Dáil Éireann debate -
Friday, 7 Jun 1935

Vol. 56 No. 20

Committee on Finance. - Vote 56—Gaeltacht Services (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the motion: "That the Estimate be referred back for reconsideration."— (Deputy F. Lynch).

Mr. Dockrell

Last night, when we adjourned, I was suggesting to the Minister that those Gaeltacht services should be treated as an ordinary business concern. Taking that analogy, and regarding the Minister as a director of a company presenting accounts to shareholders, I should like to suggest to him that he would be in a very invidious position, because he is here to-day examining the accounts of services up to the 31st March—just two months ago; that is, two months after the extension of the period he is without the figures for the stock. Imagine a public company in which the director had to explain to the shareholders that though last year's stock—which amounted to £31,375—had been taken within two months, not only was this year's stock not ready, but that there was some doubt whether it would be ready in a couple of months.

The next item I turn to is sales. The director would have to confess that, having made an estimate of sales amounting to £15,000, the sales as now ascertained amounted to £30,566. That is a considerable discrepancy and, although it is very satisfactory, I would like to ask the Minister when that was discovered, and what he proposes to do with the apparently available surplus of £15,566. Does he propose to reduce this Estimate by that amount? There is another matter to which I want to call attention. When you tot all the items which go to make up this service, namely, materials for the year, £15,000; wages of industrial workers, £6,000; rural industries salaries, £5,248; central depôt salaries, £3,232; expenses, £950, you get the total of £30,430. Now, in that total there is no item for what an ordinary business would have to face, namely, the overhead management expenses. Supposing you put these down at 20 per cent. of cost of materials and wages, you get an expenditure of £36,500 as against sales which amount to £30,500 and contemplated sales for the coming year of £23,000. The Minister, I think, would do very well if he would try to look at this through business eyes. If a loss has to be faced—and I am not suggesting that these industries should be abolished—the total of what they are costing should be stated. I take it that although the central stores were established in a barrack, the overhead charges there have to be met by the country. If so, they should be put before the country and included in the total cost of running this Government service.

There is another matter that I would like to bring to the Minister's attention. If an ordinary trader who is engaged in trading on his own money goes on wrong lines it is wonderful how quickly he will learn and change his tactics. But the Minister last year when I pointed that out said the workers have to learn. That is very true. But what I object to is a museum being established in which the unsaleable results of some of their efforts have been stored. If this was a trading concern, and some of the stock was found to be unsaleable, the supply would be immediately stopped. Here we find that last year they had a stock of £31,375 and the stock for the present year is unascertainable. I suggest to the Minister when considering the Estimate for the coming year, that the £23,000 he is carrying amounts to a year's stock on hand. That, in a private concern, would be simply preposterous and some sort of check would be immediately adopted to stop the production of stock that was unsaleable, or else to bring the workers into line to make stuff that would prove saleable. I am sure the Minister will agree that a lot of the things manufactured are seasonal and fashionable goods. Goods manufactured last year and that were highly fashionable then, this year people would refuse to purchase at any price. It is a very serious thing that stocks of goods that are altering in fashion and deteriorating very quickly should be held for over a year. Another matter to which the Minister referred was this. He said, if I heard him aright, he kept the manufacture of artificial silk fabric for the Gaeltacht as a reserve.

Mr. Connolly

What I did say was that I was hoping that the industry would be reserved to the Gaeltacht, but I assure the Deputy that I have no intention in the world of trying to have the Department make it there.

Mr. Dockrell

It is only to be manufactured in the Gaeltacht?

Mr. Connolly

Yes, to be manufactured there.

Mr. Dockrell

The Minister is apparently unaware that firms are at present manufacturing this fabric for their own use.

Mr. Connolly

I am not aware of that. It is a matter for the Minister for Industry and Commerce to give the reservation order.

Mr. Dockrell

Has the reservation order been given?

Mr. Connolly

I think so.

Mr. Dockrell

The Minister, in reply to me, said that on the 15th May they had given a month's notice of their intention to make knitted silk fabric a reserved commodity. There are firms who are at present manufacturing those goods for their own use, and I should be very sorry to see these manufactures taken out of the hands of private enterprise. They have already gone to considerable expense in putting down plant for dyeing, etc.

Mr. Connolly

Might I make it clear to the Deputy that there is no intention of taking it out of the hands of private enterprise? As far as I am concerned, I want to assure the Deputy that there is no intention of having this as a State manufacturing business. The question of having certain industries reserved for the Gaeltacht areas is an entirely different one, as he can understand.

Mr. Dockrell

So long as private enterprise is not interfered with, I am satisfied. That is the point I wish to make clear. It appears that this industry is being carried on at a loss, very possibly at a necessary loss. I cannot too strongly urge on the Minister that ordinary business methods should be adopted in the Government trading departments and that the accounts should be published in just the same way as if they were commercial concerns. I think the Government ought to set a headline to the ordinary people of the country as to the way in which their trading is carried on. They ought to place themselves above suspicion. I contend that for the Minister to support estimates for a department in which the stock is not yet ascertained and there is a mistake, namely, an underestimate of the sales, amounting to £15,566, is an extraordinary attitude for him. I take it the Minister appreciates how I got that figure. I am adding the £6,000 that is the under-estimate to the £9,000, making a total of £15,000. He states that their sales amount to £30,566. I suggest that the Minister should have told us what he proposes to do with that money which is apparently saved. I support the amendment that the Estimate be referred back for consideration. We want at least to understand what is the intention of the Government on the revised Estimate as now presented.

Mr. McMenamin

Deputy Dockrell stated that these stores are a sort of museum for the products of the workers. I should like to adopt that analogy and apply it to the Minister and his Department because I think we could send the whole bunch to a museum as far as efficiency is concerned. Speaking last night on the Vote for Forestry, he admitted that nothing at all of a substantial character could be done for the Gaeltacht areas. Of course, everyone will agree that that is a bitter disappointment. Later on in the night, when he came to introduce this Vote, he filled the cup of bitterness for these people. Every form of activity that has been known to these areas since the days of the Congested Districts Board has been closed down for all practical purposes. That is a terrible commentary on the administration of the Minister who came in here, took charge of this Department, and boasted that he was going to do certain things. We were told that this was a plain man's Government, a Government for the plain people, and that the salvation of the plain people lay in electing it as their Government. In days gone by many criticisms were levelled against the Congested Districts Board. Many gross libels and slanders were uttered against the patriotic men who constituted that Board, some of the greatest Nationalists and the greatest Irishmen who ever lived in this country. They were called British henchmen because they received certain travelling expenses to enable them to come to meetings of the Board here in Dublin. Many of them were hounded and slandered out of public life. We lived through these years and through the years that have intervened. We have lived to see a Government that we were told was to resurrect this country economically, and to-day for all practical purposes this entire area is in beggary. It is absolutely beggared.

The Minister, in trying to pad round his Estimate, made one statement that should really have evoked a smile, but when I looked around the House there was not a Deputy that attempted even to grin at the statement. The only thing he had to offer of a practical character for these areas was that two alcohol factories were going to be started in Donegal, the implication being that these were for the Gaeltacht areas. Very probably the geographical knowledge of many Deputies in the House is rather limited, but if they had a better understanding of that statement, they would have either smiled cynically or walked out of the House in sheer disgust. According to the statement one of the factories is going to be situated in Letterkenny. There are some good Gaels, I admit, in Letterkenny, but nobody will suggest that it is a Gaeltacht area, or even that it is in the Breac-Ghaeltacht. We were told that the other factory is going to be erected in Carndonagh. This is the first time I heard it suggested that Carndonagh was either in the Fior-Ghaeltacht or the Breac-Ghaeltacht. To suggest that something is being done for the Gaeltacht because alcohol factories are being erected in these two towns is something which I shall not attempt to describe in appropriate language.

For the rest, it is all stagnation. The carrageen sales are falling. I was interested to hear what the Minister had to say about that. He made no reference at all to the turnover. Putting aside, for the moment, the kelp, there is a market for carrageen. I should like to hear from the Minister what has been actually done in this matter. Has the trade in this commodity been increasing, and what are the prospects of it? My information is that this department is also dying. I shall come to kelp and the industrial side of it later. I think every Deputy in the House, irrespective of the Party to which he belongs, will agree that something must be done in this matter, because the statement of the Minister last night was nothing short of a disgrace to the Government of this country. Here is this huge area neglected, yet the Minister would doubly paint himself green in order to make it appear to these people that he was their saviour. He had to go out of his way to gibe at Deputy MacDermot about his psychology and his nationalism. I think anybody who knows anything about the history of this country will agree that the green corpuscles of Deputy MacDermot's nationalism are just as green as those of the Minister.

The man who uttered that gibe gets up and recites this litany of failure for this nationalist and Gaeltacht area, this area that has preserved the Gaelic traditions of the country. The kelp business is dead, the business in carrageen is stagnant, and the other industries there are dead or dying. That is a great record of efficiency surely. A Deputy speaking earlier referred to the industrial side of the activities of the Department in that part of the country—to the goods produced there and retailed in order to help the area. There is a manager and staff at Beggar's Bush barracks, Dublin. They are supposed to sell those goods, but, apparently, all they do is to put the goods on the shelves and leave them there. Has the Minister made any demand for an inquiry as to what the man in charge of that Department is doing? How is it, if the goods were made according to a pattern that was likely to sell well during a particular season, that the manager could not sell them, because I take it that, in the matter of quality, they were up to the standard of similar goods produced elsewhere? We all know that these goods are in great demand. They cannot be beaten for quality. Why, then, were they not sold? Why was not the man at the head of that Department asked, at the end of the season, why he had not sold them? If that occurred in the case of a private concern, what would happen to the manager?

The Minister knows something about business, or should, successfully or otherwise. Others of us have been in business and have to earn our living at it. We know what would happen if, at the end of a season, it was found that we had not sold the goods we had in stock. I imagine that we would be told that we were wanted no longer like the poor instructresses who were scattered all over the country by the Minister, and then told that they could go. These poor girls were turned out and left penniless in these various areas. They had not even their train fare to bring them back to Dublin. They had to go around as mendicants and beggars to get their train fare to take them back to Dublin. Was the manager who failed to sell those goods treated that way? Was he sacked? Not at all. Why not begin at the top instead of at the bottom. In the case of those instructresses, I take it that they did their work efficiently and that the goods they produced were of the quality demanded. Why was not the manager in charge of the sales department at Beggar's Bush asked why he was not able to sell goods that had been made according to the directions laid down by the Department? He should have been asked that, because he was really the cause of these girls being dismissed.

