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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 9 Feb 1938

Vol. 70 No. 3

Committee on Finance.—Vote 52—Agriculture.

I move:-

Go ndeontar suim Bhreise ná raghaidh thar £139,704 chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá dé Mhárta, 1938, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí Oifig an Aire Talmhaíochta agus Seirbhísí áirithe atá fé riaradh na hOifige sin, maraon le hIldeontaisí-i-gCabhair.

That a Supplementary sum not exceeding £139,704 be granted to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending 31st March, 1938, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Agriculture and of certain Services administered by that Office, including sundry Grants-in-Aid.

There are some items on this Estimate which may require explanation. The first item, £631, includes subscriptions to the International Institute of Agriculture, the headquarters of which are in Rome. What really happened was that the subscription for 1936-37 was not paid until the present financial year, and the subscription for 1937-38 will be also paid during the present financial year. It was therefore necessary to have a Supplementary Estimate. The amount payable up to the present year to the International Dairying Federation was very small. The amount has been raised, and as a result we have to pay £20 more than we paid previously. The International Beef Conference includes countries which export beef or cattle for the British market and the different countries that participate contribute in proportion to the exports. Our share amounts to £109.

Can the Minister say what countries are members of the Beef Conference?

All countries which export beef, principally Australia, Argentine and Uruguay.

Great Britain does not belong to it.

In addition to those that are exporters?

Yes. Sub-head F (1) deals with agricultural schools and farms. There are three farms concerned—Athenry, Chantilly and the Munster Institute, Cork. In the case of Athenry and the Munster Institute the expenses of keeping students and keeping live stock increased. In the case of Chantilly the position was different owing to the fact that we purchased more stallions than was anticipated when the original Estimate was introduced. Sub-head G (1) refers to the improvement of milk production. Here we had a somewhat larger number of cows under test and the travelling expenses of supervisors were heavier than anticipated. Expenditure on the purchase of dairy bulls for leasing or resale at reduced prices was £350 more than the original Estimate. With regard to land reclamation, £2,000 additional was required for the employment of gangers. These schemes were in congested districts and in other specified areas and deal with the reclamation of land belonging to small farmers which up to the present was not productive. Small grants were given for the reclamation of that land and it entails a certain amount of supervision. More work was done than was anticipated. Sub-head M (5)—dealing with the improvement of the creamery industry—is a large item. There was the purchase of two creameries, one co-operative and the other proprietary. There were also two creameries at Leitra. One was handed over to a co-operative society and Ballymacelligott was offered to the Dairy Disposals Board. We also commenced the organisation of schemes for districts in West and South Kerry from Cahirciveen to Kenmare and from Kenmare to Castletownbere. The organisation of these districts will it is expected entail an expenditure of £40,000 but not more than £8,000 will be spent during the present financial year. There will be a central creamery at Kenmare, a collecting centre at Castletownbere, and nine travelling creameries operating to bring the cream to the large centres. All churning will be done at Kenmare. It is very difficult to say with certainty at the present juncture if it is going to be a complete economic success, but it is thought that more can be done by spending a certain amount of money organising creameries in the area that will be for the good of the people, than by spending an equal amount on unemployment relief or that type of work. I have hopes that the project will succeed. At any rate, Deputies who know the area will not I think find any great fault at the expenditure of a comparatively small amount of money if there is a hope that some good can be done there. Sub-head M (8) refers to expenditure in connection with the provision of butter for winter requirements. When the Budget was brought in early in the financial year a change was made in the price of butter to the consumer and the creameries received for April 139/- per cwt. but paid a levy of 27/-a cwt. making the net amount 112/-. As they had gone through a difficult winter it was felt that we should try to continue winter prices for the month of April and that meant paying back 17/- a cwt. to the creameries for April production In addition, a certain amount of butter was left unsold at the end of April which they had to sell at 118/-, the price from May to November. We had to give an additional 11/- per cwt. on that costing £5,200 on a total production for April of 28,700 cwts. For the last four or five years we had a scheme of storing butter for winter consumption. Up to the present year the scheme was to remit a certain amount of the levy on butter in cold storage, usually I think 9/-. As the levy was only 1/- this year we had to pay up, instead of remitting the levy on 56,500 cwts. stored to the middle of September at 9/6, and after that on 16,000 cwts. at 6/- a cwt. as well as on 4,000 cwts. of non-creamery butter, making a total of 76,500 cwts. stored for winter use. In addition to that for the last four or five years we remitted the levy during the winter months in order to give a better price for winter production than for summer production. As we had no levy to remit we had instead to give a subsidy during the winter months and that amounted to 12/- a cwt. The amount spent on that was £49,000. The three items, April production, storage for winter, and production during the winter, make a total of £111,000.

There is no compensating saving anywhere in the accounts for that expenditure?

It would come out of the export bounty Vote but it was held that it was not dated on the face of the Estimate and therefore might be regarded as not included because it was not exported.

You will save out of the export bounty practically the amount of money that you are disbursing here.

In connection with the Slaughter of Cattle and Sheep Acts, the amount of compensation set out is £15,000 but there are savings against that which amount to almost £15,000. There are two items in connection with that sum of £15,000. The first is that the co-operative meat factory in Waterford entered into an agreement with me about three years ago to take cattle from the Kerry cattle area for conversion into corned beef and meat essences. Under that agreement they were paid a certain amount per head for the cattle—not a fixed amount per head. They bought the cattle at a fixed price from me. I had to purchase the cattle in the Kerry cattle area at a somewhat higher price; and, therefore, there was a certain loss, but it did a considerable amount to relieve the position in the Kerry cattle area in improving prices there. Fortunately, if you like, prices improved considerably during the present year, with the result that it became altogether uneconomic to purchase those cattle and resell to Waterford. We had a provision in the agreement that up to the 31st July, 1937, I had the option of paying them £10,000 compensation and dropping the agreement, or paying them the amount that they had spent on the factory if that was a lesser sum. As a matter of fact it was higher, and, therefore, we paid them the £10,000. As far as the Kerry cattle area is concerned the scheme is finished. They are carrying on this business now on their own. They are purchasing a rougher type of cattle and of young cows which they claim to be more suitable for the making of corned beef and of meat essences. That is as regards the £10,000. The other £5,000 was paid to the factory in Roscrea under somewhat similar circumstances. The factory in Roscrea commenced production about three years ago, I think. The original agreement there provided that the promoters would build the factory, having got a certain amount of money on loan on which they were paying 4 per cent. There was, however, an agreement that we should supply them with a certain number of cows.

They got all the money they required for the factory.

They thought at the time that they would get it. They got £16,000 on debentures, and claim that they have spent much more than that. One part of the agreement was that we would have to supply them with a certain number of cows.

For nothing?

Yes. They paid the freight on them. There was a compensation clause in case we failed to supply the number of cows. We gave them cows for a while. As a matter of fact, we were being offered many more cows than we could take, and we had to enter into a second agreement with Roscrea to enlarge the factory, and that we would send them more cows. We found, after some time, that it was impossible to get cows at the price which we were paying, namely, 50/- each. We were advised by people in the country that unless we paid considerably more we would not get the number of cows that we wanted for the factory. We would become liable, therefore, for the penalty for not supplying the cows. Instead of paying the penalty, we considered that we would be making a better bargain by compensating them for the cost of the additions to the original factory. It has not yet been decided what that amount is. We paid £5,000 on account. It would be very unwise on my part if I were to say now what I think they should get, but the position is that we have paid £5,000 on account. I should say that under the Cattle and Sheep Act everything in connection with these agreements—what has been paid out and all the rest—must be laid before the Dáil at the end of the financial year, so that all those things will come up for consideration in more detail at a later stage.

When all the money is spent, I suppose.

When the cows come home.

Would the Minister say who owns this factory in Roscrea?

The present company own it, but it falls back into the hands of the Minister for Agriculture after four years' operation at the original cost.

After borrowing £16,000 on debentures, are the boys going to sell it back to you again?

They must pay us the £16,000.

You are going to pay them at the end of four years the cost of building the factory, and they are going to hand you over a dud factory?

We have the alternative of taking our money back, and leaving it with them. If we get our £16,000 back we can leave it with them. We have the option of either taking the factory at the original cost or leaving it with them.

It would be contrary to all the principles of commercial enterprise for anyone to take back a failure.

With regard to the distribution of cattle export licences, when the scheme was brought in of giving a bounty on stall-fed cattle, it necessitated the allocation of a certain number of inspectors for that purpose. That involved an expenditure of £1,144, plus £150 for travelling expenses. In the case of the Flax Act, there was a slight excess of expenditure in connection with travelling expenses of £200. Under Appropriations-in-Aid, there was an estimated deficiency in the items set out—receipts from students' fees, sale of live stock and farm produce, etc. Most of that is due to the fact that one of the farms owned by the Department of Agriculture had to get rid completely of its stock of pigs because they had a breed that was not doing well. The result was that for some few months there were no pigs, and, therefore, no sales, a thing which was not anticipated.

They would take the land off a farmer if he told them that.

They have their pigs back again now.

The unfortunate farmer would not get time. The Minister for Lands would take the land off him and give it to his neighbour.

Were they York pigs they were getting rid of?

They are getting them back again.

They found they were not suitable?

Not at all. They are getting them back. The next item is: "Receipts from service fees of stallions, sale of colts, sale and leasing of bulls, etc.". We did not succeed in purchasing the number of stallions we had hoped to get and therefore there was a smaller receipt from the sale of stallions. The next item is: "Agricultural Produce (Eggs) Act: Receipts from fees, etc.—£1,000". That was due to a reduction in the export of eggs. Then there is: "Dairy Products Acts and Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Acts—£7,240". That is due to the fact that we had a rather large staff the previous year for the collection of the levy on farmers' butter and these officials were not necessary during the present year because we dropped the levy. If we had employed these people the amount would be recouped to the Department out of the Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Fund. As the officials were not wanted they were not paid and therefore there was no recoupment and no Appropriation-in-Aid under that head because the officials were not employed.

You paid them?

No, we did not pay them. If we had paid them we would have been recouped that amount from the Price Stabilisation Fund.

You have a compensating item?

They were not paid at all.

There would have been £7,000 going out under another sub-head?

There is that much less, on the salaries.

If these people had been continued in their employment would they have been able to collect what would pay their own salaries?

They did more than that. They did not collect enough and that is why we did away with that. The next item is: "Agricultural Produce (Cereals) Acts". The same thing applies there. At the time that we ceased paying subsidies to the wheat growers a certain amount was outstanding from certain growers to a merchant under guarantees from the Department that the merchant would be able to collect his bill for seed from these people. At the time the Bill was going through it was provided that the Department would undertake the responsibility of collecting these amounts and would pay them over to the merchants. Of course the amount is not paid out to the merchant. We did not get in as much as we expected and therefore the Appropriations-in-Aid are down by £360.

Are you taking steps to recover the amount?

Yes. The next item is "Agricultural Products (Regulation of Export) Acts (sub-head 0.9)." That deals with the export of butter to Belgium and Germany. There was less butter exported to Belgium than we anticipated, and also somewhat less to Germany, and therefore less receipts amounting to £90,000. The same thing applies to the next item, "Receipts in connection with the administration of the Slaughter of Cattle and Sheep Acts, etc."

You have a corresponding saving on each sub-head?

Yes, on the purchase. Fewer cattle were exported to Belgium. There were more cattle exported to Germany than in the previous year, but the number was fewer than anticipated probably due to shipping strikes lasting a couple of weeks, when no cattle went out. That item has been made up in that way. The number of cattle that went out in the year 1937 was 16,775, as compared with 14,382 the previous year, so that the number was actually up, but not as high as was anticipated when preparing the original Estimate.

What is the value of the cattle that went out in 1937-38, because you expected £515,000 worth to go out?

£175,000 of that sum is for the reduction on the Estimate for cattle receipts. If you take £175,000 from the original Estimate you have it.

£340,000 worth of cattle went out. You dropped £195,000 in Appropriations-in-Aid.

Yes, but I should like to assure the Deputy that there was a profit on the cattle during the year.

Was there much profit on the cattle sent to Germany?

A fair amount. I would not like to say any more now, because we are negotiating with Germany for a better price.

Can the Minister tell us what the profit was? Of course it represents a levy on the farmers who sell the cattle.

I do not want to keep that information from the Deputy, but I should like to say that this has to be produced at the end of each financial year's trading. We are negotiating about the price at present.

Perhaps it is as well to leave it over then.

The sum total that we want under the Estimate is £139,704.

In so far as this Estimate applies to the internal agricultural policy of this country, it seems to me to reveal a most astonishing situation of confusion and, in certain respects, of folly. Anyone listening to the Minister attempting to explain the Supplementary Estimate under M (8)—"Expenses in connection with the provision of butter for winter requirements" and certain of the items under the Appropriations-in-Aid deficiency relating to butter, must realise that it is now entirely impossible for any normal human being to follow the activities of the Minister in his relation with the butter industry of the country. Levies are changed every fortnight, payments are altered continually, and the Minister has constituted himself a kind of price dictator of the industry, and he manages the price by levying tolls on the consumer, and by doling out handfuls of money where he, in his absolute discretion, considers it a desirable thing to pass over £30,000 or £40,000 to the people. It would be very much better to take over the entire creamery industry and run it on the basis of the Electricity Supply Board. I would contemplate such procedure with horror because I detest Socialism. I detest concentration of every activity of the community under the control of bureaucrats or civil servants, but if I have to choose between some kind of order, be it a bureaucratic order, and chaos such as is at present going on under the Minister's activities, I would choose a bureaucratic order. Far better that the industry should be provided with an opportunity of getting on to normal lines. I do not propose to go into that aspect of the question now.

Tell us what you would do.

I have not the slightest intention of discussing that aspect of the question. If the Deputy has not heard me say that I trust he will be a little more attentive in future.

I suspected that.

One thing certain is that the chaos at present obtaining in this industry should be stopped, both from the point of view of public funds and the point of view of the industry itself. The further one delves into it, the more abundantly clear it is that, not only is it impossible for the ordinary observer to follow what the Minister is doing, but that the Minister himself, I do not believe, knows from day to day what he is doing. He simply lives from hand to mouth, doling out money one day and frantically drawing it back another day, storing too much butter this month and frantically scrambling to get butter out of the country the next month and then eventually finding that he has to import it from Denmark. I think it is true to say that not long ago when butter was saleable at a fancy price in London the Minister for Agriculture issued instructions to store in Dublin. Then when prices slumped on the British market, the Minister began to export Irish butter to the markets of the world. He then discovered when winter came that in that period of depressed prices he had sold more butter abroad than should have been sold if a balance were to be left in this country adequate to meet winter demands, and he had eventually to buy back butter from Denmark at winter prices. So we held, in Ireland, Irish butter while the price was at its highest in Great Britain and we sold in Great Britain and on the Continent when the price was at the very bottom. We bought back from Denmark winter butter at winter prices because we discovered we had not retained enough of our own production in this country to meet the home demand. That is characteristic of the chaos surrounding the administration of the butter industry at the present time. It is deplorable that it should be allowed to continue.

