On a point of order, I think there is no definite restriction on Deputies discussing anything, as we are on the General Resolution.
Financial Resolution No. 26—General—Report (Resumed).
Debate resumed on the question: That the Dáil agree with the Committee on Finance in the following Resolution:
That it is expedient to amend the law relating to customs and inland revenue (including excise) and to make further provision in connection with finance.—(Minister for Finance.)
Anything that can possibly come within the scope of Resolution No. 26.
I understood the idea was the discussion would continue while on the General Resolution, taking the items as we went along and passing to the end to-night.
I am agreeable.
When we have finished with one subject we would not go back on it but would progress.
My anxiety is to get some arrangement so that we might finish with the subject. If we take them item by item the danger is that we may spend all the time at one item.
What is the suggestion — that we should go back to some item prior to No. 21? I forgot some of the things that might be said earlier, and I wonder would the Minister object now.
I have no objection to any points arising.
The point that the Minister raised does arise, that there is a tendency to stick at one particular point and to spend all the time on that. We would be anxious to finish the discussion on Resolution No. 7 as early as possible, as there are a certain number of other Resolutions that we would like to have some definite discussion on. I do not know whether it would be possible, in respect of a certain number, to fix a point of time by which we would reach a particular item.
I am not clear as to the other Resolutions that the Deputy wishes to discuss, but an arrangement could be made to finish No. 7 by 7 o'clock or by 7.30.
We might finish No. 7 earlier.
Reference No. 21 — Superphosphates, ground mineral phosphates and compound manures.
I want very briefly to put to the Minister certain things about which I asked for information on the last day and in regard to which I am still in the dark. We are told that the aim of this particular tariff in regard to superphosphates is to prevent 1,000 people being put out of employment. We have asked what is the likelihood of these people losing employment without the tariff and the only statement I have heard was an allusion to imports in the early months of this year. If it is not possible to get the information I want now, I think I might be able to get it by way of Parliamentary Question. I would like to know what were the imports of superphosphates into the Saorstát, year by year, since 1926. I would like a further statement telling me what percentage of each year's total importation does the importation during the first three months represent. If I had that information I would have a proper method of evaluating the significance of the imports during the first three months of 1932.
Deputy Dillon raised certain matters, but his points have not been answered. He adverted to the fact that the lever with which traders have been enabled to keep down prices of the home manufactured material is in danger of being removed, the lever being the Continental manures that have been and are being imported. That is the experience of those who are accustomed to dealing in artificial manures. We are told that another lever is going to be put into the hands of the Government through a certain piece of legislation in connection with price fixing. What is the standard to be taken in relation to the prices rightly to be fixed as the proper prices to be charged to Irish users of the home manufactured article?
I would like to have information either now or later on on the following points: Is it a fact that the home manufacturers at the general meeting of the company held last summer promised a reduction in price for the 1931-32 selling season, the season we have finished, basing it upon foreshadowed reductions in three items which go towards the cost of manufacture of the articles — raw material, freights and the sacks necessary? Was that reduction in price given in the season just past by the home manufacturers to the farmers in this country? If that reduction did not take place, I want the Minister to tell me has he been able to have investigations made as to whether or not the foreshadowed reductions in raw material, freights and sacks did take place and why was it not reflected in reduced prices? I want to know if further decreases have not, in fact, since taken place because the reductions that were foreshadowed would relate to contracts that would have to be made, starting from June last, for delivery of the manufactured material in the early months of this year.
While that material was being purchased at a reduced price, is it not a fact that further reductions have taken place in all three items that go to make up the price here? Is not the consumer entitled to two reductions and will that be the price that will be taken as the standard price when any price-fixing machinery is set up? If not, what is going to be the price that will be taken by the Minister as the standard price when he attempts by legislation to fix the price at which anything is going to be sold? What is going to be the standard when he fixes the price for superphosphates in this country next year?
The matter of dumping has been spoken of, and I think it is rather hard to get the relevancy of the statement — I think it was in that connection reference was made to Britain having gone off the gold standard — about the gold standard and the matter of dumping. I would like to know if we have any figures providing data in the matter of dumping. I would like to know whether or not Continental manures have been railed through Belgium at a price that compares with the sale price here when the freight has been added. Is it not a fact that the raw material in this trade has been for years quoted in sterling and purchased at sterling rates? If that is the fact, what has the matter of Britain going off the gold standard got to do with this business?
The matter of dumping may appear to some people, looking at the thing superficially, to be proved because of the fact that Continental manure is continuing to be sold at a much lower rate here than the home-manufactured article. Can that not be explained by the fact that reductions have taken place in the season 1931-32 and are foreshadowed next season by reason of the reduction in the items I have spoken of? These reductions have not led to a fall in price in the home manufactured articles. If the Minister cannot give me information now, perhaps he will let me have it later. I think it is information that is necessary in the sense that it would enable one to form a proper judgment when one comes to the Committee Stage of the Finance Bill.
The only reason I made any reference to Britain going off the gold standard was that we must take it into account in trying to arrive at an estimate and in coming to the cost of production of the Continental phosphates, bearing in mind the price at which they are sold here.
If the raw material is quoted in sterling what difference does the altered value of the gold standard make?
In estimating the cost of production we must take into account that the Belgian labourers and those engaged in production are not paid in sterling but in Belgian francs and the difference between the two must affect the price at which the producers are selling the material here.
That did not affect the price in 1931-32.
The Deputy asked what is the likelihood of people being put out of employment. I can answer that definitely. I met representatives of the workers in the industry who referred to the fact that a number of them had been put out of employment here in several factories. In a number of factories stocks were not sold; a great part of them were not sold, and in consequence the factories were proposing to close down at an earlier date. Approaches were made to the managers of the factories and in each case we have been able to arrange that hardship will be avoided and there will not be the same diminution in labour as there has been in the past. A certain diminution has taken place and in a number of factories workers were working alternate weeks. If there was not the prospect of an increased market next year the factories would be closed down entirely.
The figures requested by Deputy McGilligan — year by year imports — can be given. They are available in the Library and I think the Deputy will find, if he takes the first three months of this year and makes a comparison with last year and the year before, that the imports this year were considerably larger. Again, we have to bear in mind that it is not so much the quantity of goods imported as the potential quantity of goods that might be imported. Then we have to consider the effect upon industry here. The last Government imposed a tariff on oats. The quantity of oats imported was comparatively small. It was a mere trifle compared with our production. It was the mere fact that oats could be imported in unlimited quantities that mattered because oats might be imported to the point when it would not pay the farmer to produce oats here.
It is not the volume of imports that matters so much. What matters is that once you permit the importation of unlimited quantities, that might tend to make production here an uneconomic proposition. That also raises the point made by Deputy Dillon, a point to which Deputy McGilligan referred. That argument was that if you put a duty upon cheap Continental manures coming in, then you have removed a lever by which the prices of the Irish produced article can be kept down. I am astonished that Deputies opposite who have been using that argument for the past few weeks did not use it previously. Why did they not use that argument when the late Government put a tariff on butter?
There was no occasion.
The price of butter was falling to a price when it did not pay to produce it, and the late Government imposed a tariff on butter for no other reason than to permit an increase in the price of butter to the home consumers to the point which would pay the home producer. Why did not Deputies opposite use that argument then? Why did they not use it when a duty was placed on oats? Why did they not use that argument on every occasion that the late Government put a duty on any article produced at home? Exactly similar circumstances prevailed. If the standard by which we are to judge of our ability to produce any article here is the lowest price at which we can buy that article from any other country in the world, then we can abandon the idea of industrial development, and we can abandon the idea of producing half our present agricultural production, we can reduce our population to 200,000, and concentrate on the production of live cattle, because live cattle are the only commercial product that we can sell cheaper than any other country in the world.
If that is what Deputies want, then they will have the complete wiping out of the towns in the country, the levelling of our hedges and the turning of our country into one large grazing ranch if it is intended to give effect to the policy they have been advocating here. But if we want to secure the survival of this nation, and if our people are to be given work here then we have got to have a different standard, and we have got to decide that the criterion by which we judge the suitability of any industry to this island is the number of workers available, the local climatic and other conditions, the market for the production of the industry, and not the price of the product in some other country where an entirely different standard of living prevails.
Deputy McGilligan asked me a large number of questions relating to the recent changes in prices, and the possible future changes in prices affecting this industry. I am not in a position to supply these figures now, but I will endeavour to get that information for the Deputy. We can then have the matter up again when the Finance Bill comes before the Dáil. In order to obliterate any misunderstanding let me say it is quite clear that we have imposed no duty upon superphosphates or compound manures imported from Great Britain or from the British Dominions. In so far as there are countries engaged in the production of these goods in which the standard of living is similar to our own, we do not intend to interfere with competition in any way.
Why not be honest about it—countries which are in the ring?
If Deputy Gorey has any information about rings it is up to him to give us that information here and now.
Does not the Minister know they are there? Can he not see it himself?
If the price of any article subject to a duty or tariff is artificially shoved up by ring methods we will either remove the duty or take to ourselves the power to burst that ring. We are not going to have that, and Deputy Gorey knows that it is not beyond the wit of man to defeat tactics of that kind. As far as the great part of the artificial manures used by the farmers, and particularly those most popular with the farmers, are concerned, we have not imposed any duty at all; no matter what country they come from there is no duty. We have received applications to extend this duty in order to cover other things, but we declined to do so. This duty was considered in consultation with the experts of the Department of Agriculture, and we fixed it upon this basis, and with the least inconvenience to the farmers. We kept in view the greatest good to the industry. We wanted to preserve employment for the people engaged in this industry, and we succeeded in doing it. Four out of five of the Irish farmers in the past used the products of Irish factories in the way of artificial manures, and we say it is no hardship if five farmers out of five will in the future use these Irish products.
I think the Minister was asked certain items of fact. Will he make inquiries to find out if the Irish manure manufacturers are members of the Fertilisers Manufacturers' Association and tell us if he can find any trace of an agreement amongst these not to ship superphosphate to each other's countries?
The fact that there is a substantial import of superphosphate from Great Britain into this country would seem at first sight to indicate that that is not so.
At first sight!
Will the farmers get these superphosphates at the same price as before the duty was put on?
At a fair price.
Can the Minister not tell us if the farmers will get it at the same price at which they were getting it before the duty was put on?
I have said that it would be at a fair price.
Can the Minister give any indication as to how many farmers this tariff will put out of business as against the number of additional people he expects to see employed?
My answer is none. It will put no farmer out of business.
Then the Minister's knowledge of farming is very little.
I wonder does the Minister know that dairy farming is very much dependent on the use of phosphatic manures? If the Minister interferes in dairy farming by putting a tariff on these manures he will certainly increase the production costs of the dairy farmers and he will do this country a great injury. In my opinion this tariff will considerably lessen employment. It does not seem to strike the Minister that dairy farming is one of the greatest sources of employment in this country.
In the matter of Reference No. 23, would the Minister tell us are there any bicycle firms in this country?
There were no bicycle assembling firms when the duty was imposed. A number of firms have since gone into the business. And it is anticipated that the importation of completed bicycles will have ceased by the end of this year, or, at all events, within a very short period.
What is going to happen with regard to the approved roads across the Border and the difficulty the cyclists will be in who have to go in and out across the Border?
A special provision is made in the fifth column which sets out that "the Revenue Commissioners may make regulations providing for the total or partial exemption from this duty for a limited period of articles liable to this duty brought into Saorstát Eireann by persons making only a temporary stay therein." These regulations have been made. Undoubtedly, there will be certain inconveniences.
That regulation is all right in regard to people coming in from outside and bringing with them a bicycle which they intend to take out again within a short period. But what regulation does the Minister intend to establish to see that bicycles are not brought in across the Border in large numbers for the purpose of sale? In nearly every country where there is a land frontier authorities have to adopt the system of registration of push bicycles. Is it intended that there should be registration here?
That is a matter for the police and the Revenue Commissioners. I may assure the Deputy that all the resources of the State will be mobilised to see that the law is not evaded.
Has the point been considered?
It has.
And there has been no suggestion of registration for bicycles?
The idea has been considered, but no decison has been taken.
Would there be any disadvantage in compelling the manufacture of bicycle wheels here? Would it not have been a better means of providing labour? So far as I can learn, the labour involved in assembling a bicycle is very small. I know one English concern has only offered 3/6 per bicycle to its agent in Dublin for the assembling of these bicycles. On the other hand, I believe the manufacture of wheels would have been a very good means of giving employment, that it would have given an opportunity to a great number of semi-skilled people throughout the country of showing their skill. Further, it would not have resulted in any increase in the cost of the bicycle. This tax will provide a certain amount of labour, but it is not going to do very much use in the way of providing labour. I believe that the assemblage of a bicycle only takes somewhat less than an hour. I think the Minister might consider whether it could not be extended, so that certain parts might be admitted in and the wheels made here.
It is intended that in due course we shall get a number of parts manufactured here.
As to item 24— photographic prints, has the Minister made up his mind about the amendment I tabled, with reference to those of a scientific, educational, or technical character?
I have discussed the matter from an administrative point of view with the Revenue Commissioners, but I have not yet reached a point when I can say that I have come to a conclusion as to what can be done. It seems to me that we shall be able to get a means by which scientific and technical photographs can be exempted, but the term "educational" would be too wide.
I mean photographs of works of art. It will be a very heavy tax.
The matter has been examined, and I shall go as far as I can to meet the Deputy. The difficulties are merely administrative.
Could it not be met by exempting such prints consigned to educational institutions or the teachers in such institutions?
We shall have that point considered.
That suggestion would not go far enough to meet the point I have in mind. I do not see why we should deny trade of a legitimate type to the distributors of educational photographic prints and sensitised material in this country. If there is going to be an exemption merely for this particular type of photographic print, and the basis as to whether it is educational or not is going to be taken, and whether it is directed to an educational establishment, then clearly we are throwing business into the hands of English distributors and taking it out of the hands of our own.
I should like to ask the Minister if he has considered the question of exhibition prints. I do not propose to deal with whether a photographic print is a work of art, but certainly there are a number of people in this country who send prints for exhibition in England. Would the prints when returned be subject to the duty? Exhibitions of photographic prints are also held in this country from time to time. While there is a definite local section there is also usually an international section, and in that the prints are clearly of an educational character, so far as the photographic trade or art is concerned. I should like to bring to the notice of the Minister this passing and repassing of exhibition prints between the two countries. I should also like to ask him what he means by "printed direct from a photographic film or photographic plate"? Does he mean a contact print?
No, printed upon sensitised material from the negative. We have photographic prints printed from blocks. It is not intended that they should be subject to duty.
This says "printed direct from a photographic film or photographic plate." Do you mean by contact, because the drafting of this Resolution is not very clear? I wish to ask whether you have in mind enlargements, as well as contact prints?
Yes.
Both contact prints and enlargements?
Yes.
Will a process such as carbro, where it is transferred, also be covered, because that is certainly contact? It is merely a peculiarity in the drafting which I bring to the attention of the Minister. It is not very clear whether contact enlargements and prints, such as by the carbro process, are included.
What is the reason for the change in the previous measurement of 25 square inches, and the reduction now to 18?
Some firms have proceeded to engage in the production of picture postcards which are actual photographs, and it is desired to give them the protection involved in the reduction of the size.
I think these postcards would come in as cardboard. Technically, a postcard when printed upon will be cardboard.
There is no duty on printed cardboard. Cardboard is not subject to duty.
That is what I mean. When a postcard of sensitised material is printed it would really come in free under the heading of cardboard. Is that not right?
Yes.
I propose to refer to that under the next photographic item.
The Minister also said that he did not intend to have a block from which photographs would be reproduced tariffed. Is not that block tariffed under another heading?
That is another matter which we can discuss later. Reproductions of photographs from a block will not be subject to duty. It is intended to apply only to what I call real photographs, that is, photographs actually printed from the negative.
Reproductions from a block are subject to a tax under another heading.
The block is included under another heading. It is intended to exclude it.
It is intended to put down an amendment to exclude it?
So far as it is subject to a duty under brass, tin and lead it is intended to exclude it, but not from the wood duty.
As to No. 25, which refers to bedding, I asked if the Minister could tell me what was the difference between a quilt, a counterpane and a bedspread, and I should like to know if he has got the information yet. The reason why I ask it is this: There is a linen tax which includes certain linen goods—Item No. 14 on this—where the tariff is 25 per cent. full rate, with a free rate for a great many of the items, and where the rate is not free it is 15 per cent. When we come to bedding we get a full rate of 37½, with a preferential rate of 25 per cent. I understand that the customs authorities are concluding from the fact that sheets are specifically excluded from the bedding heading that, therefore, bolster cases and pillow cases are necessarily included as bedding, and they are being subjected to the 37½ and 25 per cent. tax. I do not know whether that was meant. I do not know what was the point from which those who drew this up started, in order to make their discriminations. If they started from what a bedding manufacturer produces they will not get any bedding manufacturer to produce bolster cases or pillow cases of linen or cotton. Yet these things are, apparently, being considered as coming within this heading, and charged at the 25 per cent. rate, instead of, where they are linen, being charged at the lower rate. It is a matter that should be looked into. If the point of discrimination is what a bedding manufacturer would make, then these things should be entirely excluded. If they are going to be brought under the linen tariff, although it is not clear from the phraseology that they are, then they will be at the lower rate. It is a point which would want to be looked into.
Then I understand there is this specific tariff with regard to quilts, filled or unfilled. When one comes to such matters as counterpanes or bedspreads, the customs authorities are deciding that if they can catch them under linen or cotton, by reason of the fabric, well and good they are caught, but if they are not, they are going to catch them under the title of bedding. It is a question whether they were not meant to be excluded. If so, it ought to be made clear.
I will have that point examined.
With regard to Item No. 27 I take it that that is a revenue tax absolutely?
Mainly. There is some hope we will get some of these things made.
What?
Cutlery, and perhaps razor blades.
Is there any prospect of getting safety razors made here? It is necessary I suppose for people to be shaved and to have their faces clean and to make it easier for them to take off their whiskers. The Minister apparently wants to reverse that order because it will cost them more to get their whiskers off. As to knives and forks I do not see any prospect in this country of making these things here. When does the Minister hope to get some advance made in the way of knives and forks and spoons and ordinary razors? At present we know nothing about it except that he demands a tariff. The Minister admitted that this was to be a revenue tariff, but that is not sufficient to justify a tax like this.
It was only a few years ago that there was a cutlery manufactory on the quays in Dublin.
What happened to it?
It went west.
Is the Minister aware that on Gillette razor blades there is a tax already, owing to the outer cover?
That is the matter of the package tax.
Is the Gillette blade a food, a drink, a medicine or a cosmetic?
They are not subject to duty under the package duty at all.
We went to the trouble some time ago when we were discussing a tax on brushes to introduce an amendment for the purpose of exempting tooth brushes. If we are to be occupied here in this way, I wonder why we went to the trouble of taking out tooth brushes, if we are to raise a revenue on razor blades. I heard Deputy Sir James Craig say he never used a tooth brush in his life.
Surely not.
If we are to tax razor blades here I think he could make a case for transferring the tax from razor blades back to tooth brushes.
If the Deputy will look at the papers he will see that he will get a safety razor blade for a penny.
Has the Minister tried it?
A shave with that would harmonise with hair shirts.
I want to ask the Minister whether he would not introduce an amendment to exclude sensitised materials.
That amendment will be introduced.
I should like to ask the Minister if item 28 is regarded as a revenue producing duty?
Mainly.
It seems to me that you are going to collect a couple of shillings off every camera a tourist brings in——
No.
Are they specially exempted?
No, there is general power exercised by the Revenue Commissioners to exempt articles brought in by tourists for personal use.
I do not see power taken to ensure that in this case.
It is not necessary. It is the same power as that by which the Deputy if he came to Dun Laoghaire with a package of cigarettes would not be asked to pay duty on them.
But if he had more than the amount allowed.
The Revenue Commissioners have power to exclude them up to a certain quantity.
I suggest that the widest publicity should be given to that, because the fear of these things is worse than the actual situation people have to face. The Minister stated this is a revenue producing item, so I do not propose to make any comment upon the possible manufacture of cameras and sensitised materials. At the present moment there are two factories that are catering for developing and printing photographs in the Saorstát. I suppose it is not unnatural that people who are thinking of starting industries here should consider that possibly the same treatment which is meted out here to them would be meted out to other manufacturers who propose starting in this country. These two firms are cut off from the North of Ireland and the Isle of Man. Possibly the Minister may say he does not wish to enter into any negotiations to keep these markets for these people. Possibly it is not the Minister's fault. At the same time it is not the firms' fault which caters for these materials. They are both developing and printing factories and the photographic prints under another heading—the bread and butter stuff— are expressly excluded. I do not know if there is any reason for that. No doubt there is good and sufficient reason. At the same time I suppose the factories concerned look upon that trade with the idea that they ought to have the same advantage as the other people.
