If there are any amendments, they must be moved before the Minister moves to agree with the resolution.
FINANCIAL RESOLUTIONS REPORTED (RESUMED DEBATE).
Resolution No. 3 read a second time.
There are certain securities which are exempt from income tax, and that was a condition or a contract that was entered into by Great Britain at the time of the issue of the securities. The maintenance of that contract, to which, of course, we in our capacity as an independent State are not committed, would prejudice the collection of income tax from these particular securities. We are in negotiation with the British Government on the subject, and a resolution such as this is necessary in order that the revenue of the State should not be prejudicially affected. That is the reason why this particular resolution is submitted for approval by the Dáil.
A Chinn Chomhairle, I am a person of a merciful disposition, and I do not propose to inflict on the Dáil again the remarks that I made yesterday, but they apply, I think, with even greater force——
Hear, hear.
They apply with even greater force to this resolution than they did to the question we were debating yesterday. And I hope that either when this debate concludes, or possibly when the Finance Bill comes up, that the President may be able to give us some further explanation about the nature of this charge. This particular proposal has been attacked very violently in the Press and elsewhere upon many grounds. With some of those I do not agree. It has been charged that by imposing income tax upon securities that were issued free of tax the Government of this State is about to be guilty of some breach of faith. I do not agree with that. We made no contract that we would not charge income tax upon these particular securities, and I do not myself see how it can be contended that we are bound by a contract made by somebody else in respect of these securities. Also it was suggested somewhere that this proposal contravened in some way Article 17 of the Treaty, about being bound by all laws that were existing at the time. That argument does not commend itself to me. The real ground upon which I deprecate this proposal is that at the present moment anything that is calculated to prevent the money belonging to this country that is at present out of this country, and trying to make up its mind whether it is going to stay out of the country or to come back to the country, is to be deprecated very much indeed. I give one single instance.
One of the first estates sold under the Wyndham Act was an estate close to Dublin, and the purchase money was about just one million pounds. Being a settled estate, that money was all invested in securities—mostly, I think, in trustee securities. The income tax at current rates upon the proceeds of those investments would come to well over £20,000 a year. That income tax belongs to the Government of the country in which its owner is domiciled. Not only that, but when the owner of that invested property died, at current rates his estate death duty to the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the country in which he died domiciled, would amount to £280,000. That is a single instance, and there are hundreds of smaller ones— cases in which landlords sold their property under the Wyndham and other Purchase Acts and invested the proceeds in stocks and securities of one kind or other, upon the income of which they lived, keeping for themselves a house and a bit of demesne. At this moment many of those people are resident in England and are hesitating whether they will spend the money they will get from the Ministry of Finance under the Criminal Injuries Act, which we passed the other day, in reinstating their old homes, and coming back to spend the rest of their lives here and die in this country. If they come back this country reaps a crop in death duties when they die. If, by reason of taxation which discriminates against them, they decide not to come back to this country, but to make their permanent home across the water, all that money goes into the Exchequer of the country over the way. I am sure the Government are not acting hastily in this matter, but they cannot consider too long or too carefully. I trust that in dealing with every question under this first Finance Act they will do everything they can to make the road smooth for people who are at present living in exile, and that they will avoid doing anything which may have the effect of forcing those people to remain away and not to come back. Such an imposition as this imposition of tax upon an investment which at the time the purchasers bought it they believed and were assured would not be subject to income tax, is calculated to cause disturbance in their minds, and to raise doubts amongst them as to what their prospects are in regard to further increased taxation if they come back to this country.
Now, yesterday it was proposed that the income tax should be reduced from 5s. to 4s. 6d. in order that it might be the same on one side and the other. I did not support that proposal, because I am thoroughly convinced that the policy of the Government in clearing off their debt is sound, and that they acted wisely in retaining the income tax at the present figure, in order that they might put the credit of this country on a firm financial basis. I thought they acted with sound judgment in refusing to accept the suggestion that they should sacrifice current revenue for the moment and increase the indebtedness of this country by funding their debt. I do not set up to be a financier, but the argument put forward by the Ministry upon that appealed to my common sense.
I have no doubt they will not continue the high rate of income tax for very long, and it is only the shocking expenditure which has been wantonly put upon this country, that has prevented us having an income tax considerably lower than any other place. The Government are not to blame, and ought not to be blamed by Deputies or anybody else. But it seems to me they should anxiously seek to make any relaxation that will ensure to this country the money derived from the sale of estates and things of that kind, which is at present hesitating as to where it will make its final home. There is no doubt that the vast majority are very anxious to return, but little things may change their minds and decide them to make their homes elsewhere. Anyone who does come back and try to rebuild his house I think we should keep, but, on the other hand, if during the next six or twelve months, which is the critical period, they settle down in more or less permanent homes elsewhere we will not get them back. It seems to me that the first twelve months covered by the first Budget, and the first imposition of taxation, is likely to be very critical in deciding what the future income of this country from death duty which, as the President calculates during the present year will make three millions of his income, is going to be, and whether it will turn out to be three millions or very considerably less. I should welcome any assurance that may come from the Minister for Finance as to the grounds and necessity for this particular imposition.
