Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 1 May 1935

Vol. 56 No. 1

Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Bill, 1935—Motion for Financial Resolution.

Minister for Finance (Mr. MacEntee)

I move:—

(1) That there shall be charged and levied—

(a) as on and from the 1st day of April, 1935, a levy on creamery butter and on non-creamery butter excluding in both cases butter exported from Saorstát Eireann, and

(b) as from the coming into operation of statutory authority in this behalf, a levy on butter imported into Saorstát Eireann, and

(c) as on and from a date to be fixed under statutory authority, a levy on certain milk products, excluding any such milk product which is exported from Saorstát Eireann.

(2) That the said levies shall be paid to the Minister for Agriculture by such manufacturers, dealers, importers, and other persons as shall be specified in that behalf by statute, and the said levies shall be applied by the said Minister in the payment of such bounties on exported butter and milk products and in such other ways as shall be directed or authorised by statute.

(3) That the said levies shall be charged, levied, and paid at such several rates as shall be fixed by statute or by the Minister for Agriculture under statutory authority, and provision shall be made by statute for the collection and enforcing payment of the said levies.

Minister for Agriculture (Dr. Ryan)

I should like to ask whether we can presume that the discussion on this will be taken with the Second Reading of the Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Bill.

General Mulcahy

There are some points dealing with the financial side of the levy which, I think, the Minister might give some information about while dealing with the Financial Resolution.

Dr. Ryan

With regard to the Financial Resolution, there is very little change arising from the system we have followed for the last three years. This levy covered by the Financial Resolution will be levied on creamery butter sold from the 1st April, 1935, and also on non-creamery butter from the 1st April, 1935, onwards, which is sold through a factory or a registered exporter or a person on whom a notice has been served. With regard to all other products, that is, farmers' butter, etc., no levy can be put on until the Bill goes through. The levy is laid down under the Bill at 39/- per cwt. on butter until a new order is made under the Bill.

General Mulcahy

I should like to ask the Minister to tell us more explicitly what the financial effect of the Bill will be. In a Parliamentary Question, I asked the Minister how much money was raised during the year 1934 by way of levy, and he said the figures were given in reply to Deputy McGilligan on a recent occasion as £1,230,448. In reply to a question as to how much was paid out by way of bounty from that levy, the answer as given on 20th March to Deputy Norton was £1,221,233. When we dealt with the original Price Stabilisation Bill I put it to the Minister that when we took into consideration that the price of farmers' butter would be raised to the purchasing public, the increased cost to the consumer would be £1,487,000. The Minister questioned that and, as reported in column 1376 of the Official Reports of the 4th May, 1932, he said:—"We in our calculations gave the figure of £415,000 as the cost." That is the cost to the consumer. Further on he said, referring to the tariff:—"If, however, we were to take the cost of the tariff and this thing combined—to take the two together which would, perhaps, be the fairer way to look at it—the cost would be about £610,000." That is the cost to the consumer. Under the scheme £1,230,000 was collected from the creameries and approximately the same sum was paid back. That sum cheapened the butter to the British purchaser. Can the Minister say how much is going to be collected now? If we accept the figures given by the Minister in 1932, regarding the total amount of butter consumed here, which were very much smaller than the estimate put on consumption of butter on this side, he is only going to collect about £663,000. The Minister told us at that time that the total consumption of creamery butter was 300,000 cwts., that only a small amount of factory butter was consumed, and 40,000 cwts. of farmers' butter sold for consumption in the Free State.

If the figures quoted by the Minister as regards the consumption of butter are correct, then, on the levy reported, the Minister is only going to collect £663,000. Where is any change being made under the Bill? I take it the Minister will deny that the farmers are going to receive less money for their butter or that the creameries are going to receive less money for the butter they sell. Some of these financial details require to be cleared up by the Minister, and I think the House is entitled, on having this Resolution presented to it, to have a statement as to how the new procedure will affect the creameries, farmers and consumers. We hold, when we take into consideration the increase in the price of farmers' butter, that consumers in this country are paying £1,400,000 more for butter than they would have to pay if this Bill was not in operation; and more than butter consumers in England and in the North of Ireland would have to pay if they consumed the same amount of butter. When asking the House to pass a Financial Resolution dealing with legislation that permanently increases by 5d. per lb. the cost of butter to consumers in the Free State more than consumers in the Six Counties have to pay, we ought to have some rather detailed explanation of the financial effects.

Dr. Ryan

Unfortunately, I had not the good sense to look up what I may have said three years ago, but, at any rate, my forecast at the time was right for that year. The amount collected would be about £400,000 were it not that the Emergency Fund was brought into operation and the creamery industry partly financed, and, therefore, the levies were not collected during part of the year. Of course, Deputy Mulcahy is altogether wrong in assuming that the £1,400,000 is put on to the consumers. Under the new system the consumers are going to be as well off, or as badly off, as they were for the last three years. The farmers will be in the same position and the creameries will be in the same position. The only difference is that we are going to collect not more than half the levies we have collected for the last three years. Really it is quite obvious it is only a matter of bookkeeping, and if it is only a matter of bookkeeping, and if we can reduce the levies from £1,400,000 down to half that amount, the case that the consumers have been paying that £1,400,000 does not hold. We are making this change; we are now only going to collect levies on butter sold at home, and because we are making that change, the levies drop practically by half, so that the consumers cannot complain that they are paying as a result of this legislation more than what was collected on levies. It will amount in the coming year to £400,000 on creamery butter. I cannot say what it will amount to on non-creamery butter. It will not, I am sure, be as much as that. It may be considerably less, certainly something less. We may take it that it will be somewhere around £700,000—at any rate, less than £800,000—and that is a very big difference from the amount levied in the last financial year. Our calculations are based on a net return to the creameries of 100/- per cwt. That is what they got last year, so that we will be in the same position this year and it follows that the farmers supplying creameries will be in the same position. The price of butter to creameries will not be changed, so that we have the consumers and producers exactly in the same position, but by this change in legislation we are reducing levies by at least half.

General Mulcahy

What the Minister says makes the situation even more remarkable. In 1932 he told us that we consumed 300,000 cwts. of creamery butter, a small amount of factory butter and only 40,000 tons of farmers' butter. The Minister now proposes a levy on farmers' butter as well as on butter sold by creameries in this country. He expects to raise only £400,000 from the creameries and £300,000 from the farmers, so that while the creameries, the Minister expects, are going to get back £700,000 approximately as a result of the Financial Resolution, farmers who produce butter for sale here are going to provide £300,000 of that amount for the assistance of the creameries. That is a point I should like to hear the Minister develop. I should like the Minister to say in what way this is going to affect the production of butter and the amount of butter that will be exported. Will the difference of level between what an Englishman can buy Irish butter at and what a resident of the Free State can buy the same butter at be changed as a result of his operations? In the past an Englishman could buy Irish butter cheap by reason of the fact that £1,250,000 was paid as a subsidy to cheapen the cost of Irish butter in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. That amount of money will not be paid now. Will that have any effect?

Dr. Ryan

Not the slightest.

Mr. Brennan

A statement made by the Minister requires some explanation, because it seems inconsistent. The Minister stated that the farmers and consumers are going to be no worse off. Has the Minister given any consideration whatever to the case of farmers who make non-creamery butter and who supply customers? Will they be in exactly the same position? How does the Minister reconcile that? Is not this whole business an attempt to make tax gatherers of the farmers who are at present manufacturing their own butter and supplying customers? Who is going to pay the tax? How are the farmers and the consumers going to be as well off while the Minister collects a tax of 4d. a lb. off them?

Dr. Ryan

It is most unsatisfactory to have all those questions on a Financial Resolution. If Deputies opposite had the patience to wait for the Second Reading speech they might have got all the information. Why do they want it all piecemeal? Is it not much more satisfactory to take the Second Reading and let me explain what this Bill means? If Deputies wish, I will make the Second Reading speech now and be done with it.

General Mulcahy

I am very anxious to hear the Minister's general statement of policy in this matter. When a Financial Resolution is put before the House, the House is entitled to ask what are the general effects of that Financial Resolution.

Dr. Ryan

For some time the practice here has been to take those together. If Deputies are not satisfied they can divide on the Financial Resolution afterwards.

General Mulcahy

I am going to divide on this Financial Resolution. The Minister has treated the House in a very absurd way with regard to it. He is changing the scheme of financing the creameries. We can understand from the few remarks he has made that the home producers of butter are going to provide £300,000 to help the creamery machinery, and they will collect that, no doubt, from the home consumers of butter. The statement is an important one. There is this consideration too, that it is almost entirely out of keeping with previous information given to the House as to the amount of home-produced butter consumed in the country.

An Ceann Comhairle

It seems very difficult to separate the debate on the Resolution from the Second Reading debate. Perhaps the House would agree to follow the Minister's suggestion and debate the two together. Two questions will be put—a question on the Resolution and a question on the Second Reading.

General Mulcahy

I am satisfied with that, but I am not satisfied to pass the Financial Resolution now.

An Ceann Comhairle

Two questions will be put, one on the Financial Resolution and one on the Second Reading of the Bill.

Dr. Ryan

The Bill, to all intents and purposes, is a continuation of the Dairy Produce Act, which was in operation for three years and which has just expired. It has certain modifications which, from experience in the Department, were thought advisable. The Principal Act was brought in in 1932 to maintain a higher price for butter on the home market. I think, seeing that we are protecting certain industries here, and trying to give manufacturers and the workers in those factories a decent standard of living, if we had no export butter trade nobody would think it unreasonable to put a tariff on imported butter in order to give our own producers the price which we are trying to get them here, 141/- per cwt. During the 10 years from 1922 to 1932, until the original Act was brought in, the average price which creameries were getting for butter was something over 160/-. A strange thing about it during those 10 years was that there was no great increase in the price of cows, so that it may be taken for granted that farmers were not making a fortune out of butter production during that time. As I say, if we had no export surplus of butter or milk products, and if we were protecting the farmer here on the home market for the production of butter, it would not have been considered unreasonable to protect them at the level of say 140/- per cwt. for butter in the creamery. If we did that, the consumer here would have no great complaint. He could not complain any more than if we were to protect say boots or clothes or anything else. The fact that we placed butter at that level and then asked the creameries to contribute into a fund in order to finance their own exports is no concern of the consumer at all. I do not see how the consumer comes into it. If the creameries wish to cut down products and cut out export they may have that 140/- for themselves, and the consumer is in the same position. Whether they increase or decrease their export is their own look-out. If they increase their export they get less for their butter per cwt.; if they decrease their export they get more for their butter per cwt. but the consumer here remains the same all the time.

