When we consider the effect of the President's Constitution-mongering policy, it is correct to say that it does bear on the situation; that the President does now claim that there will never be peace in this country until there is a republican Constitution here. The President has not only held that up as an ideal, but he has by his declarations, stamped it as being a national necessity for the peace and proper economic development of the country. He is pursuing policies that not only to us, but, apparently, to those people who have broken away from him and are forming an abstentionist group, and to the people who, having broken away from him, are now a body whose policy is to arm and to endeavour to overthrow the State by force—he is pursuing policies that to the people both to the right and to the left of him show no hope of bringing about a condition here that will give us the type of Constitution that he considers to be the national ideal Constitution and that he considers necessary for the peace of the country.
So that clothed with the authority of the President of this State, he has, to a very large extent, been responsible for handing over to these people the type of ideal they are pursuing. He does hold himself out to them as pursuing the ideal that he has handed to them in an ineffective and futile way. It is because of that, while assuring the President of the support of every section in this House, and of every person who can be called a follower of any of the political Parties in the House, in dealing with murder and disorder and threats against the State by force, we do put it to him that, when his Minister announces to this House that they have now to take on another war against people who are carrying out these activities or people who are sympathising with them, we do want to hear from him what discussions went on between him and the sections of the people who have broken away from him; what he offered to them as sound and reasonable proposals to hold them to Parliamentary policies, whether Parliamentary policies associated with him or opposed to him. We had occasion in the past to give the House the fullest possible details of negotiations and efforts that were made to avoid strife before in this country and to prevent groups developing that would repudiate the authority of Parliament built on majority will. I ask the President not to leave this House at the present time without some explanation as to what are the differences between these groups and him. But, we particularly wish to point out to him that if the present situation has developed, it has been encouraged and fostered, and force and strength given to it by the constitution-mongering that has been his principal policy.
Again, the general type of policy he has been pursuing in connection with constitutional matters has been an encouragement to the Communists. They have seen an important and essential part of this Oireachtas wiped out by a stroke, you might say, of the Fianna Fáil pen. They have been encouraged by the statements made by the President from time to time that the financial situation that exists here and the general economic and social condition that exists here are perhaps not adequate to provide for all the needy people of the country and that there may be a necessity to go outside them. While expressing these opinions, and showing the people of Communistic tendencies how little respect he has for parliamentary institutions here, if you like, in wiping out the Seanad before he made up his mind as to what should take its place, he has been injuring the general economic situation of the country by the constitutional policies to which he holds on.
I have said that I regard the economic situation here as such that, taking the long view, it is going to enable this country to secure order, to damp down and wipe out Communistic activities. It is for that reason, in particular, that I want to discuss the economic situation here. Various Deputies and Ministers have been pretending to be enthusiastic with regard to the general economic situation here, but they must know as well as I do, and as well as the farmers in the country and the workers in the towns, the general condition to which the people who are running Irish homes have been reduced as a result of the general policy of the Government dominated by the President's tinkering with the Constitution. We have this phrase in a leader in the Irish Press of the 16th June:
"Of the economic war it can also be said that so far from succeeding in achieving its object the very reverse is the case. It has, in the first place, given a stimulus to the revival and growth of our native Irish industries which has effected more in four years than could otherwise have been attained in twenty".
The phrase rings very familiarly. The economic war has effected more in four years than could otherwise have been attained in 20. I recall another statement that:
"Truly we have lived through 30 or 40 years of Irish history within the last two years as I conceive it since the Treaty was passed. We have lived through it, and I believe that we have made more progress in these two years, though many may not see it, than would have been made in 30 or 40 years of ordinary agitation as I thought was the only thing before the country when the Treaty was passed."
To-day we realise how hollow were the protestations of the President on the 21st July, 1924, when he told us that greater progress had been achieved in the two years before that than would have been achieved by ordinary agitation in 30 or 40 years. I wonder how long we are going to have to wait before it is realised how hollow are the protestations of the Government organ "that four years of the economic war has effected more for industry than could otherwise have been attained in 20."
The President told us the other day that there cannot be a settlement of the economic difficulties with Great Britain until there is a settlement of our political difficulties. We should be clear as to what these political difficulties are. Whatever they are, they divide on one side, from the pursuit of a parliamentary line of politics, a section in this country upon whom the Acting Minister for Justice declares that the Government is going to carry out another war, and they divide us on the other side from any co-operation with Great Britain in matters that politically — from the point of view of defence and of the economic means of our country —are absolutely essential. Only on Sunday last, we had four members of the Fianna Fáil Party, who attended a Fianna Fáil Aeridheacht at Castlefin, appealing there for absolute unity in a movement that was going to frame a new constitution, one that would entirely ignore the Treaty of 1921, that would make no mention of His Majesty the King, in which there would be no talk of an ascendancy chamber, no oath to a foreign King, and one that, generally, would refuse to be a Dominion of the British Empire.
