I move that Deputy Clery be suspended from the service of the Dáil.
Orders of the Day. - Suspension of a Deputy.
Question put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 76; Níl, 50.
Tá
- Aird, William P.
- Alton, Ernest Henry.
- Anthony, Richard.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Blythe, Ernest.
- Bourke, Séamus A.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Broderick, Henry.
- Brodrick, Seán.
- Byrne, John Joseph.
- Carey, Edmund.
- Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
- Dwyer, James.
- Egan, Barry M.
- Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Gorey, Denis J.
- Hassett, John J.
- Heffernan, Michael R.
- Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
- Hennessy, Thomas.
- Hennigan, John.
- Henry, Mark.
- Holohan, Richard.
- Jordan, Michael.
- Kelly, Patrick Michael.
- Keogh, Myles.
- Law, Hugh Alexander.
- Leonard, Patrick.
- Lynch, Finian.
- Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
- McDonogh, Martin.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- Mongan, Joseph W.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Colohan, Hugh.
- Conlon, Martin.
- Cooper, Bryan Ricco.
- Corish, Richard.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Craig, Sir James.
- Crowley, James.
- Daly, John.
- Davis, Michael.
- De Loughrey, Peter.
- Doherty, Eugene.
- Doyle, Peadar Seán.
- Duggan, Edmund John.
- Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
- Nally, Martin Michael.
- Nolan, John Thomas.
- O'Connell, Richard.
- O'Connell, Thomas J.
- O'Connor, Bartholomew.
- O'Hanlon, John F.
- O'Higgins, Thomas.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
- O'Reilly, John J.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Reynolds, Patrick.
- Rice, Vincent.
- Roddy, Martin.
- Shaw, Patrick W.
- Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
- Thrift, William Edward.
- Tierney, Michael.
- Vaughan, Daniel.
- White, John.
- White, Vincent Joseph.
- Wolfe, George.
- Wolfe, Jasper Travers.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Boland, Patrick.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Seán.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Buckley, Daniel.
- Carney, Frank.
- Carty, Frank.
- Clery, Michael.
- Colbert, James.
- Cooney, Eamon.
- Corkery, Dan.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
- Crowley, Tadhg.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- Everett, James.
- Fahy, Frank.
- Flinn, Hugo.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Goulding, John.
- Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Jordan, Stephen.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Kent, William R.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Maguire, Ben.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Mullins, Thomas.
- O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
- O'Kelly, Seán T.
- O'Leary, William.
- O'Reilly, Thomas.
- Powell, Thomas P.
- Ryan, James.
- Sexton, Martin.
- Sheehy, Timothy (Tipperary).
- Smith, Patrick.
- Tubridy, John.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Tellers : Tá, Deputies Duggan and P. S. Doyle; Níl, Deputies G. Boland and Allen.
Motion declared carried.
I must accordingly ask Deputy Clery to withdraw from the House.
(Deputy Clery withdrew from the House accordingly.)
Before the discussion on the Bill is resumed, I would like to call attention to the fact that during the unseemly performance before the division was taken Deputy Cooney, amongst other things, shouted out: "It was because he got the Minister on the raw," and he then said: "There is an impartial Chairman." That was a clear indication not only to the members of the House but to the Press and to the visitors in the Gallery that he declared you, sir, not an impartial chairman but a partial chairman. I think that should be withdrawn before the debate on the Bill is resumed.
Both statements are absolutely untrue as quoted by the Minister.
I heard what Deputy Cooney said, and I did gather that his words contained the innuendo which the Minister has suggested. But I was then engaged on another matter, and I did not take any notice of what Deputy Cooney said, nor did any other Deputy bring the words to my notice. A division having intervened, I think no notice need be now taken.
took the Chair.
I do not wish to deal at any length with this Bill. I welcome it, but I think on the whole that the Bill is unnecessary and has been introduced more as an act of courtesy on the part of the Government than for any other reason. The innocent Deputy O'Higgins, in the course of an otherwise interesting speech, made an extraordinary attempt to reason with the Labour Party with regard to this Bill. The innocent Deputy O'Higgins was too new to this House to realise that to reason with the Labour Party with regard to this Bill is absolutely useless and unnecessary, because from the very beginning the Labour Party has approached this question of the audit of the military service pensions, not from the point of view of reason, but from the point of view of the passionately emotional, and I think that if we have a speech from Deputy Davin on this Second Reading debate Deputies will realise that he also approaches this matter from a passionately emotional point of view. This is, in fact, a skeleton in the cupboard of the Labour Party. The matter which is being settled in this Bill is the addled egg which was laid by the Labour Party three and a half years ago, and which was made a political party question by the Labour Party in the General Election before the last, and although the Labour Party have been sitting on this addled egg for the last few years nothing has yet come out of it.
A cackling goose!
There were more than eggs addled.
The Labour Party made this question of the audit of the military service pensions a political party question long before the agents and followers of the anti-State came into this Dáil.
Your place is up in the clouds. There is no doubt about that.
They made this matter a political party question long before the agents of the anti-State came into the Dáil in order to turn it and this State into an engine of internal combustion.
A Deputy
Is that spontaneous?
The reason why the Labour Party are opposed to this Bill, and the reason why they approach it with such passionate emotionalism, is due to the fact, in my opinion, that they are in a curious position as between the two main Parties in this Dáil. A large number of the members of both the main Parties have had common experiences and have common memories of the revolutionary period before the Truce which is defined in this Bill with reference to pre-Truce military service, and the Labour Party, I think very patriotically, refrained from taking part in political activities until the national question had been settled. But there seems to be a morbid curiosity on the part of the Labour Party to discover exactly who shot who before the Truce.
That is wrong.
There has been a morbid curiosity to discover exactly who shot who. The great mistake was made by Senator Johnson at the time when he pontificated over the Public Accounts Committee. During his long and, I must say, glorious pontificate——
I am really sorry to interrupt the Deputy's amusing speech, but is he in order in making a reference like that to the late Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, whose services to the House, to the State and to the principles of sound financial administration in this country are admitted by everyone? Is it fair that a reference like that should be made to him by the Deputy?
I think that this House is entitled to a little entertainment, and the chief entertainer should be allowed to go on. It is a very good interlude.
Perhaps Deputies would restrain themselves for a moment. As far as the Deputy has gone I do not think he has said anything from the point of view of order that calls for any comment from the Chair. Fortunately the Chair is not a judge of what is or what is not good taste.
Perhaps I might suggest to the Deputy when he speaks about Parties, that he should bear in mind that he has changed his party allegiance on more than one occasion.
Was Deputy Anthony in order in referring to Deputy Esmonde as a cackling goose?
I think this was the one occasion in the course of Senator Johnson's long service on the Public Accounts Committee that he had his judgment of what was the correct constitutional procedure to adopt challenged by the Committee, and he was defeated.
Has that got anything to do with this Bill? The Deputy will recollect that we are not discussing on this Bill what Senator Johnson or any other member of the Public Accounts Committee did or did not do.
I submit that this Bill has been introduced, according to the statement of the Minister for Finance, who introduced it, in order to allay any suspicions that there may have been as to the position of the Comptroller and Auditor-General with reference to the military service pensions and their audit. Extraordinary statements were made by Deputy Davin. He made the suggestion that the Public Accounts Committee had suggested that the pensions paid up to the present were illegal. He made a statement to that effect in the House last week—"It is regularising and legalising the payments already made or to be made in future." He definitely said or suggested——
Ah!
—that the Public Accounts Committee had implied in its Report that the payments already made were illegal. If Deputies read the Report of the Public Accounts Committee they will see that that is an entirely wrong doctrine. The first theory with reference to the audit of these accounts was put forward by Senator Johnson and is mentioned in the account of proceedings of the Committee of Public Accounts for 1927, the first year in which this was considered. He produced a long statement which was, in the opinion of the Public Accounts Committee, apocryphal and heretical, and the true doctrine as to the constitutional position was enunciated by the Public Accounts Committee of that date, which pointed out that pre-Truce service bore a strong analogy to what is ordinarily the subject of secret service. The Committee subsequently brought in a slight amendment to their previous decision, and when Deputy Davin suggests that the Committee deliberately reversed its previous decision and declared that these payments were illegal, I think he is not giving a correct interpretation of the minutes as found in the Report of the Committee. The only words which are to be found are these:—"On further consideration the Committee is of opinion that it is undesirable to deal with a charge which occurs annually in a manner which appears to limit the powers conferred on the Comptroller and Auditor-General." That word "appears" is very important. Then it concludes:—"The Committee is therefore of opinion that immediate steps should be taken to remove this anomalous position and to regularise the audit of the expenditure arising out of the Military Service Pensions Act.""To regularise the audit." There is no question about regularising the payments; it is a question of regularising the audit. It is for that reason, in order to satisfy the Comptroller and Auditor-General, that this Bill has been introduced. Naturally the followers of the anti-State in this House oppose this Bill, just as they oppose the Military Service Pensions Bill, because these pensions are given to men who knocked hell out of them a few years ago. They should develop that new spirit which is so much in evidence now throughout the world, as exemplified by the dinner given recently by General Smuts to his former opponent, and they should show a little more sportsmanship in dealing with these matters. If I were not a private Deputy I would be most anxious to extend the scope of this Bill, and to include amongst the pensioners all those who had taken part in this struggle to establish the State, irrespective of whether they had subsequently been misled by the wiles of the anti-State.
Or whether they did it at home or abroad.
You were an ambassador on the high seas.
Yes. I am referring to military service. I am afraid the time has not yet come for that, but it will come in time, and although the moneyed classes may regret it, still the moneyed classes have always shown a good example to the Fianna Fáil Party of citizenship and of obedience to public authority, and when all the persons who have participated in the struggle for the establishment of our State come to get pensions I am sure that the moneyed classes will bow their heads and obey. I am very glad that this Bill has been introduced, not because I think it is absolutely necessary but in order to wind up the muddle——
Agreed.
Which Senator Johnson and Deputy Davin——
And Deputy Esmonde.
—have created in this connection in order, I presume, to set their consciences at rest.
I rise to oppose this Bill. I quite realise how sensitive members of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party are in this discussion, and I realise how difficult it is to make a case against this Bill without being ruled out of order. However, I will have to try to keep, as far as possible, at any rate, within the procedure laid down by the Ceann Comhairle during the course of the discussion on this Bill. If this Bill is passed the Board of Assessors will be entirely uncontrolled in the matter of awarding military service pensions. The Comptroller and Auditor-General will not be allowed to examine the documents on which the claim to the pension is alleged to be based. It is an extraordinary thing that in all other public expenditure the minutest details, and all documents relating to such expenditure, are placed before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. When we come across a Bill such as this, aiming at such extraordinary legislation, we have naturally to ask ourselves, why is this extraordinary exception made? The Board of Assessors are to work in secret, and the documents on which they are to base their awards are not to be disclosed. I suggest that the reason why these documents are not disclosed is to be found in the fact that the Military Service Pensions Act has been availed of for the purposes of political graft. I do not make that statement in this House, guided by the knowledge that I am in a privileged Assembly. Anything I state in relation to the Military Service Pensions Act in this House I am quite prepared to state outside.
But I am aware that, for instance, in Co. Monaghan during the recent elections there military service pensions were disbursed wholesale by the Cumann na nGaedheal Party to men who were not entitled to those pensions according to the Military Service Pensions Act, and I will undertake to prove, in any number of cases, that as far as 60 per cent. of the people who have got these pensions are concerned, they are not entitled to these pensions according to law. In the town of Monaghan alone, and it is not a very big town, I will undertake to mention half-a-dozen cases, and I will undertake to prove that they are not entitled, according to the Military Service Pensions Act, to pensions. It is a strange thing that most of these applications had been pressed forward on many occasions between the passing of the Military Service Pensions Act of 1924 and the general elections of 1927.
It is an extraordinary fact that they were turned down time and again for some unknown reason, at least for some reason that will not be put before the public or the Comptroller and Auditor-General. These people, during the elections of 1927. in June and September, became entitled to military service pensions. I understand that names are not being mentioned in the course of this debate, and that we must confine ourselves to cases which we are prepared to cite. I am quite prepared to conform to that rule of debate. I want to draw the attention of the House to a number of questions concerning military service pensions which I asked in this House on the 13th June, 1928. I beg now to draw the attention of the House to these questions and to the answers. The first question is No. 21 on the Order Paper for the 13th June, 1928, and I will refer to the person mentioned in that question as No. 21. I asked the Minister for Defence if he was aware that No. 21 was in receipt of a military service pension: that he was courtmartialed during the Truce period and dismissed from the Irish Republican Army, and that the courtmartial sentence was confirmed by the Divisional Commandant, Dan Hogan. I also asked the date on which the pension was awarded and the date on which the first payment was made. The Minister replied that the person mentioned was in receipt of a pension as stated; that he was not aware that he was courtmartialed during the Truce period, or that he was dismissed from the Volunteers. The pension was awarded on the 30th November, 1927, and the first payment was made on the 12th December, 1927. This man was courtmartialed and dismissed from the Irish Republican Army early in 1922. He never served in the Free State Army in his life, not one hour—neither did his brother, for that matter, and he also has a pension.
I would like to know from the Minister what steps he has taken since the 13th June to ascertain the accuracy, or otherwise, of the allegations which I made regarding this man's position and his claim for a pension. He certainly has not asked me about it, nor has he asked my assistance in establishing whether this man was entitled to a pension. He knows that I would have first hand knowledge by reason of the position which I held at that time.
I got even more first-hand information.
If the Minister got more first-hand information regarding this particular case it has been the class of information which has been placed before the Board of Assessors, and it is the class of information which I want to be put before the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
If the Deputy wants, he can reduce his pension.
Is it a fact that this man was courtmartialed at all?
No.
That is not so bad. Is it denied that he was dismissed from the Army?
From the Volunteers, no.
Is it alleged that he ever served a solitary hour with the National Army?
Yes.
He served in the Army during the general elections.
He served in the elections, and laid down a demand to Cumann na nGaedheal that he was going to oppose the Minister for Finance unless he was guaranteed his pension. Many men in Monaghan made the same demand, and made it successfully. I would draw the attention of the House to Question No. 22 on the same date.
I think that the Deputy's method of dealing with these cases, by drawing the attention of the House to the question and giving the date, is tantamount almost to giving the man's name. I think it is very undesirable. The Deputy might find some other means.
I submit that we are entitled to cite cases. This is a case which has been mentioned in the House before. It is on the records of the House, and I submit that I am entitled to refer to it. If anyone is sufficiently curious to refer to it, and to look up the records to see who is the person mentioned in Question 22. I submit that he is entitled to do so.
