The intention governing the insertion of the word "empty" was to exclude bottles that were imported merely as containers and to let the tax fall on bottles that were imported as bottles for purposes of being filled when they arrive. This is one case in which it is particularly difficult to give accurate information to the Dáil in regard to the quantity of bottles that will be affected. The import figure for bottles and jars shows the value of £9,000 in the month of January last, or about £96,000 a year. However, that might include, and does include, a considerable number of bottles which would not come under this particular duty. The purpose of confining the duties to glass coloured green or black was that protection might be given at any rate in the first instance to the type of bottle which existing bottle manufacturers can make, and which they say they can make satisfactorily and hold the market with, if they were given a degree of protection. That protection is required mainly from the bottles manufactured on the Continent, not from English bottles. In the case of this particular duty, when it comes up for reconsideration next year, if it is felt then desirable to continue the experiment, it might be regarded as desirable to extend the charge to all bottles, so that if possible not only the bottle industry, but the glass industry, might grow up in the country. I do not know whether it would be possible at all to revive an industry such as the Waterford Glass Industry. But in the meantime there are factories here which make a particular type of bottle. It seems as if this industry, which has existed for a long time in the country, was destined, if something is not done at the present moment, to go out of existence completely. The duty is imposed to prevent that, and to give an opportunity for the extension, and for the opening, perhaps, of new factories in other parts of the country, and ultimately we hope to lead to the extension and alteration of the scope of the entire industry.
The amount of revenue to be derived from this particular tax, it is anticipated, will be very small. The industry dealt with is not a large industry, and the tax may be reckoned as a minor one. I would not like at the moment to risk stating to the Dáil what would be the value of imports of bottles that would come under the title "green and black." I will be able to give that when the Resolution will be under discussion on Report. It is not a very large sum in any case. The question of whether we shall alter the description so that other bottles which might be coloured, say, purple, might be included in case there was danger of the tax being evaded will be carefully considered. It is not intended that the term "green" should include ordinary medicine bottles, or bottles that are really clear glass, but which may have a greenish tinge. There was formerly a tax on bottles of green and coloured glass. The phraseology was adapted, and it may in present circumstances be necessary to extend that, perhaps, to all coloured glass. But the reason we do not put in "coloured glass" at the moment is, that there are bottles, I think, imported for the purpose of holding poison which are blue and of peculiar shape, and we do not desire that these particular bottles should be taxed. It may be possible to amend the phraseology of this Resolution in some particular way, though I think that it probably will stand and it probably will serve its purposes sufficiently. The competing firms are not likely to find it profitable to manufacture bottles, especially for a small market like this, and colour lots of bottles in any particular way. The market here is unlikely to be big enough to make that possible to be done.