The perplexity in which the short opening statement of the President, upon this motion, has left me, is all the greater when I recall the stirring speech he made yesterday against the proposal of Deputy Johnson. He deprecated double income tax on the ground of its being, by an oblique road, a passage towards bad faith. He dwelt upon that and enlarged upon it in detail. It struck me at the time, because of his failure to enlarge upon this question to-day, and it strikes me again, now, as showing that the arguments he used yesterday undermine his position with regard to this question to-day. Everything he said against Deputy Johnson yesterday upon this point was a fatal argument against the present proposal. The Deputy who has just spoken began with a very dramatic pretence of viewing this matter purely as a lawyer, and he ended very appropriately, and I think very sanely, taking, not the lawyer's point of view but the public man's point of view who considers that policy is a very important consideration. We are all able to recall the circumstances in which these 4 per cents were issued. The investing public were given a choice as to whether they would take the 5 per cents at 95 and take the risk of whatever the income tax might be, as the War went on, or whether they would elect to put their money into the 4 per cents at par, and be free of income tax. Now, those who took the 5 per cents and risked the future as regards the income tax-figure did remarkably well on the whole. Those who were cautious, and preferred to know the worst from the very beginning, that 4 per cent. would be the total yield from their investments, no matter how the income tax would fluctuate, did not do so well. They paid for their timidity, and now it is proposed, notwithstanding that that is a public contract as between the United Kingdom of that time and the investing public, to impose a tax upon them as if no such risk was taken by them and no such consequent loss. Now, I have no hesitation in saying, what the President said yesterday, that that does involve to some extent a breach of faith; I do not mean a breach of faith in the moral sense, but it is tearing up a piece of paper and breaking a contract. I gathered from the President's speech to-day that, somehow conscious of this he regards what he is doing as part of a bargain or arrangement with the British Treasury, which is not yet complete—perhaps I misrepresent him in saying so—but I gather that there are negotiations on foot with the British Treasury with regard to this and other financial matters, and that pending a final settlement a provisional arrangement of this sort is entered into for the convenience of tax collection. I have not—it is my own fault, no doubt— grasped how the collection of taxes is helped in any degree by proceeding now, as is proposed, to treat these duty-free investments as if they were new investments, and to bring them under the income tax legislation we are now engaged in framing. But I look beyond the mere hurt or injury to the pocket that is involved to the few capitalists who made this choice some years ago. I consider rather the repercussion of this thing upon our public credit. The one immediate interest is to float a loan—a favourable loan—for the Free State. What encouragement does this measure give to those who have money to invest? The Minister for Finance will issue scrip on favourable terms that will drag money out of the Banks, where it lies at 1½ or 2 per cent. interest, into the Free State securities. In considering whether or not they should put their money into this, all who are not animated by patriotic zeal will take into account how does the Free State Ministry of Finance deal with people who lent their money in response to the Government promise. Deputy Wilson has found amongst his friends many people who say, "We do not want any interest on the money we advance to the Free State. We put our hands deep down into our pockets for the Land League; we put them deeper still into our pockets for the support of the Irish Parliamentary Party on the floor of the House; and we are only burning now for an opportunity to put all our available surplus at the disposal, without interest, of the Free State."
Quite right.
I hope every member of the Farmers' Union is engaged, in his week-ends, counting up the golden hoard to see how much he can really induce himself to withhold for the mere necessaries of life. The main consideration is, not that there are a few enthusiasts like Deputy Wilson and his colleagues in the Farmers' Party, but, now and later on, what shall be the position, in the world's estimation, of the Free State as a borrowing State? That is a thing about which we must be exceedingly jealous; it is a matter about which we cannot be too fastidious, and everything that shows a light-hearted disposition, or even a tendency towards such a light-hearted disposition, to regard contracts as of no consequence —as things to be scrapped when the National interests seem to require it— is something to be deprecated. I personally, as an individual, do not care one scintilla whether those who hold 4 per cents. are made to pay for it or not; but as a mere individual, as one interested in the Free State and its credit, and anxious to set up a good precedent financially, I do very much care. It is not for the individual who is hit, or for the deprivation of whatever sum will be forthcoming, but on the great broad question of policy, that I speak. It is not good. The yield here is so slight that even if I put it only on that base calculation: How much do you get? what is it? A trifle. What do we lose when we have discouraged the investing public, and make them feel that we do not abide by solemn contracts? That we are a people quite capable of redeeming at ten or fifteen per cent. lower than we undertook to redeem at. I know very well it will be said that for the moment, inasmuch as the final settlement of the financial relations with Great Britain have not been reached, that we shall exact perhaps better terms by showing the difficulties into which we have been plunged. I quite recognise that if the Treaty had not been forced upon our delegates in the extraordinary manner in which it was done, there would be little or no pretext for the rebellion against the Free State. I feel very strongly that the maladroit way in which British Statesmen chose to exercise what they are pleased to regard as their statesmanship has done us infinite harm, and they ought to pay for it. It is a hurt, it is an injury that is incalculable, but at the same time I think that what is of far more importance in the immediate present than making a good bargain with England, if it could be made, is to secure satisfaction from the fact of there being a Free State in operation. I want the Irish tradition to be preserved in this matter. It is better that we should be so many thousand pounds on the wrong side in the matter of losing the yield from this imposition than that we should afterwards have to stand in the pillory for it as a nation who took advantage of the situation to force people into paying an imposition from which they thought they had contracted to escape.
I hope the view that Deputy Fitzgibbon gave expression to will impress itself upon the members of the Dáil. I do not think too much stress could be laid upon it. To my mind the first essential, financially, for us is to try and establish stability, and that was why it seemed to me yesterday that this was no time to look for remission of taxation, and why I think the President was taking a businesslike attitude in doing as little as possible in that respect. I think in this matter the Government are making a mistake; and while I support what Deputy Fitzgibbon said as strongly as possible, I would urge another point of view on members of the Dáil. The proposal of the Government seems to me to be making a present to the British Government of income tax to which they are not entitled. When they wanted to issue a war loan they took two forms of doing it—one a war loan where the rate of interest was 5 per cent., subject to such income tax as might be current from year to year, and another where they only paid 4 per cent., but required no income tax on such interest. Now, if the proposal of the Government here is adopted, the effect of it will be that on all the money lent to the British Government by Irish investors the British Government will be merely paying 4 per cent. interest upon it—that is to say, they are really getting the equivalent income tax upon all that interest. The two things may be compared in this way. The 4 per cent. is really equivalent to 5¼ per cent. without a return of 1¼ per cent. in the way of income tax, leaving a net 4 per cent. to the investor. Now, the proposal of the Government here leaves the British Government merely paying 4 per cent, and therefore they get the full income tax upon that interest. The proper people to come down upon for a claim for this money are the British Government, because they are benefiting by all that money lent to them by Irish investors. The proposal of the Government puts a double income tax upon the investors we heard so much about from the Deputy yesterday. It leaves the investor paying the full income tax to Britain, and he is also liable to pay the full income tax to the Free State Government. It is quite right that that income to the investors should produce revenue for the Free State Government, but it is not upon the investors the Free State Government should come down, but upon the British Government, and I hope the Dáil will insist upon that, and that those just claims against the British Government will be enforced. They have no right, after this agreement is made, to get the full income tax from the Irish investors, because they are only entitled at the best to a portion of it, such as is outlined in our Double Taxation Relief Bill. They are not entitled to get what they would get if this proposal of the Government is put into force. I do not wish in the least to diminish the force of what has been said about the necessity for giving as much encouragement as we can to investors. That, after all, is the essential thing for us at present.
