The business will be taken as on the Order Paper, from items 5 to 12, inclusive. Items 5 and 6 will be taken in the appropriate places, and item 7 before item 8. Estimate No. 25 (Supplementary Agricultural Grants) alone will be taken to-day. It is proposed not to interrupt public business at 12 o'clock noon to take Private Deputies' business, and the Dáil will sit later than 2.30 p.m. The Order for the Adjournment will be taken not later than 12 p.m.
Order of Business.
The proposal is to take items 5 to 12. Is item 11, Milk Bill, to be taken?
Not to-day.
The proposal before the Dáil is to sit until 12 o'clock to-night to take, amongst other items, the Citizenship Bill. What, might I ask, is the need for haste in connection with that particular measure? Is anyone going to suffer if that Bill does not pass this Session? Is there any need for having it included amongst the measures to be passed before the Session ends? Looking back on the last few weeks, we find that we met one day one week, and then adjourned for a fortnight, and then met one or two days in another week, and now, at the end of the Session, the Government is suffering from a serious attack of constipation of one sort or another in connection with Bills, some of which are unnecessary, and we are to be kept here until 12 o'clock to-night, without notice. This week has been marked in the Dáil by three Ministers—the President of the Executive Council, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, and the Minister for Finance —not knowing the measures before the House, and not being able to put it in possession of facts that should be given to Deputies. It was a hopeless exhibition on the part of the President of the Executive Council yesterday, and by lack of information or study on the part of Ministers, the House had to be asked to help them out of difficulties. I should like to know what reason there is why the Citizenship Bill has to be taken this Session?
I do not see that the Deputy has urged any reason why the business on the Order Paper should not be taken to-day. The Deputy talks a lot of nonsense in this House, but I never heard him talk more nonsense than he did now, when he said that Ministers exhibited a want of knowledge of their Bills. The less the ex-President of the Executive Council says on that subject the better. The Citizenship Bill is necessary.
Is it urgent?
It is.
Why?
It might be urgent to make Deputy MacDermot a citizen.
Why?
Indeed I do not know. The business on the Order Paper need not occupy us until midnight, but it is the Government's opinion that the items on the Order Paper to be dealt with to-day should be dealt with. They are measures which are necessary. I know that the Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Bill should have been before the House months ago, but on account of the changes, we had to give the local authorities about three months to get up the necessary information. Nobody wants to deny the fact—I do not, at any rate—with regard to that Bill; but it is urgent now. We are anxious that the Bill should go through as quickly as possible, and also the Supplementary Estimate, so that the local authorities may get the money authorised under the Bill. The business on the Order Paper is regarded as urgent and necessary.
After that lucid explanation, upon which I should like to congratulate the Vice-President, we have discovered that one Bill is necessary—the Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Bill. We understand that that is necessary and that the Estimate in respect of it is also necessary. The other portions of the Minister's statement are even more interesting.
Is the House in Committee?
The Vice-President was not here yesterday or the day before during the discussions that took place, but he knows all about what transpired here. He knows that the President understands exactly the difference between domicile and residence——
I know the ex-President does.
——and the other peculiarities in connection with the Citizenship Bill. We have found that two items on the Order Paper are necessary. Although the Citizenship Bill is supposed to be necessary, we have not been told why. We have not been told why it is urgent. With that lucidity and irrelevance which are characteristic of the Vice-President, we are told that because of something which he thinks happened three or four years ago, this business must go on. I congratulate the Ministry on the Vice-President's explanation. It is magnificent; it is even more than lucid—it is entrancing.
The proposal of the Government is that the House shall sit for 13½ hours to-day. Is not that right?
The Deputy can make the calculation of the hours between 10.30 a.m. until 12 midnight.
I submit that it is the invariable experience of the House that the work done in a prolonged session of that kind is apt to be badly done. It is admitted that the Citizenship Bill is an important measure, and I suggest that it ought to be considered under circumstances which would ensure that it gets the most careful and reasonable consideration. The Vice-President has given no explanation as to its urgency and, if it is so urgent, why the Government have been three years in office before they saw fit to bring it in.