We want to know from the President, first, what are the political things that divide him from the British, and that, so dividing him from the British, keep him away from the council table to discuss these things; that in keeping him away from the council table, keep us in the economic position to which we have been reduced by the cutting of our external trade with Great Britain. If the President is still going to pursue his constitution mongering policy, we ought at least to know what these things are. The country is aware from statements that the President has made here, and from statements that were made four years ago by the Vice-President after Ottawa, that the things that prevent us from trading in the old way with Great Britain, as far as having the British market there for our agricultural produce, are certain political matters. Four years have passed since that was made clear by the Vice-President after Ottawa, but in the meantime we have got no nearer as to any kind of understanding as to where the President is going constitutionally. He has said that we are going to be told all about that in the autumn. We do want to hear from the President if he is not able to reconcile in the autumn of next year his political difficulties with the people of Great Britain, and if the country, tired of what is happening here, is reduced to the absolute economic necessity of getting rid of his Government and of putting in another that will make whatever political agreement it is possible to make with Great Britain that will provide a satisfactory economic arrangement between the two countries, can we have an explicit statement from the President now that he and his Party will support such a Government in a whole-hearted parliamentary way: that they will support such a Government in dealing with disorder and with subversive movements in the country. If the President cannot satisfy us that he is going to stop tinkering with the Constitution and give this country an economic chance, we are entitled, when we take the economic interests of the country into consideration, to have, beyond any shadow of doubt, a statement from him and the Party opposite that in any changed circumstances that would put another Government in their place, it would have his parliamentary support and that of his Party and followers against people who, because there was a Party in power which would make a political agreement with Great Britain that the Fianna Fáil Ministers or the Fianna Fáil Party would not make, might make the threat of force against the State, against the then existing Government and the institutions of the State.
However, the economic situation here in my opinion demands that the President should stop tinkering with the Constitution and get down to a realisation of the condition that the people are in at the present time. The statement has been made that great industrial progress has been made here. Has the President looked around at all to see what industrial progress has been made here? It was only within the last few days that we were supplied with the latest particulars in connection with the census of production for the year 1934. As regards a large number of industries covered in that census of production, an examination discloses this fact, that the 15,300 people who have got additional employment in the industries referred to have got it at an average wage of 18/7 per week. Will the President tell the House that he realises that and, when the Government organ paints the great industrial development that has taken place in this country, will it be indicated that they have seen and realised that 15,300 people, the total to be put into industry in 22 of our major industries in the first three years of Fianna Fáil industrial development, were put in there with average wages of 18/7 a week and that these represent the type of people upon which the burdens imposed by the Government are falling?
When they talk of the well-being of the country, do they understand that residents in town and country have had to pay more money for their butter, sugar, flour and bread, millions of pounds of additional taxation that do not appear in the revenue accounts of the Government and that have had to be paid in order to give increased income to our farmers, and do they realise that these millions have gone down the sewer of futility and that they have not brought increased employment or better wages to the agricultural industry? Does the President realise that, after all the encouragement in the way of feeding the farmers with these additional payments taken from the purchasers of these commodities and with all the assistance that has been given by the general Government policy and the general Government propaganda to improve the farmers' conditions, there was less agricultural employment in the country last year than there was before Fianna Fáil took a hand in assisting the farmers and, not only was there less employment, but those who were employed got less money? Repeatedly we have had it stated here that there were 600 permanent agricultural labourers less last year than in the year 1931 and that such labourers as were employed in agriculture received—even on the figures of the Minister for Industry and Commerce— £900,000 less in wages than appeared in the wages bill in 1931.
It has been emphasised not only from here but by very authoritative people, that the Minister's figures, which indicate 21/3 for an agricultural labourer, have nothing to do with reality. Repeatedly the County Committee of Agriculture in Wexford has stated that 8/- a week was the wage paid to an agricultural labourer. The Labour Party have indicated that wages were ranging from 10/- to 18/- a week, and 12 months ago the Bishop of Cork warned the Government that agricultural labourers' wages were low because the farmers were not able to pay them and he added that it was near time the Government realised there were married agricultural labourers in Cork getting not more than 10/- a week. So that if the wages bill on the wage quoted by the Minister for Industry and Commerce of 21/3 a week per person has to be brought down any way near the figure quoted by the Wexford County Committee of Agriculture, which is the most subsidised county in the place, or the figure given by the Bishop of Cork for 1935, we have to realise that the loss goes nearer to £2,000,000 in the pool of wages available for the agricultural labourer. These are the people upon whom the increased cost of government is falling here.
