At the tea adjournment, I had dealt with a couple of points which arose out of the Minister's speech when replying on the Second Reading debate. I want to deal with just a few more points. The Minister was perfectly correct in saying that a great deal of the discussion on the motion for the Second Reading was in relation to the Tourist Board, whether by means of a company or otherwise, operating and carrying on hotels, particularly luxury hotels, and, in addition, being empowered to carry on the variety of businesses that are provided for in the Memorandum of Association. The Minister, with that debating skill to which we are all so accustomed, avoided in regard to the businesses the net point which is a simple and concise one. The powers of the board are specifically set out in Section 16 of the Principal Act of 1939 as defined in Section 1 of this Bill. The Minister knows as well as I know that, if there had been any attempt to incorporate in the Principal Act powers to enable the Tourist Board itself to carry on any of the businesses that are now mentioned in the Memorandum of Association of the new company, there would have been an outcry in the Oireachtas. My point about those businesses is clear and simple. It is that the device of a company is a device that is dishonestly trying to get away from the limitations which are imposed in the Principal Act. The board should not by any device attempt to get away from the statutory limitations which are imposed on its operations in the Principal Act, and it is because I am of that opinion that I object to these powers being included in the memorandum of the company. Whether or not it is proper or wise to include them in the memorandum of any ordinary company is quite another matter.
I am in entire agreement with the Minister that it is usual for persons floating private companies to cast the net—I think that was the phrase used by Senator O Buachalla—as wide as possible. I agree so far as that applies to a private company, but this is not a private company. The proposal here is merely a method of evading the regulations and restrictions imposed by Section 16 of the Principal Act, and I, therefore, object to any part of the funds which we are providing under Section 2 of this Bill being utilised for such a purpose.
I saw the Cathaoirleach looking at me and I wished to relate my remarks specifically to Section 2 of the Bill which we are now discussing. It is because the memorandum of the company is an attempt to enlarge, extend and widen the provisions in the original Act that I made reference to hairdressers, bakers, licensed traders, manufacturers of pleasure steamers and others yesterday. If it were an original company, being opened for private operations, that would be normal, but this is merely an attempt to get away from the provisions contained in the Principal Act. It is on that ground I object.
I do not understand, despite the Minister's reply, how this company is to dispose of itself to the general public, having regard to the provisions included in its articles. It does not appear to me that those articles were drawn with the view which has now been suggested in mind. Senator O'Donovan said yesterday that, while we were talking of the board setting up luxury hotels, we had no evidence of that. It was, perhaps, unfortunate for him that the statement appeared in yesterday evening's papers to which reference has already been made and that there was a heading to-day in the newspaper which I may describe as the Bible of my friends opposite: "Club to cater for wealthy tourists." I suggest to the Minister that, while everybody going on holidays does, without question, want more luxury than he can get at home in his normal life, we do not want merely to cater for the super-luxury of the wealthy tourist. I suggest that it would have been better for the board to utilise the money which they are getting under this section to make some positive approach to the other methods of encouraging the trade—to utilise the money to do something in connection with holiday camps. Not so long ago, the members of this House paid a very pleasant visit to certain of the midland counties. As they were coming back that day, they saw Nissen huts, erected by the Turf Board at one place for certain purposes. If that board were able to obtain those huts for that purpose, why were not the Tourist Board, if they wanted to operate holiday camps, equally able to obtain them and have them set up? The Nissen hut would be an easily-convertible structure and would provide suitable holiday camp facilities.
I suggest that the reason of the omission is not, as the Minister said, that this is to be a minor phase of their work but because, as the chairman of the board said on 7th November, 1945, they are going in for luxury hotels, that that is what they regard as their main, positive, and immediate work. While it may be said that their intentions are to the contrary, we can only judge those intentions by what we have seen so far. What we have seen does not bear out the Minister's statement of the board's intentions.
The Minister made reference, in a somewhat heated little "scene", to the members of the Tourist Board. I think that the charge made by Senator Hayes was not against the members of the board but against certain employees—not all employees—of the board. The Minister made particular reference to Lord Monteagle. It has been pointed out to me that, in fairness to him, it should be stated that his wife was one of the teachers at the college to which Senator Hayes referred, and that he himself was one of the original people associated with Sir Horace Plunkett in the initiation of the co-operative movement here. It is only fair that that should be put on the records of the House.
In a few moments, we are to discuss a Bill dealing with local government. One of the Acts which constitute the local government code was very much decried at first but was subsequently accepted as a sound proposition—the selection of local government employees by independent methods. The Minister for Local Government will, no doubt, state, when dealing with his Bill, that he believes that to be a sound method. I should like the Minister for Industry and Commerce to make clear why a similar method of operation is not suitable in the case of a board such as the Irish Tourist Board. It appears to me that what is fish for one should be fish for the other and that, when employees of one body are selected in that way, it should be desirable that employees of another body be selected in the same way.
It would be better for the Minister to make clear the exact method by which the staff of the Irish Tourist Board are appointed. The Minister, as reported in Column 6, Volume 99, No. 1 of the Dáil Debates, stated that he did not lay down any conditions in regard to the method of appointment of officers of the board. The Minister has stated that political considerations did not enter into any such appointments. I want to make it clear that, if that is the case, the method of appointment is one that the public would like explained because if it is merely a coincidence that the Tourist Board is to a large degree-staffed by persons who are of one political complexion and who are, more than that, related to what I might call for the moment for want of a better word, a certain hierarchy in Fianna Fáil, it is only fair to them that the method should be made clear. We should like to know whether, for example in the appointment of an assistant secretary to the board, public advertisements were issued inviting applications for the position and if certain conditions were fulfilled; and, further, whether in regard to the appointment of a solicitor for the board, who, I notice, made the application yesterday, the same type of opportunity to apply for the position was afforded to other solicitors who might be equally qualified to deal with the matters on which it is necessary for the board to obtain legal advice. I want to try to deal with this matter in a calm way and I should like the Minister to supply the necessary information when he is replying.
Nothing that has been said by anybody has in any way shaken my view that there is in this industry of providing for tourists and holiday-makers a great future, if the industry is developed in the right way. Even after hearing the Minister, nothing has made it clear to me that his board is going to make an effort to get the co-operation of the hotel industry. I am in entire agreement with the provision of hotels in an area such as that mentioned by Senator McGee in Louth where there is no hotel in competition.
It is a very different story to compete with an existing institution. The provision and operation by the board directly or indirectly through the company of a hotel such as Ballinahinch, which is just next to the Zetland and another hotel of which the Minister is well aware, and the provision by the board of an additional hotel in Killarney are bound, if there is not the same overflow as exists at present, to affect existing institutions. I want further to know—and I would ask the Minister to be absolutely specific on this point—whether the board is at once going to make provision—and when I say "at once" I mean during the next month—by virtue of which existing hotel keepers who want to modernise, improve, and extend their premises can get long-term credit at reasonable rates.