The object of amendment 18, as before us, is simply to leave the position as at present under the existing law. Amendment 19 has a slightly different purpose. I propose to take the amendments as before and decide the question of the morning opening first. After the decision taken yesterday afternoon the morning hour is now deemed to be settled at 10 o'clock, and we can, I suggest, proceed to discuss the other question on Section 2, sub-section (3) (ii). On Section 2, sub-section (3) (ii) the question of the opening hour in the morning arises again on the amendment of Deputy Lyons to make the hour half-past eight. A similar amendment has already been defeated for other areas. I take it we will pass that over. The next question that arises is the closing hour during the non-summer time period, which is nine o'clock in the Bill. Deputy Heffernan has down an amendment to make it ten. We will take that amendment now if it is moved.
INTOXICATING LIQUOR BILL, 1927—COMMITTEE STAGE (RESUMED).
That brings us down to the question of the hours on Saturdays. I think the only question that arises on that sub-section is whether half-past eight in sub-section (3) (b) (ii) should not be made half-past nine or ten. Deputy Redmond is not moving his amendment. That brings us down to sub-section (3) (b) (ii). There is an amendment to make the hour of closing ten o'clock instead of half-past eight.
Mr. EGAN
Are you passing over amendment No. 26?
No, I have just reached amendment 26. Deputy Egan can now move that amendment.
Mr. EGAN
I move:—
In sub-section (3) (b) (ii), page 5, line 17, to delete the word "eight" and substitute the word "nine."
The effect of the amendment is to have the hour of closing 9.30 instead of 8.30. The hour proposed in the Bill is rather early in view of the fact that people may live some distance outside a town and they may desire to purchase other goods. A great many country districts keep what they call old time, which makes it still more difficult.
This amendment deals with the period of the year other than summer time, so that the question of a variation in the rural time from the time that is kept in the towns does not arise. I would not be prepared to accept the Deputy's amendment. I have given a good deal of consideration to it. I recognise that people working up to six o'clock in the country who require to get into town before half-past eight might be somewhat rushed. I would meet the Deputy to the extent of half an hour, but I would not accept his amendment as it stands. I would bring in an amendment on Report to meet him half way in his amendment.
Mr. EGAN
I am quite satisfied with that.
Would I be in order in making a suggestion to the Minister in regard to line 5 in this section?
I think when the whole section is eventually before the Committee Deputy McBride will be in order, but at the moment we are only discussing the details.
It would be a very great convenience to country people if the hours proposed in the Bill were changed from 9 to 9 instead of from 10 to 10. I think it would have just the same effect, if not a better effect than the arrangement proposed in the Bill. People coming to fairs require to be accommodated.
That question will arise later.
The agreement made yesterday with regard to previous amendments governs amendment No. 27. That is, therefore, to be postponed to the Report Stage.
There is no occasion to repeat what I have already said in regard to this section, but I would be glad if the Minister would agree to my suggestion to change the hour from 10 in the morning and 10 in the evening to 9 in the morning and 9 in the evening.
I would not. I think 10 o'clock is quite early enough to commence the sale and consumption of intoxicating liquor, but I am prepared on Section 3 to consider whether paragraph (b), instead of being confined to urban areas, should not operate elsewhere, that is to consider whether the house that does a mixed business might not be allowed to open at 9 o'clock for the non-licensed portion of its business, the licensed portion commencing at 10 o'clock. Deputy McBride and others may say it is a hardship on a house with this mixed business—grocery and so on—not to be able to sell its groceries to the early caller who may be coming along about the hour of 9 o'clock and be compelled to keep closed until 10. We have considered in the Department whether it would not be reasonable to extend the facilities set out in paragraphs (a) and (b) of Section 3, sub-section (1), throughout the State, and we can discuss that when we come to it. On the question of drink only, I am not prepared to advance the hour earlier than 10 a.m.
Amendments 33 and 34 seek to effect the same thing. Amendment 34 is the better one.
I move amendment 34:—
In sub-section (1) (b), page 5, lines 51 to 53, to delete all words from the words "in an urban county district" to the words "the last census" and to substitute therefor the word "elsewhere."
I gathered from the observations of the Minister a few moments ago that he accepts the spirit of this amendment, that is to say, there would be permission to sell non-intoxicants.
I accept more than the spirit of the amendment; I think the form of it is all right and I accept it.
Is the Minister in doing that weakening on the point of having the mixed houses separated?
This is a question of area pure and simple—"elsewhere" in the State.
This rapid progress is rather making some of us giddy. Am I to understand that the section, as amended, differentiates between the four county boroughs of Dublin, Cork, Waterford and Limerick and the whole of the rest of the country? I think we should have it clear in our minds if it does.
Section 3 says:—
(1) Where any business other than the sale of intoxicating liquor (in this section referred to as non-licensed business) is carried on in any licensed premises and the portion of such premises in which such non-licensed business is carried on is not structurally separated from the remainder of such premises, the opening or keeping open of such premises for the purpose of carrying on such non-licensed business shall for the purposes of this Act be deemed to be an opening or keeping open of such premises for the sale of intoxicating liquor, save and except—
(a) in a county borough, on week days between the hours of nine o'clock and ten o'clock in the morning and between the hours of three o'clock and five o'clock in the afternoon."
And as I propose, in accepting Deputy Egan's amendment:
"and elsewhere between the hours of nine o'clock and ten o'clock in the morning on week days."
The net effect of that is this, that whereas we are not prepared to allow a publichouse to do its licensed business before 10 a.m., we are prepared to allow a mixed house, whether in a county borough or elsewhere, to open an hour earlier for the non-licensed portion of its business, lest it be said that we are unduly handicapping the man who has a grocery trade as well as a licensed trade as against his competitor. We will allow him to open at 9, and there will be one hour in which he will be expected to conduct only his non-licensed business.
Expected!
I use that word advisedly. If the expectation proves unsound, there will be certain consequences to the individual trader.
He would rather keep shut.
In that connection, if there is question on Report of an alteration of the two hours' broken day in the county boroughs to one hour, there will also be question of an alteration in sub-section (1) (a) of Section 3, because what I want to have is a completely closed one hour for mixed houses.
Am I right in thinking that an establishment like Findlaters will be allowed to open for the sale of groceries at 9 a.m., but will not be allowed to sell wine or beer until 10 a.m., and will be allowed to sell groceries between 3 and 5 p.m., or with any altered hours that may be inserted later in the Bill, be allowed to keep open for the sale of groceries, but not for the sale of intoxicating liquor?
The Deputy is right about the morning; he may be wrong about the mid-day, because the two hours' broken period in the day leaves the mixed house open for the non-licensed portion of its business; but if there is question of one hour, then that one hour will have to be a completely closed one hour for the mixed house.
As the Bill stands at present I am right?
Yes.
In reference to the matter of opening of mixed houses, in my constituency nearly all the licensed houses do a mixed trade. Will there not be considerable difficulty in enforcing the law if they are allowed to open at 9 a.m. for the sale of goods other than intoxicating liquor? Would not it be much better to have a 9 to 9 opening, so that there would not be any chance of a mistake in the matter?
Perhaps I can clear the Deputy's mind by suggesting that, according to the present arrangements—and I think they are temporary —a person will be entitled to sell bananas during those hours, but not "Baby Powers."
Will a club like a golf club come under this section, or are there special rules with reference to clubs? Very often on the licensed portion of the premises they carry on other business to a certain extent.
It is not a licensed premises. It is a registered club as distinct from a licensed premises.
Only licensed in respect of registration?
Technically, for the purpose of our discussion on this Bill, a club is not a licensed premises. We will come to clubs presently in Part V.
Is the Minister satisfied that there is no excessive drinking in golf clubs?
That will arise later.
Will the Minister explain what will be the position of a mixed business house where there is just one door and one counter, the grocery portion, perhaps, being nearest the door and the licensed portion further up? Would a customer be on the licensed premises if he were purchasing groceries, and would that be an offence under this section?
He can be there under this section.
It is not an offence?
During that 9 to 10 hour the trader is expected not to do any licensed business, and if he does, and is detected in doing it, legal penalties will follow.
It is a pious aspiration.
I have a much better opinion of the licensed trade than many of the opponents of the Bill.
Can the licensed trader sell intoxicating liquor during those prohibited hours for the purpose of taking away?
No.
I move:
In sub-section (1) at the end of the sub-section to add the following words: "and such general exemption order may be granted for a period of one year or any lesser period."
The purpose of this amendment is really to save inconvenience and possible cost. I do not think it can be suggested that there is anything controversial in this point; perhaps it is the only amendment in the Bill that is not controversial. According to the section, as it stands, the Justice of a District Court may make an order exempting licensed holders from the provisions of the Act relating to prohibited hours on such days, during such times, and on such terms as may be specified in such order. The purpose of my amendment is that the District Justice may have the power to make a general order over a certain period—I name one year as the period, but I am not bound by that term; six months, or something to that effect, would serve the same purpose—in regard to exemptions for purposes which would recur at stated intervals, as, for instance, fairs. Some District Justices have been inclined to make a general order upon one application, namely, that exemptions shall be granted for, say, any fairs that take place in the district during a certain period, and that order would be granted upon one application. Other District Justices have thought otherwise, and have insisted that there should be a separate application in each case, and in order to clear the matter up and to enable District Justices to make that general order upon one application, and thus save inconvenience and unnecessary cost, I propose that it shall be legal for a District Justice, in future, to grant a general order. I hope the Minister will see his way to accept it.
I agree with the Deputy that this is a non-controversial amendment. The only question that arises is as to its necessity. If the Deputy will read again line 11 in sub-section (1) he will see there that "on such days and during such times and upon such terms as may be specified in such order." My submission is that these words are quite broad enough to meet what the Deputy desires to meet. I understand the Deputy's point perfectly: he fears it will be necessary to apply for a special order for each occasion, say for each market or fair, but, as I read it, there is nothing in the section that would prevent a Justice giving an exemption for a period of one year or more or less. I am prepared to look into the section, and if the Attorney-General, or the draftsman, tells me that there is anything vague, anything that would even give rise to doubts as to the power of the Justice, I will see what will be the best way to make the matter clear. I am quite at one with the Deputy, that it is desirable that the Justice should have a more general power, and should not have to grant, for each specific case, a separate exemption order.
I am perfectly satisfied and ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
I beg to move:
Before Section 5 to insert a new section as follows:—
(1) A Justice of the District Court upon it being proved to his satisfaction that it is necessary or desirable so to do for the accommodation of any considerable number of persons attending any football match or hurling match may grant (if he so thinks fit) to the holders of seven-day on-licences in respect of premises situate in his licensing area an order exempting such holders from the provisions of this Act relating to prohibited hours on any Sunday in respect of such premises and during such times in the afternoon as may be specified in such order.
(2) Every order so made in pursuance of this section shall contain as one of the terms thereof a condition that the holders of on-licences to whom such order is granted shall during such period of exemption supply on the licensed premises food and non-alcoholic drink at reasonable prices to any person demanding same.
(3) The holders of on-licences to whom such exemption order is granted shall if and so long as they comply with the terms of such order be exempt from any penalty for contravention in respect of such premises of the provisions of this Act relating to prohibited hours but not from any other penalty under this or any other Act.
(4) Any person or persons applying for an exemption order in pursuance of this section shall not less than twenty-four hours before making the application serve upon the officer in charge of the Gárda Síochána for the licensing area a notice of his or their intention to apply for the order setting out his or their name and address or names and addresses and the place, occasion and time for which the order is sought.
This new section proposes that where any football match or hurling match is taking place on a Sunday power should be given to the District Justice to make an exemption order in respect of that special day. I do not think that this can be regarded as in any way unreasonable, because many people have to come distances to those matches and, though it may be true in one sense that they would be bona fide travellers, at the same time, as the law is now proposed, that would not assist them in regard to the exempted cities and, also, it would really be of more general convenience to have them permitted openly to partake of refreshments in the ordinary way than to have to go to the door of licensed premises and make general explanations as to where they have come from and as to their qualifications to be served as bona fide travellers.
I have put in a provision that wherever drink is served food also could be obtainable, and I hope that the Minister will favourably consider this. There have been certainly great inconveniences in the past, in relation to huge crowds who have gathered upon those occasions. I have not made the section very wide; I have limited it to the matter of football matches and hurling matches. I have not proposed it for public meetings or anything of that sort. I think it is not asking too much that the Minister should favourably consider this, and make refreshments accompanied by meals or a provision that meals shall be served with them, available for people who come for that purpose to those various centres.
I also would like to urge upon the Minister the advisability of accepting this amendment. I look upon it from the point of view of the impossibility of administering the present licensing laws on such occasions. I have seen a crowd in one of the towns in my county in connection with a very important hurling match, and in actual practice all the publichouses were open to all classes of travellers, bona fide and otherwise. It was quite impossible for the Gárda to supervise or do anything in the way of attempting to enforce the law. As a matter of fact, I really believe there was some kind of understanding, not in actual words, perhaps, to the effect that the Gárda were not going to make any attempt to enforce the law in regard to non-bona fide travellers.
Difficulties arose in connection with the matches in other towns, as the publichouses on the way were obliged to keep their doors open. Some of the publicans were summoned for allowing non-bona fide travellers on their premises. In the circumstances, I would say that it was almost impossible for these publicans to guard against offending in that way. Immense crowds passed through the towns and they were looking for food and drink in the publichouses and hotels. Some of the publicans were actually prosecuted. I think, under such conditions, it would be impossible to administer the present law, and I urge on the Minister the advisability of giving the amendment serious consideration.
The idea of exemption orders was confined, hitherto, to public markets, fairs or occasions for people following some particular trade assembling at unusual hours. The Deputy's proposal seeks to extend the idea to large concourses attending a big football or hurling match on Sunday. I prefer to adhere to the position that, for occasions like that, the provisions of Section 13 of the Bill will have to be relied upon—the bona fide section. I anticipated the objection, that that is very well for the country towns, but that for the four cities some special provision should be made owing to the fact that the Bill has no exemption in favour of bona fide travellers in county boroughs on Sunday. The publichouses in these four cities are allowed to open from two to five, and hotels can supply drink with meals from one to three, and from six to nine. Further, intoxicating liquor is not, so far as I am aware, the only form of sustenance. I am not prepared to accept the amendment. I realise, with Deputy Heffernan, that on occasions on which large crowds of people come to a town there may be some little difficulty and some need for special vigilance on the part of the police to see that the bona fide aspect of the law is adhered to. He suggests that because that is so the remedy is to throw the publichouses fully open to all comers, locals and visitors, a thing that on an occasion like that is most likely to lead to undue crowding of the publichouses, possible excesses, and possible turbulence, and riot. I am not attracted by the amendment and I advise the Committee to reject it.
The net result of the Minister's statement seems to be that, while visitors to areas other than the exempted cities may have some means of procuring intoxicating liquor under the provisions relating to bona fide travellers, similar visitors to the exempted cities will have no such means except within the hours of two and five, and, I may add, if they are able, to go to hotels. I wonder does the Minister realise that the very hours he speaks of, two to five, are the hours during which these football and hurling matches take place.
It is not during the hours, two to five, that refreshments are required, but immediately before and immediately after these hours. The fact that in Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Waterford the citizens can get drink between two and five will be very little consolation to the people who come from the country to Dublin, or go from Dublin to Waterford or Cork, to witness a football or hurling match, which will actually take place within these very hours.
