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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 7 Dec 1938

Vol. 73 No. 9

Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices Bill, 1938—Final Stages.

Deputies have been informed that of the amendments on the green paper only Nos. 9, 12 and 13, in the name of Deputy Davin, are in order.

I should like, Sir, to get a ruling on one question. I understand it is necessary under the Standing Orders of the House that amendments on the various stages of Bills must be received at a certain time. This evening when we came to the House we found some Ministerial amendments lying on the desks. These amendments obviously only came to the notice of Deputies at 3.30 p.m. and we are to discuss them now, two hours later. I should like to know if it is in order to discuss amendments which were submitted to Deputies within the past two hours. I want to know what your ruling on that is, as we protest against amendments submitted so late being taken on this stage of the Bill.

Before you rule, Sir, I want to draw attention to the fact that the same procedure was adopted on the Committee Stage this day week.

I think the question of time has not arisen in that way, but on the time the amendments were handed in at the general office. I take it that the amendments in question, in order to have been issued and typed, must have been handed into the office some time ago.

Can we know when they were handed in?

May I put it to you, Sir, that the real point is, that the Government has to have time to consider amendments which have been put down, and to frame action accordingly. The amendments which have been handed in are designed to meet the point of view expressed by Deputy Davin in the amendments which he put on the Paper, and to put those in proper form.

My amendments were put in last Friday evening at four o'clock, in accordance with the procedure laid down in the Standing Orders. As far as I am aware, the Ministerial amendments were not handed in until three o'clock this evening.

I submit that amendments must be in at a certain time, and that Government convenience and Government amendments are not the concern of the House. They must obey the Standing Orders of the House, the same as any Deputy without any Party behind him. There is no other way of doing business.

I strongly protest against these amendments being taken at such inadequate notice.

Standing Order No. 25 provides:—

All motions to be put on the Order Paper for any day shall be in writing, signed by a Deputy, and shall reach the Clerk not later than 11 a.m. on the fourth preceding day. Any amendments to such motions shall be in writing, signed by a Deputy, and shall reach the Clerk not later than 11 a.m. on the second preceding day: Provided that by permission of the Ceann Comhairle, motions may be made on shorter notice.

Apparently for that purpose motions and amendments are on the same footing. The Ceann Comhairle has obviously exercised his jurisdiction in that matter and has allowed these, perhaps on short notice, if they were on short notice—I have no knowledge that they were not in the office within the proper time.

May I submit that this point has not been brought to the notice of the Ceann Comhairle, because it is only arising now? We were handed these amendments at 3.30 to-day and at 5.30 we are being asked to discuss them. If the Ceann Comhairle were in the Chair I would make the same submission. Even allowing for a generous exercise of his discretion in permitting an amendment to be handed in, it is a very generous and very wide exercise of that discretion to allow an amendment to be handed to Deputies two hours before it is moved on a Bill about which there is no urgency and which can be passed next year or the year afterwards without any great injury. This is a Bill about which there is no great urgency, no need for haste. In the circumstances, I consider it is most unfair that we should be asked to discuss these amendments on two hours' notice, particularly when the Government had adequate time in which to submit them.

On a point of order, I submit that no ruling has so far been given.

I have given a ruling to this extent, that the Ceann Comhairle has exercised his jurisdiction.

Not yet, I submit.

Oh, yes. The Ceann Comhairle, I am informed in the office—and that is mainly the way of dealing with the matter—has exercised his jurisdiction in this matter and has permitted these amendments to be moved. By that, I think, I am bound.

He has not conveyed that decision to the House, unless he is doing so now through you.

It is quite true there is a discretion vested in the Ceann Comhairle to take notices of motions or amendments on shorter notice. A very good case should be put in respect of an amendment on short notice, which would deal with a special aspect of the matter. The Minister has indicated that the Government must have time for consideration of amendments moved by Deputies in order that they may make up their minds. I put it to you that the Government had two days after Deputy Norton's amendment was put in, and that gave them sufficient time to make up their minds on the subject and there is no excuse or case for handing in an amendment at 3.30 to-day. It may have been that it was put into the Dáil Office at 11 o'clock this morning. This amendment ought to have been in the hands of Deputies this morning and, if the Government even utilised one day out of the two days still further to make up their minds, there was yet ample time to enable Deputies to be informed. I submit, with great respect to the Leas-Cheann Comhairle and the Ceann Comhairle, that the exercise of the Ceann Comhairle's discretion is limited under the Standing Orders to a case of special urgency and it is not a case in which the Ceann Comhairle has a voluntary discretion to take an amendment at the shortest possible notice.

I am afraid that is not the precedent that has been created here, and the Standing Order does not quite say that it is for any particularly urgent matter.

So far as the prima facie case for the circulation of the amendments is concerned, obviously the Ceann Comhairle could take the line, “I will circulate and distribute those amendments and wait until the question of order is raised upon them.” I submit that if there were precedents in this case they were bad, and they were precedents in respect of which a point was not made. I am putting it to you that in this case it is not the case of a special amendment, but of an amendment moved by the Government arising out of one proposed by Deputy Davin. I submit they have considered it, and, in their wisdom, exercised a discretion as to whether they should not themselves submit another amendment. The members of the Dáil ought to have had the amendments in their hands this morning.

I do not know what exactly is the purpose which Deputy Norton and Deputy Davin wish to serve. We have been in their hands in regard to these amendments. We have had to consider them as they have been put down and we have come to certain decisions with regard to them. Our amendments represent the Government's viewpoint in the situation created. I cannot see why there should be an attempt to impute responsibility to the Government for something which we can only bear to the limited extent which is expressed in the amendments of which we have given notice.

I am in a very awkward position in this matter. I feel that the Ceann Comhairle has made a ruling. In the circumstances, I think all we can do is to go on to discuss amendment No. 9 until the Ceann Comhairle, whom I have asked to come here, arrives. I feel, in the circumstances, that I would be bound to abide by the Ceann Comhairle's decision.