Under this stabilisation plan the Department of Agriculture is managing the fund. Under the Pigs and Bacon Bill there is a different arrangement; the trade itself is taking up the management of the stabilisation fund. We can do the same here—and probably ought to do the same in the near future—and that is to bring in a Bill to hand over this whole business to the creameries themselves, or to the butter producers, whether they are creameries or farmers, and let them manage their own stabilisation fund. There is nobody here unreasonable enough to object to the protection of the producer of butter here on his own market at a fair price, and surely 140/- is a fair price, considering that they were getting 160/- for ten years previously. There has been a lot of talk during the last three years from Cumann na nGaedheal financial experts in the country—especially when speaking to what they believed to be ignorant farmers, and more especially, of course, when they believe they are speaking to ignorant consumers in the towns—to the effect that we are raising levies here and making our own people pay more for butter in order to give cheap butter to John Bull. We are getting the same price from John Bull as we would if there were no Bill, and practically the same price from New Zealand and Australia.

Mr. Dillon

What is the Denmark price?

Dr. Ryan

The Denmark price is much higher above New Zealand than it was.

Mr. Dillon

What is the price in Denmark to-day?

Dr. Ryan

I cannot say. I did not see the paper to-day, but the Deputy can read as well as I can. If he looks at the Irish Times he will see it. I say the Irish Times because I presume that is the paper which he reads. Whatever it is, it is higher above New Zealand than it was two or three years ago. Free State butter is classed as colonial butter, because it is made from unripened cream. In many other ways it is the same as Australian or New Zealand butter. Previous to the introduction of the Stabilisation Bill three years ago we were, on an average, 7/- below New Zealand. Now we are, on an average, 3/- below New Zealand, so we are coming nearer to the New Zealand figure, although they say we are raising levies off our own consumers to give John Bull cheap butter. That shows how ridiculous are the arguments of General Mulcahy and Deputies like him that we are putting levies on the consumers here for that purpose. I have pointed out that we are going to give the same terms to the farmer and the same terms to the consumer, so that ought to show any reasonable person that Deputy Mulcahy's arguments during the last three years are just nonsense.

General Mulcahy

Will the Minister tell us how it is possible to do all that while cutting the levies by half?

Dr. Ryan

I will come to that. I was going to say that I wondered whether it is any use telling the Deputy. The policy we have been adopting during the last three years was to take a levy on all butter produced in the creamery and on non-creamery butter acquired by those who came under the Act. That undoubtedly created certain inconveniences to the creameries and to the buyers, because very often a creamery, when first turning out large quantities of butter and having to pay a levy at the end of the month without having disposed of the butter, found itself in serious financial trouble and had to borrow money to tide it over the period. If it could not borrow the money, which was often the case owing to other circumstances, it had to throw the butter on the home market in order to get ready cash. The result was that a serious element of competition was introduced into the home market which had the effect of bringing the price of butter on the home market down lower than it should be. That meant that they got no benefit, because, if butter is supposed to be sold at 141/- and if prices are supposed to be fixed on that basis, if the distributors can get 138/- or 139/-, they will keep the margin for themselves and it will not be passed on to the consumer. It is proposed to change that system under this Bill and to put the levy on butter as it is sold. In that way, it will be easier for the creameries to finance their business. It is also proposed under this Bill to take a levy on butter sold at home and not on butter exported. That is where the difference comes in.

The levies will be much smaller this year than last year. The difference is that the levies are only being collected on butter consumed at home, and not on butter exported, as has been done for the last two or three years; so that every penny we collect this year is from the home consumer, which means that we are only going to collect half what we collected last year, although Deputy Mulcahy has been quoting very large figures as to the amount of the levies to be collected.

Mr. Belton

How does the Minister propose to do the same amount of work with half the money?

Dr. Ryan

That is what the Deputy does not know. The reason is that I thought out a plan. I shall explain that later on.

Mr. Belton

The Minister will be a great man if he can do it.

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy should have recognised that before now. Suppose our exports were equal to home consumption. The plan was that we collected 1/- from the export of butter and 1/- from the home butter, and that we gave that 2/- to the butter going out. That meant that the exporter had to pay 2/- and had 1/- extra for himself. He now has to pay 1/- with the same advantage. That is the whole difference.

Mr. Harris

It is quite simple.

Mr. Dillon

That is easy to understand, but how does that explain the difference in price?

Mr. Belton

The Minister found the pea this time, but it is not true yet.

Dr. Ryan

It is proposed, therefore, to collect levies only on home sales and not on butter exported. It is also proposed to fix a minimum price on home sales. I stated already that it was impossible to fix a minimum price on home sales here so long as the former system obtained, because creameries, having to pay a levy before selling their butter, found it impossible to finance their business, and found that they had to get cash quickly if they exported their butter. They had to wait for a considerable time for the bounty, and, therefore, they were tempted to throw their butter on the home market in order to get the full amount. Having removed that difficulty by financing, it will be possible, I believe, to maintain a minimum price on home sales.

There is another defect in the 1932 Act. That defect, in my opinion, is the provision in regard to a levy on non-creamery butter. The levy was only payable by certain persons registered under the Dairy Produce Act, 1924. In addition to that, we had power to serve notice on any particular person who was doing business in butter, such as, for instance, a grocer in a provincial town who was buying a considerable amount of farmers' butter and retailing it to customers. We did serve notice on many of these people, during the last year especially—over 4,000, I think. No man in the butter trade was doing anything illegal, in that connection, under the last Act, unless we served notice upon him. The change in this Bill is that it is illegal for him to do so unless he himself applies for a licence. It means that we are putting the onus on him rather than on the Department of Agriculture to serve notice, and in that way we hope to get a very big increase in the amount of levy that will be collected.

Mr. Belton

That fellow will not be much better off.

Dr. Ryan

I do not think that is so. Deputy Belton should be careful. He should not make a statement like that in this manner. It would be better for him to put it in the form of a question. These farmers—a majority of them—were selling butter to the grocers. In my experience, at any rate, what they did was that they sold, perhaps, 10 lbs. or 12 lbs. per week during the eight winter months, but when it came to the summer months the grocer was unable to take much more than that, and, as a result, they had to sell three-fourths of it to an exporter—the grocer either passing it through a factory or arranging for it to be exported. During the summer months they were only getting somewhere about 6d. or 7d. a lb.

Mr. Belton

If they have to pay 4d. out of the 6d. they will make nothing at all.

Dr. Ryan

They will get as high a bounty on the export of non-creamery butter as on creamery butter. That has not been the case in the last few years, but now the bounty will be the same. Under the present Bill there will always be the same relation between creamery and non-creamery butter, whether there is a surplus or a scarcity of either kind of butter. In the past, when there was a surplus of non-creamery butter it was sold at very low prices, but in future it should hold the same ratio to intrinsic value as creamery butter, so that the farmer who is going to pay levies under this Bill will be better off, in my opinion, because he will be getting his fair share of the pool.

Mr. Dillon

Surely the inferior article will not fetch the same price as the superior article?

Dr. Ryan

Which is the inferior article?

Mr. Dillon

I am basing the distinction on the Minister's own words.

Dr. Ryan

As I said already, no butter trader was bound, under the last Act, to pay levies unless we had first served them with notice under the Act. Our inspectors from the Department did send in quite a number of names, and other people who are interested sent in more names. We did, I believe, collect a levy off most of the buyers of butter in the towns throughout the country, but in the small remote villages we did not collect it at all. It is better that we should try to treat everybody on the same basis and make it illegal for any person to deal in butter in future unless he comes under the provisions of this Bill.

Apart from that, the Bill follows mainly the lines of the original Act. I want to follow it as it is set out. The first four sections do not raise any difficulty. Section 5 provides that all levies due under the 1932 Act should be paid into the butter fund, and all bounties due under that Act should be paid out of the fund. Also it provides for the punishment of offences committed under that Act. Section 6 deals with the registers. There will be a register of producers and a register of distributors. The producer who sells his butter direct to a consumer or sells to a non-registered person must be registered. A distributor who buys from a non-registered person must be registered. The producer must be registered himself or sell to a registered person, subject to an exception where the amount he is supplying is small. From the beginning it will be possible to control the dealings in butter and the levy will be collected. If the producer is not registered, making returns and paying levies, he must sell to a person who is registered and who makes returns and pays levies.

Mr. Belton

So it is possible to have a non-registered distributor?

Dr. Ryan

Yes, a person who is not registered can buy butter; that is true.

Mr. Dillon

Can he re-sell it if he is not registered?

Dr. Ryan

To a registered person, yes.

Mr. Dillon

Can a shopkeeper who is not registered buy butter and re-sell it to the public?

Dr. Ryan

Not to the public.

Mr. Belton

I understood the Minister to say that if a distributor bought from a registered producer he could sell to the public.

Mr. Curran

They will be paid two levies in that way.

Dr. Ryan

He could not deal as a grocer is dealing at present, selling retail; but he could buy from registered producers and sell to registered persons.

Mr. Dillon

I submit we will not get the benefit of the Minister's Second Reading speech if we are not clear on this point. The registered producer sells to a country shopkeeper who is not registered. Can the country shopkeeper then sell it to his several customers? That is the first question. Again, suppose an unregistered butter producer sells butter to a registered butter dealer, I take it that registered butter dealer can sell to his customers in the ordinary course of business?

Dr. Ryan

That is quite right.

Mr. Dillon

But can the producer sell to the registered distributor if he is not a registered producer?

Mr. Moore

Is there any proposal to register producers?

Mr. Curran

It is in the Bill that they must be licensed.

Dr. Ryan

Under Section 6 we will have two registers.

Mr. Dillon

Will the Minister clear up the point about the registered producer selling to the shopkeeper and the shopkeeper selling to customers?

Dr. Ryan

We will come to that later. Under Section 6 there will be two registers, a register of producers and a register of distributors. The registered distributor can buy butter from any producer and distribute it to his customers retail or pass it on to somebody above him wholesale, if you like.

Mr. Curran

But the Minister will get the levy on it and so long as he gets that he is satisfied.

Dr. Ryan

We get the levy as soon as the last registered person effects a sale.

Mr. Moore

The proposal in the Bill is not to register producers as such. The section sets out "the register of producers who sell non-creamery butter."

Mr. Curran

That means the farmer who manufactures butter and sells it to somebody.

Mr. Moore

Deputy Dillon referred to registered producers. I say there is no provision to register producers as such. The only register will be a register of producers, of persons who sell non-creamery butter of their own manufacture. That is different from a register of producers—a register of producers who sell, not merely a register of producers.

Mr. Belton

Surely, the farmer will not give his butter to a shopkeeper.

Dr. Ryan

I think it would be better if I were allowed to follow the Bill. Section 7 lays down that a person may be registered in both registers. Section 8 sets out that if a person becomes registered he is registered only until 31st January following; that is, his date of registration does not run the 12 months and all renewals take place from the 1st February onwards. Section 9 sets out the fees on applications for registration or for renewal. The fee in the case of a producer of non-creamery butter is 5/- and in the case of distributors the fee is £1.

