I propose to take Questions Nos. 73, 75 and 76 together.
Provision of the new port access road was a condition of the planning consent given for the recently completed West Jetty extension at Foynes. Funding for the road is to be provided by the National Roads Authority, Limerick County Council and the Shannon Foynes Port Company.
I am advised by the Department of the Environment and Local Government that Limerick County Council was awarded £378,000 for 1999 and 2000 towards the cost of the access road to Foynes Port and that they have been allocated £150,000 under the EU co-financed specific improvements grant scheme for the project for 2001. I understand that the tender process for construction of this access road has recently commenced.
On 18 September 2000 the Foynes Port Company and the Shannon Estuary Ports Company, the successor authorities to Foynes Harbour Trustees and Limerick Harbour Commissioners, were amalgamated to form the Shannon Foynes Port Company on foot of the Harbours Acts, 1996 and 2000 (Transfer of Functions of Foynes Port Company and Shannon Estuary Ports Company) Order, 2000.
Section 41(1) of the Harbours Act, 1996, provides for existing superannuation schemes, the establishment of pension funds and arrangements for pilots etc. in the context of the transfer from the former Limerick Harbour Commissioners to the former Shannon Estuary Ports Company, to continue in existence or force and apply to each person to whom it applied immediately before corporatisation. Similarly, section 1 of the Harbours (Amendment) Act, 2000, provides, by way of amendment of the 1996 Act, for its continued application to the new Shannon Foynes Port Company.