Amendment No. 1 is out of order, as it would impose a charge on the State.
In Committee on Finance. - Railways Bill, 1933—Committee Stage.
Section 1 agreed to.
SECTION 2.
The following amendment stood in the name of Deputy Dockrell:—
At the end of the section to add a new sub-section as follows:—
(2) Notwithstanding anything contained in Section 63 or in the Ninth Schedule of the Railways Act, 1924 (No. 29 of 1924), the annual sum of £47,288 shall after the year 1934 continue to be paid by the Minister to the Company.
Amendment not moved.
Section 2 agreed to.
SECTION 3.
(1) In this section— the expression "the existing capital stock" means the respective amounts stated in the second column of the Schedule to this Act of the several denominations stated in the first column of the said Schedule of the capital stock of the company;
the expression "the reduced capital stock" means the capital stock of the company as reduced by the operation of this section;
the expression "the appointed day" means in respect of each denomination of the capital stock of the company the day which is appointed by the Minister under this section to be the appointed day for the purposes of this section in respect of such denomination of the said capital stock.
(2) The Minister shall by order made as soon as conveniently may be after the passing of this Act appoint, in respect of each denomination of the capital stock of the company, a day to be the appointed day for the purposes of this section in respect of such denomination of such capital stock, and different days may be so appointed in respect of different denominations of such capital stock.
(3) On and from the appointed day the several denominations of the existing capital stock shall (subject to the operation of the provisions of this section relating to fractions of a pound of stock) become and be reduced to the several amounts respectively stated in the third column of the Schedule to this Act opposite the mention in the first column of the said Schedule of each such denomination of capital stock.
(4) Every person who is on the appointed day the holder of any portion of any denomination of the existing capital stock shall, for every hundred pounds of such denomination of such stock so held by him, become and be the holder on the appointed day of that amount of the same denomination of the reduced capital stock which is stated in the fourth column of the Schedule to this Act opposite the mention of such denomination in the first column of the said Schedule, and so in proportion for amounts of stock greater or less than one hundred pounds, but subject in every case to the provisions of this section relating to fractions of a pound of stock.
(5) No person shall by the operation of this section become the holder of a fractional part of a pound of the reduced capital stock, and where, but for this sub-section, a person would so become the holder of a fractional part of a pound of the reduced capital stock on the appointed day, such fractional part shall be treated as one pound and the amount of the reduced capital stock of which such person becomes the holder by virtue of this section shall be increased accordingly.
(6) Notwithstanding anything contained in this section, the respective amounts of the several denominations of the reduced capital stock stated in the third column of the Schedule to this Act shall be deemed to be increased by such amounts as may be rendered necessary by the operation of the next foregoing sub-section of this section, and this section shall be construed and have effect accordingly.
(7) On the appointed day every certificate of a holding of any portion of the existing capital stock shall, without any alteration of such certificate, become and thereafter operate as a certificate for that amount of the reduced capital stock of which the holder of the amount of the existing capital stock stated in such certificate becomes the holder on the appointed day by virtue of this section, but any holder of any portion of the existing capital stock shall be entitled, at any time after the appointed day, to have the certificate of his holding of that portion of the said stock altered by the Company free of charge in such manner as may be necessary to show on such certificate the effect of the operation of this section on the holding which is the subject of such certificate.
(8) Sections 10, 11, and 12 of the Great Southern Railways Amalgamation Scheme, 1925, shall apply in relation to the reduced capital stock and the several denominations thereof respectively in like manner in all respects as they apply in relation to the existing capital stock and the several denominations thereof respectively, and accordingly the words "every hundred pounds of such stock" contained in the said Section 12 shall be construed as meaning every hundred pounds of the reduced capital stock, other than debenture stock.
(9) Where under any agreement made before the passing of this Act the Company is under a legal obligation to pay or make to any other company (whether registered within or outside Saorstát Eireann) a share of or payment out of the receipts or the net receipts derived from any particular part of the railway or the undertaking of the Company, the reduction of the capital stock of the Company effected by this section shall not operate to increase the amount of such share or payment beyond the amount which would be payable under such agreement if this section had not been enacted.
(10) Nothing in this section shall entitle the holders or any of the holders of any debenture stock of the Company to appoint a receiver or take any other steps for enforcing the payment of the capital moneys secured by such debenture stock or for enforcing payment of interest for any period subsequent to the appointed day on a greater capital sum than the capital amount to which such debenture stock is reduced by this section.
SECTION 3.
I move amendment No. 2:—
2. Before Section 3, to insert a new section as follows:—
"(1) Subject to the provisions of this Act, the undertakings of the Irish Omnibus Company, Ltd., and of John Wallis and Sons, Limited, shall, on the 1st day of July, 1933, or such later date in the case of either of such undertakings as the Minister may by order appoint, be transferred by virtue of this Act to and vest in the Company.
(2) The transfer effected by this section shall extend in the case of each of the said undertakings to the whole of the undertaking and all the property, rights, powers, duties and liabilities belonging thereto or affecting the same.
(3) As from the 8th day of February, 1933, each of the said Companies shall be deemed to have been carrying on its undertaking for the benefit of the Company, and shall accordingly account to the Company for all assets, benefits and moneys received by it, and shall be indemnified by the Company against all expenses, duties and liabilities whilst so carrying on the same.
(4) No stamp duty shall be payable in respect of the transfer to the Company of the said undertakings or of any of the property, assets, or liabilities belonging or attaching thereto.
(5) So soon after the 1st day of July, 1933, or such later date as the Minister may by order appoint, each of the said Companies shall by virtue of this Act and such order of the Minister be dissolved, except for the purpose of anything to be done in pursuance of this Act.
(6) The provisions contained in the Third Schedule to the Principal Act as amended by the Railways (Existing Officers and Servants) Act, 1926 (No. 25 of 1926), shall, with the necessary modifications to adapt them to the circumstances, apply to the officers and servants of each of the said Companies and of the Company as if they were officers or servants of an amalgamating Company and the Company was the amalgamated Company:
Provided that references in the Third Schedule to the Principal Act and in the said Amending Act to the "3rd day of April, 1924," and to an amalgamating Company or the amalgamated Company shall be construed respectively as references to the "8th day of February, 1933," and to that one of the said Companies or the Company by whom such employees were so employed; and that the period of seven years after the passing of the Principal Act mentioned in Section 4 of the said Amending Act shall be construed as the period of seven years after the passing of this Act."
This is one, if not one of two, of the most important amendments from our point of view put forward either to the Railways Bill or the Transport Bill, and it is to be hoped, therefore, that Deputies, before making up their minds as to what they are going to do on the matter, will realise the significance, importance and meaning of this amendment.
First of all, we are, of course, positively assured by the Minister that his policy and that of the Government is the unification of the transport services of the country either now or as soon as that can be possibly achieved, either by a voluntary or compulsory amalgamation or unification. If that is the considered policy of the Minister and his Party, surely it is desirable that transport services owned by the same shareholding body should be amalgamated under the terms of this Bill. Deputies, no doubt, are aware that it is some considerable time ago since the Chairman of the Great Southern Railways Company at a meeting which was held, I think, last year, fairly admitted that the firms of John Wallis and Sons, Limited and the Irish Omnibus Company, Limited, were owned by the shareholders of the Great Southern Railways Company. There has been a good deal of opposition, even at the recent meeting, as to why there should be three separate sets of directors, three separate headquarters and headquarters staffs, three separate sets of offices involving all this additional overhead charge, and it was held that it was in the interests of the future prosperity of the company that the services owned by the same shareholding body should be under the central management of the Board of the Great Southern Railways Company controlled by the general manager of that board of directors.
It might be argued, possibly, that at one period there might have been some necessity or some justification for having the three road services separate from the running of the railway as such. I think, and I believe it is the opinion of experienced railwaymen, that if the present board of directors, or the directors that have been running the railway for the past eight or nine years, had foreseen, as they should have foreseen, the development of road transport, they would have made proper provision to endeavour to hold the traffic which has gone to the roads as a result of their failure to make that proper provision for serving the public during the past five years. I know working railwaymen, servants of the Great Southern Railways Company, ordinary workingmen, who suggested some years ago that with the development of uncontrolled road transport there was a great danger of the railway company's losing some of its traffic, and that it would be good business to institute a system of collection and delivery, to make provision for collection and delivery rates, and to meet the threatened road competition which was coming on at that particular period. The board of directors, of course, were unable to see that the monopoly they held for such a long period—the monopoly of traffic —could be taken from them by any means, with the result that two, three or four years ago they were driven into the position of having to purchase the firms of John Wallis and the Irish Omnibus Company in order to hold some of the traffic which had been lost through their own mismanagement and lack of vision.
The Minister is making provision for the amalgamation or unification of road services other than those owned by the Great Southern Railways Company. If there is any case for the making of an order by the Minister for the absorption or purchase of a non-railway owned road service, surely there are very good grounds for supporting the unification of those owned by the same shareholding body. What are the grounds on which the Minister justifies the existing unbusinesslike methods of management and control? Speaking on the Second Reading of the Bill, the Minister, in answer to a question addressed by Deputy Norton and myself, said that it was his opinion that the same general manager who directs the operation of the railways should also direct the operation of the buses and lorries, so that there should be unified control and definite co-ordination of all the services. Our amendment, which is very carefully prepared and drafted, is put forward for the sole purpose of assisting the Minister to bring about that very desirable result. I said in this House before that the road services owned by the Great Southern Railway Company—both the I.O.C. and the firm of John Wallis and Sons—were, and are still, taking traffic from the parent company by unfair methods of competition. Evidence has been produced by persons, whom I accompanied on deputations to the Minister for Industry and Commerce, and to the President, and previously by deputations to Deputy Cosgrave when he was President, and Deputy McGilligan when he was Minister for Industry and Commerce—and that evidence is in the Department and was quite conclusive—showing that in certain areas the I.O.C. and the firm of Messrs. John Wallis are competing unfairly with the parent company.
At the recent meeting of the Railway Wages Board in Dublin statements were made, and not contradicted by the company's advocate, the general manager of the company, that between Cork and Cobh there were ten trains each way; but nevertheless the I.O.C., owned by the same body, were running sixteen buses. Between Cork and Macroom there were four trains and twelve buses; and between Cork and Bandon three trains each way and eleven buses each way. I doubt if the Minister for Industry and Commerce has any information at his disposal that would justify him in challenging the accuracy of these statements. These statements were made by the union advocate before the Railway Wages Board, in the presence of the general manager of the Great Southern Railway, who was the company's advocate. At any rate reference to the time tables of the I.O.C. and the G.S.R. Company will prove my statement.
It is said, on the other hand, that there is no competition between Messrs. Wallis and Sons and the Great Southern Railway in regard to their respective routes for goods traffic. I shall quote one case. The representatives of Messrs. Wallis and Sons, some time ago, waited on the firm of Messrs. Gilbey and Co. and pointed out that the railway company were charging Messrs. Gilbey and Co. for certain classes of goods 79/- per ton between Dublin and Ballina, whereas his firm were willing to quote 34/- per ton by the same route, and thus secured all that traffic which was previously carried at 79/- per ton by rail. I should like to hear Deputy Good upon that particular matter. I contend that the figure of 34/- per ton is an uneconomic figure, but whether it is or not, what justification, I ask, is there for one section of the G.S.R. Company working against the other to such an extent? I wonder do the people of Ballina who buy Messrs. Gilbey's wines and whiskey or other goods they send from Dublin, secure any benefit by way of reduced retail prices for the commodities carried by Messrs. Wallis by road. Is there any Deputy from Ballina who could tell us that reductions were made in the retail prices of Messrs. Gilbey's wines and spirits?
They are all teetotallers.
I forgot that; probably that is the explanation. With regard to the operations of the I.O.C. and the denial made by the general manager of the railway company, in reply to a statement made by me some time ago, I have given proof that Messrs. Wallis and the I.O.C. are still competing for traffic, which should not be the case according to the policy laid down in these Bills. The I.O.C. are running a service from Ballina to Dublin and from Dublin to Ballina. A bus is scheduled to start from Ballina to Dublin at 7.45 a.m., and a train is scheduled by the railway company to start for Dublin at the same time. Of course the bus fare from Dublin to Ballina is cheaper than the railway fare, with the assurance that a person who goes by bus will get well shaken, while a person who travels in a railway carriage will experience no such inconvenience, and no change during the journey. If there is any necessity for me to quote any other case to prove this suicidal competition that is going on between the I.O.C. and the parent company I am in a position to quote it. Anybody who may have any doubt about carrying an amendment of this kind can find the time-tables of the I.O.C. and the G.S.R. in the library and can satisfy himself of the accuracy of the information I am quoting. The same kind of case can be quoted all over the country.