According to the Minister the staff at Beggar's Bush, with that record, is not big enough, and there is going to be a new manager as well as a new commercial manager. What are they going to do? Draw salaries to cover up the stuff produced in the Gaeltacht and let it rot in Beggar's Bush? Some well-known gentlemen belonging to a particular colour will go down to Beggar's Bush, gobble up hundreds of thousands of pounds' worth of that stuff, sell it and make enormous profits on it. They are able to buy it at scrap prices and then make their enormous profits. How do they sell it? I would like the Minister to answer that question. These men will come along, buy this stuff and sell it at world prices. If they are able to do that, how is it that the man in charge at Beggar's Bush cannot sell it? I have seen these men go to Beggar's Bush when this stuff was being sold at scrap prices, at bankrupt prices, and buy it, and then send it to England and over Europe, making big profits on it. There is no doubt about that, because I know the men that did it. Some men in my constituency came up to Dublin, bought that stuff at Beggar's Bush barracks and then sold it. What is the explanation of that, and who is to blame? Surely it is not the poor girls who are left penniless down in those areas and were not able to get their train fare to come back to Dublin. Are they to be blamed for that situation, or the people who are at the top here in Dublin? I say that the blame rests on those at the top here in Dublin.

The Minister says that he will reemploy those instructresses when the stocks are cleared. Of course the stocks will be cleared some day, but how? They will be sold as rubbish. Some of the cute gentlemen that I have mentioned, every member of the House knows them, will go down some day to Beggar's Bush barracks, buy up the stocks there at scrap prices and make a fortune out of the transaction. I do not want these people to be making fortunes out of this. Everyone who has any knowledge of business knows that when a pattern is selected for a particular season's goods that it is absolutely vital to sell these goods before the end of that season. Once the season has passed the goods, if not disposed of, are worth absolutely nothing. There is no use in the Minister saying that this situation will be cleared up this year or in three years' time, because once these goods lose their season there can be no clearing up. You are simply piling up losses in keeping them stored at Beggar's Bush and in meeting overhead charges. You are simply paying men big salaries for watching your depreciated stocks.

I now come to the kelp business. Deputy Finian Lynch was very sympathetic to the Minister in his handling of this matter. There is a huge stock of kelp, something like 6,000 tons. Storage has to be charged on that every day it remains in stock. Losses on that kelp are being piled up in the way of meeting overhead charges and the cost of storage. Have any effective steps been taken by the Minister and his Department to dispose of it? I do not claim to be an expert on any of these things, but as one having had ordinary business experience I know that the basic purpose of this kelp is to produce iodine. That has failed. We know, however from cur commercial experience that if it cannot be used for its main purpose, there are many subsidiary purposes to which it could be put. Have any steps been taken to get away from cast-iron red tapeism by trying to dispose of this kelp for some of its subsidiary purposes? I know, for example, that kelp can be used for the production of artificial manures. If it has to be disposed of ultimately for a secondary purpose, is there any prospect that a price will be got for it over and above what could be got for it to-day? If there is not a demand for it in this country for that secondary purpose, have any steps been taken to get in touch with the manufacturers of artificial manures in England? Have they been asked if they could use it for that purpose, and if a tariff were put on it going into England is there any reason why a bounty should not be paid on kelp just as there is on other of our agricultural products? Kelp is one of the things which might be exported from the Gaeltacht areas and I think the people should be helped by a bounty to produce it for export, especially if we can get no use for it here. Kelp is the one thing that those people have been living out of for some years, but in view of the way things have gone they are now left penniless and destitute and have to depend for an existence on the few shillings of unemployment money that they get. The payment of an export bounty on kelp would be a great help to them. It is regrettable to have to recite these things here, but I am sure the Minister knows as well as I do that the people in those areas are at the moment utterly destitute and are depending for an existence on the money they get from public funds.

These men in the past never drew a penny from public funds though they may have been subsidised in some respects by the Congested Districts Board when that Board was in existence. Some of them are in a terrible plight. Then we get a lecture about the patriotism and nationalism of Deputy MacDermot. Is there to be no limit to the brazenness of Deputies on the opposite side? A huge Department, for which the Minister is responsible, is permitting this area to crumble into destitution and decay. What is its national outlook for these people? What hope is there for them under present conditions? The people in that area are without a solitary ray of hope. Let this House get that into its head. There is no emigration; fishing is dead, kelp is dead, and carrageen provides work only for the women. What is the use of going down there and making a speech about the patriotism of the Minister for Lands and Fisheries or that of Deputy MacDermot? Is that going to solve the problem of preserving the Gaeltacht? Is that going to create such a buzz that the Gaeltacht will spread over the whole of Ireland, and that Belfast, as well as Waterford, Wexford and Wicklow, will be overrun by the spirit of these gallant people? The thing is a mockery. I now come to the housing question. A couple of years ago I said that, having taken a particular area, and made a calculation, I arrived at a figure of £2,000,000 as the sum necessary to re-house the people of the entire Gaeltacht. There is not much use in repetition in connection with this aspect of the Gaeltacht problem, but I notice that other Deputies keep harping on the question of the city slums. Every day, we hear about the slums in the towns and cities. There are houses in these areas that are unfit for dogs. A man who would take good care of his dogs would not keep them in the houses in which many of these people have to live. There are single-room houses in the Gaeltacht, measuring approximately 14 feet by 14 feet, which accommodate not only man, wife and children, but the hens. The amount to be spent on the entire area for this year is £45,000. When I say that £2,000,000 would be required, that is a conservative figure. When will the problem be solved at this rate? How does it come that only £45,000 is required for this year? If there is more money available, how is it that the people are not applying for it? The Minister told the House yesterday of what he was doing for the Gaeltacht by erecting an alcohol factory in Letterkenny. He did not tell the people where Letterkenny was in relation to the Gaeltacht. The Minister knows the reason why this money is not being applied for by the people but some Deputies may not know what the position is in these areas. The grant given by the Department will approximately cover the timber, slates, fireplaces, mantelpieces, windows, cement and flue pipes. Assuming the site is got free, there will, nevertheless, be lime and some outside labour required. If a trained mason is not employed, the services of a handy man will have to be obtained to do the masonry. He will have to be paid and the lowest amount you can pay that man, over and above the grant, is £24. That is a very conservative estimate. Where is one to get £24 on one of these holdings? Up to recently, a couple of stores would raise £24. But now you would want to clear a whole townland of cattle to get £24. I submit also that the economic war is crushing these people. I have never spoken on the economic war in this House before and I do not want to do so. I hear so much about it that, at night, I see cows and bullocks dangling about the bedroom.

Mr. Belton

Now that the economic war has reached your constituency, you must talk about it.

Mr. McMenamin

These things will eat in irrespective of my talking of them. Time is the most eloquent organ that exists. No class in the State is more hardly hit, so far as the economic war is concerned, than the people of whom I speak. That is one of the things that is going to handicap this great scheme which was founded for the re-housing of the people of the Gaeltacht. The grant is no good without another £30 in cash in the hands of the man who is going to build the house. He cannot raise £30. In the past, there was money to be obtained from kelp and fishing and carrageen. The money from carrageen was probably used by the women to buy boots and clothes for the children and also as pocket money. Kelp is now out of the question and so are the other two industries. There is no means of raising £30 and that is putting an end to the re-housing of the people of the Gaeltacht. I want to emphasise that no class of the community is more hardly hit by the economic war than the people of the Gaeltacht and, from what we can see from the papers, no class of the community is bearing its hardships with less complaint. As far as I know there has not been a word of complaint. County Dublin has eloquent representatives, men like Deputy Belton who will be heard, while people in other places are ground down.

Mr. Belton

They have only been affected now.

Mr. McMenamin

No. They were affected from the very first day, for this reason, that in those areas the people raise stock which passes on to the ranchers. The ranchers were caught with a good deal of stock in their hands when the tariffs were imposed but, when they went to the Gaeltacht to buy stock subsequently, they knew what to do. They cut prices.

Mr. Belton

They cut them down more this year.

Mr. McMenamin

Yes. Who has suffered but the people of the Gaeltacht who raised the cattle needed by the ranchers?

Mr. Belton

Agreed.

Mr. McMenamin

The poor people in these areas are bearing the entire brunt of this dispute. Their means of livelihood has been destroyed. We hear a lot of talk about abolishing the ranchers. The ranchers are only profit earners. They buy stock from small farmers in the Gaeltacht who lived by producing cattle and sheep. The ranchers buy at the market price, or lower than the market price, graze the stock for a few months and make a profit on the sales. Now the ranchers have out down prices. I have been amazed at the imbecility displayed here. The Minister for Local Government told the House recently something that a parish priest told him.

Mr. Belton

A poor parish priest.

Mr. McMenamin

He told him that things were in a bad way. In the first year of the economic war he said he sold his stock at a loss but that when he went to replace them he was able to buy much cheaper. I question if it was charitable to use such an argument. It is a huge problem to deal with the Gaeltacht. For years many of us have been advocating that it should not be touched by politicians. I wonder does the House agree now that we were justified in making that claim. It is a problem which deserves special care, special provision and an impartial body to deal with it. I wonder does the Minister agree to that or, is he prepared to leave that area which, we are told is the soul of the Gael as it is? Is such talk humbug and claptrap, and are these people using them to get to the top, to climb on their backs, while they go down and down? Are the people being asked to believe that there are no Gaels except those in the Gaeltacht and is that said in order to get votes? Then good-bye! Is not that what is happening? If there is any sincerity in the House the Gaeltacht should be dealt with. The task must be taken out of the hands of politicians; otherwise the cry about the Gaelicisation of the country is hypocritical. Stern steps must be taken to preserve that area. How is it to be done? Industry is dead; kelp is dead; fishing is dead. The position to-day is that the people have to walk seven, eight or ten miles once a week to sign their names in a book and return there some other day of the week to get a postal order for unemployment pay. That is the way this country is to be Gaelicised. The thing is a mockery.

