We have heard so much humbug preached by the Cumann na nGaedheal and Centre Party Deputies who have spoken on this subject that one would be inclined to think that by now they had tired of the matter, but apparently that is not so. Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney tabled a motion looking for seeds and manures for the farmers. The plea was then put forward that the farmers were in a very distressed state. That motion was followed by the present motion which seeks to relieve the farmers from rates and annuities. One wonders which of the two Parties is trying to carry the joke further.
Private Deputies' Business. - Agricultural Rates and Annuities.
Debate resumed on the following motion:—
That in the opinion of the Dáil the Executive Council should take steps to relieve the agricultural community from rates and annuities during the continuance of the economic war.—Deputies. O'Donovan and Curran.
Does the Deputy consider it is a joke?
Last year the Cumann na nGaedheal Party voted against a £440,000 subsidy for butter.
They did not.
I know some of them adopted the attitude of the repentant sinner and they turned their coats, but the fact still remains that the vast majority of them voted against the Bill. All their leaders voted against it.
What has that to do with this motion?
They then declared that the farmers were so badly off they could not buy seeds and manures, but nevertheless they voted against a £440,000 subsidy. Just before the Dáil adjourned Deputies over there wanted to put another burden of £280,000 on the farmers. They voted against the Public Economies Bill. I expect they are going to adopt the same attitude this year as they adopted last year when they voted against the wheat scheme under which farmers would benefit to the extent of £140,000.
We have not got it yet.
I expect they will also vote against the Butter Prices Stabilisation Bill, if they are to be at all consistent with last year's attitude. That will mean that they will vote against £800,000 for the farmers this year, and that amount, added to the other sums I have mentioned, makes a total of £1,100,000 against which they are prepared to vote and which in the ordinary way would go to help the farmers.
Where is the money to come from?
The money is there. Where are the rates and annuities to come from if they do not come from the farmers?
We have already paid the annuities.
The Deputy may make his own speech but he should at least give me a chance of making mine. That kind of howling will not get him very much further. These are solid facts.
Is the Deputy aware of the conditions under which the farmers are existing?
A fortnight ago we asked the Centre Party to give us an estimate of what the farmers had lost in the economic war. The President made a statement, and I think every Party will admit that the President is honest, even though some may say he is misguided. He pointed out that he was looking for equality of sacrifice. Before the Dáil we had the Second Reading of the Economies Bill.
What contribution did the Deputy make to that?
That Bill seeks to make the salaried officials of the country contribute in some small way to the losses that are being suffered in the economic war. The salaried officials are drawing £13,600,000.
The Deputy took care not to discuss that matter when the time was opportune.
The Centre Party have put in no amendment to that Bill.
Yes, we have.
The total saving is estimated at £280,000.
The Deputy must not discuss the Bill on this motion.
My point is that one day we have those Deputies putting down a motion and pointing out that the losses suffered by farmers total over £6,000,000, and on another occasion we have them admitting that the total loss of the farmers is scarcely two per cent. of that figure. The savings estimated under the Economies Bill will come to £280,000 or two per cent. of the total salaries paid. The Centre Party, by not putting in an amendment to the Economies Bill, give an indication that they are quite satisfied that the farmers' losses could not be more than that two per cent.
We had Deputy MacDermot talking here about the Empire. He said England was quite satisfied to give us a Republic, yet she insists on making us pay because we are looking for a Republic or for an independent status. Deputy MacDermot also said that the Government consented to a 50 per cent. relief in land annuities, not because it was just but because the whole thing was forced on them. There was never a more nonsensical statement made in the House. The Deputies in that Party are not doing their duty by the farmers. They had not a word to say on the Land Commission Vote last night. Such a statement is foolish and it is not true. That guarantee of 50 per cent. reduction was given months before the Dáil dissolved last year; it was given publicly by me in the presence of members of the Centre Party who were on the same platform with me then. Those are facts that are very well known.
The Deputy was more serious then.
Deputy MacDermot could not help going back and making a further appeal for the Party to which apparently he has given his heart, the old landlords who have no annuities to pay. His heart goes back to these men who still remain in this country in their large estates and who do it because they love Ireland! It was because they loved the country that they drew the rack rents that they drew out of it and it was because of that that the Deputies opposite insisted in the Land Act in keeping safe for these men the couple of thousand acres of demesne land, as they call it, that some of them held. These are facts that cannot be contradicted. The claim in this motion is a definite claim for £6,000,000 that they say the farmers have lost owing to the economic war. That £6,000,000 would represent the total relief of rates and annuities. That is their claim. But the total amount collected by Great Britain up to the present, according to the figures issued yesterday, is 2½ millions. That is very far below the £6,000,000 that the motion is claiming. I would wish if I could to get some bit of sense into those Deputies opposite and get them to look at things in a reasonable fashion. I would be anxious to give them all the help I could.
We are very grateful to you.
That is so long as they would make an attempt to represent the ordinary farmers of this country in this House but unfortunately they are not doing it. The farmers this year will gain roughly £1,250,000 by the wheat scheme——
Oh!
And by the Government subsidy on butter, and if I put down a figure of 1½ million pounds more that have been given for other subsidies I would be fairly well near the mark.
A Deputy
Put a few millions more to it.
Deputies opposite claim that the farmers are not getting the benefit of the cattle bounty. I partly agree with them despite what Deputy Keating has to say on the subject and I would be prepared to give them all the assistance I could towards getting the money now paid in cattle bounties handed over to the farmers for the relief of rates. That is a fair proposition and then the farmers could not deny that they would be getting the money. If we are to relieve the farmers we could thus relieve them straight off.
Then vote for the motion.
I would not have a word to say to Deputy Belton. He is hopeless. He is getting too uneasy entirely in that seat. These are the facts of the case and in my opinion as far as that motion is concerned I am convinced that Deputies themselves do not agree with it. They are not looking for it.
The farmers do not want relief in their rates?
Deputy O'Donovan made a statement here and that statement was not true. Deputy O'Donovan said that at a meeting held in Cork I had stated that the farmers were going to get a reduction of 50 per cent. in their annuities and in addition to that complete de-rating. That statement is not true. I was definitely in favour of complete de-rating but when we came to consider which of the two would be the better for the farmers a reduction of 50 per cent. in their annuities or complete de-rating as it is understood in Northern Ireland and across the Channel, I certainly saw that the farmers would gain more by the 50 per cent. in their annuities than by de-rating.
What was the price of dropped calves then?
May I ask Deputy Corry why he did not say that before the General Election of 1932?