While I have not, like Deputy Fitzgibbon, any sympathy at all for the financiers and others who invested their money in a vulgar trade war—not an unmeritorious investment, even though, in their view, England was not the enemy—and while I have not sympathy for those people who were not the friends of their country, I feel that it is exceedingly unwise to introduce a resolution of this kind. The very fact that those people were against us is a reason for being more scrupulously careful not merely to treat them fairly, but to show that you are treating them fairly; not merely to do the decent thing, but to let it be realised that you are doing the decent thing. The mere fact that these people's record is not a record that would commend itself to many of us in the struggle that we have gone through, seems to me to make it necessary for us, in the interests of the State, to be very scrupulous in our dealings with them. The particular loan affected by this resolution is a loan into which rich men put their money. They had as good a right to their political views as we had to ours, and proper treatment by the State to-day will show them that the qualms that many of them have had as to how they were going to be treated were unfounded. The Minister yesterday was very eloquent on the subject of double income tax. He has been reminded of that eloquence earlier to-day. Let me quote the Minister's speech as reproduced in the morning's papers. He pretended he was speaking about double income tax. With his facetious way of doing things, he talked as if double income tax was really what he had in mind. The Dáil will see that what he had really in mind was the resolution. He was pretending to bring this resolution forward, but was really against it all the time. What the Minister is reported to have stated is this: "They undertook, by reason of the change establishing Saorstát Eireann, that persons having investments should be allowed to use their own discrimination. They should not be placed under the hardship which a double taxation would impose. They got no notice of being saddled with an extra imposition. That would certainly be unfair." The Minister went further, and is reported: "It would be a breach of faith, and it would affect credit not alone with regard to those people he had referred to, but with regard to those who might possibly invest in our own loan."
These are the words of the Minister. Perhaps I am wrong in supposing the Minister had this resolution in view, but I do think, on reconsideration, he himself must see that in view of the class of persons—persons doubly suspicious of the Dáil—hit by the resolution, he should be doubly careful not merely to treat them fairly, but to do nothing that would have the appearance of unfairness in his dealings with them. If he were to try to justify in his own mind the pressing of a very unwise resolution of this kind he would have to have before him, and ought to bring before the Dáil, figures showing the billions that would flow into the Exchequer as a result of the resolution being passed. How much is it, after all, for which this very doubtful principle is being introduced, which will undoubtedly do discredit to the reputation of the first Irish Government? I think the Minister should reconsider it in view of the eloquent appeals made by the previous speakers.
I was expecting Deputy McGoldrick to wind up the discussion by following the example he set in yesterday's debate on a similar subject, and making the same kind of speech in regard to this particular resolution as he made in regard to my amendment. It was a speech, if I may say so, which argued for the amendment while leading to a vote against it. I thought we would have had to-day a speech arguing against the Government's resolution, but leading to a vote in favour of it. I agree with Deputy Fitzgibbon in saying that the case that was made against the amendment yesterday, if there was a case made against it, is the case made against this resolution. Judging by the discussion, so far as it has gone, and taking it in connection with the debate yesterday, it seems that the President and I, and those who act with me, are going to be left alone when we come to a division. I hope there will be a division on this motion. Those who followed the course of the discussion yesterday will probably be consistent and vote against this resolution—all except the President and those of us who were in the minority yesterday. The President is right to-day, as he was wrong yesterday, and I hope he will proceed despite the criticism that has been levelled against this resolution. I think we are touching political questions again. We are touching questions that go back to last December twelve months, and I suggest that the state of mind which is opposing the course of action proposed in the resolution is that it will not accept the view that there has been a distinct change in the fundamental relationship between the Saorstat and Great Britain. The arguments against the resolution can only, to my mind, come out of the minds of people who feel there has been only a political modification in the relationship, that there has been some extension of local authority, and, as regards whatever powers we may have in regard to fiscal independence, that those powers ought not to be used because they would alienate certain sections of the public in this country, would lead to the introduction of new methods of taxation, the breaking from the old traditions, and the breaking away from British practices. Inasmuch as that would mean loss to those who had invested in British securities, it must be implied that there is no intention to make any drastic change. I rather conceive the new status of the Saorstát as being of an independent economic and fiscal unit, and that we have no longer any right to think of how British investments make their profits, and who are the shareholders in those British investments. We have to think of the income of the citizen of the Saorstát after he gets it, and deal with it as his personal income. To say that an investor in a British security is to be safeguarded to the value of that security, as he would have been had we retained our fiscal unity with Britain, is to say that we have not any right to use the fiscal liberty that has been won. I do not understand why a person who is engaged in an occupation in the Saorstát which enables him to pay income tax, or renders him liable to pay income tax, and whose sales or whose commodities are mainly in England, should be treated more harshly from the income tax point of view than another person whose savings or whose income is derived from business established in England—war business if you like. I will call the War Loan a business for the sake of argument. Each of these individuals is taxed in Ireland upon his income. But that is after the income has been received. It is not by the method of earning that income by the Company, or by the association of persons called the British public; it is not by their particular business or method of earning the income that it should be taxed. It is upon what he receives as a citizen of the Saorstát. If you take that view there is no case for special treatment and special remission. I wonder why the critics of this resolution confine themselves to investors in British securities. There is quite an appreciable number of people in Ireland who have investments in American securities. Do you wish to treat them any differently from those who have investments in British securities? Why do you not suggest, when you are dealing with principles, that they should be allowed remissions? Deputy Magennis spoke of the sacredness of contracts and Government promises. I do not remember, and I have been a fairly close follower of the proceedings, any Government promises to limit taxation to people who prefer to invest their monies in securities of other countries. I do not think any such promise was made. Except upon the view that we still remain a part of this fiscal unit of the British Islands, no such promise can be charged as having been made against the Irish Government. I support the President on this Resolution No. 3. I would prefer that the last two lines of the first paragraph were deleted, but I am not going to press that at the moment. If we are in a minority of two we shall take a division on this motion.
I find myself in the singular position of agreeing with all the stages of Deputy Johnson's argument, but I find that it leads me to a conclusion quite different to that to which it leads him. He represents the argument against this resolution as amounting to a question of the right of this nation to set up an entirely different fiscal system of its own. I suggest that that is a curious perversion of the argument that has been put forward; at least it does not represent my mind on the matter in objecting to this particular Resolution. I insist that we had that right, but inasmuch as we have not yet exercised that right, inasmuch as we have taken over certain taxes which we received from the English Government, it is not for us to vary the administration of them until we have an opportunity of revising the entire system, and adopting that which is most suitable to ourselves. That is the first stage of it at least. I will give another argument later, but I wish to deal with that a little bit more fully at the moment.