I suggest that it is undesirable that the Deputy should deal with the matter in that way.
We have been hemmed in so much it is very hard to devise means by which one can deal with this matter. I think it will do, with all due respect. I asked the Minister for Defence whether No. 22 is in receipt of a military service pension and to state the date on which the pension was awarded, the date on which the first payment was made, and the period of service on which the pension was made. Further, I asked whether he was aware that No. 22 was courtmartialed and dismissed from the Irish Republican Army during the Truce period, and that the courtmartial sentence was confirmed by the Divisional Commandant. The Minister admitted that this person was in receipt of a pension which was awarded on the 12th September, 1927, and the first payment was made on 23rd November, 1927. He further stated that the periods of service on which the pension is based are as follows:—One-twelfth of period from 1st April, 1920, to 31st March, 1921; entire period from 1st April, 1921, to 30th June, 1922; entire period from 24th September, 1922, to 30th September, 1923. The Minister said that he was not aware that the person mentioned was courtmartialed during the Truce period. The Minister is not aware that this courtmartial took place either.
Is this the same case?
No. Several men were courtmartialed in our parts of the country. If the Minister wants to know, or if the House wants to know, the nature of the offence for which this man was courtmartialed and dismissed I will state it. I do not want to disclose it. I have no intention of disclosing it publicly, but if anyone wants to know I will give the information privately. I desire to tell the House and to tell the Minister that, for being a party to the same offence, a civilian was fined £200. He did not pay and he was taken to a military camp and confined for three weeks. He was released, and the first day that he opened his shop the military from Beggar's Bush seized £50 towards payment of the fine. That man's business was ruined, and he is now out of the country, whereas the other man, who was courtmartialed and dismissed, is now drawing a pension.
Granted on the 12th September.
Surely, the 12th September. I wonder how we got any votes at all. The person referred to in Question 23 is in receipt of a pension. The period of service on which the pension was based was from the 1st April, 1921, to 30th September, 1923, and the pension was awarded on 2nd September, 1927. I also asked the Minister for Defence whether he would state the date on which a military service pension was awarded to No. 24, the date on which the first payment was made, and the service on which the pension was based. The date on which the pension was awarded was 2nd September, 1927. These people live in the town of Monaghan, and the date on which the first payment of the pension was made was 5th November, 1927. The period of service upon which the pension was based made up the following periods:—entire period from 1st April, 1921, to 30th June, 1922; one-twelfth of period from 1st July, 1922, to 31st March, 1923. I live in that area, in the town which is not a very big town. That man was never in the Free State Army. We may be told that he was a Secret Service agent and that he was pensioned on that basis, but if all the men who are drawing pensions in the town of Monaghan were in the Secret Service, I wonder that we were able to carry on at all. It looks as if everybody was spying on us.
May I ask the Deputy a question? In the first case about which he asked a question, on that occasion he volunteered certain information. In the case of the others, whom he calls 22, 23 and 24, might they not be exactly identical cases to that about which he asked a question and in regard to which he volunteered some information?
I must say the Minister's question is particularly long-tailed. What exactly is the point on which he wants information?
I will tell the Deputy. In the first case about which the Deputy asked a question, I know all about it, because on the occasion he volunteered certain information. He said that he knew the facts, that the man had been courtmartialed and dismissed from the Army. He referred to a certain officer who knew the details of that. He refers to other cases as Nos. 22, 23 and 24. Did he in a similar way give such information as he would be in a position to give about these cases? Did he, or did he not?
If the Minister thinks that he is going to side-track me in this discussion, he is very greatly mistaken. I put down these questions on the 13th June of last year, and drew his attention to certain facts. Considering that I have been available since, if he wanted any information or to make any inquiry into these cases, he could easily have got it.
The Minister for Finance was the candidate then.
Of course that would not enter into it. I pass on to No. 25 on the Order Paper of the 13th June of last year. The person referred to in that question is in receipt of a pension. The pension was awarded on the 7th September, 1927. The period of service was one-twelfth of the period from 1st April, 1920, to the 31st March, 1921; the entire periods from the 1st April, 1921, to 30th June, 1922, and one-twelfth of the period from the 1st July, 1922, to the 31st March, 1923. The person referred to in that question is a tradesman in the whole-time employment of a public body. During the Anglo-Irish war he was never an hour away from his work. He was on full pay all the time. He was not in the Intelligence Department during the Anglo-Irish war. I do not know if he was a secret servant during the civil war, but I do know that during the civil war he never lost an hour from his employment. I submit that No. 25 is one of the cases that could not very well go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
The next case is No. 26 on the Order Paper of the 13th June. This person is in receipt of a pension, as admitted by the Minister, and the period of service covers 1921, 1922, and one-fourth of the period from 1st July, 1922, to 31st March, 1923. The pension was awarded on the 5th May, 1927, and the first payment was made on the 1st June, 1927—a very good time to make it. I happen to know this man was a public representative. I happen to know that he was particularly hostile to the Minister for Finance in April and May, 1927.
Before he got the pension.
Before he got the pension. He had applied time and again to the Board of Assessors, and the Board of Assessors turned him down because he was not entitled. He never served an hour in the Free State Army unless service behind a bar in a publichouse counted as military service.
He served during the General Election.
He served there faithfully and well. I can mention as many cases similar to those as the Minister would like to hear. Perhaps he has heard enough. If he requires any more, as I stated at the outset, I will give him any number of similar cases. In my deliberate opinion, based on my own intimate knowledge of the situation, these people are not entitled, according to the Military Service Pensions Act, to a pension.
There is another aspect of this matter. I have so far stated the cases of men who were not entitled to a military service pension and who, in my opinion, at any rate, were awarded military service pensions because of their political services. There is another class of case to which I want to refer. That is the class of case where persons were entitled to pensions and did not get them. I know the cases of men who do come within the terms of the Military Service Pensions Act, but who would not swallow the imperial pill. They left the Free State Army after a couple of years' service, and when they would not give their allegiance to the Cumann na nGaedheal Party, there was no pension for them. One of these cases, in the Scotshouse area, the Minister may know of. If he does not know about it, I will give him any details that he requires. This man served for two years in the Free State Army. He was certified by Irish Republican officers as having taken part in every Irish Republican Army activity in the area during the Anglo-Irish war. He was discharged with a good record from the Free State Army, but that record failed lamentably when he would not subscribe to continue to give his allegiance to the Cumann na nGaedheal Party.
The other case of which I have personal knowledge is in the Killeevan district. This man served all during the Anglo-Irish war. He served two years in the Free State Army and he was discharged with a good record but he got no pension. I mentioned this case at one time by way of curiosity, to a member of the Board of Assessors. I just wanted to know how they arrived at these decisions as I thought it would be of interest and he told me that his service in the Free State Army was all right, but that he did not give the necessary pre-Truce service and that if he had given the necessary pre-Truce service, he would have been entitled to a pension. I ventured to ask what particular amount of service was required to entitle him to a pension and I was told by that member of the Board of Assessors that he should have taken part in an actual ambush. In fact, he would nearly want to know the colour of the eyebrows of the men he shot, if he was on the wrong side. He would have to take part in an actual ambush; he was not of the right political persuasion. The men I have mentioned here did not have to take part in actual ambushes. I have here a certificate from General Eoin O'Duffy regarding this particular man's record, and his pre-Truce service. If that certificate is worth the paper that it is written on, and if this man was not entitled to a pension on his pre-Truce service, there is no man in County Monaghan, including General O'Duffy himself, who is entitled to a pension.
Here is what he says:—
I have pleasure in testifying to the splendid national record of Mr. A. He took part in all the Volunteer activities in his area, and owing to his connection with the movement he lost his job. After the truce he joined the National Army and served until he became incapacitated from a fall in barracks. He is a widower with three young children dependent upon him, and, having no employment, his present circumstances can be easily imagined.— Eoin O'Duffy, Chief Commissioner.
What is the date of it?
4th May, 1928. Eoin O'Duffy's evidence in similar terms was before the Board of Assessors when they turned down the case.
Can he not apply again before the next general election?
I do not think even at the price that he would do it. There is another angle of this Military Service Pensions Bill to which I wish to draw attention, and I think I can satisfy the House that from this angle also it is very necessary that the light of day should be let in on the decisions of the Board of Assessors. On 10th July last I asked a question in this House for the names, the rank, the gratuity, the annual service pension and the annual reserve grant of officers who resigned from the passing of the Military Service Pensions Act in 1924 down to that date. I got a reply to that question, but it is too long to read it. I find, however, that the amount of the gratuities paid up to date to officers who resigned since the passing of the Act of 1924 down to that date was £368,000—in gratuities alone already drawn. I think that on that heading alone, on a matter involving an expenditure of £368,000, the Auditor-General is entitled to know, we are entitled to know, and the country is entitled to know, if the people who have drawn that money held the rank that it is alleged they held and if they are entitled to it.
When I looked down this long list involved in that £368,000 of gratuities I found that there were certain familiar names missing. I thought for a little while and I discovered where the loophole was. The question asked for the names, the rank, the gratuity, the service pension, and the reserve grant of officers who had retired since the passing of the Act of 1924. It did not include, of course, the officers who had retired before the passing of the Act of 1924, but to whom the terms of the Act were subsequently applied. I wrote to the Department of Defence pointing out that from my point of view it was more important that we should get this information concerning the officers who had retired before the passing of the Act, inasmuch as there would be more suspicion in the public mind regarding the transactions carried out at that period. The Minister and his Department parleyed with me a little, but they refused to disclose the information. I do not want to read the letters as it would take too long but they pointed out to me the amount of labour that would be involved in going through the files of the number of officers involved, and they informed me that if I were interested in eliciting the information regarding any particular individual that, of course, they would place the information at my disposal. But this important disclosure was made — that the number of officers who had retired before the passing of the Act, and to whom the terms of the Act were applied, was 2,800. If I am to find out the details that I want regarding each one of these officers, it is suggested that the simple way to do it, the business way to do it, the methodical way to do it, and the labour-saving way to do it, is to write 2,800 letters. I am not prepared to do that. I suppose we will find it out some way, or, of course, we could, if we knew all these people, put down 2,800 questions on the Order Paper, and, I suppose, have 2,800 debates on the Adjournment, but the Minister would probably have vacated the Front Bench before we would have finished it.
I do not want to be misunderstood in this matter. Under existing circumstances, until this Act is repealed, people who are entitled by law to pensions must get them. We hope in the near future to be in a position to repeal that Act, because we do not stand for pensions for able-bodied men. We are quite prepared to see that people who have been wounded in any of the wars of independence in this country will get pensions, but, in the present state of things in this country, or under any circumstances, we cannot stand for giving pensions to able-bodied men. It is altogether contrary to the spirit that animated the men who took part in the struggle for independence.
I should like to know how do men like Deputies Haslett, Good, Cole and Myles come to support the Cumann na nGaedheal Party on a matter such as this, involving such a huge amount of the people's money, and how do they come to support a Bill such as this, that is to wrap in secrecy and mystery the circumstances under which this money is being doled out. Deputy Haslett, for instance, was returned by the Protestant Association of the Co. Monaghan. He was a farmer; he may live to be a farmer again; he may go back to the land, perhaps, after the next election; and I would certainly consider it most interesting to hear a speech from Deputy Haslett on this Bill. I do not suppose we will be treated to it, but to vote silently on a question such as this, is more than I can understand. There is an extraordinary qualification for a pension — a most amazing qualification — and again I would very much like to know the mentality in approaching this of the men on the Independent Benches— the men who used to be on them. In order to qualify for a military service pension you must have served in arms in establishing the Government of the Irish Republic, and you must have served in arms in suppressing the Government of the Irish Republic. It seems to me to be a most extraordinary qualification for a pension, but there it is. Presumably, the Deputies on the Independent Benches, including Deputy Haslett, satisfied themselves that the service to the Empire in suppressing the Republic outweighs the service to the Irish Nation in establishing it.
On a point of order, I think the Deputy is discussing the Principal Act and not this.
I am afraid he is wandering somewhat from the Bill before the House.
I am at a loss to know why it is not in order to discuss the qualifications for a pension under the Military Service Pensions Act, 1924, seeing that we are now legislating to shroud these pensions in secrecy and mystery. Anyhow, I do not think there is any use in continuing. A man could talk even to Christmas Eve here upon this subject, and it does not matter how damaging the facts might be, or what case is put up, or how indefensible is the position taken up by the Cumann na nGaedheal Party or the Independent Party, or any other party that supports this Bill. The whip is being put on, a secret arrangement has been come to, the vote will be cast and the Bill will probably become law. I am satisfied of this, that we at any rate have put the truth before the House, and if the House is prepared to vote for the Bill and make it the law of the Twenty-six Counties, they are entitled to do so, but I believe the people will have something to say to it later on.
I wonder if the Minister for Defence intends to persist with this Bill after hearing the statement made by Deputy Ward. Is he going to proceed in accordance with the words of the Minister for Finance, who said that this is definitely a Bill to prevent any inquiry into the pensions of such cases as were mentioned by Deputy Ward? Does any Deputy opposite with any sense of fair play or honesty stand for that? The Minister for Finance, in his opening statement, said that the Public Accounts Committee discussed it, and finally it was promised by the Government that the matter would be regularised and the dispute would be brought to an end by legislation. Now if the manner of bringing the dispute to an end by legislation is to be legislation that the Comptroller and Auditor-General shall not, by any means, get to see even a single one of the cases mentioned by Deputy Ward, I do not think that there is any honest Deputy in this House who will vote for this Bill. That is if there is any honesty left to Deputies on the benches opposite.
After what I saw here last week, when the Minister for Local Government and Public Health introduced an amendment, and then he himself and his Party voting against it afterwards, I cannot say much for the Party opposite. I understood when I heard Deputy Ward's statement the anxiety of Deputy O'Higgins that this Bill should go through. I understand exactly the reasons for the statement he made here when he said that these cases would be referred back by the Comptroller and Auditor-General to the Public Accounts Committee and that there would be scandal in so many words. That was a statement made by Deputy O'Higgins.
If the statement was made in the House the Deputy should give the exact quotation.
