Vol. 11 No. 23
In page 8, section 10, line 9, after "person" to insert "being a citizen of Saorstát Eireann who is a Dáil Elector for the constituency of the County of Louth and," altered to read:—
"In page 8, section 10, line 9, after the word ‘person' to insert ‘being a citizen of and ordinarily resident in Saorstát Eireann.'"
Section 10 of the Dundalk Harbour and Port Bill defines the qualifications of electors of commissioners. The commissioners and their qualifications are dealt with in Section 9. "Every person who at the time of such election shall be resident within the urban district of Dundalk or within five miles from the courthouse of the said town," and "shall be in actual occupation of land or houses" rated at £20 is qualified to act as a commissioner. The provisions of the Bill with regard to the qualifications for electors prescribes, firstly, a person who is in occupation of land rated at £20; secondly, a person registered at the port of Dundalk as the owner of not less than 100 tons of shipping belonging to the said port, and, thirdly—and this is the point of the amendment—"Every person possessed in his own right of not less than the capital sum of £100 in the stock of any shipping company or steam vessel company established at or trading from the port of Dundalk."
I imagine that the origins of this provision date back to the early days of the joint stock company and the days when shipping usually had a location and a home port, to and from which it normally and almost invariably traded, and the intention, no doubt, was to cover a vessel which normally traded from the port and belonged to the port. But with the present development, a vessel could be considered as trading from the port though it belonged to London or to Dieppe, or any other port on the Continent or in any part of the world. So long as the vessel was going to and from the port of Dundalk this section, as drafted, would entitle the registered owner of £100 worth of stock in the company that owned the vessel to have a vote for the elections of Harbour Commissioners. That is a defect that I am certain was not intended by the promoters of the Bill, but it is a defect, and it would allow of an electorate of shareholders of £100 worth of stock in any big shipping combine or any big railway company to be the controllers, through the election process, of the port of Dundalk. That nobody desires, and I want to guard against it. I put forward one or two forms of amendment to try to safeguard the position, but it has been pointed out that the form of the amendment which is printed on the green paper might raise a difficulty which would mean sending back the Bill to Committee, and that might mean a delay in the passing of the enactment. My purpose in putting forward this phraseology was to ensure that the voter would be resident in this country. I have since been informed that all the safeguards that are required would be secured by reverting to the position in the original Act of 1855, which this Bill is intended to embody and to supersede.
The original Act of 1855 stated that the qualification for an elector was that he should reside within five miles of the courthouse of the borough of Dundalk, and I am informed that no difficulties will arise in matters of order and procedure, and that there need be no further delay in passing the Bill if this form were allowed to be substituted for the form I have placed on the Order Paper, and I would ask to be allowed to substitute for the words "being a citizen of and ordinarily resident in Saorstát Eireann," following the paragraph dealing with the third qualification, to add these words: "and residing within five miles of the courthouse of the borough of Dundalk." If I am permitted to move that amendment in substitution for the one on the Order Paper, I beg to move it. As I say, it is embodying in the new Bill what has been in the Act under which the port and harbour has been acting for sixty or seventy years. It meets my contention, it is acceptable to the promoters of the Bill, and should be acceptable, I think, to everybody interested in the safeguarding of the franchise in matters of this kind. Personally I would not be inclined to press for the residence within five miles; I would be quite satisfied if the residence were within the Saorstát, but inasmuch as the question of procedure would arise, and, further, that the Act under which the Harbour Board is at present operating, contains this restriction, I am quite prepared to move this revised version in place of the version on the Order Paper.
Leave given to withdraw Amendment 1 on the Order Paper and to substitute the new amendment.
I am not quite sure that Deputy Johnson has made his position quite clear. Is this the only alteration that he proposes should be made in the Bill, as it left the Joint Committee?
In connection with this section, yes.
In connection with this section only?
Yes.
Alterations have been made in other sections. Does the Deputy maintain that these alterations should stand?
The alterations in the other sections deal with different matters. This amendment is dealing with the qualifications of electors of the Harbour Commissioners.
This does not affect the amendments proposed by Deputy Good in the slightest.
Or the later amendments by Deputy Johnson, I presume.
Or by the President.
If the amendment as now put forward by Deputy Johnson is approved, does it mean that the Bill will have to go back to the Joint Committee under the Standing Orders?
No, it does not.
Because the Standing Orders are quite clear on this point. I do not know whether Deputy Johnson has considered that aspect of the question. Standing Order 87 states:
On the fourth stage amendments may be moved, but when, in the opinion of the Ceann Comhairle, an amendment proposed on the Fourth Stage is one of substance, or introduces new matter into the Bill, the Bill shall be recommitted for consideration of such section or sections as, in the opinion of the Ceann Comhairle, are affected.
That raises an important constitutional principle. I take it that the principle underlying that Standing Order is that once a Bill leaves a Joint Committee it should not be interfered with by either House, and if it is that it should be referred back to the Joint Committee in order that the Committee may express its opinion on the case. In other words it means that it is the recommendation of the Committee that ought to form the basis of the Bill and that, except some real necessity for it is discovered, neither House should interfere with it. I do not know in this case that such a question arises. Of course it may not arise exactly on this amendment, but it is possible that it may on other amendments, and if the Bill must go back to the Joint Committee will all these points be considered by the Joint Committee?
The Deputy has been quoting the Standing Orders of the Dáil. Private Bill Standing Orders 93 and 94 deal with this matter.
Standing Order 94 of the Private Bill Standing Orders seems to have some bearing on the case:—
If any Clause or Amendment offered on the Fourth Stage of any Private Bill in the opinion of the Cathaoirleach of the Seanad or the Ceann Comhairle of the Dáil, as the case may be, is one of substance or introduces new matter into the Bill, such Clause or Amendment shall be referred to the Committee on the Bill; and no further proceedings shall be had until the report of the said Committee shall have been brought up.
We are faced to-day with the situation that changes are proposed which seem to me to introduce new matter into the Bill to a certain extent. Some changes have been made in the Seanad, but the Cathaoirleach has not ruled that they did introduce new matter. I must say that this is a very complicated matter, and I should like the Joint Committee on Private Bills to have an opportunity of considering it. But I would like to say, with regard to Deputy Johnson's amendment, that I look with grave apprehension on the introduction of a territorial restriction principle in regard to this matter. Dundalk is not a port that serves the county of Louth alone; it serves the hinterland, the counties Monaghan and Cavan and Louth. I hold that it would be very desirable to allow a representative of the cattle trade of that area to be a member of the Dundalk Harbour Board.
This amendment would not prevent that.
He would have to live within five miles of the courthouse.
No, that is only his qualification as an elector. The provision of the Bill itself makes that condition, but that is not what I am dealing with.
I submit this is not introducing any new matter into the Bill of a contentious nature. It is simply reestablishing what was the status quo for the last seventy years. If the original amendment put down by Deputy Johnson were proceeded with, it would possibly introduce some new matter of a nature that should be sent back to the Committee. But this amendment does not interfere with any of the ancient rights or privileges of shipowners in the port. It is leaving the matter exactly as it was and is taking away no privilege that they had. Therefore I say this is not a matter which should be sent back to the Committee for consideration. As far as the promoters are concerned, they are in agreement with the amendment as now put forward, and I hope the Dáil will accept it.
This is not an amendment that introduces new matter into the Bill. It does not interfere with the existing rights.
I understand the amendment to mean that nobody outside a five-mile radius from Dundalk is to have a vote in the election of Commissioners under any circumstances, as part shipowners or otherwise. In other words, if a man living outside a certain radius was interested, to a large extent, in shipping using the port of Dundalk, he would have no vote in the election of Commissioners.
The qualifications in the Bill are as follows:—
The following persons and no others shall be entitled to vote in the election of the Commissioners:—
Firstly:—Every person who at the time of such election shall be in actual occupation of lands or houses rated to the relief of the poor at the net annual valuation of £20 within the urban district and shall for each of the two years next immediately preceding the date of such election have paid rates due on lands or houses of the net annual value of £20 situate as aforesaid except such as shall have become payable within three months next before the date of such election:
Secondly:—Every person registered at the port of Dundalk as the owner of not less than 100 tons register of shipping belonging to the said port;
Thirdly:—Every person possessed in his own rights of not less than the capital sum of £100 in the stock of any shipping company or steam vessel company established at or trading from the port of Dundalk;
Into the last qualification I seek to insert:
"and residing within five miles of the courthouse of the borough of Dundalk."
These words are taken from the existing Act in respect to the same qualifications.
I quite understand that Deputy Johnson was only referring to the third qualification, but what I was asking was: Does he want to shut out all the shareholding capital in shipping going into Dundalk outside a certain radius from having a vote?
I want to shut out the possibility of the "Ching Chan Chu" Shipping Company, having 25 shareholders, each possessing £100 worth of shares, sending its vessel from China to Dundalk and claiming the right to vote for the Harbour Commissioners.
I am afraid they would not have much effect.
I want to prevent the possibility of that or anything parallel to it.
In preventing that, the Deputy is also preventing a man, say, in County Meath, interested in shipping coming into Dundalk, from having a vote.
I submit that Deputy Johnson has proved conclusively that the amendment in its new form introduces new matter, because the present Bill, as it is before us, alters the existing law. The Minister for Defence, who knows the situation thoroughly by immediate acquaintance with the facts, has repeated what Deputy Johnson told the House, that during the last 70 years the law was other than it would be if this section were passed. What Deputy Johnson proposes to do is to undo the new legislation. I quite agree with this amendment and I should like to have it passed—the amendment on the green paper. What is sought to be done in this Private Bill legislation is to create in Dundalk a situation to which we object in the port of Dublin: that a foreign shipping company has the power to vote and interfere with what is a vital element in the well-being of the citizens of Dublin and the hinterland of the city. Dundalk was free from that anomaly: that non-citizens could interfere with the control and take a share in the control and regulation of their harbour.
On a point of order, is the Deputy speaking to amendment No. 2 on the Order Paper, or to the first amendment? I think he is confusing them somewhat.
Will the Minister please point out in what I am confused? I should be very glad to have the clarification of his intelligence.
I think what the Minister of Defence meant was that Deputy Magennis may not have been here when the new amendment was moved by Deputy Johnson.