Mr. Belton

The Minister for Finance collars the lot.

Dr. Ryan

No, he does not get a halfpenny. Section 10 deals with the certificate of registration and it does not offer any difficulty. Section 11 sets out the people who can or cannot trade in butter. Under sub-section (3) you will see that no unregistered person is permitted to trade in butter except a person who sells to a person who is registered in the register of distributors of non-creamery butter. That is, a producer, though not registered himself, is quite entitled to sell his butter to a registered person. The person who purchases from a registered person is also exempt. That is, a shopkeeper or anybody else who buys all his butter from a registered person is exempt and he is not committing any offence.

Mr. Dillon

He can sell the butter to his customers whether he, a shopkeeper, is registered or not?

Dr. Ryan

He buys butter for resale—that is right.

Mr. Dillon

He can sell it whether he is registered or not?

Dr. Ryan

That is quite right. The provisions in Section 11 shall not apply to or operate to prohibit the sale of butter under and in accordance with an exemption licence granted under this Part of the Bill. These are the three classes of people who are exempt. A person cannot sell butter unless he himself is registered or sells to a registered person.

Mr. Dillon

Butter cannot be sold to the consumer unless it is passed through the hands of at least one registered person?

Dr. Ryan

The offence is £5 on the first conviction and £20 for a subsequent conviction.

Mr. Belton

Why should the producers of butter be asked to register at all?

Dr. Ryan

They are not compelled to register.

Mr. Curran

They are compelled to register.

Dr. Ryan

If the farmer is actually selling butter direct to the consumers, and if the consumers are not actually registered, then the farmer must himself register.

Mr. Belton

Suppose he sells to a shopkeeper who is not registered?

Dr. Ryan

One or the other must register.

Mr. Belton

Who commits the offence?

Dr. Ryan

The farmer.

Mr. Belton

How does the farmer know whether the shopkeeper is registered or not?

Dr. Ryan

Section 12 is the usual section that is put into all those Bills. It states that the Minister may alter or amend any entry in a register if requested by the person concerned. He may also cancel the registration. The Minister is also permitted to cancel any registration procured through fraud or misrepresentation; if the person has ceased to carry on business or has died or has committed an offence he may also cancel the registration.

Mr. Finlay

What is the maximum weight of butter that the farmer can sell? Is there anything in the Bill as to that?

Dr. Ryan

I will put it this way: The farmer need not register if he is selling under a certain quantity, 3lbs. or 5lbs. per week.

Mr. McMenamin

To each individual?

Dr. Ryan

No, altogether. Before cancelling the registration the Minister must give 14 days' notice to consider any representations made, and he must, if requested, hold an inquiry. The remaining sections, until we come to Section 16, are sections with regard to registration. Under Section 16 an exemption licence may be given to a farmer who is selling butter direct to a consumer if the butter is made from the milk of his own cows and the quantity is under the maximum prescribed and that it is not sold for resale. In addition to that the Minister may attach other conditions. The penalty for any breach of this section is £2. Anyway the point is that the farmer may supply butter to any quantity under 5lbs. a week, and if it is not given for resale he is exempt from paying any levy.

Mr. Belton

He can get what he can for his butter and he has to pay no levy?

Dr. Ryan

He is the only man who is exempted from the levy.

Mr. Curran

Do I understand that if the farmer sells 5lbs. of butter in the week he is exempt from licensing under this Bill?

Dr. Ryan

If the total quantity is not more than 5lbs.

Mr. Moore

He is not automatically exempt. He must apply for a licence and he can sell as much as he likes if he gets a licence.

Mr. Belton

There will be a good deal of poachers. Would not the Minister consider setting forth here the maximum quantity of butter?

Dr. Ryan

The maximum is 5lbs., but the Minister may make it less?

Mr. Belton

Why should the Minister have that power? The civil servants are really the Minister.

Mr. Smith

Why should not the Minister have the power?

Mr. Belton

The civil servants are ruling the country and it is against that Deputy Smith preached outside.

Dr. Ryan

If the Deputy had remained in the Civil Service he might have more power than he has here. There will be a levy on creamery butter where it is sold but not exported and also on non-creamery butter and on any butter that would have come under the Act of 1932. The levy will commence on the 1st of April. The new people such as the producers cannot be brought under the Bill until the Act becomes law on the appointed day.

Professor O'Sullivan

Under Section 16 (2) (c), the butter cannot be sold to any person for resale. Is the farmer liable under this sub-section and does he come within the penal section of the Bill? I ask the question because I want to know how is the farmer going to know whether the butter is going to be resold or not. How is that going to be proved. Is the mere fact that the butter is to be resold enough?

Dr. Ryan

That surely is a point that would come before the district justice.

Professor O'Sullivan

The Bill ought to make it clear, else how will a person know whether he is committing an offence or not.

Dr. Ryan

If we try to get a penalty in a case like that we would not get it from the district justice.

Mr. Belton

A person may take the butter from the farmer and say he is going to use it and then he may sell it.

Mr. Dillon

Both the farmer and the person to whom the butter is sold may start smuggling.

An Ceann Comhairle

If Deputies would hear the Minister they might be clearer on the matter.

Dr. Ryan

Under Section 17 certain people have to pay levies from the 1st of April. Persons who will be registered under this Bill will include those who pay levies under (b) and (c) of (1) of Section 17. There will be a levy under (d) and (e) from the appointed day, and levies become due and payable on the seventh day after the passing of the Bill and any future levies will become payable on the seventh day at the end of the month for which they are levied.

Mr. Belton

If the appointed day were the 1st of April and the person wanted to register in October, would he be required to pay levies on all stuffs disposed of from the date of registration?

Dr. Ryan

If he had been doing business, certainly.

Mr. Belton

Would he have to make an affidavit that he had not been doing business?

Dr. Ryan

He would have to pay a penalty of £5 per day as well for the offence of carrying on business without being registered.

Mr. Curran

When the Bill becomes an Act will all levies be chargeable from 1st April?

Dr. Ryan

No, only those who would have paid levies had the other Act been continued—creameries, non-creamery exporters and those upon whom notice had been served. Those who had been paying levies last year and came under the Act of 1932 will pay from the 1st April; but those under the new Act will only pay from the appointed day.

Mr. Curran

They will not be asked to pay?

Dr. Ryan

Not until the appointed day. The levies will all be fixed by regulations. There may be different rates on different products. There are various ways in which the rates may be varied. Until the regulations are made the levy on butter will be 39/- per cwt. Section 19 gives power to suspend the levy entirely. That is a power which we had not got under the 1932 Act, mainly through an oversight. As the 1932 Act was drafted, some levy was compulsory, even though it might only be 1d. per cwt. Under this Bill no levy need be charged if it is thought advisable.

Mr. Belton

Could the Minister visualise any circumstance under which a levy would not be charged?

Dr. Ryan

There was a period during 1932 when we were financing the butter business entirely out of the Emergency Fund. We did not collect levies or collect bounties. We found, however, that in order to fulfil the terms of the Act we had to collect 3d. per cwt., a nominal amount.

Mr. Belton

In other words, if the world price went up to 140/- per cwt.?

Dr. Ryan

Under the old Act we had to collect a levy and pay a bounty; under this we need not.

Mr. Belton

This would lapse if the world price came to 140/-.

Dr. Ryan

Probably. Section 20 brings in a special provision for the Kerry cattle area. Some Deputies may ask why the Kerry cattle area was chosen. It is because there is a comparatively big amount of milk in that area for its size and particularly because of the valuations of the land in that area. It is considered, according to any advice I have got on the matter, absolutely impossible to get an economic creamery system in that area. We are, therefore, driven to try and develop and improve the farmers' butter in that area because creameries could not be maintained there so as to bring every farmer within, say, three and a half or four miles' reach of a creamery. It would be impossible to bring some farmers, at any rate, within seven or eight miles of a creamery. Most of them are small farmers and for the small amount of milk they have it would be very hard to expect them to go six or seven miles per day to a creamery. It is much better for them, under all these circumstances, that we should try to give them for the farmers' butter as good a price as if they were supplying milk to a creamery. They will not have to go out daily as they would have to a creamery. They will only have to go once a week to the butter market. They have facilities for making farmers' butter and have been doing it for a good many years. The only thing necessary is to improve it. One of the measures that might be taken to improve it would be to grade it, because there was no inducement in that area in the past to produce good farmers' butter. Whether they produced good or bad butter, they got the same price. One farmer did not see the advantage of producing really good butter while his neighbour, who produced bad, dirty butter, got the same price. Under this section we can give a different price or, if you like, exact different levies on grades one, two and three butter and try and get them to improve and produce first-class butter, as they are capable of doing if they get encouragement.

Mr. McMenamin

What about equally small farmers who have no Kerry cattle?

An Ceann Comhairle

That is a matter to be raised later.

Dr. Ryan

I am talking of the Kerry cattle area first. Perhaps, afterwards I will say why other areas should not be included. I am making a case why the Kerry cattle area should be treated in this way.

Mr. Curran

Will that mean the whole of Kerry?

Dr. Ryan

No. The Kerry cattle area extends roughly from Killorglin right round West Kerry to Castletownbere. It is a mountainy district where no other cattle, to any great extent, can be kept except Kerry cattle, because no other cattle could live. There are parts in North Kerry in which you could keep practically as good cattle as in Tipperary, because the land is nearly as good.

Mr. Belton

If this Bill makes no change why exempt the Kerry cattle area?

Dr. Ryan

In the first place, we want to have power to see that a better price is given for good butter than for bad butter in that area. In the second place, we want to give as good a price for the butter in that area as they would get if creameries were an economic proposition and had been established there.

Mr. Belton

Why not apply it all round?

Mr. Dillon

I submit, with great respect, that the Minister more than discharges his duty if he gives us a general outline of the Bill and lets us go into details in Committee. At present we are having two Committee Stages.

Dr. Ryan

I quite agree, but some Deputies are not so reasonable. I do not think that the same case can be made for any other area, where you have people so dependent on milk as they are in that particular area. We have a well-defined area, an area which is just as entitled, from the point of view of milk supply, as practically any other place to get whatever help the State gives for the provision of creameries. But, on account of the terribly hilly nature of the district and the difficulty of getting roads from one place to another, it would be impossible to provide creameries within reach of every farmer.

Mr. Curran

Is the point really that it would be impossible to collect levies?

Dr. Ryan

No. Whatever you may say about them they are honest people.

Mr. Belton

The depreciation of the long-horned black cattle is the secret.

Dr. Ryan

We are going to deal with them but not under this Bill.

Mr. Belton

They are not able to carry the £6 levy.