Now when you come down to some of the other things they do, one of the factories supplies large photographic prints. If you are going to have Ireland cut off from England as far as sending prints over to the other side for exhibition purposes, it is going to lead to a considerable diminution in the trade carried on by these people. One of the factories has installed machinery and started to produce picture postcards. When you come to look at how they are now situated it is rather interesting. I understand a picture postcard such as I have here—there is no particular virtue in this particular card, it is merely an instance—would come in technically as cardboard duty free. That means that if it is produced on the other side it comes in as cardboard duty free. When our home manufacturer comes to produce these cards in competition with postcards coming in from outside, he is hit with 15 and 10 per cent. more on sensitised material. Am I right in thinking that the Minister is taking that off?
Yes. Is the postcard referred to by the Deputy a photographic print?
When it is printed and comes in it is cardboard. It comes in to him as sensitive paper and is the local manufacturer's raw material. If what is in this Schedule were to be persisted in it would mean that you would be taxing the raw material of the local manufacturer to the extent of 15 per cent. and letting the same material, when printed, in from the other side duty free. However I am glad to hear that the Minister is removing that anomaly at any rate and that the local manufacturer is not going to suffer that handicap in the future. At the same time I would ask the Minister also to consider the question of photographic prints. This is a very large question so far as the factories in this country are concerned.
I am not quite clear as to what the Deputy's point is. Is it that if we are to subject photographic prints to duty at all they should be all subject to duty, including the smaller sizes?
What I am pointing out is that if you start with photographic prints, the large sizes, that practically only hits educational and exhibition prints, but when you come to another aspect of the thing you are letting in one duty free and in the other case subjecting the manufacturer to a tax on his raw material.
The postcard size is subject to duty. The extent of the duty was reduced on the Committee Stage.
I had two other amendments down that I want to draw the Minister's attention to. I want to urge exemption in this case for such apparatus as is used in connection with any educational work or in educational institutions generally. The Minister himself has down an amendment "For use in hospitals or surgical work," and I want to add to that "or in any educational institutions," and in my other amendment "excluding scientific, medical and surgical instruments or apparatus." There are a great many of them and I hope the Minister will consider this favourably.
Yes. In so far as they are not covered by the existing exclusion, I will have it considered.
Am I to understand from the Minister if people travelling abroad take photographs with a five by four camera that a duty will have to be paid on the negatives if they are sent in here to be printed, but that if a person takes with him a vest pocket camera the prints of that will be allowed in free?
Exactly.
In other words the prints taken by the five by four camera are penalised, while the prints of the vest pocket camera are not. What is behind that policy?
The policy definitely was to make subject to duty certain classes of prints which are used commercially, mainly the cabinet size and the postcard size. It is desired to exempt from duty the ordinary snapshot size photograph because, as Deputies know, it is illegal to send dutiable matter through the letter post and if large numbers of people travelling abroad desire to send back photographic representations of their experiences through the post they would be acting illegally.
Will also a picture postcard be allowed in free?
The photographic print is subject to duty.
Would postcard sized prints from abroad be liable to duty?
Yes.
This is going to create a very difficult position, and I would ask the Minister to look into it carefully. I take it the position now is that if people travelling abroad on holiday send back prints to have them developed here these prints will be subject to duty. If that position is to be maintained, then people will be practically compelled to have these prints developed outside their own country. That seems a very extraordinary situation. I think the matter is one that the Minister might look into.
In the case of reference No. 29—gas meters—would the Minister say what gas meter firms there are in the country? Are there any?
A couple.
Are they not branches of English firms?
They are.
And they will come under another Act?
Not necessarily.
In connection with reference No. 30—galvanised corrugated iron—would the Minister give the House some explanation of it. So far as this is concerned I do not think that we have here people engaged in the manufacturing or rolling end of it. There may be some interested in it from the scrap-merchants' end. Is this tariff put on to foster a new industry or to maintain an old one? I would like to hear the Minister's explanation before I make any further comments.
I take it that the Minister has no hope of having within the next few years rolling mills here and that the purpose of this resolution is to have flat sheets brought in and galvanised here. Is that the idea?
As the resolution now stands, flat sheets of galvanised corrugated iron or steel are not subject to duty. If they are worked in any way, that is to say, if they have been serrated as well as corrugated, bent or shaped or fabricated in any way for erection they are subject to duty.
Then the idea is that they should be brought in and galvanised here?
A flat sheet of galvanised, corrugated iron is not subject to duty.
I take it the Minister's idea is that he wishes to have the corrugated iron rolled here?
No.
Is the Minister quite clear about this when he talks of flat sheets of corrugated iron? Would he explain exactly what he means?
I am quite clear as to what I mean; a sheet of corrugated iron.
Does the Minister mean galvanised?
Galvanised corrugated iron before you do anything with it: before you shape it, bore holes in it to take rivets, before you cut it for fencing and serrate the ends of it so that there will be spikes on it. All that work can be done here and we are taking steps to see that it will be done here.
That is the object of it.
It is clear then that corrugated galvanised iron can come in duty free, but that if you want to bend it or bore holes in it it is subject to duty?
Yes.
What is the position with regard to corrugated sheets of iron that are shaped for the purpose of roofing a hay shed?
They are dutiable if shaped.
I just want to ask on the wording of this: is it going to be held that you can have a flat sheet of galvanised corrugated iron?
Yes.
I suggest that that requires alteration.
I am afraid that this will produce a very peculiar situation, because I understand our policy here is that we are anxious to help the farmer. Under this Resolution, if a farmer gets in a corrugated sheet, even with a slight curve in it to cover a hay shed, it will be subject to duty, but if the corrugated sheet comes in flat, as Deputy Thrift has defined it—it is difficult I may say to conceive of a flat currugated sheet of iron—then it is not subject to duty, but if it is shaped in any way or made suitable for the farmer it is subject to duty. I would point out to the Minister that this is rather an extraordinary situation. We are anxious, as I said, to help our basic industry, agriculture, and here we are penalising agriculture. Where are all our agriculturists?
There are quite a number of idle men and idle firms in this country, quite competent and quite willing to put the bend in corrugated iron that Deputy Good talks of.
How many men will we have operating on the bending of corrugated iron?
I have no idea.
Would the Minister say how much this corrugating, bending or twisting is going to cost the farmer?
It will cost no more to get it done in this country than it costs at present to get it done in England.
Are you sure?
Quite sure.
Why is it not being done?
What evidence can the Minister produce to show that there are firms in Ireland ready to do that work? Have they the machinery to do it? I know that some of them have done a little hand-rolling in local plants, but are they doing it in any quantity? Has the Minister any idea of the hardship that this will inflict on the agricultural community, whose shelter, in many cases for themselves, and certainly for their cattle, is largely corrugated iron? The galvanising does not matter according to the Minister, but apparently the corrugating does.
The bending; not the corrugating.
It is the flat sheet coming in galvanised. Is the sheet to be curved for use as a roof? I know how it is going to be interpreted at the ports, and I think the Minister has not adverted to what the thing means. Are the flat corrugated sheets subject to tax?
The flat sheet of corrugated iron is not subject to tax.
I think if the Minister refers to the corrugated sheet as straight or bent, we will get over the difficulty.
That is the distinction? They make a distinction between straight and bent. I do not believe it, and I would ask the Minister to get further advice, because this is rather important. The Minister has inadvertently given a wrong definition as to the meaning of this. I am certain that it means flat, as well as bent, sheets provided they are corrugated. I want to know if representations have been made by anybody connected with the trade, and what representations, if any, have been made. Have representations been put up by some of our scrap merchants who hold considerable stocks of second-hand corrugated iron? We know that some of them have been busy around this House for the last eight or ten years, and we have seen them recently, and within the last month or two.
I do not even know the people to whom the Deputy is referring.
You are the only one in Dublin who does not know. We see second-hand galvanised sheets advertised in every paper in the Provinces. Every local paper has been boosting these advertisements for the last three or four months—huge stocks of second-hand corrugated iron are in hand, and I would like to know why the Minister took this line. Was it on the advice of a prospective or existing manufacturer? I do not know whether I can use the word "manufacturer," or whether I should say "assembler," but they are something between the two— a "corrugator."
Or a "bender."
Were representations made by any Irish "corrugator" or by the second-hand merchants? Next to the phosphates tariff, this tariff will hit the small farmer most severely, because he is the man who can least afford to put up expensive shedding. It is very seldom used in my county for roofing dwelling-houses, but I was amazed at the number of galvanised-iron roofs I saw in County Kildare during the elections. This would apply to another county as well, but it applies particularly to Co. Kildare. It seemed to me that almost 50 per cent. of the small farmers' and labourers' houses, not built under district council schemes, were all roofed with corrugated iron. There cannot be any getting away from the fact that, after the phosphates tax, this is one of the taxes that are going to lean most heavily on the agricultural community, and I would like to know what the Minister's justification for it is. In the case of the phosphates, it could be said that there was an existing industry, but what case can the Minister put up for this?
I find it scarcely credible that the Minister has deliberately put a duty on curved galvanised iron in order to promote the industry of bending iron in this country. I have viewed the tariff procedure with forbearance, and with what I thought to be a helpful spirit, but, if the Oireachtas of the Irish Free State is to enact legislation in order to promote the business of bending iron in this country, I think it is really carrying things to extremes.
There are more things done with the iron than the actual bending.
What are they?
When corrugated iron is used as a fence, there are spikes cut on the top of it.
That is done here.
Of course, it is.
And it is never imported in that condition.
Indeed, it is.
I think the Minister will agree that to introduce a Financial Resolution for the purpose of promoting the industry of bending and spiking iron is merely something approaching extravagance. I would ask the Minister to consider another aspect of the situation. I do not know whether he is aware of the uses to which this iron is put on agricultural holdings. The old-fashioned type of hayshed was a hayshed erected on wooden beams, with a sloping roof, and a galvanised coping on top, and it was the universal experience of everyone advising the agricultural community that that was not the best form of shed for the purposes for which these sheds are usually used, and that the most effective shed was the shed built of steel girders with a curved roof. It took a great deal of propaganda to prevail on the people to change over to the better method, and there was a great deal of conservative feeling all through the country, or certain parts of the country, in favour of the old hayshed structure. Surely the Minister must realise that for what I cannot describe as anything but the almost absurd proposal of promoting a bending and spiking industry here, he should not seriously jeopardise a work, to which the Department of Agriculture attaches considerable importance.
It might not seem at first glance that the question of the sheds or the structure of the sheds was a matter of any importance, but anyone who has experience of the country knows that by far the most economical and most enduring structure was that in which the curved sheet with the steel framework was employed. I can quite see that as occasion demands certain impositions have to be put on in order to serve useful purposes. There are useful purposes to be served by doing the second best thing if it means a great advantage to another section of the community. I respectfully submit to the Minister however that he cannot possibly persuade himself that any useful purpose is to be served by the industry he proposes to promote in this connection, and that if he consults the Minister for Agriculture I hope he will hear from him a report more favourable to free trade in iron than he heard in regard to free trade in superphosphate of lime.
I quite see the position of the Government in regard to tariffs, but I do think that the Minister for Agriculture might go further than apparently he deems it his duty at present to go in advising the Minister for Industry and Commerce that there are two sections well defined in our community. One is the section primarily devoted to agriculture and the other to industry, and while the agricultural community are prepared to go a long way to help the fortification of the position held by our industrial population, it is only creating ill-will and unnecessary difficulties to lay burdens upon them and to put annoyances and trouble in their way unless some invaluable purpose is to be served. This proposal, and the proposal with regard to compound manures, is creating and will create bitter feeling throughout the agricultural community in this country against the tariffs and, so far as I can see, I believe the feeling of the people with regard to this particular type of tariff is a legitimate feeling and one that I will do everything I possibly can to stir up and mobilise because by the operation of these tariffs they will be unnecessarily harried. I respectfully submit to the Minister for Industry and Commerce that, before he puts it forward to the next stage, he should further consult the Minister for Agriculture and ask him to get in touch with the ordinary farmers in the country and ask them what measure of sacrifices the imposition of these tariffs will require from them, and then let him balance in his mind whether the advantages he envisages are anything to compare with the annoyances and inconvenience which will be caused to the agricultural community.
I think the whole question of this duty on corrugated, galvanised, iron really resolves itself into comparative prices as between what a sheet will cost before this duty is levied and after it is levied. I do not know what that would be exactly, but I do know this, that I have been in receipt of a large volume of correspondence from farmers about this duty and also from an association which is very much interested in the tillage farmers on the same question. Deputy Gorey spoke about the amount of this corrugated iron that is used in Kildare, and I think it is quite patent to anyone passing through the county, particularly the southern part of it, that every farmer uses it for shedding purposes and in many cases for more than shedding. For that reason I would like the Minister to give this very urgent consideration. I know that the iron can be rolled in this country—or bent—I do not know what the correct term is.
A Deputy
Curved.
Curved then. I know that it can be done not very far indeed from the town I come from, but the real question is, what is it going to mean to the purchasing power of the farmer and what difference it will make from the point of view of the small amount of employment to be given and as regards the question of prices. I ask the Minister to do as Deputy Dillon has suggested, as the Minister for Agriculture might be able to give him information on it.
Surely it is open to the critics of this tariff to give us a little more information in support of their objections. How many times in a farmer's lifetime does he purchase galvanised iron? He does not erect out-offices or re-roof his dwelling-house every day in the week. Is it not the case that the average small farmer only buys galvanised iron about once or twice in his life?
He need not buy it at all if he has to wear a hair shirt.
He has got to pay a certain theoretical difference between the cost of getting it rolled in another country and the cost of getting it rolled or curved in this country. Nobody has even attempted to estimate what that cost will be. It is not alleged that there will be great inconvenience attached to it.
A Deputy
It is indeed.
I take it that there are people in this country who are prepared to do that curving. There will be no inconveience then attached to the obtaining of this galvanised iron in a curved state. The whole question is one of cost. A man roofs his outhouses once, say, in ten or twelve years and Deputy Dillon tells us that he regards the imposition of this tariff as so serious a matter that he is actually going to mobilise the farmers against all the tariffs.
On a point of correction, sir, I think you will remember that I said nothing of the kind. I said that I would mobilise them against certain of the tariffs, particularly those on compound manures and on this iron. I said no such thing as has been suggested.
Well, without attempting to define what the grievance will be to any farmers either with ten, twenty or fifty acres, Deputy Dillon emphasises again and again how seriously he regards this tariff. Surely the critics of a tariff ought to have more responsibility than that. If they are going to ask for the general support of the House, they ought to give us some little fact to encourage our support. Could not they tell us what the difference will be in getting the galvanised iron curved in Dublin and getting it curved in Birmingham, Liverpool, or anywhere else. Personally, I have no idea what the difference is and I do not think that the fifteen per cent. or ten per cent.—or whatever it is— tariff is going to make such an increase in price as will matter even 10/- to any average farmer in ten years and I ask Deputy Dillon now to give us some facts to disprove that.
Can I ask Deputy Moore to tell us how many will be employed as a result of this tariff? I would like some information as to how many firms in this country are engaged in the work of rolling or curving iron? How many hands are employed by these firms and also how much of the galvanised corrugated iron used in this country is imported first of all in the form of flat sheets? I mean what percentage of the galvanised corrugated iron used by farmers and imported into this country in the form of flat sheets is worked into galvanised corrugated iron here in the country itself?
I quite agree with Deputy Dillon that this tariff will undoubtedly impose additional hardship on farmers and particularly on the small farmers in the west of Ireland. Just take one instance alone. For the last few years quite a big number of haysheds have been erected all over the country. These haysheds are a wonderful convenience to the farmers. They save labour. They help to reduce overhead charges and, incidentally, they make it possible for the farmer to put in his hay whenever it is most convenient for him to do so, and, to a certain extent, regardless of weather conditions.
During the last three years particularly the number of haysheds erected by farmers has increased enormously, and year by year the number of haysheds erected is increasing. Not only is it in connection with the erection of haysheds that this tariff is going to mean an additional imposition on the farmers, but also in regard to the erection of other out-offices. Every farmer, particularly the small tillage farmer, is increasing, every few years at all events, the number of his outhouses. He has got to do that if he is a practical type of farmer at all. This tax again will be an imposition on that type of small farmer. It will be an imposition particularly on the keen, progressive type of small tillage farmer, the man who is farming in an up-to-date way, the man who is endeavouring to make his farm pay, the man who is endeavouring to provide the outhouse accommodation he requires for the purposes of his stock and so on. This tax, taken in conjunction with the other tariffs, the tariff, for instance, on vehicles, the tariff on superphosphates, the tariffs imposed on a number of other articles quite recently by the present Government, will make it almost impossible for any of the small farmers of this country to make any profit whatever out of their business.
I wonder does the Minister realise at what a small margin of profit many farmers are carrying on at the present time. Very few of them are making any profit, and even the most trifling imposition of this kind will add to their burden and will probably wipe out altogether the small margin of profit they are making. If the Government continue to impose tariffs of this description on articles of primary importance, from the farmers' point of view, then I say it is inevitable that the Government instead of helping the farmers will succeed in submerging the farmers and the farming industry in this country altogether.
This tax on galvanised iron will be a definite set-back to the erection of out-offices. It will be a very definite set-back to the erection of haysheds. The erection of haysheds has been encouraged by the Department of Agriculture in years past. In some cases the farmers have been financially assisted by the Department of Agriculture in erecting haysheds. In many cases officials of the Department have actually facilitated farmers in getting supplies of corrugated iron for the erection of haysheds. This tariff will put a stop to operations of that kind and will inflict very serious hardship on farmers, particularly the small farmers.
I am not yet quite clear as to what this particular tariff refers. In the Schedule it is described as galvanised corrugated iron or steel. The Minister says it does not refer to galvanised corrugated iron, but that it applies to certain iron, twisted and bent.
The Schedule does not say that at all.
The Schedule says corrugated iron or steel, excluding unworked flat sheets, but it says galvanised corrugated iron or steel. I do not mind what is excluded. The items that are not excluded are those with which I am concerned. It says that corrugated iron and steel are subject to a 10 per cent. duty. The Minister interprets the Schedule as that it does not mean galvanised corrugated iron or steel, but in my limited capability of interpreting the English language, I prefer to read it as it is printed and it certainly says that galvanised corrugated iron and steel are subject to the tariff. What will be excluded afterwards will depend on this debate, and I hope it will result in excluding galvanised corrugated iron in so far as, it refers to its use by the farmers.
Deputy Moore taunted us with failing to recognise what the cost of the tariff will be. It will cost us 10 or 15 percent. beyond what corrugated iron, twisted or bent or otherwise manipulated according as the Minister thinks, is costing us at the moment. It will cost us 15 per cent. more than the price of that article, which I cannot define, is costing us at the present moment. It will cost the ordinary farmer an addition of that 10 per cent. for that bent, twisted or otherwise deformed corrugated iron, because our experience of tariffs is that not only is the 10 or 15 per cent. imposed by the tariff added to the cost of the article, but there is generally a little bit more added in the retailers' manipulation of the figures. It will certainly cost us that. Deputy Moore taunted us with the fact that we did not use corrugated iron very often. If Deputy Moore likes to take a holiday for five or six months and goes amongst the small farmers in nine or ten counties, he will find that there is scarcely a week in which the farmer does not use this corrugated iron for some purpose or other. If Deputy Moore wishes I will describe the different purposes for which it is used but it would take me rather a long time. It is used in numerous ways besides those already referred to such as the erection of piggeries or houses.
I have spent nearly half my life on a farm and I know all about it.
It is going to raise the cost of this material by 10 or 15 per cent. beyond yea or nay. Notwithstanding what the Minister will explain to us afterwards on the particular form of iron which I cannot define according to the Schedule, some form of corrugated iron, twisted or bent according to the definition of the Revenue Commissioners—and they are very good at defining articles—will bear the tax. They will define corrugated iron, bent or twisted or distorted to any conceivable form, as being subject to a tariff of 10 or 15 per cent. I think that this tariff, in addition to the tariff on phosphates which Deputy Dillon mentioned and all the other tariffs imposed on him, will so twist and bend and galvanise the unfortunate farmer——
And corrugate him.
——that the little sprats thrown to him in the way of the £250,000 for the relief of the rates and the Butter Bill, which does not cost the Government anything, will be of little use to him. He will be so twisted and bent by the various items and the various regulations that he will be one of the number of people who, the Minister said, were necessary casualties if the policy of the Government was to be continued. I am very much afraid that the farmer as a result of this legislation will be one of the first on the casualty list if the Minister does not offer some help, and I hope he will not only offer some help but that he will exempt the farmers from the operation of this Schedule. I leave the industrialists to fight their own battles. Deputy Good stated that we were silent when they were penalised. If the Minister will consent to exclude farmers from this tariff I will let Deputy Good and the other industrialists fight their own battles.
Did Deputy Bennett ever know of a farmer who remembered the price of galvanised iron from one purchase to another?
Indeed, I did.
I would like to know from the Minister the number of people to whom this proposal will give employment?
Hear, hear.
I consider this fomented agitation on the part of Deputies opposite rather curious. I was rather amused at the Deputies who spoke. They were responsible for passing the treble annuity system— compensation for tenant rights, compensation for landlord rights and compensation for disturbance. The only thing they were united on was clapping that system on the unfortunate tenants. I was rather amused to hear these Deputies so vocal now. We all know that the position of the farmers is very bad—it is practically desperate. We all know the cause of it. We need not go very far to find a cause; we need only go to the Judicial Commissioners' Court. The reason I am looking for this information is that practically every firm of any repute bends galvanised iron.