I am quite in favour of the amendment. It is the second best to the amendment which we agreed to allow him to withdraw. But what I suggest on the matter of procedure is, that the amendment introduces new matter, therefore it comes within the regulation of the Standing Orders dealing with Private Bills.
I have already ruled that the amendment does not introduce new matter.
Is that final?
Yes, that is final.
Before we get to the subsequent amendments, may I raise a point that might be for the assistance of Deputies? I notice that the Bill circulated to Deputies for consideration is the Bill as amended by the Seanad on Report. Before we go on, or as we are going on to the subsequent amendments, could we have circulated to us the Bill that came out from the Committee that the Seanad has amended? Deputy Cooper has just raised a point as to whether certain matters should have been or could have been amended by the Seanad. I think it would be for the assistance of Deputies —at least it would be for the assistance of my own mind in this matter—if we could also have a copy of the Bill that came from the Committee, which is really the matter that we ought to be considering and not merely, I suggest, the matter that has been changed by the Seanad.
Surely we are considering the Report Stage of the Bill. Are we going to go back to the original proposition when the Bill was introduced first by the promoters? If we are going to do that, we are not going to get forward with legislation. The Bill comes up in the ordinary way from the Seanad, and if the Deputy thought that he wanted the information he now seeks to get he could have looked for it before this. I submit that the business should not be held up now in order that the Deputy may get some papers that he wants.
I am very much obliged for what Deputy Magennis calls the clarification of the Minister for Defence's intelligence. I am not asking for the original Bill. I am asking for the matter which we ought to consider on Report, and that is the matter that came from a Committee, not the matter that came from another House.
The truth is that we are all rather inexperienced in dealing with Private Bills. I think the Minister for Defence was not quite right when he said we are dealing with this in the usual way of dealing with Bills from the Seanad. Generally we get the Seanad amendments on a separate sheet. I think the usual procedure at Westminster is to mark the amendments made by italics. Deputy Magennis and myself are, I suppose, to a certain extent jointly responsible for that not being done. It would be better, and I hope it will be done in future, to mark the amendments made in Committee possibly by italics and the amendments in the Seanad by italics underlined. Then we shall see what the original form of the Bill was and know where the different alterations were made. We are at some disadvantage at the moment. At the same time, I do not think we can defer consideration of the Bill.
I was not asking that we should defer consideration of the Bill. I was merely asking that while we are going on to consideration of the next amendment officers of the Dáil should circulate copies of the Bill as it left the Committee. That is a very simple thing to get.
I am not at all anxious to cause any delay, but I think there is a very important matter concerned with the interests of Private Bill legislation in general involved in this question. I think we ought to have a definite ruling on our part as to this general question: as to whether any change in an arrangement made between contesting parties when a Private Bill goes to a Private Bill Committee is not a matter of substance. It seems to me that anything involving a change like that might well militate most seriously against the interest of Private Bill legislation: that if a bargain or arrangement is made in such Committee and comes to either House to be altered, anything in the nature of change in that bargain ought, as a matter of course, to go back to the Committee. Deputies who have had anything to do with Private Bill Committee work know that one of the very great advantages of it is, that in the presence of expert witnesses, and having heard all the witnesses, the contesting parties come more into touch with one another and are more ready to give and take with reference to their own wishes. But it seems to me if they once feel that if they give something, and if that "give" is likely to be extended when the matter comes to either House, they will be very slow to indulge in that give-and-take policy at all. The very possibility of what we seek to gain by Private Bill legislation, namely, that bargaining between contesting parties and coming to a common understanding is endangered by a change of this kind which, to my mind, is of vital importance and substance. I am not talking of this particular Bill. I am talking on the general point of the alteration of any agreement made between contestants in Private Bill Committee.
With reference to the point raised by Deputy Figgis, Standing Order No. 93 states:
Where a Private Bill has been referred to a Joint Committee, the Joint Committee shall report to both Houses. The Fourth Stage of the Bill shall then be taken in the Seanad, and the Bill, if passed by the Seanad, shall be sent to the Dáil for Final Consideration, the First, Second and Third Stages in the Dáil being deemed to have been passed. On the Final Consideration, the Dáil may amend the Bill subject to Standing Order 94, or may recommit it to the Joint Committee or refer it to a Special Committee.
Might I, with every respect, ask you to notice the words you have read:
"Where a Private Bill has been referred to a Joint Committee, the Joint Committee shall report to both Houses."
I want to know whether we have the Joint Committee's report. We have not got it. We have the Joint Committee's report as changed by the Seanad, but the Joint Committee has not reported to this House, in so far as we have not got the text of the Joint Committee's report to this House.
The report from the Joint Committee on every Private Bill is sent on to the Dáil.
I am asking where is the report of the Joint Committee which we are now considering—where is the text of it?
Copies of Private Bills are made available at the Private Bill Office, and Deputies interested in any Private Bills get their copies there. Copies of the Joint Committee's Report are sent to every member of the Dáil as well of the Seanad. And Deputies interested in Private Bills can obtain copies of them at the Private Bill Office, as I said, but they are not circulated in the same way as Public Bills are.
What I suggest is that officers of the House should circulate these Bills in their amended form.
If that is done this Bill could not be passed to-day and the possibilities are that any works connected with the undertaking will be deferred for a long time.
Where is the necessity for holding up the Bill, in view of the fact that the Standing Orders have been complied with? It is only causing unnecessary delay.
The suggestion made by Deputy Figgis should be made at some other time. This is a question of procedure. We are simply following the procedure adopted up to the present. We will now take amendment No.2.
I beg to move amendment No. 2:—
In page 8, section 15, line 52, after the word "Connolly" to insert the words "and a person to be nominated and appointed by the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company as in this Act provided."
In moving this amendment I might say a few words to clear the air somewhat. If I state, in view of the discussion that has taken place, that this amendment and the two subsequent amendments in my name are intended to reinstate in the Bill portion of clauses that were taken from the Bill after it left the Committee Stage, and if these two successive amendments are adopted by the House, then the object I hope to achieve of reinstating the Bill exactly in the form in which it left the Joint Committee will be attained. There is a great deal to be said on this point of not interfering, for obvious reasons, with the recommendations, of a Joint Committee. That is a point I will not raise at this stage. The object of this particular amendment is to add to the number of persons set out in Clause 15 as forming the Commissioners. If Deputies will look at Clause 15 they will see, first of all, there the names of fifteen elected persons. Then in addition to them there is one person to be nominated who is to be the Chairman for the time being of the Dundalk Urban Council, and in addition another person is to be added—that is, the chairman of the county council. And these two, with the elected fifteen, form the Commissioners. As the Bill left the Committee there was a third person. The words occur in line 52: " and a person to be nominated and appointed by the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company as in this Act provided"; so that would make up eighteen persons for governing the port of Dundalk.
Objection has been made to the privilege of nomination to be conferred on the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company which it had under the Bill as it left the Committee Stage to nominate the Commissioner on the grounds, first of all, that it set up a new principle. Well, in view of the Bills that have recently been before this House I think there will be general agreement that this proposal does not set up any new principle. This principle of nominating commissioners to harbour authorities is a very old one. In the adjoining Port of Carlingford, where they have a somewhat similar body of commissioners, they have nominated representatives on behalf of the railway company just exactly as is proposed in this amendment. And there are a number of other precedents for this proposal which I need not take up the time of the House discussing, because that is a matter that has been under consideration in this House on so many occasions. The reasons the promoters of this Bill had in view in putting forward this particular proposal I think were fairly obvious. I understand this railway company is the only railway company that is running into the Port of Dundalk. It actually owns portion of the quays and a considerable portion of the quay equipment in Dundalk, and under this Bill the commissioners propose to purchase that property from the railway company, but still the railway company will run into the Port of Dundalk as it does at the moment. As I said, it is quite obvious that what the Commissioners had in view in promoting this Bill was to do everything that would conduce to the trade of the port and assist the trade of the port. Now, I ask Deputies in this House what could be more important to the trade of Dundalk than the appointment of a commissioner interested in the railway being nominated by the railway company? Naturally the railway company has considerable trade interests and at times, of course, the interests possibly of the Board and the interests of the railway company may not see eye to eye. But what will do more to facilitate an understanding and settlement of these differences as between these two companies or authorities than the very fact of having a commissioner on the port authority? It is one of the things that would suggest itself immediately to a commercial man in order that business may be facilitated as far as possible.
It is hardly necessary to point out that while it lies very largely in the hands of the railway company to facilitate and add to the trade of the port, on the other hand, in the event of any difference arising between the port authority and the railway company the railway company might possibly be disposed to send its trade through other ports and thereby injure the Port of Dundalk, and it is quite obvious that from that point of view it is what the Minister for Industry and Commerce would call good business to put a representative of the railway company on the Port Board. That was one of the arrangements that had been come to between these two authorities. As has been pointed out, before Private Bills come before Private Bill Committees certain arrangements are come to in the joint interests both of those undertaking the promotion of the Bill and those wanting the arrangements. In this instance it was agreed to and supported by the local authorities, and this arrangement having been come to an amount of opposition that might have been put forward to the Bill was withdrawn. Therefore, I say, from whatever point of view you look at this proposal it is one that ought to be supported by the House. It has been agreed to by the parties promoting the Bill, and they come forward and ask that the proposal to which they both agreed should be ratified by the Committee, and the Committee ratified that proposal. Now, the question is raised, whether the principle is sound, and whether there was a precedent for that principle. From a business point of view I think the precedent is eminently a sound one, and I think there are a number of precedents for it, so that from whatever point of view you look at it the amendment is one that should be supported by the House. I beg to move.
I beg to second the amendment.
The Deputy who moved the amendment said he could quote a number of precedents. He quoted two, which is a number.
I said that there were a number of precedents.
One of the precedents which the Deputy quoted was the precedent created when we were dealing with the Railways Amalgamation Bill. I knew, at the time, it was an unfortunate precedent, and that it would be used as a precedent in other measures by other promoters, or perhaps I should not say by other promoters, but by the same interests in other aspects. But there was, of course, the contention in respect of that precedent that a certain value was given by the Southern Railways. I do not know that anything is suggested in reference to this Bill that certain value is being given. The other precedent which the Deputy quoted was the precedent of the Carlingford Lough Commissioners, and I think it is just as well to emphasise the value of that precedent. In the course of the proceedings before the Joint Committee this question was raised, and one of the Counsel having been invited to produce evidence of the precedent gave this information. He said:
"I have here a memorandum from the Marine Department of the London North Western Railway Company dated the 7th January, 1905. in which the matter is discussed."
