DAIL IN COMMITTEE. - LAND BILL, 1923—THIRD STAGE RESUMED.
I beg to move the following amendment to Section 16:—
In Sub-section (2), line 19, to substitute for the figures "1920," the figures "1921," and in the same line to substitute for figures and words "25 per cent." the figures and words "40 per cent.," and to make the consequential amendments throughout the Act.
This amendment to the section means to take two years' arrears into consideration instead of three years. It would also mean raising the 25 per cent. reduction to 40 per cent. This amendment is put up to meet the actual facts that obtain in the country. 25 per cent. on three years, if three years are to be considered at all, is really of no good to the unpurchased tenants of the country. The last three years have been three lean years. They have been three years when agriculture did not pay, and when agriculture could not pay considering the prices that were got for agricultural produce, and everybody who knows anything about farming knows that. The result is that the people who owe three years' rent have no money. But the small tenants in the West and the small tenants in the South, it must be apparent to anybody, have for the last three years carried on their business without profits. There is no surplus there. It cannot be got. I do not believe that with the most powerful machinery of the law you can recover it, because it is not there to recover. We propose to take two years only into consideration, and that these two years be subject to a 40 per cent. reduction. We also suggest that one of these two years be paid in cash, and that the other be added to the purchase money. For the moment I will say no more. Let the case develop.
I wish to support the arguments of Deputy Gorey. I know from experience that in the Co. Cork, owing to the disturbance of the last three years that it was impossible for the tenant farmers to make their rent, and not only the tenant farmers suffered from the condition of things that prevailed, but very many landlords themselves, because they had their places taken over. I know cases near the City of Cork where tenants owed last year three years' rent, and the landlords came forward willingly and offered to take a half-year's rent and give them 40 per cent. on that half-year's rent and to take on future gales a reduction of 40 per cent. until the Land Bill be passed. I know very well that there are landlords in the Co. Cork who try to get their full pound of flesh. I know of a landlord who processed a tenant for 1½ years' rent, and the tenant has to pay every penny up to the last half-year, including almost £60 in costs.
Mr. DOYLE
I quite agree with the two Deputies who have spoken as to the necessity for the amendment. I agree with Deputy Gorey in his remarks about how hard hit agriculture has been within the past three years. There has not been anything got out of it; it is a non-profitable business as far as the last two or three years are concerned. To anyone engaged in agriculture there is no need to press home this fact. People know it to their own cost. As regards former land Acts, I do not think that under them three years' arrears were ever asked for. At a time like the present, when depression is so pronounced in agriculture, why should the tenants be compelled to pay three years' arrears? I think it is really more than any of the tenants who owe three years' arrears can do. There is no use in suggesting impossibilities.
I believe the Minister would be well advised to accept this amendment in its entirety. We are told over and over again that the tenants who are purchasing under this present Bill are going to be better off than the tenants who purchased formerly. I cannot see how that can be, no matter how I look at the provisions of the Bill. The tenants who are purchasing now will be hit to the extent of £300 or £400 more in the entire cost of their purchase money than the tenants who purchased 15 years ago. By the time the two annuities terminate the man who is trying to pay on a £100 rental, even taking the largest reduction the Bill offers (35 per cent.), will be several hundred pounds worse off than the man who purchased 15 years ago.
If we could approach this question on the lines of considering that a certain man owes a certain sum of money, and ask ourselves what is the most favourable arrangement we could make for that man, it would be easy. If we could approach the matter on those lines it would be much simpler. If it were open to us to say: "He shall pay nothing," that would suit and would save us a lot of trouble. If it were open to us to say: "He shall pay one quarter or one half, or whatever fraction you like to take," there would be no difficulty whatever. In short, if we could simply consider the man himself, and consider no other circumstance of any kind—if we had that wide range of choice—there would be no difficulty in making arrangements. But this is another question that you cannot legislate about without taking into account all other relevant considerations. There was reference made to previous arrears Acts. The last was in 1881. I pointed out on the Second Reading, and I do not think that anybody who knows the fact will deny it, that there is a radical difference between the arrears problem of to-day and the arrears problem of 1881. I am talking now in general terms.
In 1881, or, to be more accurate, before 1881, and before the Act was passed, the tenant paid whatever rent the landlord liked to charge him for his holding, and practically all the tenants were rack-rented. There was nothing to stop the landlord from increasing the rent as much as he liked, and in a great percentage of cases the landlord took advantage of that right. The tenants were rack-rented— there is no doubt of that. The rents were higher. On the average they were more than 50 per cent. higher than they are at the present moment; and remember that they were higher notwithstanding prices have doubled. I do not say the profits have doubled, but prices have doubled. The actual figure before 1881 was considerably more than 50 per cent. higher than at present, after more than forty years and after the European War. The fact is that in 1881 the real reason for the Arrears Act was that the tenants were utterly unable to pay their rents—very high rack-rents.
You could not get blood out of a turnip, and the tenants could not pay. They were being evicted on a very large scale and, as a result of legitimate agitation in Ireland, the Act of 1881 was passed and the Fair Rent Courts set up. Since then most of the tenants have got two decadal reductions—most of the tenants with whom we are dealing—and the rent has been kept strictly within bounds. The present strike against rents was only indirectly a strike in regard to amount. It was really a protest against the fact that the tenants had not purchased. I think that is a fair statement of the case. The present strike against rent is directly, anyway, a protest against the fact of the non-purchase by the tenants.
Not the only reason, perhaps, but that was the direct reason for this strike. It began in 1920, at a time when we could not complain that conditions were as bad as they are now, and when it began the reason, as expressed by the tenants through all their organisations, was the fact of non-purchase. That is the radical difference between this arrears problem and the arrears problem of 1881. Everyone in the country knows that, and everyone who has read the manifestoes and the utterances of the tenants' organisations will agree that that is the state of affairs. If the landlord is entitled to £67 14s. as the interest on the purchase money of this land, then he is entitled to something more in regard to arrears. If the figure of £67 14s. is right——
We can argue that when the time comes, but if the figure is right then the landlord is undoubtedly entitled to something more on arrears. Whether you agree that it is right or not you must admit the principle that the landlord who has, until he gets this £67 14s., or whatever sum you like, to pay his own head rents and interests in full without any abatement, must get something more. You must admit that whatever annuity he gets as a result of the price he receives, he must get something more on arrears. During the last three years we had to face the facts that the particular landlords with whom we have been dealing had to pay their head rents. They had also to pay their mortgage charges. A man who owes interest to a mortgagee is in a totally different position from the man who owes rent to a landlord. Everyone knows enough about the country to understand that. The mortgagee has remedies easily enforcible, and there is no public opinion, and never has been any, against such enforcement. In fact they always have enforced, and they are ready to enforce, for the very good reason that nothing suits the mortgagee of an encumbered estate more than to foreclose. He will get the whole estate, and he stands a very good chance of getting more than his mortgage as the owner. He stands a chance of getting considerably more than his mortgage. The fact is landlords have had to pay their full rent and interest charges during the last three years and to do so without any abatement. They had to pay the usual rate during the war for a safe mortgage. That means 6 per cent., and it ran during the last three years. We are dealing with estates which are heavily encumbered; at least a very great proportion of the particular estates are heavily encumbered. If the landlord gets his purchase money, or £5,000 of these encumbrances attached to the purchase money, and if you take £100 of that purchase money which represents £100 owed by the landlord on foot of a mortgage, the position will be like this: On that £100 he gets 4½ per cent., whereas on that £100 he is liable for 6 or 7 percent.
It must be a Jew he is dealing with.
He is liable for 6, or perhaps 7, per cent. to the ordinary Banking House, the ordinary Insurance Company or to the Jews if you like. He is in a position to get over that difficulty the moment he gets his purchase money, because he can pay off the capital money in bonds. Until he gets his purchase money he must meet those interests in full and you cannot ask him to remain from this date until the appointed day in the position of getting only 4½ per cent. out of the rent, which is the same thing as out of the purchase money, and paying 6 per cent. on it. That is the reason why you must give more to the landlord, and why you must give a greater income to him in respect of arrears and payment in lieu of rent until the appointed day then you need to ask the tenant to pay afterwards. It is clear that in equity if X is the annuity, or half X is the income which the landlord is entitled to receive after the appointed day, after receiving his bonds, he must receive something more than X up to that date if he is to meet his rent and charges. I am using the letter X so as not to complicate the question. Whatever the price or annuities may be, he must receive more. We fixed the landlord's income at £67.14, and I daresay we will have a very interesting debate on that when we come to the question of price.
I have already defended it on the First Reading, and on the Second Reading. We fixed his income in respect of arrears and in respect of payment in lieu of rent until the Appointed Day, at £75. He is not going to get that £75 in full. The cost of collection will be deducted. The amount he will get will probably be nearer £70. We are leaving an extremely small margin—the margin between something like £70 and £67.14—to meet this big difference in outlay which the landlord has up to the appointed day.
With regard to arrears, we have not been told why we should write off this extra year's arrears. It has not been suggested that during that year the vendor will be allowed by the owners of his head rents, and by his mortgagees to write off their interest. Everybody knows that they will do nothing of the kind. For that year he will have to pay his interest and his head rents just in the same way as he has to pay them for the two following years. In a great many cases he will probably have to borrow money for that purpose. As regards the tenant who has not paid any rent for the last three years, what has he done with the money?
Squandered it on motor cars.
He should not have done that, but I do not think he did it.
I do not think he did either.
He is not in the same position as if he had paid his rent every year. He has a certain amount of that money. He has paid nothing in respect of rent for three years—nothing whatever. The amount of money which he set aside for rent has not dissolved or evaporated. This is really a question of trying to do the fair thing. I know perfectly well that it is different to pay a lump sum down, and to pay the same sum by easy instalments over a period of three years. A tenant who has to pay £24 now can hardly pay it as rapidly as the tenant who had to pay £12 each year for the last two years. That is the reason we have given a reduction at all. We have given this 25 per cent. reduction, and in doing that remember we are putting these tenants who owed these arrears in exactly the same position as if they were paying annuity. Perhaps I am wrong in saying exactly the same position. They are really in a slightly better position than if they were paying annuity. The average reduction under the 1903 Act was less than 25 per cent.
On First and Second Term. We are dealing with First and Second Term now. We can get the returns any time.
We are always asking for them.
They are on sale. The average reduction to First and Second Term tenants under the 1903 Act was something less than 25 per cent. We are giving this reduction now straight away in regard to arrears, so that the effect will be that from the year 1920 the tenants will be paying the same amount as if they had purchased. This is a question of a bargain. On the one side you have the fact that the landlord has to pay interest and has to pay his head rents, and on the other side we have to remember that the tenants who have to pay a lump sum down are in a different position from tenants who paid in instalments over a period of three years. We tried to strike a bargain. On the one side you have the very relevant consideration that you cannot afford to give the same reduction to the tenant as you could even in regard to annuity, because the interest the landlord must pay out of his rents is considerably more.
Take a tenant with two years' arrears. He gets 25 per cent. off each year. That is a half-year's rent written off, and remember that we have also written off any rent due before 1920. Now, that man has not paid anything for two years. It is not a great hardship on him to pay a year down. He got notice of that on the 1st May, when this Bill was introduced. And it is not a great hardship on him to pay a half-year between this day and the Appointed Day, as well as interest in lieu of rent, subject also to 25 per cent. reduction. The man who owes three years' arrears has saved more than that. He has saved an extra year. When we commenced collecting annuities there was no difficulty in collecting two years' annuities from tenants who had purchased. There was a certain amount of loud talk in the beginning, a certain amount of complaint about hardship, but they nevertheless paid up cheerfully. We are putting these men in exactly the same position as if they were purchasers. They will be paying the same amount as their neighbours who have purchased. The reduction we give in regard to arrears is exactly the reduction they would have got if they had purchased. I notice that the figure the Deputy has set down is 40 per cent. He has also made the same claim in regard to price. Now, I put it to him that, even admitting his own figure—which I do not admit—of 40 per cent. reduction in regard to price, is it fair in the circumstances to ask the same reduction in regard to arrears? Let us get at it step by step. I want the Dáil to examine the question and to say whether they think we should give the same reduction in regard to arrears as in regard to price. I would like to hear the Farmers' Party on that point. If they say we should give the same reduction I would like to hear their reasons. We must treat this question as a business proposition, and we must have reasons for what we urge. I would like to hear also why this extra year's rent should be written off, having regard to the fact that all the charges which the landlord must pay were running in this year. And then, why should the figure be 40 per cent.? I have explained exactly why we have fixed 25 per cent. I have shown that a 25 per cent. reduction leaves an income of £75, less the cost of collection. That would bring it down to about £70, and we have only about 5 per cent. to cover the high rate of interest which the landlord must pay, and in regard to which he can get no abatements and has no remedy until he pays off the capital.
Let me first deal with the last point raised by the Minister. Everybody who had any connection with the Convention of 1918 knows, from the figures put before that Convention, that the landlord's income of 100 per cent. was only nominal. His real income was about 75 per cent. The cost of collection, estate charges and bad debts amounted to 25 per cent. Seventy-five per cent. and, in a few cases, 77½ per cent. fairly represented what the landlord actually received net. In making this 25 per cent. reduction and collecting arrears for the landlord, you are putting him in the same position as he was before; nothing worse.
The question has been asked, what the tenants have been doing with the money that accumulated for the last three years. We know that the average valuation of unpurchased tenants' holdings through the country is from £10 to £15. It does not require any great stretch of imagination to realise the small amount of money that must pass through the hands of occupiers of these holdings and the small amount of profit they could have made in that period. In many cases there could have been nothing left. The tenant has to contend with the lean years, and we know the state of agriculture recently. I do hope the tenant has not gone down to Kilkee or Tramore for the week-ends, as some of us do. He has not, I think, squandered his money like that. The 1918 Convention and the 1920 Bill took two years arrears into consideration. That was by way of agreement between the two sides. In this Bill we are going outside of what the landlord agreed to in 1918 and again agreed to in 1920. There is a new line now being struck, and I do not know what is the reason. We have been also asked why we demand this reduction now. For the last two or three years we have not had normal times. We have not had facilities for marketing. We have not had a rail service. There is no use in shutting our eyes to these facts. The tenants could not get their produce to the markets, and some of it has been lying there for six or seven months. It is only during the past few months that it was got away in some districts. During all that time it was only a question of home consumption. The times were not normal. We are asked, why make a difference in respect of annuity and arrears? We have arrived at more or less normal times. Railway services are being carried on. We expect that in future years men will be able to do their business in a proper way. During the past three years they did not get a return for their work, owing to the conditions. We are dealing with certainties for the years to come. During the past few years there was no certainty in regard to a return for the work done.
We are not comparing the present position with the 1881 position. We are comparing it with the 1920 and the 1918 position, and when two years were agreed on in 1918 and 1920, certainly two years ought to be able to be agreed on in 1923. We cannot shut our eyes to these facts. We cannot get over them. The landlords' case has been put up very well. The condition they are in might be true; I am not in a position to dispute it. I know nothing about the landlords' end of the stick, but I do know a little about the tenants' end of it. I know that the average man in the country has very little return for his work. He had to live up to some kind of standard; not alone that, but he had to support an Irregular army who were quartered on him for months—almost for a year—and who robbed him, who took away his food and everything he had, and who broke down his roads and bridges. It is not a question that he will not, but he cannot afford to pay. There were a few counties, such as Dublin, with easy access to makets and with a fair rail service. These might be in a favoured position; but if you go to the West or to South Leinster, they were living in a condition of almost impossibility. I want you to realise the tenants' position, and not be giving too much attention to the position of the landlord. Try to realise the position of both, and try to do justice to both. There is no use doing justice to one and injustice to another. I am not speaking on my own behalf or on behalf of any party, or on behalf of a few people. I am speaking on behalf of the whole 70,000 unpurchased tenants. I am taking the average man, and I do say with all sincerity that the Government will not be able to recover these three years' arrears. Another thing that I think I mentioned on the Second Reading: If you add a year's purchase or a half-year's purchase to the purchase money, it will be very serious. A half-year at 4½ per cent. will almost mean one or two years under the Wyndham Act, where the interest was, I think, 2¾ per cent., whereas it is now 4½ per cent. You can very easily put a millstone around the tenants' necks in that way. Although the Minister has made a good case as regards the landlords' position, I do not think that he has made a case whereby he should make it impossible for the tenant in the future, or put him in an intolerable position, or put the country in the position that it will have to be security for his failure.