The President yesterday stated that the English system was an admirable system of fiscal policy; that the English system was a good one to adopt, an approved one. He seemed to argue, therefore, that it could not be very much better. It is, of course, a good system. It is a good system devised for the conditions that prevail in a highly industrialised country like England. But a system that may be good there is not necessarily a good system here. One may go so far as to say that because a system is good in England, therefore the system cannot be good here, because the conditions that prevail in the two countries are entirely different. But we have not varied the system. In spite of the wholly different set of circumstances we have taken over the English system. Seeing we have taken over that system, let us, until such time as we find it necessary to revise it, and revise it as drastically as it requires to be revised, let us at least observe conformity, to which we have given some form of service in this Resolution, and keep that conformity throughout. Let there be reciprocity as between the like taxes in each of the two countries. There is an even deeper argument, and that was touched upon by Deputy Johnson. It was right, I think, that the opposite case should be put. He asked the question fairly. Not being a Minister for Finance, I will not say it was a rhetorical question. Why not ask for similar remissions in the case of taxes from the United States or from France or Germany?
Why only should we ask that there should be this obligation in respect of taxes in Great Britain? There is a very effective answer to that surely. At the time when this war loan was issued free of income tax this country—forcibly, it is perfectly true; against its will, we agree—was part of the same fiscal unity, and under a contract which we here, as part of the Free State, have since entered into with Great Britain, an international contract known as our Treaty, we have admitted our liability in that war. Article 5 of the Treaty quite indisputably admits that the Free State undertakes part of its liability in the European War. If it undertakes this liability in the European War, then surely it undertakes its liability in such stock as might have been issued in its name at the time for the liquidation of its obligations and liabilities in that war. There was no contract of that kind in respect of the United States. When we get a little further from these times, when we have, as I earlier expressed the wish that we might have, a system that will be devised for our own needs, and will differ root, stalk and branch from the system that prevails in other countries, differ as radically as our conditions differ, then we will be able to move away from the conditions of the contract to which Deputy Magennis has referred. But at the present moment the conditions of that contract remain. We have admitted it in an international instrument, and, having admitted it, it is perfectly just to say, as Deputy Magennis stated here to-day, that to the people who bought that war loan, issued in the name of this country, which we took over from the Government that prevailed here, as a going concern, we have an obligation in respect of the stipulations attaching to the issue of that stock. We may not like that it should be so, but I urge that it is so, and I think that if Deputy Johnson were to say, as I understood him to say, that it is right for the Irish people to get an entirely different fiscal system, so that we can get further and further away from these conditions, I agree, but we have not got there yet. Therefore, I do urge there is a contract in this matter, that we do stand in this connection, and for the time being, in a different relationship to Great Britain than we stand with regard to any other country, and we will so stand so long as certain unexpired obligations which we undertook under the Treaty continue to exercise their influence upon us. I do not know how many members of this Dáil there are who own large portions of the kind of stock to which we are referring. I do not happen to be of their number, but I am sure that people in this country, and public bodies in this country, who undertook the purchase of that stock did so in the belief that they were purchasing stock the obligations of which would be recognised by this Government, and I think that there is a contract in that connection, to which the President yesterday made clear reference. If his words used yesterday were sound in connection with the matter then under discussion they are equally of application to-day, and they tell in every phrase and every sentence against resolution number three.
I would like, if it were in order, to go another round and see whether, after the matter had been explained at some length, Deputies who have addressed themselves to this particular resolution with such remarkable ability might possibly examine their financial consciences and see whether it was possible that they made a mistake. If we now issued one million pounds four per cent. tax compounded security, and the people of Great Britain were to take up that particular security, what exactly would be the relative positions between persons deriving income from such security and citizens of ours now deriving income from this particular security? Is it likely that the British Government would say the Free State Government have undertaken in this case that there will not be any deduction from this particular income, and that it will be tax free? It is not by any means likely if, when we come to the financial adjustment, we were to take over, let us say, one million pounds, and that we took over this particular item for our own State, and that we were paying it to our own people, that all the arguments so ably advanced by the last speaker would prevail. What really is the case? Do not bother about what the Minister for Finance said yesterday; rather concern yourself with what is actually the particular matter under discussion, and which amounts to this, that you have here got four per cent. security tax compounded. What does it amount to? It actually amounts to £5 6s. 8d. security, from which, before you get it, £1 6s. 8d. is deducted, and you actually get £4. Who gets the £1 6s. 8d.?
A DEPUTY
Great Britain?
Precisely. What do we want? We want to divide the £1 6s. 8d. That is what you say we are not entitled to do, that we are breaking faith and reducing credit, and that we are certainly not giving notice. I have explained already that we are in negotiation at the present moment with the British Government on this subject. Do not pass this resolution, and there are no negotiations. The British Government can tell us, "You are already committed. You have not interfered with a single item in the resolution, which provides that this is tax compounded and that those people are entitled to get that money without any deduction whatever from it." How are we to effect a division of the £1 6s. 8d.? I do not know of any other way than this. Mention has been made about credit. Are we to be looked upon as philanthropic humbugs in order to maintain our credit? What else would we be if we allowed an opportunity such as this to escape us at this moment without taking the necessary steps to see that the State does not lose its quota of whatever income tax is deducted before this particular distribution of dividends is made? The first payment of four per cent. tax compounded dividends is now about to be made. Pending negotiations with the British Government we have taken no steps to deduct the tax, as in the case of the British Government. Have we broken faith there? People ought to be rather careful about those statements about breaking faith. I do not want to break faith, but I am not going to be written down by anybody as a humbug, and I would be a humbug if I did not bring in a resolution of this kind to have the matter settled in a proper manner. I do not expect that there are many members of this Dáil contributing a form of tax known as super tax. There may be, but I have not discovered them. If you had that luxury, and I am sure you would wish to have it, you would know what this four per cent. tax compounded means; you would know, in the computation of your income, that this is not written as four per cent; it is written down as the full value of it. Deputy Magennis knows that, because he presumably pays super tax; so you see there are some advantages. One learns something from being wealthy. In this particular resolution there are five different series. The first series is 4 per cent. war loan, 1929-'42; 4 per cent. national bonds (first series), 1923; second series, 1928; third series, 1928; fourth series, 1929. People have an opportunity of taking either 5 per cent., which would be subject to deduction of income tax, or of taking this 4 per cent., which would be tax-compounded. We can, if we wish, negative this resolution, but I do not think that the Dáil, having thoroughly understood the matter, will leave Deputy Johnson and myself in a minority. This is certainly a business proposition. It is not a proposition in which any person is being deceived. It is a proposition in which you are being presented with the facts of the case. We were not consulted about the issue of this particular tax-compounded security. We are entitled now to stake a claim in respect of the sum that the British Government gets the benefit of for distributing this particular tax. Are we entitled to our share of the distribution in respect of the citizens of our State who have those securities in their possession? Obviously we are. That is the essence of this resolution. Therefore, I say to you: "Do not mind so much what the Minister said on yesterday, but rather concern yourself with the essence of the thing under discussion now."