What?
If Deputy O'Neill will come with me when he is in Cork I will show him the process being worked. This Resolution will not apply to the houses in County Kildare about which Deputy Gorey spoke. I know a large number of farmers' houses where corrugated iron was put over the thatch. This duty does not apply to such cases at all.
That is a lie.
The Deputy should withdraw that expression.
I withdraw it. With the best intentions the Minister is wrong: he has misled the House.
I asked Deputy Gorey to read the resolution.
Read it for us. You will interpret it better than the Minister.
The Deputy is very dull.
Will the Deputy—
Sit down, you know nothing about it.
More than you do.
A large number of farmers are using the bent corrugated iron for out-offices and haysheds. They find it a great saving in timber for roofing. They use two wall-plates and put the iron on them. Bent corrugated iron is used three times as much now as it was five or six years ago. I should like to know what extra employment will be given as a result of this proposal, and what quantity of iron is coming in in a bent state. As far as I know every firm of any standing that is selling corrugated iron is bending the iron in its establishment. I invite Deputies to come with me to see the work being done. I consider this agitation to be fomented. I absolve Deputies who were not here before the last election, and who are not responsible for the 37 or 40 blisters that were placed on farmers by previous Acts. Deputy Bennett was silent when the Acts that caused these blisters were put on the farmers, and he walked very kindly into the Lobby after the Parliamentary Secretary for Lands and Fisheries in order that every extra ounce of loot that could be extracted from the unfortunate farmers was extracted from them and handed over to the landlords. The Deputy was very favourable to the Parliamentary Secretary of those days. I consider that this tariff represents very little seeing that practically every firm dealing in a big way in corrugated iron are bending it themselves. I should like if the Minister would state what quantity of corrugated iron comes in in the ordinary state and what quantity in the bent state.
And how much dearer it is.
Fifteen per cent. added
The fifteen per cent. will give extra employment to people who are now in receipt of home assistance. I do not believe in Deputy Gorey's dictum that it is all very well for me to grow crops to sell to unemployed people, and that it is good enough for these labourers to buy my produce out of 8s. weekly home assistance that they get for the support of their wives and children. I believe if we could provide employment for our people by preventing imports we should do so. I am with the Minister in that. I would ask the Minister to let the House know the amount of corrugated iron that comes in in a bent state and to state whether the prevention of such imports will give employment to our people and how many extra hands will be employed.
I have a certain amount of sympathy with the Minister in dealing with a matter of this kind. Many of us appreciate the desire of the Minister to give employment. But may I say, as one who has some little knowledge of the subject, that the bending of corrugated iron is a very simple process, done with a very simple machine and that it gives only a very small amount of employment? The difficulty that I see in connection with this particular tariff is this: that corrugated iron is not manufactured in this country, and it is not likely to be manufactured here. Corrugated iron is imported through certain centres and it goes through certain routes, in many cases through direct routes from certain towns and cities on the other side, where it is manufactured. This particular tariff will upset that. In other words, the corrugated iron will have to go from the port where it comes in to the rolling mills to be bent, it will have to be carted to the rolling mills, and having been bent there, it will have to be carted back to the railway station, and then sent to its destination. That is to say, the cartage and the cost of delivery will be inflated very considerably. It is not the bending process that is going to cost so much at all, but it is the difficulty that is going to be created and the expense that this particular bending is going to be. I do not know whether that particular point was clear to the Minister or not. But there is another point that I should like to make clear to the Minister. It is that I am quite satisfied that 90 per cent. of the bent, corrugated iron coming into this country is used by farmers; and the extraordinary thing is that, under this particular tariff, this is the only item of corrugated iron that is going to be tariffed. I want to be fairminded, I want to be helpful, that is always my desire; and what I want to make clear is this: that, as regards this particular item, 90 per cent. of it is used by the farmers and that that is the only commodity in connection with imported corrugated iron that is tariffed. It does seem to me, knowing something of the position of the agricultural community at the moment, that it is an unfair tariff, an unfair burden; and I am sure that when the Minister comes to look into it he will find that the amount of additional employment that will be created by the rolling and bending of corrugated iron will be infinitesimal in comparison with the amount of trouble, worry and additional expense that will have to be borne by the farmers.
It is with a view to amending the wording of this Resolution, that I rise. The wording here is: "Galvanised corrugated iron." If the Minister is serious on the distinction that he has made——
"Galvanised corrugated iron or steel, excluding unworked sheets of such iron."
I know what you mean. I have a clearer idea of this than the Minister seems to have. If the Minister puts in the words "galvanised bent or curved corrugated iron," I am satisfied. If he does not, then the provision will apply to every kind, straight or curved. Whoever advised the Minister included straight as well as curved iron. If we cannot argue it on the basis that it will be bent or curved sheets of corrugated iron, we cannot argue it at all— unless the Minister agrees to put in that. Will the Minister agree to that?
I think the Deputy is reading from the first copy of the Resolution. In the second copy the matter is much clearer.
I want to know what it means.
"Galvanised corrugated iron or steel, excluding unworked flat sheets of such iron."
I hope that is right. When Deputy Moore rises in this House he always takes up the attitude of a student. He is always looking for information from somebody, generally from the Opposition, he never looks for information from his own side of the House, and he never seems to know anything about the matter himself. I wonder has he any idea of the life of galvanised iron in the different localities in the country. Has he any idea of the life of galvanised iron in Dublin or in any other city? Has he any idea of the life of galvanised iron around our coast where the salt breezes play on it, as compared with its life in the inland towns? Does he know anything about that? Does the Minister know anything about that? He wants to know how long it will be before the corrugated iron will have to be replaced, how often it will have to be replaced. If he would tell me the particular locality that he has in mind I can tell him to within a few years the life of it.
For the last half dozen winters the necessity of shelter for stock has been more apparent than it ever was before, and farmers who have had the experience of three or four winters have been forced to the idea—I have heard several farmers speaking about it— that if they are going to keep their stock, they will have to put up additional winter shedding. What is the effect of this tariff on them? It is going to deteriorate our stock, it is going to prevent farmers from putting up any shelter, and this at a time when cattle are undoubtedly cheaper than they were four or five years ago. These are serious considerations. Galvanised iron is used extensively in the country. If the Minister's intention is right, it relieves the situation, to an extent. If the straight sheet is on a different basis to the curved sheet, this relieves the situation to a very considerable extent, but the difference in price between the straight corrugated sheet and the curved sheet is so little that this tariff of 10 or 15 per cent. is very little short of robbery, having regard to the difference in price. The charge is not justified at all by the labour required.
Let us get at it from another angle. Perhaps the Minister can tell us what is the value of the annual imports of corrugated iron. The Minister has the figures. He has a Department to get them for him, and it is information that we should have also. We should also have the difference in value of the imports of the curved sheet and and the straight sheet. Another reason why corrugated iron is so popular in the country is that it does not require tradesmen to put it up. It is easy to erect, and it may be handled by the people themselves, who could not afford to pay fancy prices for labour, who certainly could not afford to pay 1/2d an hour for having it put up. Because it is popular it will be always used in preference to some of the heavier materials. I do not see any prospect of an alternative in this country either in the manufacture of corrugated iron, asbestos, or any other material for roofing to take its place, and the tariff is simply a burden on the agricultural community without any resulting benefit.
Deputy Moore informed us in the course of this debate that he spent half his life on a farm. And he gave us the full fruits of that half life experience, and told us that a farmer who purchased galvanised corrugated iron did not remember from one purchase to another the price that he had paid for it. If the Deputy was at the other end of the transaction he would know that not only did the farmer remember the price of it but that he offered a few pence or a few shillings less than at the previous purchase before getting back to bedrock again. The serious matter in this is the definition that has been used, and it will certainly bear looking into. The phrase is "galvanised corrugated iron or steel, excluding unworked flat sheets of such iron." The words "or steel" are part of the definition. The words "or steel" do not come into the exclusion part. I wonder why. I do not know that the addition or the exclusion matters much. But I do think that this is going to be a matter of considerable difficulty for any Customs officer to interpret, according to the views set out here. He will find before him the phrase "excluding unworked flat sheets of such iron." The Minister stressed the phrase "such iron" as bringing in the phrase "galvanised corrugated." But even so, there is such a contradiction that the Customs officer is bound to decide for the narrower and more rigid interpretation. He will be faced with the phrase "excluding unworked flat sheets of such iron." As regards the word "flat" we might be able to get the definition made clear, that a sheet of iron is flat if it has no other shaping than the corrugative. But that could be precisely stated. The Officer of Customs has that other phrase to add to his difficulties—"unworked." Surely he has got to take the interpretation that it is a sheet, that it will eventually be a galvanised corrugated iron piece of work. But at the time that he gets it, it is unworked inasmuch as it is neither corrugated nor galvanised.
At any rate I suggest that there is a possibility that the definition might then be too wide and that it might bring in things not intended—say sheets of iron that have not been subjected to other processes than galvanising. That is certainly not the intention of the phrase we have here. The material, apart from the definition as to the cost of the goods, is the only test in the end. The cost includes more than the price which has been increased on the article itself by reason of the operation which it is intended to have done in the country because of the tariff. The cost here of the actual operation of bending or shaping these sheets may not be very much but the inconvenience and the trouble that may be caused by the rehandling and the stoppage of direct deliveries will also add to the final cost, whatever that may be. All these extra costs and inconveniences in the charges for rehandling have all to be worked out against whatever the estimate is as to the number of men to be put in employment or added to the number already in employment. What that number may be I do not know. I look upon this as a supreme test of the optimism of the Minister. I do not think the figures will help him. The imports of corrugated iron in the year may run to about £200,000 but I do not know that there has been any segregation of that made on any proper basis as between corrugated iron which has been bent and corrugated iron which has been brought in in the flat unworked state. Some estimate of that has to be given before we can form any proper estimate of the tariff. The wording has to be looked to if we are to have the full intention of the Minister carried out.
The wording in my opinion clearly expresses the intention we had. I do not anticipate that any interpretation will be put upon it by the Revenue Commissioners other than that which we meant to imply. The intention is clearly that the sheet of galvanised corrugated iron which has been worked or fabricated for use in any way is subject to duty. If that has not been worked or fabricated for use then it is free of duty. It is not possible to give the figures relating to the import of galvanised corrugated iron whether flat sheets or fabricated iron. The import figure relates only to galvanised plates and sheets. That includes not merely corrugated sheets but also uncorrugated sheets. It is not possible to give anything like an estimate of the amount of employment that is going to be given through this tariff. And that is so for a number of reasons. One is that we have no precise information as to the annual requirements of the country in this case, secondly, because the firms that engage in this work also engage in other work. The employment given directly might, and in our opinion possibly will, be supplemented by the fact that the bringing of the work to these firms will also lead to bringing them other orders that might not have been available to them if the work had not to be done here.
It is, if I may say so in parentheses, rather a remarkable fact that since the imposition of certain duties, firms have become aware of the work that can be done in certain factories here; they have become aware of the facilities that are available for getting the work done. Even where there is no duty, the fact of getting the work done here has meant a considerable increase of orders to Irish firms even in the case of goods not subject to the duty at all and this merely because the imposition of these duties has focussed attention upon the industrial resources of the country. A rather remarkable instance of that has been brought to my notice. This is not going to mean any extra cost to the farmers and neither is it going to mean any extra inconvenience to the farmers. It will only mean that when a merchant is ordering a rolled sheet or anybody is proposing to erect a building, he is going to get the corrugated iron from the Irish merchant and have the fabrication and rolling done here. It can be done here, as has been pointed out by a number of Deputies. It is quite a simple process. That is why I was at a loss to understand Deputy Dillon. He started off by saying that this duty was of little importance to the Department of Finance and then he proceeded to say that it was an extravagant duty. In one place he said that it was not worth the printing of the forms in the green paper and he ended by saying that it was so oppressive that the farmers of Roscommon were marching on Dublin.
I drew the attention of the Minister to the fact that the amount of employment it will give is negligible, that the amount of revenue it will give is small, but that the inconvenience it causes is quite out of proportion. I could not reasonably expect the Minister to understand my arguments as he is not an agriculturist. It is the annoyance to the farmer I was referring to.
If the small farmer in the country is buying corrugated iron he will go to the merchant in the small towns and it is the merchant in the small towns and not the small farmer in the country who will be annoyed. The Irish merchant is to have the rolling done here rather than have the rolling done in England. I must say that I cannot feel any deep regret that the Irish merchant will be annoyed because of that.
The Minister will not get much sympathy in the country for that viewpoint.
It is rather interesting to find this rapidly developing interest for the small farmer.
For the farmers.
It is quite a new development and I wish it every possible success in its development.
It is going to develop certainly.
Yes, the electoral needs of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party will cause it to flourish quite rapidly. Deputies opposite will bear in mind that the small farmer will feel offended if he is going to be held up here as the bogey to prevent anything being done in the direction of helping to solve unemployment. The fact that the small farmers to the extent of 75 per cent. or more voted for the policy which we are now putting into operation; the fact that the small farmer can see benefits in this policy that we are putting into operation is an answer to what the Deputies on the other side have been saying. It is not the fault of the Deputies that they are unable to understand a reasonable viewpoint like that. It is a natural handicap on them. When we raise the prosperity of any one class in the community we are rendering assistance to every class because the prosperity of one class means benefit for all.
I ask the Minister to go down and make that speech to the employees of Gallaher's factory.
Is there not an omission in the description in the Schedule? Should the Minister not have added the words "of such iron or steel"?
I am informed that although it is called galvanized iron it is in fact galvanized steel. That is why that amendment was suggested to me. It certainly does appear to me that the words "iron or steel" should be put in twice.
With regard to Reference No. 31, I would like, on the question of pipes, to direct attention to what seems to me to be a curious form of wording:—"Pipes made wholly or mainly of wood and designed or intended for use in smoking tobacco or other substances." What are the other substances that the Minister believes the people of this country are smoking and that he must put a tax on pipes to keep out? I would also like to know from the Minister whether there are any very cheap wooden pipes made in this country. I mean the type of pipe which the ordinary workingman smokes, wooden pipes costing 6d. or 1/-. I am perfectly aware that Kapp & Peterson make very good pipes of a higher grade, but I am not aware that they put upon the market any pipe at a small figure like 6d. or 1/- which the ordinary workingman or the ordinary small farmers smoke.
One fault in this proposal is the exclusion of the chalk pipe. Chalk pipes are still made in this country.
How many are imported? What imports are there of clay pipes?
There are a considerable number used, especially in the West of Ireland.
I can assure the Deputy that there are no clay pipes now used there.
Indeed there are. Lately I went through the only factory in Ireland making clay pipes and the proprietress informed me that clay pipes made in Scotland are imported into the West of Ireland and she is unable to compete with them for the reason that the clay from which the pipes are made comes from Scotland. The Scottish manufacturers get the clay on the spot and they are able to send the ready-made article here at a price with which this lady is unable to compete. The clay pipe is still used in many country places and at one time the manufacture of it gave employment to considerable numbers. In this factory I inspected the other day upwards of 20 or 30 people were constantly employed at one time. These people are still in the locality. I saw some of them making pipes. If they were given an opportunity of holding their own against the Scottish importers it would be a good idea. It would do no harm. The pipes would be sold at the same price and we would have the satisfaction of smoking home-made ones.
I suggest that the Minister should consult with his medical colleagues on the subject of certain pipes. There is a general belief that one of the causes of cancer is the smoking of clay pipes. The Minister might think it wise to investigate that.
I think that is briar pipe manufacturers' propaganda.
Possibly, but it might be worth investigating.
What is the import value of pipes in any of the years past? I think it is so small that it is included somewhere under the miscellaneous group.
The import value was £10,000.
Has there been any segregation made, indicating whether the pipes were clay pipes or briar pipes?
The figure I gave refers to briar pipes.
I believe the only people who purchased clay pipes within recent years were unfortunate tourists, who came here and looked upon them as characteristic of the country and took them away for that reason. That represents the bulk of sales of clay pipes. There are numbers of clay pipes used by young people for blowing bubbles. If there was propaganda on the part of the briar pipe manufacturers it was successful propaganda and, in my opinion, it is a good job that the clay pipe has gone out. I want to know if the imports do not mainly consist of very superior pipes, presentation sets, and things like that. I believe that is the type of article that is most imported. The other type of pipe that is imported is very definitely the absolutely cheap pipe which certain people buy. Apart from the presentation sets, upon which one does not mind a tax being put, there is definitely a very cheap pipe imported.
With regard to the wording in the Schedule—"or other substances"—surely the Minister is not suggesting that we are becoming addicted to the habit of smoking hashish?
The necessity for putting in the words "or other substances" arises out of the word "designed." The Revenue Commissioners said it would be possible to evade duty because someone could say: "This pipe may look like one in which to smoke tobacco, but I intend to smoke brown paper in it" or something of that sort. We do not anticipate that there will be any considerable smoking of substances other than tobacco. Nevertheless, it is contended that the words are necessary.
Is this to be interpreted subjectively instead of objectively?
The words in the Schedule are "designed or intended." There are two firms engaged in the manufacture of briar pipes in this country. One firm has a very substantial export trade; about 75 per cent. of its products are or have been exported. It is incorrect that the imports are represented by either very expensive or very cheap grades. It is true there is a very cheap grade of briar pipe imported that is not likely to be made here. If there was any medical reason for the disappearance of the clay pipe. I think a medical man would say there is equally good reason for the disappearance of the very cheap wood pipe which is imported. There is a factory in Dublin engaged in the manufacture of cheap pipes.
The greater part of our imports in pipes is represented by those of medium grade similar to the products of factories here. One of the factories has been subjected to very intensive competition recently and, in fact, the number of people employed has diminished. It is anticipated that this duty, although small, will help it to regain its old position and to ensure that some increase in employment in the industry will be afforded. There is a considerable amount of skill required in the manufacture of a good pipe. We have the skilled workers here, skilled workers with an international reputation, and it is hoped by this duty that we will be able to save them from unemployment.
I know the West of Ireland better than Deputy Goulding because I spent my whole life there and I am aware that clay pipes have entirely gone out of fashion. When I was a boy clay pipes were very extensively smoked, but during the last ten years I do not think I saw one. They have completely and entirely gone out of use in the West. The Minister said the danger of disease would come through cheap briar pipes the same as through clay pipes. That is not so. It is alleged by certain medical opinion that the smoking of clay pipes brought cancer of the lip. Cancer of the lip was very prevalent amongst the smokers of clay pipes. It was the contact of the clay with the lip which was supposed to bring on cancer and, I believe, did bring it on in many cases. That would not apply at all, of course, to the cheap briar pipe. If the cheap briar pipes are not being manufactured here, as I take it from the Minister they are not —
They are.
Who manufactures them?
All the firms now in this industry are manufacturing a cheap briar pipe.
A Deputy
What is a cheap pipe?
A pipe retailed at about 1/- in the shops.
Who retails them? I do not know of any cheap Irish-made pipe except a pipe with a hopeless flaw which is filled up with putty and would be valueless. I ask the Minister to inquire further into the matter, and see if he could not exempt pipes retailed at 1/- from this tax.
From what I know of the process of pipe manufacture, blocks of wood are imported from Greece, or wherever the wood is grown. These are carved into pipe heads. It is not until the pipe head has been actually produced that the manufacturer knows at what price he is going to sell the pipe. It may turn out to be a first-class quality, a second-class quality, or a low-grade head, and the value of the pipe ultimately produced varies accordingly. There is, however, another firm, besides the one which has an international reputation, engaged in the manufacture of pipes in Dublin which is producing cheap pipes and selling them as such.
I have never seen them.
Has the Minister considered that the diminution in the industry of pipe-making is largely due to the increase in cigarette smoking?
That is so.
As to the statement that the smoking of clay pipes is injurious to health, I should like to have that borne out by medical testimony.
I only put it as a question.
I have heard it frequently stated by medical men, but I do not put myself forward as an authority.
I never heard any authority express an opinion in connection with it. Apart from that, the fact is that clay pipes are still in use in the West of Ireland. The proprietress of this factory assured me that she had a considerable trade with the West of Ireland until she was cut out by Scottish importers. I think it would be only fair that the Minister should include clay pipes in this and give this factory a chance of keeping on the industry, small though it is. The people engaged in it are living in a very poor district, and were in constant employment before the Scottish importers cut them out. It is not too much to ask that clay pipes should be included.
To clear up the difference between Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney and the Deputy on the other side, I should like to say that, oddly enough, both of them are right. Clay pipes are not smoked in the West, but they are still used as a token of mourning. They are used on the occasion of funerals as a token of mourning. Oddly enough, the consumption is still substantial. I think there is a good deal to be said for Deputy Goulding's theory, that if there is any little business done in them, there is no reason why it should not be done here. The price of the commodity is so trifling in any circumstances that it is one of these tariffs on something used by the agricultural community which I would be prepared to support.
In support of Deputy Goulding's statement, I might say that in the county we represent clay pipes are sold in practically every small shop in the villages. I constantly see them smoked and yet I claim that we have no more cancer than any other county. The old people think that a clay pipe is the best pipe to smoke. They have been advised by doctors to smoke them and not to smoke wooden pipes.
