The National Development Corporation Bill is paraded before this House as legislation designed to deal with the economic problems of the country, particularly those of unemployment and lack of investment. These are both interrelated. It is essential to raise the level of private and public investment, thereby creating opportunities for employment which will remedy in some respect the basic unemployment problem affecting this country socially and economically at present.
Viewed in that context, I question that this Bill is any answer to that basic and fundamental problem. The creation of a bureaucratic corporation of this kind on top of the existing semi-State bodies and organisations is not a getting to grips with the unemployment problem. It is merely creating yet another bureaucratic organisation on top of those already geared and mandated, under the legislation establishing them, to deal with the problems of investment, of joint venture participation, of co-operation with other State bodies or with the private sector in development and investment. That is spelt out in the Bill itself because under the First and Second Schedules there is a list of all the State-sponsored bodies on whom the National Development Corporation will rely to carry out the investment about which I am talking.
We have the example of Aer Lingus. They are already engaged in areas of expansion and will have further areas for expansion in which they can participate without any National Development Corporation or administrative apparatus of this kind. They have already diversified successfully into hotel development, aircraft leasing, training programmes, repair and maintenance operations. There is a whole range of aviation and hotel related activities in which Aer Lingus are already involved — substantially and successfully involved. They do not require any administrative apparatus to supervise what they are doing or not doing. They have the expertise, the financial, production and marketing experience to carry out that sort of work. It is complete duplication to establish an elaborate structure such as the corporation proposed in this legislation while Aer Lingus are there. If the State wants Aer Lingus to intensify existing activities or to go into the kind of developments I have mentioned, the State can make further equity capital available to Aer Lingus to carry out these operations. Alternatively, Aer Lingus can enter into any joint venture arrangement they may wish or participate with other airlines in areas of expansion which would give more employment. All these possibilities already exist under the legislation establishing Aer Lingus. All that is necessary is the political will on the part of the Government to give Aer Lingus financial and governmental backing to proceed in these directions.
The same goes for every one of the organisations mentioned in the Schedule to this Bill. Each of them could go ahead at the moment without the need of a further layer of bureaucracy on top of them, meddling in their affairs and causing a further impediment to development.
Bord Gáis Éireann are mentioned in the Schedule. This organisation, given the proper mandate in terms of financial backing and political will, can develop further into Limerick, Galway and towards the north and north-west. Progress in that area has been too slow. It requires political direction and will not be improved in any way by putting a national development corporation between the Minister and BGE.
Bord Telecom are now moving into areas of expansion, and other possibilities will present themselves if political will is exercised by the Minister. Sometimes that political will is exercised in a negative way and I would ask what the Government propose the NDC could do to improve the situation of the B & I line. They require positive help and no amount of NDCs or bureaucracy will improve the performance of the B & I and rationalise and expand their activities but rather will constrict their activities.
Irish Life Assurance Company is one of the dynamic growth companies. They have established a building society and are proceeding not only into insurance development but into the development of housing and property. They do not require a development corporation to impede rather than facilitate progress.
When one reads through this list one sees excellent semi-State bodies already in existence who have the legislative mandate to expand. All they require is political will on the part of the Minister and the Government and the necessary financial backing to enable them to implement proposals envisaged by them to ensure further expansion, investment and consequent employment.
Bord na Móna are also mentioned. In what way will the National Development Corporation facilitate Bord na Móna, who have been doing an excellent job in regard to turf cutting and supplying turf burning power stations? Their expansion into milled peat and the treatment of reclaimed bog are very advanced and a lesson to the world as a whole. We would envisage further investment and expansion into the area of forestry development, the transfer of the activities of the forestry division of the Department to Bord na Móna, who would be given a fresh mandate to engage in the commercial development and exploitation of our forestry and timber resources as well as the development of our peat resources. The two go hand in hand and we would see further downstream ancillary activities taking place under the guidance of a single State-sponsored body. What function would the NDC perform in that context? All that is required is a mandate from the Minister and a change in legislation to add forestry development to peat development as part of Bord na Móna's operation and, if necessary, the financial support to enable them to get on with the job.
In all these State-sponsored bodies we have the structure, the expertise and the resources to allow for further expansion, provided there is political will and financial backing by the State. It can all be done under the existing semi-State companies.
The ESB have successfully diversified their activities. In Africa and the Middle East they have undertaken consultancy contracts relating to the construction of transmission and power station facilities. They have done this from their own resources and much more could be done if the Government had the will to provide the ESB with the finance to expand in these directions.
