I move:—
Go ndeontar suim ná raghaidh thar £70,590 chun slánuithe na suime is ga chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá de Mhárta, 1932, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí Oifig an Aire Tionnscail agus Tráchtála, maraon le Coiste Comhairlitheach na Rátaí.
That a sum not exceeding £70,590 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1932, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, including the Rates Advisory Committee.
On previous occasions I have gone into this Vote in great detail. I do not intend to repeat that this year. I have not had any information up to the present as to any special point on which Deputies desire detailed information. Presumably, these points will be raised as we go along. I will take the Vote under the two or three main headings, under which it is divided. As far as the statistics branch is concerned, there are at the moment being published the results of the 1929 census of production, according as the results of each industry are compiled. We have issued some fifteen of these, and the remaining eighteen will be brought out as we have them to hand. They are mostly in an advanced state, and they ought to be issued before the end of the year. We are making preparations to take a complete census in 1932, relating to production in the year 1931. We are also preparing a printed report covering the census for the years 1926 to 1929. As far as the census of population is concerned, considerable delay has been caused, and is still being caused, owing to the volume of industrial status, generally spoken of as the unemployment volume, about which I have spoken here on many occasions. Other volumes are proceeding, while a certain amount of delay has been caused in the compilation of other statistical matters. I tried to get an advance as far as possible in Gaeltacht and Irish language volume, the industries volume, and the fertility and dependency volume. They are held up by reason of the delay in the industrial status volume. With regard to that I have to come to a decision almost immediately as to whether or not I should separately publish that volume in what I consider to be an unsuitable form, that would not make such a useful public document, or else to see if I cannot speed up the written matter which is to be attached to it in order to get something which would be of use to the public. That decision must be taken in the next four weeks. That volume being got out of the way, it will be possible to get to the completion of these other three volumes very speedily, and publish at least one of them almost immediately.
During the year we changed the method of publication of certain trade statistics. A new series of monthly reports is being issued. We are also going to produce an annual trade report. The first of these is in preparation and will be issued during the course of the year. In connection with these trade statistics, in conjunction with certain other groups, we collected statistics showing the countries of origin as distinct from countries of consignment. That is an idea that will turn out to be very valuable. We propose to continue that work; also the collection of statistics with regard to agriculture, transport, prices, live stock, cost of living, unemployment, labour exchanges, industrial disputes, and so on. We have in an advanced state of preparation a statistical abstract that will contain in one volume a number of statistics of the Free State. The first issue of that abstract should be available in a few months time.
The second section of the Department, to which I will refer briefly, is the section called the Trade and Industry Branch. Here the work is so multitudinous that I find it very difficult to concentrate on any one thing more than another, in the absence of any precise request for information on a special point. The work is varied. I described it in very considerable detail on another occasion. The varied activities of the branch have been kept up. On the labour side there has been great activity during the year, investigating such things as wages, conditions of labour, so as to have these in handy form for the purpose of comparison with other countries, and for the purpose of putting information before prospective industrialists when these make enquiries as to rates that would have to be paid here, and the conditions in which workers in a particular industry would normally live. We have had considerable difficulty with one big item in connection with disputes during the year. It is not generally recognised that some of these disputes stop short and do not become known to the public. It is not generally recognised how much work is done in the conciliation line. Roughly there has been through the year one trade dispute of an important type to be dealt with pretty nearly every week. Of course, once a dispute starts it does not mean that it is finished within a week. There have been some forty to fifty of these disputes to be decided during the year.
During the year also this side of the branch had considerable investigation to do arising out of the report of the Commission on technical education and the production of the Apprenticeship Bill, which was before the House a few days ago, by means of which we hope to effect considerable improvement in the conditions under which apprentices are taken into business, and particularly considerable improvement in the training of a particular kind in an industry. On this side of the branch's activity in connection with the international labour office conventions, the post-war view has been that it is better to level up conditions through the world, particularly on the Continent, so that in any conflict that emerged after the war in the economic plane there should be something approaching equal conditions. This country has a pretty good record in the matter of the number of conventions that have been received, accepted and put into force in the country.
On the general side of inducing industrialists to embark on enterprises in this country, we have to rely in the main on the officers of the branch who have to deal with the Advisory Committees. I spoke at length last year of the work done by these committees. There are some thirty or so of them, composed of representatives of industries, grouped in certain ways. With these we have frequent contact, and in conjunction with them we approach people who are the cause of difficulties and seek to have things remedied. We are gaining more and more the confidence of these industrial groups. These committees are making more regular application to us in connection with difficulties that arise, and to a greater degree than ever before they are paying very definite testimony to the work that is being done by the Department's officers in getting conditions improved for them. I have spoken already of the work that has to be done on the conciliation side, through intervention in labour disputes and in conjunction with the collection of material relating to wages and conditions of labour. The information that is so derived hardly ever relates entirely to the particular matter that is in dispute. In the course of the dispute almost all the conditions of a particular industry are brought to the surface. The result is that the officials who deal with it are very well informed as to the general conditions in industry, and this information, added to the information that is derived through the Advisory Committees, leaves us in a very good position to adjudicate on difficulties as they arise, and to give good advice to people who may be seeking to open up in the country.
