I desire to raise a question concerning Questions 18 and 20, which were on the Order Paper yesterday. I could understand the Minister for Finance being lighthearted about a matter like this, but I was certainly surprised at Deputy Keyes intervening and saying that anyone who attempted to throw light on the subject would be talking through his hat, because I am drawing attention to a very important and a very serious matter. I want to get some more information, and I want to point out the great distinction there is between the delicacy with which the Minister for Industry and Commerce treats his side of the matter and the want of delicacy with which apparently his organisation treats unfortunate people who go to the exchanges looking for work. The facts are that a representative of an English firm applied to the employment exchange, or, to use the official statement used by the Information Bureau, stated "they might have permanent employment for a considerable number of new workers." My information is that 300 were to go.
The Adjournment—Employment of Irish Girls in England.
Where did the Deputy get his information?
I got my information from people who went to the labour exchange.
No number was mentioned to the applicants.
The Information Bureau states: "a considerable number of new workers." The Minister stated yesterday that no number was mentioned. Those who were interviewed by the officials in the labour exchange state 300. The official statement also says:
"No offer of employment in the manufacture of paper hats or any other class of goods in England was made through the Dublin Employment Exchange to anybody."
It goes on:
"No girls have been sent by the Dublin Employment Exchange to take such employment."
Further, the Minister has no information as to whether a number of girls have gone as a result. The general attitude of the Minister on the subject of this employment was disclosed yesterday when he was asked for information with regard to applications received from labour offices in England or Northern Ireland. He said he could not say how many were received in six months, or how many persons were now in employment without references to these labour exchanges, so that approaches from outside firms through the official machinery here for workers to go abroad are unnoticed or unrecorded.
I did not say that.
These are the facts, and in the case of this definite application we have outside girls going to the labour exchange, signing up and being offered work in England on February the 23rd if they interviewed a person upstairs on the manufacture of hats. I asked the Minister for the terms on which that employment was offered, and he would not say what they were. The terms were 26/- a week, that they were to refund 2/- weekly until their travelling expenses were paid, that they were to pay 16/- weekly for board, and that they would be engaged from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. on week-days, and from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m. on Saturdays. That was the information conveyed to them through the officials, and pressure of an implied kind was certainly brought to bear on persons to go over to England for that employment.
What pressure?
The pressure which reflects itself in this particular way, that when one young girl went home to her mother she said: "I am afraid there is a lot of us going to be cut off. They are sending girls to England." The mother could then say: "I hope you will not have to go." There was only this girl and her brother to assist the mother. The next day that girls came in to sign some of them were sent for interview. At least one girl could go home after that and tell her mother that she was afraid the money would be cut off as they were sending girls from the Labour Exchange to England. A young girl who was in receipt of insurance payments was asked to take this work and to go for interview. She was told that she had no sense when she would not go for the interview. A docket was then pinned to her card and she was sent to the referee the following Saturday. She was questioned by the referee as to whether she was seeking work or not and was given another chance. The referee told her that she could go on signing. When she came on the following Thursday to get her money she was told that the supervisor wanted to see her.
Does the Deputy say that the girl was asked to attend an interview?
She was.
The Deputy states that?
I do. She was told that she had no sense when she would not attend. When she did not attend, her card was marked, and she was told on the following Thursday—two days afterwards—that she would have to go to the court of referees on the following Saturday. She went to the court of referees, and was questioned as to what she was doing to obtain employment. She was given her last chance and was told that she could go on signing, which implied that she could still go on receiving unemployment insurance. On the following Thursday she had to interview a supervisor, who told her that she had no more stamps. She then went and saw another supervisor, who referred to her files and told her she had stamps for two or three months. That is one case of a girl treated in that particular way. The other case is that of a girl picking up the atmosphere outside, and telling her mother she was afraid the money was going to be stopped. It was the general opinion spread among the girls at the labour exchange that if they did not agree to go to England they were liable to have their money stopped on the grounds that they were not seeking work. On the question of the 300 vacancies, the 300 vacancies in England were mentioned freely by the girls around the labour exchange, and by girls who had not anything to do with being offered this work because they were not in the class that would be offered it. Definitely then outside you have such a want of delicacy and such a want of scrupulousness in dealing with this particular matter that the impression could be conveyed to girls that their unemployment insurance money was likely to be stopped if they turned down an offer to go to London.
