I move amendment No. 1:—
To delete lines 31 and 32 on page 2.
This is merely a drafting amendment. These words are not necessary.
Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) (No. 2) Bill—Money Resolution. - Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) (No. 2) Bill, 1935—Committee.
the expression "the Act of 1933" means the Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Act, 1933 (No. 43 of 1933);
the expression "agricultural land" does not include any land forming part of a railway or a canal nor any land in a scheduled urban district which was, at the passing of the Act of 1898, situate in an urban sanitary district, but subject to those exceptions and to any declaration made under the next following sub-section of this section, includes all land which is described as land in the valuation lists under the Valuation Acts and is situate in the rating area of the council of a county or of a scheduled urban district;
Amendment put and agreed to.
I move amendment No. 2:—
In line 51, to delete the word "described" and substitute the word "entered".
This is also a drafting amendment.
Amendment put and agreed to.
Section 1, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Sections 2 and 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
SECTION 4.
Question proposed: "That Section 4 stand part of the Bill."
On this section, perhaps the Minister would explain why £100,000 less is being provided for the relief of rates on agricultural land this year.
I think that was gone into on the Second Reading.
I do not agree, Sir. Again, I think the Minister should address himself to this subject. He knows as well as anybody else the position in which the agricultural community is placed. At the danger of repetition, I would point out what I have brought before him on other occasions. The Minister quite recently instructed his Commissioner in South Tipperary to find out why certain rent collectors were failing to collect all the rents in respect of labourers' cottages in the area. A week or so ago, the Press reported that four of these collectors reported to the Commissioner that they could not hope to collect these rents. The first reported that he could not do it, because the labourers had not the money and that the average wages they received was 8/- to 10/- per week. The second reported that a number of labourers depended on home assistance or unemployment assistance for their maintenance. A third reported that the farmers in his area were in such a condition that many of them were six months in arrears in paying their labourers' wages. A fourth pointed out that certain industries that existed formerly in farmers' houses had since been discontinued and that the labourers had no income. That is simply a reflex of the condition of the agricultural industry in general. It is in a year in which these things are brought directly under his notice from an area like South Tipperary—conditions that are only indicative of the position in many parts of the country, and that have been explicitly brought to the notice of the Executive Council in other counties, notably in Wexford—it is in a year in which such conditions manifest themselves that the Minister is reducing the amount of money that is to be given in relief of rates on agricultural land. We had a long discussion on various aspects of the Budget on Committee Stage the other day, and it was brought to a close unceremoniously by a three-days guillotine motion. This is part of the Budget taxation. It is taking £100,000 out of the pockets of the ratepayers of the country to patch up the financial situation the Minister for Finance is dealing with. It is being taken from that section of the community who are bearing the brunt of the Minister's economic war. This additional taxation of £100,000 comes on top of £117,000 in the shape of rates extracted from another section of the agricultural community to meet particular payments in respect of land annuities for the particular reasons disclosed by the rate collectors.
I should like the Minister to make some statement in connection with this section. The Minister, being at the head of the Local Government of the country, should try to look matters fairly and squarely in the face, and put a stop to this demand for £100,000 from the agricultural community. The stopping of this £100,000 can have only one result, and that is to lead to the breakdown, or partial breakdown, of local services throughout the country. The Minister must have his reports from his own officials in Tipperary as to what is happening. The same is happening all over the country. The Minister must realise that it is unfair and unjust, and must have a very detrimental effect on the local government services of the country to stop this £100,000 from them. There is no doubt that the Minister for Local Government is taking this course on the initiative of the Minister for Finance. I believe that is the pivot on which the whole thing hangs. I appeal to the Minister who has these things in his control not to allow this state of affairs to continue. He is charged with the administration of the public services. He ought to realise that the particular section of the community affected are unable to meet these demands.
I pointed out before, and I would like to point out again, that it is not that rates are not being paid. There are some rates which are being paid by the farmers in South Tipperary even better than ever before. This deduction this year in the Agricultural Grant is made to make good the non-payment of land annuities which is a course, simply shifting back the burden on to the farmers. I said before it was time to divorce this question of the non-payment of the Agricultural Grant from the non-payment of the land annuities. The Minister then said it would require legislation to do that. But even so we can enact legislation pretty rapidly in this House.
Not with the Deputy in opposition.
When it is a question that affects the amelioration of the farming community the Government are very slow about it. I would remind the Minister that when his Party were on this side of the House they professed great sympathy for the over-burdened farmers, and they professed their readiness not only to reduce rates but to wipe them out altogether. What have they done since they came into power? They have piled up additional rates upon the community and, now, they are stopping £100,000 from the Agricultural Grant. We all want to see the social services of the country carried on. Having been engaged for many years in local government affairs I say the people are making the very strongest efforts they can to meet their obligations in connection with the payment of rates. But when the burden is too great and the demands are too heavy you cannot expect the people to be able to meet them. I ask the Minister for Local Government and Public Health to look seriously into this matter and even if it needs legislation to divorce one from the other, it ought to be done and done without delay.
I was not far wrong in my surmise that Deputy Mulcahy greatly wanted another opportunity for discussing the economic war. We have no objection to his discussing it on this or on any other Bill. We are always prepared to meet discussion of that question, if the Ceann Comhairle is willing. It is now becoming a kind of hardy annual.
You do not really want to discuss it.
Yes, I say we are quite happy to have discussions on every aspect of it if the Ceann Comhairle is willing.
Even on a section like this?
Just as Deputy Mulcahy introduced it here.
I would not have been half as mild if I wanted to deal with the economic war. I would not place the Minister in a position which he could not understand.
I know the position as well as anybody. I know it as well as Deputy Curran, who is more intimate with the farming community than I am. I say honestly, were it not for the campaign for the non-payment of annuities there would not be in certain counties rates due which are due there this year. In counties where that campaign was for a time successful, and where they have had additional rates upon them, in consequence of that campaign, the rates in many cases have since been paid, but they are paid at more expense to the individuals and to the State itself. That expense comes back again upon the individuals or the State in one form or another. Deputy Curran knows that as well as I do.