This problem must be handled by setting up a special body, independent of politicians and providing the necessary money. We have had schemes for beet growing, wheat growing and tobacco growing because the people in certain areas had the power, and were noisy enough to make themselves effective with the Government. They got what they wanted. Will we have to kick up a shindy—a thing that nobody wants to do—before effective steps are taken to do something for the people of the Gaeltacht? We have been told that there are two classes of people in this country, the Gael and the Gall; that the Gall is to be banished for the Gael. We have subsidies for wheat, subsidies for beet, and millions of pounds raised for factories for the Gall. Where are the millions for the Gael? Does the House ever look at that aspect of the question? When we hear people talking about patriotism and about the Gaeltacht, apparently that is all there is in it. All talk. There is no emigration now. Not a solitary door is open to the people except to march to the police barracks once a week, sign their names in a book and get postal orders varying from 1/- to 6/- as unemployment allowances. The Minister states that two alcohol factories are to be erected in the Gaeltacht, one in Letterkenny and the other in Carndonagh. Where is Letterkenny? A huge planted area lies west between Letterkenny and the Gaeltacht.

Mr. Belton

It sends very cheap potatoes to Dublin.

Mr. McMenamin

It is not the Gaels produce them. Some Deputies know Carndonagh. They will remember that ex-Deputy White represented that area.

Mr. Belton

He knew something about potatoes.

Mr. McMenamin

He did, and does. The Minister stated last night that he could not recommend having these factories run at a loss to the State. Girls were taken from the Gaeltacht areas (many from Donegal) to be trained as instructresses and afterwards sent to centres in Cork and Kerry, and were later dismissed. When these girls were dismissed they were almost penniless. Were it not for the generosity and good-will of my colleague, Deputy McFadden, I do not know what would have happened. Was not that a nice position? Was it creditable to this State to have girls arriving in the city after being in Government employment, and finding themselves in the position of mendicants? The position makes one indignant. There is nothing but decay in the Gaeltacht. I am not condemning the Minister. No man ever did anything who did not fail some time. It is by failure experience is gained. When I failed at anything I resolved when I tackled the problem a second time to succeed. That is what I would say to the Minister, and not to be dismissing the girls when the real cause is the fact that the men do not sell the stuff that is produced. I would make sure to make these gentlemen "hop," and I would make sure that they would discharge the duties for which they draw their salaries. If they did not, there is a very simple remedy—do with them what the Minister did with the girls, and give them the road. They are, of course, under the impression that they are quite secure and that their salaries are assured. Is the nature of their employment such that they cannot be dismissed, no matter how inefficient they are?

Deputy Dockrell went into the commercial aspect of this matter. I do not want to condone inefficiency anywhere. It is a thing to which I have been hostile all my life, even in the very smallest matters. The very smallest thing that is worth doing is worth doing well, but I am afraid that Deputy Dockrell is not thoroughly acquainted with this problem. It is a difficult problem, and it is a problem that will always, in my opinion, call for assistance from public funds from any and every Government in this country. I think the country will have to make up its mind to that. It may be regrettable, but it has got to be done. There is no use blinding ourselves to it. I will go this far with Deputy Dockrell, that anything done should be done as efficiently as possible. Apparently, these men are doing nothing at Beggars' Bush. Stocktaking is being done, and no prices put on goods. What would happen to such men in any commercial concern, large or small, when such inefficiency was discovered? How long would they last? What is the cause of this? Apparently they are all right, and they are quite safe, and no matter how they manage these things their salaries will come in. This place in Beggars' Bush wants a bit of a shake-up. It wants some of the blue-mould blown off it. It wants a breath of fresh air blown in through the doors and windows, and that blast of fresh air should be so strong to blow those who are guilty of this incompetency there clean out, if necessary.

Mr. Anthony

They should be homespun.

Mr. McMenamin

I would ask the House to talk to the Minister quite frankly in this matter and to speak the truth about it. Let there be an end of this prating about using these people for national purposes when there is nothing there but utter decay and not a solitary ray of hope before them.

Eamonn O Cíosáin

Ní mor atá le rá agam ar an Meastachán so, a Chinn Comhairle. Bhíos ag éisteacht leis an Teachta deireannach atá tar éis labhairt agus leis an ullogón a bhí ar siúl aige i dtaobh ceiste na Gaeltachta. Is léir do na daoine a bhí ag éisteacht leis go gcuireann sé a lán suime 'sa cheist seo, agus is mór an truagh é ná cuireann níos mó Teachta an tsuim chéanna ann. Ní chluinimíd focal Gaedhilge sa Tigh seo go dtí go dtagann an Meastachán so os comhair na Dála. Tá daoine ag gearán mar gheall ar an Rialtas i dtaobh na Gaedhealtachta ach 'sé ceist na Gaeltachta an cheist is achrannaighe atá againn le réidhteach agus mar gheall ar sin, ba cheart dúinn go léir bheith ar aon intinn in a thaoibh. Do bhíos ag éisteacht leis an Teachta O Loingsigh ag cur síos ar an laghdú airgid atá dá thabhairt sa Mheastachán so seachas an méid a bhí san Meastachán nuair a bhí sé féin í réim.

Im' thuairim-se, ní cúrsaí airgid atá i gceist in aon chor ach ceist scéimeanna maithe agus níl aon mhaith bheith ag caitheamh airgid ar an nGaeltacht gan mhaith. Deintear gearán mar gheall ar dhúnadh ranganna cniotála agus rl. sa Ghaeltacht ach níl aon mhaitheas bheith ag coimeád oibreacha ag siúl nuair nach dtugann siad obair ach do scata beag cailíní, ach ba mhaith liom an t-Aire do mholadh de bhárr na suime a cuireann sé 'sa Ghaeltacht. Níl aon mhaitheas bheith ag cur síos ar cionnus is ceart ceist na Gaeltachta do réidhteach go dtí go bhfuil sé déanta agus déanta go maith. 'Sé an rud ba cheart do dhéanamh ná a lán de sna daoine atá 'na gcomhnaí 'sa Ghaeltacht fé láthair do thógaint amach as. Táimíd go léir ar aon aigne mar gheall ar sin. Is maith an rud go bhfuil a lethéid sin de sceim curtha ar bun ag an Aire, agus molaim go mór é 'na thaoibh.

Sé an rud a chuirfead os comhair an Aire ná go bfeacfaidh se cuige nach mbeidh aon bhaint ag na daoine seo leis an saoghal amuich.

Muna ndéanfaí é sin, is amhlaidh a déanfaí díobháil don scéal. Ba cheart sagart, dochtuir, oifigigh poist agus rl. dá gcuid fein bheith acu i dtreo na beadh aon bhaint acu leis an gGalltacht. Tá súil agam-sa nách fada go mbeidh sluagh mór daoine ag teacht ó Chiarraidhe fé mar a tháinig ó Chonnamara. Tá mórán talaimh i gCondae Tiobrad Arann le roinnt agus 'sé mo thuairim go mba cheart daoine ó Chiarraidhe thabhairt go dtí an Chonndac sin.

Maidir le Beggars Bush, cloisimíd a lán cainnte mar gheall ar an méid earraidhe atá le díol ann. Má tá cúnlach orra anois, ní ar an Aire atá an locht. Ní dóigh liom go bhfuil locht ar éinne mar is dócha gur deacair na rudaí seo do dhíol uaireanta, agus go dtí go ndéanfar sin, níl aon mhaith bheith ag cur isteach orra. Níl an Teachta McMenamin sásta leis an áit 'na bhfuiltear ag cur dá monarcean i dTír Chonaill, ach más mar sin atá an scéal aige agus má tá locht le fáil aige mar gheall air, ba mhaith liom a rá leis go mbeimíd ana-shásta leo in aon áit thíos i gCiarraidhe. Aontuím leis an Teachta sa méid adubhairt sé gur cheart dúinn gan leigint do pholitidh eacht do chur isteach ar an gceist seo. Ceist ana mhór agus ana-thabháchtach é agus is cuma cé'n sórt Rialtais atá i réim, má's Rialtas Gaelach é caithfidh siad aire a thabhairt do'n Ghaeltacht. Na daoine atá ag cáineadh an Rialtais mar gheall ar staid na Gaeltachta, b'fhearra dhóibh suidhe síos agus machtnamh do dhéanamh ar an sceal agus scéim do cheapadh chun saoghal na daoine sa Ghaeltacht d'fheabhsú. Annsin, b'fhéidir leo an scéim do chur ós cóir an Rialtais agus más scéim fhónta é agus muna nglacann an Rialtais leis, beidh faill acu an Rialtas do cháineadh.

Níl ach cúpla focal le rá agam i dtaobh scéim na dTithe. Is dóigh liom go mba cheart don Roinn dul ar aghaidh níos mire leis an scéim seo. Do labhair an Teachta Domhnall Mac Menamin ar an droch-chaoi atá ar na tithe i nGaeltacht Thír-Chonaill. Do bhíos ag éisteacht leis an Teachta O Loingsigh ag cur sios ar an méid oibre a rinne an Rialtas a bhí i réim go dtí le déanaí ar son na nGaeltachta. Ní thuigim conus atá an méid sin drochthithe sa Ghaeltacht fé láthair, má's fíor an scéal d'innis an Teachta mar gneall ar an méid oibre a rinne a Rialtas fhéin. Ba mhaith an rud dá dtabhfarfadh an tAire figiúirí dhúinn mar gheall ar an méid tithe do tógadh i réim an Rialtais dheireannaigh agus i réim an Rialtais atá againn anois. Dá mbeadh an t-eolas san againn, bheadh fhios againn ce'cu ag dul i méid no i laighead atá obair na dtithe. Act is cuma conus mar bhí an scéal sa tsean-aimsir, tá gá le tuille tithe sa Ghaeltacht fé láthair agus tá súil agam go raghaidh an Roinn ar aghaidh níos mire leis an scéim seo.

Mr. Dillon

I understood Deputy Kissane to say two things with which I cordially agree. Firstly, that no matter how many houses were built in the Gaeltacht in the past, there are still a great many to be built; and secondly, he would like to hear from the Minister an explanation of the reason why the building is not proceeding rather more rapidly.

Mr. Kissane

I did not say any such thing. I said that it would be interesting to know how many houses were built during the régime of the last Government and how many have been built since our Government came into power. I did not question the speed with which they were being built, but I said that the better the speed, the better for the Gaeltacht.

Mr. Dillon

The Deputy says that it is not a matter of very great consequence what is the comparative rapidity with which houses were built in the past. The thing that is of consequence is how the present deficiency in the housing is going to be disposed of in the future and also that it is necessary that we should know, and know immediately, the efficiency and the rapidity with which the housing scheme is being carried on.

