I have no doubt Deputy Kehoe will intervene to say a word on that. I think it would be franker and more helpful for the President if he did not make Caitlín Nì Houlihan and the Republic responsible for airing before the House views that they do not deserve, because at the conclusion there will be no one in order in answering him. There are certain points arising on the administrative side of the Vote which, I think, he might have, with advantage, elaborated. The Minister referred to the facilities placed at the disposal of nationals in this country by our consuls in America for the collection of bequests and matters of that kind. I should be glad if the President would let us know if there is a schedule of fees which nationals in this country are called upon to pay for services rendered, and whether he can devise any method of attracting the attention of the people, particularly those in the rural areas, to the facilities available at present of a consular character which were not available heretofore. As the President is aware, many people in this country have claims for bequests in America, and they often find themselves delivered into the hands of unreliable attorneys and have suffered material loss as a result. Others, of course, have dealt with reliable and honourable attorneys in the United States and got what they were entitled to. I believe it would be of material assistance if the facilities available at the consular offices were made known to people at large, and perhaps the assistance of the Incorporated Law Society might be invoked, as to whether they would be prepared to co-operate in connection with consular matters. That is something upon which I am not prepared to express an opinion, as to whether they would place some kind of professional obligation upon themselves when communicating with professional brethren in the United States. I imagine that if consular facilities were directly brought under the notice of solicitors throughout rural Ireland, and if solicitors were willing to recommend their clients to avail of them, it would be of a very great importance all round.
Now we come to the trade agreements made, and the President disengenuously referred to the German Trade Agreement by saying that we had reduced the trade balance there from three to one to two to one. He did not state the nature of the merchandise which we shipped to Germany during the first trade agreement. Would I be far wrong if I said that as a result of our first trade agreement with Germany we proceeded to pay the land annuities not only to Great Britain but to Germany as well? Can he congratulate himself upon establishing a three to one basis of trade with Germany, when one of the provisos was that in addition to selling cattle there we are paying a share of the land annuities to the Reich? I remember that when Germany was purchasing cattle at 19/- or 20/- per cwt. here the world price was 39/- per cwt. Having bought these cattle in Dublin for 19/- the Germans got cheques for round about £10,000 every month for cattle shipped from the North Wall. In fact, I believe in regard to some cattle sold to Germany it would be cheaper to slaughter them and to dump the carcases into the Irish Sea. We are not to congratulate ourselves in succeeding in persuading the German Government to buy from us if we have to buy from them £3 worth of merchandise for every £1 worth that they buy from this country. They buy our cattle at half or less than half their market value, and then they accept with our compliments fat cheques to facilitate them in carrying them away. As far as I am concerned, I want to make this clear, that if that is the best agreement we can get with Germany, we should not have any agreement, and if that is the best in buyers that we can get from Germany, I wish to God they would stay away, because the more often they come the more damage they will do and the less they will pay. It is well to speak bluntly in regard to this matter.
If the President would come here and say that on the basis of a three to one agreement he had succeeded in reopening the German market for herring, then he might reasonably ask the House to endorse the terms of the agreement because, admittedly, salt herring is an export for which we have lost all the markets we had. We were at one time in a position to send herring to the United States, to Russia and to Germany, and I think we should have reflected very carefully before negotiating a trade agreement on the basis of three to one without salt herring constituting a part of it. If salt herring were a product of a wealthy corporation or a rich trading union it might not be of such concern, but, when face to face with the fact that salt herring was the means of livelihood of a large number of our people along the Western seaboard, who have no other means of livelihood and whose alternative was to go on the dole or to emigrate to Scotland, then I think the social advantage to be derived from maintaining that trade in existence was well worth a substantial economic concession, either to Germany or to the United States of America. I have asked the Minister for Agriculture on a previous occasion as to what steps he proposes to take to secure trade agreements that would assist us to dispose of those herring which the Germans will not take from us now, and I want to ask the Minister for External Affairs now, whether, in view of his failure to compel the German Reich to accept part of our shipments to that country as herring, he would open negotiations with the British Government to exchange with it for some economic concession a share of the export quota which they have got for the German market in salt herring?
That does not seem to be so unreasonable when one realises that the German market has consistently stipulated for Donegal matje herring, because of its peculiar quality; and at the present time that class of herring is actually being brought from the Donegal coast, where it is landed by British trawlers, into the territory of Northern Ireland, and there cured and shipped to Germany on British export quotas. That procedure deprives our fishing population of the employment they got in catching and landing the herring in our ports, because it is now all done by British trawlers, and, what is more important, it also deprives of their livelihood the large resident population of fish curers who live and work around the ports of Saorstát Eireann, and who have now to go into Derry and try to get work if they can there, and to spend a substantial part of their wages on keeping themselves and paying lodgings, or, if they cannot get work in Derry, to go to Scotland and try to get migratory labour of one kind or another there.
I believe that a trade agreement with Germany which does not provide for the acceptance by Germany of some commodities of that character which are difficult to dispose of elsewhere is perfectly useless; but I think it reflects greatly on the Government that they have consented to deal with the German Reich on the basis of two to one, when we are prepared to take from Germany commodities which we could buy very much more conveniently elsewhere, and they take nothing from us but horses, cattle and agricultural produce at their own price—an artificial price which has been artificially fixed for them in this country, and which results in their being able to cart that stuff from this country to Germany and have it there as cheap as they could buy it from practically any other nation in the world.