I hope you will say the same thing to-morrow.
It is such a good thing that I do not mind saying it a second time. I have in mind, just as much as Deputy Fitzgibbon, the necessity of restoring confidence in the minds of those people who have some doubt first of all in respect of our ability, and, secondly, in respect of our justice. I think it is a very good thing that Deputy Fitzgibbon draws attention to these matters in the Dáil. It is very necessary. I do not think that those who are at present hesitating have any real reason for questioning the bona fides of the Dáil or of the Oireachtas. I think the general—the almost universal—idea in this country is to see justice done to those people. We want to make the country an example amongst other nations of the right of people to live in it, and if that order can be reassured by an explanation of this particular resolution I hope they will road all sides of it and that they will realise that in this matter we have the interests of the revenues of our State at heart. It is not really a question of interfering with those people. They cannot be interfered with. They have a good case. They have a contract with the British Government, and I am sure the British Government will see that they get justice in connection with that contract. In the last resort, if the worst comes to the worst in regard to this particular item, notice is now given to those people that they can change this particular security for another. But I am sure they must also look to the revenues of the country, and they must also realise that if we made no claim for a division of the profit of this particular security we would not be acting in the interests of the State, and they would have some right to question our ability to carry on the government of the State in a proper manner. I agree with Deputy Thrift that the ideal solution of the difficulty would be by arranging with the British Treasury to make good our share of the tax, but there would be no use in our approaching the British Treasury except we made our position clear. We are staking a claim in respect of income tax which we cannot get except we pass that resolution. It is for that reason I put forward the resolution. It is my duty to do so, and I think I have convinced the Dáil that there is no confiscatory design behind the resolution. It is a resolution to secure that the revenues of the State shall not lose because of the conditions in respect of a particular security having undergone a change.
Would it be consonant with order to ask a question for the purpose of obtaining information?
Certainly
I would be quite willing to vote for the President's speech if it were a resolution. Is there any possibility that the resolution would be made to conform with the speech, because on a previous occasion I voted for what a Minister said and found out that I was committed to something different. I am quite satisfied that the Ministry of Finance should be armed with this power, such as it is, to negotiate with the British Treasury, but I should like an assurance that that is all the use that is to be made of it—that the imposition is a temporary imposition, and that what will be sought is relief under the terms as set out by the President just now. To some of us I think the resolution means something different from what has been explained. That, of course, is due to our stupidity. I admit that.
I think it would be useless to give the President a sword and insist that it be made of wood. If he is to get a sword let it be one he can fight with. I will vote for this motion.
Might I ask the President for a little further explanation? He has partially reassured me. I take the meaning of his speech to be that the effect of the resolution is practically that a person who is receiving £4 as interest on this particular loan is to be regarded as having received something like £5 6s. 8d. and having paid £1 6s. 8d. tax?
That is right.
If that is exactly what is to be the effect, I do suggest to the President that it is not what the resolution says.
That has been suggested at great length in all the speeches.
It is very unfair to allege all these sleight-of-hand tricks against the Minister for Finance—of all the Ministers the most honest.
There are others.
Question put: "That the Dáil agree with the Committee in the resolution."
Agreed.
Resolution 4 read a second time.
I beg to propose an amendment. I hope the members of the Dáil will adopt my views in the same smiling way that they passed the last Finance Resolution. This is an imposition of the law as it stands. At the present time, the tenant's purchase annuity is the basis of his income tax, but some clever revenue expert discovered that some of the tenants got reductions in their rent under certain statutes, and they want to rake in the shekels from the hard-working farmers, in order to swell the revenue of the Free State. Now, I do not believe that the revenue which will be obtained by this resolution is worth the antagonism that will arise in the minds of the farmers at the action of the Government. The people will feel aggrieved that the Government have indulged in pin-pricks of this sort in order to obtain a little extra revenue at the present time, when the British Government are engaged in giving relief to the farmers from several taxes, while here we have our own native Government making every effort to cripple the only industry of any importance that exists in this country. The position is this. Under the Ashbourne Act of 1881, and subsequent Acts up to 1896, purchase annuities were calculated with a rate of four per cent. interest, but when the new legislation was passed, the purchase money was advanced at three and a-half or three and a-quarter, and the Government, in order to level up the old purchase annuities, agreed to decadal reductions. The result was that the men who purchased on four per cent. annuities were relieved, and they were allowed to come in under the Land Purchase system at three and a-half per cent. Now the case will be made that by reason of the decadal reductions, and the original annuities being reduced, the farmer has a better and a higher income from its holding. I want to point out, and, perhaps, Deputies here do not know it, that every time a farmer accepted a decadal reduction he placed himself ab initio on a renewed period of payment. Tenant farmers who bought in 1885, and accepted the decadal reduction in 1915, had merely to begin again with 49½ years still to run on their holdings, and are in the same position as a man who purchased under the 1903 Act, and if the law is to be applied they are in the same position as the man who bought on an annuity bearing 3¼ per cent. interest. The Ministry is now trying to revert back, and collect income tax, as if the purchase price was at 4 per cent. For example, if a man's rent, thirty years ago, was £100, the Ministry to-day want to say that that is the man's income. The reductions which have been got in the meantime, and which the British always allowed, is not to be allowed now, and if this resolution passes, a farmer will be taxed as if that was his income to-day. I wish to move as an amendment, to insert after the words “purchase annuity” the words “or the amount of the annuity paid at the time by the tenants.” I hope the Dáil, for the sake of the small amount of money that this resolution, if not amended, would bring to the Treasury, and for the sake of preventing the propaganda that could be made on this at the Elections, will agree to insert these words in the resolution.
The amendment is in the first paragraph of the resolution to delete the word after the word "mean," and to substitute in lieu thereof the words, "the annuity paid at the time by the tenant," so that the resolution would read, "That in subsection (1) section 187 of the Income Tax Act, 1918, the expression, ‘purchase annuities,' shall mean the annuity paid at the time by the tenant."