Dr. Ryan

Sections 21, 22 and 23 do not give rise to any difficulty. Section 24 is for the prohibition of the import of butter, and Section 25 gives power to collect a levy in case the butter is imported. It is a rather new principle perhaps. It is not a tariff. Any levy collected will be paid into the fund in case butter has to be imported, which is not, I think, likely. For the last three years we have not had to import butter at any time, with certain exceptions where a small quantity was taken in perhaps on a few occasions and again exported for one reason or another. Part V deals with the restriction on the importation of milk and milk products. It is the same thing as the restriction on the imports of butter, with the exception that we cannot collect a levy in that case. By Part VI we may prohibit exports. Having prohibited exports we may also license certain people to export. Exactly the same provision appears in the Act of 1932. Part VII deals with the payment of bounties and does not give rise to any great difficulty. It is very much the same as the 1932 Act.

Mr. Belton

Will the Minister develop his statement on Section 32 (3) regarding the breaking of contracts?

Dr. Ryan

I can foresee where that sub-section would be necessary. We had to stop the export of butter last September. Then the German agreement came along and we had to license someone to export butter in order to keep that particular market going until the flush season came on again in April. A licence was given to the Dairy Disposals Company to fulfil that contract. But suppose we issued a licence to someone to export butter and found, perhaps after two or three months, that it had not been availed of, we might issue a licence when we have a sufficiency of butter to meet a particular contract. After two or three months if a licensee had not availed of a licence, we might feel that we had not sufficient butter and might revoke the licence.

Mr. Belton

Would not the licence be given on the understanding that the butter would be exported within two or three months? An exporter might have to meet contracts and the intervention of this sub-section might mean breaking a contract and leaving the exporter liable.

Dr. Ryan

It is always well to have wide powers in this matter.

Mr. Belton

As far as I can see, when you have sufficient powers we can stay at home; we will have complete dictatorship.

Dr. Ryan

In Sections 38 and 39 a maximum price and a minimum price may be fixed. It is proposed to fix a minimum price. The maximum price will not be fixed. The minimum price will be fixed on the home market. According to the Second Schedule the price will be 141/- for wholesale quantities and 145/- for what are regarded as retail prices. Section 40 deals with existing contracts.

Mr. Belton

Would it not be well for the Minister to have, when fixing the minimum price, some regard for the cost of production?

An Ceann Comhairle

Are not these obviously matters to be raised in debate and not by way of questions to the Minister now?

Dr. Ryan

Section 40 compels a person who enters into a contract to supply butter to quote at the minimum price. If an order is issued changing the minimum price then, though a contract has been made on the existing minimum price, the contractors must also change the price. The fund is dealt with in Section 41. Into that fund we will pay anything that may remain under the 1932 Act, which is only a small amount, and also all money for licences and fees under this Act. Some time ago Deputy Belton said that the Minister for Finance was going to collect all the moneys. He is not. They will go into this fund, as well as all levies collected. Out of the fund we are paying the bounties due under the 1932 Act and the bounties due under this Bill, as well as the salaries of any temporary staff of inspectors that may be employed for the purposes of the Act. There is provision for ordered marketing. The fund is exhausted at a certain period of the year, when it is £100,000 in debt maybe, but it comes back to level on March 31st, the end of the year. It has been the experience for the last three years that in October we must borrow to maintain the fund.

Mr. Belton

Will the Minister explain about the fees?

Dr. Ryan

The Minister for Finance has to direct how fees are collected. There was such a regulation under the Public Fees Act, and if that is not varied the Minister must make a regulation whether the fees are to be collected by cheque or otherwise.

Mr. Belton

That does not compromise Section 41 (3).

Dr. Ryan

I will make sure that it does not. We can now come to the last section, dealing with the question of marketing. At the time the Act of 1932 was going through, a number of Deputies made a strong plea that we should do something for ordered marketing. I found it impossible to do anything at that time, because there was great prejudice in the creamery industry against central marketing. In fact that prejudice lasted, I might say, almost up to recently. Now there is a different feeling on the question. I think I can say that we have almost an unanimous feeling in the creamery industry for some sort of ordered marketing. The position is this, that some creameries had good contracts in Great Britain, and when that was found out by other creameries they came along and cut the price, perhaps by offering butter at 1/- or 2/- per cwt. less. Great damage was done in that way. Even a single creamery might be selling butter to a fairly good customer and, having a surplus, might sell the remainder to a competitor of that customer at a few shillings less.

Those things are sometimes found out, and of course naturally the creamery would lose its first good customer, and its price would be down a few shillings per cwt. They were gradually cutting each other in this way, and the price was not realised that we should have realised on the British market. We had the whole question examined. We got a return from every creamery in the country showing exactly where each creamery sent all its butter last year. We found there were very few creameries maintaining a regular connection in the British market. Evidently the big majority of them were changing around from one place to another according to the price. Although that particular deal perhaps—the particular deal which they made in the month of May last year—may have been 1/- or 2/- better than sticking to the customer they had, it was very bad policy in the long run. In face of this prejudice which there was against getting creameries together for some sort of ordered market, the only thing we could do under the last Bill was to try to encourage the good sellers by giving an equal subsidy to all. In the beginning there was a demand made from some quarters that we should bring everybody's price up to a certain level. We did not do that. We took the average selling price of all good creameries for a month. Suppose we were bringing the price up to 100/-, and suppose the average price which they all realised was 72/-, including the Government subsidy, then the bounty payable under the Bill was the difference between the two. It was calculated in that way. Of course the person who was getting a good price had that advantage all the time over the person getting the bad price. That was all we could do over the last three years. It was not much, and did not improve things very much in regard to getting the maximum that could be got in the British market.

We find that there are certain centres in Great Britain flooded with Irish butter at certain times, particularly, of course, the ports which are nearer to this country, while there are other large centres which would take our butter if any creamery would send it. The point is that the freight to those particular centres might be higher. For instance, the freight to Newcastle is higher than the freight to Liverpool, but there is no doubt that with a small amount of Free State butter in Newcastle as compared with Liverpool it might get a higher price. However, no creamery wants to take the risk of paying a few shillings more per cwt. before it is sure that it will have that advantage on the further away market. It is only by having some sort of organisation to combine them together, and let the organisation take the risk of trying new markets and taking a certain amount of butter off the markets which we are flooding, that that can be done.

Mr. Belton

Is not the Minister aware that there is a vast difference in the quality of butter in various cases.

Dr. Ryan

There is very little difference.

Mr. Belton

That is not what the customers think.

Dr. Ryan

I think if the Deputy were to examine the figures of the surprise butter inspections he would find that over ninety per cent. of our creameries may now be treated as first class. The percentage is gone up from something like 72 per cent. to 94 per cent. in the past few years. Even on the surprise inspections we cannot catch them out as making bad butter. A few months ago we got together the people interested in the creamery butter industry generally. It was a very representative meeting, and we had some discussion on this matter of ordered marketing. We did not go further than that; we did not even mention the words central marketing, because as I have said there is such a prejudice against it. I thought we might aim at least at getting some sort of fixed contracts for the year between the creameries and the buyers on the other side. It is not necessary that a creamery here should supply 100 cwts. of butter every week of the 52 weeks to the people on the other side. The people on the other side have told us that they do not want that nor do they expect it. What they do want is to know beforehand what amount of butter they may expect. If they take one hundred or two hundred cwts. of butter during the month of April from a certain creamery, and if that creamery gets a 1/- more from somebody else in the month of May, and goes away, they do not want it back again. We got those creameries together and asked them if they would be prepared at least to give an indication of the amount of butter they would have for export during the six or seven months in which they export, the amount for each month, and whom they would be likely to sell it to. We thought we could also perhaps fix a price. The Danes do that. Perhaps we have not reached that stage yet, but at any rate we thought we should aim at fixing a price. We got a Committee set up as a result of that rather large meeting. There is now a Committee dealing with that matter which I believe has the confidence of the creamery industry in general. There are three creamery managers, three suppliers and two exporters on that Committee. They are examining the possibilities of getting ordered and regulated marketing as far as possible. They believe that they have to go slowly. They believe that they cannot launch out immediately into any sort of central marketing organisation, but that they ought to go slowly, try to get some regulation in the market, and try to get the best that possibly can be got from the export market. We then got the bigger buyers from Great Britain to come across. They came here in two groups. The agents came on one occasion and the big wholesalers or distributors came on another occasion. They are very willing to fall in with and in fact welcome the suggestion of some sort of ordered marketing——

Mr. Dillon

This sounds very like high treason to me.

Dr. Ryan

In fact, they said they would welcome some sort of regulated marketing, because they want to know if possible for the next six months how much butter each one of them is to expect during each of those months. They do not mind how little or how much, as long as they know beforehand what the quantity is going to be.

Mr. Dillon

This is the market that is dead. They do not mind how much as long as they know what it is.

Dr. Ryan

They do not, of course.

Mr. Dillon

That is the market that is dead and gone, and there is no use in crying after it, thanks be to God.

Dr. Ryan

When Deputy Dillon is finished with this idiocy, I might proceed.

Mr. Belton

This is a greasy substance.

Mr. Curran

What did the other fellows say when they came over?

Dr. Ryan

I was inclined to tell the Deputies what the position is, but, as I say, when you are dealing with idiots like Deputy Dillon, it is hard to proceed. If the Deputy could make an intelligent interruption——

An Ceann Comhairle

The word "idiot" is not parliamentary, as applied to a Deputy.

General Mulcahy

That is perfectly understood, Sir.

Dr. Ryan

I am sorry, Sir, and I shall try not to use the term again. The Committee which was appointed here to deal with this question are still sitting, and I believe that they will be able to get those contracts with regular customers on the other side to supply stated quantities during the export period, but I am afraid that for this year, at any rate, we may not reach a stage where we can fix a price for our butter week by week as they do in Denmark. That may be reached at a later stage. It is admitted by everybody concerned that our butter is as good, and, in fact, better. As a matter of fact, we believe that it is better here, but they admit that it is at least as good as the New Zealand butter, and there is no reason why we should not get the same price under an orderly regulated marketing scheme.

Mr. Curran

How much are we below Danish butter?

Dr. Ryan

We have been as much as 22/- below Danish butter at times.

Mr. Dillon

Why?

Dr. Ryan

It must be remembered that the Danish problem is a different question. Unless New Zealand and Australia were to combine with us to try to get the same price in the British market, we cannot do much in that direction. We cannot go far above them. Danish butter is a different butter and has been getting a much higher price. It is made from ripe cream, is sold in casks and so on, and is sold in different markets from the New Zealand, Australian and Irish, and has gone away very far at times from these butters. How we can come nearer to Danish butter, however, unless the New Zealand and Australian sellers are prepared to do something to co-operate with us in the way of putting up the price, I do not know.