I would submit to the Minister that there is a strong case for something to be done for the exempted cities in this respect. He has mentioned that the people would be entitled to go to hotels under a later section in this Bill, and there partake of a substantial meal, and if they desire, also intoxicating liquor. He knows, as well as I do, that the great bulk of people that go to these football matches are not those who can go to hotels. Very often they take their lunches with them by way of sandwiches, and if they did go to hotels there are not sufficient hotels to accommodate them. There have been, here in Dublin, some 20,000 to 40,000 people present at some of the great finals in the football or hurling field.
It is for the bulk of the people I am asking the Minister to have some regard, people who would not be able to afford to go to hotels and, who, therefore, owing to the present position, if they came to any of the exempted cities would not, in the first place, have the advantage of the bona fide section, and, in the second place, would not be able to get their drinks without leaving the football or hurling field which they actually came to visit. I think there is a strong case on this question, and I would ask the Minister to reconsider the matter. I am not pressing the case from the point of view of areas outside the exempted cities because there they have, it is true, a certain facility in the shape of the existing bona fide provisions. Anyone who goes to the exempted cities of Cork, Waterford, Dublin and Limerick, for the purpose of witnessing a football or hurling match can get no liquid refreshment except during the very hours that the hurling and football match is going on or unless they are able to go to hotels and have a substantial meal. With great respect I would ask the Minister to reconsider his attitude on this and, if possible, make some provision for these people on the next stage of the Bill.
Might I point out that any traveller who has a ticket can get refreshments at the railway termini.
I would like to see Deputy Wilson fighting his way at Amiens Street, or any other railway terminus, trying to get refreshments on a day such as I mention.
I am afraid the amendment is rather wide. Personally, I should not care to see the publichouses flung open on Sundays for every football and hurling match held throughout the country, or even held in the city. But I think the Minister might consider the question of meeting Deputy Redmond with regard to provincial and all-Ireland finals. What Deputy Redmond has said with regard to all-Ireland finals in Dublin is quite correct. It has been a complaint on the part of many people from different parts of the country that not only can they not get drink on these occasions in the city but that they cannot get even food. The great majority of the people attending those finals are not people who can afford to go into hotels, because they are not in a position to pay the prices that would be charged. Many of them are very poor people who take one day off in the year to see an all-Ireland final. They have to put a few shillings together in order to travel on that one day in the year.
I was certainly struck with what happened in Thurles last year—a matter to which Deputy Heffernan has referred. There were two matches played there and in that small town, of 4,000 or 5,000 population, you had 30,000 visitors from all over the country. It was quite obvious to everybody that the publichouses were open as on an ordinary week-day, and that the law was not sought to be enforced. I think the Gárda were quite right in their attitude, because it would have been almost impossible to enforce the law in the circumstances. If the Gárda had insisted on the law being carried out, many of the visitors would have to return—some of them to Cork and Kerry —that night without any refreshment whatsoever. I think the Minister should consider the insertion in this Bill of a provision which would leave it in the discretion of the District Justice to grant an exemption order in the case of a big match, such as a provincial final or an all-Ireland final in Dublin or in the provinces. That would probably meet the desires of most people. I certainly think that we could not expect the Minister to agree that publichouses should be allowed to open freely on Sundays for every football or hurling match held in the country.
If the amendment is withdrawn, without prejudice to the Deputy's right to bring it up again at a later stage, I will consider the points that have been urged, and I will see whether it would be possible to introduce any new provision on Report. If it is not possible to do so, I will notify the Deputies interested in sufficient time to enable them to bring up any amendment they please on Report.
I move:—
Before Section 12 to insert a new section as follows:—
"Nothing in this Act shall operate to prohibit the holder of an on-licence in respect of premises which are for the time being a hotel or restaurant supplying intoxicating liquor to any person on such premises on any week-day, not being a Saturday, between the hours of ten o'clock in the evening and midnight, and on any Saturday between the hours of half-past nine o'clock in the evening and midnight, provided such intoxicating liquor is—
(a) ordered by such person at the same time as a substantial meal is ordered by such person,
(b) is consumed at the same time as and with such meal.
(c) is supplied and consumed in the portion of such premises usually set apart for the supply of such meals, and
(d) is paid for at the same time as such meal is paid for."
This amendment is intended to make provision for the supply of intoxicating liquor with suppers under the conditions already prescribed by the Minister in Section 11: that is to say, that it should be open to the proprietor of a hotel or restaurant, and of no place other than a hotel or restaurant, as defined in Section 1 of the Bill, to supply liquor with a supper, which is in itself a substantial meal, the liquor being ordered at the same time as the meal, being consumed at the same time, and being paid for at the same time. Seventeen years ago I was partly responsible for bringing into law the Hotels and Restaurants (Dublin) Act, which made it possible under definite restrictions for liquor to be supplied with suppers in Dublin. I am glad to see that the Minister has accepted that Act, has embodied it in his Bill, and has even extended it. But there are one or two imperfections in that Act. For instance, in order to take advantage of the Act, it is necessary that application be made in court; it is necessary that a solicitor be instructed; it is necessary that at least 24 hours' notice be given. Though the Act is useful, it only operates in the case of large parties, where it is worth while for the hotel or restaurant proprietor to employ a solicitor and pay his fee for making application in court. It only operates, too, in a case where the supper is premeditated some time ahead, so that it is possible to give the order and give 24 hours' notice. In almost every capital city of the world that I have knowledge of, an individual, without organising a party, can go into a restaurant, order a substantial meal in the form of supper and take alcoholic liquor with it. I should except from that the cities of Canada, Australia and the United States. Ostensibly you cannot do so in those cities. But in London, Paris, Rome and most of the capital cities of the world one can order a substantial meal and have a bottle of wine or a glass of whiskey with it. You do not have to go through all the formulae that you have to go through here—applications and notice and so on. If we are trying to develop our tourist trade, and if we are to put not only Dublin, but Cork, Limerick and even country towns on the same plane in regard to the attraction of visitors as London, Paris and Rome, we might as well harmonise our licensing regulations. The conditions and stipulations laid down in this amendment are those suggested by the Minister himself in regard to the supply of liquor on Sundays and other prohibited days. I do not think that this is a provision which lends itself to abuse. To begin with, "hotels" and "restaurants" are very carefully defined. There are not an immense number of hotels with sleeping accommodation for more than ten persons in any of the small country towns. The amendment applies only to a very limited number of houses. I believe it is a workable amendment, and I would urge its adoption by the Committee.
I support Deputy Cooper's amendment. The Minister has acted so reasonably in the conduct of this Bill that I am sure he will consider Deputy Cooper's arguments. It is only fair and reasonable that this measure of liberty should be given to the owners of hotels and restaurants.
I desire to support the amendment moved by Deputy Cooper. I think the Minister himself, on the Second Reading of the Bill, put forward the idea that a person having a substantial meal in a restaurant or hotel should be entitled to get a drink, and that is what this amendment asks. I think that Deputy Cooper put forward this amendment not on his own behalf, not directly from himself, but from the people who are interested in the hotel and restaurant business, not alone in Dublin but in the other exempted cities. I am quite sure the Deputy did not move the amendment on behalf of two or three or four people, but on behalf of all the entire hotel proprietors in the exempted cities. When the 1923 Bill was before the House the Minister, speaking to an amendment that was then moved by Deputy Cooper, said he was at a loss to know what was the meaning of a substantial meal. It means this: that if a person goes into a hotel or restaurant and orders a substantial meal consisting of eggs and tea—I would call that a substantial meal—and wishes to have a drink with it during prohibited hours for the ordinary licensed trader, he is entitled to have it. I hope that the Minister, taking into account the mover of the amendment, will accept it. It would be quite different if I were the mover of it, or Deputy O'Connell or Deputy Everett. I am sure it will have great weight with the Minister because it is being moved by Deputy Major Cooper. Of course he is a Deputy of this House, and a Major in the British Army.
The Deputy will have to discuss the amendment, not the mover of it.
I can discuss the proposer of the amendment.
Certainly not.
For the reasons put forward by the mover of it, I hope this amendment will be accepted by the Minister. I think it is necessary that the proprietors of hotels and restaurants should get the facilities asked for. I think the amendment is a fair one and I support it strongly.
It is quite improper to say that the Deputy is putting forward the amendment on behalf of a particular interest outside the Dáil. The Deputy is putting forward the amendment himself.
I did not maintain that the Deputy put forward the amendment on instructions from a party. I said that he put forward the amendment not on behalf of two or three people, but on behalf of the general body of proprietors of hotels and restaurants.
Perhaps the personal explanation had better come from me. Like every other Deputy who takes an active part in the proceedings of the Dáil, I am frequently approached with suggestions for amendments to be moved. I reject many more of them than I adopt, and I never adopt any amendment that does not appear to me a sound one. I do not think that I have ever adopted one in the form in which it was suggested to me. I draft every one of my amendments myself, and have never taken up any that I was not prepared to stand over as representing my own opinions and my own views. That is one thing that I will not do. The other thing that I will not do is, to to take up Deputy Lyons' speeches second-hand and repeat them as my own.
I should like to support Deputy Cooper's purpose in moving this amendment, not for the reasons stated by the last speaker, but for some of the reasons stated by the mover. The amendment, as drafted, would appear to facilitate any one in a hotel who was not there on a particular occasion, but who happened to be there on an ordinary week-day or Saturday, in obtaining intoxicating liquor with a meal after prohibited hours and up to midnight. I think that suggestion is both desirable and reasonable.
There are many occasions when exemption orders would not have to be asked for or would not perhaps be granted, when people find themselves away from their home, not necessarily at a sufficient distance to render them bona fide travellers, and it would be only right that they should be able to partake of liquor in the shape of intoxicants with whatever they have in the nature of supper. Many people, young and old, go to dances which may last after the hours for the sale of intoxicating liquor. It may occur in a hotel and they may require supper and something to drink with that supper. Especially in cities like Dublin, there should be some facility in this matter. As Deputy Cooper has said, in practically every other country in the world, at least its capital, is facilitated in this way, but his amendment is not confined, as far as I read it, to Dublin. In that respect I desire to support it, because elsewhere the same state of affairs might well exist in districts, especially pleasure resorts, seaside and others, where people are gathered in hotels, and are not strictly without the limit of the bona fide traveller. There is nothing extraordinary in this proposal. It is in existence in England, and we have been told heretofore throughout the discussion on this Bill of the restrictions——
Did the Deputy say England or London?
I said England.
Is it throughout England?
I could not say. London is in England.
I am aware of that and so is the Deputy.
It is in England and in the capital, which, I presume, is London. The fact that there are other restrictions with regard to the sale of intoxicating liquor in England has been mentioned to us here in support of further restrictions. I submit, on the same lines, that if the sale and consumption are permitted in parts of England certainly there should be no reason why the same should not be permitted here. The conditions are very similiar. Both are capital cities and both are more or less the centre of society, for what it is, in their respective countries. Therefore, I desire to support this proposal, because I believe it is not asking for any further extension in regard to reasonable restrictions, but is merely asking for the application of principles which are recognised everywhere, especially in countries where the restrictions on the sale of liquor are generally greater than they are here.
I should not say that I am not here for the whole of the Saorstát, in common with other Deputies, but I cannot avoid saying that I am particularly interested in the city of Dublin. There is a lot of camouflage about this amendment. To me it appears that it is legislating for the man, citizen or visitor, who has money, against the man or woman who has not, in other words, legislating for the rich and not for the poor, and assisting the rich to get drink in a manner in which the poor man cannot get it.
I would like to support this amendment if it were made general to the Saorstát.
It is.
I should like a hotel or restaurant to be clearly defined. I suggest it be left to the superintendent of police to visit a house, with "restaurant" written over it, and see whether there was sufficient accommodation inside it to give substantial meals. This will give rise, from time to time, to an amount of trouble and suspicion, but at the same time there are a great many people coming into towns and villages over the country who would be able to get a substantial meal in a publichouse or hotel that they would not be able to get in a private house as satisfactory or as digestible. I would not like to see it confined to the great cities or the high-class hotels. If I am assured by the Minister that this is going to be made general throughout the country and that it would be left to the discretion of a superintendent to determine when a house is fit to be a restaurant, then I am prepared to support it.
I hope the Minister will refuse to accept this amendment for the very reasons Deputy Redmond mentioned about dances. I see nothing objectionable in dances. They will go on to the end of time. But what I see very objectionable is the fact that young people go to a dance and have a sit-down supper where bottles of wine, champagne and intoxicants of other kinds can be ordered and taken by those young people just because the drink is accompanied by a substantial meal. It is within the knowledge of all of us that young people have been ruined by going to those suppers and they have been drawn to the use of intoxicants by having those suppers. I hope the Minister will unhesitatingly refuse to accept this amendment. We know very well that "How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done" is true. If they sit down to supper they will partake of intoxicants. The downward path is very easy. I hope the Minister will emphatically refuse to accept the amendment.
I would like to ask the Deputy one question. Can I? Do you ——
The Deputy cannot ask a question in that way.
Can I ask through you?
No. The Deputy must sit down.
I realise that an amendment which secures the joint support of Deputy Cooper and Deputy Lyons is deserving of the deepest consideration.
When you had the support of Deputy Lyons in 1916 you did not say that.
I forgot that.
You forget that and a lot now.
DEPUTIES
Order, order.
It is all right.
It seems to me that the objection made by Deputy Myles Keogh is a sound one, that in effect this amendment is class legislation. It simply means that whereas we will have one set of laws and one closing hour for the ordinary citizen, for the other different type of citizen to whom 5/-., 6/- or 7/- is a small matter, the closing hour shall be midnight. For the citizen who will turn into a hotel or turn into a restaurant and order what Deputy Cooper, like myself in another section, describes as a substantial meal, there shall be no closing hour until the clock strikes twelve. I know that superficially a case can be made out for the amendment, but, on the other hand, one has to consider just how a section of this kind would work out in practice. What it would mean is that for a preliminary tax of 5/-, 6/- or 7/6 one can buy three additional hours for the consumption of intoxicating liquor. Deputies have to make up their own minds as to the desirability of that, and just how we would like this City and this State of ours to develop. Deputy Cooper holds up the ideal that we should be the giddy competitor of London, Paris and Rome, and that we should develop a night life of our own, and generally we are told that this amendment is one calculated to develop the tourist traffic and throw the other capitals of the world that have hitherto been centres of gaiety, into the shade. I think that this tourist traffic argument can be pressed too far. If it means that we are to mould our social life and our social development here, not so much along the lines of thought of the residents of our own State as along the lines of thought and fancy of hypothetical potential visitors to our own State, I disagree.
At every turn you are told: "Do not do this or you will annoy the tourists," or "Do not do that or you will annoy the tourists." Some seem to suggest that the old Victorian idea that Sunday might be a day different from any other day in the matter of the sale and consumption of intoxicating liquor is to go by the board for fear that the tourists would not come to this country. We might run too far along those lines. All our ideas of restraint, sobriety and temperance and the restrictions which seem necessary or advisable in order to maintain or retain those ideals are to be sacrificed now to some hypothetical tourist who will turn his back on us if he cannot drink until 12 o'clock at night.
I am not prepared to accept the amendment, and I am certaintly not prepared to accept the amendment now in this Bill. This Bill does not exhaust the recommendations of the Intoxicating Liquor Commission. We have put aside and left over for a future Bill certain of the recommendations, amongst which particularly is the question of codifying licences and dealing with hotel licences. Deputy Redmond and Deputy Cooper talked at one moment about the capital, and the desirability of developing a hectic night life in our capital as in other capitals.