Mr. DOYLE
In supporting the amendment proposed by Deputy Wilson, I see that the Government have singled out no other industry to change the basis of assessment of income tax except the agricultural industry. Surely to goodness, the industry is not in such a prosperous condition that that should be done. If the Ministry were to listen to the losses which agriculture has sustained, and which we have been hearing about for the last two or three months at the Agricultural Commission, I think they would adopt a different attitude. Deputy Wilson applied the term, "pin pricks," to the effort that is being made to try and screw the last farthing from the hard-worked agricultural population. I would like to say I regret this action on the part of the Government at present towards agriculture, which is so depressed in every country in the world. We have the English people coming to the rescue of the farmers at the present time, where the farmers are paying lower wages, and where they have better markets and have everything at their doors, but our paternal Government comes along with their pin-prick resolution to try and extract something more from the few purchase tenants who made their bargains under the old Ashbourne Acts, and other Acts that have passed since. It only shows that the Ashbourne Act did not do justice to the Purchase Tenants at the time. When the 1903 Act came along it made a definite settlement with the landowner, and in the legislation that followed, the former Acts were varied every ten years by decadal reductions. That showed that persons who purchased under the Ashbourne Acts did not get the best of the deal. At a time when agriculture is struggling, and industry is in the poorest possible way of any other industry in the country, the State comes along to extract every possible penny of income tax out of the farmer. I think it is unjust, and this proposal should never have come before the Dáil. I trust the amendment will be accepted.
At this stage An Leas-Cheann Comhairle took the Chair.
I suggest it is due to the Dáil that we should have some explanation of this resolution.
Very well, I will give it now. Under Schedule B the tax on land was increased in 1915, and it was provided, as far as Ireland was concerned, that the annual value for the purposes of Schedule B should be taken to be either (a) judicial rent, (b) annual interest in lieu of rent payable to the Land Commission, or (c) the purchase annuity payable under the Land Purchase Acts. In any case, where it was done, no one of these measures of value was less than the valuation. Now the difficulty it is proposed to get over by this resolution is that in (c)—that is, the purchase annuities payable under the Land Purchase Acts. There was one case brought before the Courts, where the original payment in respect of the charge which was assessed was £41. It had reduced in a number of years down to £17, so that you can see the amount involved is a bagatelle. £5 would be the excess on £41. At the very outside it would be £5, and in the other case it would not be more than £2 2s. 6d., so that it is a very small sum, but Deputies will see the unfairness of it from the point of view even of two particular holdings, one in which the sale has only recently taken place, and let us say the annuity was £75; and the other, in which it took place thirty years ago, where the original annuity was £100, and through a number of reductions has come down, and is now £20.
It could not come down to £20, perhaps £70.
Well, we will take that figure—from £100 to £70, although I am not disposed altogether to accept the figure—but a man having paid off during thirty years most of the sum due would have a farm at an annuity of £70 per annum which would be a very much more valuable holding than that of a man who only recently bought and was paying a level sum of £100 the whole time under the 1903 and other Acts.
Yes; at 3¼ per cent. as against 4 per cent.
But the man who bought under the 1903 and the 1909 Act has all this money due, and he is assessed on £100. The other man has a holding almost bought out, and he has a much better negotiable instrument in the market. The case is put that he should only be assessed on a diminishing annuity, all the time having an opportunity of showing that he has a less profit than what he is charged on. In other words, if he is paying an unreasonable charge he must have made a loss, and if he can prove he has made a loss then there will be no charge. If the case is an unjust imposition, if the assessment be in excess of what he is legitimately liable for, all we want is the return, the balance sheet. Surely that is not too much to ask. That man may have a son perhaps in Dublin who has taken a house in Merrion Square, and is earning £3,000 a year and he will be taxed; and he may have another son an engineer and another a K.C., and they will be taxed, but the fine place that has provided them with a profession is to escape.
I do not know what is the real volume that is effected by the proposal put into this Bill. I am very much interested in a case under one head. I see a great display of anxiety here on the part of the Government to equalise the position of different classes of tenants with regard to the respective annual income of these tenants. Now, I hope that the same policy will be followed when they come to try and put all classes of tenants on the same basis, within a very short time, under the Land Purchase Bill. That is the only thing I have to say on that point. I really do not think that so many hundred pounds have descended to seventy pounds—that it is really worth while to put such a proviso into a Finance Act at all. It seems, in any case, to discriminate against the farmer and gives an opportunity to the Farmers' representatives here to allege that they are being discriminated against in the Finance Bill. What the extent of the fine that this will inflict on the farming community will be I cannot say, nor am I in a position to say the number of hundreds that have descended to seventy pounds. Neither is anyone here except those who have technical knowledge on the subject. I think it is a mistake to put a proviso in the Finance Bill at all, for, no matter what it will bring in, it will certainly leave the insinuation that this Dáil is discriminating unfairly against a part of the community. That is a matter of great importance in the country. That is all I wish to say except that I am in sympathy with the farmers in trying to get rid of that clause in the Finance Act.
I am not rising to speak on this matter, but to put before the Dáil a point with regard to our Standing Orders. When Deputy Wilson spoke the Minister's explanation was not before him, though he might reasonably have expected that the explanation would be given on the introduction of the resolution. Seeing that the Minister did not give that explanation until a later stage, and in order that the matter may be put more fairly, I think Deputy Wilson might be given an opportunity of speaking further to the resolution.
I had intended giving the Deputy that opportunity.
With regard to the explanation given by the Minister for Finance, he has taken up the attitude that by reason of this resolution he is merely placing the tenant who brought under the Ashbourne and subsequent Acts in the same position as those who brought under the 1903 Act. We contend, and we can prove, that by reason of the fact that the Ashbourne Act was calculated on the basis of 4 per cent. that there was a reduction due to the farmers, and that the men who brought from 1885 to 1903 and got their reductions, were merely in the same position as the man who purchased under the 1903 Act, and who then had 49½ years of a fixed annuity to pay, similar to the man who brought under the 1903 Act. Why, I ask, should you discriminate for the sake of the small amount involved? Ten millions was the amount of the purchases under these early Acts. While the British Government was in power in this country the Revenue Commissioners never tried to bring in people who were on the border line. This is one of a series of interpretations of law which we resent. You heard the Minister to-day replying in connection with the case of transfer duty. A man purchases a farm for fifteen hundred pounds, and if a tenancy he pays £15 to the State; if a land purchase annuity, or something else, he pays £15 to the State for buying it, and then, because there is a debt due to the State, he has to pay 1 per cent. on the redemption of that debt. That is the interpretation as applied by the Revenue Commissioners. It never was intended by the Legislature; it is only getting the backs of the farmers up against the established Government, whom they wish to help, and whom, so long as they act in a reasonable way, they are prepared to help, and have helped. With regard to the gentlemen who, we are told, were able to send their children to Merrion Square and other such places, I can only say that I was the son of a big farmer myself, and I had to go across the sea and work as a workman. I had to earn money there, and come back home to buy a farm. How many of those are there who are able to send their children to a school in Merrion Square? How many of those farmers had to send their sons across to other countries? Is it not in this way we are losing our population? Everything is taken out of the land.