I interested myself some time ago, as I was obliged to, by going to Kings-bridge and making a case for continuing the railway service from Dublin to Edenderry by Enfield. The railway officials met us very courteously and said they would do all in their power; but what did they do? They put on a bus from Edenderry to start at the same time as the train with the object of killing one of the services or the other, but really with the object of killing the passenger train service in order to substitute the bus service. Several other Deputies have spoken to me on this matter affecting branch lines in their own areas, and they can confirm from what has happened in their own areas that what I am saying is perfectly true. What is the justification for the continuance of this cutthroat competition and the continuance of this treble service of management in the Great Southern Railway services? Under the Northern Counties Committee the rail and road services are run by the same body of directors and a general manager. I am certain there are Deputies listening to me who have large shareholding interests in the Great Southern Railway, and who are naturally interested in seeing that these Bills are made real pro-railway Bills as the Minister intends them to be. I should like to hear from any of those Deputies, and especially Deputy Good, who is I know in a position to speak in this House on behalf of a large section of shareholders, why there is any necessity or justification for three separate sets of directors. You have directors on the board of the parent company, and the same or some of the same directors on the board of the I.O.C. and on the board of Wallis and Company, receiving separate fees for controlling in this unbusinesslike way the business of the railway as a whole. Is there any justification why the three services should not be brought under the same board of directors and these different separate headquarter charges saved? I shall listen with a good deal of interest, before I say anything further, to what the Minister has to say to this amendment. I can assure him it was a very difficult amendment to draft, and that in the drafting of it we had the advice of very able lawyers who know something about the industry which has to be dealt with in this measure.
I should like to hear, first of all, if there is any reason from a business policy point of view, why the services should be separately conducted and controlled, with all these overhead charges which would be unnecessary if the business was under the control of a central management. I know that disputes have been arising from time to time between the headquarter staff of the Great Southern and those in control of Wallis's and the I.O.C., as to why certain things were done which, in the opinion of the people responsible, the management of the railway, were injuring the railway. Can anybody imagine a clerk or a stationmaster, who is paid directly from the headquarters of the railway company, being called upon to accompany an agent of Messrs. Wallis and Company to canvass for traffic for Messrs. Wallis by road which, otherwise, could be held for the railway company? I know that happened. I know the railway workers who were called upon to do that did not like it, because they knew that unbusinesslike methods like that are likely to lead to the closing down of the railway in the areas which they are serving. I know the Minister has certain cases of that kind on his file given to him by the representatives of the unions at certain conferences at which I was present. I hope to take another opportunity of dealing with the amendment after having heard the Minister, and especially after having heard the spokesman for the shareholders, as to the desirability of the amendment and as to the justification for the carrying on of Messrs. Wallis and Company, the I.O.C., and the G.S.R., under three separate boards of directors with the unnecessary overhead charges which that involves.
There is only one matter that really requires to be decided in connection with this amendment, and that is whether this amalgamation should be brought about as a result of this amendment, or by the railway company in their own time and at the most convenient season. Deputy Davin has made a great deal of capital cut of the competition that is going on between the I.O.C., Messrs. Wallis and the railway company, and the dreadful thing that was involved in three sets of directors and various headquarters that were superfluous. But there has to be a beginning to everything. The Minister can correct me if I am wrong, but there is no doubt I think that the railway company are sincerely anxious to put an end to this state of affairs at the earliest possible moment. Some of the competition that Deputy Davin has mentioned is, I think, more apparent than real. While I do not for a moment doubt the accuracy of his statement in the case that he instanced, I can give him instances where Messrs. Wallis's charges are 50 per cent. over those of the railway company. If you assume that the same sets of directors are controlling the three bodies, you can, at any rate, say that they have lucid intervals. There is no doubt that they are working towards amalgamation, and from that point of view I would much prefer to see the railway company doing this themselves. There are certain financial difficulties as well as administrative difficulties, and they ought to be given some little time to compose these and bring this amalgamation about in their own time. I agree with a lot of what Deputy Davin said, but it is much better that the railway company should manage their own affairs than that the State should step in and that on an appointed day and at an appointed hour something should take place.
I rise to support the amendment. May I take this opportunity of congratulating my friend, Deputy Davin, on the very good case he made for it. He has proved conclusively that the present system is absolutely wasteful, and I think it will be admitted by all Deputies that the first step which must be taken to put the railways on their feet is to cut out any waste that there is. If anything was required to drive home the case which Deputy Davin made it was supplied by Deputy Dockrell.
Deputy Davin told us that Messrs. Wallis were quoting rates 50 per cent. less than were quoted by the Great Southern Railway. Deputy Dockrell, on the other hand, stated that he knows of cases where Messrs. Wallis quoted rates 50 per cent. higher than the Great Southern Railway, and he said that that went to show that the directors of these particular companies had certain lucid intervals at any rate. It seemed to me that it went to show that there was no intelligence displayed in the matter. The statement of Deputy Dockrell showed that the wasteful competition was much worse than was set before the House by Deputy Davin. I should like to hear from the Minister, if he is opposing this amendment, or from any Deputy, the reasons against accepting the amendment. Surely if we are trying to put the railways in a position to cut out, as far as possible, outside competition —whether we say so or not that is the intention in the mind of every Deputy who is in favour of the Bill—it is absolutely ridiculous to have the railway company's own omnibus and lorry services competing against the railway.
If we are to cut out unfair and wasteful competition I suggest that the railway company ought to start to set their own house in order. At the moment I believe that there is a necessity for the closest co-ordination of these three services and that if they are to be worked in an economic and useful way they should be under the same board of directors and the same management. I think the Minister will agree that if you have two separate boards, two separate sets of officials and two general managers in any service, there is bound to be wasteful competition and there is bound to be inefficiency. We ought to aim as far as possible at getting 100 per cent. efficiency on the railways and that cannot be done unless all services owned by the railway company are brought to the point that the railway company own Messrs. Wallis and the I.O.C., just as they own the rolling stock on the railways. Deputy Dockrell said that it ought to be left to the railway company to do that in their own time and at their own sweet will.
We know very well what the railway management has succeeded in doing with the railways for a number of years. We know quite well that unless this House in the interests of the country—I will go further and say in the interests of the shareholders as well as in the interests of the company, and in the interests of the employees—gives a direction that at a date, whether it be the 1st July or some time fixed by the Minister—and if there is one part of the amendment with which I am entirely in disagreement it is that which leaves it to the sweet will of the Minister to fix the time—these companies shall be absorbed, conditions will become worse. I agree that there must be a transition period during the bringing together of the three companies and that the question of adjusting finances may take some time, but I think we should state some definite time. I think that Deputy Davin will agree that putting this matter on the long finger means putting some of the employees in danger.
The Deputy is quite right in that.
That is the reason I stress the point. I cannot see any reason for the suggestion made by Deputy Dockrell except to give the companies a grip on the employees which they should not have. Those who were members of the House during the passage of the 1924 Act thought that it was fairly watertight, so far as the employees were concerned, but we know quite well that afterwards the company was able to drive a coach and four through the sections that purported to safeguard the interests of the employees. These are a few of the points I should like to make. In my opinion if there is any point in this Bill, it is to cut out waste and wasteful competition. To do that I suggest it is only fair that this amendment should be inserted and that the railway competition panies should start to cut out waste and clear up their own house before they start cutting on the outside.
One is always interested to hear Deputy Davin speak on this railway problem because he speaks with a good deal of authority. I am sorry he is not in the House at the moment. He was much more cautious in his remarks than Deputy Morrissey who succeeded him. Deputy Morrissey let the cat out of the bag, I think, when he said that they were disappointed over the 1924 Act and that it had not been at all as watertight, in regard to employees, as the Deputy expected.
As the House had expected.
That is really the foundation on which this proposal of Deputy Norton's is based.
Nonsense.
We shall hear that in a moment. I was interested to see Deputy Davin shed crocodile tears over the condition of the railways. Of course, as usual, he blamed the unfortunate directors for the present financial plight of the railways. We have heard that on many occasions in this House and I have heard it on many occasions outside the House. I would attach some importance to it if the financial position of the Irish railways was quite different and distinct from the financial position of the railways in Great Britain or in other parts of the world. I find that the plight and the difficulties of railways in Great Britain and in other parts of the world are very similar to what I find here in regard to our own railways. Yet the directors here are blamed. I hold no brief whatever—I have been told that I am a shareholder, but I think Deputies might have prefaced that with the word "unfortunate"—for the directors, and if I were satisfied that the directors were to blame certainly I would have no hesitation in blaming them. Let me take the case of one very large company in Britain, one of the largest companies which has at its head one of the most celebrated economists of the present day, a man whose reputation is world-wide, whose name and views we all respect. That man is head of one of the largest railways in Great Britain, and reading through their balance sheet the other day I was brought face to face with precisely the same difficulties as our railways are confronted with. Therefore we must get some other solution, and I think it is time we did, for the economic plight of our railways rather than blaming the directors.
Whatever may be the cause of the trouble in connection with the railways, there is no doubt in my mind at all as to the reasons for putting forward this amendment. This amendment is not aimed in any sense at benefiting the railways. The whole object of the amendment is an attempt by the Labour Party to get, for the trade unions, complete control of transport in Southern Ireland. The position at the moment is that the employees of the railway company belong to one or other of the three big unions, either the National Union of Railwaymen, the Association of Locomotive Engineers or the Railway Clerks' Association. Our railways are controlled by these bodies. These are English unions having their headquarters in London. Recently there has been a strike on the railways, and it has been brought home to these three big unions that it is absolutely essential if they are to exist in future that they must not alone have control of the railways but also have control of the buses and other forms of transport competing with the railways. That is the object, so that when they say there is to be a stoppage, the stoppage shall be complete. There is the whole object of this proposal in a few words.
As I said, Deputy Davin shed crocodile tears over the condition of the railways, but that is all camouflage. The real object behind this is to get complete control of these particular forms of transport. If the Minister supported a proposal of this character I would be greatly surprised. He has been at some pains in this House during the last three months or more to explain to us how necessary it is that the control of industry should be in the hands of nationals. He waxed eloquent on many occasions on that proposal. He has passed through this House and through the Seanad a Bill known as the Control of Manufactures Bill. The whole object of that Bill is to ensure that the control of industry will be in the hands of nationals. The whole object of this amendment is to ensure that the control, from the trade union point of view, of the transport industry shall be vested in the three unions which control the railway industry at the moment. That is the proposal the Minister is asked to support. If the Minister gives his support to that proposal, with that knowledge before him, I shall be greatly surprised and a good many other people in this country will also be greatly surprised.
We have heard from the two Deputies who have just spoken that it is utter waste to have these three companies carrying on business that might be better done by one company. I have not sufficient information about the businesses controlled by these three companies to know whether it would be advisable to amalgamate the three of them under one board of directors. I would not, however, carry that principle too far. In what we know as mass production at the present day that principle has been carried too far on many occasions. Efforts have been made to unite too many businesses under one control, and it has been found that instead of increasing efficiency, the standard of efficiency was lowered. In my opinion it is a matter that should be decided by the boards and their advisers. They have all the information, all the data, before them, and it would be unwise and unjust for a Parliament to interfere with the discretion of a board as to whether its business would be more efficiently managed by one central board or by a series of boards. Supposing I were to say to the three big unions which control the transport industry of the country, and which make this small poor country of ours the cockpit for fighting big principles affecting large numbers on the other side——
Hear, hear!
I do not want to deal with that problem at all, but it is well known to everybody here that a principle was at issue in Great Britain affecting reductions of wages and if that principle had to be fought in Great Britain it would mean involving and paying 750,000 employees. That same principle could be fought here— an effort could be made to establish it here—at a lesser expense. That was why the trouble was brought about in the North of Ireland. It was even cheaper to settle it in the North of Ireland than it would be in the South of Ireland, where there are larger numbers. It is exceedingly unwise, no matter from what point you take it, to give this additional power to these particular bodies. I will go further with the analogy. Supposing I were to put down an amendment to the effect that these three unions should amalgamate under one central board and pointed out that it was gross waste to have three staffs and three headquarters——
On a point of order, this is scarcely relevant to the amendment.
Deputy Good is in order in giving his interpretation of this amendment, but he has wandered far afield in exploring the origin of the current railway strike.