I was going to say, in conclusion, on this point, that this particular Committee is a provisional Committee, and that it is hoped that, if they meet with any success and get the whole-hearted support of the creameries throughout the country, we may be able to get the creameries to form some sort of society under, say, the Provident Societies Act, which would be a legal entity and which would do business on their behalf and would be elected by them in the ordinary way in which the committee of a friendly society would be elected. Apart from that, there is nothing else arising out of this Bill that we need touch on, in my opinion. If there is, I should be only too glad to deal with it as soon as I have an opportunity to do so during the course of the debate. The only other question is with regard to two Schedules. The First Schedule may be confusing to Deputies because it says that the rate of bounty on creamery butter is £1 5s. per cwt. and that, on non-creamery butter which was in the ownership and possession of the exporter on 31st March, 1935, the rate of bounty is £1 12s. 8d. per cwt. The reason for that is that that butter, in the exporter's possession on the 31st March, would have been entitled, had the other Act been continued, to a bounty of £1 12s. 8d. The quantity involved is only a small quantity. There is only a small amount of money involved and it is sufficient to pay on the amount of butter which is there to be exported, and that amount can be paid as soon as this Act goes through. Under the new Act, however, where we collect a levy, it will only provide a bounty of 25/- and, therefore, 25/- is laid down as the bounty under this Act. It will be noticed that there is the same bounty on all other non-creamery butter, and bounties on tinned cream, raw cheese, and so on. These bounties are based on the butter-fat content and so on.

With regard to the Second Schedule, I have already mentioned that 141/- per cwt. is fixed for home sales of butter of not less than 20 cwts. in Dublin, and, where less, 145/-. Outside Dublin, the wholesale limit is put down as 5 cwts. instead of 20 cwts.

Mr. Curran

Can the Minister tell us why the price for non-creamery butter is not fixed on the same basis as creamery butter?

Dr. Ryan

It would be very difficult to do that.

Mr. Curran

I know it is difficult, but why is it not fixed?

Dr. Ryan

Is not the fact that it is very difficult to do so a very good reason?

Mr. Curran

It means that the Minister does not know what to put there.

Dr. Ryan

If the Deputy knows what to do in the matter I shall be glad to hear him.

Mr. Curran

I do not know, but I think the Minister should be able to fix it.

Mr. Belton

Before the Minister concludes would he give us, roughly, the proportion of creamery butter sold on the home market to non-creamery or farmers' butter?

Dr. Ryan

I shall try to answer that question later on.

Mr. Dillon

The Minister displayed some irritation when I interjected a comment on what has been said by his Leader and his associates on a prior occasion about the British market; but I think it is an interesting comment and something that Deputy Brady ought to listen to with care, because he, and people like him, believe that President de Valera thinks that the British market is gone. A great many innocent people in this country take the same view, as a result of such statements. Now, however, they listen to the Minister for Agriculture, when he is really talking business and coming down to the hard tacks of his Department, saying quite blandly: "I asked the British people to come over here and talk to me, and they say, ‘Send us all the butter you have so long as you let us know in time what quantities you have for disposal'." The Minister says here that these British distributors are willing and anxious to co-operate with us not only in that regard but that there is no limit to what they will take from us if we will only let them know beforehand what quantities we have for disposal. In view of such statements, would Deputy Victory and Deputy Brady take note of that and realise that they are only being made fools of when President de Valera gets up in Ennis and says that the British market is gone? Would Deputy Victory and Deputy Brady realise that when President de Valera says that, he is only saying it for the purpose of impressing on the virgin minds of Deputy Brady and Deputy Victory that they should have some sense of responsibility and that they should not allow themselves to be made fools of on the platforms of this country at the instigation of President de Valera or anybody else? The market is not gone. Even if President de Valera and others of the Cabinet would say: "The British market is gone, thank God," the Minister for Agriculture says that the market is still here; that it has not gone; and the Minister for Agriculture goes on to say that if only our own producers would co-operate with the British distributors, a great many of our difficulties would be solved for all time. Would these Deputies get that into their heads and would they apologise to their constituents and say that they now believe that President de Valera was only making fools of them?

The Minister has spoken to-day about central marketing. To hear the Minister speak of it one would imagine the problems to which he referred to-day were of yesterday's growth. These are problems that have perplexed the butter-producing industry for the last ten years. May I say that so far as I am concerned the Minister will have all the help and co-operation I am in a position to give him in instituting some kind of a central marketing system which will place our exporters in a position to deal with the British distributors on an equal footing? Where you have a number of creameries competing against one another for the custom of individuals in the British distributing trade it means that our creameries are at the mercy of the British wholesale distributors. I have a considerable experience of the applications which one receives from British wholesale distributors where they ask you to forecast accurately the quantity of the commodity that you want to sell them and add: "We have no difficulty in distributing it, but we must know in advance what you are going to send us." The Minister knows as well as I do that it is not always possible to give an accurate forecast of what one particular unit in the creamery industry will be able to ship in any given week, but it is possible to forecast, with pretty considerable accuracy what the entire industry will have for disposal from time to time.

If you could once bring all the product of the industry which it was intended to export into the hands of one central authority, that central authority would find it a comparatively easy thing to advise his consignees what quantities he would expect them to take in a given period. Furthermore, I will submit that when this central marketing is set on foot we should make a very vigorous endeavour to grade our marketable produce. At the present time in the Department's surprise inspections a very close and exhaustive grading is done on the basis of which marks are awarded. Certain creameries are distinguished for the excellence of their produce as compared with the local competitors. I would like to see the Minister examining the possibilities of grading the butter for the export market and setting the seal of Departmental approval on certain butter as being first grade butter, on other butter as being second grade butter, and I expect there would be other butter perhaps of a grade which he would not recommend for sale to retail customers, but of a grade which ought to be confined to the confectioners' trade or for utilisation in some other similar way. I have not the slightest doubt that if the Minister would do that a great deal of the difficulties we have to face in the British market will disappear.

The Minister has said, quite casually, that Danish butter is making 20/- a cwt. more than our butter on the British market. That does not seem to surprise him. He seems to think we ought to be very grateful that we can keep neck and neck with New Zealand and Danish butter. We have beaten Danish butter on the British market; on certain occasions we have got a couple of shillings more than has been got for Danish butter on the British market. Within the last few years we have got as big a price as Denmark has got for her butter in the British market. May I submit to the Minister that if he can do two things, one, to reform the system of marketing on the lines I have suggested and, two, stimulate winter dairying in this country— secure that our producers will be in a position to supply their customers not only in the plentiful summer months but in the scarce winter months as well—we may reasonably expect not only to get as good a price for Irish butter on the London market or any other part of the British market as Denmark is getting, but a better price? That ought to be the ambition that should be set before us.

I think the Minister is imprudent in implying, publicly, that he is contented with a situation wherein Irish butter is valued 20/- a cwt. lower than Danish butter. That does not reflect the true values of the two commodities and it is only because we are failing to market our butter efficiently and failing to maintain all the year round supplies that our butter is not making as much as Danish. That is the kind of position the Minister could really remedy if he would put his mind to it, if he would make up his mind once and for all that the British market is not gone, thank God, and if he would adhere strictly to his North Wall declaration that the British market is now, and forever will be, the best market we have in which to dispose of our agricultural surplus.

Those general principles arise on the consideration of this Bill. The Minister has gone into the Bill in great detail. I prefer to state three grounds upon which I think this Bill ought to be opposed. One is because it perpetuates the system of providing for the necessary subsidy by way of a levy. If it seems necessary to the Legislature, that we must have, during a period of crisis and difficulty, an artificial price for butter in order to carry on the dairying industry while world conditions are in confusion, then my submission is that such subsidy as may be necessary should be charged on the supply services. There is no logical reason at all, if you have to raise £400,000 or £500,000 for the dairying or any other industry, why you should raise it from a group of the community arbitrarily selected, such as the butter consumers. Why are they any more liable for the social duty of carrying on this industry in a time of crisis than any other section of the community?

I say it is highly undesirable to finance a subsidy of this kind through the medium of a levy and that the Minister should come to the House, boldly and courageously, tell the House what sum is necessary to provide the assistance which the industry requires if it is to survive, and ask the House to provide the money at the expense of the general taxpayer and not at the expense of one particular section of the community. There is a dual advantage. Firstly, the burden is farily spread and secondly, the Legislature is in a position to perceive at all times what the necessary step for the protection of the industry is costing, and there is no concealment such as takes place under the system of raising levies and putting these charges on to the retail price of butter in this country instead of letting the article sell at the most advantageous price here or at the world price and assist the industry by such subventions as may be necessary from the supply services.

I say that specially because it seems to me that there is force, and that is the second reason why I object to this Bill. I object, and my contention is that we are paying inflated prices for butter in this country in order to provide cheap butter for a foreign market. I entirely agree that owing to world conditions something must be done to carry on the dairying industry until world conditions rectify themselves and until economic prices are forthcoming for dairy products. But in the meantime, if it is absolutely necessary to dispose of any butter on the part of the dairying industry at about 77/- per cwt., surely it is our own people who should get the advantage of such a state of affairs. Surely there is no conceivable sense in saying that the poor person in Dublin must pay 1/5 a lb. for butter whereas a similar person in Manchester can get the same quality butter at 10d. a lb. Owing to this levy system we are making the consumer of butter carry the whole burden. If we were to make the taxpayer carry the burden we would make the butter cheaper for our own people instead of charging 1/5 a lb. for it here as against 10d. a lb. in Manchester and the English cities. If we were to sell the butter here at 10d. a lb. the result would be that the sale of margarine would be wiped out. Would not that be a very good plan? Would it not be much more desirable than shipping it abroad at nearly half the price at which it is being sold at home? If the butter has got to be disposed of at a cheap rate, why not dispose of it at home at a price at which our own people and those who are constrained by economic circumstances to eat margarine could purchase butter instead?

Mr. Moore

Has Deputy Dillon made any calculation as to what scope there is for an increased sale?

Mr. Dillon

I think it would be very great. Indeed it would be enormous if the price were reduced to what it is in England, but I have not made the calculation to which Deputy Moore refers. The suggestion has been made by the Minister that there is a close analogy between the principle of this Bill and the principle underlying the Pigs and Bacon Bill. How the Minister responsible for the two Bills could say such a thing astonishes me. There is no analogy whatever between the two Bills. What the Pigs and Bacon Bill is designed to do is to level out the price curve. The purpose of that Bill is to avoid undue fluctuations in the prices and to adapt the industry to the quotas in Great Britain. As to that, there is no question whatever of getting artificial prices by subsidising exports and charging high prices at home. It may happen sometimes that we would be able to get better prices for bacon in Great Britain than in the Saorstát. The very reverse is the case in regard to butter. So there is no analogy whatever between the regulation system in the Pigs and Bacon Bill and the regulations about to be set up here.