I think sub-head O (11) really gives rise to something closely approximating to a grave scandal. Here you have a small group of private capitalists who come to the Minister and express their readiness to embark on a speculation and the terms of their speculation are as follows: If the Minister will lend them £16,000 they will build a factory on condition that they get all the raw material for the industry from the Minister for nothing, and the Minister will buy that raw material out of public funds; furthermore, that the Minister must tell them the exact amount of that raw material which he will deliver to them for nothing every month and if he should fail to deliver the last cow to the number he undertakes to deliver, he has to pay them a penalty in respect of his failure to do so. They are to sell the product of the factory and put the entire proceeds of the sale into their own pockets and, at the conclusion of four years, they can sell the factory back to the Minister by declining to pay the debentures and handing back the factory to the Minister if, as has transpired, the business for which the factory was originally built has come to an end. The Minister is to be made a present by this group of speculators at the end of four years of a factory which is useless, and the boys are to go off with four years' plunder in their pocket. Well, now, really such a transaction as this is scandalous beyond description.

Then we are told that these gentlemen have actually had the effrontery to make a claim on the Government for compensation and that the Minister has paid them £5,000 on account and does not dare to say here what is his estimate of the ultimate liability. Was there ever such a revelation of the misuse of public funds? Did anyone in this House, either on the Fianna Fáil Benches or on the Opposition Benches, know at any time when the Minister's Estimates were before the House of the nature of this transaction? I should like to know if there is a single Deputy in this House who realised the nature of this transaction. I do not believe that there was a single one except those directly interested in the transaction. We are now informed of the true nature of the transaction, when the time comes for paying the penalties and when nothing can be done about it.

Realise what has happened. The Minister, under cover of our authority, has entered into agreements binding the State to pay penalties of an unascertained character and laying the absolute obligation on the public funds of this country to pay moneys out to these warriors who are engaged in this speculation, if speculation it can be called. Were the accounts of this private company — that is to say, a private company, as opposed to a State-controlled company — audited by a Government auditor? Does the Minister know whether profits have been made during these four years, and, if so, how great were these profits? Perhaps the Minister would tell us now is this a private company or a public company? Does the Minister happen to know?

I think it is a private company.

A private company! I have no doubt that if these gentlemen were a body of independent persons of whom the Minister had no knowledge except that they came along in the ordinary course of business, and he understood that they would carry on, that they were in no way connected with the Minister or his Government——

I shall answer all this.

Were they members of the Dáil?

Who is in the group? Would the Minister be good enough to tell us?

I shall answer all these questions afterwards.

I infer from what the Minister said now that some of the members of the private company were, in fact, connected with the Government, and he rests on the fact that this was a private company, obliged to publish no balance sheet, obliged to reveal not one figure as to what its profits were or were not. Was there ever such transaction entered into by any Government, dictatorial, democratic or otherwise? How can the Minister come to this House and ask for money to maintain conduct of that kind? It is a howling public scandal.

He is getting money back here!

He is paying out £4,000 on account of damages for failure to deliver a sufficient quantity of raw material for nothing to this private company.

There are Appropriations-in-Aid.

Appropriations-in-Aid have nothing to do with it. The Minister has fixed this House with warning that this is only the first instalment of what he proposes to do, and that he does not venture to estimate what their ultimate claim is going to be. Remember, the injury which they suffered is that the Minister did not deliver to them for nothing a sufficient quantity of the raw material on which they were operating. Such a transaction I never heard of, nor anybody else either. I listened with interest to the promise that the Minister is going to explain it all to us. I hope he will, and I will be particularly anxious to hear from the Minister has he taken, or will he now take, urgent steps to put in Government auditors to this company and report to this House what profits have been made, and what claim in equity this company can have to large damages, in view of the fact that at the conclusion of their four years' operations they could pass back to the State the worthless factory for the entire sum it cost them to build it.

The Minister directs our attention to the fact that the Appropriations-in-Aid fall short by £1,000 in respect of fees on the export of eggs. That has got nothing or very little to do with the situation operating abroad. The fall in the output of eggs is almost entirely due to the maize-meal mixture scheme set on foot by the Minister himself as part of the internal policy, without reference to external relations or external policy of any kind whatever, but just as a useful normal departure in the normal agricultural life of the country. What actually happened? This fraudulent, reckless, and irresponsible scheme was thrust down the throats of the people of this country. The object of it was, if you please, to increase tillage — to consume a greater quantity of barley and oats in this country than had been consumed heretofore. What actually happened? We are now consuming less barley and oats than we consumed before the scheme was put into operation. It emerged, after the damage was done, that the price of Indian meal had been raised so high over so long a period by the maize-meal mixture scheme that the number of fowl in the country had dropped by about 4,000,000. It then emerged that, quite unknown to or unrealised by the experts, the fowl of the country were consuming a very considerable quantity of oats; that they were keeping a very considerable quantity of land under oats in the country, which would cease to be under oats if the fowl were not there to eat them. All this land was kept under oats, which were consumed by the fowl and exported profitably in the shape of eggs—an export worth £2,250,000 per annum. Five years of the maize-meal mixture scheme brought our export of eggs down to £700,000 per annum; it reduced our export of eggs by nearly two-thirds, and so destroyed the consuming power of the egg-production industry in regard to oats and grain that the loss of oat acreage resulting from the destruction of the egg industry far exceeds the increased quantity of oats and barley consumed as a result of the maize-meal mixture scheme.

In that way we have burdened our people for five years with an immense charge, and mark you, we have burdened the poorest parts of the country with that immense charge, because if you take the hen population and the pig population of this country — and remember, the maize-meal mixture largely affects pigs as well as hens — you will find them concentrated everywhere in the congested areas, while the grain-growing areas are concentrated in the richest parts of the country. We were subsidising the richest parts at the expense of the poorest parts. For five years we laid that burden on the backs of the poorest section of the community. We destroyed the pig trade; we destroyed the egg trade; we reduced the acreage of grain; and we derived no benefit, direct or indirect from the whole experiment. Nevertheless it is being carried on to the present time, and I venture to say that Deputy Allen is thumping a tub about it down in Wexford. I should not even be surprised if Deputy Allen still believed in it. He is an innocent, good-natured kind of man. He was misled into this business, and he still probably nurtures some sort of illusion that it was sound, but that something went wrong; he does not know what. But these are the facts. These are the inescapable facts published in the Minister's own statistics, and so to-day we are face to face with the fact that the fees payable in respect of export of eggs are down by £1,000.

We are told that £400 in respect of deficiency in appropriations-in-aid results from the complete deterioration of the entire pig stock on one of the Minister's own farms. Was there ever such a confession made by a Minister responsible for a Department of Agriculture? Just imagine one of our farmers discovering that he had to take his entire stock of pigs and dispose of them on the grounds that they were so bad that he could not keep them on the place any longer. Everyone would say "Well, the sooner that fellow gets out of farming, and becomes a tram conductor or something else, the better for everyone concerned." The Minister would have qualified to become a tram conductor if that were one of the tests. On one of his own farms there has been such a deterioration in the grade of pigs that he has had to clear out the whole lot, and buy in a new stock, probably from some farmer whom his colleague, the Minister for Lands, will shortly certify as not being able to keep his lands in accordance with proper methods of husbandry, so that his lands will be taken from him and handed to some fellow who believes in farming a la Deputy Allen, and who will start producing in north Wexford a Manitoba No. 1 wheat superior to that which can be produced in Canada.

To choke the Deputy!

There is a very odd item here under sub-head I (4). The Minister explains that the expenditure of £2,000 — I direct the special attention of the Labour Party to this — on land reclamation schemes will be recouped to him out of the Unemployment Grant. We always had land reclamation schemes. We always had appropriations under the Land Commission Vote for those land reclamation schemes, but under the new dispensation you make a great hub-bub about all the money you are providing for the relief of the unemployed, and then you proceed to go around from one Vote to the other and pay for the normal expenditure that ought to be undertaken on those Votes out of the unemployment relief grant. That means either of two things; either you dislodge the normal worker who would get employment under those Votes at the ordinary rate of wages, by employing relief workers at 24/- a week to do the same work, or else you simply take from the Relief Vote the money that was ordinarily voted in the ordinary way for the maintenance of the public services. Would I be right in saying that this £2,000 is recouped from the Unemployment Relief Fund, and that in regard to the persons employed on those reclamation schemes, their work is valued on the basis of a 24/- a week wage? I should be glad if the Minister would tell us that.

Now, in regard to G (1), I want to direct the attention of the Minister to sub-head D. That, I understand, has to deal with the special-term bull, and I want to ask the Minister this question: Is it true that the Minister is making a profit out of these special-term bull transactions? My reason for asking that is that I suspect the Minister is going around the country with an air of benevolence bestowing special-term bulls on selected farmers as a bounty from the Government, when, in fact, what is happening is that the Minister's inspectors go to a show and, after all the good bulls, the expensive bulls, have been bought either by private persons or the Department for the purpose of distributing under the premium bull schemes, the Minister then buys all the left-over bulls which are adjudged by his inspectors to be fit for service at all at knock-down prices, and, having bought them at knock-down prices, he then proceeds to distribute them to farmers throughout the country as special-term bulls, and gets from the farmer who buys the special-term bull £6 or £10 more than he, the Minister, paid for the bull when he bought it. If that is true, I think it is an indefensible operation and highly undesirable, and I seriously doubt the prudence of this special-term bull system at all. We all know the difficulties that lay in the way of raising the standard of live stock in this country. The average small farmer was inclined to say: "Ah, the ould bulls were the best ones, and these Department bulls are not much good." Now, the only way to overcome that natural prejudice, the existence of which it is only common prudence to recognise, was to allow no bull to go out to the country as a Department bull, except a really tip-top animal, so that gradually all would come to realise that, if a bull was a Department bull, it was as good an animal as could be got. It is a mistake, in my judgment, to send out as a Department bull what is only a medium-class animal, and we have got to remember that when you call an animal a special-term bull, or a premium bull, or whatever else you call it, the country people lump them all together as Department bulls. I think that, on the whole, the Minister would be well advised to reconsider that business and to withdraw from the system of sending out special-term bulls altogether, and confine himself to sending out to the country nothing but the really choice bulls which have been associated with the premium standard over a long time.

Now, the Minister has described to us an item of expenditure here, which he undertook, under M (5), for the development of the creamery business in the County of Kerry. He says that it may prove to be uneconomic, but that no one will grudge the £1,000 or so that the scheme will cost, even if it is uneconomic, owing to the special circumstances obtaining in Kerry. I think the time has come when we ought to ask ourselves a question here, and that is, how much would it cost to supply milk; free of charge, generally, to the necessitous population of the cities of this country? I wonder if you paid the farmers of this country five pence a gallon for milk and, instead of trying to convert that milk into butter, brought it into the large centres of population and distributed it free, or at a nominal sum — and I would prefer to distribute it free — what would it involve the public purse? I think many people would be astonished at how little it would cost. It is pretty generally admitted that the most perfect foodstuff you can possibly get for young people is milk. I am convinced that, if you proposed to distribute it generally, it would have to be on the basis of pasteurising it all. Some people would say "How would you bring the milk all the way from Kerry to Dublin?" Well, that is nonsense, because all the milk that goes into London comes from greater distances than from Kerry to Dublin, and in many parts of America the milk is carried hundreds of miles to the centre of population where it is consumed, and the question of distance presents no difficulty. I suppose that, 100 years ago, if a man got up and suggested that you ought to bring water into every house in Dublin, and not only into every house, but into every tenement and every room in which people live, prudent financiers would have laughed at such a suggestion and said that the cost of pipes would be ruinous and that the cost of the maintenance of such a system of water supply would be prohibitive. We have now changed our minds in that regard, and I say that the idea of bringing milk into the centres of population in the same way is no more ludicrous than the idea of bringing water into the cities was 100 or so years ago. Can any individual walk through the streets of Dublin and see children literally starving—because an under-nourished child is a starved child—and say to themselves, quite blandly, that it is unthinkable to provide that child with the food requisite to give it enough? I feel the exact opposite. I feel that, so long as you have children living in an urban or indeed in any other centre, about whom you are bound to admit that they are not getting enough food, far from saying that it is grotesque to insist, without counting the cost, that they must get it, it is insane not to say that the thing is to give them food and count the cost afterwards.

The Deputy is preaching Socialism now.

Not at all. I am not preaching Socialism, but the soundest of economics.

It would require legislation.

No, Sir, because the Minister under this section says deliberately that he is going to lose some money, the primary object of which is to maintain the milk production in County Kerry, and I say that, instead of converting it into butter, the milk should be brought to Limerick or Dublin and given out to the people. I press on the House — of course I do not expect the House to rise up now and to say that this thing should be done to-morrow or the day after to-morrow — but I do press on the House that some effort should be made to find a remedy for a great social evil. The disposal of milk at the present time is extremely difficult. It does not seem to be possible for us to produce milk economically for conversion into butter, because the position in New Zealand and the Antipodes generally seems to be that they can produce butter more cheaply. Denmark seems to be able to do it because of their particular methods, but it is not necessary to go into the question of winter production and so on. Whatever the reason, the disposal of milk in a manufactured condition is extremely difficult. In England, they have tackled the problem by setting up milk boards and actually raising the price of milk. Here in Dublin we have actually entered into a conspiracy with the milk producers to raise the price of milk by a ½d. a quart. If any person who walks every day through Gloucester Street, Marlborough Street and Lower Gardiner Street could imagine that the Minister, or the Government, would still raise the price of milk to these people, it would seem to be incredibly outside betting. Could we not approach this problem, where there is redundant milk in the country, by recognising that milk production is a vital element in the live-stock industry of this country and that we have got to have milk production if we are to maintain the immensely valuable live-stock industry and, instead of manufacturing milk into butter to be sold at an uneconomic price in Germany, Great Britain and elsewhere, we should organise transport, if necessary in glass-lined vehicles, bring the milk to Dublin, pasteurise it and, if needs be, distribute it free? I seriously throw out that suggestion to the House for consideration, and I venture to make this prophecy: that if we have not the courage to bring into existence and operate some scheme of that kind in our day, our children certainly will. It is incredible to think that a foodstuff like milk should be wasted by converting it into butter that nobody wants and for which nobody will pay, when you could consume it in its ordinary condition, pasteurised or else produced in such a hygienic way as to render pasteurisation unnecessary—and I think that that is impracticable. It astonishes me that there should be any choice between the two methods.

I should be glad if the Minister would tell me netly what exactly does the beef conference refer to under one sub-head? What I mean is, do they meet ever so often, or do they recommend to the British Government what the import quotas will be, or what functions have they got? I say straightly to the Minister that, in my judgment, a very grave obligation indeed devolves upon him to explain in full detail the nature of the transaction that has taken place between his Department and the Roscrea Meat Factory, and I feel bound to say that, on the facts disclosed, the prima facie evidence is that a very grave and undesirable scandal is at present proceeding in regard to that matter.