I think it is probably true that there requires to be some change in the method of assessing farmers for income tax purposes. But I do not think there has been any case made by the Minister for Finance in making that change by this method. I will support the view that Deputy Wilson has set forth. In fact, I think it would be still better to let things remain as they have been until a bigger change has been found opportune. I think the case that has been made by the Minister has not justified the change, and I therefore propose to support the amendment of Deputy Wilson.
I am glad the Deputy Wilson explained the point that he was making in his last speech, because the matter is a vexed one, and I am in support of what he suggests for the reason that he stated, which is that when the purchase annuities under the earlier Land Purchase Acts were decreased, they were decreased, if I understand the matter correctly, in order to bring them on a parity with purchase annuities under later Acts. Well, if that be the case, and there is no counter-case, then Deputy Wilson, it seems to me, has proved his case against this Resolution.
I do not think it is quite correct to say they were reduced to bring them on a parity with the others —with the Land Purchase annuities under subsequent Acts. I think that is part of the rhetoric of Deputy Wilson. At any rate, the law, as it at present stands, is very obviously in need of amendment, and it will be clear, if I say this much, that there is nothing at the moment to prevent any farmer who has the money from redeeming the entire of his annuities to even the last pound. He is assessed at present under Schedule B for the judicial rent only, or the annuities, or the valuation. If the annuity is less than the valuation, he is only assessed on the lower. That would mean that by that expedient a man may escape the operation of the Income tax altogether. But the Revenue did interpret the Act as meaning that the tax would be payable on the original purchase annuity. They assessed one person, and it was tested in court, in the case known as the case of Corcoran v. Judge. That was decided against the Revenue. It was decided by the Judge that the Act meant that the tax should be assessed on the annuity then paid. But in deciding that this was the meaning of the Act, Mr. Justice Gibson said: "It is so absurd that it must be based on a mistake as to the nature of the purchase annuity which was erroneously proposed to be fixed for the period of its currency." It is quite clear, when you are using this as a basis, that you must have some stable thing. If a man gets a decadal reduction next year, that does not mean that his interest in his holding is less, and that he should be assessed for less Income tax on his holding. There seems to be an absolutely clear case for the slight change that is proposed to be made by Resolution 4, and to talk as if they were imposing heavy taxes on the agricultural community is rather poetic. This means that there shall not be the disparity that has existed in many cases between two holdings absolutely of similar value, and where one, owing to the operation of those decadal reductions in the annuities has become very much less than the other, and has decreased by the operation of the decadal annuities, while certainly the interest of the holder in the holding (which is the test when we are assessing taxation) has not decreased. I would submit to the Dáil that a case has not been made out against it, and the law, as it stands, is clearly in need of the change which it is proposed to make.
I thought that we should have had from the Minister an explanation that, instead of deepening the mystery of this transaction, would throw at least a little light upon it. Most of us are old enough to know that the original calculations made were proved by experience to be wholly erroneous, that the annuities which the farmers were paying originally were quite too large, and after something like eighteen years' experience of the harsh operations of the wrong calculation, the British Legislature amended the law, and a new scale of annuity was determined on. Now, every period of ten years this reduction that has been spoken of took place. The arrangement was that Income tax should be paid upon the value at each of those periods. The Minister seems to be under the impression that we are, to use a colloquial phrase, "to take the rough with the smooth," that we are not to account to the farmer for righteousness the amount that he paid originally on the larger sum, and that now, because after the lapse of years, he is to pay those things which are in the nature of instalments, and that after years, when these are becoming less and less, that we should turn back the hands of the clock, and that he should pay what we consider is the absolute value of the holding. We are not doing anything of the sort. We are trying in some way, with some approach to equity, to apportion the annual contribution to the State by the farmer, on foot of what he enjoys from the annuity with respect to his landholding.
I am altogether with Deputy Wilson in this matter, and to contend that because some farmers, being so excellent in their craft, that they have done well, and that their sons and daughters have inherited their industry and enterprise and something of their wealth, and have been able in their line of life to do better, that therefore all farmers are by a turn of the clock to be put back where they were in 1885, is not sound argument, but simple foolery. We had an eloquent appeal from the P.M.G. a few evenings ago, in which he proved to us, and I agree with him, the correctness of giving a preference to Irish manufacture in regard to supplies to State departments. He stated that the money of the taxpayer was well applied in relief of Irish industry, and that the expansion and advancement of Irish trade, which accrued therefrom, flowed back again in a larger volume of return in the way of taxes in the long run. I think that was a sound argument. But is there any greater or more important industry in the country than the agricultural industry?
I am not going to take the line that Deputy Wilson ingeniously suggested ought to be taken to hold out prospects at the next election. There is no use in intimidatory methods. I think the Dáil can properly be appealed to, without reference to the coming fate of any individual Deputy or Minister—I think it can be appealed to, on consideration simply of what is just and right. If we are anxious to leave no section of the community with a sense of grievance, if admittedly at the present time we are trying to adjust things in a very difficult period of transition; if, as has been admitted, we are trying to get our fiscal machine to go on operating in spite of the jolts to which it is subject, I think it is better, and I say this again, with all due consideration, it is better that we should lose to the Revenue whatever little is to be gained by this Resolution, and leave the farming industry with a confidence in the Ministry, that the Ministry and Dáil, as a whole, is anxious for. All that improves the agricultural industry, and gives a sense of security and happiness to the farmers.
We are not going to make very much revenue out of this, even if the lawyers could defend it in the Courts, as I greatly doubt. We are not going to gain very much. I would rather put more on income tax or super tax all round and get the money in that way, and let there be a feeling that we are all paying more than we would like to pay because we have to reconstruct the country, than to allow one particular section—and that the most deserving section of the community—to feel that somehow it is being made to bear an extra burden. All theorists, as you know, with regard to social development get back to the land not in the real sense of getting back to it to do spade work, but to make it bear the burdens. There are all sorts of wild-cat schemes and theories prevalent that the land belongs to the people, and that, because of that, from it directly and almost exclusively must come the revenues to pay the cost of the administration of the country. This is not the time to argue against these things, but I think we ought to show a hostility to those notions of making the land bear the burdens by coming to the rescue of the farmers on this particular issue, because they have a case. We are promised a great Land Act, in which all the grievances of the farmers will be dissipated, and we shall have a smiling and happy land so far as the agricultural community is concerned.