I was merely giving a typical illustration. The purport of this amendment is to amalgamate these three boards under one central management. As an analogy I am taking the three Labour unions. Every argument that Deputy Davin put forward could be applied with equal force to an amendment suggesting the amalgamation of the three Labour unions. I know something of Deputy Davin and the House knows something of Deputy Davin and other Labour leaders and we have experienced their attitude when proposals were put forward dealing with labour matters which they considered should be left entirely to the Labour unions. I cannot imagine Deputy Davin waxing more eloquent on any subject than he would on that subject, had I put forward a similar amendment to the one he has submitted, specifying the three unions instead of the three boards. I am quite satisfied that the railway company, notwithstanding all the abuse that is being poured on the members of its board, is the best authority to deal with this particular question. It is only on their authority that I would rely. They have all the data and experience and it is for them really to settle the question. I would make exactly the same remark with regard to the three labour unions. Deputy Davin, no doubt, would say to me: "This is an intolerable interference with the rights of the trade unions."
A poor parallel.
I say that this proposal is an intolerable interference with the rights of public companies. These are matters which the companies themselves should settle. They ought to have their rights just like trade unions. I hope the House will respect the rights of both parties.
If we were to take serious notice of the utterances of Deputy Good, I think the Minister would do well to withdraw completely from the legislation he is advocating, seeing that the management of transport generally in the country is being carried out in a sufficiently magnificent manner and to the abundant satisfaction of everybody. Deputy Good believes that the directors of the railways are the best people to do their own job in their own way. He tried to draw an analogy with respect to the unification of the railway unions. If such an amalgamation were necessary, the labour unions would be quite satisfied to bring it about; but they are not going to seek for State aid in doing their own job. Deputy Good conveniently forgets that we are making a present of £285,000 to cover up the ineptitude and mismanagement which have brought transport into the chaotic condition in which it is to-day. It is because of that ineptitude and inefficiency on the part of the management that we are enacting this legislation to-day.
We are asked to perpetuate that menace to transport, that origin of all chaos, by keeping three sets of nonentities, styled boards of directors, who are drawing fat salaries and who are carrying on an insane, cut-throat competition, one with the other, with money belonging to the shareholders of whom Deputy Good is one. Deputy Davin has quoted instances where they are not working in co-operation, but in direct competition with each other. Such instances could be quoted ad lib. without challenge. Is Deputy Dockrell prepared to produce one scintilla of evidence that these boards will be more sensible in their attitude in the future? We are asked to give them a prolonged lease of life in order to allow them to continue to do the mad, chaotic things they have been doing. We are asked to give them a subsidy in order to permit them to carry on for a further period.
We are told by the Minister that we can secure the unification which he himself has admitted to be desirable. The Minister indicated quite recently, and the President also indicated that unification was one of the things that must be secured if chaos is to be eliminated from the transport industry. The Minister says he can secure it by a stroke of the pen. Deputy Dockrell says it must be brought about at the sweet will of the boards of management and in their own time. Deputy Good denounced the principle entirely and declared that it was tending towards control by the unions. I cannot see the relevancy of that. Deputy Good says that this proposal is a direct attempt to secure control of the transport industry by the railway unions. I will leave that to his own imagination. The amendment speaks for itself. It asks that these three contracting parties who are benefited by this amalgamation be brought under one control in the interests of the transport industry of this country. Let us have the other side. Deputy Morrissey has made a suggestion on this matter.
Is there something sinister behind the reluctance of these three contracting parties to come into the amalgamation at once rather than to come in at their own sweet will? I suggest there is. The Minister is handing over this Bill to the companies allowing them to bring about amalgamation at their own sweet will. If he is callous enough to do that we will find later on that there will be a very attenuated staff, and many of the servants of these companies will be dismissed rather than have dismissal take place after the amalgamation. That I suggest is the policy that is in opposition to this amendment. These men will be thrown away, as a disused writing pen when it has served their purpose.
Deputy Good has been at great pains to bring in something about Deputy Davin's crocodile tears. I wonder if there have not been greater crocodile tears on the part of the Deputy. We have heard from Deputy Dillon about the poor old ladies with a few railway debentures. There is no sympathy in the heart of Deputy Dillon for the men who are now to be victimised in addition to the thousands of men who are at present walking the streets of this country and who are drawing outdoor relief as the only means of keeping them from starvation. In the opposition to this amendment there is the very same fell purpose on the part of the management to get rid of its redundant staff without compensation. They want to get rid of them in advance without any compensation. I ask anybody who is interested in the progress of the transport industry and who wants to see it run on successful lines to say that the principle enshrined in this amendment is essential to the success of that transport industry. In order to have that industry run on right lines it must be run under the control of one body. I say that the railway company, having got advantages on the one hand, they ought to take the risk on the other hand by giving legitimate compensation to those men who may be found redundant.
Deputy Keyes who is carried away by the flood of his own eloquence, made reference to the fact that I mentioned that debenture holders and preference shareholders were not bloated plutocrats. He then went on to say that I had great sympathy for these people, but not for the faithful servants of the railway companies. Will Deputy Davin repeat that statement, or will he tell this House that when some members of his union were being dismissed and their homes being broken up, I went to the management to make a case for them, and I was told by the members of the Labour Party that the rule of the railway unions was "last in first out"?
Yes, and——
Wait, now. When I went to the management they informed me that they were prepared to take exceptional cases into consideration, but the Labour Party said that if homes were to be broken up let them be broken up, and I said that that was not showing sympathy——
The Deputy was told that "last in first out" was the policy if redundancy was to be got rid of. That is the policy that we are standing for, and that is the policy we will defend in this Bill.
I told them that time and I tell them now that that is a doctrine characterised by absence of sympathy or human feeling. If that is Deputy Keyes' human sympathy or consideration for railway men it is not mine.
I submit, sir, there will be a very favourable opportunity given to the Deputy later to ventilate his views on this matter, but he is not in order on this amendment.
I am prepared to be ruled by the Chair.
The Deputy is presumably coming to the amendment.
I am replying to a statement made by Deputy Keyes and I submit I am in order.
On that point, I want to say that if a Deputy makes, in passing, an irrelevant remark, no Deputy is entitled to make a lengthy reply to such a remark. Discussion of past actions of railway unions is out of order. The Deputy must speak to the amendment.
In my opinion this amendment has no merits. It is divided into two sections:—(1) to make amalgamation compulsory, (2) to get conditions appertaining to the railway service prescribed for all services under the road transport companies. As regards the first part of the amendment, my view is that it is like a bull in a china shop. The Minister said on the Second Reading that he saw that these three companies must be amalgamated. He said that he would see that they would be amalgamated and that the directors are given a full and adequate undertaking that they would be amalgamated at the earliest possible moment. Deputy Davin should know that in an amalgamation of this kind a variety of complicated and elaborate considerations come up for review. These things cannot be done like that. They may take time. They require a certain amount of negotiations. It is absolute folly to attempt to rush operations of this kind by ill-informed and ignorant legislation.
There would be something to be said for this amendment if the Minister for Industry and Commerce had not made it perfectly clear on the Second Stage of the Bill that this aspect of the situation had his attention and that adequate safeguards would be in the Bill to ensure that the three companies would be amalgamated and that one board of directors would suffice. At the moment it is calculated to be anything but helpful to drag complicated financial matters of this kind into a public discussion here. The Minister's speech on the records is quite sufficient guarantee that the amalgamation will be carried out at the earliest possible moment. If the amalgamation were not carried out that speech might be made the basis for raising the whole matter here again and taking him to task.
Such an amendment as this can do nothing but injury to the transport industry. If the Minister wants to make a defence of his Bill as it at present stands it is by rejecting this amendment. That amendment must go out. It is highly inconvenient for everybody. As far as the second part of the amendment calling for certain action is concerned, it will eventually result in the three big railway unions getting the transport industry in this country into their hands. I was gratified at seeing the move made by Deputy Good to the left. I was glad to see Deputy Good's move to the extreme of angry nationalism. I was glad to hear him give whole-hearted support to the principle incorporated in the Control of Manufactures Bill. In that matter I am in sympathy with Deputy Good. I think it is a monstrous thing that trade unions with their headquarters in England should be in a position to dictate to the community here and to paralyse the entire transport industry of this country whenever they take it into their heads. I agree with Deputy Good that the strike at present in the North of Ireland is largely due to the fact that the National Union of Railwaymen wanted to try out here the strike on the principle of a more economic balance-sheet. Our men in the North are suffering because of that strike.
Deputy Good knows more about the real reasons than Deputy Dillon does, if the Deputy is anxious to hear them.
I am most anxious to hear them. Deputies will have ample scope to address the House when I have finished.
We will have the strike question to-night.
With deep respect I suggest that this amendment is calculated to create a situation in the transport industry in this country as a result of which it will become the slaves of certain unions. I am going to suggest that these unions are controlled in Great Britain, and I wish to draw the attention of the House to the fact that at the present moment these very unions to which I refer have precipitated the strike.
Is the Deputy entitled to come here deliberately to try to confuse the whole situation?
The patient is recovering.
Deputies would certainly be well advised not to enter into the merits or demerits of the strike, a settlement of which is at the moment pending.
I have no desire to press that line if Deputies consider that reference to it would complicate matters.
The Deputy knows that it would. He is not as ignorant as he lets on—the pretended ignorance of the lawyer.
The Deputy may rest assured that I seldom simulate ignorance. In fact, the Minister for Industry and Commerce tries to make out that I simulate omniscience. When dealing with this amendment there was criticism of the directors. I presume Deputy Keyes was in order in referring to the directors as nonentities and persons anxious to victimise the servants of the company.
I agree with that.
I think that criticism was largely unjustified and was of no value for the purpose of this amendment. The directors may be fairly criticised for many things, one being that despite their combined efforts they have been able to clean the railway carriages, which one would imagine would be a comparatively easy thing to do. If there is to be criticism of the directors I do not think we should forget, when considering the amendment, that the railway unions have insisted on conditions in this country which, in some cases, result in it being necessary for the directors to employ two engine drivers to do the work of one, and that on many branch lines it will be found their uneconomic condition is largely due to the conditions insisted upon by the railwaymen's union. Perhaps there are two trains running in the day to some of these places, one at 9 o'clock in the morning and one at 6 o'clock in the evening, but two engine drivers must be kept there, because these men cannot work more than eight hours, although their work consists largely of bringing two trains there daily. The same applies to railway porters and to other officials who are not allowed to work broken hours.
That is an incorrect statement.
It does not matter when the Deputy is making statements against the amendment.
This amendment has no bearing on train services or the numbers of railway employees.
It is very difficult to speak after a Deputy criticises the directors and declares that they are a gang of nonentities whose principal concern is to victimise the servants of the railway. That is a very comprehensive charge. If I were to reply in similar terms, I would require to use language about the railway men to which I am not prepared to subscribe.
Deputy Keyes did not use the word "gang."
Presumably the incompetence was to suggest that the principal purpose was to victimise faithful servants.
The statement I made was that those who became redundant should be given sufficient compensation.
Does the Deputy say that he did not refer to the directors as incompetent nonentities?
Certainly, and the evidence is there.
Deputy Keyes did not use the word "gang."
I withdraw the word "gang." In face of criticism of that kind it is difficult to restrain one's language carefully, because one is driven to generalities which are as indefensible as the statement made by Deputy Keyes. Deputy Keyes went on to say that legislative amalgamation is literally asked for in exchange for a subsidy from the nation for the railways in order to restore them to a position of solvency, as a result of incompetency. He forgot to add that there is a subsidy in an indirect way given by this Bill, which will possibly be more than balanced by the liabilities which we are giving to the railway company in Section 7. I do not wish to prejudge the issue in any way. I have no desire to be told later on that I am making the enemy's case, that I am instructing Sir Josiah Stamp in railway matters, or that I am giving wrinkles to the law agent of the L.M.S. Company. But I am suggesting that there is a possible liability which may conceivably arise. Deputy Morrissey detected some sinister purpose in the resistance to this amendment. I have now entirely forgotten what the sinister purpose was, so that I am not in a position to deal with it. It was something quite as preposterous as the reference by Deputy Keyes to the Board of Directors. I submit that the first part of this amendment is drafted in ignorance of all the circumstances surrounding the case, that it is calculated to do nothing but damage, and to achieve nothing that will not be achieved if the amendment were not passed. The amendment is directed towards making the employees of the road company subject to the same conditions as the employees of the railway company, and to bring them within the ambit of the three big railway unions. I am not so extremely national on that subject as Deputy Good, but I am prepared to go this far and to say that, in my opinion, the English unions have quite enough power in this country without getting more. I would prefer to see these men in the secondary branch of the service operating under conditions where they would ordinarily turn to Irish unions for the usual trade protection that workmen are entitled to. On these two grounds I think the Minister should reject the amendment and stand fast in his rejection.
