In the course of his speech last night the President spoke in a manner which showed he did not understand the principles of this Bill. I notice that the President has left the Chamber. I was going to make him familiar with some of the provisions of the Bill, but apparently ignorance in this matter serves him and his cause better than knowledge. He spoke about a certain newspaper. He referred to the business capacity of Deputies of this Party. He adverted to the complexity of local government and very portentiously stated that his Government had given every consideration to the efficiencies which would result from combining services and combining certain areas in accordance with the proposals in this Bill. When the President was asked a simple question which went to the root of the whole matter he showed that he knew nothing whatsoever about the Bill. So far the speech of the Minister for Local Government and Public Health and the speech of the Minister for Education are the only speeches that we have heard from the Government Benches with regard to this matter. I hope that before the President's colleagues in the Executive Council rise in the debate they will endeavour to understand the provisions of the Bill and not follow the example of the President and rise unprepared; I hope that they will at least know what section of the Bill allocates the powers of the municipality as between the council and the manager. I hope that they will at least know that in this Bill there is no section which gives power to the council to frame Estimates and that they will not repeat the silly, unfounded argument which the President used in support of the measure last night.
I will come back to the Bill. The main proposals which this Bill sets before the House are three. The first is not to establish the City of Dublin, but to establish a coastal borough. The City of Dublin is already in existence, existing within certain restricted and narrow limits which everyone agrees have hindered the development and progress of the city. The coastal borough is not in existence. The establishment of that borough is one of the new and main proposals of this Bill. The second proposal is the creation of a City Manager with practically uncontrolled authority. The third proposal is the establishment of a special and privileged franchise. These are the three principles contained in the Bill. It has been said by the Minister for Education that the onus of proof in this matter rests upon the Deputies on these Benches. He stated that it is for us to prove that these provisions are not acceptable to the House, or that they should not be accepted by the House. The boot is on the other foot.
The Minister in drafting this Bill has ignored altogether the recommendations of the Greater Dublin Commission. He has pitted the fruits of his own intellect against the fruits of the combined labours of a number of very eminent men, selected for their knowledge of the subject. These are men with practical experience of local government extending over a number of years. The Minister has come comparatively recently to the Department of Local Government. I do not think that he ever served upon a local authority in his life. Whatever experience he has had of public administration, it was not obtained in the service of a local authority. Yet this Minister, wholly without practical experience of the problems with which local authorities have to deal, asks the House to accept his judgment in this matter as being better and worthier of acceptance than the experience of men like Deputy Corish, Professor Magennis, and all those other people of experience who constituted the Greater Dublin Commission, and of the majority of those who gave evidence before that Commission. Every one of these were people who had long years of practical experience of local government and had given intensive study to the problem. The President said last night that in this matter they came before the House as judges. That is not so. They came before the House as advocates of new, novel and untried proposals, and they set these proposals against the considered recommendations of men of experience and knowledge in these affairs. It is on them, therefore, that rests the onus of proof.
Now, what were the arguments advanced by the Minister for Local Government in introducing this Bill? He said that, having studied the conditions, they came to the conclusion that the coastal borough was a separate place in its whole outlook. That may be the Minister's conclusion, but I submit that the House will not be doing justice to the people of Dublin, or to the people of the coastal borough, if they accept that simple statement without asking the Minister to advance the grounds upon which he based it. What are the facts upon which that conclusion is based? Let us hear how that conclusion has been adduced from these facts, and then we shall be able to determine for ourselves whether or not the conclusion is well founded. But I submit that there is one big fact which all of us are aware of, that in itself would be sufficient to refute the Minister's conclusion. He said that the coastal borough was a separate place in its whole outlook from the City of Dublin. Where does the separation begin? Even geographically where does it begin? Will the Minister show us where. clearly and unmistakably, a person leaves the separate entity of the City of Dublin to step into the separate entity of the coastal borough? The places are contiguous and they merge into one another. There is no geographical or structural separation between the coastal borough and the City of Dublin. If there is, will the Minister tell us where it is? Is there any conflict, any disparity, or separation of interests between the people of the coastal borough and the people of the City of Dublin? The great majority of the people of the proposed coastal borough are dependent upon the City of Dublin for their livelihood. I am perfectly certain that almost 70 per cent. of them, if not more, spend the greater portion of their lives in the City of Dublin. How can these people, earning their bread and living the greater portion of their time in Dublin, going in and out of the city every day, entirely dependent for their future and present maintenance upon the prosperity of the city, living in the coastal borough, have any outlook that is not almost exactly the same as that of the people who live within the artificial limits that have been imposed upon the city? Will the Minister, when he rises to reply, show how a population, 70 per cent. of which spend the greater portion of their time in Dublin and are entirely dependent on Dublin for their existence, can have a separate outlook from those living within the artificial confines of the city?
The Minister has made the point that, after all, the coastal borough and the City of Dublin have separate drainage schemes. So have Pembroke and Rathmines. But the mere possession of separate drainage schemes does not, in the judgment of the Minister, endow Pembroke and Rathmines with a separate outlook from the City of Dublin. Not only have Pembroke and Rathmines separate drainage schemes, but they are, from the point of view of Dublin City, I believe, much less detrimental to the health of the Dublin community than are the separate drainage schemes possessed by the Townships of Blackrock and Dun Laoghaire. That, however, is merely a technical matter. But the Minister has made the point that because Dun Laoghaire and Blackrock have separate drainage schemes, then Dun Laoghaire and Blackrock should not be taken within the confines of the city, while at the same time, and in the same Bill, he takes Pembroke and Rathmines with their separate drainage schemes and incorporates them. I think the Minister is in a logical dilemma there. If his reason for excluding Dun Laoghaire and Blackrock is that they have separate drainage schemes, then Deputy John Good is justified in demanding that for that same reason Pembroke and Rathmines should be excluded from the Bill. It would not be, in my eyes, sufficient justification for the demand, because I do believe that we do want a Greater Dublin.
I believe that this city should have freedom to extend wherever the needs and desires and amenities of the citizens urge it to extend, and that the Minister should not in this matter adopt the somewhat superstitious practices which prevail amongst savage nations. We have heard how in China the feet of the growing babe are imprisoned in artificial fetters in order that the development of that human being will not take place in that direction. I believe that in South America there are savage tribes which try to prevent by similar artificial means the development of the skulls of infants. The Minister is doing that with the City of Dublin. He says the city may develop to the north, it may develop to the west, it may develop to the east, but the south is stopped, that it will not move towards the sun.