Mr. Kissane

I did not mention the word "deficiency."

Mr. Dillon

Seeing that you were speaking in the Irish language, I do not see how you could use the word "deficiency," and I must say that the Deputy speaks it beautifully. I wish I could speak it as well. Do not let the Deputy misunderstand me at all. Before I proceed to deal with that detail, I should like to refer to something which the Minister had to say last night in introducing this Estimate and in closing another for which he was responsible.

An Ceann Comhairle

If he was closing the debate on another Estimate the debate may not be reopened on this Vote.

Mr. Dillon

I do not wish to reopen it. I wish to make a comment on the Minister analogous to that which he made on a member of this Party. The Minister for the Gaeltacht told the House last night that they must recognise that Deputy MacDermot did not belong——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Minister last night, in closing a debate which lasted some 12 hours, made certain references. That debate may not be reopened now. There may be other opportunities of discussing such matters. If the debate on one Vote were to be continued on another, debate would be interminable. The House should realise that occasionally a Minister may conclude a discussion.

Mr. Dillon

I do not propose to say anything that is not strictly relevant to the Minister for the Gaeltacht— the Minister for the Gaeltacht as distinct from the Minister for Fisheries, Lands, or any other Department. When I hear that individual comment on the fact that a Deputy of this Party does not belong to this country——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy surely understands the Chair. The concluding speech made by the Minister last night cannot be replied to to-day.

Mr. Dillon

I do not wish to comment on it in any way. I want to say this, that I deplore the fact that Senator Connolly is Minister for the Gaeltacht. I deplore it because it seems to me that Senator Connolly is the reject of every part of Ireland, and I do not know why he should be inflicted on the Gaeltacht. Belfast will not have him. Galway will not have him. Nobody seems to want him.

Mr. Connolly

On a point of order, is Deputy Dillon entitled to say that I am the reject of every part of Ireland; that Belfast will not have me, and that other areas will not have me? I have yet to learn that Belfast will not have me.

Professor O'Sullivan

Is this a point of order or disagreement?

Mr. Connolly

If one has to submit to attacks all the time, without coming back, I want to know where it is going to end with Deputy Dillon?

Mr. Dillon

The Minister will have plenty of opportunity to answer.

Mr. Connolly

I can answer the Deputy fully on all those points.

Mr. MacDermot

The Minister is himself very ready with unprovoked personal attacks.

Mr. Dillon

Every time the Minister makes unprovoked personal attacks, he will get what he is looking for.

Mr. Connolly

I stood three years of attack without coming back until last night.

Mr. Dillon

The Minister may look forward to it with pleasure and anticipation. I think the next time that he desires to remark on the appropriateness of certain persons to take part in public life——

An Ceann Comhairle

If the Deputy does not refrain from answering what the Minister said on another Vote, he will have to resume his seat.

Mr. Dillon

I am commenting on the suitability of Senator Connolly as Minister for the Gaeltacht. As such, I think he is wholly unsuitable, and I will give my reasons to the Chair for saying so.

Mr. Smith

Who is going to be the judge?

Mr. Dillon

I venture to say that in being inflicted on the Gaeltacht he is in the unhappy position that nobody else would have him. My suggestion is that it is time the Gaeltacht made it perfectly clear that they do not want him either, and for this reason: there is one Vote in this book of Estimates which is consistently reduced year after year, and that is the Vote for the Gaeltacht. I want to know why? If there is one Department in the State which is starved for money and ought to have more, if there is one Department in the State in which there does not seem to be sufficient Government activity, it is the Gaeltacht. In every other branch of the national life, bureaucracy is rampant. Government expenditure runs riot, and Government interference runs riot. The Minister's colleague, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, can never appoint sufficient civil servants to inquire into the people's affairs. The Minister for Agriculture boasts in this House that he creates hordes of officials every year to poke and pry into people's business, but there is one Department in which the Government might do something for the people. That Department is the Gaeltacht. In that there is a steady reduction of Government expenditure. I think it is time the Minister told us why. He explained last year that the Estimate showed a decrease of £31,000 but that that was partly accounted for by the fact that certain services were transferred to a new Department and that the salary of the Minister was transferred to a different Department, but he wound up by saying that having made all adjustments the net reduction last year was about £31,000. This year the reduction is £10,000. If the Minister were in a position to come before us and say that despite any apparent reductions in the cost of the services no actual reductions in the services themselves had taken place we might listen to him with patience. In fact, we know there has been a very material reduction in the activities of the Department in the Gaeltacht. A number of the industries which had been carried on in the Gaeltacht for a very considerable time have been closed down, and we are informed that they are closed down because there is no demand for their products.

I want the Minister to tell the House quite frankly what is the policy with regard to the Gaeltacht industries. Is it to concentrate on quality and to make the trade mark of the Gaeltacht industries, which heretofore has been the Round Tower, the simile for top quality? My submission to him is that, unless he adopts that line, any attempt to put the Gaeltacht industries on anything even approaching an economic basis is perfectly hopeless. The advantage which we have in the commercial world in the Gaeltacht is a highly developed technique, but the product of hand labour is not and never will be able to compete with the machine-made product. There is, however, a demand in the United States of America and in this country for a high-grade hand-made product, if it is properly marketed. I fully recognise that it takes time to build up a high-grade product of that kind, and in the interval between getting the work in hand and creating a highly efficient distribution of a quality product, some steps must be taken to get rid of the seconds and the rejects which have to be disposed of while perfection is being attained. There is no reason on earth why that process should not be fitted in with the economic policy of the Minister's colleague, the Minister for Industry and Commerce. As it is, wide and frantic protection is being given to machine products in the hosiery end of the trade, and there ought to be ample scope for the distribution of hand-made products of the Gaeltacht industries, even at a reduced price. To my mind, the proper line to pursue now is to set an ideally high standard for the products of the Gaeltacht industries, and to dispose in the home market of any article which does not come up to the top standard set, without setting the trade mark of the Gaeltacht industries upon it. It may cost a little money. It may require subvention for some considerable time, but it will be a far better thing to spend the money in that way than to spend it, as it is at present being spent, on doles and free beef to people who are willing and anxious to work, but from whom work is being taken from one end of the Gaeltacht to the other.

In regard to the Gaeltacht housing scheme, I know that some months ago the situation was that there were enormous numbers of applications for grants and loans in the Housing Department of the Gaeltacht Division, which had been approved but which there was no money to finance. I raised that point more than once in this House and there was some kind of quibble that an application for a grant or loan could not be approved until there was money to meet it. I do not propose to follow that quibble, but certainly a very large number of cases were adjudged eligible for grants if money was there and there was not any money to meet them. Last year, I believe, £300,000 was made available for housing grants, and I would like the Minister to tell us now whether there is in his Department any application for a housing grant or loan which, though suitable, has not been given for lack of funds. If there is, I should like him to say why it is that he is not applying to the House for all the money he wants in that direction, as it is clearly the policy of the Oireachtas to facilitate housing in every possible way they can. I take it, that being their general policy, they will be anxious in a special degree to facilitate it in the Gaeltacht areas. I often wonder, when I hear Deputies waxing so enthusiastically about the Gaeltacht, how many of them really interest themselves in what the actual situation in the Gaeltacht is. I wonder what percentage of the able-bodied people willing to work if they could get a job in West Donegal to-day and in North-west Donegal are receiving unemployment assistance. I do not believe I exaggerate when I say that the majority of the able-bodied people in the Fior-Ghaeltacht in Donegal are to-day receiving unemployment assistance and free beef or cheap beef.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Is the Minister for Lands responsible for the administration in that respect?

Mr. Dillon

Yes, Sir, inasmuch as he has failed to provide them with employment.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I cannot accept that. The Minister for Industry and Commerce is responsible for the administration of the Unemployment Assistance Act.

Mr. MacDermot

The Unemployment Assistance Act does not provide employment. It is not a question of providing unemployment assistance; it is a question of providing employment.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy MacDermot should not endeavour to annotate Deputy Dillon's remarks. Deputy Dillon said he doubted if some percentage of the able-bodied workers in the Gaeltacht were in receipt of unemployment assistance.

Mr. Dillon

The Chair misheard me. I said I wonder will I exaggerate if I say that the majority of the able-bodied persons who are willing and ready to work in the Donegal Gaeltacht are receiving unemployment assistance and free or cheap beef. I mention that to direct the attention of the House to the fact that this vast body of men and women, who are willing and able to work if they could get work, have not got it.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Is not that part of the administration of the Department of Industry and Commerce —the provision of unemployment assistance for able-bodied people who cannot get work?

Mr. Dillon

The answer is to be found in column 1192 of Volume 53 of the Dáil Debates, I submit, with all respect. There the Minister for the Gaeltacht, speaking last year, said:

"To me the real test is the amount of wages which, out of the Vote, will find its way back to the workers in the Gaeltacht."

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair does not go to the Minister for Lands for a direction to rule. I am not concerned with what the Minister for Lands said in respect of any situation. The position is, in dealing with unemployment and the administration of the Unemployment Assistance Act and its collateral provisions, that these are matters for the Minister for Industry and Commerce.

Mr. Dillon

I do not know what individual Deputies are to be guided by. The Minister for the Gaeltacht says in this House that he is going to devote the money which he asks the House to vote to provide work and wages for the people in the Gaeltacht. Now, having said that, and having got tens of thousands of pounds from this House on that pretext, am I not entitled to say to him: "Did you spend the money for the purpose for which you asked it?"

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That is not what the Deputy was endeavouring to say.

Mr. Dillon

Did the Minister spend the money he asked for to provide work for the people in the Fior-Ghaeltacht? I think he did not spend it that way and the reason I think that is because a very large body of people in the Gaeltacht who are ready to work and who would take the work the Minister said he would provide for them if they could get it, are getting unemployment assistance. They would not be getting unemployment assistance if there was work to do, because they would be rendered ineligible for it if they refused a job when they were offered it. Therefore, I assume, they were not offered a job, although the Minister undertook to provide work for them. Accordingly, I want to ask the Minister what is the Government policy? Is it to turn all the people of that part of the country, who are the most hard-working section of the community in Ireland, into paupers, or is it his intention to provide them with work?