I would vote for this Supplementary Estimate with a good deal more enthusiasm if I were sure it was going to pull this staggering industry out of the mess of economic chaos in which it certainly is to-day. Listening to the Minister's speech one certainly finds no grounds for enthusiasm as to the future of the dairying industry. Apparently the Minister himself does not know in what direction he is going or in what direction he is driving the dairying industry. I had thought that Deputy Dillon would have indicated a line of policy on the part of the Opposition which might improve the dairying industry or drag it out of the staggering position in which it is at present. I believe that, under present circumstances, the dairying industry cannot be saved, and that under the circumstances of the past four or five years it could not be saved, without providing a subsidy at the expense of the taxpayers.

Why should these circumstances continue?

Deputy Dillon knows the reason, or, if he does not know the reason, Deputy Bennett or Deputy Fagan or the other Deputies near him will be able to tell him. From the evidence given it is clear that during certain periods within the last two or three years the dairy farmer without a subsidy would be only in a position to get 2½d. per gallon for his milk.

Only 1¼d.

I want to know from Deputy Bennett whether the dairy farmers could continue to supply milk if they were guaranteed a price of only 2½d. a gallon?

Why does Deputy Davin say that?

The figures are available, but Deputy McGilligan has not made a study of them nor has he made as much study of this question as he might.

Will the Deputy tell me why he puts the figure at 2½d. only?

The price of butter in the world market in which we have to sell it is such that creameries could pay only 2½d. a gallon for it if they were given no subsidy. I ask the Minister to say whether that is roughly correct or not?

At one time it was.

Then with the large amount we voted this year and last year for subsidising butter, the price has not exceeded 4½d. per gallon. Now that price of 4½d. a gallon is not an economic price to the dairy farmer and if we are going to support this industry by a system of subsidies — if a subsidy is justified at all it is only for the purpose of providing a proper price for the dairy farmers — and if we are to vote for this subsidy let us have a figure which would give the farmer something like 6d. per gallon. I would like to be checked up on these figures by Deputy Bennett. Notwithstanding the large amount which has been voted by way of subsidies in the last year or two and making allowance for what we are now asked to vote on the Supplementary Estimate, the extraordinary position in my part of the country is that the milk supplied to the Midland creameries has dropped by 30 or 40 per cent. I would like to ask the Minister now to give the House an explanation for that state of things.

Has any reason been suggested to Deputy Davin?

I would like to hear what the Minister has to say on the matter.

Has not Deputy Davin taken the opinion of men in the dairying industry down the country?

I do not think there are many creameries in the constituency that Deputy Brennan represents, but the Deputy probably knows something about the industry, and perhaps he would contribute in this debate something in the way of information.

Not less than yours.

I am entitled to ask the Minister, in spite of Deputy McGilligan's interruptions, for his explanation as to why the supply of milk to the Midland creameries has dropped by over 30 per cent.?

Deputy Davin did not understand the compliment I pay him. I would rather have his opinion.

I am an enthusiastic supporter of the establishment and the extension of the dairying industry on co-operative lines. I have listened with pleasure to the Minister paying lip service to that policy. He has gone much further than giving lip service to it, for he has come to this House, and the majority of the Deputies here, in spite of the Opposition, have voted millions of money for the purpose of maintaining that industry. But notwithstanding that the Minister has not gone far enough. If we are going to maintain or extend the dairying industry on co-operative lines we will have to go further than the Minister has gone. There is no use in establishing creameries under the co-operative system, getting the farmers to supply milk to them, giving them a proper price for the milk and giving them a guaranteed market for it either at home or in Great Britain, unless the Minister is prepared to go one step further, a step which will enable us not only to maintain the market we have got but will enable us to get a better market in Great Britain for our butter. If we are to build up a market in Great Britain or wherever the market may be in the future, we will have to copy the methods of competing countries. What are the methods of competing countries? Denmark is crushing us out of the English market because the Danes are organised on co-operative lines for production and for sale. They have organised themselves for the purpose of supplying big purchasers in Great Britain.

I thought the Deputy did not want the British market.

I have a limited knowledge of the methods of marketing butter, eggs and bacon in this country. From that limited knowledge I say that not only will we not maintain the position we hold in the English market to-day but we will lose that position unless the Minister wakes up and sets up, in addition to a marketing scheme, an efficient selling organisation which will get us a better price and a better market in Britain for our butter. We are all glad to know that the Minister was engaged recently in negotiations with the British Government. The negotiations are going on for the purpose of securing a wider trade agreement, an agreement which will probably get us a guaranteed market for more eggs, butter and bacon, if we can produce them and be in a position to place them on the British market.

You opposed the sale of them there.

We supported this policy when the Deputy went into the Division Lobby against it. Deputy Fagan generally makes a contribution in this House by way of interruption. I hope I have provoked him into making a speech, making some intelligent contribution. If he does, I would like him to quote a speech in which any Labour Deputy since 1922 opposed the sale of our surplus produce in the British market.

That is a good one.

The Deputy need not laugh. Will he tell us where it is?

Does Deputy McGilligan or any Deputy there seriously suggest that I am a convert to this policy?

Yes, of supporting the British market.

At all times I have advocated, both by speech and vote, the extension of the dairying and allied industries, and the selling by efficient marketing methods of our surplus butter, eggs and bacon in whatever may be our principal market, Britain or elsewhere.

The Deputy must be one of the apostles at the moment.

I do not think so; I am quite certain I am not. Let me say that speeches of this kind were made from these benches before many of the present Fine Gael Deputies came into this House. The majority of those who came into this House with me in 1922 have since been kicked out. They may still be supporters of this policy, for all I know. I have travelled a fair share in many countries, and I think travelling is the best education anyone could get. Deputy McGilligan may say that the graduate of the university is the best educated, that that is the beginning and end of education. I think the man who has a fair amount of commonsense, and who keeps his eyes open and his ears to the ground when he travels around the world, will learn more than any man who takes out a degree in a university and who goes no further than a university.

I agree with you, but I wish you travelled farther.

The far-away cows have long horns.

Amongst the places I had the privilege of visiting were Paris and London.

There is plenty of agriculture there.

Some of my colleagues went further.

I am sure on such occasions the Deputy was universally admired.

One cannot fail to notice the fact that in London particularly, the centre of our principal export market——

You are certainly emphasising that.

One cannot fail to notice that there you have two or three catering firms, feeding a moving population of 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 people. Imagine Lyons and Co. of London being compelled, as they would be under certain circumstances, to come over here and visit 20 or 30 creameries for the purpose of finding out whether they could get all the butter they require daily, in a guaranteed quantity. These big London catering firms will come to the people of a country who can supply them with the butter, eggs and bacon they must get daily for the purpose of feeding their customers. We cannot supply here because we have no selling organisation capable of providing the eggs, butter and bacon in the quantities which large firms like Lyons would require.

What about beef? We killed all the calves.

I am encouraging the Minister to take a further step in the case of the dairying industry which will ensure success to it and which will ensure of the dairy farmer being provided with a profitable price for his milk and a guaranteed market at a reasonable price for his butter, bacon and eggs. The type of criticism which Deputy Dillon put up here to-night is not going to bring us to that stage. I challenged Deputy Dillon quite deliberately, when he was criticising the policy of the Minister — although it is not a clear-cut policy — to say what he stood for. I challenge Deputy Dillon to deny that his policy is to do away with the subsidy and let the dairy farmers rest on their own individual efforts. The Deputy says that that is the only way the dairying industry can be saved. That is the surest way of destroying it. If we want to ensure its success we must continue to subsidise the industry by providing a profitable price for the dairy farmer and setting up, although it may mean legislation, a marketing organisation which will be capable of helping our dairy farmers to compete with the Danish in our principal market.

What is a profitable price for milk?

I am not an expert, but I am sure if the dairy farmers of the midlands were guaranteed a price of 6d. or 6½d. a gallon they would regard it as a profitable price. If I am wrong I would like to be corrected, but I would prefer the views of a man like Deputy Bennett to those of Deputy McGilligan or Deputy Dillon. I hope that Deputy Bennett, who must feel very keenly the position of the Limerick dairy farmers, will make some contribution to this debate and will say in emphatic terms whether he is a supporter of the subsidy policy under present circumstances, or whether he is supporting Deputy Dillon in abolishing the subsidy and letting the dairy farmers get the best price they can.

I would like the Minister to say what the future policy in regard to dairying is to be. Has he any clear-cut policy which will hold out greater hope for a better price and a better market for the surplus butter which we have to sell? Deputy Dillon referred at length and in rather humorous terms to the peculiar position of the Roscrea meat factory. Roscrea borders on my constituency and, following up what the Minister said to the House this evening, I think it is desirable that he and those advising him on matters of this kind should have some clear-cut policy as to the future position of the factory before the four-year period expires. More than that I am not going to say. I am not going to associate myself with some of the rather personal criticism which Deputy Dillon directed against the conduct of that particular place.

Such as?

When Deputy Dillon reads some of the remarks he made in reference to the present conduct of the Roscrea factory, he can judge for himself whether he was using this debate for the purpose of scoring points off the Minister at the expense of some Government supporters associated with this factory.

What does the Deputy suggest I said?

I should like the Minister to indicate his plans for the extension and development of the dairying industry.

The Deputy did not answer my question. He is hunting with the hounds and running with the hare.

I am voting for this subsidy, anyway.

I would like to refer to a few items, and, following Deputy Davin, I will deal with a few matters concerning the dairying industry. We have here, as we have in all Estimates connected with agriculture, provision for numerous sums for the dairying industry. As Deputy Dillon says, the ordinary Deputy who gets hold of an Estimate in connection with the dairying industry or the industries allied to dairying, is somewhat confused. He ends by giving it up and saying he does not know where he is. The position of the dairying industry is that many farmers are reducing their herds, and some of them are getting altogether out of dairy stock. That, in some way, explains the deficiency in the milk supply in Deputy Davin's constituency. That is operating in many districts. There would, of course, be other reasons for the deficiency in the milk supply. There are, as is shown by another Estimate, other influences operating against the dairy farmer. When the Minister was referring to item 4, which deals with agricultural schools and farms, he explained that the additional sum was required because the feedingstuffs for stock were more expensive. That is one of the things that operate in connection with the dairying industry. The cost of feedingstuffs in dairying has gone up. There is, then, the factor of the recent legislation regarding agricultural wages. Everybody was glad that that measure was passed, and would be glad if its provisions could be operated.

The Minister knows the difficulties in the way of doing that and I do not want to enter into them. The Minister has had deputations from farmers in this connection. Deputy Davin knows as well as anybody else that the farmers are in difficulties in this regard. The fact that Deputy Davin is so strong an advocate of increased prices in the dairying industry is proof that Deputy Davin knows the difficulties which the farmers are experiencing in complying with that Act. He knows that it is impossible for the farmers to comply with the Agricultural Wages Act in existing conditions. Every other Deputy knows the same. I come from practically the biggest dairying county in the State. Deputy Davin was good enough to say that I know something about dairying. He challenges us to say what we would do. Anybody who reads the programme of our Party knows of one thing which we would do. We were the first Party to take up the principle of a guaranteed price for milk.

How will you get it?

Deputy Davin advocated 6½d. a gallon but he did not say where he would get it. He said that the Minister could get it. I agree with him that it must be got if the dairying industry is to be maintained. If dairying is not maintained, bang goes the agricultural industry altogether. If dairying goes, everything else will go, with results not altogether confined to the dairy farmers. It is, perhaps, belated recognition of the serious plight of the dairy farmers that has brought us such outspoken advocacy of the improvement of the conditions of these farmers from the Labour Party. In recent years we had not that outspoken sympathy and support. We have it now because a belated measure to improve the conditions of the agricultural labourer was passed by this House. I am in agreement with that measure, as every other Deputy must be in agreement with it, but every Deputy, from the Minister down, knows that that is a measure which cannot be operated for any considerable time. It may be satisfactorily operated for a short time in the dairying industry, but it cannot be continued in operation for long unless something additional to the small Votes before us to-day is offered to the dairying industry. There is no way out of the present plight of the dairying industry except something in the way of a guaranteed price for milk. I hope the Minister is considering that point. That would cure the other things of which I spoke. There will be no serious opposition to the Agricultural Wages Act or any other similar measure provided the farmer is put in a position to meet his overhead charges and given some prospect of a living.

How will you get the guaranteed price—by subsidy?

Deputy Davin thought that he suggested a means by which the Minister would get the 6½d. I am making a suggestion to the Minister on similar lines. When I asked the Minister to do this, I was assured that Deputy Davin was behind me. I thought he was prepared to go further than I was. Now Deputy Davin retorts upon me by asking me where I am to get the money to do this. In making the request I was expecting Deputy Davin to back me.

I am delighted to hear Deputy Bennett repudiating the policy advocated by Deputy Dillon.

Deputy Davin knows as well as I do that Deputy Dillon is one of the leaders of the Party which was the first to urge the principle of a guaranteed price for milk. It is futile for Deputy Davin to be engaging in the type of interruption in which he is now engaging. Let him read our programme.

That is your policy only since the last election.

I may have thought that it did not go far enough, but that was the line of our policy in relation to dairying. If the dairying conditions are worse now than they were at the time the heads of our policy were adopted, it follows that more drastic remedies will be required. That, however, is a question for another day.

When did you adopt that policy?

I did not wait until the year 1938. I have been arguing for that policy for many years, and I had not Deputy Davin's support until 1938.

You did not do it in 1932.

Nobody minds Deputy Davin.

Deputy Davin's advocacy is of considerable use to me, and I am delighted that he realises now, owing to the complaints of his constituents, that something must be done for the dairying industry if it is not to be extinguished. He knows full well that the Agricultural Wages Act cannot be continued in operation for more than three months unless the Minister steps in and gives the farmers a quid pro quo in respect of the increased wages.

Hear, hear!

Deputy Davin says "Hear, hear," and Deputy Heron has almost a fit at the other end of the bench.

The Minister knows that it is necessary to provide the farmer with a better price for milk if he is to continue in the industry. The Minister has had his attention also drawn to the fact that the farmers are not, under present conditions, able to comply with recent wages legislation. I agree with Deputy Dillon, as regards the two factories in Waterford and Roscrea, that the principle adopted was altogether wrong and undesirable. The old contract system provided that when a man made a reasonable contract he should be held to it. When the ordinary contractors enter into a contract they generally do so in the light of what they think the future market will be. The Minister contracted to supply cattle to Waterford at 10/- a cwt., and he contracted to supply other cattle to Roscrea at nothing per cwt. In the one case he is going to compensate them because he can no longer supply cattle at anything like 10/- a cwt., and in the second case it is altogether impossible, even with the finances behind him, to supply cattle for nothing any further. He entered into what one must call a foolish and disastrous contract, and unfortunately put a provision in the original contract that he would compensate them if he could not fulfil it, and apparently he is now about to pay the compensation. I wish the people who are getting it luck, and I hope we will never have a repetition of such a performance.