Having settled the question of the railway directors and the strike I would like to get back to the case for the amendment. The members on the Labour Benches say that they heard quite a number of cases made against the amendment. Deputy Davin was suffering some time ago from blushes brought on him by congratulations from Deputy Morrissey on the case made for the amendment. I do not think Deputy Davin made such a case for the amendment. In fairness to what was in the mind of the Deputy, and in fairness to a certain section, it would be well if the position was cleared up somewhat. As I understand it the amendment would secure that the two companies mentioned would come under the control administratively of the railway company, that there would be an amalgamated company consisting of the railway company, Messrs. Wallis and the I.O.C., and that as a result of the amalgamation we would have administrative control by a single company, so that such duplications as the Deputy considers absurd would be in time eliminated. The second point that arises on the amendment is in regard to the capital of the two companies—the Irish Omnibus Company and Wallis and Sons. I should like to hear what the intention of the Deputy is with regard to that capital. Under the schedules of the Railway Bill, the existing capital is being written down, and it seems to me that, under the amendment, the capital of the Irish Omnibus Company and Wallis and Sons would be taken and thrown into a general pool without any arrangement being made as to how the present railway shareholders or the shareholders of these two companies would stand, either in relation to the capital of the two companies or the general amalgamated capital that would eventuate from the passing of this amendment. I should like to hear the Deputy on that point. The third point is with regard to the right to compensation of employees of these companies who, as a result of any economy in organisation, may be deemed redundant. The intention of the Minister, I take it, is to have a situation brought about here in respect of transport that will result in the amalgamation of these two companies with the railway company. In any such amalgamation, I see no reason why the employees of these two bodies should not be made as secure as the employees of the Dublin South Eastern Railway Company were made when the amalgamation of the railways took place. I am given to understand that in neither the Railway Bill nor the Transport Bill is there any promise of security for the employees of these two companies.
I ask the Deputy again to develop the case for this amendment, because I take it that he accepts it as the intention of the Minister to bring about in time the amalgamation of these two companies, and that he is particularly interested in the position in which the present employees of these bodies will find themselves after amalgamation— what security they will have with regard to further employment or what compensation will be given them if they are dislodged. The Deputy thought it well to inform the House that this was not a common or garden amendment, that it was put together by a lawyer or lawyers, about whom at other times the Deputy is supercilious. I should like to know whether the Deputy was really concerned with sub-section (6) or whether the professional draftsman coming up against the point involved in No. 6, said: "We will simply have to make a complete job of this; we cannot set up the position of these employees satisfactorily except we bring about the amalgamation of the companies." I suggest to the Deputy that, when he thinks the matter over, he will find that he is not concerned with the arrangement of the capital of these two companies, that he is prepared really to leave the settlement of that aside for a while——
Seeing that the Deputy is talking, apparently, with some information, perhaps he would tell us more about the capital of the company and how the company was purchased.
I do not know anything about it. I am talking without any information at all. When, as in this amendment, we are asked to amalgamate three companies, I suspect that two of these have some capital, that there are people with shares in these companies, and that there is some money behind them. If you take these two companies and amalgamate them with another——
Is Deputy Mulcahy aware that the chairman of the company stated at the shareholders' meeting last year that the two companies were owned by the shareholders? The question of capital should not be brought in at this stage to confuse the issues raised by the amendment.
I am not introducing the question of capital to confuse things. I am introducing it to get matters clarified. If the Deputy can assure the House that there will be no capital complications in the carrying out of the amalgamation of Wallis and Sons and the I.O.C. with the railway company, then my path will be somewhat smoothed. I am interested in seeing that the employees of a firm like Wallis's, who have been more or less official carriers for the railway company for years and years, should have some security as regards their future if amalgamation is brought about. This firm has a large number of employees, some of them with very long service. We should be certain that these employees will get the same conditions as were extended to the employees of the Dublin South-Eastern Railway Company when the railways were amalgamated. I am not introducing the question of capital to confuse the situation at all. I think the Deputy will appreciate that what is involved here as regards capital is a serious obstacle to every Deputy in casually accepting this amendment without any explanation of the difficulties by the proposer. I feel that sub-section 6 of this amendment is what the Deputy is really concerned about. That contains a principle that I, and most of our people here, would be prepared to support. But I think that the lawyers or lawyer whom Deputy Davin spoke about told him that they would have to make a complete job of it. I think the Deputy, for the purpose of having a completely rounded amendment, has been led into stretching his net much wider than it would be useful to go. I support the Deputy as regards sub-section 6. I do not think he himself knows what is being done in this amendment as regards capital and I am not disposed to support the Deputy in that respect. I should like to hear what the Minister has to say as regards bringing about the control that the Deputy seeks at the earliest possible moment.
I have no knowledge whatever of the business administration of either of these companies, but I know a little of the administration of the railways. On the question of amalgamation, as embodied in this amendment, there is one point which I support to the full. I ask the Minister's consideration of it. It is common knowledge that these two carrying companies, the Irish Omnibus Company and John Wallis and Son, Ltd., have been carrying on a co-operative business with the railway in the carrying of goods. From information that we have, the position is that if people tender goods to the railway they find themselves charged a certain freightage and, on going to either of the other two companies, they find that they can get their goods carried at a cheaper rate. That seems extraordinary. There was one case some time ago in which a bicycle was tendered to the Great Southern Railway. The freight charged was exorbitant and it was brought to the Irish Omnibus Company and taken by them at a reduced rate, and the Irish Omnibus Company sent it to the railway company, who brought it to its destination. That is a small instance of what is going on and which has caused a good deal of the contention that arises regarding these two companies. I think there is a strong case to be made for their amalgamation. If they have been working together and co-operating with the railways they ought to be combined in one company. There are other things in the amendment which need a good deal of consideration before they could be adopted.
I am in complete agreement with Deputy Davin as to the necessity of securing unification in the direction and management of the three transport undertakings owned by the Great Southern Railways Company. In fact, I think that there are very few people who have given any consideration to the position of transport in this country who are not of the same opinion. The only question on which difference might exist as between Deputy Davin and myself and other Deputies who have spoken on the matter is as to the means by which that unification is to be secured.
I stated here, on the Second Reading of the Bill, that the only reason why amalgamating clauses did not appear in the Bill was the assurance I had received from the railway company that amalgamation would, in fact, be carried out. It would be exceedingly difficult to draft amalgamating clauses. There are difficulties associated with the ownership and liability of these other road undertakings which could not be easily resolved. No doubt, if we set out to resolve them, we could do it, but, in view of the fact that they are going to be resolved for us, I see no reason why we should attempt it. I have been definitely assured again by the Great Southern Railways Company that the amalgamation which is possible will be achieved within six months from this date, and I assure the Dáil that, if, in fact, amalgamation is not achieved by then, I will introduce here the necessary proposals for legislation to effect it.
The difficulties I have referred to, however, justify the course of action I am recommending. By unification, I take it, Deputies mean the bringing under the direction of one board the activities of the three companies and the appointment of one general management to control them. It may be necessary, because of the legal and financial difficulties to which I have referred, to maintain in theory the existence of three separate companies for a while longer than six months. On that I am not in a position to express an opinion, but the assurance I have received is to the effect that there will be one board of directors and one general manager for all the activities now conducted by the three companies within six months from this date, and the assurance I give the Dáil is that, if, for any reason, such action is not taken, I will have the necessary proposals for legislation before the House for its consideration. I think that statement on my part would justify the withdrawal of the amendment. Even if the amendment were passed, I doubt very much if the amalgamation which it proposes to achieve could be carried out within less than six months. The amendment by itself has a number of flaws in it which arise naturally from the lack of information which those responsible for its drafting laboured under—a lack of information which would constitute a considerable difficulty even if the amendment were being drafted officially, but which could be overcome, no doubt, in time, if official proposals have to be brought to the House.
The other points that arose out of the debate I do not think will cause very great concern. The statements made by Deputy Good, which have been made quite recently by other ultra-nationalists like himself are, I think, of no consequence whatever. The idea has been created in certain quarters that, by amalgamating road and rail services, we are producing a position in which one union or one group of unions would be able to effect a complete stoppage of transport services at any time if they desired to do so. I do not see how that position is going to be created or prevented by any action we take in a matter of this kind. So far as I am aware, most of the employees of the Irish Omnibus Company, at the present time, are members of the National Union of Railwaymen, so that, if the National Union of Railwaymen wanted to stop these omnibus services now, they could do it and they could continue to do it in the future if the Irish Omnibus Company disappeared and the services were run directly by the Great Southern Railways Company. On the other hand, so far as I am aware, most of the omnibus services which are owned and controlled by the Great Northern Railway Company are staffed by men who are not members of the National Union of Railwaymen and yet the services stopped, so that no change in the management and direction can possibly affect that position. If an amalgamation of unions takes place in respect of one trade dispute sufficient to stop services then the services, presumably, will be stopped no matter who is responsible for the management or who owns them. If, on the other hand, the unions are not in a position to do that, the position will be reversed, no matter what the management or the ownership is, so that I do not think there is any point to be made in that connection at all—certainly, no convincing point.
There is one question that arises out of the amendment and that is the possibility of redundancy in the staffs of the road transport undertakings in the event of their being amalgamated with the rail undertaking. I have gone into that, however, and I am quite satisfied that there need be no redundancy except amongst the directors and in the management and I am sure that Deputy Davin will accept my statement that anybody rendered redundant amongst the directors or in the management of the companies will, probably, be amply provided for.
That is the point. If this amendment is not passed, in bringing about unification by legislation, will the shareholders of the company be in a position to give large sums by way of compensation to the directors and highly-placed officials, and to ignore payment of compensation to ordinary workers who may become redundant?
There is nothing in the amendment or in any type of legislation which I could devise that could prevent the company doing what they like in a matter of that kind.
With their own money!
Deputy Good would not object to that.
My point is that as far as the ordinary clerical or outdoor staff are concerned there is going to be no redundancy. Instead of there being redundancy, I rather contemplate that the staffs will have to be increased, because of the provisions of the Road Transport Bill and the other provisions of this Bill. The services which will be operated by the new organisation will be the sum of the services now being operated by the separate organisations. At least the same staff will be required, and, as the services will probably be increased arising out of the elimination of other services, increased staff will probably be required. If I thought there was any real danger of redundancy I would say that there was a case for a provision of this kind, even though it would off-set considerably the waste to the elimination of which Deputy Davin referred, because waste would arise out of duplication and redundancy would be the consequence of that duplication. I do not think the danger exists at all. On the contrary, I think the position will be that the staff will have to be increased, in order to provide for the new services and the new traffic that will arise when the Road Transport Bill comes into effect, and that the amalgamation does not effect any overlapping apart from the management and the boards of directors.
Might I ask the Minister would it be quite open to the company to dispense with men who had given life-long service—in order to take in younger men—without giving them any compensation whatever?
We are not going to settle every social problem of that kind by legislation. That is the purpose for which trade unions exist. It is possible for the company to do that now; it will be possible for the company to do that in future. I do not see what type of legislation we could devise to prevent things of that kind happening, except we take power to say that no man shall be dismissed without Ministerial sanction or an act of the Dáil. I can assure Deputy Morrissey that in the matter of enforcing certain conditions which should apply where redundant employees have to be dismissed the trade unions have shown themselves quite strong enough to ensure that their point of view will be considered, and as far as I am aware they have—if not a definite agreement with the Great Southern Railway Company— secured what is tantamount to a regular practice in the matter of dispensing with employees for whom there is no work.
Might I ask the Minister upon what grounds of public policy he can justify making provision for compensation to be paid to people who will lose their employment as a result of his orders made under this Bill, and ignoring the rights of the people who were employed by Wallis's, and who may lose their employment as a result of voluntary unification?
My answer is that they need not lose their employment.
Why do you say that?
There is no reason why they should lose it.
That is your opinion.
We are not combining two organisations to do the same business for the purpose of effecting reduction in the staff. We are bringing two organisations together, doing different types of business, for the purpose of securing uniform direction. The assumption should be that the staffs are going to be increased, because of the increased services undertaken under the provisions of these Bills.
That is purely the Minister's opinion.
