Committee on Finance. - Resolution No. 10—General (Resumed). – Dáil Éireann (10th Dáil) – Tuesday, 16 May 1939

Committee on Finance. - Resolution No. 10—General (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That it is expendient to amend the law relating to customs and inland revenue (including excise) and to make further provision in connection with finance—(Minister for Finance).

Minister for Industry and Commerce (Mr. Lemass)

In the course of the debate upon the Budget, I said on Friday last that the Budget was framed and I urged that the discussion on the Budget should proceed, in the light of certain accepted ideas, firstly, that the State should pay its way, that is to say, that normal expenditure arising in any year should be defrayed from revenue raised within that year; secondly, that, in the main, there is no source of revenue other than taxation; and, thirdly, that the amount required to be raised by taxation cannot be reduced unless expenditure is reduced and that there can be no substantial reduction in expenditure except on the social services. These ideas are easy to express and, I think, easy to understand, but if Deputies opposite had kept them in mind when speaking on the Budget the debate might have proved of much greater value. Deputies at least would have avoided the futility of fulminating against increased taxation without suggesting directions in which a reduction of expenditure might be sought and they would have avoided the futility of demanding less taxation and more expenditure at the same time.

Since Friday, I have had an opportunity of reading in the Official Debates the reports of the speeches made by the principal members of the Opposition who have already participated in the debate, and I feel that I should urge these Deputies, and, in fact, all members of the Opposition Party, to read these speeches for themselves. I think it will do them good. They will note, as I noted, a complete absence of serious thought, an absence of useful proposals, an absence of any relationship with the facts and, particularly, an absence of any vestige of a constructive policy. I know the difficulty the Opposition Deputies are in. They want to be able to get whatever political advantage is to be secured by opposing increased taxation and, at the same time, they want to keep themselves free to urge new expenditure which they think might be popular—the derating of agricultural land, or some such scheme to which they are committed. Speaking from a fairly long experience of Irish politics, I advise them that they cannot have it both ways. They cannot move in two directions at the same time, and it is useless for them to attempt to do so. If they do attempt it, as Shakespeare would have said, the voyage of their lives will be bound in shallows and in miseries.

Mr. Dillon

One man clapped the Budget. Let another clap that quotation.

Mr. Lemass

Thank you.

General Mulcahy

On a point of order, I think we have on many an occasion asked that Shakespeare should not be quoted in this House.

Mr. Lemass

I intend to quote Shakespeare as often as it suits me.

General Mulcahy

Our experience here is that Shakespeare has always been quoted in serious situations, in an effort to hide the levity of the people who quote Shakespeare. The Minister is dealing with a serious situation now.

Mr. Lemass

Nothing has arisen in this debate so far that would give rise to anything but levity. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the speeches which were reported in the Official Debates as having been made by members of the Opposition, and I realise that so long as those speeches represent the mentality, the thought and the policy of that Party, this Government is in no danger from it. Deputies will not realise that here they have to deal with facts. When Deputy Cosgrave goes to Thurles, or to some other part of the country, he can talk in the knowledge that very few of his audience will be fully informed as to the facts and will be able to contradict him, but here he has to deal with facts, and, although I must admit that humbug will occasionally pass as wisdom when dressed in the eloquence of Deputy Dillon, nevertheless, in the long run, it is facts that matter. This Budget is a fact.

The Budget this year was a difficult Budget. It was difficult because, when we came to frame it, we found that the revenue from existing taxes did not balance the anticipated expenditure. That deficiency was due to two causes, firstly, an anticipated decline in the yield from certain taxes, and, secondly, an expected increase in expenditure, almost entirely for defence purposes. The Government had to decide whether that gap between anticipated revenue and anticipated expenditure should be bridged by reducing expenditure or imposing new taxes. As I have said, we had to bear in mind that the only practicable method of reducing expenditure so as to effect a substantial saving was by cutting the social services. It decided against a reduction in the provision for social services; it decided against making that reduction for reasons which have already been stated in the House, and which I state again to day. As new taxation was unavoidable, it decided—as it was its duty to decide—to impose that new taxation in the form which would cause the least hardship and produce the least onerous effects on our economic and social conditions.

If the Budget requires defence, it requires it on two main grounds; firstly, we must show why expenditure at the present scale upon social services should be maintained, and, secondly, we must show that the new taxes upon which we decided were preferable to other taxes that might have been adopted. I do not think that that second point is seriously challenged— certainly, no member of the Opposition Party has done so yet—and I think we can take it as more or less agreed that, if new taxation is unavoidable, the particular taxes selected were probably the best, even though we recognise that any new tax was bound to have adverse consequences of one kind or another.

Take this matter of the social services. It is the common tactic among Deputies opposite to compare the tax revenue of the State—the total expenditure of the State in the current year—with the year immediately prior to that in which the present Government came into office, and to emphasise the increase that has taken place in order to accuse the Government of extravagance. "Squandermania" was the word that Deputy Cosgrave used. I want Deputies opposite and particularly those Deputies who have frequently spoken here about the inadequacy of our social services, who urged occasionally the extension of those services—to note the significance of that word. I am sure that the word was chosen deliberately by Deputy Cosgrave—if he does anything deliberately—for the purpose of conveying a definite idea. He did not seek to convey the idea that economies were possible in administration, that there was—as might possibly be the case—in any large Government Department a certain amount of waste which could be eliminated. He used another word entirely, "squandermania," a very euphonious word which, of course, got a headline in the Irish Independent. I just want Deputies to keep it in mind —not merely to-day but in the future and to urge those outside this House who are beneficiaries of our social services that they should keep it in mind, too.

Last year the total expenditure upon all the supply services exceeded by £6,500,000 the expenditure of 1931/1932 —the year before this Government came into office. That was due to an increase of over £5,000,000 on social services proper, an increase of about £500,000 on other similar services and an increase of something over £1,000,000 on the amount provided for the development of agriculture and forestry. That is what has been called extravagance. I think it is my duty to challenge at once that it is an extravagance for the people of this State to provide the new services upon which that money has been spent— pensions for poor widows, work schemes for the unemployed and houses to replace the slums. Deputies might quite reasonably argue that these schemes, however desirable they may be in themselves, are at present beyond our means. I would contest that argument. However, to describe them as "squandermania" reveals a mentality which I am incapable of understanding. If that word means anything, it means that the provision of moneys for these social services, for these particular purposes, is to squander them, and that it is a form of mania to undertake the making of such provision.

I do not think that the present expenditure of this State on social services is beyond our means. I am prepared to debate that matter here with any Deputy in the House who is prepared to argue the other way, or debate it with the Banking Commission or with any other commission. The taking of money from one section of our people—say, from the income-tax payers—in order to give other sections—the old, or the sick, or the widowed or the unemployed—some means of maintaining themselves does not, in fact, reduce the national income.

That is the question that I am putting to the House.

General Mulcahy

That is the question that we are putting to the Government.

Mr. Lemass

The ability to pay a subsidy to agriculture—and it is agreed that a subsidy of some kind and in some form is necessary to enable it to maintain itself in present circumstances — depends upon the existence of other forms of productive activity within the country.

The fact is, without going into the circumstances which those free trade advocates regard as the ideal, that it is still improbable, to put it at its mildest, that we could get such a substantial increase in agricultural output as to make up the loss of industrial output which would result. The national income in such circumstances would decrease, not increase, and our ability to maintain the expanded social services necessary in such circumstances would be less than it is at the present time. That policy, if seriously put forward as a policy by anybody, must be rejected at once. We must reconcile ourselves to the fact that agriculture needs assistance, and if it is going to get that assistance we must have within this country other forms of productive activity upon which the charge to assist agriculture can be placed.

Mr. Belton

Built up and maintained by taxing agriculture?

An Ceann Comhairle

Order!

Mr. Lemass

It is common ground between us that assistance to agriculture, to be effective, must take the form of a reduction in costs. That statement, however, which is made by Deputies opposite as if it could stand unqualified, must, I think, be subjected to a number of qualifications by those who have given thought to the matter. In the first place, we must, I think, have regard to the use that is made of the land so that those who make the best use of it will get the most help. Secondly, we must seek to encourage forms of production designed to meet our own needs for which the export possibilities are the best. I think these two considerations rule out the hit-and-miss method of agricultural derating of which Deputy Cosgrave has lately become so fond. That form of agricultural assistance, given irrespective of other considerations, would, in my opinion, be a waste of money. Certainly if we could afford to impose new taxes now upon our people, to tax their sugar and tobacco so as to get the amount of money that would be required to carry through that policy, I think there is no Deputy in this House who could not devise a much more useful means of utilising that money for the benefit of agriculture than the particular method that Deputy Cosgrave is advocating. That statement must be subjected to further qualifications: that in order to assist agriculture we must be prepared to pay in this market an economic price for the products of our farmers. The Deputies opposite do not like that. They have frequently used as an argument against the Government the fact that butter is dearer here or that wheat is dearer here or that some other agricultural product is being sold at a higher price in this country than in Great Britain. The price in the world market is for our farmers an uneconomic price at the present time. Therefore, we must be prepared to pay an economic price here.

Mr. Davin

Why do you not do it yourselves?

Mr. Lemass

The Government have legislated to that end and have operated that particular policy since they came into office despite the opposition of Deputy Davin and his Cumann na nGaedheal friends. That particular policy was begun when the Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Act was introduced in 1932, and it is a policy which has been subjected to wholesale misrepresentation at every election since. At every election since Deputy Davin has used that as one of the hooks to get a few votes—the fact that butter was dearer here than in Great Britain, or that the price of some other agricultural product was maintained here by Government action at a minimum level. It is not possible to rehabilitate our Irish farmers and to put agriculture on a paying basis if we are not prepared to do that. We have faced that situation. If the Deputies opposite are prepared to admit that, surely they ought to have the moral courage to come in here and say so. They have not done that. They know that I am speaking the truth, but they will not say it. Instead they will sing dumb. Deputy Cosgrave goes down to Thurles and talks about some scheme for derating agricultural land, in the middle of a speech in which he was talking about Government expenditure. But he did not give the people of Thurles any information as to where he was going to get the £1,000,000 to carry out his scheme.

It is difficult to make a speech here.

General Mulcahy

The Minister is not attempting to do it.

Mr. Lemass

The importance of agricultural production and of assisting farmers to increase production is recognised. We must remember, however, that there are social considerations which may set a very definite limit to the extent we can go in that direction. Possibly by some system of ranching, by reversing the activities of the Land Commission, and by submerging our smaller family farms into larger holdings, we might get lower costs and greater output. Is that our desire? We are not prepared to do that. Our aim is to settle as many families as possible on the land on economic holdings, realising that some loss of output and efficiency must result, but holding that the social advantages gained far outweigh the disadvantages. Do Deputies opposite agree with that policy? When all is said and done about agriculture, the need for greater industrial activity will be more apparent than ever. I do not want in this matter to go over familiar ground again. Year in and year out I have tried to convince Deputies opposite that their attitude in relation to industrial development was nationally bad, that, in any event, it was inconsistent with their stated policy. They have been preaching the need for greater production here, and urging that it is only on the basis of increased production that the range of social services we have built up, and which our needs necessitate, can be maintained. We cannot get that increase of production unless we are prepared to maintain our industrial development policy. Those who speak about the need for increased production, as Deputy Cosgrave does, and who, at the same time, oppose our industrial development programme, are obviously confused in their minds. I refer to this matter now merely to urge the Party opposite to reconsider their attitude, which obviously is illogical and wrong. If they are to place themselves in a position in which they can formulate something which will have the outward appearance of such a policy, they will have to start from that point.

There is, however, a serious question which the Dáil has to consider in relation to the Budget, whether we can succeed in expanding our national income so as to maintain efficient Governmental and social services. We have had many pessimistic speeches, and it is necessary to examine what grounds there are for pessimism. Probably there are some Deputies who may have been moved even to tears at the plight of the country as pictured during the course of the debate on Thursday and Friday last—soul-stirring pictures of appalling horror! Let us hear some of them. I should like to quote from a speech by Deputy Dillon as reported in the Official Debates:—

"A number of industrial concerns which this Government has been responsible for starting are on the verge of economic collapse...

"The earning capacity of a large part of people living on the land have been virtually destroyed...

"Our national income is fast disappearing...

"We are on the road to an economic break-up in this country...

"It will be brought to an end by anarchy, and out of anarchy will come some form of tyranny which will make this country a by-word before the world...."

Other Deputies followed in the same strain. What are the facts which can be adduced to prove that? Deputy Dillon did not produce them. No Deputy produced them. We got references to a decline in the number of pigs and a decline in the number of hens, a 20 per cent. decline in pigs and a 15 per cent. decline in hens. The Deputy told us we "will be brought to an end by anarchy and out of anarchy will come some form of tyranny which will make this country a byword before the world." Why should we only repeat one or two facts which appear unfavourable? Why, when considering the question of agricultural output, and the effects of Government policy upon agricultural output, ignore such obvious matters as an increase of 140,000 acres in the area under tillage, why ignore the increased number of dairy cows, and the fact that the number of cattle has been doubled; why ignore an increase of £30,000,000 in the value of the gross output of our industries, or an increase of 51,000 in the number of people employed in industries? If there are a number of facts in our national position which are undoubtedly unfavourable and cause concern, there are a number of other facts of a different kind, that Deputies opposite ignore, or which they do not take into account when preparing speeches to be delivered here—if they do prepare their speeches—or when attempting to formulate this mysterious policy which has not yet seen the light of day. We will be the first to admit that there was some weakening of our resources during the economic war, but despite the weakening, as a nation we are still financially sound. The fact is that our financial organisations are stronger and more durable than before the economic war.