Take the latest illustration—the County Westmeath. It was the most backward of the Twenty-Six Counties in the payment of its rates. Then, when the County Council was got rid of, and a Commissioner appointed, the rates came in without the asking. In a few weeks after the Commissioner was appointed, payments came in at a rate not previously known in the County Westmeath. The money is there, and there is no difficulty in getting the rates collected when the ratepayers know they must be paid. The ratepayers were well able to pay, and there is the general belief that the Council had stopped the ratepayers from paying up. The same is true of South Tipperary and of other counties. The rates are higher in some counties than they would normally be, because of the position created there—that is going back some years—but we are getting back to normal. Next year the rates will have to meet the annuities position where it exists, and there is no intention, so far as I know, of altering the law with regard to the guarantee. The late Government operated that section of the Land Act and penalised various counties where there was default of payment. There was then no demand from Deputy Mulcahy or from Deputy Curran for an alteration of the law.
The amount was not much then.
The Act operated in the same way then that it does now. I should, of course, say that there was no campaign being carried on then against the payment of the annuities. At that time the full amount of the annuities had to be paid. Now the amounts to be paid are only half what they were then.
They are about three times more now, and the Minister knows that.
I do not know anything of the kind. What the Deputy has said is not true. The annuities have been halved.
But England is collecting the whole of them.
That question has been debated here ad nauseam, but the Deputy will never convince the House that he is right on that.
I do not suppose that I will convince those who sit on the Government Benches, but the country is convinced.
The country is not convinced, and if it were we would not be sitting here.
How many deputations had you from your own farmer-supporters on the question?
None.
Deputations to the President?
I thought the Deputy meant deputations to myself.
No. They went to the President and refused to meet Ministers.
At any rate, if that is the Deputy's view it is not the view of the majority in the country or in this House.
You will have to meet that view before very long.
We met that view in the local elections in the rural areas in 1934, and we swept the rural areas. I suppose the Deputy will admit that?
I always admit the truth.
These deductions have to be made so long as the law remains as it is. I see no reason for any change in the law in the near future. Therefore, these deductions will continue to be made. The loss will be the loss of the counties and the individuals concerned. They will have to bear the additional cost of collecting the rates in the way that they are being collected. As regards the annuities, the losses will be losses suffered by the counties concerned. When these moneys are repaid, the counties concerned will eventually get the benefit. If the people are wise they will pay their annuities and their rates promptly and not be putting additional expense and trouble on themselves or on the State, which has been obliged to indulge in this expense in the last couple of years.
The Minister, in dealing with this important matter, should not mislead himself by any consideration of a county like Westmeath. Westmeath got rid of the services of a Fianna Fáil county council, and no doubt things are being carried on a little better there now. It has also to be borne in mind that Westmeath is one of the counties the did not dip very deeply into the Fianna Fáil mess of pottage—of subsidised crops. Westmeath is also one of the counties that is peculiar for this: that while it did not take the same amount of subsidies from the public purse for its agriculture, it managed, nevertheless, to add to the number of agricultural labourers given permanent employment there. It also increased the number of agricultural labourers getting temporary employment. It is not in the same position as, say, Tipprary, where, in spite of subsidies, the number of agricultural labourers permanently employed has been reduced as compared with, say, 1931, and where the additional number of agricultural labourers getting temporary employment is only about half the number that got the same kind of employment in Westmeath during the last three or four years. Westmeath is also in this position, that its total warrant for last year was less than for the year before, whereas in the case of North Tipperary and South Tipperary the warrant for last year showed an increase of £6,000 in the case of the former and of nearly £30,000 in the case of South Tipperary. The warrants for both North and South Tipperary must be very much increased this year as a result of the withdrawal of this £100,000.
With regard to the land annuities, I have no desire to discuss the economic war, but it would be getting away from realities entirely if it were not pointed out that the economic war touches everything that we discuss here. The Minister has not produced any argument to show why additional taxation to the tune of £100,000 should be put on the ratepayers by the withdrawal of that sum. Of course the financial situation, the discussion of which the Minister for Finance had to close down in such a summary fashion in the last few days, has to be bolstered up by stretching out the hands of the tax gatherer over the borders of ordinary revenue by taking this additional sum of £100,000 from the taxpayers.
The effect of this is to cut down relief of rates on agricultural land by £100,000. I wonder by what method of reasoning the Minister can conscientiously support that deduction? When the Minister was out of office he, in common with the whole of his Party, considered that in the situation then existing it was necessary, in order to save agriculture from utter ruin, to remit all rates on agricultural land. I think it was in the beginning of 1931 that the Fianna Fáil Party introduced a motion here to relieve the rating on agricultural land by the provision of an additional sum of £1,000,000. It was estimated that, with the other grants, that would relieve the rates on agricultural land to the extent of £2,200,000. The Minister, during his first year in office, gave, in fact, an agricultural grant totalling £2,200,000. Now he proposes to cut that down to £1,900,000 or thereabouts. Is it his case that agriculture does not need relief as much now as it did in 1931, or that poverty has so increased in the country that the Exchequer, in view of its commitments to other sections of the community, cannot afford to grant the same rating relief to agricultural land that his Party considered was the very minimum that should be given to it when they were out of office, and that the Minister actually gave during his first year of office?
The Minister knows that the economic war in 1932-33 was not as severe on the people as it was in 1934 or as it is this year. Not only are conditions made harder every day we carry on the economic war, but the cumulative effect is becoming greater. I would like to know the arguments for a reduction in the agricultural grant. I heard the Minister saying that the land annuities had been halved. He knows perfectly well that they have not been halved. On paper they have been halved, and, if agriculture was given back the entire amount that the British are collecting by way of special tariffs, I would admit they were halved, but not until then. The Minister knows that for 20 years there are payments of £600,000 on account of local loans to be met. He knows that these are being paid to his Department now by local authorities and by individuals. But he does not pay that money out. He knows that the British are collecting the £600,000 from agricultural produce. That £600,000 is an additional burden on agriculture, compared with the time that the Minister said there should be relief of rates on agricultural land to the minimum extent of £2,200,000. The total amount collected by the British from agriculture is in the neighbourhood of £5,000,000. That was not being collected by the British when the Minister said that there should be relief of rates to the extent of £2,200,000.