And should be the opinion of anyone who gives a moment's consideration to the point.
I am afraid the Minister's opinion is inaccurate.
Will the Minister undertake that if any reasonable number of people lose their employment as a result of voluntary amalgamation, he will bring in a compensation measure to compensate them, the same as people who lose their employment under this measure?
I take it, in the first instance, the organisations responsible for safeguarding the interests of those employees will act; I am quite certain they will act. It would be only in the event of injustice arising out of something we effect on grounds of public policy that the question of insisting on compensation would arise. Undoubtedly in such circumstances I would insist on compensation. That is why compensation provisions are in the Bill in relation to the closing of branch lines. The act would take place with the permission of the Government, or in consequence of the fact that changes had taken place——
That is not an answer to my question.
In those circumstances I think there is a case for compensation, but where there is no ground for assuming that redundancy is likely to arise the introduction of compensation provisions would be unnecessary, and would in fact impede rather than facilitate the position we want to bring about.
Might I ask the Minister if what he states will happen, and there will be no redundancy, what is his objection to putting in a saving clause to the Bill?
What clause does the Deputy want to put in?
I want the Minister and the House to safeguard the position of the men. If the Minister says redundancy will not arise, what is his objection to putting in the clause?
Definitely, the reason why it is not going in is, first of all, because we are not enforcing amalgamation. We are taking the view that amalgamation is something the railway company should undertake of its own accord as a step towards sounder management. We may be in the position—I do not think it is likely—where we would enforce amalgamation. The main reason why we are anxious to see amalgamation brought about is not for the purpose of saving whatever comparatively small sum of money will be saved by it, but to ensure that there are going to be in charge of the transport services in a great part of this country men who are not merely railway directors, but men who will regard themselves as in charge of a transport organisation obliged to provide the type of transport which the public convenience necessitates. I do think that the development of transport on sound lines has been retarded by the fact that we had controlling a large part of the transport organisation men who were purely railway directors, considering every question from the point of view of effect on the railways, and other men who were interested in road services and not in railways. We want a board of directors that is not going to be a railway board or a road transport board, but both combined, charged with the responsibility of ensuring efficient services. That is the reason for the amalgamation. That is why we are taking certain steps to ensure that it will come about. That is why I say that if it is not achieved within six months legislation to compel it will be introduced. I want to say that I have found that the persons responsible for railway management have exactly the same point of view, and have given me an assurance that amalgamation will in fact be achieved before six months have elapsed.
Will the Minister say if there is anything standing in the way, so far as capital reconstruction is concerned, of the early or immediate unification of the three services?
There are difficulties, arising out of the manner in which those enterprises have been financed, which would make it exceedingly difficult to draft legislation that would cover every point. It is much better that amalgamation should be effected by the company itself in the manner in which it is proposed, because it would mean that those difficulties would be met by people who have full knowledge of the facts, which otherwise it would be very difficult to obtain.
Did not the Minister tell the House on the Second Reading of the Bill that this could be done by a stroke of the pen?
I did not say it myself. I said that members of the railway board have said to me that it could be done by a stroke of the pen, and would be done as soon as I asked. There are, I know, these difficulties. These will be overcome. You will have within six months the position that most people consider necessary, and that the railway companies are prepared to achieve.
The Minister certainly showed admirable adroitness in getting away from the point about safeguarding the rights of the men. Is the Minister prepared to put into the Bill a section which will safeguard their position? He says that he is quite satisfied that there will be no redundancy; that they will want extra men. If that is so, then surely he ought not to have any objection to putting in a saving clause such as I suggest.
I am not taking it upon myself to say that there will be no redundancy in transport. I am definitely of the opposite point of view. I do not think that we can take upon ourselves the obligation to direct matters of that kind. These matters are arranged between the companies on the one hand and by the unions on the other. I am quite satisfied that if any question of that kind arises it will be adjusted. We are not taking the position that this is necessarily going to result in redundancy. Quite the contrary. Nothing that we are doing, or that will arise out of this amalgamation, will necessarily mean redundancy. I would say the result may be quite the contrary. My expectation is that the staffs responsible for the services now being conducted by this and the other organisations will have to be increased because the services are going to be increased.
That is the Minister's opinion. The Minister, in the course of his remarks, talked about what happened between the trade unions and the railway companies prior to this. We had experience of what occurred under the 1924 Act, and that is why we want to try to safeguard the position. We know that the trade unions were not able to secure justice for the men who were rendered redundant as the result of the passing of the 1924 Act.
The Deputy is talking about a different thing altogether. Under the 1924 Act the railway companies were amalgamated for the purpose of creating redundancy and reducing the costs of administration. This is an entirely different operation altogether. This is not the amalgamation of two railway companies, but the bringing of a road transport organisation and a railway transport organisation together for the purpose of getting unified management. That need not necessarily mean redundancy.
I hope the Minister is right.
If the Minister visualises a continuance of the services referred to by Deputy Davin, services which are generally considered to be wasteful, and that his hopes with regard to redundancy are based on that, then I am afraid he is unduly optimistic.
There is a railway and a bus service between Dublin and Limerick. I do not think that the bus service between these two cities should be stopped, although I do not imagine that very many people travel all the way by bus from Dublin to Limerick. I imagine the railway company would adjust its rates so as to attract people to travel by rail, but it has to be remembered that the bus service between these two cities connects up a lot of fairly large towns and serves the public need. What we contemplate is that the road and railway services are going to be brought into closer relationship with one another. We contemplate the road service gradually growing as the transport needs of the country grow. It is hardly necessary to emphasise the point that people to-day require far more transport than they did fifty years ago. We think there is going to be a very definite increase in the road services operated by the railway companies, because of the provisions in the Road Transport Bill. That is why we contemplate an increase in the number of people employed on the road services operated by the railway companies.
If the men can be protected between now and the compulsory unification of the services I think it would meet the point.
I do not see why there should be any dismissals. There is no advantage to be gained by the railway company in dispensing with anyone whose services are required. The Deputy may take it as certain that there is no one in the employment of the Great Southern Railways, of Messrs. John Wallis or of the I.O.C. at the present time whose service is not required. I think that every person who could be dispensed with by these organisations has been dispensed with during the last few years because of the tightening of the financial position.
This projected amalgamation of the I.O.C. and John Wallis and Co. with the Great Southern Railways seems to rest on the Minister's view of what is likely to happen, plus what some railway director or directors told him. On the last occasion on which he spoke the Minister appeared to be much more definite about the projected amalgamation than he is to-day.
I am giving a definite time limit to-day.
On the last occasion the Minister said that this amalgamation could take place by a stroke of the pen.
Would the Deputy quote what I did say?
Unfortunately I have not the reference at my hand. I was listening to the Minister's speech, in which he certainly implied that a railway director told him the amalgamation could be achieved by a stroke of the pen. At all events, the Minister's Second Reading speech and his declaration to-day make it clear that he believes that the amalgamation of these companies with the Great Southern Railways is desirable from the transport point of view. It was clearly to be inferred from what the Minister said that if there was any obstruction to that amalgamation, either on the part of the directors of the railway companies or of the other services, he would take power within six months to effect the amalgamation in a compulsory way. It was clear that he desired to have the amalgamation carried out on a voluntary basis rather than be obliged to use compulsory powers, his view being that a voluntary amalgamation would obviate certain difficulties which might arise under compulsory amalgamation. But, in the end, the result is the same; that he is either going to have voluntary amalgamation if the companies agree, or compulsory amalgamation if they display any opposition. At all events, we will have a position created where these three companies will function in the future as one. If there was to be compulsory amalgamation the Minister could not possibly resist the claim for compensation for those disemployed as the result of it. The Minister prefers voluntary amalgamation, and, because he does, he justifies it only to get rid of certain legal difficulties. He does not propose to make provision for compensation for the staff now employed by those services who may lose their employment as a result of this voluntary amalgamation.
The Minister, in resisting the claim for compensation either in the event of voluntary or compulsory amalgamation, tells the House that he cannot see how redundancy or unemployment is going to result. But the Minister is not infallible in these matters. He has frequently given expression to opinions in this House that were not justified by subsequent developments. He has frequently painted rosy pictures of the industrial development that was going to take place by building the tariff wall higher and higher. The rosy promises made by the Minister have certainly not been fulfilled, as the unemployment position in the country will surely indicate to him. Now we are told, because the Minister at this stage cannot see that any unemployment will result from this amalgamation, that therefore it is unnecessary to make any provision by way of compensation for those who lose their employment. I would ask the Minister to call together a meeting of the employees who will be affected by this amalgamation and ask them whether they are quite satisfied to rely on his promises in that respect.
If the position is that the amalgamation, voluntary or compulsory, will not bring about any unemployment, then, there will be no financial burden put upon the amalgamated company, in which case the Minister, if he put in a compensation clause, would be putting in a safeguard which might not be used and, if not used, would impose no burden on the company. I suggest to the Minister that, if his only objection to providing for compensation is a fear that the compensation clause will not be adverted to or invoked in order to secure compensation in the event of dismissal, the Minister can afford to dispense with that excessive sense of legislative tidiness and might go to the extent of putting in a clause to provide for compensation for any unemployment which might be caused as a result of amalgamation. From the point of view of the employees, it is poor consolation to know, if they are dismissed, that the dismissals have surprised the Minister for Industry and Commerce. If they lose their employment as a result of the amalgamation, it is poor consolation to those who lose that employment for the Minister to say that it is something he did not anticipate. At any rate, the Minister's surprise will not pay many bakers or grocers.
I think it is very desirable that if this amalgamation is to be brought about, whether by pressure through compulsion or by representations to the railway company, that compensation should be provided for these people who may lose their employment as a result of the State's bringing about amalgamation of the three competing services. The Minister said yesterday to Deputy Morrissey that if amalgamation does bring about redundancy or unemployment— which is another name for it—it is a matter for the men's unions to make representations to the company. The Minister says that the railway unions have agreements at the present time covering that point. It is a pity that he did not say what kind of agreements they have on that point. The Minister ought to know that they are legislative agreements. The railway unions can make representations in case of redundancy because they have legislative agreements, but if they went making representations without these agreements, would they get the same hospitable reception as the Minister imagines? What reception does he think they will get if they go to the railway companies or the amalgamated company with no legislative agreement but merely on the moral ground that they ought to be compensated, having regard to the circumstances in which they did lose their employment? They can do it only because they have legislative agreements on the point of redundancy. If they had no legislative agreements, I am afraid that the results of their negotiations would be very poor.
If the Minister wants to make sure that the amalgamated company would pay adequate compensation to those employees who lose their employment as a result of the amalgamation, then he ought not to object, if he pretends to stand at all for the interests of the employee, to put in a provision in this Bill to secure that the same legislative agreements will be there which will enable the unions in this case as well as in the case of the railway companies to go to the amalgamated company and secure compensation for those who have lost their employment as a result of amalgamation. The Minister has made no provision whatever for compensating those who have lost their employment as a result of amalgamation. It will not be a financial burden and, if it is not a financial burden, what is the objection to putting in a safeguard to make sure that these employees will get compensation? If the safeguard has to be availed of then it is proof that the Minister, when he said there would be no unemployment, clearly was talking without any precise knowledge of the possible developments of amalgamation. What the Minister is doing, or is seeking to do, is to bring about a voluntary amalgamation to enable the amalgamated company to do what it likes with the staff—to dismiss the staff who, in many cases, have given considerable service to them—and to make no provision whatever to give any compensation to the people who have lost their employment. This is the pro-railway Party; this is the pro-railway Minister; this is the pro-workingman Government; and yet the Minister resorts to all kinds of debating dodges to avoid the safeguarding of compensation for these people who may lose their employment as a result of this amalgamation, and who will derive very little consolation from the fact that the Minister did not know that unemployment would come about through amalgamation.
In listening to the speeches of Deputies it appears to me that we are forgetting one side of the problem altogether in talking about amalgamation. This is a private concern in which there are 27,000 shareholders. 7,795 of these have holdings of less than £500 in value. When the Deputy talks about compensation, he considers only the question of labour. I have stated here before that as far as I am concerned one likes to see that labour gets fair play, but I should like to see all the people concerned getting fair play. Let us contrast the position of the two at the moment. Labour in the Great Southern Railways Company, at the moment, has, according to the statement of the Chairman, wages 140 per cent. more than pre-war.
The amendment under discussion refers to possible disemployment in Messrs. Wallis's and the I.O.C.