Now I come to the third objection, and it is a very grave one. That is a proposal to extend the levy system to the manufacturers of home-made butter. Section 20, the Minister himself admits, is going to impose a great hardship. The Minister recognises that. In parts of the County Kerry where he knows that the erection of creameries is unthinkable, he says that it would be an unjust and indefensible hardship to apply the levy rates provided in the Bill to the products of the farmers in that area. I must confess that as I listened to him—and I listened to him with great attention— I did not hear him defend at all the justice of the proposal he is making. The Minister said that the producer of the home-made butter will pay the levy, but that he will be getting an increased price if the butter is exported. What the Minister seems to have forgotten is that in practice the producer of the home-made butter will go in and sell his butter to a wholesale factor who will be scrupulous to deduct the levy from the price of the butter. But that wholesale factor will sell it to the manufacturer, who will blend it into factory butter and possibly export it.

Does the Minister seriously suggest that the bounty on the export is going to travel back to the farmer who sold the butter in the first case? Am I not right in saying that the moment the butter is sold to the registered factor the levy must be paid, and the registered factor can only hope to recover that levy by getting it from the butter manufacturers? Then we must depend on them to pass it back to the producer of the butter. But suppose, as will inevitably happen in the flush period when there is more butter in the hands of the producers than they can sell, there will be competition for the custom of the butter factor, who will be in a position to say to the producer: "If you do not like my price you can leave it," do not we all know that what will happen is that the butter producer will have to take the best price he can get, and that price will, in fact, be substantially less than he would get for the butter if this whole system of levy were left out of the question altogether? At the present time there is an artificial price for butter similar to that in the Schedule to the Bill—141/- and 145/- per cwt. When a person comes in with a firkin of butter, the country shopkeeper is open to buy that firkin of butter or else order butter from the creamery. If he orders from the creamery he has got to know that he has to pay the creamery at least 141/-. The country person offering the firkin of butter knows that too, and if the shopkeeper offers the woman 9d. or 10d. a pound she can say: "Why should you offer me 9d. or 10d. when you are buying creamery butter at 1/3¾d a lb.?" And on this occasion she is probably able to sell the firkin of butter at 12d. or 13d. a lb. according to the demand that obtains at the moment and according, of course, to the quality of the butter in the firkin. I am, from my own experience, prepared to say that a good firkin of butter at present is worth at least 1/- per lb. What will it be worth when this Bill comes into operation?

That is one aspect of the question. The second aspect is that this Bill requires every producer of butter to register if he proposes to sell his butter to a shopkeeper or to a factory unless the shopkeeper or factory is registered. I do not know what the Minister's own forecast is, but I am quite satisfied that the vast majority of producers will not register, because they have no facilities for keeping official records or for conforming to the regulations. If they do not register, do Deputies realise that they will not be allowed to sell, according to the Minister's forecast, more than 5lbs. of butter in the week? So that if they have half a dozen customers who take a couple of lbs. of butter apiece from them they have to throw that business away unless they are prepared to register and keep all these documents which a Department requires, particularly if the Department of Finance is interested in the records to be kept. If a country person, selling her 12lbs. of butter to her neighbour, fails to keep her documents correctly, she is liable to very heavy penalties and is unquestionably guilty of defrauding the Revenue. Is it conceivably possible that this House desires that every woman in the country who sells a few lbs. of butter weekly to a neighbour is to be turned into a registered butter factory? If you do not intend that, then I suggest that this Bill ought to be either rejected or amended. I doubt if the Minister will contemplate amendments sufficiently comprehensive to admit of the exclusion of the domestic producers of butter. If he will not, then I suggest to him that he must withdraw the Bill and confine its operations to the creameries in the country.

There is very grave danger of a system of dragooning the people growing up in this country and becoming an every-day practice. I entirely agree with the Minister that, in face of modern conditions, it may be necessary to give Government help to industries to organise themselves to meet modern conditions of trade. But there is a very wide difference between that and a universal bureaucracy that wants to intrude itself into everybody's home. There has been from time immemorial a desirable and lucrative little business conducted by the farmers of this country in the manufacture of butter in their own kitchens and in their own dairies and in the sale of the product to their neighbours. To my mind that is a desirable and admirable institution. This Bill is directed to destroy that system. Deputies should realise that in so far as that is its purpose the Bill is a bad Bill and should be rejected. In so far as the Bill is directed to carrying on, in these difficult times, the dairying industry and to promoting the cause of central marketing, and in so far as it is directed towards showing the Minister's determination to develop winter dairying, the Bill is good. In so far as it intends to finance its operations out of a levy from butter, with the result that the poor of this country must pay 1/5 per lb., while the people of Great Britain can buy our butter for 10d. per lb.; in so far as it is designed to exact a levy on the domestic producer of butter and to make an end of that highly desirable system of agriculture which has obtained in this country for a very long time, the Bill is a bad one. On the ground of its application to these aspects of the question, I strongly urge the House to reject the Bill, to require the Minister to redraft the whole measure in such a way as will meet the necessities of the situation without the damage which the measure, as it at present stands, might do.

Mr. Bennett

As the previous Act has expired, I expect the Minister had perforce to bring in some measure to help him to continue the dairying industry. We all hoped that when the necessity arose to bring in a new measure some better provisions would have been introduced than are offered in this Bill, and that the price guaranteed to the farmers would have been higher than it has been hitherto, instead of being one or two shillings less per cwt. Unfortunately, we are engaged in what is commonly called an economic war, and, being engaged in a war of any kind, it is natural to expect from any Parliament responsible for the carrying on of things that the people in the front-line trenches who are bearing the brunt of the war should be put in a position to help them to carry on the war. If one is engaged in a military war one takes good care that the soldiers are properly equipped. They have their necessities provided for in the way of arms and equipment; their dependents are also provided for, and all this is done at the expense of the Exchequer. We have no such system in this Bill.

My objections to the Bill are that the price guaranteed to the farmers is not a just one; that 100/- per cwt. for butter in the present circumstances is not a price that farmers can carry on with. Even if all the dire effects of the economic war did not exist, 100/- a cwt. would not be a price which would really maintain a farmer and help him to carry on dairying. If we take into account the other difficulties that the farmer is labouring under in carrying on this war, the other losses he has to incur, 100/- a cwt. is an absolutely uneconomic price to offer him for his butter.

In this debate I do not want to go further away from the question of butter and dairy produce than I can help. On reading over the measure I saw that it was necessary for the Minister to have a definition of dairy produce lest anyone might be confused. I have, at various times, ventured to bring to the Minister's attention the fact that butter and milk do not constitute the whole produce of dairy farming; that there are other things to be considered. The Minister knows of cattle and calves, to mention one branch, where the losses on the output of dairy farmers are a good deal more than the loss on the milk side. To suggest that 100/- per cwt. guaranteed for butter is going to be any adequate compensation to farmers for the war they are helping to carry on is absurd. A certain body brought it to the Minister's attention recently that anything less than 120/- guaranteed for butter would not be sufficient to meet even the cost of production. That suggestion was made by a body competent to speak for the dairying industry. As a practical dairy farmer representing a county of dairy farmers, I can state definitely that 120/- per cwt. would not meet the cost of production of milk. At the rate of 120/- it would not pay to produce milk. Something better than this Bill must be provided if dairying is to be carried on and if the war lasts indefinitely.

My second objection to the Bill is that it brings in a section of farmers not included previously. I am referring to small farmers who produce butter and who are now to be subject to the ramifications of this measure. If any class of farmers should be left out, it is the class partly left out under the previous Act; small farmers who produce a small amount of butter in outlying places. As Deputy Dillon pointed out, the Minister has seen the difficulty in relation to Kerry farmers. I should say that a greater number of farmers in other places will labour under precisely the same difficulties. In the mountainous and craggy parts there are small farmers who produce a small amount of butter. That helps them to exist. It is now proposed to deny them whatever little advantages they had. I strongly object to that. The loss on the other side of the dairying industry is considerable to small farmers who are to be subject to a levy under this Bill. They practically existed by the rearing of one or two calves. The income of small farmers in Clare and in the hilly parts of Limerick and other counties was practically derived from the sale of a few pounds of butter and of the few calves that they reared. Not only did they rear the produce of their own cows, but many of them went to the dairying counties and bought calves and reared them. These are the men we are trying to drag under this legislation, men who would not in the end get any of the advantages that properly organised creamery districts get from the Bill. The Minister proposes to exempt certain farmers, who have only one cow. I do not know if he is even going to exempt them, because any cow worth having is going to provide one pound of butter in the day or seven lbs. in the week. A man with one cow does not eat much butter. He is not able to do so. He will want to sell the 7 lbs. but the Minister by this Bill is only going to let him sell 3 lbs. The Bill is not even exempting the one-cow farmer. The Minister thinks that a certain class of farmers producing butter are to be exempt. I say that they will not be and that no one who can be called a farmer will be exempt.

The Minister is going to set up a new class of smugglers under the Bill. There is bound to be smuggling of butter into the homes of consumers, into shops and other places. I hope the consumers will at least get the benefit of that. The Minister's officials are going to have a hard task in collecting money from small farmers who sell more than three pounds of butter. I wish the Minister luck if he attempts to enforce the provisions of this Bill. The Minister found a difficulty in collecting certain other taxation. When the inspectors or collectors go to certain portions of the country to try to exact 4d. on every pound of butter produced, all I can say is God help them. When I looked at the Bill I was between two minds whether to vote for or against it. I decided in the end that if I voted for it it would be for the reason that the original Bill has lapsed, and that some method must be available if the export of butter is to continue. The Bill does not satisfy anyone in any Party. The farmers are not satisfied with the price offered and consumers are certainly not satisfied. I do not believe any Deputy is satisfied in his heart with a Bill which gives the ordinary farmer something less than 4d. a gallon for milk, while he loses any chance of selling some other dairy produce.

The Bill is going to make consumers bear an altogether inadequate portion of the burden for the war that we are involved in. It does not put the burden of carrying on the war on the Central Fund as would be the case in any other war. If the Bill eventually passes through this House I hope it will be radically amended, so that, at least, farmers will be offered 120/- a cwt. for butter, which is the lowest price, as the Minister will admit, at which it could be economically produced. Secondly, that any sums needed to provide that price will be borne as far as possible under the present circumstances from the Central Fund, and lastly, that the poor unfortunate individuals whom somebody might call farmers, who make four, five, six, eight or ten pounds of butter themselves will be left in peace.