I read with interest a speech by Deputy O'Higgins on the Budget in which he said if this was the price of victory in the economic war, God deliver us from another such victory. That was amazing. It is possible that Deputies opposite have forgotten the part they played during the economic war. While it was in progress Deputies opposite went round the country telling the farmers that, if it could only be brought to an end, everything would be perfect, that the prosperity of the farmers would be restored, and all their difficulties would disappear. Deputy Keating and others made such speeches. It was those Deputies in their attempt to break the national will played the English game during that struggle. We told the farmers that the ending of the economic war would make little change in the position, and that the campaign Deputies opposite were engaged in, to get the people to throw out the Government to bring the situation to an end was false; that the charge that all our troubles arose from that had no foundation, as the ending of the economic war would make no difference. We were proved to be right and they were proved to be wrong all the time.

Mr. Cosgrave

You made sure of that.

Of course it did.

Since Deputy Keating persists in interrupting, I am constrained to ask him to leave the House for the remainder of this day's sitting.

Deputy Keating withdrew from the House.

Mr. Lemass

We increased the tax on petrol and the British increased the horse-power tax. The British have a tax on tea and we have no tax on tea. There is nothing in our circumstances to justify all the pessimism of the Party opposite and the purpose of my speech here to-day is to try to show that there is no justification for gloom and to dispel the atmosphere of despair which Deputies opposite have been trying to create. We on the Government Benches, make no claim to infallibility. We do not say that our policy is perfect in every detail and that we are incapable of making mistakes. But if there is an alternative policy to ours, let it be produced. Where is it? The Leader of the Opposition Party should have taken advantage of this debate—the most important debate of the year—to state precisely where his Party stood on matters of major public policy. Read his speech and see if you will find any trace of a policy in it. When he came up against the direct question put by a member of the Labour Party as to what he proposed to do in the circumstances described in terms so despairing as those used by Deputy Dillon, to which I have referred, his answer was "My policy is to throw out the Government." Did the presumed leader of a presumed Party ever insult the intelligence of his supporters more than the Deputy did by that statement? Is that the best the Deputy can produce in the way of a policy?

Mr. Cosgrave

The very best.

Mr. Lemass

I thought so and I am glad to have his confession. As one who knows the Irish people, I tell the Deputy that he will not get a blank cheque from them in that way. If he is going to throw out the Government and replace them, he will have to put forward a clearly-stated policy, a policy which he stands over and is not ashamed of. There are many alternative policies, but Deputy Cosgrave has not come down in favour of any one of them. He is trying to hop from one to another, as circumstances necessitate. He will have to be specific and state for what he stands. He will have to say what he proposes to do for the agricultural industry, for social services, in respect of housing, the relief of unemployment and all the other problems so constantly mentioned but in relation to which not a single constructive proposal has come from the Deputies opposite in the last seven years. The policy of the Opposition Party is merely negative. Let them come out now. They have an opportunity to-day to tell us what they stand for and not what they are against. Leaders of the Opposition Party will stand up to address this House when I shall have sat down. I invite them to tell us for what they stand. They cannot ignore that invitation. They must, at least, stand up and say they are not going to do it and they must tell us why. But if they take themselves seriously as a Party, and if they ever hope to realise Deputy Cosgrave's ambition of throwing out the Government, they will have to answer my questions. What do they stand for? What will they do if, by any mischance, they ever become the Government? Along what lines would they proceed to deal with these social problems which undoubtedly exist, which the Government are dealing with and with which they would have to deal? Our policy is a sound policy. We believe in it, and we stand for it. We hope through that policy to leave this country at the end of our term of office much better than it was when we found it.

General Mulcahy

The Minister is to be congratulated on the fact that he has started to read some of the Opposition speeches, and probably Deputy Cosgrave is to be congratulated that some of his week-end examinations of the situation have made the Minister change his tune very substantially since he appeared before the House on the 12th May, when he began the speech that he has just finished. Apparently the idea of the Minister for Industry and Commerce when he started to address the House on the 12th May was that members of the House had no business to discuss the Budget except to deal with the ways and means by which the amount of money that it was estimated would be spent in the country next year, and that the Government, by their Parliamentary majority, had forced this House to agree would be spent this year, would be raised. He suggested, more or less, that our mouths were to be shut on every other aspect of the situation.

The Minister has definitely changed. I think he has definitely changed in another respect also. He began by telling the House that it was essential to preserve the credit of the State. Surely nothing could be more disastrous to the credit of the State and to the well-being of our people—their ability to be allowed to develop their own resources, to do their work, to earn their own livings and to rear their families—than the policy of the Minister and his Government since they took up office? What has been the effect of the policy of the Minister on the well-being and the economic future of our people? When he was speaking here on the 12th May the Minister said:—

"A great part of our future development depends on the willingness of the people in this country to entrust to the State their savings or their capital for expenditure upon capital undertakings." (Parliamentary Debates, volume 75, column 2366.)

The position is that the country is being presented with financial legislation which will oblige the people to disgorge, through the extraction machinery of the Government, a substantial sum of money. We consider that the people are not able to pay, and I believe the Minister will not be able to extract all that money. In the light of existing conditions, he indicates that the policy of the Government is to extract money from the people in order that the capital undertakings of this country may be developed. Having regard to the history of the Government during the last seven years, and having regard to the industrial position that prevails, the fact that these words were spoken by the Minister for Industry and Commerce threatens more the existence of our industrial position than anything else could have done.

The Minister points out this evening that the well-being of our industries is the only thing that will tend to keep the fundamental basis of our country's wealth—that is, our agriculture—in any kind of flourishing condition. The Minister asks to be put up against facts. He tells us not to talk about hens or pigs. Let us take some facts in the present situation. I will go back on the last three years, 1936, 1937 and 1938. The average number of persons registered as unemployed, or employed on relief schemes, in each month of 1936 was 108,672. During that year 23,711 persons emigrated and the fall in population was 4,000. In 1937 the average number of persons registered monthly as unemployed or working on relief schemes was 105,394. The emigration that year was 30,630 and the fall in population was 19,000. Last year the average number of persons registered monthly as unemployed or employed on relief schemes was 107,903. The emigration was 27,231 and the fall in population was 11,000. In the three years gone past you had an average of 107,000 persons registered each month as unemployed, or employed on relief schemes. These were persons for whom the Government could not provide work, nor could anybody else. Some were employed on relief schemes, which the Minister euphemistically calls social services. There was an average of 107,000 or 108,000 and the emigration totalled 81,572, while the fall in population was 34,000.

These are statistics other than hens and pigs that the Minister can take as expressing certain aspects of the social and national, the industrial and the agricultural, position during the last three years. Down on top of that come the Government with an enormous increase in taxation to be added to the already abnormal burden of taxation under which the people have been suffering for the last three years. This taxation is imposed in conditions of which these figures are symptomatic. This Government, when they came into office, promised us that they were going to alter conditions so as to enable everyone to use his hands and his brains, and whatever capital he might have, to good advantage in the country. That statement was made seven years ago in Navan, the Minister for Defence speaking. Everybody was going to have an opportunity of using his hands and brains and capital.

There was more than that. The Lord, when he was making Ireland, endowed it with sufficient riches and natural wealth to keep a population of 20,000,000 in comfort—that was said seven years ago, the Minister for Defence speaking again, after he had a certain experience of what it meant to be a Minister. Fianna Fáil was then taking over a country that they persuaded the people could maintain 20,000,000 and they declared that everybody would have an opportunity, when Fianna Fáil got into power, of using his hands, his brains and his capital. The people were told there would be wealth and plenty for everybody.

The first move they made was to increase the amount of taxation. The Minister for Defence, speaking in September, 1932, said that every action of the Government since they took office showed that they were alive to the low standard of living forced on the farmers and workers, and when they had to raise taxes they imposed them on people who were better able to pay, the people with large incomes, the people paying super-tax. There was at that particular time only £4,000,000 additional taxation put on the people, who were induced to believe that the Government taking the money and the Government spending the money could use hands, brains and capital in building up this country. What has been the result? The Minister knows that, in spite of all the energy and in spite of all the efforts that have been applied, his social services to-day—the expenditure on which he boasts and the reduction in which he challenges and dares anyone to reduce—include £1,037,000 for unemployment assistance, payment to people who cannot get work, and £1,500,000 for relief schemes and employment schemes for work provided by the Government in whatever kind of way, and all ways were unsatisfactory. This work was provided by the Government for persons who cannot get employment in any other way. There was an increase of over £1,000,000 in the Land Commission in a country where in the last four years the number of men working on Irish land has fallen by 43,000. These, we are told, are the social services.

We are challenged to say that we would reduce the expenditure on these. If this country continues to have to spend £1,037,000 on unemployment assistance and £1,500,000 on relief schemes throughout the country, if it has to continue to bolster up the well-being of agriculture by an expenditure of £1,800,000 on the Land Commission, then, it simply is asking us to write a certificate in big broad figures of the utter bankruptcy of this country. We are not prepared to write that certificate or to subscribe to it. What we do point out and what we do think it our duty to point out is that by interference with the people who own and run the land, by interference with people engaged in commercial occupations and even interference with the people engaged in industrial occupations in this country, the Minister and the Government are preventing the ordinary people of this country—who are the only people who by their hands, brains and capital can build up the country—from getting on with the job that is theirs to do, the job that cannot be done without them.

What on earth does the Minister mean when he says:

Is it because he appreciates the tendency in this direction that the Minister for Industry and Commerce tells us that "a great part of our future development depends on the willingness of the people to entrust to the State their savings or their capital for expenditure upon capital undertakings"? The Minister has already heard complaints of the difficulty that industrial undertakings suffered in 1938 as a result of uncertainty, the bad harvest and other matters of that kind. The Minister is aware that never before was there in the City of Dublin such a continuous tendency to an increase in the number of persons registered as unemployed in this city. The Minister is fully aware of the difficulty, increasing every day, of getting employment for young fellows leaving school in the City and County of Dublin. He must realise what that means to industrial and commercial life, a condition of which we have some kind of reflex in the census figures of 1937. It is upon a situation like that he imposes this additional 1/- income-tax.

The Minister for Defence in September, 1932, in Navan is reported as having said:—

Let them do their work and organise their business in their own way. The end of the present 12 months will tell the Minister for Finance and his colleagues something more about the possibility of continuing to tax the people of the country in the way in which they have been taxed in the past.

The Minister asks us how we are going to reduce. Why is it that we have increased expenditure on education when there are less children in the schools now by about 7 per cent., or why is it that there is increased expenditure in connection with the Department of Agriculture when, within the last four or five years, 43,000 men have lost their employment on the land?

Mr. Lemass

That is not true.

General Mulcahy

The Minister's own figures show that it is true.

Mr. Lemass

They do not.

General Mulcahy

Mr. Davin

Does the Minister deny that he and his colleagues repeatedly made these promises to the people? I mention this because the Minister for Industry and Commerce has endeavoured, deliberately, I assume, to mislead the House when he said that all the increased taxation brought about since Fianna Fáil came into office, the present Budget included, is due solely to increased social services. The Army Estimate for 1932-33 was £1,318,458; the Army Estimate for this year is £3,252,199, an increase of 146 per cent. in an Estimate which they said, in effect, they were prepared to wipe out when they came into office. Does anybody but the Minister for Industry and Commerce and those who will not say anything for or against this Budget deny that that is trying to cod the people? The people are, in my opinion, much more intelligent to-day regarding the activities of the Fianna Fáil Government than they were apparently when these promises were made, or when they were misled by these promises.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce has made many interesting statements and admissions. He said that this State is a business concern and must be run as such and he proceeded to elaborate that—and I agree with him—by saying:

We are here as the representatives of the shareholders of that concern, dealing with the annual balance sheet, the annual profit and loss account.

What is the attitude of the Minister who is a director in this business concern called the State? The Ministers, I presume, are the directors of this concern. He admits that Deputies are the shareholders, and the taxpayers, I suppose, are the people who have to pay up whenever they are called upon to do so. Acting on behalf of the shareholders here—and, like other Deputies during the past few years—I raised proper Parliamentary Questions regarding the activities of State concerns in which the taxpayers' money had been invested. I asked for certain information in connection with the administration of the Industrial Alcohol Company. That company is controlled by seven serving civil servants whose salaries are included in the Estimate which we have to pass. I was refused the information which I was entitled to receive as a shareholder; the Minister, who stated that this was a business concern, saying that it would not be in the public interest to give me information.

I asked for similar information on 9th March this year concerning the administration of the Sugar Manufacturing Company, and although information of the same kind was given to Deputy Dillon on 30th April, 1936, regarding the position at that time, I was refused the information which any representative of the shareholders is entitled to get at the meeting of a business body. Mark you, the information was given to Deputy Dillon on 30th April, 1936, when the Government had not got a clear majority, but when they got their clear majority, they were prepared to play any way they liked with the people. I was refused information on 9th March concerning that company in which a very large amount of money is invested by the taxpayers. Some time ago, I also asked for certain information concerning the administration of the Turf Development Board, another body which was set up with the assistance of the taxpayers' money and the board of which is largely controlled by serving civil servants.

Acting Chairman (Mr. Brennan)

I am afraid the Deputy is not entitled to discuss the administration of these boards. Anything which is outside the responsibility of the Minister for Finance cannot be discussed on the Budget.

