I thought at one period of the debate that the Minister was going to take a hint from his colleague and become once more the bold, bad buccaneer. He was rather mild in his speeches on the Second Reading, but there was a display of temper to-day which we did not expect. I did not quite grasp the cause of it until he came out with the reference to Friday morning. At first I did not grasp the significance of the interruption but now I understand that the suggestion is that there is a certain extra publicity given to the proceedings on a Friday morning. The Minister naturally objects to that in connection with this Bill. While Deputy Mulcahy was answering a question put by a supporter of the Minister, the Minister tried to stop the Deputy in the midst of that answer. The Minister does not want publicity for this Bill or for the fact that Government Departments are using less turf. We are in full agreement there, at all events. I can understand his point of view, and I can understand the efforts he made to try to prevent information getting over to the public. We know that information has no effect on the Minister. We know that statistics, costs, or anything else have no effect on him, but he objects to their getting over to the public and objects to Friday morning debates because he thinks they may get over to the public.
It is obvious that the Minister thought that the passing of this Money Resolution by the Dáil was a purely formal matter. His interventions in the debate are an indication of that. The fact that he gave no information whatever at any stage up to the present as to the cost of the Bill is proof that he regards the money side of it as so purely negligible, in the sense of being formal, that the Dáil need not be informed. He could have given information to the House. He had an opportunity afforded him by the Resolution, if he was unable to give even an estimated amount of the costs, of at least giving some indication of the type of expenditure he envisages under the Bill, but he did not do it. When an effort was made to point out to him that this Bill was an elaborate Bill and that every section involves expenditure, for otherwise it could not be administered, the Minister tried to prevent that question even being put to him.
If this debate on the Resolution has taken the particular form it has taken, the responsibility largely lies with the Minister who, up to the present, has given no information about his plans. Not merely has he given no information on the type of expenditure he envisages under the Bill, on the amount of expenditure that he envisages in the next 12 months or two years, but he has given no information on the plans he has in mind which will lead to expenditure. Anybody reading his introductory speech on the Second Reading and his reply to the debate will see that he refused to give information as to the extent, be it great or small, to which he intended to operate the Bill or expected to operate it.
How is it possible for the House, without the slightest help from the Minister at any stage, to form any idea of the costs involved? The Minister tries to convey, on the one hand, that this is a serious measure intended to be operated to a considerable extent, and the next moment he certainly conveys the impression that it is merely a gesture, that there is nothing serious behind it, and that he does not intend to operate it to any extent. Faced not merely with these conflicting statements of the Minister, but with the fact that the Minister, apparently, has no definite mind at all on the matter, how can the House be asked, with any show of reason, to vote money, not merely vague in amount, but completely indefinite so far as the purposes for which the money is to be voted are concerned?
All the information we get concerning what we are now asked to sanction is in a general way contained in the Money Resolution itself. Anybody can see that nothing could be more vague or general than the Money Resolution. Money has already been spent by the Minister's Department in the promotion—so it is alleged—of the turf industry. Is that to be continued under this Bill? Again, there is no information. Is all the propaganda and publicity, which cost a certain amount of money for the last couple of years, still to be continued, and if it is, is it one of the matters referred to as being ancillary to the increased production of turf? If it is, the Minister, whom nobody could accuse of being reticent or hesitant in the way he speaks in this Dáil, gives no information here. Money was spent on propaganda. Is it irrelevant to point out to the House that, so far as the figures at our disposal seem to show, money has been wasted?
The Minister declared, in a child-like fashion or in a copy-book headline fashion, that you cannot take statistics of two years and compare them. He objected when Deputy Mulcahy pointed out that there was a considerable falling off in the production of turf between the years 1931 and 1934 and said: "You cannot base anything upon that." The next thing the House had a right to expect after that small debating point had been made by the Minister was that he would give the figures of the several years, from 1931 to 1935, and show that the tendency to which he referred was an upward tendency. Did the Minister show that? He did not even attempt to do it. When the Minister has not figures before him he is never at a loss to give figures, and when he does that they are always rather striking. He did not even suggest that if we take the figures for the years 1931 to 1935, they would show an upward tendency. If there was any real point in the objection he made to Deputy Mulcahy's statistics he had an opportunity of proving it and driving it home by producing the figures for the intervening years. If the Minister had not time to do that when Deputy Mulcahy spoke he could have brought them forward to-day to show that there was some justification for asking for this money.
Is publicity one of the things we are still spending money on? The money, we are told, is for ancillary purposes. It is quite useless—judging by results till now—for the purposes of this Bill, but technically, and to the Minister's mind, it comes in under it. "Ancillary" it has not been in fact. The figures quoted show, if they show anything at all, that it has not led to an increase in the consumption of turf. But the Minister always holds that the statistics produced by his Department do not prove what they seem to prove —he never tells us what in fact they do prove. All he says here is that they do not indicate what the position is with regard to turf development, but he does not say what they do prove. The only way he can show that these publicity efforts do not come under this Resolution is by acknowledging that up to the present his publicity efforts have been a failure. I admit there is one particular Department in which the Government is supreme, namely, propaganda. But not for commercial purposes; purely for political purposes.
I think the House has really been treated very cavalierly by the Minister's irresponsibility in dealing with what is described as an important measure. Has the Minister any idea of the expenses? Will he tell us, as we have been so frequently told by various Ministers when Bills are introduced into this House, that no extra officials will be employed? Is that the contention of the Minister? If we got this information we should be in a better position to deal with the matter. We will have to wait to hear the Minister's reply, and then we can make up our minds how to deal with the matter.
It has not been unusual in this House, when Bills of this kind, with compulsory powers and so on, are introduced, to be told that no additional officials will be necessary. That is a statement very frequently made. Unfortunately experience seldom fits in with the rather optimistic forecasts of Ministers. It is not easy to see how— I am assuming for the moment that the Bill is seriously meant—with the elaborate powers put into the hands of the Ministers in this instance, there is not going to be very elaborate machinery of administration. Unless the Minister takes the line that officials already existing can deal with the matter — and our experience would lead us to expect some such statement from him —then many additional officials will be required. It is not easy to see, if the existing officials of the Minister are doing their work at present and have sufficient work to do, how the amount of additional work imposed by this Bill is going to be done without considerable addition to the staff of the Minister.
There are a number of points that might be urged against this Resolution, but, for my part, I prefer to deal with them when we come to the particular sections, and I shall raise them there. Not the slightest attempt has been made by the Minister to supply the information which the House is entitled to expect, or even to give the vaguest hint of what the amount of money involved in the administration of this Bill if it becomes an Act is likely to be.