My submission to him is this, that if he would assess the amount of money that is being spent in the Fior-Ghaeltacht at the present time under the Unemployment Assistance Act and suggest to the Executive Council that his appropriation—the appropriation of the Minister for the Gaeltacht— should be increased by that sum in order to enable him to subsidise Gaeltacht industries, he could try out in that very restricted area a very valuable experiment and that is, how far can you provide work by subsidising labour instead of providing doles direct to men who would prefer to earn their livings instead of getting money for nothing? I say that the situation obtaining in the Gaeltacht provides an admirable opportunity for experimenting on that economic theory which has been described as priming the pump. Instead of distributing money in this way let the Minister go to the Gaeltacht Industries Branch, go to any individual entrepreneur in the Gaeltacht or to any enterprising individual prepared to start work there and say to him: “If you will undertake the production of the merchandise which the local people are in a position to produce, we will make a contribution towards the wages cost.” I think if that is done, and I believe it could be done, it will go a long way to solve a very undesirable unemployment problem in the Gaeltacht and it would do more, because it would provide a national experiment in a very restricted area where there would be no danger of the cost becoming ruinous and it would give us the material on which we could determine for the whole nation an unemployment policy that might solve the difficulties that are overwhelming not only this country but Great Britain, the United States of America and the whole world at the present time.

The Executive Council have now decided to put the Fisheries under the Department of Agriculture and the Gaeltacht is under a Minister of its own. It is extremely difficult to discuss the Gaeltacht without discussing Fisheries too, because, as a matter of fact, if the Fisheries collapse, as they are at present allowed to do in the Gaeltacht, the difficulties of the Minister for the Gaeltacht are doubled and trebled by the failure of a Department over which he has no control at all. I do not know why the Executive Council have decided to transfer the Fisheries to the Department of Agriculture. It seems to me an extremely imprudent plan. I am convinced that the idea of the old Congested Districts Board was right and that was that every service connected with the Gaeltacht should be brought under the direction of one board or individual. In that way, it would be possible to co-ordinate services and to have one head for all of those services in the Gaeltacht and not, as is possible now, to have one Minister pulling against another Minister possibly unconsciously, and thus all the difficulties created by the Gaeltacht problems will be in their full force.

Did I understand Deputy Kissane to suggest that the great majority of the people of the Gaeltacht should be removed from the Gaeltacht and that the Athboy experiment should be extended a good deal more than it is to-day? I think the Ministry ought to make up their minds about that before they start tinkering. In that regard, two matters have to be considered; first, the language problem, and, secondly—and this is far more important—the welfare of the people of the Gaeltacht themselves. If we can so arrange things as to make livelihood in the Gaeltacht possible and happy for the people there, then it would be very undesirable to extend the business of colonies at Athboy or anywhere else. Because no matter what the Minister for Education says, in two generations the Athboy colony will have forgotten Irish and we will find them in very much the same position as the outer fringes of the Breac-Ghaeltacht where the old people speak Irish amongst themselves and the children make no use of it at all in their lives. Nevertheless, if the Government have made up their minds that the problem of maintaining the people in the Gaeltacht at a reasonable level of comfort is impossible, the time has come then to face the issue and to get them out of it. The language must look after itself. It would be an intolerable doctrine and wholly indefensible to suggest that the residents of the Gaeltacht should be kept in servitude, misery and poverty for no other reason than to preserve the language. I believe we could make the Gaeltacht happy and reasonably prosperous for the people there if we had the courage to do it. I believe if we want to preserve the Irish language, and to extend the Irish language from the Gaeltacht to the Breac-Ghaeltacht and to the rest of the country, we have to do it. But we ought to make up our minds which we are going to do and do it. If we are not going to put our backs into the business and make continuous residence in the Gaeltacht possible and reasonably happy for these people, then get them out of it as quickly as you can, but do not hang fire between two failures and leave the people to suffer as a result of our indecision.

I do not believe in making a criticism of this Department without offering some suggestion as to how I would meet the difficulties that arise. When introducing this Vote last year the Minister, as reported in column 1197 of Volume 53, said: "It is estimated that £59,570 worth of turf will be purchased from these areas this year. The whole administrative cost of this is estimated at £1,620 and the purchase price of the peat will go almost entirely to the male labour engaged." I should like to ask the Minister how far has that anticipation been fulfilled? How much peat was bought in the Gaeltacht areas and how much money went into the pockets of the people of the Gaeltacht? I should like to see Irish speakers left in the Gaeltacht and I should like to see the Gaeltacht made an economic proposition. I believe that can be done in one way and in one way only. We have got to provide an opportunity for the children of the Gaeltacht residents to earn good incomes in this country without emigrating so as to reproduce a situation which obtains in other parts of the country, where the moment the child is earning a good salary he is the element that makes continuous residence on uneconomic holdings possible and possible at a reasonably high standard of living.

In this country there are abundant opportunities for earning good wages as school teachers, members of the Gárda Síochána, instructors of one kind or another, nurses and, indeed, in certain kinds of domestic service as children's nurses, for which the children of the Gaeltacht would be admirably suited if they get the educational advantages necessary to equip them for these posts. If we pursue this policy it will have two advantages; first, it will provide these children with the wherewithal to send home to their parents a few pounds every month in order to make it possible for them to live; (2) it will keep these Irish speakers in the country and it will send them out as grown men and women amongst the people where they will speak Irish, use the language and introduce to distant parts of the country the correct accent and blas of Irish as it ought to be spoken. Deputies may say “this is a very inconsistent observation on the part of Deputy Dillon. He is complaining about the Athboy experiment; he is complaining that the Athboy colony will lose the language. Then, why is he saying that these people will keep the language?” My suggestion is this—to make it clear to the mind of every resident in the Gaeltacht that the language is an asset and an instrument whereby he will get a good position. Once he has learned that lesson, once he is convinced that the language has a financial advantage for him, you have in that man an apostle of the language. He will go out and speak it and demonstrate to the world that he is an Irish speaker. In that way, you will get rid of that feeling which is doing so much harm to the Irish language, that feeling which makes people ashamed to speak it. Then the Irish speaker will realise that he has an advantage over those who cannot speak the language; he knows that he speaks the Irish language with the native blas. In this House Deputy Kissane delights in getting up and saying to me: “Yah, I was speaking in Irish and you did not understand me.” I should like to see a little of that in every boy coming out of the Gaeltacht. It does not sit well on Deputy Kissane, because he ought to have sense, but I should like to see that childish arrogance about the Irish language in every youngster who is being sent up to be a Civic Guard or a national teacher or in any other capacity. That is what we want—that he should constantly be looking round at his neighbours saying: “Yah, you do not understand me.”

We are going to provide an alternative to emigration in order to send many people back to the Gaeltacht to study and learn Irish, but this is the great difficulty we have to face. I do not like to be throwing bouquets at my own constituency, but I want to face the real problem. There is a scheme for training nurses and a great many of the girls who come up for training do not seem to have the educational equipment which makes it possible to train them. The odd thing is that Deputy Brady and I know, and everyone else knows, that these boys and girls in the Gaeltacht, in their own home county, are highly intelligent, very hard-working, and apparently fit for anything. But, for some queer reason, they do not seem to take to technical training as well as children not from the Gaeltacht.

I am going to make a suggestion in that connection. I urged on the Minister for Education, when his Vote was before the House, that he ought to contemplate in the near future raising the school age. I suggest to him that as yet he would have very great difficulty in compulsorily raising the school age to 16. I, therefore, suggest that his objective should be to reduce the school age for the primary school to 13, and then to set up a system of schools analogous to the American high school, or what we call the ordinary secondary school; make one year's attendance in that secondary school compulsory, and then offer two years more free, voluntary attendance to any child who wanted to stay. I think in 10 years' time the difficulties of making compulsory attendance at that school for three years instead of one year would vanish; and every child would want to stay, and every parent would recognise that it was his duty to let it stay. But I think that if you try to do it immediately there will be a row.

I am suggesting that if you can try out the unemployment scheme in the Gaeltacht, which is a restricted area, where we can see the limit of our possible liability, let us try out the educational experiment there. We have a problem, and that is to mould children so that they will be fitted for the technical education which will make them wage earners in the way we want them. We want to find out whether the educational plan will work or not. Let us kill two birds with the one stone. I suggest to the Minister for Education that he should offer his co-operation to the Minister for the Gaeltacht and perhaps slaughter three birds with the one stone. He could get six or eight, or, perhaps, ten schools and close them and build one good central school in which he could accommodate not only a primary school for children up to 13 but a school which would cater for children from 13 to 16. He could then bring the children in from the outlying districts in buses, as is done in practically every country in the world but this, give them the kind of education we contemplate here, and turn them out, at 16, native Irish speakers with a modest secondary school education, better equipped than any Gaeltacht child to take technical education of any kind. He could also increase the facilities which are already substantial, but which, I think, should be further increased, for admitting these children to the teachers' training colleges.

In that connection let me turn aside for a moment to say that I feel that if we are in earnest about the revival of the Irish language we ought to lay down the principle that every eligible candidate for training as a teacher, who is a native Irish speaker, should be taken and trained as a teacher, whatever the cost may be. Therefore, these specially educated children could be trained as teachers, trained as instructors or instructresses, trained as maternity or Jubilee nurses, such as move through the country, or taken into the Civic Guards. Having so trained them, while I think the Gaeltacht should be equipped with native Irish speaking instructresses, Gárda, etc., we should hope to equip the whole country with them in due course. Above all, we should make it clear, and would by that method make it clear, to every child in the Gaeltacht that the Irish language was a priceless heritage; we would make it clear to every child in the Gaeltacht that we are really in earnest in the value we set upon the language and in the solicitude we are prepared to show to any body of people who would preserve it, as they have preserved it; and we would, by the process of experimentation which I have outlined, glean invaluable information which may be used all over the country at a later stage.

My submission to the House is that fiddling and foostering with the Gaeltacht is going to get nobody anywhere, and that, unless there is a bold policy adopted which will completely alter the whole outlook of the residents of that area, it would be much better to do nothing at all and let nature take its course; because turning them into paupers, turning the best element in this country, the hardest-working element, the most independent element, into paupers is a wretched commentary upon any Irish Government. When you remember the rounds to which the Congested Districts Board used to go to make work for them rather than to give outdoor relief or put them into the union, and you see our own Government throwing up their hands in despair and saying, "We will put all the men on Aranmore island on the dole, because we cannot find anything else for them to do," surely that is a hopeless confession of failure. That confession of failure must continue unless some bold and comprehensive policy is adopted which has some definite objective in view.