Mr. Davin

I am not discussing the administration of any of the bodies I have mentioned. I have merely taken the Minister for Industry and Commerce at his word, that the State is a business concern and that we represent the shareholders. If that is so, I am entitled to say that it is wrong for the Minister for Industry and Commerce to refuse certain information regarding the profit and loss account, or, if you like, the mismanagement, of bodies in which the taxpayers' money is invested. I do not propose to go into detailed questions of administration because if we are going to be ignored to the extent that we will not be given answers to ordinary business questions by the director of a big business concern like the State, there is no use in attempting to discuss the administration of these concerns.

I asked for similar information in connection with the Agricultural Credit Corporation and I was given the same kind of reply by the Minister for Finance. I asked for certain information in connection with the investment of the taxpayers' money in the proposed oil refinery. I was again choked off by the Minister for Industry and Commerce, a director of this big business concern called the State. What happened? About three weeks after he had refused to give me the information, the British papers published more information than I had asked for and the Irish papers gave the whole case away to the people here; but, as the representative of the shareholders in a concern in which the Irish taxpayers' money was involved, I was refused that information. The Minister for Industry and Commerce may try to cod the people, although I daresay he will cod fewer in the future than in the past, but he is not going to get away with it by saying that this is a business concern, while, at the same time, he refuses any information in connection with the expenditure of the shareholders' money, as to whether they are losing money or making money, or as to whether the taxpayers' money invested in these State subsidised concerns is creating more wealth for the country as a whole.

The whole policy of this Government, he says, is to stimulate production. I ask the Minister for Finance to give us, when he is replying, some information in the shape of figures as to the extent to which the Government have helped to stimulate production since they came into office. I presume that the Minister for Industry and Commerce, when he spoke of the policy of the Government in regard to that very desirable purpose, was referring to the stimulation of agricultural and industrial production. We know that agricultural production has been stimulated, to some extent, in the past by the activities of the Agricultural Credit Corporation which was established by the previous Government and carried on by the present Government. It gives loans to certain farmers who comply with the certain conditions, and to the extent to which loans have been made available by that body, there is no doubt that the previous Government and the present Government have helped in that respect. As every farmer Deputy and every farmer of this country knows—and particularly farmers who have been getting benefit under these loans or getting benefit from some other source—they have to pay very exorbitant rates of interest for the loans which they secure. However, it is something at any rate in the right direction.

Could the Minister for Finance, who has all the figures at his disposal in connection with the assistance given by way of loans to the agricultural community—furnish us with the total amount advanced, by way of loan, by the Agricultural Credit Corporation since it was established? I ask for that information, because I am convinced—as one who knows a little, at any rate, about the present condition of the farmers—that we require something more than the activities of the Agricultural Credit Corporation to stimulate agricultural production in this country. At any rate, the rate of interest is prohibitive and is an excessive charge as part of the overhead charges on agricultural production to-day.

Mr. Gorey

Who can get loans from the Agricultural Credit Corporation?

Mr. Davin

The only people who can get them are the people who can pledge their farms and pay pretty high legal charges for the land and who can afford to pay a prohibitive rate of interest. I want information, at any rate, and I hope the Minister for Finance will not refuse that information and will give the total amount by way of loan already advanced by that body to the agricultural community. Would he also say—if he would take the risk—whether he is satisfied that the activities of the Agricultural Credit Corporation meet the situation from his and from the Government's point of view to-day?

That is not, I admit, the only way by which agricultural production can be stimulated. A Government can give considerable assistance by way of subsidy to the dairying industry, and undoubtedly this Government in particular are doing better than their predecessors. However, I have stated in this House before and I repeat it again, that if the subsidy can be justified for anything—particularly for agricultural production—it can only be justified on the basis that it provides the people to whom it is given with an economic price for whatever they produce or sell in the home or foreign market.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce — who knows nothing about agriculture, and he exposed that fact in this House—made a statement or allowed it to be inferred from his statement, that the farmers are getting an economic price for whatever agricultural commodities are being subsidised by the State. We have set up an industrial alcohol concern. When that Bill was going through the House I raised a question as to whether the Industrial Alcohol Corporation was prepared to pay an economic price for the raw material. The price was then given as £2 10s. per ton for the beet to be purchased from the farmer. I know that the beet price in the home market was much higher than £2 10s., and I had this feeling—and I hope that Deputies, whether they are producers or not, will agree with me—that, if the Industrial Alcohol Corporation, or concerns of that kind, are going to be allowed to sell their manufactured articles at a competitive price in the home market or in the foreign market, the body that is in charge of the particular concern should buy the raw materials from the producer at an economic price.

Mr. Lemass

Is the Deputy fighting for the farmers or for the oil companies?

Mr. Davin

The Minister is not going to be allowed to make my speech. I hope he thoroughly understands the meaning of the question that I have addressed to him and will not evade answering it when it comes to his turn to reply. I have stated that the present Government have given a considerable amount by way of subsidy to the restoration or the maintenance of the dairying industry, and I assert here to-day, from the information at my disposal, that that subsidy does not enable the farmers to secure an economic price for their milk. There is proof of that in the recent returns issued by this Government. The latest returns issued in connection with the quantities of milk supplied by the dairy farmers of this country to co-operative creameries disclose the very serious fact that the supply has been reduced during the last year for which figures are available by 12 per cent. over the previous period. Surely to goodness the dairy farmers are not going out of dairy farming and refusing to supply milk to the co-operative creameries because they are getting an economic price or a profitable price. I assert that they are getting out of dairy farming with a consequent decline in the supply of milk because dairy farmers are not getting an economic price for their milk.

What is the position with regard to the beet industry? Will the Minister give us, when he is replying, the information which he refused to give me here in this House some time ago as to the extent by which the acreage under beet cultivation has been reduced? He surely will not get up and assert that if the farmers are getting a profitable price they are going out of beet production because they are getting too much out of it.

There is a considerable reduction in the acreage under beet cultivation. I speak from knowledge of the conditions in my own area, and I have the figures for two years ago, but I have not the figures for last year and the Minister has refused to give them. I know that there are farmer Deputies in this House who are engaged in beet production and who may know more than I do, but I assert again that the farmers are not getting out of beet production to the extent they have because they are getting too much out of it, but because they are not getting an economic price. That is my reply to the Minister for Industry and Commerce, but everybody is aware that he knows nothing about agriculture—no matter what he may know about other things. He is undoubtedly the greatest political bluffer that has been put into office since this State was established. His speech on Friday and his concluding speech here to-day are positive proof of that.

Without any political prejudice, and with all the sincerity that I can use in speaking in this House, I say that the position of the agricultural community is much worse to-day than it was when the economic war started. I have that information from reliable servants of local authorities and from some servants of this Government who have some contact with people in the country. I have heard it from people on whom I rely more than I would rely on those who sit on the front benches.

There is only one way in which to stimulate agricultural or industrial production, and that is by making possible the issue of more money, cheap money, or even free money, and placing it at the disposal of the agricultural community to produce more, whether for the home consumption or for export. How can the farmer, without the necessary agricultural machinery, with land only half-stocked, produce more without capital or credit to help him? It is silly to hear the Minister for Agriculture going around the country—and the sooner he stops it the better for himself—telling the farmers to produce more and to work harder. I do not know how they can produce more without capital and without credit. How can industry give increased production, or even remain in existence, or compete in the market with competitors, unless it has the same amount of capital or credit at its disposal to enable it to do so. That is the solution of the problem which the Minister for Industry and Commerce, in conjunction with his colleagues, knows to exist at the present time.

Deputy Cosgrave, speaking from records which are available to the Minister for Finance and which have been furnished by the Banking Commission, has indicated that there are 125,000 farmers in this State in bankruptcy or in a semi-bankrupt condition. When is the Agricultural Credit Corporation or some other corporation going to enable those farmers to come into production and produce the more which I want to see produced and provide food for our own people who are not getting enough and for the purposes that the Minister for Industry and Commerce indicated here to-day, namely, increased production for export?

The Minister for Industry and Commerce—again speaking without knowledge of that matter—talking of egg production, was apparently ignoring the fact that since the economic war started the export of eggs has declined. The latest figures show that in 1938 the export had fallen by £500,000, compared with 1932.

That is the value of the egg exports, as indicated in the returns furnished to Deputies of the House by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. I ask the Minister for Industry and Commerce could he indicate, or could the Minister for Finance, or anybody else, indicate how we are going to recover the value even of the market we have lost in that direction? As far as I can see, the only way of recovering the market we have lost is to provide— as I believe the Minister for Agriculture intends to provide—credit facilities of a certain kind for those who will go into egg production. But, having done that, I warn the Minister for Agriculture and those who are going to provide the money that, if they do not organise distribution and sales on a proper basis to compete with our competitors in the only market we have, we are not going to get the increased sales on that market which the Minister for Industry and Commerce appears to anticipate. We are up against new conditions of competition in the only market to which we are exporting our agricultural products. Twenty years ago there were not the big catering concerns in the big cities of England, Scotland and Wales that are there to-day. There was no great Lyons and Company, catering for moving populations of many millions a day. Does the Minister suggest that the organisation of the agricultural produce available for export to-day meets the needs of the catering concerns in England or elsewhere, that are prepared to buy our eggs, our bacon or our butter? No such thing. Lyons and Company cannot send travellers over here to visit every tuppence-halfpenny co-operative creamery in the country to try and get the butter they require per day, per week, or per month. Lyons and Company and firms of that kind will only buy from the people who can supply goods in large quantities, of the quality and at the price they want. They cannot take any risks. A firm that feeds a moving population of 2,000,000 a day in the City of London alone cannot be relying on individual creameries in this country to supply them with Irish creamery butter. We must have, in the long run, a central selling organisation for butter, bacon and eggs before we are going to increase our sales in the British market. The sooner the Minister makes up his mind to do that the better. He is only wasting money if he does not do so.

The Minister for Agriculture told this House that he was in favour of setting up a central selling organisation for the sale of butter in the English market, but somebody has held his hand. I suggest that the people who have been holding the Minister's hand in this matter are not the farmers who supply milk to the co-operative creameries, but the individual creamery managers who, if the central selling organisation is established, will lose the privilege of a few visits per year to different parts of England to sell Irish creamery butter. I suggest that the only way of increasing production for export to our principal British market is to set up a central selling organisation. That must be set up if we are going to produce and export the goods that the big catering concerns are prepared to take from us if we supply them in sufficiently large quantities of the quality and at the price that they can be purchased on some other market. That is why Denmark has beaten us out of the British market, and the Minister for Agriculture knows it perfectly well. The sooner he faces up to it the better. Otherwise he is wasting money in trying to increase production for export, because the market will not be secured for either eggs, butter or bacon, even the market we lost.

I do not know whether Deputy Allen agrees with me or not, but if he does —I say so sincerely—I hope he will use the influence which I know he has in Ministerial circles to press home his point of view.

Mr. Allen

What about the central selling organisation that was set up by the creameries?

Mr. Davin

The organisation to which the Deputy refers was never under the direct control of the Government. The Government is supplying large sums of money per year in subsidising the dairying industry, and because the Government is doing that I think they should see that the money set aside for that object is used for the purpose of getting an economic price for the dairy farmer for his milk and also to provide a market for increased butter sales in Great Britain through a central selling organisation. I suggest you cannot get an increased market through any other channel.

I have made inquiries about the question of egg production and the possibility of recovering even what we lost in the British market in that connection. I am assured by people whose business it is to meet and deal with egg producers in the West of Ireland, where egg production was well organised, that they cannot get their old customers back again. They have gone over to England and have failed because their old customers of seven or eight years ago are much bigger customers to-day. Their demands are greater and the individual egg producer or seller of eggs, if you like, from the West of Ireland or anywhere else, cannot give those people the quantity and, perhaps, the quality they are looking for. Therefore, even the latest return which has been furnished to Members of this House shows that, even compared with April of last year, there has been a further reduction in our egg exports. There is something radically wrong there. If we are going to continue to subsidise—as I am in favour of subsidising under certain conditions—the dairying industry and other agricultural industries, I say that they should be subsidised upon certain definite conditions, namely, that the money we are setting aside on behalf of the taxpayers will be used for the purpose of getting the maximum return for the people to whom it is given.

There seems to be a funny idea in the minds of the present Ministry at the present time—an idea which they never disclosed to the electors, less than 12 months ago, when they were seeking their votes. Twelve months ago the Minister for Finance, who is the most eloquent member of the Ministry, told the electors to clear this Labour Party and every other Party out of the way; to give Fianna Fáil a clear majority so that they could put their own policy into operation without being held up, as they were in the past, by small Parties like the Labour Party and members of the Independent Party. They got their clear majority and nobody came into this House on the date of the first meeting of this Dáil with greater delight than I did, for this reason: I saw that they would not be going down the country during the life-time of this Dáil whispering to the members at meetings of the local Cumainn that they would have done so-and-so were it not for the fact that they were held up by the Labour Party. They cannot trot out that excuse any longer. They got their clear majority, but where is the policy? They said they had an agricultural policy, an industrial policy and a transport policy. They said they had a drainage policy, and a policy for dealing with profiteering. What have they done since they came back with their clear majority? Nobody on this side of the House has any power to prevent them putting their policy into operation. Shortly after they came back they indicated to the country that they had no agricultural policy. They set up a commission consisting of 24 persons, to sit for two, three, four or five years, or as long as they like, to talk until they are shut up by the order of the Minister for Finance, which will probably be given on the eve of the next general election. That is the agricultural policy. They have no policy.

Arising out of that, may I ask the Minister for Finance, if the Government are anxious to assist the agricultural community, or rather, if they were in any way anxious to assist them before this Budget was introduced, whether he made any representations through his colleague, the Minister for Agriculture, to the Agricultural Commission to consider the advisability of submitting an interim report? Were the members of the Agricultural Commission asked to submit an interim report and, whether they were or not, has any interim report been submitted to the Government by the Agricultural Commission? I hope the Minister for Finance will not evade answering that question when replying.

