State companies & the Threat of Privatisation

Click here to download the full Congress document 'State companies and the threat of privatisation: What do the party manifestos say?'

Labour Party: The party is committed to state enterprise and it will use the commercial state companies as a key part of the recovery. It opposes the privatisation of these companies.

Fine Gael: Fine Gael is committed to expanding some state utilities (possibly with private involvement) but it does support full or partial privatisation of these companies.

Fianna Fáil: Once committed to state enterprise, Fianna Fail has privatised many state companies and in Government it would be likely to privatise more.

Sinn Féin: While it has published few specifics on the role of the commercial state sector, in general the party has been supportive of these important indigenous companies.

Green Party: While the Green Party is supportive of the public transport sector – which contains a number of state companies - the party supported the loaded terms of reference set for the Review Group on State Assets. It seems to favour ‘competition’ rather than public control of key commercial assets.

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