The Minister knows he will get all the co-operation he wants in any constructive work he proposes for the Gaeltacht. I suppose he has had commissions, and is sick of the reports of commissions, but would he not even call in the Deputies of his own Party, representing Gaeltacht constituencies, and ask them to put up definite schemes to him for which he would seek sanction from this House? I hope he may do something of the kind. I hope the Minister for Education will suggest to him that the educational experiment I have outlined could be profitably tried out in the areas I have indicated. If they do that, I am confident that they will get from every side of the House all the help they want; that they will do useful work, not only for the people of the Gaeltacht, but for the whole country; and, by improving the conditions of the people, who are living there, solving a long standing problem, they will, with the expenditure of that money, purchase for the whole people all over the country the only effective instrument whereby the national language can be preserved for succeeding generations.

Mícheál Og Mac Pháidín

A Chinn Comhairle—Níl mé ar aon intinn leis an Teachta O Docraill gur chóir gnaithe deantúisí na Gaedhealtachta a chur faoi ghéar-scrúdú. Ins an chás so, níor cheart dul d'réir an Manchester School of Economics. Ní dheachaidh Seaghan Bhuidhe é fhéin d'réir na riaglach sin nuair a chuir sé ar bun Bórd na gCeanntar gCumhang ná an sean Congested Districts Board.

Acht le theacht anois ar an Mheastachán atá romhainn, tá sean-fhocal againn i dTir Chonaill: "Nach dtuigeann an sathach an seang agus má thuigeann fhéin ní i n-am." 'Sé a dhálta sin ag an Rialtas le muinntir na Gaedhealtachta. Gealladh an domhan cruinn dóibh; mealladh iad le briathra milse agus fealladh ortha san deireadh thall. Amach ó bheagán atá an Roinn Oideachais a' dhéanamh ní fheicim-se Roinn ar bith eile ag déanamh dadaidh don Ghaedhealtacht ar bhfiú trácht air. Creidim go bhfuil an tAire ar a dhícheall. Acht tá mé ag éagcaoint go mór air nach bhfuil sé ag déanamh níos mó 'na Roinn fhéin. In áit tuilleadh airgead a sholáthar do'n Ghaeltacht, 'sé an rud a laghduigh sé an Meastachán so gach bliadhain ó fágadh cúram na Roinne air. Nach aisdigheach sin. Cad chuige ar laghduigh sé an Meastachán so a bhí ag dul 'un tairbhe do'n mhuinntir is boichte san tír? Ar ndóigh, ní thig leis níos mó oibre dhéanamh ar níos lugha airgid.

Nuair a bhí Fianna Fáil ar an taoibh seo den Dáil, bhí gleo agus callan aca siocair nach rabh an Ghaeltacht ag fághail cothrom na féinne ó Chumann na nGaedheal. Anois, tá an chumhacht aca féin agus tá siad ag giorradh an airgid ar na daoine bochta so. "Más dona maol is seacht measa mullóg." Rinne an sean Rialtas mórán do mhuinntir na Gaedhealtachta. Thug siad obair agus saothrughadh dóibh, rud nach bhfuil aca anois. Chuir siad déantúisí ar bun thall is i bhfus, cniotáil, bróidneóireacht, figheadóireacht agus mar sin. Chuir siad tús ar so uilig agus bhí fútha tuilleadh dhéanamh nuair a fuair Fianna Fáil greim ar Rialtas na tíre. Agus, annsin, caidé gnidheas Fianna Fáil? Seadh, maise, 'dhul lorg a gcúl in áit dul ar aghaidh leis na deantúisí seo. Nach doiligh creidbheál gur chuir siad críoch leis na déantúisí a cuireadh ar bun faoi an sean-Rialtas? Acht 'sé clár na fírinne é, agus níor thug siad obair ar bith ina n-áit.

Rinneadh éagcóir mhór ar na cailíní a tugadh as an Ghaeltacht go Baile Atha Cliath le inneall-chníotáil d'fhoghluim. Nuair a bhí siad oilte, cuireadh na cailíní seo i gceann ranganna cniotála ó Thír Chonaill go Corcaigh. Acht chuir an t-Aire críoch leis na ranganna sin agus b'éigin do na cailíní seo dhul abhaile. Deir an t-Aire go rabh an chníotáil ag cailleadh airgid ar an Stát. An léir don Rialtas nach cailleadh ar bith deóntas diomhanais nó an "dole"? Nárbh fhearr go mór airgead a chailleadh ar obair ná ar dhíomhanas? Ba chóir go mbeadh fhios ag an Aire nach féidir déantúisí ar bith chur ar bun san Ghaeltacht gan beagán airgid a chailleadh leo. Is maith liom cluinstin go gcuirfear na ranganna so ar bun arís. Is truagh agus is brónach an chaoi atá ar bhuachaillí agus cailíní breaghtha 'san Ghaeltacht san am i láthair. Níl aca acht an "dole" agus gan súil aca le dadaidh eile. Níl obair seasmhach aca agus ní thig leo dul go Meiroca. Mar dubhairt mé cheana táthar a'dhéanamh bacaigh dóibh in aghaidh a dtola. Caithfidh siad déirce a ghlacadh agus fuath a gcroidhe aca do.

Tá fhios ag an Aire nach bhfásfaidh biatas no cruithneacht no tobac ar shléibhtibh loma Thír Chonaill no Chonnamara. Acht caithfidh na daoine bochta so díol ar iad a thógáil ar bhántaí míne na tíre. Nach bhfuil sé beag go leor ag an Rialtas cúiteamh a thabhairt dóibh anois agus oibreacha buan-seasmhach a thabhairt do mhuinntir na Gaedhealtachta. Tá an tAire ar seachrán má shaoileann sé go ndéanfaidh na monarchain alcóil maith ar bith do Ghaelhealtacht Dhún na nGall. D'fhéadfadh siad maith a dhéanamh do'n Ghalldacht ann acht beidh an Gaedheal ar an chaol-chuid mar bhí sé ariamh. Tá mé ag iarraidh ar an Rialtas machtnamh níos cúramaighe a dhéanamh feasta ar cheist so na Gaedhealtachta, mar is ceist mhór, náisiúnta í.

Mr. Connolly

I had hoped that this Debate would go on reasonable lines, and I had hoped that the former Minister would have had enough sensitiveness about the conduct of the Gaeltacht development during his regime to have allowed me to go by lightly in my reply. I deliberately drafted my statement in such terms as would enable me, shall I say, to gloss over some of the iniquities that were perpetrated before the advent of this Government into power, and into the control of the Gaeltacht like everything else. There were various reasons why I did so. In the first place, there is, despite all the things that have happened, a certain feeling of attachment for certain people who, at different times, in critical circumstances in this country, played a really manly and worth-while part. There was a second consideration—a more delicate and a more awkward one—which I had hoped to avoid. I had occasion to change the whole organism of the Gaeltacht Department, to change the whole management and control of the Gaeltacht Department. Deputies here know, from my attitude and other things, that I hesitate very much to cast any reflection on anyone who is not able to come into this House and defend himself. Since, however, the circumstances have been referred to, and since we have had to listen to a statement—I shall not apply any adjective to it—from Deputy McMenamin, showing complete ignorance of everything that was, everything that is, and everything that we hope for the Gaeltacht, it is not possible for me to let the statements that have been made by the former Minister and by other speakers go by without indicating just what we did find and just what we had to do.

Deputy Lynch handled his stuff with considerable discretion, as he always does, and made certain superficial illogical arguments on the attitude we are taking up. He reiterated the complaint that we were reducing the services in the Gaeltacht and that we were starving the Gaeltacht. I think he went even further in his denunciations and stated how we were isolating, neglecting and completely ignoring the Gaeltacht. I take that statement with reasonable seriousness. I do not think I do any injustice if I say that I could not take anything Deputy McMenamin says seriously, and I do not think anyone else could. He belongs to Donegal and knows it. I am concerned with Donegal, as I am with every county in the Gaeltacht. Deputy Dillon with his usual aplomb denounced me as an unsuitable person to deal with the problems in the Gaeltacht. He is probably right. I assure him and other Deputies that I have no desire to handle the problem of the Gaeltacht. My Parliamentary Secretary works hard, and I work reasonably hard, and we have three Departments to handle. But I say that the Land Commission, which involves £1,500,000 and the Forestry Commission, which involves £250,000, are child's play as regards administration and management compared with the anxiety and worry that this Department causes us. I am not saying that it was possible for Deputy Lynch and his staff to do miracles in the Gaeltacht, and I am not saying it is possible for us to do miracles in the Gaeltacht. I say it is an intensely difficult problem. But to say that we have neglected and ignored the people of the Gaeltacht and done nothing for them is either stupid or dishonest, and I am not prepared to say which.

Let us see what went on in the Gaeltacht prior to the taking over of the Department by its incompetent present Minister. Would it surprise the House and the country to know that the giving of the £2 grant by the Minister for Education, to the families in the Gaeltacht, in the last financial year, represented exactly three times the former amount of the annual wage content of the Gaelic industries under Deputy Lynch, namely, £18,000. What was the position that I inherited? I found that Deputy Lynch, in introducing his estimates, paid no attention to what was being spent. The estimates I am presenting represent something. They represent an intelligent anticipation of what it is hoped to spend for the services for the coming year. I would like to have avoided this indictment because it involves more than Deputy Lynch. When I came back from the London conference two years ago, and found the condition of things prevailing, I knew that no one could reconcile such a state of affairs with ordinary, decent, business conditions. Deputy Dockrell may be surprised to learn that when I came back and found how things were, I applied to the Minister for Finance to do either one of two things: either that he should send to the Gaeltacht Department financially expert officials and get something in the way of a commercial account made out of what was going on, or, alternatively, that he should allow me to appoint a staff of commercial accountants to prepare a set of accounts. In all the years Deputy Lynch was in charge such a thing as a commercial analysis of what was going on in the Gaeltacht never took place. I fully appreciate the point made by Deputy Dockrell.