I will answer that question. At the time of the General Election of 1932 we had to consider which in our opinion would be the better for the farmers. At that time there was no proposal of a 50 per cent. reduction in the annuities.
Would it be any harm to ask Deputy MacDermot when he became interested in the farmers of this country?
Does Deputy MacDermot deny that the farmers will gain more by the 50 per cent. reduction in their annuities than they would by de-rating? I am speaking of the ordinary working farmers who have an annuity to pay. I do not allude to the particular class that Deputy MacDermot spoke about last night, and it was principally because of the amount of money that that class gained out of the £750,000 relief in rates that was given here last year that I plumped for the reduction of 50 per cent. in the annuities. I did that because I did not want to see the Lord Barrymores of this country drawing more from this country than they are drawing already.
If I might interrupt, I would like the Deputy to meet the point fairly. The point I made was that after full consideration the Fianna Fáil Party decided at the time of the General Election in 1932 that the farmers were to be given relief in their rates. I have expressed no opinion as to whether it was better or worse. My suggestion is that the real reason they changed their minds was because they saw they were not able to collect the annuities.
Deputy MacDermot says that they cannot collect the annuities. Deputy MacDermot has no land and therefore he is not able to give an opinion on the matter.
That is a great point surely.
We did not hear any more, by the way, of the legal action that Deputy MacDermot in conjunction with the legal luminaries on the opposite benches was taking some time ago to prevent the Government collecting the annuities.
Wrong again. I never took any legal action or spoke to anyone about taking legal action about these annuities.
I beg the Deputy's pardon. But Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney and the ex-Minister for External Affairs were moving about taking action.
Deputy MacDermot's Party briefed King's Counsel in County Wicklow with a view to taking action against the payment of these annuities.
I, as a farmer understood that too, that they were taking action.
I know nothing about what has been done by individuals in County Wicklow. They may have belonged to our Party, but it is not true that the headquarters of the Party or anybody representing the Party decided to institute legal proceedings against the collection of the land annuities. I know what Deputy Corry is referring to. He is referring to the proceedings started by the Cumann na nGaedheal Party. We had nothing to do with that. What we did was to take legal opinion and to disclose that legal opinion to our organisation.
Is that legal opinion in our favour or against us?
I am quite willing to give that opinion to the Deputy if he wishes it, but it is only wasting the time of the House.
Some other time then we will have it. Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney and those associated with him were going to take legal action against the Government for daring to collect the land annuities. They would take legal action if the Government dared to collect them for anyone else but for John Bull. In that event the Government were to be brought into court. I wonder what happened to the lawyers or what happened the case. Then, Deputy Desmond Fitzgerald told us here last night that every negotiation they had with Britain was successful.
Your President said so.
What happened the negotiation they had about the £270,000 or £280,000? Were they successful in getting that? They were not. That was one case of unsuccessful negotiation. When it came to getting England to disgorge money, they were not successful. When they asked for a paltry £280,000 relief, they were refused. I do not know what successful negotiations they carried out last December or January. They must have had some kind of successful negotiation or they would not have embarked on the wildest game of bluff any party ever embarked upon. They guaranteed that the farmers would not be asked to pay any annuities until 1934 and that then they would get a 50 per cent. reduction. Under what agreement with those to whom they claim the annuities were due was that guarantee given? The people of this State are entitled to that knowledge and I think that every Deputy, no matter to what Party he belongs, realises that a copy of that agreement would be of great assistance to our President in fighting his case.
What agreement?
The Cuban agreement.
The agreement under which you guaranteed that the farmers would not be asked to pay any annuities until 1934 and that they would then get a reduction of 50 per cent. Surely there was some agreement about that.
Who said there was?
Otherwise, you knew very well you would never come back and that you would never be asked to carry out your guarantee.
We were not the only people who broke promises.
Give the man a fair "do."
We stand by every promise we made. Our friends over there are split up. The Centre Party is already divided.
Carry on the joke and let the farmers starve.
If you thought the farmers would starve——
You admitted yourself at the Cork County Council not very long ago that they were in a very bad way.
I admit the farmers are in a bad position.
I got that out.
I am a farmer myself and I know it.
You have £30 a month.
I do not deny it. You have £30 a month for a long time too, Dan.
Will you forego the £30 and stand on a level with the other farmers of the country?
Perhaps the Deputy would forego interruption and make a speech of his own.
That is what happens here. We have Deputies who preach the most daring kind of humbug and who cast burden after burden on the farmers. They vote against every proposal brought here for the assistance of the farmers and, on the other hand, they say the poor farmers are "broke." We are sick of that kind of thing and it is time it was ended. Deputies opposite have played that game all along. If they carry out the same action this year as they carried out last year, I have pointed out what the farmer will lose. I pointed out already what the farmers would lose if Deputies opposite succeeded in their endeavour to prevent the passing of the Second Reading of the Economies Bill. I pointed out what losses that would cause to the farmers—losses directly due to their action. I admit that the farmers are badly off. Nobody can deny that. As I pointed out on several occasions here, the farmer's income from his exportable produce fell in the years 1924 to 1931 by £13,000,000 odd. Taking what Deputies opposite would call the two last normal years, we find that there is a drop of £6,000,000 between what the farmer got for his exportable produce in 1931 and what he got in 1930. That is double the amount of the land annuities.
Due to a drop in price.
There was a reduction in price and prices have been reduced since. Anybody can see that prices are still dropping.
Plus 40 per cent.
Taking last year, and comparing it with the year before, we can normally allow for an £8,000,000 drop in the prices.
And we are paying 40 per cent. on top of that.
These are facts that nobody can contradict. We are giving allowances to the farmers. The farmers are getting a reduction of 50 per cent. in their annuities. They are getting a subsidy of £800,000 on butter this year. They are getting a subsidy of £140,000 on their wheat. I represent as many farmers as any Deputy on the other benches. (Interruptions.) Any time I go back to them, they will put me in. I admit I did not get the class of votes that Deputies opposite got and I do not want them. If I saw that class of people going in to vote for me, I would examine my conscience and wonder what was wrong with me. I am anxious that the farmer should get all the benefit we can give him. We have heard arguments from all quarters that the farmer has not been getting the benefit of the cattle bounties. From my knowledge, I admit that there is a great deal of truth in that. I examined the problem for myself and I am prepared to go with Deputies opposite, or with any Deputy in this House, to the Minister for Agriculture or the Executive Council and endeavour to induce them, instead of giving that bounty on cattle, to give the money in direct relief of rates so that the farmer will know he is getting it. I do not want to see any middleman or well-to-do cattle dealer collaring the cattle bounty and sticking to 50 per cent. of it, as I know he is doing. The farmer should get the full benefit of all we can give him. But this business is all humbug. If ever there was an insincere motion brought before this House, it is the motion at present being discussed—a motion for relief amounting to £6,000,000. There is no denying it. We are prepared to give the farmers all the relief possible. The farmers, as I pointed out, have got a sum of £2,000,000 in relief by subsidies, etc., and in addition to that a reduction of 50 per cent. in their annuities (Interruption). Nothing is any good to the rancher I admit. There is no good in giving him a butter bounty when he keeps no cow.