Deputy Gorey puzzles me a little bit with some of the figures he has given. I take it, first of all, that the average rent that is paid by the tenant under this amounts to £10.
Ten to fifteen pounds would be the average.
The Deputy told us we were going to hamstring these men and make it impossible for them to live in the future, and prejudice the physique of the race if a year's purchase at £10 at 4½ per cent. be added to the rent. That sum of £10 at 4½ per cent. will be 9s. per annum. I do not know if I understood the Deputy correctly. Did he infer that that 9s. is going to prejudice the future of this country?
I think that argument would work at the landlords' end as well as at the other.
The position with regard to the landlord is that he has not got the money.
Begin at something else, Mr. President.
I will take it another way. The Deputy states that there have been three lean years. I understand that 1920-21 was a lean year. I can give the Deputy painful evidence of the fact that it was a perfectly normal year. I do not know whether he questions the fact that it was a normal year.
I know a particular case during the period where sixteen head of cattle were sold at 80s. per cwt. That is a fairly good price, and it is not evidence of the fact that there was a lean year there. The Deputy ought to be in a position to give us figures. If he makes the case, he is justified; if he does not make the case, he needs justification; and I am afraid in this case the Deputy will need more than justification.
The months of February and July. The sum in question was £420 for sixteen head of cattle; the price was 80s. per cwt. I say that was a perfectly normal year, and £100 rental in that year was made by the tenant. He profited by the fruits of his work in that particular period. In the normal course of events if it had not been for the interruption of the National movement he would have the money, and he would have paid it. If we then take the three years it is fairly obvious that there was that one year in which he was perfectly well able to pay that rent, and the sum according to this clause in the Bill for the three years is £225. Therefore, what he is asked to pay, if we are to take the Deputy's information that there were two lean years, is an average of £62 10s. —in other words, there is a deduction of £37 10s. in two lean years. The Deputy knows, I suppose, as well as anybody the force of the point that has been made by the Minister for Agriculture that mortgages have had to be met, that the interest has had to be met, and these three lean years that the Deputy has spoken of must have been exceedingly lean years for the landlord, and that, whatever the tenants' position was, the landlords, who did not get any rent for three years, must have been in a very precarious position. Some of these have a life interest only, and they benefit only to the extent of whatever these arrears amount to. As regards the Deputy's suggestion of a 40 per cent. reduction for two years and the other year to go, the sum of £120 that the landlord is to be paid for three years would be an actual reduction of 60 per cent. in respect of the three years. I suggest to the Deputy that he ought not to insist upon this Bill at all, that it would be far better value if he could get over three years, and at the end of every three years, say, we will compound the arrears by paying 40 per cent. reduction in respect of two years, and that will settle the case. There will be no necessity for the Bill.
I do not know anything much about the landlord's end of the stick, as Deputy Gorey calls it, but I have come across a little of the farmer's end of the stick in the ordinary course of my trade. I find myself occasionally called upon to advise some farmer who is purchasing a farm upon the title of the farm he is going to buy, and I have come across cases not before the war or in the early days of the war, but during the last twelve or eighteen months in which a farmer who owned one farm, so far from finding agriculture a losing business, was willing to purchase another farm on forty, fifty and sixty years' purchase of the annuity of the farm he was going to buy. Whatever the opinion one may form here of the farmers of Ireland, they are not such fools as to put enormous sums of money into the business that their own experience has proved to them to be a losing job. When you find any farm put up in this country for sale it is purchased at an enormous price by people who are in the same business and who want to continue it in a new farm, I do not think that the business of agriculture is quite so hopeless as Deputy Gorey would lead us to believe.
You are talking about the graziers.
I am not talking about the graziers; I am speaking of the ordinary rich farms through the country. My business, so far as it goes, does not run in the grazing counties. I have very few clients, if any, in Meath or Kildare. So far as I get business from the country it mostly comes from the South and South-West. In the year 1920-21, this year that this amendment proposes to wipe out of consideration altogether, the deposits in the Joint Stock Banks in this country went up by twenty-three million pounds. There was one hundred and sixty-three millions deposit in the Joint Stock Banks at the end of 1920, and in 1921 it had gone up to one hundred and eighty-six and a half million pounds. The main increase in this case was in those banks which operate through the present Irish Free State, and that money was not the banking by landlords of exorbitant rents they had extracted from their tenants, because they were not getting anything. Therefore, that £23,000,000 came from somewhere. It did not come out of the landlords' pockets, and I do not think it came out of the profit of those industries that have not yet been started in the Saorstát, but that we hope now to see springing up. Looking to the sources from which that money came, the only place I can see it came from is this losing business of agriculture. Twenty-three millions, added to the one hundred and sixty millions that were already on deposit receipt in Joint Stock Banks, must have come from somewhere. Where could it have come from except from practically the only business that is carried on in the Saorstát, the business of agriculture? That is not a flea bite of twenty-three millions, because at the outbreak of the war there was only about sixty million pounds on deposit receipt, and the amount on deposit receipt since then has gone up from sixty millions to one hundred and eighty-six millions. Eighty-four millions of that has come in since the year 1918, and that in the Saorstát must have come from agriculture and nothing else. Therefore, it does not seem to me, from the return of the banks, that the trade is a very losing one. In the year Deputy Gorey seeks to strike out of consideration agriculture was not the least profitable, because the increase during that twelve months was the biggest increase since the return of the Joint Stock Banks was first issued.
In the year 1920 the harvest was late, and oats were sold in October by those who were fortunate enough to have it thrashed. Towards the end of that year prices began to come down, and they were down by a big percentage in February of 1921. Before May fairs could not be held, and by May certain classes of stock had reduced in price by half what they were in 1919 and part 1920. The cattle bought in the middle of 1920 had to be sold for 40 per cent. less than what they were bought for. It was the greatest slump in one year that the agricultural industry ever experienced in Ireland, and many energetic, industrious and enterprising persons came to grief and were unable to pay their creditors.
I was very much struck by the President's speech and by Deputy Fitzgibbon's. Now, the President told us a nice little tale about sixteen bullocks that cost £4 or £4 10s. per cwt. I am not quite sure which, but there is no dispute certainly about the sixteen bullocks. Probably there were sixteen or twenty more where these sixteen came from. Now, the man that has sixteen bullocks and is farming in the ordinary way must have a huge farm. Probably they were three-year olds. Now, I do not think, when the President was referring to these sixteen bullocks, that that would apply to ten out of the seventy thousand unpurchased tenants in Ireland. He had some friend who was a grazier in Meath, or Dublin, or somewhere, who had these sixteen bullocks, and when he instanced this case he did not explain at all that this tale of the sixteen bullocks would not apply to ten out of the seventy thousand men we are discussing in this Bill. That disposes of that argument. Deputy Fitzgibbon talks about the huge reserves that were in the banks and that were accumulating in the banks, and no doubt he wants to infer that all these millions were put up by the seventy thousand unpurchased tenants with an average valuation of £15 a year. He wanted to infer that, and that the four hundred thousand purchased tenants in the country would have little to say to it. He wanted also to infer that the other interests, what is known as the "trade" in Ireland, and that all the other industries and professions had nothing at all to say to these millions. He wanted the Dáil to infer that all these millions were put up by these tenants, who were rolling in riches. Perhaps it would be nearer the mark to say that these millions were the portion that the purchased tenants made during the war, as compared with the unpurchased tenants, and that was made by the different businesses that were living out of Irish agriculture. There are a few trades living out of Irish agriculture.
Yes, there are a few trades; Guinness and other interests down from Guinness. Deputy Fitzgibbon made a very nice case for his friends, but I would be more impressed by his speech if he would put his hand upon half a million of all this money that was accumulated by these seventy thousand unpurchased tenants. If he could do any definite thing like that I would be inclined to listen to him with greater attention. Even if he showed me any figures I would listen to him. I really think the State will have to put up some millions to meet the losses that these people have suffered. He is talking about what 9s. in the year would mean to the average tenant. Now, the same argument applied to my friend the landlord. It will cut both ways.
When you come to talk about "bobs" like that you arrive at very little. The only point that is plain is that a few shillings mean a lot to poor men. It means the difference between existence and starvation. I will not say it means the difference between existence and comfort, for it never did. It is up to this Dáil and it is up to the Government on behalf of the nation to do what is right. We consider that they have not done what is right. We consider that where other agreements have been come to in recent years between two parties concerned—where the landlords have agreed to take two years into consideration—that it is beyond the limits of justice and fair play to take three years into consideration. I made that clear in previous speeches, and the point has not been answered.
If I might personally explain, I would say it is only fair to the unpurchased tenants to say that I did not charge, and I did not intend to be understood as charging, that all this money had come from them. My argument was that a great deal of it must have come from agriculture in which they were engaged.
The Deputy has not dealt with the question whether or not the year 1920-21 was a lean year. That was my case, and the reason why I introduced the particular bullocks to which he takes exception. He states that it is on this matter of 9s. a year that the danger really lies. Nine shillings a year means 2d. a week. If the Deputy can explain to me that seventy thousand unpurchased tenants are necessarily going to be starved by having to bear this 2d. a week, I am prepared to reconsider my position.
Mr. DOYLE
The President is talking about 1921.
Mr. DOYLE
I think it was for 1921 you quoted us the story of the bullocks.
Mr. DOYLE
You spoke of selling in February and July.
No, I spoke of a purchase.
Mr. DOYLE
Mr. DOYLE
As far as the year 1921 is concerned, I say it is one of the leanest years that the farmer ever met in Ireland. I know that the few pounds he made in the war was all lost by him in 1921. He talks of cattle in July, 1921, being worth £4 a cwt. Why, there were not cattle in July, 1921, worth £4 a cwt. With all due respect to the President I say that, and I would like to see the quotations from the cattle market for July, 1921. It was a time when fat cattle could not be sold. I have reason to know well that in July, 1921, fat cattle could not be sold. Moreover, the Minister for Agriculture has told us that he is putting the unpurchased tenants for these three years on a par with the purchased tenants by giving them this reduction of 25 per cent. That is so for three years. What about the 15 years previous, when they were paying 25 per cent. more than the purchased tenants? Where a tenant's rental was £100 he paid in those fifteen or sixteen years £300 by reason of not being purchased. The reason why we are asking 40 per cent. on the purchase price is that these tenants may be put on something of a par with the tenants who purchased previously. Of course, the Minister made a statement all through that his prices were going to put the tenants in a better position than those who had purchased. I cannot find how they are going to be in a better position in any shape or form. He also dwelt on mortgages. I do not think that the tenants are responsible for that. I do not think that the tenants should be called on to pay exorbitant prices because the cost of living of the landlords has gone up.
I am sorry Deputy Gorey did not tell us where in the 1920 Bill his provision about the two years' arrears appears. I have the Bill here. There is no such provision in it about limiting the arrears to two years.
I can show you the agreement between the two parties.
I have the Bill here, and I would be anxious to see it.
I was one of the men who made the agreement.
The Deputy stated that the 1920 Bill allowed the landlords two years' arrears. I have the Bill here, and that is not in it.
I made the agreement. Do you deny the agreement?
I know nothing about the agreement that the Deputy made with the landlords.
Before we go any further with this I would point out that it is a question of the 1920 Bill, not any agreement made by Deputy Gorey.
The Deputy knows the agreement is not the point. There was no arrears problem in 1920. There were derelict holdings where rent was due, but there was not ten per cent. due all over the country. There was no arrears problem, comparatively. The problem we have now is not a problem in the same sense as that of 1881. If farmers were making £10,000 a year on a £20 holding some farmers would owe some landlords arrears. The tenants who owed rent for years and years came in and paid it during the war, in the good years. Deputy Doyle admitted that this twenty-five per cent. reduction brought present tenants purchasing under this Bill to the position of tenants who had purchased under the 1903 Act.
Mr. DOYLE
For three years; that is exactly what I said. If you reduce tenants' rent by 25 per cent., you are putting them in the same position as if they were paying an annuity for three years. That is the fact. He explains that this 25 per cent. was made during the war. On a £20 holding, 2s. a week is £5 a year. That was during the war.
Mr. DOYLE
It was during twenty years. We had not the war for twenty years.
The war lasted from 1914 to 1918. I would like to ask how many hens would lay £5 worth of eggs per year. One good hen would do it.
The Minister's hens. I want to put in a claim for a sitting of the Minister's eggs. I have the first claim.
One good hen, let us be strictly accurate, would lay the difference, £5 a year, and £15 a year on a £100 holding was simply the price of one very bad bullock during the war.
Mr. DOYLE
It was during fifteen years previously. I did not mention the war period alone.
Please allow me to approach the subject in my own way. I am talking of the year 1920-21. Deputy Gorey said we should keep away from shillings and pence. I can quite understand that, because he knows perfectly well that this rent and arrears question is an artificial one. Rents at present are the smallest part of a farmer's outgoings.
The small man especially. There are 70,000 holdings at £12 a year for the average holding. It is the smallest part of his outlay. We all know this rent question has attained an importance out of all relation to its economic importance, and I can quite see the reason why Deputies Gorey and Doyle would like to keep away from the figures. Take the £100 holding. The loss to the tenant who did not purchase during the war was £15 a year, the price of a very bad yearling during the war. Take the average holding, the £12 holding, the difference in the year between the annuity and the rent is £3. On the average £20 holding, a first-class economic holding, the difference is £5 a year. It is on those figures that all those diatribes are based. We ought to treat it as a business proposition. We ought to remember if we take over estates as they stand that it will affect the country's credit if we do not pay a price both for arrears and rent itself which will be at least the price which a banking institution would give for these. If we are prepared to sell the country's credit, and if now the time has come when we must sell and injure the country's credit, let us at least get value for our money. This advantage of £3 on the £12 holding, and the £5 on the £20 holding, and £15 on the £100 holding is hardly worth it. That is a serious aspect of the problem which the Dáil would do well to take into account. Is it worth while to injure the country's credit for such trivial advantages to one particular class?
Níl puinn agam le rádh. I think that this amendment of Deputy Gorey's, which we are asked to accept here falls very short of the requirements of the nation. He states here that he represents the Unpurchased Tenants, and that it is in their interest the Bill is made. If that is so, he is equally bound to add to his amendment that the rent paid during all those three years by those unpurchased tenants should be refunded. I think, in equity, he cannot dispute that contention, and that is the claim he puts before the Government. That is obviously the case he represents.
There are two points I should like to put before the Minister with regard to the question of arrears. The first is that whatever those men had done with the land for the last three years, there was one thing I would ask them not to believe—that is, that those men had that amount of money in the bank or have it at their command. The people in their circumstances found the money slipping away from them, and it is not possible for them to hold it. Another point he should give more consideration to is made by Deputies here, and that is that fairs and markets were for a while held up, and they suffered considerably. Taking those two points into consideration, I think it would be very difficult for tenants who are three years in arrears to meet the case. If he could, I would like to make a greater demand upon him; but, in view of the case he has made, and of the fact that his whole aim in this Bill is to strike a fair bargain, I would suggest that in connection with those three years in arrears he would take off half a year of the purchase money. That would to some extent serve to meet their case.
I think the suggestion put forward by Deputy Sears is an admirable one, and perhaps one that would meet the case made by Deputy Gorey to some extent. If Deputy Gorey sees his way to accept that suggestion, I think pressure could be brought on the Minister to accept it. I am sure, if it is the unanimous opinion of the Dáil that that should be done, I would ask the members of the Party on my left seriously to consider that proposition, and perhaps it would end the controversy over the arrears.
I am an unpurchased tenant myself, and I speak for many other unpurchased tenants. I do not believe there is any problem with regard to arrears of rent during the period mentioned, because those were years when people had a flush of money, and they ought to pay up the arrears. If we passed this amendment as it is, it might be brought to bear upon us later. We recollect the time when we were fighting the Local Government Board, and when a certain organisation sent round organisers to tell the people to pay no rates.
We will be at it again very soon.