Amendment No. 9 is consequential, is it not?

It is lopsided.

It is not half as lopsided as your amendments which were handed in so late.

If the Deputy wanted to achieve what he referred to on the Committee Stage, the right way to do it was to deal with the operative and principle section, and that is Section 23.

Have you made any ruling on the point, Sir?

You can take either amendment No. 9 or amendment No. 12, as the Deputy was informed by the Ceann Comhairle.

Or amendment No. 13, which is the more sensible one.

Or amendment No. 13. The whole principle can be debated on any one.

The parliamentary tactics of the Minister for Finance are not going to upset my calculations in this matter. I daresay the intention aimed at in amendment No. 13 is the same as in the case of amendment No. 9.

It is not.

The Ceann Comhairle resumed the Chair at this stage.

As the mover of the amendments that have been declared by you, Sir, to be in order——

Wait a minute; do not anticipate a judgement.

There is no doubt about the question of the order of my amendments.

Amendments Nos. 1 to 8 inclusive are out of order, as they are obviously amendments that should have been moved on the Committee Stage. Amendments Nos. 9, 12 and 13 arise out of an amendment moved by the Minister in Committee. It might be argued that that ministerial amendment was of an explanatory character. Furthermore, the Deputy challenged a division on the section but, nevertheless, the fact that the amendment was inserted in Committee leaves the House at liberty to attempt to rescind the amendment on the Report Stage. For that reason, I am allowing Deputy Davin's amendments to be moved. I have suggested to the Deputy in a note to him which, perhaps, might possibly be regarded as impinging on the merits of the matter, that amendments Nos. 9 and 12 would abate one pension and amendment No. 13 would abate the other. Presumably the Deputy did not intend to abate both. If so amendments Nos. 9 and 12 might not be moved, and a decision taken on amendment No. 13. That, of course, is a matter for decision by the Deputy.

We are not questioning your ruling on the amendments on the green paper, but I asked the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for a ruling on the question as to whether, having regard to the Standing Orders, and even to the discretion vested in the Ceann Comhairle, it is fair to hand us two ministerial amendments at 3.30 to-day and expect us to discuss them at 5.30. The Minister for Finance has said that these amendments are consequential on seeing the amendments submitted at Labour Deputies. But the Labour Party amendments were submitted at 4 o'clock on Friday last and nothing emerged following their submission until 3.30 to-day, when I discovered this on my desk. I submit the Ministry had adequate time in which to present alternative amendments if they did not like the Labour Party amendments. The House is being asked, on a Bill for which no haste can be pleaded, to discuss two ministerial amendments handed in two hours ago. I suggest these amendments are not in order, having regard to the terms of the Standing Order, and I submit that even the exercise of the Ceann Comhairle's discretion should not bring us down to the point of having to discuss amendments handed to us two hours before we are asked to debate them. That is using the discretion of the Chair to a very wide extent. We do not think there is any need to have these amendments dealt with to-day. There is no urgency about the Bill.

It is within the discretion of the Chair to accept these amendments. The amendments arise definitely out of prolonged discussion on a previous stage. The Deputy will concede that. They do not run counter to the amendments which I have accepted from the Deputy's Party, in fact one of them meets him to an extent. I am further strengthened in my decision to accept the amendment by the fact that this is a Money Bill; it is a matter of finance and the first ministerial amendment proposes a reduction of charge. The second ministerial amendment makes no change in the Bill as it left Committee. The Chair would scarcely be justified in refusing an amendment which is a reduction of charge. As to the point about this Bill not being urgent, that is not a matter for consideration by the Chair.

Can any case be pleaded why an amendment of the kind submitted by the Minister could not have been brought in much earlier?

That is a matter that would arise on the merits during the discussion.

Deputies have rights here as well as Ministers, and we should have got these amendments much earlier than two hours ago.

If they, the amendments, proposed a radical change and did not, as they do, meet points that arise out of prolonged discussion on Committee, the Chair would hesitate to accept them.

We were tied to the condition that the amendments should be submitted last Friday. They were submitted. The Standing Orders surely do not envisage a condition where Deputies' amendments must be in four days before the sitting and where Ministers' amendments can be put in at two hours previous to the sitting.

The notice is rather short. If they contained new matter that did not arise out of previous discussion, the Chair would not accept them at such notice. In the exercise of my discretion I accept them.

That same undesirable procedure was allowed to be adopted by the Minister for Finance on the same question last Wednesday.

With the leave of the House. The Deputy was here and he could have objected.

In face of the fact that one Party in the House is objecting I do not think——

I have decided in favour of accepting the amendments.

If the general feeling of the House is that this Stage of the Bill should be adjourned until after the Recess well and good. I do not want it to be understood, by any manner of means, that we are rushing this Bill. The Report Stage was ordered for this day by the House. I am in the hands of the House, and if there is any disposition on the part of the House not to proceed with the Bill to-day, well and good.

That meets my point of view.

There is more than that.

I am expressing my view. Others can do the same.

There is an order for the Report Stage of the Bill to-day.

The Minister would have to move that the Fifth Stage be taken forthwith.

There has been a lot of talk about the way in which Parliamentary time has been frittered away. The House is adjourning to-day. It has been dealing with a matter which is supposed to be a matter of importance. That matter is being dealt with now on Report. A certain amendment, amending this Bill in a particular way, was brought forward by the Labour Party. The Minister for Finance is clearing up doubts that the Labour Party, in the amendment they have brought forward, suggested did exist. I think it is absurd for the House not to realise that the amendments before it now are amendments arising out of the amendments put forward by the Labour Party and to make that position clear. I think it is absurd to be frittering away Parliamentary time in not dealing with it now.

The Bill is ordered for to-day.

I think we can proceed.

Can we not deal with it to-morrow or Friday? There is no difficulty about postponing the discussion until Friday.

It is a question for the Minister. The Chair carries out the orders of the House. If it is not postponed until another day the House goes ahead with the Report Stage now, as ordered.

Is the Minister proceeding with the Bill?