We want a free market.
That is the trouble. If he could get the bullock to milk it would be all right.
We have more than bullocks in our constituency.
We are prepared to give the farmer who follows the plough all the assistance we can.
That farmer only wants fair play.
You do not know anything about him.
I forgot more than ever you learned or any members of your Party.
On a point of order. Deputy Corry referred to me as a bullock.
No.
What is the point of order?
The point of order is that disgusting scurrility should not be allowed.
What is the point of order?
The point of order is that Deputy Fagan says that Deputy Corry called him a bullock.
On a point of order. I submit that the time has come to prevent men like Deputy Corry turning this place into a dog fight with disgusting scurrility of that kind. That kind of scurrility is the lowest and the most contemptible form of scurrility. I confidently anticipate that the Chair will sternly deal with that.
I think the time has come when Deputies opposite should allow Deputy Corry to make his speech.
If that is the nature of his speech it would be much better not made.
Dr. Ryan
Let him finish his speech.
Deputies must resume their seats. I did not hear Deputy Corry make any improper reference to any particular Deputy or call him any names. If the Chair heard that the Chair would have taken action. There is no question of that. I suggest that Deputy Corry might reasonably return now to the motion before the House.
I should like Deputy Fagan to understand that I did not make the statement which he attributes to me. I would not make it in this House. I said that the particular class of farmers, namely, bullock ranchers, would gain nothing by the butter subsidy because their bullocks would not milk.
You looked very hard at me. I am not a bullock rancher. I have more tillage than any Deputy in this House. I have over 30 acres of tillage.
I am very glad to hear that, but it is not as much as I have— I have 35 acres.
I employ more men than any Deputy.
Come down and have a look at mine. To return to the motion, I have pointed out that the benefit we are conferring upon farmers amounts this year to something like £4,000,000 not counting the agricultural grant. There is the 50 per cent. deduction in annuities and a sum of £2,000,000 in subsidies, and if you add to that the agricultural grant it will come somewhere near the £6,000,000 for which Deputies are looking. These are reliefs given directly to the farmers. If Deputies opposite will apply their minds to finding out the manner in which those reliefs are not reaching the farmer and if they come along with their case they will get all the assistance I can give them. I can promise them that. We are sick hearing howls from all quarters of the House. We had a dog fight recently between Deputy Keating and some other Deputies as to whether the farmers were getting the benefit of the cattle bounty or not. I believe the farmer is not getting the full benefit of that bounty and that he should get it. If the amount is set aside for the benefit of the farmers the farmers should get it into their hands. I am prepared to help Deputies opposite in that. This motion is brought in by Deputies who have given in this House full proof, if we are to take their own actions, that the total amount of the loss to the farmers owing to the economic war amounts only to two per cent. That is what I gather from their action here. I have not yet seen any amendment by the Centre Party to increase that two per cent., which is the total of the savings made by the Economies Bill. As I have said already, every Party in this House has admitted that the President is honest.
Question.
We shall take no notice of you. That accent of yours cannot be understood. The President has made a statement here that he is anxious to have equality of sacrifice. I am just testing the bona fides of the motion. I would expect that the Centre Party would jump at that and, if they thought the farmers were losing a terrible amount of money by the economic war, that they would state in flat terms what that amounted to and that they would see that the other services of the State suffered an equal sacrifice and that they would keep the President to his word. The Vice-President also stated that. According to the actions of the Centre Party in this House, the total losses of the farmers in this economic war amount only to two per cent. That is the amount of the savings in salaries—two per cent. That is their position. I would be very anxious to see some honesty of purpose amongst them. If there were some honesty of purpose perhaps we would get much further in helping out the farming community. I should like these Deputies to remember that we here represent at least three times as many farmers as they do. There are 77 members in this Party and each of them represents a certain number of farmers. There are Deputies on the Cumann na nGaedheal Benches who also represent farmers. I would be sorry to think that the total number of representatives of the agricultural community in this House should be the number in the Centre Party.
We represent the right ones.
I do not want to get into any further quarrel with the Deputy if I can avoid it, but I am afraid his statements here from time to time do not bear out what he says. That is a difference of opinion. I do not want to go into it with him. I do not want to say anything hard of anyone. I am very mild at times. These are the facts. I wish Deputies opposite would stop the bluff and the humbug they are trying to carry on here. Let them try to be honest for once and they will do better. What complaints have they to make? They are quite satisfied, for instance, with the manner in which the Land Commission carried on for the last 12 months.
A Deputy
Are you?
You are quite satisfied because you did not say anything about it.
We will say plenty.
You waited until the Minister had concluded last night and you had not a word to say. These are solid facts which cannot be contradicted. I will not say anything about the Cumann na nGaedheal Party, because my idea is that if they claim to represent any percentage of the people they would be honest in one thing. They would either admit that at the last General Election here they tried to carry out a gigantic bluff in giving a guarantee which they could not stand over, or else they would give to the President and the Executive Council the benefit of a copy of the agreement under which they were able to guarantee to the farmer that he need not pay any annuities until 1934, and that then he would get a reduction of fifty per cent. Their knowledge of the British Government, unless they had some late agreement with them, would not bear out that statement. Their knowledge that the British Government had refused them a paltry £250,000 the year before would not bear out giving any guarantee whatever of a reduction in annuities; therefore they must have had some agreement. If they have that agreement it is their duty to put it down here or else clear out and not try to bluff the people.
It is amusing to sit here and listen to Deputies opposite appealing for a little honesty from the Opposition Benches after the gigantic fraud and plunder which has been perpetrated on the only industry in this country that could, in normal times, stand on its own feet. We heard quoted in the last few minutes all the types of facts that ever any man heard quoted before. We were told about the subsidising of butter. Should not the fact that it was necessary to subsidise butter, that one of the key sections of the agricultural industry wanted a subsidy, be sufficient warning to the Government to hasten slowly? When that key industry wanted a subsidy, wanted artificial respiration so to speak, was that the time to bring it out and throw it on the economic bayonets of the British Empire?