Deputy Gorey has already spoken three times. Perhaps he would not like to hear how often he has interrupted. However, I will allow him one more speech.
I am impressed by the helpful suggestions of Deputy O'Donnell, and I have also listened to the helpful suggestions of Deputy McGoldrick. I know they were meant to help us in this amendment. Deputy Hughes and Deputy Sears have taken a very sane and helpful view. I am sorry, representing the people I do, that I cannot accept that view. The people I represent have adopted a certain attitude; I am only their instrument, and have to carry out their instructions. One thing that appears from this is that it affords a great ray of hope, especially to the West of Ireland, and I do think the West has a chance of getting on the right track and on the road to prosperity. I have heard it queried here: "What does ten shillings mean to the small man?" It means a lot. When you talk about ten shillings or a pound, it means a big lot to the small man. How much has the small man to give away? How much is he likely to make with his small valuation? You must try to look at the matter from the small man's point of view. Take into consideration his method of living and his home comforts, or his lack of them. Ten shillings mean a lot. We are told, too that it was only the price of a bullock, or a "screw," perhaps, in the years of the war that had made a difference to the man who did not purchase land and the man who did for the 14, 15, or 16 years between the operations of the last Act and the beginning of this Act. This is a bigger problem than many who are dealing with it lightly are inclined to think. If ten shillings are not taken into consideration in the life of a small man, then what are you going to base your calculations on? You must begin to realise that he has very little income and very little to derive from the soil. Ten shillings may mean more to him than twenty pounds to a big man. I cannot withdraw this amendment, because it is the considered judgment of the people I represent. If this fails—I suppose it will, for I see no other signs—it will probably mean that there is nothing to prevent the suggestions made by our friends taking effect at a later stage. I must put this to a division.
As an unpurchased tenant, I want to thank you, A Chinn Chomhairle, for permitting Deputy Gorey to make another speech, if for no other reason than that it has been exceedingly helpful. I thoroughly agree with what seems to underlie the arguments that he and his colleagues have put forward. Ten shillings seems a very small amount stated absolutely, but in conjunction with a variety of other things which go to make the conditions of life for the small holder it means an enormous amount. It means more than we, perhaps, can altogether realise. What I think is so particularly helpful is Deputy Gorey's declaration that he is speaking on this matter purely as a delegate. His position is one in which some of us occasionally find ourselves when we express on some particular matters not quite our own views or our own convictions, but rather those arrived at by the people whom we undertook to represent. It seems to me a compromise could be arrived at on this matter if an opportunity were given to Deputy Gorey to consult those who have instructed him to make this case. That 1921 was a bad year, for instance, is one of the alleged facts controverted. We all, surely, remember what the summer of 1921 was like—the hurtful effect of it upon 1922, the absolute absence of rain for months, the particularly torrid weather—weather almost semi-tropical—and we know it was most hurtful to the farming interests, and made the following year much more hurtful still.
Now, the want of markets, the general social upheaval, the insecurity, all combined, tended to make farming unprofitable in the years following. I think, as a matter of equity, we ought to take that into account. I do not think there is provided a sufficient basis for the demand to have arrears reduced by 40 per cent. I must say candidly that while I am advocating in a way what Deputy Doyle and others of the Farmers' Party advocated, they have not made a case for a reduction of 40 per cent., but they have made a case for making it easy for those who have a burden of arrears to shoulder, and that ease might be supplied in the fashion indicated by Deputy Sears—instead of calling for the payment of a lump sum, to allow it to be distributed over a number of years. There was a fallacy underlying some of the arguments, at least it seems so to me, with regard to those arrears. The question was put, "What had the farmer done with the rent?" Why, that assumes he had it. Otherwise, it is pretty much like the question asked by Lord Dundreary of the lady for whom he was manufacturing small talk. He asked her: "Does your brother like tea?""Do you know, Lord Dundreary," she replied, "that I have no brother?" He said, "Quite so, but do you think if you had a brother that he would like tea?" What did the tenant do with the rent that he is not able to pay? That is an unanswerable question. While I cannot, therefore, vote for Deputy Gorey's amendment as it stands, I yet feel that there is a great deal that ought to be met in the case put forward insufficiently in support of it. I would ask Deputy Gorey to withdraw the amendment, notwithstanding his instructions, and to allow this matter to be dealt with on the lines of distribution of certain arrears over the annuity payment.
In my view, in any case, the real reason for this strike or failure or inability to pay was the fact of non-purchase. That meets the point Deputy Magennis makes with regard to the question, "What has the farmer done with the rent?" It is not a case of the farmer in general not having the rent, but of a farmer withholding the rent as a protest against non-purchase. I tried to take into account the bad markets, the confusion, the hot summer of 1921, and all the other relevant circumstances when we fixed the 25 per cent. I tried to take into account the circumstances on the other side too, and we endeavoured to come to something which we considered would be reasonable, having regard to the interests on both sides. I am ready to consider the suggestion of Deputy Sears, but unless Deputy Gorey withdraws his amendment and accepts this amendment, which could be prepared on the lines suggested by Deputy Sears, I can do nothing, and there is no alternative except to let the matter go to a division.
I do not know what this suggestion means in actual figures.
I am prepared to consider Deputy Sears' suggestion, namely, in the case where a tenant owes three years' arrears that a half-year should be added to the purchase money.
What about the tenant with 2½ or 2 years' arrears?
That would reduce the payment to 2½, and the half-year would be added to the purchase money. If Deputy Gorey is not prepared to accept that, then at present there is no alternative except to let Deputy Gorey's amendment go to a division.
If the Minister can see his way to add in every case a half-year to the purchase money——
I would not agree to that. Take the case of a man who owes two years' arrears. He gets 25 per cent. per annum off, and that is a half-year's rent on two years, and he only owes 1½ years' rent. It is not a hardship to ask him to pay in those circumstances. I do admit there is a slight difference in the case where a man owes three years' arrears. There may be a certain amount of hardship, and to meet that I am willing to accept Deputy Sears' suggestion that in the case of three years' arrears a half-year is to be added to the purchase money.
A man with two years' arrears has already paid full rent for one year, and he is to get nothing but 25 per cent. off. Then the man who did not pay at all and who owed three years' rent will be treated as you suggest?
We could not accept the proposal; it is too ridiculous.
Amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 19; Níl, 39.
Tá
- Donchadh Ó Guaire.
- Seán Ó Duinnín.
- Domhnall Ó Mocháin.
- Tomás de Nógla.
- Liam de Róiste.
- Tomás Mac Eoin.
- Seoirse Ghabháin Uí Dhubhthaigh.
- Seán Ó Ruanaidh.
- Liam Ó Briain.
- Tomás Ó Conaill.
- Aodh Ó Cúlacháin.
- Liam Ó Daimhín.
- Seán Ó Laidhin.
- Cathal Ó Seanáin.
- Domhnall Ó Broin.
- Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.
- Risteárd MacFheorais.
- Mícheál Ó Dubhghaill.
- Domhnall Ó Ceallacháin.
Níl
- Liam T. Mac Cosgair.
- Gearóid Ó Súileabháin.
- Seán Ó Maolruaidh.
- Séamus Breathnach.
- Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.
- Seosamh Mac Suibhne.
- Peadar Mac á Bháird.
- Mícheál de Duram.
- Pilib Mac Cosgair.
- Mícheál de Stáineas.
- Domhnall Mac Cártaigh.
- Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
- Éarnan Altún.
- Sir Séumas Craig.
- Gearóid Mac Giobuin.
- Liam Thrift.
- Eoin Mac Néill.
- Liam Mac Aonghusa.
- Pádraig Ó hÓgáin.
- Pádraic Ó Máille.
- Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
- Fionán Ó Loingsigh.
- Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.
- Criostóir Ó Broin.
- Caoimhghin Ó hUigín.
- Proinsias Bulfin.
- Séamus Ó Dóláin.
- Aindriú Ó Láimhín.
- Liam Ó hAodha.
- Proinsias Mag Aonghusa.
- Eamon Ó Dúgáin.
- Peadar Ó hAodha.
- Séamus Ó Murchadha.
- Seosamh Mac Giolla Bhrighde.
- Liam Mac Sioghaird.
- Tomás Ó Domhnaill.
- Earnán de Blaghd.
- Uinseann de Faoite.
- Séamus de Burca.
Amendment declared lost.
I beg to move Amendment 21:—
In Sub-Section (2), line 19, to insert after the word "cent." the words:—"In the case of a tenant the total rateable value of whose holdings exceeds thirty pounds, and 50 per cent. in the case of a tenant the total rateable value of whose holdings does not exceed thirty pounds, or of a tenant of whose holdings not more than one-half is permanent pasture."
The object of this amendment is to secure that a large farmer or grazier who does not till half his land does not get the same benefit by the reduction as a small farmer or a large farmer who does till his land. The figure, £30 valuation, is selected as a reasonable dividing line.
I am neither an unpurchased tenant myself, nor do I claim, like Deputy Gorey, to represent 70,000 unpurchased tenants. I have been wondering whether Deputy Gorey, if there were 70,001 unpurchased tenants, would make the same claim. My support in this case is on behalf of the small tenant farmer who tills his land. He is the greatest asset to this nation, in so far as he is a member of a body that produces the food for the nation. The Minister for Agriculture wanted to know what these people did with their money, and Deputy Gorey said he hoped that they did not go to Kilkee or Tramore, or some other watering place. I am sure Deputy Gorey would not go so far as to say that the small tillage farmer who works hard for the benefit of the people is not entitled to a fortnight's holidays at Tramore.
He is, if he could get them; but he never could.
He did not get them last year, but that was not due to the clerk of the weather, but to the high political atmosphere prevailing at the time. If the small tenant farmer cannot get his holiday at Tramore or Kilkee, there is one thing certain, that the landlord will get his holiday at Monte Carlo, or some other such place, at the expense of the man who pays the rent. I would ask the Minister to approach the consideration of this amendment by enquiring into the conditions in which barley and other crops were produced during the last three years. Up to the year 1920 there was, generally speaking, no reason to complain with regard to the price for barley or other products. In 1920 the price ranged from 45s. to 52s. In 1921 it was from 18s. to 28s. 6d., and last year it was considered lucky to sell at from 11s. to 18s. We are told that the small farmer generally tills his land with the assistance of his own family. But are they not entitled to some return for their labour? In any event, in order to meet the cost of production, exclusive of any price for the use of his land, the price would require to be from 18s. to 28s. 6d. Therefore in selling barley, if he was lucky enough to sell it, he sold it at less than one cost of production, making no allowance or consideration for the use of the labour that was employed or the use of the land that produced this particular commodity. Against that you have the landlords' interests represented by Guinness's brewery, who sold the product of that particular commodity at the same price last year as it did three years ago, when the price of barley was 52s. a barrel. Perhaps the Minister would explain where the difference goes, or whether the two million five hundred thousand that Guinness handed out to their shareholders not very long ago, was at the expense of the tenant farmers of this country. As well as sowing barley, the tenant farmer usually produces whatever food is necessary to feed pigs, and I think that the price for the last couple of years is very low in regard to them, notwithstanding the fact that there is very little reduction for those who have to buy the finished article over the counter. The Minister said yesterday that the small landlord or the small estate was more likely to be encumbered than the large one. I suggest that the same argument applies in regard to the unpurchased tenant, and that he would be less able to bear the burden for reasons, some of which I have already given, and that the Minister himself has pleaded on behalf of the landlord.
at this stage took the Chair.
The President in dealing with the points put up by Deputy Gorey referred to the fact that sixteen head of cattle were sold at 80s. per cwt. at a certain time. I would like the Minister to make enquiries, and I would like to learn, as a result of the enquiries, the number of unpurchased tenants of valuations of less than £30 who were able to put sixteen head of cattle on the market at 80s. per cwt.
Very few at any rate. The Minister also dealt very exhaustively with the position of the tenant—the position he will be in under this Bill as compared with the tenant who purchased under previous Acts. When the previous Land Bills, not compulsory, certainly, were passed, and when the tenant took advantage of them, money on the market was stationary at that particular time, prices were generally the same from one year to another; they were not affected in the way they have been affected in the last six years or since the outbreak of the European War. Money could also be borrowed at a very much lower rate than it is being borrowed at the present time. The position around the country at the moment, so far as I can gather, is that the small farmer owes money to the shopkeeper, the shopkeeper owes money to the wholesaler; very few of them owe money to Guinness, at any rate. The whole thing, as far as I can see it, is carried on on paper credit. There is one thing certain, and that is the two classes of people in the country who are suffering are the producer of the food and the consumer, who has nothing else to fall back upon except his weekly wage or salary. There is somebody in between these two who is getting a good whack out of it, at any rate. The Minister said you cannot take blood out of a turnip. If he could imagine that argument being applied as an excuse, it could by a stretch of the imagination be applied to the small farmer who owes two or three years' rent. I suggest it is an impossible proposition for him, even with the assistance of the Sheriff, to collect the arrears of rent, and he had better try to meet the situation by something in the nature of the amendment which I am supporting. I think it was Deputy Gorey referred to the cost of carriage. I have seen cases where a bag of potatoes or a bag of barley cost more in freight over eighty miles of Irish railway than you would have actually to pay for them at the pit. I do not know exactly what he meant by bringing it into a question of this kind, but I suppose it was for the purpose of showing that the man who produced the article is getting the least out of it. The Minister also seems to take the view that the non-payment of rent for the last couple of years is merely a protest on behalf of unpurchased tenants in so far as the landlords were not willing to sell.
The Deputy should try to quote me properly. I stated my view on that question at least three times. The Deputy knows it. I do not want to state it again.
I am sorry if I misinterpreted the Minister, but I did not take down what he said in shorthand. I took it that was the view he put up. If it is, I certainly do not agree with his statement.
If I did not say it, you do not agree with it?
There is nobody—at least I am not, at any rate—supporting an amendment of this kind in order to injure the country's credit. Landlords, generally speaking, will not depend on rents for a livelihood. You will find that anything worth anything in this country is owned by a very small number of people, and the landlord who lives in Monte Carlo out of the rents he gets from the tenant-farmers of this country generally gets something else out of big establishments such as Guinness's brewery. You can take it for granted that you are not actually going to send the landlords into bankruptcy or into any Home in this country, at any rate, as paupers if this amendment is carried. I think if the Government are not prepared to meet in some way the barley growers and other small farmers of the country, they will drive them out of existence. The amendment, if the Minister is prepared to accept it, I think will meet the present case of the very small farmer, who, generally speaking, is the food-producer, and is Ireland's greatest asset at the moment.
I am wholly in sympathy with the principle that underlies the amendment, but I think that the line at which the barrier is drawn between the two classes is not a line that can be accepted. I represent a county in which the average valuation of holdings is £8.
I represent a county in which the average valuation of the holdings is £8, and with the men on these holdings men like Deputy Gorey have very little sympathy or very little knowledge of what their economic requirements are, because he lives in a different atmosphere. He is accustomed to big farms and big grazing problems, but he does not know anything about the conditions that apply to holdings in a county such as I represent. With all due respect to the pretentions he makes here of representing the community generally, in this respect, I submit, he is not properly qualified to understand these things. I think if the partition between these two classes were regularised in some way, this amendment could be accepted. I could not possibly vote for it as it stands. There are forty thousand holdings in Tirconnaill with a population of two hundred thousand. These people are labouring in the general interests of agriculture. They are not gambling on big prices or small prices; they are applying themselves to the best interests of agriculture, and they are a class that ought to be supported. They have something in common with the people of the West of Ireland, though in the West of Ireland tillage is not engaged in to the same extent as it is in Tirconnaill. They represent, I suppose, 6,000 of the unpurchased tenants, and the money that would be involved in a remission with regard to these men would be very small, and to the landlord generally it would not amount to anything very much. In the case of big farms and big ranches it would amount to a good deal, but it does not amount to very much in the case of the small land-holder, who is working in the best spirit of agricultural development, and who only ekes out a bare living despite his arduous work. What would apply to him would not apply generally to the farming community more or less represented here by Deputy Gorey. I submit that it would be well if the Dáil would find some dividing line here. It is absolutely essential in the interests of those who are struggling. The man in the high-rated holding, generally speaking, is practically a landlord himself. I do not draw much distinction between the large tenant and the landlord. They are both engaged in speculation—the landlord as to how much he can make out of his estate, and the tenant as to how much he can make for applying to his own specific purposes. I think that this amendment should be considered in a further stage of the Bill, and it is one, if properly drawn, that could be supported. Much money will not be involved; it will take very little from the landlord, while it will mean a great deal to these small land-holders. Generally speaking, these people have always met their obligations, and the amount of their arrears will bear no proportion to the arrears in the case of large holdings, where there has been a cessation of payments of rents for a considerable time back. Although these people have not been very well able to meet their engagements, they have at the same time made a struggle to meet them, and they should get encouragement. I have a recollection myself—and it extends further back than even Deputy Gorey's recollection— when, as a little boy, the landlord of one of the farms we held died, and for five years no person was in a position to collect rent. At the end of five years I was sent with five years' rent, whereas in the case of others who did not pay the arrears they were allowed off with a half-year's rent. The man who paid got no consideration, but the man who did not meet his obligations was the man, I think, that was looked after by the Act of Parliament. I think that was immoral, and if we are to do things as we ought to do, we should look at it in that way, and not as a matter of expediency. These things are matters of equity, and they may be dealt with under those principles. A margin should be drawn between the small tenant and the large one, and in this case it can be done, but the margin here is too wide. I cannot support the amendment unless the margin is drawn.