Yes, the statement was made in the House. It will be found at page 1759. No. 5, Volume 32, of the Official Report, and the statement made was: "Deputies on all sides of this House know that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has got to report to the Public Accounts Committee, and the Public Accounts Committee in turn have to report back to this House, and that, year after year, that particular report is made the subject of rather large headings in the daily papers. Do they want us to believe that there is going to be departure from that if the Public Accounts Committee deal with this particular subject? If it is referred to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Public Accounts Committee it will naturally appear in the Press." Deputy O'Higgin's statement is that if these cases go back to the Comptroller and Auditor-General they will be referred by him to the Public Accounts Committee. Every Deputy knows that no case is referred by the Comptroller and Auditor-General back to the Public Accounts Committee except a case which, in his opinion, was a wrong payment, and there are going to be a great many of these cases referred back, and according to Deputy O'Higgins there are going to be glare headings in the Press every day about them. That is the condition of the Bill which Deputies on the opposite side will have to support and to go back to their constituents after having done so.
I happened to serve as a responsible officer in the I.R.A. in one particular area from 1917 to 1922. I was in charge of that district for the whole period and I knew every individual in that area who had any service in the I.R.A. during that period. As a matter of curiosity I addressed a question to the Minister for Defence some time ago and got a reply. I might say that in that reply the Minister for Defence did not give the information required. The reply, to my mind, was a falsehood in itself. The reply said that a man named So-and-so from Cork had got a pension of so-and-so. It did not say whether the man was from North Cork, South Cork, East Cork or West Cork. It gave no information on that. Cork is a very large county and I congratulate the Minister for trying to cloak the issue. I made inquiries and I may state for the information of the House that about March, 1921, individuals in my district who were not members of the I.R.A. went round at night to the homes of those who were out on active service and told their people that it was a shame for their sons to be out fighting for another district. They endeavoured to interfere with the activities of the I.R.A. in that matter. In order to prevent that, early in April, 1921, I issued an Order by which all able-bodied men in my district who were not members of the I.R.A. were liable to be called up in a labour battalion and to be engaged cutting trees and digging drains and breaking bridges and that. I have tracked down two of these pensions that are being paid. All the services these individuals had rendered pre-Truce and the services for which they got these pensions were that on two occasions they were dragged out of bed to join the labour battalion in cutting down trees and breaking bridges. That is all the service they rendered. If the House thinks that this entitles these men to pensions then they will vote for this Bill.
I would ask even any members of Cumann na nGaedheal here who are interested in the welfare of the country if they consider it just and honest that the source of information on which those pensions—the cases quoted by Deputy Ward and others—should be withheld and that they should continue to draw their pensions without any inquiry into the manner in which the pensions were given. I can give other cases, the case of one individual, for instance, who was sworn in by the present Minister for Finance in 1914 when he was carrying a pike down in Cork in the days before he turned over to the Empire. This man served actively during the whole period up to the truce. He joined the National Army after the truce, and on account of his pre-truce service was made a lieutenant. He served up to 1924, when he resigned from the National Army, and got no pension or anything else because apparently he took some small part in activities for which some of the ringleaders were—I will not say drummed out, but—swept out of the Army, and for which those individuals who were ringleaders in whatever happened are at present in receipt of large pensions. This man joined, owing to the fluent tongue and persuasion of the present Minister for Finance, the Irish Volunteers in 1914, served actively up to 1921, and joined the National Army when the split came and served as a lieutenant in the National Army up to 1924. Is there any justice in depriving that man of a pension because apparently he was one of the dupes, and at the same time award the ringleaders in the revolt large pensions? That was the position of affairs. Men whose names at the time were mentioned in this House were driven out of the Army. They were afterwards given large pensions. I met this unfortunate dupe walking about at home, with the heels gone from and the toes out of his shoes. He was deprived of any pension, whilst the gentlemen I mentioned continue to draw large pensions. Where is the justice in that?
I appeal to Deputies opposite that if there was ever an occasion when they should assert their rights here, this is it. The time has gone, owing to our presence here, when the Front Bench will hit them with a mallet if they do. If there is any backbone in them, now is the time for them to assert themselves and not to let a burden be placed on the unfortunate taxpayers of their constituencies for whom they are appealing here day after day and week after week. Personally, while the Military Service Pensions Act continues I would like to see those who served actively during the Tan period drawing their pensions, but I do not think it by any means fair or just that, as in the case mentioned by Deputy Ward, service for a month or two at a General Election should be considered military service, pre and after Truce. But in the cases mentioned by Deputy Ward there is no other reason why those people should have got a pension except that they served actively from June, 1927 to October, 1927. You will notice that the pensions mentioned by Deputy Ward were awarded immediately before June, 1927, or in September, 1927, immediately after the election. I think if these cases are correct, and I have no reason to doubt them, that the seat of the Minister for Finance in this House is pretty well paid for by the taxpayers in the country.
Are the Deputies opposite going to walk blindly into the lobby here and vote for the cloaking of any inquiry into anything of that description? Are they going to do it and go back and face their constituents and say: "We voted to prevent any inquiry into this? We know the fellows did not earn it, but all the same, the poor devils want it." I think it is time that Deputies opposite asserted some independence, that they should say to themselves that they will not get any wallop on the head for what they do, but say: "We will show that the Minister for Defence is not going to lead us by the nose to vote for pensions for election service," for that is what those pensions amount to. I do not think there is very much use in speaking here after the scene here last week, when I saw the Minister for Local Government leading his whole party into the lobby to vote against his own amendment.
I think as soon as the people in this country will realise what has happened here you will have a body something stronger than the unemployed coming up here to clear them out. The Minister for Defence is smiling. No doubt he is sure that he can work the mallet on any member who dares to vote against the Bill, but I say this much to the Minister for Defence, that if he and his friends, after they introduced that Bill, were the Government of any other country in Europe, the lampposts of their city would be adorned at night. A body comes in here and endeavours by an Act of this Dáil to cloak up the giving of military service pensions for election work. I do not think they would have the neck in any other country in Europe but this to do it, and I do not believe that the citizens even of this piece of Ireland are so smashed down that they are going even now to put up with it.
Mr. P. Hogan (Clare):
I have somewhat recovered from the rhetorical anæsthetic that Deputy Esmonde administered to the Dáil some few minutes ago. Having more or less recovered from it, I made some incursions into the volumes in the library to find out what Deputy Esmonde had to say on other occasions. We have got to remember that pensions are awarded for service in the Republican Army and in the National Army. I can quite understand why Deputy Esmonde is anxious to keep from the Comptroller and Auditor-General the files on which the assessments of pensions were made because his estimate of the National Army on one occasion was very interesting. It was on one such occasion as that that he suggested that in any normal country I would myself be executed for certain statements I made regarding the National Army. However, what the Deputy himself said in connection with the National Army is more interesting. In Volume 8, column 1299, he is reported as saying:
"We are supposed to have an Army, but what exactly is that Army for? What could that Army do? We have a Ministry of Defence. Is that Ministry capable of defending the country? I doubt it very much.... The President is Commander-in-Chief and Minister for Defence, but I doubt if the President could defend Dalkey Island against an invasion. How many guns has he got? ... I do not know how many machine guns the President has. He may say that for the purpose of the defence of the country he is covered by Article 6 of the Treaty, under which the English Government, for the next two and a half years, will take charge of the defences of the coast, but what guarantee have we that if any danger arises the British Government will not invite the Lord Chief Justice of New Zealand to discuss their responsibilities under this Article? I doubt if the President, even inside Ireland, could defend the capital. I doubt if he has enough machine guns to hold the line of the Boyne."
Deputy Esmonde knew the National Army could not defend the line of the Boyne, and could not defend Dalkey Island, and could not defend the city. Is there any misunderstanding then as to why he should be careful that the files as to rank and service should be withheld from the Comptroller and Auditor-General? Is not he perfectly consistent in his attitude in withholding these files? He has not changed. He knows perfectly well what was the extent of service the National Army could give. He has said it. It is in black and white in this volume. Therefore he is acting quite consistently in endeavouring to keep the files from the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I listened to Deputy MacEntee yesterday evening with some interest. He said that the action of the Executive Council, and of the Minister for Defence in particular, was a slur on, or was not giving due consideration to the Committee of Public Accounts or to the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General. But it is more than that. It is a slur on the Dáil, who, in the last analysis, should control every item of expenditure and who cannot control every item of expenditure except by their officer, the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
When the Minister for Defence and the Executive Council say they cannot give to the Comptroller and Auditor-General the files on which these assessments were made, then they are saying to the Dáil in effect: "We ignore your jurisdiction, we ignore your control over the finances of the State. We will make disbursements and payments for which we will not give you any account." In the interests of the men themselves who are getting pensions the Executive Council ought not reduce this vote to the level of a secret service vote. It ought to give these files to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and take these men out of the position of those people who are getting payment for secret service. In certain respects, I am inclined to agree with the Minister for Agriculture. He would preserve the Comptroller and Auditor-General from contamination by coming in contact with these files. The Minister himself, of course, is one of those rare products of Irish life, an innocent politician. He would save the Comptroller and Auditor-General his innocence and simplicity like himself. He does not want him to see the files on which the pensions are based. He could see the files of pensioners, but he does not want him to see the files on which the assessments are based. He says that rank and length of service are the only things which influence the decisions of the Board of Assessors. I think anybody who kept his ears open for the last few years must have heard it said that rank and length of service were made to suit the pensions granted and not the pensions made to suit rank and length of service. If the Minister cares a great deal about the men who are getting pensions he will give these files to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and have the public mind disabused on that matter.
The Minister for Agriculture told us that the great value in evidence was the opportunity that one got for cross-examination, an opportunity in coming to a decision as to the veracity of the evidence given and the general character of the person giving evidence. That, no doubt, is quite true. The evidence of a person under cross-examination and his general attitude towards the questions are very valuable to anybody in coming to a decision. Does the Minister for Defence or the Minister for Agriculture say that the entire Board of Assessors were present when all evidence was given, and if those members of the Board who were absent could come to a conclusion on the longhand transcript of the evidence what was to prevent the Comptroller and Auditor-General from arriving at a conclusion as to the evidence that was tendered and submitted in longhand? It is another example of the innocence of the Minister for Agriculture.
The Minister for Agriculture also told us that the Minister for Finance could refer back a case if new evidence could be adduced. How could the Minister for Finance say it was new evidence unless he knew what the old evidence was? If he did not know what the first evidence, which we will call the old evidence, was, how could he say that statements which came in were new evidence? Is the Minister for Finance to be in a position to examine the files while the officer who is responsible to this Dáil for all disbursements is to be prevented from knowing what is in these files?
I simply rose to stress the position that it is not the Comptroller and Auditor-General's office, and it is not the Committee of Public Accounts that is being ignored; it is the Dáil, the elected representatives of the people, who in the last analysis should have control over every payment made in this State, and should have control through its principal officer, the Comptroller and Auditor-General, that is being slighted by the Executive Council and the Minister for Defence. In effect, the Executive Council and the Minister for Defence are saying to this Dáil: "We will not allow you to have access to these files; we ignore your authority; we will do what we like. We will vote the money and we will give whatever pensions we like. We will give you no evidence as to how we make these assessments or as to how we arrive at the rank and years of service of those people to whom we pay the pensions."
Not being conversant with this question of pensions, and not being one who took any active part in either war, pre-truce or civil war, I must admit that my knowledge is not very great as regards the manner in which pensions have been granted. But as one representing a very considerable body of taxpayers in the constituency which I have the honour to represent, I think it is my duty to see that whenever pensions are granted there will be sufficient reason for granting these pensions, and also to see that the official who, by virtue of the position he holds, is the only one to whom the taxpayers in general can look for protection, namely, the Comptroller and Auditor-General, will be in a position to inquire into the granting of these pensions to find out the different reasons and to find out the services rendered by those who are in receipt of pensions at the present time.
The attitude taken up by the Government on this Bill seems extraordinary, because it is obvious to anyone who takes the trouble to give any consideration to this matter that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has very often been the means of more or less placing the Government in a position to be able to repel accusations of extravagance that have been levelled against them in the past. The very fact of having the Comptroller and Auditor-General is a safeguard for the Government themselves or for any Government that may be in power, because they can state to their critics that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has to be satisfied as to the expenditure of any public moneys, that these moneys are being expended in the manner and way for which they were intended. The Comptroller and Auditor-General, by virtue of his position, must be convinced that all moneys, even to the last farthing, has been spent as was intended by the Act. To curtail the powers of the Comptroller and Auditor-General would, I think, be very bad policy, especially in regard to the matter of pensions, because there does exist at the moment not alone amongst the supporters of the chief Opposition Party in the House but even amongst the strongest supporters of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party, without taking into consideration at all that very big proportion of electors who are attached to no Party, a very strong suspicion that pensions have been granted to people who are not entitled to them.
In view of the present economic position of this country, it is almost criminal to think that men should be drawing pensions, some to an amount of £150 a year, or £3 a week, for services that they have not given. I could speak very strongly on this question of pensions if I wanted, because I hold that in an infant State like this no pensions should be paid at all. The necessity for paying pensions should never have arisen in this country, but that is beside the question. I would be like a voice crying in the wilderness in going any further into that matter, but the next best thing I can do is at least to ensure that before the pensions are granted all the evidence in connection with these pensions and the services rendered by the people in receipt of these pensions should be placed before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. That would apply to all those pensions that have been granted. That is the only safeguard that we have at the moment in regard to the expenditure of public moneys, and it is a safeguard that, in my opinion, the Dáil will be very wise to hold and to preserve.
It is a remarkable thing that side by side with the granting of pensions we had introduced into the Dáil very recently a Bill having for its object the giving of relief to able-bodied men in the city of Dublin. It is rather significant that the columns of the city Press, editorials have appeared protesting against the introduction of this Relief Bill and against the burden that it will place upon the ratepayers of the city. But we have no leading articles in the same quarters on the question of pensions. We have had meetings of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce protesting against the burden that would be placed on the shoulders of the ratepayers as a result of this Dublin Relief Bill, a Bill that has for its object the keeping of body and soul together in the case of thousands of decent men who are entitled to that relief. Yet I have no recollection of hearing or seeing any statement or protest from members of the Chamber of Commerce.
We have had speeches here in the Dáil of members of the Government Party protesting against this Poor Relief Bill. Yet I have been patiently waiting to hear these same Deputies raise their voices against the wilful waste that has undoubtedly existed in this country in regard to the granting of military service pensions. A huge sum has been granted for these pensions. I know of two men who, to my own knowledge, have not rendered any service whatsoever to the country, who have got pensions, and side by side with that we have thousands of men, including some of my own friends, who would scorn the idea of a pension, because they maintain that when they went out to fight they fought for the honour and freedom of the country. I hold, in view of the position of this country in the present time, and taking into consideration the condition of the farming community, and especially the condition of thousands of farmers in the Cooley area, in the county of Louth, who at the moment are faced with bankruptcy owing to the fact that there is practically no market for the disposal of their agricultural produce, that these pensions are an intolerable burden. The position is one that makes people furiously to think.