I am afraid we will have to proceed with it.

The Minister proposed amendments here. Does the Minister say that these amendments imply that he is making changes in the Bill?

I feel that we have, in the circumstances of the case, to accept the principle of the amendments put down in the name of Deputy Davin so far as they relate to military service pensions. That is the position which our amendments are desired to give effect to.

Then it is making Parliament absurd if the Minister does not proceed with them.

Amendments Nos. 9 and 12 are not moved?

I move amendment No. 13:—

In page 13, Section 23 (3), to delete paragraph (e).

I am doing that with the approval of the Chair.

Not with the approval of the Chair nor its disapproval, but with the sanction of the Chair.

It is entirely wrong for Deputy Mulcahy to suggest in his unusually excited state that the Minister's amendment proposed to clear up certain doubts. The only way the Minister takes advantage of this method of handing in amendments is to create doubts.

I should like to remove one doubt. What the Chair did say was that the amendment moved by the Minister on the Committee Stage was ostensibly to clear up doubts. That amendment opened up the way for this amendment of Deputy Davin's.

The amendment moved by the Minister on the Committee Stage was handed in and dealt with in the very same way and the Minister can make lengthy speeches and give lengthy explanations when he wants to. He was not inclined to be very eloquent or make lengthy explanations of the amendment which he handed in at equally short notice as the ones handed in to-day. However, the amendment which I am moving on behalf of the members of this Party is for the purpose of making it impossible for dual pensions to be paid to the same people. The members of this Party, through the leader of the Party, in speeches made in this House on previous occasions intimated their desire and intention to make it possible for compensation or gratuities to be paid to persons who rendered military or ministerial service to this State over a certain troublesome period, but there is a limit, in the opinion of the members of our Party, to the extent of the generosity to which the House should go in matters of this kind. The members of this Party are of the opinion that a pension of £500 a year is, if you like, excessively generous, whereas under the terms of the Bill as it now stands it is possible for an ex-Minister in receipt of a military service pension to draw a sum far in excess of the figure of £500 a year. I do not know whether it would influence the members of this House in matters of this kind if I made a comparison between the pensions which people get as a result of long service in the public service when compared with ministerial or ex-ministerial maximum pensions under this particular Bill. An ex-Minister with seven years' service to this Stage will, under the terms of this Bill as it now stands, receive a pension of £500 a year but a public servant, a civil servant, would require to be an assistant secretary of a Department of State and to have given about 40 years' service before he would receive the same pension. An ex-Minister will receive £500 a year after seven years' service but an assistant secretary of a Department, with a salary of £1,000 a year, will only receive a pension of £500 a year after 40 years' service. I hope that will sink into the minds of the members of the House who may be inclined to vote with enthusiasm for the Bill as it now stands. The intention of this amendment, at any rate, is to make it impossible, if we can do so, for ex-Ministers to receive two pensions from the State—the same employer—at the same time.

I do not propose to accept this amendment but I propose instead to ask the House to accept the amendment of which I have given notice to-day and around which the discussion up to the present has centred. I should like to say that I think that Deputy Davin has not been quite fair to the House when he has tried to equate the position of a Minister to the position of civil servants and to imply that there is nobody except a Minister who could receive such a pension upon such a short term as seven years. The Deputy has been in this House when Bills were passed dealing with the judiciary of this country and under those Bills it would be possible for members of the judiciary to receive such a pension after such a short period of time in certain circumstances. But apart altogether from that, it is almost misleading for the Deputy to say that this can be done, that an ex-Minister can receive a pension of £500 a year after only seven years' service. The Deputy knows that there are many ex-Ministers who have served more than seven years and quite a long time more than seven years, that they will be probably called to the service of their country again in the normal course of political life in this country and that, for every additional year of service that they give over and above this seven years, they do not get any increase in salary but that for every year a civil servant or judge serves they do, up to a maximum of two-thirds of their salary. So that, you already have in this country men who have held high public office but no more responsible office I contend, than a Minister holds, who, having served 15 years, can retire with a pension of £2,000 a year. They are not held up to the same sort of public obloquy as I and my colleagues and those who held ministerial office in this country before and those who will hold ministerial office after us have been held up by Deputy Davin. The main point of the Deputy's amendment is this—to make sure that a person who served his country from 1916 to 1923 and who draws what is known as a military service pension, and who had to justify his title to draw that pension before an impartial tribunal, is now going to be deprived of that pension.

And why? Because in the interim since 1923, in the 15 years that have elapsed since 1923, he has devoted himself to the public service in this House and in the Government of his country. Whatever service he has given since 1923 is either going to be disregarded in so far as he has a pension for military service rendered from 1916 to 1923—that either one or the other of those pensions is to be wiped out. That is what the Deputy is contending.

That is not so.

Well, perhaps that is not in the Deputy's mind now, but I cannot see what else was in his mind. He said it was to prevent one man from having a dual pension. As I pointed out on the Committee Stage of this Bill, while it would be possible for an ex-Minister to draw a military service pension, that could only be in respect of the period from 1916 to 1923. If he afterwards is elected to this Dáil and takes office as a member of the Government of this country, then he creates a new claim to pension, not by virtue of the service he rendered from 1916 to 1923, but by virtue of the service he renders subsequently in his new capacity as a member of the Government of this country. That was the point that was at stake here. The Shanley Committee, quite fairly and properly, I believe, adverted to the fact that these were two absolutely different types of service, that, in so far as the military service pension was of any value whatsoever, it had been rendered for what was notionally a prolonged period of service, and that it must have been rendered over that period in circumstances of great difficulty and danger and, accordingly, the committee said: "It is not right that the pension which has been given in respect of services rendered during that period and under those circumstances should be wiped out, or that the Ministerial pension which arises under quite a different set of circumstances, and quite a different form of service to the country, and in quite a different time, should be abated merely because a person had served his country during the revolutionary period from 1916 to 1923." They took cognisance of that fact and, in my view, rightly took cognisance of it, and that was the principle upon which the Government was proceeding. When the Government got this report, they studied it very carefully. They could not accept the, Shanley Committee's view in regard to Ministerial salaries, having regard to the circumstances of the time, but they did accept the view of the Committee in regard to pensions, and, mind you, when they accepted that view, they were fortified by expressions of opinion from all parts of the House that one of the things that ought to be done in the public interest was to make proper provision for those who had served in the Government of this country.