You were ten years in office.
It is the Government that claim this is urgent and, consequently, it is up to the Government to show why they consider it urgent and to show from past conduct that they are genuine in saying it is urgent. The business of this session, as Deputy Cosgrave has pointed out, has been conducted in a positively farcical manner. There is not alone the point that he made about inadequate information being available from Ministers as to measures they were recommending to the House, but we have been meeting here for a day a week or, at the most, two days a week.
Never one day—two days.
Yes, we did meet for one day one week.
What about the 28th November?
It has been through the mismanagement by the Government of their own business that we have got into a jam, if we have got into a jam, at the end of this session. I suggest that they should meet us in this matter. It is not a question of desiring to be unreasonably obstructive. We want this Citizenship Bill to get adequate consideration. Let us have sessions of the normal length and let us get as far with the business as we can this week and the two days next week on which it has been decided to sit before the motion for the Christmas adjournment. But do not ask the House to scramble through the business of the Dáil in the midnight hours.
Will the Vice-President say if the necessity for this rushing through the work to-day is because the Government want all this business on the Order Paper completed before Christmas?
All the business is not on for to-day.
Is the necessity caused because they want the remaining stages of these Bills to be taken before Christmas?
I think so. That is to say, the remaining stages of the Bills that are on the Order Paper to-day and some additional Bills that will come before us.
Can the Vice-President tell us now what business it is proposed to do before Christmas?
Before when?
Before Christmas.
The business on the Order Paper to-day, with the Supplementary Estimates and some additional Bills.
Do I understand that the Vice-President is moving a motion that we sit late to-day?
I read it out.
The Vice-President informed the House of the business to be done but he did not move the motion to sit late.
It will be moved.
Will the Vice-President say when that motion will be moved?
The two will be moved jointly, or with separate decisions if it is so desired.
I take it that no motion has been moved as yet.
A motion has been handed to me:—
That the Dáil sit later than 2.30 p.m. to-day, and that the Order for the Adjournment be taken not later than 12 o'clock midnight; and
That consideration of public business be not interrupted to-day at the time fixed for taking business of Private Deputies.
When is that motion going to be moved?
Within a few minutes.
I move it now.
Can the Vice-President give us any further information as to the necessity for this?
I have no further explanation to give.
I protest that this is simply trampling on the Dáil as an institution. The Standing Orders laid down certain normal hours as the hours on which the House will meet. These hours were arrived at after considering the personal commitments of the people who constitute the membership of the Dáil. These hours were selected as the hours most suitable to the classes of people who were Deputies so that they might be given an opportunity of attending in some way to their own private business as well as giving their time to public business here. We understood from the Government, taking into account the amount of work they wished to complete before Christmas, that the Dáil was expected to rise yesterday. The Vice-President now tells us that we must take all stages of the Citizenship Bill before Christmas; that we must take all stages of the Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Bill before Christmas and that we must take all stages of the Imposition of Duties Bill together with certain Supplementary Estimates, and that no consideration at all is to be given to the motions that are down on the Order Paper in the names of Private Deputies—motions that have been down for months and in respect of which we heard from the President within the last few weeks some expressions of appreciation as to the generous spirit in which the Government wished to approach these Motions and to give facilities to private Deputies for their discussion.
The Vice-President tells us now that the Rates on Agricultural Land Bill is urgent. But will he tell us why the First Reading of that Bill could not be taken on the 14th November? Is there anything in that Bill which would prevent its being introduced on the 14th November or earlier if the Dáil were sitting? Is there anything in the Imposition of Duties Bill which would prevent that Bill being introduced before the 14th November if the Government had taken the trouble of doing it? Then, we should have these Bills adequately discussed and we could have private Deputies given the time that is normally due to them. In view of the fact that the Government business which normally should have been ready on the 14th November, was not ready some of the generosity of which the President has spoken could have been extended to private Deputies in the second week of November in which the Dáil sat. When we met on the 14th and 15th November, these two Bills could have been introduced as well as the Supplementary Estimates—Science and Art and the Circuit Court. These Bills could then have been disposed of in the Parliamentary week beginning the 21st November. What happened was that private Deputies were deliberately squeezed out of their rights by the refusal of the Government to give them time for the discussion of important Motions. I charge that Government business has been held up in the hope that the Opposition Deputies will break off to their homes and that the Government will then be able to scamper through the business——
Nonsense.