Would the Deputy suggest a reasonable figure?
He does not want to be dishonest.
There would be an easy way for Deputy McGoldrick to support that. If the Dáil accepts the amendment as it stands, it would be possible for Deputy Gorey to reduce the figure by a further amendment.
I am not accepting the amendment. Deputy Sears made a suggestion on the last amendment in regard to the question of arrears. I expressed my own view of it. That is as far as I am prepared to go. We are reminded that we must be equitable in those matters. We cannot have casual figures or haphazard ones. So far we have had no reasons given by the opposition. I want to know how this figure of 50 per cent. was arrived at. We have not got a single reason yet for any figure suggested by the opposition either from the Labour Party or the Farmers' Party. It seems to be simply a question of putting down whatever figure one happens on. I showed very clearly how we arrived at this figure. I showed its exact bearing on the price, but we have not got a single reason for a single figure put forward by the other party. I congratulate the Farmers' and the Labour Party on the happy position they are in. They are not in charge of the Bill, and are not responsible for it. The land question is a very old question, and everyone almost is interested in it. The opposition is in the happy position of being able to suggest any figure, either 50 per cent. or 60 per cent. If the labour Party suggested 50 per cent., the Farmers would suggest 70 per cent.
On a point of explanation, may I say that we had no knowledge of the Farmers' amendment at all when we put forward ours.
No one suggested you had. If the Farmers say 40, they say 50. The two parties are having a picnic. I do not envy them their position. Some day I may be put in that position myself. This debate is appearing daily in the Press. There is an election coming on in a short time, and without very much cost, without making themselves responsible for any of the consequences of those amendments, they can go down to the country and talk about 50 or 60 per cent. Deputy Davin can tell his constituency about the small farmers in whom he is so very much interested.
Why did you not keep the Bill until after the elections?
I do not begrudge either the Farmers' Party or the Labour Party their present position. I wish I was in it myself. We can all make allowances for a thing of that kind. I do not think anyone is going to be deceived by this tremendous interest in agriculture in general. We, however, who are responsible must give reasons for our figures. We must consider what reactions they will have on the credit of the country. We must see that the figures square with justice, because I hope this Bill will pass and be put into operation, and that in two, three, four or five years time we will not have any reason to be ashamed of it. We have to put in figures accurately, realising that we are responsible for the Bill. I would like to hear this 50 per cent. defended. I am not good at mathematics, but I think I could prophesy that I could defend 60 per cent. by exactly the same reasons as I could 70 per cent. I do not know why Deputy Davin, having regard to the price of barley, did not put in an amendment that no arrears be paid.
I spoke in support of my own amendment, and the Minister should answer the arguments that I put up then.
I hope Deputy Gorey will take notice that there is a division also in the Labour Party.
Those benches should take notice too.
We do not blame any one for not wasting time listening to the arguments that have just been heard, because no one takes them seriously. Deputy Lyons suggested 100 per cent. Does Deputy Davin agree with that? If he does, why does he not stand up for it?
We did not like to embarrass you.
Thanks very much, I will accept that reason, as it is the only one available in those circumstances. Barley is practically down to pre-war figures. We are bringing rents down to pre-war figures. We are dealing with pre-war figures. Remember that. Wherever there was inflation as a result of the War, and wherever the tenant got a benefit as a result of that inflation, we are not taking it into account. We set out expressly to deal with the tenant's position as if prices were exactly pre-war, and that is the reason we gave this 10 per cent. contribution in order to lend the money at the price at which we could borrow and lend money before the War. You are to deal with the tenant in pre-war prices as if the European War had never occurred, and as if those conditions were exactly the same as pre-war. When people talk about the price of barley, barley is down to pre-war price, and in some cases below it, but we are dealing with the tenant as we would pre-war, and we are giving the tenant between 10 and 15 per cent. better terms than pre-war. Deputy Doyle admitted that 25 per cent. deduction would bring it down to the 1903 Act. Now we are giving 35 per cent.
Mr. DOYLE
I want to say that I admitted no such thing that you were putting them on a better basis than the former tenants. You are putting them on a worse basis. Take the rental of £100——
You are not allowed to make a speech.
Mr. DOYLE
He made a statement and attributed it to me. I say there is no such thing as better terms, and that the price the Minister is offering in this Bill is worse.
Deputy Doyle will have an opportunity of speaking after the Minister.
I think the Dáil heard the Deputy admit that if we reduced the rent by 25 per cent. the reduced rent would be equal to the average annuity that would be paid by the tenant who had purchased. Is that correct?
Mr. DOYLE
No; I qualified that statement considerably.
He admits having made it, but he qualified it. Statements can be made, but when you see to what they lead you can qualify them. I do not think Deputy Doyle is the sort of man who would run away from statements which he makes. The reduction of 25 per cent. would bring the tenant's annuity down to exactly what was paid before the war under the 1903 Act. He admitted that. We give the tenant in this Bill 35 per cent. reduction, so that not only are we saving him from the inflation in prices as a result of the war and from the dearness of money, but we are giving him better terms as far as his annuity is concerned than if he had purchased pre-war. We are giving him 10 to 15 per cent. better terms. When Deputies talk of barley being back to pre-war price they must remember that. They must remember that we took that into account, that that was the reason why we fixed this reduction, or at least one of the reasons. We are not saying anything about the things that are not down to pre-war prices, but which are much above pre-war prices. We are not making any allowance for that, but we are certainly allowing the tenant for everything that is back to pre-war by this 35 per cent., and we are giving him 10 to 15 per cent. better terms with regard to prices. Deputies should remember that when they are talking of the price of barley. We took all these considerations which I have heard now into account. We worked out our figures with very considerable thought, and after, I hope, giving the question the time and attention that such serious questions are entitled to get. Having done that, we are entitled to get from a responsible opposition how they defend this figure of 50 per cent. Apart from the reasons that I referred to at the beginning, I think they ought at least to make a show of defending these figures. I heard Deputy Davin talk on the cost of production, basing a number of interesting arguments on it. I had a look at the farmers' benches and I was hoping that Deputy Gorey would rise to the occasion and point out that this cost of production argument cuts both ways. There is an item called labour—surely labour has something to do with it.
These people do not employ labour.
That is the reason that the cost of production is used here. The cost of production argument is one that I am glad the Labour Party have definitely given their allegiance to. I certainly will not advise the Dáil to accept this amendment and to accept any amendment on these lines. I have stated what I had to say to Deputy Sears' suggestion, and I would not go any further.
Mr. DOYLE
The Minister for Agriculture stated that I agreed that he gave the same reduction in the Bill to the unpurchased tenants. He gave the same reduction for three years. In stating that, I asked the Minister what amount did tenants pay in excess for fifteen years previously. Would the Minister answer that? He began then telling us about a bullock paying the difference. But that meant fifteen bullocks. Five pounds meant five times fifteen pounds. I admit that you gave it to the unpurchased tenants for three years, but what about the fifteen years previous when they got nothing? What about the case where the £100 tenant was compelled to pay £300 more than the unpurchased tenant beside him? It is all very well for the Minister to say that we are using this for propaganda. Possibly the Government will go down and use something else for propaganda, about the sectional attitude we are taking up here.
This point that Deputy Doyle refers to is most amusing when one bears in mind what the Minister said a while ago, when he said that this question of rent is a comparatively small matter to the tenant farmer today.
That is the Minister's statement. The Minister has brought in a Land Purchase Bill in the Dáil, where 50 or 60 Deputies attend out of 128. He wants to get this passed before the election. We are charged with introducing amendments with a view to the public. I think the charge can be quite fairly thrown at the Minister in view of his own statement that the question of rentals is comparatively small. This matter of land purchase, as the Minister himself said, should be dealt with by a Parliament representative of you all. This was placarded all over the country: "The country should be fully represented in the Parliament of the nation," and that Parliament should deal with this land question. Well, in view of that, I think it does not lie in the Minister's mouth at any rate to make these references to amendments put down with an eye to the public. He has asked why 50 per cent. was put down, why is 25 per cent. put down? I will tell him. Twenty-five per cent. is his figure. It is intended to apply to all those who owe rentals, whether they were men living by their work on the land or whether they were men living by the sale of cattle which were grazed on the land. If it is a fair reduction for a cattle grazier, then at least the tiller of the soil is entitled to double that reduction. Now, the Minister may say that on that argument he is entitled to 60 per cent., 70 per cent., or 80 per cent. I would agree. He is certainly entitled to a greater reduction than the man who simply grazes cattle on the land, and whom he says is entitled to a 25 per cent. reduction. We have been very much familiarised with the contention from those who, if they were present, would be sitting on the Ministerial Benches, that the grazier, the large farmer who grazes his cattle, and the small farmer who works the land should be treated on a different basis. That is true, or it is not true. The echoes come from the Ministerial Benches that it is true. We want to test it. Are they prepared to treat the tiller of the soil on better lines than they would treat the grazier?
The Bill answers that question.
The amendment is put down with a view to eliciting the views of the Ministry on that proposition.
The Bill itself gives them.
The Bill does not on the question of arrears, at any rate. Deputy McGoldrick told us that. I do not suppose there are many Deputies here who have a better knowledge of the position and the condition of the small tenant farmers than Deputy McGoldrick has, and he agrees that there should be a line drawn between the two classes of tenants. He thinks that the £30 mentioned in the amendment is too high, but at any rate it will include all those whose interest he has at heart, so he need not object to the amendment on that account. If he agrees that there is a large number, or any number, who are over £20 valuation or a £10 valuation, that should be included in the 25 per cent. category, well, that is a matter that we can perhaps accommodate him with. At any rate, he agrees with the principle that there should be a distinction drawn between the tenant who is tilling his holding, the small holder who must perforce, if he tills his holding, live out of the proceeds of that holding, and the extensive holder who has not tilled his holding. He got into arrears because of his failure to back the winner in the cattle gamble of 1921-22.
We are prepared to agree with the Minister that a 25 per cent. reduction is sufficient for him. The Minister contends it is a fair proposition that such a holder is entitled to a 25 per cent. reduction of any arrears, and we retort that if he is entitled to such a reduction, then the man who did his duty by the State, the man who fulfilled his trust in his holding, is entitled to a greater reduction than the man who simply used the land for the purpose of a cattle ranch. That is the case for the amendment. The Minister accepts the principle; then the figures may be arranged, and I am sure we will be able to accommodate him either to follow Deputy Lyons's suggestion and wipe out all arrears, or to modify the figures, and, as a matter of fact, to collaborate with the Minister in making this distinction as effective as possible, to give a preference to the land-holder who tills his land as against the land-holder who refuses to till his land. I have a table here in connection with one county. It is not, perhaps, the best illustration, and it was got out for an entirely different purpose. In the county there are 162 holdings, ranches averaging 340 acres and with a total acreage of 55,059. The total number of men employed on all that property was 432, or one man per 128 acres. What proportion of those holdings would come under this Bill I have not the slightest conception of. I do say that kind of land-holding in other counties, and to some extent in this county, ought to be penalised as compared with the tenant tiller of the soil. This amendment will at least test the principle whether it is intended to place the grazier on the same plane in regard to arrears as we are proposing to place the tenant-holder who is a tiller of the soil.
Deputy Johnson does not apparently realise that the answer to his important question is the Bill. If he will look at Section 21, Subsection (3), and at Section 28—sections upon which I dwelt in the Second Reading—he will find the whole spirit of this is to relieve the tenant with whose interests he is so much concerned.
Touching the placing of him in a proper economic position.
We are dealing now with the question of arrears.
I know; but Deputy Johnson proclaimed with great rhetorical effect, and with the air of an expectant victor entering into the captured citadel, that this was going to test the whole character of the Bill——
Whether or not those who propose it meant it for the advantage of the right sort of land occupant or the wrong sort of land occupant, and it is merely with that particular aspect of his argument that I am now standing up to deal. It is quite obvious to anyone who studies the Bill that it was conceived and framed in the spirit of rectifying all the wrongs that are outstanding in regard to the landless men, the agricultural labourer, who is deprived of land because of the operation of previous Purchase Acts, people who have uneconomic holdings, others who were debarred from turbary rights. And then there is a provision dealing with the farmer who has a large holding of untenanted land and who is going to work it. Again, Deputy Johnson ought to note that one of the requirements which the Land Commission is to insist upon in regard to all applicants under Section 28 for advances is the capacity of working the soil.
We are not dealing with that particular character of the Bill. We are dealing with arrears, and only arrears—things that have passed, not things that are to come.
This is logic running mad, because if a Deputy advances a certain doctrine or view in order to support his criticism either of a Section or an amendment to a section, anyone is entitled in any sane assembly to stand up to rebut the argument, whether or not he takes or does not take the view with regard to the other matter out of which this doctrinal disquisition arises. I submit that I am quite in order in attempting to show that this declaration that the amendment has the incalculable value of testing the whole Bill is put forward here, with the recommendation that it is the touchstone, and I suggest to anyone who reads the Bill fairly that the touchstone has already been applied satisfactorily.
I find myself being forced into the position of being the only one to stand up for the unfortunate farmer. Deputy Johnson says he would like to give advantage to the man who performed his trust. It is when you get down to the question of what he means by performing his trust—the trust that the State put in him by giving him this holding—that we begin to differ. Tillage did not pay for the past year. Potatoes are £1 a ton, and a man could not afford to till to the same extent as heretofore for a number of reasons. Are we to penalise a man because he did not till to such an extent as in previous years, because he did not till to a large extent, even though, if he did till to a large extent, the tillage might not pay? That is the doctrine. I am not saying now that a large farmer should not till considerably. The large farmers can and do, but you are not making the measure the amount of tillage. Is that fair, considering that when you go for a certain area of tillage, for reasons which I will not go into now——
May I remind the Minister that there are alternatives—the valuation of the holding or the amount of tillage?
The Deputy did not really defend the amendment so much as the general principle. I am on the same point as Deputy Magennis. This was the touchstone, and the Deputy's test was the amount of tillage that was done. Are you to penalise a man because he did not till to such a very large extent that it would not pay him? I agree that the State is entitled to expect that a man should use his land properly. But, on the other hand, the owner of the land is entitled to take into consideration whether he can make a profit or not.
He is not in it for his health.
He is entitled to take into consideration how much he can till and make a profit. If you make the measure purely and simply the amount of tillage, then you are doing an injustice. I think the Farmers' Party will, at least, bear me out in that. I do say that if you want to draw a line that you cannot do it at a valuation of £30 or £10 or £5. You will get men whose valuations are under £10 not giving value to the State for the land they have got. You will get men whose valuations are over £10 not giving value to the State. You will get men—and plenty of men—whose holdings are under £5 valuation, who are giving full value to the State, and you will, likewise, get men with over £100 valuation giving full value. But what the Deputy suggests is that the Land Commission, immediately this Bill is passed, should set out and examine every holding in Ireland. That is what would have to be done if the Deputy's idea were carried out.