All kinds of apologies are being made for this economic war. We are told that looking over the last ten years tillage went down in the country and that agricultural prices went down. They did, the world over. The index figures show that the price of all products went down in the last ten years, but the price of agricultural products went down more than any other. They did not tell us that during that ten years the Party opposite put 6d. in the £ malicious damage to property tax on the agricultural ratepayers of this country, and in the present session introduced a Bill to pension the people who did that malicious damage——
It was after that you joined the Party.
——under the faked Minister for Defence of the faked Republic, who has just spoken.
"We did but see you passing by."
We want to get to the real position of the case, and see the offer that was made to England, which was withheld from the farming community of this country. What were the commitments on foot of the land annuities prior to the 1923 Act, and rates payable out of agricultural land in the financial year 1932-33? Approximately—the figures are substantially correct—there were three million pounds on foot of annuities, and one and a half million pounds is an overestimate for the rates on agricultural land during the year ended 31st March last. That makes a total liability on agriculture of four and a half million pounds for those two items. During that period our Government said to England: "The old arrangement under which we were to pay you five million pounds a year will not continue." I am not going into the rights or wrongs of the attitude taken by the Government in that matter, but they said to England: "We will not pay you that five million pounds unless you can prove you are entitled to it. While waiting for you to prove your title we will put that five million pounds into a Suspense Account." That money stayed there. If England can prove her claim to it she can get it. That was the authoritative statement of the President on behalf of his Government.
I hope that the President and his Government will be at least as accommodating, and give the same measure —and only the same measure—of fair play to the farmers as was offered to England; in other words, that if we can prove that the moneys that were in the Suspense Account belong of right to the farmers of this country we should get them. We ask no charity in that; we ask no privilege beyond the privilege that the President offered to the British Government. That is the kernel of the whole thing. We need not run away on butter subsidies; we need not run away on wheat subsidies; there was an alternative which I drafted for the Fianna Fáil Party when I was a member of it——
Dr. Ryan
You must have done it quickly. You did not think it over; you had no time to think while you were in it.
I had time to think, and I thought it out while the Minister was chasing the rainbows. Those little quips are not going to divert the argument from its sequence or its logical ending. We claim that the same previleges, or the same rights, be extended to us as were extended to the British Government. All the moneys were put into a Suspense Account, and an offer made to England that if she accepted arbitration on our terms—it does not matter about the terms—and the arbitration court decided that those moneys in the Suspense Account should be handed over to the British Government, we were committed in all honour to hand them over. If such an arbitration were held, and the decision was to hand these moneys over to the British Government, I am quite satisfied that no member of this House would honour the bond more than President de Valera himself. I say that in all fairness to him. That arbitration was not held. England did not exactly ignore it, but, for the sake of argument, it is immaterial what England did. In effect, we can assume that England said: "We will not bother about arbitration on your terms, but we shall proceed to collect these moneys in our own way." She proceeded to do so.
It is for the Government to prove that England has not collected the annuities, plus the pensions and the Local Loans. Instead of collecting three millions from the farmers on foot of the annuities, England proceeded to collect five millions from their produce. When our Government would not pay England she put in the bailiffs and is now in the act of seizing produce value for five millions. It is time to throw off the mask and to tell the country the truth, instead of the bogies and the misrepresentation that won the last elections, plus intimidation and personation; to tell the truth that the annuities which were not paid directly are now being paid by the seizure of our produce at the British ports to which they are sent. The farmers are paying five millions. The Suspense Account, which was not to meet any Budget commitment, but to satisfy England's claim if the matter went to arbitration, was not touched. England got her money from the 40 per cent. duties on the exportable produce. The farmers or agriculture paid that, yet the moneys in the Suspense Account were collected. The farmers lost three millions that they had undertaken to pay, plus two millions that the Government had undertaken to pay. In all honesty, and in all fair play the moneys in the Suspense Account should have gone in globo to help agriculture as it belongs by right to the farmers. If those on the opposite benches claim to be working for the interests of this country—after not working for it for a long time—we should have a little of the elements of honest trading. When the goods of a section of the community are seized, and when the Government is not able to protect them from seizure for debt, surely it is the duty of the Government to pay the debt, when they built up a fund to do so. That fund was not used to discharge the debt. The money in that fund should have been given to the section of the people whose produce was seized to discharge that debt.
Normally the annuities under the Land Acts prior to 1923 amounted to three millions which, with rates amounting to £1,500,000, made the liability £4,500,000 with which farmers were confronted 12 months ago. Then came the economic war—the other round with England. When we got to grips we found that instead of paying £3,000,000 for annuities, our produce to the value of £5,000,000 was seized to satisfy England's claim. In addition, thousands of civil bills went out from the Land Commission in order to compel farmers to pay the annuities, despite the fact that their produce was being seized at the British ports on foot of the very same annuities. We were told here by the President, and also outside this House, that farmers should pay their annuities to the Land Commission. Occupants of the Opposition Benches were taunted by the last speaker. He inquired where were proceedings instituted by his Party. Where are the writs for annuities that were sent out by the Land Commission before Christmas? They have been all withdrawn because when the President, the Ministers, and their back-benchers went before the country they found that the farmers were beginning to remove the scales from their eyes. Then another crop of lies and misrepresentations were "put-over" on the farmers, and especially on the small farmers.
A Deputy
They did it well.
Yes, very well. As the Deputy knows it is only necessary to go through Cavan, Longford, Roscommon and Mayo, and to look at the heaps of broken stones that normally will not be required on the roads for the next ten or 15 years. These stones were broken, partly as propaganda for Fianna Fáil, and they won the election.
They were not fired.
During the last year the farmers had to meet the £5,000,000 that was seized by England, had to pay £3,000,000 in annuities to the Land Commission, and had to accept the promise that is now being held out that they will be funded. Whether the farmers paid or did not pay, the liability is there. For the sake of this argument, and as a matter of bookkeeping, we can say that the farmers have paid £8,000,000 on foot of annuities alone. Taking the annuities at £3,000,000, rates to the county councils amounting to £1,500,000, had also to be paid. Let us deduct what farmers should pay from what they actually paid or were liable for. Taking £4,500,000 from £9,500,000 leaves £5,000,000 that the farmers were overcharged in the last year. Roughly, in the present year, there is the same commitment on foot of the total annuities and rates and we may look forward to £5,000,000, being the value of exportable produce being again seized. Owing to the reduction in the Agricultural Grant by £500,000, there is a sum of £5,550,000 on the wrong side. We will have to pay to the Suspense Account half the annuities—the whole up to November— and we get—is it an ex gratia grant or conscience money—£2,000,000 off the annuities. That leaves us in the position of having to pay the full amount without any reduction, and of having to pay the rates, leaving a net overcharge of £2,000,000.
