugar in our country, a very important indigenously resourced industry. We will watch developments in the months to come and the bids and counter-bids with interest.
I, like many, felt that for the last 18 months of this Government the Fianna Fáil Party had changed their spots and that stroke politics would no longer dominate the agenda. Recently, however, we have witnessed the abuse of lottery funds by Ministers for political gain, an attempt to rig constituencies, the issuing by the Minister for Agriculture and Food of confidential information to his backbenchers regarding farm improvement programme grants and now this latest debacle.
I, like others, was very disappointed with the tenor of the Taoiseach's speech this morning. It set the tone for what is turning out to be a futile and sordid debate. When he of all politicans indulges in dipping into political history he is on a very dangerous wicket. Is it possible for him to forget that a former Taoiseach, a member of his own party, put him, the present Taoiseach of our country, on trial in the dock some 20 years ago for effectively giving effect to a decision of a Cabinet sub-committee? No, tragically for the workers of Thurles, the future of Siúicre Éireann and our country, the leopard has not changed his spots.