The President referred briefly to his German trade agreement. It was a source of some surprise to me that he did not dwell a little more triumphantly on the Spanish trade agreement, which I feel sure he regards as a feather in his cap, the famous agreement which provided for oranges and eggs. The more I learn about that agreement, the less savoury it becomes. I had occasion to direct the attention of the House frequently to the fact that the result of that trade agreement has been that, while import quota licences were issued to about 150 fruit importers in this country, the terms upon which they were issued resulted in granting a virtual monopoly of orange imports to one firm or two firms. These firms are now in a position to demand that every other fruit importer will take from their consignment so much oranges as their import quota provides. What the price arrangement between these importers is, I do not know, but the net result of the whole transaction has been that the quality of oranges available here from Spain as compared with the quality of oranges which heretofore were available from Palestine, during the season when Palestine oranges were available in this country, shows an enormous deterioration, and we are now obliged to eat bad oranges, pay more for them and what do we get in return? We get in return a market for eggs in Spain, on every case of which we have to pay an export bounty, so that we have now undertaken not only to pay the land annuities to Germany, but we have determined to deliver a share of the land annuities to Spain.
All the oranges we buy from Spain must be paid for in cash, and are paid for in cash. The eggs we ship to Spain are paid for by the Spanish importers, but, strangely enough, the payment for our eggs is not made to our shippers, but to the Spanish Government who undertake, if and when convenient, to forward the currency to this country. While we are paying cash for oranges, the Spanish Government is remitting to us the money due for the eggs, sometimes three months, sometimes six months and sometimes nine months, after the eggs are delivered. I do not know what the President thinks of a trade agreement founded on terms like that. I do not know if the President feels with me that a trade agreement which results in a virtual monopoly for individual firms is not a good trade agreement. I do not know whether the President thinks that trade agreements which are founded on a basis that we have to pay a bounty on exports of which we could readily dispose in the British market but for the economic war, at a good price without any bounty at all, is a good trade agreement, but I do not think it is. I think that if that is the best trade agreement the Minister for External Affairs can report to us as a result of his European activities, the sooner he sheds the responsibility of Minister for External Affairs the better it will be for himself and for everybody else.
I want to ask the President of the Executive Council a question to which I think we are entitled to an answer. The President has referred at some length to the agony of mind which he is suffering as a result of the occupation of our ports and there were murmurs of approbation from the Fianna Fáil Benches. I want to ask the President now if, in the future, some European power determines that it is expedient for the purpose of acquiring territorial concessions in this country to attack this country with naval forces, does the President contemplate building up a naval force adequate to protect our coast? That is one question. Secondly, suppose a naval power in Europe does proceed to attack our ports and any of the nations associated with us in the Commonwealth of Nations defends our coasts from that attack, will the President request that nation to desist from repelling the threat to our territory? I think we ought to know. I do not think we should allow ourselves to be induced to accept the position of the ostrich in regard to that matter.
Nothing to my mind is more disgusting than the attitude of the person who is willing to wound but is afraid to strike, the person who is swaggering around announcing that he does not want any association with anybody else, who wants to stand on his own legs, but the moment that dark clouds gather on the horizon, runs like a redshank to sue for protection. I think the President should state quite clearly what is his view on that matter. If it is that he believes that the circumstances in which the British at present occupy the ports are inconsistent with the national dignity, I have not the slightest doubt in my mind that negotiations with the British with a view to altering that status can be successfully concluded. If he means that he declines to afford Great Britain any accommodation whatever to facilitate the naval defence of her own territory and of this country, in the event of a threat from another naval power, then I think he should tell us what plans he himself has to provide the adequate defence which, he said, he recognised it was the duty of any country to establish in the absence of comprehensive and effective guarantees forthcoming from some arrangement of association with our neighbours. I think our position is perfectly clear. We recognise and value the terms of association provided for in the British Commonwealth of Nations. We do not believe that, in the event of an attack being made on one member of the British Commonwealth of Nations, the other members thereof would stand by and allow that attack to be carried to a successful conclusion. We recognise, as I think all sensible men must, that, from a tactical point of view, this country and Great Britain are closely associated, and that a landing by an enemy of this country, or of Great Britain, on the soil of Ireland would not only jeopardise our independence but would materially endanger the safety of Great Britain itself.
I believe that, in the event of an attempt being made by a Continental power to overwhelm this country by an assault based on a naval invasion, we would be absolutely powerless to defend ourselves if we had not a guarantee of assistance from Great Britain. I do not believe there is any use closing our eyes to that fact. I believe that Great Britain has no desire to avail of that position in order to put this country at a disadvantage under existing circumstances. I agree that it is good business and sound statesmanship to consult with Great Britain, as we at present do, in regard to matters of defence and to go as far as we can, consistent with the best interest of our people and the national dignity, to facilitate the perfection of such measures of defence as are now, and would for ever be, necessary until such time as universal peace is assured. If the President feels that the existing arrangement, whereunder Great Britain has certain accommodation in two ports in this country, is inconsistent with anything which he conceives to be necessary for the maintenance of national sovereignty or independence, then I think it devolves on him to say what there is in that arrangement which he thinks offensive, and what alternative arrangement he would propose for the adequate naval defence of the two countries. What alternative proposal would be acceptable to the Government of this country if the existing arrangement is a source of irritation, annoyance and increasing ill-will between the two Governments?
I do strenuously object to an annual repetition of the lamentations about our ports and about the awful misery we are enduring in regard to our ports. Nobody in this country gives two hoots about the ports. Ninety-five per cent. of the people know nothing about what ports are occupied. If the President would call his own Party together and ask them: "Can you tell me where are the two ports in this country which are occupied by Britain——"