I was twitted with introducing this Bill before the Election. Every Party in the Dáil asked me at least five times across the floor of the Chamber when this Bill was coming. I was pressed by all parties to produce it. If I have one file in my office I have a thousand, from all sorts and conditions of organisations— Back to the Land, Labour, and Unpurchased Tenants—asking when I would bring in this Bill and telling me to bring it in immediately. Now I am told it is introduced for election purposes, and again we are twitted with supporting the landlords.
Do you remember the Governor-General's speech?
I remember it quite well. All the demands made were that we should deal in this Bill with averages. The tenants pointed out—and rightly pointed out—that the old system was slow, and that it was not, for the difference, worth while to have the Land Commission going over all the holdings, examining them and pricing them, Having regard to the fact that we were dealing, to a great extent, with judicial rents, it was urged that we should adopt the system of averages—that we should strike averages and have the operations of the Bill as far as possible automatic. Nobody ever suggested that there should be a line drawn. All these organisations looked for averages. A rough and ready method was what they wanted. The Deputy can make what capital he likes out of that. Rough and ready methods are what they asked for. I have given them the ready methods, and I have given them fine methods as well. Not a single organisation through the country ever asked for anything except an average figure.
Did they ever ask for tillage?
I am not on that at the moment. I cannot deal with two points at the same time. I was blamed by every party for not making one figure apply to First, Second and Third Term rents. I could not see my way to simplify it down to one figure, but I brought it down to two figures, and I think that was rather good. I was rather criticised for that, and we seem to be back at this position now: wherever any average is likely to prejudice the position of the particular people whom a Deputy is interested in at the moment then the Land Commission is to value the holding. Each Deputy is interested in a different class or a different section or a different part of the country, where there are special conditions, and we are gradually getting back to the position under the 1903 Act of handing over the work to the Land Commission and getting them to examine all the estates and go into the circumstances of each holding—getting them to take the special circumstances of each case into consideration and do justice to each case. It would be very nice if we could do that, but it would take at least twenty years, and we would be back to the good old time under the 1903 and 1909 Acts.
I claim that I produce figures which do justice. I claim that it is not as hard a task to do justice by averages in this particular Bill as it would have been before, because we are dealing with figures that have not been inflated, and that are really rock-bottom figures. Most of the tenants went into the Land Courts when they were set up, and a certain standard figure was put on each holding. We can take a line from that figure. Where tenancies are non-judicial we are allowing the Land Commission to value them. As regards the judicial tenants, we can take a line from the standard figure and we can be very accurate. Every farmer knows that it would not be worth while, for the purpose of righting the little injustices that might be done in particular cases, to go back to the old system and to have the Land Commission do everything. We have tried in this Bill to meet the requests and desires of the tenants' organisations and the labour organisations who wrote to me urging me to deal in averages; there is no use at this hour of the day quoting a particular case and suggesting that the Land Commission should be set going again, inspecting holdings and generally inquiring into how the people use their farms. That is the way to hold land purchase up. It would do more harm than good. What the tenants want is expedition. What we want is expedition. We want to get the Bill passed and to see it operating at the earliest possible moment and in the most expeditious way, and we want to make the tenants the owners of their own holdings.
I am of opinion that the Minister for Agriculture did not regard this amendment in a proper light. I think it is an amendment that should meet with the approval of even the Minister for Agriculture. Considering that the amendment is designed to benefit the really poor man, it would be surprising to find that the Minister for Agriculture or any member of the Government would urge its rejection. The amendment says that in a case where the tenant's total rateable value exceeds £30——
He is to get 25 per cent. and in the case of a tenant whose valuation does not exceed £30, or of a tenant of whose holdings not more than one-half is permanent pasture, he is to get 50 per cent. That is one of the most necessary amendments that have been introduced in connection with this Bill. It is not put forward for electioneering purposes. We know that these Benches would be packed after the election, whether or not this amendment was put forward. If the Minister or the Government reject this amendment it will show that it is really a capitalist Government, and out for the big grazier and not for the poor man. The men who can turn out 16 fat bullocks to the market, I can assure the Dáil, are not the men we are seeking to get this 50 per cent. for. I have the honour to represent a county with the best land in Ireland next to that of Meath, and there is no man in my constituency who can fatten and turn out 16 bullocks on a holding under £30 valuation. Take the argument put forward by Deputy Gorey, which I consider was honest. I am sorry to say that Deputy Gorey was misled——
Misled by the Minister for Agriculture when he introduced the Bill. Mr. Gorey, on the second reading of the Bill, said:
Now, with regard to the question of price, the price set out in this Bill falls very far short of the demand we put forward, and that applies to both price and arrears. I will deal with the question of prices first. They are not even as high as the prices demanded by Fr. Maguire on behalf of the unpurchased tenants of Co. Monaghan. These were 45 per cent. on first term rents, 40 per cent. on second term, and 35 per cent. on third term.
I read that out for the purpose of showing to the Dáil the necessity for accepting this amendment. The Farmers' Party at the time accepted those terms, which were the smallest put forward by that particular unpurchased tenants' organisation. It is only right that the Dáil should now accept this amendment for the purpose of benefiting the poor man. I fully realise that in some counties a holding of £30 valuation is a good holding, and one a man can live on. It would be an injustice if we did not do something for the man who tills a good portion of a small holding. We are not penalising by this amendment anybody who really does justice and contributes to the prosperity of the State. I am of opinion that the Farmers' Party, so far as they have gone, have tried to do justice to the people they represent. But we must take into account that, as Deputy McGoldrick said a few moments ago, and as I was sorry to hear mentioned, Deputy Gorey, the leader on the Farmers' benches, was not out for the uneconomic holder or the unpurchased tenant, but was out for the grazier when he wanted to deal with the sporting rights so that everybody could rear greyhounds. Amendment 20 was out for the interests of the small men, and if that amendment was out for the interests of the small man, so is Amendment 21. The Minister for Agriculture said that if a man owed rent amounting to £24, it would be spread over a term of three years. That would be £8 per annum. How could a man with six or seven acres of land, some of which, to my own knowledge, is not worth 2s. 6d. per acre, pay back arrears to the extent of £8 a year? I am surprised at the Minister for Agriculture, at the Dáil, and at the Government, and I would be twice as much surprised if any Teachtai would vote against this amendment, because I hold that this amendment does justice to all classes. You may compromise in the amendment. If it is a decent compromise I am sure the members at this side of the Dáil will not force it to a division. We do not want to show the hands of any Deputy here; we simply want to see that justice is done. When I used the phrase "Showing the hands," I meant we do not want to do them out of votes at the next election. If a tenant at the present time owes £24, I wonder how much profit the landlords have made in the last twenty or thirty years. I can assure this Dáil that in the last twenty or thirty years a lot of the landlords still in Ireland came into the possession of the land not morally or legally, but through grabbing. I do not see why these people should be entitled to get an excessive rent from the original owners of the land.
I said on the occasion of the Second Reading of the Bill that the landlords were worthy of all the names that Deputy Professor Magennis called them. Of course, Deputy Professor Magennis did not mean to call the landlords names, but he tried to interpret what was passing through Deputy Gorey's mind. I say now he was perfectly honest, and that the majority of these men have come into the possession of the land through grabbing, and here we are, one of the legal Assemblies of the Irish people, and we are going to do justice to the men who battered down the homes of our ancestors with the battering-ram and with the help of an enemy Government. Are we going to do justice to these men now by giving them three years' arrears with a slight reduction of 25 per cent.? When you take that into account, that we are going to do justice to those people, I do not see why the Minister for Agriculture or the Government cannot accept this amendment and do justice to the unpurchased tenant. I hope the Minister will accept the amendment, and I hope that, if a division is called for, the Dáil will not have it said that they are out for the grazier and the rancher, and that they have no thought for the unfortunate persons who are the backbone of the nation, the unpurchased tenant, the evicted tenant, and the ordinary worker.
There is just one part of this amendment that I do not agree with. That is the latter portion, where a distinction is made between the man who tills his holding and the man who does not. I do not think that this distinction would be made by the man who knows Ireland. There are portions of it eminently suitable for tillage, and there are vast tracts where tillage could not be carried on—namely, the mountainous and bog districts. With regard to the small farmer, why he should receive better treatment than the large farmer I think it is quite apparent, but we have never been asked anything about divisions on this question of arrears. We are asked to put up figures. Our arguments have been figures enough. For the last three or four years farms have been run at a loss. If the money is not there, where is it to come from? You are asking for money that is not there. I certainly agree with the portion of the amendment that would give some preferential terms to the small farmer, but I cannot agree with the other part, because there are vast tracts of land in Ireland where tillage cannot be carried on. There is no use in trying to make a distinction on those lines, but there is every reason and every justice in making a distinction between the small man and the large man. We have not put down figures, because nobody is able to tender actual figures with regard to tillage and farming generally. The figures must be judged by the profits that come from farming. Anybody who wants to run a farm of fifteen or twenty acres will very easily find out for himself what the profit is.
Anybody who is not acquainted with the circumstances of the small man has no business talking about him. One must live beside the small man before one can get to know the actual circumstances under which he lives; one has to see what he is able to produce, what his revenues are and what his credits before any kind of solid opinion can be formed as to his actual position. Anyone who wants to legislate on behalf of these people must become familiar with all the figures which this knowledge would give before he can deal with the position of the small man.
I would like to know from the Deputy whether the Unpurchased Tenants' Association or the Farmers' Union ever made that distinction before?
I never said so. As I have already stated, my anxiety in dealing with this matter, is to save something from the wreck. Deputy McGoldrick, in his speech, drew a picture of a good little boy, I do not know how many years ago, going away with five years' rent in his pocket, with instructions to pay it like a good little fellow. From what I know of Deputy McGoldrick, as a man, I am not surprised that he went away with five years' rent in his pocket and paid it out cheerfully. That does not surprise me, nor does it surprise me that the good little boy has grown up into a good little man. What I do object to is his complaint that when he went away and paid his five years' rent, in a few months' time an Arrears Bill was introduced whereby his neighbours had all their arrears wiped out. I think he used the word "dishonesty" in regard to these other people.
Yes, you did, and I think you also used the word "immoral." According to Deputy McGoldrick all these people were rogues, they were dishonest, and they were immoral and, according to him, the Arrears Bill was introduced in order to relieve the condition of these rogues and dishonest and immoral people.
What I said was that the legislation was immoral.
That will be very interesting reading for the people of Donegal, or, as I believe the Deputy calls it, Tirconaill—very interesting reading indeed for the regues and the dishonest and immoral people of Tirconaill.
They appreciate honesty in Tirconaill.
Deputy McGoldrick told me that I knew nothing about the people of Tirconaill, but I think I know more about them than he does. They have entrusted me to look after their interests, and I want to know from Deputy McGoldrick who instructed him to appear for the Unpurchased Tenants of Tirconaill, or on whose behalf he was speaking? If he shows me any written authority entitling him to speak on behalf of the Unpurchased Tenants of Tirconaill, I am prepared to apologise to him.
I can show abundance of it.
I would like to see it. The Unpurchased Tenants of Tirconaill do not think very much about you.
I am the man who represents them.
We have nothing to do with what the people of Tirconaill think on that.
They will settle the matter themselves when they get the chance.
Which is Deputy Gorey or Deputy McGoldrick the Deputy for Tirconaill?
That question does not arise.
Perhaps we may find our way to Sligo yet. You can never tell.
You do not represent it yet, anyway.
I have not said so. I never made the claim that I misrepresented it, as some people are doing at the moment. I again appeal to the Government to take into consideration the claims put forward for this amendment by Deputy Davin and other Deputies. There is no getting away from this fact that, if you want to talk about equity, you must try to divide the equities as between the landlord and the tenant, and do justice between both. The case has not been put up that the landlord has to meet certain payments, but it is only the landlord's case that has been put up. When you talk about the landlord you mean, of course, the greatest wasters in the country; when you talk about the uneconomic and mortgaged landlord you are simply talking about the most disreputable element in the community; you are talking about wasters, men who want medical attendance for something—I will not mention what I have in my mind— men who lived a certain life, and now we are asked to do justice to these people and to make the small men pay off their mortgages for them.
I am afraid that Deputy Gorey places a wrong interpretation upon this amendment. He seems to think it is an amendment giving a preference for the future to the people who till a certain amount of land.
That is not the position. As I have already pointed out, I presume the Minister will be in a position to enforce the payment of whatever conditions are laid down in this Bill so far as its application to the landlord is concerned. All we ask is that the people who have tilled a certain amount of land or whose valuation is below a certain figure should get the concession which is stipulated in the amendment. The Minister, no matter how polite he may be, and he has been very polite on this matter, cannot deny that at a critical period in the country's history, at a particular time when there was a food shortage, certain people tilled a certain amount of their land, and by doing so they have lost a considerable amount of money, and as a result many of them are now heavily in debt. What we ask is that the situation, so far as these people are concerned, should be relieved by the acceptance of this amendment. The Minister, in turning down this amendment, says he is doing it because of representations that have been made to him by tenants' organisations. If we are seriously to accept the statement of Deputy Gorey here, there is only the one tenants' organisation in the country.
I have not said anything of the sort.
You stated that you represented 70,000 of the unpurchased tenants of the country. I do not claim to represent the unpurchased tenants, but I take a generous view of my responsibilities in this matter. I should like to point out that it is not for electioneering purposes that I support the amendment. In that connection I am not as much concerned as some people, at any rate. The Minister made some reference to my views on the farmers' attitude. I could not exactly catch what he said.
I referred to the costs of production.
All I want to say on that is that I am a farmer's son, and that I worked on the land before I went to school in my bare feet as well as in my boots, and I know the situation exactly.
The Deputy knows very well that I am not referring to whether he worked on a farm or did not work on it. I stated that I was glad to see the Deputy give his allegiance to the costs of production principle as a principle which should guide us in arriving at various things—rent, wages, and things of that kind.
I mentioned that in order that the Minister should not be under any misapprehension as to my knowledge of the conditions of the people on whose behalf I speak. Whether it is a coincidence or not, anyone who knows the local circumstances knows that this particular clause would cater for the class of people who live in the area that I represent. Deputy Gorey knows that too, and, as far as I am concerned, I realise that I am discharging nothing beyond my responsibilities in supporting an amendment of this kind. The Minister also said it would be necessary, if this amendment were accepted, to examine every holding, which means, I presume, every unpurchased holding. I suggest that is not the case, and would not be the case if the Minister accepted an amendment of this kind. He also said that the Bill was drafted in such a way as to make provision for the barley producers. He states, and to a certain extent correctly, that the price of barley has gone down to the pre-war figure. But what is the price of the product of the barley? Has that gone back to pre-war price?
I am talking of the products produced from the barley.
I thought you understood what I meant. I meant the difference between the price of the article the barley produced last year and the price of the barley itself. If the price of the barley has gone back to pre-war, it is certain that the price of the product of the barley is not gone back to pre-war. The whole gist of the argument advanced by the Minister is in support of the claim of the pauperised landlords the people who live in Monte Carlo on the interest, not of rents, or of Guinness's shares, but, according to the Minister, on the interest of what they owe. There is no desire, so far as I am concerned, to get the thin end of the wedge in as to the amount of tillage in the future. It is only a question of giving a concession to certain people who, owing to extraordinary circumstances, have suffered, and to the knowledge of the Minister have suffered, and who shall get some consideration over and above the big rancher who is provided for under the terms of the Bill on the same lines as the small farmer.
The Minister has based his opposition to this amendment on the ground that everybody had asked him to deal with this question in averages. Well, I do not know what representations were made to the Minister, but I know that representations by the score had been made to Deputies here on these benches that a difference should be made between the treatment of the grazier and the treatment of the small farmer, who in the great majority of cases tills a fair proportion of his holding; so that the representations made to the Minister are different from the representations made to us, and just as he is claiming to act upon the representations made to him, we are acting upon the representations made to us. I would like to remind the Dáil that, notwithstanding what the Minister said about the effect of this amendment, notwithstanding the plea that he made for those who did not till last year because tillage did not pay, we are not asking that they should be in a worse position than the position which he himself proposes to put them in.