I support Deputy Goulding's proposal. I should like to point out to him that in the County Cork we have ideal clay for making these pipes and that they need not go to Scotland for it. I suggest to the Minister that if, as he says, there is no great importation of these pipes, the tariff will not do any harm to the poor farmers about whom Deputy Dillon has so much concern. I suggest to the Minister that he should include clay pipes under this tariff, and if there is any employment to be given, let it be given at home.
There seems to be an impression in some quarters of the House that clay pipes are not generally smoked in this country. I know one part of the country pretty intimately and the clay pipe is in general use there. A good many people prefer it to the wooden or briar pipe. We are all accustomed to the person in the countryside who seasons his clay pipe and then, on a winter's day, he often breaks off a portion of the shank and converts it into what is called a jaw-warmer or a "dudeen." Deputy McGilligan thinks that clay pipes are simply sold as souvenirs to gullible tourists who will take them away under the impression that they have something redolent of the country when they are taking their departure from our midst. That is not so. Clay pipes are a general utility in the countryside, as I know it. I wish to support Deputy Goulding's plea, that as we have a factory turning out these pipes the Minister should extend the benefit of the protection to that industry. Prices, we are assured, will not be altered. As clay pipes are in general use in many parts of the country and cost so little, why should they not be manufactured at home and the employment given to our own people, even if we have only one factory? We have the protection for the consumer that the price will not be raised and it is very small. Even Deputy Dillon is with us in this. I hope he will pardon me when I say that I have some ironical feeling when I notice the solicitude for the agriculturist and the working farmer on the part of some people who are not engaged primarily in agriculture.
Does the Deputy refer to me, because he is quite mistaken if he does?
Do you derive your living primarily from agriculture?
Yes, and farming.
I am glad to hear that. As to clay pipes being a potential source of cancer, Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney said the clay pipe is falling into disuse in the West. I do not dispute that, because I have not the same knowledge as he has of the West. It is, however, generally known that, unfortunately, cancer is on the increase in the country. The use of the clay pipe, it is said, is decreasing, so that you cannot blame the clay pipe for the increase of cancer. My intention in intervening was to support Deputy Goulding's plea, that the clay pipes used in this country should be manufactured at home.
Do I understand the Minister agrees to include them?
I shall have the matter considered.
That will be an extension of the tariff.
It could not be done except by Resolution.
Item 32 deals with roof felting and felting substitutes and other like substances intended for use as roofing material. I would like to know from what source the demand for this duty comes. It seems to have some connection with No. 30.
None whatever.
Does it include asbestos roofing?
No.
We are assured by the Minister that it does not include asbestos, which is a substitute for slate. "Substances intended for use as roofing materials." It is very like a substitute. These Resolutions should have a specific definition. If it is not intended to include slates and asbestos roofing, it should be stated. I am afraid you will have confusion on this question of asbestos as soon as this Resolution becomes law. Again I ask is this a revenue Resolution or is it going to induce any activities here? Is it meant to handicap the importation of this class of material here in order to give Irish slates a better market?
These materials are manufactured in the country.
The Minister says they are manufactured in the country, but the only question I want to be clear about is that asbestos slates are not included.
They are not included.
I should like to assure Deputy Gorey——
I do not want any assurance.
I should like to assure him that in a very short time he can get these asbestos slates here. I want to make that clear to him. If he is satisfied with that reassurance, I am satisfied.
Can the Minister tell us whether canvas would come in under this heading, as we know canvas is used largely for tents and covering and is a substitute?
No.
There is a duty on it already.
No.
I think if it is intended to exclude it it should be mentioned. It is often used as a temporary roof covering just the same as felt is used as a temporary roof covering. There are other substitutes for felt that have asbestos in them as their basis. For instance, you have asbestos slates. Would they be used as a substitute? There is an ambiguity about the wording that one would like to see cleared up, because, while it may not be the intention of the Minister to regard these commodities as "substitutes" for felt, the Revenue Commissioners may take a different view. I think if it is not the intention to include these they ought to be specifically excluded.
I might draw the Minister's attention to the fact that there are asphalt preparations and that the number of these preparations is legion. The absence of a definition will leave the Revenue Commissioners in a very grave state of confusion.
I want it to be clearly understood that roof felting and felting substitutes and other like substances intended for use as roofing material are subject to duty definitely and clearly, but asbestos and canvas are neither roofing felts nor other like substances.
Does not the word "like" depend upon the word "felt"?
Yes.
Do I understand canvas is not tariffed?
That is so.
What about tarpaulin or linen?
That is a different matter.
Has the Minister no explanation with regard to this Item No. 32?
Roof felting and felting substitutes are manufactured in this country, and all we hope to do is to get the imports worth about £20,000 in felt stopped and the home product substituted.
Would rubberoid be a felt substitute?
I take it it would be.
I understood the Minister to say that in the definition of "roof felting and felting substances and other like substances intended for use as roofing material" you had to bring down to the word "like" the word "felt."
Yes.
And anything that is not of felt is not a like substance even though intended for roofs. The question as to rubberoid is as to whether it is a felt substance.
That is so.
Deputy Gorey might like to know that Messrs. Graves, Waterford, are extensive manufacturers of roof felting.
On Item 33, floor-covering, I notice that the exclusion is precise as far as oilcloth and linoleums go, and then we get one of those general phrases "substances of a nature kindred to oilcloth or linoleum." I would like to ask is it intended to exclude cork lino? There is such a thing as cork lino which is not really lino.
That would be excluded but rubber flooring would not.
This definition will have to be cleared up later in connection with the main things including carpets and rugs, but I want to ask about one or two main things. As far as I understand there was an importation of about one quarter of a million pounds of carpets and floor rugs, linoleums and oilcloths and things like that. Of that sum about £150,000 represented the carpets side and £100,000 the substitutes side. I do not know whether in this country there has been any development of the carpet industry. There are two of the luxury type but their business is mainly export or used to be. In recent years these carpets were getting more fashionable with people who can afford them. In the main it was an export business. What hope is there of having the carpet industry or the floor rug cloth industry extended in this country, and if it is to be extended, is it not rather going to be at the expense of the export which is at present the main part of that industry in the country?
For this year this duty is mainly intended for revenue purposes. It has a slight protective effect, but only slight. The two firms engaged in the manufacture of carpets and rugs here are mainly engaged in the manufacture of the better class goods. We have had certain enquiries and discussions going on as to the possible development of the industry at the other end. I would not like to say that we are clear that immediate progress will be made in the matter but the thing is being considered. However we decided on the imposition of the duty knowing that in a sense it would be mainly a revenue tax. We were not opposed to it as a revenue tax but the protective effect of it is of some value and it gives us scope to secure that if possible an industry will be developed in the production of these goods.
Can the Minister say whether ordinary matting — it is sometimes called cocoanut matting and at other times coir matting — would come within this particular item? It is a rough class of matting that is used very extensively, and so far as I know it is not manufactured here.
If the Deputy is referring to ordinary matting it is subject to duty.
Would rubber matting be subject to duty? It is extensively used now.
It applies to floor coverings, excluding oilcloth and substances of a similar nature.
Will the Minister say whether rubber flooring would be included?
Rubber flooring would be dutiable.
I am not quite clear about cork floor covering. Is that under the exclusion or is it not?
In my opinion it would be covered by the term "substances of a nature kindred to oilcloth or linoleum."
In the case of cocoanut matting you can run into a very serious position in connection with it. It can be used for floor covering, but it can be used for other purposes as well. It is used, for instance, to cover the ordinary spring board, and one would hardly call a spring board a floor. It is also used on golf tees and one would hardly call a golf tee a floor. I am anxious to know if cocoanut matting used for these purposes would be subject to duty, and how you can differentiate and know for what purpose it is being brought in?
I think the benefit of the doubt will have to be given in favour of its being imported for the purpose of covering floors. In connection with Reference No. 34 —"manufactured articles which are made wholly or mainly of brass, tin or lead," etc. — it may help to shorten discussion if I announce that it is intended to alter this duty to some extent. It is proposed, at any rate, to divide it into three parts. So far as lead is concerned, the duty will apply only to lead pipes and lead sheets.
And to lead pipes and to lead sheets only?
Yes. So far as tin is concerned, it will apply to a specified list of articles of tin, and in the case of brass goods it is proposed to prepare a list of the articles that are to be excluded. I had hoped to have an amendment ready for the Report Stage of the Resolutions, but owing to pressure of work in the draftsman's office it was not completed in time. This matter, however, will be dealt with in the Finance Bill. Arrangements are being made with the Revenue Commissioners by which the modifications will be brought into force at once so that no inconvenience will be caused. In any case, we are arranging for the publication as early as possible of the duty in the form in which we intend to apply it in the future, so that importers and merchants will know exactly where they stand. In the meantime, if duty should be collected it will become repayable on the making of the amendment. We also intend to take power in the Finance Bill to permit importation under licence, free of duty, of certain articles of these materials which are used by manufacturers in the process of manufacture. There are some articles of that nature, the importation of which is very small in quantity, and if a duty were to be collected on them it might be a considerable inconvenience to manufacturers. It is not possible to provide against every such possibility and to enumerate all these articles. Therefore, it is proposed to take this licence power which will enable us to secure that manufacturers will not be impeded by the holding up of small articles of brass, tin or lead required by them in the process of manufacture.
Is the Minister satisfied that in introducing his amendment in that form the interests respecting which I have put down an amendment will not be involved?
If the Deputy is referring to scientific instruments, the answer is "No." There, as in the case of brass, it is proposed to bring in a specified list of articles that are to be excluded.
It would, I suggest, be impossible to deal with the point that I raised in that way. Very many of them are only made to order as the occasion arises, and very often they are made completely of brass. I suggest to the Minister that he should consider some general proviso, somewhat on the lines of the one that he has just referred to dealing with other articles, allowing the Revenue Commissioners to admit articles of a type required for scientific, medical or surgical work either on licence or definitely excluding them from the tariff.
It is intended that surgical, scientific or optical appliances or apparatus will be excluded.
I think that making the publication the Minister has referred to is a better way of dealing with this than that outlined under Reference No. 34. The Minister has stated that lead sheets and lead pipes are dutiable. I would like to know if lead bends and lead traps are dutiable.
I take it that what the Deputy is referring to are types of pipes.
They are definite specified articles. I do not think that you could describe them as pipes, although a bend might be described as a pipe and a trap as a pipe. I would like to know into which category the Minister is putting the two items I refer to? Perhaps he would prefer not to answer at this stage.
I will look into the matter, but it is intended that lead pipes and lead sheets of all kinds will be subject to duty. In fact, there is not a very large importation of these things. They are mainly made here, but there is some importation of them which it is intended to stop.
[An Ceann Comhairle resumed the Chair.]
I take it that the Minister knows what a lead trap is? Is that intended to be dutiable?
I will look into that. I will have to be clear about it.
The reason I ask the question is because that article is not made in this country. In connection with tin, the Minister's proposal to enumerate certain articles is. I think, a good one. It is also proposed in the case of brass to enumerate certain things that are dutiable.
There was considerable difficulty in doing that in the case of brass. In fact the decision at the moment is that instead of enumerating the articles that are taxed we are going to take the reverse course: to enumerate the things that are not dutiable.
While that is satisfactory so far as lead and tin are concerned, I would press on the Minister not to abandon the idea of enumerating the list of brass articles. The number of brass articles made in this country is not very great, and as the House knows, brass enters into a variety of goods. It is present in all sorts of things, in articles in which the Minister would never guess it is used. It is used so extensively that it is not fully realised until the unfortunate importer gets up against the question. I hope the Minister will not abandon his idea of making a list of brass articles.
When the Minister is preparing his list of brass articles to be excluded I hope he will not forget the component parts of corsets and their suspenders. A great portion of these goods is made of brass. The Minister may not be aware of that. I am quite serious in putting forward this suggestion. We have a corset industry here — the Twilfit Corset industry — as the Minister is aware. As the law stands at present the component parts of corsets, brass or steel, are subject to duty, and I am quite sure that it was not the Minister's intention that they should be subject to duty. Therefore, when he is preparing his list excluding articles made of brass I hope he will include the articles I refer to — the component parts of which are of brass and steel.
In any case, there will be definite power to license in that case. That would be a minor article required by a manufacturer for the process of manufacture.
A Deputy has handed me this article for the information of the House. This is a portion of the corset to which I refer.
Where did the Deputy get that?
From the manufacturer, I presume. This corset industry is a big industry in which there are 200 employees, and it is certainly beyond a joke. Half of the component parts of corsets come under the heading of manufactured articles of brass and steel, and I am quite sure it is not the intention of the Minister to put a tariff on them. The textile parts are not dutiable, and I am sure the Minister will include the other parts in his list of articles that will not be subject to tax.
There is no duty on articles of steel at all. The duty applies only in the case of brass, tin and lead. However, it is intended to modify this duty in the way I have indicated, and I hope soon to be able to circulate the modified proposals to Deputies.
I take it that it will not be necessary to put down a specific amendment to exclude these articles, on the Finance Bill?
Might I join with Deputy Dockrell in suggesting to the Minister that he should adopt, in respect of brass, the course he proposes to adopt in respect of the other metals, for the simple reason that it is perfectly astonishing where brass will turn up in almost every trade, in all sorts of combinations, such as boot buttons, buckles, tags of laces, and in all sorts of odd places, which the Minister, I have no doubt, has no desire to bring within the scope of the tariff? If he segregates the particular products of the Irish brass industry, he can very easily schedule them and, at a later date, add to the Schedule, if it should become necessary, by special legislation.
Does the Minister propose to exclude from the duty what are known to the trade as leads and brasses in newspaper production?
Yes.
There is one important matter to which I would like to draw the Minister's attention. This tariff will cover machine parts. There are parts of machines which it is absolutely essential to get as quickly as possible, because a factory or workshop is held up until those parts are obtained, and it might mean the stoppage of some hundreds of workpeople. Some means will have to be found whereby these parts can be got through quickly. At present, what is done is that the manufacturer, who has all the models for these particular parts, sends them, in many cases, by passenger train, so as to expedite delivery, and what will now happen, under this proposal, is that they will be held up in the Customs, and we who are in business, know that once a matter gets into the hands of the Customs authorities, it takes some little time to get it out.
I have to deal, at the moment, with a number of commodities, and it may surprise the Minister to hear that some of these commodities, which are excluded from duty, are held up. That is the extraordinary position in which we find business at the moment. If a factory is not to be held up for want of some small minor items of brass work, in connection with machines, it will be necessary to devise some means of getting these parts through and avoiding this delay at the Customs. Some permit can be given, which can be accompanied by a docket, or something of that kind, whereby expedition will be ensured. in regard to obtaining these articles quickly, and avoiding a long stop or a stoppage of some days, which is very material to some of these factories. I would suggest to the Minister that attention might be given to that matter arising out of this particular tariff.
Would ordinary drawn brass wire be regarded as manufactured brass for the purpose of the duty?
No.
Might I ask the Minister if it is his intention to exclude from the duty manufactured tins?
No.
It has been put to me by one merchant that a tariff on these particular articles will have a very bad effect. As a matter of fact, it has been put to me, that he would have to go out of that line of business if the tariff was imposed. This particular merchant has, this year, given a number of these tins free to the farmers, for the purpose of establishing trade, and he informs me that if he is prohibited from buying the tins, he will not be able to carry on his business. I would ask the Minister to look into this application I make on behalf of this merchant and to see his way to remit this tax.
I received representations, on behalf of a merchant in Limerick, for the exclusion of ordinary tins required in the packing industry, and, in support of that application, it was stated that the manufactured tins could be imported cheaper than the raw materials. I had investigations made and I find that that is completely incorrect. There is a very large number of firms in this country engaged in industries which involve packing in tins of one kind and another, and, in the majority of cases, these firms engage in the manufacture of their own tins, and when I approached a number of those best competent to pronounce on the matter, with the statement that it was possible to import the manufactured tins cheaper than the raw material, they told me it was nonsense, and stated that, if that were so, they would not be making the tins themselves. They were all making their own tins, and they found it more economical to make them than to import them. In any case, there is a number of firms in the country engaged in the commercial manufacture of these tins, and there is no reason whatever why we should not be able to meet all our requirements in them. There are certain exclusions that must be made. There are one or two special types of tins required in particular industries, and we propose to take power to exclude these, but the ordinary commercial tin required for packing peas or vegetables or polishes or anything of that kind can be made here and made cheaper than they can be imported.
This particular merchant I have in mind informed me — and he is prepared to substantiate his statement by facts and figures — that he is in a position to buy the manufactured article cheaper than he could buy the raw material, and I would ask the Minister would he reconsider his attitude, if this man definitely proves his statements?
Undoubtedly. If he proves them, I will be very interested.
In the case of highly specialised patent machinery, of which about two-thirds of machinery parts are not brass, but which has a small attachment of brass, would it come under the duty?
No; the duty applies at present to articles wholly, or mainly, of brass, but I have mentioned that we propose to modify that duty to make sure that there will be no misunderstanding as to the articles we intend to make subject to the tax.
Previously, in connection with the wooden articles tariff, I raised a point about devotional objects, religious emblems and so on, and I think a promise was given that these would be released immediately, where they were held up in the customs.
I promised to look into the matter.
I want to find out whether it is proposed, in any of these lists that were to be furnished to us, to include such things as religious medals, such as those spoken of here, and certain additions to crucifixes and fonts, sometimes made of the metal described — is it proposed to have a comprehensive exclusion of religious articles or to exclude a certain type of small religious trinkets which at the moment is being held up in considerable quantities. These were purchased in considerable quantities for immediate purposes, and if there is not a decision on this matter within the next few days, it will be too late, and will be no use at all. I refer to articles such as medals, brooches, rings, etc., made of metal such as here described, and I suggest that it would be wise to have the exclusion in regard to such articles implemented at once.
As far as medals are concerned, the majority are, in fact, not subject to duty, and we are considering how far we can exempt the others. As far as articles made of wood are concerned, having gone into the matter, I would be very slow to exclude such articles from the duty because I find that there are three firms in Dublin alone engaged in the manufacture and sale of these things, and they are, in fact, subject to competition of a rather peculiar kind from the Continent. They will possibly find that the suggested duty will be a very great advantage to them in the developing of the business and maintaining their grip upon it. The duty on woodwork in this respect has a very definite protective effect, and while I do not like to give the impression that a definite decision has been come to, we will have to be very careful as to the articles we exclude.
I may have misunderstood what was said on the last occasion, but I thought that the articles were not intended to be brought within the woodwork tax. At the moment, however, I am talking of the metal side, and I do hope that whatever decision is come to, in regard to the exclusion of certain religious emblems of a metal type, will be speeded up so as to enable these things to be cleared, because if it is not done within the next few days it will be no use.
The Minister referred to two or three firms manufacturing certain religious objects. For his own guidance I would suggest that he refer to one firm that makes rosaries, for which industry Deputy McGilligan got protection from this Dáil. I would be interested if the Minister would apply to that firm, engaged in the manufacture of rosary beads, and ask them what relation their prices bear to-day to the prices when Deputy McGilligan got protection, and he will find that in many other things, as soon as protection descended on the industry and a decent interval elapsed, full advantage was taken of the protection.
I want a point cleared up. A contractor to the County Council who supplies sheep dip has been held up for the want of iron drums, which the customs authorities are withholding. Are these drums being held up because they have brass outlets? Are they subject to a duty?
No.
The tax has been mentioned by Deputy Dillon. I want to make the position quite clear on that. I did not give that protection, but the Tariff Commission did. The report, having regard to the condition in which the industry found itself, was brought before the House and accepted with certain recommendations of the Tariff Commission, which recommendations have not been adhered to. I have heard certain similar statements in regard to that industry made publicly. My only knowledge of the industry was that they made a further application to me on the basis that the tariff was not sufficient. I suppose they really meant it did not give them a sufficient price.
Will the Minister reply to what I said with regard to machine parts of brass, and what can be done in that connection?
I will have that examined. It is to be understood, of course, that the whole question is at present in a state of flux.
In item 35 it is intended to delete the words "and component parts of such appliances, apparatus, accessories and requisites," which were inserted through a misunderstanding. The duty only applies to the completed articles. The intention is to secure the assembling of these parts here.
I suppose this is a revenue tax?
Oh, no. There is a very large number of golf clubs for instance made here.
Made here?
Well, assembled here.
Oh, yes; but that is different.
In my opinion the Minister is penalising quite considerably and avoidably such institutions as schools, sports and pastimes.
Will the Minister consider the danger of gravely interfering with tourist traffic, and will the Revenue Commissioners instruct the customs men that any appliances carried in the way of personal luggage will not be subject to the tax?
That is so. The Revenue Commissioners will exercise the powers they have always exercised in that respect. Certain dutiable articles taken in by a person for his own use, such as a pack of cards, will not be interfered with, and that would also apply to such things as a camera, a tennis racquet, etc.
Will the Minister assure us that the customs men will be specially instructed not to interfere unduly with tourists. It is extraordinary how a lady when she goes back to England can spread the good news about how the nasty customs men held her up and interfered with her.
Will the Resolution apply to such things as hunting requisites such as saddlery and harness?
Saddlery is excluded. It may be necessary to make that definitely clear. There is, of course, a duty upon manufactured harness of one kind or another, but this duty does not alter, in any way, the duty already imposed on harness.