Now, as I said, the Government examined this matter. They saw that the amount involved was comparatively small, was much less, even in present circumstances, than £500 a year, and was not likely in any circumstances to amount to more than £1,500 a year, and, even to that, for only a comparatively short period of time. In so far as most of the men who enjoy military service pensions are no longer young men—most of them are bordering on 50 or over 50 years of age—therefore, the burden that was going to be imposed was not going to be a substantial burden. With all these facts in mind, and bearing in mind, firstly, what I consider to be the absolute justice of the case, and, secondly, that as the amount was comparatively small at the present time, and would have been comparatively small at any time, we were prepared to give effect to the recommendations of the Shanley Committee in this regard, and to allow a person who had earned his military service pension by military service from 1916 to 1923 to draw that pension and to draw a Ministerial pension as well, if he had qualified for a Ministerial pension in equally difficult circumstances—in equally difficult circumstances, I say, and if anybody wishes to hold that against me, I make him a present of it—which have prevailed up to the present period.

That was the position of the Government, but what did we find? We found this: That the moment we were prepared to give effect to that principle, there was going to be an attempt, on the part of some sections of the House at least, to blackmail Ministers because they might be interested parties, and to blackmail ex-Ministers for the same reason, into accepting financial obligations without due inquiry into them. Because we were prepared to accept the recommendation of the Shanley Committee in regard to Ministerial pensions, then we were going to be asked to open the flood-gate everywhere, and to find the country involved, perhaps, in one instance, it has been estimated, in an expenditure of over £40,000 per annum, simply because, in order to blackmail Ministers, some people were prepared to draw false analogies between these two pensions and in an entirely different set of circumstances. Therefore, because somebody might falsely say that Ministers, when dealing with their own position and their own cases were prepared to do this and that and the other, when they came along to deal with a certain other class of society, even if the cases should be shown to be demonstrably not the same, they would not apply the same set of rules and principles to these other particular cases. Simply because Ministers were not going to put themselves in that position, then the Ministers come here, being charged with responsibility for the public purse, and feeling that they cannot put themselves in a position in which their control over that public purse is going to be weakened by the sort of misrepresentation which is going to be levelled against them—then Ministers are prepared to say that, even though they feel that the recommendation of the Shanley Committee was well founded, and though they and other people like them are going to be the sufferers, they are not prepared in these circumstances, for the sake of what it might mean to them or others, to put themselves in a position in which their control over the public purse would be weakened, and are not going to submit to the blackmail of interested parties.

Accordingly, I am prepared to oppose Deputy Davin's amendment, but to give effect to it, in so far as the military service pensions are concerned, by the amendment I put down, with this saver: that we shall rule out a pension under the Military Service Pensions Acts, 1924 to 1934, in any case in which the pensioner is also entitled to a widow's pension. There is one case of a pension which, I believe, is long overdue. If we went all the way to apply the full rigour of Deputy Davin's idea and exclude completely military service pensions—to compel the military service pensioner's widow's pension to be abated completely by the fact that the person receives a Ministerial pension or a widow's pension or also holds a pension under the Military Service Pensions Act, it would mean, in the case of this particular widow, to whom I have referred, that she would lose £10 and the State would save £10 pen annum. Now, as I have said, this case is long overdue, and I do not think it would be just or that we would be entitled, or would be expected by Deputy Davin or Deputy Norton to mulct her to that extent. As I say, I am prepared to accept the deletion of the words "military service pensions" from the exempted moneys covered by Section 23 of the Bill.

Deputy Norton rose.

The Deputy has not already spoken on this amendment?

No, Sir. We get a rather unusual reasoning as to why this amendment has been submitted by the Government and why it has been submitted late, but anybody who talks on this Bill must be prepared to withstand the foul abuse and gutter variety of oratory in which the Minister for Finance indulges. Phrases like "blackmail" have been used here. On the previous Bill, I was subjected to a characteristically low attack from the Minister for Finance who stated that, while he was before a court martial, I was wearing His Majesty's uniform. I want to take this opportunity, Sir, of saying that, if the Minister refers to His Majesty's uniform as being the uniform of His Majesty's Army, His Majesty's Navy or the uniform of any of His Majesty's armed forces, I never served for one day in them. I did serve in the Post Office as a boy messenger, and I make no apologies to the Minister for Finance or to anybody else for having served in that capacity. That fact, however, was used to-day by the Minister, with that specially tortuous mind of his, to try to misrepresent me before the public. I do not think it is any crime to have served in the Civil Service in the days before 1922 or in the days before 1916. I would have been in good company in that respect, in any case. Many members of this House have served in the Civil Service. I resigned from the Civil Service and might have got a pension. My resignation was due under Article 10 of the Treaty, but I disliked that Article intensely and refused to take a pension in those circumstances. The Minister for Finance chooses to misrepresent me here, but I think my record among those who know me will at least protect me against that kind of muck-and slime-slinging in which the Minister indulges and which is a disgrace to a ministerial office in this country. However, Sir, even at the risk of calling forth that peculiar kind of invective and vituperation in which the Minister for Finance indulges, I want to say something on this amendment and to say something later on the Bill, generally. I heard the Minister talking, in that hysterical way of his, about blackmail. He tells us that the reason the Government has decided to amend the Bill is because there might be blackmail. Well, a Minister for Finance ought to know what is the meaning of blackmail, but apparently this Minister for Finance does not know what the meaning of the word "blackmail" is. I take it that his reference to blackmail refers to a motion which was submitted by the Labour Party and which asked the Dáil to request the Government to introduce proposals for the purpose of amending the Unemployment Assistance Acts so as to provide that military service pensions payable to Old I.R.A. men will not be taken into account when calculating the rate of benefit to which such men are entitled under the Unemployment Assistance Acts. In this Bill as submitted to the Dáil we saw clearly that pensions payable to members of the Ministry who served in the Old I.R.A. were excluded for the purpose of the pension they were to receive as Ministers under this Bill. If that represented a considered declaration of the Government's policy in respect of those pensions, why should not that same arrangement be made applicable to the Old I.R.A. men, the vast majority of whom are getting pensions which according to the answer given by the Minister for Defence to-day amount only to £17 18s. per year? When an Old I.R.A. man has a pension of 7/- per week, or 1/- per day, and he seeks unemployment assistance benefit for himself at the rate of 7/-, the State says to him: "You cannot get unemployment assistance benefit because you already have 1/- per day from the State as an Old I.R.A. pensioner." But under this Bill you can receive an Old I.R.A. pension of £300 or £350 a year——