There is another matter to which nobody has so far alluded — the distribution of export licences. We are at the moment in the position that we cannot produce enough cattle for export, and I thought that we would have arrived at a period when cattle licences would be no longer necessary, and when free trade amongst the farmers themselves would be allowed. There may be some reason for the continued operation of the licensing system, but I know that there is grave dissatisfaction with that system. I know that some people have licences to throw away while other people who want them cannot get them, and, as a matter of fact, although the licences are not worth much now— there were days when they were worth £3 each and there was traffic in them at £3 — there is traffic in them even at 5/-. The time has definitely come when this system of licences in respect of agricultural produce should cease, particularly when we are in the position that we cannot produce enough cattle for export. I hope the Minister will pay some attention to the suggestions made, particularly by Deputy Davin and myself, and that he will endeavour to provide such conditions for the creamery industry generally that there will be some prospect of its continuance, because the Minister, if he gets the same reports as I, and if he reads the auctioneers' lists in the various dairying industries, must be aware, as I am aware, that many farmers are reducing their herds and a good number of them getting out of the dairying industry altogether.

I was glad to hear Deputy Davin advocating the establishment of selling organisations in the British market. I would back him up in that, and I suggest that the Minister should look into it because the Danish farmers are surely beating us in the British market, and it is up to our Government to start something on the lines suggested in order that we may beat the Danes. I am very proud that the day has come when Deputy Davin agrees that the British market is the only market for our surplus produce here, and I am proud that commonsense has at last come to the people in this House. They told us a few years ago that the British market was dead and gone for ever and that we would get alternative markets. That is all gone now, and I am glad that it has gone. I hope Deputy Davin's suggestion will be acted on by the Minister, and if he had made that suggestion two or three years ago, there would not be so much poverty amongst the farmers to-day.

What about the truce?

With regard to the Waterford and Roscrea factories, the Minister has found them very bad propositions. There is a certain amount of money lost and all I can say is that any man with commonsense who would make a contract to supply anybody with cattle at 10/- a cwt. for two or three years ahead must have thought that cattle were going to be worth nothing.

Roscrea got them for nothing.

Roscrea must be a charity affair — that is the way I look at it. So far as supplying cattle at 10/- a cwt. for two or three years is concerned, all one can say is that the man who agreed to do that must have thought that cattle were going to be dirt in the country. Both the Waterford and Roscrea factories are subsidised, and if every factory in this country is subsidised as these two are subsidised, God help the taxpayers of the country.

With regard to licences, I know quite a lot about them, and I know the trafficking that has gone on for the last four or five years. I handle them practically every day in the week. The Minister may laugh, but I see it going on, and I suggest to the Minister that there should be some other arrangement made for giving out those licences. In our Committee of Agriculture, if I want a licence for March or April, I have to put in the list now, but how could I know what cattle I will have fat in May? I could go out to the market in March, buy 10 or 12 cattle and put them in the stall for a fortnight or three weeks to fatten, but if I had not applied for licences in February, I can get none. That situation should be remedied, because it means that men are not encouraged to buy beasts to eat the food which they have around their houses and to fatten for a month or six weeks. I suggest that the whole system should be done away with. I cannot see that the system is necessary because we did not half fill our fat cattle quota for the last two years. I suggest that the licences should be left at the ports — I suggested that before, but there must be some difficulty about it — so that when men are shipping cattle, they could get as many as they wanted.

It is questionable whether the Minister is entitled by law to charge farmers ? each for these licences. They are given to him by the British Government for nothing, and I question whether he has the right to charge ? each to the farmer. Everybody in the cattle trade is bothered and annoyed with the licensing system, and I ask the Minister to change it. You go to the Dublin market and buy cattle and you find that people have not got licences because they did not apply for them. Many of them come down to the County Committee and they have to go back because they are not applied for. If they were at the ports, people could get them easily when shipping cattle. Another matter on which I want information is whether the Minister is going to adopt the Horse Breeding Commission's report or not. I am not saying I am in favour of it, but I should like to know if he proposes to adopt it. At the last meeting of the Horse Breeders' Association I was requested to ask the Minister about it, and I take this opportunity of doing so.

With regard to the German cattle trade, before this year I did not think much of that trade, but I admit that it was a help in the market this year. I give the Minister credit for that, because there is, in my opinion, a kind of ring at present among dealers, and the German buying tends to check that ring. If the German or the Government buyers were not present, prices each week might not be so good. Many farmers in the country would like to know soon whether the German cattle buying is going to continue, because you can buy a certain sort of cattle for that market. I should like the Minister to say whether it is going to be continued or not. If the Minister made a profit I think that is not fair to the farmers. If the Government find that a profit has been made they should give a little higher price, only asking for a margin which would not show a loss. That would help to increase the price of cattle in the Dublin market and elsewhere. If there is a big profit it is not a good thing that the Government should carry on in that way. They should work in such a way that the profit could be passed on week in week out, so that it would react in prices being higher, by making shippers to the English market increase their prices.

It is highly significant that the members of the Labour Party have realised the necessity that exists to assist an industry that is absolutely down and out. Evidently the Deputy who has just laughed has not suffered in the depression which has hit the agricultural community. The Labour Party in the past had to cut out any connection with the agricultural labourers, but now, after a terrible fight, they have realised that it is only by helping the farmer to pay wages that they can get anything like reasonable conditions for the agricultural labourers. Deputy Davin spoke in favour of helping the dairy farmers. He knows that a larger amount of labour is employed on dairy farms than on any other form of agriculture. There was an allusion during the discussion to the purchase of bad bulls. I do not think any of the activities of the Department has been more inimical to the welfare of cattle breeding or stock raising than the setting loose of an inferior class of bulls through the country. Independent farmers who in the past purchased high-priced bulls realised from experience that it was essential to do so if they were to carry on on the right lines. Deputy Fagan referred to the cattle licences. What is the necessity for these licences now when we are not able to fill the British quota? What is the necessity for employing 16 temporary certifying officers when the quota cannot be filled? That situation has been brought about by the policy of the Government in slaughtering calves. The position we find ourselves in now is that many farmers are understocked and are not able to supply the cattle when there is a market and a demand for them in the English market. I think such a provision now is absolute waste of money, and that it should be devoted to some other purpose.

Reference has been made to the Munster Institute in Cork. That is an excellent institution, and I should like if the Minister could extend the amount of land as well as the operations of the institute so that demonstrations would be available for farmers who visit Cork. It would be a very good thing if young farmers visited the institute and saw the different experiments carried out there. There is an urgent demand for stallions in the constituency I represent. Appeals have been repeatedly made to the Department to supply stallions, but the reply is that they are unable to do so. Having regard to the importance of horse breeding and the bloodstock industry the Minister should make a special effort to provide stallions of the necessary high standard for an industry that is especially valuable in Ireland. Deputy Bennett dealt with the position with regard to the milk industry. Assistance has been given to dairy farmers near cities in order that they might supply milk at specially fixed prices not only to public bodies but to the poor generally. The Minister might give special attention to the remarks of Deputy Dillon with regard to the provision of free milk for the necessitous poor. There is no better form of food for building up a healthy and virile population. The Minister might take that question into account, in order to secure a distribution of milk that can be sold at something like a reasonable price.

The castigation which has been given to the Department over the scandalous position in regard to the Roscrea factory need not, I think, be further touched upon, but I must say that the sooner things of that kind are brought to an end the better. I am afraid we have to discountenance some of the acts of the Department, however good, and to regard them as unbusinesslike, and as exceedingly bad as financiers, when such an example is set by the State.

We were asked what means we would take to improve the position of the agricultural community. My answer would be to remove many of the taxes and heavy imposts that are on almost every item connected with agricultural production. If there was less interference with agriculture, Irish farmers, with their tradition and experience, as shrewd business men, would then be better able to make a fist of an industry which they have brought to a very high state of efficiency. I might also mention the de-rating of agricultural land and buildings. I see the Minister laughing. If the agriculturists of this country are poor remember it is all due to the present policy.

The general policy of agriculture is not under discussion.

We were asked to say how we would relieve agriculture, and I gave an indication of how it could be done in connection with taxation.

Irrelevant questions do not justify irrelevant answers.

The question should not have been asked.

If I may make a submission, the sub-heads covered by this Vote are so wide that it would be hard to say what is general policy, and what is not general policy.

While I agree with the Deputy's submission, I have ruled that the subject matter referred to by Deputy Brasier is out of order.

As you did not rule the question out of order, I answered it.

We had a round-up by Deputy Dillon to-night, and I must sympathise with Deputy Brasier in finding himself out of order. Deputy Dillon discussed old cows, dairies, old type bulls, Manitoba wheat, milk prices, the feeding of children and a special sucking pipe from Kerry. As all these things were discussed on the Vote, I sympathise with the Deputy. There are a few matters on which, apparently, Deputy Dillon is condemned as a heretic even by his own Party. Deputy Dillon condemns root and branch special types of bulls which Deputy Brasier says, and I agree with him, are of great benefit to our district. The price of milk and the dairying industry have been discussed. We had the announcement made by the Party opposite that they were the first to adopt a guaranteed price for milk, but I would like to take their minds back to the period, a few years ago, when the dairying industry was faced with bankruptcy: when the price of butter on the English market was between 68/-and 73/-, and when the price of milk at the creameries was between 1¾d. and 2d. per gallon.

The price was never as low as that.

Indeed it was, and, when the Minister for Agriculture came to the Dáil with a Prices Stabilisation Bill, the Deputies opposite voted against it. I congratulate Deputy Bennett, because he was the only member of the Party opposite who joined with the Labour Party and ourselves at that time in seeing that the farmers would get a price for their milk. We cannot have Deputies at one moment agitating for a better price for milk and at the same time coming in here week after week raising an outcry about the price of butter. If the price of milk goes up it follows that the price of butter must go up. If a guaranteed price is to be given to farmers for their milk, then there will have to be a higher price for butter. I am glad to see that Deputy Davin is supporting that policy. I am sure that no member of the Labour Party would wish to see the farmers getting an uneconomic price.

Is the Deputy aware that the members of the Labour Party advocated guaranteed prices for the farmers before the Fianna Fáil Party came into the Dáil in 1927?

I am not concerned with what kind of a show you ran before we came in in 1927.

The Deputy's language in reference to the Dáil is not parliamentary.

I regret it. Deputy Bennett referred rather belatedly to the plight of the dairy farmers. Their plight, and the prices they were getting for their milk and butter, was recognised by this Party in 1933, when the Prices Stabilisation Bill was introduced by the Minister for Agriculture, a Bill that the Deputies opposite very strongly opposed and voted against. If it were not for the introduction of that measure the price that farmers would have been paid for their milk for two years would not have been 3d. per gallon. We could have settled the whole cattle trouble on the line of giving the farmers whatever price butter was on the English market and paying the full tariff for them, but I would like to see how many farmers could produce milk at 2d. per gallon. That was the position we were up against and that we had to deal with.

Deputy Dillon also attacked the admixture scheme, but I did not hear Deputy Brasier agree with him on that. I am anxious to know how much of the agricultural policy of the Party opposite is put forward by Deputy Dillon, and to what extent the Party agree with that policy as put forward by him. Are we going to have a different agricultural policy from each member of the Party opposite?

Certainly not.

Was Deputy Dillon then expressing the views of Deputy Brasier when speaking to-night——?

I advise the Deputy to mind his own business.

——when he definitely opposed the admixture scheme? I am very anxious to know that.

The Chair is waiting to hear Deputy Corry's opinions on this Estimate.

And I am giving them.

What about the price of beet?

We are not discussing that now, but should we unfortunately have another day on it, I hope the Labour Party will advise their people not to handle tainted goods.

The Deputy is a rebel against his own Party on that.

Deputy Dillon is for ever attacking the admixture scheme under which our farmers have succeeded in getting a price for their barley and oats. Until this Party came into office and introduced that scheme, oats and barley were practically unsaleable. Deputy Brasier knows that as well as I do.

I found a market for my barley, and the Deputy followed on my coat-tails.

The Deputy never found a market for anything except for old clothes. In connection with the Roscrea factory, it is right to point out that about 94,000 old cows, which were a burden on the farming community, were got rid of following the establishment of that factory.

The factory got them for nothing.

The farmers at least got 50/- for them. I think, however, it is correct to say that the Minister for Agriculture got letters from every farmers' association in the Free State demanding that the old cows they had should be taken from them because, at the time, the position with regard to old and uneconomic cattle was a very bad one and demanded immediate attention. I would not agree to any extension of the Munster Institute. I suggest that visitors going to Cork, who wish to study up-to-date farming methods, will, if they pay a visit to the farm attached to Cork University, see them in operation there. I was amazed to hear Deputy Brasier urge an extension of these farms, in view of the fact that a short time ago he said that they were uneconomic.

I never said that, and the Deputy knows it.

The trouble with the Deputies opposite is that we cannot get two of them to agree on anything.

The Cork Deputies should reserve this exchange of compliments for Cork. That would lead to more orderly debate here.

The debate on the Estimate has shown clearly that so far as the Deputies opposite are concerned they have no policy whatever. They come along and say that they are going to give a guaranteed price for milk, and at the same time get up and complain about the price of butter.

The Deputy must not repeat himself.

Unfortunately, no matter how often you state a thing for Deputies opposite, it does not sink in.

You have read our policy and that is enough.

I was rather surprised at the attitude taken up by Deputies opposite and I am glad to see that all sides of the House are now going to see that the farmer gets a decent price for his produce, even though it does drive up the price in the home market. I hope that we will hear fewer complaints about the cost of living and all the rest of it in the future from Deputies opposite, and that when Deputies are discussing the motion on the Order Paper on the cost of living, which now stands adjourned, we will hear less noise and talk about it, seeing that Deputies are agreed that the farmer is entitled to a fair price for his produce.

What about the taxes put on him?

This Estimate has been fairly exhaustively discussed already and I shall confine my remarks to three points with which I should like the Minister to deal when he is replying. In this Estimate there is an additional sum of £17,000 set aside for the purpose of reorganising the creamery industry, mainly in regard to the extinction of the redundant creameries. I realise well that, in the absence of legislation, it is rather a difficult matter for the Minister to deal with the wholesale reorganisation of the creamery industry in this country, and I am anxious to know from him whether this £17,000 is part of the expense at least connected with the general scheme for the reorganisation of the creamery industry, or whether this money is to be confined entirely to the creamery areas he mentioned when introducing the Estimate. I think the Minister some years ago, when discussing another agricultural estimate, gave us to understand that the experts in the Department of Agriculture were considering his scheme for the general reorganisation of the creamery industry in this country with the object of eliminating the redundant creameries and giving the other creameries an opportunity of bringing down their overhead expenses and putting them in a more economic position.