We are not asking that at all. We ask that those who did go to the expense of tilling, and the small holder who is presumed to have tilled, should be placed in a better position than those who did not, and whom the Minister considers are entitled to 25 per cent. reduction. What is the explanation? Deputy Gorey and others have explained that when you are trying to provide sustenance for three people on a certain holding you are at greater expense than if you are trying to provide sustenance only for one, and the cost in connection with operations of tillage are heavier than the cost in connection with the operations on a grazing holding and inasmuch as there are more people to live out of a grazing holding, there is more difficulty in saving money to pay off these arrears.
Now, the Minister thinks he has scored a point by quoting Deputy Davin's reference to the cost of production. But that is not discovery. We at least know, whether the Minister is aware of it or not, that when five men are employed upon a farm it is a cause for a greater output of cash than if only one man were employed upon the farm. That is no new discovery. For we are maintaining, and it is at the back of this amendment, as it is at the back of our attitude to this Bill, that the land is there for people to live upon, and that the more people you can provide sustenance for out of the land the better it is for the country, even if the profits are not so great to the individual holder and if the profits are not so great to the grazier. If the opportunities for saving money to pay off these arrears have been reduced by the fact that he tilled rather than grazed, that is a fair case for advantage to be given to that holder, because he is not in as good a position to pay. More people had to live out of the produce than in the case of the grazier. But the contention of Deputy Magennis that there was any attempt to make this amendment the touchstone of our attitude to the Bill, or the touchstone, rather, of our intention to the Bill was quite a misinterpretation of anything I said.
Quite frankly and clearly I said that we were dealing with the question of arrears and that we wished to make a difference in the treatment of the smallholder or the larger holder who tilled and employed labour on his holding, and the large holder who did not employ labour upon his holding, and that that was the touchstone of the attitude of the Deputies who were always insisting that there should be a distinction drawn between these two classes of land-holders. I admit and acknowledge with gratitude that there are portions of the Bill that quite fall in with that conception, but I want the whole Bill to fall in with that conception, and this amendment is designed to amend this Section dealing with arrears, in that direction.
Question put.
The Committee divided: Tá, 18; Níl, 37.
Tá
- Donchadh Ó Guaire.
- Seán Ó Duinnín.
- Domhnall Ó Mocháin.
- Tomás de Nógla.
- Liam de Róiste.
- Tomás Mac Eoin.
- Seán Ó Ruanaidh.
- Liam Ó Briain.
- Tomás O Conaill.
- Aodh Ó Cúlacháin.
- Liam Ó Daimhín.
- Seán Ó Laidhin.
- Cathal Ó Seanáin.
- Domhnall Ó Broin.
- Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.
- Risteárd Mac Fheorais.
- Mícheál Ó Dubhghaill.
- Domhnall Ó Callacháin.
Níl
- Liam T. Mac Cosgair.
- Gearóid Ó Súileabháin.
- Uaitéar Mac Cumhaill.
- Mícheál Ó hAonghusa.
- Séamus Breathnach.
- Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.
- Seosamh Mac Suibhne.
- Peadar Mac a' Bháird.
- Seán Mac Garaidh.
- Pilib Mac Cosgair.
- Domhnall Mac Cártaigh.
- Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
- Éarnan Altún.
- Sir Séamus Craig.
- Gearóid Mac Giobúin.
- Liam Thrift.
- Pádraig Ó hÓgáin.
- Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
- Piaras Béaslaí.
- Fionán Ó Loingsigh.
- Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.
- Criostóir Ó Broin.
- Caoimhghin Ó hUigín.
- Proinsias Bulfin.
- Séamus Ó Dóláin.
- Aindriú Ó Láimhín.
- Liam Ó hAodha.
- Proinsias Mag Aonghusa.
- Éamon Ó Dúgáin.
- Peadar Ó hAodha.
- Séamus Ó Murchadha.
- Seosamh Mac Giolla Bhrighde.
- Liam Mac Sioghaird.
- Tomás Ó Domhnaill.
- Earnán de Blaghd.
- Uinseann de Faoite.
- Séamus de Burca.
Amendment declared lost.
I beg to move:—
In Sub-Section (2), line 22, to add after the word "made" the words:—
"No proof of the existence of the custom of a hanging gale shall be required other than receipts for any two years' rent prior to the year 1920, or the production of the books of the landlord or his agent in respect of the same period. Such books shall be produced on demand of the tenant."
This amendment at least should not give rise to much contention. The purpose is to deal with the hanging gale. In the case of a good many estates in the country a hanging gale has been customary. In some cases it is a half year, but there are cases where it is a year. That has always obtained on estates. We want to have no further proof necessary of a hanging gale than the producing of the rent receipts to show that the date is a half year or a year hence. I think the amendment is one that the Minister should accept.
Before the Minister agrees to the acceptance of the amendment I would like to draw his attention to the wording of it. The Section deals with estates on which a hanging gale is customary, and the amendment proposes that you should prove that custom by the receipts for any two years prior to the year 1920.
Those two years might 1820 or 1821, or any other two years back to the Flood, as far as I can see from the amendment. Therefore, if the amendment, or anything on the principle of the amendment, is going to be accepted, some definiton ought to be given as to the particular two years that are going to be adduced as proof of custom.
On a point of explanation, this amendment was sent up from Cork and Limerick at the last moment and I had only time to put it in. I believe it is the custom in these counties to have a hanging gale.
I am not denying that hanging gales are customary on many estates, but that you should prove that custom exists by producing rent receipts of a hundred years ago, which would be admissible under this amendment, does not seem to me to be right.
The word "any" may be left out on the Report Stage.
We are on the Committee Stage now and that is the Stage for getting amendments into proper order. It might become part of my duty in my ordinary professional capacity to argue some case upon this amendment, and it seems to me perfectly clear that if this amendment passes in this form you can prove that the hanging gale was customary on an estate to-day by producing the landlords' books of 100 years ago.
I take the view that the word "any" was not intended at all—I do not know.
I take it that what the Deputy wants to get at is to prove this is the most expeditious manner possible. That is the meaning of the amendment. There is no doubt that the amendment is open to the objection stated by Deputy FitzGibbon, and, I think, that the Bill as it stands is really more satisfactory because Section (19) says:—(1) It shall be the duty of every landlord and of every person receiving rents and profits on his behalf to furnish to the Land Commission within the prescribed time and in the prescribed form such particulars as they may require for the purpose of the collection of compounded arrears of rent and payment in lieu of rent, and the Land Commission shall have power to require any person paying rent to any other person in respect of a holding to give such particulars with respect to the holding as they may so require.
That is to say that the Land Commission have power to compel the landlord to produce his books but we could not agree to the books being produced for any two years.
I do not think the word "any" was meant there.
We could not bind the Land Commission by saying that they shall only look at books for two years and for a particular two years. We could not agree to that. There would be no reason for shutting out any evidence that the Land Commission might like to get. The books of the landlord will, in ninety-nine cases out of one hundred, prove the hanging gale, and in ninety-nine cases out of one hundred there will be absolutely no dispute. There may be one case out of one hundred where there will be a dispute and, in that event, the Land Commission will have to decide the custom. Hence, it is not right that any evidence should be ruled out, especially any evidence that might be as much in the interests of the tenant as that of the landlord. We are proving the custom. In the particular case where there would be a dispute it might be of importance to the tenant to produce other evidence besides the landlords' books. I have convinced myself that the Bill as it stands in Section 19 is better than the amendment. As the Bill stands the landlord must produce his books. Say that the Land Commission rule in 100 cases that there is a hanging gale. One case may be disputed. All the parties, and especially the tenant, should be in the position of bringing any evidence they like. I think the Bill covers the points better than the suggested alteration.
I know that there are specific cases covered by the amendment, but I am not able to give you the details as I am not aware of them. I do not know anything about the wording, as the amendment was drafted in Cork and sent up to me. I do not know the circumstances, but I know that they were sufficient to animate the men who sent up the amendment.
Section 19 gives complete power to the Land Commission to have the books produced. In fact the whole section gives the Land Commission complete power to make the landlords produce anything they wish, and the Deputy knows that the books and the receipts would show if there was a hanging gale. In any case, where there is a dispute why rule out evidence that might be in the interests of the tenant? "Any" two years would be completely out of the question.
I do not like the word "any" myself. I think it would be wrong.
I might say that the Minister's view is right, and I give one instance that has occurred to me at the moment. I rather think that in many cases where a hanging gale was the custom that during the fat years 1918 and 1919 tenants did in fact pay up these hanging gales as they were then able to afford to do so, and did not like to have it hanging over them. It would be rather unfair where there was a hanging gale to allow that to be wiped out by the production by the landlord of receipts for that year showing that a tenant had paid in full and therefore alleging that he was not entitled to the hanging gale. I did not make any comment at all from the point of view of attacking the tenants or protecting the landlords. I only made a comment on the wording of the amendment. The Minister's explanation, I think, gives the tenant all the protection he can possibly want.
If the Minister will not accept the amendment I suppose I had better withdraw it.
Deputy Gorey should consider that. The point made by Deputy FitzGibbon did not occur to me. Consider the case where the tenant paid the hanging gale in 1918, the books might show that it was paid up while the custom might be there, and your amendment would rule the tenant out.
I am at a loss for an explanation as the amendment does not concern me personally, or any of my constituents, but some people down in Cork and Limerick.
The amendment might suit certain people, and might be a great injustice to tenants in other parts of the country. Section 19 makes sure that tenants will have the benefit of the books or any other evidence that they like to bring forward.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment No. 23 depends on No. 21, and falls with it. Amendment No. 24 was dependent on Amendment 20 and falls with it.
I move: In Sub-section (4) to insert after the word "Income Tax," line 32, the words "less the usual deduction of one-eighth." I am afraid this amendment is open to criticism of very much the same kind that I ventured to make on the last amendment. I am afraid it does not fit in very well in the place I proposed, and I am not at all sure that it carries out the object I had when putting it down.
The deduction of one-eighth per cent. was allowed, or has hitherto been allowed, in certain cases, and it appears to me possible that it might be contended by the Inland Revenue that the compounded arrears of rent is not really rent at all but is some other form of income and that, therefore, the deduction of one-eighth per cent., which the receiver of that rent would have been allowed, would not be granted to him, because it was not really rent but was some compounded payment in lieu of rent. I put down this amendment rather for the purpose of directing attention to that point and for ascertaining from the Minister whether these compounded arrears were or were not to be treated as if they were the rent that they represent. I could not find any place in the Bill in which the provision for this deduction should be made except in Section 16 and again in Sub-section (4) of Section 17, and therefore I put down the amendment in these two places in order to ascertain from the Minister whether or not it was his intention that this deduction should be allowed in future in the case of compounded arrears of rent. I formally move the amendment in order to get that infortion from him.
resumed the Chair at this stage.
I can give the Deputy an undertaking that the same deduction will be allowed in respect of compounded arrears of rent as would be allowed in regard to rent. I think also, that the compounded arrears of rent are the same thing, but in any case we will not refuse deductions which would be allowable in respect of the amounts of rents and which is considerably less than the rent.
That satisfies me, and I ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Motion made and question "That Section 16 stand part of the Bill," put and agreed to.
SECTION 17.
(1) In the case of every holding to which this Act applies rent shall not be payable by the tenant in respect of any period after the gale day next preceding the date of the passing of this Act. There shall be payable by the tenant to the Land Commission as from the gale day next preceding the date of the passing of this Act an annual sum in lieu of rent equivalent to
75 per cent. of the annual rent to which the holding was subject at the passing of this Act,
which sum is hereinafter referred to as "payment in lieu of rent."
(2) Payment in lieu of rent shall be collected by the Land Commission in accordance with rules made by them.
(3) Payment in lieu of rent shall continue to be payable up to the appointed day.
(4) There shall be payable by the Land Commission to the person or persons entitled to receive the same a sum equal to the amount to be collected as payment in lieu of rent, from the gale day next preceding the date of the passing of this Act up to the appointed day, less income tax and such deduction towards cost of such collection as the Land Commission shall consider reasonable and proper. This sum, less such deductions as aforesaid, shall be paid in equal half-yearly instalments and in accordance with rules made by the Land Commission.
(5) If the interest of any person entitled to receive the rent of a holding or holdings shall not be sufficient to constitute him a person having power to sell to tenants under the Land Purchase Acts, any rent payable by him to the next superior landlord in respect of the holding or holdings shall be reduced by 25 per cent., and, if necessary for the purpose of ascertaining the rent payable by such person in respect of the lands comprised in the holding or holdings, any rent payable by him shall be apportioned by the Land Commission as the justice of the case may require. Similar provisions shall apply and proportionate reductions shall be made in the case of any superior rents payable by any superior landlords who have not an interest sufficient to constitute them persons entitled to sell under the Land Purchase Acts.
Amendment:—"In Sub-section (1), line 42, to insert after the word ‘Act' the words: ‘in the case of any tenant the total rateable valuation of whose holdings exceeds thirty pounds, or of whose holding more than one-half is permanent pasture, or 50 per cent. of the annual rent to which the holding was subject at the passing of this Act in the case of any tenant the total rateable valuation of whose holdings does not exceed thirty pounds or of whose holdings not more than one half is permanent pasture.'"
I formally move this amendment.
I cannot accept this amendment. I do not propose to go into the reasons, which I have stated already on the amendment to Section 16.
Amendment put and lost.
Amendment by Mr. FitzGibbon:—
"In Sub-section (4), to insert after the words ‘Income Tax'' the words ‘less the usual deduction of one-eighth.'"
That amendment goes along with the other one, and I ask permission to withdraw it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment by Mr. FitzGibbon: "To delete Sub-section (5)."
Since I put down this amendment I have received explanations which have satisfied me that it is unnecessary, and I beg leave to withdraw it also.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Motion made and question put:—"That Section 17 stand part of the Bill."
Agreed.
SECTION 18.
(1) The Land Commission shall have for the recovery of compounded arrears of rent and payment in lieu of rent the same remedies as a landlord has for recovery of rent as well as the same remedies as they have for the recovery of unpaid instalments of a purchase annuity.
(2) The Land Commission may, if they think fit, employ in the collection of compounded arrears of rent and payment in lieu of rent any land agent, solicitor or land clerk nominated by the immediate landlord, or in default of such nomination, selected by them on such terms as to remuneration and otherwise as may be prescribed by rules made by them.
Amendment by Mr. Duggan:—
"To insert a new Sub-section after Sub-section (1), as follows:—"Where, owing to the death or absence of the tenant of a holding or otherwise, a difficulty arises in ascertaining in whom the tenancy of a holding is ested, the Land Commission may, if the tenant is dead and there is no legal personal representative of such tenant, or no legal personal representative whose services are available, appoint any person to be administrator of the deceased tenant, limited to the purposes of all proceedings under this Act in relation to the holding, up to the appointed day, and if the tenant is absent, or if, in their opinion, it is otherwise necessary, nominate any person to represent the tenant for the purposes aforesaid. The person so appointed or nominated, while acting in such capacity, shall have the right as against all parties to enter into receipt of the profits of the holding or of the rents payable by the sub-tenant thereon, and shall be liable to the Land Commission for compounded arrears of Rent and Payment in lieu of rent payable under the provisions of this Act.' "
I move the amendment, which provides that where a tenant dies, leaving no legal personal representative, or even in the very unlikely event of the tenant disappearing, that the Land Commission may appoint a person to represent the tenant for the purpose of proceedings under the Act.
Amendment agreed to.
Motion made and question put:—"That Section 18 as amended stand part of the Bill."
Agreed.
Motion made and question put: "That Section 19 stand part of the Bill."
Agreed.
SECTION 20.
(1) Where a holding is sub-let in whole or in part the rent payable by any sub-tenant to the tenant thereof shall, as from the gale day next preceding the date of the passing of this Act, be reduced by 25 per cent.
(2) No tenant shall be entitled to recover from a sub-tenant any greater sum in respect of arrears of rent than a sum ascertained in like manner as compounded arrears of rent are to be ascertained under this Act.
(3) This section shall not apply to any sub-letting made for the purpose of temporary depasturage, agistment or conacre, or for temporary convenience or to meet a temporary necessity.