Yes, but we are dealing with a private company and what the Deputies are urging is that injury will be done by amalgamation to one particular class, and they want to protect that class. I say that injury will be done to another class about which nobody seems to bother at all. They think that it is only the one class that is to be considered. There are 27,000 shareholders in the railway company with which it is proposed to amalgamate Wallis's, and the shares of these unfortunate shareholders have been reduced in value from £100 to £5. There are Deputies in all parts of the House who can tell of families who are absolutely starving as a result of this reduction in the value of their capital.
Due to what?
How did that deprive them of their food? However, we can discuss it in the next section.
I want to show that when you are dealing with problems of this magnitude you must not only consider the injury done to one particular section. We must be fair and I would ask the Deputies, while I have a certain amount of sympathy with their side of the matter, to consider also and sympathise with the unfortunate shareholders.
I am rather surprised that Deputy Good and Deputy Dockrell, the President of the Chamber of Commerce, could not and did not face a discussion on the merits of this amendment as to whether it is in the business interests of the Great Southern Railway Company and the 27,000 pauperised shareholders of that concern to allow competition of that kind to be carried on even for another six months.
Deputy Good and one of his new recruits, Deputy Dillon, endeavoured to show that the object of the amendment was to try to secure control over the amalgamated company by unions with headquarters in England. I am not going to stress the undesirability of giving control to members of unions with headquarters outside the State in matters of this kind, but none of these objections were raised in 1916, in 1918, or in 1921 when the members of the same unions were in the front line trenches fighting for this country and when Deputy Dillon's voice was not heard in this House or out of it on the subject.
Indeed my voice was raised loud and long on the subject.
At any rate whether the headquarters of those concerned were in Ireland, or elsewhere, the policy of the Irish Railway Union is set by the Irish members of the union. It will not be news to Deputy Dillon to know that the Irish Party up to a certain period, and until the Irish people prevented them, sought their advice and lived in surroundings of British imperialism.
Deputy Davin will not draw me.
I am prepared to engage in discussion, or public debate, at any time on the merits of the point raised by Deputy Dillon as to whether or not it is the Irish members of the union that control the policy here or whether that policy is dictated by people outside. It is on the same footing as the statement made by the Deputy's leader in Enniscorthy, when he said that the members of this Party were financed by a British union. It is quite untrue; there is a British law that prevents that. If the Deputy wants further evidence to prove that it is untrue I will produce it.
Now let me come to another point. The Minister challenged Deputy Norton to produce the record showing that he said that unification of these three services could be brought about by a stroke of the pen. On the 8th March he is reported, in the Official Reports, column 360, in reply to inquiries from these benches, to have said:
"I have been assured that unification can be achieved by a stroke of the pen, and that a stroke of the pen will be made when we ask for the making of it."
If that is so, and if there is no insuperable obstacle in the way, and no destruction of capital is involved, why not use the pen and bring about that unification the same as the unification of the other transport services? But I am somewhat troubled about another statement which is rather in conflict with that made by the Minister on the same day in column 404. Some Deputy, whether Deputy Norton or another, got a letter addressed by the Minister to an individual who lost his employment in the service of the Great Southern and Western Railway Company without getting compensation; and this is what the letter said:—
"The Minister further wishes me to state that it is not proposed to secure the amalgamation of the Great Southern Railways Company with the Irish Omnibus Company and John Wallis by legislation, but in the event of such amalgamation being effected by the Boards of those Companies the position of the employees is a matter for discussion between the Companies and the Trade Unions in the first instance."
What is the use of a Trade Union official going to John Wallis & Co. after this Bill is passed, and some of the employees lose their employment as a result of voluntary unification, and making a claim for compensation if there is no provision for compensation in the Bill? Would it not be foolish for the directors not to argue that there is no provision made for compensation? The union's representatives would be only justified in making representations if employees lose their employment, and do not get compensation, which the Minister provides in other sections of this Bill. If unification can be secured by a stroke of the pen, and no real obstacles are in the way, then there is no real difficulty confronting the Minister. If unification is not secured under the terms of this Bill it will mean, as Deputy Good knows well, though he will not admit it, that many of the directors of the Great Southern Railways and John Wallis & Co., who are the same directors, are going to get large sums in compensation. The Deputy knows well that directors, and high officials, will be bound to become redundant and will get compensation while it would be the right of the Company to dismiss other employees without compensation of any kind. Does the Minister deny that? He cannot.
The railway can dismiss railway employees to-day without any question of compensation.
I am talking of the dismissal of some of the employees arising out of unification of the services. I am not talking of dismissals for disciplinary reasons.
I am not talking of dismissals for disciplinary reasons either.
It is the right of any employer to dismiss employees for some reason but, where the workers are highly organised, the employers will not do so except for good reasons. The Minister knows, and Deputy Good knows, that if a man is dismissed, either in the building trade or in the railway industry, or from the staff of John Wallis, for good and sound reasons, the unions are not the first to make representations on behalf of members dismissed for obviously good reasons. If a man, for instance, is dismissed for drunkenness, after repeated warnings, the unions do not make representations to the employers to take back that man. They do not generally make unreasonable demands like that.
The Deputy mentioned the building industry which I know something about. Supposing an employee loses his employment there by reason of slackness of work, would the Deputy argue that he should be compensated by the employer? That is what he wants the Minister to do.
If workers engaged in an industry, for reasons of good sound public policy, lose their employment and become redundant as the result of the passage of legislation, it has always been the custom of the British Parliament, and of this Dáil, on previous occasions in connection with legislation passed, to make provision for compensation for those who become redundant as the result of such legislation.
Then why urge legislation that makes people redundant? I cannot understand the attitude of the Labour Party in this matter.
The Deputy knows that there are sections of this Bill that even he welcomes. I have not heard him say on behalf of the shareholders that he would refuse the financial section of this Bill. Will the Deputy get up and tell the Minister to scrap the Bill because of the present of £285,000 that he is making to the shareholders of the company?
I will say this that the present position of the Great Southern Railway Company has been very largely brought about by legislation passed in this House in 1924, and on other occasions.
There is a very curious combination in opposition to this amendment. There is the opposition led by Deputy Dockrell, who holds the position of President of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce and who says: "Do not interfere. Let the companies do this in their own good time." He is supported by the opposition of the Minister who says this can be done by a stroke of the pen at my sweet will but not in a day.
The Deputy proposes to leave it entirely to the discretion of the Minister.
Oh no.
Read your own amendment again.
We have here a combination of good old Tory Deputies, Messrs. Good and Dockrell, and that super-patriot, Deputy Dillon, and the Minister for Industry and Commerce, taking the same side in opposition to the Labour Party without any reason whatever. It will be very interesting to read in the Official Reports in the interval of the holidays which begin next Friday, and end on the 26th April, some of the remarks made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce during these debates. The only persons he convinced were those who are absent from the House on the debates on this amendment, and other people, like Deputy Good, who naturally speaks for the Chamber of Commerce, and the interests he represents and who never sees, and never will see, any justification for making reasonable provision for people who lose their employment as a result of the passing of legislation of this kind.
They will take all that is good in the Bill; they will take the taxpayers' money provided for them in certain sections of the Bill, but they will refuse to take the responsibility of making reasonable provision for those who may lose their employment as the result of the passage of legislation which, I contend, is in the interests of the shareholders of the railway company.
It has been suggested by Deputy Dillon, and, I think, by Deputy Mulcahy, if not with the same eloquence, that the only thing we are concerned about in this amendment is the section which makes provision for the payment of compensation to redundant employees. That is not so. We are concerned, and I, particularly, am concerned, that the railway company should be put on a proper and firm financial foundation; that it should be enabled to carry on all sections of its business in fair competition with those who are competing with it. If that end is a desirable one, it is very desirable that the three services now working in competition with each other should be brought under a central management, and that that should be done as quickly as possible in the interests of the shareholders.
In the interests of Labour.
Does Deputy Good suggest to the Minister that it is desirable that they should have three separate boards of directors, while at the same time realising that these three separate boards consist of some or all of the same individuals; that they should be allowed to draw on an average £1,500 a year as directors of the railway company; that they should be allowed to be appointed, while it is unnecessary that such a thing should be done, as directors of Messrs. Wallis, and receive in addition £1,000 a year as directors of that concern, and perhaps another £1,000 or £800 as directors of the I.O.C.? Is that desirable or necessary?
Is it not a private company, and cannot the shareholders pay the directors what they think they are worth?
Does Deputy Good, as a businessman suggest that he would divide the business which he controls into sections, put one section under one body of people drawn from the general board of directors and put another section in charge of another body of people, paying them three times for doing the work of the same concern? Is that desirable or necessary? Is it necessary to have separate headquarters and to pay rent and rates and other necessary overhead charges for these establishments, when all the work could be done with one board and one headquarters under the same central management?
Is it not a private company, and is not that a matter for the shareholders?
Is Deputy Good defending that? Will Deputy Good tell Deputy Mulcahy what is the present position of the I.O.C. and Messrs. Wallis, so far as capital is concerned, and how these two concerns have been purchased; that they have been purchased indirectly out of revenue earned by the railway company? What is the difficulty in the way of bringing about this unification? What is the necessity for continuing the cut-throat competition between the two services owned by the same share-holding body? I have quoted certain cases for Deputy Good, and I shall quote additional cases to show that this cut-throat competition is being carried on in areas where it is not necessary. Why should there be omnibuses starting from certain towns at the same time as trains start from these towns to other places? Buses are starting from Ballina to Dublin and from Dublin to Ballina at the same times as trains are starting from the same points. You have eleven buses running between Cobh and Cork at the same time as trains are running to and from these places. I believe it would be necessary, as the Minister pointed out, to have bus services running from Dublin to Limerick, but I think that under a proper system of central management it should be possible, with less expense, to have an inter-changeable system between the rail and road services, so that persons could, if they wished, travel by road from Limerick to Dublin, and return by rail if it suited them.
So they can at present.
I shall leave Deputy Dillon to learn a little bit more about the present methods of management.
Amendment put.
The Committee divided: Tá, 23; Níl, 85.
Tá
- Anthony, Richard.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Brodrick, Seán.
- Burke, James Michael.
- Burke, Patrick.
- Coburn, James.
- Corish, Richard.
- Davin, William.
- Doyle, Peadar S.
- Esmonde, Osmond Grattan.
- Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
- Keating, John.
- Keyes, Michael.
- MacEoin, Seán.
- Minch, Sydney B.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
- Norton, William.
- O'Connor, Batt.
- O'Higgins, Thomas Francis.
- Pattison, James P.
- Redmond, Bridget Mary.
- Reidy, James.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Alton, Ernest Henry.
- Bartley, Gerald.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Belton, Patrick.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Bourke, Séamus.
- Brady, Brian.
- Breathnach, Cormac.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Browne, William Frazer.
- Carty, Frank.
- Concannon, Helena.
- Corkery, Daniel.
- Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
- Crowley, Timothy.
- Daly, Denis.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Dillon, James M.
- Dockrell, Henry Morgan.
- Doherty, Hugh.
- Doherty, Joseph.
- Donnelly, Eamon.
- Dowdall, Thomas P.
- Finlay, John.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Flynn, John.
- Flynn, Stephen.
- Gibbons, Seán.
- Good, John.
- Goulding, John.
- Hales, Thomas.
- Harris, Thomas.
- Hayes, Seán.
- Holohan, Richard.
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Jordan, Stephen.
- Keely, Séamus P.
- Kehoe, Patrick.
- Kelly, James Patrick.
- Kelly, Thomas.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Kissane, Eamonn.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Lynch, Finian.
- Lynch, James B.
- McGovern, Patrick.
- McGuire, James Ivan.
- McMenamin, Daniel.
- Maguire, Ben.
- Maguire, Conor Alexander.
- Moane, Edward.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Murphy, Patrick Stephen.
- O'Briain, Donnchadh.
- O'Dowd, Patrick.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O'Kelly, Seán Thomas.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, The.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- Pearse, Margaret Mary.
- Rice, Edward.
- Roddy, Martin.
- Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Martin.
- Sheridan, Michael.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Thrift, William Edward.
- Traynor, Oscar.
- Victory, James.
- Wall, Nicholas.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C. (Dr.).
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Corish and Keyes; Níl: Deputies Little and Traynor.
Amendment declared lost.
With your permission, I do not propose to move amendments Nos. 3, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10. I shall say what I have to say on the Section.
Does that apply to amendment No. 23?
We shall see about that later.
I move amendment No. 4:—
In sub-section (1), lines 42 and 44, in sub-section (3), lines 12 and 13, in sub-section (4), lines 20 and 22, and in sub-section (6), line 36, before the word "Schedule" in each of those lines to insert the word "First."
