I agree entirely with the tenor of Deputy Johnson's remarks, and I will try to give whatever information I can give at such short notice, but possibly there will be some details which I am not in a position to fill in. It is an undoubted fact that Press correspondents are exploiting this question for their own reasons. That has been done for a long time and is still continuing. I do not know what those reasons are, but that it is a fact is perfectly clear. There is no abnormal distress in the West this year. I say that definitely and deliberately. There is always distress in the West, as Deputy Johnson has pointed out, but the distress this year is not, taking the whole congested districts into account, particularly unique. There might be perhaps small areas this year within the congested districts in the West in a worse condition than they were last year. On the other hand there are areas in a better condition than they were last year, but on the whole the distress this year is nothing more acute than the normal distress in those areas.
We tried to envisage this problem as a whole at the beginning and we endeavoured, when tackling the problem some months ago, to co-ordinate the work of the various departments. For that reason the Minister for Local Government and myself summoned all our officials here to Dublin, got them all into the same room and got exact information as to the various districts which needed relief for one reason or another. We prepared maps showing acute poverty. On the same map we coloured in the failure of potatoes and the turf supply. Moreover, we prepared other maps shaded differently showing whether there was partial or three-quarters or one one-quarter failure of turf, potatoes and of crops generally. We did the same for poverty where there was acute poverty, poverty less than acute and something which you could hardly describe as poverty and could not describe as comfort. We had that information and we are satisfied that that information is accurate and that the areas were defined accurately, and that we had reliable information on all those questions. We knew exactly where there was real poverty and acute poverty, where the turf and potatoes failed, and where there was unusual distress. We then, on that information, made definite schemes, first, to provide work, second, to provide fuel, coal and timber as an alternative to turf, and third, to provide seed potatoes.
There is never real famine in the West unless there is a failure of potatoes, and there was no failure of potatoes this year, except in one or two limited areas, and in those limited areas because Champions were sown. The only potatoes that failed this year were the Champion and the Irish Queen. We have been trying for years to get the people in the congested districts to grow other potatoes than Champions and Irish Queens. We took full advantage of the fact that the Champion had failed to get in other varieties. The failure of the Champion did more to change the mind of the small farmer who is fond of that variety than any propaganda our Department could do. We spent practically £30,000 on the best of seed, and that seed is being distributed where it should be distributed, first of all in the areas where potatoes have failed, in a small part of Mayo and limited districts in Kerry and all over the congested districts. £30,000 worth of the best varieties of potatoes, Kerr's Pink and Arran Victory, will go a very long way, and has resulted in productive work. They will increase and multiply, moreover, and be there the year after. It will bring large supplies of fresh imported seed into those districts, and will do a considerable amount towards preventing famine and distress in so far as it can be prevented in future years. The only regret I have is that we are not able to get in bigger supplies. It is not an easy matter because Government buying puts up prices, and you had to buy carefully and distribute carefully. Potatoes were bought and sold at very reduced prices indeed, especially in cases where there was real poverty. A similar amount of money was spent on fuel. We have not provided fuel for every district where turf had failed. We could not do it, and it was not necessary. In some districts where turf failed there was not acute poverty, and in some there was no poverty at all. We took out the districts where there was acute poverty, and at the same time where the turf failed. We provided fuel for those districts. We bought fuel reasonably, resold it at a small price, and gave credit wherever credit was necessary. The arrangements for the distribution of seed have been made by the Department of Agriculture in those areas, and the arrangements for the distribution of fuel are in the hands of a small committee under the supervision of an officer of the Department of Local Government.
One hundred and seventy thousand pounds approximately was voted for relief works in those districts. The schedules of those works were not prepared suddenly, they were not a lastmoment decision. We foresaw this six months ago, and the Land Commission had ready various works which they would have to do in those districts, in any event. They had them scheduled, and were ready to begin, and they began them promptly. We took into account, in placing those works, the factors that I have mentioned—poverty, failure of fuel, and failure of the potatoes. We tried not to place those works in areas where we had given relief of another kind. There has been co-ordination in regard to those three main varieties of relief, and I say, deliberately, that with the relief given by the State this year, the conditions in those districts are not worse— if anything they are slightly better— than they ordinarily are. That is the exact position, as far as I know it, and I think my information is accurate. There is never famine in those areas except there is failure of the potato crop, and in some of the really poor districts the potatoes were better this year, strange to say—considering the weather—than they have been for the last five or six or ten years. There was a better crop than the average in Donegal this year. I hope there is a Donegal Deputy listening to me. The crop there was better than the average crop for the last ten years.
We had very little difficulty in selecting the counties to be examined. They were the counties with congested districts, and, in addition, the County of Cavan. Of course, we had the elections to help us and, judging by the remarks of some Deputies on this question, we should have refrained from doing anything in Connemara this year, because there were no elections. We should have taken the same course in Kerry and in Donegal, according to these Deputies. But I pass from that question. We picked out the counties. They were very well known. Everybody knows them. We examined those counties carefully in respect of the three matters I have mentioned—poverty failure of fuel, and failure of potatoes. The work of the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Local Government has been co-ordinated, and the work of relief is going ahead promptly. The money voted is being spent, and it is meeting the case. In addition, there is, I think, £3,000 set aside for a very useful scheme for providing meals for school children.
With that provision for relief, there is less distress in those areas than there was in 1912, 1913 or 1914, when all our Press correspondents were silent and when all the other benevolent people were silent also. I should say that there are a good many voluntary agencies doing useful work—they have always been doing useful work in those districts—and the Government has already set up a committee to co-ordinate that work. But, on the whole and in the nature of the case, the work the Government can do itself through the Land Commission and the Local Government Department is, of course, far more considerable than could be done by the best intentioned and best organised voluntary associations. At the same time, there is a committee endeavouring to co-ordinate the work of those bodies and I do not think there is any cause for anything like anxiety on this question at the moment.
As we are talking about congested districts, what has really happened is that we are spending money on those areas for the purpose of keeping people there next year to spend it on them again. That has been the position for 30 or 40 or 50 years. Deputies will have to face the problem and a big decision will have to be taken to deal with certain well-defined portions of the congested districts, which we all know and which we can all envisage at the moment. They can be dealt with partly by land purchase, but only partly. If we succeed in dealing with half the congests—I say this as a result of close examination of the figures— by the exercise of the powers we have to acquire land under the Land Act, if half the congests in certain areas adjoining the sea coast can be dealt with, then you will have done as much as you possibly can by land purchase. You can do a lot more, you can go another quarter of the distance towards solving the problem—giving all these men hard work, hard work which will enable them to live decently and rear their families decently—by schemes of drainage and reclamation. A big lot can be done in that way, but when drainage is finished and land purchase is finished there will still be a residue which will have to be dealt with. But this is not the time or the place to discuss how it will be dealt with.
That generally is the position in regard to the congested districts, and these are the possibilities and the potentialities, as I see them.
