When we adjourned the debate on this Resolution, Deputy Burke was speaking. I want to oppose this Resolution because it was introduced with what appeared to me to be a thoroughly fraudulent representation by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. In discussing the Second Stage of the Bill in respect of which this Money Resolution is introduced, the Minister said he expected to put between 40,000 and 50,000 people working at turf-cutting and establish in this country in the turf-cutting business an industry second only in importance to the agricultural industry. That is, in my opinion, the type of fraudulent statement which is bringing democracy into discredit the world over. Sometimes I suspect that the Minister wants to destroy democratic institutions by talk of that character. The more I see of him the more I feel that his mind is becoming more Hitlerlike with the passage of every week. The Minister knows perfectly well that 50,000 people are not going to be employed in cutting turf. He knows perfectly well that to describe the turf-cutting industry in this country as ever likely to be the second most important industry in the country is the wildest and most irresponsible misrepresentation.
In that connection, it is useful to bear in mind that, up to date, we have spent about £50,000 on the development of the turf resources of the country in accordance with the Minister's new turf policy, not to speak of the very large sums spent out of the Relief Votes in building roads into the turf bogs for the purpose of facilitating the Minister's experiments. This expenditure of £50,000 was recommended to the House, in the first instance, by the Minister for Education, who was then acting temporarily in some other capacity. He said that the reason he recommended these turf proposals to the House was that he wanted to compensate the counties of Connacht and the County of Donegal in some measure for the fact that they would not share in the sugar bounties or the wheat bounties or the great industrial wealth that was going to be created by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. We spent £50,000 to provide an alternative bounty for the County of Donegal and the counties of Connacht, with the astonishing result that, comparing the production of turf in the counties of Donegal, Mayo, Galway, Clare and Kerry in the years 1931 and 1934, we find that we actually produced in these five counties in 1934 242,000 fewer tons of turf than had been produced in 1931. It is scarcely surprising, therefore, that we are reluctant to vote an undetermined sum of money in this Money Resolution to continue experiments of that kind. So far as the official figures reveal, two-thirds of the number of sacks and one-half of the co-operative societies' expenditure of £38,000 was laid out in the five counties to which I have referred. Nevertheless, the production of turf fell by nearly 250,000 tons. I suppose there was some increase in the production of turf in the County Kildare, but whether that was the primary motive of the Minister or not, it would be difficult to know.
Let us be clear on this question. I am perfectly convinced that an attempt will be made hereafter to persuade the public that the Turf Bill we are now considering is designed to facilitate inquiry into the development of power from turf. I want to say that if this Bill had in it anything designed to provide a fixed sum wherewith to try out that experiment, I should be in favour of providing the money for one reason only—not because I personally believe in the possibilities of power from turf, but because I have learned from experience in this country that any scheme which carries the recommendation of Sir John Purser Griffith is deserving of investigation. He has been interesting himself in this matter. He has given it as his opinion that there are undeveloped potentialities in it. That is an opinion to which I attach the highest importance, and knowing the kind of service that man has given this country, knowing that he gave his plans and his assistance whenever the occasion offered, I should be in favour of saying that whatever scheme he recommends as being in the national interest ought at least to be given a trial. Where the trying of it would provide valuable employment to deal with the desperate unemployment situation with which we are confronted I should be very glad to see it done.
No such proposal is made in the Bill to which this Money Resolution has been proposed. We are asked to provide an indeterminate sum to do something that no one quite knows the nature of in an area which has not been delimited, and which has yet to be determined. To that I strongly object. The recommendation is made in terms of exaggeration and misrepresentation which are patent. It is going to interfere very materially with consumers of coal. No one can buy coal in future if he does not buy with it the prescribed amount of turf, when the Minister brings the Bill into operation in the areas he has not named. Of course, a householder, when buying coal can buy turf from a member of a co-operative society set up by the Bill, get a certificate from the society, and clear himself of any obligation to buy turf from a coal merchant. There is no use closing our eyes to the fact that this is going materially to increase the cost of fuel to the occupants of every house. Every labourer's cottage being built has a small coal range installed, and all these people will have to buy turf with coal. They will have to dispose of the turf somewhere if they cannot use it, and if they have to do that, they will have to do so at a loss. Heretofore, the practice was that turf-cutters, having saved the crop, came to town with a cart of turf and sold it in the street to the best bidder. Now, there is an obligation on every householder who burns any coal to buy turf from a coal merchant, and that will virtually destroy the well-established method of disposing of the turf crop. Many people will ask what is the exact reason for the co-operative societies. The reason is quite plain. It is necessary that the House and the country should know the reason: because the Fianna Fáil clubs are flagging and something has to be done to whip them up.