Does the President realise the position the farmers are in? He has cut down their income by an amount that appears to be appalling. The British Government will have taken in land annuities by the end of the year—by the time we see the President's Constitution proposals, if he does not withdraw this Estimate now and consider the things that are important and fundamental so far as the interests of our people are concerned—a sum of £25,000,000. The Irish farmers will have had extracted from the produce that crosses the Channel fully that amount. Not only that, but on their trade with Great Britain for the last few years they will have lost £53,000,000. What that means to the farmer, particularly when we add the consequential losses that arise out of the reduction in the price that he gets in this country—what that means to the farmer we can have only a small general impression. It does mean this, taking one example, that for a beast for which the farmer would get £17 in 1931, he will get £8 10s. or, at the best, £9 now. That loss is otherwise reflected in the various commodities he sells, excepting, perhaps, butter. The loss to the farmers of £53,000,000 in five years on their export trade alone is a dead loss.
While it is claimed that the cereal policy of the Government has brought in additional income to the farmers the facts that we are aware of as regards the lack of additional employment in agriculture and the enormous fall in wages for agricultural labourers show that the farmers have got nothing to make up for these huge losses, and it is clear that the money paid by the people in the towns—additional money for their sugar, flour, bread and butter—is no addition to the farmers' income but is simply dropped into the farmers' pockets to fill some of the vacancies created there by the loss of their trade with Great Britain and the reduction of their income from our own people. It is on the farmers who have had these losses and the agricultural labourers whose wages are so substantially reduced that the burden of government falls, a burden that the Minister for Finance not only gives us no reason for thinking is going to be reduced, but that he has completely run away from explaining.
Reduced as we are to a Single Chamber, responsible for examining the general economic condition of the country, the financial position, and dealing in a proper way with legislative proposals, we have been completely denied by the Minister for Finance any explanation of the huge burden of taxation that he is continuing to impose on the people. We have asked him does he remember in 1932 when he came forward to impose substantial increases in taxation, that he then boasted he was putting £4,000,000 additional taxation on the people. He explained then that he was obliged to introduce an Emergency Budget. We have asked him if he remembers mentioning to the clothing manufacturers at the beginning of last year that this year was the first year in which we would return to Budget normalcy. We have asked him does he realise that he presents a bill to the people this year that is a couple of hundred thousand pounds more than the bill he presented on the occasion of his Emergency Budget. We ask him and the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the President and any Minister who has any sense of responsibility do they realise that, when the additional £4,000,000 was asked from the people for the Emergency Budget, Ministers went throughout the country and told the people that all this money would be taken from the rich?
I would ask them to remember that last year the tune was changed; that Deputy Hugo Flinn stood up, and, with such a display of defence as he could make, said: "Why should not the working-man be taxed," and that the Minister for Education had to appear this year and ask, as it were, "Why should not the working-man pay?" The consumers paid last year in customs duties alone £2,000,000 more than they did before Fianna Fáil began their great industrial revival assisted by tariffs. The shipbuilders of Dublin to-day, who see their work being sent across to Glasgow and to Great Britain to be done there because it would require a customs duty of 41 per cent, to get the work done in Dublin, are asked to pay on every single article that goes into their homes 50 per cent., 75 per cent., and 100 per cent. In those duties, as I say, last year £2,000,000 was taken more than was taken in the year 1931. Lumping the financial position, by the end of this year if we cannot stop the policies that are being pursued the Executive Council will have handled £27,800,000 more than the previous Government would have had to handle if they were carrying on the administration of this country. They handled more than that. They handled £10,000,000 set aside annually in the past at the rate of £2,000,000 a year to cover payments due in respect of local loans, so that they will end up this year having handled £37,800,000 more in five years than their predecessors in office would have handled. Where on earth does any Deputy see throughout this country any evidence that there has passed through the hands of the Government that additional huge sum?
In regard to the considerable amount of taxation which the Fianna Fáil members and Fianna Fáil Ministers complained so bitterly about in the past, not only did they collect the substantial sums of money collected in the past in taxation and other revenue, but they will, by the end of the fifth year which we are now in, have handled £37,800,000 more. In spite of handling that money the very work that is going on in the country and that it should be possible to pay for substantially out of these sums is not being so paid for. The previous Administration built 23,440 houses, and paid in building grants £1,529,000. They paid every halfpenny of it out of revenue. The present Government pride themselves on their housing. They had, it is true, built up to the 31st March last—that is in their first four years—30,749 houses. They paid in grants £1,023,000, but in spite of the fact that they have handled such enormous sums of money they have left a debt on the State to the extent of, I think, £2,264,000; so that, handling this money as they are, and leaving so little reflection of it in the well-being of the people or in work in the country, they are leaving in respect of housing alone a pile of debt to the extent of that particular amount.