Who made the offer?
They were given particulars through the hatches of the labour exchange, and asked to go up for interview. In one case the girl was told that she had no sense if she would not go. We asked the Minister how many girls were sent to employment in England as a result of this offer, and he told us that no offer of employment was made, and no applicants were sent to England. Girls have gone to England to obtain this employment; other girls are prepared to go, and are expecting to be called. If the Minister will refer to the labour exchange to-day he will find that there is one particular hatch in the women's part of the employment exchange where a girl can go if she wants to be transferred to England for this work.
With the industrial situation what it is here, we would expect that through the machinery of the Minister's Department he would keep a watch on the number of girls and the type of girls that were going to work in Great Britain, on the class of work they were going to, and on the terms of their employment there. The only point on which he is able to correct our information is that this is a question of felt hats; that it is permanent employment. That is all. He goes no distance to inform the House as to what the pay is, or as to what the general conditions of work are, although, as I say, those particulars are available and are known to be what I have stated. That extends apparently not only to girls, but extends to men throughout the country. But the Minister stands completely back. He is very scrupulous, very delicate, with regard to that particular kind of information. He is going to shut his eyes completely to what is going on. Representatives of an English firm may come over here and may apply at the labour exchange for persons to go abroad. They will be given accommodation in the office of the labour exchange in order to interview people. In this case, although accommodation was provided in the labour exchange for this lady to conduct the interview, the Minister says: "The lady was not permitted to take the names of applicants, nor were the applicants informed of the name of the prospective employer." Squeamishness is certainly carried to the extent of ridiculousness, and is carried beyond the point at which we could believe that that statement is true.
I want further information from the Minister as to what steps he proposes to take in future to see that girls will not be induced to accept employment of this particular kind in Great Britain through fear of losing the statutory payments they are entitled to here. That is one thing. Secondly, I want to know from the Minister why—if there are applications to his Department of this particular kind or of the kind that he implies he would receive from the Labour Department in Great Britain and Northern Ireland—he does not keep a record of the vacancies that are offered, a record of the class of work, the terms of employment and the number of people who go? Surely if any plea of sincerity is to be attached to some of the statements that the Minister and his colleagues make with regard to the development of industry here and the necessity for getting people here employed in industry, the Minister will keep a watch on what is happening to people of the class in regard to which the outside firm which approached him in this particular case have written so appreciatively of their capacity and qualities for engaging in industrial occupations.
I would have thought that Deputy Mulcahy would have had the good sense to let this matter drop. He discovered a mare's nest and is now frantically searching for some eggs in it, or, having regard to the Mutt and Jeff cartoon in the Evening Herald the other evening, perhaps I should say that he has discovered a cow's nest and is now looking for bottles. Neither eggs nor bottles are to be found, and the mare itself is turning very rapidly into the shape of a rabbit. The whole purpose of Deputy Mulcahy's speech now, and of his raising this question on the adjournment at all, is to convey the impression that he has got hold of something, namely, that there is no record kept of applications to the employment exchange for workers, but that was not his allegation last week. He wants us to forget the allegation which he made last week. That allegation was that an offer of employment in England was made to certain girls through the Dublin Employment Exchange, and that because they refused to go they had their unemployment assistance benefit stopped.
I said that one girl had; I said that the offer was definitely made and that one girl had her unemployment assistance stopped.
I will read what the Deputy said:
"One girl was offered this and she declined it, and the lady at the hatch asked her was she declining to take on this work, and she said she was; and the normal payment that girl expected to get that week, having got it in previous weeks, was withheld from her."
Deputy McGilligan butted in and said:
"Here is a question of forced emigration from the labour exchanges through the cutting off of the girls' unemployment money."