I think the Minister agrees with me that there are many counties where there are certainly redundant creameries to-day, and if these redundant creameries were closed down it would certainly assist in reducing the overhead expenses of the central creamery or the remaining creameries and in putting the creamery industry in a healthier economic position than it is at present. I also have the impression that, even before the Minister and his Party assumed the responsibility of Government, there was a scheme for the general reorganisation of the creamery industry in the course of preparation by the officials of the Department of Agriculture. I should like to know what has happened to that scheme, whether the Minister has pigeon-holed it or put it on one side to be examined in connection perhaps with legislation for the purpose of giving him wider powers to deal with the whole problem of creamery reorganisation.

Every Deputy, including Deputy Corry, is agreed and has admitted that the farmers are getting an uneconomic price for their milk. Sometime last year an agitation, which gained a great deal of prominence, was started in this country for the purpose of getting a better price for milk. I do not wish to say one word about the merits or otherwise of that agitation, but, in any event, the Minister apparently was forced to take cognisance of the effect which that agitation had on milk producers, because he himself sent around, and I think is still sending around, officials of another Department for the purpose of ascertaining the views of creamery managers and members of creamery committees on this question of an economic price for milk. I know that the Minister also has met more than one deputation in recent months for the purpose of discussing this rather vexed question of an economic price for milk, and I suggest to him that this would be a very suitable occasion for him to make a statement in connection with the matter.

The Minister himself stated on one occasion in the Dáil, when the cost of living was lower than it is to-day and feeding costs were much lower, that no farmer could produce milk at less than 5d. per gallon. I know that the Minister is satisfied that the price which the creameries are paying to-day for milk is not economic, and I also think that he has satisfied himself now that the price will have to be increased if milk production in this country is to be encouraged and the butter situation saved. I suggest to him, therefore, that he might avail of the discussion of this Estimate for the purpose of making some statement on that point and I hope his statement will be a favourable one.

There is a sum of £111,000 set aside here for the purpose of making provision for winter requirements of butter. The amount, I admit, is a very large one. Nevertheless, in existing circumstances, and by virtue of legislation which has already been passed regulating the butter industry, it is necessary to make provision for the storage of winter butter. But I sincerely hope that the Minister will take steps to ensure that such a situation as arose last winter will not arise again, when the Minister was forced to buy foreign butter, mainly Danish, and sell it to the unfortunate producers of this country at a profit of something like £50 per ton and, at the same time, we were forced to sell our own butter in the British market at a price far less than could have been obtained a few weeks earlier. There does appear to be a lack of organisation somewhere, either in the Department or in the organisation responsible for the marketing of our butter, and I suggest that the Minister should give the Dáil an assurance that such a situation as arose last winter is not likely to arise again, and that the unfortunate consumers of this country will not be forced to pay such a price for butter, and that the Minister, at the same time, will not allow his Department or any other Department to reap a profit on a transaction of that kind.

The greater part of this debate has dealt with the price of milk and butter. Deputy Roddy referred to the item of £111,000 for the provision of a winter supply. I should like to know how much of that sum will go towards the production of winter butter or the encouragement of winter dairying. Winter dairying was carried on very successfully in this country in years gone by and it was one of the greatest assets that the dairy farmer had, where it was carried out. From some of Deputy Davin's remarks it would appear that dairying is confined to the production of milk and butter. That is only one of the arms of the dairying industry. The dairying industry has several arms. One of the results of winter dairying is that you have early calves.

In my constituency years ago, before we had the unfortunate slaughter of calves and other economic disturbances, when we sold calves from 10 to 12 months old, the early calf fetched a price that was most economic. If the farmer did not get a price for his milk at the creamery, it could be utilised in other ways. He had, as I say, a very good price for his early calf. The same held with regard to pig production and fowl. As far as I know, the pig industry is steadily going down because the cost of feeding stuffs, as a result of the admixture scheme, has gone up so much that it is almost impossible to produce pigs at a profit. Very few beyond those who engage in mass production can now produce pigs at a profit. I should like to know from the Minister how much of this £111,000 goes for the encouragement of winter dairying. I would suggest that some of the money provided under sub-head O. O. (11), in connection with export licences, should be devoted to the encouragement of winter dairying, as it has been suggested that these licences might be done away with. That would be a step in the right direction.

In connection with sub-head G (1), improvement of milk production, I see here an item for grants to cow-testing associations. As far as I can remember the report of a meeting of the Shorthorn Breeders' Association, which the Minister attended, I gathered that while cow testing has been carried on in this country for a good many years, there has been a very slight improvement or increase in the quantity of the milk produced. It is nothing like what it should be. That speaks badly for cow testing, as it is carried on in this State. I think if you could increase the quantity of milk from 450 gallons, which I think is the average yield per cow, to 600 gallons, you would give assistance to the dairy farmer and when you are giving him assistance you are assisting everyone in this State. I think the only way to increase the yield is to have cow testing made compulsory and to have it carried out under State control, at the expense of the State. It is very hard to expect farmers to pay two or three shillings annually per cow to have cow testing carried out. I think it would be worth all the expense involved if cow testing were compulsorily carried out as a State business and if all the non-productive cows were removed to Roscrea. If such a compulsory system were adopted, I believe that in a short time the 600 gallon cow would be the rule rather than the exception in this country. If that were done there would be less need for subsidies.

When milk was selling at 3d. per gallon in this country, the farmer at least had the advantage of having a market for the other arms of the agricultural industry—butter, cattle, calves, pigs and poultry. He has lost his market for those items, owing to the unfortunate economic dispute. Those items have become a dead letter as far as he is concerned, hence all the cry for the subsidising of milk and butter. Now that we hope that all these difficulties will disappear in the near future, we think we can look forward to a better time in the dairying industry and we need not have this pessimistic note that has been struck by some speakers here to-night. Coming back to the question of winter dairying, I would stress the point that the Minister should give that branch of the industry all encouragement. We lack continuity of supply in our markets. If we could get that continuity of supply, so that we would have an equal supply all the year round, I think it would be worth spending money to achieve it.

I should like to refer briefly to the small item of £200 provided under the Flax Act for travelling expenses. I was able to get a concession from the Minister, for which I am very grateful, for Cork under the Flax Act, but the growing of flax has not got the encouragement that it should get in County Cork, where the farmers have a flax tradition. I would ask the Minister now that some of this £200 provided for travelling expenses should be devoted to sending an instructor down there. Now is the time to assist the farmers in Cork who cannot grow beet or wheat. They can grow flax and handle it well. The price of flax has been profitable for the last few years. The Government has not lost anything by giving a guaranteed price. I would ask the Minister again to spend some of this money by sending an instructor down to encourage the people in the flax-growing areas in County Cork. I do not know if I might refer for a moment to stallions. Every year that this Estimate is brought forward I have asked that registered Clydesdale stallions should be provided. There is a demand in West Cork for them and the Minister might consider meeting that demand.

I should like to have from the Minister an explanation of what is meant by the term "creameries and associated businesses" mentioned in the detail of sub-head N (5) — Improvement of the Creamery Industry. The reason I ask for the explanation is that many people are concerned at the moment about the activities of some of the creamery undertakings of the country. They were established at first to deal with milk and milk products, and later on they added poultry and other sidelines. Now they have in many cases extended their business still further and blossomed out as retailers of goods other than these milk products. A number of the smaller shopkeepers in the country are complaining of this practice. They have some justification for that complaint because it is well known that many of these creameries escape income tax, and they are provided for in various ways out of Government funds. I think it is a matter into which the Minister should look in the near future. It is a system that has grown up and possibly it may be difficult to check it now, but certainly something should be done in the direction of at least confining these creameries to their original functions, namely, that of dealing with milk and manufacturing milk products.

Denmark was mentioned a few moments ago by Deputy Davin. Whilst it might be useful to emulate Denmark in the matter of the marketing of their products, I feel that there are not many people who would care to emulate Denmark in other ways. The Danes usually export most of their butter and eat margarine. I do not want to see the Irish people reduced to that position. I am supporting this Vote because I have always advocated, and will continue to advocate, that agriculture should have the first claim on our Government. Some time ago it was brought home to the Minister himself that most of the farmers, particularly the dairy farmers, are existing under extraordinary conditions in this country. At a dairy conference held in Cork recently, at which the Minister for Agriculture was present, a veterinary surgeon who occupies a high position in Cork City in the administration of those Acts, read a very fine paper. I was struck by four instances which he gave of the impoverished conditions of some of our farmers. Let me say that he advocated that the cow-testing associations should have a much greater membership. I am glad to know that Deputy O'Donovan touched on that matter, because I believe that many farmers at the present moment are unable to afford the expense of joining those cow-testing associations at the rate of 2/- per cow, some farmers having 20 or 30 cows. I want to read an extract from that paper, and it will be an eyeopener to many persons who do not live so close to the agricultural areas as some of us do. He speaks of his intimate association with farmers throughout the Counties of Cork, Kerry and Limerick, and cites three cases which he says would represent the position of many farmers in those areas. Here is what he says:—

"Farmer A resides in County Limerick on a farm of 85 Irish acres, P.L.V. £77 10s., rent and rates £68, milks 27 cows, and employs two boys and a girl. His total income from all sources on the farm, including calves, pigs, and poultry was £465 16s. last year. His expenditure in rent and rates, food for livestock, manures and seeds, labour, maintenance, and repairs and other such essentials to production totalled £481 10s., leaving him at a loss of more than £15 without having provided for himself, his wife and five children. Farmer B lives in County Cork on a farm of 50 statute acres, P.L.V. £21, milks 15 cows, labour is provided by himself and his two sons. His total income from all sources, which in this case included nine tons of potatoes, was £223 last year, and his outgoings in respect of his household and his farm amounted to £205, so he is left with but £18 to provide for the future of his two sons and three young daughters, not to speak of making provision for his own and his wife's old age."

Would the Deputy inform the Chair to what particular item in the Estimate he relates his quotations?

Item M (5) — Improvement of the Creamery Industry.

I understood the Deputy to refer to potatoes among other commodities.

Anyhow, those are cases which are brought to the notice of this House only on very rare occasions, nor is the general public always conversant with the facts. I am quite sure that reforms of any character mean an increase in Government expenditure which, in turn, means an increase in taxation. We cannot have it both ways, and because of that I am supporting this Estimate.

Limited as is the review which this Supplementary Estimate affords us to-night, it makes one feel I do not know whether it is sympathy for the Minister, or whether we ought to extend him our pity. Some may think he is entitled to sympathy for having had to bring this particular Estimate before the House to-night in the form in which it had to be brought before it. It does seem an extraordinary thing that Deputies speaking on this Estimate — particularly Deputy Davin, who spoke about the British market so often — did not get down to bedrock. One would imagine we were speaking about a normal period and were trading in normal times. Of course we are not. Mind you, I have a certain amount of sympathy for the Minister, who is endeavouring to put up some kind of scheme to tide himself and his Party and this country over their own blundering. What has happened? If any person wants to know what has happened during the Fianna Fáil régime, I would recommend him, as far as agriculture is concerned, and particularly those items before us to-night, to take the advice given by the Minister for Industry and Commerce, and look at the figures which his Department has produced. We have gone down in everything. When Deputy Davin spoke about co-operative marketing in London on an equal basis with Denmark, one would imagine that we could get in on an equal basis with Denmark. Of course, at one time we were on the British market with a preferential rate of 10 per cent. Now we are there with 40 per cent. against us, while Denmark is there with 50 per cent., and yet Deputy Davin thinks we can compete with those people. In view of the negotiations which are proceeding at the moment, it was really a pity that the Minister brought in this Estimate this evening if he could have avoided it.

Deputy Davin seemed to think that the Minister did not have any clear-cut policy with regard to the Roscrea factory. Personally, I do not think he ever had such a clear-cut policy on anything. He told us here to-night what appeared to be the most extraordinary thing I ever heard in my life, that he entered into a contract with a certain private company to give them the money—on certain debentures which they were supposed to pay back—to build a factory in Roscrea; to supply them free with the raw material; and afterwards, if he was not able to supply them with the raw material, to compensate them for the fact that he was not able to supply them. The Minister told us there is danger now of the factory closing down; that we can get our debentures back, amounting to, I think, £18,000; or that we have the alternative of taking the factory. I wonder what we are going to do with it? If the factory in Roscrea, which was established for the manufacture of meat meal from old and diseased cattle, goes on the market, I wonder how much the taxpayers will be able to realise on the sale of it? Would it not be much more economical for the Minister — except, of course, that it would not hide the blundering of Fianna Fáil well — if he did with the old cows what he did with the calves, that is, give every man 50/- for the skin of the old cow? Then he would not have the factory; he would not have this white elephant on his hands, and he would not have to give any compensation. Of course, he could not have faced that at the time. It would not do. Really the most extraordinary disclossure I ever heard in my life was this one in regard to the position in which this State has been put in order to get over the blunders of the present Government. Some effort really had to be made to deal with the old cows. The Minister knew perfectly well why the old cows were on the people's hands. There was a time when any farmer could fatten his old cow and get rid of her, but after the Minister came in, the farmer could not do it. The Minister knows that. Instead of facing the country and saying: "We will give you 50/- for every old cow," the Minister entered into a contract with some company to build a factory and accept all the consequences.

There is one particular matter to which I should like to refer. Deputy Dillon referred here to-night to the provision of special-term bulls — the purchase of dairy bulls for leasing or resale at reduced prices. I maintain that, to a certain extent at least, Deputy Dillon was correct in what he stated. When he stated that the Minister made profits on the resale of those bulls, I do not know whether or not he had information to bear it out, but I do know that the Department has made a profit, in this way: That they have ceased buying the first-class bulls, which were premium bulls, and distributing them through the country, but have got in those other special-term bulls, which are not premium bulls. In that way, the Department is making money on the transaction in comparison with what happened before. I should like the Minister in some way to make a survey of what is happening in the country to-day with regard to these particular bulls, and he should try to find out whether his efforts in relation to the provision of short-term bulls has met with any success. Personally, I think his efforts have not met with success and that the scheme has worked the other way around. The whole fabric of agriculture, however, has been broken up, and the Minister must find some kind of expedient of this type to get over the period. Now, we cannot have any progress in this country — and the Minister knows it perfectly well — until agriculture is put on a paying basis, and I do not see any reason whatever why it could not be done if this country were trading under normal conditions and if the people running the Government in this country would recognise that it must be run in that way. I do not see any reason why, under normal conditions, agriculture could not be put on a paying basis, but it is not fair to take the present time as a normal period. This is an abnormal period of trading, and when people are making suggestions they should realise that we are not trading in a normal period. If, as Deputy Davin says, we are going into the British market to compete with the Dane and are not able to sell him down, the reason is that where we had a 10 per cent. preference, it is now 40 per cent. against us.

That is not the reason at all. It is made good to the farmer.

What makes it good? It is the levy on the farmers.

But the return to the farmers is more than they give.

Suppose we did not have to jump the 40 per cent., would we be any better?