The land is the source from which we get food for consumption and also for export. It is the raw material from which our new industries spring. If land, which is the source of all our wealth, is to-day, in this Christian country, worthless as security for those who are producing, there is something radically wrong. That is an urgent reason why the position should be revised by those in power. Any farmer who wants an advance from a bank on the security of land, upon which there is no mortgage, will not get one penny, as Deputy Gorey and other farmers know, without the signature of a farmer friend with money on deposit, but if he takes a piece of paper, representing shares in some concern in Timbuctoo, he will get an advance from the same bank on some unstaple security. When the Minister for Finance sat over on this side of the House he held views somewhat similar to mine. I wonder has he forgotten the speeches he made on those occasions when he was in the Front Opposition Bench.

I am trying to remind Deputies that until serious financial matters of this kind are thoroughly probed into, and until the Cabinet has investigated the recommendations of the Banking Commission, and produced a report for the information of their supporters and for this House, this country will not make any greater progress, and will not be capable of responding to the appeal of the Minister for Agriculture, to work harder and produce more. Agricultural and industrial production are governed by the policy of our existing banking institutions. If I ever understood the personal views of the Taoiseach, I understood him to hold views that were in conflict with those of the banking institutions. If that is so, his first responsibility is to set up a cabinet or a Party committee to go into the report of the Banking Commission and, through this House, to tell the country what their views are, and what their financial policy in future will be.

I have good reason to know that a loan proposed to be floated recently by a big public body was held up for a considerable time by the activities of our existing banks. I know a big institution which drew a certain amount of money out of its funds so that it might invest it on a certain date in corporation loan but it had to leave it on deposit without interest for a considerable period because there was some row going on between the Minister for Finance and the banks. Eventually, I suppose, the banks' point of view prevailed, with the result that the institution lost a considerable amount of money in the way of interest while the fight was going on. These financial institutions are deciding the financial policy of this country. That policy should be decided by the Minister for Finance on behalf of the people of this State. The sooner those members of the Government Party who have not read the Report of the Banking Commission take it home and study it carefully and then bring it up for consideration at the next Fianna Fáil meeting, the sooner they will be doing their bit to respond to the demand made by the Minister for Agriculture on the farmers to work harder and produce more. The farmers cannot do that under present circumstances. I ask Deputy Meaney, a hard-working farmer from County Cork, if he will say, in all sincerity and seriousness, that the Agricultural Credit Corporation, as at present constituted, meets the reasonable needs of the farmers as regards credit.

Mr. Meaney

It is as reasonable as the Deputy's speech.

Mr. Davin

I challenge him to say "yes." Deputies on those benches ought to press the Minister to do something to meet the reasonable needs of the agricultural community. I had intended to say something more in regard to other matters which I thought were pertinent to a Budget discussion of this kind, but I bow to your ruling, A Chinn Comhairle, and await the earliest available opportunity to bring up other matters which I thought I had the right to raise on this Budget.

‘I duly received your letter of the 4th instant (last October). I have since discussed confidentially with two or three big banking houses in London the possibility of issuing a loan on behalf of the Dublin Corporation on the terms you suggest. I regret, however, that at the present moment none of them is prepared to join in under-writing such an issue, largely, I think, for sentimental reasons

Sentimental reasons!

and due to the fear that the Treasury would not authorise such a loan being issued in London as the proceeds are to be spent entirely in Dublin. You may be aware several issues of a similar nature have recently been contemplated, but as portion of the funds to be raised were spent abroad the Treasury has definitely refused to sanction these loans.' "

An Ceann Comhairle

All that appears irrelevant to the remarks made by the Leader of the Opposition, and to which Deputy Kelly purports to reply.

Mr. Kelly

I will come down to that in a couple of minutes. I am not five minutes speaking yet.

"I am very sorry I have not been successful in my efforts but, possibly, if sentiment changes during the next six months or so it may be then possible to make an issue as the terms you suggest are quite attractive for a Corporation loan.

‘P.S.—The enclosed speech does not help to confidence in Irish credit.'

Professor O'Brien: What speech was it?

Councillor Kelly: Do not tell him."

That is the only reference in the whole thing out of which arose this paragraph in the Independent and also in the Irish Times. I simply told Mr. Sherlock not to tell him who made the speech. It was supposed to be so sentimental that it prevented them giving the money. That is what I got. That is not the way it extends in the paper. The question was asked, “what speech was it,” and because I said: “Do not tell him,” therefore, I prevented them getting the money. That is the implication. When it came to pass that there was no chance of me giving evidence in a proper way, I set out, standing on my feet, not sitting in the chair, protesting all the time, and I gave them an account of the position of Dublin. its housing conditions and the awful conditions the people were in. I let them know something about it and, in response to this, I asked them this question: “Who is going to stand in the way of housing these people?”

Many references have been made to this Banking Commission since its report was issued. I am not going to go into it or make any further reference to it. I only want to make the case clear. The reason I applauded the Minister the other day was because it was said or implied to me in many ways and on many occasions that his Budget was going to interfere with the social work in this country and city, and he was a man struggling in a sea of financial adversity, overwhelmed with many things in connection with his Budget. No happier man went out of this Chamber the other day than I when I found there was going to be no interference whatever with the social work of this Government. What about the money! What do we care about the money when the health and wellbeing and comfort of the people are concerned? We are doing the job now. The Minister is helping us to do the job and the Government are helping us to do the job and I do not care about the Banking Commission Report or about this statement. I was always the same. I would not allow it to remain in the mouth of any man to imply that I say one thing here and another thing outside in the streets.

Mr. Belton

Look at the returns.

Mr. Belton

An extraordinary thing about the fortune of the Minister for Finance, as disclosed in his Budget speech, is this fact: That only for the failure, or partial failure, of the beet crop last year—its failure in coming up to expectations—the Minister would have to meet a very big deficit in his Budget, because the beet factories did not produce as much as was expected, and there were more imports than were anticipated, there was a windfall of about £1,500,000 to the Treasury.

Most of the ground on this Budget statement has been gone over, and there is no use in my repeating what others have stated. The Minister devotes a good portion of his speech to the dead-weight debt. He tries to juggle figures to show that, comparatively, the dead-weight debt was diminished last year. In regard to the dead-weight debt, there are two items which the Minister should have taken into account in framing his balance sheet. In the annual debt charges he took credit for the half pre-1923 annuities which had been remitted—£1,400,000 odd—but he did not take into account the loss sustained by the agricultural community, who had to bear the cost of the economic war which produced whatever advantages the settlement gave; neither did he take into account the loss to the fertility of the land which was caused by the conditions under which agriculture was carried on during the economic war. If he took those into account, he would find they would more than equate the remission of the land annuities. In a statement made by the Minister for Agriculture, if I may be permitted to refer to it shortly, he accused me of a change of policy on wheat growing. I wish to repeat here that I never changed my outlook on wheat growing. I hope to see it not only kept at its present standard but increased. The Minister said that I impressed him with a speech of mine on one occasion about ten years ago. I do not remember the occasion. I am glad that I did impress him, but I want to assure him that my outlook on that particular subject has not changed since. But if wheat is to be grown it must be grown in an ordinary rotation, according to the principles of good husbandry, and not according to the land robbing policy of the last six or seven years. I do not want to refer to it at any greater length.

It is not a fair comment, and it shows the desperate straits to which the Minister for Industry and Commerce was driven to-day; it shows the bad case he has when he defends it by insinuating that the policy of everybody in this House, except the Minister and his Party, is free trade. The Minister knows that the policy of the previous Government was not a freetrade policy. Perhaps he did not consider that the previous Government was moving fast enough in a protectionist policy, and that view I personally share with the Minister. But here is where the Minister made a mistake, although he probably sees the error of his own ways now; the previous Government pursued a protectionist policy which was perhaps conservative, but which kept an eye on the main industry, and put no greater burden on it than the industry could bear. In those days of that conservative policy, no one who promoted it or supported it would get up here in this House and say that agriculture wanted a subsidy to carry on. The Minister for Industry and Commerce admitted to-day that it wants a subsidy to carry on. Why does it want a subsidy? Simply because his industrial policy was mistaken, because it went too fast, and put a greater burden on agriculture than agriculture could bear. As a convinced protectionist, I very much deplore the speed at which the Minister and the Government went in the matter of protection. His admission to-day is an admission that he went too fast; that his policy has failed. He will not put it that way, but it bears no other interpretation. If an industrial policy has failed through being too quick, and the nation turns it down, it is very hard for any succeeding Government to put over a protectionist policy in this country. That is the reason for my regret. The Minister, perhaps in an overflow of enthusiasm, could not see anything wrong; he thought tariffs were the cure for everything. He went too fast, and now agriculture, the very industry the profits out of which were to carry through to success his protectionist policy and his industrial policy, has cracked up under the strain. He said so to-day. He said it must be subsidised. I said, in an interjection, that it could only be subsidised out of itself. From where will it be subsidised? It will have to subsidise industry by a protective tariff. If industry then has a profit, is that going to subsidise agriculture? Surely, with an intervening stage, that is agriculture subsidising itself, which is absurd.

The Minister enumerated—they are enumerated in the White Paper, and there is no need to go over them again —what are social services and partially social services. We were asked if we were opposed to them? He talked about the Government's housing policy. In the Budget speech it is stated by the Minister that 54½ per cent. of the cost of the housing drive has been borne by the Government, and that in Dublin 43½ per cent. has been borne by the Government. Will the Minister contradict this—that the housing drive has dried up in the City of Dublin for want of finance? Who is responsible for that? A question was flung across to us here as to whether we are opposed to those social services. We are not. Are we stopping the building of houses? In Crumlin there are 100 or more acres, in Cabra a couple of hundred acres, in Drumcondra 50 or 60 acres, and in Donnycarney about 100 acres of developed land ready for the putting up of houses, but there is no money to put them up. Why? Deputy Davin explained how pleased he was that, when there was a Fianna Fáil victory at the last general election, it was sufficiently big to give Fianna Fáil no excuses—a clear majority over the whole House. For the last 12 months you have run this country with that majority, and you did not care about any of the Opposition Parties. All we can do is to bark; we cannot bite. You are the Government. We cannot deny you any of the things you propose to do. Credit, or want of credit, for the country rests on your shoulders. Why is it we have to stop building houses in the City of Dublin? I hope that will be answered.

Mr. Davin

Because we are buying guns with the money with which we should build houses.

Mr. Belton

We are buying guns to defend this country that will be defended whether we like it or not, not for love of us, but because it is absolutely essential in the British system of Imperial defence to defend this country against foreign invasion. We are going to spend millions on defence which we could spend in employing thousands, who are idle to-day, in clearing the slums of Dublin and the slums throughout the country. We have not the money to do that. We went to the public recently. I will not say whether we got the money or not, but we asked only what would pay our present commitments, and the Minister for Finance, with full knowledge of the whole situation, agreed with the banks that we should not ask for any more. I challenge contradiction on that.

Now, this is the position. We have £3,000,000 of a scheme ready in Dublin. If we could get £3,000,000, we could enter into contracts. In some cases we have the tenders and we could place the contracts right away. The development work is all done. Drainage, sewerage, roads are all in train for the erection of houses. We have 30,000 people on our books looking for houses. We have the material to build the houses; the materials now are pretty well got in the Dublin mountains. We have the lime. We can burn it in Dublin or we can get it from Laoighis, Meath or Kildare. We can get earth flue-liners, pipes, from Laoighis, Arklow and elsewhere. A considerable number of the industries set up and subsidised by the present Government relate to the building trade—drain water materials, sewer pipes, tiles, grates, surrounds and mantelpieces. There are thousands of people who could be engaged in the manufacture of these materials sitting down at present because of want of employment.

Let us not fool ourselves. People are blaming the banks. Deputy Davin blamed the banks. Is it not known to the Minister and to the Government, that even Government stock is difficult to cash? The banks have trouble in handling large blocks of it because of the difficulty of cashing it, in case there is a draw upon them for money. These are all the fine points of borrowing and financing schemes. I think the system is to blame. I always believed that when we got our freedom here and got control, the first thing we should do, before we bothered about the Dáil at all—for it does not control the credit of the country; it is merely a talking shop—was to re-model the banking system. The real Government of the country is the banking system where the central bank is situated. Our central bank is in Threadneedle Street. That central bank controls all our finances, our currency and our credit. As far as I know the bankers in this country, I believe they run the system efficiently. They get hard-hearted and cold at times but I can vouch for it that the best business advice I ever got from anybody I got from a banker.

Mr. Davin

How much are they giving on land?

Mr. Belton

Nothing. Neither would Deputy Davin nor I give anything on land if we were situated as they are. After the speech of the Minister for Industry and Commerce who would give it? Here is our national industry, upon which 80 per cent. of our people must find a livelihood, and we are told by the spokesmen of the Government to-day that that industry cannot live without a subsidy. Where in the name of Heaven will a subsidy come from? Who will give anything on land? Is that not a complete justification of the bankers' policy?

Mr. McGovern

The Agricultural Credit Corporation will not give it either.

Mr. Belton

Anybody who can get money from the Agricultural Credit Corporation will get it on similar conditions anywhere else.

Mr. Davin

He will get it in Thread-needle Street.