We want to know—particularly in respect of the statement here that the economic war has given a stimulus to the revival and growth of our native industries here which has effected more in four years than could otherwise have been attained in 20—how long are we going to wait before the hollowness of that statement is appreciated by the members of the Fianna Fáil Party. It is perfectly clear that it is appreciated by the Minister for Finance. That is why he runs away from the discussions that have been invited from him both on the general resolution for the Budget and on the Second Reading of the Finance Bill. The Minister for Finance appreciates the situation, but he will not admit it. There is hardly a member of the Fianna Fáil Party who does not appreciate the situation, but they will not admit it. When members of the Fianna Fáil Party go to the Fianna Fáil Aeridheacht in Castlefin, the reason why they have to talk about the Republican Constitution, the ascendancy Second Chamber, the King of England, the British Empire, and the ignoring of the Treaty, is that they have to keep far away from anything touching the ordinary lives of the people. Those things, which are the material from which the President weaves his various constitutional ideas, are the things which have stood between this country and the proper carrying on of its business. Those are the things which have developed in the country the type of organisations that the Acting Minister for Justice had to condemn so strongly the other day. Not only are they the things which have brought about those conditions in the country but they are going to continue those conditions in the country until the President gives up tinkering with constitutional matters, and gets down to the things that really affect the economic conditions in the country.
Those things can be settled, and again I draw the President's attention to the explicit statement which was made to a representative of the Irish Independent. As reported in that paper of the 20th August, 1932, the Vice-President in Ottawa stated.
"We have, I believe, reached the basis of a settlement. It is impossible to fix the date on which agreement will be arrived at but it is measurably close".
In practically the same terms, or in even more explicit terms, he gave a similar interview to a representative of Le Matin, the report of which was reprinted in a Quebec paper. This House should know now in 1936 what were the terms which were offered in Ottawa in 1932. They should know what proposals the President has of a constitutional nature which he thinks he can get accepted by the British Government even though he cannot get them accepted by the people who are planning to overthrow this State by force. There is one way in my opinion in which a settlement of such constitutional questions as are outstanding between ourselves and Great Britain can be arrived at, and that is by carrying on in a proper way the ordinary work which exists between the two countries. Protestations of goodwill mean nothing to people with whom you are closely associated and with whom you have to work daily—at any rate, as compared with full and complete and decent co-operation. The President has been handed down, by the people who were making the real progress when he was patting himself on the back for having made 30 or 40 years' progress in 1932 or 1933, a position in this country that makes him and those he represents co-equal in status in every respect with the British Premier and the British Ministers of Great Britain—a position that makes this country in no way subordinate to Great Britain in any aspect of its internal or external affairs, any more than Great Britain is subordinate to us in any aspect of her internal or external affairs. There are definite matters of common interest, economically, between the two countries. There was an approach made in Ottawa dealing with economic questions that showed that there could be co-operation and that there could be agreement—showed so much that that was possible that the Vice-President gave several interviews stating that that was so. If that were possible in 1932, it is possible to-day; and the country is being surely treated, or will surely be treated, by the Fianna Fáil Party, to the thing that was stated when they first embarked on their economic war—to the economic counterpart of the civil war.
If the President is going to persist in holding this country in the way in which it is suffering at the present time from enormous economic losses, suffering the growth of disturbances that inevitably arise as much, if not more, out of economic wants and economic ill-being than they do, perhaps, out of his political blundering— if he pins us to that for any further length of time then, as I say, he is treating this country to the economic counterpart of the civil war and is doing this country infinitely more damage than even the civil war did this country. People are inclined to say that the civil war should not be talked about or argued about. It was not talked about or argued about after 1924 or 1925; and until it was necessary for the Fianna Fáil Party to stir up their old constitutional ideals in order to get a strong political tail behind them, the civil war did not matter in this country either between the ordinary people or between politicians. The President, however, as I say—I only speak of the civil war by way of comparison—is doing more damage to the country by his present policy; and the economic damage, the political damage, the social damage that was done by the civil war is as nothing compared with the economic damage that is being done to-day. It is these things that are holding us to them to-day in the same way as, four or five years ago, the President's constitutional tinkering held us, and I ask that this Estimate be referred back so that he can consider the whole situation, and I appeal to the President to drop his head-on tinkering with the Constitution and allow our constitutional development to develop in an ordinary way in connection with definite national things that he can state and definite international things that can be thoroughly understood by the people of this country and the people of Great Britain.