Mr. Curran

In connection with this Bill I have made up my mind to oppose it, no matter what view Deputy Bennett may take, because it places a hardship on a section of the farmers in this country which can least afford to bear it. To my mind, it says very little for the Fianna Fáil Deputies representing the agricultural industry or representing the farmers that they are absent from the House on this occasion, because even if they did not know or had not studied the Bill sufficiently, if they came in here and listened to the debate they would be able to judge something from it. I think a Bill like this should be left to an open vote of the House. What does the Bill purport to do? The Minister says it is necessary to introduce it owing to a recent Act having lapsed. Of course in so far as doing something for the dairy industry is concerned we could support it, but the particular parts to which I strongly object are the licensing, and the levy on farmers. One wonders what we are coming to in this country. If a farmer wants to sell seven or eight pounds of butter— they often sell it to private customers —he cannot do so now without being licensed, and he has to pay 4d. per lb. to the Government tax-gatherer when he comes round. The Deputy need not laugh; that is what is in the Bill. That is one of the things to which I object.

Mr. Smith

Of course he can sell seven or eight pounds of butter without being registered.

Mr. Bennett

He will pay tax on it.

Mr. Curran

He cannot sell it to the ordinary consumer without being registered and without paying the levy on it.

Mr. Smith

He can sell it to a registered person.

Mr. Curran

He can do that, but there is a practice in this country amongst a good many farmers—and the Deputy knows it—of selling butter to private people. They can no longer do that. They will have to be licensed and they will have to pay a tax of 4d. per lb. Coming down to the question of the dairying industry, the Minister says here that they fixed a price of 141/- per cwt. That may sound all right to somebody like Deputy Kelly and others who do not know all the circumstances in connection with the price of butter, but the point is: what does the producer get? What is the net price of the creamery which sells the butter? It is about 100/- or 102/-. The average price, and the Minister knows it, which was paid last year by the creameries was about 4d. per gallon. As pointed out here before, that would be about 10d. for the raw material which goes to the making of butter. The Minister has agreed with me before, and has himself stated in this House, that that is not an economic price to cover the cost of production. The position of the farmers in the Six Counties has often been mentioned in this House. Deputies on those benches have asked what the farmer in Northern Ireland is getting. He is getting 5d. per gallon, where we are getting 4d.

Mr. Smith

Since when? Not so long.

Mr. Curran

Is he getting it now?

Mr. Smith

Not so long anyhow.

Mr. Curran

I cannot go into dates, but anyway he is getting 5d. per gallon and even 6d. and 7d. for milk supplied to the creamery. I wonder would the Minister for Agriculture agree with me?

Dr. Ryan

No.

Mr. Curran

No farmer is getting it?

Dr. Ryan

He is not getting 7d. anyway.

Mr. Curran

In certain circumstances, where there is Grade A milk supplied.

Dr. Ryan

But he has three years before he will pull up with us.

Mr. Brennan

You admit anyway that he gets 7d.

Mr. Curran

Where he has Grade A milk he is entitled to 7d.

Dr. Ryan

We are getting more than 7d. for Grade A milk.

Mr. Curran

At the creamery?

Dr. Ryan

They do not have to go to the creamery.

Mr. Curran

In some cases in Northern Ireland they might have to go to the creamery. The price of milk delivered to the creamery in Northern Ireland is 5d. per gallon anyway, and it is 4d. here, and yet we have Fianna Fáil Deputies, from time to time, asking what would the position be only that the Fianna Fáil Government is in power. I do not at all agree that there has been justice done to the dairying industry in this country, and I do not agree that the price which the farmer is getting is at all commensurate with the cost of production.

Dr. Ryan

If there were a Fianna Fáil Government in the North it would have been done three years sooner.

Mr. Curran

Why does not the Minister for Agriculture here give the farmers a reasonable price, as has been given in Northern Ireland? Instead of the legislation which the Minister is now introducing here why does he not introduce legislation similar to that in the North?

Dr. Ryan

That is a sensible question.

Mr. Curran

Why does he not do that instead of taxing everybody in the country, and the unfortunate farmer himself in the first instance? The fact of the matter is he is pretending to give a good price to the farmers, and they have not been getting it at all. Of course I realise that with the position as it is in the British market something has got to be done, but I always consider that it should be done out of the Exchequer and not through the means by which the Minister is seeking to do it, that is by collecting a levy off everybody. Nobody can agree—and I am sure there are many Fianna Fáil Deputies who do not agree—with the legislation indicated here, under which every small farmer through the country will pay a tax of 4d. per lb. The farmers have only been able to carry on this little industry because of the fact that creamery butter commanded a good price. They were able to sell their butter in some cases at, perhaps, 2d. or 3d. a lb. less than the price of creamery butter. What will the position be when the levy is on? The farmers were able to dispose of their home butter because it was sold at a few pence a lb. less than creamery butter. Then there was no levy. What will be the position when the levy is on? What will the position be when they have to take 4d. less? I think it will put them out of business. The Minister knows very well that the creamery industry in this country is not established as a whole. It is not established in every place. My own county is fairly well equipped with creameries, but there are other places which are not. I think the farmers will be placed in a very difficult and desperate position as regards this Bill, that is, of course, if the Minister wants to enforce it. How he is going to do that I do not know. This Bill, like other Bills, might be innocent enough in the first instance, but with Minister's orders and everything else one does not know where one stands. Like other Deputies, I would suggest to the Minister that he should withdraw some parts of this Bill, and certainly that part of it which applies to the levy on farmers' butter. There may be some farmers who have escaped paying the levy in the past. Some of them who had big contracts with hotels and convents may have escaped the levy, although there may be no justification for their escaping it, but certainly the small farmer—who is the man I speak of and the man whom I think the Minister and the Government should not get after in this instance—is the man who will be hardest hit if the Bill is worth anything at all. As far as I am personally concerned, I think that that part of the Bill should not be introduced at all, and that the Minister should do something, either by way of withdrawing this Bill or by introducing some other Bill which would take out these provisions. We all agree that it is necessary to help the dairy industry by every means in our power. It is only reasonable and necessary, in our present circumstances. I would suggest, however, that the Minister ought to help the dairy industry in the way in which it is being helped in Northern Ireland, and not by way of a levy, which means taking it out of the pockets of the farmers and giving it back again, so to speak. For instance, the creamery with which I was associated paid £7,100 last year by way of a levy and got nothing back. I am told, of course, that it got the home market. Of course, it got the home market, but who is paying for it? The producers are paying for it. The Minister admits that he collected £1,250,000 last year from the dairy industry. I admit that it is necessary to do something for the dairy industry, having regard to world prices at the moment, but I do not think that the British price should be the world price. I hold that whatever the price may be, it should have some relation to the cost of production. I think that everything should be based on that. This Bill, in my opinion, does not give the cost of production to farmers in connection with the dairying industry.

Mr. Dowdall

I do not want to delay the House very long, or to make a speech in this connection, except to call attention to one or two points which have been stressed by members of the Opposition. I think that it might be just as well if people on the other side of the House, and people in the country generally, should get these points into their minds. To listen to Deputies on the Opposition side, one would think that there was nothing good at all in this Bill. I do not know if I am right in the quotation, but I think the saying was that nothing good can come out of Nazareth. The idea of the Opposition seems to be that nothing good can come from the Fianna Fáil Government. The Deputy, who has just spoken, called attention to the fact that the Fianna Fáil members were not in the House to examine the Bill and to hear the debate on it, and he said that if they had been here they might have got some information. As a matter of fact, if they had been in the House and if they had listened to what was said by the Opposition, they would have got a lot of false information. One of the things that are not taken into account by the Opposition is the price of all agricultural produce all over the world. That, definitely, is not taken into account by the Opposition. They know it quite well, but they do not tell the public the position of affairs. The price of all agricultural produce all over the world is down in the dumps. It is in the doldrums. According to the Opposition, of course, the Fianna Fáil Party are responsible for that. According to these people, it is because the Fianna Fáil Party are in office that world prices are so bad.

The Deputy who spoke last referred to the price of milk given to the farmers in the North of Ireland; but the mere fact that the Government of Northern Ireland had to go to the aid of the farmers there indicates that the produce of these farmers could not be made a paying proposition unless their Government came to their aid by subsidising them. That was the market that Deputy Dillon was referring to a while ago, where he said that the Fianna Fáil people had stated that the market was gone, and thank God it was gone, and all the rest of it. The actual fact is that prices are so bad in England, and in the world generally, that Governments have got to come to the assistance of their own peoples, or else their peoples cannot carry on the business which is their normal means of livelihood. I happen to be engaged in the butter trade, not alone in the Free State, but also in England. We bought Polish and Siberian butter last year at 60/- a cwt. That would be about 6½d. per lb. There is a duty of 15/- a cwt. into England, and that brings it down to 45/-. With freightage and so on, that would bring it down to 42/-, or 4½d. per lb. How much a gallon will that price, of 42/- per cwt., enable the farmer to get for his milk? Certainly not 4d. It would be just as well if Deputies opposite and people in the country generally would get into their heads the fact that the real reason for prices being so bad is the condition of the English market—the market that we should be seeking, according to Deputies on the other side. I am not saying that it is not a valuable market, but I do not agree at all that it is the admirable institution that Deputies on the opposite side want to make out. One of the chief points made by the last Deputy who spoke—I am sorry that I cannot remember at the moment what constituency he represents—is that we are going to have a levy on the farmers—the poor farmers—and that they are the people who can ill-afford to pay the levy. The Deputy suggested that, instead of collecting from the farmers, the Government should produce this money by means of taxation, from the Central Fund, or by some such means.

Mr. Curran

Exactly.

Mr. Dowdall

Does it matter two straws, if money has to be raised, whether it is raised by the ordinary method of taxation or by direct levy from the farmers, because the money has got to be taken from the farmers anyway?

Mr. Curran

That is a new theory, at any rate.

Mr. Dowdall

Another point raised was the question of the registration of the small farmers. The suggestion was that it was not a good idea to have them registered. Deputy Bennett, I think, mentioned smuggling earlier. Well, of course, certain people are always prepared to break the law, but I do not think it amounts to a great deal.

General Mulcahy

If they are the right type, it does not matter at all!

Mr. Dowdall

My point is that if the farmer does not register, all he has to do is to sell to the registered dealer.

Mr. Curran

Yes, but they will pay the 4d. all the same.

Mr. Dowdall

Quite so, but one would imagine, according to Deputies opposite, that this kind of thing did not take place in other countries. For instance, in South Africa we had an attempt by the Government there to collect a levy to make certain exemptions. They found that the farmers were endeavouring to circumvent the Act and to get more from it than they should. They imposed a stamp on a wrapper and no butter could be sold except in a wrapper with the stamp on it. That stamp was the amount of the levy per lb. Some of the farmers sent this butter to their friends and told them to be particularly careful about the stamps and not to dirty them, and in that way the stamps were used over and over again. That is what the farmers were doing there. I am not saying that they were justified in doing it, but that is what they did. The Government then issued paper wrappers bearing an embossed stamp that would be sure to get dirty when used, and that was how they overcame the difficulty.