When I think of these things and see the ease with which it is proposed to vote large sums of money by way of pensions really the matter becomes too serious. When one considers the fact that there is well nigh a quarter of a million pounds being paid out in pensions, when one considers the fact that this huge sum is being paid out and that this year there cannot be voted in the Dáil fifty thousand farthings for the relief of unemployment, I think a position has been reached which should be changed and changed immediately. I think this House should set itself against the policy of curtailing the powers of the Comptroller and Auditor-General in any way whatsoever. By virtue of his position he is looked upon as the watch-dog of public expenditure in the interests of the nation. For that reason alone this House should be slow to curtail his powers. I for one will never support a Bill having for its object the curtailing of the powers at present enjoyed by the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I hold the Government would be wise to allow the light of day, as far as the granting of pensions is concerned, to be thrown on all the evidence and all the facts connected with those pensions. If the pensions are genuine, why the necessity for any concealment of the facts in connection with them? If the Government or the Board of Assessors can stand over the pensions they have granted, what is the necessity for preserving this secrecy? What is the necessity for not allowing the Comptroller and Auditor-General to have free access to all the files and all the papers and to a full and complete transcript of the evidence which is in the possession of the Board of Assessors? I cannot see for the life of me why the Government should seek to adopt this attitude in connection with military service pensions. For the reasons I have stated, I think it is time for Deputies of all Parties to face facts. At the moment we are a poor, struggling nation and, while I am prepared to admit that any young man who rendered service to this country and who, as a result of that service, finds himself incapable of earning a livelihood, would be entitled to a pension, still I think the time has arrived when, if we are to solve many of the problems that exist at the moment, it will be absolutely essential that this question of pensions should command serious attention from all Deputies here.
I can assure the House that the time has passed for throwing dust in the eyes of the people. The time has passed when it can be said that nobody pays any attention to what is said on the Opposition Benches. The people of this country are thinking, and there does exist a very considerable body of opinion that is going to make itself felt in the very near future. I say it is about time for the members of this House to realise the position in the country, to realise that we are going headlong to bankruptcy, that it is our duty to conserve our wealth and to be careful, above all, in matters affecting public expenditure.
One of the ways in which Deputies should exercise the greatest care and caution arises on this question of pensions. The country is too small; it cannot afford these payments, and I hope and trust that as a result of this debate the Government will consider this question of pensions in all its aspects, bearing in mind the capacity of the people to pay, and bearing in mind that there do exist in this small State at least 40,000 to 50,000 men who cannot find the wherewithal to keep body and soul together. We must legislate here for the whole people of the State and not for a section. For these reasons I hold that the Dáil should reject this Bill. It should reject it because the Bill sets out to restrict the powers of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, the only official to whom the taxpayers in general can look as the one who will watch carefully their interests.
I think we should try to view this thing with something like common sense. We will first take a little matter of history. In 1924 an Act was passed providing for military service pensions. That Act, unlike a good many Acts, provided for a Board of Assessors. It provided that the Board should include a judge or a barrister of ten years' standing. It provided that the Board should report to the Minister their findings as to the military service of any applicant for a certificate. It provided that every report shall contain findings upon the military service of the applicant in Oglaigh na hEireann, in the Irish Volunteers, the Irish Citizen Army, Fianna Eireann, or in the Hibernian Rifles.
Will the Minister indicate to us if the Act did provide for any particular specific qualification in the other members of the Board of Assessors?
No. I have already pointed out that, unlike any other Acts, this Act provided that the Board should contain a judge or a barrister of ten years' standing.
And the Whip of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party.
Obviously the Board should include one member who, by reason of his special training, was capable of valuating any evidence that would be put before the Board, being in that way qualified in a manner that we know perfectly well the Comptroller and Auditor-General is not qualified.
A minority of one on the Board?
All approved by the Cumann na nGaedheal Party.
I have mentioned that the Act provided for a judge or a barrister for the Board of Assessors. The Board, the Act provided, would report on the military service of applicants in the pre-Truce days — military service in the National Forces or the Defence Forces of Saorstát Eireann — and, in addition, the Board would report on the period of services of such applicant in each such force or body as I have indicated. It would include pre-Truce service and also National Army service. These reports were to be forwarded by the Board, and eventually they would come before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Act also provides that such report shall be in the prescribed form. The form prescribed is laid down in regulations which were laid on the Table of this House, and were available to members of the House. These regulations were not questioned or challenged by members of the House. It provides that the findings of the Board shall be final upon the applicant, but that the Board may re-open the findings at the request of the Minister on the grounds that new evidence is available. It does not provide that the Minister may re-open it. The Minister can only request the Board to re-open it, and it is only the Board that can re-open. Moreover, the Board and the Board only may alter or discharge the findings therein as may seem to them just in view of further evidence. The Act provides that the pension assessment is decided by the Board and by the Board only. The Minister cannot re-open the question. He cannot alter the periods or the service laid down by the Board. The Act provides that the Board is the sole arbiter on the matter. The Act provides:
For the purpose of calculating the amount of military service pension which any holder of a certificate of military service under this Act shall receive the military service of such person as found by the Board of Assessors and set out in his certificate of military service shall be reckoned as the equivalent of the respective periods of years of military service respectively specified in the second column of the First Schedule to this Act, and the total number of years of military service in respect of which any such pension shall be granted shall be calculated in the maner set forth in the said First Schedule and the Second Schedule to this Act.
Clearly from the Act itself the Board decides whether a man had service both pre-Truce and post-Truce, the rank that he held and the period during which he had given that service. It is perfectly clear from the Act that the decision of the Board cannot be varied by any person whatsoever. It cannot be questioned by the Minister, though the Minister may, but only on receipt of what purports to be additional evidence — that is, evidence which was not before the Board before — submit that evidence to the Board and request them to consider their decision. The Board may or may not, as it chooses, re-open or reconsider, and if necessary alter or discharge its findings. As the Act lays that down it is perfectly clear that the service, rank and membership are defined by the Board and are not variable by anybody. It was in order to safeguard the situation, that it was decided that the Board should not include an accountant, but that it should include a judge or a barrister of ten years' standing, because it is well known than an unqualified person is likely to misunderstand the value of evidence.
Would the Minister make this point clear, whether or not the Act provides that the expenditure on military service pensions should, or should not be subject to the control of the Comptroller and Auditor-General?
It is subject to the control of the Comptroller and Auditor-General in this way, that the Act provides that there shall be a board. It provides what the board shall do. It provides that the military service, rank and membership shall be such as is decided by that board.
Does it provide that access shall be denied to the Comptroller and Auditor-General in respect of certain documents which he asks for?
I suggest that perhaps I should bring this discussion back to common sense, as everything is best judged by common sense. The Deputy asks, does it provide that certain things shall not be available? Does it expressly provide that? It does not say that, but it is implicit in every article that I have read out. The suggestion of Deputies opposite in this discussion has been that the Comptroller and Auditor-General should read over whatever notes the Board made themselves on their authority and decided to keep. They might have decided, if they so wished, to keep no notes whatever of the evidence.
Might I remind the Minister that the original application of the Comptroller and Auditor-General in this matter was to have an opportunity of examining the applications sent into the Board.
The Deputy is also aware, I think, that the offer was made to the Comptroller and Auditor-General to see the original applications, but in view of the nature of them a request for a guarantee of secrecy in the matter was asked for, if I remember rightly.
I think what the Comptroller and Auditor-General was asked to guarantee was that only he personally should examine certain files, and I believe he refused to give that guarantee, because he felt that the giving of it would be a restriction on his statutory and constitutional rights.
I want to come back to the history of this. I think I have read out the more relevant sections of the Bill which indicate clearly to any person who wishes to see it, and has the intelligence to see it, that the decision with regard to the periods of service, rank and actual membership of the bodies mentioned is clearly defined by the Bill to be such as is set down by the Board in their report. The Act does not empower any other person, whether it be the Comptroller and Auditor-General, the Minister or anybody else to vary the report of the Board. As I read the Act, the Comptroller and Auditor-General cannot decide on the evidence, no matter what the evidence may be, that the period of service, rank or membership is other than it has been decided by the Board. All that he could do at best would be to call the attention of the Board to certain facts and ask them to reconsider them. But the members of the Board are the final deciders on that and not the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
The function of the Comptroller and Auditor-General is to audit. When a question of law arises, the functionary to decide that, and the ultimate authority on the matter as far as we are concerned, unless the case goes before the courts, is the Attorney-General. This matter went before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. He was put in his position pre-eminently because of his capacity to audit. The Attorney-General advises on questions of law. The Comptroller and Auditor-General requested that these files should come before him to enable him to consider the evidence, the Act having already provided that a man qualified to judge evidence as the Comptroller and Auditor-General is not qualified, should be on the Board, and that the matters coming before the Board should ultimately be decided by that Board and by nobody else. Deputy Derrig took up a lot of the time of the House in speaking on this Bill. He tried to be superior to the Minister for Agriculture, and said that the Minister had not even read the report of the Public Accounts Committee.
It seems to me that while, as I have said, the Deputy took up a lot of the time of the House that he had not read the report of the Public Accounts Committee himself. Time and again he came back on the point that the fact that the Attorney-General had given an opinion on this matter was not made available to the members of this House or to the members of the Board. Even after the President had given him the column, the date and everything else in connection with that, the Deputy still continued to come back on that point simply wasting the time of the House because he himself had not taken the trouble to read the report. The Attorney-General having been asked whether these things should or should not be put before the Comptroller and Auditor-General gave his answer in the negative. That information was made available to the Public Accounts Committee, and through them to this House and to the public generally. On the question of law, the Attorney-General decided that there was no need for these things to go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Public Accounts Committee considered the matter three times. I do not propose to dig up the exact words they used, but roughly and without misrepresenting them, they decided on the first occasion that the action taken in not making these things available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General was quite justified. I think that was their decision. Very well, the thing went on.
On the next occasion, while not reversing the decision, they modified it to this extent, that they requested that the situation be regularised. One could say that it was regularised in that the authority to state the law on the matter had made his statement, that authority being the Attorney-General who was qualified to state the law, and not the Comptroller and Auditor-General who was not qualified to state it.
May I ask who asked for the advice of the Attorney-General, who is the officer responsible for giving legal advice to the Government?
I am not quite sure, but I think it was the Minister for Defence. That was made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General through the Public Accounts Committee, and consequently to the Dáil and to the public. He was the authority qualified to state the law on the matter and not the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Does the Minister realise that the Attorney-General is the officer who gives advice to the Government as against the Comptroller and Auditor-General, who is responsible to this House?
He is the highest authority we have to appeal to unless the thing goes before the courts, and it has not gone before the courts — the man whose advice the Government is bound to take. He gives his advice, and not the Comptroller and Auditor-General, who is not a legal man, and not qualified to state the law.
What is the necessity for the Bill then?
The necessity for the Bill is, as Deputy Esmonde has said, largely a matter of courtesy. When there is the slightest doubt, or any possible doubt, it should be rectified. There are other matters in the Bill which are introduced because some people may hold that there is a certain doubt. The Committee of Public Accounts, first of all, approved of the withholding of these things from the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and secondly — not as Deputy Davin stated wrongly when he said the Committee had reversed their opinion; they did not — they merely asked to have the matter regularised. Thirdly, as far as I understand their words, having been told it is going to be regularised, as it is now being done, they expressed their appreciation of that. He said that "in deference to the opinion of the Committee, proposals for further legislation will be laid before the Oireachtas." To quote from the report: "He states that, in deference to the opinion of the Committee, proposals for legislation will be laid before the Oireachtas, and he states that the object of these proposals will be to establish that the data on which the Board of Assessors based its findings shall not be, and shall be deemed never to have been, subject to audit by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Committee is satisfied with this determination to seek a decision of the Oireachtas on this matter." When told this was being done the Committee expressed their approval of the fact. Every Deputy on the other side gives elaborate explanations of the craft and villainy we are attempting to conceal by this, when it is merely introduced to remove certain doubts. That, roughly, is the history of the Bill. An officer qualified to advise has given his advice, which should set people's minds at rest.
Does the Minister mean by the language he has now used that the Comptroller and Auditor-General who is appointed by this House on the nomination of the Government, is not qualified to advise the House?
Does anybody suggest because a man is the Comptroller and Auditor-General that he is qualified to advise this House on a matter of law? I presume that if the House wants advice on the matter of law that it will go to a person who is qualified to give it.
This is not so much a question of law as the practice that has existed from 1876.
It is not a question of law, but it is a question of the expenditure of public money.
The question of practice is a matter for a lawyer to decide. It is a matter of legal practice, and is not a question for the Comptroller and Auditor-General to decide. When people like Deputy Derrig talk about the auditing of funds I suppose they mean adding up the pros and the cons, and subtracting one from the other, and the difference is the answer.
Will the Minister quote my exact words?
When it comes to a question of public policy I think the primary advisers are the Executive Council. You have an Act making it perfectly clear that decisions on certain laws should be ultimately decided by a certain board. You have been advised legally that the evidence on which they make their decisions should not go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Are we to take it that the Government is not accepting the legal advice received?
The Government is accepting it.
Why this Bill?
Try to get down to commonsense. The Deputy knows, I think, better than somebody else who has not the intelligence that he has — say Deputy Derrig — that to some people you must make things doubly clear. Say, if you are making a box and five nails will hold it together to carry so much weight, Deputy Derrig comes along and says the box will go to pieces in the post with only five nails in it, and to quieten him you put in another five or six nails — just to make the box doubly secure!
The Minister did not quote the Deputy's words yet.
If I begin to quote Deputy Derrig's speech it will be found that it was largely based on lack of knowledge.
That is your opinion.
Deputy Derrig said: "In any case, the opinion of the Attorney-General has been quoted here. I do not propose to quote it if I am wrong. I can afford to do without it. The statement of the Attorney-General, who is not here to answer, has not been produced to the Dáil to show that the Comptroller and Auditor-General is wrong." It was produced to the Dáil, but the Deputy did not read the report.
I did.
And time was wasted because the Deputy did not know what he was talking about.
Is the Minister aware that the committee which reversed its decision of the previous year had that advice before it?
Yes, but Deputy Derrig had not and he wasted the time of the House.
If the Minister has any other point to make let him make it.