I have heard the Minister say more or less the same thing several times: that the Revenue Commissioners have power to exempt certain small articles? Why is it necessary to have special provision at the end if there are general regulations covering it? I thought the Minister was tearing a rather big hole in the regulations when he spoke to-day of a person coming in for, say, a month's holiday bringing in, say, 500 cigarettes. Surely there is a limit?
Oh, there is.
Well, will he tell us then how many golf balls would be allow in the case of a golfer coming into this country with a handicap of 18, and playing at a seaside course? What would he call personal use under these circumstances?
There are regulations made in these matters. There is, for instance, a definite number of ounces of tobacco allowed for personal use, or a certain number of cigarettes. I take it that the number of golf balls will also be regulated.
What is the regulation in regard to the number of plates or films that may be allowed in?
I am afraid I could not say.
Would the Minister consider sympathetically the question of requisites for boys' and girls' school games or requisites used in school pastimes? It is a very serious question.
I should like if the Minister would give us some idea of the amount of revenue he hopes to get from this tax. Personally, I am against any sort of tax or tariff in connection with outdoor games because I consider it is a tax on the health of our people. This is a tariff on our school-going boys and girls. I think it deprives us of the good name that we enjoyed as sporting people, to put a tax on these articles. If the Minister could give us some idea of the amount of revenue which he hopes to derive from this tax it would be very interesting.
I cannot give that information, but it seems to me that this duty is intended to have a protective value. It will be a protective duty and at the same time, will bring in a certain amount of revenue.
We are now allowing in such things as the heads of golf-clubs so as to allow of their being assembled here?
Yes.
The item in the Schedule enumerates appliances, apparatus, accessories and requisites for sports, games, gymnastics and athletics other than personal clothing and wearing apparel. Does the description "requisites for sports" change the meaning of the term "wearing apparel"?
It is proposed in another Bill, the Finance Customs No. 2 Bill, to remedy that old standing grievance by taking out of the definition of wearing apparel "sports requisites." Certain sports requisites such as boxing gloves and cricket pads were heretofore regarded as wearing apparel and were subject to the apparel duty. It is now intended to make clear that they are not to be regarded as wearing apparel and to make them subject to this duty which is the smaller duty.
Will that apply to sports clothing such as tennis whites?
Oh, no.
I should like to suggest that the tariff should be retained on these articles. I suggest that they be put back in the original category in view of the inducement that this offers to a special class of farmers represented by Deputy Gorey to leave their fields and go cricketing. I would make an appeal to the Minister to increase the duty.
The Deputy is not in order in suggesting increased taxation at this stage.
Might I suggest to the Minister that equipment for hunters might be examined from that point of view?
Would the Minister say that the lesser duty will apply to such things as pads or are they exempt altogether?
Oh, no. Sports goods that were hitherto regarded as wearing apparel will now be subject to this duty, but will not be subject to the much higher duty imposed on wearing apparel.
They will not be subject to duty at all?
They will be subject to the duty on sports requisites. In regard to item 36 it is intended to exclude certain binding material.
I would suggest that fishing nets be excluded.
They are excluded. In one or two cases I received a report from Donegal that the Customs officers collected duties on nets imported. That was an error and the duty has been repaid.
I should like to bring to the Minister's notice the fact that there is a number of fishermen on the Donegal coast who catch salmon and who get their nets from fish merchants in England. They are supposed to pay for their nets out of their catches. They have not the money to pay the duty on them and in some cases the nets have been held up. I wrote to the Minister and he said he would look into the matter. I should be obliged if their dispatch could be expedited.
I shall look into that.
Would the Minister say that the necessary material for mending nets would not be tariffed? It would inflict much hardship on fishermen along the Cork coast if they had to pay for the material for mending their nets. The Minister must be aware that these men are not able to pay the duty.
A Deputy has referred to net twine. Is that excluded?
No.
The duty is imposed on ropes and twine, or hemp, or like materials. Does that include shoemakers' hemp?
There are one or two classes which are used by manufacturers and shoemakers and brush-makers and it is intended to exclude these from the duty. There are three firms engaged in the manufacture of ropes in this country. At one time, it was quite a substantial industry here. It has recently declined, due not merely to competition but also to the decline in the use of ropes for one reason or another. There is, however, a fairly substantial import and there are possibilities of reviving the industry to a substantial extent. There are three firms engaged in the industry at the moment and there are others who propose to engage in it. There is no reason why we should not be able to supply our requirements in all classes of cordage and ropes.
What is the percentage supplied by the home manufacturers?
It is less than 50 per cent.
It used to be only 20 per cent.
Is all shoemaker's twine excluded?
No.
Might I draw the Minister's attention to the fact that this is one industry in which the people who are going to be hit hardest are people inside Ireland but outside the Free State? I imagine from my experience of the rope industry that the bulk of our rope comes from Northern Ireland. I think that it is a pity as we shall never have in the Twenty-Six Counties rope works such as are to be found in Armagh and Belfast. You may smash some of the rope works in the North of Ireland, and as I do not despair of seeing a united Ireland some day I think it is a great pity to destroy these industries if you have no prospect of building up industries here.
This was a very substantial industry in Dublin and in other parts of the country at one time. Waterford is a case in point. It has been very badly hit. In fact, there is only one firm of any substance left in the industry in Dublin. There is also a firm in Waterford and a firm in Clara which makes jute twine. The production of the home industry in 1929 was only 25 per cent. of the requirements of the country and about one-third of the value of the imports. The existing firms are entitled to get some encouragement to increase their production. The duty is a very small one. It is designed to give encouragement to the industry in the hope of getting it going again. Discussions have taken place with one firm in the Six-County area which is contemplating establishing a factory here, but I cannot say how far these have gone at the moment. The design is to encourage this industry here.
Allowing that this is an industry which at one time might have been substantial in relation to what it is now, that was a time when rope was in much greater use than now. Even with what would be called a substantial trade in relation to what it is now, it was never very substantial in relation to the Belfast industry.
There was a substantial export trade from Dublin at one time.
It was a very long time ago.
Irish rope was indigenous to the northern province.
I should like to draw the Minister's attention to the very serious impediment that is likely to result to the fishing industry if impositions are placed upon this class of rope. In the salmon fishing industry special kinds of rope are required and, unless they can be obtained the fishermen may not be able to carry on. In order to do so they will have to pay the tax, whether they like it or not, if they want to obtain a class of rope which is not manufactured in this country. I have something to do with the salmon fishing industry, so far as starting schemes goes, and I have to import a particular class of rope from Bridgeport because it is suitable to the industry. No such rope is manufactured here. The Bridgeport rope is superior to that manufactured in Belfast. I draw the Minister's attention to the need for leniency in this matter until an industry is definitely established. I am in sympathy with the establishment of the rope-making industry. If requirements can be had here nothing will please me better. To place an imposition on an article of this description will, I think, result in hardship on a very poor class of people. Efforts have been made to establish the fishing industry, particularly by the Sea Fisheries Association, and unless care is taken serious loss will be caused to poor people. I respectfully ask the Minister not to impose this tax until an industry is established here.
Is item 37 intended to be by way of an addition to hosiery?
Yes. As the Deputy is possibly aware, there is a certain class of tubular knitted fabric imported, and there is considerable danger to an industry which might develop here. It is to prevent the genuine hosiery industry being damaged by what would be a sewing industry of that kind, as well as to give protection to this industry in the production of the other class of knitted fabric, that the duty is prescribed in that form. There are two firms engaged now in the knitted fabric industry and a third firm is installing machinery to engage in it. It will take some time before that is done. In the meantime it is desirable that we should not hold up certain firms importing this knitted fabric which cannot at the moment get the particular fabric they require made here, or made in sufficient quantities. Consequently we have this licence arrangement which is designed to secure that in future all the requirements in knitted fabric will be manufactured in this country.
As regards Resolution No. 8, the newspaper and periodical tax has been brought down to something more reasonable than it stood at, but there are still a big number of papers coming under the impact of the tariff, and that will cause considerable inconvenience and hardship. As far as it is possible to understand it there are mainly two changes made in the Resolution. There has been a change allowing for a rebate on returns, and the simpler point — one of value — a reduction of the duty from 1½d. to 1d. and the preferential rate from 1d. to ¾d. Outside of that we have what is put down in the amendment. That excludes daily papers, and also newspapers and periodicals "which are in the opinion of the Revenue Commissioners, trade or craft, or trade union, or scientific, or religious, or educational publications". The difficulty is to discover what is intended to be hit by the tax. Apparently it is intended to bring periodicals to a point that is somewhat comparable with the fiction point to which the book tax has been brought. Under the new situation with regard to books the only books taxed are books of fiction in English, or books in English printed here and sent out to be bound, or books whether printed here or not that come in bound in leather. You have something now approaching the fiction point, and with considerable further exceptions which make it difficult to understand why the tax is kept at all. We are having excluded daily newspapers, irrespective of size, and we also exclude newspapers and periodicals of these peculiar types "trade or craft, or trade union, or scientific, or religious, or educational publications". The whole point is going to turn on the interpretation given to what is "educational", and the same difficulty comes up in the interpretation likely to be given to the word "scientific". A religious periodical will mark itself. To a certain extent the trade or craft papers will mark themselves. What is an educational paper? A more rigid interpretation would be a periodical which has in it only items which refer to some part of the science of education. I do not presume that is what is meant. I hope that is not what is meant, and that there will be something more liberal in the way of interpretation than that. If one sets out from that and takes periodicals which would be of use only to teachers, that is a clear cut thing. Supposing one sets out from that, what is the definition? What is the interpretation likely to be given to the definition? Almost every periodical has some educational value, even the scrappy sort of periodicals that come in such as "Pearson's Weekly,""Answers" and "Tit-Bits." They set out to give information and are presumed to be of educational value. Sometimes they set out to give information which is alleged to have scientific value. They give certain facts which they say are of value to people with a scientific turn of mind. Are these things going to be brought in under the exclusion clause and, if so, what is the tax now intended to get and what type of paper? I have heard this argument since the amendment came in. It was pointed out that possibly one thing that would come under the tax would be certain journals which circulate almost entirely amongst, and are read by, womenfolk. I have heard the ingenious argument put forward that they can be brought within the exclusion clause as craft papers. There are articles in these publications which are of definite value, even from the educational point of view. If they are going to go, I do not see what the tax is going to catch. If I could get some information on the point, by way of a concrete illustration, as to the types of periodicals that will be caught, it would be much easier to discuss this matter. If I thought that a liberal interpretation would be given to the words "educational" and "scientific" I feel that the tax is almost definitely wiped out, but I am not altogether clear on the point. I am anxious to know what would be caught by a more rigid interpretation.
I do not think that the exemption will be interpreted — I hope it will not — with undue liberality. I do not think that any person can have any difficulty in apprehending what is going to be covered by the designation "trade" or "craft." They are journals the subject matter of which appertains entirely to one craft or one trade or another. For instance, an engineering review would be a trade or craft or scientific journal. It would possibly contain features as a result of which if might be allocated to one or other of these categories. I do not think that the Deputy has any doubt in his mind as to what would be covered by the category "religious." With regard to educational, it is not intended there to confine the exemption solely to journals used merely by teachers or by those concerned only with the science of pedagogy. The type of journal in mind in that connection is a journal which is concerned with the teaching of stenography or shorthand. A concrete instance which possibly might help the Deputy is a journal published from week to week in relation to shorthand —"Pitman's System of Shorthand." I do not think that a series such as these, popular educational works which come out in weekly parts connected say with engineering in various forms—I do not think that they could be described as periodicals. They would come definitely under the heading of "books printed outside Saorstát Eireann and bound in paper covers."
With regard to women's journals, unless these were mainly devoted to women's crafts such as needlework or dressmaking, I think that they should not be exempt from duty. Works like "Vogue" and publications of that sort would, I imagine, be liable to duty, because I do not think that they mainly relate to trades or crafts. A gardening magazine, like "The Amateur Gardener" I am afraid, would be liable to duty. If they were designed or intended mainly for professional use, then I think, they would be excluded under the category "trade or craft." But in connection with the duty, if there is good reason shown for the extension of the exemption to gardening magazines it would be considered. But at the same time I am quite certain that if the demand for these magazines is sufficiently large, we shall be able to produce them in this country, so as to give a certain amount of employment to our writers and our printers, and that consequently they should not be exempted.
May I ask the Minister are the weekly religious newspapers subject to the tax as against the Sunday Press coming into this country?
They are religious periodicals and they would be exempt now.
I wish to draw the Minister's attention to a class of journal which might be within the exemptions, which I think ought to be within the exemptions, which are probably intended to be, but whose position is not free from doubt. I refer to the legal weekly journals which are coming into this country and which are of very considerable educational value. They are educational publications and are of use to the profession and others. I would suggest that the Minister should put it beyond doubt that such journals come under the word "educational," if there is any doubt about it. It would also be contended that they are trade or craft papers and they may come within that designation. I do not use the terms in any unpleasant sense. I am sure that the Minister intended to exempt these weekly journals which are of the very greatest importance to both branches of our profession and of very great advantage to law students. If a tax is put upon them it will make them still less frequently found in this country. The more publications of that sort that come into the country, the better it is for the profession, for the students, and for the public.
I think there is no doubt that the legal journals are exempted.
Under what head?
Craft or educational.
I should like to have a pronouncement from the Minister upon the subject of such publications as "Weldon's Own Journal" and "Weldon's Bazaar for Children," and quite a number of similar two-penny papers. I certainly think that they would come under the head both of trade journals and of educational journals. Most of them contain no fiction whatever. There are paper patterns given away with them and they are used largely not alone by dressmakers but by thrifty housewives. I am not referring to such publications as "Vogue" and "Modern." I mean those dealing exclusively with the trade, the dressmaking trade, and with the making of garments both for women and children. Some of them such as "The Bazaar" have features for children and contain most useful reading matter and paper patterns. I should be sorry if the Minister would put a tariff on these publications, and thus exclude them not only from those engaged in the dressmaking business but from thrifty housewives as well. They are used throughout the Saorstát, and I do not think that there are any journals published in this country that would perform the same purpose. I should like a pronouncement from the Minister on this matter.
I am sure Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll will recognise that I am rather at a disadvantage in discussing this aspect of the tax, because, after all, these publications are only names to me. But I gather that these publications are used very largely by professional dressmakers for the purpose of their business, and speaking, of course with every reservation and subject to the determination of the Revenue Commissioners, I think that they would be exempt from the tax if it is proved that they are used mainly or almost entirely by professional dressmakers for the purpose of their business.
I do not know if the Minister has been approached on the subject of this tariff by the people who are most hit by it. If he has been approached at all he must have heard a great deal more about it than I have. But I can tell him that in my constituency the hardship arising out of this tariff is really distressing. As the Minister no doubt knows a very large number of defenceless people, old ladies, delicate people with pensions, have set up stationery shops in my constituency. Well, of course, all Donegal is close to the Border and these small stationers have been obliged to increase their prices for the periodicals that they have been in the habit of getting in regularly for their subscribers. These subscribers are now buying them across the Border and thus these small stationers are being put out of business. Would the Minister say whether this is a revenue tariff or a protective tariff?
A protective tariff.
To protect what?
The printing industry.
I cannot see how it will. I quite see how very desirable a thing it is to stimulate Irish publications and Irish literature, but can the Minister honestly feel that he is not inflicting a heavy injury on that section of the population who, in my opinion, is far more deserving of sympathy than the labouring class? These are the people largely who are trying to keep up a quality for which I have reverence and admiration but for which there is a good deal of scorn in the world to-day and that is, respectability. These people are trying to make ends meet. Their custom has been taken away from them. Their customers are writing abroad for these books and publications or they are going across the Border to purchase them. In Dáil Eireann perhaps that sounds a triviality, but there are many small houses in this country in which a great tragedy has been caused by these tariffs on books and papers. Many of the people who conduct these stationers' shops are being placed on the list of the very poor, though these people hitherto prided themselves that they were not a burden on anybody.
That is the aspect of the situation that I put to the Minister. They have made some attempt, I believe, to bring their case before him, but as the Minister will readily understand, the great bulk of these people have nobody to speak for them. They are not very articulate; they have not the gift of expressing themselves and very many of them do not want to pretend that it makes as much difference to them as it really does. I have already communicated with the Minister on this matter. Because of the enormous burden of work with which he is faced I have been reluctant to pour any additional correspondence on him. I could, however, send the Minister the bulk of communications I have received from a number of people who are suffering through this tariff. If the Minister were to look through this correspondence he would see the minor tragedies of a large number of people. In the matter of newspapers and periodicals I think it is extremely difficult to interpret what is "scientific," or "religious," or "educational." I am not trying to be facetious, or trying to make points against the Minister. Deputy Wolfe drew attention to publications dealing with the law. There are a number of political journals that are highly educational and very valuable. I think it would be very difficult to deny that political reviews are educational. If one looks at the religious papers we have "The Church Times," which is a Protestant paper; "The Universe," which is a Catholic paper, and a number of Church papers of that kind primarily designed for consumption by members of one particular religious persuasion. Will it include these papers? The general tone of these is concerned with religious matters. I cordially join with Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll in urging on the Minister the necessity for letting in dressmakers' papers, because they are a vital necessity to all dressmakers in the country, and Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll will agree with me in saying that these people could not carry on their business without these pattern papers, which are essential to them. They are trade journals which are essential to many people in this country. Reference No. 6 deals with books printed outside this country. I do not suggest that those who pay 9d. for a book would object to pay 10d. instead, but it would seem hard that these books should be taxed. I cannot help lamenting that Ernest Benn's enterprise in making literature cheaply available to the public should suffer.
The point to which I drew attention at first has been further elucidated to some small extent in the direction of causing more confusion, which I hope will be the result, because it may help to get this tax entirely removed. We were told by the Minister that "educational" publications are not going to be interpreted in that precise way. Very good. Then there is to be some wider meaning or extension than that. Yet I did gather that the Minister thought that legal journals or periodicals would come in not under the heading of "educational" but under the heading of "craft," and still he excepted engineering from the exceptions; one must infer that it would be a thing that would be taxed.
No.
Why? There is a journal called "Practical Electrical Engineering."
That will come in.
Will that be exempt?
I want to make it clear that I am not interpreting this Bill and am not the final arbiter.
I object entirely to that point of view. It will not do to say hereafter that we have passed financial legislation here and that there is a body to interpret it. We ought to know at the moment what it is intended to tax. Is it intended to tax "Practical Electrical Engineering" which comes into this country every Friday? Is that intended to be taxed?
Is that an engineering work published in weekly parts and when 52 of these parts have been issued the publication is complete?
So far as I know it is of that type, a weekly educational engineering paper. There is a paper called "The Nursing Times." It is a journal of educational value for those in the profession.
Is that not under craft?
That is the nature of it. Others of those journals, such as "The Tailor and Cutter," will show by their terms that they are journals that should be exempt. Then there are such papers as "Our Dogs," a paper of tremendous value to people who keep dogs. Is that to be exempt? I think Deputy Dillon has referred to certain political journals as of value. What about "The Statist" and "The Economist"? These journals are of tremendous educational value. Are they to be taxed? They have hardly got to the point when they are called scientific.
Nor are they educational.
They do lead to the point that they are an advance on financial and economic thought. There is no person of average intellect who would not say about them that they are of educational value.
Are they educational in their general character?
We must get somewhere. According to the Minister, education is not to be interpreted so strictly as to be defined merely as bearing on the science of pedagogy. We would like something approaching a definition of the term. Does it come to the point that it will mean that some papers on engineering can be brought in?
"Practical Electrical Engineering," which the Deputy has referred to — could that be described as a periodical?
Undoubtedly.
Why?
From the trade point of view, it is not described as anything else.
If it is a periodical there is no difficulty about it. It is an educational work and will be exempt. If it is not a periodical, in so far as it is not the intention of the publishers to bring it out at stated intervals from year to year, then quite clearly it is not covered by this duty, but it may be by another duty.
"Practical Electrical Engineering" comes into this country on the Friday of every week. I think it is a weekly. Therefore, it is a periodical.
It may be a work published in instalments.
It is not a book, in fact.
It may be.
Let us leave it, then. There is a paper called "Wireless," which has nothing to do with the announcement of radio programmes, or if it has, it is a minor section of it. It is for the use of the rather expert type of amateur in fitting up sets or enlarging or adding to sets. Is that scientific? Is it educational?
It may be both.
I imagine it could be caught by both terms, yet I was amazed to hear the Minister when he was speaking on this line. He said a book called "Engineering" was not going to be exempt.
I said the "Engineering Review" was exempt.
Let us take the book on gardening to which Deputy Mrs. Collins-O'Driscoll referred. Are there any books that come in relating to gardening that are not of educational value? There are many people interested in that particular type of outdoor occupation. Where does the term stop? We want to know what the Revenue Commissioners are to have by way of terms of reference. It may avoid many references to possible misinterpretations later on. I shall try to get at some definition by the process of exclusion. It seems to me what is intended to be caught by the tax are purely children's papers and, if that is so, it is rather a scandalous thing. I have in mind these little coloured prints that children buy and for which there is no substitute in this country; I doubt if there ever is going to be a substitute for them. They are not tremendously attractive themselves.