Then he quotes the Provisional Order:
"The appointment of the Commissioners shall be regulated as follows: the following four persons are hereby appointed Commissioners namely, William Forster, Richard Allen Minuitt, Edward Tipping, and Richard Mayne."
And the section continues to say that:
"The remainder of the Section deals with the appointment of Commissioners by the Newry Navigation, the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company, etc."
Evidence in that regard was tendered in the form of a memorandum from the London North Western Railway. The Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company is an off-shoot owned by the London Midland and Scottish, or, as it then was, the London and North Western Railway Company. Whatever may have been the justification in those days, and I do not think it was very great, does not apply now. There has been a change in the national relations. Saorstát Eireann is independent in respect of such matters as this of the British Government, and the London and North Western Railway Company or the L.M. & S., as it is now, have no special claim to have any rights in respect of public authorities or quasi-public authorities such as port and harbour boards in Ireland. The same company, it is contended, has a right to appoint commissioners in respect of the Carlingford Lough which includes Newry and I think includes Greenore, and that is adduced as a reason for giving the same company the same rights in respect of Dundalk. The Deputy supports his contention by saying that if the interests of the railway company and the interests of the harbour board came by any chance into conflict it would be an advantage to have a commissioner of the railway company in consultation with the harbour authority as a member of that harbour authority.
I want to put the contrary case—the possibility of conflict of interests between Dundalk and Newry or Dundalk and Greenore. If the railway company's interests favour certain concessions in regard to Greenore, as by chance they may, or Newry, as by chance they may, they balance by having one commissioner a nominee of their own on the Carlingford Board and another on the Dundalk Board, and the interests of the company are going, as far as the commissioners can provide, to be exerted in favour of whichever the company would desire, and if Dundalk's interests were opposed to the company's interests in relation to Greenore or Newry then the interests of the nominee of the company on the Dundalk Board would be against Dundalk. The idea that this is merely a private arrangement affecting a private concern is quite false. As a matter, I suppose, of convenience, Bills of this kind, which are partially private but mainly public, have been referred to Private Bills Committees, and it is contended that because the interests of private people may be under discussion and arrangements come to between private people then the public interest as affected must not be brought into play, and that the private agreement must be allowed to prevail. I contend in the main this is a public and not merely a private measure dealing with private affairs. The proposal to give a right to the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Company to appoint a commissioner on the Dundalk Harbour Board, as it has a right to appoint a commissioner on the Carlingford Harbour Board, as it has a right to appoint a commissioner on the Great Southern Railways, and as it will attempt to claim a right to representation on every other of a similar kind of Board that promotes private Bills in the future, is, I contend, a thing that ought not to be countenanced. It was done in 1864, in the middle of the last century, when they were discussing the Carlingford Lough Commission. It was done, unfortunately, in respect to the Southern Railway. Do not let us repeat that mistake in respect of the Dundalk Port Bill. At any rate this is not a private limited company.
We do not agree that it is a mistake.
I am appealing to those Deputies who realise the mistake they have made, especially when a conservative body like the Seanad also recognises that it was a mistake and is not prepared to repeat it in this measure. The Seanad decided that it was an unwise provision, and I think the Dáil is not going to embody in this measure a provision which the Seanad refused to accept, giving the London, Midland and Scottish Company a right by statute to appoint a commissioner to manage the affairs of Dundalk Harbour. If we do that we simply repeat the blunders of the past. We tell the London, Midland and Scottish Company that whenever any matter is brought forward in the Dáil or Seanad affecting traffic between England and Ireland, they are justified in claiming a statutory right to appoint the governors of the local affairs in respect to trade in this country. I say that that is a right to which we should not accede, and I ask the House to refuse to adopt the amendment.
Deputy Good's amendment raises a very important question of principle. I am not going into the merits of the case which Deputy Good has made or into Deputy Johnson's answer. I am thinking of another point and looking at the matter from an entirely different angle. I have now got what I was unable to get before, without going to the trouble of running across and getting it myself, and that is the actual Bill reported by the Committee. This Bill has got in it the words that Deputy Good has put into his amendment. In other words, the Bill, as reported by the Committee to both Houses, was in a certain form and the Seanad deleted certain words and the effect of the amendment now is virtually that the Dáil do not agree with the Seanad in changing the Bill. He has put it in another form so that it appears that we were putting in certain words. I think, with all respect, he has done his own amendment, from his point of view, something of an injustice, because what he is doing, so far as I can see from a comparison of the two Bills, is that he is inserting the exact words which the Seanad deleted, and he is calling on the Dáil not to agree with the Seanad in changing the Committee's report.
I suggest, on a point of order, that if we were to agree with the Seanad and reject the amendment of Deputy Good, the matter would have to be re-committed. We have adopted a very elaborate set of Standing Orders and a procedure for Private Bill legislation, and we have empowered this Private Bill Committee to do certain things which we cannot do. The Committee can, for example, send for persons and hear them on oath. It can send for papers and documents and can investigate matters in a form of detail which is not open to our procedure here, and we have empowered the Committee to do that for certain specific purposes. The Committee has done that and has come to certain conclusions. I am not, however, going into the merits of the case which it considered. All I know is that a Joint Committee, presumably, made adequate investigation into the facts, and came to certain conclusions, and we are now asked whether we will stand with what I venture to say is an improper amendment of the Seanad as, in my opinion, that Bill should have been re-committed by the Seanad. It has, however, come before us in that form and we are now asked whether we will agree with the Seanad in changing the words inserted by the Committee when that Committee has been empowered to make investigations into the facts not within the power of the Dáil or Seanad. I am not putting this matter from the point of view of the merits or demerits of the case, but from the point of view of Private Bill procedure. That procedure is that if a Bill is reported to us in a certain form we are right to assume that very careful investigation has been made and the changes made are within our power and should be made only after very careful thought. Where they touch matters of substance, they should, according to Standing Orders, be referred back to the Committee. Apparently we are precluded from that now and I shall vote for the amendment, not necessarily for the reasons which Deputy Good has put forward, but for the reason that his amendment is asking the Dáil not to agree with the Seanad in changing the report of the Private Bill Committee in a matter of substance without referring that matter back to the Committee.
Deputy Good in speaking on this amendment spoke of the recommendations of the Joint Committee and made the statement that the Committee ratified the proposal contained in the agreement between the Dundalk Commissioners and the railway company. The House will be misled if it accepts that as the position. Deputy Cooper has remarked on the fact that, generally, we are not old or experienced in the matter of dealing with Private Bills. That is a fact, and from the point of view of a member of the Committee which dealt with this Private Bill, the clause that contains this agreement was left in the Bill as it was dealt with in Committee simply in order that it might appear before the two Houses on the Report Stage and be discussed there.
I do not know whether it would be an unsatisfactory way of dealing with the matter in a Private Bill, if the Private Bill Committee would agree to leave the words in the Bill for the Report Stage. That might be an unsatisfactory way of dealing with the matter instead of dividing on it when it was under discussion, but the Committee perhaps were brought into that position by the fact that it was very difficult to get information before the Committee as to what the position really was. The London, Midland and Scottish Company had not a representative before the Committee to explain their case, and to explain why a representative of that railway company should be put on the Commission. The inclusion in the Bill of this proposal also definitely raises the question of whether representatives of a railway company, pure and simple, should get nomination on a board of harbour commissioners. The committee, at any rate, as far as I could sense their feelings, were constrained by the agreement that was entered into between the railway company and the Commissioners, however that agreement came about, and the fact that an important principle was raised. They were constrained by that consideration to leave the matter in the Bill for the Report Stage.
I think that the point involved in the matter would not get a fair consideration on its merits, if Deputies allowed themselves to think that the Private Bill Committee, in dealing with this matter, put it as a recommendation to this House that the clause should remain. Personally, it is not my opinion that the clause should remain in the final draft of the Bill. We are faced with the general question now as to whether a railway company leading into a particular port should get a representative on the harbour commissioners of that port. We are faced with a decision on that question. If harbour commissioners are going to be set up in a democratic and in an ordinarily elective way, without giving any special consideration to any particular type of organisation in the country, such as railways, then we are faced with the question of deciding whether the London, Midland and Scottish Company should get a representative on the Dundalk Harbour Commissioners.
Some facts in the matter would perhaps help the discussion now. The Harbour Commissioners propose to purchase certain quays in Dundalk. The London, Midland and Scottish Company have a quay frontage of 730 feet. It is proposed to purchase that quay frontage altogether, including a railway siding, mooring posts, and a weighbridge. Connicks have another quay of 580 feet, and it is proposed to purchase their quay front and mooring posts and the rails left there, if they are their property. So far as we could find out they are not. They belong to the London, Midland and Scottish Company. Then there is Williamson's quay, with a length of 210 feet, including sidings and turn-table. It is not clear if the rails are the property of Williamsons, or whether they have a renting arrangement with the railway company for using them. Then there is O'Rourke's quay of 255 feet, which along its frontage is served by no railway. Whatever facilities are there for handling cargo are their own. It is proposed by the Harbour Commissioners to buy the quay itself, and in return certain facilities are to be granted to these different people.
For instance, in return, the London, Midland and Scottish Railway have got an agreement by which any plans that may affect the railway company's property shall be submitted to the railway company and an agreement arrived at in regard to these plans before the commissioners start any work, that alterations and reconstruction necessitated shall be constructed by the commissioners and shall be agreed on by the railway company, and that the railway company shall get the free use of the rails along the quay except in respect of traffic which is through traffic, that is traffic which is not for the Port of Dundalk itself. In the case of Williamsons, when the Harbour Commissioners have purchased their property, the Commissioners shall divide off Williamson's property from the Harbour Commissioners' property by a wall which they will hand over to them. They will further give priority of use over all other users to Williamsons in respect of their portion of the quay. They can, if necessary, maintain a turn-table in front of their quay and have the free use of it. If the railway company, or if the Commissioners carry out the reconstruction of the railway lines on the quay, Williamsons will get the same facilities for connection with the Great Northern Railway and the London, Midland and Scottish Railway as they have under the present conditions. In the case of Connick's Quay, they are being secured by the Commissioners so that they will not be interfered with by any changes made by the Commissioners and, as far as the quay front is concerned, they will have priority over all other users in connection with the using of that particular part. In addition, any plans that may affect their property will be submitted to them before the work is carried out by the Commissioners. As far as O'Rourke's Quay is concerned, they are promised or guaranteed priority on their quay front before all other users, and they are guaranteed at least the same connection by rail with the Great Northern Railway Company and the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Company as they have at present.