They were careful to point out, in order to soothe and comfort Deputy Daly, that the amendment applies to the entire State. Now, what is the hotel in the average provincial town or village? A publichouse with a few spare bedrooms upstairs, in which a chance visitor may be lodged. And with the preliminary tax of a substantial meal, which might be fish and chips, there need not be a closing hour until midnight. If we are to go into this question of hotel licences and of separate licences for hotels and possibly separate regulations for hotels, then we have to define very carefully what we mean and what we do not mean by a hotel for the purpose of any concessions of the kind that are sought here. The position under the Bill is that people staying in a hotel can get a drink at any hour. Section 12 (e) provides that. The point of this amendment is to extend this to people not actually stopping in the hotel, with the limitation that if they are to drink until midnight they have to eat or order and pay for a substantial meal. There are some people who, with no particular appetite, would be prepared to order a substantial meal costing 4/- or 5/- for the sake of an additional two or three hours for the consumption of intoxicating liquor.
Question.
Deputy Lyons does not know any people like that. Possibly Deputy Cooper does, and possibly Deputy Redmond does. I am not accepting the amendment.
It is with great regret that I find myself in disagreement with Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll. I would like to point out to her that she has been supporting a Bill, and that under that Bill, which she and others have been supporting, all the evils she deplores at dances are possible. Section 5 of this Bill gives power to grant exemptions in the case of dances. All the dances held in Dublin are getting exemptions. My amendment meets the case of a man and his wife who might motor into the theatre a distance of 20 miles and who might want to get something to eat, possibly a whiskey and soda and a glass of wine. Dances got exemption and can get exemption still.
Might I interrupt— anyone motoring 20 miles into Dublin would be a bona fide traveller and he would be entitled to get a drink.
Very well, I will say nine miles to satisfy Deputy Wilson.
Three miles.
No, nine miles. However, I will not go into that matter. It is almost as rare to find Deputy Myles Keogh and the Minister audibly in agreement as to find Deputy Lyons and myself. I was surprised to find the Minister taking up Deputy Myles Keogh's cry that this was class legislation.
If my amendment can be considered as class legislation, then Section 11 is equally class legislation. Both provide for people who could afford to go to hotels and restaurants and order meals. I am not ashamed to admit to Deputy Myles Keogh that I do want to cater for the rich; I do want to attract rich people to this country. I want to retain the comparatively small number of rich people that we have in the country by offering them similar amenities to those offered in other countries. The people who will benefit most come under two headings. One is a small class—the Minister for Finance— and the other class is the poor. Amongst the latter class are the taxi-drivers and waiters. Any number of trades in the city of Dublin would benefit by visits of the rich. They will not raise any cry of class legislation.
That point of desiring to offer equal amenities with other great cities. I think, covers all the Minister says about starting night life here. I do not suppose there will be any violent or extended night life in Dublin, similar, for instance, to what one would expect in London. I remember the time when London was more or less a dead city after half-past eleven at night. There must be some development in Dublin just as there has been in other cities. In other places that development is noticeable and it is almost inevitable that it will apply here, and if we do not share in that development we shall find ourselves left in a backwater.
About two years ago, in a burst of that candour that occasionally assails Ministers when they get on a public platform, the Minister for Justice informed the world that Ministers always put more into a Bill than they intended to carry. I am quite sure the Minister spoke the truth. More recent observation has persuaded me that Ministers do put more in a Bill than they ever intend or think it possible to carry. Even at the risk of losing Deputy Daly's support, I will say that I put more in my amendment than I thought I would carry.
I suggest a strong case has been made out for the four county boroughs, and if the Minister will accept the four county boroughs, though I shall drop a tear in the Lake of Killarney and possibly another on the slopes of Kilworth mountain, I would accept that as a fair compromise.
Can the Minister give us any date when this system of codification in relation to restaurants is to be brought in? That matter seemed to me to be one of the most important reforms suggested by the Intoxicating Liquor Commission. It is ridiculous to class a large city restaurant, behind which there is a very considerable amount of capital, on the same basis as the country publichouse.
Why?
Well, they do an entirely different class of business. If I went into one of our country publichouses and ordered Vol-au-vent a la Bordelaise, I would be very curious to see what I had got.
You might get as good stuff there as anywhere else.
It is unreasonable for the Minister to put up that defence —to say "Wait for codification and wait for a more definite classification," without indicating when we are to receive it. I believe that that particular matter is an essential part of the report of the Intoxicating Liquor Commission. I believe that all their recommendations were contemplated to be adopted in conjunction with their report. If the Minister says "I will not accept this now because we have not yet proceeded with the codification," I think I am entitled to press that he will give us an idea when he is going to proceed with this codification.
I do not at all agree with Deputy Cooper in his last statement. He is prepared even to accept a compromise with the Minister for Justice to exempt from the Bill all the hotels and restaurants outside the four county boroughs. I do not think that is right. Before one gets a hotel licence one must have, at least, ten bedrooms and not, as the Minister for Justice said a few moments ago, four or five rooms. That is not so. One must have, at least, ten bedrooms, and the place must be capable of accommodating at least ten paying guests before one is entitled to a hotel licence.
Take the case of a man who goes from the city to Mullingar, Athlone, Longford, Clonmel, Carrick-on-Suir, or anywhere else. If he takes a friend in with him to have lunch in any hotel surely that friend should be entitled to get refreshments just the same as the man himself is entitled as a bona fide traveller. Deputy Cooper says that, even suffering the loss of Deputy Daly's support, he is quite agreeable to compromise with the Minister to exempt rural districts from this amendment. If Deputy Cooper put forward this amendment on behalf of the hotel and restaurant proprietors ——
I did not.
Then he put it forward, not alone on behalf of a certain section of that class, but on behalf of the entire lot in the Saorstát. Surely, Deputy Cooper will do as much for the hotel proprietor in Clonmel as the hotel proprietor who lives in Dublin, or is Deputy Cooper going to be led by the men who live in Dublin, because they are the men who can vote for him while the men in Clonmel cannot? Is that the Deputy's idea?
I would like to be quite clear on this amendment. I intend to support it as it stands, and I hope Deputy Cooper will put it forward in its present terms. If there is an understanding that on the Report Stage the Minister will introduce something that would cover the substance of this amendment, I am quite satisfied, but I would first like to get that assurance.
It is necessary that the hotels and restaurants should have additional hours for supplying intoxicating drink with a substantial meal. Licensed traders, on the whole, do not supply substantial meals. They have their shops open for the sale of intoxicating drink—according to the licensing laws in the Saorstát—from 9 in the morning until 10 at night. The hotel is different. The hotels have a greater interest at stake than the ordinary licensed trade.
Hotel premises are of more value than licensed houses, and it is necessary, if you agree with capitalism as, apparently, the Minister does, to try to facilitate hotel proprietors. The Dáil should, therefore, in my opinion, accept the amendment, or at least replace it by some provision that will cover the point for the whole Saorstát.
My name has been trotted out a few times during the last quarter of an hour, and I would like to point out to the Minister that I have not the slightest sympathy for any man who can get into a hotel, and have a good substantial meal but not get a drink with it. My sympathy is with the poor man who has to trudge along the road and take a drink to enable him to travel, but not to enable him to digest a substantial meal in a hotel.
Deputy Cooper has urged this amendment on the attention of the Dáil, first on the plea that it would be advantageous to the tourist traffic and, secondly, that it would encourage the rich section of the community to remain in the country, giving them leave to spend their money and enjoy themselves in any way they desire. At the risk of expressing a view that will probably meet with a good deal of opposition, I would, at the outset, like to question the value of the tourist traffic as an asset to this country. I think that tourist traffic from abroad would be a very doubtful asset, for one or two reasons. It means that a certain proportion of our population would look forward to deriving their support from, at least to a certain extent, charitable contributions of visitors. It would not be conducive to employment, but would be a demoralising influence. To my mind, if we could induce Irish people to spend their holidays here, we would do far more useful work.
With regard to catering for the rich and keeping pace with developments in Europe, if you cater for the rich in this way are you sure that you can confine it to the rich? The example of rich people enjoying these privileges over people who cannot afford them would, to my mind, be very injurious. The extravagance of the very rich is one of the most corrupting influences in the present social system, especially as regards classes who cannot afford the expenditure of the rich, but who are continually trying to ape their manners and extravagances. If you could segregate the rich, and if you could ensure that their example would not be copied by people who could not afford it, there might be something to be said in favour of Deputy Cooper's amendment. In view of the risk of corrupting a much larger section of the community, I do not think that this amendment would be of benefit in a country like this. For these reasons I oppose it.
I would not enter upon this discussion except for the remarks of Deputy McCurtain. Without desiring to be offensive, I may say that I have not heard during the discussion this evening any remarks displaying more ignorance of the subject matter under discussion than those of Deputy McCurtain, who is one of the men we recognise as an intellectual. The Deputy says that bringing in a foreign influence would corrupt us. In the name of all the eternal verities if we cannot stand a foreign invasion of that kind and make use of it to supply us with cash, our moral standard is not strong. Deputy Cooper told us that the means of accommodation in hotels and restaurants should be free from certain restrictions. I agree with him. The Minister may have different views, but, in my opinion, this is an exceeding reasonable amendment, and if the Deputy pushes it to a division I will support it.
I support this amendment mainly for the one reason given by Deputy Cooper, namely, that we may attempt to cater for the tourist traffic. I am in disagreement with the remarks of the Deputy from my county, deprecating the tourist traffic, because I believe that an influx of tourists can be turned into a very valuable asset for the country. We are all aware that these countries which cater for this particular class of traveller try to provide entertainment and amusement for them, and unless they do so, people will not visit them but will go where such entertainment and amusements are provided. If we ask tourists to come here I think we should try to provide facilities for their enjoyment.
took the Chair.
It is all very fine to talk about being democratic, but we cannot be democratic in everything, and in this matter we are dealing with a particular class of people who largely come from outside. I think from some of the statements made by Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll that she must be under a slight misapprehension, for as I understand the purport of the amendment, its effect would not be that people attending dances could get intoxicating drink at any time during a dance on buying a substantial meal. As I understand the custom at those dances is that one substantial meal is served.
On a point of explanation, that is exactly what I said: The proprietors of hotels need not apply for an exemption for dances if this amendment were carried. If the amendment were adopted people attending the dances could get bottles of wine or intoxicants of any kind with a sit-down supper.
I do not want to misunderstand Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll. I appreciate her point of view fully, but I think the amendment would not have the effect she says. It would not be practicable to order a substantial meal at any time during a dance. That would not be likely to happen. What would happen is that one substantial meal would be provided, and at that drink would be available, but not at any other time. I think this amendment has more in favour of it than against it. It is not perhaps desirable from every point of view, but it has certain advantages, and I recommend it to the serious consideration of the Ministry.
Can the Minister give any answer to my question about further legislation dealing with hotels and restaurants, and when he thinks he can introduce that?
I will guarantee to the Deputy that it would not be sooner than a year's time.
Amendment put and negatived.
took the Chair.
SECTION 13.
(1) Nothing in this Act shall operate to prohibit—
(a) the holder of an on-licence in respect of premises situate in a county borough from selling intoxicating liquor for consumption on such licensed premises to bona fide travellers at any time on any week day, or
(b) the holder of an on-licence in respect of premises not situate in a county borough from selling intoxicating liquor for consumption on such licensed premises to bona fide travellers
(i) at any time on any week-day, or
(ii) on Saint Patrick's Day between the hours of one o'clock and three o'clock in the afternoon or between the hours of five o'clock and seven o'clock in the afternoon, or
(iii) if his licence is not a six-day licence, on any Sunday between the hours of one o'clock and three o'clock in the afternoon or between the hours of five o'clock and seven o'clock in the afternoon.
(2) Every person who by falsely representing himself to be a bona fide traveller buys or obtains or who attempts by such false representation to buy or obtain on any licensed premises any intoxicating liquor during a period in which the sale of intoxicating liquor on such premises is prohibited by this Act shall be guilty of an offence under this section and shall be liable on summary conviction thereof to a fine not exceeding five pounds.
(4) For the purposes of this section a person shall not be a bona fide traveller unless the place where he lodged during the previous night is situate in a county borough and is at the least ten miles (measured by the shortest public thoroughfare) distant from the place where he demands to be supplied with intoxicating liquor, or the place where he lodged during the previous night is situate elsewhere than in a county borough and is at least six miles (similarly measured) distant from the place where he demands to be supplied with intoxicating liquor.
I move:—
In sub-section (1) (a), line 38, to add after the words "week day" the words "or at any time on any Sunday save between the hours of seven o'clock in the morning and one o'clock in the afternoon on the latter day."
This amendment refers exclusively to sub-section (1) (a) and that refers exclusively to boroughs. In effect, the Minister proposes by this sub-section as it now stands to alter the existing law in regard to county boroughs and to prevent bona fide traffic on Sundays in those county boroughs. What I propose is that we should revert to the existing law, and that in county boroughs there should be permitted bona fide traffic as at present. I see no reason, and so far the Minister has advanced no reason—I suppose we will hear from him now if he has any reasons to offer—why the law should be altered in regard to exempted cities in this respect. It is true there is no use in blinking the fact that in the city of Dublin, though it was possible to have bona fide traffic on Sundays under the existing law, yet at the same time, for one reason or another, by custom or practice, that has virtually died down, but that state of affairs does not exist in regard to the other county boroughs, namely, Cork, Limerick and Waterford. I do not know whether the Minister is inclined to draw any distinction between the county boroughs in this respect, but I would point out that there is a distinct difference between these cities, inasmuch as cities other than Dublin, which are known as exempted cities, are in reality not great centres of industrial, social, or, if you like, official population. They are largely great county towns, and they have a constant stream of people coming in and out of them from districts which might or might not be covered by the existing bona fide provisions.
I cannot see why the existing state of affairs, certainly in these three cities, should not be allowed to continue. There has not been, as far as I am aware, any special suggestion made by the Liquor Commission that there should be a change in this regard.
There has.
In regard to the exempted cities?
At the bottom of page 13. "No bona fide traffic should be permitted in any of the exempted cities."
What I mean to convey is that there has been no particular reference to the exempted cities, as distinguished inter se, and that is the real object of my amendment. As I have already explained, for reasons which I need not enter into, for some time past there has been no bona fide traffic in the city of Dublin. In the other exempted cities, certainly in the one for which I can speak, there has been a certain amount of this traffic, and no special argument has been put forward by the Liquor Commission to show why that particular form of traffic should not be continued. It seems particularly hard to realise why this special portion of the Bill has been suggested. In regard to Dublin there was really no necessity for it, because the state of affairs was as I have explained, and in regard to the other cities, I think that up to this—and, of course, I have to await what the Minister has to say upon the question— no case has been made why the existing provisions for bona fide travellers should not be continued. It is for these reasons that I have tabled this amendment, and I hope that the Minister will give serious consideration to the position of these other cities in this regard, as distinct from that of the city of Dublin.
The effect of the amendment is to enable bona fide travellers to be served in the county boroughs after one o'clock on Sundays, so that these four cities, in addition to having the facilities of a 2 to 5 opening, should be permitted to do a bona fide trade, contrary to the recommendation of the Commission which examined into this matter. The Deputy admitted that bona fide traffic had been eliminated from Dublin, that that was stamped out by the former Recorder of Dublin, probably by extra-legal action, but we are concerned with the fact that he took the view strongly that in the capital, where the 2 to 5 opening was allowed, there should not also be the bona fide system, and by various forms of pressure on members of the licensed trade in the city he did in fact bring about a situation where you had not, coincident with the 2 to 5 opening, a system of bona fide sales. If I may speculate about the reasons for that, I take it that as Dublin was served by so many railways and tramways he felt that it should not be free to people to pour into the city from the outskirts and to figure there for the remainder of the evening as bona fide travellers, when the facilities which the residents of the city enjoyed from 2 to 5 o'clock were adequate to deal also with that influx of visitors that might take place to the city during the course of a Sunday.