The Deputy was wrong in this matter. He was speaking in ignorance as usual. At another stage he thought it was possible under this Act to give pensions to people who had acted on the side of anarchy as against the National Army. I think that is very clear.
It is a very smelly red herring.
Deputy Derrig said: "There can be no question or doubt that they had not complete evidence in these cases. There can be no question or doubt that they exceeded their duty and power in making their court secret, and further, there can be no question or doubt that they were actuated by political motives, because they belonged to one party which had just been at strife with the other party, and it is only human nature that they should have a certain attitude towards the people on the other side, and that they should determine that these people or anybody associated with them could never get a pension. or should never in fact be called up. on in this matter, particularly if it were a case of giving evidence to prove that some staunch and tried supporter of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party in Co. Meath had a rather weak military record." The Deputy made the statement that nobody connected with those on his side, the side of anarchy, was called upon to give evidence and a few minutes after Deputy Fahy said that he gave evidence.
That shows that the Minister does not know what he is talking about, for Deputy Fahy spoke long before I did.
He was in America at the time.
Really this is absurd. The Deputy ought to know what he talks about before he gets up and makes a statement. Deputy Derrig wanders over a number of columns. He is in col. 1747, 1754, and 1755, and Deputy Fahy only comes on in col. 1767. If the Deputy would know what he is talking about before he wastes my time and the time of the House by interrupting me and lecturing the Minister for Agriculture——
You are not worth interrupting.
— as to his knowledge of the work of the Public Accounts Committee——
Read the rest of the speech now and try to get some points out of it.
There are really no points in it. The Deputy spoke entirely with a lack of knowledge and with a complete misunderstanding of the question. I would like to suggest that men with less than ordinary intelligence can only hold their own with other people by really sincere, honest, hard work, and when they try to do it without sincere, honest, hard work they only make a mess of it and waste other people's time.
The super-intellect of the Front Bench?
This business is challenged on two grounds, one, on precedent and the rights of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and the other on the grounds of the prevention of public dishonesty. Now, the Comptroller and Auditor-General has such powers as this Dáil gives him. It is perfectly clear to me that if this Dáil decides at any time to limit in any specific way the powers or the functions of the Comptroller and Auditor-General it is not creating a precedent except in so far as that specific case is concerned. We are not breaking a precedent, and we are not in any way injuring him in the carrying out of his function, because his function is to carry out the duties that are given him by this Dáil. Here is a case where I think most intelligent people will agree that his function is not to supervise the evidence as given before the Board of Assessors. Obviously he is not qualified to do that. Obviously the body that by its very constitution had to contain a judge or a barrister of ten years' standing, was better able to judge, and when the ultimate decision in the matter must be theirs and not his, I suggest that it is futile that he should do it.
I think that the Minister is under a misapprehension. The Comptroller and Auditor-General has no powers of decision whatever. He has only powers of reporting that in his opinion certain cases are or are not justifiable. That is all he can do. He cannot decide.
I think if Deputies will take the trouble to read the Act they will find that the report of the Board is what decides certain things, and these are the very things that they want to throw in doubt. They say they can be varied by his seeing them. They can only be varied by the action of the Board itself. That is perfectly clear. On the question of public policy, the proper authority is the Executive Council; on the question of law the proper authority is the Attorney-General — at any rate not the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Might I also point out to the Minister that the Comptroller and Auditor-General contests entirely, in relation to his particular duties, that the Attorney-General has any jurisdiction over him whatsoever, or that he has even power to express any opinion that would be binding on him?
The Deputy will admit, whether that is so or not, that it is a question of law, and I suggest that the Comptroller and Auditor-General's function is to audit and not to give opinions in law.
But even if it is a question of giving a judicial decision, the person to give it in this case is not the Attorney-General; it should be given by the courts of the State, and by nobody else.
Very well then. He did not take it to the courts of the State. There is another method of settling the whole matter—common sense. It comes before the Dáil. Is any useful purpose served? That is the question that has been discussed in the Dáil.
Is the Attorney-General an officer of this House?
Of course he is, just as the Government are officers of this House.
Is the Attorney-General an officer of this House?
He is, of course.
He is not responsible to this House.
He is responsible to this House — to us, if you like.
Did the Executive Council consider the idea of bringing a case before a judge?
No, obviously not. Here is a perfectly simple case. An Act was passed. Whether the thing is explicitly made doubly clear now or not, it is perfectly clear that the intention there was, first of all, that the Board of Assessors should have a quasi-judicial function by the fact that it was insisted that it should have on it a judge or a barrister of ten years' standing. Deputies on the other side have constantly charged that the Board of Assessors consists exclusively of party hacks and so on. The Chairman of the Board was a judge. The Act did not in any way specify that the Board should keep any notes of the evidence. Whether they did or not, whether, if they did keep notes they kept complete notes, is a matter I am not qualified to state, because I have never seen any of the files. For their own convenience, presumably, they may have kept notes of the evidence, but that would have been a matter for their own convenience. The Act speaks about their report and so on, but it says nothing about keeping evidence. The Comptroller and Auditor-General comes along and says he must see the evidence to see if what is stated in the report put before him is correct. I submit in common sense that that is really absurd. As to the function of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, analogies were made. His function is to audit the accounts of Ministers, and incidentally of their accounting officers. But the Comptroller and Auditor-General, in auditing the accounts of my Department, has made available to him everything that is available to me or to my accounting officer.
Two arguments were made, one that there was no harm in having everything made public and, the second that if the Comptroller and Auditor-General did this it would not make for publicity. If the Comptroller and Auditor-General, in auditing the accounts of my Department, is going to make any report I must see to it that anything he can report on I and the officials of my Department must have available to us. If the Comptroller and Auditor-General is going to see evidence which may cause him to reverse a decision, according to the arguments of the Deputies opposite, obviously if he is going to do that the evidence on which he does it must be available to me and to my officials as well as to him, because he is auditing the accounts of my Department and my accounting officer cannot defend them when the Comptroller and Auditor-General has information and files available to him which are not available to my accounting officer.
This discussion has not been to get the truth; it has been purely casuistic. It has been argued that it was necessary that he should get this information because it would prevent money going to people who should not get pensions. On the other hand, casuistically, not with a desire for truth, it was argued that it would be no harm for him to see the documents because he would only report cases that are irregular, and therefore, as the Government is satisfied that everything is regular, he would not have to report anything. That is not aiming at the truth; it is a perfectly dishonest reason. Let us settle the facts. Yesterday Deputy MacEntee read certain extracts from the Report of the Public Accounts Committee, carefully cutting things short so that the Dáil would not know the true facts. When you try a ruse like that you are most likely to take in the most stupid people and not the most intelligent. It is perfectly evident that through his trying to work that on the Dáil he has taken in one unfortunate Deputy, a Deputy who took Deputy MacEntee at his face value, and landed himself into being put out of the Dáil. Deputy MacEntee referred to a number of cases. Remember that he had urged that the Comptroller and Auditor-General when he would do these things would only report things which were irregular, and that his report would not make for publicity or injure any person. The Deputy stated the case of a person wounded in 1916. He undoubtedly endeavoured to convey to this House that this was reported because it was irregular. He said that the pension, if he was a private, would be £50, if he was a captain £75, if he was a major £100, and if he was a major-general £125, and he definitely tried to convey to this House that this money had been saved through the action of the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I did not try to convey that.
Well, the Deputy conveyed it to one unfortunate man who got himself suspended.
Let that incident rest. The Deputy is not here to answer.
I think I made it quite clear that I did not express any opinion, that these were cases only reported to the House, that the Comptroller and Auditor-General did not decide on the matter, and that these cases were subsequently investigated by the Public Accounts Committee.
And the Deputy carefully refrained from giving the results of the investigations. He quoted the case of a member of the Civic Guard in receipt of a wound pension. I would like to hear of anyone who was here yesterday and heard that speech who failed to take from it other than that the action of the Comptroller and Auditor-General had saved the State money. In connection with case (1) he proceeded to read from page 218 of the Report of the Committee on Public Accounts for the financial year 1924-25 and he quoted statements made by Mr. McGrath to the effect that this person was not a volunteer.
He very carefully refrained. however, from continuing to read extracts from the evidence dealing with this case, which showed that it was proved to the satisfaction of the Committee of Public Accounts that the person concerned was properly certified as having been a Volunteer, he being on duty on that occasion.
That does not prove that the case was not one for inquiry.
The Deputy tried to convey that the Comptroller and Auditor-General was saving the State money in this case by an analogy——
No, I only stated one instance.
In the second column on the same page, from which I quote the facts, are: "that on the second or third day of the Easter Rising this man offered his services to the Irish Volunteers in Boland's Mills, but he was not accepted owing to his not being attached to the I.R.A. He was, however, asked to do some independent intelligence work for them, such as watching the movements of British troops and reporting them. While on this work he was wounded in Great Clarence Street by, it is alleged, a British sniper. On that basis the certificate was given that the man was in fact a member of the Irish Volunteers. There was no formal attestation, etc." The Chairman, in passing from this case, remarked that "the Adjutant-General certified that this man was a member of the Irish Volunteers, and that he was wounded performing his duty as such member. I think whatever we may say about the particular case, that we are not here to judge between one officer or another as to whether the man was a member. We must take the report in the matter to the Minister, and on that the Accounting Officer for this Vote would be justified in accepting the liability." Anybody who knows anything about the Volunteers — even the little that Deputy MacEntee knows about them — should appreciate that this statement of facts justifies the giving of a certificate that this man was wounded as a member of the Volunteers in the course of his duty.
Case No. 2. He went on to quote page 216 — the Comptroller and Auditor - General's note — which says:
I observe that some ex-members of the forces in receipt of wound pensions were accepted for service in the Gárda Síochána and continued to draw their wound pensions without any modification of either pay or pension.
But he carefully refrained from reading on the evidence in the same column, which proves conclusively that the Statutes of this House were fully respected in respect of the particular case he mentioned, and that no action followed the calling attention to the matter by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. This House did not provide that in the case of persons entering Government service any portion of their disability pensions should be recovered, or that pensions should in any way be reduced. He quoted again that a member of the Volunteers was injured at his private occupation, and that but for the Comptroller and Auditor-General the State would be paying pensions to persons shot or injured while following their ordinary occupations.
I did not say that.
He again carefully refrained from reading on the same column in page 215, in which the circumstances are clearly set out to show that the particular case referred to was that of a Volunteer who was shot by the Black-and-Tans in his shop. The facts of the case, as stated in the minutes of evidence, show that he was shot because he was known to be a captain in the Volunteers. It would be interesting to read the Chairman's remark in passing this item. After quoting Section 31 of the Act, he says, "and received such wounds while performing such duty as a member. That is the condition. The authority set up — in this case the Minister — after enquiry has certified that the claimants were wounded in course of duty. I think it is recognised that the course of duty in these days did not preclude a man following his employment, or appearing to follow his employment. In the circumstances I think it is our obvious duty to pass it."
Will you admit with regard to the first case I stated that that was the only case in which I said that as a result of the report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General money was saved to the State? That is the case of those who were paid pensions under the wrong head.
The Deputy said in that case that owing to the action of the Comptroller and Auditor-General the money was saved to the State.
No, I quoted a remark of the accounting officer in that case that owing to the report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General some of the moneys had been recovered.
The steps for recovering the money were taken before the Comptroller and Auditor-General drew attention to it, the accounting officer or anybody else notwithstanding to the contrary. On the question of public policy, the proper authority is the Executive Council, and are we forming an opinion on public policy which is not really shared by other people? Deputy MacEntee quoted from 1863 and 1874 in England. Now, in this country there were special circumstances, and everybody in this House knows it. Prior to the Treaty and prior to the Truce there were conditions of war here which were unlike war conditions in any normal country. There were conditions in which people were resisting an alien Government, and they had to do it in the most subterraneous method possible. That was necessary. Undoubtedly it meant in effect that practically the whole work of the war took on itself the ordinary attributes of secret service. Deputy Davin maintains that there will be no harm in these things becoming public.
On a point of personal explanation. Will the Minister for Defence be quite accurate and quote from the Official Report any statement of mine to that effect? I defy him to do it.
Deputy Davin urges that the files of evidence should go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Does the Minister withdraw what he previously said?
Very well, I withdraw. Deputy Davin urges that the evidence in these cases should go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. He knows perfectly well that as the Comptroller and Auditor General will be auditing the affairs of my Department it must also go before the officials of my Department. He knows perfectly well that the Comptroller and Auditor-General must report anything he considers to be irregular. He knows perfectly well that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has reported things that he considered to be irregular, but that were not irregular. I will tell him this, that to my knowledge the reports of the Public Accounts Committee have already injured a man in his business in a most unfair manner. I will tell him this also, that I have read the reports of the Public Accounts Committee and of the Comptroller and Auditor-General; I have read in them about Colonel A. and Major B. and the indications given were given sufficiently clearly for me to know who was who.
Were the members of the Public Accounts Committee who took responsibility for putting these facts before the House in that way going beyond their powers?
I am not saying that they were. All I am saying is this: Here is a proposal that this evidence be made available under certain circumstances which may make it necessary to be published to the world, with the experience that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has reported things that he deemed to be irregular, but that were not irregular, so that he might report things that are perfectly regular and make them public, with the knowledge that the reporting of these things has been done in such a way already as to allow anybody ordinarily informed in the matter, such as myself, to realise the identity of the persons. It means that the proposal which is put by the Opposition is this, that steps should be taken which would almost inevitably mean that the contents of these files should be public, and Deputy Davin stands for that.
The Minister has previously withdrawn that statement —
Oh no.
— and I ask if it is right for him to repeat it.
What is the statement that the Deputy complains of?
That I stand for the publication of certain things which would not be in the interests of the people concerned. He withdrew that previously but he has repeated it now in the insolent language which he usually uses in this House. He certainly does.
That is not fair.
The statement that the Deputy complains of is that he stands for the publication of these documents?
That I stand for the publication of information which would injure an individual in the wrong.
Is that what the Minister stated?
No, what I stated was this: I will deal with my conclusion before my premises, and the conclusion was possibly more than I should have given. The Deputy challenges that. Then I demonstrated that in a particular circumstance, provided a certain course is followed, it will almost inevitably follow that the evidence in the files will become public.
I illustrated that by giving cases and showing that it was almost inevitable, and I said that Deputy Davin, by proposing that the action which he has urged, and which has been urged by the Opposition in this House, should be taken, is proposing that some of the evidence will almost inevitably become public property. I propose to go on to show that it will be an injury to the individual.
rose.