Commercial accounts were opened and established and it took close on nine months to get our bearings as to the state of affairs there, on commercial lines. Yet we are told we are incompetent and inefficient. Three years went by and the kindest thing I can say in this House, in regard to that matter, is that Deputy Lynch did not know a damn thing of what was going on. Let us take what we inherited. We closed down some centres. I made it clear last year, and I make it fairly clear to-day, that if I can get on with a moderate loss I will keep centres open. But when I find that the relative amount paid for administration and management amounts to four or five or six times the cost of the workers surely to God it is time to take stock and see where we are.

There was a centre opened in Annagry for the making of Irish poplin—an industry which inherently belongs to the City of Dublin. Poplin makers were here in Dublin and could not get enough work to keep them going. Then someone suggested that poplin making should be done in the Gaeltacht. It might have been done if proper methods had been adopted. I found a man there paid a salary but no money was paid to the workers for a considerable time after that. We have sold 53 dozen ties out of that place at 2/- a dozen. That was part of the stock we had inherited and it cost £2,000 in salaries, material and expenses, and about £123 went in labour. Was I right in closing that down? Is there any Deputy here who will say I should have kept it on?

We hear a great deal about the weaving of tweeds. I am prepared to allow that a reasonable amount of time should be given for the training of the workers in that matter. It meant that we were training workers in the place to which the industry belonged. What was the position with regard to these tweeds? We inherited 60,000 yards of tweeds. I want Deputies to examine this case. I have some reasonable appreciation of merchandise. Surely it is not suggested that it was necessary to manufacture 60,000 yards of goods in order to train workers. Anybody with any knowledge of commercial or textile industry knows that girls have to be trained in order that they may be put to work in these factories. Those engaged in the tweed making in Donegal are as intelligent and as competent as any workers in the country. We got rid of 35,000 yards of that tweed at a job price—a much better job price than I would have paid for it. I do not know what they are going to do with it. It was not faulty manufacture, but it was faulty design. It was of a colour that no man—I am not a dress designer—would ever dream of putting into such materials.

Mr. Norton

Why did they not dye it blue?

Mr. Connolly

They did not dye it blue; if they had done so, I might have sold it to the Blueshirts.

Mr. Norton

That would not have meant much now.

Mr. Connolly

I went into Ardara and I found a young man standing there. He was drawing £2 10s. a week. For what? I do not know. I found a man acting as sub-agent in Glencolumbcille at £2 10s. a week. What did I do? I closed down Ardara. I did not cut off the workers in Ardara. On the contrary, I met the workers and discussed it with them. They said: "If you provide a mart where these idle looms are, we will undertake to sell our goods there direct. It will cost you nothing. Will you send us an expert once, twice or three times a year to examine the goods?" I did that, and these men are working; and they say they will get better results than ever they got from the management of the Gaeltacht industries under Deputy Lynch. That remains to be seen but, at all events, I am not going to pay wages, to keep services nominally going to bluff this House. The whole Gaeltacht Industries service was one huge bluff. Last year on the Estimate, I exposed one instance where £40,000 was earmarked for the purchase of yarns. That looked very good in the Estimate, and it possibly enabled Deputy Lynch to go to the country and to say: "Look at the amount of our Vote." What happened? £14,000 was paid for yarns and the remainder went back into the Exchequer. That was part of the bluff. It would have been better if none of that £14,000 had been spent.

We are told that we are killing the Gaeltacht. I have given you one key figure of £18,000 which goes to the Gaeltacht families, which goes direct to them without a penny of expense and it is worth the whole period of Deputy Lynch's activities in Gaeltacht industries. I am sorry he is not here to listen much as I regret to have to discuss it. We closed down certain centres for the making of socks. Why did we close them down? We lost £1,000 on socks alone in the clearing of "jobs"—4,377 dozen of "jobs." Deputy Dockrell will appreciate what I mean when I say that the "jobs" had to be "jobbed" out. What is the position that we have tried to get? We have tried to get certain centres which it would be possible for the local people to take over. There is a dual reason for that. In the first place, there will be local interest. In the second place, they will have possibly a local market which, under the system that is being run by the Gaeltacht industries, is not possible because we only sell to the wholesale trade. I think that is perfectly sound and right. They in turn sell to shops in the country. There is however a big market in nearly every area which can be secured for local production without the cost of transport and expenses. That does not mean that we are closing down any centre where we can produce goods for which we can get a market. I am glad to say that we are now getting really decent orders and that for the first time, we are inspiring confidence in the buyers that they will get a reasonably good service and that we will not have goods coming on the market of the interminable "job" types which were inherited from Deputy Lynch and his colleagues.

I spoke last night about truth. I would like some honesty in facing up to this business and in facing up to the other things that are so often trotted out here. If there was one crime of bluff, of incompetence, of bad management, of a case where a Minister did not know what was going on in his Department, it was the case in which Deputy Lynch was in charge of the Gaeltacht Services. I did not think that the speeches on this Estimate would have been such as would force me to say that. I had to make a very drastic change. Deputy McMenamin, in his stupid way, went on to talk about the men on top, and of how the men on top were not being interfered with and were still drawing their salaries. Those who are interested in the Gaeltacht know what has happened and if Deputy McMenamin had the slightest interest in what was going on he would also have known. Deputy Lynch discussed the question of the earnings and the utility of the earnings to the people of these areas. I agree entirely and it is my purpose to see as much of these earnings there as possible. I want to see the Gaeltacht industries expanded. I am satisfied that if we have any reasonable break of luck in our work, we will have a number of these centres opened again. We already have an expansion in the centres that did good work and orders are increasing for them. Perhaps, while I am on that point, I might deal with the centres we have closed so that what was done might go on record. We find an instance of the following nature in Keel, County Mayo. We paid £141 for management and £97 went to the workers. That was good, very good, as compared with Annagry where we paid a salary of £4 10s. a week with practically nothing coming to the workers. Two young boys were being trained to work at about 4/- a week.

Again, may I say that I have visited the areas in which I am interested. I have no interest in them except to see that they are developed. I have been all over Connemara. I have been all over Donegal and Mayo, and I am not talking at second-hand. I may say that I would like, as a real cure for the Gaeltacht to draw a red line from Donegal to Kerry around these areas on which it is a crime to have human beings living and to take the people who are there and put them on the ranch lands as we are trying to do to-day. In Cleggan, under Deputy Lynch, we paid £190 for management and £41 to the workers. That centre is closed down, for the simple reason that there was very little demand for the socks we got from them. I am not saying that we shall not open it again. I am hoping that I shall open all these centres again, but I shall not open them under the old conditions. I would prefer to send the people cheques from the Department for the £190 that went in management and dispense with the £14 that went to the workers in such a centre. The Inishere centre was closed down for the same reason as Cleggan. In Gorumna, one of the areas that needs money and employment more than any other part of the country, £186 was spent in management and £166 went to the workers. That centre would have been continued if we had been able to get orders for the type of sock produced. The centre in Cape Clear was closed, but has been reopened. We got a special order to keep the work going there. Adrigole is a centre that has been taken over, and that is being worked by a local committee, and I am reasonably satisfied that it will give more employment. In Deputy Lynch's last year £45 went to the manager and £5 to the workers. In Annagry, where tie-making was carried on, £363 went in management expenses, and £102 was paid over that period to the workers. I have already explained what had been done about Ardara and Kilcar. We cannot sell at the moment the embroidery work that was done there. In the case of Glencolumbcille, the work that used to be done there is now being given out in Kilcar. In Carraroe £133 was paid in the tweed department for management, and the workers got £42. In Tourmakeady, County Mayo, £133 was paid for management and £19 to the workers.

Mr. MacDermot

What period is the Minister dealing with?

Mr. Connolly

1932-33.

Mr. MacDermot

Could the Minister give the figures for the two succeeding years?

Mr. Connolly

I have not the list at hand, but I could get a list made out for the Deputy.

Mr. MacDermot

Deputy Lynch was not in charge in 1932-33.

Mr. Connolly

The arrangements for 1932-33 had already been made, and this deals with that period. It is reasonable to suppose that the fruition of the plans made for training would have made itself manifest at that time. The centre at Glengariff has been sold to a local body, and I think it will be quite satisfactory. In Ballydavid, County Kerry, £100 was paid for management and £16 to the workers. In that case the place was closed down because of the refusal of the workers to accept standard piece rates. In Meenagoland, County Donegal, there was a really good centre devoted entirely to hand-knitted goods. That locality is fairly well provided with work at the present time through a local contractor who has taken up that work. The centre at Keel, County Mayo, has been taken over and will be managed by a lady of experience who will run the centre much more effectively and cheaply than we could do it in the Department.

These are some of the reasons why we closed down centres, and I think any fair-minded Deputy will realise from what I have said that there was adequate justification for dealing ruthlessly with the management that we inherited. I am satisfied that, for good or ill, we have now got things going. We have got things cleaned up, or at least they are in the process of being cleaned up. It was a dirty and an awkward job to clean up, and I suggest that nothing has been closed down that could be kept open, bearing in mind the facts and figures that I have given. I leave it to the House at that.

Deputy Lynch knows the methods that are adopted with regard to housing. We know that the figures for housing do not show up, as regards the finished houses, for two years generally after sanction has been granted. It is true that we have provided £45,000 for our Estimate this year, but it is also true that we have allotted £72,354, of which £55,718 is in the way of free grants. The loans amount to £16,636, so that the fact that we have only estimated for £45,000 does not mean that there is any delay in sanctions, and, as Deputy Lynch said last night, it is the sanctions that count. We are not responsible for the delay in getting the work done. We have had considerable trouble in getting those to whom allocations, whether of grants or loans, had been made to finish the work. One of the chief difficulties has been in getting them to complete their outhouses. We have put on additional surveyors with a view to speeding up, not the allocation of the money, but the finishing of the work. We expect to have fully overcome any delay with regard to allocations by the end of the calendar year. We are in a fair way of getting things on a properly organised basis in the matter of deciding on the surveyors' reports both as to grants and loans.

Mr. Coburn

Who is primarily responsible for the delay in finishing the houses?