Can the Deputy think of no other papers?
I am thinking of racing papers and periodicals. They will probably be caught. When that is known there will be a bigger outcry than the Minister possibly imagines. Then there are papers of the society type. It does not matter very much to anybody whether those papers are taxed, because they are of the type that the people who buy them can afford the little extra. From the point of view of the revenue to be derived from them they will certainly not be lucrative. It is merely a case of causing inconvenience without having any protective effect from the angle of getting papers of that type established here.
In the fourth category we find women's journals. We have got certain exceptions at least envisaged. Certain women's papers which are wholly or mainly of use to dressmakers, whether professional or amateur — they will, I hope, be exempt. How many women's journals do not include paper patterns, do not make them a regular feature of the publication? If it is merely a question of paper patterns, I doubt if any of the smaller women's journals are going to be caught by this at all. It will be necessary to get these things examined in much more detail. I think it is fairly clear that children's papers are going to be hit, that the racing papers are going to be hit— although there are people who say that they have a highly educational value — and that society journals will be hit.
There are numbers of papers dealing with animals. Quite a number of people are dog fanciers and there are many who are very interested in birds. You can go down the whole list of domestic animals and you will find books relating practically to them all. I do not know whether it is intended to catch these. I am not quarrelling about definitions, because we do not know what is intended to be caught within the scope of this tax. It seems to me that this thing is brought down to the point where there is going to be very little in the way of revenue and I cannot see any reasonable claim that there is going to be the slightest possibility of substitute journals being established here; in other words, that there is going to be a protective effect.
I have never been able to understand why it was thought necessary to impose this tax without having some touch with the people interested in the trade. There could not have been any question of forestalling. In the case of a weekly there might be a week's supply, and in the case of a monthly a month's supply, delivered in advance, but that would not set back the revenue considerably. The changing and chopping has caused a lot of inconvenience. I think the trade should have been consulted. The only explanation is that this was taken in a scattered sort of way and thrown in with a lot of other things.
There is another matter that is causing confusion. For the purpose of making discriminations, I understand certificates of origin have been demanded. They certainly were in the beginning. Most of these papers bear the certificate of origin on their front page. The place of publication is indicated. On the Continental ones, I think it is universal. At the beginning it was not the practice to accept the designation on the front page as indicating where the publication came from. If that is cleared by now, another advance has been made.
I would like the Minister to give some indication of the protective effect that he anticipates will result from this tariff. In reply to a question as to whether or not this was meant to be a revenue tariff, the Minister said it was meant to be protective. It is extremely hard to see what employment can possibly follow from this tariff. Numbers of these periodicals are imported in small quantities. I saw a return prepared by some trade organisation which indicated that on the average, out of a very large number of papers habitually imported to Dun Laoghaire, 200 or 300 of each issue would be all that came in. It is quite impossible in the case of the vast majority of them that substitutes could be established or carried on here. If the circulation of these papers is cut down, it can scarcely follow that the circulation of any paper that is in existence here or that may come into existence will be increased. If, for instance, the society papers referred to by Deputy McGilligan have their circulation reduced, it does not follow that very small substitutes here will have an increased circulation. I scarcely think it will affect them at all. People who want the bigger and more ornate publications will probably pay for them. Those who are not willing to pay are not very likely to be satisfied with the very much smaller journal it is possible to run here. So far as papers like The Economist and The Statist which were mentioned are concerned, if to any extent their circulation is discouraged, it does not mean that any journal existing here is going to have a larger circulation. If you put a tax on any of the papers mentioned you may get a little revenue. The revenue certainly will not be of a very large amount. If the Government had been wanting either revenue or employment on any substantial scale, the main periodicals that are exempt should not have been exempt. After all, so far as the importation of periodical literature is concerned the daily papers are the main thing. It is quite possible that if there had been a tax at this rate on the daily papers quite a lot of citizens might have been driven to reading the Irish Press who ordinarily do not read it, and the Government would have been killing several birds with that particular stone. But, with the tax as it is, it looks as if simply this was happening: that having, without consideration put this duty on, the Government were obstinately clinging to some remnant of it; that they were behaving in this matter exactly as they are behaving in connection with the book tax, where they have practically retreated from the position they took up, but maintaining a hopeless sort of tax on certain classes of books in order to be able to say that their great tariff policy is intact. So far as newspapers and periodicals are concerned, they seem to be doing something of the same sort. These exemptions that are being given in respect of trade, craft, and educational periodicals will result in so many borderline cases, and so many complaints arising, that the need for further exemptions will become so apparent that I should say this particular tax will ultimately break down and have to be abandoned.
I think some member of the Government has boasted that if they found they had made an error they were not too proud and were not too frightened to confess that an error had been made and to make a change. I would think that this is one of the particular taxes where they ought to confess they had blundered and that they ought simply to abandon it. The discrimination that will be required to be exercised by the revenue authorities will cause trouble and annoyance, and from that point of view I think it is clear that this is not worth persisting with. There is no revenue in it to any extent, and there is no employment in it. It is not going to have any effect on public opinion. If one wants to enable national feelings to take a better tone, that is not going to happen as a result of this. If you want to affect public opinion or national sentiment, then you will need to exclude the daily papers. In this case the Government certainly seem to be straining at the gnat and swallowing the camel. Even as regards children's papers, I think there is nothing to be said for merely trying to make papers dearer or to cut them off. There would be a good deal to be said, and later on the Government may have to take certain steps, in regard to papers in Irish, especially papers of various classes suitable for children, very young children and children a little older. But, whatever may be done in regard to these papers, it will have to be done in a direct way. No purpose is going to be served in that direction by a mere tax on the papers which will be hit by this particular tax.
I should like to reinforce the remarks made by Deputy Blythe. I think this tax is a mistake. I agree that in its present form it is a great improvement on the form in which it was presented first. A tax on papers and on books is equivalent to a tax on light. The Government has denounced certain things as medieval. If ever there was a medieval step it is this. It is simply bringing back the stamp tax, which the English publicists had such difficulty in getting removed. There had to be a crusade to get freedom of the Press. As this is an improvement on the form in which it was first presented I hope the Minister is going to interpret the word "educational" in a very wide and generous sense, so as to include the papers to which Deputy Blythe alluded. Children's papers are most important. They are most educational. I think there is something petty and cruel in putting a preposterously heavy tax on small papers like children's papers and other papers. A child is just as much interested in the adventures of "Tiger Tim" as the Minister himself. I have had strong protests from my young friends that they have to pay an extra penny for their penny papers. I hope the Minister will see his way to modify the tariff, so that it will bear some relation to the cost of the paper. It is rather absurd that a tax of 100 per cent. should be put on a little paper of this sort. I would, of course, if I could, like to persuade the Minister to wash out the tax altogether. I think you will effect nothing from a cultural point of view and gain very little from a revenue point of view by this tax, and you will succeed in irritating every class of the community. I make a very strong appeal on behalf of the children. Also from an educational point of view, those smaller magazines which teach our wives how to cook a good dinner or sew on a button, are very necessary and I think they should come under the exception of educational.
I should like to join in the appeal to the Minister to drop this tax altogether. I do not think it is going to have any useful effect, and I doubt if it will pay the cost of administration. There is just one aspect of it which occurs to me. The vocational schools all over the country are developing a genuine interest in various handicrafts that have not been much practised heretofore, at all events have not had the very considerable following which they will have as a result of these vocational schools. Most of the pupils in these schools, if they are to profit by the instruction given, have to follow up the literature attached to the subject. There is no literature, generally speaking, in this country dealing with many of them, and it is doubtful if there will be until we have a bigger population. There will, undoubtedly, be hardships caused to many people who are not in a position to pay more for journals from which they get great educational experience. For instance, in connection with motor transport, I think there are up to half a dozen journals that can be called partly trade journals and partly general. If they are dubbed general and are taxable, it is largely ambitious mechanics, who are anxious to know all about their own business, who will have to pay the tax. I do not think the Minister desires to tax such a class. I can see hardly any business or trade in the country in which the employees would not be affected to their detriment by this tax. It may mean that they may miss ideas with regard to their vocation that would be very valuable to them. I can conceive many difficulties resulting from the tax. It will have hardly much effect, I think, in keeping out undesirable papers. Those who value undesirable publications will probably be content to pay a higher price for them, and I doubt if the money that is, perhaps, foolishly and thoughtlessly spent upon a lot of journals of a rather anaemic type, and which represent rather futile reading to the general public, will be more wisely spent if these journals cease to circulate here. On the whole, there are so many flaws in this proposal and it will cause so much dissatisfaction in its administration that I suggest to the Minister that he should consider if he would not be well advised in removing it altogether.
I am very glad that Deputy Moore has forestalled me, because I am inclined to think that the Minister will pay very much more attention to the remarks of Deputy Moore than any remarks that I might make upon this subject. I should like to support very strongly the statement that Deputy Moore has made. I put it to the Minister that the number of periodicals which will be affected, in view of the modifications he has made, will be very few, and that the collection of the tax will cost the State very much more in revenue than is likely to accrue as a result of the duty. We must bear in mind that any undesirable publications are kept out under the Censorship of Publications Act, I agree with Deputy Moore that most of the periodicals coming into the country are of some value, and in many cases of very great value to employees in different occupations in this country, and are of particular value to pupils attending vocational schools. I put it, also, to the Minister that so far as the majority, if not all, of these journals are concerned this is not a protective tariff. There is no possibility, I think, of producing, in this country, any substitute for these periodicals that we are now proposing to tax. In the first place, the circulation, if confined to this country, would be very small, so small indeed that it would be utterly impossible for us to get the contributions of the best brains or to pay the price that is paid at the moment, in order to get experts to contribute to these journals. That is a point that I certainly would put to the Minister and I think he will realise the force of it. Many of these journals imported here and sold at a comparatively low price are very useful, and particularly from the domestic point of view are valuable, because of the fact that the contributors are experts. These experts can only be commissioned to write various articles because of the very large circulation that these journals have.
But there is another aspect of the matter. The circulation of these journals gives a considerable amount of employment in this country. There are many people in this country particularly in the cities dependent altogether for their livelihood on the sales of these journals or they go a long way to help them to earn a livelihood. I am sure the Minister has had some representations made to him before now on this matter. A number of cases have been put to me of very great hardship that would be inflicted, not only on the readers of the journals, but on the distributors of the journals, if the Minister insists upon this tax. I submit that when we consider the number of journals that will get through the strainer between the Censorship of Publications Act and modifications he has now introduced this tax is worth nothing. I strongly support the suggestion made by Deputy Moore that the Minister should drop the tax altogether.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce, speaking in this House about a fortnight ago, said they were not going to be as unreasonable as the late Government, and he went on to say that if a good case could be made they were prepared to drop the tax. If we could show them, he said, that they were making a mistake they would be prepared to admit it. They were not going to stand on their dignity. I think, in this particular case, the Minister ought not to stand upon his dignity. I cannot hope that he is satisfied with anything I have said, but I hope he will find that his colleague, Deputy Moore, has made what I consider to be a very good case and that he will, at least, consider the matter seriously. I certainly urge that he should drop the tax altogether. I do not think it is going to do any good from the point of view of revenue or protection. I am certain it will not. As I know how the Minister and his colleagues have always, one by one, stated that they are anxious to get the youth of the country on their side, I warn the Minister that this tax will undo all his propaganda for the last ten years. Even at a cost of undoing that propaganda I am still advocating the abolition of the tax, because I know that nothing the Minister could possibly do would have a worse effect, from his point of view, upon the youth of the country than if he insists upon this tax.
I do not know whether the Minister is a married man. I presume from his Budget he must be. If he is, and, like many of the other married men in this House, has been asked for an extra penny or three-halfpence for every penny he was asked for before the Budget in respect of children's papers, that in itself might have some effect upon him, but I say, in view of the modifications such as have been put into the Schedule and the effect of the operations of the Censorship of Publications Act, it is not worth while going on with this tax, and I suggest it should be dropped.
I should like to add one or two words to the strong case made by Deputy Moore and Deputy Morrissey against this tax. I think it is possible that you might have one or two papers started in view of a tax like this, but I am convinced with Deputy Morrissey that to run them for a time satisfactorily and successfully would be quite impossible with the small circulation that they would get here. I wonder has the Minister any figures to show him how small would be the number of papers that would be affected by giving the modifications he has promised. I wonder has the Minister realised how many small shopkeepers throughout the country are really making their living out of the sale of these weekly papers. I wonder does the Minister realise what a serious thing is the delay in the distribution of these weekly periodicals that used to come in with the morning mail, and which were distributed through the country by the trains. That is now going to be exchanged for a period of slow getting through the customs, which will lead to these papers reaching their destination days after the time when they used to reach them. The trouble of administration that is going to arise from these daily newspapers is going to be a most serious thing in connection with this tax. Lastly—and I think the point is of very considerable importance—I wonder has the Minister realised what kind of reaction is going to follow this type of tax? I cannot vouch for the truth of the statement, but it has been made to me on what I would take to be fairly satisfactory authority, that this tax has been followed by the withdrawal from these papers which are published in the Free State of English advertisements on a wholesale scale, so that all that is going to come to these papers from the confinement of sale to them is almost, if not quite, neutralised by the revenue loss they are suffering as a result of the withdrawal of these advertisements. Putting all these considerations to the tail of what has been said by Deputies Moore and Morrissey, I hope the Minister will seriously consider whether it is worth while going through with this tax or not.
In reading through this list of exceptions, I notice that scientific or religious or educational publications are excluded. That word "scientific" may, of course, be used in various senses, but I take it that the Minister means applied science purely, physical science, so to speak. I would point out, however, that there is a considerable number of what I will call technical publications which, so far as I can see, would not come in under this word "scientific." For instance, medical journals like the "Lancet" would seemingly be liable to duty. I cannot see any reason why that should be. Then you have legal publications, like the English "Law Times," and various other English or foreign weekly papers, dealing with legal subjects, which could not be published in this country. For instance, I will take what I know something about —the Irish "Law Times." That is a very excellent paper, published in this country, but the English "Law Times," or the American, or various other legal publications which come in here, are not, in the slightest degree, in rivalry with the Irish "Law Times," and I cannot see why the importation of these legal publications should be taxed. I cannot see what good it will do.
Again, this word "periodical" is very wide. Take, for instance, the English law reports, which it is necessary for Irish practising barristers to have, and which must certainly be in all libraries. They are published in monthly parts, and I take it that whatever is published in a monthly part is a periodical, and, as such, will be liable to this tax. I will seriously ask the Minister to consider these classes of papers, which cannot conceivably be said to be rivals of papers published in this country. They are completely different from the papers published in this country. Then, again, if you take the ordinary English, French or other reviews which are periodicals, and which come in—they are published weekly, fortnightly, monthly or quarterly, and all these are subject to tax, and yet they are not in the slightest degree in rivalry with any paper that is published, or could be published in this country. I am sure that if the Minister himself reads such periodicals as, let me say, "The Nineteenth Century Review," or the "Fortnightly Review," he does not read them for a certain thing in one of the publications, but because he sees, here and there, an article written by a particular person that interests him. He does not read the whole "Fortnightly" through, but he reads it because there is an article in it by some person whose writing interests him, and because that person will not be writing an article on that particular subject in any weekly, monthly or quarterly which is published in this country.
I cannot see how it would be a help to any quarterly that is published in this country that other quarterlies should be excluded. I cannot, for instance, see that it would be the slightest help to the circulation of "Studies" that the "Dublin Review" should be subjected to duty. I cannot see the sense of putting a duty on high class literary papers. If you do put the duty on, I do not suppose that you will kill their circulation to any extent. I grant you completely that, on a 2/6 periodical, the fact that you are going to pay ¾d. extra will probably not hit its circulation in the slightest, but it is an annoying tax, and it is the principle that lies behind it that must be considered. It is the putting on of a tax on knowledge that appears to me to be a very bad principle, and there is no compensating gain that I can see.
I would like to ask the Minister, if this tax is going to stand, what is going to be the position of provincial importers of these periodicals? Are they to employ a staff in Dublin or Cork, or at the importing port, to deal with the acceptance of a parcel from the customs authorities there? In what way does he expect that provincial periodical importers are going to deal with the position at the ports? It has also been found in respect of a certain number of publications, not so very long ago, that the people issuing these publications made a definite campaign through the country, with a view to getting people in certain areas to take their papers by post from Great Britain, so much so, I understand, that some of the organised newsagents had to deal with the matter in an organised way, and approach some of the publishers or distributors in Great Britain with a view to getting that practice stopped.
If, without any tax here, it was a paying matter for newspaper people in Great Britain to carry on a campaign like that, the position under this is likely to be that persons who want to continue to get certain journals will be induced to get them by post from either the agents or publishers in Great Britain. The general effect of this tax will be to put a certain type of newsagent completely out of business. Already, some of them have pointed out that their sales have been reduced by from fifty to seventy-five per cent., and that reduces their general working margin. In most of these cases the business that is carried on is a kind of composite business, such as a tobacconist selling sweets, stationery and other items, and the loss of clientele for newspapers, or for these periodicals, is going to mean a loss in some of the other branches of their trade. I appreciate the fact that the Minister has, on his own benches, Deputies who are definitely out against this tax, and I think that a consideration of the position, in which a particular type of newsagent finds himself, is going to persuade him that this tax ought to be done away with. As a revenue tax, it is not worth having, and as a tax itself it is going to injure a fairly widespread section of the people.
I think it is no harm to get quite clear the purpose which the imposition of this duty is intended to serve. This country is probably unique in the world, in its situation, in so far as we are a small people, adjacent to a much larger and wealthier nation, and speaking, for the most part, the same language. Because of that fact, almost the entire weekly, monthly and quarterly Press of this country has been imported. Because of the fact that we are adjacent to another country speaking the same language, there has been a continuous flood of foreign periodicals into this country, and any possibility of developing a series of Irish periodicals, representative of our people, and serving the needs of our people, has been stifled. The effect of that, I think, has been nationally bad, and if the effect of this duty were to stop in part that flood of foreign periodicals, I think it would be all to the good. It is not going to do that, but it is going to slow it up, to some extent, and make it possible for native periodicals to take the place of those now being imported. In so far as that takes place, a very definite national gain would have been registered. I do not think it will take place to any substantial extent.
There is no reason whatever why the bulk of the periodicals which are being imported cannot be printed here. When the tax was first imposed certain approaches were made to my Department by people interested in the publication of these periodicals. I think, in respect of quite a number of them, a very definite move to have them printed here would have been started by now were it not for the continuous statements that appeared and reappeared in the Press, that the tax was likely to be removed at some date in the near future. The position is that if anybody with journalistic leanings in this country desires to get an opportunity of developing his talents in that respect, he is practically compelled to go abroad at the present time. There are only a few weekly periodicals published here and these few are having a very hard fight to carry on. It is hoped and intended that, as the result of this duty, a number of new publications may start. Some move has already been made in that direction. It is true that in order to give effect to the intention behind this duty periodicals are being made subject to the tax that are not likely to be substituted by any periodicals produced here. I do not think that that is a thing to be regretted. It is true that very informative and interesting reviews and journals of one kind and another will have to pay duty, but most of these are sold at substantial prices, and the increase in the prices of a 1d. or 1½d. will not retard their sales or impose any hardship on readers. Reference has been made to children's newspapers. It is true that there is a fairly considerable sale of these newspapers in this country and that some of them are of a type not likely to be produced here. Cumann na nGaedheal have stepped into the breach to take the place of some of them in recent weeks, though it may have been an entirely unintentional action on their part. However, to some extent the idea has been met by what they did. The position is, however, that it is nationally desirable that the influx of these foreign journals should be checked in some way. We can get on here and get on quite successfully without "Answers," without "John Bull," and without "Ideas."
And without the "Daily Mail."
Is the Deputy arguing in favour of the extension of the duty?
I am not allowed of course to advocate it but I say I cannot see the Minister's argument if he will not apply it to the "Daily Mail," the "Daily Express" and the rest of them.
If I propose it will the Deputy support me?
Certainly, as regards, the "Daily Mail."
I will hold the Deputy perhaps to it.
Why not be clear and name the things you want to keep out?
We have excluded from this duty a series of certain types of journals. Most of the journals that will be excluded under this Resolution are journals of small circulation in this country. Journals with a circulation of 10,000 upwards are not excluded. It is not unreasonable to ask that they should be printed here. They can be printed here without any substantial increase in cost and without any inconvenience. We have printing works and printers and all the facilities for producing them here in the country. We are putting it up to these journals that if they want circulation in this country they should at least give that amount of employment to our people.
How many weeklies are there with a circulation of half that figure?
There is quite a substantial number with double that.
I am informed that there are 16 with a circulation of half that.
We know that there is a large range of these journals with a circulation of 20,000 and upwards in this country.
Nonsense.
"Answers."
A large number!
A fairly large number.
"Answers" is one.
I am afraid that I cannot give a complete list of them but there is a substantial number of them with a fairly large circulation.
With a circulation of 20,000?
I am not saying that. I am saying that those with a circulation of 10,000 upwards at least should be printed here. I think we are doing no harm in restricting them.
Is it on account of their quality?