If you have earned it.

——and still get another State pension of £500 per year. The blackmail to which the Minister referred is an endeavour by the Labour Party to ensure that the Old I.R.A. men will not have their military service pensions of 7/- taken into consideration when seeking unemployment assistance benefit. One would have thought that that was a progressive kind of reform to undertake, but the Minister described it as blackmail, and in order that his political face may be saved from the danger of any smudge getting on it, we are told that this Bill must now be amended, so as to prevent the possibility of the Government having to whistle two tunes at the one time when we come to discuss the other motion. That is the only reason for the Government's proposal to amend the Bill. Our view is that if you are not going to give the Old I.R.A.— people who have small pensions—freedom from calculation of those pensions in assessing their means for the purposes of the Unemployment Assistance Act, the State ought not to exclude substantially higher pensions in the case of Ministers who are likely to be eligible or are eligible for the pensions provided in this Bill. If there is going to be one law on the subject, it ought to be applicable all round. But what we are doing in this Bill, as introduced, and as passed through the Committee Stage, is that we are going to exempt Old I.R.A. pensions for the purpose of entitlement to the Ministerial pensions, but we are going to make a deduction from the unemployment assistance payable to Old I.R.A. men who are in receipt of small pensions. It is for that reason, and to bring this Bill into conformity with that position, that this amendment has been put down. If we are going to have one law it ought to be for everybody.

To save subsequent amendment, I shall put this amendment No. 13, which proposes to delete paragraph (e), Section 23 (3), in the form that these words "a pension or allowance" stand part.

What will be the effect of that?

Those words would stand, if question is affirmed, but the rest would not be thereby affected. Deputy Davin proposes to delete the whole section. If the House decided that the section should stand, difficulties would arise. The Minister proposes to delete certain words, and if the House decided that the whole section would stand, the matter would end there. Hence I am putting the question that four words stand.

What are the words?

The first words —"a pension or allowance".

Then I will be at liberty to move my amendment?

If Deputy Davin's amendment is defeated, if the question as you put it from the Chair is carried?

The Minister may move to delete any subsequent words.

Will the whole section stand if Deputy Davin's amendment is defeated?

Yes. The question might be put the other way, that is, directly.

I think it would be better to put it in the form that it be deleted.

Can others express a desire on the subject?

I suggest that you ought to be guided by your own judgment in the matter.

Question put: "That the words ‘a pension or allowance' in par. (e) stand."
The Dáil divided: Tá, 76; Níl, 9.

  • Aiken, Frank.
  • Bartley, Gerald.
  • Beegan, Patrick.
  • Boland, Gerald.
  • Bourke, Dan.
  • Brady, Brian.
  • Brady, Seán.
  • Brasier, Brooke.
  • Cleary, Mícheál.
  • Cooney, Eamonn.
  • Cosgrave, William T.
  • Costello, John A.
  • Crowley, Tadhg.
  • Derrig, Thomas.
  • De Valera, Eamon.
  • Dillon, James M.
  • Dowdall, Thomas P.
  • Doyle, Peadar S.
  • Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
  • Flynn, John.
  • Flynn, Stephen.
  • Fogarty, Patrick J.
  • Friel, John.
  • Fuller, Stephen.
  • Gorry, Patrick J.
  • Harris, Thomas.
  • Hogan, Daniel.
  • Humphreys, Francis.
  • Kelly, James P.
  • Kennedy, Michael J.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Kissane, Eamon.
  • Lemass, Seán F.
  • Little, Patrick J.
  • Loughman, Francis.
  • Lynch, James B.
  • McEllistrim, Thomas.
  • MacEntee, Seán.
  • Breen, Daniel.
  • Brennan, Martin.
  • Breslin, Cormac.
  • Briscoe, Robert.
  • Brodrick, Seán.
  • Browne, Patrick.
  • Buckley, Seán.
  • Childers, Erskine H.
  • MacEoin, Seán.
  • McFadden, Michael Og.
  • McGilligan, Patrick.
  • Meaney, Cornelius.
  • Moran, Michael.
  • Morrissey, Michael.
  • Mulcahy, Richard.
  • Mullen, Thomas.
  • Munnelly, John.
  • O Briain, Donnchadh.
  • O'Grady, Seán.
  • O'Loghlen, Peter J.
  • O'Reilly, Matthew.
  • O'Rourke, Daniel.
  • O'Sullivan, John M.
  • O'Sullivan, Ted.
  • Reidy, James.
  • Rice, Brigid M.
  • Ruttledge, Patrick J.
  • Ryan, James.
  • Ryan, Jeremiah.
  • Ryan, Martin.
  • Ryan, Robert.
  • Sheridan, Michael.
  • Smith, Patrick.
  • Traynor, Oscar.
  • Tubridy, Seán.
  • Walsh, Laurence J.
  • Walsh, Richard.
  • Ward, Conn.

Níl

  • Corish, Richard.
  • Davin, William.
  • Everett, James.
  • Hickey, James.
  • Hurley, Jeremiah.
  • Keyes, Michael.
  • Murphy, Timothy J.
  • Norton, William.
  • Pattison, James P.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith; Níl: Deputies Corish and Keyes.
Amendment declared lost.

