Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 10 May 1939

Vol. 75 No. 16

Financial Resolutions. - Vote 70—Export Subsidies.

Minister for Agriculture (Dr. Ryan)

I move:—

Go ndeontar suim ná raghaidh thar £404,000 chun slánuithe na suime is gá chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá de Mhráta, 1940, chun Conganta Airgid um Easportáil.

That a sum not exceeding £404,000 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1940, for Export Subsidies.

There are three items in this Estimate. The first is £434,000 for subsidies on exports of dairy produce, which provides for the assistance of the dairying industry by means of subsidies on exports of dairy produce. The provision has been fixed to provide for an average value of 134/- per cwt., f.o.r. on creamery butter production during the main season, and 145/- per cwt. during the winter months, based on the following figures:—Estimated production in 1939-40, 800,000 cwts.; estimated home sales, 410,000 cwts.; and estimated exports, 390,000 cwts. I would like to say that last year we budgeted for a price of 130/-, but we actually achieved 135/-, because prices on the foreign market turned out somewhat better than we anticipated. This year we anticipate 135/-, and that is on the basis of a net price for our butter on the foreign market of 108/-, that would be a gross price of 112/-.

Mr. Dillon

Is there to be a levy this year?

Dr. Ryan

There will be a levy for some time, but by every shilling that the export price improves on that figure, 112/-, the levy will go down by 1/-, and it is quite possible that the levy will be very small. I think the subsidy on creamery butter will cost £370,000, and the subsidy on other items of dairy produce will cost £64,000; that is a total of £434,000.

The second item provides for subsidies on exports of eggs of £160,000. This provides for the payment of 1/- a great hundred on 3,000,000 great hundreds and 9d. per great hundred on pullets' eggs. The number of pullets' eggs will be, of course, very small.

The third item is a subsidy on exports of potatoes—£12,000, that is for the export of seed potatoes to markets other than the British market. The British market has been more or less closed to seed potatoes and that has had the effect of diverting a certain amount of seed potatoes from that market to others where we are getting a foothold, and it is in order to enable our exporters of seed potatoes to hold what they have and, possibly, to increas what they have in those other markets that we are providing the export bounty. It does not apply to seed potatoes exported to the British market but only to markets outside the British market.

Mr. O'Neill

Why is the British market closed?

Mr. Dillon

There are three matters to which the Minister has referred. The subsidies on the export of dairy produce will amount in this year to £434,000, and the Minister forecast that, if there is any levy, it will be a very small one. He also thinks his price for butter more than sufficient to produce 5d. a gallon for milk. I think I am correct in that.

Dr. Ryan

It should be about 5.7d.

Mr. Dillon

More than sufficient to produce 5d. a gallon for milk. I ask the House to remember that on a previous occasion we went deliberately to the country and said that we foresaw a trend in the butter market which would enable us to save the people of this country, and that with a modest contribution from the Exchequer we would be in a position to guarantee the farmers of this country. 5d. a gallon for their milk, without imposing any burden on the consumers of butter in this country. The Minister for Agriculture went down to Wexford and produced what purported to be a calculation made out by the experts of the Department of Agriculture, to prove that what we had undertaken to do would cost the Exchequer £2,000,000, I think.

The forecast we made has now come to pass, and, in fact, we are in a position to give the farmers of this country 5d. a gallon this year without any contribution from the Exchequer or any levy on butter, and with the contribution here envisaged, about £400,000 from the Exchequer, we are in a position to give them 5½d., or rather over it. I mention that fact in order to remind Deputies of the reckless and unscrupulous kind of fraud that is practised on the people of this country. If a responsible Minister goes down and, speaking as a Minister, with the expert knowledge which he alleges is available to him from the experts of our public Departments, and deliberately misleads the people, and misleads them on the authority of what he says is official information, the people of this country are going to come to the conclusion that no public man in Ireland can be believed upon his oath. And if that conviction spreads—and, God knows, there are certain gentlemen sitting in front of me at the present time who give ample grounds for that belief—it is going to react upon us all because it is going to give force and substance to the contention that democratic politicians are frauds, self-seekers and chancers whose stock-in-trade is misleading the voters of this country.

Mr. Smith

God help the Deputy if the people ever get critical of his statements.