Suppose you had to pay the price on the British market, where would you be?

If we were able to get into the British market with a 40 per cent. advantage on our present prices, would we not be better off? Yes, we would.

You have no guarantee.

With all our non-guaranteeing, we are dying to get into it. Every one of us is dying to get into it, and the Deputy knows it. Now, we have the whole list of agricultural production — so much of it as calls for it—under review to-night. It sets out clearly the road we are travelling, and the sooner the Minister for Agriculture makes up his mind that it is really a disgraceful thing to have to bring in an Estimate like that into this House — and it is a disgraceful thing where the State is made responsible for something like the case of Roscrea — and the sooner that sort of thing is wiped out, the better. Agriculture is, and will be at all times, the mainstay of this country. Everybody realises that now, and the Government realises it now, when we are practically too late, but even if the lesson taught is an expensive one, the fact that the Minister had to bring this before the House may have done good.

The discussion on this Estimate may be helpful to the Minister with a view to improving the agricultural policy and possibly raising the standard of living of the people in the rural districts. That is really what is at the bottom of most of our troubles — that the standard of living of the people on the land is too low, and they cannot make a living in their own country. That is the root of the problem of emigration and of migration into the towns from the country as well. All this trouble has arisen out of the low standard of living and the difficulty the people on the land experience in trying to make ends meet. Now, I say that the Minister is making great efforts, according to his own views, to help agriculture. A great deal of public money is being spent on agriculture, but the question is whether or not it is being spent in the proper way. It is with a view to helping out the Minister in these directions that we are here to criticise constructively and, if possible, to help the Minister out. I dare say, however, that the Minister, just as in the case of everything else that is spoken about on this side of the House, will get up and say that this is all Fine Gael propaganda and there is nothing constructive in it. That is generally what is said, no matter what is proposed or what suggestions are made from this side of the House. The Minister must see, however, that although we are spending more on agriculture now than ever before, the position is that we have less milch cows, less cattle, less pigs, less sheep —less of everything—and less people working on the land because they are flying out of it.

The minimum wage of 24/- that has been fixed is the lowest for any industry in the State, and yet the people on the land cannot pay it. That is a well-known fact. It is an unfortunate position and one that must be faced up to, that agricultural people who require agricultural labourers are not able to pay them the minimum wage. How, then, are these farmers themselves and their own families to work at the smaller wage which they can get? That is the position in which the country is, unfortunately. Now, with all the money that is being spent on agriculture at the present time, I think that something could be done to improve agriculture by means of some scheme that would be self-supporting. I proposed a self-supporting scheme to the Minister before, but he turned it down. The scheme I proposed was for the setting up of demonstration farms. I think everybody in this House will agree, no matter on what side they are, that where we are spending over £1,000,000 upon an industry in order to help the people in that industry and to instruct them in research work and so on, it would be well worth while to bring home to the people in that industry how the best use could be made of their land, and how to get the best advantage of the Department's information and of the experiments that the Department's officials have carried out. I am still convinced that the best way that can be done is by means of these demonstration farms, where practical proof could be given and where it could be shown how these things should be reduced to practice. It is all very well to experiment and to spend plenty of money upon experimenting and upon research work, but, unless you can get the people to believe in it, they will not profit by it. I know that the Department is doing very useful work and has always done very useful work, but the trouble is that the people have not confidence in it, and that is why I would recommend the Minister, if he does not wish to go in for a scheme like this in a large way, to begin it in a small way. I recommend that, at least, he should run a demonstration farm in each county. That would not be a big thing.

The Deputy must know that this is a Supplementary Estimate and does not amount to £1,000,000. No money is provided in it for setting up demonstration farms in each parish or county.

I quite see that, but I notice that the very second item on this Estimate is £1,000 for agricultural schools and farms. Upon these agricultural schools and farms there has been £36,000 spent under the original Estimate, and now a further £1,000 is required. I therefore think that it should not be very much out of order if I suggest——

A little out of order is not much harm, Sir.

I am not questioning the Ceann Comhairle's ruling, to which I bow. But to my mind it would be well to try some scheme that would be self-supporting. The scheme I am proposing would be self-supporting, otherwise it would not be worth trying. I leave the matter at that. I hope the Minister will consider this suggestion. Now, on the question of the improvement of milk production, I do know that milk is not being economically produced at the present time. It should be remembered that milk is only the source of half the profits of the dairy farm. The rearing of calves and so on would be the other half, and anything that can be done to improve the price of young cattle is helping the dairy farmer. Anything that can be done to improve store cattle will help the dairy farmer while it will be no burden on the taxpayer. That is a point of which the Minister should never lose sight. When speaking of agriculture we do not want to confine ourselves to milk alone. Milk may be very important in one district, while in another district wheat-growing or beet-growing may be the important item. But when we speak of agriculture we should consider agriculture as a whole, and in this country, taking the thing in general, it is the mixed system of agriculture which pays. Any branch of agriculture that is self-supporting or nearly self-supporting should be encouraged in preference to branches that require large subsidies.

That is a principle it would be well the Minister should keep in mind, for, in the long run, it would save the taxpayer and increase and encourage production of agricultural products in the country. I said branches of agriculture that are nearly economic, because I do not think any branch of agriculture just now is economic. What I say is that milk production and the production of store cattle, sheep and pigs and all these things should be taken as a whole. Then each item that is likely to be economic should be encouraged, rather than go to the extraordinary expense that is connected with the growing of beet and wheat. These two crops are confined to certain portions of the country. They are no benefit to other sections——

They are also outside this Supplementary Estimate.

Very well, I will get away from that. I was only making a passing reference. I am just recommending to the Minister that he should encourage those lines that are economic and that are capable of being pursued in almost every part of the country. The next item on the Vote is "Land reclamation, etc. Schemes in congested districts and other special areas." That is a very useful item and one that should be encouraged. I think there could be an extension of that scheme. The extension that I suggest is that the employment of agricultural labourers at certain periods of the year should be subsidised to a certain extent. For instance, anyone who employs extra men for draining and cleaning or improving the land should get a subsidy for this work. This would refer to people who would not be qualified at present to get grants. Part of the wages should be paid to farmers so as to encourage them to do work of this kind that in itself is not economic. In some districts the land is of inferior quality. I refer specially to congested areas; this is work that would be scarcely economic. At the same time, when we bear in mind that there is so much money paid in doles to people for doing nothing or doing work that is of very doubtful value— such as making roads where they are not wanted—it would be worth while to subsidise people for doing reproductive work of this kind on the land to the extent, say, of one-half or one-third of the wages paid. This might be tried in congested areas. It would result in reducing the number of people in receipt of unemployment assistance and at the same time the lands of these areas would be drained, the district made more healthy, and production increased. It would be a benefit in another way, because it would improve the morale of the young people who are now being demoralised by getting money for doing nothing. This is a matter to which I would urge the Minister to give consideration. Perhaps he would make an experiment in a small way and then see whether the experiment could be extended. I am putting these few suggestions to the Minister because I believe he is wishful to help agriculture, and we should encourage these branches of farming that require the least assistance. That is a thing the Minister has not been doing up to now. If he were to do this, he would find that it would be more profitable to everybody than encouraging the production of crops that can never be economic. I hope the Minister will bear these things in mind and that he will set up a number of these demonstration plots on which he will experiment in a small way.

In reference to grants for reclamations to farmers, I would like to point out to the Minister that many of the schemes in question have not been completed within the period set forth in the scheme. I understood the Department stipulated that the schemes should be completed before the 31st March. However, in view of weather conditions and other difficulties, a number of small householders in these congested areas found it impossible time and again to have the schemes completed within the scheduled time. I would ask that, in such cases, some arrangement might be made with a view to having the time limit extended. I should also like some consideration to be given to the difficulties existing in these areas, and that the system should be adjusted with a view to facilitating those small holders and enabling them to qualify for the grant in April or at any later period that would be required.

The other item to which I would like to make reference is the question of cheap seeds, such as seed oats and seed potatoes for the small holders in congested districts. I understand that the Department have restricted the output and that the quantity to be allowed this year will be, roughly, one-third of last year's allocation. I appeal strongly to the Minister to continue the same allocation as last year. I understand that the experts in the Department make the case that the results were so favourable last year, and the statistics went to show that everything was so satisfactory, that they felt there was no further need to give subsidies or assistance of any sort; that the point had been reached when these areas were able to maintain themselves so far as the special seed was concerned. As against that I would like to point out that the conditions were so bad in the poorer districts that the people had to use all their seed potatoes and the other seeds that were available and there was nothing left with which to get them through the next season.

The Department's point of view may be all right from the theoretical end, but from the practical aspect the story is quite different, and I would like the Department to maintain the position of last year and so help to carry on the good work that they have already conducted on behalf of these poor people. I make that case, knowing the conditions. I am aware that the inspectors find it difficult to satisfy all the requirements of the people. I know it would be absolutely impossible to meet all the requirements if the Department insist on their restricted issue of seeds.

Does the Minister intend to intervene before concluding on the Estimate? There have been a lot of points raised on which there is further information requested. Does the Minister not propose to give that information, so as to enable the debate to be conducted in a more detailed fashion?

When I am concluding, I am prepared to answer any questions that may be asked.

Is the Minister not going to give the information that has been asked for?

The usual practice has been for the Minister to conclude on a Supplementary Estimate.

Yes, when the Minister has given the details to enable the debate to be carried on, and which he has not given this time.

I have already given very full details.

As regards the Roscrea factory, does the Minister pretend he has given details about that?

I gave certain details.

Then I am afraid I shall have to ask him some further questions in order to secure certain details and necessary information in relation to other points. There are several matters to which I should like to direct the Minister's attention. One has reference to the general policy with regard to agriculture in the main, and that aspect of it which is known as the dairying end. There appears now to be agreement amongst everybody that the dairying industry has got to be subsidised. But when that is said, the matter is by no means finished. Once subsidies are brought into any scheme in relation to economics in this country, we find ourselves back again in the old circle. Subsidies are not got out of a sort of bottomless pit, into which the Government may dig at any moment. Subsidies can only be got from the ordinary taxpayer. If there were any question of trying to subsidise the production of milk and to charge up the necessary amount on the consumers of milk, there would be even a greater howl than has arisen. The same practice has been tried in regard to butter, and is being observed in regard to bacon.

There are some people in the country who imagine that they have said all that is required of them when they tell us there is guaranteed such a price as will enable the farmer to be given a certain amount per gallon for the milk. They wash their hands out of it when it comes to the question of who is to be responsible for the money. It is impossible to give a guaranteed price now except by placing an intolerable burden on the people at a period when production generally is down. Those people who have with glee chortled over the situation that has been brought about in which agricultural production is down by some £10,000,000 to £20,000,000, look rather wry when they are asked where, out of that diminishing production, they are going to find the extra money required in order to give the farmer what is thought to be a proper price for his milk. It is not playing fair with the electors for people to come here and, in a light-hearted fashion, speak of a subsidy, leaving it to others to find where, out of the mess which has resulted in a decreased production, or in a production for which a price cannot be got, the money is to be obtained.

There is a welcome change in this House. On a previous occasion, when I spoke to the motion on the cost of living, I gave a quotation from the President where he said that the British market had gone for ever, as far as he could see. What is the position to-day? His followers are now waiting hungrily for the moment when he will declare the British market open to us. Some years ago there would have been cheers at the statement that the British market had gone for ever. There was a period when many people were deluded into false hopes about other foreign markets and about the home market. Now those people are hoping against hope that the British market will again be opened to us. For five years it was regarded as good politics, and it was lauded as sound patriotism, to talk about the closing of the British market, about turning our backs on it and pretending that we had no use for it. The people who carried on that sort of thing find themselves in a difficult position to-day. They are looking hungrily to the time when the declaration will be made that the British market will be open to something like the old extent.

You cannot continue indefinitely this policy of subsidising an industry that has been partially killed through Government action. There seems to be agreement now that whatever subsidies have to be got for any purpose, they ought not to be raised off the foodstuffs of the people. Subsidies, like the moneys that are required for any social service, are found out of taxation of luxuries or semi-luxuries, and the Government have been forced to confess that they were obliged to tax the necessities of life, not because they liked it, but because there was nothing else left to tax. How the Government's policy of endeavouring to dart in two directions is to be reconciled, I do not know. If the Minister brings forward a definite proposal to get the farmers properly remunerated for the milk that is produced, he, no doubt, will have the support of the House; but let him take heed and see whether the other policies he has been engaged in fathering for some years have not been in some way responsible for bringing the price that can be got for milk in the country to the present point. There is definitely a clamour for the British market at the moment.

We embarked here on a policy of self-sufficiency, an unattainable idea, and we applauded any other country going in for a policy of self-sufficiency. As long as that policy was operating with enthusiasm, so long was there a lowering of the standard of living and an increase in the cost of living in every country. Only in the last two or three years, when that policy has been found to be the complete fraud it is and people have veered from it, has there been any lift in the cloud of depression. We think that we can make our little effort to damage British trade, and we want the people upon whom we rely to give us a decent price for the foodstuffs we have to export to be put into a position to pay this bigger price while patriots down the country will applaud everything we think will bring them to their knees. There is to be a reconciliation of the impossible. We are to be patriots, patting ourselves on the backs for all we do to bring the British down, and then cringing in our endeavour to get Britain to pay us a better price for the goods we must export to her because no other place will take them.

A very nauseating scandal is obviously concealed under this item O.O. 11 in which £15,000 is being provided for payment to two separate factories. They are being paid, so far as I understand from what has been recounted to me of the Minister's speech, on foot of penalty clauses in two contracts. The Minister fears that they may be enforced against him because he contracted to supply Waterford factory with old cattle at 11/- per cwt. and call no longer keep his contract and that he contracted — most marvellous of all — to supply Roscrea factory with cattle for nothing——

I should like to set Deputy McGilligan right. We want to protect our products down in Waterford.

The Minister contracted to supply Waterford with something at 10/- a cwt. and—most marvellous of all—he was to supply Roscrea with cattle for nothing. Apparently, he entered into a binding contract, with a penalty clause, that if he did not continue to supply Roscrea with cattle for nothing, Roscrea would have an action against him. We are told that he is making an advance of £5,000 in respect of some unascertained liability in respect of that penalty clause. That is an interesting contract. Is it going to be published? Shall we get full particulars of it? Shall we be told what the Government was going to get out of it at any time? I cannot understand the Government guaranteeing to supply raw material for nothing if it has to pay something for it and is not going to get something out of it in the end. These cattle which wended their way to Roscrea found themselves coming out in the form of some sort of tinned stuff. That was to be sold. At what price? Were the Government to get any part of the price or was that handed over to the promoters? If it was, it was a completely one-sided contract. Did the Minister ever hear of a contract in which one party bound itself to supply raw material for nothing to a factory and the factory people were allowed to get away with that item of profit or with whatever profit was made or to be made out of it? If the Government were to be made a present of these cattle, one could understand their benevolence but one would inquire who were the parties to whom they were so benevolent.