Amendment by Mr. W. Sears:—
"In Sub-section (1), to insert after the word ‘holding' the words ‘to which this Act applies.'"
In the absence of Deputy Sears I beg to move this amendment, which is merely a drafting amendment.
Amendment agreed to.
I beg to move that Sub-Section (3) be deleted. Clause 20 allows the reduction which the tenant gets, in case this Bill applies to him, to be passed on to a sub-tenant of his, but it shuts out, in Sub-Section (3), a class of people who are, in my opinion, entitled to get this relief also. In some parts of the country small tenants, tenants of uneconomic holdings especially, take conacre on the farms of larger tenants to a very considerable extent, and these people would be benefitted if this Section were deleted. I think that as the tenant gets a relief himself he should pass on the relief to those who are paying him rent, even though it might be of a temporary nature. In some places, as a matter of fact, although conacre is of a temporary character legally or nominally, still there are cases where small tenants bordering on large farms have conacre year after year, and if the tenant of such a farm purchases his land and gets a reduction I think that benefit should be passed on to these as well as the regular sub-tenant provided for in Sub-Section (2).
I do not think the Deputy is alive to the full implications of his amendment. You have a number of temporary lettings for several different reasons and if you pass on this reduction as a general rule, in perhaps the great majority of cases you would be doing a very big hardship to people who make temporary lettings for all sorts of reasons. Take the case of a man who dies and who leaves a wife and young family, none of them able to take up the land. It is a purely commercial transaction. They get the person who takes a temporary letting as a tenancy, a purely commercial transaction, making no claim whatever to the land, having no tenant right, not even a future tenancy, and having it simply because he thinks he can make a profit out of it at the rent. This Bill deals with all tenancies, even future tenancies, but it does not deal with the sort of people who take land in this fashion temporarily as a gamble, as they do in most cases—as a business transaction, in order to make a profit. They look into every aspect of it, and as business men they make their calculations, and make quite sure, as far as they can look forward, to making a reasonable profit out of it. The commonest case of all is the case I have just mentioned, because for one reason or another, perhaps owing to shortage of cash, perhaps the tenant is dead and his wife is unable to run the farm, she makes a temporary letting, and she is probably not able to make nearly as much money as if she were working the farm herself. She lets it to a man who has capital to spare, and who hopes and expects, and probably makes sure, that he takes it at a rent which will leave him a fair profit. It would not be right or fair to apply the provisions in regard to the reduction of rent to such cases. These provisions deal with cases of people who have a certain right to the land over and above the particular agreement which began the tenancy, and it would be most unfair in cases like these that are not being dealt with by the Bill at all to extend the same benefits to them. If the Deputy will think out the cases that are likely to come under that section, then, I think, he will agree that it would be unfair to reduce their rents. They are not tenants and they have no claim anyone can think of, morally or otherwise to the land. There may be a few cases of conacre tenants who have not enough land and who are forced to take land in this fashion. We are trying to deal with them otherwise than by the Bill. We are taking all the powers we can for the relief of congestion, and we hope that will not happen in future. By far the greater number of cases that come in under Sub-section 3 are the kind I mentioned, such as owing to the death of the tenant, his wife is unable to work the land and she lets it to a business man who takes it as business transaction, after going into all the facts and figures, and generally who is able to make a far bigger profit than the tenant who is not able to make anything like as much as she or he would make if in a position to work the land.
Amendment put and lost.
Motion made and question put: "That Section 20, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
Agreed.
SECTION 21.
(1) Subject to the provisions of this Act and notwithstanding anything contained in any other enactment, all tenanted land wherever situated and all untenanted land situated in any congested districts county and such untenanted land situated elsewhere as the Land Commission shall, before the appointed day, declare to be required for the purpose of relieving congestion or of facilitating the resale of tenanted land, shall by virtue of this Act vest in the Land Commission on the appointed day, in the like manner and with the like consequences as if vesting orders under the Land Purchase Acts had been made on the appointed day in respect thereof in pursuance of subsequent purchase agreements entered into by the Land Commission with the respective owners of the lowest interest in the land constituting an interest saleable under the Land Purchase Acts, at a price fixed by or under this Act.
(2) The foregoing sub-section shall not apply to:—
(a) Any land which has been purchased under the Land Purchase Acts or is on the appointed day the subject of an actual purchase agreement thereunder lodged with the Land Commission before the date of the passing of this Act, or
(b) Any land which is not substantially agricultural or pastoral or partly agricultural and partly pastoral in character, or any land comprised in a holding the main object of the letting of which was for a residence, or
(c) Any parcel of untenanted land which is a demesne, home farm, park, garden, or pleasure ground or any holding usually occupied by a person regularly employed on such demesne, home farm, park, garden or pleasure ground, or
(d) Any holding or parcel of untenanted land which in the opinion of the Land Commission possesses a substantial value or utility whether potential or actual as building ground, or
(e) Any land which is vested in or held in trust for the State or any Government Department, or is held by any local or public authority for the purposes of their powers and duties as such, or is held by any corporation for the purposes of a railway, tramway, dock, canal, water, gas, electricity or other public undertaking.
(3) Notwithstanding anything contained in the foregoing sub-sections, where the Land Commission before the appointed day declare in the prescribed manner that any land wherever situated, hereinbefore excluded from the operation of this section (other than land which comes within the description in Clause (e) of sub-section (2) of this section), is required for the purpose of relieving congestion, then such land shall vest in the Land Commission pursuant to this section.
(4) For the purposes of this section the expression "home farm" means a farm used for the convenience or advantage of the landlord's residence and in connection therewith, and not merely as an ordinary farm for the purposes of profit.
I move: "To add after the word ‘land,' Sub-section (1), the words ‘or such land, however owned or held, as may be required for the reinstatement of a former tenant thereof, or his representative, under Section 28."' I desire to be brief in proposing this amendment, and I do not desire to dilate on the hardships suffered by evicted tenants, or to make any appeal to sentiment in this matter. The purpose of the Bill, as I take it, is declared in Section 21, that the land be vested in the Land Commission for the purpose of relieving congestion, and facilitating the purchase of untenanted land. The purpose of my amendment is that power be also given to the Land Commission to deal with cases of evicted tenants. It is the first of a series of amendments. The others follow from this one if it is accepted. The amendment I propose does not mean that automatically the question of the evicted tenants is raised. It means that the power is given to the Land Commission, and the officials connected with the Land Commission, to investigate the cases. If they are fraudulent cases naturally they will be thrown out. If they are genuine cases it is only justice to those who fought the land war in the past that their cases should be considered. That is the purpose of the amendment.
I was wondering whether, on a point of order, it would facilitate matters if my amendment were taken first? It includes the matter in which Deputy de Roiste moves, but mine is of a rather wider nature, and it is certainly intended to include what is covered in Deputy de Roiste's amendment.
"Or for the development of agriculture or otherwise in the public interest." Deputy O'Connell is going on the assumption that it would be to the public interest to reinstate the former tenant or his representative.
Yes. Provision is made that that may be done under Section 28.
As a matter of order, I think, Deputy O'Connell's amendment should have come first, as his is the wider one. If the wider one is not carried then the narrower one could not be proposed.
I think Deputy de Roiste's is a reasonable amendment.
Wait till we decide the question of which amendment comes first. Will Deputy de Roiste allow his amendment to stand or fall by Deputy O'Connell's?
After his, I am quite satisfied.
If Deputy O'Connell's amendment is carried Deputy de Roiste's will not be moved?
Yes. If his is carried it covers my amendment. If his is defeated then I propose my amendment.
Then we will take Deputy O'Connell's amendment first.
I move: "In Sub-section (1), to insert after the word ‘land' the words ‘or for the development of agriculture or otherwise in the public interest.'" The Section provides that land may be automatically vested in the Land Commission, but only for the specific purpose of relieving congestion. Section 21 provides that all tenanted land shall be acquired, and it, of course, will be ordinarily sold to the tenant who occupies the land. It provides also that all untenanted land in the Congested Districts themselves will be used to enlarge congested holdings. It also provides that untenanted land in other districts may be acquired, but only, as I say, for the specific purpose of relieving congestion, or facilitating the sale of untenanted land. Land may be acquired for other purposes.
The purpose for which Deputy de Roiste raised amendments is intended for the sale to the evicted tenants or for the provision of holdings for evicted tenants. The provision is made in Section 28 by which advances may be made or provision may be made to provide land for the evicted tenants, and also under Sub-section (1) (d) of Section 28 for labourers. Under (E) any other person may get advances or holdings may be provided for them. There is no provision, however, whereby land could be got except in the rather slow and tedious process provided for under Section 32 I think. There is no provision by which land could be got for this specific purpose. We think that provision should be made under Section 21 by which land could be acquired by the Land Commission for such purposes as are mentioned in Section 28. The land could be automatically acquired under the provisions of this Section. There are other matters too for which it might be highly desirable to acquire land or small portions of land. But the Land Commission may find itself debarred by reason of limitations in this Section. During the Second Reading I mentioned that it would be possible to have in certain areas model farms or small plots which could be used for educational purposes in connection with a scheme that may be developed or introduced for agricultural education in connection with a county or district school or they may require small plots in connection with the National schools. That would be another purpose. That land must be provided for out of the tenanted land that is retained by the Land Commission. Naturally the tenants will object to that. Or that land might be provided for out of untenanted land that will be purchased, and this does not fix the terms of purchase and does not provide for arbitration as to the price and it may not operate compulsorily. The Land Commission may find themselves in this position that they would be able to acquire a large farm of one hundred and fifty to two hundred acres of untenanted land to relieve congestion. But if it wanted a quarter acre plot for experimental purposes or a few acres for a school farm it would have to go through a tedious process set out in Section 32. That is why I suggest that the words set out in the amendment should be inserted in this Section: That is that they have a right to acquire land for the development of agriculture or otherwise in the public interest. The matters which can be included in that would be at the discretion of the Land Commission and I think it would give them a bigger scope than what they have at present under this Section.
The Amendment reads "or for the development of agriculture or otherwise in the public interest" the Land Commission is to have compulsory powers to acquire land not only for the relief of congestion and for facilitating the resale of untenanted land but also for the development of agriculture and in the public interest. That is an extraordinarily wide clause. This is a Land Purchase Bill. It proposes to buy land from the owners and to resell it to tenants for agricultural purposes. Deputies should not endeavour to make this Bill a Bill for the Acquisition of Land for all purposes. That is unsound. When we legislate we should at least know what we intend to do. Apart from any other consideration there would be a great many objections to giving the Land Commission such wide powers. They can acquire land for a railway, and not only could they acquire land for a railway but they could acquire congest holdings and pay the owners in accordance with the terms set out in the Bill. Very probably there would not be the same unanimity about the price then. They can acquire land for any conceivable purposes, public buildings, railways, anything else you like to think of. There is nothing to stop them. All the terms of this Bill would apply to such land regardless of the purposes for which it was acquired; for something never intended in the Bill, and acquire it from people from whom it was never intended to take land. We should confine ourselves to Land Purchase. We should make sure that we have at least a fair general idea of the powers we are giving the Land Commission or any Government Department under them, though the development of agriculture might mean anything else. Remember you are giving these powers over all lands, over the lands of tenants, over lands of landlords and fee farms; all sorts and conditions of land for agricultural development at the discretion of a public department or otherwise in the public interest. Surely that would be giving almost arbitrary powers to the Land Commission and powers that may be capable of being abused. As a general principle it is unsound to legislate in such general terms. I want the Dáil to confine the Bill to Land Purchase, and if you want to take land for railways or any other purpose let us pass an Act. Let us go into the details of the case and know exactly what it is we want to do. Deputy de Roiste is anxious to see that there is sufficient land provided for the evicted tenants. That is strictly one of the purposes of this Bill. He is entitled to be assured that we have made provisions to acquire sufficient land to deal with all genuine cases of evicted tenants within the period which is prescribed in the Bill. I want to make one thing clear in the Bill and that is that it is primarily for the relief of congests. We have been talking all the afternoon and evening about the arrears and about the question of price, and on the question of price we spent a long time, but the real question, the real sore that is to be salved is this of the congests. This problem of the congests is the real question to be dealt with. I am hopeful, not so much that the tenants will find a big difference in their rents, but that they will find themselves in economic holdings as a result of this Bill. If that is done the real difficulty will be solved. It is quite easy to make the tenants the owners of their own holdings and to make advances to landless men, and put them on holdings which will give them a chance of succeeding. But the problem of the congests is one of immense difficulty, and I want to make it clear that it is the problem to which we gave the greatest care. I want to show that the congests have first claim. There are a great many difficulties. There is the difficulty, as I pointed out before, that if you even have the land, you may not have enough of land in the right place to meet that. We are taking the power to take land already purchased. I may say that only in extreme cases will we go to land already purchased, and only where we could get no other. But we are only taking these powers. Even with these powers we will not be able to deal with congestion in the West, or to deal with it in the neighbourhood of particular estates where congestion exists; there will have to be migration. You have the difficulty there that congests are not willing to leave and the second difficulty that you have the landless man and other possible aspirants to land in the neighbourhood to which they are going, hostile to them. We must do everything we can to remove these difficulties, if we are to solve this problem of congestion. I think that we have done a good lot to remove these difficulties, both from the point of view of the migrant difficulties that will be met by migrating the landless men and the tenant in the neighbourhood to which he has been migrated. We must make it perfectly clear in the Dáil that we are going to deal with congests first. Congests have a greater claim than evicted tenants. A large number of evicted tenants have already been dealt with. There are a large number still to be dealt with, but we cannot hope to go back and remedy all those wrongs which were done for the last 30 years. We are not in a position in the country to help every person. We are not in a position to pay consequential damages to people whose property has been destroyed within the last 3 years. We do not pretend that we can. We are not able to remedy all the grievances, even with regard to evicted tenants, that have accumulated for the last 40 years. Further, we have to take the country as we find it. We have to remember that a number of vested interests have grown up around certain holdings. There are cases where tenants were evicted long before '81, and I know that Deputy Liam de Roiste has tabled an amendment asking us to go back long before '81. There are cases where tenants were evicted from holdings at present in the possession of religious orders and public establishments of all kinds. But there were tenancies that changed hands five times between 1870 and 1881. There were people who came in 20 years ago and bought some tenancies for more than their full value, and with the consent of everyone. We could not take those tenancies away without paying compensation. Further, there are evicted tenants' holdings belonging to people who are living or whose representatives are alive, and we could not place those back, because if they were in occupation of those holdings possibly we would have taken them from them to relieve congestion. All sorts of vested interests have grown up within 30 years, and we cannot hope to wipe them out, and make things right as we could 40 or 50 years ago. If we face the country as it is at the moment with the big problem of congestion, with thousands of tenants huddled together on the West Coast of Connaught, and practically in all parts of the country, and if we deal effectively with that, and go on to deal with the resources at our disposal with the evicted man later, we will be taking the problem in its proper sequence. In Clause 21, to give you an idea of the problem, we are automatically taking up every perch of untenanted land in the province of Connaught, in Kerry, in Donegal, part of Cork and Clare, and yet that will not be sufficient to deal with the congestion in those particular areas. We go practically outside those counties because we can acquire the land compulsorily wherever we require it, and we can take up and acquire demesnes or even purchased holdings where we require them, and where we can get no other land. Although we have to take up automatically all the land in the Congested District counties I have named, yet the land will not be sufficient to deal with the congests within the Congested Districts. Nevertheless we will be able to reinstate a considerable number of evicted tenants in those districts on those lands, and we will be able to sell to landless men a considerable number of holdings for this reason. On one estate there will be very little congestion. You buy an estate, you deal with congestion, you may only have 4 or 5 holdings to deal with, and may have 30 parcels of untenanted land. You may bring in a congest there or put in landless men or representatives of the evicted tenants. Take the case of another estate. Here you may have far less land than would relieve congestion. The first case may be at one end of the county, the second at the other end. It may be more convenient to go outside Connaught and migrate the congests to where you find sufficient land in some other parts of the country. In any case congestion is so scattered and variable that you have to buy untenanted land practically everywhere for its relief. The largest percentage of the evicted tenants come from the province of Connaught. Can we do more in that than take up every perch of untenanted land? What else in an Act of Parliament would meet the situation in a better way or give the tenants better terms? Let the Deputies consider that. It is very nice to be putting in big words about the development of agriculture and evicted tenants and all the rest of it in Acts of Parliament. Nothing you could put into that Bill would do any more for the evicted tenants that were evicted from Connaught than we have done already, because we have arranged to take up every perch of untenanted land in Connaught. A somewhat similar process will operate outside if the Bill is taken into operation. Practically everywhere untenanted land will be taken up. We will deal with the congests first, the evicted tenant next, and the landless men after. We cannot take the risk of leaving the congested districts as they are, and we cannot deal with the problem in any other sequence than by dealing with the congests first, then with the evicted tenants, and then the landless men. If I am right practically all the untenanted land will be cleared for the purposes of the Bill. We can do no more. If you agree with me that the sequence is right—congests, evicted tenants, and then genuine landless men— and if you agree with me that we will be able to break up practically all the available land for the relief of congestion, even though when we take it up we will not be able to deal with all landless men, then I cannot see how you can improve the Bill by anything else.
