What are the real facts? What work has been done to get the people in this city out of houses condemned ten or 15 years ago as unfit for human habitation? We were told that the Government were going to make available abundant funds, and that they would add more, and that if there was any delay in spending these funds they were prepared to go into the business themselves and take control and push it through. Yet, looking at a return of the builders' labourers unemployed this year, as compared with last year, we find there is a reduction in the number of unemployed of 28 men; that there were 2,069 builders' labourers unemployed in such trades as carpenters, bricklayers, stonecutters and masons, plasterers, painters, plumbers last year; there are still unemployed 2,030. Does that show any evidence of any real activity going on in the business of dealing with that problem, or does it show any constructive work done, when we find that there are as many as 15 people living in one room in Dublin, when we find two separate families reared in one room, and when we find people at the present time living in cellars? There was quite recently at least one case to my own knowledge of a family living in a coal cellar in Dublin. What defence has the Government, which has been in office for 12 months with a knowledge of these facts before them, and having avowed their intention to put an end to them, to make to-day when these conditions still prevail? There are hundreds and thousands of unemployed people living in this city under conditions not fit for beasts much less for human beings. What has the Government to say in its own defence for having allowed that condition of affairs to continue?
The Minister for Finance has thrown out the challenge to-day: "If you want to reduce expenditure make your suggestions." That might be a legitimate reply if the Minister did not occupy his seat here in this House, and a high place in the Government, on the undertaking that he was going to reduce expenditure on public administration by £2,000,000 a year, and on the undertaking that he was convinced that the cost of administration in 1929 was far beyond the capacity of the people to bear. But since the Minister has forgotten that and challenged me, by implication, to suggest to him a method of reducing expenditure I make this suggestion. I am glad that he shows no tendency to make his economies at the expense of the social services in this country, but I deplore the fact that he is prepared to sponsor a political and economic policy which creates the necessity for social services that should not be necessary, and that are not wanted elsewhere.
There are two ways of producing the desired economy. One is by making up his mind, and by the Executive Council doing the same, as to whether they want a Republic for the Twenty-Six Counties or whether they would accept co-equal membership of the British Commonwealth. If they make up their minds that a Republic is necessary then they should take it and take it now. There is nothing to stop them. If the people want it, the people have a right to get it. Then we can review the situation in the light of our new constitutional status. We can decide the standard of living which this country can afford to its people as an independent nation and we can cut our cloth according to our measure. There can be little doubt that when the Minister finds himself face to face with that situation and turns to us all for counsel how best to meet it, he cannot hope to come into this Dáil and ask that we should maintain a standard of public expenditure which will be measured at £31,000,000 per annum. If the people want a Republic, it will be our duty to measure our expenditure according to our resources and we know what we have to do. On the contrary, if the Executive Council make up their minds that the future of this country lies in co-equal membership with the other nations of the Commonwealth, then they have a clear and open course before them as well, and that is to put an end to a war system which is creating a widespread and ever-increasing poverty among our people. I quite agree that the essential and permanent social services should not be touched, but I suggest that when normal prosperity is restored to our people, after the terrific handicaps which have been put upon them by the economic war are removed, a situation will then exist in which a number of the social services set out will not be necessary.