What is the Deputy's objection to that?
I cannot repeat word for word what the Minister said, but the gist of it was that the Public Accounts Committee published information, and that it injured a particular individual in his employment.
Yes.
And that I stand for that.
I did not say that.
I think that the Minister is entitled to state that advocacy of a particular course has a particular meaning, and will have certain results. That is precisely what he is saying, but I do not think that there is anything personal in the matter. I do not know how the Minister can be asked to withdraw a statement of that kind. It does not cast any reflection on the Deputy. It is giving the Minister's view of the result of what the Deputy is advocating. That happens constantly.
I suggest that it is quite unfair for the Minister to mention me personally when he knows that I signed that report as the unanimous report of the Committee.
I think that the Deputy has misunderstood my line. I have stated, first of all, and I think it is agreed, that Deputy Davin has urged in this debate that these files be made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I pointed out that in his examination of the files it will be part of the audit of my Department, and therefore I must see to it that, if he is going to have access to these files, my office which he will be criticising must also have access to the files, so that it may have an opportunity of rectifying anything that may be wrong before he calls public attention to it.
May I point out to the Minister that the speech which I made was made on my own personal responsibility, and that I never spoke as Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee?
I am not talking about that. I am just trying to point out a lot of things that the Deputy overlooked when he advocated a certain course, and I hope that, having seen that he has overlooked so many things, he will change his opinion when he comes to consider them. First of all, if the Comptroller and Auditor-General has access to the files I must insist that we must have access to them. We have not had access to them so far. Secondly, I said of my own knowledge, as a result of the publication of things of this nature, that at least one individual has been injured in his business. Thirdly, I pointed out that the Comptroller and Auditor-General refers things to the Public Accounts Committee which he deems to be irregular, but which are not irregular.
Which the Committee may not, in fact, deem to be irregular.
Which the Committee may not, in fact, deem to be irregular. Therefore, I am building up the case. I have said also that I have read the reports of the Public Accounts Committee, and I am not quite sure whether it was their report or the Report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I think that the Minister should be made to withdraw that.
Withdraw what?
He said that the report of the Public Accounts Committee was the report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I have not said so.
I am sorry.
It is the Minister's accent. We cannot understand what he is saying.
I am afraid I will take as long as Deputy MacEntee, there are so many interruptions. I must try to build up this case again.
Without foundation.
The Deputy can interrupt me to point out any flaw in my argument. First of all, I say that the Deputy has urged that these files should be made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I say that they should not, because I have known a man to be injured in his business by reports of that kind. I say that the report—I do not know whether it was portion of the evidence given by the Comptroller and Auditor-General or the report of the Public Accounts Committee—was made in such a way that I was able, by the data it gave, to recognise individuals.
But you have information that is not available to the public.
I was not at that time Minister for Defence. It was merely through my association with the movement all through and with similar knowledge as is possessed by many people in this State. Therefore I say that it is almost inevitable that if the course proposed by the opponents of the Bill is pursued, the contents of, at least, some of these files will be public knowledge. At least they will be so widely diffused that that is practically inevitable and I cannot guarantee that a man's livelihood will not be interfered with. If this information is widespread through my office, through the office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and possibly referred to in veiled language at the Public Accounts Committee, referred to in their report in veiled language, published in the Press in veiled language, it seems to me practically inevitable that the public will get to know about it.
Surely the Minister has some sense of responsibility and he would not permit anyone but a trustworthy officer to have access to such files.
I have known it to happen already.
Will the Minister say what would be in the files except the rank, period of service and proof of membership?
The rank and period of service by law is such as is defined in the report. Legally, it exists only in so far as it is reported by the Board and decided by them. That is available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. What he wants is the whole evidence adduced and any proof on which the report by the Board is made. I suppose we need not bother looking up the exact evidence, but I think it will be agreed, or, at least assumed, that the person to whom detriment would be done would be a beneficiary who received a pension. I do not want to go on digging through all the speeches but I do not think that it will be denied that in meeting this point it was assumed by opponents of the Bill that the person who might be injured by the evidence was the person who drew the pension. I have not seen any of the files. Nevertheless, in one way or another, I have a fair idea of the evidence given in a number of cases and I know this, and I mentioned it to Deputy Davin, that there are men employed in the special employment in which Deputy Davin takes special interest, men employed outside the jurisdiction of the State, who are not necessarily themselves drawers of pensions but who are involved in evidence which was made available to the Board. I suppose that I myself was eligible for a pension but I have not got a pension.
I did not apply for a pension, so I think Deputies may grant me sufficient selfishness to assume that I would not be struggling here grafting for others when I did not graft for myself. I happen to know that there are men employed in employment in which Deputy Davin is particularly interested, who were involved in this evidence, and who are outside the jurisdiction of this State. Here is an Act laying it down perfectly clearly that the decision as to rank and so on rests with the Board. Here is a question as to whether the Comptroller and Auditor-General, as well as seeing everything in the report, should also see the evidence upon which the legal men decide. The Attorney-General, our appropriate officer, advises that he should not see it. Here is the fact that we know that the publication of the evidence is undesirable in the general public interest, first of all. I have heard—I do not know whether it is true or not— that there is one man working alongside another man who, if the evidence came out, would be shocked because of the actions of the relatives of the other man against him. I know that there are men outside the jurisdiction of the State, not themselves beneficiaries under the Act, but whose names were invoked in the evidence, and actions they did on previous occasions were cited in proof of certain facts.
Mr. Hogan (An Clár):
What about the Indemnity Act?
The Indemnity Act extends only to the area of the State. People ridicule the idea of loss of life and liberty and Deputy Derrig said we were at peace with Great Britain. I do not know whether Deputy Derrig ever shot anybody, but suppose he had shot Mr. A, and that after the Truce he had migrated to England and had got a job with Mr. A's mother, does he think that it would injure him in his livelihood if Mr. A's mother knew that Deputy Derrig who had got a job over there, was drawing a pension, and had actually shot her son?
I would like to know how many of the I.R.A. have got jobs like that.
Deputy Derrig, in that case, would be getting a pension, and the fact that he was getting a pension would be published by the Minister's Department and Mrs. A would know that.
Things that are equal to the same are equal to one another.
I quite agree.
Is the Minister aware that General Smuts and a German General dined together last week?
The Deputy will agree than many men were associated, particularly with the type of employment in which Deputy Davin is particularly interested, and that they gave a great deal of assistance. The assistance they gave and its implications were quoted by totally different men in giving evidence and he surely recognises that, independent of the friendship of governments and of the fact that this country is at perfect peace with England, though Deputy Derrig is longing to throw himself against the might of the Empire—we cannot help that—
Does the Minister suggest in the argument he is now using that the trusted officer who has been unanimously appointed by this House cannot be trusted with information of that kind? If that is so all civil servants are in the same position.
I suggest that the Deputy ought to try to follow me. This trusted officer of the House is bound to report anything he deems to be irregular. He has reported many things he deemed to be irregular. He must report to the Public Accounts Committee and we know that their reports are published annually. We know, as I have had proof already, that he often quotes things which he deems to be irregular and which the Public Accounts Committee deem are not irregular.
In the famous case of Mrs. A and Deputy Derrig is not the Minister's contention that the pension has been rightfully awarded to Deputy Derrig?
I am coming to that. That is casuistic argument. The Deputy said that this should be done because of the money it would save for the State and, secondly, that nothing but irregular matters would be reported. I say that, if anybody got a pension which he should not get, the record of the Comptroller and Auditor-General would be such that, if he did not believe that the Board was justified in believing these people, he would report the case. I have taken some cases amongst those which Deputy MacEntee quoted to prove that. I am dealing now with the question of public policy. It is not in the interests of the State to have all the details that are set out in evidence published. It is our duty to safeguard the State from that. This Bill purports—I will not say to safeguard it because I think it is already safeguarded as the Comptroller and Auditor-General has not the right to see these things—to make doubly certain that no such wrong shall be done to the State or to any people who have assisted the State in its struggle for freedom.
I did not suggest that.
Although the Deputy has not suggested it, he has proposed a policy which leads to it almost inevitably. Deputy MacEntee said something about persons getting pensions who are not entitled to them. I am not going to state that anybody gets a pension who is not entitled to it, but I would go so far as to say that if anybody is getting a pension which he should not get, he is getting it by virtue of perjury.
You want to save the criminals.
If the Comptroller and Auditor-General gets the file and turns it over, he says: "Such a man took part in such an ambush." He has to take the evidence as he sees it there. He cannot say: "Here is the evidence of ninety-two people who came along to say that this man gave all the service which he claimed, but I have been told that every one of them were perjurers, and that he should not get a pension." He cannot do that.
Will the Minister say——
Why not allow the Minister to conclude?
He is provoking questions.
I do not mind interruptions in the least.
The Minister should proceed with his speech.
Can the Minister state that the Board heard evidence in relation to every application?
I have told the Deputy——
Who is to discover the perjurer?
Obviously, not the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Who?
Let us come to that. Deputies ought to admit that there are, as I am quite prepared to admit there are—it is a thing that worries me just as much as it does the Opposition—people who did not give the service they are supposed to have given. I am not saying that they should not get pensions, but I am quite satisfied that anybody who is getting a pension which he should not get, is getting it by virtue of giving wrong evidence. I am satisfied, once that wrong evidence is given, that when the Comptroller and Auditor-General goes through the files of evidence he has to take at its face value what these people said. He is not going to say that three people said that the man was there on the occasion, and that three other people did not know whether he was there or not. He has got to take it at its face value. Any wrong done in the way of pensions being given, is the result of perjury. Nobody knows better than the Deputies facing me that there is not that feeling towards perjury that there should be amongst a large section of the people in this country.
Since you perjured yourself in 1921.
The Deputy should not make that remark. It is most disorderly. Deputy Cooney ought to withdraw the statement that the Minister perjured himself.
That the Minister perjured himself?
I never said that an oath was an empty formula.
The Deputy said that the Minister perjured himself in 1921. Is the Deputy going to withdraw that statement?
I cannot withdraw.
Then I order the Deputy to withdraw from the Dáil.
(The Deputy not offering to withdraw from the Dáil.)
I direct the attention of the Dáil to the conduct of Deputy Cooney.
It is an historical fact.
I move: "That Deputy Cooney be suspended from the service of the Dáil."
Question put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 78; Níl, 51.
Tá
- Aird, William P.
- Anthony, Richard.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Blythe, Ernest.
- Bourke, Séamus A.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Broderick, Henry.
- Brodrick, Seán.
- Byrne, John Joseph.
- Carey, Edmund.
- Coburn, James.
- Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margaret.
- Conlon, Martin.
- Cooper, Bryan Ricco.
- Corish, Richard.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Crowley, James.
- Daly, John.
- Davin, William.
- Davis, Michael.
- De Loughrey, Peter.
- Doherty, Eugene.
- Doyle, Peadar Seán.
- Duggan, Edmund John.
- Dwyer, James.
- Egan, Barry M.
- Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Gorey, Denis J.
- O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
- O'Reilly, John J.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Reynolds, Patrick.
- Rice, Vincent.
- Roddy, Martin.
- Shaw, Patrick W.
- Haslett, Alexander.
- Hassett, John J.
- Heffernan, Michael R.
- Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
- Hennessy, Thomas.
- Hennigan, John.
- Henry, Mark.
- Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
- Holohan, Richard.
- Jordan, Michael.
- Kelly, Patrick Michael.
- Law, Hugh Alexander.
- Leonard, Patrick.
- Lynch, Finian.
- Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
- McDonogh, Martin.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- Mongan, Joseph W.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Murphy, James E.
- Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
- Myles, James Sproule.
- Nally, Martin Michael.
- Nolan, John Thomas.
- O'Connell, Richard.
- O'Connell, Thomas J.
- O'Connor, Bartholomew.
- O'Hanlon, John F.
- O'Higgins, Thomas.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
- Thrift, William Edward.
- Tierney, Michael.
- Vaughan, Daniel.
- White, John.
- White, Vincent Joseph.
- Wolfe, George.
- Wolfe, Jasper Travers.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Boland, Patrick.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Seán.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Buckley, Daniel.
- Carney, Frank.
- Carty, Frank.
- Colbert, James.
- Cooney, Eamon.
- Corkery, Dan.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
- Crowley, Tadhg.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- Fahy, Frank.
- Flinn, Hugo.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Gorry, Patrick J.
- Goulding, John.
- Hayes, Seán.
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Jordan, Stephen.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Kent, William R.
- Kerlin, Frank.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Maguire, Ben.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Mullins, Thomas.
- O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
- O'Kelly, Seán T.
- O'Leary, William.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- O'Reilly, Thomas.
- Powell, Thomas P.
- Ryan, James.
- Sexton, Martin.
- Sheehy, Timothy (Tipperary).
- Smith, Patrick.
- Tubridy, John.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle; Níl, Deputies Little and Allen.
Question declared carried.
I call upon Deputy Cooney to withdraw from the House.
(Deputy Cooney withdrew from the House accordingly.)
I want to say——
The Deputy has not a right to speak now. I want to hear the Minister.
The Minister made a similar statement.
I want to hear the Minister now.
I do not want to be put out.
I call upon the Minister.
The Minister made a statement as bad as the statement that Deputy Cooney made.
Is the Deputy making a point of order?
Yes, a point of order. The Minister made a similar statement to what Deputy Cooney made.
The Minister made no statement to the effect that an individual named in the House had committed perjury.
He made a worse statement—he accused the whole Party.
He did not.
If I did, I wish to withdraw it.
Deputies must be clear that what is out of order is a definite personal allegation.
Against one person or more?
Against a named person.
If general allegations required action from the Chair, I suggest that we have been accused of graft and everything else during this discussion. If I have suggested that Deputy Cooney or anybody else—
The Minister had better pass on.
I will come to the point—that in the case of men drawing pensions who should not be drawing them, it is the result of perjury and that, in so far as rectifying that is concerned, the examination of the files by the Comptroller and Auditor-General is no remedy whatsoever, because the evidence that would be given to him would be the perjured evidence, and he would have to accept that on its face value, so that the whole argument that his examination was going to save the State so much, and was going to get after the people drawing the pensions wrongfully, goes by the board. Deputy Coburn said he knew of cases of men who were getting pensions who should not. I have never heard of them from him. Deputy Ward quoted a number of cases. I remember one case quite well. Deputy Ward asked about a pension drawn by some man. He gave me an account of it, stating the periods for which the man was drawing the pension. He then said that during one of these periods this man had been court-martialed and expelled from the Volunteers. Naturally, I immediately got after the case, and as a result, I got confirmation of what Deputy Ward stated, and the man's pension was reduced by the period for which he was out of the Volunteers. Deputy Ward has now questioned whether this man had ever been in the National Army. The evidence I have is that he was in the National Army.