Mr. Belton

He will. I think it was deplorable to have made that case here to-day, with the situation in this country as serious as it is. I know that some people will say that I should not, perhaps, have made the statements I have made here, but I think they are trivial, as regards confidence, compared with the statement made by two Government Ministers in the last week —the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the Minister for Agriculture. The Minister for Agriculture stated within the last week that there is no agricultural product, that we could produce here, which we could not import more cheaply. There is something wrong somewhere. Is our land the worst in the world, or are we operating that land by the worst methods in the world? Or are the overhead charges so great that we cannot sell products at a price equivalent to that at which they can be produced in other countries?

Mr. Aiken

Or are other people subsidising exports?

Mr. Belton

I do not think that would account for it. Exports may be subsidised when they are a terrible glut on a foreign market. To my detriment, I knew years ago, when stuff became a glut on the Covent Garden market, it would be rushed to Dublin and the growers round Dublin had to look out for squalls then. The exporters of that produce to this country got something which was not an economic price. That only happened when there was a glut but, in the case of systematic exports from another country to this country, I cannot see how subsidising these exports is going to affect the position. I should be glad if the Minister would deal with that if he speaks on this Budget and give us a case in point. The statements, made by the two other Ministers, of which I take a serious view, were not qualified by any proviso of that kind. If they can be qualified, and if that view can be sustained, it does not make the situation so bad as if there was no subsidy for foreign produce imported into this country. I do not believe that that is the case.

The Minister for Agriculture also dealt with derating, and said that it was world prices that regulated prices here, and that the interchange of live stock here was governed by foreign prices and not by whether land was derated or not. Does it not occur to Ministers, and should it not have occurred to them before the present terrible situation arose, that the controlling point in connection with the whole policy of protection and the prices that should follow the protection of certain articles was the British market, and that no industrial products should be tariffed, and thereby increased in price, to the agricultural consumers, to an extent that would make it impossible for them to produce economically for the British market? The Government have done so. Apparently the Government are unanimous that the British market price, that is, the world price, for agricultural produce in this country is not an economic price, and that there is an unknown source of wealth in this country—unknown to me anyway—from which agriculture is going to be subsidised so as to make up the difference.

There is another very serious problem about which I am surprised that the Labour Party have been so silent, and that is the position of the agricultural labourer. The position has arisen and the Government have agreed to it, and it is taken pretty well philosophically by everybody, that the agricultural labourer is only to get about half the wages of any other labourer. I do not know if it is in the mind of specialised agriculturists like the Minister for Industry and Commerce that no technique is required from an agricultural labourer.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy is now going into some details that would be more relevant on the Estimate for Agriculture.

Mr. Belton

I will pass it over by saying that the modern system of agriculture requires great technique, and nobody controlling prices, as the Government are, and particularly the Minister for Industry and Commerce, should put such a burden by way of tariffs on manufactured goods that agriculturists require to buy as to increase the overhead charges and render agriculture unable to pay a wage that would attract intelligent workers who could develop that technique and thereby reduce the cost of production. The situation that the Government find themselves in is their own making. Our credit is not high. The last page of the Minister's statement paints a terrible picture if war comes.

According to the Minister, if war comes we will have nothing left but our eyes to weep with. I forget the percentage, but about 30 or 40 per cent. of the entire revenue of this country comes from customs. The Minister says that if we have a war, that source of revenue will dry up and some other source will have to be tapped. What other source will produce about £10,000,000? I think the position is desperately serious, and that there should be no increase in taxation. In fact, there should be a reduction in taxation. Not only could the need for an increase be obviated, but a reduction could be effected if we stopped this "cod" about defence and guns and bombing planes, and all this parade and recruiting speeches over the radio.

Mr. Davin

And motor artillery.

Mr. Belton

Yes. I notice that during the year with which we have been dealing, certain special circumstances aggravated the demands on the Exchequer and helped to bring about a deficit. The first of these was a deficiency of £68,000 in Appropriations-in-Aid under Vote 61 on account of unemployment assistance. I think the biggest sinner from the Minister's standpoint, if not the only sinner, in this regard is the Dublin Corporation. The Dublin Corporation was obliged by law to levy ? in the £ for unemployment assistance. They did so according to their interpretation of the law, because in the City of Dublin there is a good deal of property that is not rated. It has a valuation, but they do not levy rates on it for reasons we need not go into. The corporation took the effective valuation and assessed 1/6 in the £ on that effective valuation; that is, the valuation on which they assess the ordinary rates. Now the Minister comes along and says—I do not blame him personally; I suppose we would all look for the biggest sum of money we could get in similar circumstances— that the intention was that ? in the £ should be levied on the entire valuation. That is the difference between us. I believe that if the Minister carries this through, and we have to revise our rates for the current year, they will go over £1 in the £. A very serious position will be created in the City of Dublin, with all its big and small industries, if the rates are to go up 1/- or 2/- in the £ above the present very high figure, with income-tax in addition up 1/- in the £. I suppose the surtax people, like Deputy Briscoe, will smile at the increase in the surtax.

Mr. MacEntee

I notice that the surtax payer who is talking is not smiling.

Mr. Belton

I wish you were speaking the truth. I would not mind. I put it to the Minister that he should consider the situation very seriously, particularly because of the unemployment we have in the city and in the country. I am sorry I cannot congratulate the Minister. Every year up to this, one of his familiar phrases was that the revenue was buoyant. There was not a Budget statement of his prior to the present one in which he had not used that word several times. On this occasion it does not appear even once in the whole statement of 55 pages. From the Government side of the House, on the occasion of every Budget for the last six or seven years, a series of statements was trotted out, which members of this Party were credited with having used, in which it was foretold that this country was going into bankruptey. All that the Government had done or proposed to do was trotted out to the House and still we were told we were not anywhere near bankruptey. I hope that nobody will cry "wolf" now.

The Budget speech disclosed a very serious state of affairs, economically and financially. Industry is going to be taxed in this country. We have the unemployment figures rising. I see no hope from any quarter. I should like to see on the part of the Government a more intelligent appreciation of the real facts and factors of the present situation rather than the bluffing speeches in defence of the Budget, to some of which we have listened to-day. I do not see much hope. I do not suppose that, even at this eleventh hour, there is any chance of this Government retracing their steps, and saying to the people, who are poor and want bread instead of guns, that bread and such things are here; and that, if money is to be provided, it could be better invested in bricks and mortar, in the building of houses, instead of in guns. I think that would be the proper way to spend that money. It seems to me that, in regard to the increase of income-tax here, the defence has been made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce that that increase of income-tax is only bringing it on to the British level. It must be remembered, however, that, under this present war scare, hundreds and thousands of millions of pounds are being spent in Great Britain, and that high wages and high salaries are being paid, and high profits being made, as a result of the war scare, and that, therefore they can afford to pay in Great Britain for these armaments. To that extent, that is a kind of an employment scheme, but if the war does not come off, of course, they can scrap all these schemes. However, while the scare lasts, they are able to put their unemployed people to work and they are able to circulate both work and money. Of course, it would take an economic investigator to follow out carefully all the ramifications of this matter of taxation; and, even then, I think he would not be any nearer to finding out—even if it were not a question of putting people to work—what it would amount to; and, certainly, with regard to the increase in income-tax, and the circulation of money, we have no compensatory increase of that type of expenditure here in this country.

For instance, let us suppose that in this City of Dublin we had £2,000,000 to be expended on armaments. That would mean that the people who are producing agricultural products for the inhabitants of the City of Dublin would have an enhanced market—apart from the enhanced market outside this country—enhanced prices and, consequently, enhanced profits. In such circumstances, I do not think we would mind the little bit of increased taxation, because we would be making these increased profits and getting these increased prices. Apart from that, many thousands of people would be put to work in the factories that were engaged in making these munitions of war, and they also could afford to pay the increased tax. As things are, however, we have nothing of that kind, and there is no comparison between our country and Great Britain at the moment. In the case of Great Britain, millions of pounds are being poured out for armaments, but that is not happening here. If people are working and making double the money they would otherwise make, their attitude is: "Well, what about an extra 1/- on our income tax?" If we have a few hundreds of pounds or a few thousands of pounds added to our income, would we not all be willing to pay 1/- extra on our income, by way of tax, when we are enabled to double our income? That is what is happening over in Great Britain, but the conditions here are entirely different and it is foolish to try to compare the two cases.

The Minister also stated that he did not hope to get, this coming year, from income-tax, the amount he got last year, and he proposed to remedy that by increasing income-tax, on a diminishing income. I think, however, that the worst of all the taxes has been the petrol tax, because every industry —even including the agricultural industry—is dependent on petrol. The matter of the tilling of the land and the carrying of the produce of live stock and other products of the farm to and from markets is now largely dependent on petrol. I think there was 8d. a gallon on petrol already. I think that that was enough of a tax. Before the advent of the motor, or of steam coal, whoever thought of taxing a draughthorse? I agree that, in the case of the motor-car—let it be either a motor machine or motor power—petrol should be taxed to the extent of the wear and tear on the roads used by these vehicles, for the maintenance of the roads. I think that it is only equitable that there should be a tax on these vehicles in connection with the maintenance of the roads, but I think that such a vehicle should not be asked to bear any more in the way of taxation. That is my conviction. I remember the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance—I am sorry that he is not here at the moment—giving a lecture here on that very matter.

That, of course, was before he and his Government got into office, and I dare say that, if he should leave office, he and others will be lecturing us in a similar way. I may not be taking quite as gloomy a view of the situation as the Minister for Finance is taking, but I will say that I would not buy a gun, nor even a cartridge when the situation is as it is at the moment, and I think I could sleep as comfortably in my bed without the 30,000 men of Commandant-General Aiken's Army who are supposed to be protecting me, along with the Muirchú and the five bombing planes at Killiney, because if anybody wants to attack this country, they would be snapped up inside of half an hour. Nobody will attack us for the sake of Ireland itself, but only for the sake of Britain and the British Empire and her allies, and our geographical position in relation to Great Britain, and I think that Britain and her allies may be depended on to defend this country. In those circumstances, I think we should concentrate on protecting and helping the hungry people in our own country instead of concentrating on the defence of the country itself.

Mr. Gorey

That is not the only instance of activity by the Land Commission recently. I suppose the Minister wants revenue, and considering that the annuities are now revenue, I think the Minister must have put on the whip, judging by what I see down the country. There are other playboys whose letters I could take out of the bag. It has been said here—I think it is true, because the Banking Commission Report's figures prove it—that there are 125,000 farmers who owe money to the banks. I do not know the number who have money on deposit, but outside those two classes, if I can make any reasonable calculation from the position in my own country, there would be more than 100,000 who have never been in the bank, who have never been able to get credit from creameries, shopkeepers or banks, and who are on the verge of starvation or actually starving. This man is not the only man in my territory in this position. I do not know this man at all; and I never met him. He is on the outside of my constituency and is more in Deputy Davin's constituency. He would know him better than I do, if I mentioned his name. Did the Minister want to say something?

Mr. MacEntee

I am sorry; I ought not to interrupt the Deputy.

Mr. Gorey

To be quite frank, there seem to be two reasons for our being in our present position—the fact that the State is carrying more people in a privileged position than ever before, and the economic war. In my opinion, the root cause is inside, and not due to any outside happenings. There never were more people in a privileged position than there are at present, including the people in sheltered trades in this city and all over the country. I suppose the Minister knows now—he ought to know—why he is on those benches at all to-day, and why he is not up with his colleagues for having strangled the country. They were told here that it was the Imperial defence programme in England, involving expenditure of thousands of millions of pounds, and which brought a certain purchasing power into England which saved the situation here in 1936, 1937 and 1938, but if we had gone on as we were in 1933, 1934 and 1935, accepting the prices we had to take, with the loads that we had to carry and the sympathy we got from you and your colleagues——

An Ceann Comhairle

From the Minister.

Mr. Gorey

——from the Minister and his colleagues, where would this country be to-day? The Government was saved by something altogether outside their control—probably by the hand of God. I hope it was. However, the facts are that the Government was saved. This country was being strangled, and the victim was taken out of the Government's hands and saved, as by a miracle. These are the playboys, the playboys that the Minister referred to the other day. If there is one man in this House who has brought back the bitterness which existed, that man is the Minister for Finance.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce asked who was going to pay for what Deputy Cosgrave said was the remedy for the agricultural depression, namely, derating. Who was going to pay? The idea of justice did not cross the mind of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, or even the minds of anybody on those benches. The people in privileged positions here in the city and all over the country—the new aristocracy—have even increased by 300 or 400 per cent., and these are the people who are going to get any consideration from the Executive Council; but the people that really matter, the people who are down and out, are to be left down and out and left hungry, so long as those in privileged positions are having it all their own way, and so long as wealthy displays can be indulged in in the city by those people who are drawing easy money. The Minister said, too, that there was no suggestion of a plan, no suggestion made by anyone that anything could be done. I do not claim to be a genius, but I offered a few little suggestions which I thought would employ nearly all the unemployed at reproductive work. The other day I suggested minor drainage; I suggested dealing with the rabbit pest. I admit that we have to deal with other pests which beset this country—and probably the biggest pest is on the front bench opposite.

The Government is wasting £3,000,000 on the unemployed—at least, it is nearly all being wasted; and, besides, it is, to a large extent, demoralising the young people, who have not enough work to do, who never can be made to work except by force, by legislation, by putting them under officers. After all, when we were boys ourselves we were very much inclined to cut work and have a good time. Human nature is not a perfect machine that you can expect to get definite results from. The unemployed would be better off engaged in exterminating the rabbit pest, which would save the country millions of pounds annually.

Acting Chairman (Mr. M. O'Reilly)

The Deputy should not review the agricultural position.