It is not a normal thing, nor is it a desirable thing, that the central Government should have to distribute free milk. By all means, when the necessity is there, and when the poverty is widespread, let the Government step into the breach and meet the grave emergency. But who can say that it is a desirable situation that our Government should be distributing free milk to the people. It is not a desirable thing, nor is it a commendable thing, that our people should have been reduced to such a level that the central Government should be supplying them with free fuel. If it is necessary, by all means it is the duty of a Government to stand between its people and destitution. But surely it is not a desirable way of remedying that situation to be acknowledging the inevitable existence of destitution and to be relieving it with free milk and free turf. Surely the object of an Administration should be to restore a measure of prosperity to the country over which it is appointed that will secure that every section of the community will have a moderate standard of comfort and will not stand in need of grants of the very necessities of life.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce, in a flood of rhodomontade yesterday, proclaimed that the dawn of prosperity was at hand; that he saluted the rising dawn of a new industrial development. He looked to me like a man who was saluting the morning after the night before. Here is a record of his glorious industrial achievements: the marble quarries which have been derelict for many years were again in production, and the stone quarries were experiencing a new era of prosperity. The stone quarries' prosperity is characterised by the picture of young able-bodied men sitting on the sides of roads with a hammer in their hand doing the work that we used to give to the poor old derelict paupers in the poorhouse. When a man was past his labour, when a man was so hopelessly unable to do any work that was useful, 20 years ago the custom was to put him sitting on a heap of stones, give him a hammer and let him break them. The stone-breaker was the synonym for futility and for a spent and past life. One of the fruits of the Minister for Industry and Commerce's new industrial resurgence is that the young men are promoted to the stone heaps to break stones with a hammer. "We have also examined," he said, "the possibilities of producing here nitrogenous manures of various kinds." I hope that last remaining branch of the manure industry will be spared the munificent interference of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who embarked on a scheme of development for the rest of the manure industry in this country, with the result that the Minister for Agriculture was wailing through the land that the people were now buying manures and that it would result in serious injury to the whole country if they would not buy them. He now knows that the consumption of manures in this country has fallen by 25 per cent., largely as a result of the interference of the Minister for Industry and Commerce.
He went on to say that they hoped to give considerable employment in the production of peat for fuel. I see the distinguished sponsor of that new industry in this country has just arrived in the House. I trust that the peat industry may thrive in the hands of the Minister for Defence, but if his best contribution to public policy is to be nothing better than the peat industry God help the future of our native army. I doubt if the President seriously believes that we are going to build up a great industry in this country by providing peat as a substitute for coal in the ordinary requirements of this country for fuel. I very much doubt that a single member of the Executive Council believes that that is anything but a very harebrained scheme. Of course, it is very good propaganda. Of course, it is difficult for me to go down the country and to say to some chap who has 50 acres of bog: "President de Valera says this is a gold mine; I tell you, what you already know, that it is worth just so much as you are going to cut and burn in your own house." His answer will be: "Is not President de Valera a very smart man, and he says it is going to be a gold mine; why should not I believe him?" My answer is: "Why should he not?" Where ignorance is bliss it is folly to be wise. When you have not got meat it is well to have promises. I am afraid that there is not a member of the Executive Council who does not fully realise that putting their hand to turning the peat bogs of this country into gold mines shows very little practical common sense.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce, carried away by the flood of his own eloquence, went on: "The only solution of the unemployment problem is the provision of useful work. The Government is devising means of getting a larger number of people employed on the land. There is no reason why the land should not give as much employment as the land of Denmark."
Did the Minister for the moment forget what that observation should bring to his mind? While we are engaged in telling John Bull that Caithlín Ní Houlihan is prepared to lay down her life rather than submit to his scandalous blandishments, Denmark is beating at his door begging to be allowed in. Denmark is prepared to do anything by way of trade concession with England—to do anything that England asks in order to be given permission, not to increase her exports to England, but to maintain the exports she has. She is prepared to take her steel from them; she is prepared to take her requirements in coal from England, and almost anything else that England would ask Denmark is prepared to do.
What is the use of putting people on the land if you destroy the market in which the products of the land have got to be sold? What is the use of talking of providing employment for people if you tell them before they begin to work that they will get no pay for the work they are to do. It is all very well for the Labour Party to be talking about unemployment. I sympathise with the man who is ready to do a day's work and cannot get it. But what have the Labour Party to say about a man who not only is ready to do a day's work, but who does the day's work and finds at the end of the day that not only is there no pay for him but that on the contrary he has lost. Is there an agricultural representative or one engaged in agriculture in this House who does not know men who have to work with all the skill and industry they can command, who have done the best they possibly could and having done the best work, discover at the end of the day's work that far from having earned something, they have actually lost money in putting seeds and crops into the land?