Not on account of their quality, but on account of the fact that they are foreign products and because there should be some opportunity given for the development of Irish periodicals to supply the needs of the people.
Why not apply that to the English daily papers? What is the case?
I do not see that there is any strong case against it but we have decided to start with certain periodicals.
The Minister has argued for employment. The dailies will give more employment than the weeklies.
Are you sure of that?
I want the Minister to make the case.
The Deputy is making the case. I am not proposing to apply it to the dailies.
Why?
Because I am not at all sure that it is going to mean increased employment.
I suggest that it is not a tariff that is wanted but an extension of the Censorship of Publications Act.
No.
Evidently it is a cultural aim, although the Minister for Finance told us it was an economic idea—a revenue matter.
There are two classes of workers whom it is intended to help by this duty, one the printers and the other the journalists. There is certain raw material here. There is an unlimited supply of journalistic talent. We want to give it some chance of developing. It has had no chance up to the present. It has been stifled by this flood of publications. The imposition of this duty is going to give it some chance. Already there are indications to some extent that the needs of our people are going to be met by native publications and native publications of quality, just as good, if not a lot superior, to those that are being imported. Talking of this duty as a tax upon knowledge or culture or anything of that kind is altogether wide of the mark. It is nothing of the kind and it is not intended to be anything of the kind. It is intended to secure for this country some advantages which the keeping out of these things secures for other countries. This nation is perhaps in a unique position. It is beside a much larger and wealthier nation, speaking the same language and the natural thing is to expect that these publications will come in.
What about Switzerland? They import publications in three languages and yet they have a strong nationalism.
I will concede to the Deputy the point as regards Switzerland.
I could name other countries.
The effect upon newsagents if it has any substance at all is likely to be purely temporary. In so far as there is a demand for such publications that demand will be met. It will be met either by native publications or by these English publishing firms coming in and having their journals printed here. I am satisfied that that is the development that is most likely to take place. The majority of newsagents are only dependent to a very small extent upon the sale of weekly journals. In so far as they are newsagents only the daily press must constitute a very large part of their business. The vast majority of them are also tobacconists and some of them are engaged in selling fancy goods as well.
Did the Minister consult them recently on that?
Undoubtedly, the Deputy knows what I am saying is a fact.
I am informed that quite the opposite is the case.
The Deputy cannot pick out one firm in the City of Dublin engaged in the sale of weekly papers only.
I have not said that. They sell fewer morning papers than they do weekly ones.
The vast majority are only newsagents as a side line.
I quite agree. But they are not selling more daily papers than weekly ones.
I cannot speak as to the actual number they sell but the sale of evening and daily papers constitutes a large part of any agent's business. The imposition of this duty is not going to involve a lot of delay in the circulation of such papers. If the undergraduates of Trinity College have to wait until Friday or Saturday for their "Home Notes" it will not entail any great hardship on them. Neither do I think it is likely that English advertisers are going to retaliate by refusing to advertise their goods in this country. They do not advertise in Irish periodicals as a concession to us. They advertise here because they want to sell their goods.
That is not the point. It is a matter of circulation.
If a paper has not got the circulation, it will not get the advertisements. The English firms that advertise in Irish newspapers will advertise only if they are satisfied that they will get a return for their money and because they want to sell their goods. It seems to me that this duty is justified from every point of view. It has a very definite protective effect, not alone in the increased employment of skilled workers, but it is also going to be of definite advantage in creating the possibility of the development of a weekly national press, that will serve the country's needs, not merely in political matters, with which we are already supplied, but other classes of periodicals now supplied from abroad.
Mr. Hayes
The Minister's explanation of this tax, sir, resembles very much what he had to say about books, with one difference. It appears to me that, although the Minister does talk about giving employment to skilled labour, his aim in this matter is really a cultural aim. He spoke of us as a small country side by side with a big country, which has a language which we all speak. I am just as interested as the Minister in the development of the Irish language and of Irish culture, but the difference between us is that I know what I want and I have some clear ideas as to how to get what I want. The Minister, in his enthusiasm for a tax, simply taxed books at first; then he taxed periodicals; then he created confusion; then he made certain exemptions; and then he made a case for the tax when he was finished. Now he comes along to tell us what he meant, which includes not only getting revenue, increasing employment, and the development of industry, but the development of an Irish culture. It seems to me that in this tax on periodicals, which I admit applies mostly to periodicals in the English language, if it was a cultural aim it was a matter for the Minister for Education, and if it was censorship aim it was a matter for the Minister for Justice. If it was a mixture of both, to help the various things being done for the spread of the Irish language and the cultivation of a distinctive national culture here, then the Executive Council should have sat down and done some thinking as to what effect such a tax would have on their general educational and cultural programme. That was not done. Instead of that, they slapped on a tax on periodicals, and for my part I cannot understand why English daily papers, and more particularly a certain type of English Sunday paper, were exempted on cultural grounds. The Minister's point of view is that the English periodicals which we get in stifle local periodicals. It is a matter of doubt, as long as we speak the English language, whether we ought not, in fact, to be cut off from a great many publications printed in England. I would make bold, as a person who knows the Irish language and is very strongly in favour of it, to say that it would be a great pity that we should be cut off from a good deal of what is published in England. If certain publications are bad for us, intellectually or otherwise, we should find out what these are and we should keep them out entirely —not by way of a penny tax. If the Minister is interested in keeping out something that has a bad effect, I suggest it is not through the Minister for Finance or the Revenue Commissioners, but by some other process, that it should be effected.
The more we examine the question the more difficult it is to work it out. I wonder whether the Minister would tell us how the word "religious" is going to be construed? What kind of paper will it include and therefore exclude from the tax? "The Universe," for instance, was taxed in the beginning because its superficial area did not exceed 320 square inches. Now I take it, it will not be taxed because it is regarded as a religious publication. But there are a great many papers which, while being very sound from a religious and moral point of view, might not be considered by the Revenue Commissioners as religious publications. I think it is an absurd burden to place on the Revenue Commissioners to define what is a religious publication. For instance, I get from America what I regard as the finest periodical of its kind printed in English — the "Commonweal"—but I think if I were put to it I could make out a case that it is not a religious paper, although it deals with social, political and other questions from the Catholic viewpoint. It has generally an article on Catholic apologetics, but some weeks it has not. I suggest that it is absurd that such a paper should be taxed; because it is not entirely devotional, it may not be deemed a religious publication.
There is another type of periodical such as publications from England which are devoted entirely or almost entirely to dressmaking and knitting and to the cutting of patterns. I am not speaking with personal knowledge of these but I got a domestic brief on them. It stands to reason that in a country of three millions with a comparatively small urban population we can never produce out of those three millions as great a variety of that kind of periodical as they do in England. The people who buy that kind of paper are the poorer or lower middle class people who want to make clothes for themselves. I take it that the Minister in his great crusade for national uplift would be all for home dressmaking. It would surely please his soul, if not his eye. It just illustrates how difficult it is to frame a tax of this kind at all without becoming foolish and futile.
Some mention was made of "Studies." Take the similar publication in the United States to "Studies"—the paper called "America." This paper I assume will not be either educational, religious, or scientific and it will be taxed. The thing amounts to this, that to keep out a considerable amount of rubbish the Minister imposed a revenue tariff and that means for the people who read such publications a tax upon light and nothing else. One can think of all kinds of publications which are going to be kept out which are very useful—publications which could not possibly be produced here and which the Minister is going to tax. I would suggest that such periodicals and particularly that type of pattern book for dressmaking and the making of children's clothes and so on, should not be taxed but should be encouraged. Such a tax is a tax on home industry.
The Minister mentioned that a number of publications have a circulation of over 20,000. My information, as far as I have been able to get it, is this, that there are coming into the Free State 17 religious publications, 33 technical and trade journals, 17 journals dealing with agriculture and allied topics, 20 racing papers—they will not come under the exemption I am sure— and not more than 16 publications out of the 400 have a sale of more than 5,000 in this country.
That is not right.
Mr. Hayes
It may not be right, but it is the information supplied by the people who profess to know, the wholesalers. This tax, like the book tax, shows that it was imposed without any thought. It created a great deal of confusion amongst people who are carrying on a legitimate business, who are entitled to carry on that business and who are entitled to get due notice if their business is going to be dislocated. There could be no such thing as forestalling in periodicals. The tax having been imposed, the Minister had indicated to him a number of difficulties and the proposals intended to remedy these difficulties only make them worse.
I suggest that the Minister's case, more particularly on the cultural side, is entirely without forethought, that he put the tax on first and then he did some thinking, that then he made the cultural case and that that case is not worth considering. The proper position with regard to periodicals and English publications was this, that if we are going to consider them from the national or cultural point of view, we should get a general idea of what we want and apply a censorship of some kind which would enable us to keep out those we did not want. Simply to apply a revenue tax instead of having the effect of improving us culturally, socially or morally, will have no such effect at all. The whole matter requires reconsideration. The more exemptions recommended to the Minister and the more the Minister yields to the demand for exemptions, the more clear it becomes that the tax in itself is bad and should be withdrawn in its entirety.
Listening to the remarks and the contributions of the Opposition on this particular tax, one is struck by the amount of knowledge that could be acquired by the Opposition if they were really to sit down and examine what this tax really covers. The only speaker that contributed anything that showed that he was either briefed or, as he said himself, knew something about the subject, was the last speaker, Deputy Hayes. People forget themselves when they talk about these papers. They talk, first of all, as if every periodical that came in here was printed by a particular producer and that he looked after his trade here on his own merits. Nobody has said how many periodicals there are, and yet it is very easy to find out. I am informed that there are roughly 370 and that these periodicals are controlled by two big concerns, one of whom, I think, controls somewhere in the neighbourhood of 240 and the other the balance. It has been suggested that this was a tax on light. I do not think even the wholesale agents know the number of periodicals they sell——
They could give you a printed list of them.
We have seen the printed list.
There is not the slightest difficulty in knowing what all this is about.
Take the argument first of all that there is one class of periodical that has a circulation of a certain amount. If it pays them to look after that trade here, it will pay these people, provided they have a certain circulation, to get it produced here. If the circulation is small it will prove that the demand is not so great, and that it will not be a terrible loss if the circulation of that periodical is discontinued, with the exception of religious journals or periodicals which are educational or scientific in their nature. Reference was made to American periodicals printed in the English language. If anybody bought an American periodical here he had to pay a price largely in excess of the American price even before the tax was imposed, and nobody cried out against it. A copy of any publication printed at 5 cents in America, costs 9d here. There can be no hardship in that case. Such papers as the "Literary Digest" and the "Saturday Evening Post" cost 9d. even before England went off the gold standard. If I am wrong in that I would like somebody to correct me. I have paid 9d. for these papers.
How much is 9d. in gold ounces?
We shall come to that a little later. Has anybody grumbled as to why we should be charged 18 cents. for a paper retailed in America at 5 cents? To get back to the periodicals which are taxed; if a certain number of these periodicals have a circulation, and if the people who control them wish to preserve their circulation here, they can very easily pay the tax themselves until such time as they can come over here or get some other people to print them for them here. As regards the smaller publications, whether the circulation is 5,000, 10,000 or 15,000, I understand a great number of them can be turned out here. I shall not give the names of any of them here, but they can be turned out and employment given if there is a demand for them. If there is not a demand, it is not going to be the great hardship on the general population that has been argued here. I do not know whether Deputy Hayes is going to argue that the fact of the 20 racing papers being taxed is a tax on light.
Mr. Hayes
I have never read a racing paper in my life, and I did not refer to a tax on light in that connection. I said that a number of people who read good papers that could not come in under the exemption here, were going to be taxed, and the people who read Sunday papers are not. It is going to be a tax on light for the people who wish to read these papers.
The Deputy did not say it was a tax on light. Is the Deputy going to say that his point of view is the point of view that is to be accepted as to the papers to be allowed in free or exempted from the tax? Might not somebody else have another point of view as to what would be considered light? The man who picks out winners considers that he is being taxed from his point of view. Deputy Hayes might consider that the papers he mentioned should be exempted, but probably the people who read the racing papers think that they should not be taxed. Are we going to argue that this is a case of a tax on light?
Mr. Hayes
It is a tax on loss.
Some of them say that they make good investments in these papers, and that they pick out a lot of winners. These people sell their papers by displaying posters such as "50 winners last week, 60 the week before." I have been approached by wholesale newsagents in my constituency, and they are satisfied that this matter will right itself in the end, and that eventually the greater good will be achieved. There is a lot in what has been said about stopping certain journals from circulating here, but that comes under a different heading, and can be dealt with in a different manner. If Deputy Hayes thinks certain Sunday newspapers are not desirable, he has the means at his disposal of getting rid of them. If he sends to the Minister for Justice a copy of any periodical which he thinks should not be circulated here, it can be dealt with. We have certain gentlemen engaged in reading these papers to see that those which should not be circulated here are not circulated.
There has been a lot of talk about this tax, but not many of those who contributed to the discussion seemed to know what the tax was intended to achieve, eventually, for this country. It is going to put the printing into the hands of people here in the case of a great many of those periodicals which boast of a large circulation here. There are certain other little organs with a small circulation here, and it would not pay to have them printed here. The price to be charged for the amount of literary matter and paper would be too great in comparison with the amount of material, labour and journalistic cost. It is about time that this step was taken and I hope the Minister will stick to his original idea and exempt only such journals as it is desirable to exempt. There are, of course, certain scientific journals which could not be printed here; but, generally speaking, I hope the Minister will stand firm and treat exemptions on their merits.
It is rather hopeless to make any appeal to the Minister for Industry and Commerce on the ground that papers have a literary value. Obviously, the Minister considers that it is bad for people to read any high-class English periodical, that it is bad for our culture to read high-class criticism, by first-class English writers, of books which are written in the English language. When the Minister puts forward an argument of that sort, I am afraid that I so completely fail to follow him that it would be useless for me to make any further appeal on that head. I should like to ask the Minister to deal with a matter I raised before, which he has completely overlooked. That is, the taxation of publications such as legal and medical publications.
In my opinion, they could be held to be trade journals.
I do not think they could. As a matter of fact, the Revenue Commissioners do not treat them as such.
Do they not relate to the science of law?
I do not know whether the Minister is trying to be funny or not. I cannot hear him.
Do they relate to the craft of law?
The Minister for Finance is so taken with his own humour that he has become inaudible. I should like to ask the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who can treat a serious matter seriously, whether he does not consider that publications of a legal, medical, dental and generally scientific nature should be exempt, as also journals dealing with farms, horticulture, and so on. These journals are not in substantial rivalry with any paper published here. They have a limited circulation and should be exempt. If the Minister refuses to do as I suggest, I should like to know why he refuses.
It is intended that legal journals should be exempt. If they cannot be exempted as trade journals, or craft journals, they can, I think, be exempted as trade union journals.
We all appreciate the Minister's humour, but I should like him to be serious on this occasion. As a matter of fact, these journals are being taxed at present. I happen to know that tax was demanded on these journals last week and that the acceptance of them was refused.
Application for exemption must be made. That is, possibly, why they were subjected to duty. It is intended that journals of that kind should be exempted from duty.
There is no statement in the Resolution that application must be made for exemption. Will the Minister give instructions to the Revenue Commissioners that duty is not to be demanded on periodicals of that nature?
Undoubtedly, the journals in question will get out of paying the duty if they come within the terms of the exemption. I am afraid the publishers of the journals will have to show whether a legal newspaper relates to a craft, a trade, or a science. I am quite certain that it is within the scope of legal ingenuity to bring these journals under the heading of "religious," if necessary.
I agree with the remarks made by Deputy Morrissey and I hope he will bring in an amendment to include the Daily Mail and the Daily Express in this tax. Within the last two weeks, the Daily Express dismissed some thirty hands in Cork. The whole lot seem to be acting on a set plan to throw as many on the unemployed market as possible. The number of copies of this paper sold per week in Munster alone is 175,000. Still, they threw all their staff out of employment. I ask the Minister to see that some revenue is got out of these 175,000 copies by placing a tax on them. If they are not going to give employment here, why should they not be taxed? After all, the newspapers produced in this country—I do not care what colour they are, or how dirty a lot of them are, even the United Irishman—give employment in printing here. I ask the Minister to impose a tax on English daily papers in view of their present boycott of Irish labour. Apparently, they have joined the ring for creating unemployment, and they should be made to pay through the nose. Some of the money got from them could be used to provide employment for those whom they disemployed. I suggest, after the argument Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney put up a little while ago, that they should brief him to make an appeal for them for exemption. We see these English daily papers coming in every day, and we see their definite plan—I do not know whether it is at the instance of the Deputies opposite or not, or whether there is any special association formed for creating unemployment. I do not know which of the two rings is dealing with the question, but, apparently, the “Daily Express” has given way to one of them. I ask the Minister to clap 1½d. on each copy. Let the people who want to read these papers pay for them.
I think Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney is somewhat wrong in what he has said about legal papers. It is only fair to say that I am a subscriber to an English legal paper, and that it comes to me free of taxation without demand on my part.
By post?
Yes.
That is the way they will all come soon.
Can they come free by post?
Yes.
I want to get some information from the Minister in connection with a particular journal. The British Legion—an organisation which is largely benevolent and philanthropic in character—in addition to dealing with social work, advises its members on pension matters, pension warrants and items of that kind. It publishes a journal which has a certain limited circulation in this country. I should like to know from the Minister if that journal will be considered a trade journal, a craft journal, or a trade union journal, having regard to the special character of the structure of this organisation. The admission of the journal is of considerable benefit to the members of the British Legion, many of whom, like other workers, are suffering from the effects of long-continued unemployment.
How would Deputy Norton describe the journal?
It falls into one of these categories because the organisation does a good deal in the way of providing work for its members. In isolated districts particularly, it does some of the work which, in other places, devolves on trade union organisations. I should be glad if the Minister would exempt that journal, having regard to the character of the organisation.
It would be impossible to offer an opinion on the matter without being familiar with the general trend of the contents of the journal. The interpretation of this section rests with the Revenue Commissioners, and it is for those interested to make a case to them. If the journal is within any of the descriptions mentioned, it will be exempted.
Will the Minister say that that is not the kind of journal he desires to tax?
I am not familiar with it.
It is perfectly easy to get the names of all these journals circulating here and to classify them, because you are only dealing with a couple of large wholesalers. There are only four groups, and at present we have a very blurred objective. To assist us, will the Minister undertake, before we come to the Committee Stage of the Finance Bill, to circulate a list showing a sample group of papers that, on cultural and other grounds, ought to be stopped, a group of papers the producers of which would be likely to print an Irish edition here, a group showing the type of periodicals which it would be reasonable to expect would be produced by Irish writers and publishers and printed in the Free State, and, fourthly, a group of publications which we ought to allow in free of tax?
I am afraid I could not undertake to do that.
We do not know where we are going at present. Neither the Revenue Commissioners nor anybody here can help us along the pathway which the Minister thinks he sees in front of him. It will take a group representing the Department of Education, or an inter-departmental group, to look after the situation and see what path is to be mapped out.
We will deal with Resolution No. 9 now.
I should like to ask the Minister to consider the question of application forms. A number of ex-servicemen's associations, such as Deputy Norton has referred to, deal with relief here. Application forms sent in now to be filled up by certain societies are, in certain cases, taxed. Would the Minister be prepared to exempt these forms?
I understand that the cheapest quality of tea comes from outside the area entitled to the preferential rate. I do not think that it is good business to buy very cheap tea. Other people disagree with that and buy it. I think it was not the intention of the Minister to place a tax of 6d. on the cheapest quality of tea. At all events, it should not have been his intention. Perhaps the Minister would look into the matter before it comes up on the Finance Bill. The tea is from Java.
I want to draw the attention of the Minister to a circumstance to which I drew his attention personally some time ago. Is the exemption provided for in this Resolution?
No.
This only refers to the Customs duty.
Would it not be better to deal with Resolutions 9 and 10 together?
We will take the two together.
There is a provision in the Resolution that any person having more than 1,000 lbs. of tea in his possession would become liable to this excise duty retrospectively, and would require to make a return of the actual quantity of tea in his ownership on the 12th May. It is further provided that any person who had less than 1,000 lbs. in his possession should pay nothing by way of retrospective tax. That means that a man who made a return showing that he had on the 12th May 999 lbs. of tea, pays no retrospective tax, while a man who had 1,001 lbs. of tea pays tax on the entire 1,001 lbs. I think I am right in saying that. The Minister subsequently announced that he had resolved to make a concession to the latter class, and that they would not be taxed on the first 500 lbs. of tea, but, if they had more than 1,000 lbs., they would have to pay tax on all over the first 500 lbs.
I want to submit to the Minister that such an arrangement is inequitable. There is an obvious difficulty, and it is obviously the desire of the Minister, in so far as he can, to relieve anybody from retrospective taxation except those who are trying to forestall the duty. I think it is a bad principle for him to introduce that system in taxation at all. I know he follows the practice of the British Government in making taxation retrospective, but that does not improve the principle in any way. I would submit to the Minister that the circumstances prevailing in Dublin and London are different.
