Vol. 508 No. 5
14 Mr. Deenihan asked the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands the process which will be used to value the RTE network upon the establishment of Digico; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [19127/99]
36 Mr. Deenihan asked the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands if a similar employee share holding arrangement as that which applied for the workers of Telecom will be put in place for Digico; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [19126/99]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 14 and 36 together.
An interdepartmental project management group, chaired by my Department was established by Government last year to oversee the implementation of the Government's decision to establish a new commercial entity, in which RTE will be a minority shareholder, which will be responsible for the provision of terrestrial transmission and technical facilities to broadcasters in the future. The project management group is being assisted in this task by a consortium of advisers headed by AIB Corporate Finance. One of the issues on which the project management group requires the assistance of the advisers is the manner in which the transaction to establish the new entity is to be structured. The advisers are currently exploring a range of possibilities in this regard with a view to making a recommendation to the project management group. How fair value is to be attributed to the existing RTE Transmission Network will be considered as an integral part of that process.
I understand that negotiations are at present ongoing between RTE and representatives of RTE's Network Employees in relation to their proposed transfer to the new DTT transmission entity. As these negotiations are ongoing and are properly a matter between the employees and their employer, I do not believe that it would be helpful for me to comment further at this stage in relation to the question of an employee share option.