One can see the scope for expansion when reading through this list of State-sponsored bodies. Bord Fáilte could expand in the tourism field; CTT could expand in the export area; Kilkenny Design Workshops could expand in the specialised area of design; the National Board for Science and Technology could expand advanced research into technology; SFADCo have great expertise in regard to industrial development on a regional basis. There is enormous scope for expansion and development. One is struck by the paradox of a Government who have the temerity to bring in this legislation, pretending to deal with development and expansion, while at the same time they are presiding over the liquidation of Irish Shipping and the quasiliquidation of B & I. In regard to both these companies the Government are taking an entirely negative, restrictive and reactionary approach.
Coming back more directly to the mandate proposed in this legislation, is there anything in it that could not be done by the NEA, the IDA or the ICC, who are already engaged in this business? They are all concerned precisely with investment on behalf of the State, joint venture investment or private investment. I suggest that the proposal to establish this body is no more than an elaborate piece of window dressing because the State companies are already there, the apparatus is there, and all that is proposed here under the guise of further progress and development is another bureaucratic animal to supervise the State companies already there and to wind up one of them, the NEA.
We do not want this new bureaucratic animal to graze on the State companies already there. The existing State companies can do this work. The British invented the term "quango" but the British have been dismantling them as have countries all over the world. I am all for State enterprise provided it is channelled into productive areas, provided it is properly financed and given a mandate to do the work and to proceed under the overall political direction of the Minister and the Government. Here, however, we have a Government running away from their responsibilities and establishing another bureaucratic monster to meddle and intervene between the Minister and the other semi-State bodies who are fully equipped to do the work. This legislation is nothing more than window dressing to try to get the people to believe that something miraculous will happen.
Nothing will happen without political will and finance. The political will can be exercised and the financial resources made available through a whole range of State-sponsored bodies already in existence. Progress merely requires the Minister to sit down with the chairmen of these bodies and their boards, and ask them where we can go, where do we stand, what new ideas are emerging, what new activities do these State bodies require investment for.
The IDA have been doing an excellent job attracting industry here, arranging that companies would come together. What kind of relations will be established between this new animal and the IDA? Why are the NEA being wound up and replaced? Is it not quite clear that this is just political stunt making or window dressing, whichever you like to call it? A new bureaucratic structure is being established which will not contribute one whit towards development and expansion. It will just be a further layer of bureaucracy frustrating activity by the existing semi-State bodies. This work could be done by more co-operation between the Minister and those bodies. If difficulties should arise, a special State body could be set up to deal with them. For instance, if there is a problem in relation to forestry development or downstream timber activities, Bord na Móna are ideally geared to take on that problem. The law could be amended to give them an extra mandate and extra finance for that purpose. Alternatively, a State body could be set up to deal precisely with forest development and the development of timber products.
To set up this vague elaborate structure which, given time, will turn into a magnificent white elephant is an extraordinary action by any Government. Of course it will not get time because before this legislation has been enacted there will be a change of Government and this legislation and any animal or quango that may incipiently emerge from it will be consigned promptly to the wastepaper basket by the incoming Fianna Fáil Government. We will set about getting the existing State bodies to carry out enterprises more efficiently, or establish further State bodies if there is a vacuum and a need.
That is the way to go about business, and I am sure that is the view of Deputies John Bruton and E. Collins, if they were to stand here and speak openly, if they did not have the albatross of the Labour Party around their necks. Just because this quango was proposed in the Labour Party policy before the establishment of this Government, the Fine Gael Ministers are hung with it. Those Ministers agree fully with what I am saying — one of them is sitting opposite me — but they are hung with this Labour albatross and have to go along with this parliamentary charade in order to keep the Labour Party boys quiet for another few months.
Bringing everything down to bedrock, that is what this Bill is all about. It is in aid of keeping the Labour boys happy for a few more months. Deputies John Bruton and Dukes and Eddie Collins fought a fight for sanity, and for three years they frustrated and prevented the Labour Party from getting their way. They were right to do that, but they were wrong finally in succumbing, which they did because of political opportunism and expediency in satisfying the junior partner. That is why we are wasting time here talking about this Bill.
That is my general approach. There is not much need to go into detail on the weaknesses of the Bill. The whole Bill has been wrongly conceived and will remain stillborn because we will be the next Government. That is why the Bill or any fledgling administration brought into life during the brief period while it is law, before we are the Government, will be consigned to the wastepaper bin.
As we are engaged in a parliamentary exercise, there are certain aspects of the Bill that show it for the complete nonsense it is even were it concerned with the sort of magnificent drive for expansion, development and investment in jobs that the Labour Party would like to trumpet about. I might ask the Labour Party in particular, as the junior partner in Government, to look at section 15 (1) where there is contained a more restrictive clause than any obtaining in regard to any State body really doing their work. Here I am thinking in particular of the IDA. Under that subsection no more than £1 million can be expended by this quango without seeking the approval of the Minister. They are completely hamstrung from the beginning. I will read the subsection to illustrate my point:
Subject to subsection (2) and subsection (3), the Corporation shall not, without the prior permission of the Minister, invest in an enterprise an amount or amounts exceeding in the aggregate £1,000,000.