London is the great market of the world for tea, and at the time the tax was imposed it became eminently desirable to capture the tea that was awaiting auction in Mincing Lane. No such state of things exists in Dublin, though it is admitted that certain persons attempted to forestall. I also submit that if that retrospective policy had not been adopted the price of tea would not have advanced at all, and the reduction in sugar would have been passed to the consumer. There would have been no necessity to advance the price of tea, because the present stocks could have been replaced by prudent buying and the extra tariff of 4d. per lb. on tea would mean that virtually the same quality of tea would be sold. But where you have tea already purchased for sale at a certain price, and knew there was to be a retrospective duty at 4d. per lb., frequently the tea would be sold at a narrower margin of profit than the excess demanded. The consequence was that it became necessary for every trader to increase his price.
If anyone is going to get 1,000 lbs. of tea free of tax, I submit to the Minister everybody should get it. I cannot see any grounds upon which the Minister can defend allowing a man who has 1,001 lbs. of tea in his possession a remission extending only to 500 lbs. and allowing a remission of 999 lbs. of tea to a man who has that quantity of tea in stock. I do not think it is necessary to elaborate that at very great length, and there is no need to suggest remedial measures; but I do suggest to the Minister that it does not make very much difference to anybody. It is only a question of, say, £10 in round figures to anybody, so that the sum of money in that is not so very much. Then it will create a feeling of dissatisfaction and discontent if this concession is not given, and I think there will be legitimate grounds for asking for it.
Deputy Cosgrave asked the Minister to look into one matter. I would ask him to look into it, too, and to reassure himself that he is not getting a biassed view on that question. There has been a lot of irresponsible talk amongst interested parties about the virtues of Java tea, and we have heard a lot about the cry of the poor and the needy for the delicious beverage that is to be extracted from Java tea. I have no hesitation in saying that it would be difficult to find a more inferior grade of tea than Java tea. I have no hesitation in saying that any competent tea merchant can secure an Indian substitute for Java tea. It may not have in appearance quite as attractive a quality as Java tea, but in true beverage quality it is much superior to Java tea. There is undoubtedly a temptation as far as I know and as far as my experience goes amongst certain merchants to deal exclusively in Java tea, because Java tea selling at 10d. per lb. looks like Assam tea selling at a cost of 1/4 per lb. Assam tea, at the same price as Java, has not the same appearance and will not command in the market as good a price. I am not saying for a moment that other merchants could not put forward a case to the Minister which would induce him to grant the remission Deputy Cosgrave suggested, but I think it would be to the Minister's advantage if he took the opportunity and precaution to see that the experts he consults are not persons who are interested in the promotion and sale of Java tea in this country.
I join with Deputy Dillon in entering my protest against this proposal in connection with the question of the 4d. per lb. retrospective tax on tea on the ground of its being inequitable and unjust. To start with, the trader who is carrying a stock of 1,000 lbs. of tea gets off free of duty, whereas the trader who was carrying a much greater quantity has got to pay duty at 4d. per lb. on the whole quantity. On reconsideration the Minister has retreated from the position he took up at first. He has taken a backward step but it was a backward step in the right direction inasmuch as he has mitigated to some extent the penalty which he inflicted on men from whom he was likely to derive the biggest revenue. The trader who was carrying a large quantity of tea was in the position that his capital was locked up in that stock. He has to carry that stock for a considerable time and he has his money invested there because he is carrying that large stock. The Minister is going to derive from him very much greater advantage in the way of revenue than he is from the other trader. But in this matter of the tax the Minister penalises him from getting on an equal footing with his competitors in the trade. That is an unbusinesslike law. It is fantastic. I certainly would not like to imagine for one moment that any Minister, charged with the grave responsibility of administering affairs such as the Minister for Finance is managing in this House, would act in that way. I would like to be fair, generous and sympathetic, for this reason that the Minister's is a very difficult task and that it is one that requires grave and serious consideration. It is quite evident to me or to anybody that the Minister might be fully justified in saying "well I had not an opportunity and I had not time." If the Minister said that I, for one, would be quite willing to acquit him of any error of judgment or any intention of being unjust. But I think seriously and sincerely that a grave injustice is contemplated. The proposal is unjust to the man from whom the Minister is to derive the greatest revenue.
Under this proposal the Minister is placing a trader at a disadvantage compared with his neighbour who has the advantage of being free from the 4d. tax. Already the Minister has made an adjustment by remitting the 4d. tax on 500 lbs. of tea. The trader who has a quantity greater than 1,000 lbs. in stock has to bear the burden. There is certainly an injustice. There are various reasons why certain traders carry much larger stocks than others. One of the principal reasons is the cost of freight. To secure freight on the best terms a trader will buy a large quantity of tea. That brings him certain advantages, but there are certain disadvantages also, because he has to take that large quantity into stock and he has to pay for it in due time. His capital is locked up in that stock and if he has not the cash he has to go to the bank for an advance with which to discharge his obligations. Very few bankers will be so obliging as to give an overdraft free of interest.
The only place one will get any consideration is when one will be dealing with the Revenue Commissioners. They are always generous. I have no doubt the Minister will be more generous still. On this occasion I will not ask him to be generous, but to be just. I appeal to him to hold the scales evenly between one individual and another. I ask him to be just to himself and to prove that he is capable of taking a clear view of this situation and can be trusted to carry out his obligations as Minister for Finance. I ask him not to inflict injustice on one set of traders and give very great advantage to another. I appeal to the Minister to reconsider this matter. He has already gone 50 per cent. of the way to remedy the position. I ask him to go the other 50 per cent.
I join in supporting the appeal made by Deputy Dillon and supported by Deputy Davis. I admit the Minister has already made a substantial concession to meet the difficulties occasioned by his first proposal. I think he might go the one step further, delete the 500 lbs. and substitute therefor 1,000 lbs. If he does that, he will meet what is manifestly the justice of the case. Deputy Dillon referred rightly to the fact that retrospective fiscal and penal legislation is undesirable where it can be avoided. From opinions expressed by the Minister when he was in the Opposition I think he is not in favour of retrospective penal or fiscal legislation where it can be avoided. I agree that this is the one exception where it might be justified. The Minister is quite right in taking steps by retrospective legislation to anticipate anything in the nature of a gamble on what the Budget was likely to contain.
I respectfully submit that no man will buy the difference between the stocks he has and 1,000 lbs of tea in order to anticipate the Budget. If he buys at all he will buy a great deal more. If a man wanted to anticipate the Budget he would run up to 3,000 lbs. or 5,000 lbs. of tea. I do not complain about this legislation being retrospective. It is on a different basis from the fiscal and penal legislation that was made retrospective by the last Government. The Minister is just as consistent to-day in proposing that this legislation be retrospective as he was in proposing that the legislation introduced by the last Government should not be made retrospective. I recognise the difference. In these cases, where people endeavour to anticipate duty and try to gamble in regard to future duty, I think the Minister is bound to intervene.
The difference in this matter works out at something like £8 6s. 8d. No man, in order to make that amount, would anticipate the Budget. The Minister in this instance might extend the concession to 1,000 lbs. of tea. It is a comparatively small matter. It will not make much difference to the Budget and perhaps it will remove a certain temptation which might otherwise exist. I would not ask the Minister to increase the exemption to an extent that would exempt people who endeavoured to anticipate the Budget. The figure of 1,000 lbs. of tea will not exempt such people. The Minister has already made some effort to remove a manifest injustice from his first proposal. I will ask him to go the whole hog and, in view of the trifling difference, he should exempt the additional 500 lbs. of tea.
Before the Minister replies might I ask, in view of the fact that the agreement is that this Resolution will be passed to-night, and in view of the importance of Resolution No. 14 dealing with the tobacco tax, whether we could not from 10 o'clock pass on to the tobacco tax so as to give the Minister for Industry and Commerce an opportunity of explaining the Resolution?
I think it would be very unfair to limit the discussion on the tobacco tax to half an hour. There will be ample opportunity of discussing it on the Committee Stage of the Finance Bill and possibly on the Second Stage. A large part of Thursday and all day on Friday were devoted to a rambling discussion on superphosphates and a large part of this afternoon was also given over to the same subject. I think it would be exceedingly unfair to discuss the tobacco duty in half an hour in order that Deputy Mulcahy might launch the speech which he has prepared.
I have no speech prepared. I am merely anxious to hear some explanation from the Minister for Industry and Commerce of the proposals submitted here. The Minister can have the whole half hour for the purpose of going through the proposals contained in the Resolution. It is desirable that as much light as possible should be thrown upon the matter, particularly when one takes into consideration that the workers in Gallaher's factory will have their original notices expiring to-morrow. I contend we are meeting the Minister in every possible way. One should take into consideration the number of important items that could be further discussed on this General Resolution, such as the tea tax, the tobacco tax, the corporation profits tax, surtax, the entertainment tax and Hospitals Sweepstakes.
Were they not all discussed on Friday here?
I do not think the Minister can object in any way to the type of discussion that has been on these Resolutions. The matter discussed on Friday was a relatively important matter. That discussion speaks for itself. We have now half an hour before the Dáil rises, and I think that the importance and urgency of this question would suggest that the Minister for Industry and Commerce should take the opportunity of explaining this Resolution.
Of course, the Chair is in the hands of the House. The Chair cannot instruct Deputies how to proceed.
An agreement on the lines Deputy Mulcahy suggested might have been made if the proposal had been put forward earlier in the evening, when there would have been an adequate opportunity for discussion on this matter. But the Opposition, judging from the manner in which they handled the debate so far, deliberately shut this thing out from discussion. They could have dropped the footy points they were making in regard to the tax on periodicals and come to this, when the Ministers were ready to discuss the matter if the Opposition wanted them.
Are we to understand that the Minister for Industry and Commerce will not take the opportunity to-night to explain the proposal in this Resolution which has not yet been explained because of the way in which the Budget is going through the House?
Again I should like to emphasise that if the Opposition wished to have a prolonged discussion in this matter they had ample opportunity during the last four or five hours to discuss it.
I am not looking for a prolonged discussion on anything. I am looking for an explanation of the terms of this Resolution here.
Obviously if we are not going to have agreement we are wasting time.
I suggest that it is not a waste of time for any member of this Assembly to raise any question affecting 300 employees.
First of all, there are not 300 concerned.
I suggest that the Deputy should not try to misrepresent what has been said by the Chair. I said that unless we were about to reach an agreement on the matter raised by Deputy Mulcahy, we were obviously wasting time. The Chair should not be misrepresented.
We have had four days in which this matter might have been discussed in detail and it has not been discussed. The Opposition made no attempt to bring it into discussion until 10 o'clock to-night, when they had Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and to-day to do it.
Does the Minister forget how many Resolutions this House gave him on Thursday with practically no discussion, because he delayed his Resolutions so that it was impossible to have a discussion if he was to have the Resolutions that night?
Because there was no person on the Opposition side competent to make an agreement and keep it.
This is getting us nowhere.
I should like to support the appeal made by Deputy Wolfe. It certainly looks anomalous that a trader with 1,000 lbs. of tea should be mulcted and that a trader with 999 lbs. should get off. One must draw a limit somewhere, but still there is a good case for exemption. I think the Minister would not be straining the point too far if he were to agree to the suggestion made by Deputy Wolfe. After all, it is rather hard on the man who accidentally had 1,100 lbs. of tea in his possession. If he had sold some of that tea the day before he would be clear of the duty. If the Minister could see his way to agree to this suggestion it would be only fair.
With regard to the point which has been made by Deputy Dillon and, I think, by Deputy Davis, I should like to say a word. Deputy Dillon, I think, went rather further than Deputy Davis, and very much further than Deputy Wolfe. He suggested that there should not have been an excise duty on tea at all. I think that Deputy Dillon must have been unaware of the conditions which existed a short time before the Budget, when there was a very considerable amount of forestalling indeed. The Revenue Commissioners know of importations of tea as large as 100,000 and 200,000 lbs. brought in definitely with the idea of forestalling the customs duty and profiteering. I do not think that any Government is entitled to disregard a fact of that nature and to allow a person to speculate in that way, when speculation can be prevented. I am perfectly certain that because an excise duty has been imposed on this occasion, and because some people have been very badly caught—possibly quite a number of people have gambled and have imported three or four times their normal stock—because fingers have been burned once, we are not likely to have an attempt again to anticipate either a duty upon tea or upon any other essential article of food.
It has been argued that so far as the exemption limit is concerned we are creating anomalies. Admittedly, we created anomalies when the limit was fixed at 1,000 lbs. and we were presumably creating a lesser anomaly when we reduced the limit to 500 lbs. But is there any way in which a tax can be imposed or remissions granted and the creation of anomalies avoided? It does not matter what you do; some lucky individual is going to benefit more than another and some unlucky individual is going to suffer greater loss than others. The reduction of the exemption limit has been argued from the point of view of the man who is fortunate enough to possess or to be able to buy, more than 1,000 lbs. of tea. It was stated originally that it was unfair that he should be charged upon his old stock. Admittedly, there was an element of inequality in that. But, think of the case of the man who has not 1,000 lbs. of tea, but only 100 lbs. of tea. The man who has more than 1,000 lbs. is going to get 500 lbs. of tea duty free, and is going to get what profit he can secure on that. But the man who has only 100 or 200 lbs. of tea, the moment his little stock is exhausted, has immediately to go into the market and pay duty upon the tea which he purchases to replenish his stock. From his point of view is not all the anomaly in the fact that his more fortunate neighbour, who is able to carry a bigger stock, gets off free of duty with 500 lbs. of the stock which he holds? It is because of that that we have decided to take the middle way. We hold that in the case of a man who holds more than 1,000 lbs. if we exempted the first 1,000 lbs. of stock we would do an injustice to the man who held only 100 lbs. We are taking the average figure between the two and granting an exemption to the first 500 lbs. of tea and we say that that on the whole represents the best solution of a very difficult problem in equity. That is why the 500 lbs. was taken. I heard it said here, and I think it was Deputy Dillon who used the argument, that if we had not put an excise duty on tea at all, or if we granted an exemption up to 1,000 lbs. there would be no increase in the price of tea. Does any Deputy for a moment believe that that would be the case? What did the gentleman who brought in 100,000 lbs. of tea bring it in for, or what did the gentleman who brought in 200,000 lbs. of tea bring it in for, except to increase the price the moment the duty was put on, and to take advantage of the 4d. and to put it in his pocket? Even if that was not his intention, it has been represented to me that the smaller traders who carry the smaller stocks, the moment their stocks were exhausted, even if they had refrained from putting the price up in the first instance, would in two or three weeks have had to increase the price of tea. There was no possible way, human nature being what it is, and the facts of the trade being what they are, in which an increase of the price of tea could be prevented. That is the plain and simple fact in regard to the matter. We cannot achieve equality all round. We have to strike a mean, an average. There is going to be advantage on one side of the line and disadvantage on the other. We have to find a middle way, and the middle way between making the man with 1,000 lbs. of tea or over pay the tax upon his full stock or nothing is to take it half way and grant exemption on 500 lbs.
Deputy Cosgrave made a point about Java tea. I was very glad to hear Deputy Dillon put up the counter case to that. I am told that Java tea is very inferior tea and the cheapest class of tea. I am told that possibly most of it might be described as rubbish and dirt and the sweepings of the tea house floors, and that it might not be any harm, from the public health point of view, if we kept out altogether, at least, the very cheapest qualities of it. For that reason there is in regard to Indian tea a substantial inducement contained here in the Resolutions for merchants to import Indian teas direct from the gardens and to blend them here. I have been struck by the fact that no one person has adverted to the advantage which the amendment, introduced in this Resolution on Report Stage, will bring to our home blenders.
The position, hitherto, in regard to the blending industry in this country has been that our blenders were being driven off their own market and that virtually all the tea consumed in this country was being blended elsewhere. The blending industry, at one time, was quite a considerable one, not merely in large cities but in every large town. There was blending going on all over the country. I believe it is possibly the way in which tea best suited to a district can be got. Although I do not know much about the tea industry, I am told the blend must be suited to the water of the district. I am informed that hundreds of people were engaged in this industry until the last twenty years or so and that the industry, as a whole, has declined, particularly since the advent of the cheap package teas which are blended and made up in Great Britain. In the attempt to revive the industry here it will be noted that the amendment introduced into Resolution No. 9 provides that the 4d. rate of duty shall apply only to teas which have not undergone any blending operation outside the country of origin, and, so far as the present intention of the Government is concerned, the 4d. rate will be applied mainly to Commonwealth teas, that is to say, mainly to Indian and Ceylon teas. The cheaper Java type to which Deputy Dillon referred will be excluded from the benefit of the preference.
[An Ceann Comhairle resumed the Chair.]
I have not a closed mind upon the matter. If it can be shown to me that this clamour for the cheaper rate on Java tea is not a ramp for the benefit of a few people who specialise in that particular type of tea I shall be prepared to consider whether I will grant the low rate of duty on all teas imported direct from the gardens, that is to say, in the words of the Resolution, on all teas that have not undergone any process of blending outside the country of origin. I have an open mind upon it. I have not sought the advice of any person as to whether the Java tea should come under the 4d. or 6d. rate. The original intention was to apply the principle of Imperial preference. We are not wedded to that principle in regard to tea. We have given effect to it in regard to virtually every other commodity, but if impartial people whom I can regard as disinterested will come to me and make a good case for applying the preferential rate to Java tea or any cheap tea I shall be prepared to consider it.
But we are not at the present moment disposed to yield to clamour which I believe is not disinterested. I would like if Deputy Cosgrave or those who are asking that the 4d. rate should be applied to Java tea will give some reasons why the 4d. rate should be applied to that commodity. Up to the present I have not heard a single reason for it. They have not put forward a single argument to back up their contentions, but we have heard here from a Deputy, who, I think, is competent to speak on the matter, very strong and very cogent reasons why the 4d. rate should not be applied to that particular brand of tea.
In view of the lateness of the hour, and of the fact that this Resolution is to be taken to-night, I suppose I may deal with the subject matter of Resolution No. 14?
Might I interrupt the discussion on this point—can I assume there is agreement to give a first reading to the Finance Bill, 1932, now?
There will be no difficulty about taking the first reading of the Finance Bill.
Will you divide on the Resolution?
No. We have already divided on the general Resolution on Committee Stage. The Minister is pressing so much on the matter of time that we want to cut down as many divisions as we possibly can. There are many of these Resolutions against which we would have divided very definitely last Thursday, but it would simply take time from discussion. I want to ask, in connection with Resolution 14, whether the Minister has anything to say that will alleviate in any way the position of anxiety felt with regard to Gallaher's factory in Dublin. If I might call it so, the Resolution is a half-baked Resolution, that is supposed to enshrine a policy, and, arising out of the discussions that have taken place, the discussions which I understand the Minister has had with the directors of the firm, and with some of the labour bodies, I would ask him if he has anything to say that would in any way alleviate the position. I would point out in connection with this Resolution that it is very difficult for anyone not in a responsible position to understand what may or may not be the effect of it. For instance, the President to-day is, on behalf of the nation, discussing certain important matters with the representatives of another nation. Section 3 of this Resolution provides that there shall be certain discrimination in favour of a manufacturer of tobacco, who, on 1st April, 1922, was and has been continuously since that date a licensed manufacturer of tobacco carrying on business as such manufacturer in Saorstát Eireann, and whose business as such manufacturer is shown to the satisfaction of the Revenue Commissioners to be in the beneficial ownership of an individual who is an Irish-born resident. If the President were in the position of being a beneficial owner of the factory that is most benefiting under this discrimination, the factory would not be entitled to the discrimination. That is a fact and that is why I call——
Is that what the Deputy wanted to bring out?
That is why I call this a half-baked Resolution. Some explanation is wanted of the policy behind this, particularly in view of the fact that whether Messrs. Gallaher do close down their factory from to-morrow or not, they are in the difficult circumstances, that the Minister understands, that they have notified their employees of the possibility of their closing down to-morrow.
Paragraph 3 of the Resolution is designed to save the native manufacturers owning factories established here for over 100 years from extinction in this present year. That is the purpose of it and nothing else— not to differentiate against anybody, not to drive anybody out of business, but to ensure that the ten native manufacturers, many of them established here since the year 1800, will be kept in existence. They were dying and they were decaying under the policy of the last Government.
Nonsense.
The former Minister for Industry and Commerce got up here, and in one of the most pitiful speeches ever listened to on these benches, threw up his hands and said he could not protect those——
When was that?
——against the inroads and encroachments and pressure of their wealthier competitors.
When was that?
When Deputy Dr. O'Higgins——
Will the Minister explain that he is doing that, because it is an important thing?
Yes, I am doing it. The point about it is that the native manufacturers are prepared to take into their industry virtually anybody who will be unemployed under this Resolution.
Rubbish.
Deputy McGilligan says "Rubbish." When Deputy Dr. O'Higgins got up, prompted by Deputy McGilligan, twelve months or eighteen months ago, and pleaded the case of the Irish manufacturers who would not be allowed to show their Irish goods in Irish shop windows, what remedy had Deputy McGilligan then to offer? None. He turned tail, and flew away.
Not at all.
Because Deputy McGilligan would not stand up to anybody, but this Government is going to stand up to this, and is going to say that, so far as we are concerned, Irish factories which have been established here for over 100 years, whose products are known the world over, and who have given continuous employment to our people, are going to get the chance, not merely to live, but to flourish and expand in this country.
Under 7d. extra?
Question put and agreed to.