The economic war does not come into this Vote. The Minister said certain things about the economic war, and Deputy Belton said the opposite. That settles the matter. Let us now get back to Section 4.
The Minister is reducing the relief for agricultural rating, and I am curious to know what case he will attempt to make for doing so. His colleague on the Government Benches, the Minister for Education, assured his constituents in Carlow-Kilkenny that when his Party came into power no rates would be charged on agricultural land. The Minister was at one with him in that, and so were Deputies who are going to vote for this reduction of £100,000 for the relief of agricultural rates. I took the Minister's speech to mean that when the storm about refusing to pay the annuities has passed, and when we are back to normal, so much will not be withheld, and the Guarantee Fund will not be raided in order to meet deficiencies of land purchase annuities. The Minister knows very well that the conditions obtaining are responsible for the deficiencies, and for the difficulties that confront local authorities in this respect. He mentioned that his predecessor allowed that section of the Land Act to operate, and that he insisted on the deficiencies in the Land Purchase Fund being made good out of the Guarantee Fund. I have an open mind on that. Even if we were back to normal, the time may not have yet arrived when that section could be dispensed with. I concede that. We all know the local prejudices and difficulties that would confront the Land Commission if it had to collect the annuities directly. It just brings on a certain amount of pressure. I daresay the idea of the Government, as with their predecessors, and I must admit amongst people closely associated with local government, is that by having the section operating it brings home to the people that any loss by and attempts at conspiracy or boycotting of sales cannot be borne by the Land Commission but must be spread over the community. I admit that there is a good deal to be said for that, even in normal times, and consequently I am not going to argue it against the Minister or the section.
The Minister will admit that the local authority with which I am associated has faced up to its responsibilities very well. A couple of months ago it raised a large overdraft which has been since reduced according to the ebb and flow of the rates. The Minister boasted some time ago that they swept the local elections. They did not sweep the body with which I am associated, but that body is prepared to co-operate with this or any other Government in carrying on local government. When it comes to business it is not politics counts. You cannot do business with politics. I am assuring the Minister that the body with which I am associated is prepared to co-operate with him or with any Minister, but I say that the conditions under which agriculture is working are such that it is being run at a loss. I am not now speaking of what are called ranchers. I am speaking of ordinary working tillage farmers, and mixed farmers, big and small. I say that there is no margin left and that agriculture is in a considerably worse condition in County Dublin than it has been in the memory of anyone connected with the industry in the county. There is no need to prove that.
I will give one instance. There was a change in the system. Deputy O'Reilly and Deputy Kelly are aware that a similar position confronts people in Meath. We took a census of the fat stock in County Dublin ready for the butcher this month. There are slightly over 5,000, and licences for only 411. When the Minister talked of a grant of £2,200,000 for agriculture, every beast fattened in the county had a licence. The only hall-mark required was that it should be fat, when any. port in the country would take it and ship it to the British market. That is not the position now. We can only ship 411 animals. What will we do with the others? The first money for grazing comes to the County Dublin in July, because Dublin is the earliest grass county in Ireland.
It is one of the three or four grass fattening counties, and all we can get for the month of July—our heaviest month—is 411, or roughly 4 per cent. of the licences that, it is presumed, will be granted. I ask the Minister to consider that, which is the practical proposition before us. Some people will say: "Why do you not till your land, and you will not require these licences?" We do till our land, but we could produce in County Dublin enough food for the whole of the Free State. If every other county did likewise, what would we do with the produce? Even on these 411 animals, we will pay £6 each. That £6 had not to be paid when the Minister was shouting that the poor farmer was down and out. There was a free market and that £6 had not to be paid on the 5,000 or whatever the number was. Not only that, but there was a free market for various other lines which we exported from County Dublin. There is no free market now. I should like to hear from somebody on the Government Benches some justification for this proposal. There is no justification on the ground that we have got commensurate relief otherwise. It cannot be shown that we are better off now than we were three or four years ago, and the Minister said then that we could not meet our bills. Nothing has intervened since to improve our situation. If the Minister said that the country is so poor now that it must give £300,000 or £400,000 less, he would be telling the truth, and I would agree with him. That would be a justification for reducing the Agricultural Grant. I challenge him or any colleague of his to give that excuse. This is a march, blindfolded, to bankruptcy.
Section 4 put and declared carried.
Sections 5 and 6 agreed to.
SECTION 7.
(1) In this section— the expression "the qualifying period" means the period which began on the 1st day of January, 1934, and ended on the 31st day of December, 1934, and the expression "adult workman" means a male person who, on the 1st day of January, 1934, was not less than seventeen years of age nor more than seventy years of age and who was not and whose wife was not, at any time during the qualifying period, the rated occupier of agricultural land the valuation or the aggregate of the valuations of which during the qualifying period was equal to or greater than five pounds.
On behalf of Deputy Brennan, I move amendment No. 3:—
In sub-section (1), line 30, to delete all words after the words "seventy years of age" to end of sub-section.
As the section stands, it would mean that the employment allowance would not be made to a farmer in respect of a male person employed, if that person or his wife was at any time during the qualifying period the rated occupier of agricultural land the valuation of which was equal to or greater than £5. It seems to me that a small farmer with a valuation of £5, or a little more, would in nearly every part of the country in present circumstances be entitled to get some kind of benefit under the Unemployment Assistance Act. I should like the Minister to verify that. Here, the Minister says to a farmer: "You will not get the benefit of the employment allowance if you engage on your farm a person who, though looking for agricultural work, is the owner of a holding of a valuation of £5 or more, or whose wife is such." I think that that is a very unreasonable restriction to place on farmers in regard to the selection of their own employees. It seems to me extraordinary that a person who is probably entitled to some grant under the Unemployment Assistance Act should be prejudiced in respect of employment by a proposal like this.