It is proposed to apply the same to the other county boroughs that have the 2 to 5 opening, and I consider it a reasonable proposal. Presumably they have the 2 to 5 opening on some such grounds as that the number of people coming into these cities in the course of any given Sunday would be so great that the sensible thing to do was to allow a brief opening rather than try to enforce there the bona fide system that is enforced throughout the rest of the country. I do not know on what grounds there came to be this exemption for the four county boroughs, but it is an exemption of very long standing, and it was once, in fact, a somewhat longer opening than the present three hours; it was reduced, I think, from five hours to three. But it does seem a reasonable and a proper thing to take the view that this opening for three hours in the afternoon should be adequate for these four cities, and that there should not be allowed, over and above that, a provision that, provided one has travelled the statutory distance into these cities, one may figure there up to a late hour in the night as a bona fide traveller. I think the recommendation of the Commission is a sound one, and I am not prepared to accept the amendment.
Amendment put and negatived.
For the remainder of these amendments we come down to the question, outside the county boroughs, of the hours for bona fide travellers on St. Patrick's Day and on Sundays, and I confess that it seems to me to be a matter of extreme difficulty to discuss amendments with regard to St. Patrick's Day before we deal with Sundays, particularly in view of the fact that there are official amendments dealing with the hours on Sundays. If I might for a moment be allowed to assume that these official amendments would be carried, they would have a certain effect on the whole of the discussion subsequently. So that if it meets with the approval of those Deputies who have amendments down I think that we ought to dispose of the Sunday hours in this section first and let St. Patrick's Day stand over to the next stage. It is impossible to have a discussion on St. Patrick's Day as separate from Sundays, particularly when the Sunday hours actually in the Bill, it appears, are not the hours that will be in the Bill after this particular stage. If that meets with approval I propose to take amendments dealing with Sunday hours. Deputy Byrne is agreeable to that course, I am aware. Then there is Deputy Redmond.
Very well. These amendments will come up on the further stage?
Yes, the amendments dealing with St. Patrick's Day will come up on the next stage when the Bill is reprinted. Any amendments which may be made in regard to Sundays can be put into the new form of the Bill.
I will move amendment 43 now.
I want to get agreement on that. If we take amendments 43 and 46 we shall get to a decision about Sunday hours.
On these two amendments can we discuss the question of hours on Sunday?
Yes.
Will it be possible to discuss the question of distance in connection with these two?
No: the question of distance arises on an amendment by the Deputy himself later on.
I know it does. It would not be possible to avoid discussing them together, because I think the Minister has rather an open mind in regard to the question of time and distance. I think a certain amount of latitude might be allowed in regard to these amendments.
If we are taking amendments 43 and 46 together, I will allow a certain amount of latitude with regard to the question of hours.
I beg to move:—
In sub-section (1) (b) (ii), line 45, to delete the word "three" and substitute therefor the word "seven" and to delete lines 46 and 47.
On this question of hours the proposal set out in amendments 43 and 46 represents what I am prepared to stand on, if no solution emerges from the discussion that would represent perhaps a more radical change in the position with regard to Sundays than is provided for in the Bill. There are Deputies who favour the idea of a limited opening throughout the State on the basis of a complete abolition of the bona fide traffic.
I am sorry to interrupt the Minister on a point of order, but I am somewhat confused about this. According to the amendment paper, amendment 43 deals with sub-section (1) (b) (ii), line 45. That deals with St. Patrick's Day.
That is right. We should have taken the Sunday hours, and amendment 44 is the first amendment which deals with them. Amendment 44 comes on now, unless Deputy Heffernan will give way to amendment 46 and see will the actual Ministerial amendment be carried. He can have his amendment on another stage.
I am prepared to do that.
I move amendment 46:—
In sub-section (1) (b) (iii) to delete all words after the word "Sunday," lines 48-49, to the end of the sub-paragraph and substitute therefor the words "during a period of summer time between the hours of one o'clock and eight o'clock in the afternoon or on any other Sunday between the hours of one o'clock and seven o'clock in the afternoon."
If the bona fide traffic is to be retained, this is my idea of the hours: one to seven in the non-summer time, one to eight in the summer time period, with a discretion to the District Justice in particular cases where the circumstances might differ somewhat to alter that to 2 p.m. to 9 p.m.—the same number of hours, but moving them one hour later. I did not like from the start the idea of any break in the bona fide traffic. If it is to exist at all it is a difficult matter for the police—it has always been a difficult matter for the police, but to try to administer a break of two hours in that would simply be a task beyond the capacity of the members of any police force. Therefore, whatever the hours be on Sunday they should be simply a straight run. I am prepared to recognise that there may be a case for a somewhat different set of hours in the summer time from that which prevails for the rest of the time. The proposal I am, however, standing on, if we are to have bona fide traffic, is one to seven p.m. in the non-summer time, one to eight p.m. in the summer time, with a discretion to alter from two to nine. Perhaps Deputies might be permitted some latitude on this amendment to talk generally on the question of the bona fide traffic. I would like, for one thing, to ascertain just how much support there is within the Dáil for the idea of the abolition of the bona fide traffic on the basis of a limited opening throughout the State, on the basis, say, of a two to five opening, such as exists in the four county boroughs at the moment.
If you are prepared, sir, to allow such a discussion I would like to indicate some considerations that are present in my mind in that connection. There has always been a prejudice against the idea of Sunday opening. When it was first instituted there was considerable opposition. I submit conditions have altered very radically since it was first instituted, that for one thing the bona fide traffic has grown by reason of the increased mobility of the individual to proportions that were undreamt of in those times. The increase in the use of the ordinary push bicycle, for instance, is one factor, and the advent of the motor cycle and motor car is another. You have now a new factor of the buses, which will be spreading more and more throughout the country, so that the bona fide traffic has, in its proportions, altered very radically within the last twenty, thirty or forty years. It is a question to-day whether from the point of view of those interested in the elimination of abuse and excess, the elimination or diminution of the profanation of the Sunday, it would not be worth while, a good exchange, to accept a limited uniform opening throughout the State in exchange for the complete abolition of the bona fide traffic.
If public opinion in general, and perhaps clerical opinion in particular, is ripe to accept that challenge, then I certainly am ripe to accept it, because my own conviction is that it would be a good exchange, that it would mean less excess, less abuse, less profanation of the Sunday to abolish the bona fide traffic root and branch and allow a limited opening through the State.
What would be the period of opening that the Minister would suggest?
The period would be the period that exists in the county boroughs at the moment—a three-hours' spell in the afternoon. I should like to develop somewhat my idea on that point. I believe that a great deal of the excess and abuse attendant on the bona fide traffic comes from the fact that the individual moves out of his home area in which the ordinary checks of human restraint, of human respect, operate; that he, to a greater or lesser degree, according to the distance he travels, and perhaps according to his own significance in the scheme of things, loses his identity; that a kind of holiday spirit takes hold of him, and the idea that having travelled so far with a definite purpose in mind he should fulfil that purpose abundantly. I do believe that the bona fide traveller, who is, in fact, not a bona fide traveller but a mala fide traveller, takes very much more drink than he would take if he could get it nearby in his home area, that the man who sets out on the definite mission of getting drink —and we know that, in fact, it is impossible for any police force, however intelligent, to distinguish between that man and the man who does not, because, the devil himself, as the judge said, "knoweth not the mind of a man"—the man who goes out on the definite mission of getting drink, who travels the statutory distance in order to get that drink, will, in fact, take much more drink, having travelled that distance with that object, than he would if he could get it more conveniently.
I may be told in reply that more people will drink if you had a uniform limited opening throughout the State than drink under the existing system of the bona fide traffic. On that point, I would be glad that people would clear their minds on this question of Sunday drinking—whether it is the drink that is bad in itself, whether there is some essential difference between the Sunday drink and the Thursday drink, and whether on either day or both days it is not the drink, but the excess and the abuse in drink, that is the evil. I want Deputies to put to themselves the question, whether having a drink on Sunday is, in fact, an indifferent act, like having one's lunch on Sunday, or having a boiled egg on Sunday, and that it is the excess and the abuse of drink that makes the difference. If we agree that it is, in fact, the excess, the abuse that we should aim at eliminating, then I do believe that for those primarily interested in eliminating anything that tends to profane the Sunday, it would be a good exchange to abolish the bona fide traffic and have a limited uniform opening throughout the State. At any rate, I do wish that people generally would think more and harder on the question than they have done up to the present. The bona fide traffic has grown and is growing. The bus is a new factor.
The number of motor cars in the country is increasing; the mobility of the individual is increasing year by year; and the more that takes place the more it will become a question of whether the other idea would not now —whatever the situation might have been 40 or 50 years ago—be the better idea, and more in the interest of decency and restraint.
The trouble is largely that people think so much in terms of their own parish, their own area. The clergy say: "Well, we have no bona fide travellers here, thank God, and we do not want the publichouses open." I would prefer that people would take the State as a unit and consider whether the greater excess, the greater amount of abuse, the greater amount of profanation arises from the present regulations than would or could arise from the change which I have outlined.
I may be challenged—I have no doubt whatever I will be challenged— and asked why, holding those views, did I write into the Bill a provision along other lines. That is fair enough, and I want to give an explanation. I am not fortified in this view by any recommendations from the Commission, and if I am told that public opinion in general, and clerical public opinion in particular, does not want this change I will accept that. I am talking largely now for the sake of putting a particular point of view. I do not want to write into this Bill something that is wholly against the trend of public thought on this matter, that is wholly against the view that most generally prevails throughout the country. I am suggesting that that may not necessarily be the sound view and the correct view and that there is very definitely another side to the matter. I wish that Deputies would talk quite freely their own opinions on this point.
Coming back to the amendment with regard to hours, if the bona fide traffic is to remain, then I stand for a substantial pruning of the hours—I stand for an 8 o'clock close down in the summer-time and a 7 o'clock close down in the non-summer-time period. As the law stands, if a man travels the statutory distance he may drink all night up to 12 o'clock. I do not think that is right. I think that there should be a closing hour on Sundays at which the bona fide traffic should cease and that that closing hour should be reasonably early. If we are to retain the bona fide traffic I stand for those hours.
What about the distance?
I will talk about the distance later. I am standing firmly, at any rate, on those hours if we are to retain the bona fide traffic, and I would not be open to accept amendments varying them. We can discuss the distance as a thing apart— and I think it is a thing apart from the question of time—but I hope that any Deputy who has thought out the question as to whether the bona fide traffic as such ought to remain, whether he agrees with the recommendation of the Commission that it must remain a necessary evil and anomaly in our social legislation, will express those views, so that we may get some picture as to what is the view of the House on this question.
We have reached Section 13 dealing with the bona fide traffic, to which there are a number of amendments on the Paper. The question of the county boroughs has been disposed of. The question now is the bona fide traffic outside the county boroughs, the question of hours on St. Patrick's Day, and the hours on Sundays. We have decided, as a matter of convenience, to leave out of consideration St. Patrick's Day, and to proceed with the discussion of the hours on Sundays. We are considering amendment 46, moved by Deputy Dolan, which must be taken in conjunction with amendment 50.
Amendment 45 stands in my name.
Amendments 46 and 50 hang together, because they contain a certain provision. We have, also, decided to allow latitude of discussion on the general question which the Minister has discussed, namely, whether it would be advisable to abolish the bona fide traffic in consideration of limited hours of opening all over the country. Therefore, more latitude will be allowed to Deputies than they would be entitled to under the terms of amendment 46 now before the Committee.
In view of what the Minister said as to his intention in regard to the hours that he proposes for bona fide traffic, if I may venture to do so, for the purpose of facilitating discussion upon this matter, I suggest that the Minister's amendment should be inserted at the next stage of this Bill. Then the discussion should take place and amendments could be tabled to those hours. I think that would simplify matters. It would mean, it is true, postponing the discussion at the moment. But I suggest that the Minister should table his amendment for the next stage, put in his new proposal with regard to hours, and let that be the substantive proposal at the next stage, and let Deputies move amendments and, upon them, discussion would take place.
Would not the same purpose be achieved if the Minister's amendment was accepted at this stage, and appeared in the reprint of the Bill? Deputies could then move their amendments to the new hours, which are more in favour of the movers of the amendment than the hours actually standing in the Bill as read a second time.
As far as I am concerned, speaking only for myself, I am prepared to adopt that course—to accept for the moment the Minister's proposals in regard to hours for the bona fide traffic, subject to the subsequent right to move amendments similar to the ones I have upon the paper. I desire to say, at once, that I was very much struck by the speech we have just listened to from the Minister. I think he deserves great credit for making this suggestion and throwing open to the Dáil the opportunity of discussing a suggestion which was not one of those actually put forward by the signatories to the report of the Liquor Commission. I think his attitude in this respect has been a courageous one. There is a great deal to be said from his already expressed points of view, and many others, for his mooted alternative, namely, that of substituting a period of general opening throughout the country on Sundays in the future instead of continuing the present bona fide system. The question was raised at the Commission, but it did not meet with very great support—in fact, I think, the contrary was the fact —from the avowed advocates of temperance reform, and the Minister, very candidly, has said so himself.
Of course, to make this change would be a very radical step. It would alter the whole licensing system, and, I think, Deputies would require more time and opportunity to consider this than they will have at their disposal during the discussion of this Bill before making any attempt to give effect to this suggestion. But I, for one certainly, would not put it out of my mind. However, the conclusion I come to in dealing with this Bill as it is now at the time we are considering it, and in the circumstances, is that it would be almost too drastic a step for us to depart without further grave and serious consideration from the existing system. No one denies the abuses of the existing system, and nobody upholds the system in its abuses. But, though there may be abuses, at the same time, for many years it has been, and at the moment it is, the only workable system whereby justice can be done to those who are placed in certain positions on certain occasions throughout the country.
The exempted cities are now disposed of, except in regard to weekdays.
The hours that have been suggested by the Minister do not altogether commend themselves to me. If this system is to be continued I see no reason for departing from the existing hours, that except between 7 in the morning and 1 in the afternoon—these hours were put in principally because they were stated to be the hours of divine service—everyone should be entitled to the facilities afforded bona fide travellers provided they are qualified. The Minister has proposed now the hours 1 to 7 in the winter time and 1 to 8 in the summer time. He gives a discretion for the alternative of 2 to 9 in the summer, if it is so desired.
I have already mentioned the case of a place like Tramore, Co. Waterford. I could mention numerous others. I am sure others will be mentioned during the course of the debate, such as Howth and other places in County Dublin, to which, especially in the summer time, people travel. They spend a considerable time in recreation of one sort or another there. I still say that from 1 to 8 o'clock is not sufficient to meet these cases, or from 2 to 9, because people might, as they do, start out in the late afternoon of the summer to go to a bathing or seaside resort, and might desire refreshment of the nature we are discussing at a fairly late hour without having either the time or the means, or even if they had both, the desire to go into a hotel or restaurant and partake of a substantial meal. I think that the arguments I used on the Second Reading debate apply equally to these hours.