Is Deputy Mulcahy questioning the Bill as a whole or this amendment?
In speaking to the amendment I am endeavouring to suggest that if you consider what is being taken from the railway company and what is being given back to them, they do not stand in any different position as a trading or business company from any other business people whose property has been taken from them along the quay front. If what I say is not a fact, then the House should be informed what are the facts. The point I do wish to make is that particular point. So far as I am personally concerned, either in Committee or in Deputy Good's statement, I have not heard any reason why this particular case of the railway company should be treated in a different way from the point of view of getting representation on the new Harbour Commissioners in Dundalk than either Connicks, Williamsons, or O'Rourkes.
I cannot refrain from paying a tribute to the adroitness of Deputy Figgis. His contribution to this debate, like many others on other occasions, is remarkable for its ingenuity. Under cover of the profession that he did not deal with the opposition to the amendment on its merits, he supports the amendment. In fact, he manages to reassert the position he took up during the amusing interlude of last evening's debate. According to some Deputies the reason why these words should be re-inserted so as to make the Bill read as it came from the Private Bill Committee, is that a bargain is a bargain. There were negotiations between the promoters of the Bill and the railway company in question, and this arrangement was arrived at, and it should be honoured. The position here is precisely a parallel to the position as explained by the Minister for Finance on the last occasion. A Private Bill Committee is not the last court, nor is it indeed a court at all. It sends forward recommendations by way of report to the two Houses. If Deputy Figgis's argument were sound he really attacks the arrangements provided for Private Bill legislation. In effect, what he invites us to do is to make an act of faith in the Private Bill Committee and accept its recommendation, presumably without criticism or alteration.
To this extent only: that if the motion were to send this matter back again to the Committee to consider, after hearing such witnesses and examining such documents as is found necessary—seeing that it had the power and that we have not—I would agree with that amendment. We have not the process of investigation that the Private Bill Committee has.
You had a right to read the evidence.
We have as stated here the Bill as amended by the Seanad on Report. Either Deputy Figgis contends that the Seanad has acted wrongfully or he contends that the provision made for further dealing with the Bill after it has left the Committee——
I am very reluctant to interrupt the Deputy, but I have no other opportunity of speaking, and I would like to correct him. My contention was, and I make it with all possible respect, that the Chairman of the other House should have referred the matter back to the Committee.
That is a matter for the Seanad.
I am entitled to hold that view. I may be presumptious in holding it.
If Deputy Good's amendment is defeated it would be open to him to move that the Bill be recommitted to the Committee.
In any case, Deputy Figgis's argument has this extraordinary conclusion that because he holds the Seanad were wrong and dealt wrongly with this, therefore, he supports the amendment. It is within our province, and we are exercising a constitutional right in altering a recommendation. The principle involved here is precisely the same principle that was involved in the first amendment as framed by Deputy Johnson and put down on the Green Paper. It is a very important principle in connection with a State that claims, and rightly claims, to have the most democratic Constitution in the world. If we pass the amendment of Deputy Good we turn our backs on the principles of democracy. That is what it comes to. I agree with Deputy Johnson's contention in this matter, though I do not accept, of course, all the arguments he put forward. In one of the cases to which he alluded where we gave certain privileges to a railway company, we got a good price for it. There was a quid pro quo.
I did not say I agreed with that. I said that was a contention which helped to carry it through.
There was a quid pro quo. There is no ground for believing with Deputy Johnson that the Seanad is sorry or has realised its mistake. Here a privilege is claimed for this great corporation, to give it power to interfere inside in the control of this harbour, and there is no quid pro quo. As a realist in politics I look for something. Nothing for nothing is the corollary to that. The tendency in these matters, after all, is for Deputies to rely on the principle of bargaining. The only case that could be made for this is the case put forward by Deputy Good, a specious case, that it was recommended by the Private Bill Committee, which had the witnesses before it and went into all the evidence. It now transpires from the evidence, as I think I may justly call it, of Deputy Mulcahy, that they did not recommend it. They merely, in an attitude of judicial neutrality, allowed it go before the Houses of Parliament to determine what was to be done in the matter. There, unwittingly, Deputy Good has spoken in a manner that would leave us under a wrong impression.
This clause was approved of by the Committee in the form in which it appears.
That is technically correct, it was approved of by the Committee. It was not deleted or altered by the Committee. We understand that the sense in which it was sent forward was, the Committee was well aware it would have to run the gauntlet of discussion in the two Houses.
There is no such statement in the report.
There is no such statement, but everything does not require to be stated. There are any amount of things we take for granted. Life, as Deputy Good knows, is run on these lines. The case here is not a bit better, after the statement of Deputy Mulcahy as to the mind of the Committee regarding the granting of this concession to the railway company, because it came in the report of the Committee. It is quite obvious that the proper thing to do is to allow that additional commissioner to be provided from some of the popular bodies in the district, say one of the authorities in Newry, instead of introducing the representative of an alien corporation.
As I understand it—I would like to be corrected if I am wrong—a Private Bill such as this is a recitation of a number of bargains between certain people and these bargains having been arrived at are submitted in the form of a Bill and statutory authority is asked for them. If that be the case with regard to this measure, and that this bargain was made between the railway company and the Commissioners and agreed to between them, and if the bargain had been altered without the consent of one or other of the parties, it appears to me then that the principle of the measure is interfered with. It is almost in this position, that any Deputy asking to have the Bill re-committed would be entitled to get consideration for that. I do not think we could reasonably refuse, in the event of the bargain not being completed in accordance with whatever agreement was made, should it be asked, to have the Bill re-committed, in order that those who come to that agreement would have an opportunity of considering what other agreement they might arrive at.
The President's statement puts a rather different complexion on Private Bill procedure. If we are to take it for granted that a Private Bill is merely a recitation of a series of bargains between private individuals, and that it only affects private interests, very good, but here is a Bill that affects public interests and public matters. It introduces matters of very grave constitutional importance in Private Bills. Are we to assume that in Private Bill legislation, for instance, which gives the right to a company to compulsorily acquire lands, that that is a matter of private bargaining? The very fact that it is brought into the Oireachtas to be discussed on the Report Stage in the two Houses proves that that is not the position at all. We have here to regard the public interest, and to override bargains between private persons.
I quite agree, but we have the right to object and say: "No, we will not give statutory authority to that particular agreement," but I would suggest that if we alter it without the concurrence of the parties who made the agreement we are doing a thing we are not entitled to do.
I maintain we are absolutely entitled to do it. The parties may make a bargain which would be directly in opposition to the public interest. No bargain of that kind ought to be referred back to the parties to agree upon. We are surely going to override private bargains when we speak as a legislature. This question, I would remind the President, is not a new question. It was considered and discussed in Committee, and the evidence taken before that Committee was printed and made available to every member of the Dáil and the Seanad. Presumably the members had this evidence before them, and the Bill as it came to us from the Seanad is in its present form. I submit that we are wrong in assuming that having passed through those processes, we are bound to refer the measure back to allow a new bargain to be made, and that we can only implement the bargains between private individuals. I am afraid that view of our functions in respect of Private Bills which deal with public matters is going to limit our prerogative and power as a legislative assembly.
If this is a Private Bill that interferes with public matters, should not the chairman of the Committee have prevented it going before the Committee at all?
The difficulty we are in in this matter, and it is a very important matter, is that the Committee in this instance, owing to inexperience, did not adequately fulfil their functions as regards Private Bills. The Committee has not only to judge between the various interests and individuals, but it has also to judge between those interests and the public interests. For that purpose it receives a representation from the various public departments, such as the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, and others, as to how public interests will be affected by the proposals in the Bill before the Committee, and its report should take these factors into consideration, and be a deliberate, considered report. In this case the Committee did not take that view of their functions, and that is unfortunate. I would ask the Dáil not to adopt the implications of Deputy Johnson's view, which seems to violate the principle of the Standing Orders. Once you have it laid down as a doctrine that once a Private Bill has passed the Private Bill Committee it is liable to be pulled about and altered without the promoters being consulted in any way by any Deputy with a crank on a particular subject, then no one is going to go to the expense of promoting a Private Bill at all. They will carry out their wishes by private bargains, and in that way the public will be far worse off. If a railway company acquired lands voluntarily by private bargains we would have no say in the matter. It would be open to me if I wished to build a railway on my own property without any safeguards. It would be open to a railway company to acquire lands by private contract. It would be expensive, but it would not be more expensive or inconvenient than Private Bill procedure, with no certainty that the report of the Committee in the matter would be anything like final. Just imagine that a railway company brings in a Bill, and it passes through the Committee, and comes here. Some Deputy interested in prohibition seeks to add a condition that no intoxicating drink should be sold in the refreshment rooms. It seems to me that a position like that would create an impossible state of affairs and would strangle industry. I speak with reluctance on this matter, as I am a shareholder in a railway company, but I am also concerned in making our Private Bill procedure a success. I say that we are in danger of taking a course here to-day which may injure and break down the whole mechanism of Private Bills.
As one of the Deputies representing Louth, and as one who can claim to know the feeling of the people concerned in this particular matter, I ask the Dáil not to pass Deputy Good's amendment. In my opinion it contains an audacious proposal, absolutely unwarranted, and wholly wrong in principle, a proposal which, if accepted, would certainly go in some way towards weakening, if not destroying, the already very limited democratic control of public bodies of this kind. What does the Deputy ask us to do? He asks us to confer by statute on a limited liability company the right to nominate in perpetuity a Commissioner on the Harbour Board of Dundalk. That representative is to have all the rights and privileges of an elected representative. It was argued here to-day that the Dundalk Harbour Board have agreed to this proposal. Granted, but let us examine the circumstances leading up to this agreement. The Dundalk Harbour Board's object in the promotion of the Bill was to enable them to improve the port of Dundalk so as to make it possible for boats to arrive and depart at any state of the tide. They found themselves in conflict with a very powerful railway company, who were apparently not satisfied with the usual methods of compensation, and threatened to oppose the Bill unless they got a further quid pro quo in the shape of the powers sought by the insertion of a section, and which is in the amendment of Deputy Good. The Harbour Board, apparently in fear and trembling at the extra expense this opposition would cause, and fearing that the Bill might possibly be lost, were compelled to swallow the proposal. You may call it an agreement if you like. Probably the Harbour Board themselves will tell you it is an agreement, and they are quite willing to stand by what they did in the matter. I say they were forced to that agreement. It was a most unheard of thing to do. This railway company asked for the power which Deputy Mulcahy has aptly pointed out none of the other interested parties asked for. The Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Company, otherwise the London, Midland and Scottish Company, are to get power and facilities to nominate a representative on the Harbour Board of Dundalk. That is a power that has not been asked for by local people who are also concerned in this matter. Now, when the matter came before the Seanad, the Seanad very properly recognised the absolute injustice and the reactionary tendency of the proposal and they very promptly threw it out. We have Deputy Good coming here to-day in the interests of the railway company and asking the Dáil to reinsert this most objectionable clause.