I move amendment No. 14:—

In page 13, Section 23 (3), to delete all words and figures from and including the word "under," line 52 to and including the word "or," line 54.

I have explained the reasons for it, and while I think the recommendation of the Committee was justified, and could be justified if properly argued, I quite despair of either a just or a proper argument of it so long as Deputy Norton remains in Irish public life. Accordingly, I feel that to avoid the misrepresentation—and the false analogies which would be drawn here-after—of Ministers who are themselves in the position of having been awarded a military service pension in respect of services rendered to this country in a military capacity from 1916 to 1923, and who become also entitled to a pension in respect of services rendered as a member of the Government of this country, during the period, mainly, subsequent to 1923, as the amount of misrepresentation which would be indulged in would, I think, publicly embarrass Ministers doing their duty to the people so far as the public understanding is concerned, I, for one, and those associated with me, cannot accept that position. I think that is unfortunate, and that the effect on public life is not going to be good. If we are going to have democracy, and if we are going to expect from Ministers the disinterested service necessary to keep the public life of any country clean, we have to see to it that those who come here to discharge the responsibilities of Ministers should, at any rate, by virtue of the great responsibilities which they do discharge and the wide powers entrusted to them and the trust reposed in them, that they ought to be placed in a position of comparatively easy circumstances after they had served this country during the period that the people called them to do so.

I am perfectly certain that nowhere, in any field of endeavour in this or any other country, could you find individuals carrying greater responsibilities than Ministers of this State do now, and Ministers of this State did before we came into office and, I suppose, Ministers of this State will carry after both our predecessors and ourselves have long passed from the public sphere. But it appears that Ministers must not merely discharge those duties, but they must be held up to public obloquy, to personal misrepresentation, simply in order to serve a little Party spleen, and, in order that the scope for such spleen may be diminished, I am proposing this amendment.

All I want to say with regard to the Minister's statement is that it shows that the Ministry are becoming somewhat sensitive. I wish to Heaven a certain amount of the sensitiveness that they are showing at the present time could have been felt by them for the last six years and then we might have a less miserable picture painted by Deputy Norton and the members of the Labour Party to-night, and by us for the last four or five years. I do not know whether the Labour Party are to be congratulated at the present moment for what they are achieving here. They are, at any rate, achieving something. They are forcing the Ministry to accept an amendment from themselves dealing with a particular point. I do not know whether on this occasion they are to be congratulated.

If this is showing that the Ministers are more sensitive with regard to public matters than they were, that is to be welcomed. If the fact is that the Labour Party are able to impress the Ministers to make up their minds on certain matters by coming out more into the open and attacking them from the outside rather than colloguing with them, then we wish, on more important and bigger matters for the general welfare of the country, the Labour Party greater success than they are achieving at the present time. I consider that the Minister's speech to-night contains an element of cowardice in it that, I hope, will quickly pass from the Ministry and that, now they are apparently making themselves prospectively poorer than they otherwise might have been, that their self-esteem will return to them and they will look on the situation in the country with calmer eyes.

I did not intend to intervene, but if the Labour Party could take any responsibility, and I am sure it could not, for the concluding sentence of the Minister for Finance, it it would be something to be partly proud of to get from the Minister the admission that, from his point of view ex-Ministers had rendered equally good service to this State as himself and his colleagues are now doing. That, I take it, was the impression the Minister intended to convey to the House. It has been suggested to me that in moving this amendment the Labour Party were consciously or unconsciously victimising some of the ex-Ministers. In putting down the amendment the Party had no regard whatsoever to persons. It would be far from the thoughts of any of us who have responsibility for putting up these amendments to the House to do it in a fashion that would inflict punishment on any person whether an existing Minister or an ex-Minister.

Certain reflections properly arise in connection with this amendment. My Party and I supported this Bill, and I would vote for it again to-morrow. I would support it again to-morrow because the principles enshrined in it are sound, and designed for the protection of the people themselves. The Ministers of this State are, in our judgement, entitled to remuneration consistent with their services. It is unnecessary now for us to recapitulate what was said on the Second Stage. This reflection does present itself—the passage of this amendment means that if a Minister of this or the previous Government had served in the British Army and was in the enjoyment of a British Army pension, he could draw his entire pension as Minister of the State of this country. But for the crime that he was in the Irish Army and served his own country he is to be denied. If he served as a mercenary in any army on the Continent, and got a pension for his war services, he would draw his Minister's pension, but because he was guilty of the folly of fighting as a soldier in the Irish Army he is to be penalised. That is a principle that I will not vote for. I have no apology to make, even to the rabble to whom Deputy Norton appeals.

The working classes are a rabble?

No honest voter in this country will be deceived by the attitude taken up by the Labour Party into the belief that this Party, in supporting this Bill, was not acting in the profound conviction that it was doing so in the best interests of the people and of the State.

Probably Deputy Dillon represents more of the rabble than we do.

That is a nice distinction for the Irish people.

No honest voter will be deceived into the belief that in supporting this Bill we are not acting according to our convictions.

Who are the rabble?

No one but the uninformed rabble to whom Deputy Norton looks in adopting this attitude will be deceived or carried away by any misrepresentation as to our attitude. That gives rise to this reflection—time and again the predecessors of the present Government were challenged with a challenge very similar to that made by the Labour Party to the Government of to-day. They were told that what they were doing—as they saw it in the best interests of the country— would be misrepresented up and down the country for the purpose of stirring up uninformed prejudice against them. Knowing as they knew, with all their political experience, that the actions that they felt themselves under an obligation to take in the best interests of this country would be misrepresented to the people and political capital made out of it, they stood their ground and said: "Though we know that this may cause us considerable loss of support in the country, we will face misrepresentation by our opponents, because we know that what we are doing is right." They were misrepresented and they were politically injured in the country. And that kind of misrepresentation eventually drove them out of office.