I do not know if the Minister has perused all the amendments, but I have one down suggesting first that the bona fide hours should be allowed to remain as they are, and a subsequent amendment, in the event of that one not succeeding, suggesting that the hours should be from 1 until 10 o'clock. I would appeal to the Minister to consider the later hours. Ten o'clock is not very late in the summer, especially with summer time. At that hour it is really only 8.30 sun time. I suggest that 10 o'clock in the summer time would not be an unreasonable hour to ask to have the facilities afforded bona fide travellers. However, we will have an opportunity on the next stage of further discussing this matter.
I would like to say, on the question of general opening throughout the country, that that would not quite meet the case that the bona fide system meets at present and on the other hand, it might create a new situation. What I mean by that, is that it would afford local people an opportunity, which they have not now, of partaking of liquor, and it might not necessarily afford travellers, especially those at seaside or pleasure resorts, the facilities which they enjoy under the present law, or even under the Minister's own proposal in regard to the bona fide traffic. Certainly I cannot say that I am convinced that general opening throughout the country would be a greater service in the cause of temperance, but I will also say that I am by no means unconvinced in the matter.
Still, I believe it would be foolish to depart from the present system. That does not mean that I think the present system is anything in the nature of an ideal one, but, before departing from it, we should give the whole question the most careful consideration. At this stage of this Bill it is not opportune for us to depart from a system which has obtained for several years. The thing for us to do is to try to improve that system for the benefit of the public at large.
I want to understand the position in regard to those amendments. I take it that we are discussing amendment No. 44, the effect of which, if passed, will be to extend the bona fide hours to a greater extent than is provided by any of the other amendments on the paper.
We are taking a decision on amendment 46 at this particular stage in order to see in the Bill an hour which, from the point of view of the people who have amendments down, is a better hour, and which is the Ministerial view of the matter. I thought the Deputy was clear about that. We are taking amendment 46, but we are taking a discussion on the general question now, and on the next stage the Deputy will, if these words are inserted in the Bill, be quite in order in endeavouring to extend the hours.
I am willing to withdraw my amendment and to accept the Ministerial amendment, provided that I have the right to introduce my amendment at a later stage and to have it discussed in Committee. It is rather difficult to give a decided opinion on the very large topic opened up by the Minister in his rather candid statement. I may say that I thoroughly approve of the spirit in which that statement was made. It is somewhat in contrast with the statement made yesterday. Any opinions I may express at this stage will be tentative. The public have not yet had an opportunity of discussing this aspect of the question—that is, the complete opening on certain hours on Sundays. Public opinion has not in any way crystallised on that aspect. We are speaking at short notice, and the opinion I put forward, as I said tentatively, is that the rural community would not care to accept the alternative the Minister has offered. The clerical element in the rural community would, I think, be more strongly opposed to it than the lay element. The Minister's ideas in this regard seem to be coloured by the opinions which he holds in respect of the present bona fide traffic. The Minister's ideas on this matter are not in any sense mine. The Minister seems to regard the present bona fide traffic as a tolerated evil, whereas I regard it as a form of necessary licence. The Minister seems to think that the bona fide provisions are largely availed of illicitly, that the people who take advantage of them are not bona fide in the proper sense of the term. I am not in a position to make any definite statement on that, but I think the bona fide legislation is not abused to the extent which the Minister seems to think.
One of the first questions we have to decide is whether bona fide provision is necessary or whether it is not. It is difficult to arrive at a considered opinion, because all our ideas are formed from habit and practice. We are all somewhat conservative. We are all inclined to stick to what we have become accustomed to, and we resent quick changes. I am inclined to think that the present system of bona fide traffic is necessary and that the suggested proposals of the Minister would not, in any sense, meet the requirements of the people. The whole question hangs on whether a man who needs a drink when travelling is entitled to a drink. That right has been recognised. For that reason, I maintain that we should make available for any bona fide traveller the opportunity of getting a drink at any time during prohibited hours. My amendment aims at maintaining the existing conditions. My contention is that if a man requires a drink from 1 to 7, or from 1 to 8, the same man may require a drink between 7 and 10 or 11 o'clock. I cannot see why a man should be entitled to a drink between 1 o'clock and 7 o'clock and why he should not be entitled to a drink between 7 o'clock and 10 o'clock. A man may be genuinely bona fide at 8 o'clock. He may be more genuinely entitled than the man who is travelling at 4 o'clock or 5 o'clock. In modern times, with the use of motor-cars, it is quite common for people to be out much later than 7 o'clock.
He becomes more and more genuine as the night goes on.
No, but he remains just as genuine. I believe that the effect of the Minister's suggestion would be a definite increase in drinking. It would cause a rush of people into the publichouses in the towns during restricted hours. The result of that would be that the people would consume the drink in a hurry. Sunday being a day on which the working man has money to spend, he would consume his drink in a hurry and you would have scenes. You would have drunken men in the villages and you would have a certain amount of profanation, which would be objectionable to the ordinary citizen and particularly objectionable to the clerical citizen.
I believe that public opinion is opposed to the opening of publichouses in accordance with the suggestion made by the Minister. Personally, I am strongly in favour of the retention of the present bona fide hours, because I believe that if we recognise that the bona fide traffic is necessary, we will also have to recognise that it is as necessary at one hour as at another. If a man is genuinely bona fide, he is as much entitled to a drink at 10 o'clock at night as he is at 2 o'clock in the day.
I desire to say a few words in response to the invitation which the Minister for Justice has addressed to Deputies. It seems to me that the Minister, in the course of his speech, overstressed the inter-dependence of the two questions which he mentioned—a general opening on Sundays as against the bona fide traffic. The Minister spoke repeatedly of the general opening as being a good exchange for the abolition of the bona fide traffic. I do not think the two questions are, in fact, inter-dependent at all. If there are abuses, and I admit there are in connection with the bona fide traffic, the way to get rid of them is not by creating what, in my opinion, would be a greater abuse, that is, a general opening of publichouses on Sundays. I have no doubt in my mind that if you had that general opening you would have far more drinking on Sundays than at present.
I believe that people who never bother about drinking on a Sunday now would, if the opportunity were there, avail of it. In speaking now, I have the rural areas almost entirely in my mind. Let us picture what would happen in a country village. Under present conditions the number of bona fide or mala fide travellers in a village on a Sunday for the purpose of getting drink is small compared with the number of people who live there and never travel on a Sunday for the purpose of getting drink, but if the publichouses are thrown open on a Sunday for three hours then, undoubtedly, a very large proportion of the people in that village will avail of the opportunity presented for taking drink—many of them people at present who never bother about taking a drink on Sunday.
I am inclined to say that a man does not want so much a drink as he wants another drink. With many men the desire for the second, third or fourth drink is much greater than the desire for the first one. Men going into publichouses on Sunday to get a drink will certainly be very anxious to remain on and get more drink, and even when the closing hour comes they will be a serious temptation to the publican in the village to break the law. That is an abuse that I believe will arise from Sunday opening. The Minister asks us to look at the matter from the point of view of the State as a whole. I think Deputies who look at the question from the manner in which it will affect their own particular districts are not to be blamed. It is not unreasonable for those who are aware of the abuses that take place in the neighbourhoods of the large cities, where at present you have Sunday opening in the afternoons, to ask why should the publichouses in their little districts or villages be also opened on Sundays in order to get rid of these abuses. These abuses should, I think, be tackled on their own merits. Bad as the abuses are at present. I think they would become far bigger if there was a general opening on Sundays. This would certainly be putting a temptation in the way of people who now do not drink on Sundays or even on weekdays.
In the case, say, of a man who does not take a drink from one end of the week to the other, he may wander into a village on a Sunday evening, and if the publichouses are open he may be tempted to enter them. In that way this general opening might have the effect of making a drinker of a man who otherwise would not have become one. I think that is a consideration that the Minister should take into account when discussing this question. I am certainly against the idea of a general opening on Sundays. I do not see why it should be put forward as an exchange for doing away with the bona fide traffic. If there are people in the community who think that the bona fide traffic abuse has reached such proportions that there ought to be a complete closing on Sundays, well, then, let that question be faced. For my part I do not think the abuse has reached that stage yet.
I may say that I am speaking now entirely of the rural districts. I am not referring to the county boroughs at all. There are, undoubtedly, some bona fide travellers. If they want a drink and if they feel they are entitled to it, it is no use, as Deputy Heffernan said, to say to them: "I will allow the publichouses to open in other districts between 2 and 5 where nobody was particularly anxious that they should be opened." I agree, of course, that this is a question on which various views are held. I have expressed mine in response to the invitation of the Minister.
I think the Minister for Justice has done a great service by inviting the Dáil to give its opinion on this question of the bona fide traffic. I take a great interest in temperance reform, though I do not consider that I am by any means a Pussyfoot. I endeavour to take a reasonable view of the matter on both sides, and from the point of view of the law to try to get what is best for the country. I agree with everything the Minister has said, and I hold that the bona fide traffic, carried on as I saw it, was nothing but a complete farce. I was a magistrate for about 30 years, and during that period I had considerable experience in dealing with these cases. I happened to own a place—I lived in it myself for many years—that was one of the beauty spots in the county. There was a right of way through it, and I can say that on Sundays, when the publichouses in the district were supposed to be closed, I have seen more drunken people going through my place, up to a late hour at night, than I could count. I am talking now of some years ago, but I believe things are better now. This was an intolerable nuisance, and you had that kind of thing going on in the district when the publichouses were supposed to be closed. I said before that most of the cases of drunkenness that came before me as a magistrate were cases that occurred on a Sunday. We must look at things from a sensible point of view. I know that, to a great many enthusiastic temperance reformers, the idea of opening on a Sunday is anathema, that the idea of such a thing is not to be considered and that they have a great prejudice against it. Everyone desires, of course, that sobriety should be observed on the Sabbath Day, but we have to look at human nature as it is.
I, long ago, came to the conclusion that it was not to be got by having the house closed but nominally open. The front doors were shut and the back doors were open. There was more drunkenness in that part of the country, on that day, that I know of. Frequently, in lonely mountainous districts, I have seen people borne out of some of those houses when they were supposed to be shut. I do not suppose there is any chance of reform in this direction, but I see nothing to alter my conviction that it would be far better to be honest and have the houses open for a limited number of hours than to have illicit drinking going on. With the reduction of the houses that will take place under this Bill there ought to be much more efficient supervision by the Gárda Síochána. It is far better to be open and working in the light of day than to have drunkenness going on all day, all through the country in a certain number of houses, badly conducted, and in shebeens. An expression of opinion has been asked for. I am as keen about reform in the licensing laws as anyone can be, but I am afraid the time is not ripe for it yet. There is a very strong feeling against it. It would be far better for the country to look the matter straight in the face and deal with it on that line. If the houses opened, under proper supervision, for three hours it would be better than to have what is going on. If that is not to be, I say the hours in the Bill are the best, and it is necessary that the bona fide hours should be less. They are ridiculously and unnecessarily long, and I say now the hours the Minister has suggested, which, possibly, may be altered in two particulars, are the best to regulate this drinking, which must be kept under proper supervision.
As I understand the bona fide traffic on Sundays, it practically amounts to this:—Unrestricted drinking between certain hours in certain localities. The ten mile limit, under the altered circumstances as we find them to-day, is very little prohibition. The Minister recognises that, because he said that the abuse of the bona fide system has grown enormously. We all admit that. New conditions have grown up that have led to it. He has put before you the alternative of a fixed opening for three hours on Sunday. When we look at it, on the one hand, from the point of view of seven hours' unrestricted drinking, as against three hours' unrestricted drinking, of course we all go for the three hours unrestricted drinking. The evil is one which will have to be countered in the very near future. I agree with very much of what Deputy Wolfe has said about the evils that have grown under this bona fide system
Any of us who visit our beauty spots on Sundays during the summer months are appalled at the conditions found there. Visit Glendalough and I think the conclusion you will come to, notwithstanding the attractions of the place, is that it is not a place to visit on a Sunday. The amount of drinking that goes on in this beauty spot, particularly Glendalough, on Sunday, is appalling. Not alone does it affect that particular area, but those charabancs and motors going to that area do not stop as frequently going there as when they are returning. It seems to be the duty of everyone on the charabanc to stand a drink to the driver at one of the many publichouses which the charabanc passes coming in. The charabanc pulls up and a number of people get out, including the driver. You can just imagine the conditions under which those cars are driven back to the city. I do not know whether any of you have to drive on a Sunday night. I have had to do it frequently along those roads and the driving is such that it is not safe to go on them after certain hours. That is a condition of things that must be met.
Therefore, if the Minister only puts up the alternative of unrestricted drinking for three hours as against seven hours I shall plump for the three hours. I do not know, however, that it meets the whole situation. It will certainly do a great deal to prevent the drinking that goes on which I have mentioned. Having visited a number of beauty spots in Northern Ireland on Sunday and having visited our own beauty spots in the Free State, I say there is no comparison at all as to the conditions in them. As we know Northern Ireland to-day, you have total closing there on Sundays, and I must say the conditions one finds, as a result, in their beauty spots are very different from the conditions one finds in our own. One does not find those scenes which are so very objectionable. I must say that to make a suggestion whereby those difficulties one has in mind can be remedied, from what I have seen I would go for the adoption of the system at present in vogue in Northern Ireland. The view, of course, that is held is that that would possibly be too drastic for the gallant Captain on my left and those for whom he very often speaks. I am satisfied from what I have seen that that is the only remedy that will make safe the roads and surroundings of these particular places. Drastic as it may seem, I must at all events, from my experience, advocate it as a method for dealing with this difficulty.
I congratulate the Minister for Justice on the very broad-minded speech he has delivered here this evening. He has thrown, more or less, the responsibility on the whole Dáil for this Bill, and that is just about what we wanted. In all his remarks I did not hear him mention nor do I understand yet how many miles he has in mind as sufficient to make a man a bona fide traveller. Hitherto we had three miles. The real traveller, the man who had to walk three miles, is the man I have in mind. The Minister is speaking of the man who has to drive three miles. It does not take that man three minutes sometimes to drive these three miles, whereas it took an hour on the part of the poor man with nails in his boots to walk three miles through the mud of necessity, and not only the poor man in the country, but perhaps the man inside the counter all the week who is taking a walk for his health on Sunday. I mention those three miles simply because I would like to know what I would be swopping for those three hours. It is suggested that the publichouses be open for three hours in the country. That goes to show that I was not very far from the harbour yesterday, when I said four hours.
There is one little exception in the country to the general run and that is seaside resorts. We have a few of them South also, and they must be separated, to my mind, as far as the law is concerned, from the inland towns. I would ask the Minister for Justice how many miles he has in his mind in order that a man might be deemed a bona fide traveller? I have not been informed of it yet. Now we come back to the three or four hours' opening. I hold that the young men who are drinking in their own village and who are under the supervision of their own Gárda, and under the supervision of their own people very often, are not in the same danger as the collection of young men who go away fifteen or twenty miles in a motor car and have a jolly fine day for themselves Deputy Good pointed out, and every time they are having one themselves the chauffeur will have one. We can well imagine their condition in the evening. I understood from the Minister this evening that he left the matter to us to decide on, and to express our views openly on it—it will be decided by the free vote of the Dáil, and that is the proper way to decide it. We will leave it to the discretion of the Minister for Justice after that to vest in his police officer in any seaside town a certain discretion whereby he could ask for a few hours' opening for visitors to a particular seaside resort. Until I find out how many miles a man will have to travel before he is to be deemed a bona fide traveller, I will keep my mind open as to whether the opening is to be for three or four hours, or whether the system of bona fide traveller is to be continued.