Mr. Gorey

I am not reviewing it, but I am pointing out the way in which the Minister for Finance could usefully employ the moneys that are going to be spent elsewhere. Surely there is nothing in Ireland which would be more immediately reproductive than minor drainage. He has said that there were no suggestions: there were several suggestions, and these happened to strike me, and I do not think any sensible person will say that they are not reproductive and not worth considering.

One bog drained, one stretch of water-way drained, would give a more reproductive return than the building of the 30,000 houses that were talked about here. I admit that during the time of building the houses give employment, but when they are built the employment ceases.

Going back again to the question of the ports where the money is going to be spent, the only ports worth anything to us are our shipping ports—Waterford, Drogheda, Dublin and Limerick, and perhaps Cork and Rosslare. These would be of infinitely more value to us than Lough Swilly or Cobh; these are the ports to which some attention should be given, the ports that really matter. The other ports which have been talked about are of no use to us and are not worth heavy expenditure in defence.

I think Deputy Childers was very clear about the question of the economic war. I think his whole speech was very fair and disclosed a frame of mind which deserves to be commended; and my only regret is that this speech came from a man who had outside blood in his veins. I think his speech was an example to the native element here, and it is humiliating to me to have to admit that. And yet, the interest which Deputy Childers took in this question of the economic war was merely the interest of a Party man, a public man; whereas our interest in it was that of people whose whole life work—the life work of themselves and their fathers—had been ruined, and who now had no notice taken of the plight in which they were left, but who were supposed to stand here doing nothing, or sit dumb all the time, whilst they were faced with the prospect of being ruined and of their children being ruined, and who were to keep their temper all the time. It is asking really too much. Unfortunately, there is no response from the Executive Council to explain the position that was created during the economic war and which is now being felt very acutely by the farmers.

I referred before to the British boom that saved the situation here. There is scarcely a man or a woman in Ireland to-day, in 1939, who would not be down on their knees cursing the present Executive Council were it not for that boom under miraculous circumstances that saved the people here. The Minister and the Government were miraculously saved by outside influences, by something over which they had no control. The Minister's heart was black at the time of the Marsh's Yard affair, and I think his heart is just as black to-day because he has the farmers where he wants to have them —in a vice—and he wants to keep them there.

Mr. Maguire

The introduction of the Budget is an annual affair, and it brings forth the usual forms of criticism. All the crimes that the imagination of Deputies in this House can conceive Ministers to have been guilty of are trotted out, with a certain amount of exaggeration, I suppose. Deputy Gorey referred to the Minister on the Front Bench this evening as a man with a black heart. I do not know whether that is a result of the Deputy's displeasure regarding the Budget, because he did not refer very much to the Budget, but more to the economic war; but he says that the Minister's heart is still black. The Budget seemingly provides very useful opportunities for disclosures of that kind, when a man can get in at other people's hearts and discover their colours and disclose them to the House.

Otherwise, Deputy Gorey's speech did not contain very much useful criticism, if any at all. It is an easy matter to criticise a Government when they introduce a Budget, because a Budget must always necessarily contain some additional costs. Any cost is going to hurt some person. It may be an increase in income-tax; it may be an increase in the cost of living, or some other matters. All these are going to be hurtful to somebody, and they are, naturally, unpopular.

I suppose it is reasonable in politics that the Opposition members will take advantage of any opportunity that enables them to justify an attack on their opponent, and to win the sympathy of the public to that extent. I think it was Deputy Cosgrave on the opposite side who referred to statistics showing that this country had depleted its resources considerably, that our investments abroad, our reserves of capital, were diminished, and that that was an indication that the management of our affairs was bad, and that some radical change was required. I am not too sure that the best indication of a nation's prosperity would be the growing reserves of liquid assets either at home or in investments abroad.

I am rather inclined to think that a much better indication of national prosperity would be gauged by the standard of living of our people, the attention to child welfare, and the care of the health of our people by better housing and sanitary conditions, and by generally establishing a national asset in a stronger and more virile people. It is only after these essentials are provided for that any indication of national prosperity is shown by the safeguarding of national wealth in the form of growing finances. In view of the Government's attempts to create these national assets of sound healthy manhood and womanhood, it is difficult to realise that no recognition whatever is given to them as national assets, but that the opposite view is taken— that our obvious reserves of wealth are dwindling to the extent that they are no longer liquid, but may be engaged in other production. Only that side of the position is seen, and the picture is painted accordingly.

I think, myself, that the Government's duty does not entirely end in merely making those provisions for social well-being. Much more is needed. We require, not merely to attend to child welfare when the circusmstances of the home make that necessary, and not merely to provide for the school attendance of our young people to give them a reasonable elementary knowledge of educational matters. There is the still further need for the Government to press forward the scheme by which these young people will be technically trained to undertake some useful task and perform some useful function in this country. Personally, I believe that the solution of our problems will not be found by acting on the advice of Deputy Gorey to cease building houses and cease contributing to social services. All over the world there is a tendency on the part of the people to greater spending and greater freedom. Means must be found to provide these facilities. There is no use in our thinking that the retrogressive action that Deputy Gorey advocates will solve the problem. The solution may be found in more intensive and more scientific methods of production. That applies with equal force to our farms and to our factories and workshops. Instead of taking advantage of the Budget to attack the Government, I think it would be better if, on such occasions, our general policy was concentrated from every quarter of this House in starting a campaign to lead and educate our people. We should tell our farmers how they can produce more per acre of land and increase productivity of stock, and tillage and in every department. Science has shown that increased production of more high-class commodities is possible. To get our people to undertake that increased production, the Government should ensure that those engaged in that work will have a reasonable reward for their efforts. It is the duty of the Government to ensure that that reward is promised, and that it is secured.

However closely the world may be tied to its financial system, in my opinion, that system is largely responsible for all the ills from which the world suffers. Wars are made as a result of the operations of financial systems. I am not foolish enough to suggest that we can depart from that system. Nor do I suggest any alternative system, because I do not know of any; but I do know that rigid adherence to the financial system is responsible for a lot of misery in the world. I know, too, that without seriously interfering with that system, if at all, we have in existence in this country another system which works hand in hand. That system is the old system known as barter. It was, I suppose, the first form of exchange between neighbours and also between nations. Barter still exists amongst the country people. A man in the country who is short of seed potatoes finds that his neighbour has a surplus of them but that neighbour is short of hay. The man who is short of the seed potatoes has a surplus of hay. An exchange is made, and both men are satisfied. That transaction does not appear in any book-keeping system. It does not mitigate or interfere with the ordinary exchange of commerce. I think that system should be extended, and that the Government should provide a State institution in this country that would provide the necessary loans —not in cash, but in cattle, seeds, manures and other such requirements —and take in exchange the surplus product of each borrower, and perhaps take, too, in part exchange, labour, where labour was available. I believe substantial interest could be given on those lines to the intensive improvement and cultivation that is necessary if this country is to keep apace with the times. Our people must be got more and more into production. Unemployment in the country is definitely unnecessary. There should be no such thing as dole necessary in the country, at least for eight months of the year. Plenty of work is available, but if we are going to wait until there is sufficient money to meet it, the work will be delayed and progress will be slow.

With that system of barter, or swapping, as it is called in the country, many of those schemes could be undertaken, having an exchange of labour instead of money. If you had co-operative working by those interested, an immense amount of useful work could be done at a comparatively small outlay in cash on the part of the Government. The areas would need to be fully organised and a proper system adopted. I believe that if Parties in this House, instead of taking advantage of the opportunity they have here of blackmailing their opponents and of attempting to destroy the Government by holding them up as people with black hearts and evil designs against the community in general, were to concentrate on the real problems that confront us, and were to tell the farmers that the best solution for their difficulties is to take advantage of the most scientific methods of production, they would be doing good service to the country. They could tell the farmers that they would back them in any reasonable effort to get a reasonable reward for their labours. The workers should be approached also and told that their co-operation was necessary. The plain facts of the case should be put before them. Deputies would not be advancing the workers' cause by telling them: "If you vote for us there will be a certain amount of money made easily available for you." It is no solution of the farmers' problem to tell them that you are going to give them complete derating of their land or to say anything that would give them the idea that they would not have to pay their land annuities. Statements of that kind may have a vote-catching effect, but they are dishonest.

The best service that Deputies can render the farmers is to tell them that the surest way to advance their own interests is to adapt themselves to modern methods of farming. That may mean increased work or it may not. It will definitely mean more money for them, and that is the only solution. Deputies on the Labour Benches, instead of telling the workers to watch the clock or the number of hours they work, or to press hard for increased wages, should impress on them that they are entitled to reasonable conditions. That, of course, is admitted. They should do their best to arouse in the workers a sense of duty so that they will carry out their work during the regulated hours with as high a degree of efficiency as possible. In that way they will be helping to increase production. They will enable our goods to be sold at as reasonable a price as similar commodities produced in any other part of the world. These are the sort of things that require to be told to farmers and workers. If Deputies were to do what I suggest, I think it would have far more effect than all the denunciations that we hear from the benches opposite consequent on the incidence of the Budget taxation. I believe that the Budget, in so far as it aims at improving the health of our young people, of giving the people better housing conditions and a little more comfort to the old people at the end of their days, is a sound national Budget. As such I support it and recommend it to the House.

Mr. Brasier

I was present when the Minister for Finance introduced his first Budget in the Dáil. I recall the spirit of exultation with which he introduced it. He probably looked upon it as a constructive effort on his part. We on these benches hoped that there would be a limit to the amount of taxation levied on the people. At that time the country was beginning to feel the depression in the agricultural industry. Things became worse in the years that followed, but consequent on the settlement of the economic war last year we hoped this year for better things. We all look back with horror on what the country went through during the period of the economic war. We hope the country will never experience anything like it again. At any rate, we are glad it is over. We hoped that the settlement would ultimately bring some form of prosperity, and that it would help to maintain and increase happy relations between this country and its principal market. Instead, we find that the Estimates for Public Services are increasing. New taxation is being levied. Hence we must ask ourselves: is there to be any limit to the burden that is being placed on the people, and particularly the agricultural community? If there is to be no limit, then there must be a reduced standard of living and lower production.

Deputies on the Government Benches emphasise the need for increased production. I agree with them that it is a desirable object to encourage the agricultural community to produce more, and also, I should say, the industrial community, but if we are to get that the producers will need some return for their labours. The people of the present day are not going to be satisfied with the standard of living that prevailed in the time of their fathers and their grandfathers. You cannot expect the agricultural community to make the best use of the enormous national asset that we have in the land if you tax them more or less out of existence, or tax their requirements for production. Even the £48,000 subsidy for manures is not at all equal to the amount of assistance that is given to English farmers. One of the best methods to encourage increased production is to enable farmers to purchase manures at a reasonable price. In addition, the farmer must be in a position to have live stock to manure his land. If he is not in that position there is no use telling him to produce more. Neither can he hope to produce more if his rates are so high that, in the end, he is unable to meet them and gets seriously into debt. You have large farmers in the country who owe as much as £700 in rates. What is the use in asking men in that position to produce more?

In the first page of his Budget statement the Minister for Finance said: "If it were not for the fact that an unexpected and unlooked for overplus of £562,000 on the Estimate occurred in the customs duties from imported sugar," and so on. If you analyse that statement, what does it mean: that comparatively few farmers in the country were able to make the beet crop pay last year, owing to an exceptionally poor crop. In fact many of them went out of production because they felt that it would not pay them to grow the crop, due largely to the high cost of manures and of labour. The saving of the crop usually occurs at a very severe period of the year when, as a rule, we have very wet periods and heavy frosts.

I look upon it as a note of warning that the Minister for Finance is overjoyed that he is to get an increase in his Estimate of £562,000, due to the fact that the beet crop was practically a failure last year. But that will not be open to him in future. We must look with a certain amount of trepidation to the fact that the Minister is taking £150,000 from the Road Fund. That will decrease the amount of employment that could be given from that fund, and it is well known that the amount to be given by the local authorities will have to be correspondingly increased or that more road workers may lose their employment. Another £100,000 is being taken from schemes to provide employment. These schemes helped to keep the wolf from the doors of many men who were seeking employment.

I am not one who was against these employment schemes, although some Deputies on the opposite benches were totally opposed to them and would not touch them. The people affected will now have to seek unemployment assistance, and extra money will have to be got for that purpose. Surely to goodness, that cannot be regarded as good finance. The best thing that could have been done was to have left these schemes as they were, even though some Deputies may not have approved of them. At any rate, the work given put bread into the mouths of men who were in the position that they could not provide for themselves unless they received home assistance. As Deputies are aware, home assistance is not available to any man who is able-bodied, so that the only thing for them was to get unemployment assistance. The £100,000 taken off the Estimate for Public Works and Buildings also means a reduction in employment. When we realise the effect of these reductions, we have to ask ourselves if the saving of £562,000 will be available this year, or whether the beet factories will be working to capacity. Farmers who grew beet have received appeals from the factories to embark on a big acreage. When an industry that was looked upon with pride by the Government of the day has to make appeals to the agricultural community to grow more, as the factories cannot get the acreage they require to keep going, it is an indication that that side of the industrial policy was a failure. It is a question if it can be replaced by any other branch.

We had a reference to relief for the agricultural community, but the Minister has not indicated in the Budget any means whereby the present position can be relieved. I do not want to allude to the Estimates for Agriculture, but, inasmuch as the interests of the agricultural community were not attended to then, it is on the Budget debate we must explore means to help an industry that is already over-taxed and certainly over-rated. We find that some of the largest farmers are utterly unable to pay the rates they owe. Cork County Council publishes a list of defaulters amongst the ratepayers, and it includes an overwhelming number of large farmers, aye, and small farmers, who are unable to meet the demand notes. Is there any better way to relieve men whose resources have been depleted by the economic war, except by making these demand notes a charge on the whole country, instead of on an isolated industry that makes very little use of the services for which the rates are needed.