These figures do not take into account the losses we have sustained by the depression in prices here, caused by the effect of the penal tariffs in throwing back produce worth £15,000,000 or £16,000,000 that normally would be exportable. That is thrown back on the Free State market and depresses prices exactly to the exportable value of that produce. I am not taking that into account at all.
But, after all, the worm must turn some time. As Deputies are aware the Dublin County Council found it necessary to take a stand on this: that the ratepayers paid last year and would pay this year through the operation of the tariffs and the action of the Land Commission in collecting even half the annuities considerably more than the total annuities that the farmers of the country had contracted to pay, plus a rate necessary to meet the requirements of the local services of the county. The County Council, in common with many other county councils, refused to strike a rate for the current year. As a result we have got an ultimatum from the members of the front bench opposite who were to do so much for the farmers—to give them complete de-rating. Instead of complete de-rating, we find, in the ultimatum we received this: "The grants provided this year come to £1,750,000 or only £198,022 less than the maximum release given in one year (in 1931) by the previous Government." In that year the wholesale price index was 52½. It is now 51½. General prices have come down without any interference in trade, and on that reduced price of one per cent. we have piled on to our price level here this 40 per cent. which we must face.
The Government when out of office promised to give the farmers complete de-rating, but in office their action has been responsible for confiscating 40 per cent. of the prices that the farmers would normally receive and the apologia they make for that is that they are only reducing the 1931 grants by £198,022. They have threatened mandamus proceedings against the Dublin County Council, and also I see by this morning's paper, against the farmers of the County Tipperary for laying claim to a fund that beyond a shadow of doubt belongs to the farmers, the very same fund that they have offered to the British Government if it could prove title to it. Will the Government agree to stay proceedings? I am not asking for any mercy or for delay in the matter. The Government can go on as hard as they like; we will be ready to meet them, but I take it that they ought to be prepared to give fair play all round. We do not want any special treatment, but the farmers want to get the same offer as was made to the British Government—that is, that if they can prove their title to the Suspense Account and the £5,000,000 they will get it.
I want to know if the Government are prepared to delay these threatened mandamus proceedings against the County Dublin and the County Tipperary. I think Kilkenny County Council is in it, too, and I suppose Cork, Donegal and a few others will also follow. I want to know if these mandamus proceedings will be delayed until we have an opportunity of making our case as to our title to that sum of £5,000,000. We are only asking the Government to make the same offer to us as they have made to the British Government. If they do not give us that equal chance, then it will be easy to see that they are playing and have played England's game. We only want an equal chance with the foreigner and it is up to our Government to give it to us. I doubt if they will give it.
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy can be sure we will not.
No, because you would be found out and you do not want to be found out.
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy is found out now.
The Minister was found out long ago, even his own county is finding him out.
Dr. Ryan
The mandamus is finding the Deputy out now. There will be no mercy.
And there is none asked for. Do not think for a moment that the white feather will be shown to you, but we see the sense of national justice in the attitude of the two Ministers. The Government are giving England the right to lay her claim to that fund, but there is to be no mercy given to the Irishman to lay a claim to it. Now, who is playing England's game? In connection with the refusal of the Dublin County Council to strike a rate, we were given this reminder in the ultimatum: "I am to point out that it is a most important duty of the council to ensure that there shall be no interruption in the conduct of the civic services with whose administration they are entrusted, or for which they are obliged by statute to supply the required funds, and the Minister for his part is obliged to take steps to see that such duty is properly performed. He could not acquiesce in the inaction of the council and so far as his powers admit, he must see that the local services are properly maintained, and that the sick, the poor, the mentally infirm and the general community should not be called upon to suffer avoidable hardships." We have paid the money that should be there to cover the cost of these services and the Government have squandered it. We only want the boot put on the right foot. I had not the pleasure, or the pain, of hearing the Minister for Industry and Commerce on this motion the other evening, but, like the Minister for Agriculture, he fell back on the last trench. "We went before the country a few months ago and they returned us; therefore, we are right." Will the two Ministers opposite meet two men from this Party in any constituency in the Free State and see what the farmers think of their policy now?
Does the Deputy want another general election?
No.
I thought not.
But will the Ministers come now and disclose their hand, the hand they did not disclose at the general election? Will you go and tell the farmers that, instead of de-rating, the agricultural grant will be reduced? Will you go to the farmers in the country and tell them, not what you told them before—"Elect President de Valera and the economic war will be settled in a few days; when this country demonstrates that it is behind President de Valera, the economic war will be settled"——
Hear, hear.
Months have elapsed now and there has not been one word about a settlement of the economic war. On the contrary, that paper which claims truth in the news but which has some news that is not truth, in its leading articles has claimed that the economic war is a blessing, that a new orientation in economic policy was essential, that that is coming about and that we should throw up our hats and cheer. The Minister for Industry and Commerce claims that that economic war has produced mushroom factories or perhaps I should transpose the words and say factories that grow up like mushrooms.
He said no such thing.
When pressed on his explanation of the reduction in the registered unemployed in the Athlone districts yesterday he rather gave himself away.
I did not; quite the reverse.
I am afraid you will not learn rural conditions in Capel Street.
There is a practice growing up of Deputies on both sides of the House addressing each other across the floor without recognising the Chair at all. There is a distinct and definite Standing Order that references to Deputies must be made in the third person. References to "you" and "you" across the floor are distinctly irregular and disorderly. If any Deputy wants to refer to Ministers or to other Deputies he must refer to them in the third person.
It was explained to the House yesterday by the Minister that the reduction in the registered unemployed in Athlone—I am sure it must have been a slip—was due to the fact that farmers and farmers' sons had ceased registering.
No. I said that of the total number of the reduction, half were actually placed in employment by the Department.
Am I to understand that one-half of the total number that were registered in Athlone area recently were farmers and farmers' sons?
No.
I understood the Minister to say, just before I put the question, that up to half the total number that were registered in the labour exchange in Athlone were farmers and farmers' sons.
The question was about the reduction in the number of registered unemployed in the Athlone area. I said that we could account for half of them by the fact that we had placed them in employment. The other half presumably got employment by their own efforts.
It shows the extent to which Government funds were used.
This was since the election.
That was the bribe, to make good terms with the small farmers and small farmers' sons in the Athlone district for the general election.
This took place since the election.
We had already fooled them. There was no necessity for it.
The Minister knows why they ceased registering as well as I know it. They could not get work.
The register shows that 3,500 were placed in employment.