Will the Minister state whether he is referring to No. 21 or another?
No. 21 is the case. The Deputy will know the case by the fact that he stated the man had been court-martialed and dismissed from the Volunteers. He quoted other cases. I got up while he was speaking and asked him in reference to one of the cases if he had stated the facts that he considered would negate the right to a pension, as he had done in that other case. He said that I was trying to draw a red herring, or something like that, but I really wanted to know. If the Deputy had given me any information throwing doubt on the man's right to a pension during any portion of the time, or during the whole time, I would have immediately made inquiries in my Department. I remember one case. I do not remember any other case. I have the file here.
Will the Minister explain how it came about that these men did not receive pensions until the two general elections six or seven years afterwards?
What file has the Minister before him in this case? Is it the file that was before the Pensions Board?
No, I have the office file.
I understood the Minister to say that as regards No. 21 on the Order Paper of 13th June he has ascertained that this man served in the National Army. I say that the man never served in the National Army; neither did his brother, who was also in receipt of a pension.
The Deputy may send me evidence about that. I have before me, just as anybody else would have, evidence that he did serve in the National Army.
That is why we want the Comptroller and Auditor-General to look into them.
He would be just in the same position as I am. Another Deputy of the Fianna Fáil Party one time asked me about a man drawing a pension. I gave him the pension he was getting and the period it was for. He assured me, I think across the floor of the House, that he was in a position to prove that the man should not be getting a pension. My immediate response to that was to ask him would he get evidence to that effect? He brought me evidence, or what purported to be evidence. I have never seen the file under which that man got the pension.
A number of signed letters were brought to me by the Deputy. I went through them. It was a coincidence that all these letters were written by members of the anti-State forces. I did not discount them for that reason, but that was notable. In these letters these men made statements, and incidentally referred to other men who were in a better position to give information about the man than they were. I immediately got after these other men, and, as a result, that case was proved to my satisfaction, and I shall be prepared to show Deputy Lemass, or anybody else who is incredulous, exactly what happened. Any Deputy who goes through the case will say that such evidence as came in proved that the man was entitled to the pension he got, and that the Deputy, who stated across the House that he was in a position to prove that he should not get a pension, was wrong in his statement of the facts. The Deputy did his duty as a citizen, of course. When he thought that the man should not get a pension, he gave all the evidence at his disposal which he thought would prove that. There have been two cases of men being prosecuted.
Why did they not get the pensions until the General Election in 1927?
What is the use of correlating two dates that way? The date of the termination of the Pensions Board was, if I remember rightly, March, 1928. Very often in this discussion Deputies spoke as if the Board were still functioning, and still sending in reports upon which pensions will be given. I disbanded the Board nearly two years ago. If I remember rightly, it was in February or March, 1928, and they have not been functioning since. If somebody came along and gave me what looked, if you like, sound evidence that a man was drawing a pension that he should not be drawing, I would naturally call the Board together, and ask them to compare the evidence which I had now received with the evidence put before them to see if further action was necessary with a view to cancelling or reducing the pension, or even prosecuting. In two cases actually the Board prosecuted people for perjury. I think I have proved here——
Will the Minister state why these people I have referred to have been refused military service pensions time and again, down to the June and September elections, when they were brought together by Mr. Blythe's election agent and promised a pension on condition that they supported him?
The Deputy makes a statement which, of course, one can ignore. What happened is this:— The Pensions Act was passed; a man wrote in for a form; he got that, filled it in and mentioned certain witnesses that he could call. The evidence came in. He was possibly called upon to send in further evidence on certain points. He sent in all the evidence of his pre-Truce activities. It was reported that he did not receive a pension because his service as required by the Act was not proved.
But he might come along at a later stage—and it very often happened, to my knowledge—with additional evidence:
"Provided however that the Board may at any time re-open any or all of their findings at the request of the Minister on the grounds that evidence not available prior to the making of their report had since become available."
It very frequently happened that what purported to be additional evidence came in. When a man sends in something and says it is evidence additional to the evidence which has been before the Board when they refused a pension or only assessed a pension at so much I send that evidence to the members of the Board asking them if it is additional evidence, and if so, to re-open the case and consider it in the light of this additional evidence. In cases the Deputies referred to, that were refused and were later granted, they were only granted as a result of the applicant producing evidence that he did not produce on the occasion of his previous application.
Is that the evidence of the election officers?
There is no use in the Deputy speaking to me because I do not understand him. I do not think I miss much anyway.
I would like to ask the Minister a question. The Minister made a statement a while ago to the effect that where there was an adverse report against a certain man who was claiming a pension it generally came from people who were anti-State.
I did not say that.
Yes.
No. The Deputy misunderstood me. The Deputy having asked a question about a certain individual and his pension——
There is no use going back on that.
Anyway, I did not make the statement. To sum up, an Act was passed which clearly laid it down that the period of service and the membership should be such and such only as was defined by the Board of Assessors in their report and they are the only people who can alter or discharge that. The Comptroller and Auditor-General, the Minister, nobody has a right to say that the rank was this and not that, nobody has a right to say that it is this membership and not that membership, nobody has the right to say in this period, not in that period, other than the Board. They are the only people as laid down by the Act. The Act clearly did not consider that the Comptroller and Auditor-General would review the decisions of the Board. It is perfectly clear in the Act, although the Act may not specifically have stated it, that the Comptroller and Auditor-General may not see the evidence. It is perfectly clear that the Act never visualised the Comptroller and Auditor-General auditing, to quote Deputy Derrig, the evidence. That is perfectly clear because the report of the Board, at whatever stage it is made, although they may vary it at anybody's request, is the final report. Nobody else can make a report, and, for the purposes of this Act, the rank, the period of service and the membership shall be such as defined by the Board only. That made it clear that it was not proposed that the Comptroller and Auditor-General should review these cases.
It was stated here in the debate that it may be that the undesirability of having these files made public was overlooked at the time. I do not think it was, because it seems to me inherent in the wording of the Act that something of that nature was adverted to. The mere wording of the institution of this Board insists that it shall contain a judge or barrister of ten years standing and that their report on these matters should be final. That seems to me to indicate somehow or other that this situation was adverted to. Anybody in this Dáil knows perfectly well that these files contain statements of facts and incidents prior to the Truce that it is not in the public interest should be made public.
A decision of this House that these files, as in the case of other Government documents, should go through the ordinary course of survey by the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and that he, in his discretion, should report publicly to the Public Accounts Committee, meaning, as that does, that they should go through the ordinary machinery of my department and be available to the various officials of my Department would make the publicity of the details contained in these files practically inevitable.
The proper deciding authority as to what is or what is not in the public interest is the Executive Council, and our decision that it is not in the public interest coincides, I believe entirely, with the real judgment of every member of this Dáil. It may be casuistically urged not to treat these differently from all other public documents, that it does not imply that there will be any publicity. I have demonstrated that the action previously—I am not complaining about it—of the Comptroller and Auditor-General and of the Public Accounts Committee has been such as to justify one in presuming that it will make for publicity. We are the proper people to decide, but I suggest that nobody in this House thinks otherwise than that it would be against the public interest. To my own personal knowledge there are individuals inculpated in that evidence before the Board—although I have never seen any of the files—who are outside the jurisdiction of this State, and who are in such a position that publication of the facts about them in those files would injure them in their livelihood and possibly even to a greater extent. I have pointed out that the Comptroller and Auditor-General is not by his training a man qualified to judge the value of evidence, that the law passed by this Dáil stipulated that the Board should contain at least one man by his training capable of evaluating evidence. As far as I remember, it contained two men of legal experience and one man who during the period was getting legal experience. The Comptroller and Auditor-General has no legal experience. The Act obviously considered that this Board required certain qualifications for considering evidence, and we know that in the appointment of the Comptroller and Auditor-General we did not go into the matter of his qualifications for valuing evidence. I suggest that it is not in the public interest that these files should go before the Comptroller and Auditor-General, resulting, as it inevitably would, in publicity of their contents.
I have suggested that there is no need for this thing to have arisen because the legal adviser to the Government has advised them that they need not be open. The bringing in of this Bill does not mean, as so many people have suggested, that we in any way find fault with the action of the Public Accounts Committee. As a matter of fact, the reports I have read I entirely approve of. I do not know why people should not accept them in the spirit in which we are accepting them. I have pointed out that all the arguments suggesting that the proposal that the Comptroller and Auditor-General should have access to these files would lead to the unmasking of people who had drawn pensions, who should not be pensioned, amount to nothing. There is nothing in that because the Comptroller and Auditor-General could only read the evidence before him. It is almost inevitable that there must be some who are drawing pensions who should not be drawing pensions. That will not be met by the Comptroller and Auditor-General, because if there is perjury the Comptroller and Auditor-General going through the files must accept the perjury he reads there as gospel.
What becomes then of the whole opposition to this Bill? Should the Bill pass or should it not? Even if the Bill did not pass I do not think that we would need to give the files to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. Our best legal advice is that we need not, and the only contention to the contrary is that of the Comptroller and Auditor-General who is not qualified and of Deputy MacEntee whose position on the Front Bench led me to believe that he was to be in the Cabinet, but I understand now he is going to be the Attorney-General in the very shadowy Cabinet.
As regards the qualifications, is the House to understand that the Attorney-General, who is not an officer of this House appointed by this House and directly answerable to this House, is superior in a matter of this kind to the Comptroller and Auditor-General who is appointed by the House and answerable to the House?
All I am saying is that in a question of law the Government in its action has to be guided by the Attorney-General.
It is a question of right.
It is a question of law. Rights do not enter into it. I have tried to make the thing as clear as I can in spite of a great deal of interruption. I suggest it is perfectly clear that it is not in the public interest that these things should come before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I suggest that the Act never anticipated that they would come before the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I suggest that their going to the Comptroller and Auditor-General will not assist to the extent of one iota in discovering one pension that should not be given.
Would the Minister state by what means he proposes to have inquiries made into these cases where he believes that pensions have been granted to people who are not entitled to them?
Many Deputies have got up here and have stated to their personal knowledge—in one case, the most bona fide case that I came across, it worked out the other way round—that many people were getting pensions to which they were not entitled. As a matter of fact, usually that statement is made with a lack of the full conception of things. If Deputies get up and say they know for a fact that a man is drawing a pension who should not be getting it, it is their duty as ordinary citizens, let alone as Deputies, to come along to me with that evidence. I will naturally consider it, and matters arising out of it may, as happened in this case, enable me to approach other people who are even in a better position to give me information on the matter than they are. Once I have done the best I can to get information on it naturally my action will be to call together the Board and say to them: "Such a person is getting such a pension, people have come along with this statement and are prepared to swear on oath. I submit this to you to compare it with the evidence on the files and see whether action would not lie in the matter; in any case to summon the beneficiary and demand of him to rebutt any evidence that has come forward."
If the Minister is so anxious to get cases like that why does he not give us the addresses so that we may be able to identify those who are getting pensions? There is no use in giving us a hundred names of John Murphys, Paddy Murphys, Tom Sullivans in the County of Cork and refusing to give us the addresses.
In the majority of cases the Deputy knows he will be able to form a fair idea as to the men who are getting the pensions. As far as I understand Deputy Ward he stated he wanted certain information. He put an elaborate question which gave a considerable amount of work to my Department. I gave him a complete answer to his question as far as I understood him. When he was speaking he said he had asked the wrong question. We were put to all that trouble for nothing. Then he wanted to come along with another question about records which we really had not got in the Department. If he came along and was able to prove to us that there were illegal cases we would naturally then get after a whole lot of the illegal pensions. We would put the whole machinery of the Department at work to get after them. People get up time and again and say that they know cases of people who are getting pensions who should not. One member of the Fianna Fáil Party did certainly lay himself out to give that assistance. Deputy Ward was of real assistance to us in reducing a man's pension. We have prosecuted two other men. As regards the list of names, while you may be doubtful about some, there will be at least more than half that you will be pretty certain of, John Smith in this place or Pat Houlihan in another place. By writing up to us we will say that is the man, go ahead, there is no difficulty about that. If Deputies say they cannot make out those getting pensions how can they say they know people getting pensions who should not be getting them?
Is the inquiry by the Board of Assessors to be open to the public or is it to be private?
The Board of Assessors ceased to exist two years ago. What is the Deputy referring to?
In the event of reports being made about persons getting pensions who are not entitled to them I understand from the reply that the Minister has given that he will now summon the Board to examine the new evidence submitted.
To see if a case lies.
Is that inquiry to be public or private?
Will the Board of Assessors consider the new evidence in public?
If the Deputy sends along certain evidence that would go before the Board, provided it did hold water, because often people think they are making a very great statement but it does not amount to much. When that case goes before the Board the Deputy will be called, naturally, to come forward and to substantiate the evidence he had sent in.
The Minister has indicated that where certain information is brought under his notice referring to a person who is in receipt of a pension that he will immediately take steps to inquire into the matter and see if there is any foundation in fact in the information placed at his disposal. I want to draw his attention to Question 22 on the Dáil Order Paper of 13th June.
That is not a question; the Deputy is making a statement. I have sympathy with Deputy Maguire in asking a general question, but I do not want to hear Deputy Ward on a particular case.
I want to ask the Minister what steps he took to test the information regarding a certain person referred to in Question 22 of 13th June to the effect that this person had been courtmartialed and expelled for a certain offence.
Unfortunately, in the circumstances I could not answer that question. The Deputy would naturally have to come to me with the question. I do not remember cases.
What I want to know is, what steps did the Minister take with regard to the person referred to in Question No. 22, concerning whom I did give to him definite information, as well as about the person in Question 21.
I did not know that until this minute. I would have to look that matter up. In the one case he gave me information that the man was courtmartialed and expelled from the Volunteers. He also stated that a certain officer had information on the matter. That case I remember. When I got that information I immediately called upon that officer to give information on the matter, and that officer confirmed what the Deputy told me.
The Minister did not inquire into the other case?
I could not tell the Deputy which case that was. I know that in any case that was brought to my notice wherever there was definite information that threw a doubt upon the thing, I and my Department immediately got after it. I only remember the one case that the Deputy referred to. I do not know what others there are. I have tried to make the thing as clear as I could in very difficult circumstances.
Question—That the Bill be now read a Second Time—put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 67; Níl, 61.