I object to the statement that I appear in the interests of the railway company. I do not.
It may be argued that the railway company ought to have representation on the Harbour Board. Perhaps they should. But, after all, the electorate would be the best judge of that. If they want that representation, and if they think they have a very good case for it, let them appeal to the electorate in the ordinary way, and I am sure that the electorate will give them representation, provided, of course, they think they deserve it, and provided, of course, that the electors think that the interests of the port of Dundalk would be best served by giving it.
There is another matter in connection with this which has not so far been mentioned. It has been mentioned in the Seanad, but not here, and probably it will be appropriate to mention it. This particular railway company, I understand, control the port of Greenore. The port of Greenore at the present time deals with most of the traffic from what I might call the north midlands and a good portion of Ulster. They deal with it simply because this traffic is composed of goods of a perishable nature, butter, eggs, cattle, and so forth. Greenore deals with that traffic simply because it is an up-to-date port with daily sáilings to Holyhead, and simply because Dundalk is not sufficiently developed to enable that traffic to be dealt with there. It is in the interests of the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company to develop the port of Greenore. It is not in their interests to develop the port of Dundalk. If this amendment is passed we will then be in the position of having a representative of the Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway Company on the Harbour Commissioners of Dundalk, whose interest it will be to see that the port of Dundalk will not be developed. I feel I owe an apology to the House for taking up so much time on this matter. To my mind the proposal is so very absurd and the objections to it are so perfectly obvious that to me, at any rate, it is absolutely inconceivable that the Dáil should do anything else except it.
As far as this amendment is concerned I am in this position: the promoters of this Bill came to an agreement with the L.M.S. representatives, as has been truly stated here, to buy off whatever opposition they might give to the proposal before the Private Bill Committee. That was the reason the agreement was come to. The promoters carried out that agreement in so far as they inserted a provision in their Bill and put it before the Committee. They stood for it there. The Committee allowed the proposition to go forward so that, as Deputy Mulcahy, who was Chairman of the Committee, states——
No.
Well, you were a member of the Committee in any case. It was allowed to go forward, so that the Oireachtas might decide the matter for themselves. I hold that no matter what any Private Bill Committee may do, or insert in any document put before them, the Oireachtas should still be the final judges, and the Oireachtas can change the document in any way they like. It would be a bad thing for the country if that were not so—that the elected representatives of the people should not have the final say in any of those matters. While that is so, the promoters of this Bill are quite willing, and have always been quite willing, to accept the decision of the Oireachtas. If the Oireachtas thinks it is better in the public interests that the L.M.S. or any other company should not have representatives by statute on any of those boards, the promoters are willing to accept that. If the Dáil in its wisdom thinks that a representative should be put on this Board by statute, the promoters are prepared to accept it. Their primary interests in the matter is to get their Bill passed so that they can get on with works that are necessary for the port of Dundalk and for the trade of Dundalk, and the area around that the port serves. Hitherto matters have been held up, and facilities could not be got on the quays in Dundalk for the proper discharging or berthing of vessels. That is a thing that has been felt for a long time, and the promoters of this Bill took the first opportunity they could get under an Irish Parliament to remedy that injustice.
I want now to come back to the amendment. As far as the amendment is concerned, the promoters leave it absolutely in the hands of the Oireachtas, or the Dáil now, to do anything they wish with it, either to reinstate it or to reject it. As far as the amendment is concerned, the position the promoters took in the matter was to put this measure forward. I am representing Dundalk, and I certainly will vote for the amendment as it stands on this condition, that it is carrying out the agreement that was come to. I do not say, if there was any other body dealing with the matter, that I would vote for an amendment of this kind; but, seeing that I am in the position of knowing everything that transpired between the company and the promoters of the Bill, I am constrained to vote for it on this ground alone.
As representing the Harbour Board or as representing Dundalk?
As representing Dundalk.
I am sure the House will extend its sympathy to the Minister for Defence in this matter——
The Deputy has not the right to speak a second time.
Then why have others the right to speak half-a-dozen times by way of interruption? I will interrupt in this case, with your permission. There is such a thing as an immoral consideration in law, and it is not binding when it is discovered.
Has one the right to reply?
I beg to move:—
In page 8, section 15, lines 52 and 56, after "chairman" in each case to insert "and vice-chairman."
Section 15 provides that the number of Commissioners carrying this thing into execution shall be eighteen. There follow the names of fifteen persons who shall be the first Commissioners. It is also provided that the Chairman for the time being of Dundalk Council, and the Chairman for the time being of the Louth Co. Council, shall be ex-officio members of the Board. That leaves one vacancy.
That leaves one vacancy, due to the deletion of the representative of the railway company. I am therefore proposing that the Vice-Chairman for the time being of the Dundalk Urban Council shall also act ex-officio as a member of the Board. I may say that this representation of a popular character does not by any means satisfy what I consider to be the equities. I would much prefer, had there been no risk as a consequence of holding up this Bill of delay in the carrying on of the works, to move in favour of a considerably larger representation from those councils. In deference to the argument that to insert a proposal of this kind in the Bill might militate against the work being carried through successfully, I agreed to limit the amendment to adding the Vice-Chairman of the Dundalk Urban District Council, making three popular representatives, the Chairman and the Vice-Chairman of the Dundalk Council and the Chairman of the Louth County Council to sit on this Board of eighteen. It is too small, but in view of all the circumstances I am contending myself to move that only the Chairman and Vice-Chairman shall be appointed by the Dundalk Council. The insertion of this name would fill up the number of eighteen and it obviously requires that some name should be added to fulfil the obligations in the section itself.
I second that, because I think it meets the wishes of a great many people that there should be some popularly elected representatives—that is, elected under a popular franchise— on this Board. While the Chairman of the Dundalk Urban Council and the Chairman of the Louth County Council were embodied in the Bill as it came down it is thought that there should be a further person now that there is a vacancy, and the Vice-Chairman of the Dundalk Council has been suggested. All the promoters have agreed to that.
While there may be good reasons when we are considering an ordinary Bill for the proposals put forward by Deputy Johnson, yet when we are considering a Private Bill and have had recommendations from the Committee that was considering that Bill, I am in entire agreement with what the President said, that it is either a question of approving of all of those recommendations or sending the report back. I do not see there is any other procedure open to us.
I will take Deputy Good's motion when we have gone through the amendments
I shall have to consider whether I shall move any such motion. I want to make the protest that while the principle from other points of view may be all right, seeing it is moved on a private Bill after that private Bill has been through Committee, I think that it is a different proposal from that point of view and should not be assented to by the House.
This Constitutional doctrine has been raised as a side-wind against the amendment. Surely Deputy Good is aware, as every member of the Dáil ought to be aware, that legislation is legislation no matter what epithet you put before it. It may be good or bad legislation, it is legislation. It may be a private Bill or a public Bill, but it is legislation and it is the legislative function of the Oireachtas that is in question here. Whereas in one case the Bill originates in one or the other House of Parliament, in the case of a Private Bill it is promoted by an individual or by a corporation. Except for the difference of origin and except for the stages of its preparation and promotion it differs in no respect from any other piece of legislation whatever.
Why is it sent to a Private Committee?
Because it is Private Bill legislation. That is a question of procedure; that is the method of handling it. To give a crude illustration that occurs to me. The baker and the pastry-cook both alike manipulate flour. They practically use the same ingredients but they have a different method of procedure. The only difference between them is that they produce out of flour a new substance. They have different ways of manipulating materials, but in essence the thing is the same. If Deputy Good reads the Constitution and inquires minutely into the provision for Private Bill legislation, he will realise that the Bill has got no sanctity or superior quality over that which originates in the Seanad or Dáil and goes through all its stages alternately in both Houses. The mere fact that it concerns private interests and has to be brought to the notice of the Oireachtas in a particular way does not give it any peculiar sanctity. Once it has come into the Oireachtas, Standing Orders state that it is really to be dealt with as if it had originated in the other way. It is deemed to have gone through certain stages in the House.
I support Deputy Johnson's amendment. The point to which he refers as to the necessity for a more democratic control of our ports or an examination as to whether the present type of control is democratic enough, taking into consideration all aspects of the matter, is one which I personaly think is very much wanted. It struck some of us who were dealing with this Bill in Committee as a very important matter. I think, however, we must realise that there will be a tendency on the part of any Committee dealing with a Private Bill of this nature to shirk going into the examination of such a broad question as that The population of Dundalk is about 13,000. We were told that the number of electors under this scheme will only be about 700. That is about one in twenty of the population of Dundalk will vote to elect representatives as commissioners to control the harbour. That may or may not be right, but I do not think we can hope that the initiation of an examination as to whether it is right or not will start on any particular private Bill. I think this matter ought to be borne in mind. The whole question requires to be examined from the point of view of democratic government, and the point of view that the proper control and utilisation of our harbours is a big national question.
I do not think anything has been said to alter the opinion I expressed before. It is open to the Dáil itself, and it has absolute power to alter a measure of this sort when it comes before it. In my view it ought not to refuse permission to recommit the Bill, to give those who made those arrangements an opportunity to make other arrangements. The principle of the Bill is one thing. We can object to any bargain made between two people, but having come to a certain stage I do not see, if it be pressed that this Bill be recommitted, that we can stand in the way of it.