On relief schemes for a fortnight and then they ceased registering because they could not get any further work.
These men never registered before. They only registered at the dictation of Fianna Fáil canvassers. They would not get work otherwise.
And they got it.
The country will find out bit by bit how you just got 50 per cent. of the seats at the last election. Do not be claiming the election result as a mandate for the continuance of the economic war. If you were to separate and segregate the economic war from all other high falutin' promises that were made you would not get 30 per cent. of the Dáil returned as your supporters, and well you know it. The Minister also stated in speaking on this motion that "if the penal duties of the British were imposed to ensure that they would only have the status that the British wished for them, then it was the old fight that had been going on for hundreds of years. If they had gone into the fight for the purpose of getting concessions, he was prepared to admit that they had mismanaged the whole thing but there was no question of concessions; they simply claimed that they had a right to retain certain that had been paid out." That is a Press report of the Minister's speech. He said that we did not go into this fight for concessions. What did we go in for? For the love of a fight, is it? I did not know the Minister was such a scrapper. He was spoiling for a fight. Perhaps he has got enough of it now.
Dr. Ryan
You would not be in the way of knowing.
Perhaps he has got enough of it now. He told us that it gave us an opportunity of developing the industrial arm. I think before the Minister was in swaddling clothes many of us here were drinking in the teachings of the one-arm and the two-arm nation in this country from a distinguished Irishman. The ambition of that Irishman was a two-arm nation. The late Government tried to have a one-and-a-half-arm nation. England wanted us to have only one arm. Fianna Fáil has gone one better and cut off the only arm we had and left us without any arm at all. Our distinguished Minister for Agriculture and his colleague, Deputy Corry, just now charged Deputies on this side of the House with having opposed the butter subsidy last year, and said it was a crime against the farmers and against agriculture, the most important arm of agriculture. There was a time, when the present Minister for Agriculture was trying to find out something about agriculture, when he staked his hopes upon the plough but he has swung round now and he is apparently staking them on the cow.
Is it not a very unhealthy sign that a subsidy has to be given to the dairying industry and is it not a very peculiar situation that, at the present time, our butter is going at 75/- or 76/- in the British market while it is 136/- here, artificially kept up? With all the penal tariffs and all the other tariffs that we have on here, the working man in this country has to pay very nearly twice as much for Irish butter as the British working man has to pay for it. What are we getting? We are not getting 75/- but 60 per cent. of 75/-. We are getting 47/- and we are sending our butter over to England—and the Minister for Agriculture stands over that as sound national policy. He has to pay commission and transit charges as well and all he is getting is 47/- a cwt. while he will not let a cwt. of Irish butter out to the public here, let them be poor or rich, under 136/- a cwt. and, mind you, we are at war with these people and an economic war at that. All my reading of history and of war shows that, if you are at war with a country, it should be treason to trade with that country but, instead, we call it a war. We glory in it and we glorify it as a war but we are taxing the people in order to give our produce to England cheaper than we give it to our own people and, then, they are not playing England's game! No, we are playing England's game.
Do you suggest that butter should be left at the world's market price?
I suggest that all agricultural products should be left either at the world's market price or should get the same protection. If I am to pay men producing potatoes, why should not I get the same protection for my produce so as to give my men good wages as the Deputy could get for his boys milking cows?
He has not got a metropolitan market.
He has not got metropolitan commitments. He has not got a metropolitan valuation and he has not got metropolitan rates or metropolitan wages to pay and he has a lorry to fetch his goods into the Dublin market in very nearly the same time in which I could put them in. That however, is getting down to personal matters.
I thought the Deputy was sympathetic to the motion.
I am sympathetic to the motion and the Deputy—I did not want to say this—ought to remember that I was the originator of this motion at a conference in the Mansion House on the 15th September last when the Deputy got up and proposed a negative to it. See the "Irish Independent" for the 15th or the 16th September of last year. Deputy Curran, at the instigation of Deputy MacDermot, moved a direct negative to this motion when I put it up at a conference of farmers and ratepayers in the Dublin Mansion House. I am sympathetic to the motion and I shall continue to be sympathetic to it. I am glad that my friends on the right have seen the error of their ways and I am glad they have put this motion before the House. I am sure that they will stand by it now when they have fathered it. If the Cumann na nGaedheal Party had fathered it, we would not know whether they would go to this side or that side or not vote at all.
I am seconding this motion in the hope of being able to convince this House and the Government of the exact position of the farmers. I do not intend to follow the line on which previous speakers have spoken and I will just refer to Deputy Corry's speech by saying that I was unable to find anything in it which had any particular bearing on the motion before the House. With regard to Deputy Belton's speech, I will say that I do not feel equal to talking in millions as he has talked but I shall try to point out to the Minister and to the House the inability of the farmer to meet rates and annuities under present conditions. Under the system of farming which has been carried on, rightly or wrongly, in this country, the farmer has depended on his livestock to meet his ordinary obligations, even apart from rents and rates and so on. I am sure that everybody will agree with that. I know that the Government do not see eye to eye with that policy. They want to change it but I say that no Government can change, even with the greatest co-operation from the farming community, the agricultural policy of this country in a month or a year and I also say that no Government, present or future, can devise a suitable or profitable substitute for the livestock of this country. It had to be the main industry and the main wealth of the farmer.
What is the present position? I will be told, I know, by the Minister in his reply, that the British markets are declining. I realise that. I realise that the British market is not what it was but I would tell the Minister that the present policy of the Government has compelled us farmers to take half a price in a bad market. That is exactly what we are getting. He said, recently, that the economic war was responsible only for 18/- per head on cattle. I can produce at this moment a document for the Minister which shows that on thirteen cattle sold in England there was paid to His Majesty's customs a sum of £66 4/7, that is, over £5 a head. Of course, I know that there was a subsidy or bounty given in connection with that. So much for the cattle industry. I do not believe that it is necessary to go at length into all the details which I have heard talked about here to-day, extending over the past ten years. I want to face facts as we know them at the present moment, whoever is responsible for them.
What I want the Government and the House to realise is the exact position of the farming community at present, no matter who is responsible for it. We have had, as I said, a moment ago, a system of farming in this country for a good while. I do not want to be taken as saying that a change in the agricultural policy of this country might not be desirable and that more tillage would not be necessary. I do not want to say anything against that but I want to try to impress the present position on the Minister for Agriculture. The position with regard to horses is the same as that which applies to cattle. The forty per cent. is absolutely the ruination of the industry. Stud farming has been carried on in this country, and a good deal of employment in that industry has been closed down with very bad results indeed. Stud farmers were responsible for bringing a very big amount of money into the country year after year. That is no longer the position.