He went further; he said:
"I have other evidence—not so direct as that, perhaps, but bearing out that that is what is happening."
That is not what is happening, and, as I pointed out to the Deputy, there is not a single iota of truth in the story that he reported here. There was no offer of employment made through the Dublin Employment Exchange in connection with this matter. As the Deputy was informed, no offer would be made except at the request of the British Ministry of Labour. That is the normal practice in operation between the two countries. If an employer here wants a worker from Great Britain, the application is sent through the British Ministry of Labour. The British Ministry of Labour would not send a worker over here except at the request of the Department of Industry and Commerce. Our practice is the same. It is not true that there is no record kept of the offers of employment to Irish workers which are received through the British Ministry of Labour. That is not the question the Deputy asked. The question asked about approaches to the Department by employers. Any employer who approached the Department with an offer of work would be informed that that offer would not be entertained unless received through the British Ministry of Labour. In this case there was no offer of work, and certainly there was no offer of work to engage in the manufacture of paper hats. Where the Deputy got hold of the paper hats for the Coronation story I do not know. He got quite eloquent about it. "The attitude of the Saorstát was one of detachment and protest to the Coronation," he said. "Is this detachment and protest? We are going to send girls over to make paper hats for the Coronation."
The Minister will read in the Kerry papers this week that girls down there were offered the same kind of employment.
Oh, this is a new story?
Yes, a new story.
As authentic as the last.
Yes, as authentic as the last.
In this case, a firm in England, for reasons of their own which I have not mentioned and which appeared to be quite good, were anxious to employ a certain number of Irish workers. They sent a representative here, but that representative was informed, as I have said, that no offer of work would be considered unless it was received through the British Ministry of Labour. No offer of work was made to anybody, and nobody was sent to take that work through the Dublin Unemployment Exchange. People may go to England in search of work other than through the instrumentality of the exchange, but so far as the Deputy's statement is concerned that girls signing for work at the exchange were offered work in England, were sent to England to take that work and were refused unemployment assistance if they did not take it, there is no foundation whatsoever for it.
In the case of the one girl whom the Deputy mentioned, I had a search made of the records of the exchange and was able to identify the girl to whom the Deputy referred. Her name is Mary Lennon. That girl was not sent for this interview at all.
She refused to go.
The two officers at the exchange at which this Miss Lennon was signing were not approached in any way concerning the employment offered in this particular case. The girl's unemployment assistance was stopped because, in the opinion of the unemployment assistance officer, she was not genuinely seeking work.
Why did the court of referees tell her to go on signing?
Her case went to the court of referees, and she was told she was being given a last chance. The court recommended that she should be allowed to sign, but, in connection with the investigation of her case, it was found that she was not entitled to unemployment assistance at all, because she did not fulfil the statutory qualifications.
After her case had gone to the court of referees.
The whole allegation that the Department is forcing girls to emigrate to England, and that the machinery of the employment exchange is being used to exercise economic pressure on unemployed girls in Dublin, to make them go to England, is based on this case—the case of a girl who was not approached at all in connection with this employment, and the stoppage of whose unemployment assistance was entirely due to the fact that, under the Act, she is not qualified to receive it. I do not know whether Deputy Mulcahy expects the Dáil ever to take him seriously again, in view of the wild story he apparently accepted from somebody in this connection, and to which he gave immediate publicity without undertaking the slightest investigation into its accuracy. Nobody has ever had unemployment insurance benefit or unemployment assistance stopped because of a refusal of an offer of work outside the Saorstát. Deputy McGilligan alleged here that it was our policy to encourage emigration by stopping benefit payments in these circumstances. It has never happened, and I challenge Deputy Mulcahy to produce any case in which it has happened, and I certainly challenge Deputy McGilligan to produce here, or elsewhere, the other evidence that that is the policy of the Government to which he made reference in the debate. This whole story is a flop, Deputy. Forget about it—it is the best thing you can do.
The Dáil adjourned at 2.15 p.m. until 3 o'clock on Wednesday, March 31st.