Notice taken that 20 Deputies were not present; House counted, and 20 Deputies being present,

Mr. Brasier

For the benefit of Deputies who were not present to hear my remarks, I was referring to the position of farmers who are overloaded with the burden of local taxation, and I was suggesting that the time has come for the Government to take action. Before it came into office it was not satisfied with the measure of relief given by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government, but went into the Lobby in favour of a motion to provide £1,000,000 extra in order to relieve farmers from the cost of local services. That was surely an indication that the Government was in favour of derating. It should be remembered that when the Derating Commission brought in a report, whether it was favourable or otherwise, the conditions that existed at that time were not such as to prevent farmers from paying their rates. Since then, rates have advanced to an overwhelming extent, and to-day, owing to the trials that farmers have gone through in the last five or six years, so much arrears have accumulated that it is impossible to meet them. Deputies who are members of Cork County Council can bear me out when I say that in many cases ratepayers owe as much as £700. I do not know if lists of defaulters are published by other county councils, but I am sure that Deputies are aware that farmers are finding it increasingly difficult to bear the steady increase in local taxation.

I suggest to the Government that one of the first things it should consider is the derating of agriculture. Where the inequitable method of rating is based on the poor law valuation of agricultural land, I say that it is an unjust means of taxation on people who derive very little benefit from the services provided. The time has come to ask the Government seriously to consider the question of derating. Although the matter will be before the Agricultural Commission that is at present sitting, it is one factor that should come before the Government in the form of an interim report from that body. I am sure the Government could get an interim report if it was asked for as to the best means of relieving agriculture. In my opinion, the only way to relieve agriculture is by relieving it of a system of taxation that has brought many farmers down, and that has reduced their capacity to produce.

Deputies who have referred to the necessity for increased production from agriculture know well that if a farmer is overwhelmed with taxation, if he has not the means of working his farm, then definitely he cannot add to the production of his holding. There was a time when Deputies on the opposite benches were very much in favour of derating. It is an extraordinary thing that, at a time when the agricultural community is hardest hit, they should have gone back on their old principles and refused to give them the measure of relief which farmers with whom they are competing in Northern Ireland and in Great Britain are receiving. These farmers not only enjoy derating of their agricultural land, but they also enjoy derating in respect of their buildings, and they have got various subsidies to enable them to do what you are asking the farmers here to do—that is to increase production. Production cannot be carried on without adequate capital or without those aids which agriculture in other countries enjoys. There is hardly a country in the world which is not giving definite assistance to agriculture, to men who had not to go through the trials and tribulations that the Irish farmer had to go through. The time has come when you must, of necessity, relieve agriculture. During the economic war, young farmers, driven to desperation, had to go through the agony of mind which resulted finally in the tragedy of Marsh's Yard, when young Lynch gave up his life that his brother farmers should be enabled to live. It is not so long ago since that tragedy happened, and I appeal to the Government to come to the relief of the men who shared in such tragic circumstances.

When the Minister alluded to the increase in old age pensions, I began to wonder how it is that, with a depleted population, we should have so many more old people applying for the advantages—if they can be called advantages—of the old age pension. It must be a matter which only the Minister himself can explain, because the old age pensioners who came on the list first must be dying out. They cannot very long enjoy what, to them, means the keeping of body and soul together. There is only one explanation, and that is that, instead of increasing prosperity, this country is going back, so that old people do not possess the statutory means which would disqualify them for the old age pension. The position is getting worse and worse and, therefore, the Minister, like the wise financier he is, sees the necessity for making provision for these people. The indications in his Department or in the Department of Local Government show him, I presume, that there is an increasing number of applicants for the old age pension, and that a better case can be made for them than could be made a few years ago under better conditions or, at all events, under conditions with which we were able to cope.

There has been a tremendous increase in taxation—over ten million pounds from the time the Government came into office. I should like to know what the results of that increased taxation have been. Has the country grown more prosperous or is the agricultural community the only community who have suffered? I do not think that the report of the Banking Commission, on which the heads of some of our Departments sat, would indicate that there is an increase of prosperity. Although there may be a certain amount of money in the banks in the names of farmers, it must be remembered that that is mortgaged in the bone and sinew of the farmer, his sons and daughters, that it is mortgaged on his thrift and on the lowest standard of living under which it is possible for him to exist. It is the result of years of thrift and saving, and it cannot be taken as an indication of prosperity. I do not regard it as such, and I do not think that the life of the farmer compares favourably with those who have a better means of making a livelihood in this country. The farmers are in the unhappy position that they are parting with workers because they are not able to pay them and because, perhaps, the workers may not be giving as good a return for their wages as the necessities of agriculture would demand. I think that that is a tragedy to them. Our agricultural population is slowly but surely going off the land, not because the farmers are unwilling to employ them, but because the means of paying them are not there. There is a serious responsibility on any Government which permits that state of affairs to continue. I urge the Government to see that that side of the question gets its very careful consideration.

There is one point to which I did not intend to allude. Certain members of the Labour Party were exulting in the fact that the poor man was not being taxed. I cannot altogether agree with them in that. The poor man's tobacco is being taxed, so that if you do not tax his tea or sugar you are taxing other things which he uses. His clothing is taxed. The taxi-driver and the man who earns his living from lorry traffic will have to pay an increased tax, and I am afraid that will result in loss of work for the men concerned. An additional shilling is being placed on income-tax. I do not suppose any of us have very much sympathy with the wealthy classes or with those who are making considerable profits in business, but you have to take into consideration that you are taxing the employing classes. You are taxing business, and it is not so many years ago since the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance was very strongly advocating the abolition of income-tax and prophesying the amount of good it would do. It has been emphasised many times that a low income-tax was very desirable and induced wealthy people to come and live here. It must be remembered that there was a threat by the Minister when he said, when introducing this additional tax of a shilling: "If I fail to get, by means of this progressive tax, a fair and ample contribution to our needs, I must get the equivalent, by taxation of a more regressive type, not only from those who now pay income-tax but from those who constitute the mass of the population and whose cash incomes are even lower."

That is a very serious threat from the Minister in regard to people whom the Labour Party congratulated him on not touching. It means that even income-tax is passed on, and I suggest that the 5/6 is passed on to the poor man who is supposed to have escaped it. He is the man who will have to pay when it was passed on throughout the whole country.

That definitely has to be taken into consideration, and I feel that the Minister would be wise in refraining from any further increase on those people who cannot possibly bear it, people with very small incomes. I allude also to a small body of people who, at the last election, threw a good deal of weight into putting Fianna Fáil back into office. Perhaps they considered they were doing a wise thing, and they expected they would get a pat on the back and be protected from an increased income-tax. I do not know if that is exactly the position, but we have to consider that they made a mistake and they do not find the occupants of the front bench the genial patrons they expected.

We have to take into consideration another aspect, and that is housing. A very considerable amount is given for housing, but I venture to say that every penny is swept away by the increased duties on materials required for the housing industry. Therefore, it only means changing the money from one pocket to another by carrying on that system. Deputy Davin referred to the need for loans for the agricultural community, and he also referred to the Agricultural Credit Corporation. Was there ever a period in the history of the Agricultural Credit Corporation when they were more conservative in the amounts they gave to agriculture?

I think there is not a Deputy who is not well aware that it is with the greatest difficulty that a farmer can get a loan. He must be a very creditworthy farmer, and he must have watertight security before he can get any advance. If a farmer asks for a loan, the Agricultural Credit Corporation make sure that he is a man with a due regard to citizenship; he must be a man with a holding where the sheriff can operate, if necessary. If not, they are not prepared to be generous. There is one very definite necessity, and that is for the taxes to be taken off agricultural production. If the dream of Fianna Fáil in regard to agriculture is to be realised, the Government must offer more facilities to the farmers. They must give them the means to carry on economic production, and they must reduce the costs that are at present loading the farmers down.

Mr. Meaney

As regards the Budget, it appears to me that it is a very gloomy one, so far as the Opposition Parties are concerned. Although they speak with divers tongues, an air of gloom seems to hang over every speech from the Opposition Benches. They knew, as well as the people on this side of the House, and as well as everybody who has an interest in the affairs of the country, that the State was faced with a position which meant increased taxation, a position in which the Government were bound to defend the rights and liberties of the people of the country. As usual, Deputies on the Opposition Benches tried to paint a picture of agriculturists being in dire need, and the Government standing idly by and allowing agriculture to decay. What are the facts? At the moment the agricultural community are getting, roughly, five times more assistance from this Government than they got from Fine Gael. The intentions on the opposite side of the House may be good, but the only conclusion I can draw from their speeches, if they are to be taken seriously, is that it means that they are sabotaging the country's credit, the country's safety, and the country's future.

The one item of expenditure to which they take most objection is the amount spent on defence. What is the position? We have but lately attained our freedom, and what was won by the sufferings and the lives of generations of our fellow-countrymen and women will not now be sold for a mess of pottage. Deputies opposite try to ridicule the idea of an Irish army trying to defend this country. Perhaps they would prefer that we should leave the protection of Irish citizens to a foreign Power. What did our people die for down the generations? Is it for a betrayal at this moment? The Government of the day have the destinies of the nation in their hands, and they are going to act up to their responsibilities. The people who saw their relatives sacrificed and suffering, so that we might be free, will not, I am sure, refuse to provide the last halfpenny required for taxation in order to put this country in a proper state of defence.

I think it is well that the people should realise what the Opposition speeches mean. None of us like to be taxed. It is not a pleasurable thing, but there are worse things. I heard a Deputy on the opposite benches saying a lot about the Minister taxing the agricultural community. The Deputy has now left the House, but I may say that he does his part to increase taxation locally, and then he comes here and preaches about the farmers, the rural population, how they are downtrodden, bowing down under a load of local taxation, in the putting on of which he does his part. Why has the Deputy not the courage of his convictions and stand by them? Why leave the local county council office, come up here and condemn the very act he does himself when sitting in the county council chamber down the country?

As regards taxation, I have pleasure in complimenting the Minister for Finance on the way in which he provides this essential taxation. There is a tax on petrol, an increase in income-tax and a tax on tobacco. These are the three headings. The three methods adopted will not at least hit those who are most in need. After all, when it comes to a question of taxation, when it comes to a time of stress, the most helpless people are the poor and the needy, and I am glad to see that the Minister considered the case of these people and did not put any burden on them. In conclusion, as far as the people of the country are concerned, they appreciate the position and they all agree that this at least is an equitable Budget.

Mr. Coburn

Undoubtedly the amount of money asked for by the Minister in this year's Budget is a very huge sum. It is a sum of money which, in the opinion of many people, is rather big for a small nation like this to carry. The Minister's Budget this year is something in the region of £34,000,000 or £35,000,000. When one considers that huge figure and compares it with what it took to govern this country 30 or 35 years ago, the comparison is all against the Minister's Budget in the year 1939. The fact of the matter is that there used to be a little country called Ireland. That country used to be governed and carried on on an annual expenditure of something like £10,000,000 or £11,000,000. At that particular period we were told that Ireland was being overtaxed. The same country to-day is being taxed at the rate of almost £50,000,000 per annum. I am sure Deputies on the Government Benches will open their eyes, prick their ears and say that I am speaking nonsense. I am speaking of Ireland. We in this part of the country are taxed £35,000,000 a year, and the tax in the Six Counties is £15,000,000. That is £50,000,000, not to speak of the secret and indirect taxation. Including indirect taxation, or hidden taxation, we are carrying a burden of almost £60,000,000.

This must be a great little country. This little State must have been well looked after by those in charge of it. It must have been built on very solid foundations when, after 20 years, including a period of civil war and another six or seven years in a useless, senseless economic war, it is still in a position to yield an annual taxation of £35,000,000. The Minister for Finance, in the days when he was Deputy MacEntee, stated on a certain occasion, the occasion of the introduction of a Budget by the late Minister for Finance, his opinion of that Budget. He characterised the burden of that particular year as immense. That burden, incidentally, was between £23,000,000 and £24,000,000. He told the Minister at the time that he was foredoomed to failure. He told him that he could not collect the £1,150,000 extra in that Budget over the previous year, the sum he set out to collect. Deputy MacEntee on that occasion pointed out that the country was already groaning under a load too heavy to bear and that accordingly it was not in the power of the Minister or any other Minister to collect the extra £1,150,000 from our impoverished people. Later he told the then Minister for Finance that "our warnings have been justified; the Minister has failed to collect that £1,150,000. He has not collected half of it; he has only collected a little more than one-third."

Deputy MacEntee wound up with these very remarkable words:—

"The pitcher will go to the well once too often, not because the pitcher in this case is in any danger of being broken, but because the well will run dry."

Deputy MacEntee on that particular occasion said that the then Minister will go to the well once too often with the pitcher and that the well would run dry. That was the time when the Minister for Finance was budgeting for £23,000,000, or £1,150,000 over the previous year. I wonder how the well stands to-day, when the Minister has run to the same well, if it exists to-day, not for £23,000,000 or £1,150,000 extra, but for £35,000,000, a difference of £12,000,000 between 1928 and 1939. I am sure the Deputies will realise the truth of the opening statement when I said that this is a great little country, and that it must have been well looked after in the days of its infancy when it weathered the storm so well in the last 20 years.