On the whole, the main work of this side of the Department is regarded as procuring the best survey of industry as it exists in the country and clearing the ground for prospective new industrialists. This we can do, as I said, through getting a pretty good idea of the conditions that exist in business. We have to pay special attention to these industries which have received the benefit of tariffs. We have the special duty of seeing how far employment has increased, how far increases in prices may have been caused by the first imposition of a tariff, how far these are being progressively lowered and how far we are sure at the end the prices have reached a point which in all the circumstances of the country is fair. We then, I say, put some of the information which we have at the disposal of people who come to us from time to time seeking new openings. I make a discrimination by saying that we put some of that information at their disposal, because, clearly, some of the information gathered through an intimate connection with an advisory committee is most confidential and cannot be broadcast to people, who if they entered into the country's work, would be in the position of rivals to some of those already existing. On the whole we have effected pretty good touch on many occasions between people who seemed interested in certain things— the people who had technical skill— and those who had money. Some of the industries, in particular one or two, which have received the benefit of the tariff in the country have found that in order to keep employment at the figure which it had reached in the earlier years of the tariff they have to turn their attention towards an export market.
In this connection there is another side of the work, to see that the trade relations of this country, and any other country to which there is likely to be an export outlet, are put upon the most favourable terms that we can secure. The trade relations as between this country and the other countries where there might be an export outlet are in the main satisfactory. Some of them are regulated by temporary agreements. Some of these temporary agreements will have to be continued for quite a long time. Two treaties have, of course, been signed. One is on the point of being signed and a few others are in the course of preparation. There are tendencies observable with regard to a change in the conditions on which countries will enter into very close trade relations, so that it is not always easy to get speed in this matter. Some countries desire to wait until they see how certain continental tendencies are developing before they commit themselves to a new rigid convention.
We have also a duty which we carry out of giving to any of our business people whatever information we can collect through the medium of our representatives abroad, or whatever information can be collected even by correspondence, as to the openings in other countries, the tariff system in other countries and the impediment put upon goods going into these countries, and the standing of these people with whom it is desirable to do business. A certain amount of the information collected in the branch is given publicity through the medium of the "Trade Journal." A certain amount of other matter is given to inquirers when they come along, or given through the medium of officials, when they get in contact with industrialists, arising out of disputes or any other matter, and where it seems to them that there is any prospect of these people whom they meet being encouraged by the receipt of this information to develop in a particular way.
On occasions during the year action has been taken in connection with the sale of products supposed to be manufactured in this country, and which are being falsely described in that way. A subsidiary activity of that type has preceded applications which are made for registration of trade marks which would seem to indicate production in the country when, in fact, the production is not here, when these should not be registered.
The producers in the country have I think, some of them certainly, expressed their agreement that the branch has been of great assistance to them through the medium of the Government contract. I have representatives on the committee which deals with these matters and we, in every case, try to see, where an article is procurable in this country, that there should be a very vigorous attempt made to have the contract limited to the home manufacturers. We have a corresponding duty on the other side to see, if there is going to be a preference given, and in nearly all of these cases there is, that that will be used in a proper way and that the consumer will not have to pay anything beyond what is reasonable if the contract, as it is in many cases, is definitely confined to applicants from the country. We have through meetings for special purposes had an examination made of prices in special trades. The public has had the benefit of a reduction in prices particularly in one item and in certain sides of two or three other matters. There are certain disputes about prices still going on and we believe that this method of getting to grips with the particular people involved, on a special case being made, is likely to produce better results and is less wasteful in administrative energy and expense than a system of compulsory regulation of prices.
During the last year attention was called to two movements of a type that seemed to be very close to unfair restriction of trade. Both of these were taken up after attention was called to them. In one case the combination has practically disappeared and in the other the activity which was feared has certainly not developed.
Another branch specially referred to in the report is the geological survey. I should like just to direct special attention to that particular branch. Its work is hardly known. In fact, any comments passed upon the geological survey in this country seems to be based almost entirely on a misapprehension as to what is being done. Foreign observers are much more acute in their remarks on this and have on occasions on which any of them visited the country passed the comment that there is as good a geological survey here as any country can point to. The system under which the survey works— it has only been in conjunction with my Department for the last three years—is this, that year after year there is plotted a field programme for the year. That field programme is carried through as well as conditions allow, and generally, results in the production of matter of a particular type and information added to it in the form of a memorial. The maps are produced in the Ordnance Survey and the memorials are published. If I might take an example. Last year— 1930-31—the field work consisted in mapping parts of the Connaught coalfield. That is a piece of work which has been going on for a considerable number of years and is thought likely to be finished in one other field year.