The pig breeding industry was a source of very great income to many small farmers. These small farmers were the greatest pig producers in the country. I think that is realised by everybody. That industry has now gone off a good deal and the farmers have given up pig production for two reasons. One of these is the old story of the economic war, and the other legislation which has been introduced into this House in connection with the Cereals Bill. I tell the Minister that this is having a very serious effect in different parts of the country and I shall explain the reason why. Maize meal delivered in the creamery of which I happen to be a member costs 12/9 per 20 stone. Barley meal delivered in the same creamery costs 20/- per 20 stone. Must it not be apparent to everybody that there we have a great increase in the price of the raw material? I know it suits certain districts, and constituencies, such as the Minister for Agriculture represents, but is it not a big hardship on those who are unable to grow barley and never will? I do not say anything against the quality of the barley. I know that barley meal is good feeding, but it is the price I complain of, and I hope the Minister will take note of that fact. Pig production has practically gone out of existence owing to that very fact. Now take the egg industry. Eggs are sold in the country for 3d. per dozen. That is the price although when one comes to Dublin one is charged much more right enough.
One of your Deputies said that the hens are on strike. If they hear what is being said about them here they will lay no more.
That is the price anyway that eggs are fetching in the country. Now with regard to the dairy industry about which we heard so much previous to, and during, the general election. I am not one of those people who want to criticise everything and who can see no virtue in anything that the present Government may do. I want to say here and now that that is the one thing that has met with the approval of the vast majority of the farmers of the country. At the same time I would like to remind the Minister of a statement of his when he said that it cost 5½d. to produce a gallon of milk when the Commission was set up. Taking that statement as substantially correct, the Minister knows well the average price of milk last year. It was less than 4½d. per gallon and, even with the help the Government gives, we are still not getting the cost of production despite what Deputy Belton said. I took the trouble to find out exactly what the charge per gallon meant upon the Central Fund for last year. I found that the amount was anywhere in the neighbourhood of .48d. and that was the benefit the Central Fund contributed to the creameries last year. I wonder would the Minister accept that figure?
The Minister for Local Government mentioned, recently, the benefits the farmers now enjoy in respect of rates. I am not to be taken as saying that farmers should not pay rates or anything else. I do not develop that line of argument at all, but I say that under present circumstances the farmers are not able to pay rates. The Minister mentioned the benefits the farming community derived from social services. He mentioned particularly medical benefit, sewerage, and water works. I fail to see how the Minister can imagine such things as that. The farmers do not derive these benefits. I take my own case as a fair example, and I am neither a big farmer nor a rancher, and the only benefit I seem to derive from the rates is in regard to the road I travel on. It is a fallacy to say that the farmers derive these benefits. I take this particular case which I put to the Minister. There is a rural and an urban area in my district. The valuation of the urban area is £8,000, that of the rural area £16,000. The amount of home assistance paid is £100 per week in the urban area and £20 per week in the rural area. That is one item alone as an example of how the rates hit the farmers in the rural areas. He also mentioned about small farmers with a £10 valuation and under. I know that the farmers in my county of £10 valuation do not derive their means of livelihood from their farms. They derive their means of livelihood mainly or solely by working on the roads for the county councils, and from the grants sent down by the Government to the local councils. That is what they derive their livelihood from, and a good job, too. With a horse or a jennet they could earn from 48/- to 50/- a week at that class of work and anybody will tell you that they would starve if they had to derive their means of livelihood from the small farms they possess. I have gone into these matters very briefly, and I do not want to delay the House any longer, but I hope the Minister for Agriculture, whose duty it is to look after the farming community, will be impressed by the statements I have made which are not those of a politician but of a practical farmer. I ask the Minister to tell me any article or commodity which a farmer could produce last winter that would have paid for the cost of production and leave any profit. Now, that is fair. That is general. I am not talking now about farmers like, probably, Deputy Belton and Deputy Corry, who live in close proximity to large towns and cities. I am excluding these. I am talking about the general run of farmers round the country. What article can he produce that would pay for the cost of production for the last six or eight months and leave him anything to live on? That is a fair question.
Will the Deputy answer a question?
I am asking a question.
Will the Deputy say whether he is prepared to allow to the tillage farmer who grows barley the cost of production? The Deputy was complaining a while ago about the price.
I put the thing before the Minister for Agriculture as I saw it. I know well that beet is good; but how many farmers in the country are not growing beet? There is a small number growing it, I know, and they can make a profit; but I am talking about the general run of farmers through the country, and I do not find —I am speaking as a practical farmer and not as a politician—I do not find anything that would pay for the cost of production in the past six months and leave the farmer any profit. Will the Minister answer that question? He cannot answer it.
Dr. Ryan
I can answer it. When you are finished, I will answer it.
There is nobody else allowed to speak when he finishes. I am anxious to pay my respects to the farmers. I am sick waiting for an opportunity all day.
All Deputies will have an opportunity of speaking.
Yes, but only two, or perhaps three, have spoken up to this.
Well, now, I have not taken up too much time.
No, you are the most reasonable, I admit.
I do not want to take up too much of the time of the House talking what I consider is not relevant to the motion before the House. But that is the position as I see the whole thing before me as a practical farmer.
Perhaps, the Ceann Comhairle would just allow me to depart from what is strictly the motion. I will not depart very much from it and I will not ask much latitude—not anything like the latitude taken by some of the Deputies who spoke before me. There is a story being told down the country about a farmer who had bullocks to sell. He happened to meet a Fianna Fáil Deputy who was also a farmer, and he asked him would he buy the bullocks. He said he would not. So the farmer said to him: "I wonder what I had best do with them?" The Fianna Fáil Deputy said: "The best thing you can do with them is to run them at such and such a point-to-point meeting coming off in the country in the near future." Now, that is a new idea, and it might commend itself to some of the enterprising point-to-point committees; but it should be one of the conditions that the bullocks should be ridden on the occasion by some of the Fianna Fáil Deputies. Just imagine 15 or 16 bullocks charging down the course with Deputy Corry in the front!
The last Deputy's speech just shows how impossible it is to please everybody, and I think that the question put by Deputy Corry should illustrate that well. Deputy Curran, being from a creamery district, congratulates the Government on what is being done for the creameries and, I think, he has not made any objection to the price of butter going up here and not going up in Britain. I think Deputy Curran objected to Deputy Belton's attacking us on that, and that he would defend the price of 135/- here, even though it is not that much in Great Britain. He would defend it all the more if it were in Britain as well as here. He does not object to the subsidy in any way. But when it comes to a matter of paying a little more to the grain producer, there is a very serious objection raised. I am quite certain that if we took a Deputy from the Midlands, from Leix-Offaly, say, or Longford-Westmeath, some of those counties that go in for cereals more than for creameries, they would favour the cereals rather than the butter. The unfortunate thing is that we have to try to do our best to be just to the farmer no matter what he produces, whether it be butter, grain, cattle, tobacco or anything else.