This is purely a drafting amendment.
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 5:—
In sub-section (1), after line 51, to insert the following words:—"references to the portion of any denomination of the existing capital stock held by a person shall be construed as referring to the total amount of such denomination held by such person whether he has one certificate or more than one certificate in respect of such holding."
The purpose of this amendment is clear.
Amendment put and agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 9 not moved.
I move amendment No. 11:—
To delete sub-section (7) and substitute a new sub-section as follows:—
(7) On the appointed day all certificates in respect of the existing capital stock shall become and be void, and every holder of any portion of any denomination of the existing capital stock shall be entitled, at any time after the appointed day, to surrender to the Company the certificate or certificates (rendered void by this sub-section) for such portion of such denomination and to receive from the Company free of charge a certificate for that amount of the same denomination of the reduced capital stock of which such person becomes the holder on the appointed day by virtue of this section.
This amendment is necessary because some shareholders will have more than one certificate of the same denomination of stock. Consequently it will be necessary to recall these certificates and to issue new ones.
Amendment put and agreed to.
Question proposed: "That the section, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
I at first proposed to move, or had in mind to move, certain amendments affecting the Minister's scheme in detail, but I thought it was perhaps more useful, and certainly wiser, to appeal to him on very broad grounds to withdraw these reconstruction proposals altogether. I submit in the first place that they are not essential to the Bill. The reconstruction proposals put forward will not increase by one penny piece the actual value of the company. I submit that the Minister has really nothing to gain by these proposals. I hope to show him that he is doing something which is most dangerous in itself and likely to lead to consequences which even he will regret. I suggest that instead of this section he should introduce a section which will enable debenture holders by, say, a three-quarters majority, to accept reconstruction proposals and thus get over the difficulty with which he has been faced—that as at present constituted, one single debenture holder could put a veto on a proposal.
The Minister is trying to do something which vitally affects the interests of property holders. He is proposing to do something which, if it is in the interests of the company, should be done, and I suggest can be done and, when it is found advisable to do it, will be done, by the shareholders themselves. If he introduces a section giving the power which I have specified to the debenture holders to gain by body, everything he hopes to gain by his proposals can be done by the shareholders themselves. I submit that in justice and in equity it ought to be done by the shareholders and not by the State.
The first reason I give the Minister for the appeal I make to him is that this is an arbitrary interference with the rights of property holders and that he is taking this step without regard. Which the State has had up to the present, for those rights. He is doing it for some purpose which is quite beside the mark compared with the magnitude of the step he is taking. One can analyse that statement from various angles. First, I take the debenture holders. They are in quite a different position, as was rightly pointed out on the Second Reading debate, from the ordinary stockholders. They lent their money at fixed rates in order to enable the company to use its own capital in certain ways. It was a loan to the company, and it is a debt now owed by the company. The State proposes to cut down the magnitude of that debt arbitrarily. It is to be the will of the State to say that the person who lent that money shall not get back all the money which he lent, but only a fraction of it; he shall not be allowed to get the full terms of the bargain he made when he lent the money. I submit that the debenture holders are in a special position when this proposal is being considered. Their money is not the capital of the company at all; it is simply money borrowed by the company and used for its own purposes.
Now I will take the guaranteed preference stocks and put those two together. I will draw the Minister's attention to the fact that up to the present trustees have been justified in regarding such stocks as trustee stocks in which it was safe for them to invest money entrusted to their care, and in which they were allowed by the State to invest money without fear as to State interference with the particular stock the trustees decided to invest money in. If the Minister goes through with these proposals, he will be striking a blow at the security that trustees have felt they could rely upon hitherto in their dealings with moneys entrusted to their care. If the Bill in this form becomes law, no trustee will feel justified in putting money entrusted to his care in any trustee stock in the Free State. There will be no guarantee by a later Bill, brought in by the Minister or some Minister succeeding him, that stock shall not be further reduced both in value and in interest-bearing power. Anything that can be done with one stock can be done with another.
The Minister, on the one hand, is rightly anxious to do all he can to secure that Free State money is kept in the country. By this proposal he is undermining and undoing every step he has taken hitherto to keep a large proportion of the money invested by the public within the bounds of the State. It is a distinct inducement to go outside the bounds of the State, because there stocks can be found to which the element of insecurity brought in by this Bill does not apply. I appeal to the Minister to consider that point earnestly. He is doing real harm to the security that trustees have hitherto felt in trustee stocks in this State.
The proposals outlined in the Bill are harmful to a section of the community which is worth considering and which we have spent two hours or more in considering on behalf of the Labour Party. I am anxious that the interests of those for whom Labour Members are zealous should be preserved. I submit that this interference with trustee stocks is going to harm that very section of the community which is most deserving of our sympathy and appeal, the poorer section. It is not a case here of striking at large capital holders. I cannot give the Minister information as to the magnitude of the stocks that are held by the section of the people for whom I am speaking, but I know they are very large. Charities spend their money very largely for the benefit of the poorer sections of the community and these charities are the largest holders of the trustee stocks. As Deputy Good mentioned a short time ago, there are almost 8,000 holders of stock in this company, the value of whose stock is £500 or less. That will give the Minister some idea of the wideness of the blow he is dealing by these reconstruction proposals.
This is a matter which entirely concerns the company. The Minister's proposals do not raise the market value of the company's assets by one penny. It simply takes the money from the debenture holders and from the guaranteed preference holders in order to give the preference shareholders and the ordinary shareholders who are the largest stockholders, a chance of getting a dividend. This proposal in the Bill is redistribution rather than an improvement in the condition of the accounts. I think the Minister hardly realises that a step like this, once taken, which goes to the root of State interference with private property, is a step which will carry him in a direction in which perhaps he does not want to go far. But there may be others who may succeed him, who may be ready to go a very great deal farther. I appeal to the Minister as strongly as I can to withdraw this reconstruction proposal altogether. Let him take any one step he likes to get the railway company to consider whether it is in their interest or not; let him leave it to the shareholders and to them alone to make this decision.
I am afraid that I have got to resist Deputy Thrift's appeal. At any rate, I feel that the grounds on which the appeal is made are not sound. We have taken the point of view that reconstruction of the finances of the railway companies is necessary. We put that point of view to the directors of the railway companies who agreed. The manner in which reconstruction was to be effected was discussed from time to time between the directors of the company and myself, but no positive action was taken by the directors of the railway company to give effect to what they agreed should be done. As we were proposing to bring to the Dáil legislation designed, not merely to organise the finances of the railway companies, but to reorganise the whole transport industry of the country for the benefit of the railway companies in general and of the Great Southern Railways in particular, we felt that we could not wait indefinitely until the railway directors agreed amongst themselves as to what form this reorganisation should take.
How will this reconstruction of the finances affect the transport question?
That was one of the points made by Deputy Thrift, but it is a point that was discussed also on the Second Reading. In discussing this matter we must bear in mind the whole provisions of this Bill and the whole provisions of road transport. A new scheme of transport is being devised. It is being brought into effect by legislation regardless of whether certain interested parties want it or not. It will operate to the detriment of a number of individuals in the country. That scheme is being brought about because of the precarious position in which the various railway companies find themselves. If the sole purpose of that scheme in the minds of the railway directors is to enable them to pay a return upon a very large amount of dead capital, then the scheme—apart from the fact that it would be defeated from the beginning —would be entirely unjustifiable.
The only grounds on which we could justify the scheme and the only grounds on which we could justify the very drastic action we are taking in the reorganisation of transport here is that the new situation is going to be availed of in a reasonable manner for the benefit of those who are the owners of the railways operating in the Saorstát. It is easy to contemplate the railway directors anxious to pay some return on their ordinary stock. It is the natural desire of the directors of any company to so organise it that they will pay a return upon its ordinary capital. They are usually directly the representatives of the owners of the ordinary capital. In the case of the Great Southern Railway I admit that the owners of the other capital also elect the directors. But the owners of these other classes of capital have not got a return this year and there is no prospect of a return next year. It is reasonable to understand that the directors of the railway company would exercise their powers to ensure that a return would be paid. If that capital is to remain at the present figure any attempt to pay a return under present circumstances would wreck the whole transport organisation in this country.
It would destroy the prospects of any economic revival and do irreparable damage to external and internal trade. We cannot allow that.
If the railway owners and the railway directors are taking the point of view that they must maintain their holdings at their nominal value, then the rest of the scheme goes by the board and we will let them go along that road. If we do, it is obvious that they will come to bankruptcy in a few years. In that situation it would be possible for us to come in and reconstruct transport here with no question of this kind arising to trouble us. We would much prefer that this reorganisation was undertaken by the directors themselves, but there are legal difficulties to prevent them. In fact they have taken no step beyond consultation to get powers to produce a scheme.
That scheme may not be a perfect scheme. I admit that no scheme can be perfect and must be largely guesswork. It is not possible for anybody to-day to look forward for ten years and to estimate what the companies' position will be at the end of that time. To be able to estimate with any degree of accuracy, a person would have to know what the prospects and the earning capacity of the company were likely to be for ten years ahead, otherwise there would be no basis for preparing a reconstruction scheme. It may be that a better reconstruction scheme was possible. We asked the directors to give us advice and assistance in this matter. They have known for a long time our views on the necessity for reconstruction. They had information for a long time past that it was our intention to embody this particular reconstruction scheme in the Bill. They were asked to give us all the information they had on the subject. They were asked to suggest any alternative which they thought in justice should be suggested and they have not done so. They might have consulted other financial experts than those they consulted already and let us have the benefit of the advice they got. They did not do so.
There is a scheme now before the House. I am not happy about the minor stocks. I think we are acting unduly harshly about the minor stocks. I was waiting to get information and representations which would permit of a review of our proposals in that respect and we have not got them. It is I think entirely incorrect to argue, as Deputy Thrift argues, that we are prejudicing the possibility of the debenture holders getting their loan back. They cannot get their loan back. The debentures are irredeemable. The only way they can get their loan back is by selling their stock. It is not at 85 they would sell it but at 30 or 35, which is the present market quotation. If there was any serious attempt on the part of any number of debenture holders to get back their capital by selling their stock the price would be much lower than 30 or 35.
Of course, the same thing applies with regard to Guaranteed and Preference Stocks. The Deputy based a number of arguments on the point that trustees were charitable organisations authorised to invest money in guaranteed and other stocks. Section 1 (g) of the Trustee Act of 1893 authorised them to invest in debentures, rent charges, guaranteed or preference stock of any railway in the United Kingdom if the dividend paid during the last ten years had not been less than 3 per cent. on the ordinary stock. That was changed by a Rule of the Supreme Court of Ireland and they became entitled to invest if any dividend had been paid on the ordinary stock for a ten years' period. The fact is that the absence of any dividend this year, not on the ordinary but on the guaranteed or preference stocks, has settled that question for trustees. This Bill proposes to carry on the trustee status during the period of reorganisation.
Does that affect debentures?
It affects debentures. Trustees are forbidden to invest this money in these railway stocks.
In debentures?
Yes.
Read the whole of the extract from the Trustee Act. I would like to have it read consecutively in order to understand it.
Section I says that trustees may, unless expressly forbidden, invest in the following—a long list is given—(g) debentures, rent charge, guarantee or preference stock of any railway in the United Kingdom if a dividend had not been less than 3 per cent.
And the amendment to that by the Supreme Court Rule.
If for ten years next before the date of investment they had paid a dividend on ordinary capital. There was no question of 3 per cent. there. I think Deputies must realise that the position of the railway company is such that there is no prospect, subject to reorganisation of its finances, of any dividend being paid on the ordinary stock at any time in the future. So far as we can estimate it on the figures available for this year, even the amount of the interest on the reduced debentures is not likely to be earned, unless some substantial improvement takes place.
Will the Minister say what was the first year there was a failure to pay dividends on ordinary stock?
This year. But the company did not earn enough in 1925 to pay debenture interest. They paid dividends on ordinary stock from some reserve funds which they kept. They paid out of that each year in order to maintain the trustee status of their stock.
This was the first year they refused to pay?
Because their reserves had become almost exhausted.
They have reserves enough yet.