I think if Deputy Wolfe were now present he would admit that the scenes which he described, and which he stated that he witnessed on Sundays as arising from excessive drinking, were confined to a particular locality. I think he will admit that. He mentioned a certain beauty spot. I think it is not very hard to put a name to it, because the Deputy undoubtedly meant Poulaphouca, in Kildare. That place is the resort of large numbers of people from distant places, and particularly from the city of Dublin. The description which Deputy Wolfe gave to it may be warranted or not from the point from which it is looked at. I have been there, now and again, and I did not think it was altogether as bad as Deputy Wolfe stated. At all events, admitting it was bad enough. I would like the Dáil to realise that that state of things is confined to this particular locality, and that the abuse of Sunday drinking is not at all general in the Country Kildare. As to the suggestion made by the Minister that the question of general opening on Sunday should be considered, I must say, that so far as my knowledge goes, there is no demand whatever for that in the country— neither by the public at large nor by the licensed traders themselves. I am satisfied that there is not a demand amongst the licensed traders for general opening on Sundays. Deputy O'Connell has drawn a dark picture of what the condition of things would be if you had general opening on Sundays. He has warned you that people living adjacent to publichouses in the small towns and villages, and who never in the past left their homes to look for drink on Sundays, might be induced by reason of the fact that the publichouses would then be open, to seek drink on Sundays, and perhaps to take drink to excess. I can remember the time when there was no total Sunday closing, when the houses were open all day on Sunday, and at that time in some of the towns, especially the towns bordering on the Curragh, scenes were witnessed amounting to a regular pandemonium. I think the Dáil should pause before giving any support whatever to the proposal to open publichouses on Sunday.
Might I ask the Deputy whether I am to take him as saying that he has a personal recollection of the time when publichouses were open for the sale of drink on Sundays throughout the country?
Yes, I have.
That was in 1878.
Certainly, I remember it.
I would like to say just a few words on this question of the bona fide traffic. I want to say that so far as I am concerned, I have no difficulty whatever in making up my mind as to the merits of the Minister's suggestion that the publichouses be open for three hours on Sundays. I am absolutely against it. I believe the country will be against it.
Why?
Before I sit down I will tell the Deputy, I hope, my reasons. One of the reasons would be that it would be presenting opportunities for drinking to people who at the moment have neither the opportunity nor the desire to take drink on Sundays. The Minister asked us to look at this matter from the point of view of our own particular district or constituency. He then proceeded to discuss the matter from the point of view of the city of Dublin and its surroundings.
No.
Deputy Good followed in the same direction. We were told about the tremendous abuse of the bona fide traffic. Now, so far as I know, there is no general abuse throughout the country. There is abuse undoubtedly to a certain extent, but there is no general abuse in the way that has been suggested. Deputy Good went so far as to say that it was a question of three hours unrestricted drinking or seven hours unrestricted drinking. I submit that is an exaggeration. There is no unrestricted drinking on Sundays at the present time. We know very well a traveller has to satisfy a publican that he is a traveller, and the numbers of people who go outside the three-mile limit in the country for the purpose of drinking are very few, comparatively speaking.
I am trying to visualise what would happen if we had the publichouses in every town and village in the country open for three hours on Sundays. I am trying to picture what a temptation it would be to men who at present do not think of going outside the three-mile limit, or who, if they do think of it, are not in a position to go. We must remember that men who go to drink either on a Sunday or a weekday do not go altogether for the sake of the drink alone; it is as often as not for the sake of the company. If the publichouse is open on a Sunday, men who usually sit in their own homes on Sunday afternoons and who would not dream of taking a car or walking three or four miles in the country to the nearest publichouse, would certainly think of going round the corner to the adjacent publichouse.
I have no doubt that the Minister's suggestion would be a very good one from the point of view of the publican, but a very bad one from the point of view of the public. If publichouses are allowed to be open on Sundays the Minister will not achieve what he is aiming at in the Bill—lessening the consumption of drink. From the point of view of temperance the proposal is certainly very bad.
Deputy Wolfe talked about people going out through back-doors on a Sunday. We all know that obtains to a certain extent in every place, notwithstanding the careful supervision of members of the Gárda Síochána. We know quite well that even if the publichouses in the country should be allowed to open from 2 to 5, drinkers would still be going out through the back-doors from 5 till midnight. That is no cure for the disease at all. This is really a question of providing even greater facilities than there are at present for drinking on Sundays.
I am not at all satisfied that a case has been made out for the three hours opening in the country boroughs. I would like to hear a case made out for such opening. I do not see why publichouses should be open on Sundays. I submit a case can be made for bona fide traffic. The man who is travelling, and who is out for a day's enjoyment, is certainly entitled if he wants one, two, three or four drinks, to get them.
Does the Deputy consider it would be practicable to administer the bona fide system in Dublin? Suppose there were no 2 to 5 opening, and suppose you put Dublin purely in the same position as any provincial town, does the Deputy think it would be feasible to administer the bona fide system in Dublin?
I said that I did not hear any case made out for the proposal. I take it what the Minister has suggested is one of the points in favour of it. I would want to hear a very strong case made before I would be satisfied that there should be free drinking, even in the cities, for three hours on Sundays. What does it mean? Immediately the publichouses are open they are filled. We find queues lining up outside publichouses just as they would line up outside a cinema, waiting for the clock to strike 2. Then those people rush into the publichouses and so long as they have money they will remain there drinking until finally the places are closed down at 5.
Have you had any experience of that?
Have you?
I have not.
It is really a question of consuming the greatest possible quantity in the space of time at their disposal. The proposal now is that you are to substitute that system for the present system of bona fide traffic with all its drawbacks, and it has its drawbacks and abuses. I submit that the abuses through the country do not exist to the extent suggested here. I suggest the Minister should allow the hours to be from 1 to at least 10 o'clock.
Does Deputy Morrissey believe that the three mile limit is sufficient to constitute a bona fide traveller? Does he believe there are abuses of the system?
I will talk on the mileage question when we come to it; we are not discussing it at the moment. We ought to get out of our minds that right through the country there is this terrible abuse of drink on Sundays. We are told that in the country we have dozens and scores of young men going out from towns to the first publichouse outside the limit and they stay there all day, get drunk to the extent that Deputy Good speaks about, and go home a danger to themselves and the general community. It is not fair to the country, it is not fair to the standard of sobriety we have attained in this country, to suggest that. That may obtain around the city. I do not know. I am not in a position to speak for the city. But speaking for my own country and some of the neighbouring counties that I go through from one Sunday to another. I have certainly seen nothing of that nature.
I believe that the gentlemen who use charabancs on Sunday are not always as drunk as they seem to be. They are often in good spirits. Their sense of dignity is not as great as that of Deputy Good, and they believe in giving vent to their feelings. We know that there is another type of drinker who is often, perhaps, a greater danger to himself than to the country. There is the gentleman who goes to the club or hotel and stays there until he is brought out by the waiters, but he has a sober driver outside to drive him home, and he is perhaps either too drunk or too stupid to let people outside know whether he is drunk. I strongly resent the suggestion that every party of workers who, after their week's hard work, hire a charabanc on Sunday morning to spend a day in Wicklow or Kildare in summer, go merely with the object of getting drink, and on the return journey become a nuisance to themselves and everybody else. That may happen, and, I suggest to Deputy Good, it happens just as often with people who have more sense and who have more opportunities of enjoying themselves than people who use charabancs, but they are better able to hide it. We ought to make up our minds that we are not going to improve the country or make for temperance by giving greater facilities for drinking on Sundays.
A fairly wide field has been left open to us in relation to this suggestion by the Minister of a limited opening of three hours for bona fide traffic on Sundays. I do not believe that it would make for temperance or help the community. I think it would involve such a redistribution of trade as would possibly, in view of the principle which we are adopting in regard to licences, necessitate compensation. By compelling a man to drink at home during these three hours I do not think that you are going to help the cause of temperance. At present there are not many abuses in regard to bona fide traffic, but I fear that if this proposal were adopted the abuses that would take place would far outweigh any advantages which we could hope to derive from a limited opening of three hours all over the country. Moreover, most of the establishments in which intoxicating liquor is sold have changed hands within a number of years back, and they have been bought and sold in relation to the position they occupy and the opportunities for trading which they enjoy under the existing system. If you are going radically to change that system and take away from these people, or any of them, their means of livelihood, which they had reason to believe was going to continue, I do not see how, in equity, you can refuse to give them some compensation for the injury which you will do to them in that respect.
I do not intend to pursue the matter further on that particular aspect of the question beyond expressing an opinion on it. That opinion, like most of the opinions that have been expressed here, has not had time to mature, but is given on the spur of the moment, from a cursory glance at the matter. I am of opinion that the suggestion would not help the cause of temperance nor be beneficial to the community generally as a substitute for the existing system. This amendment which has been accepted by the Minister stipulates that a bona fide traveller cannot be served after 8 p.m. on Sundays in summer time. I submit that that is going some distance, in any case, to improve the position in the Bill providing that the hours shall be from 1 to 3 and from 5 to 7. The arrangement of 1 o'clock to 7 in winter and 1 to 8 o'clock in summer is, at least, a straight run and one that we will be able to support, in the hope that we will succeed in persuading the Minister on the next stage to extend the time a little further in relation to seaside resorts. Deputies from my county are much concerned with the question of seaside resorts, as we have a bigger proportion of them than many of the counties represented here, and I feel that there is a certain responsibility upon us as to what ought to be equitably done in the interests of such places. The interests of such traders ought to be considered as carefully as those of the temperance or other interests which are supposed to weigh with legislators. I think confusion is caused, in the first place, by the introduction of summer time into legislation. It tends to confuse things, and we have already quite enough confusion. People hardly understand the hours for opening or closing, or their exact position in regard to the clock.
I will agree to an amendment to a uniform period of 1 to 7 o'clock.
Make it 1 to 8 o'clock. I do not like summer time in whatever direction it is used. It is to the confusion that I object and not so much in regard to the extra hours. It means great confusion to the people generally. Some go by one time and some by another, and I suggest that summer time should not be introduced. Make the period an hour less or an hour more, but do not bring in the question of summer time.
Surely the Deputy understands that this is not so much a question of summer time but the period of summer time, the period in which the time is officially changed. As to the time in both periods, it is the official time prevailing in the State.
It has been so in regard to legislation and has caused infinite confusion.
I am afraid that I could not clear up the Deputy's confusion on this or some other matters.
I do not suppose I am more confused than others, but I am talking for those who are confused. I know from actual experience what I am talking about as to the difficulties that are created by the introduction of summer time into legislation. I think seaside places should get special consideration, but I feel it is impossible in a measure that proposes to deal with matters generally to make special provision in favour of particular places. The suggestion was made by some Deputies that seaside places should be put in a separate category or schedule. I do not beleive that it would be possible to do that, and difficulty and trouble would be created in the matter of definition of seaside places. In my opinion, whatever is being done should be general in relation to the question of the hours in which bona fides are entitled to be served. I do not feel that I would be justified in going into the question of distance here. I have heard the subject referred to in debate, but I do not want to overstep the rules as regards what I am entitled to deal with. It is an important question, and on another amendment I will say what I have to say on the subject. Meanwhile I leave the question of hours alone. It is a grievance and requires modification, as it is distasteful and very hurtful to a very important and valuable section of the community.
I have been engaged in examinations for the last couple of afternoons and, unfortunately, I have missed the discussions that have taken place here, as well as the statements made by the Minister. I understand the Minister has asked the House to consider whether there should be Sunday opening generally throughout the country for three hours during the afternoon, or bona fide traffic allowed between 1 and 7 or 1 and 8. I am absolutely opposed to the general opening of publichouses on Sunday throughout the country. This matter was discussed very fully before us in the Commission. To one after the other of the witnesses I put the question: "Do you think there is any general desire for Sunday opening throughout the country?" and the answer invariably was: "Certainly not." This answer did not come only from those who were advocates of temperance, but others. It came also from a judge who had great experience of the people. I admit that, on the whole, the police were in favour of it. I concluded they were in favour of the general opening on Sunday because it would be much easier to exercise supervision in the three hours during which the licensed houses would be open than to keep control of bona fide traffic. With regard to that traffic, I do not think anything was argued with more force, and an attempt was made to get the bona fide traffic removed in its entirety. I have personal experience of its abuse, much more in the earlier days than of late years, but there is no question that abuses still exist. That may be so to a small extent in country places, as Deputy Morrissey has said, but there is no question of the evil effects in districts around Dublin.
The question of such places as Glendalough, Killarney, and seaside resorts occupied a good deal of our attention, and we found it would be an extremely difficult matter to do away with the bona fide traffic, particularly as regards tourist traffic, in those places. It was suggested by some members of the Commission that it would be possible for tourists to be served in the hotels in these places under the hotel licences. On the other hand, it was pointed out that would mean class legislation, and no member of the Commission was prepared to sign a document regarding which it could be said it was sought to divide one class from another as far as legislation was concerned. When the trade appeared before us one gentleman from Bundoran wished to have the bona fide hours extended from, I think, 12 noon until 11 at night. He wanted apparently to catch the people who were coming from the Six Counties, who made Bundoran a calling place. As I say, there was no great desire on the part of the licensed trade to settle this difficult question of bona fide traffic. We came to the conclusion, by which I am firmly abiding, that it would be a very retrograde movement to have Sunday opening throughout the country, and that we should have the bona fide traffic confined to about four hours in the afternoon. I am sorry I have not heard the Minister's statement, as I should wish to say something further upon it. But, unlike Deputy McGoldrick, I have not come to a sudden determination in regard to this, for we made up our minds very definitely in the Commission upon the matter.
In my opinion the opening of publichouses on Sunday would be very undesirable. I believe it would be a retrograde step, and I do not think the licensed traders of the country are in favour of it. I was very much struck with the remarks made by Deputy Wolfe. He appears to be in favour of temperance, and at the same time he wants the publichouse open on Sunday.
On the point of explanation, I cannot prevent the state of things that exist. I only want to try to make them bearable for both sides.
The Minister called for an expression of opinion from the Deputies, and I think he has got two very favourable opinions from the Benches opposite. Deputy O'Connell put the case for rural Ireland in a straight and honest way, and in my opinion he expressed the views of every person who knows the state of affairs in the country.
I wish to express my opinion as to the Minister's counter-suggestion regarding the bona fide traffic. I believe it would be a very wrong thing to have a general opening of publichouses throughout the country on Sunday. Neither the people nor the trade, in my opinion, want this, and I believe many of the publicans in the towns and villages would not take advantage of these opening hours if they were granted. I believe, however, that the real bona fide traveller is entitled to refreshment if he wants it during certain hours. I do not altogether agree with the length of hours suggested by some. As to the hours put forward by the Minister, I think if he extended them by one other hour it would be sufficient for all purposes. The counter-suggestion would deal very harshly with the seaside resorts. If these resorts were allowed to open only for three hours you would probably have during these hours a state of congestion and disorder with which I do not think the Gárda could deal. At present the bona fide hours are spread over a longer period so that the traffic can be better dealt with. My county, at least, would not be in favour of Sunday opening generally, and the people would be very pleased to let the bona fide traffic remain as it is. There are several seaside resorts in my county, and if the bona fide traffic was removed a number of houses would be wiped out altogether.
I did not at all appreciate the speeches made by Deputy Wolfe, Deputy Morrissey and Deputy Conlan with regard to Sunday opening. To my mind, Deputy Morrissey did not consult his constituents to find out whether they would wish to have a three hours' opening on Sunday or not. I put it to Deputy Morrissey that he has not acquainted the publicans of Cahir, Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir ——
I do not represent the publicans.