Let this burden, whatever it be, be measured then; let it be part of the operation of the Land Act, and the adjustment of the new position in relation to the new Finance Laws. That will serve everybody's interest, and it will leave nobody aggrieved.
With reference to the very eloquent and impassioned statement of Deputy Wilson about those decadal reductions having been brought in since 1903 so as to put the people who purchased before that on a party with those who purchased since, let me say that the decadal reductions began nine or ten years previous to that.
On a point of explanation, I never said they came, in in 1903. It was my colleague who mentioned that. They came in before that, but the object was to reduce the rate of interest.
I have not much more to say on this matter. First of all, there is not a relatively large number of holdings affected by this resolution. Secondly, those who are affected are relatively better off than those who are not. That is to say that the reductions that have taken place far exceed, I believe, any additions that this particular resolution would add to the cost. Thirdly, we are precluded from making assessments in respect of those farms except on this particular restricted basis. Ordinary business people can be assessed at any price. Drapers, brokers or other people like that in business can be assessed. I mean an assessment can be made on them exceeding the amount they have received in profits. It is open to them then to come in and prove that they did not make that much money, and make a claim to be assessed on whatever sum is so proved or accepted. In the case of the farmers, revenue authorities are restricted from making an assessment in excess of what is made out. It is really a bagatelle. The question is whether you are not really asking for what is equitable. I believe you are. I believe it is not an inequitable charge. It is not an unreasonable charge, and it is made only in respect of farms the actual value of which has increased, and may be wiped out altogether if it can be shown that no profit is being made We ask and insist upon others at particular times showing the profits they have made. We cannot ask it in this case If, for example, a man should have an excellent year, making three, four or five times the amount he would normally make, even those Deputies who represent the farming interest will admit that the profits do certainly exceed the assessment. I think that ought to be admitted.
There is no profit.
If there are no profits there will be no taxes, but I think we are entitled to ask that we should see a balance sheet in those cases. It is not an imposition. It is not a thing that every other citizen of the State is not asked to produce, and I am sure Deputies will admit it is the interest of the Ministry to deal equitably and fairly with all classes of the community. In this particular case it appears to us it is unfair to ask a tenant who was bought out under the 1903 Act, and who may be alongside one who was bought out under the Ashbourne Act, or under the decadal reduction, to pay at rates that were in full accord with the person who bought under the Ashbourne Act. That person has realised benefits and has got advantages which the other person did not for perhaps 20 years, and which even he does not enjoy to the same extent as the person who bought under the Ashbourne Act.
If it be shown to us that there is an inequity in it, if it is an imposition beyond their resources, we say there is an alternative. There is a method for your disproving that, and there is a method for your getting out of it altogether if you have not made money. In this case no person will be assessed beyond the amount he has actually made. If that be admitted in respect of other businesses, other occupations, other salaries, and other investments, why should there be an exclusion in this case?
Amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 22; níl, 25.
Tá
- Seán Ó Duinnín.
- Domhnall Ó Mocháin.
- Tomás de Nógla.
- Riobárd Ó Deaghaidh.
- Pádraig Mag Ualgairg.
- Darghal Figes.
- Tomás Mac Eoin.
- Seoirse Ghabháin Uí Dhubhthaigh.
- Seán Ó Ruanaidh.
- Liam ÓBriain.
- Liam Mag Aonghusa.
- Tomás Ó Conaill.
- Ristéard Mac Liam.
- Seán Ó Laidhin.
- Próinsias Mag Aonghusa.
- Cathal Ó Seanáin.
- Tomás Ó Domhnaill.
- Seán Buitleir.
- Domhnall Ó Broin.
- Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.
- Ristéard Mac Fheorais.
- Mícheál Ó Dubhghaill.
Níl
- Liam T. Mac Cosgair.
- Séamus Breathnach.
- Deasmhumhain Mac Gearailt.
- Micheál de Duram.
- Domhnall Mac Cárthaigh.
- Éarnán Altún.
- Gearóid Mac Giobúin.
- Liam Thrift.
- Eoin Mac Néill.
- Seosamh Ó Faoileacháin.
- Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
- Piaras Béaslaí.
- Fionán Ó Loingsigh.
- Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.
- Criostóir Ó Broin.
- Pádraig Mac Artáin.
- Séamus Ó Dóláin.
- Aindriú Ó Láimhin.
- Éamon Ó Dúgáin.
- Peadar Ó hAodha.
- Séamus Ó Murchadha.
- Liam Mac Sioghaird.
- Earnán de Blaghd.
- Uinseann de Faoite.
- Séamus de Burca.
Amendment declared lost.
On a point of order, the last vote was given by a Deputy who was not in his seat as required by the Standing Orders.
AN LEAS CHEANN COMHAIRLE
He was in the precincts of the House.
He was not in the precincts of the House when he voted.
When I voted I was in my place.
On a point of order also each Deputy is supposed to rise from his seat when voting.
Motion made and question put: "That the Dáil agrees with the Committee in Resolution No. 4."
The Dáil divided: Tá, 25; níl, 21.
Níl
- Níl.
- Seán Ó Duinnín.
- Domhnall Ó Mocháin.
- Tomás de Nógla.
- Riobárd Ó Deaghaidh.
- Darghal Figes.
- Tomás Mac Eoin.
- Seoirse Ghabháin Uí Dhubhthaigh.
- Seán Ó Ruanaidh.
- Liam Ó Briain.
- Liam Mag Aonghusa.
- Tomás Ó Conaill.
- Níl.
- Ristéard Mac Liam.
- Seán Ó Laidhin.
- Próinsias Mag Aonghusa.
- Cathal Ó Seanáin.
- Tomás Ó Domhnaill.
- Seán Buitléir.
- Domhnall Ó Broin.
- Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.
- Ristéard Mac Fheorais.
- Micheál Ó Dubhghaill.
Motion declared carried.
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Tá.Liam T. Mac Cosgair.Séamus Breathnach.Deasmhumhain Mac Cárthaigh.Micheál de Duram.Domhnall Mac Cárthaigh.Earnán Altún.Gearóid Mac Giobúin.Liam Thrift.Eoin Mac Néill.Seosamh Ó Faoileacháin.Seoirse Mac Niocaill.Piaras Béaslaí.Fionán Ó Loingsigh. |
Tá.Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.Criostóir Ó Broin.Pádraig Mac Artáin.Séamus Ó Dóláin.Aindriú Ó Láimhin.Éamon Ó Dúgáin.Peadar Ó hAodha.Séamus Ó Murchadha.Liam Mac Sioghaird.Earnán de Blaghd.Uinseann de Faoite.Séamus de Burca. |