asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he has been able to make any arrangement with the British and Northern Ireland Governments regarding reciprocal agreement under the Unemployment Insurance Acts, and if he is aware that many citizens of the Saorstát holding insurance cards stamped with British stamps are deprived of benefits which they claim they are entitled to under these Acts.
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - INSURANCE ACTS—RECIPROCAL AGREEMENT.
I would refer the Deputy to my answer to the question of Deputy Mac Eoin on this subject on the 19th December, 1924. Both question and answer are reported in the Official Report of that date. A reciprocal arrangement with Great Britain would involve a substantial financial adjustment in favour of Saorstát Eireann, migration of labour being mainly one way. This the British Ministry of Labour declined to make, and it has not since indicated any change in its position. A reciprocal arrangement with Northern Ireland would, however, be quite simple, having regard to the more or less equal interchange of labour. Since I gave my reply on 19th December, 1924, the question of a reciprocal arrangement with the Government of Northern Ireland has been re-opened by the Irish Labour Party and Trade Union Congress, and on the 18th March, 1926, I sent officers of my Department to Belfast to discuss the matter with the Ministry of Labour of the Northern Government. These officers put forward for the consideration of the Northern Government a choice of six alternative proposals which exhausted all the forms that reciprocal arrangements on the subject could take, including a proposal in regard to which the Minister of Labour for Northern Ireland had previously expressed himself to the representatives of the Irish Labour Party and Trade Union Congress as favourably disposed. The feasibility of these proposals was demonstrated by the officers of my Department. At the time, the Ministry of Labour in Belfast neither accepted nor rejected the proposals, but in the following October, after a lapse of seven months which allowed ample time for full consideration of the matter, the Minister of Labour definitely announced that those proposals were not acceptable to him. I should add that the Northern Government has at no time made any concrete proposal for reciprocal arrangements. It has merely rejected all the proposals which my Department made, without suggesting any modification or amendment, or indicating any alternative.
The efforts I have made and the lengths I have gone to bring about a reciprocal arrangement for unemployment insurance indicate that I realise the hardship resulting from the present position to insured contributors who are not able to obtain unemployment benefit in respect of contributions paid in Northern Ireland, but so long as the Northern Government chooses to withhold its co-operation in this matter I am unable to do any more than I have done to solve the problem.
In regard to unemployment books stamped with British stamps, I am unable to accept liability for the payment of all the benefit when all the contributions have been received by Great Britain. As that country is unwilling to credit me with the contributions on which I would pay benefit no further progress can be made in the matter.
Will the Minister say whether, since the date in 1924, he has opened up communications with regard to the possibility of reciprocal arrangements with the British Government?
Since what date?
Since 1924.
I think the replies which we got some time previous to that date showed that there was no hope whatever of getting any success in further negotiations with them. If the Deputy has any reason to believe that that could be done now I would willingly open up the matter again.
I regret I have no reason to believe it, but I was wondering whether the Minister had found some means of suggesting a revision of the terms which would take into account the over-balance in one direction.
Well, I can get that matter looked into with a view to getting further letters sent to the British Government, if there is any chance of success in the matter.
I realise that the Minister has done all that could be reasonably expected so far as Northern Ireland is concerned
In view of the hardships that are inflicted on many citizens, I hope that the Minister will continue his efforts with the British Government towards making this arrangement and not let the matter lie low.