Before this particular amendment is put, may I say that I came here to-day to make a statement with regard to a certain number of these amendments, which seemed to me to introduce a new principle into the methods of governing statutory harbours in this country. I think what I have to say might as well be introduced here, especially as Deputy Mulcahy has alluded to the big national question involved in connection with the whole control of the harbours of the country. Certain amendments have been put down. Deputy Johnson moved one which introduces a new departure in policy. The Deputy says he is introducing better element of democratic control.
I did not use that phrase.
I reported the Deputy wrongly, then. That would be one of the objects of the amendment. In so far as that is a departure, I am not going to object to it now. I have not even a point of view on it, because I had definitely reserved those matters, and had hoped to bring before the Executive Council and the Dáil, before this, resolutions setting up a statutory enquiry into the whole question of harbours operating under authority—the whole question—the development of harbours, the question as to the present position of the Statute Law relating to harbours, the question further of the constitution, the powers and the methods of administration in connection with these harbours. If I take up no decided attitude in this matter, and appear even to welcome this amendment brought in by Deputy Johnson, I do so while stating that these matters are ones which I hope to get referred during the summer to a statutory committee, and I hope nothing here will be taken as giving prior assent to something that committee may report absolutely against. I do not want to prejudice the findings of the Commission that I hope to get set up.
I am surprised at the view of the Minister in this connection. He deals with the matter as if it were an entirely new one and was somewhat revolutionary. The contrary is the fact. In Wexford town the Corporation has two representatives on the Harbour Board. The Mayor for the time being is one and the Corporation elect from their members another in August each year. I understand the same position prevails in Cork, Waterford and Dublin, and I fail to see where the new departure is. I agree with Deputy Mulcahy that people who have a population to the extent of 13,000 should have a greater representation than they have had in the past and, as I said, the Minister for Industry and Commerce need not be afraid to commit himself as far as this amendment is concerned. That is the position. The position Deputy Johnson tries to bring into operation is the position that prevails all over the State.
May I reply in interruption, as Deputy Magennis has set the example. I tried to make my remarks refer to the group of amendments which Deputy Johnson had down and I was speaking more specifically to the one which was withdrawn, No. 1 on the first Green Paper. A new departure had evidently been introduced there. I think it is a new departure inasmuch as it is not universal. I know it is the case with regard to many of those authorities. I have also said that I welcome this amendment.
Is this amendment in order in accordance with Standing Order 86, which mentions that if any amendment is proposed introducing new substance into a Bill, certain consequences will follow?
On that point of order, the section that has come to us speaks of the chairman for the time being of the Dundalk Urban District Council and the chairman for the time being of the County Council of Louth, and the chairman and vice-chairman is surely not an introduction of new matter or matter of substance, more especially in view of the fact that eighteen persons are appointed as commissioners in the section itself, and only seventeen are named. There is a blank for one. How is it going to be filled up?—merely by an extension of the principle involved in the section itself. That is not a matter of substance or new matter.
This is a matter which arises under Standing Order 94 of Private Bills Standing Order, which is similar to Standing Order 86 of the Dáil. It is not an amendment of substance. The matter, I understand, was discussed at the Committee and was objected to at that time by the promoters. They have since agreed to the principle.
Amendment 4 is consequential on amendment 2 and therefore fails.
I move:—
In page 9, section 16, line 4, to delete the section and to substitute the following:—
"In addition to the Commissioners for the time being nominated by or elected pursuant to and acting in execution of this Act the chairman and vice-chairman for the time being of the Dundalk Urban District Council and the chairman for the time being of the county council of the county of Louth and the successors from time to time of each such chairman and of such vice-chairman of the Dundalk Urban District Council shall be Commissioners to act in execution of this Act and each of them shall continue to be a Commissioner to act in execution of this Act during such time as he remains chairman or vice-chairman respectively of the said urban district council or chairman of the county council respectively. The provisions of section 9 of this Act shall not be applicable to either the chairman or vice-chairman of the Dundalk Urban District Council and their respective successors or to the chairman of the county council of the county of Louth and his successors, during the time that they retain their offices as such chairman and vice-chairman respectively of the Dundalk Urban District Council and chairman of the county council of the county of Louth, and they and each of them shall exercise the same rights and authority as any other of the Commissioners."
Although it appears very formidable, it is merely a recasting of the section in the Bill itself to embody the amendment we have just carried.
I move amendment 6:—
"In page 24, section 82, lines 51, 52 and 53, to delete the words ‘to direct prosecutions by indictment or otherwise against the offender for any nuisance or other offence' and to substitute the words ‘in any case which can under this Act or otherwise by law be prosecuted by them before a court of summary jurisdiction, to direct prosecutions before any such court in respect of offences.'"
I move this because it appears that prosecution by indictment is a matter which is within the province of the Attorney-General. There is no objection to the Commissioners taking action, but to give power to direct prosecution by indictment or otherwise would conflict with an Act we have already passed—with section 9 of the Criminal Justice Administration Act, 1924.
I second the amendment.
Amendment 7 is consequential.
I do not know whether this would be the right stage at which to raise this matter, but it seems to me to be a very important one, that when amendments have been made which to my mind are clearly amendments of substance, this Bill should be recommitted to the Committee which sent it forward to us. As I said before, I think we shall be doing serious damage to Private Bill Committee procedure if we make alterations of this kind in the recommendation of that Committee, and do not recommit the Bill to them. I do not know what stage would be the right stage to move that it should be recommitted, but I should like to do it.
On a point of order, have you not ruled, sir, as a final decision that the amendments are not amendments of substance and did not introduce new matter?
Did the Leas-Cheann Comhairle rule that the amendments standing in the name of Deputy Good were not matters of substance? I was not here, I regret to say.
He had not an opportunity. He would only have an opportunity of pronouncing if the amendments of Deputy Good introduced new matter, but they did not. What they did was simply to place the Bill in the position in which it was when it left the Joint Committee. Wherever the omission took place, that is the place where the question ought to have been raised as to whether it was new matter.
But there is an alteration. It is a matter of substance or new matter.
On a point of order, I submit your ruling, sir, cannot be challenged now. If it is challenged there is a way of dealing with it, but this is not the time.
I should like to support what Deputy Magennis has said and to refer to your ruling that anybody could move that the Bill be recommitted. By the interpretation that Deputy Magennis has given, a ruling of that kind cannot be questioned.
The point of order that I want to make is that the Bill has now passed all the stages which would allow of further recommittal. The amendments have been discussed on Report and have been passed. The only time that a Bill could be recommitted would be before the amendments had been passed, not afterwards, and the procedure now is: "That the Bill do now pass."
I would not subscribe to that. I do not think that is the correct interpretation. There would be no reason for recommitting it before the amendments were passed. It is when the amendments are passed you are presented with a different instrument from that which you had before.
Standing Order 86 reads:—
When a Bill has been returned from a Special Committee, or from the Dáil sitting in Committee, notice shall be given of a motion to receive the Bill for final consideration. On the Fourth Stage (that is this Stage) amendments may be moved, but when, in the opinion of the Ceann Comhairle, an amendment proposed on the Fourth Stage is one of substance, or introduces new matter into the Bill, the Bill shall be recommitted for consideration of such section or sections as, in the opinion of the Ceann Comhairle, are affected."
When the amendments are proposed is the time to recommit them to the Committee. But when the amendments are passed, the Report Stage is completed and the question put before the House is:—"That the Bill be now passed."
I rose, sir, on your stating that the motion was: "That this Bill be now received for final consideration." I based my statement on the last four lines of Standing Order 93, which reads:—"On the final consideration"—and your pronouncement was that the motion is: "That the Bill be now received for final consideration"—"the Dáil may amend the Bill subject to Standing Order 94, or may recommit it to the Joint Committee or refer it to a special committee." With all respect, I suggest that this is the proper time to move that the Bill be recommitted to the Joint Committee.
There is only one point I wish to put to you, sir, and that is this: when we were considering amendment No. 2 you gave a ruling that the proper time to move for recommittal would be after the amendments were concluded, and it was upon the basis of that statement of yours that we proceeded for the last hour.
I hate points of order, but as a matter of commonsense and courtesy, it seems to me there has been such substantial alterations in the Bill that the Dáil ought very willingly to return it to the Committee, so that they may have the amendments made before them and make any report they wish to the Dáil on the matter. I do not suggest that that should be done if it is out of order, but I think it should be done out of consideration for the Committee, that it would be an indignity to the Committee to make such drastic alterations in the Bill without returning it to them to advise them of the amendments made.
The Deputy's suggestion is going to place the Dáil in a difficulty and those of us who are responsible for these amendments. The amendments were the result of a compromise between the promoters of the Bill and those who are responsible for the amendments. They were proposed to the Dáil and watered down so that they would meet with the approval of the promoters of the Bill. If only the amendments as finally passed are going to be recommitted, I claim the right to introduce very much more drastic amendments before that Committee and before the Dáil. The more drastic amendments which were originally put forward were, as I say, diluted, watered down or modified, so that they would be acceptable to the promoters of the Bill, and they were so accepted with a view to facilitating the passing of the Bill, so that the work could be gone on with at an earlier stage than would be otherwise possible. If that procedure has to be thrown overboard, and the Bill is to go back to the Committee, then I would claim the right to put forward much more drastic amendments, and I hope to carry them.
I should like to ask on a question of fact, did you, sir, not rule about an hour ago that the proper time to ask for recommittal was when the amendments had been concluded?
The amendments proposed by Deputy Johnson and by the President were not amendments of substance and I accepted them for that reason. A new situation was created by the rejection of amendments standing in the name of Deputy Good. Those proposals were in the Bill as agreed to by the Committee, and it seems only fair that permission should be given at this stage for the Deputy putting forward these amendments to move that the Bill be recommitted to the Committee for further consideration, because these amendments were agreed to by the Committee and it would seem reasonable that the Committee should be given an opportunity of again discussing the matter, to see could proposals be put up which would be acceptable to the Oireachtas. I will accept the motion from the Deputy.
What is the use of sending an amendment to the Committee that has been adopted by the Dáil? What has the Committee to do with it?
Does the Dáil realise what the recommitting of the Bill will mean? Does it realise that it will mean the loss of the Bill?