If this amendment were adopted, it would mean that the rated occupier of a holding of a valuation up to £20 could get the allowance on his own holding and work for somebody else who would also get the allowance in respect of his employment. I do not think that that would be fair. I heard the Deputy comment earlier to-day on the number of unemployed agricultural labourers. I think that it would be fairer that the occupier of a £5 holding should get the allowance which is to be given him under the Bill and work his own holding and that the person who wants additional assistance should take people who have not holdings of their own than that people who have holdings which might be valued up to £20 should be employed. The idea underlying the Bill is that the holding should be judged according to the number of persons who get a living out of it, whether they be members of the owner's family or his employees, and that every holder should get an equitable share of the amount allowed under this section. The adoption of the amendment would not, I think, improve the Bill. It would have the opposite effect, in my opinion. We will get a more just distribution of the money available by adhering to the terms of the section. Agricultural labourers would not, if this amendment were passed, have the employment available to them that would otherwise be available.
I do not think there was any use in the Minister saying that my proposal would allow people, who would become automatically entitled to their primary grant, to leave their own holding, or earn the grant in respect of their own holding, and then go and work on somebody else's holding. The proposal means just what it says there: that is, to prevent a situation arising by which a person, who has a holding of, say, £5 5s. valuation, is prejudiced in respect of getting employment by a provision which is called an employment allowance. The Minister knows that the difference between the primary allowance and the supplemental allowance last year was only 2/-, practically, for every county; so that the, as you might say, unwarranted income that a person of £5 valuation might get, when you take into account the difference between the supplemental and the primary grant, would be a little over £5 at 2/- a £. In other words, the difference would be 10/- and, because he gets 10/- more than he would get on his valuation on the supplemental grant, he is to be precluded and prejudiced from getting employment by, say, some local farmer who was induced to take some other person in his place so that he could get the particular relief in rates he would get under the employment allowance. It must be remembered that the man who is prejudiced here, more than likely, is a person for whom, by reason of his position there, the State has provided unemployment assistance—one of these people who, the Minister for Industry and Commerce was declaring the other day, has been suddenly thrown on our political screen through the Unemployment Assistance Act, great numbers of whom in the West of Ireland and other places came on our register and are in receipt of unemployment assistance.
I hold that what the Minister is proposing is wrong. There might be some question as to the limit to be proposed, and it may be that the limit would be required to be put there, but whatever the Minister might substitute as a limit there would not drive him to consider what the effect of this unemployment allowance has been at all. However, perhaps we shall have a word to say about that on the section. I submit, however, that it is utterly wrong to have a provision in the Bill that prejudices a person, for whom the State has provided unemployment assistance, because he is not sufficiently employed.
With regard to Deputy Mulcahy's point, I suggest that a man with a holding of a valuation of anything over £5 in this country would not be a man who would be looking for permanent employment at agriculture. It is only the type of man looking for part-time employment and getting part-time employment who would not be eligible in that way for any reduction.
He would be precluded in that way without having it here in the section.
The Minister is not prepared to allow the actual circumstances of the person to dictate the situation. A statute must be passed to prevent him getting any chance.
I think that Deputy Harris's remark, so far as it means anything, is actually in support of the amendment. I suggest that the Minister might increase that £5. After all, land of a valuation of £5 is a very small piece of land.
I do not see any need to put it in when he would be only temporary. I think it would not affect the matter.
Nevertheless, he is a person who is probably being assisted under the Unemployment Assistance Act all the year round, except for the employment period.
The effect of the amendment is to delete any reference to the valuation. I think that the point made by Deputy Harris is that a man with a certain valuation will surely have a bit of work to do for himself and cannot go into employment for the whole year, and that if he is not a full-time man there is no relief. Accordingly, I think that Deputy Harris's comments on this are 100 per cent. in favour of the amendment. In any case, I do not think there could be any abuse of that allowance that would make it worth while for the Minister to enshrine it in an Act.
I think that, in justice, it is necessary to have that limitation there. I see Deputy Belton's point, but it does not exclude any bona fide and genuine agricultural labourer form employment if his valuation is under £5. If his valuation is over £5 he would not call himself an agricultural labourer. I think that in most of the counties of Ireland a man with a holding of a valuation of over £5 would call himself a farmer and not an agricultural labourer. Of course he might go, in some periods of the year, to work for a farmer with a larger holding in the neighbourhood, but then he would not be entitled.
Then there is no need to include it in the section at all.
I think it is necessary. We have been forced to that view as a result of our experience of certain claims that have been made.
I suggest to the Minister that if such claims have been made they were bogus claims.
I should like to know from the Minister what is the average valuation of holdings in the whole country. As my information goes, the average valuation is somewhere about £10, although some holdings are as low as £1 and, of course, we know that in some of them the valuation would be up to hundreds of pounds. In this connection, I think that Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney made a case last year both against the age of 70 years and against the retention of £5 as the limitation. Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney mentioned some cases where men of 70 years of age were employed and could get better employment than anything they might make out of their own farms. He had in mind the cases of men who were accustomed to go to fairs for an employer, and things of that sort. He pointed out that these men were very suitable for that work and that, in certain cases, they had never worked on their own farms. There was another case in the West, which was brought to my notice, where a man with a holding of his own was employed continuously by another farmer in the district. The farmer in question had from six to ten men employed, but this one particular man, with a small holding of a valuation of between £5 and £10, was the most suitable man for his work. In such a case, I suggest that it would hardly be just, either to the man or to the farmer concerned, that he would not be regarded as one of those entitled to get employment on the land. In the first place, that man is essential to the farmer, and whatever advantage the farmer may get under this measure would not justify him in dispensing with the man's services. On the other hand, the farmer is giving that man employment all the year round, and still he is not entitled to get this reduction in the rates. The result is that it creates a good deal of discontent and dissatisfaction all around. In these two cases, the position is that these are practically the two best men they have got and they are not entitled to get the reduction to which the employment they are giving really entitles them. In these two cases, then, there is certainly an inequitable provision in the Act, and I think the Minister ought to reconsider it.
I suggest to the Minister that the question of valuation will adjust itself. Unless there is full-time employment, there is no benefit. Then, the higher the valuation an employee has on his own land, obviously, the less time he can give to an employer. Accordingly, I suggest that the thing will adjust itself.
It could happen that a man could have a holding with a valuation of £7 or £8, and he might not be industrious enough to work his own holding, and would let it to somebody else and then work constantly for a farmer. I think that that is a case that requires consideration.
There would be very few such cases.
These cases do arise, and for that reason I think the Minister was right.
There are very few cases of that kind.