Mr. Connolly

The people who get the loans. We cannot finally clear them until our surveyors certify that the jobs have been completed. We encourage the people to get the houses finished as quickly as possible so that we can get them off our books. The kelp position was touched on by Deputy Lynch. He made his apologia for kelp or made my apologia for it. We know the condition of the iodine market. I can say there is no avenue of possibility for kelp that has not been explored. We are at present getting special investigations made all over America with regard to the use of kelp for chemical purposes other than iodine. Deputy McMenamin talked loosely and stupidly about the use of kelp for fertilisers and for feeding stuffs. We asked the Department of Agriculture twice this year to try to find a use for kelp as a fertiliser. The Department feels that certain disabilities would arise from using it. Its action is calculated to have, in certain respects, a deleterious effect on the soil. The matter is still under investigation to see if we can find any means that will enable us to give something for the kelp. I am quite prepared to lose a £1 or even £1 10s. 0d. a ton on kelp, but the position is that we cannot get rid of what we have got. It may interest Deputy Lynch to know that the 6,000 tons which he held is still on our hands. That might be quite easily understood in the present state of the iodine market, but conditions out of which certain contracts were fixed, verbal contracts mark you, leave us in the position that we hardly know where we stand with regard to the contractor concerned.

Mr. Dillon

What does the Minister mean by a verbal contract?

Mr. Connolly

A verbal contract is a verbal contract, and I think the Deputy understands what a verbal contract is.

Mr. Dillon

Not in such a thing, if it is for the sale of goods.

Mr. Connolly

Does the Deputy know that we have no real background to this contract? Our position as regards the conditions on which certain consignments of goods were sold is of the flimsiest kind.

Mr. Dillon

If the Minister has any allegations to make, he should make them.

Mr. Norton

The Deputy came in too late to hear them. They should be put in the industrial trust.

Mr. Connolly

There is no one who would welcome an inquiry into the Industrial Trust Company more than I would, and, more than that, I propose to have it.

Mr. Dillon

And such other enterprises?

Mr. Connolly

Into every enterprise with which I was ever concerned. The Deputy comes here and, without knowing anything whatever about his background, just flings out charges and attacks people. Of course, that is part of the Deputy's make-up, and I do not propose to deal with it. Deputy Dillon talked about different industries that he would like to see. He would like to see all sorts of industries in the Gaeltacht. I should like to see all sorts of industries in the Gaeltacht. Deputy Dillon said the other evening that he would not grow wheat or beet. He is perfectly entitled to express that view, but might I make a suggestion to him? He represents a Gaeltacht county. If he will not grow beet or wheat, what about considering a certain line of business in which he is. Why not consider coming up to Donegal with me, looking for a site and putting £10,000 into a factory? If the Deputy is not interested in one branch of the Government's policy, perhaps we could induce him to take an interest in another branch, which would make up for that. I make that offer in good faith.

Mr. Dillon

I do not believe you do.

Mr. Connolly

Whether you believe it or not, I have, at least, half-a-dozen friends in industry going over the Gaeltacht to find out where we can get industries going. Annagry factory, which under Deputy Lynch cost the State about £2,000, has been closed down, but I have induced one man to go in there and open a carpet factory.

I am trying to induce another manufacturer to go into a place in Crolly, in the Deputy's constituency, which has been closed down for years.

Mr. Dillon

I have often referred to it in this House.

Mr. Connolly

I do not say that I will succeed. I succeeded in one case and a relatively poor man was willing to put up £5,000 for the Crolly venture because he is interested in the language and believes, with me, that we ought to do what we can for the Gaeltacht. I put a reasonable proposition to the Deputy who represents that constituency. He knows various branches of industry — textile and otherwise—and this would be a gesture which would off-set his attitude in regard to the other part of the Government's policy. I do not think that it is worth while going into all the raimeis used by Deputy McMenamin. The House heard it and probably understood it. Deputy Kissane spoke of the piling up of the stocks in the depôt. He is quite right in saying that these stocks were piled up under the old administration. I have dealt with that. With regard to the number of houses built in the past and the number of sanctions, I could, if I wished, make a certain amount of political capital out of that. However, I do not think that that would be fair or quite honest because, as Deputy Lynch said last night, the year in which a house is finished does not always represent the year in which the spade work in connection with that house was done. Many of the houses in respect of which sanction had been given in Deputy Lynch's time were only completed in our first year of office. I have to take part in politics, but all I can say is——

Mr. Dillon

That you are not like other men.

Mr. Connolly

A list will be published showing the various periods during which sanctions were given and houses finished, with particulars of the expenditure. That will give a complete picture of what went on in the various years. I do not think there is anything which I can now add. I shall go through the report of the debate when it appears. I have had to give the reasons for closing down certain centres. I should like to have avoided that. Most of these centres are in process of being cleaned up. When that is finished, those which can be opened up will be opened up. We are now in a reasonable position to produce the goods the people want and which can be produced in the homes and in the centres. I agree with Deputy Dillon that we can only hope to find a market for quality goods from the Gaeltacht. It is not a question of making money or saving money but it is a question of relativity as between the money the workers are going to get and what the management is going to cost. The year before we came into office, £6,000 was paid in wages. In the following year, we paid £12,000 and, in the year after that, £10,000. Last year, we paid only about £7,000 in industries. I am hoping that that will expand. There are indications that it will if we get on sound lines. I think we are getting on those lines. We are cleaning up the dirty mess which was left us with bad stock, job lots and "seconds," and we are getting away from the hopeless, chaotic state of affairs which we inherited. When that is done, I am reasonably hopeful that we will do a certain amount of work in those centres. In my opening statement, I referred to the work of the other Departments. If Deputies will examine the relief work grant and the activities of other Departments, including the Department of Education in respect of scholarships, they will realise that much more is being done for the Gaeltacht than was ever done.

Mr. Dillon

I put a specific question to the Minister, to which I should like an answer, if he can conveniently give it. Last year, he spoke of spending £56,000 on turf in the Gaeltacht areas. He said it had been calculated that that amount of turf would be purchased. Has he at hand any figures which would show how his prognostication worked out?

Mr. Connolly

The Turf Development Board gave me last year an indication of the contracts they had made for turf in the Gaeltacht areas. I did not say that we were spending that amount. I said that it was anticipated that contracts amounting to £58,000 or £59,000 —I am not sure of the figure—would go to the Gaeltacht. I do not know what the result of that was, but I believe that most of these contracts were carried through. It was not a question of a Government Department spending money. It was a question of purchase by the Turf Development Board. I have not the exact figure spent by the Turf Development Board in preparation for that work in the Gaeltacht, but I think it was around £7,800 or £7,900.

Mr. Dillon

If the Minister can conveniently get the figure later of what actually was spent in relation to the estimates which he gave for turf purchase in the Gaeltacht, I should be glad to have it.

Mr. Connolly

I shall try to get it for the Deputy.

Mr. Dockrell

The Minister did not deal with the £15,000 credit produced by the under-estimate of the sales——

Mr. Connolly

If Deputy Dockrell would permit me, I should prefer to leave that matter over until the stocktaking and the accounts are completed, in view of the fact that a balance sheet will shortly be issued. I thought I made it clear that we started last year, for the first time, to get really commercial accounts. We had a period of about six months or more in which to clean up the position. These commercial accounts have to be agreed with the Department of Finance, and if the Deputy does not object, I should prefer to leave the matter over until I have these complete figures.

Mr. Dockrell

Are we going to see at a future date a balance sheet of how the Gaeltacht industries for last year really did turn out? It is a mockery discussing the matter here without knowing the stock and without having some of the vital figures. I quite agree with what the Minister says. At the same time, he should remember that he has chosen the time at which to bring forward this estimate.

Mr. Connolly

I cannot commit myself definitely to say if this commercial balance-sheet will be published. It is my intention to have it published. I presume there will be no difficulty with regard to the Department of Finance in having it published. The accounts have to be audited and then submitted to the Department of Finance. I do not anticipate any difficulty about publication. It is my intention to have a clean slate shown as regards every item of expenditure in the Gaeltacht and in these services, so that Deputies and everybody will know what goes to the workers and what goes on expenditure in the management and every other detail. Deputy Dockrell can take it from me that, as far as I am concerned, I am anxious to have the commercial accounts dealt with as he and I would like to see them in a commercial firm.

Question put.

The Committee divided: Tá, 29; Níl, 56.

Tá

• Beckett, James Walter.
• Belton, Patrick.
• Bennett, George Cecil.
• Burke, James Michael.
• Coburn, James.
• Cosgrave, William T.
• Costello, John Aloysius.
• Desmond, William.
• Dillon, James M.
• Dockrell, Henry Morgan.
• Doyle, Peadar S.
• Keating, John.
• Lynch, Finian.
• MacDermot, Frank.
• McFadden, Michael Og.
• McGilligan, Patrick.
• McGovern, Patrick.
• McGuire, James Ivan.
• McMenamin, Daniel.
• Morrisroe, James.
• Mulcahy, Richard.
• Nally, Martin.
• O'Mahony, The.
• O'Neill, Eamonn.
• O'Reilly, John Joseph.
• O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
• O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
• Redmond, Bridget Mary.
• Rogers, Patrick James.

Níl

• Aiken, Frank.
• Bartley, Gerald.
• Blaney, Neal.
• Boland, Gerald.
• Boland, Patrick.
• Bourke, Daniel.
• Brady, Brian.
• Breathnach, Cormac.
• Breen, Daniel.
• Briscoe, Robert.
• Cleary, Mícheál.
• Concannon, Helena.
• Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
• Crowley, Timothy.
• Daly, Denis.
• Derrig, Thomas.
• De Valera, Eamon.
• Everett, James.
• Flinn, Hugo V.
• Flynn, John.
• Flynn, Stephen.
• Fogarty, Andrew.
• Geoghegan, James.
• Gibbons, Seán.
• Goulding, John.
• Hales, Thomas.
• Harris, Thomas.
• Hayes, Seán.
• Houlihan, Patrick.
• Keely, Séamus P.
• Kehoe, Patrick.
• Kelly, James Patrick.
• Kissane, Eamonn.
• Lemass, Seán F.
• Little, Patrick John.
• Lynch, James B.
• Maguire, Ben.
• Maguire, Conor Alexander.
• Moore, Séamus.
• Norton, William.
• O'Briain, Donnchadh.
• O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
• O'Dowd, Patrick.
• O'Grady, Seán.
• O'Reilly, Matthew.
• Pattison, James P.
• Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
• Ryan, James.
• Ryan, Martin.
• Ryan, Robert.
• Sheridan, Micheal.
• Smith, Patrick.
• Traynor, Oscar.
• Victory, James.
• Walsh, Richard.
• Ward, Francis C.

Tellers:— Tá, Deputies Doyle and Bennett; Níl, Deputies Little and Smith.

Question declared lost.

Vote put and agreed to.

Progress reported. The Committee to sit again.