Mr. Dillon

I venture to say that no statement I ever made can be contradicted and proved to be false out of my own mouth.

Mr. Brady

Were you not once challenged?

Mr. Dillon

I have been challenged a thousand times, and flattened the man that challenged me every time. If the Deputy wants to issue any challenges let him go and tie a wet towel around his head and make out the challenges, and then we will deal with them. In the meantime, the Minister for Agriculture here to-day tells us that not only is 5d. available, but 5.7d. is available, on the assumption that there is a bounty of £400,000 given to dairy products.

It is well that the House should bear that in mind and evaluate accordingly the solemn pronouncements of the Minister for Agriculture on future occasions, and realise that, although we are afficted by a Minister for Agriculture capable of making a statement of that character in public, there are also, happily, men in the public life of this country who see a little further than the end of their noses and who can give the people a reasonable, intelligent forecast of what the future holds and, being able to do that have the capacity intelligently to plan for the contingencies that the future may bring upon us. It is the folly of Fianna Fáil, who have staggered along from day to day, from one disaster into another, that has brought us to where we are. They have never tried to look ahead or anticipate events. They have never tried to make provision against the things that were about to come. If they will only learn from this deplorable revelation this evening of the Minister's conduct, some useful purpose will be served.

Mr. Allen

What about the rest of the £19,000,000 you promised?

Mr. Dillon

I do not want to give Deputy Allen a short answer, but he is a man whose very appearance invites the offensive remark and I implore of him not to draw it from me.

Sub-head B of the Estimate deals with the bounties and subsidies on exports of eggs. To-day we had presented to us by the Minister for Finance a statement in which credit was taken for the bounty contained in the Minister for Agriculture's Estimate. We were told that it formed part of a sum of £10,250,000 that it was proposed to provide for the agricultural community of this country. Under the heading of "eggs" in the tables in connection with the Financial Statement for 1939—Table 8—there appears the statement: "Eggs—Increase in the value of egg production as a result of State intervention, £290,000". Now, the fact is that prior to the blight of Fianna Fáil descending on this country we were exporting to Great Britain eggs to the value of £2,300,000 per annum.

Donnchadha O Briain

How many were we importing?

Mr. Dillon

This intelligent member of the Fianna Fáil Party wants to know how many eggs we were importing into this country. As I have said, we were in a position to export eggs to the value of £2,300,000 per annum, but after six years of Fianna Fáil administration our exports are valued at £800,000. Therefore, we have reduced the value of our export of eggs during the last six years by nearly 60 per cent.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I would remind the Deputy that all that was gone into on the Estimate for the Department of Agriculture. It may be relevant to sub-head B of this Vote, but I do not think Deputies ought to repeat speeches made on the ordinary Agricultural Estimate.

Mr. Dillon

I have no doubt that, so long as I remain relevant, I may be assured of the protection of the Chair.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Yes, but the Deputy is certainly departing from the precedent of the House in raising matters already discussed on the Agricultural Estimate.

Mr. T. Kelly

The Deputy is looking for fight.

Mr. Dillon

So long as I remain relevant I have no doubt that I can be assured of the protection of the Chair. The bounty here suggested is £160,000. It is designed to retain the remnant of our export of eggs to the British market, a remnant which has been created by the wicked folly of the Minister who is responsible for this Vote. That wicked folly has been represented by his colleague, the Minister for Finance, here to-day as being a benefit conferred by him on the egg business of this country. Is it not hard for any rational man to keep patient while fraud of that kind is employed in this House to justify the unspeakable record of the Government that at present afflicts this country?

In regard to sub-head C, incongruously enough, it has something to recommend it. There is no doubt whatever that the seed potato industry which has grown up in this country, notably in the neighbourhood of Athlone, is a valuable industry. It is one that we ought to develop, and if there are transient difficulties, I think the Minister is amply justified in any attempt he makes to overcome them until they are dissipated by the course of events. I understood the Minister to say that while our markets in countries other than Great Britain had been damaged by supplies that were diverted from the British market into those other countries, we still retain the market in Great Britain.

These bounties are designed not to help our exports to England but to the other foreign countries where we have got markets recently. I think that is amply justified. I hope that in a short time these export bounties will no longer be necessary. I have no hesitation in concurring with the Minister, so long as they are necessary in order to retain the position we have won for these seed potatoes, that it is wise to ask the House for such a sum as will enable the producers of potatoes to retain those markets.