Deputy Curran mentioned the pig industry and said that they were not paying. I am very sorry that I did not attend to my own business a day sooner, and I could, perhaps, give better information. But I did send pigs in to-day, and I am absolutely certain that those pigs will pay, because I am getting somewhere between 59/- and 65/- according to whether they are lean or fat. The feeding-stuffs used for these pigs were bought at an average of £6 6/- per ton. My usual experience is that about a quarter of a ton will fatten a pig. I expect to get at least £3 15/- per pig. That leaves a fair amount for labour, the price of a small pig, rent, rates and so on. If other things were as favourable as that—I do not say they are—but if other things were as favourable as that, farmers would be quite satisfied. That is one instance of a product that is paying at the present time.
Deputy Curran also mentioned eggs. How has the economic war interfered with eggs? The Deputy says they are 3d. per dozen down the country. Some people here, I am sure, know something about that. Let us put 50 per cent. on them before they are exported. That means they are exported at 4½d. 40 per cent. on that is almost 2d. We are giving a bounty of 2d. on the eggs, so that the economic war cannot be held to be responsible for the low price. If eggs are being sold at 3d., the bounty amounts to as much as the tariff; so the economic war cannot be blamed for the low price.
Does the Minister agree with the price I stated?
Dr. Ryan
I say those figures are correct. If the price is more than 3d., the tariff is higher than the bounty, but if they are only 3d. it is equal to it.
That is perfect reasoning!
Dr. Ryan
Of course it is perfect reasoning. 40 per cent. is 4½d., and the economic war cannot be blamed.
I shall answer the Minister in a few minutes, to use his own phrase.
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy also raised the question of butter and, I think, he made the complaint that we were not doing, perhaps, enough for butter, because I stated that the cost of milk production is 5½d. per gallon. That was the last figure for the cost of milk production from the Department of Agriculture. It is the only theoretical figure I have. I think the figure I have given is right and the cost of production is 5½d. per gallon. What are we doing in regard to milk? The world price of butter is 72/-. Let us assume that there is no economic war and that we are selling our butter in England just the same as the New Zealanders and Australians and can get 72/-. On an average it costs the creamery 20/- in expenses and 3/- or 4/- for freight and selling costs. If you take 23/- from 72/- you get 49/-. That is what they have to distribute to the milk suppliers and that works out at 2¼d. a gallon. With existing prices, bounties and subsidies milk would be 4d. a gallon, so that the difference of 1¾d. would come out of the pool or the Government subsidy.
Deputy Belton's speech contained a lot of figures which were hard to follow. The main point was that the Government is playing England's game. He said that because the Government would not give the farmers the same chance as they did give England. We said to England: "We will put this money in a suspense account and if you prove it is yours we will give it to you," and the Deputy asked why we should not say the same to the farmers. I like that argument because it represents an advance from Cumann na nGaedheal. They want us to give the farmers time to prove that the money is theirs. Before the last election Cumann na nGaedheal wanted us to prove why the money should not go to John Bull. We would much prefer that the money should go to the Irish farmer rather than to John Bull. At any rate, we did not wait until the farmers proved that the money should go to them. We gave it to them.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer in Great Britain in his Budget statement the other day said that he was going to collect three and a half millions on tariffs on Irish products going into England. Let us take it that there is a sum of £2,000,000 a year for all time to give a reduction in annuities—£3,000,000 this year. While the economic war is on we are doing a lot of other things. Export bounties this year will amount to £2,500,000 not to speak of other interim bounties such as on wheat and tobacco, which will amount to £250,000. In that way the farmer gets £2,000,000 in the matter of land annuities; £2,500,000 in respect of export bounties and £250,000 in respect of other bounties, or a total of £4,750,000 as against £3,500,000 which the Chancellor of the Exchequer will collect.
The Minister referred to annuities for all years to come. Does that mean that the annuities are to be made permanent?
Dr. Ryan
Not at all. It was made very plain at the last election by Cumann na nGaedheal that we were going to impose a land tax for all time. It was made clear by us that we were not, and that the farmers could trust us. The farmers did trust us. We were asked by Deputy MacDermot why we changed from total de-rating to a remission of the land annuities. We changed because it was much better for the farmer. The total rates remission for the farmers for the year would be £1,450,000, or roughly £1,500,000. In the case of the land annuities the remission would amount to £2,000,000. The only section that might object to the dropping of the de-rating proposal would be the townspeople. They might object because we are giving the farmers more than we ever promised them. With regard to the motion, if we could afford it we should relieve the townspeople also of rates. The whole point is that we cannot afford it.
We cannot afford to pay them.
Dr. Ryan
Where would we get the money? We would have to reduce our expenditure or increase taxation. Does anyone suggest that we should reduce old age pensions or any of the other payments that are being made? When we try to make economies by way of cutting higher salaries we are met with the greatest opposition by some Deputies here. No suggestion is made as to where we can get the money. If we did not collect these annuities and rates and taxes where would we get the money to keep Government services going?
The suspense account.
Dr. Ryan
That is already gone.
Surely the Minister recognises that it is perfectly justifiable for us to point out what we consider to be the duty of the Government towards the farmers and that it is not in any way incumbent on us to suggest means to the Government for getting them out of difficulties that they themselves created.
Dr. Ryan
Perhaps it is justifiable all right. The same sort of speeches were made on this motion as were made on Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney's motion. We know as well as Deputies opposite the condition of the farmers. We know they are badly off in some ways but not quite so badly off in other ways. What we were anxious to be informed about was where the money would come from.
The Minister should read his own speeches in 1927 and 1928.
Dr. Ryan
The total amount required to do what is suggested would be £3,500,000.
Pending the bringing about of a settlement of the economic war and restoring normal conditions, would the Minister not consider the advisability of seeing that other sections of the community contribute an equal share of the sacrifices? Why should he be anxious to throw the burden on one class?
That is socialism.
Dr. Ryan
We are giving back to the farmers more by way of benefits than we are taking from them.
What about the famous promise to reduce taxation by £2,000,000?
It would appear as if some Deputies here are rapidly becoming socialists.
The clock saves the Minister to-day.
Debate adjourned.
The Dáil adjourned at 2 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Wednesday, 3rd May, 1933.