The Government had to purchase these cattle. We paid for them. The Government had contracted that, for four or five years, they would buy cattle, making the taxpayer pay for them, and hand them over free to the Roscrea factory. They would not ask the Roscrea factory whether they made profits or losses, because the Government had no share in the profits and, I hope, had no share in the losses. The Government bound themselves to continue to supply these cattle to Roscrea for a number of years: If that is the contract, will the Minister take a piece of gratuitous advice? The contract is so bad that it could not be enforced and he need not hesitate to go into court to get it set aside. The only plea that could be set up against the Minister would be that he knew what he was doing. The Minister might have to enter the sad plea that he was slightly deranged at the time the contract was made. Would any man in commercial life present himself as a sane man before the public and say he bound himself in a penalty clause, which could be enforced against him in court, to supply goods free for which he had to pay and out of the product of which he was to have no share?

There are other items in connection with Roscrea which will need further examination. A road was made to that factory. I understand it was made free by local labour on the ground that the people making it were to be given employment for a number of years in the factory. I hope the Minister has not guaranteed to pay them something if they are thrown out of the factory. Who are the directors of this company——

On that point, I understand that this company is a private company. It is the established practice of this House not to discuss the affairs of private companies or private individuals.

We are being asked to pay money to a private company. I suggest that it is a matter that goes to the root of parliamentary institutions that we should be allowed to find out whether there are, or are not, Deputies of this House making money in that company. I suggest that there are.

The company in question is, I understand, a private company. The action of Deputies, as members of such companies, is not a matter for discussion in this House. I presume that the Comptroller and Auditor-General will have to decide whether the money is properly spent or not, and thus Deputies may question this or any other transaction — that is, in connection with the Public Accounts.

On a point of order, if any company enters into relation with the State by virtue of which it exacts heavy penalties from the State and puts large sums of money into its pocket, does that not abrogate the protection afforded by this House to the affairs of private individuals? If private individuals enter into personal relations with the State, on foot of which they claim the right to collect large sums of public money, does not that constitute an abrogation of the rule?

It is on record that there have been Deputies who had an interest in companies that had Government contracts. That fact would not justify the introduction of their business concerns or of their companies into debate in the Dáil. Neither is it permissible to discuss the affairs of this private company, the constitution of its directorate, or whether or not Deputies are connected with it. If it is desired to arraign the Government or a Minister on such a matter, it should be done by formal motion and not casually on a Supplementary Estimate.

I suggest that this matter goes to the root of parliamentary institutions. Most governments have arrangements whereby all members of Parliament who become interested in a contract have to reveal and declare it. Most governments and most parliamentary institutions have provisions whereby publicity is given to the fact that members of parties are entering into contractual relations with the Government. It is sought now by the Minister to conceal that, and the rules of the House to which you have given expression — and which I have not yet understood — aids and abets that nefarious practice. It is a thing that certainly strikes at the root of parliamentary institutions if there is to be secrecy about such a matter as this. Whether it is a private company or not does not matter. I am not revealing for the first time that it is notoriously manned by Deputies. Should a private company, exhibited in that way, which never can lose, be kept alive so far as votes from this House can keep it alive, while the Minister can never win? The Minister was to supply goods free to this factory. How the profits were to be made the Minister was not, apparently, concerned because he was going to get no part of the profits. Yet, the Minister ties himself by a penalty clause to the company, which contains a couple of members of his own Party. I assert that as a fact.

I trust I was not misunderstood when I referred to companies, in which Deputies were interested, having Government contracts. I named no company. The Deputy seems to be making a charge against members of the House. Such a charge cannot be made in that informal manner. The Deputy, if he so desires, may raise the matter, by motion, but neither the concerns of a private company nor its composition may be discussed in a casual way.

Apparently there has been some misunderstanding of my remarks. I am not charging any Deputy; I am charging the Minister, and he is the man who is answering for this Vote, that he entered into a completely indefensible contract, and I say that, as an aggravation of that, the parties who can only be gainers—who certainly cannot be losers so far as votes of public money can put them in the right position — happen to be Deputies, or companies partly composed of Deputies. The Minister, however, must bear the blame for this, and he does not get away from the blame by attempting to be secretive about the matter. I presume this contract will have to be discussed by the Public Accounts Committee. I hope it will be published, and I think the Minister should publish it now, and if he had no shame about it, he would publish it and every detail would be thrown open for every Deputy who is interested to read. Instead of our getting in a piecemeal way, by question and by more or less putting things to the Minister which he cannot deny, a hold of this nauseating affair, the Minister should have stood up and told us exactly what happened. If no more is said than what I am saying very briefly, surely there is something for the Minister to reveal.

The Minister binds himself that he will disburse public money under a penalty clause. The penalty is to be inflicted on him — and he appears to think it is a penalty that can be enforced legally — because he cannot carry out a promise. What was the promise? That he should supply cattle free to Roscrea for five years. As a bad bargain phrased that way, there might be some of the edge taken off it if the Minister could say: "I was to have got this, that or the other thing," but the Minister does not tell us that. It is not there. The Minister never was to gain; the State never could gain; and the people never could gain. All that was to happen was that public money could be devoted by the Minister to this concern when this concern threatened the Minister with an action —an action that could not be stood over on any grounds of equity, but an action which the Minister would hate to defend. It is an action which, I believe, if fought out, will not be fought out in open court, but some hugger-mugger class of arbitration board will be set up in such a way that the public will get no notice, and all that they will be told is the amount of the bill which they have to foot. We have a foreshadowing of that to-night. This £5,000 is an instalment.

Of courses it was a scandalous transaction. No brains could ever have been associated with it. The only thing associated with it was camouflage and secrecy. It has been put here already to the Minister that it would have been a better performance for him to say to the people, as he did with regard to the calves: "We will give you so much for every old cow you slaughter and of which you send us the hide." If that had been done, whatever money has now been lost could have been divided up amongst the farmers, and we would have had the knowledge that it went into the hands of the people who had the old cows and killed them. Instead of that, we find that these animals were gathered into Roscrea; subsidies paid to Roscrea for the erection of a factory; a lot of machinery gathered together, inside walls, with a Government pledge to take it over on a certain date; the factory now rendered unusable; and the Minister bound to make good on a penalty clause some sum of money, of which £5,000 is the first instalment, because the cattle, under his mismanagement, are no longer so bad that they can be supplied for nothing to Roscrea.

The Minister, of course, did not dare to attempt the business of having the slaughter of old cows as well as the slaughter of calves running at the same time. That would have been too great an exposure of the policy he stands over; but that, although scandalous enough from the angle of economics, would not have been bad from the angle of business. This is the same result. It gets the cattle killed in a way that brings no benefit to the community. The only benefit there is arising out of the whole transaction is to those people who are concerned in the factory. What is going to happen to the building eventually? There was a building put up. Who stood for the cost of the building? I am told that there was something said here to-day about debentures for £16,000. Is it that the factory cost £16,000? Who supplied the money? What about the machinery? Where did it come from? Is there much machinery? What did it cost? What is the scrap value of it, if it is going to be scrapped? Is it machinery that can be changed for anything else, and, if so, what is it likely to be used for? Can we run it on industrial alcohol from potatoes for some other absurd purpose? What will happen eventually if we find that the factory cannot be used? What is the end of our losses in this connection?

I suppose the Minister cannot be asked to give some guess even as to the figure he will likely lose over this penalty clause because he might be giving himself away too openly, but would the Minister tell us how is this matter going to be fought out? Will it be in public? Will it be tried by a judge, or is he going to scuttle into a corner before some arbitrator? Is there going to be a secret bargain about this? What is going to happen to the building? Has the Minister any idea as to a new use for it? Is he going to be saddled with it? What about the machinery and, in the end, will the Minister promise — he cannot do it now, but some day — to tell the House the sorry story of the Roscrea factory and what it has cost the country? I have often heard the phrase about chickens coming home to roost and I have often wondered what would happen when the white elephants came home to roost, but we are beginning to realise now some part of it.

A number of matters have been raised on this Estimate which, I suppose, I might take in order. Deputy Dillon spoke of an incident about 12 months ago and said that we had sold butter on the British market at a low price and had imported butter afterwards from Denmark at a high price. I do not happen to have the figures of that particular incident at hand, but I do know that, during the last five years, it happened only once that our calculations as to the amount of butter required for the winter and our calculations as to the production for the winter were wrong. That was in the winter of 1936-37. A certain amount of Danish butter did come in, but not at an exorbitant price. This year, to date, the amount of production on which we calculated is about right, and it would look as if the amount of butter which we kept in cold store for the supply here at home will work out at the proper amount. The Deputy made an accusation against me on a former occasion that in that year, 1936, when this miscalculation was made, we stored butter in July and August, when prices were high, and sold it in September and October, when prices were low, and said that anybody with any common sense would have done the other thing —that is, sell the butter in summer and keep it in September and October for winter use. We followed exactly the same practice in 1937 as in 1936, and it happened that we were absolutely right. We stored our butter in July and August, when prices were low, and sold it in September and October, when prices were very high. We happen to be right, so that the person of common sense is not always the person who can make the best forecast of these things. There is a great deal of chance and we must make the best forecast we can, and take the best possible view you can of the prospects on the foreign market.

The next point that was raised by Deputy Dillon was in relation to the Roscrea factory. Deputy McGilligan has made a speech which I would say he would be glad to get the opportunity of making. He seldom appears on an agricultural Estimate, but when this matter of Roscrea was mentioned, I saw him coming into the House. I wondered if he had been sent for, but I knew what he was going to do and what he was going to say. He is always glad of an opportunity to accuse his opponents of all sorts of wrong-doings and to throw out his usual accusations, semi-accusations, insinuations and so on.

He repeated verbatim what I had already said.

I would not give Deputy Dillon that credit. I do not believe he is half as clever as Deputy McGilligan.

Possibly that is true, but the substance was the same.

He may be trying. He is, perhaps, a good pupil of Deputy McGilligan, but he will never have the bitterness. He may try, but he will not have it.

So I should be happy.

The Deputy should be happy because it is not his nature. Deputy McGilligan started by saying that it was a scandal and by making insinuations. He asked questions and I have no objection to answering them. The Ceann Comhairle has overruled the question of mentioning names. I will have the question answered publicly. Deputy McGilligan knows, Deputy Dillon knows, and everyone knows who is connected with the Roscrea factory. It is only a matter of having the names published which, I am sure, we can have done. Let us try to get back to the position of the Roscrea factory when started early in 1935. There were numbers of old and uneconomic cows here which would not be allowed into the British market. We did not want to kill them for human consumption. I will not say that they were all diseased but, under the regulations, a number of them were. As we did not want to kill them for human consumption, it was a problem at that time to know what to do with these old uneconomic cows.

Bury them.

That is what would have happened. At the same time, as there was a deficiency in meat meal in this country we thought we could make use of them for that purpose. At that time there were factories in this country making meat meal. In order to give Deputy Dillon and Deputy McGilligan, if they are willing to learn, some idea of the economics of that particular business, I think the documents can be produced. I had a certain firm approached to know on what terms they would take old cows. It was an existing concern and would not take them if it got them free. First of all, the firm would need to enlarge their premises. They would not take money on loan. They would take a grant and would take the cows free if delivered. That, roughly, is what the offer made to us meant. The position was then put up to me that we should do this business on our own as a State concern. When these things are put up by officials as well as by people outside, they differ. Some officials rather favour State concerns, while some officials wish to avoid it, if possible, so that one gets a difference of opinion, with such advice. This group came along. I honestly cannot remember now, but I may have discussed it with some of the group. I certainly did not ask them to put up a proposition. They came along and put it up. I would say that it was a much better proposition than one put up by an existing firm. Documents can be produced to prove that.

If the Deputy wants another inquiry they will be.

Had this firm been compensated to get out of business?

Were not some people in Dublin compensated over Roscrea?

No. That is a different matter, and has nothing to do with Roscrea. They came along undertaking to do the business, roughly on the lines indicated. They would undertake the building of the factory with a capacity to deal with something like from 900 to 1,300 cows a week. They had not enough money. They had some money. I do not know how much. Roughly, they had £7,000 or £8,000 of their own. This private company asked for a loan and we advanced £16,000 on debentures. There was an agreement that they were to put some money into it. Unless we made an agreement and delivered the cows, they would not do so. We made an agreement to deliver the cows free at the rail and they paid freight, which was more than the other firms would do.

Did they pay the freight?

Yes. They took them in at that time. I am assuming that Deputies opposite are honest in inquiring into this matter. I think if I was on the Opposition Benches I might ask for a lot of information. If we are honest about inquiring into this matter let us go back to see the price of fats at that time, which was one of the big items. The price of hides was another big item. Then there was the position in the meat meal market. They were turning out a certain quantity of meat meal. There was only a market three or four years ago for about half the quantity of meat meal turned out, and there was no prospect of getting any export market elsewhere. They had to take a chance. They said they probably could not get an export market. As it happened, they did not want it, because they sold meat meal roughly at £4 a ton less than any other firm, and in that way got bigger consumption. The price has remained down by £4 or £5 a ton less than it was before that. I say, therefore, that at that time it was not altogether so rosy a prospect.

Did I understand the Minister to say that with State assistance these gentlemen sold meat meal for about half the price and wiped out all the existing firms?

No, I did not say anything about a State subsidy.

They were getting the raw material for nothing?

I did not say that there was a subsidy on meat meal. I do not think Deputy McGilligan wants to get at the truth of this. We will assume that he does, and we will go ahead. It did not look such a rosy prospect then, because the price of hides is much higher and fats are much higher.

Are hides higher now?

They are not, perhaps, as high now as they were last year. They are higher than they were at the beginning of 1935. All these points were there, so that it did not look such a rosy proposition as it looks to those on the opposite benches now. It did not look to be a rosy proposition to the existing factory. We would be glad to give these terms to the existing factory if they accepted them.

How many of the existing factories were consulted about it?

I could not say, but I will look it up. I am sure more than one was consulted. Deputies want to know something about the agreement. As I stated, they had some money, but I do not know how much. I should say that under the Slaughter of Cattle and Sheep Act the heads of the agreement, at least, should be placed on the Table of the Dáil. Probably they have been placed on the Table. I am not sure. The agreement set out that we should deliver so many cattle, and if we fell down on the delivery of that number, we could pay a certain amount of compensation each year.

When was the agreement placed on the Table?

I am not sure, but under the Slaughter of Cattle and Sheep Act the heads of any agreement made were to be placed on the Table. I do not know if the time to do so was limited, and I do not know if they appeared on the Table.

The agreement, at any rate, was that at the end of four years they were to pay back what they owed to us — that is, the £16,000 — or we had the option, on the other hand, of buying from them on an agreed basis which, I think, was the original cost. We had both options, of either taking our money back within the four years — the money that we had lent them — or of taking over the factory on an agreed cost, I cannot say what it was.

