Vol. 402 No. 7
13 Tomás Mac Giolla asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he has carried out any investigation into the loss of more than £10 million incurred by the IDA on the land and premises which they sold as a result of a direction from the Government in 1987; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
I have not carried out any special investigation into the matter referred to by the Deputy. The Committee of Public Accounts are currently examining this issue in the context of their consideration of my Department's 1988 appropriation accounts. I await the committee's report with interest.
As a member of the Committee of Public Accounts I am fortunate to have a copy of the report to which the Minister referred. Will the Minister agree that the list of extraordinary sales forced by the Government require an explanation? I instance, for example, 14 acres of land purchased at Navan by the IDA for £142,000 and sold for £20,000.
I must dissuade the Deputy from quoting at Question Time as it is not in order to do so.
There are a number of examples, the most blatant ones being at Ballyfermot, Navan, Ringaskiddy, Galway and Carrick-on-Shannon. They all demonstrate the same thing that arose in the 14 acres of land purchased at Navan for £142,000 and sold for £20,000. That seems incomprehensible. An auctioneer, when asked about the situation at Ballyfermot, gave information totally at variance with the price at which the IDA were forced to sell this land and, in view of that——
The Deputy seems to be imparting information rather than seeking it. Let us proceed by way of pertinent, brief, relevant questions.
Having regard to all the information I imparted, does the Minister consider it important and urgent that an investigation should be held into the prudence of the Government direction to cause these lands to be sold at that price and whether there was any question of insider trading, in terms of insider information, as to how these lands were sold?
Deputy Rabbitte has made his point.
Deputy Rabbitte referred to what he called the report of the Committee of Public Accounts on this matter. I understand that the committee are still investigating the matter.
What about the report from the Minister's Department?
That is a different matter. I said in reply that I await with interest the report of the committee which is the appropriate body to inquire into these matters. This question is before them at the moment and they can ask whatever they like and make whatever comments they like in regard to it. I will wait and see what they have to say.
I raised this matter late last year following the production of the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General which clearly highlighted this scandal. Will the Minister say whether there were any discussions with his Department about the sale of these lands before it took place? Will he also comment on the fact that the IDA now have to acquire new lands at inflated prices to recover the loss of available sites for industry in future as a result of the stupidity of their action some time ago on the instructions of the 1987-89 Fianna Fáil Government?
I presume — although I have not specifically inquired about that point — that there would have been a discussion of some kind with my Department about it because my Department would have passed on to the IDA the Government's instructions in this regard. The IDA are currently buying very little, if any, land and when they do it is not in substitution for what was sold in 1987 and 1988. It is land which would be required for a current proposed project. I have no evidence of the necessity on the part of the IDA to replace any of the land they sold in 1987 and 1988.
I suggest that there is a shortage of land, particularly in some urban areas. In view of the fact that this matter is now under detailed examination by the committee, will the Minister indicate that no further land will be approved for sale by the IDA until the committee issue their findings?
There certainly will not be any forced sales by the IDA but, in the course of their normal business, the IDA sell land to industrialists to enable them to build plants on it or to sell it when the plants have already been built. There is constant buying and selling in that business, that will have to continue in the normal course of business. I do not propose at the moment to give any direction to the IDA to sell off things simply for the sake of selling them. It would be as well for the House to bear in mind that the IDA hold a lot of land and a great deal of empty industrial buildings comprising many hundreds of thousands of square feet. It would be in the public interest if they were occupied or, in default of that, if they were put to the best possible use in the national interest.
Is the land sold at public auction?
I assume that the Minister, as the Minister responsible, would have a responsibility to investigate the land deals by the IDA and that he should not just leave it up to the Committee of Public Accounts. Since there is a general belief among the public that a scam has taken place in certain cases, will the Minister now consider that he has a responsibility to fully investigate the circumstances behind some of the deals — from whom the land was originally bought, to whom it was sold and if some of the land has even been sold on? Will the Minister give an assurance to the House that he will carry out a full departmental inquiry into the parties involved in these deals?
As pointed out, the Committee of Public Accounts are dealing with this matter at the moment. They are the appropriate body to investigate it and to comment on it. When they have completed their report, which I presume will be in the next few months, I will receive a copy of it and it will be published. I will examine the report with interest and make whatever decision needs to be made in the light of the evidence and comments published by the committee.
Does the Minister agree, with the benefit of hindsight, that it was a crazy Government policy——
Madness.
——to direct the IDA to cause some of its land bank to be sold off at bargain basement prices and that there must be, as Deputy Allen suggests, reason for the utmost concern as to why certain parcels of land were sold off at bargain basement prices when the market was clearly otherwise?
We are having repetition.
I do not agree that it was crazy policy to tell the IDA to dispose of some of their unwanted assets, any more than it is a crazy Government policy to tell various Government Departments and agencies to get rid of things that they do not need.
That was not the case. They were told to produce money irrespective of how they got it.
The State frequently holds assets unnecessarily, on which they get no return whatever.
That is not true.
I cannot comment on the level of price received, but it is worth bearing in mind that these sales took place at what one would call the bottom of the market. That was unfortunate, but who was to foresee that within a year or two prices would have increased very considerably?
A can of worms will be opened on this yet.
