There is nothing to prevent the company deciding to-morrow to get out of the business of running that railway, and in that case the ratepayers of Co. Donegal would have reason to realise what the decision would mean for them, because the ratepayers have guaranteed the payment of the interest upon the debentures of that company. In any event the Deputy can take it that road transport can be made to pay. I appreciate that the scrapping of the railway line in West Donegal is going to involve the construction of new roads in that area and that it would be unreasonable to ask the County Donegal to bear the cost of the construction of these new roads entirely. There is no reason why County Donegal should not be asked to maintain these roads, when constructed, assisted, as they would be assisted in the ordinary way, by grants from the Road Fund, which is produced by the taxation of motor vehicles; and in so far as the motor vehicles operating on these roads would increase in number, the revenue of the Road Fund in consequence would be inflated, and the Road Fund would make whatever contributions it deemed reasonable and fair to the County Donegal County Council, to assist them in maintaining the roads of the county used by these vehicles.
The construction of new roads is a different problem in so far as the question of providing proper transport in that end of the county is concerned. It seems to me a matter of re-organisation to an extent that will ultimately mean the elimination of the railway and its substitution by road services. At the present time, the position, as I understand it, is that the omnibus services operated by the Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway Company are, in fact, maintaining the railway. The profits realised by that company from omnibus services are helping to meet the loss on railway working. If the railway was not there, if the company could by some means get rid of the railway and of the liabilities attaching to the railway, it would be in quite a comfortable financial position. It is because the railways are there, and because the problem of even getting rid of the railway is going to impose new charges on the company, that it finds difficulty in effecting the change over to the roads which involves the purchase of new vehicles for the transportation of goods and the new omnibuses for an extension of its passenger service.
That is a matter in which they might possibly look to us for assistance, and I am prepared to consider the affording of that assistance if I am satisfied that the plans of the company are prepared with a full realisation of the facts, with a full knowledge of what is contemplated and with all the various difficulties faced up to and solved, so that we can point to a date, with some degree of definiteness, on which all question of State assistance for transport in County Donegal can be ended, and the services, whatever they are, then operating, maintained on a paying basis. The railway employees are part of the problem. The railway company, as the Deputy knows, is obliged, under the terms of the Railway Act, 1924, to provide compensation for its employees if they lose their work, in consequence of an order made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce terminating any of their railway services.
That is one of the problems. The financial burden which the provision of that compensation imposes on the company is one obvious reason why it is finding difficulty in procuring the finances to effect the re-organisation which we contemplate, but that has got to be faced, and the responsibility of deciding that a certain number of these railwaymen are going to lose their employment and get their compensation will have, at some stage, to be taken. A number of them, possibly a majority of them, can be provided with employment in the substituted road services. Some of them, because of age and other considerations, will be unsuitable to take that employment, and for them, under the terms of the Railway Act, compensation has got to be provided, and that compensation is going to impose an annual charge on the company for a number of years to come.
The question is: Can the new services of the company, the reorganised services, the road services, meet their own working expenses and meet the charges on the additional capital which has got to be secured, in order to provide them, plus these charges which will be inherited from the railway system, the uneconomic railway system now working, because not only will these charges arise in respect of compensation for workers, but the existing load of debt which the railway is carrying will have to be shifted, to a considerable extent, at any rate, on to the backs of the new transport organisation that succeeds it? These are all parts of the problems, and I agree that the company might, with some show of reason, look to the State for financial assistance for the purpose, and only for the purpose, of effecting that change over which will obviously put Northern Donegal transport on an economic basis, but if the only question that arises is one of providing a subsidy from State funds to keep going an uneconomic system, which is bound to collapse some day, no matter what subsidies we continue to give it, I think it is a waste of time providing money for the purpose. In fact, we extracted, as the Deputy says, from the company, a promise, when we gave the subsidy last year, that they would not approach us again for that purpose nor have they done so.
This matter is, of course, not merely one for us. In the past, the subsidies given to that company were contributed, one half by the Government of the Free State and one half by the Government of Northern Ireland, and if financial assistance for the reorganisation of the services provided by that company in order to release it from its difficulties, is to come from State funds, presumably the Northern Government must be expected to contribute equally with the Free State Government to that end, but, in any event, the position, so far as the Free State Government is concerned, is that its assistance is conditional upon the company's plans being based upon a realisation of its position, and on a determination to put its services on an economic basis, no matter what is involved in that.
The Dáil adjourned at 10.55 p.m. until 3 o'clock on Thursday, 13th December, 1934.