It might have been substantially in excess of the debentures outstanding?

Possibly. That was the agreement. If I were to come here to-day and tell Deputies that I could, within four years, take back my debentures, I think they would say that I should also have an agreement to take over the factory if it was a going paying concern. It was hard to imagine how it could be a going paying concern if all supplies stopped. But suppose we stopped the scheme of supplying the old cows, it is quite possible that they could collect those cows at a very small cost themselves. Some of those old cows were not worth anything to any other person except the Roscrea factory and, naturally, they could get them very cheap. I am not sure whether they could make it a going paying concern, but possibly they could. As I say, we had the option to purchase. If it proved that, after four years' experience, it was a factory that could be put on a paying basis, we could then take it and run it ourselves, or take it and let it to another company. I was asked the question whether any Deputy was connected with this company. Yes, there was a Deputy of this Party connected with the company. The Ceann Comhairle has ruled that we must not mention names. The name will be made public, and there is no desire to conceal it. Take the Waterford factory, for instance. We made the same type of agreement with the Waterford factory. We agreed to give cattle at 10/- a cwt. to the Waterford factory — as Deputy Gorey said, the best of cattle — because we had to clear a certain area in Kerry, suitable healthy cattle, good for canning and the making of meat extract.

We made that agreement with Waterford. It also contained a penalty clause under which we had to pay up if we did not go on with our contract. We paid up £10,000. It was a much smaller transaction than with the Roscrea factory. In the case of Waterford we were dealing with between 4,000 and 10,000 cattle a year, while in the case of Roscrea the number was 50,000. Therefore, anyone can see that the amount of capital required in Roscrea would be higher than in the case of the Waterford factory. Hence the compensation clause was higher. A Deputy opposite was connected with the Waterford factory and no one will find any fault with that.

He was not a Deputy.

He is a Deputy now.

That is another story.

I am wrong. There was a Deputy connected with it.

There is the difference that the Waterford factory was not started for that special purpose.

But still it stood to gain that £10,000.

Would the Minister say what was the basis of calculation in respect of the £10,000?

In the case of Waterford it was that we were to pay them either £10,000 or their capital outlay, whichever we thought the lower.

Am I to understand from the Minister that ever £100,000 worth of free cattle were given to this Roscrea factory?

Very much more. Almost 100,000 cattle were delivered in three years.

At £2 10s. each?

So that the factory got a subsidy of £250,000?

Will the Deputy admit that he allowed the estimates for the last three years to go through — the Dáil voting £180,000 for cows for Roscrea — and never noticed it?

We did not realise the imbecility of the bargain.

Is it not a fact that Roscrea canned some of this stuff and thought to sell it both here and on the continent?

There was none of it sold here.

Well, on the continent?

They may have.

What about the compensation paid to people here in connection with the Roscrea factory?

I was asked whether we had compensated certain firms here in Dublin as a result of setting up these factories. Under the agreement we made with the Waterford factory, we did ask firms that were doing a very small business here in Dublin to go out of business on the basis of compensation, which they did.

And those firms were compensated?

They were, because they were in the business. We wanted a firm that would take the Kerry cattle. We wanted a firm that would take over the entire business, and we made that agreement with Waterford.

And you were to get certain profits.

What was the cost of the compensation?

About £3,000, I think.

It is a mercy it is so low.

I may be wrong in that. It may be £3,000 or £4,000. Deputy McGilligan can go now, because I think I have finished with Roscrea.

Let us make everything quite clear. Is it true that the Roscrea factory, having received free £250,000 worth of old cows on the representation that they were going to convert them into meat meal, did, in fact, slaughter and can some of those old cows for human food and seek to sell that on the Continent as an Irish packed meat product?

I honestly cannot answer whether they tried to sell it on the Continent.

Did they try to sell it outside the Saorstát?

They did make a certain amount of tinned meat.

And tried to sell that as an Irish packed meat product that they got for nothing.

Is it not a fact that they tried to sell some of this as sides of Irish beef in Belgium?

Would the Minister consider the giving of a subsidy for some old humans and send them to Roscrea?

Agreement on every side of the House.

Why Deputy Walsh should insist on insulting himself I cannot imagine.

If we want to have the truth of the matter, there was no food left Roscrea factory except in tins — at any rate not, as Deputy Fagan says, in sides for Belgium.

I heard a person trying to make a price for sides from Roscrea factory for Belgium. I was listening to the conversation.

That is not true. I do not want to move on if there are any other questions to be put.

We want the contract and documents referred to.

Under the Act I must put certain information before the Dáil. It may have been put before the Dáil, but if not it will be.

There are two other documents you said you would give the House.

I do not think the Deputy will ask me to bring before the House a letter from a private firm in reply to a communication from me.

Why did the Minister refer to it?

I am prepared to show it to any Deputy privately.

Will the Minister not publish it, taking out the name of the firm? We do not want the name.

I will see if that can be done.

We want to see how far there was a finger poked in anyone's eye.

My finger?

No; yours would be more the eye than the finger.

The Deputy did say that I could put up a plea in court of being mentally deranged at the time. It is just the Deputy's style.

It is the Minister's affliction.

If the Deputy went out we could have a more pleasant debate.

I will hear the Minister without any interruption.

I do not agree with Deputy Dillon that because the export of eggs is down there is a corresponding decrease in production. As a matter of fact, I think if he will look up the figures — I am not sure if they are published yet, but I have seen the figures from the Department of Industry and Commerce, which, if not published yet, will be soon — he will find that there is a very big increase in the consumption of eggs in this country — in fact, almost sufficient, so far as I can read the figures, to make up the gap between the exports six or seven years ago and now.

You do not believe that.

Deputy Dillon, or some other Deputy, said to-night that we ought to look at the figures supplied by the Department of Industry and Commerce and learn for ourselves.

You do not do that.

I did that all right.

Someone has been telling you things again.

With regard to land reclamation schemes, it is true that seven or eight years ago we had schemes for the reclamation of about 3,000 acres of land. It has now gone up to 50,000 acres. The agricultural overseers and the assistant overseers who were there in 1929 and 1930 are still on the Vote for agriculture. It is only the men who are taken on temporarily during the winter for land reclamation work who are put on the employment scheme Vote. So that it is not true, as Deputy Dillon says, that we are shifting over the expenditure under some heads to the employment Vote and in that way relieving the Vote for agriculture. As to special-term bulls, it is not true that we are making any profit on them. These bulls are never sold for more than they are bought at, and sometimes they are sold for less. It is not true either to say that the good bulls are gone before we purchase these bulls. We try to get the best bulls possible.

I think the Minister will find that some of his own officers have stated in public that the procedure whereunder the special-term bulls are purchased is that the premium bulls are bought first.

That is right.

Then any bull which has not been sold is picked up by the Department and distributed as a special-term bull.

I think you will find that the best buyers are there and that they do get the best possible bulls after the premium bulls. Deputy Dillon suggested taking this milk from the Kerry area where we propose to put up creameries. He thought it might be done in an economic way. It is perhaps a very good scheme from a social point of view to give milk to people who cannot afford to purchase it, but as an economic proposition it would be altogether hopeless. It only costs about ¾d. per lb. to convert milk into butter in a creamery. If you take the average cost of distribution of milk in Dublin at the moment I think it must be about 8d. or 9d. per gallon. If you compare that with the ¾d., which is the cost of converting the milk into butter, surely if we are to give the farmer the same price for milk, it is cheaper under a semi-State scheme at least to convert it into butter and sell the butter, rather than try to distribute it free in Dublin or elsewhere. That may have its merits from a social point of view, but not from an economic point of view.

The Beef Conference meets in London and all countries exporting beef into the British market are members. They deal, first of all, with the global quota for the quarter. They make recommendations to the British Government as to what the global quota should be for all countries and then make recommendations on the division of that global quota amongst the countries participating.

Is this country regarded simply as on an equal footing with, say, the Argentine or elsewhere, or does our membership of that Beef Conference permit us, subsequent to the discussions, to make individual representations to the British Board of Trade for special advantages for ourselves?

Yes, we have made these individual representations outside the Beef Conference in regard to, say, the fat cattle quota and so on, and so far that has not been objected to by the Beef Conference.

Deputy Davin said I held out no great hope as to the dairying industry. It is very difficult to make any forecast of what is there for the dairying industry in the years to come. The present price is undoubtedly unremunerative to our farmers; that is, I suppose, even if we had a free market, about 110/- or 112/- per cwt. That would mean at the present time, if we had no subsidies or bounties and so on, that the farmer would only get about 4d. per gallon for the milk. I think no Deputy would claim that that would be sufficient, even if he were getting a better price for his young cattle as well. I am sure there would be an agitation that we should try to do something better for the dairying industry — that they could not possibly carry on at 4d. per gallon. It is true that if we had no stabilisation scheme and bounties and so on, in the year 1935 the price payable to the farmer would be about 2½d. per gallon when butter was 69/- per cwt. on the world market.

I do not know if I can give Deputy Davin any very convincing reasons why the supply of milk in the midland creameries has gone down. I had graphs made out on one occasion showing the price of milk and the supply of milk, the price of cattle and the number of cows. So far as I could learn any lesson from these graphs, they would go to show that if the price of cattle is rising usually the number of cows goes down and it has far more influence on the number of cows than the price of milk. However, that was only over a comparatively short period, which perhaps was not sufficient to be a reliable guide on these matters. It may be due to both causes — that the farmer considered the price of milk unsatisfactory and at the same time saw an improvement in the price of cattle. Probably it is due to both.

Would it be due to the fact that they cannot get anyone to milk them?

The question which Deputy Davin put to me as to the future dairying policy is a big one. I think, as I said before on several occasions, that we should try as far as we can to maintain the number of cows in the country, because a great deal depends on the number of cows we have—in the first place, the number of calves and the output of milk, not only for human consumption but also for the feeding of calves, pigs, poultry, etc. It is therefore a very important basic industry. We should try, as far as we possibly can, to keep the dairying industry going. There are, of course, two factors in the situation which we must always keep in mind. The world price is an important consideration, and if we have to subsidise our dairy farmers so as to bring the price up to the level at which they can continue to produce, to find the difference between that price and the world price may mean a very heavy burden at times on the taxpayer. As far as our forecasts for the coming year go, it would appear as if the world price of butter is not going to be any better than it was last year, even if it is as good, so that it will take a considerable amount of money to keep our dairying industry going as it is, and it will take considerably more to improve matters.

A question was raised about the distribution of cattle licences. When the distribution of cattle licences was in the hands of the Department, I think there was a great deal of dissatisfaction, and Deputies opposite were kind enough on some occasions even to suggest that the friends of the Fianna Fáil Party got more licences than friends of the other Parties. It was an extremely difficult thing to distribute those licences — in fact, impossible to distribute them and give satisfaction. Eventually they were divided amongst the county committees on the assumption that the county committees would know more of local needs and would try to distribute them fairly. I think we shall have to continue that system. Deputy Fagan said that in order to get licences for April he would have to apply now. I do not think that can be so.

You would have to apply for them now in order to get them two months hence.

I applied for 20 licences recently, and I was told that I could not get them until April.

I must make inquiries into that matter. It should be possible by applying now to get them in March. If they are applied for early in February, they should be available in March, but the county secretary must have sufficient time to make up his mind as to how many he can give. In regard to the charge for licences, I think it is a good thing to charge something because, before we commenced to charge, people who did not want them applied for them, and when they got them threw them aside and did not use them. Imposing a small charge means that they will be available for those who really want them.

The question is, are you entitled to charge?

We can go on charging, at any rate, until somebody challenges it. With regard to giving out licences at the ports on the demand of exporters, a great complaint was made before when a system such as that was in operation that the exporters were not passing back the benefits of the full prices to the producer.

At that time there was a scarcity of licences.

I am afraid we would have the same complaint again if we did that.

Is it not true that we are not filling the quota or anything like it?

It is true, but I am afraid that if only the exporters would have access to these licences we would have that complaint from the farmers, whether there would be any foundation for it or not.

I do not see how you could get that complaint when you have not enough fat cattle for all the licences available.

I am afraid the present system will have to continue, for this season, at any rate. With regard to the report of the Horse Breeding Commission, most of the recommendations were adopted. There are some that have not been adopted up to now.

Are these all the Government are going to adopt?

Practically, that is all they are going to do. Deputy Fagan said that we were making big profits out of the German trade.

I did not say big profits.

I would not say we made big profits but it has paid us this year. Even if we did make big profits, I do not see how we could do what the Deputy suggests. If we send our buyers into the cattle market and they give a good price, they cannot give a great deal more than anybody else, as if they did we would have sellers immediately coming along, saying: "We want to sell our cattle for the German market because we can get more by selling them in that way than by selling them to anybody else."

If the Minister had a little profit, could he not afford to give 1/- or 6d. per cwt. more this week than other buyers? That would tend to raise the prices next week.

We have tried to do that on many occasions. We tried in the past to raise the market price by giving 1/- or so per cwt. more than anybody else.

If the £4 5s. tariff were taken off they would not be going to Germany.

They might.

They would go to Johnny Lord and Mosey Lee.

They might not, but we shall see.

That is rather hopeful —"we shall see."

Deputy Brasier talked about sending out inferior bulls. We have been trying to get the best possible bulls. Of course, there are only a certain number of bulls in the country. Deputy Roddy asked if it was proposed to have a general reorganisation of the dairying industry under this Estimate. In this Estimate no provision is made for such reorganisation but we are continually having that matter under review and trying to reorganise the dairying industry in general. Where there are creameries that can be amalgamated, or where creameries can swop auxiliaries, we do our best to bring them to an agreement. We cannot use any compulsion on them. All we can do is to suggest that it would be a good step to take.

Sometimes they do what is suggested to them, but in most cases they do not. It is true that we have had a number of meetings and consultations with dairying interests about what the price might be for the coming year. I have not yet been able to make any announcement because, although we might make a forecast for the coming year, we have not yet reached agreement as to what the taxpayer would be able to give us to tide us over our difficulties.

Deputy O'Donovan asked how much was being devoted to the winter production of butter. I mentioned the sum already — £49,000. Deputy Anthony raised a question with regard to the type of trading carried on by co-operative societies. That question does not arise under this Vote, but I can assure the Deputy that the money voted for new societies will not be used to encourage their activities in mixed trading. Deputy J. Flynn raised two points. One had reference to the reclamation schemes and he thought it would be well to continue them beyond the 31st March. I shall take a note of that point, but I am afraid it is rather difficult to carry out what the Deputy suggests. It may be easier to do it now than formerly because we are working under somewhat different conditions. I shall take a note of the suggestion to see if it is possible to give effect to it. In regard to his suggestion about seed potatoes and seed oats, I shall try to ascertain if we can give out the same amount of seed as we gave out last year. The only other speaker, I think, was Deputy McGilligan, who devoted his attention principally to the Roscrea factory. I have, I think, covered all the points raised.

Vote put and agreed to.
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