I suggest that the case which the leader of the Opposition has put up is probably an exception. I imagine there would not be many cases, if you take the whole country, where a man having a holding of over £5 valuation would prefer to go around and work for somebody else. The Deputy has a case or two in mind, but I think they would be exceptions. I am not closely acquainted with agriculture myself, and do not know what the conditions would be in counties where those holdings are in the majority. Take Donegal, for instance. I think 85 per cent. of the holdings in Donegal would be under £10 valuation. I do not know how many there are in Mayo, but probably about 80 per cent. would be under £10 valuation. The number of men in those small holdings who would be prepared to give up their holdings and work as whole-time employees for somebody else would surely be very small, and the number who would be prepared to do that over the whole country would also be very small. Therefore, if there is any hardship on anybody I would say it is infinitesimal, and no bona fide agricultural labourer is being excluded. A man on a holding of £5 valuation would regard himself as a small farmer and not as an agricultural labourer. There are men unquestionably on holdings with a valuation of £5, or maybe more, who have special qualifications—they may, perhaps, be good after horses, or good as ploughmen—and who will work for neighbours during a period of the year, but the period during which they work for neighbours would not entitle a labourer to claim unemployment allowance in any case, so there is, therefore, nothing lost.
The question of valuation would adjust itself, and people on holdings with high valuations would be excluded.
I think the House ought to be divided on this amendment, because, in my opinion a person who is entitled to public assistance under the Unemployment Assistance Act is, by the section as it stands at present, prejudiced in getting employment, and I do not think he should be. If it is necessary to have a legislative clause binding certain classes of persons it ought to be fixed at a point substantially above the point at which the State would come in to assist a man by giving him public funds.
Question put: "That the words proposed to be deleted stand."
The Committee divided: Tá, 53; Níl, 24.
Tá
- Aiken, Frank.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Brian.
- Breathnach, Cormac.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Browne, William Frazer.
- Carty, Frank.
- Concannon, Helena.
- Cooney, Eamonn.
- Corbett, Edmond.
- Crowley, Timothy.
- Daly, Denis.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Doherty, Hugh.
- Dowdall, Thomas P.
- Everett, James.
- Flynn, Stephen.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Gibbons, Seán.
- Goulding, John.
- Harris, Thomas.
- Keely, Séamus P.
- Kelly, James Patrick.
- Kelly, Thomas.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, Michael.
- Kissane, Eamonn.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Lynch, James B.
- Maguire, Ben.
- Maguire, Conor Alexander.
- Moane, Edward.
- Moore, Séamus.
- O Briain, Donnchadh.
- O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
- O'Dowd, Patrick.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- Pattison, James P.
- Pearse, Margaret Mary.
- Rice, Edward.
- Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Martin.
- Ryan, Robert.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Victory, James.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Níl
- Belton, Patrick.
- Coburn, James.
- Cosgrave, William T.
- Costello, John Aloysius.
- Curran, Richard.
- Dockrell, Henry Morgan.
- Doyle, Peadar S.
- Esmonde, Osmond Grattan.
- Fagan, Charles.
- Finlay, John.
- Fitzgerald, Desmond.
- Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
- Lavery, Cecil.
- MacEoin, Seán.
- McGilligan, Patrick.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- Nally, Martin.
- O'Higgins, Thomas Francis.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, The.
- O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Redmond, Bridget Mary.
- Rice, Vincent.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith; Níl: Deputies Doyle and O'Leary.
Motion declared carried.
Question proposed: "That Section 7 stand part of the Bill."
On the section, the idea I take it behind this employment allowance is to make use of the Agricultural Grant to try and increase agricultural employment in the country. I would like to ask the Minister if he has anything to say with regard to the effect of the grant in that respect? At first when we got the 1933 figures for agricultural employment and now when we have got the 1934 figures we have been pointing out in spite of the huge subsidies to certain classes of crops in the country that there is very little increase in agricultural employment and particularly very little increase in the province in which we might expect the greatest increase—that is Leinster. There were 158 fewer employed in the province of Leinster in 1934 than in 1931 in spite of the fact that the greater part of the subsidised crops is grown in the province of Leinster. With this employment allowance in addition now, it seems to me that the amount of the primary grant in respect of relief of rates on agricultural land generally all over the country amounted to £2 per head of the total population engaged in agriculture. The employment grant in Leinster, that part of the country which was the place where this subsidised employment was given to agricultural labourers, amounts to an additional £1 per head of the population engaged in agriculture. It diminished in Mayo to £1 for eight people and in Leitrim to £1 for nine people. A sum of £1 in respect of every person engaged in agriculture has been put into the province of Leinster. It has been put in in this forced way as an inducement to persons to employ labour. That inducement added to these subsidised crops has brought us this result that there are 158 fewer persons employed in the province. I would like to ask the Minister whether he has considered the effect of this as an inducement to employ people at all? It does not appear to have this effect. It appears to be a family allowance in respect of the male members of the family of farmers in fairly reasonable circumstances. The person who has a valuation of less than £20 will not get this relief. The farmer with the valuation of £20 and upwards gets this additional relief in respect of every male member of his family or of his permanent employees.
If we consider the figures that the Minister for Industry and Commerce has given in respect of agricultural employment in the country as a whole we will see the position. The Minister tells us that there were 16,000 more people employed in agriculture in 1934 than in 1931, but 15,000 of these are members of the farmers' own families. I wonder what has happened? The farmer with a valuation of £20 and upwards has every male of his family stuck down on the list as engaged in agriculture. Is not that what has happened? It has brought about this increase in the number of people employed. This employment allowance has been the inducement given to the farmer to do this. But so far as Leinster is concerned where this was supposed to make the greatest impression, the result seems to be little. Indeed it seems to be nil in respect of the permanent employment of labour. I would like to hear the Minister on this subject. It seems to me that the Minister has started the idea of a family allowance for the male members only of the farmers who are in fairly good conditions. This to my mind is certainly a novel point at which to start the idea of a family allowance, but I do not think there is anything but a family allowance in it.