I do not think so. Even if it did, a bargain was made between two people; they presented it here and we do not stand over the bargain. We have already expressed our views on it, but it is open to the people who made the bargain at any rate to have these facts before them. As Deputy Cooper said, it would probably put an end to Private Bill procedure if it were known that agreements come to between persons outside, or on the Committee Stage of a Bill, were open to be rejected, amended or altered in any way at our will and pleasure, without being sent back for consideration. That would not be just. In this case there is no necessity that the Bill should be lost—none whatever. There may be delay, but I anticipate it will not be long. But, it is certainly due to the people who made this agreement, that there should be a reconsideration. Something was given, something was taken. We said: "No, we will not have that." Those who came together in order to come to an agreement have a right at least to have that before them for consideration.
Is there any motion before the Dáil?
Recommittal.
There is no motion.
I am prepared to move, if I am in order, as I contend I am, that the Bill be recommitted to the Joint Committee. I asked was I in order.
I will accept the motion of the Deputy.
I move then, that the Bill be now recommitted to the Joint Committee.
I beg to second that.
On a point of order. The Standing Order is quite clear. If there is recommitment there must be a direction to deal with certain specific sections.
That is before the amendment is passed.
If this procedure is in order at all, and the Leas-Cheann Comhairle has ruled it is, then this section which directs what is to be recommitted must be incorporated in the motion.
No.
I submit to you with all respect that the principle that the President lays down about bargains ought to be applied here. To-day Deputy Johnson had on the Order Paper an amendment to insert the words: "Being a citizen of Saorstát Eireann who is a Dáil elector for the constituency of the county of Louth," and he expressly stated that he withdrew that amendment, which was of great importance constitutionally. He substituted for it a watered-down amendment. We agreed to the substitution, on what consideration? Simply upon this, that it was to save the Bill from the necessity of recommittal, that it was of the last importance that the Bill should not be recommitted and have its position endangered. On that understanding we agreed unanimously to the withdrawal of that amendment, and we accepted the other. Surely, I submit, we are entitled to allege that there is a breach of faith to the Dáil to-day if after that understanding, fully and explicitly entered into, we are now to propose to recommit the entire Bill.
Is that on amendment No. 1?
Yes.
I was here when that was discussed, and nothing was said at the time in reference to any bargain between Deputy Johnson and anybody else.
Undoubtedly there was.
I challenge the accuracy of that piece of history. I have a distinct recollection of what occurred. I said that I supported the amendment as the second best arrangement of Deputy Johnson's in that form, because Deputy Johnson had himself explained the situation. You, sir, put it as a formal motion to the House, which agreed to give permission to Deputy Johnson to substitute for what was on the Order Paper the amendment he subsequently proposed. The reason that Deputy Johnson gave in favour of that substitution was that by adopting the language of the law as it had existed for seventy years hitherto we were not introducing, as he contended, new matter. So that I submit, sir, with all respect, that there was a bargain, there was a clear understanding in the House that the Bill was not to be recommitted, and we discussed most of these amendments in view of that. The President himself gave as one of his reason against the amendment what is now being used as a reason for the recommittal.
I might point out that I said that if Deputy Good's amendment was not passed there was a case for recommittal, and I stated that, telling Deputy Good, or telling the House, that if he or any other Deputy were to move the recommittal of the Bill, in the event of that passing I was prepared to support it and that it was just and right that we should have it. I do not know whether that was a bargain or not.
I quite understand the motives that actuated the President in supporting the recommittal. He has always, in this House, been anxious to preserve the amenities. He is very anxious now that the public should not regard all the operations in the promotion of a Private Bill as futility. But what the President overlooks is that every man who promotes a Private Bill knows that he does so at certain risk; he has to fight his way through Committee; he knows perfectly well that even after that stage has been completed and he is successful that he has to run the gauntlet in the Oireachtas. He is perfectly willing, it is presumed, to take these risks. But surely we are going to abandon all the rights of Parliament if it is to be contended seriously that wherever two parties, one a promoter of a Bill, and the other a declared opponent, come to an arrangement between themselves, that the Dáil is to be merely a recording body.
I have never said that.
It has never been said. I am inviting those who make the contention that the President has made to see what they are doing.
I said distinctly that the Dáil had a perfect right to object to any bargain that was made, to turn down, or alter it if they liked, but that they could only do it on condition that they would recommit it.
The idea behind all this is that there is something of a sacrosanct character in the bargain entered into. What if the bargain be entered into under duress? What if it be, as I suggested in my interruption, an immoral consideration? A contract may be perfectly a contract so far as all the legal requirements are concerned and fail because the consideration would be regarded in a court of law as being an immoral consideration. It was apparent from the debate to-day that the arrangement entered into between the Dundalk Harbour Board and the London, Midland and Scottish Railway was practically entered into under duress. We were told by the Deputy who has the best right to speak on the matter that it was to save expense, it was to guard against the possibility of utter defeat, that that arrangement was entered into on behalf of the Dundalk Board. Now, after solemnly debating this question subsequent to the debate in the Seanad we are to commit the Bill again, and the whole thing is to be fought out again. It is quite possible that with this nicety and scrupulosity of the President, that those who entered into the bargain shall now have to withdraw from the bargain. I ask the President to consider that if in effect we are not killing the Bill in the guise of preserving public confidence, which is not at all shattered, in Private Bill legislation. If there are those so ignorant of the procedure of Private Bill legislation and its essential character as to believe that alterations effected in a Private Bill on the various stages of its passage through the Houses of Parliament may alter it from what it was originally, if they believe that because of the possibility of these alterations there is no value in Private Bill legislation, the same thing, mutatis mutandis, would apply to any measure introduced into the Dáil. Will the public declare that they have no faith in the legislation machine? Let me remind the President of an actual concrete case. Will the public say that they have no faith in the legislative machine because a resolution passed yesterday is, on the motion of a Minister, rescinded to-morrow? I am quite sure that such a case is in the memory of everyone here; it is quite recent. Yet nobody has said: “We abandon to have faith in the Dáil.” Everyone knows that these things are incidental to a legislative chamber, that there may be waves of opinion, that there may be second thoughts, but you are to look at the practical side of these things.
It is about time that the Deputy would look at the practical side of it.
I have been doing nothing all the time but looking at the practical side. I submit that the position of this House, its regard for its own independence, the preservation of its rights, the setting before the public of a proper conception of what is the relation of the Dáil to Private Bill legislation, is a practical matter and that questions about eggs, and hens, and dairies alone are not practical questions. The practical result here is that if the Bill is recommitted the Bill is dead.
Yet this is an important measure, a very important measure, and I do say that the repercussion of such a thing as this is more likely to have a disastrous effect upon those who would promote Private Bills than the reverse, because, after all, the promoters of a Private Bill may, under duress, be forced to make certain concessions and to trust to the wisdom of the Houses of Parliament in the public interest to set the thing right, to adjust the balance, and to restore equity. I suggest that to take the view of Private Bill legislation, that it is some sort of a thing differing in essence from public legislation, is a complete misconception. The public are affected here, not proximately the public of Dundalk and its district, but this harbour of the Free State. It is an important harbour, which might develop into something greater, and the commercial expansion of the Free State is dependent on its not being throttled. That surely is practical. It may be that I do not see eye to eye—that is my misfortune—with the President as regards what is practical and what is not, but it seems to me that to take a step in the interests of abstract theory which may endanger, if it does not actually secure the defeat of the Bill, is pursuing phantoms.
On a point of order, may I ask what are the terms of the motion that is before the House? There were some very excellent things said which might deserve re-saying if we knew what the motion is that is before the House.
My motion simply is that the Bill be recommitted to the Joint Committee.
On that point, may I say that I think it would be a very foolish proceeding for this House to adopt a motion, the effect of which would be to send a Bill of this kind back again to the Joint Committee. If such a motion as that were adopted in the case of this Bill, it would mean that the Bill would be held up, and that no work could be done under it for at least twelve months. That is a thing that the promoters of the Bill do not want. I am sure that Deputies are not anxious that such a thing as that should occur, because I may point out that under this Bill it is proposed to carry out work which will involve an expenditure of money amounting to sixty or seventy thousand pounds. I may say that work is urgently needed in that particular district, and for that reason it would not be fair or just, to my mind, to send the Bill back again to the Joint Committee. The inevitable result of adopting such a course as that would be that the Bill would have to come back to this House again before the autumn session, and, of course, under circumstances of that kind, it would have to take its chances as regards getting a place on the legislative programme. The probability is, if such a course were pursued, nothing would be done before January next.
In a case like that the promoters would have to start off again and get the preliminaries carried out which are essential before any work can be done. First and foremost they would have to get the money that will be required. Arbitration proceedings would have to be held for the purpose of arranging the amount of compensation to be paid to the owners of the private property concerned. All that would take a considerable time, and if we are going to put any block on this matter now, I say that we are not doing justice to the people who promoted this Bill. Neither would we be doing justice to the unemployed people in that district who are crying out for work—the work which this Bill will provide them with if it is passed through. I am sure the House will agree that it would not be fair to recommit this Bill for another reason, and it is this: that the promoters have already gone to a good deal of expense in this matter. There is one point I desire to mention, and it is that the harbour of Dundalk at the present moment is practically free of any debt whatever. They had debentures for £35,000 which were not due to become payable for 10 years hence—until I think the year 1935. I can see that all these debenture holders are all paid, and the promoters of the Bill are in the position of being able to go on the money market immediately. They will be able to get all the money they require, because they have not any debts whatever hanging over their heads. That is a consideration that should be taken into account here, and therefore I hope the Dáil will not agree to recommit this measure.
I would ask the mover of the motion whether he has read the minutes of evidence taken before the Joint Committee that dealt with this Bill. If he had read the minutes of evidence he would have seen what cross-examination took place there on this particular point, that there was a pretty settled feeling among the members of the Committee, except the chairman. They showed their feelings in cross-examination against the idea that a representative of the railway company in question should be put on the Harbour Commission. The evidence would bear out for him what I, from my point of view at any rate, made clear to the Dáil, that the matter was not accepted as an approved thing to stand in the final draft of the Bill as it left the Committee. It would suggest to him, too, that in sending back this particular point to the Joint Committee, he would be simply wasting time and would be involving the Dundalk Harbour Commissioners, and even the railway company itself, in more expense. Deputy Johnson has pointed out that if this Bill is to go back under the terms of the present motion to the Joint Committee, there are other and larger issues with regard to the franchise to be raised. In view of what the Minister for Industry and Commerce has stated I do not think it is desirable that responsibility for going into those matters should be put upon a small committee of five members of the Oireachtas. Matters might be raised there which would probably lead to a long discussion, and I do not think you could get the five members of the Oireachtas who were on this Joint Committee to agree and settle down and make up their minds as to what should be done from a proper point of view with regard to the franchise in the whole matter of these ports. As I see it, if the Bill goes back you are going to be up against that question. My impression is that the Committee are going to shut down their minds, and are not prepared to discuss the franchise question in its general aspects. If they are not going to be prepared to discuss that, they are certainly not going to be prepared in an open-minded way to give a representative to the railway company on the Dundalk Harbour Commission.