Mr. Corry

I do not think that the statement made by Deputy Dillon tonight should be allowed to go unanswered. When speaking about butter he raised the question of the price of milk to the creameries. Deputy Dillon and his Party did go down the country, and they gave that guarantee, but the farmers were too well aware that two years previously the Party with which the Deputy is now associated marched into the Lobby here and by their votes declared that in their opinion three-halfpence per gallon was sufficient for milk. That is why the people did not believe Deputy Dillon or his Party when they went down the country. Deputy Dillon has made this an excuse for saying that it was due to wild and untrue statements by the Minister. Deputy Dillon forgets that the Butter (Prices Stabilisation) Bill cost the country close on £800,000, and that in the following year we were able to give the farmers 3¾d. for their butter because the price of butter in the English market at that time, after we had paid the tariff on the butter going over, was 70/- per cwt. We may thank the war mongers that the price of butter is what it is to-day. We are able, without any subsidy, to pay 5d. per gallon for milk to-day, and if we are the only people we have to thank for it are the war mongers. Deputy Dillon tried to get away with something else.

Mr. Coburn

What about the British market that you used to despise?

Mr. Corry

He poses here as the one honest man whose statements cannot be contradicted. The Minister for Agriculture, when winding up the debate on the last vote, read out a statement which had been made by Deputy Dillon some days ago. The statement was to the effect that the 10/- per ton of a bounty or subsidy on superphosphates, voted by this House, was not going to the farmers at all but to Messrs. Goulding.

Mr. Dillon

Which is strictly true.

Mr. Corry

It is absolutely untrue.

An Ceann Comhairle

The debate on the Agricultural Estimate was concluded by the Minister. The matter that is before the House is the export subsidies on dairy produce, eggs and poultry and potatoes.

Mr. Corry

Unfortunately for the House, Deputy Dillon rambled back into a discussion on the Agricultural Estimate when dealing with the bounty on eggs and poultry. I am answering some of the statements he made. I do not wish to enlarge on it, but the farmers who are members of this House—they sit on all sides—and the farmers through the country know very well that the moment the 10/- per ton was passed by the Dáil the farmers got the benefit of it.

An Ceann Comhairle

Was that matter raised on this Estimate?

Mr. Dillon

No.

Mr. Corry

Other things were raised.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Estimate before the House is very definite.

Mr. Corry

I do not wish to delay the House further, after having called attention to these facts, and to the wild and untrustworthy statements—I cannot call them by their proper name, unfortunately, as we are in the precincts of the House—made by Deputy Dillon at various times on subjects which he knows nothing whatever about, namely, agriculture. He knows no more about it than my old shoe.

Dr. Ryan

Two points were raised by Deputy Dillon. I do not admit at all that the statement I made on one occasion was a reckless statement. As a matter of fact, if the Deputy cares to go back and to look it up he will find that I stated "on the present price of butter." That is how it was calculated. It was the cost, whatever was said. If the Deputy says it was £2,000,000, I accept that "on the present price of butter." It may be that the Deputy had more foresight, and did forsee a rise in butter in the world market. If so, good luck to him. The statement was not a reckless one. I would be very sorry indeed if I should make a reckless statement which would have the effect of lessening the belief of the Irish people in his statements, or which might destroy the ingenuity and intelligence of a public man. That would be a pity, no doubt. I will try not to injure the reputation of the Deputy in any way, either indirectly or directly. With regard to eggs, there is a statement, which was issued by the Minister for Finance, and he talked about State intervention. It mentioned that we were paying so much on the export of eggs. We had the matter up already. It was accepted that the price of our export surplus regulates the price at home. If therefore we raised the price of eggs exported by one shilling a dozen, naturally we raised the price of eggs at home by one shilling a dozen. That is what the Minister for Finance stated, and it is a safe way of getting the figure.

Mr. Dillon

Of getting the figure. That is true.

Dr. Ryan

I think that particular matter might be discussed further tomorrow, and I suggest leaving further discussion until then.

Question put and agreed to.

The Dáil adjourned at 9.15 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, May 11, 1939.