Therefore, the corporation ab initio is limited to not spending more than £1 million without approval of the Minister, who must then refer to the Minister for Finance, who will bring it before the Government, who will strangle any such project at birth. That is not the way the IDA are run. Rightly the IDA have always had an open mandate to carry out their developments. Likewise, Aer Lingus have a similar open mandate, as have all of the major State companies, such as the ESB, over the years. This corporation, which will supervise the whole lot of them, organise them all into joint ventures and new proposals, cannot make a move if any such major development exceeds £1 million. Do the Government realise the age in which we live and the pretentiousness of this Bill? If this Bill is what it pretends to be, it is a total contradiction in terms if the corporation is not allowed to spend or invest any more than £1 million without approval of the Minister and, in turn, the Minister for Finance and the Government. We are right back into the maw of bureaucracy once more, the whole purpose of what is intended being frustrated.
I am now making points that presume to some degree that this Bill is seriously intended, seriously meant to be what it states, when it is not. Probably I am going through details here that will not matter a whit because the Bill will never be effective or achieve anything. When the Government were pretending to throw a sop to the Labour Party, pretending to introduce a Bill that might be of some consequence, at least they might have continued the pretence and given an open financial mandate to such a body to get on with the job, implementing the whole range of tasks set out in section 10 which contain two pages of magnificent objectives of the corporation, all of which are already being achieved by existing State sponsored companies.
Two-and-a-half pages of that section are devoted to reiterating those aims and objectives, giving this new corporation objectives and aims already written into the mandates of existing State bodies established by legislation in this House. There are two-and-a-half pages of glorious prose which, if read in isolation, might lead one to believe there was some serious intent behind the establishment of this corporation until one reaches section 15 (1), under whose provisions one sees they cannot make a move if any such project is in excess of £1 million, when they must seek Ministerial approval and so on — back to be buried by the Civil Service establishment. That is that, as far as the Labour Party are concerned.
There is little else to be said about the Bill. Indeed, both the Bill and its Explanatory Memorandum revolve around the two sections I have mentioned, one dealing with its objectives and the other with its financial limitations. Other than that it amounts to an administrative, bureaucratic exercise, purporting to establish a new bureaucratic body that will prove to be doubly frustrating. It will prove frustrating to existing State-sponsored bodies who want to go ahead, get on with the job and who will discover this body meddling in their affairs. It will be frustrating to the Minister concerned because this body will be sandwiched between himself and the State-sponsored bodies for which he is responsible. Indeed, it will amount to a further frustration of the existing bureaucracy which will have yet another layer to deal with between the Minister and the existing State companies with whom they have to deal.
What this Bill proposes is a bureaucratic mess for which there is no practical, financial or economic reason. It is a bureaucratic mess designed purely to meet certain political imperatives caused by the desire of the senior party in the Coalition to keep the junior party in Coalition quiet. That is just not good enough after three years in Government. We have a number of excellent State-sponsored bodies. I might avail of this opportunity to pay tribute to them, many of whom engaged in forms of diversification and investment to date that have been highly successful. These were State-sponsored bodies in the main established by Fianna Fáil Governments, that have worked excellently. I was associated with one in particular, Aer Lingus, when as Minister for Transport they expanded into a whole range of areas related to aviation but not concerned with direct flying, all of which have been very successful — operations concerned with repair, maintenance of planes, the leasing of planes, hotel development, and so on. That type of initiative has been shown by other State sponsored companies over the years.
However, the Government have sought to diminish the role of State-sponsored companies. Born na Móna have also done a magnificent job and there is scope for further development and activity on their part. You can go right through the whole list and see that there is enormous scope for development, provided there is political will and finance is made available to do so. The only response by the Government is to propose legislation to set up this body but — and I will be proved right in two years' time — it will never be a viable operation. It is stupid and futile in the extreme mainly because it is being set up for all the wrong reasons.
Existing machinery can carry out the job which is required and the Industrial Credit Company, the Industrial Development Authority and the National Enterprise Agency already do this job. The facilities and agencies are there and, although this legislation may be passed, the National Development Corporation will never get off the ground. If by any chance it did, we will ensure that it will go down when we are in Government again. We will be a Government who place their confidence in the State-sponsored companies like the B & I and others which have been established to do specific jobs. We will ensure that these companies will be restored to health and properly managed and we will rid the economy of any bureaucratic excrescence which may develop as a result of this legislation.