In answer to the Deputy, may I say that I have no interest at all in these amendments. I am perfectly satisfied so far as the amendments are concerned, that they should go forward as they are. I would be still better satisfied if the Bill were recommitted to the Joint Committee, and that the Joint Committee sent it back to this House in exactly the form in which it is now. I am not interested in these particular amendments at all, and indeed I may say that I have no particular interest in this Bill. I am, however, interested in the procedure of Private Bill Committees in general, and I feel convinced myself—the President expressed himself on the same point a great deal better than I could hope to do—that in future Private Bill procedure and the possibility of reconciling opposing parties will be seriously diminished if you make a change like this and do not send that change formally back to the Joint Committee for reconsideration. I should hope in this particular case there would be no great delay in calling the Committee together and putting this before them. In five minutes they could send it back to us. As far as these proposals are concerned I am finished with them. As regards reading the minutes of evidence, I have read part of it, but not the whole, but I think that is a very immaterial point to my mind.
The Deputy has stated that he is acting in this particular matter in a broad way, and that he has taken a broad view of the position. I would like also to take a broad view of the question. Does he think that if the Bill comes back to the Committee that the whole question of the franchise and the representation of ports is not going to be raised?
No. There is absolutely no necessity for that.
No necessity, I admit, but does the Deputy believe it will not be raised?
I seconded the motion, but I did not then speak on the question of sending it back. In answer to Deputy Professor Magennis I might say that there are other people who made bargains and who have as much right to have them carried out as he or any of his friends. The Deputy made great play about Deputy Johnson stating why it was he submitted a certain amendment. That fact was not present to my mind when I was supporting the amendment. It was the Deputy's amendment I had in mind. It was no concern of mine what arrangement was come to in order to see that the Bill was going to pass. Everybody is concerned about the Bill going to pass. Everybody who has got his part of the bargain settled wants the Bill to pass, but those who did not get their parts of the bargain settled are not to be considered at all. In other words, Deputy Professor Magennis says: "I am going to have these amendments passed, and if not, then the Bill is not going to pass." But if he gets his amendments, and another person comes along with bargains that he has made in order that the Bill would pass, Deputy Magennis says "No, you will not have it, and you will not hold up the Bill." The Deputy cannot have it both ways. He cannot have his pound of flesh and eat it.
The case is on the broadest grounds. It is on excellent and very sound ground. There was every reason why the Bill should have been sent here in order that it should pass. It was not done. All the people who have spoken to us about the particular condition to which exception has been taken had an opportunity of going before the Joint Committee and of trying to get excluded that particular objectionable clause, the one which referred to the nomination of a director of the railway company on the board. There was an opportunity there for them to do that, but they did not avail of it. It will effect a very good purpose to send this Bill back. In the first place, committees in future will bear in mind the direction that is given here in the Dáil regarding special representation on boards. They will further have in mind the discussion that took place here on the general question as to how they should advise the Dáil. All that, I suggest, will save time in the future, even though there may be a little time lost now. There is no necessity why the Bill should be lost, and in any case we ought not to be presented with a pistol to our heads, saying that if you do not do this just as we want it, you are going to lose £30,000 or £40,000.
I consider that the motion is out of order, and I consider further that the Dáil ought not to be meddling in this matter at all. You have already ruled, A Leas-Chinn Comhairle, that none of the amendments placed on the Order Paper to-day would alter the Bill substantially. The alteration that the President seems to have had in his mind was made in the Seanad, but the Seanad has sent the Bill here in that form. To my mind, if anybody should send the Bill back to the Joint Committee it is the Seanad. We did not make any substantial alteration in the Bill. I wonder where does the Seanad come in in this matter. Have we not to send the Bill back again to the Seanad? I understand that the Bill was initiated in the Seanad.
The Bill was introduced under Private Bill procedure.
Anyhow, I cannot see how you could accept this proposal.
Is Deputy Corish questioning the ruling that has been given?
I cannot hear any more points of order. I have decided to accept the amendment.
Perhaps you would consider a point of order regarding the terminology of the amendment. Can you refer the whole Bill back for consideration?
The amendment reads: "That the Dundalk Harbour and Port Bill, 1925, be recommitted in respect of Sections 15 and 92 of the Bill as amended."
This raises an extraordinary position. We have not touched Section 92 at all.
No. Amendment 7 on the Order Paper fell as being consequential. I asked the leave of the Chair to modify the original words.
I submit that this is a different motion entirely that is now before the House.
Take a division and it will settle the matter at once.
I submit that what happened was this: the Joint Committee sent up a report which went to one House before it went to the other. What came to the Dáil from the Seanad is not what was sent originally from the Joint Committee to the Seanad, and it does not comprise and does not embody in it the agreements which were made. If the Seanad neglects to do any certain thing, there is no reason why we should do the same thing. The matter ought to have been the subject of a motion there, but as it was not done there I suggest it is our duty to do it here.
It is due to me, and I want the privilege of making this personal explanation. The Order Paper contains a certain amendment in my name. I was approached with a view to considering the position that would be created if this amendment of mine was carried. It was pointed out that the Vice-Chairman of the Seanad who is closely involved in the question of Private Bill procedure would advise that in the form in which the amendment I put forward was written it would involve matter of substance, and he would advise that it ought to be referred to the Private Bill Committee in accordance with Standing Orders. So that that procedure would be unnecessary, the question of the new form was submitted, and it was agreed that that form would not involve sending the Bill back to the Joint Committee. Therefore, permission was sought to amend, and all amendments discussed were discussed on the assumption that there was no need to refer them back to the Private Bill Committee because they were not matters of substance.
On Deputy Good's amendment I certainly raised the other question.
I quite understand the President made the suggestion that the other procedure might be followed. But that does not alter the Standing Orders.
I wish to ask a question with respect to what Deputy Johnson said. Did not An Leas-Cheann Comhairle say on Amendment 2 that with a view to facilitating the discussion that at the end of that amendment the question of recommittal to a Committee could be entertained, and, therefore, did we not proceed from Amendment 2 to 7 on that basis, and was not that the contract?
You have ruled, A Leas-Chinn Comhairle, and I can only say with regard to the phraseology of my amendment that it will be a matter of grave consideration whether I shall not do a particular thing to get more reasonable and equitable amendments inserted in the Bill when it comes back. The amendments agreed have been agreed to as a result of an agreement with the promoters. This House is superior, and must claim to be superior to Private Bill Committees and to any private arrangements. We have inserted these amendments in deference to the public interest as against conflicting private interests, and I shall certainly reserve the right to propose to insert very much more drastic amendments in the Bill if it is sent back.
One thing I would like to say is that what Deputy Johnson says is absolutely correct. Amendment No. 1 was the one that was supposed to create all the trouble as far as the recommittal of the Bill was concerned. I approached Deputy Johnson on behalf of the promoters, and we came to a watering-down arrangement. Deputy Johnson did not like it, but in order that the Bill would pass the Dáil and not be held up, he consented, and on that ground alone, to water down the amendment. It is only due to Deputy Johnson that I should say that. I think it is only fair to Deputy Johnson that I should say that.
I want to say a few words on this matter as a member of the Committee that considered this Bill. I think it would be quite unwise to refer these things back to the Committee. The Dáil can only pass a resolution but it has to get the concurrence of the Seanad, and that may be forthcoming or it may not. If it is forthcoming and if we pass this resolution, we have first to seek the concurrence of the Seanad.
That does not require recommittal.
It would. You would have to get the consent of the Seanad to recommit. They may give it, but if they do not you will have a deadlock between the two Houses.
I think if we put the question there would be no deadlock.
On a point of order, would you state to the House on what ground you refuse to hear Deputy Hogan, who is addressing the House on the motion, as I submit, properly? He is cut short. There must be order or regulation governing the procedure of the House.
I thought that Deputy Hogan did not want to speak further.
Certainly I do. The point I was making was that if the Seanad refuses to recommit——
That is not so.
I submit with all respect that the Seanad are free agents in the matter. If we pass the resolution to have these sections recommitted to the Joint Committee, we must send a message to the Seanad acquainting them of the fact and asking their concurrence in our decision. They are free agents and can accept our motion or, as is quite possible, they may turn it down. If they turn it down there will be a deadlock between the two Houses and we should obviate such a possibility. I submit that the proposal is unfair to the Oireachtas, to the Private Bill Committee, and to the promoters of the Bill. Deputy Thrift's amendment may be accepted by the House, but, even so, if it becomes a substantive motion it is open to Deputy Johnson to move that all sections of the Bill be sent back to the Committee, and, from what Deputy Johnson has just said, I fancy that that is his intention. I submit that that will throw a very great burthen on the promoters of the Bill, as they will have to appear before the Committee again by counsel, they will have to recall their expert witnesses, and the whole question will have to be considered de novo. I do not know whether it will be referred to the old or to a new Committee, but they will not be bound by the report which has been presented. It is perfectly just and understandable that they will not be. The matter will then have to be reported in the Dáil and Seanad once more, and will all these amendments be discussed and will this stage be repeated?
I submit that we are entering into an interminable discussion on the Bill if we consent to the proposal to refer it back to the Joint Committee, and, if there is anything wrong, and if the promoters are dissatisfied with our decisions, they can drop the Bill and refuse to proceed further. I do not know what their intentions may be, but, I submit, we are the absolute masters of the position, that there is no means of controverting our authority, and, though the promoters can refuse to take the Bill, our decision should not be questioned.
I hope that this motion will now be put, and I also hope that it will not be voted on, because I think it may lead to great complexities. All I am anxious to see is the principle established that when a contract is cancelled it should be sent back to the original Committee.
Although I think that Deputy Thrift does not mean it, if his motion is carried it will really mean the killing of the disease by killing the patient. If the Bill is recommitted we will probably have heard the last of it, much to the joy of those opposed to it.
Amendment put and negatived.