If there had been a considerable decrease in agricultural employment we would have heard a great deal about it. It would have been given here as another evidence of the collapse of agriculture, and those interested in propagandising the features of the agricultural situation would have been very vocal on the subject. But Deputy Mulcahy, in the figures he has quoted, and despite all he has said about the calamitous condition of agriculture in the country, has failed to show that there has been a calamitous fall in employment in the agricultural industries. They do not deny the fact that in certain areas there has been an increase in agricultural employment. It was only last year that for the first time this system of bounties on the employment of labour on agricultural holdings was introduced. The figures for last year were the first figures we had, and, therefore, there is no real basis of comparison. Even these figures that we have would require to be checked by the local authorities. They have been checked, I presume, by those who have made the census, but the first year their checking was not probably as close as it might have been. I am satisfied that after a few years' working of this scheme, when year after year the returns will be made by the occupiers of the various holdings, there will be an opportunity given of checking these figures and it will be shown despite the depressed conditions of agriculture in this as in most countries the world over, that the consequent reduction in employment that might be expected to follow considerable depression of that kind and which might be expected to exist here as elsewhere, will have been shown to be abated as a result of the system adopted here. It will have abated as a result of one of the methods used to encourage the agricultural community. I only wish that the subsidy for employment could be greater. I do not know that the subsidy, such as it is, is a very great encouragement, but it possibly is some encouragement and some relief to the agricultural community in general. Possibly, when conditions are better the farmers will not need encouragement of this kind. But I think the principle is a good one, and although the amount available to encourage and support the principle is not extravagantly generous, still I think it is a good principle and should give encouragement, at any rate, to those of the agricultural community who do employ one or more male hands all the year round. It is an encouragement, to some extent, to keep these in employment all the year round rather than take them on for two or three months at a busy season and then drop them until they are further needed.
It seems to me that what the Minister has been talking about is not in any way indicative of any change in the amount of employment in the country. So far as I can gather, the Minister is comparing figures compiled by county councils this year with figures compiled by the county councils last year, and says that in certain areas there is an increase in the number this year. But that, to my mind at any rate, does not by any means go to show that there has been any real or substantial increase or any increase at all really in agricultural employment. This provision came into force last year, and a considerable number of employers discovered that they were not entitled last year to a rebate because they were employing men who owned holdings of over £5 valuation. Of course, what is happening, and what will always happen in a case like this, is that people are simply getting over that by means of little shifts which enable them to get payment for persons who are really owners of holdings of £5 valuation. It only means a change in the name of the owner of the holding. Then the person who was not counted last year goes on for this year.
The Minister is putting employers of labour in this position. You have a man who has a holding of £5 valuation and you have either to dismiss him or you have to lose any advantage you get under this section. You give him the choice either of making over his holding to some trustee or else tell him that he will have to go. Of course, they make them over in a great many instances to some trustee or put them in their wife's name or their son's name, and the man continues to be employed as before. The putting in of that particular figure of £5 will add, of course, nominally to the figures this year and increase them over the figures for last year. Then, again, the result of not employing a person over 70 will put men over 70 out of employment, because people are losing thereby.
It seems to me that any bulk of employment that the Minister can show is of persons working upon their own family holdings, and that is merely a matter of book-keeping. The thing only started last year. What was going to happen was not clear to people and they did not understand it. The Minister started it very late in he year. Naturally, it takes a very long time, especially in backward regions, for people to understand a new Act or the notices which may be sent to them by the county council. This year they are more alive to it and it would be very astonishing if the Minister did not find a very considerable increase. I am always very sceptical as to these statements or as to how it can be verified when a man is returned as working on his father's farm. How many days has he been working off it. I should like to know? If the Minister knows this country, and I am sure that by this time he knows a little about rural Ireland, I am sure he knows that there is many a man appearing as working for his father who is working on the roads a good part of the year.
The Minister may be satisfied that these sort of things will happen, so that any statistics he may produce are absolutely valueless as far as showing the number of persons employed at agricultural labour. What they do show is that people are beginning to work out in their own minds how they can best take advantage of this provision. Naturally, people who see these particular advantages in the way of reduced rates going are not altogether scrupulous. People are not always scrupulous when dealing with Government funds. People are not at all scrupulous as to the accuracy of the returns they make. The Minister's contention therefore is, to my mind, a very unsound one. It is not always safe to rely on statistics or on figures, and I think this is a particular example in which figures will prove absolutely nothing as to the amount of unemployment.
I really think that when we are spending £380,000 in this particular way we ought to go a little beyond the Coué position and examine whether in fact employment is being given as a result of this. I submit that there is no evidence of it. I think that a Department like the Local Government Department, which has so much machinery and which is in touch with the position in the country from very many points of view, ought to be able to examine the situation and make up its mind about it. There is no use in labelling a few things here, there and elsewhere as employment-giving devices if, in fact, that has simply a propaganda effect for a year or two in getting people into the belief that something is being done for them that is not being done. The Minister must have been away during the discussions in the House for some weeks past or he would have heard a considerable amount about the position of the agricultural workers and the remarkable absence, even in the Minister for Industry and Commerce's figures, of any results in the way of increased employment being given by the very considerable amount of increased subsidies. In the province of Leinster, where in respect of the primary grant they got £2 a head for every one of the population engaged in agriculture, they now get an additional £1.
The Minister does not seem to realise the conditions upon which that is superimposed. There were 40,000 additional acres of beet grown in the year 1934 as against 1931 and 73,000 additional acres of wheat. Two-thirds of the beet was grown in Leinster and a little more than half of the increased wheat crop. Yet the numbers of the type of person the Minister wants to see increasing in agriculture in the country, the permanently-employed agricultural labourer, have decreased in the province of Leinster. If the Minister thinks they have increased anywhere else in the country he should look at the figures provided by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. The Minister for Industry and Commerce says that this year 16,836 persons have been additionally employed in agriculture, but 15,700 of these are members of the farmers' own families. In the province of Leinster, or if you take the area from Louth to Cork which is the area where you have agricultural economy of the kind that would give employment permanently to agricultural labourers, there is not the slightest trace that this employment allowance is increasing the number of persons permanently employed in agriculture.
Is the Minister satisfied that there is an effective check on the return of employees? What is to prevent my putting in a fictitious list of employees?