The reserves are going bit by bit. The company cannot continue, if each year it is not earning sufficient profits, to pay the amount of the fixed charges on the different classes of capital. These are the facts. It seems to me that there can be no question about the necessity and the desirability of having a reconstruction of the company's finances. I say that if the railway directors had been acting in a prudent manner they would have attempted to effect that long ago. The directors of other companies faced with similar conditions carried out reconstruction. There were difficulties in this case, difficulties about conferring certain legislative powers upon them. These would have been provided. Apart altogether as to what would be good policy for the railway board to undertake in any circumstances, the fact that these Bills are before the Dáil, and that the changes are for the benefit of the railway company, in the main, makes it essential that there should be a reconstruction of the finances. I argued this at considerable length on the Second Reading, and I do not think Deputies are likely to have had their opinions changed by anything that has been said since. I would like them to feel that this is not a reckless interference with what is regarded as private property. It is an essential part of a well-considered scheme to put the transport industry on a sound economic basis which it cannot reach unless the changes contemplated in the Bill are made.
Can the Minister make any distinction in the capital between the debenture and the other stocks? Does he look upon them all in the same category?
No. I explained that we were, in fact, improving the position of the debenture holders. A person might hold a nominal £100 in debentures. The stock was irredeemable. The only way to get the investment back was by selling the stock. The prospect is that the stock will improve and not disimprove.
You are going to the revenue.
Undoubtedly.
The Minister makes the point that these debenture stocks are irredeemable. He therefore suggests that this is really not interference with property, and that the debenture holders' only remedy was to sell them in the open market for what they could get. The Minister has forgotten two things: (1) that while debenture stocks may be irredeemable, they carried with them what was a guarantee of a permanent 4 per cent. As a matter of fact, that aspect does not appeal very much to me. The Minister knows as well as I do that there is something inherent in debenture stock other than its irredeemability. The position of the debenture holders to-day is that if on the next dividend day they went to court these people could put in a receiver and seize the company's entire revenue for their dividends.
And the entire revenue for last year
They are not allowed to seize it.
The point is that there is an element in debenture stock which does not exist anywhere else. I entirely agree with the Minister, and I think he is perfectly right to bring the strongest possible pressure to bear on the board of directors to reconstruct the capital of this company.
By law?
I said to bring the strongest pressure to bear on them, but I say that it is gravely imprudent —I will not say he is not entitled to do so—to reduce the capital by legislation. Let me put the case in this way. These debentures were in fact a loan to the company by the original subscribers. They are creditors of the railway company. What we are saying to the railway company is: "Take thy Bill and write £85 off." Take the other case where a farmer came along fifteen years ago and borrowed £3,000 from a bank, to which he added £3,000, in order to buy a farm. The farm has depreciated in value and the earning capacity has gone down, but the bank wants to take land that cost £3,000 and sell it to pay their debt. That farmer can come along and say that the railway company was in the same position and were told to write off £85. The farmer will ask: "Why did you not tell me to write down the bill I owed the bank? It is less my fault that I have got into this trouble that I am in than it is the railway company's fault. There may be a case made against the railway company that they were inefficient, or one thing or another. There is no question about me. I have worked as hard as I could, with all the skill and industry that could be put into my business, but world conditions and high State policy—which is involving an economic war with England—have reduced me to a condition in which my assets have depreciated independently of anything I could do, apart from anything I have actually done. Surely I have a stronger case for the legislature to come to my assistance and cut down my liability than the railway company has? My answer to that is that you cannot do that, because if you interfere with securities of that kind you may derive temporary advantage, but in the long run your power to borrow, the whole credit of the trading community of the country, your security on a bond, will be so much injured that the temporary advantage you will get by that interference will be far outweighed. So long as we are in a position to say: "We would not do it for the railway companies; we would not do it for an individual; we will not do it for anybody," we are on sound ground, and I think unassailable ground. On the other hand, the moment we make an exception and interfere by legislation, in a somewhat casual way, we break through that principle, and open up the whole economic structure of the country to very serious dangers which I know the Minister or anybody else does not want to incur. I see the difficulty that one debenture holder could hold up the whole scheme as the law at present stands, but everywhere else we are conferring democratic rights on communities—the right of self-determination; there is nothing wrong with conferring democratic rights on a body of debenture holders; there is nothing wrong in bringing the old-fashioned, archaic debenture instrument of the railway company up to date, bringing it into line with the modern debenture deed, and giving the debenture holders the right to decide by majority—two-thirds or three-fourths or whatever the Attorney-General may advise—as to common form of modern debenture deed.
I would suggest to the Minister that having taken that course he should publicly tell the railway companies that the debenture holders have got to make up their minds now to take their remedy or to reconstruct their capital; that if they are prepared to do neither one thing nor the other, then they are not going to be allowed to cut across State policy; that the legislature will not allow them to refuse, through pure cantankerousness, to exercise their rights, or to refuse to make it possible to carry on the transport of the country. A different situation then arises, because their rights have been secured to them and they have been given an opportunity of realising their security if they want to do so. If they do not choose to do so, and say that the legislature can take any steps they wish, then no principle has been broken in on. Their rights have been maintained, the whole fundamental principle upon which credit is founded has not been disturbed, and nobody has been injured. That is my objection to the way in which debenture stocks are being dealt with in this Bill. I do not disguise the fact that if the Minister had put it up to the debenture shareholders to do this job themselves I would have asked the debenture holders to do a more radical job than is done by this Bill. I would have asked the company to reduce their capital perhaps even further than has been done; I would then have invited them to accept from the Government a guaranteed loan of a very substantial sum to bring the transport system of this country up to date; and I would have placed them under obligation to create a sinking fund for the redemption of that loan within a reasonable time; because in my opinion capital reconstruction proposals for this company that do not provide for liquid assets to bring the existing railway system up to date and rehabilitate it are going to fail. What is really wrong with the railway company at the moment is that it has got itself down into a slough of despond and cannot get itself out. Its carriages are rotten; its rolling stock is decrepit; its permanent way requires extensive repair; the industry is honeycombed with unemployment; and what the company really wants is liquid capital to set it on its feet. To my mind a very different proposal might be voluntarily accepted by the company if the Minister were prepared to say that he would make funds available to them on loan, with terms of repayment, which would really open up a new horizon and give them a chance to make a constructive and fresh start.
With regard to the equity of this proposal, the Minister proposes to reduce the City of Dublin Railways' guaranteed stock to 50. That guaranteed stock is 100. I think I am right in saying—the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—that this is stock in respect of which the Dublin Steam Packet Company was one of the guarantors; I think the L.M.S. was a guarantors, as well as the Great Northern Railway and the Great Southern Railway. There is lying in the bank at present a sum, I think, of £65,000, which the person who was appointed to wind up the Steam Packet Company was ordered by the court to leave in court in order to sustain their guarantee of interest on this loan. If I am not much mistaken, the guarantees which the Great Southern Railway Company and the Great Northern Railway Company each gave take precedence over every other charge on their profits. Before they can pay interest on their own stocks they are obliged to redeem their guarantee. There is no equity in cutting down the stock to 50. Then take the City of Dublin Junction. I think at the moment the City of Dublin Junction is a paying proposition, earning its dividend. Why on earth should shareholders in that concern suffer a reduction of 35? Here, questions of real equity enter in, and I think it is a mistake to incorporate proposals in this scheme which are manifestly unjust. The Minister himself showed his hand. He says when pressed: "I make no disguise of it. I would much sooner the railway company carried through this reconstruction themselves," but the Minister has forgotten that on his Second Reading speech he gave us the reason why they could not do it, because he pointed out that as the law stood at present—while they could negotiate a reduction in preference or ordinary stock—they were absolutely powerless in face of the debenture holder. What I suggest to the Minister now, for the various reasons I have set out, is that he should introduce a section into this Act altering the original debenture instrument and bringing it into line with the ordinary debenture deed.
What is the justification for that? What difference is it going to make to the public credit, or to the debenture holder who disagrees with the reduction?
There is a very fundamental difference because any experienced person, notably the Attorney-General, will tell the Minister that the earlier mortgage instruments of this character had this peculiarity— that one mortgage debenture holder could hold up a big scheme. I think the Attorney-General will confirm me when I say that modern mortgage instruments usually have not. The modern trend of legal draftsmanship is that a mortgage instrument is provided with certain safeguards so that a majority of the mortgage holders can carry through a scheme by a majority of two-thirds or three-fourths as the case may be. All you have been asked to do here is to bring this deed—as a matter of fact it is a Statute not a deed—into line with modern mortgage debenture practice.
But what difference is it going to make? You are simply altering the basis upon which you agree to make a loan. I am certain that if the Bill had that proposal in it we would have had precisely the same speech from Deputy Dillon.
Well, providentially, it had not. There is nothing unusual in asking for the withdrawal of the provision and of modernising and bringing up-to-date the debenture instrument. There is nothing unjust in that. It does not go to the root principle upon which credit is founded. The Minister said, when introducing the Bill, that he did not want to discuss it in a party spirit, or to ram it down the throat of anybody in the hope that we might arrive at something approaching unity. I am not objecting to the general principle of capital reconstruction, but I am drawing the Minister's attention to the things I have mentioned because I believe they contain pitfalls that may have escaped his notice. I am drawing his attention to the absence of equity, first to some of the proposals for reduction. I do not think that he can challenge me on that ground. He admits himself that he would prefer in principle that the company would do this reconstruction work themselves. In fact, in principle he agrees with it. I put it to him that if he will restore freedom of action to the railways and get authority from the Executive Council to propose to the Dáil a Government guarantee for a loan—I would go so far as to say of two million pounds—to the railway companies that the railway companies would be prepared to accept a more stringent capital reduction than is proposed here, and as a quid pro quo for a Government guaranteed loan they could set about modernising the transport system of the country, and put the railways back into the position they were in some years ago of becoming profit-earning concerns.
I very much doubt, unless you do that, that this resolution will achieve very much for the shareholders at all. I invite the Minister to empower the debenture stockholders to act in the way I suggest. Put it up to the railway companies to put forward their last word, what they are prepared to do in the way of capital reconstruction in exchange for a Government guaranteed loan. If they do not put forward an adequate proposal then I invite the Minister to say to them: "Very well, go ahead to bankruptcy and when you burst yourself we will take you over as scrap iron." I think that along those lines the Minister would secure a better arrangement of the whole situation, and establish the transport system of the country on a secure and enduring basis.
I am assuming that amendment 11 has been incorporated in the section and on that I want to put a preliminary point. Has any consideration been given to the phrase "Every holder"? I presume it is intended to mean every bona-fide holder. As set out, it might mean that any man, no matter how he came to buy certificates, would be entitled to demand and get certain things from the railway companies. I start off in my consideration of this section with this: that this country has got to have a big transport undertaking either as it was in the past, almost entirely a railway business, or, as I think it will be in the future, a mixed rail and road business. Envisaging that as the future, I think we have got to take into our consideration two items which characterised the railways previously: (1) in relation to their employees, and (2) in relation to the capital employed in their construction and working. The employees were regarded as being more or less of a permanent type, and because of that they were exempted from the provisions of the unemployment insurance code and so on. A stockholding in the railway was also marked out as being of a peculiar type. The quotation given from the Trustee Act, as amended by the Supreme Court rules, showed the special position that railway capital was regarded as having.
Now we are setting out towards a new transport system so far as this measure and the other measure can do it. We are attempting to cater for the railway employee being preserved in his rights as far as possible under the changed circumstances, and further, that if there is anybody else engaged in transport not of a railway type we are looking to his interests by insisting upon certain compensation or gratuities being paid. That is being done, even although we start off on the assumption that there are too many employed in transport as a whole in this country. That is, to my mind not merely justice but more than justice for the employees. Let us look to the case of the other people, those who have invested capital in the railways.
To-day we want to get something both in the way of security and something in the way of special enticement with regard to the capital involved in the new transport undertaking. These two measures look to the future not of a railway monopoly but of a transport monopoly under the auspices of the old railway companies. We are looking forward to them having to acquire road transport vehicles. If we do mean that we must regard them as wanting extra capital. What inducement do we hold out to anyone at the present moment to put a penny into the capital of the new transport undertaking? I think I have clearly stated the plan. We are going to have a new transport undertaking, a mixed rail and road business. We are going to need capital for the acquisition of the road vehicles. We have made certain provision, as far as we think just and possibly even more than just, for the employees—those who are going to continue in the employment of the road transport undertaking and those who are going to be put out of employment. What about the people who have employed their capital in the railways to whom you are going to go in the future for this extra capital that will be needed? You are certainly going to cool down the enthusiasm of anyone to put——
What inducement does the Deputy think we should offer?
An inducement along certain lines.
Would the Deputy now move to report progress?
I move accordingly.
Progress reported: The Committee to sit again at 7.30 p.m.