You will merely raise false hopes; you will merely make the difficulties greater; you will make the difficulties of migrating congests greater.
I hope I have misunderstood the argument of the Minister because it seems to lead to this conclusion, that the problem of relieving congestion will eat up all the untenanted land that may be taken in any part of the country.
That is not exactly what I said.
I tried to explain the point. If you take the province of Connaught, where we are taking up every perch of untenanted land first, what is going to happen there? You have an estate where there are three or four congests and you find you are able to deal with them and have hundreds of acres of land over. You must take up the whole estate. You have taken it up automatically and you find you are able to deal with three or four congests. Over and above that you have 7 or 8 parcels of land. It is open to you to bring into that land migrants from other estates. It is also open to the Land Commission to say: "well it would be more suitable to give this land to the landless men of the neighbourhood and to migrate the congests that exist elsewhere in the congested districts to some place outside the congested districts." They might be on the borders and they might go outside. The point I am making is you will have to take up all the land. Congestion is so variable and so widespread; it is more intense in one area, it is less intense in another area. So far as Connaught is concerned you will have to take up all the untenanted land in order to deal with the problem there. Even though you have taken up all the untenanted lands, you will not have sufficient land to deal with all the congests, and you will find it necessary to send some of them outside. You will also find in your rearrangements that it would suit better to give certain holdings to landless men on an estate rather than bring in congests to it, and as a compensation for that to take out congests and put them somewhere else. It is a matter of rearrangement. Outside the congested areas, let us take it that the Land Commission buy 1,000 acres of land and that acreage is held under the one title. They have to buy the whole of it; they are not going to buy 2 or 3 holdings out of it. They may require only 50 acres of that for congests. There may be one congest in the neighbourhood and when he is dealt with, the balance is all for landless men. Though they acquire the land compulsorily for the relief of congestion, they buy it because it is held under one title; it is just one estate, one farm, one parcel of untenanted land. They buy it for the relief of congestion. There may be 1,000 acres in it and they may require only 200 acres for the relief of congestion, but they must buy it all. They dispose of the 200 acres for the relief of congestion and they have the balance for landless men. They have acquired the whole parcel—that is the technical name—the whole estate if you like, for the relief of congestion; but they will find that they have large areas which they do not require for relieving congestion.
I see the point of the Minister more clearly. It seems to me that much of the argument would tend to support the object of the amendment —that there should be power given for such untenanted land to be acquired outside of these parcels on compulsory terms for such purposes as are admittedly in the public interest—if you like in the interests of agriculture, if one likes to confine it to agricultural purposes. That is the general idea underlying the amendment; but there may well be needs which would require the acquisition of land for this purpose even to fit in with the case the Minister has made. Take the sequence in Section 28. In paragraph (e) we find “any other person to whom, in the opinion of the Land Commission, an advance ought to be made.” If the opinion of the Land Commission were that an advance ought to be made to a certain person or persons, and that land could not be acquired under the terms of the Bill in the place where these persons would be convenienced or benefited, then there should be within the Bill provision for the acquisition. under the terms of the Bill, of such untenanted land as they may consider desirable. We have in mind purposes such as has been mentioned by Deputy O'Connell—the school farm, for instance, the case of landless men or labourers, who may well be in the opinion of the Land Commission, persons to whom advances ought to be made. But there may be no untenanted land, at least there may be no land acquired under the scheme for the relief of congestion which may be convenient for the occupancy of those people to whom the Land Commission think advances ought to be made. There is no intention in this amendment, I am sure, to defeat the intentions or desires of the Minister in the administration of the Bill. It is honestly intended as an improvement, and to meet what we conceive to be the intentions of the Minister; but the restriction he has spoken of would deprive the Land Commission of the power to acquire land except at prices which might well be exorbitant inasmuch as they have to be by agreement, and there is no appeal. The case that is made is that the ultimate object of the Bill is to secure land purchase for the development of agriculture. Surely, it is not a very great extension, or is not incompatible with the general intention, that the development of agriculture should be one of the purposes for which land might well be acquired under the Bill in addition to the relief of congestion. I think the amendment is distinctly in accord with the intentions of the Minister, as he has himself outlined, and I am rather astonished that he should resist it, though I think he resisted it because he imagines there is some ulterior purpose in it.
I do not see why this amendment should be passed. If I happened, instead of being what I am, to be a forty-acre freeholder—not a landlord at all, but a person who, by mere accident, happened to be in possession of 40 acres of freehold land, which I farmed and worked in the ordinary way—I see no reason why the Land Commission, at a price to be fixed by themselves, should take my 40 acre farm from me in order to give it to somebody else, or to set up an experimental farm, or to use it for what they themselves might consider to be a public purpose. This amendment would confer power on the Land Commission to take the farm from any man who owned it and farmed it, and whose forbears had owned it and farmed it from time immemorial, at their own price, in order to make it an experimental farm, or to give it to an evicted tenant who never was evicted from it at all, and who never owned it. If a public body are going to take land for public purposes in that way, they ought to take it at the price which the owner would get for it in the market. This amendment might apply to the owner of any plot of land, however small, in any part of the country. It does not seem to me to be the sort of amendment that should be put into a Bill to enable tenants to buy out their holdings, and to provide from persons who have too much land in Congested Districts economic farms for the congested.
In supporting this amendment I would like to ask the Minister if he takes into account the large farms that are outside the province of Connacht. I know a particular farm of 770 acres on which there is a landlord and tenant. The Minister may call that tenanted land, because there is one employé. The owner was prosecuted for the licence of the dog that the man takes with him around the land. Is it really democratic, in any shape or form, to allow a person like that to retain possession of 770 acres of land?
Read the Bill—Section 27.
I have read Section 27. There are many people living in the vicinity of that ranch, and it is but right that it should be divided. I would like to ask the Minister, now that he admits in this Bill that the evicted tenants should be reinstated, does he realise the necessity of giving these evicted tenants compensation for the time they were out of their farms, through being illegally evicted?
That is another question altogether.
How much would the Deputy give them?
If he gave them as much as he gave the landlords, they would be highly compensated.
Under Section 28 provision is made for advances and holdings for several classes of people. That includes evicted tenants, labourers, landless men and, generally speaking, under 1(e) of that Section, “any other person to whom, in the opinion of the Land Commission, an advance ought to be made.” Power is given to the Land Commission to acquire compulsorily and automatically such land as may be required for the relief of congestion. I unhesitatingly agree with the Minister when he says that the relief of congestion is the most important thing to which this Bill refers, and the most important work it sets out to accomplish. There is no difference whatsoever about that. But suppose the Land Commission finds that it wants to give land to evicted tenants, how is it to proceed? The only way, if it has not enough land to relieve congestion and to give holdings to the evicted tenants, is to provide for the evicted tenants through the operation of Section 32. In that case, it can only acquire the land after agreement with the owner as to price. There is no appeal to arbitration, and if the owner is not agreeable to accept the price offered, or to accept the market price, as Deputy Fitzgibbon mentioned, they cannot compel the owner of this land under Section 32 to hand it over, even though they may want it for the evicted tenants. All that this amendment proposes is that, if such land is wanted for that purpose, or for the other purposes set out in the Bill, there should be power to acquire it.
As a matter of fact, I only suggested one additional use for which the land might be required—school plots or school farms. All the amendment seeks is that power should be taken under Section 21 to acquire land if required for any of these purposes. The Minister read into the amendment—rightly, perhaps—things that were never intended. It was not intended—though the wording might lend itself to that reading— to deal with any purposes outside agricultural purposes, pure and simple. I was not thinking of railways or houses. The only object I had in mind was that the Land Commission should have power to acquire land for the purposes which the Minister has set out in his own Bill.
There is one feature of this question in which I am particularly interested, and that has reference to the evicted tenants. I had intended raising this question under Section 28, but as it has been raised under Section 21, I would like to get an assurance from the Minister in respect of a certain body of evicted tenants in which I am specially interested. The Minister in his statement suggested that congests have a better claim than evicted tenants, that there would not be sufficient available land to deal with congests in the congested counties, and that they would have to go outside these counties to provide for the congested tenants. He quoted certain cases of tenancies which had changed hands five or six times since 1881.
I want to give a case of an estate from which the tenants had been evicted, but the estate is still in the hands of the landlord, and I should like to get an expression of opinion from the Minister for Agriculture as to what exactly is going to happen in the case. I am perfectly satisfied with the Bill as it stands, because the land on that estate will pass into the hands of the Government and the Land Commission, and then the question arises how it will be dealt with. The estate to which I desire particularly to call attention is known as the Adair Estate and from this estate fifty or sixty tenants with their families were evicted wholesale in the year 1860, and the estate was turned into a deer-park by the owner, John Adair. That land is still a deer-park, and the descendants of the tenants, and some of the actual tenants, are alive still and are living round the neighbourhood, others are scattered in foreign countries. Section 28 of this Bill deals with persons evicted 25 years before the passing of the Act of 1903. That does not carry us back to the year 1860. In addition it deals with tenants evicted on ejectment for non-payment of rent. I do not want to go into the history of this case, but anyone who knows anything of the history of the Land War in Ireland will find the record of this case of the Adair Estate. It was really a question of spite on the part of the landlord against the tenants; it attracted great attention at the time, and was well known through out Ireland. It was not a question of non-payment of rent, and, therefore, would not come within paragraph (c) of Section 28; it may come within paragraph (e), but by that time probably there would be no land left when you had dealt with the congests, landless persons, persons evicted from 1878, and labourers, all of whom come within paragraph (e). I do not think there can be any question in a case like that, that the people who have first claim on an estate like the Adair Estate, are those who were flung out on the roadside, and for whom subscriptions had to be raised to ship some of them to Australia to make their way the best they could in life. As I have stated some of these people are living still in the neighbourhood, but possess no land. I do not think you would find even the congests in Donegal would press their claim in a case like this before the claims of the representatives of the tenants who were evicted from this estate at the time of which I speak. This is a question that can be dealt with when the estate passes into the hands of the Land Commission, and I want an expression of opinion from the Minister that he will consider the necessity of bringing within the provisions of the Bill an estate like the Adair Estate, and that he will remember that the descendants of those tenants still claim that that land is theirs.
I am in a position to reassure Deputy Ward that Donegal is one of the counties in which we will take up every perch of untenanted land we can get. We can do no more; and when we take up that land automatically it will be a question for the State Department to divide large farms as between the congests and the evicted tenants. The Deputy will agree we can do no more than take over all the available land, and I hope I will be able to reassure him on the other points when we come to Section 28. Of course, I would have to hear his proposition, and when I hear it I will consider sympathetically any proposition he is prepared to make in regard to any particular case he knows of.
I do not suspect any arriere pensée in regard to Deputy O'Connell's amendment. I am satisfied that the Bill as it stands meets the intention which the Deputy has in mind much more fairly than if the amendment were inserted and if every interest were invited to stake its claim.
Amendment put and declared lost.
I beg to move the following amendment:—To add after the word ‘land' in Sub-section (1), line 60, the words ‘or such land, however owned or held, as may be required for the reinstatement of a former tenant thereof or his representative under section 28.'"
The last case, as I take it, was made for general purposes. The arguments against it were that it was too general. May I now state the particular case of the evicted tenants, and to my mind Deputy Ward has practically made that case. This amendment is directed to give to the Land Commission power to deal with the evicted tenants question. The purpose, as section 21 declares, is for the relief of congestion and to facilitate the re-sale of tenanted land. My amendment is directed so that the Land Commission would have power to take land for the reinstatement of evicted tenants. I must say that I, in common with many persons here and probably throughout the country, was under the impression that this Bill was intended to deal, as far as possible, with every land problem. I infer from the statement of the Minister for Agriculture that it is principally to deal with congestion and to facilitate land purchase and for other particular purposes that he has in mind, but that it was not intended primarily for dealing with other things connected with the land problem. Still, even though we were labouring under a misapprehension in that respect, it surely must be admitted by the Minister for Agriculture that it is the interest of every person to try and make this Bill applicable to every case, so that some of the problems that have been agitating farmers and owners of land in this country for some time past, should come under this Bill and should be met, and that as far as humanly possible, when this matter is first dealt with in an Irish Parliament we should get a settlement of these problems now so that they may not come forward again. I infer from what the Minister said that it may be necessary later on when congestion is relieved and land purchase facilitated to bring in an Evicted Tenants Bill, but as we are dealing with the question now it surely is, as I say, the right of everybody who has an interest in the land question to try and make this Bill applicable to all the other problems. The purpose of the amendment I have already stated.
As the Deputy does not seem to know it already, this Bill deals with other problems besides congestion. It deals with evicted tenants and landless men. It is not a Bill to give everything to everybody, and does not profess to be.
I know myself there are numerous claims by evicted tenants. Some of these claims may be perfectly sound and many of them are, perhaps, unsound. I quite see that the Minister for Agriculture has just as much sympathy for the evicted tenants as any of us, and I know thoroughly well that he will deal with them sympathetically. At all events, there are many cases which the Bill does not provide for, and to my mind these require investigation. As Deputy de Roiste points out, this amendment purports to give certain powers to the Land Commission to investigate all these claims, and I think that, to consider the large number of claims that are in course of preparation it will be essential the moment this Bill becomes law to provide the Land Commission with some such machinery to examine the sound and the unsound claims.
Amendment put
The Committee divided: Tá, 16; Níl, 35.
Tá
- Seán Ó Duinnín.
- Domhnall Ó Mocháin.
- Tomás de Nógla.
- Liam de Róiste.
- Tomás Mac Eoin.
- Seán Ó Ruanaidh.
- Liam Ó Briain.
- Tomás Ó Conaill.
- Aodh Ó Cúlacháin.
- Liam Ó Daimhín.
- Seán Ó Laidhin.
- Cathal Ó Seanáin.
- Domhnall Ó Broin.
- Domhnall Ó Muirgheasa.
- Risteárd Mac Fheorais.
- Domhnall Ó Ceallacháin.
Níl
- Liam T. Mac Cosgair.
- Gearóid Ó Súileabháin
- Seán Ó Maolruaidh.
- Séamus Breathnach.
- Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.
- Peadar Mac a' Bháird.
- Seán Mac Garaidh.
- Risteárd Ó Maolchatha.
- Pilib Mac Cosgair.
- Domhnall Mac Cártaigh.
- Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
- Earnán Altún.
- Gearóid Mac Giobúin.
- Liam Thrift.
- Liam Mag Aonghusa
- Pádraig Ó hÓgáin.
- Pádraic Ó Máille.
- Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
- Piaras Béaslaí.
- Fionán Ó Loingsigh.
- Séamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.
- Criostóir Ó Broin.
- Proinsias Bulfin.
- Aindriú Ó Láimhín.
- Éamon Ó Dúgáin.
- Peadar Ó hAodha.
- Séamus Ó Murchadha.
- Seosamh Mac Giolla Bhrighde.
- Liam Mac Sioghaird.
- Alasdair Mac Cába.
- Tomás Ó Domhnaill.
- Earnán de Blaghd.
- Uinseann de Faoite.
- Séamus de Burca.
- Séamus Ó Dóláin.
Amendment declared lost.
I move to report progress until to-morrow.
Agreed.