I know Deputy Belton would not be guilty of that. What Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney says of the country as a whole is, no doubt, true. There is no doubt that people are not always scrupulously honest in filling up these returns. I would remind the Deputy, however, that it was late last year when this system was introduced. It was in operation for only part of the year, so that we have no returns with which to compare the figures or the summaries made out of the returns supplied by each county council. There is nothing with which we can compare them. We have not got this year's figures. When we get this year's figures, we will have some basis of comparison. It is only after two or three years' experience, when we have got all necessary information through the local officers of the county council assisted probably by the Gárda Síochána, and the rate collectors, that we shall have all the required knowledge at headquarters from these sources. It is only after a few years' examination, taking each year separately for survey or review, that you will get down to accurate figures. Where there have been returns that have not been strictly honestly filled up, they will be eventually discovered. You will then have a check but I do not know how long it will take to arrive at it. After two years working, you might be able to arrive at some definite decision as to what has been the effect of this new method of allocating the agricultural grant.
There is no fixed system of checking? Would not the insurance cards afford an effective check?
There have been discussions between headquarters and the secretaries of the county councils on these matters, and the secretaries generally, after consultation, have arrived at their own methods of checking these returns. They have available official machinery to check all the returns that are sent there. They frequently seek information from the Gárda and they get information from the rate collectors and various other officials of the county councils in the different localities. Where there is any doubt about the absolute reliability of these returns the returns are sent to the officials with a view to having them checked. As I said earlier, it cannot be assumed that many farmers would look upon 2/- or 3/- in the £ as an inducement to employ an extra man, but at any rate it is an indication of the desire of the Government to support those who go in for keeping their men all the year round. I hope that when more money is available, after this principle has been adopted, that the amounts that will be available for distribution under these conditions will be greater and that the returns when they come in at the year's end will show that there has been an improvement in the number of men who have been permanently employed on agricultural holdings all over the Free State. There was a system in operation—I do not know whether it was a growing system or not—of taking on men for seasonal work and letting them go afterwards. That, no doubt, continues at harvest time and other times of the year. The practice of taking on men and keeping them in employment is one to be encouraged and in so far as this system would encourage it, it is all to the good.
Are those returns certified?
They have been sent up to us by the secretaries of the county councils.
Are they certified after the farmer fills in the returns? Is he not obliged to get somebody to certify them to the county council?
No, I think not.
I am sure he is.
He sends them in to the county councils through the rate collector.
Would not the national health insurance cards be a simple and effective way of checking the returns?
I think every rate collector knows every man in the area over which he collects.
He does not.
Are the rate collectors paid for doing this work?
They are.
The farmers' sons would not be insured. I know of a case where a farmer kept on his nephew. This would also apply to Deputy Mulcahy's statement as to the number permanently employed in agriculture. Quite a number of farmers have taken in their nephews, and these people are not registered or are not accounted for, but they are still permanently employed in an agricultural occupation.
Do these men pay national health insurance contributions?
They would not for the sons, but they would for the nephews. He gets up to £20 for every son.
He does not stamp his card.
You want to deprive him of any benefits for the employment of the son.
The Deputy said he knew one case of a man bringing in his nephew. From that he seems to have concluded that everybody who has got a spare nephew brings him in.
I do not see why any farmer's son should be deprived of the right to a living. I say he is entitled to a living as long as he is able to work.
What has that got to do with it?
Did the Minister not say some time ago that the tendency amongst farmers was not to give permanent employment? I should like the Minister to reply to that question. He made a statement in the House that the tendency among farmers was to employ, not permanently, but temporarily.
I do not know what was the Deputy's question.
I am asking the Minister if he made a statement in the House that the tendency amongst farmers was not to employ permanent labour.
I did not say that.
Question—"That Section 7 stand part of the Bill"—put and agreed to.
SECTION 8.
(3) If the portion of the agricultural grant payable under this Act to the council of a county exceeds the amount necessary for making all the primary allowances, employment allowances, and supplementary allowances required by this Act to be made by such council and the payments (if any) required by this Act or by Section 50 of the Act of 1898 as applied by this Act to be made by such council to councils of urban districts, the said portion of the agricultural grant so payable to such council shall be reduced to the amount so necessary for the making of all the said allowances.
(4) Whenever the Minister is satisfied that the council of a county has, throughbona fide error or mistake, incorrectly fixed the amount of the supplementary allowance to be made by such council under this section, the Minister may authorise such supplementary allowance to be made at the rate so erroneously fixed, and thereupon, notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in this Act, such supplementary allowance shall be made at the rate so erroneously fixed.
I move:—
To delete sub-section (3).
A contingency, it was thought, might arise when this sub-section was originally put into the Bill, which I am now satisfied will not arise and so I ask leave to withdraw the section.
May I ask the Minister to explain why he wants this amendment No. 4? A county council may get a great deal more than they are entitled to. Why should the error be perpetuated instead of being put right?
It would look as if this section was put in here in order to cover up any errors that might be discovered in the allocation of the grant. No error, as far as we are aware, has been made. No error has come to our knowledge. But in the allocation and special division of the money in different counties it might happen that it might be discovered the following year that somebody was deprived of some small amount. It has not happened, but it might happen. If someone discovered that he was deprived of a £1 some litigious persons might take the council into court and get the whole rate quashed.
I cannot follow the Minister. The rate is struck, and the rate will be a good rate. If the allowance is made and a good rate struck I cannot follow the Minister's argument that the rate of itself would become bad. Surely the rate is good whether the allowance made to a particular individual is good or not. It seems to me that if a mistake is made, and that if an individual is not allowed his allowance, then, the amount he overpaid to the county council should be allowed to him in his next year's rate.
The supplementary rate allowance depends upon a grant. If a mistake occurred probably that could be rectified the following year and the amount made up to the individual. But there is the risk that a litigious person might take them into court and get the rate upset.
Has the Minister been so advised by his law officers?
I have.
Then I accept that.
Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 5 not moved.
Section 8, as amended, agreed to.
Section 9 agreed to.
SECTION 10.
Question proposed: "That Section 10 stand part of the Bill."