Deputy Donnelly knows the close attention business people have to give to their business to day if they are to keep out of the bankruptcy courts. The Government is taking advantage of that strain on the business professional and the farming community to-day to get them out of a difficulty. The Government are trying to get the business of the Dáil through with very inadequate discussion. They want to get business that requires serious consideration by this House rushed through. This attitude of the Ministers in shutting down the Dáil—the Dáil was shut down for three months up to the 14th November—has only one object. Since the 14th November the Dáil has only met eight days, and during those eight days the Government business was conducted in such a way as to squeeze Private Deputies out of their rights by preventing discussions on the motions down on the Order Paper. Now, an endeavour is being made to manaeuvre the situation so that Deputies will be prevented from discussing Government business.
This motion is the usual Fianna Fáil version of the closure. It is an extremely amazing fact about Fianna Fáil that they have an infinite capacity for doing dirty things and not doing so openly. When doing these things they wrap the mantle of sanctimonious rectitude about themselves and then stab someone from behind the pall. On the Second Stage of the Citizenship Bill we had a statement from the President that he expected everyone in the House would lend a hand and that he expected them to take an interest in that Bill so that we would have an agreed measure and there would be open discussion. Then the President came in with his Bill and he floundered about like a sea-lion that had got into a bog. Though he had been hauled out by the Opposition and straightened out repeatedly, still the stress on his spine was too great, and accordingly the Fianna Fáil closure is produced in order to let him flounder through the whole Bill without correction. That is the whole story.
The Citizenship Bill was brought in by the President for the purpose of wrapping the green flag around him and embracing Caithlin Ni Houlihan. There is the pretence of putting an end to the British connection. The whole business has been motived in that way. Now, in the remaining stages of the Bill the closure must be put on so as to prevent Deputies having an adequate discussion on the Bill. And then we will have the Government, through the Irish Press, to-morrow or next day, explaining what a marvellous achievement the Citizenship Bill is. The whole thing is perfectly understandable. Anyone who knows the mentality of the Party opposite knows the purpose of this motion. It is simply to squeeze out discussion so as to prevent the House from exposing the absurdity of many of the Government's actions and from exposing the amendments which they propose to the Bill. Deputies opposite have nothing else to do but to come down to the House. But vast majority of the Deputies on this side of the House have occasion to earn their living.
Oh, oh!
The mere idea of earning one's living throws the other side into convulsions of laughter. It is so long since they did it that it seems absurd to them that any sensible man should occupy himself in such an operation. If this House is to sit until midnight and right up to Christmas, then the majority of members of this Party cannot attend to the deliberations of the House. If that brings any satisfaction to the Ministers, they are welcome to the information. If we are to sit here at a time when the ordinary citizen has to give attention to his private affairs in order to earn his living, then the members of this Party cannot assist in the transaction of public business. Whenever the Fianna Fáil Party want to effect the closure in that way, they are welcome to do so. They will get their own brigades to trot in and out of the lobbies, but they will not get the co-operation and the assistance to which they would be entitled in normal circumstances.
I do not want to be led into divagations, but when I heard the effect that this Citizenship Bill was going to have on Deputy MacDermot's nationality, I was tempted to ask what effect it would have on President de Valera's nationality. I shall not pursue that question and I suggest to the Opposition that they should not pursue it either. This is the closure and you might as well say so. It would be much more honest and much more decent on the part of the Vice-President if he would introduce a guillotine motion in respect of the Citizenship Bill and a closure motion in respect of all the other business on the Order Paper, That would be the honest thing to do. I am certainly not going to sit here until midnight——
Having nothing else to do.
