As Deputies will see, this is a Bill to enable the Executive Council to take the measures that it is its duty to take in order to fulfil its obligations under the Covenant of the League of Nations. Deputies will remember that fourteen members of the League of Nations were of opinion that the Covenant had been violated by one of the member States, and that that State resorted to war in violation of its contracts under the Covenant. That opinion of these fourteen members of the Council of the League of Nations was concurred in by practically all the members, as was also their statement that one of the member States had violated its Covenants. The members resolved themselves into a Committee to consider how the obligations which fell to be discharged by each individual member, in virtue of the Covenant of the League of Nations, might best be coordinated—that is, the measures which had to be taken to carry out these obligations. That Committee is the Committee referred to in this Bill as the Co-ordination Committee.
Deputies should remember that it is not the League as an organisation that is acting in this case. The obligation is an obligation on each particular member to act, and action is being coordinated by these members meeting apart from the Assembly of the League of Nations. That Committee appointed a sub-committee, which was called the Committee of Eighteen, to consider and prepare in advance a scheme for coordinating these measures—measures mainly of an economic and financial character. When these proposals have been considered and adopted by the Committee of Eighteen, they are brought before the Co-ordination Committee, on which there are representatives of all the member States with the exception of the parties to the dispute. The proposals that are here in the Schedule to this Bill are proposals that were adopted by the Co-ordination Committee.
The scheme of the Bill is simple. The main text simply empowers the Executive Council to make Orders to give effect to these proposals that are in the Schedule. Section 2 (2) empowers the Executive Council to make the Orders that I have referred to. It also gives power to make Orders that are ancillary or incidental to or necessary for the enforcement of all or any of the Orders referred to. Section 3 empowers the Executive Council to amend or revoke these Orders. In Section 4 there is provision for the exemption of religious or humanitarian bodies or organisations from the operation of these Orders. In Section 5 it is declared an offence to act in contravention of the Orders, and penalties for such action are set out. In Section 6 there is provision for the laying of the Orders that are made, with the usual conditions, on the Table of the House.
That is the scheme of the main body of the Bill. With regard to the proposals in the Schedule, Deputies will notice that the first has reference to the exporting of arms and implements of war. The second has reference to financial measures. The third proposal has reference to the prohibition of importation of Italian goods. The fourth proposal puts an embargo on certain exports to Italy. The fifth and final is the organisation of mutual support, in which is set forth what are the steps that States should decide to take in mutual support in the carrying out of these obligations.
It may be asked was legislation necessary in order that our obligations under the Covenant should be carried out. As to proposal No. 1, we could probably have, by administrative action, done everything that was necessary in regard to the arms question. As to the financial measures, by co-operation with the banks we could probably have carried out in the main our obligations in that regard. However, both because of the exception which we have made with regard to the exemption of religious bodies from the operation of these Orders, and also because certain difficulties which could not now be foreseen, might arise, it was deemed advisable to have even in their regard legislative authority. With regard to the proposals about trade legislation, I must say that was certainly necessary. In any case we thought that in a matter of this kind it was only right that the members of the House should have a full opportunity of discussing this whole matter.
I think that the Bill itself is self-explanatory. There has been a good deal of publicity of League activity recently, and I feel satisfied that Deputies, and most people in the country who are interested, have made themselves acquainted in the main with the dispute and with the obligations of the member States under the Covenant.
I do not know whether it would be wise at this time to talk of any misunderstandings that may have arisen in connection with our position. If there is to be any reference to these, perhaps it would be better to deal with them at the close of the debate. Sometimes any attempt to deal with misunderstandings at the start only gives rise to further misunderstandings.
The point at the moment is that when we joined the League of Nations we really entered on an international treaty. We accepted the Covenant and undertook the obligations which are set out in the Covenant. The moment we decide we are satisfied that a State has violated its obligations under those Articles of the Covenant which enjoin it to seek a peaceful settlement of disputes, and has resorted to war instead, then automatically we become bound to fulfil our obligations. If we refuse to fulfil these obligations we can only be held as having violated the Covenant and our international contracts. For your representatives in Geneva, therefore, there was a very simple question to decide—whether there has been a violation of the Covenant or not, and, having agreed that there was a violation, whether the State would carry out the obligations which follow on such a decision. We agreed that the violation had occurred and I hold that there was no choice but similarly to agree that the measures which are set out here in the Covenant should be taken, of course, in conjunction or in co-operation with the other States. The idea of a coordinating committee was to see that the measures which each State is bound severally to adopt would be guaranteed in such a way as would make them effective.
This is not, I think, a Bill in which much can be done in Committee. We have not in the Schedule of the Bill the complete text of the Resolutions as they were passed at the Committee. There are parts that are really directions to Governments and things of that sort. The full texts are available in the Library, and, if Deputies desire-it, we could have the full texts supplied. I have a copy here which was. published in the League documents. We could have these full texts copied and circulated. The omissions are, as I have said, simply those things that it would be quite inappropriate to have here in a Schedule to an Act. For instance, here is one omission and I take it at random: "The Governments are invited to put into operation at once such of the measures recommended as can be enforced without fresh legislation and to take all practicable steps to secure that the measures recommended are completely put into operation by October 31st, 1935...." It is quite clear that paragraphs of that sort do not refer to the measures which would be covered by any order which the Executive Council would be called upon to make.
I do not think it is necessary to recommend this Bill to the Dáil. I think every Member here will find himself in exactly the same position as your representative—as I—found himself in Geneva, that there was a clear case both as regards having resort to war without acting in accordance with the provisions set out in Article 12 and other Articles of the Covenant, and that it was clearly set out in Article 16 what we should do in such a case. I am perfectly certain that every Deputy who approaches the matter in that way can only come to the one opinion, and I expect, accordingly, that Deputies on all sides of the House will vote for this measure.