They did their duty, according to their lights, and there are many Deputies in this House who remember it. They were patriots as well as statesmen. They said to those who misrepresented them to the people: "Do your worst; we see our duty and we are prepared to do it, whatever the political consequences." Can the Minister deny it? Will the Minister compare his conduct and the conduct of his Government with the conduct of the Government that preceded them—with the conduct of their predecessors. The Minister presents to this House an amendment which he himself says should command no support. Does the Minister remember when his Party were putting up amendments of that kind to the Cumann na nGaedheal legislation? Does the Minister remember the Cumann na nGaedheal Government resisting these amendments because they believed they owed a certain duty to the country? Do the members of the Fianna Fáil Party remember the days when they went around the country consciously misrepresenting what the Cumann na nGaedheal Government were doing?

Deputy Dillon did it himself against the Cumann na nGaedheal Government for a long time. What about the £19,000,000 that this country would have to pay as a result of the Cumann na nGaedheal agreement? Deputy Dillon made certain statements of that kind himself.

Is there not a sad comparison between the resolute stand taken by the Minister's predecessors in doing certain things which misrepresentation made unpopular with the people and the position taken up by the Minister, who despairingly says: "My record would not stand criticism of that kind; if I were misrepresented in that way I could not face it; it would get me down"? The Minister has deplored the deterioration in the conduct of politics in this country. Whatever deterioration there is it is trifling compared with the fact that a leading Minister in this House can get up and say that he was forced into doing what was wrong——

I did not say that.

The Minister did not say it in so many words. There has certainly been a terrible falling away. I have never yet, up to this, heard in this State any public man making such an admission. I am very happy to feel that no colleague of mine on these benches has ever or ever will make that kind of statement. Certain of my colleagues lost their precedence in the public life of this State, and even lost their seats in this House, because they scorned the recourse to subterfuge. They have been rejected by the country but they have been rejected in the knowledge that no threat, no misrepresentation ever made them move one-quarter of an inch from what they conceived to be their duty. They faced whatever criticism they got, conscious of the fact that they were doing their duty. For a good deal of that criticism I was myself responsible. They have stood their ground against all the criticism and misrepresentation, and they gave an air of purity to the public life of this country. I am proud to have men like that for my colleagues. I think the Minister would be a great deal more comfortable were he able to say as much for his own actions.

That is a latter day reflection. Some of us remember other days.

I hope that the Minister's action to-day will constitute no precedent and that we will never again have the miserable scene of a Minister getting up in our Parliament and saying that misrepresentation has scared them into doing what he believed to be wrong.

I want to intervene in order to stress a point made by Deputy Dillon. It is an astonishing state of affairs that a civil servant or a British Army officer or an American or Continental Army officer can draw a full pension as ex-Minister of this State but that they are going to be penalised if they fought for this State only and this country only. Deputy Dillon said that this should not refer only to the person who served in the National Army. It actually refers to a person who served from 1916 to 1921 —a person who did not take part on either side in the civil war. I think that is very unfair and very unjust. Furthermore, this amendment affects, I think, only two Ministers.

More than two.

There are two particularly affected. There may be one or two others. But this does not increase the sum to be paid until the Fianna Fáil Government goes out of office. There is only a small number, at any rate. Now it is a pity that the House is establishing such a bad principle. It is only for a very short period of time, anyway, because 20 years from now will shift the whole lot of them. There is no question about that. Twenty years more will finish off every man who fought from 1916 to 1921.

Is it not a fact that some of the ex-Ministers concerned might be Minister again?

I hope and pray that they will, because then we will have a Government that will be fit to govern the country, a Government that will not be intimidated by the Liam Davins and the Bill Nortons, a Government that will stand up to the country and tell them the truth.

That is all boloney.

The Deputy was looking for it. Indeed, I think 20 years is too long an estimate. The strain of these two periods has been very severe and we find that the death roll is increasing daily. Yet because of some snag in the mind of the Labour Party who put up the amendment we have the Government running away from it. The Labour Party in this are going contrary to one of their own principles, because they have been urging that a military service pension should not be taken into account when fixing the dole or the old age pension. What should apply in the one case ought to apply in the other.

We were told this evening that it was blackmail and that that is the reason the Minister is amending this Bill.

I submit that this amendment should not pass this House. I regard it as very narrow-minded on the part of the Labour Party to take the step they are taking. I am going to vote against it and I ask other members of the House to do the same.

Amendment put and declared carried.

I move amendment No. 15:—

In page 13 to add at the end of Section 23 (3) the following paragraph—

(f) a pension under the Military Service Pensions Acts, 1924 to 1934, in any case in which the pensioner is also entitled to a widow's pension."

I explained the purpose of this amendment.

The Minister wrongly represented the Labour Party point of view in his speech on this matter. We would not stoop to the low level indicated by the Minister in his speech on this particular matter.

The Deputy's amendment proposed to do precisely what I am endeavouring to save now.

Amendment agreed to.
Question—"That the Bill as amended be received for final consideration"—put and agreed to.
Question proposed: That the Bill do now pass.

We object to the Fifth Stage being taken to-day.

Can the House decide that?

In what way can the House decide that, Sir?

By way of division.

Are you ruling that?

That the House is competent to decide—undoubtedly.

By suspension of the Standing Orders?

There is no Standing Order to be suspended. There is nothing in the Standing Orders which would prevent the taking of the Fifth Stage now.

There is no reason, Sir, why the Fifth Stage should not be fully debated now if Deputies wish?

None whatever. An objection to take the Fifth Stage can be decided by vote.

The effect of all that will be that the motion will be adjourned, and will be reached about 9.30, and there will be only an hour's time left for discussion of the motion on the Adjournment.

That depends on the Deputy. Are we taking the Fifth Stage now?

It depends on the Minister, and the type of conduct, good or bad, he can generate in the meantime.

I move that the Fifth Stage be taken now.

Question proposed: "That the Fifth Stage of the Ministerial and Parliamentary Offices Bill, 1938, be taken now."
The Dáil divided:—Tá, 80; Níl, 10.