Tá
- Aird, William P.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Blythe, Ernest.
- Bourke, Séamus. A.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Brodrick, Seán.
- Byrne, John Joseph.
- Carey, Edmund.
- Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
- Conlon, Martin.
- Cooper, Bryan Ricco.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Crowley, James.
- Daly, John.
- Davis, Michael.
- De Loughrey, Peter.
- Doherty, Eugene.
- Doyle, Peadar Seán.
- Duggan, Edmund John.
- Dwyer, James.
- Egan, Barry M.
- Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Gorey, Denis J.
- Hassett, John J.
- Heffernan, Michael R.
- Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
- Hennessy, Thomas.
- Hennigan, John.
- Henry, Mark.
- Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
- Holohan, Richard.
- Jordan, Michael.
- Kelly, Patrick Michael.
- Law, Hugh Alexander.
- Leonard, Patrick
- Lynch, Finian.
- Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
- McDonogh, Martin.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- McGilligan, Patrick.
- Mongan, Joseph W.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Murphy, James E.
- Nally, Martin Michael.
- Nolan, John Thomas.
- O'Connell, Richard.
- O'Connor, Bartholomew.
- O'Higgins, Thomas.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
- O'Reilly, John J.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Reynolds, Patrick.
- Rice, Vincent.
- Roddy, Martin.
- Shaw, Patrick W.
- Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
- Tierney, Michael.
- Vaughan, Daniel.
- White, John.
- White, Vincent Joseph.
- Wolfe, George.
- Wolfe, Jasper Travers.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Anthony, Richard.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Boland, Patrick.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Seán.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Broderick, Henry.
- Buckley, Daniel.
- Carney, Frank.
- Carty, Frank.
- Cassidy, Archie J.
- Coburn, James.
- Colbert, James.
- Corkery, Dan.
- Corish, Richard.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
- Crowley, Tadhg.
- Davin, William.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- Everett, James.
- Fahy, Frank.
- Flinn, Hugo.
- O'Reilly, Thomas.
- Powell, Thomas P.
- Ryan, James.
- Sexton, Martin.
- Sheehy, Timothy (Tipperary).
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Gorry, Patrick J.
- Goulding, John.
- Hayes, Seán.
- Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Jordan, Stephen.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Kent, William R.
- Kerlin, Frank.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Maguire, Ben.
- McEllistrim. Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Mullins, Thomas.
- Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
- O'Connell, Thomas J.
- O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
- O'Kelly, Seán T.
- O'Leary, William.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Tubridy, John.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle; Níl, Deputies Davin and G. Boland.
Question declared carried.
When is it proposed to take the Committee State?
I propose to take the Committee Stage now.
We object. Surely the President should give us some time to consider amendments for the Committee Stage and to look up the statements that have been made on the Second Reading. We ought to be given time to prepare amendments.
I think it is very unfair to ask now for the Committee Stage of a Bill to which so much importance has been attached. I think it is wrong to rush a Bill like this through the House and it is wrong to suggest that the Committee Stage be taken immediately after the Second Reading.
There is no Bill that has got so much consideration from Deputies opposite as this measure. The really important stage is the Second Stage, and it is nonsense to suggest that the Committee Stage in the case of this Bill is important; it is nonsense to claim any serious importance for the Committee Stage of this Bill. The real principle of the Bill was dealt with on the Second Reading and it is unreasonable on the part of Deputies opposite to object to the Committee Stage being taken now.
There is one section of the Bill in connection with which some provision should be made for reopening cases. As we read the Bill these cases can never be reopened, not even by the Minister for Defence.
It is laid down in the Military Service Pensions Act that the Minister for Defence can at any time ask the Board of Assessors to reconsider any cases.
It is scandalous that this Bill should be rushed through the House in this fashion. After all, we have been here since 23rd October, and the Government have taken no steps to provide us with sufficient work. They now try their usual tricks of rushing legislation at the last moment. It is absolutely ridiculous. Bills of less importance than this have come before the House with sufficient time for their proper consideration and for the handing in of amendments on the Committee Stage.
I submit that we have not had adequate or sufficient time to draft amendments, which we are entitled to move on the Committee Stage. The ordinary calculation is that in the case of a Bill of this importance the usual period of time allowed to draft amendments will be given. Merely to use a majority in order to get a Bill through the Committee Stage—for this cannot be done without the consent of the House—is a misuse of the majority I submit that we should be given proper time to consider this Bill in the light of the new fact that it has gone through its Second Stage. We could not be expected to assume that this Bill would go through its Second Stage. Therefore we are entitled to the usual period of time between the Second Stage and the Committee Stage in order to be in a position to draft amendments.
I move that the Committee Stage be now taken.
I do think that it cannot be claimed that this Bill is one of urgent public importance. I do not think that that claim can be made for this Bill. That claim was made to-day by the Minister for Justice in regard to the Courts of Justice Bill, 1929, and we were not unreasonable. I think it is unreasonable on the part of the Government to ask that this Bill should be treated as a Bill of urgent public importance, because on the face of it, it is not a Bill to which these terms could apply. I do not think it is reasonable to ask that the Committee Stage of the Bill should be taken now immediately after the Second Reading. I think it would be treating the House in a very improper way to ask that a Bill of this kind, for which there is no justifiable reason for pressing in this urgent way through the House, should have its Third Stage rushed through now. I do not think that there is any adequate reason for asking that it should be done.
I would like to ask what reasons the Government can bring forward to the House to justify them in pressing the Committee Stage at this time. It is usual under the Standing Orders that there must be two or three days allowed for amendments. That has been the procedure for six or seven years. There is no urgency about this Bill. I would like to know the reasons the Government have for treating the House in this way, except the fact that they have their six pensioners here forming a majority.
It would be better if the Deputy were less offensive when speaking. He should remember that when they entered the House his Party had one pensioner, at least. More than one pensioner was elected as a member of his Party drawing pensions from this State.
Wound pensioners and that is quite different from service pensioners.
It does not matter; the term is applicable and it is a term that the Deputies opposite ought not to make a term of reproach because it is not that. It is a term of reproach in respect of an alien authority giving pensions, if it so desires, to those who would be prepared to support that authority. That is quite a different case, however. The case for this Bill, as I said, was made on the Second Stage when the principle of the Bill was discussed. We are asked now why we are pressing this measure. Deputy Briscoe, as the spokesman of the Party opposite, has been inquiring for at least two years when we intend to conform with the request of the Committee of Public Accounts. We have now done so. I may say that no Bill has got such an extensive Second Reading on the part of the Deputies opposite as this Bill. Few speeches have been made by the Deputies on this side of the House. Many speeches have been made by Deputies opposite. The Deputies on the Opposition Benches showed a desire at one time to have a decision on the Bill. They have been afforded every possible opportunity of debating this measure. They have not been limited in the course of the debate. The principle of the Bill was fully dealt with on the Second Reading and it is futile and foolish to suggest that this is a Bill which admits of amendment. Once it is accepted that the principle of the Bill is the matter which is decided on the Second Stage——
What about the Standing Orders?
I should like to suggest——
The Deputy has spoken already.
I am submitting another reason.
The Deputy has already made a speech and he must not make a second speech.
I am merely raising a point of order.
Does it not apply to every Bill that the principle is decided on the Second Stage? The President has given no reason why this unique procedure should be adopted in connection with the Military Service Pensions Bill. It has never happened before in our experience, unless in the case of a very harmless Bill, that the Committee Stage was taken immediately after the Second Reading. Surely the President will give us some reason why we should depart from general procedure.
The definite question before the House is that the Bill be now taken in Committee.
Perhaps the Chair will indicate if there is any definite period that should elapse between the time when the Second Reading of a Bill is completed and the taking of the Committee Stage?
The Standing Orders in relation to amendments govern that matter. The House could not possibly anticipate—
No. The position is that when a Bill has received a Second Reading a motion may be made that the Bill be considered in Committee. That is the motion which we are discussing, and it is in order. We have had this point of order before.
Is it not the practice that it is only by the consent of the House that the period between the different stages of a Bill can be shortened?
I am afraid not. Every matter that comes before the House must, if necessary, be decided by vote. If this is not agreed to, and if the President puts it to the House, it must be voted upon.
How is the difficulty of putting in amendments to be got over? I understood that two days' notice has to be given in connection with amendments. As Deputy MacEntee pointed out, there are matters in this Bill which, on consideration, this Party might think it advisable to amend.
There has not been one mentioned yet.
I, as an individual member, object to the Committee Stage being taken now because it is not indicated on the Order Paper. There was no provision made for the Committee Stage and there was no announcement made that it should be taken. I think it is taking an unfair advantage of the House.
We do not want unduly to inconvenience the Government, but I would like to point out that the case made by the Minister for Defence was that there was no need for the Bill; it was only introduced to clear up certain doubts and to meet a point brought forward by the Committee of Public Accounts. According to the Minister for Defence, the legal position will not be altered by its passage, nor will any serious change in the present position be brought about.
What about the Fourth and Fifth Stages?
I propose to take all stages this evening.
I think it is up to the Chair to rule this out of order.
Why is there not time given for the consideration of such important measures as the Agricultural Produce (Fresh Meat) Bill, the University Education (Agriculture and Dairy Science) Bill, and the Dublin City and County (Relief of the Poor) Bill? Why are they not taken this evening?
If the Deputy had put that question when we were having long speeches made by his colleagues this evening it might have been of more advantage.
The Minister for Defence talked for at least two hours.
No.
I timed the Minister.
I take it that a decision on a matter like this proceeds from precedent, and I suggest you will be establishing a very dangerous precedent if you allow the Bill to be taken in all its stages now when a very considerable part of the House objects.
I have no function in this particular matter at all. I have no doubt that under the Standing Orders a motion can be made for the taking of the Committee Stage of the Bill, and if that motion be carried, then the House can go into Committee on the Bill at once.
Without any notice?
Yes, without notice. We must finish the Committee Stage, take a motion for the Fourth Stage and then take the Fourth Stage. We can then take a motion for the Fifth Stage, and go on with the Fifth Stage.
I want to give notice that I propose moving three amendments to this Bill. I want now to give two days' notice that I intend doing that.
Arising out of what the Ceann Comhairle has said, I want to ask whether, as well as the actual letter of the rules of the House, there are not certain practices making it possible for the business of the House to be carried on by common understanding and that this is a gross breach of these practices.
The Deputy can urge that against the doing of a particular thing, but it is not a matter for a ruling by the Chair.
I notice that when a Bill has been read a Second Time and when it is ordered to be considered in Committee of the whole House, that a day is then named for the taking of the Bill in Committee. If there is a departure from that and it is decided to refer the Bill to a Special Committee, the President must move a motion. Would not the ordinary notice under the Standing Orders be required to cover a motion of this sort?
There is no doubt that the Standing Orders provide that the various stages of a Bill may be taken one after the other. It is not generally done, but, if necessary a motion can be made, and the Chair has no option but to take it.
On behalf of our Party we object to the Committee Stage of this Bill being taken tonight. I think the President will agree that at any time he was in a position to point out to the House that a Bill was urgently required and that he wanted to take it without the period provided under Standing Orders elapsing, he was always given facilities. I think in view of the fact that the Minister for Defence has made the statement that this Bill is not required, and in view of certain other statements that he made, that the Bill would require to get closer examination on Committee Stage than it will be possible to give it if it is taken tonight. I think in the light of the statements made by the Minister for Defence this evening and so as to enable members to prepare any amendments which they may think necessary, that the President ought to agree to the Committee Stage of this Bill being postponed.
Arising out of the last statement made by Deputy Corish, I suggest, in view of the fact that this Bill has been introduced largely to salve the conscience of the Labour Party, that every facility should be given to carry through the Bill in its last stages.
It would have been more decent to move the closure in the Second Stage than to do this.
Question—That the Committee Stage of the Bill be taken now—put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 73; Níl, 61.
Tá
- Aird, William P.
- Alton, Ernest Henry.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Blythe, Ernest.
- Bourke, Séamus A.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Brodrick, Seán.
- Byrne, John Joseph.
- Carey, Edmund.
- Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
- Conlon, Martin.
- Cooper, Bryan Ricco.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Craig, Sir James.
- Crowley, James.
- Daly, John.
- Davis, Michael.
- De Loughrey, Peter.
- Doherty, Eugene.
- Doyle, Peadar Seán.
- Duggan, Edmund John.
- Dwyer, James.
- Egan, Barry M.
- Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Gorey, Denis J.
- Hassett, John J.
- Heffernan, Michael R.
- Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
- Hennessy, Thomas.
- Hennigan, John.
- Henry, Mark.
- Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
- Holohan, Richard.
- Jordan, Michael.
- Kelly, Patrick Michael.
- Law, Hugh Alexander.
- Leonard, Patrick.
- Lynch, Finian.
- Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
- McDonogh, Martin.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- McGilligan, Patrick.
- Mongan, Joseph W.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Murphy, James E.
- Murphy, Joseph Xavier.
- Myles, James Sproule.
- Nally, Martin Michael.
- Nolan, John Thomas.
- O'Connell, Richard.
- O'Connor, Bartholomew.
- O'Hanlon, John F.
- O'Higgins, Thomas.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
- O'Reilly, John J.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Reynolds, Patrick.
- Rice, Vincent.
- Roddy, Martin.
- Shaw, Patrick W.
- Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
- Thrift, William Edward.
- Tierney, Michael.
- Vaughan, Daniel.
- White, John.
- White, Vincent Joseph.
- Wolfe, George.
- Wolfe, Jasper Travers.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Anthony, Richard.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Boland, Patrick.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Seán.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Broderick, Henry.
- Buckley, Daniel.
- Carney, Frank.
- Carty, Frank.
- Cassidy, Archie J.
- Coburn, James.
- Colbert, James.
- Corkery, Dan.
- Corish, Richard.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
- Crowley, Tadhg.
- Davin, William.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- Everett, James.
- Fahy, Frank.
- Flinn, Hugo.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Gorry, Patrick J.
- Sheehy, Timothy (Tipperary).
- Smith, Patrick.
- Tubridy, John.
- Goulding, John.
- Hayes, Seán.
- Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Jordan, Stephen.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Kent, William R.
- Kerlin, Frank.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Maguire, Ben.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Mullins, Thomas.
- Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
- O'Connell, Thomas J.
- O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
- O'Kelly, Seán T.
- O'Leary, William.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- O'Reilly, Thomas.
- Powell, Thomas P.
- Ryan, James.
- Sexton, Martin.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle; Níl, Deputies G. Boland and Allen.
Motion declared carried.