But you represent the people.
Order. We are not discussing Deputy Morrissey.
I presume I am in order in discussing the Deputy's speech. I hold it is the wish of the people that there should be a general opening on Sundays of from two to three hours, and I hold, further, that the Deputies I have mentioned have not voiced the opinions of the people, either of the members of the licensed trade, or of the ordinary workers and ratepayers in their districts. It is the wish of the people that all publichouses should be opened on Sundays for two or three hours. I, or any other man or woman, can come to the City, go into a publichouse on a Sunday from two to five and get a drink, but I cannot do that in the country, where I am supposed to go as a bona fide traveller. Why is it that there cannot be a general opening on Sundays? It is the wish of the majority of the people. We do not want this bona fide trade at all. We simply want the same facilities in the country as in the four county boroughs. We heard Deputy Conlan say that in olden times it was an absolute abuse, that every man who saw a publichouse open had to rush into it and get drunk, whether he liked to or not. I say that is ridiculous and absurd. That is not the Irish character. The worker, for whom Deputy Morrissey maintains he speaks, is not wrapped up in alcohol. He is more wrapped up in the question of maintaining, clothing and educating his family. That is his hobby, not the publichouse, and it is all the same to him whether it is open on Sunday or Monday. On account of the wage he receives for the sweat of his labour he cannot afford to go into a publichouse and get drunk on Sundays. I wonder if Deputy Morrissey ever had any experience of standing in those queues he mentioned, the same as a queue outside a picture house, waiting on a Sunday for the publichouses to open so that they can refresh themselves. I am sure that he has not.
I am prepared to accept the Deputy's impression.
I want to show you that you are not representing the people you are supposed to represent.
The Deputy must address the Chair.
If a Deputy stands up here and maintains that the people whom he is supposed to represent are saturated in liquor and are perpetual drunkards it is my duty, as a representative of Labour, to contradict that.
I did not understand the Deputy to make any such statement.
Well, he made the statement that there are a great many queues outside the publichouses on Sundays. If there was a general opening I hold that you would have far less abuses than you have at present. What do you find with the bona fide trade? You find that publicans in the country towns and country districts must remain in all Sunday waiting from one until seven for somebody to come. But if you had general opening they would be free until three and they would be free from five, and they could go where they liked. It would mean doing a good turn to the publican as well as to the ordinary citizen. I sincerely hope that the Minister will agree to have a general opening in the whole Free State and do away completely with the bona fide traffic.
I have not very much to say, except that, coming from a rural district where there are a good many publichouses but not many villages, I think the people there would not be in favour of general opening. If the bona fide traffic regulations were left as they are, or the hours proposed in the Bill modified a little, I think that they would be quite content. I do not think there is any village or town in my district that wants general opening. In fact, I know that there are a good many publichouses, even at the present time, which do not admit bona fide travellers on Sunday; at all events all the publichouses do not, and therefore I do not think they would be at all in favour of general opening on Sundays. In my opinion a great many of the clergy of all denominations would certainly object to it, and I think there is no necessity for pressing the matter any further. I would appeal to the Minister to extend the hours of bona fide trading a little, to let it go to ten o'clock at least, and I think that would answer the case very well.
There is not much left to say on the question of a general opening after all the discussion we have listened to, but as I spoke in favour of a general opening on the Second Reading, I cannot let this debate pass without again recording my conviction that a general opening for a limited number of hours would be an improvement on the present system. Since the debate on the Second Reading I saw in one of the papers that some temperance organisation had protested against Sunday opening. There is no doubt that people who are interested in temperance do not seem to recognise or to consider that there would be any advantage to be gained for temperance by the substitution of a general opening for a few hours for the present bona fide system. That possibly is due to the fact that a number of these people come from places where the bona fide traffic has not become an abuse. The abuse, I am prepared to admit, is confined to very few areas, principally areas which are the bona fide resorts of large centres of population.
My colleague for County Tipperary has said that there is no abuse in the country districts. That, at first sight, would seem to be true. Of course, if I were to take Deputy Morrissey on a fine point, all the abuse is in the country districts, because the places where the abuses arise from the city visitors are rural areas, otherwise they could not have a bona fide traffic on Sundays; but, not to take him on that rather unfair point, there is a form of abuse in the country other than the abuse that exists in the city, that is, the number of offences against the licensing laws that occur purely as a result of the bona fide regulations. Anybody reading reports of licensing cases in the local papers will see that 99 per cent. of these cases are in some way connected with the bona fide traffic. They arise out of that, and while these cases in themselves may seem a very small proportion and are few and far between, we can take it, I think, for pretty certain, having regard to the difficulties in administering the bona fide laws, that these few cases represent the few occasions on which people happen to be "copped" and that there are a far greater number of cases in reality which are never discovered. That in itself is a serious abuse, because it leads to contempt of the law. You have the same thing in America to-day, the Prohibition law universally evaded, and it is admitted that when any law, supposedly in operation, is broken day in, day out, and broken more or less with impunity, it is a bad state of affairs in any State.
The fact is that at present there are abuses, grave abuses under the existing administration of the bona fide law, and the question before the House at present is whether we will throw up our hands and say: "This thing must go, but we see no remedy," or whether, on the lines suggested throughout this discussion, we will find an alternative. Much has been made of the argument that if you have general opening for a few hours on Sundays people who never think of drinking will be inveigled into the paths of riotous intemperance. I wonder if that is so? I do not think that when the Minister talks about a general opening on Sundays he altogether precludes the possibility of limiting the chances of improper drinking by the adoption of some such system as the split-hour system, that publichouses in the rural areas might be opened, let us say, from the hours of one to two, then closed for two or three hours, and opened for a further few hours later on. That would meet the convenience of people who come to the town in the mornings, who want to get a drink, and it would also meet the convenience of people who are entitled in the ordinary way to a drink in the course of the day, and would prevent, to my mind, any considerable abuse.
The main principle underlying this Bill, as far as it is capable of fulfilment, without undue interference with the right of a man who is going to take a drink or two and leave it at that, is to allow him to obtain his drink and at the same time to curtail the opportunities of people who indulge in excessive drinking. The Bill, as it stands at present with regard to Sunday traffic, is altogether out of harmony with the remaining sections of the Bill, and it requires some such provision as a general opening for limited hours to bring it into complete harmony, to do away with the opportunity for unrestricted drinking on Sundays, and to substitute therefor some means by which a man who is entitled to get an ordinary amount of liquid refreshment on Sunday may get it, and at the same time to curtail opportunities for excessive drinking.
Another difficulty that might arise in the administration of the general opening principle would be that in certain districts, seaside resorts and places of that kind, the hour that would be most suitable would not apply in the ordinary rural districts. The Minister might see his way to leave that to the discretion of the District Justice, so that in one district the hours might be from one to four or from one to five, and in another district from four to seven. That, I imagine, would not offer any considerable difficulty, and in that way you could make some accommodation for the needs of particular places.
There is one more point in favour of the general opening that I would like to bring to the attention of the House. that is that any system grounded on the bona fide traffic system must involve discrimination as against particular traders. Certain traders are bound to get almost the total benefit under the bona fide system. That has the evil effect of throwing the consumer into the hands of one or two traders and of leaving them—and I think it happens in some cases, at least—to supply a commodity that would not be taken if there was universal competition. Pleas have been made during the discussion in the interests of a particular class. For what it is worth, I now make a plea on behalf of a particular class. There are all over the country aged poor people who could not possibly walk three miles and who could not afford to pay for a conveyance to take them that distance, and if any man is entitled to a drink on Sunday I think the man coming on towards 70 years of age, who perhaps needs it to sustain his vigour, is better entitled to it than the man who goes out for a holiday. Such a man cannot get a drink near his home at present, but he could if there was a general opening. That is a plea for a number of people who under existing legislation have not a reasonable opportunity for obtaining a drink.
took the Chair.
I am glad we had this discussion, and I am prepared to accept as a result of the discussion that Deputy MacCurtain and myself are in a minority in the view which we hold. It is well, however, that Deputies should be clear about the position. Under the Act of 1924, we carved a rather big hole in the bona fide day on Sunday. We provided that as between 7 a.m. and 1 p.m. bona fide traffic should not run. That was a six-hour slice out of the day. Prior to that a man who travelled the statutory distance could drink as long as he was able to stand it. There was scarcely any limitation of time. When a man travelled the statutory distance I do not know that his privilege even ceased at midnight on Sunday—I doubt if it did. The present position is that in the four cities the residents may drink in the local publichouses for three hours from 2 to 5, and that elsewhere the people who travel the statutory distance have 11 hours, if we take the halt at midnight—they have from 1 p.m. until midnight to drink. That is the position as it stands. Under the Bill, if my proposal is carried in the matter of hours, the position will be that for three hours the residents of those four cities may drink freely and locally from 2 to 5, and that elsewhere persons who travel the statutory distance may drink for six hours in the non-summer time period and for seven hours in the summer. In face of that it is, of course, not just sound to speak of Sunday opening as an evil. That really means a pretty general consumption of drink on Sunday. The question simply arises whether it would be a better thing to have a limited uniform opening throughout the State in exchange for a complete abolition of the bona fide traffic; whether, in fact, the position of three hours in four cities and six or seven hours elsewhere, conditional on travelling a given distance, is better than three hours throughout; whether it would mean less excess, less abuse, less profanation of the Sunday.
There are really three positions: There is the position of three hours in the county boroughs and six or seven elsewhere, conditional on travelling a given distance; there is the dry Sunday, which Deputy Good advocates; or there is this idea of a limited uniform opening throughout the State. That is a matter on which clearly Deputies have different views, each Deputy holding his own view with a certain amount of conviction. I have mine, but I did not feel justified, in the absence of a recommendation from the Commission, in embodying it in the Bill, and I think I am wise. I am quite prepared to agree that public opinion —certainly public opinion as voiced here—is not ripe to accept anything of the kind. In the circumstances there is only one course, and that is, to keep pruning at the bona fide hours to bring them within measurable distance of the number of hours that one would be prepared to envisage and stand over for a uniform opening. But I believe myself—and this is, of course, purely a personal view—that the bona fide traffic, as such, is doomed. I would not advise any man to invest money henceforth on the basis that it is going to survive. I do not believe it is. I think that with the increase in motor traffic, with the increased mobility of the individual, to which I have referred, the day will come, which has not apparently come yet, when people will be prepared to say that it is a better and sounder thing to agree to a limited opening throughout the State on Sunday than perpetuate this statutory farce of the bona fide traffic.
I think I made it clear to the Dáil that if they turned away from the idea of a complete abolition of the bona fide traffic in exchange for a limited opening throughout the State, then I was standing over those hours in amendment 46, which stands in the name of Deputy Dolan. I think those hours are reasonable—that is, six hours in the non-summer time period and seven hours in the summer time period. Special areas may choose whether they would take those seven hours from 1 to 8, or from 2 to 9, and the District Justice is given a discretion in that matter. The Commission recommended a break in the bona fide traffic, but it would be practically impossible to administer it. It would be a heartbreak to the Gárda Síochána sergeants throughout the country, and it would really be imposing too severe a task upon the police. I am, therefore, favouring a straight run of six hours in the autumn and winter, and seven hours in the summer-time period.
The Minister would not think of starting earlier and finishing earlier?
I would not think of starting earlier for a very good reason, and that is, that I do not want to see happening just what Deputy Daly does want to see happening—I do not want to see the whole last-Mass crowd caught by the open door of the publichouse, and that is why we have chosen 1 p.m. as the opening hour. Deputy Good was not drawing a caricature when he described the conditions arising out of the bona fide traffic around Dublin. It is a fact that these buses and charabancs and motorcars pour out of the city in the early part of the day on Sunday and that it is a genuinely dangerous thing to be facing out from Dublin at night along the Bray-Stillorgan Road or practically any of the roads leading into the city. These charabancs come lurching along the roads—you would think the vehicle itself was drunk as well as its cargo—literally taking both sides of the road. There is a halt at every village on the way back, at which the occupants dismount, which is piling Pelion on Ossa, so to speak, and always treating the driver to make assurance doubly sure. I am not shaken in my view by the general discussion that has taken place here, that it would be a good exchange for people who are primarily interested in checking the abuse and excess to accept a limited opening throughout the State in exchange for complete abolition of the bona fide traffic.
Deputy O'Connell says I stressed and overstressed the inter-dependence of the two things. "Why talk of exchange?" he said. "If a bona fide traffic is an abuse why not abolish it?" Deputy Morrissey suggested that I should also abolish the 2 to 5 opening in the four county boroughs. Talking in terms of practical politics, I do not envisage a dry Sunday as a possibility. I think people will have to make their choice; they will either have to suffer under the bona fide system, and its attendant evils, or face up to the other thing that is giving limited facilities throughout the State on Sunday evenings. I think people will not be prepared to stand for a completely dry Sunday, for the abolition of the bona fide traffic without some little compensating facility generally throughout the State. I do not believe that any Government could table such a proposal and survive. After all, we have to think in terms of what is attainable. I can quite understand temperance societies that write on their banners "Complete Sunday Closing" and lots of other ideals which they scarcely think themselves are attainable. I do not think they are attainable. I think it is a choice between one course and the other.
I am quite prepared to accept now that public opinion is not ripe for a uniform opening throughout the State, and, in the circumstances, I see nothing for it but to take another chunk, so to speak, out of the bona fide day at the end of it, limiting it to the hours between 1 and 7 in the non-summer time period and 1 and 8 in the summer time period. I hope that process will continue, that hours will be pruned from time to time and brought within measurable distance of what one might be prepared to accept as a uniform opening. I believe great evils arise from making people travel on Sunday for drink, driving them out of their home area where they are known and where the checks of human respect operate. With the increase in motor traffic and the increase of those buses and so on I believe that evil will become more and more impressed upon people's minds until in the end the view I hold and the view Deputy MacCurtain holds will cease to be a minority view, as it is fairly obviously just now.
I shall now put amendment 46.
There will be an opportunity at a later stage of moving an amendment to it?
Yes. No other proposal has been defeated at this stage.
Amendment 50 would require to be moved now as consequent to amendment 46.
I beg to move amendment 50:—
Before sub-section (2), on page 9, to insert a new sub-section as follows:—
"(2) The Justice of the District Court may in his discretion, on the application of the holder of an on-licence in respect of premises situate in the licensing area and after hearing the principal officer of the Gárda Síochána in the licensing area, substitute the hours of two o'clock and nine o'clock in the afternoon for the hours of one o'clock and eight o'clock mentioned in the foregoing sub-section in relation to Sundays during a period of summer time, and whenever such order is so made the foregoing sub-section shall, during the residue of the period of summer time current at the date of the order or, where such order is not made during a period of summer time during the period of summer time commencing next after the date of the order, have effect as if the hours mentioned therein in relation to Sundays during a period of summer time were two o'clock and nine o'clock in the afternoon."
We shall now take amendment 51, opening up the question of distance.
In the absence of Deputy Heffernan I move amendment 51:—
In sub-section (4), line 6, to delete the words "ten miles" and substitute therefor the words "five miles."