  • Aiken, Frank.
  • Bartley, Gerald.
  • Beegan, Patrick.
  • Boland, Gerald.
  • Bourke, Dan.
  • Brady, Brian.
  • Brady, Seán.
  • Breen, Daniel.
  • Brennan, Martin.
  • Brennan, Michael.
  • Breslin, Cormac.
  • Briscoe, Robert.
  • Brodrick, Seán.
  • Buckley, Seán.
  • Childers, Erskine H.
  • Cleary, Mícheál.
  • Cooney, Eamonn.
  • Corry, Martin J.
  • Cosgrave, William T.
  • Crowley, Tadhg.
  • Derrig, Thomas.
  • De Valera, Eamon.
  • Dillon, James M.
  • Dockrell, Henry M.
  • Dowdall, Thomas P.
  • Doyle, Peadar S.
  • Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
  • Flinn, Hugo V.
  • Flynn, John.
  • Flynn, Stephen.
  • Fogarty, Patrick J.
  • Friel, John.
  • Fuller, Stephen.
  • Giles, Patrick.
  • Gorry, Patrick J.
  • Harris, Thomas.
  • Hogan, Daniel.
  • Hughes, James.
  • Humphreys, Francis.
  • Kelly, James P.
  • Kennedy, Michael J.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Kissane, Eamon.
  • Little, Patrick J.
  • Loughman, Francis.
  • Lynch, Finian.
  • McEllistrim, Thomas.
  • MacEntee, Seán.
  • MacEoin, Seán.
  • McGilligan, Patrick.
  • Maguire, Ben.
  • Meaney, Cornelius.
  • Moran, Michael.
  • Morrissey, Michael.
  • Mulcahy, Richard.
  • Mullen, Thomas.
  • Munnelly, John.
  • O Briain, Donnchadh.
  • O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
  • O'Grady, Seán.
  • O'Higgins, Thomas F.
  • O'Loghlen, Peter J.
  • O'Reilly, Matthew.
  • O'Rourke, Daniel.
  • O'Sullivan, John M.
  • O'Sullivan, Ted.
  • Reidy, James.
  • Rice, Brigid M.
  • Ruttledge, Patrick J.
  • Ryan, James.
  • Ryan, Jeremiah.
  • Ryan, Martin.
  • Ryan, Robert.
  • Sheridan, Michael.
  • Smith, Patrick.
  • Traynor, Oscar.
  • Tubridy, Seán.
  • Walsh, Laurence J.
  • Walsh, Richard.
  • Ward, Conn.

Níl

  • Cogan, Patrick.
  • Corish, Richard.
  • Davin, William.
  • Everett, James.
  • Hickey, James.
  • Hurley, Jeremiah.
  • Keyes, Michael.
  • Murphy, Timothy J.
  • Norton, William.
  • Pattison, James P.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith; Níl: Deputies Keyes and Hickey.
Question declared carried.
Question put: "That the Bill do now pass."
The Dáil divided: Tá, 80; Níl, 10.

  • Aiken, Frank.
  • Bartley, Gerald.
  • Beegan, Patrick.
  • Bennett, George C.
  • Benson, Ernest E.
  • Boland, Gerald.
  • Bourke, Dan.
  • Brady, Brian.
  • Brady, Seán.
  • Brasier, Brooke.
  • Breen, Daniel.
  • Brennan, Martin.
  • Brennan, Michael.
  • Breslin, Cormac.
  • Briscoe, Robert.
  • Brodrick, Seán.
  • Buckley, Seán.
  • Childers, Erskine H.
  • Cleary, Mícheál.
  • Cole, John J.
  • Cooney, Eamonn.
  • Corry, Martin J.
  • Cosgrave, William T.
  • Crowley, Tadhg.
  • Derrig, Thomas.
  • De Valera, Eamon.
  • Dillon, James M.
  • Dockrell, Henry M.
  • Dowdall, Thomas P.
  • Doyle, Peadar S.
  • Esmonde, John L.
  • Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
  • Flinn, Hugo V.
  • Flynn, John.
  • Flynn, Stephen.
  • Fogarty, Patrick J.
  • Friel, John.
  • Fuller, Stephen.
  • Gorry, Patrick J.
  • Harris, Thomas.
  • Hogan, Daniel.
  • Hughes, James.
  • Humphreys, Francis.
  • Kelly, James P.
  • Kennedy, Michael J.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Kissane, Eamon.
  • Little, Patrick J.
  • Loughman, Francis.
  • McEllistrim, Thomas.
  • MacEntee, Seán.
  • MacEoin, Seán.
  • McGilligan, Patrick.
  • Maguire, Ben.
  • Meaney, Cornelius.
  • Mongan, Joseph W.
  • Moran, Michael.
  • Morrissey, Michael.
  • Mulcahy, Richard.
  • Munnelly, John.
  • O Briain, Donnchadh.
  • O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
  • O'Grady, Seán.
  • O'Higgins, Thomas F.
  • O'Loghlen, Peter J.
  • O'Reilly, Matthew.
  • O'Rourke, Daniel.
  • O'Sullivan, John M.
  • Reidy, James.
  • Rice, Brigid M.
  • Ruttledge, Patrick J.
  • Ryan, James.
  • Ryan, Martin.
  • Sheridan, Michael.
  • Smith, Patrick.
  • Traynor, Oscar.
  • Tubridy, Seán.
  • Walsh, Laurence J.
  • Walsh, Richard.
  • Ward, Conn.

Níl

  • Cogan, Patrick.
  • Corish, Richard.
  • Davin, William.
  • Everett, James.
  • Hickey, James.
  • Hurley, Jeremiah.
  • Keyes, Michael.
  • Murphy, Timothy J.
  • Norton, William.
  • Pattison, James P.
Tellers:— Tá, Deputies Little and Smith; Níl:—Deputies Hickey and Hurley.
Question declared carried.
Bill certified as a Money Bill.
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