Is there any country in the world, outside of the Free State, in which the people get 100/- for their butter? I do not believe there is one. One would think that this portion of the island, the Free State, was an El Dorado in which the people had merely to make demands to which the Government would comply. The only way to succeed is through hard work and if the dairy farmers in Limerick, about whom Deputy Bennett was speaking, did more work and a little less dairying they would be much better off. The cost of production in dairying is pretty high but, at the same time, 100/- is a much better price than any other country is able to pay its farmers. That is a point that should be borne in mind. If Deputies insist on calling attention to 100/- as a poor price, they are indeed very unreasonable. I think it is a very good price and it indicates a considerable increase over the price obtained in other countries where perhaps they are producing much more butter.

Mr. Belton

It was difficult to follow the reasoning of the Minister, speaking first on the Financial Resolution and then on the Bill. I have an open mind on the Bill. If the Bill were standing by itself as a beginning I would have no hesitation in opposing it, but a system has been in operation and I suppose the fact that it has operated for two or three years makes it incumbent on the Government to continue that system. There are many objections to this Bill which are common to many Bills that have been introduced here. It seems to me that it has become the fixed policy of the Government to give general powers to Ministers to do certain things and Ministers implement those general powers for the purpose of making orders that, in my opinion, should be made only by this House. If that development goes far enough it will not be very long until there will be no need for a Parliament at all. General powers will be vested in the various Ministers and once they are vested in the Ministers they will be automatically vested in the President, so that the President becomes an absolute dictator and the Ministers will have to dance to his tune. Probably, they are accustomed to that by now.

Deputy Dowdall took Deputy Curran to task for making the case that farmers will have to pay a levy of 4d. a pound on their butter. Deputy Dowdall said that was not so, that the farmer had not to be registered to sell his butter so long as he sold it to a registered distributor or so long as his production was below five pounds per week and he sold it to a consumer. It matters very little to a farmer whose sale is only five pounds a week whether he has to pay a levy or not. It would matter, perhaps, only the price of a glass of whiskey. But in trade he has to pay the levy himself or sell to a registered distributor. The only difference is that in the one case he pays it out of his own pocket and in the other case he gives it to the registered distributor. I fail to see any point in the argument put forward by Deputy Dowdall.

I would like to see this thing debated in a calm, non-Party atmosphere, because it is a Bill in which there is a lot and it will not be properly debated if it is not debated in a non-Party atmosphere. The Minister for Agriculture juggled with figures in the early stages of this debate. I think he got a little confused in his figures. He said that the Bill provides that there will be no levy on butter exported and that the bounty payable on exported butter will be provided by registration fees and by levies on butter consumed at home, the levy being 39/- a cwt. I asked him if he could give the relative amounts of butter consumed at home, the relative amounts of creamery butter, factory butter, etc. I believe the levy applied to factory butter before and in the case of farmers' butter—not factory or creamery butter—no levy applied. Now, he intends to put a levy on that similar to the levy on creamery butter, and he is going to hand that amount of money over to this fund to provide bounties for the export of factory and creamery butter. In fact, he is calling to his aid the people who produce butter for sale locally and I cannot follow his reasoning when he says that nobody would gain anything or nobody would suffer anything by this Bill.

I have a little experience of the trend in the consumption of butter and I put this to the Minister that the consumption of creamery butter at home is increasing and that the consumption of farmers' butter is diminishing. If the levy on creamery butter was to remain the same and the new levy, where there was not one before, was to be put upon the farmers' butter I see nothing for it only that, of course, some farmers will carry on while they can obey the law. We are debating this from the standpoint that there will be no evasion of the law. The production of farmers' butter for sale must cease. The Minister knows that on the whole there is a good margin between the price of non-creamery farmers' butter in the ordinary sense and the creamery butter. The Minister knows that the farmers' butter, even without a levy, is not increasing in bulk. Now he puts a levy on it which will diminish the returns to the farmer by 4d. in the lb. The result will be that farmers' butter must go out of commerce altogether. I would like to hear the Minister, or somebody on his behalf, put up arguments that will convince anybody with a knowledge of the trade and general conditions that the farmers can bear this levy of 4d. in the lb. The farmers will get nothing in return.

The people who are using the farmers' butter to-day, if asked to pay 4d. a lb. more for it, will buy creamery butter instead. I asked the Minister if he has any returns showing the consumption of this kind of butter that heretofore was not subject to a levy but which will be subject to a levy in the future under this Bill. I wonder would these figures approximate to the position—300,000 cwts. of creamery butter and 40,000 cwts. of farmers' butter. I would like the Minister to take a note of this and deal with it. I have no special information, but I think these figures are substantially correct. The position with regard to the consumption of farmers' butter is this, that under present conditions the sales were not increasing and creamery butter was encroaching on the sales of farmers' butter. Notwithstanding the fact that creamery butter had to pay 4d. a lb. levy that the other butter did not bear, the position was as I have said.

I would, I think, be substantially correct in saying that in the City of Dublin the public taste is such that creamery butter is entirely used. And Dublin City is the largest consumer of creamery butter in Ireland. The people here want creamery butter, and they want it as cheaply as they can get it. I think the Minister would be well advised to cut out that section altogether. If the Minister thinks of retaining the 5lbs. maximum he should cut out the sub-section. This 5lbs. is not an exemption. Perhaps the only material need for the Bill is to rope in those people who are not suppliers to creameries.

I thought that the Minister made an exceptionally bad case for the exemption of the Kerry cattle area. That area is not supplied with creameries. The cow population of the country that is supplying creameries is not by any means half the cow population or near it. There are only a few counties that are fairly well supplied with creameries. What disadvantage does the Kerry area suffer in comparison with any other area that is not well supplied with creameries? The Minister talks about the distances that people have to travel if creameries are there. The only material fact that remains is that there is not a creamery near them to which to take their milk and manufacture it into butter. Therefore they must have special advantages. Whether a creamery can be started in other areas or not, the fact remains that you have not creameries in other areas. These areas are in precisely the same position as the Kerry cattle areas.

I know perfectly well what is the trouble in the Kerry cattle areas. It is not a question of milch cows but a question of five, six or seven year old cattle on the mountains that heretofore got a market at £4 or £5. These were bought by dealers and thousands of them were grazed along the Shannon and elsewhere in the grazing areas. There is no market for these cattle now because at no time would they be able to bear the £6 per head tariff. As a matter of fact the man who would take a present of one of them would be in debt because the intrinsic value of the animal would be under £6 so that with the £6 tariff they would be worth less than nothing. I am quite satisfied that that is the real problem that is facing the Minister in the Kerry cattle area. If that is so he should face that problem in its nakedness and not try to camouflage it by saying that Kerry cattle areas have not creameries and that consequently they must get an exemption from the levy and get the benefit from the markets that the levies will bring them. That is not fair dealing. If we are going to have a Free State with the hope of a Republic for the 32 counties some day let us not try and set up a second Ulster in the south by creating a new boundary. If we are going to have legislation for the Free Sate let it be for the Free State and not for 25 out of 26 counties. It will be very interesting to analyse this whole question of levy and bounty on the export of butter. It will be worth while to analyse and investigate the wisdom of keeping the prices of butter at a higher figure as stated by Deputy Dowdall, than obtains in any other country in the world. I agree that the price of butter is higher than in any other country in the world. That is a commercial fact that anybody who reads commercial news or intelligence knows.

Is it the best thing to do? First, of all, we should consider just as any man buying any article or making any investment considers, is this thing worth the price? The Minister did not develop the question of the price levels in Great Britian. All the information he gave us was that our price in Great Britain had been about 7/- per cwt. below the New Zealand price, and that latterly it has been brought up to within 3/- per cwt. I suppose that our price in the British market on that basis would be about 72/- per cwt., which in fact means 43/- per cwt. net.

Dr. Ryan

How does the Deputy make that out?

Mr. Belton

Have we not to pay a tariff of 40 per cent. on that butter?

Dr. Ryan

Yes.

Mr. Belton

Take 40 per cent. off 72/- and what is left? What is 60 per cent. of 72/-, if it is not 43/-?

Dr. Ryan

The British authorities do not make it up that way.

Mr. Belton

No. The British authorities take 72/- and calculate on that the amount of the tariff. If the Minister and myself join in exporting butter to England I put it to the Minister that this is the position. We will get 72/- gross for that in the British market. Our returns will show that. On that 72/- the British will make a calculation of the 40 per cent. special duty.

Dr. Ryan

That is right.

Mr. Belton

The Minister agrees?

Dr. Ryan

They do not arrive at the same as you do.

Mr. Belton

Does the Minister mean that percentages are worked out differently in Great Britain? If the method of working out percentages that I am adopting is not the correct one, he will inform the House, and through the House the public, that 60 per cent. of 72/- is not 43/-. Then we have to pay freightage and various odds and ends out of that. Before that happens, those consuming butter at home have to pay 39/- of a levy. Even if the whole lot can be transferred to a bounty, are we not sending the British butter for nothing?

Dr. Ryan

No.

Mr. Belton

What are we doing then? Would it not be better in the long run if there was no levy and if you dumped any surplus of butter you have into the Liffey? I ask the Minister to think that over. Then the consumer at home could have his butter at 5d. per lb. less and nobody would lose. That is a little calculation that the Minister should think over. There is another thing that the Minister ought to think over. As I said, I should like to see this matter debated outside of Party politics; but there is one outstanding fact, that everybody entitled to speak for the Government on any platform, either outside or inside this House, claims one thing—the inalienable right of this country to independence. I do not want to develop that further; but what explanation has the Minister for Agriculture, elected by that Party, to give to this House as to why Denmark can send its butter into the British market and get 22/- per cwt. more for it than we do, even before the tariff is taken off, and in addition has an exchange advantage of 25 per cent on that? Now, "Up the Republic." A Republican Minister for Agriculture leaves John Bull in control of the money, credit, and exchange——

Dr. Ryan

If I were able, I would not.

Mr. Belton

What are the Government doing? Are the great Fianna Fail Government so impotent that they are not able to run a national credit and currency system in this country such as Colonies like New Zealand, South Africa, Canada and Australia are capable of doing and are actually doing?

Dr. Ryan

Put that before the Banking Commission.

Mr. Belton

I would be ashamed to have any responsibility for the Banking Commission if I belonged to that Party. I would be ashamed of an alleged republican Government setting up a Banking Commission and inviting foreigners to act on that Commission and putting before the foreigners as one of the terms of reference: are we going to have a national currency or not?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Will the Deputy move to report progress?

Mr. Belton

I move to report progress.

Progress reported.