Will the Minister say whether sub-section (1) (h) is for the purpose of spreading over the urban districts part of the £718,000 which has been withheld from the local authorities in respect of land annuities? A certain amount of money is being withheld for the non-payment of land annuities, and sub-section (1) (h) seems to me to be intended to allow the county councils to deduct from moneys that would otherwise be paid to urban councils part of the moneys so withheld. Do I understand that this is machinery for spreading over the urban areas such deductions? Do I understand, from the Bill, that Dun Laoghaire will be called upon, under this section, to pay portion of the land annuities outstanding in respect of the Co. Dublin?
I do not know about Dun Laoghaire. There are certain urban areas that would be affected, but I do not know whether Dun Laoghaire would be affected, as the Deputy says.
Section 10 agreed to.
Sections 11, 12, and 13 agreed to.
SECTION 14.
I move amendment No. 6:—
To insert before sub-section (3) a new sub-section as follows:—
"(3) The council of a county may if it so thinks fit after a presentation of the relevant facts and conditions of persons unable to meet their rate obligations within the collection year, give credit for the credit note or credit notes (if returned) in carrying forward rates for future collection."
I do not want to drag the economic war across the situation, but the Minister must know that there are a considerable number of people in the country who have really great difficulty in meeting the demands for rates made upon them. They have that difficulty whether it be the first moiety or the second. Whatever he thinks may be the cause of it, the addition to the rates made in respect of each amount of money outstanding in respect to the land annuities is going to make their position additionally difficult. This amendment simply makes it possible for the county councils, on the presentation of the relevant facts and conditions by persons unable to meet their rate obligations within the collection year, to give credit for the credit notes if returned in carrying forward rates for future collection.
I agree with the Deputy that as long as people have to meet payments like rates and annuities you will always find some who find it difficult to pay. You will find others slow; even though they could pay they hold out to the last moment. With regard to credit notes, it is a system adopted by some county councils to encourage people to pay. If they do not pay before a certain date they forfeit the allowance. If any credit was to be lost it would probably amount to less than £2 a year—£1 in each moiety. The point was made against these credit notes that some county councils think it is an unfair system to give to people who can pay an advantage over those who find it difficult to pay and therefore do not use the credit notes. I have heard all sides and you cannot get anything like an unanimous opinion. Some were very strongly in favour of the credit note system; others against. Where it is in operation it is used to encourage people to pay within a certain limited period. If people do not use it they forfeit the amount and it is of no value at all.
If there is no limit to the time to which the credit note can be used, the credit note is no assistance towards getting in the rates. Therefore, if there is to be no limit, as suggested in this amendment, and if the credit note can be carried forward and used five years hence when the person pays his arrears, if he does pay them, I think that would be a system which it would not be wise for any Minister to encourage.
It was only on the 5th December last that the Minister introduced to the Dáil the previous Bill of this kind. Section 14 of that Bill refers to a person presenting a credit note " before the end of the current financial year or such later date as such council, with the consent of the Minister, shall fix." That is, in the last Bill, the Minister did not fix the thing firmly to the end of the financial year. He took powers to extend the period in respect of which the credit note would be credited. His sections in the present Bill are somewhat different in their form from those in the Act, and, as far as we can see, there is no provision—at least, I have not come across it—by which the Minister allows an extension either to a county council or to himself.
It was suggested, after consultation with the secretaries and other officials of county councils, that, where they had been using the credit note system, they were somewhat hampered by the restriction which fixed the last day of the half-year or the year as the last time by which the credit note might be used. Having discussed the matter with them, I met them by agreeing to put that section to which the Deputy referred into the Act of last year, enabling the Minister, after consultation with local authorities, to extend the period to which the credit note might still be used. We have not refused any applications during the last financial year or up to the present for extensions, but I am strongly of opinion that it would be unwise to allow the credit note to be brought into operation and used in respect of arrears. If this amendment be adopted, the credit note might be used for arrears of rates extending over a number of years, and I think the Deputy will agree that that would be a system that would not make for simplicity, at any rate, in handling the accounts of the rate collectors of county councils.
Am I right in taking it that this Bill is drafted in such a way that, unless a person pays his first moiety by 31st October, 1935, he will lose the first moiety of his credit note, and that unless he pays his second moiety by 31st March, 1936, he will completely lose the second moiety of his credit note?
He will.
I suggest that that is an appalling piece of hardship. Just consider the position the ratepayers were in last year. There were substantially over £1,000,000 of arrears at the close of the financial year. There was a considerable amount of delay in making up the warrants, and while the warrants were being made up, one might say, the first six months of the last financial year of the local authorities was spent, not in collecting the current rates, but in squeezing about £800,000 of arrears of rates out of the ratepayers, and the new warrant was presented to the ratepayers with £300,000 of an extra bill tacked on. They ended the last financial year, a tremendous effort having been made, as the Minister admitted, by the ratepayers to meet their liabilities, with £1,100,000 outstanding. There was that amount facing the ratepayers at the beginning of this financial year. I asked the Minister a short time ago what the amount of the assessments and the total warrants for each county were, and he could not give them to me for the reason that he was not aware that they had been completed in some counties. That was in July.
There is no doubt that some of the £1,100,000 outstanding at the beginning of the financial year is being collected, and is being collected with a considerable amount of difficulty, throughout the country and before October next, as well as whatever will be collected out of that sum of £1,100,000, half of the increased warrant, a warrant substantially increased by the inclusion in it of a part of £718,000 in respect of land annuities not paid up to the proper time last year, is going to fall for payment. Unless the whole of that first moiety is paid on 31st October this year, as well as substantial arrears, the credit note is going to be lost to those people who have not paid their moiety. I submit to the Minister that that is an outlandish proposal and that it is not seriously put before the House. If the Minister does put it to the House seriously, I think he ought to tell the House what the position now with regard to rate collection is with respect to the arrears from last year; what the position with regard to the issue of the warrants for the rate collection for the current year is; and how much of the arrears of last year is included and how much of the £718,000 in respect of land annuities not paid last year is included; so that we will know what kind of a bill the people are going to pay on the 31st October of this year. I think this is an outlandish proposal on the facts as we know them. The Minister has more up-to-date facts and can give a more up-to-date review of the position and a clearer idea as to what is before the unfortunate ratepayers from now until 31st October, and as to what exactly he has got out of them from 1st April to date.
Progress reported.