The country wants you.
When the imbecilities of the Opposition shall have subsided, I shall continue to speak. No other Deputy who really wants to do useful work in this House will attempt to spend 12 or 13 hours discussing a measure such as the Citizenship Bill. Every Deputy on the opposite side of the House knows that. That is the reason that this motion is introduced— to prevent full and adequate discussion of the Citizenship Bill. There is no reason whatever why the Committee Stage of that Bill should not be put back until the 13th February, if we want to do any really useful work upon it. Possibly the Ministry have come to the conclusion that the Bill is not worth any useful work, that it is so futile and so ineffective that it is just as well to let it run through in whatever shape President de Valera wants it. If they do want it to be examined, after their experience of last night, it is obviously a Bill which ought to be put back until the 13th February. The House should be given ample time to consider it in all its aspects. If it is not put back, there is going to be no examination of the measure. There is going to be an incompetent and inefficient Bill passed into law, with the usual inconvenience that ensues upon such legislation.
May I say that Deputy Dillon is fond of wrapping the mantle of respectability around him and priding himself in this House as a bright example of what a debater should be. Having listened to his remarks just now, I say to him that if he gets nasty retorts in this House, no man deserves them more.
I said nothing personally offensive to the Vice-President.
Not to me.
So long as it is to his Party, I do not mind.
"Damn fool blatherskite; pudden-headed reasoning."
If Deputy Dillon wants to encourage decorum in debate, he should be more careful of his own language. With regard to the closure of which Deputy Dillon speaks, Deputy MacDermot has reminded us that we are having 13½ hours to-day. If Deputy Dillon thinks 13½ hours in one day are not sufficient to allow him to express himself on the Citizenship Bill, he is welcome to consider that proposal as a closure.
I should like to ask the Vice-President, because I do value the courtesy he has always shown to me, if I have said anything offensive to him.
Nothing whatever to me.
I made a rather tart rejoinder to the reference made to the nationality of a Deputy, but that was originated from the other side.
You said nothing offensive to me.
Question put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 55; Níl, 29.
Tá.
- Aiken, Frank.
- Bartley, Gerald.
- Beegan, Patrick.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Brian.
- Brady, Seán.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Carty, Frank.
- Concannon, Helena.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Timothy.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Doherty, Hugh.
- Donnelly, Eamon.
- Flinn, Hugo V.
- Gibbons, Seán.
- Hales, Thomas.
- Harris, Thomas.
- Hayes, Seán.
- Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
- Houlihan, Patrick.
- Keely, Séamus P.
- Kehoe, Patrick.
- Kelly, James Patrick.
- Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Kissane, Eamonn.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Lynch, James B.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Maguire, Ben.
- Maguire, Conor Alexander.
- Moane, Edward.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Moylan, Seán.
- O Briain, Donnchadh.
- O'Doherty, Joseph.
- O'Dowd, Patrick.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
- Pearse, Margaret Mary.
- Rice, Edward.
- Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Martin.
- Ryan, Robert.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Traynor, Oscar.
- Victory, James.
- Ward, Francis C.
Níl.
- Anthony, Richard.
- Beckett, James Walter.
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Brennan, Michael.
- Burke, James Michael.
- Burke, Patrick.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Desmond, William.
- Dillon, James M.
- Dolan, James Nicholas.
- Doyle, Peadar S.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Keating, John.
- Lynch, Finian.
- MacDermot, Frank.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- McGovern, Patrick.
- McMenamin, Daniel.
- Morrisroe, James.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Nally, Martin.
- O'Mahony, The.
- O'Neill, Eamonn.
- O'Reilly, John Joseph.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Redmond, Bridget Mary.
- Rice, Vincent.
- Rowlette, Robert James.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Trayner: Níl: Deputies Doyle and Bennett.
Question declared carried.
Ordered: That Public Business be not interrupted at 12 o'clock (noon) for the taking of Private Deputies' Business.