As was mentioned on the Second Reading, there does not seem much to say on behalf of the proposal as it stands in the Bill, because the existing limit of five miles from the exempted cities was arrived at as late as the year 1906, and traffic and mobility have not increased to such an extent since then as to justify the doubling of the distance. Some strange anomalies would arise if this proposal were carried. A person living within a mile of one of those county boroughs might be within bona fide distance of, say, a seaside resort, and when he arrived there would be entitled to get a drink, whereas a person actually living in the city, the difference being only a mile between them, when he travelled to the seaside would not be able to procure a drink. Perhaps I might make myself clearer if I gave an illustration. I will again fall back upon Tramore. A person living in the city of Waterford would not be entitled to get a drink in Tramore as a bona fide traveller, because Tramore is only seven miles from Waterford, whereas a person living within one mile beyond Waterford, which is practically in the suburbs, if he went to Tramore would be entitled to get a drink. That certainly seems to be an anomaly. It is penalising unnecessarily a large number of people.
But apart from that, which might seem a trifling instance, you have the whole question as to whether there is now any real reason for doubling the statutory distance. Ten miles is as easy to cover in a motor car as five miles and possibly might only take very little longer, but ten miles to a pedestrian is very different from five miles even to a cyclist. A pedestrian might be quite prepared and able to walk a distance of five miles, but he would not be able to cover the ten miles. Therefore, this proposed legislation is undoubtedly, if not in the interests of a particular class, against the interests of a particular class. The proposal, I submit, has not, so far, been justified, and I hope the Minister will re-consider it. Perhaps it might be possible for him to arrive at some compromise as regards the city area and the country area. At present the distance in the rural areas is three miles. I would suggest that six miles would be far enough from the city and four miles in any country district. He might even consider the possibility of making a universal distance throughout the whole country, say five miles from the city as it is at present, and five miles within country districts. I do not think he is warranted in doubling the distance, both from the city to outside places, and also between country areas. I hope he will listen to the discussion on this question and take the view of the House, as he has done on the question we have just been debating.
Are we dealing exclusively with amendment No. 51 now?
Yes.
On this question of distances, the recommendation of the Commission is that distances be doubled, and that is the provision in the Bill. One can see considerations for and against that. On the one hand, it is not in question that there is greatly increased mobility since these distances were fixed. Deputy Redmond reminds us that the city distances were revised not very long ago; certainly not nearly so long ago as the other distances were originally fixed. On the other hand, there is the question that this proposal simply wipes out one set of vested interests and creates new ones. To the cyclist, the motor cyclist or the owner of a motor car, the change is inconsiderable. I do not feel sufficient conviction on the matter to put these proposed changes in distance to the Dáil as a matter of confidence. If there is a division, I will vote for the provisions of the Bill, as recommended by the Commission, but I certainly do not feel justified in stating that this change is one on which the Government should resign if defeated.
Question—"That the words ‘ten miles' stand part of the section"— put and negatived.
Question—"That the words ‘five miles' be there inserted"—put and agreed to.
Amendment 52—"In sub-section (4), line 10, to delete the words ‘six miles' and substitute therefor the words ‘three miles'" (Deputy Heffernan)—agreed to.
Section 13, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Amendment 53 (Deputy C. Byrne) hangs on previous amendments, which have been already postponed. Amendment 53, I think, might be postponed also.
Several points are dealt with in the amendment by Deputy Redmond to this section. Two of them are dealt with by other amendments. Amendment 55, in the name of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Executive Council, deals with the question of discretion with the District Justice. Amendment 57 deals with the relief of bona fide purchasers. If Deputy Redmond were agreeable, we could get a decision on the question of discretion for the District Justice on amendment 55, to which, if he thought fit, he could propose an amendment. The question of the relief of bona fide purchasers could be dealt with on amendment 57. The other question, as to the life of an endorsement on a licence, could be dealt with now separately or on the next stage. Perhaps it would be more convenient to deal with it on the next stage.
I am agreeable to the procedure you propose, and I shall, therefore, move an amendment to the new section proposed before Section 22. With regard to the question of the life of the endorsement, I shall postpone that, with the leave of the Committee. I can deal with the remaining points on amendment 57.
I move amendment 55:
Before Section 22 to insert a new section as follows:—
"22.—(1) Whenever the holder of a licence for the sale of intoxicating liquor is convicted by a Justice of the District Court of an offence a conviction for which is required by this Act to be recorded on such licence such Justice may, if satisfied that by reason of extenuating circumstances (which shall relate only to the technical character or the trivial nature of the offence) such conviction ought not to be recorded on such licence, make an order stating such extenuating circumstances and declaring that such conviction shall not be recorded, and whenever such order is so made such conviction shall not be so recorded.
(2) Whenever an order is made by a Justice of the District Court under the foregoing sub-section on a prosecution at the instance of a member of the Gárda Síochána, an appeal shall lie at the instance of such prosecutor to the Judge of the Circuit Court within whose Circuit the District or part of the District of such Justice is situate against such order, but not against the conviction in respect of which such order was made, and if such appeal is dismissed such Judge may order the costs of the appeal to be paid by such prosecutor."
I have not been able to table my amendment to this proposed new section.
I will take the Deputy's amendment now.
My amendment is:—
To delete in line 5 of the proposed new section the words in brackets ("which shall relate only to the technical character or the trivial nature of the offence").
After this official amendment was put in, I heard suggestions that it did not represent a fulfilment of what I promised on Second Stage in this connection. What I said on Second Stage, in fact, was:
This Bill provides an appeal on that issue (endorsement issue) to the Circuit Judge. We say to the trader who has been convicted of any of the offences which have an endorsement as a consequence that if he could convince the Circuit Judge of his area that, having regard to the attendant circumstances, the offence which occasioned that particular endorsement was trivial, or purely technical in character, it shall be competent for the Circuit Judge to order that that endorsement shall be, for all practical purposes, inoperative and of no effect. I have been pressed on this matter and I am prepared on the Committee Stage to make even an advance on that position. I want to be very clear on this. I do not propose on the Committee Stage or on any other Stage of this Bill to revert to the position that a fine rather than an endorsement will be the normal consequence of a definite full-blooded breach of these laws, but I am prepared to give favourable consideration to some form of wording such as this: "That the District Justice shall, unless, having regard to the attendant circumstances, the offence is of a trivial or purely technical character endorse the licence." That wording conveys my idea. No doubt in the hands of the Parliamentary draftsman it would be altered somewhat, but that is the idea. I will give that, provided that there will lie with the Superintendent of the Civic Guard of the area an appeal to the Circuit Judge if he considers that an over-indulgent view has been taken of a particular case. I am anxious to meet the trivial case, the purely technical case. I am anxious to meet the case of a man whose clock is five or seven minutes wrong and who has been detected no doubt in a breach of the licensing laws, but not in a deliberate, premeditated breach. I am anxious to meet the man who is caught out under a technicality and whose offence is trivial, but I do not propose to revert to the position that a fine rather than an endorsement would be the normal consequence of a definite full-blooded breach of these laws. I may seem unduly insistent on this matter, but I am anxious not to be misunderstood, and if we leave to the District Justice a certain discretion to meet the purely trivial or technical case, I ask in exchange for that that there shall lie with the police officer, the superintendent of the district, an appeal to the Circuit Judge if, in his considered view, an over-indulgent view has been taken of a particular case and of the circumstances of a particular case, that he may go a step higher and go to the Circuit Judge and ask him whether he considers that that offence in its setting was of a trivial or technical character.
I claim, and I think all Deputies or nearly all Deputies will agree with me, that the official amendment that is on the Paper represents fully and completely a fulfilment of anything that I promised in this connection on Second Stage. (Amendment 55 quoted.)
I am told there is objection to the words in brackets "which shall relate only to the technical character or the trivial nature of the offence." That is to make sure, for instance, that the poverty of the trader would not be pleaded as an extenuating circumstance. The extenuating circumstances must relate only to the trivial nature or the purely technical character of the offence, and I think that is a necessary provision. One person, with a liberal outlook on these matters, might be prepared to regard many things as extenuating circumstances. The heat of the day might make it necessary for the client to get refreshments while the poverty of the trader might make it necessary for him to glean illegitimate profits by trading after hours and so on. The extenuating circumstances that must be relied on in this matter, if there is not to be endorsement, must be circumstances relating to the trivial nature or the purely technical character of the offence. Again may I say that the concessions that were indicated on the Second Stage have been magnified in a manner that certainly amazes me and my officials who knew just what they were. It was simply hyperbole to speak of the Bill as a distorted remnant of its former self after this particular provision had been inserted. This thing is a small matter, but it is just. It meets the only kind of case that I am prepared to consider, that is the purely trivial case, the case which I myself or any other Deputy in the Dáil might agree to be so trivial or so technical that endorsement ought not really to follow as a penal consequence. It meets that case. On the other hand, it meets no more than that, and I do not wish to meet more than that.
I think you will only get observance of those laws by taking the line that the normal consequence of a definite breach shall be endorsement rather than a fine, and that is the position that I want to preserve. That is the position I believe that I have preserved while making provision for the purely trivial and technical case. Now I was told all along by the licensed trade and their advocates that it was the trivial case, the purely technical case, they wanted to meet: the case of the man whose clock was slightly defective and went a few minutes wrong. They said it would be a great hardship if such a man had his licence endorsed. Very well, that case is met by the proposed amendment, but now it begins to emerge that that is not the case that should be met at all, that it is something else—a much more serious thing, a definite breach of the law and not a trivial or a technical offence. We must stand somewhere and draw the line somewhere and say there is finality. At this point confidence comes in, and I stand definitely and fully over this official amendment. I am not prepared to make any concession whatsoever, and if a modification of that amendment is carried, well. I shall regard that as an issue of confidence on which the Government appropriately should leave office.
The Minister has sought to prove that he has fulfilled his pledge given on the Second Reading.
Does the Deputy suggest that I have not?
Will the Minister please allow me to conclude my sentence? The Minister has sought to prove that he has endeavoured to fulfil his pledge given on the Second Reading in regard to this question of endorsement. The pledge that he gave on that occasion, as recited by him again to-day, was that he was prepared to give a discretion to the District Justice in regard to the attendant circumstances if the offence was of a trivial or technical nature. The Minister may honestly believe that in the section he is now proposing he is giving effect to that pledge. I do not deny that he may honestly believe he is doing so, but I will endeavour to show the House that, in my opinion, he is not. What his section proposes is, that if the District Justice is satisfied that by reason of extenuating circumstances which relate only to the technical character or trivial nature of the offence such conviction ought not to be recorded on such licence and so on. I submit that that section refers only to offences which in themselves were technical or trivial, and that it does not refer to attendant circumstances on other offences which might render those other offences thereby technical or trivial. I intend very shortly to explain the position in this regard.
In discussing this amendment, one cannot lose sight of the fact that it is proposed in a subsequent section to repeal the Probation of Offenders Act. I shall deal with that in a moment, but I would like now to recall to the mind of the House the position of a licensed holder at present in regard to endorsement. By the Licensing Act of 1872 certain convictions were made endorseable and the endorsement was to be recorded unless the magistrate, as he then was, should otherwise direct. That provision was actually repealed in the year 1874 by the Licensing Act, Section 38, but it was re-enacted by Section 16 of the Act of 1924 with the further condition that the conviction should be recorded with no provision for a discretion for the District Justice. In the year 1907 the Probation of Offenders Act was passed by the British Parliament with the object of providing some means to enable judges in criminal cases to have some discretion whereby they could mitigate sentences which might seem to them in certain circumstances connected with a case unduly harsh. It was stated by the Minister, and I am not going to score a petty point off him on this question. I think rather inadvertently at the end of the Second Reading debate, that a decision had been come to in our Courts that the Probation of Offenders Act did not apply to these licensing cases.
I did not like, at that stage, to take up much of his time—he had not much to spare before the House rose—and I simply said: "I can assure him that is not so." I find it necessary to inform the House as to the legal position to-day of licensed holders in regard to the Probation of Offenders Act. A case came before the Courts recently, and it was a test case where a licensed publican was charged with opening his premises for the sale of intoxicating liquor at a time, prohibited by law, 2.15 p.m. on the 17th of March, 1926, St. Patrick's Day. He pleaded guilty. It was admitted that his house was well conducted and that this was his first offence. The District Justice gave defendant the benefit of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, and ordered that he be discharged conditionally on his entering into his own recognizances. There was an appeal from that case, and it was held, on appeal, by the Appeal Tribunal, consisting of the President of the High Court, Mr. Justice Sullivan and Mr. Justice Hanna
"That on the facts in this case stated, that the justice was not entitled to give defendant the benefit of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907. The District Justice, before giving the defendant the benefit of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, should be satisfied that the case falls under one of the heads of this Act, and should state explicitly on which of the grounds provided in this Act he relies before applying the Act."
These words are taken from the Official Legal Report. The result of that is obvious, namely, that in this particular case, the title of which is Gilroy v. Brennan, the Court of Appeal held that the District Justice was not justified in applying the Probation of Offenders Act, but that was a very different thing from saying that in no licensing cases was this Act applicable. In fact, that is borne out by the second portion of the headnote which I have read, where it is stated that the District Justice, before giving a defendant the benefit of this Act, should be satisfied that the case falls under one of those heads. Therefore, I contend that the Probation of Offenders Act instead of not applying to licensing cases to-day has, by this case, been shown to be applicable to them.
"The Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, provides by Section 1 that ‘Where any person is charged before a court of summary jurisdiction with an offence punishable by such court, and the court thinks that the charge is proved, but is of opinion that, having regard to the (1) character, antecedents, age, health, or mental condition of the person charged, or to (2) the trivial nature of the offence, or to (3) the extenuating circumstances under which the offence was committed, it is inexpedient to inflict any punishment or any other than a nominal punishment, or that it is expedient to release the offender on probation, the court may, without proceeding to conviction, make an order either (1) dismissing the information or charge; or (2) discharging the offender conditionally on his entering into a recognizance.'"
I want to draw Deputies' attention to what this means. All those heads are distinct and exclusive and the word "or" is used between each of those various categories, meaning thereby that where, under any of those heads, the Court was satisfied that the case could be met that they were entitled to apply the Act. The President of the High Court, Mr. Justice Sullivan, said at the conclusion of his judgement:
"I am therefore of opinion that none of the three grounds specified in the first section of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, was established on the evidence before the magistrate and that he was not, in the words of the question we are asked, ‘right in law in applying the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, to the offence in question.'"
I submit that there is a record of a judgement in the Court of Appeal where the President of the High Court laid it down first that there were three grounds and then says "none of those three grounds was sustained," but Mr. Justice Hanna, went further in his judgement, and said:
"It is a matter of common knowledge that the legislature having by the Intoxicating Liquor (General) Act, 1924, made a breach of the Licensing Laws so very serious an offence, possibly leading to a disqualification, appeals are made to the justice to deal with cases under the Probation of Offenders Act."
The reason I have read that judgment is this, that it shows first, that the Probation of Offenders Act can be applied. It should not have been applied to that particular case, it is true. It shows, secondly, that in the terms of the Probation of Offenders Act there were three separate and mutually exclusive clauses under which this Act could have been applied. What the Minister proposes here is that extenuating circumstances may be taken into consideration—yes, but extenuating circumstances in regard only to one of the heads mentioned in the Probation of Offenders Act—extenuating circumstances in regard to trifling and technical offences which probably are not mutually exclusive but properly would fall under one head—extenuating circumstances, only in regard to that head of the Probation of Offenders Act and not in regard to either one or other of them, namely, to the age, character, or antecedents, or to what are called extenuating circumstances in the nature of the offence.
Mr. O'CONNELL
Will Private Members' time be taken to-morrow?
Yes. We will keep on this Bill until we finish it.
The Dáil adjourned at 8.30 p.m. until Friday, 12 o'clock.