The three things on which the Minister has concentrated to increase his revenue so far as this Budget is concerned, are income-tax, a tax of 2d. per gallon on petrol, and 8d. per lb. or ½d. per ounce on tobacco. Let us deal first with the income-tax. Fortunately or unfortunately, I am not one of those who has to pay income-tax. Because of that fact it would be only natural to assume that I would not have much sympathy with income-tax payers so far as the tax which they have to pay is concerned. I should imagine that people would say that Deputy Coburn should follow the example of other Deputies, and state that it was right and proper to tax the rich—take it from the rich in order to give it to the poor.

I have never enjoyed the novelty of paying income-tax. I do not know what it is to pay it. I have been used to hard work most of my life. I think I know as much about work as any Deputy on the Fianna Fáil or Labour Benches, but I say it is absolutely wrong and almost suicidal for men of the type of Deputy Corry to get up in this House and state that he gloried in the fact that income-tax had been raised by one shilling, and his only regret was that it had not been raised by double that amount. There would be some weight in that argument if, after taxing the rich for the last six or seven years, Deputy Corry, or any other Deputy who advocates an increase on this question of taxation, could point to the fact that as a result of that increased taxation the Government had solved many of the problems which they set out to solve, particularly that of unemployment.

I challenge any Deputy on the Government Benches, or on any other bench, who has advocated the policy of taking money from the rich on the assumption that it is going to make more comfortable the lot of the poor, to point out to me what progress, if any, has been made in that respect during the past five or six years. Is it not a fact that to-day we have as much, if not more, unemployment than we had six years ago? Is it not a fact that the cost of living is much higher than it was six years ago, and that, as a result of the cost of living being higher, the money earned by the poor can buy less food, less clothing, and less everything else than it could buy six or seven years ago? Is it not a fact that the taxation in this country is £5,000,000 or £6,000,000 extra every year? I say that more in sorrow than by way of criticism. I am not saying it to twit the Government, but facts are facts.

Anybody who gives a moment's thought to the position of the people in the country as a whole—not to the people here in the City of Dublin or in any other large city or town in the country—and who studies the position of the people in the little towns and villages, the position of the labourers in the towns, and of the farmers and the agricultural labourers, must admit that their position is worse to-day than it was eight or nine years ago. I am a worker myself. I have mixed with them for the last 40 years. That is my honest opinion of the situation as it exists at the moment. I am not talking politics. I am simply answering the Minister, and putting before the Deputies of this House the very same facts as the Minister himself put before the House eight or nine years ago when he was Deputy MacEntee. There is no improvement, I am sorry to say, so far as the position of the people of this country is concerned. Therefore, there is no weight in the argument that it is right to tax the rich in order to improve the lot of the poor. Of course, my dear friends over there, who preached so much class distinction in the years prior to their forming a Government, can never understand the fact which I am going to put before them—that there are large numbers of people in this country whom they used to style as ex-Unionists, and sometimes, when they got into a fit of bad temper, as Freemasons, but those people have love for this country, and have stayed in this country, although the income which they derive from any estates in this country is not sufficient to meet their outgoings, and they have to depend on moneys derived from investments abroad. Those people are giving a very large amount of employment to a type of person for whom employment is very scarce at the present time. Everybody will know the type of people to whom I am referring—that good old type which kept men working until they were almost 80 or 90 years of age. They kept them working day in day out, week in week out, year in year out. To-day these people have to pay more to the State, and the first thing they will do is to look into their accounts. Perforce, they will have to reduce their staff. In the case of men employing nine or ten, they will do with six or seven. No remarks will be passed about the one or two who were dismissed here and there throughout the country, but the aggregate of those ones and twos and threes and fours over the Twenty-Six Counties will run up to thousands. There is a great hullabaloo in the Press and in this House about a little factory employing 20 or 25 people if it happens to shut down for a week or two, but no remarks will be passed on the state of affairs to which I have referred, which exists all over the country at the present time.

It will be seen, therefore, that the argument that a tax on the rich will benefit the poor is a fallacy. It was good propaganda at the cross-roads. The poor people down the country who did not pay income-tax, and did not understand much about it, believed that every £1 taken in that way was going to do them good. We all know that a £1 derived by means of taxation is sometimes not worth 5/- by the time it reaches those for whom it is intended. Everyone knows that. In regard to petrol, the same arguments can be used. The same applies to tobacco. The tax will interfere with the business arrangements of those who are engaged in the manufacture of tobacco at the moment. It is going to increase the cost of that article to the poor man; we cannot get away from that fact. Everybody knows that to some men tobacco is as essential as food, and nobody will doubt that even the price paid for it prior to the introduction of this Budget was over and above what the ordinary working man of this country could afford to pay.

It is usual, on occasions such as the introduction of a Budget, for the Minister to give a general survey of the conditions which exist in the country, and also to intimate to the House what are his plans and the plans of the Government in regard to the future. I do not know what ideas are in the Minister's head, but as far as I can see the Minister for Finance and the Government are making no provision for a position which must necessarily arise in the very near future. I refer now to the very large number of people who are engaged in the building of houses. A good deal of nonsense, in my humble opinion, has been spoken about house building. Let me say at once that the building of houses for the workers in this country is undoubtedly a very laudable project, but it must be remembered that there will come a time when the production of any more houses cannot be proceeded with. I am not at all sure that we are very far from that time. That may not apply here in Dublin, but certainly in many of the other centres throughout the country house building will cease to be an avenue of employment in the very near future. It is a well-known fact that during the last six or seven years some 20,000 or 30,000 extra people have been put into employment as a result of the intensive campaign entered upon by the Government in regard to the building of houses. Might I ask the Minister what plans, if any, he has in mind to meet that situation which must of necessity arise?

I am quite aware that house building is one of the best means of providing employment, and providing it quickly, but not employment of a continuous nature. Everybody knows that once a housing scheme is finished there will be no houses needed in that locality for practically 50 years, or in some cases for 70 or 80 years. The position at the moment, even here in the city, is that after every scheme is finished you have thousands of men knocking at the gates asking when the next scheme of house-building is going to start. As I have already stated, since the housing drive was initiated, 20,000 or 30,000 men, over and above those who followed the building trade as their normal occupation in the last 20 years or so, have been employed on building schemes. We all know that there are people who have followed the trade all their lives, but I am speaking now of people who have come into the trade in recent years, and I should like to know what are the Minister's views on the problem of providing employment for these people in future. I do know that at the moment if the Government were to take away its all-protecting arm in so far as building is concerned, you would have very little house building or building of any other description in this country. So far as I can see, private enterprise, as we used to know it of old, is practically finished. Were the Government to stop the subsidy you would have no house-building in progress at present. I should like to know if the Minister has any plans to absorb those who at the moment find employment in house building but who, I regret to say, will find that avenue of employment closed in the very near future.

Again, I should like to ask the Minister whether the Government intend to implement the promises they made some years ago to derate agricultural land. That is a matter which has been a great bone of contention amongst all Parties for some years past. Undoubtedly the Government were very sweet on derating some years ago, but for some reason or another they seem to have changed their minds recently. With a view to refreshing their memories, I propose to quote from observations made by no less a person than the Taoiseach himself some time ago.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would the Deputy please give the date?

Mr. Coburn

The 18th April, 1929. Speaking on the Budget of that year Deputy de Valera, as he then was, said:—

"The Minister spoke of derating and stated that if adopted here it would be at a cost which would practically make it prohibitive, but he closed his ears to those who pointed out that a sum which would far more than cover the cost of derating is unwarrantly exported every year. We believe that the sum paid to England"

—I presume the Taoiseach was referring to the annuities—

"is not due and, that if the greater portion of it were retained here in the Exchequer, there would be no need to put on extra taxation to relieve the present burden on agriculture. We know, of course, that agriculture is our principal industry, and that seven out of every nine engaged on productive industries are engaged on the land; also, that two-thirds of the wealth of the country is produced from agriculture, and, moreover, that the greater part of the remaining one-third is produced from industries ancillary to farming, such as bacon-curing, butter-making, brewing, distilling and so forth. The pressure of rates is particularly severe on our farming community. If we take into account the fact that they have to compete with rivals in Great Britain itself and in Northern Ireland, who are relieved of that burden of rates, we realise what a severe handicap there exists and will remain on the farming community."

That money is not exported to-day. It has been retained by the Government. The question I should like to put to An Taoiseach, if he were present, is: Has derating been granted? The annuities have been retained. Derating has not been granted to the farming community. Instead, we have the spectacle of the man who stated in 1929 that not one penny of these moneys was due, going over to England and paying in the year 1937 a sum of £10,000,000. On the face of that statement, I think it is rather strange that the Minister for Finance had not something to say in regard to the derating of agricultural land in the Twenty-Six Counties. That is one of the means whereby the farmers could get immediate relief which would put them on exactly the same basis, so far as their export markets are concerned, as the farmers in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Minister's Budget statement this year has been conspicuous by the absence of any mention whatever of derating.

I am of opinion that it is a mere waste of time to mention the question of unemployment in this country or to ask what is going to be done about it. I have stated before my own opinions on this problem. I do not believe that this or any other Government can solve the problem. I was rather fascinated by some of the remarks made to-day by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. It is a strange thing that whenever any real sledge-hammer arguments have to be used the Minister for Industry and Commerce seems to fulfil the rôle of the general utility man. He fulfilled that rôle very effectively this evening. Amongst other questions which he put to the Opposition, in connection with criticisms of expenditure, was: "Do you want to reduce old age pensions, widows' pensions, unemployment assistance, unemployment benefit, relief schemes, and so forth?" Of course none of us wants to reduce the expenditure on deserving social services, but there is one item upon which I should like to join issue with the Minister. I, for one, am here to tell the Minister that I have a very decided objection to that item appearing, so far as expenditure under this Budget is concerned. That is the item of unemployment assistance. One would think that that was a very bold statement coming from one in my position; but I think that that is one of the items that could be cut out of this Budget. I accept the Minister's challenge on that item alone. Not only do I accept it in this House, but I am prepared to go on any platform in the Twenty-Six Counties and make the same statement.

Mr. MacEntee

Convert your Party to your point of view.

Mr. Coburn

The Minister seems to boast of the fact that the Government have provided £1,500,000 by way of assistance to people who at the moment find themselves unemployed. When one considers the challenge of the Minister one recalls the boast which the Minister made some five or six years ago in regard to the Fianna Fáil plan, that if returned to power he, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, not only would provide employment for all the people of the Twenty-Six Counties at rates which would give them a decent standard of living, but he would be compelled to send to America and bring home the exiles to fill the jobs in the factories. I consider it is an insult to the intelligence of Deputies and to the intelligence of the people for the Minister to get up and boast about his £1,500,000. In some cases the paltry sum of 4/- a week is given to a man to sustain him. Then we are asked by the Minister: "Do we challenge that item of expenditure?" I challenge it, and I am prepared to argue the point, not before the rich people of the country, but before the workers.

After six or seven years of intense industrial activity on the part of the Minister, with a consequential big increase in the cost of living, the Minister has nothing more to offer the unemployed than a mere £1,500,000, which works out at anything from 4/- to 15/- per person per week. The Minister is a long way from fulfilling the promise made early in 1932 or 1933 when he boasted that, if given a free hand, he would not alone absorb the unemployed in this country, but would have to bring back the exiles from other lands to fill the jobs. Of course, as I said then, and as I say now, the Minister was talking nonsense. I had not to wait six years to say that. I said it at that time, when Deputies opposite were cheering. I said it at every election, and will continue to state it in public at every election with regard to such statements as that— that they would absorb the unemployed as a result of the industrial activity. I am not belittling that activity. But, as a result of that, we have increased expenditure; we have as many, if not more, unemployed to-day than there were previously. Therefore, it is futile and childish on the part of Fianna Fáil Deputies to twit other Deputies with indulging in criticism for the sake of criticising the Government.

It was amusing to listen to some of the Deputies referring to speeches made by the Opposition. I was rather amused this evening by the speech made by Deputy Maguire. He introduced a new element into the matter. He spoke in general about the Budget, and then talked about some peculiar plan of barter. It was the funniest thing I ever heard. If a man is short of hay, but has plenty of potatoes, he has to go to a man who has plenty of hay, and give him potatoes in exchange for hay. The Deputy went on to say that if the Government would erect buildings, they could go on in that way by exchanging hay, potatoes, oats and straw, etc. I looked over twice to see if it was Deputy Maguire who was speaking, because I always looked upon him as a very sensible and commonsense man. How many officials would be wanted to work a scheme of that kind? What would be the cost of getting three or four stone of seed potatoes from one farmer and giving them to a farmer who had no seed potatoes, and take in exchange from him a few cwts. of hay and give it to a farmer who has no hay? Talk about increasing civil servants—they would be increased by the thousand every week if a scheme of that kind were put into operation. That is what Deputy Maguire thinks is the solution of the farmer's problem.

I do not pretend to be a farmer. I am not a specialist in the business. The Minister for Industry and Commerce, by his speech this evening, would lead one to believe that he was a very large farmer. He seemed to adopt the rôle of an expert in everything connected with farming. He spoke of farmers being better off to-day than they were seven or eight years ago. But the acid test of all this wealth that is supposed to be possessed by farmers is the fact that there is less employment being given on the land. The Minister boasted of the wheat scheme, and of the subsidies being paid for bacon, butter, etc.

I wonder how the farmers of this country lived before there were subsidies on bacon, butter, wheat, or anything else. Has it come to this, that in this country, where we boasted of our great liberties and our great national character, as typified by the slogan, "Sinn Féin"—self-reliance— there is no industry which can stand on its own legs? Why are we always boasting about the great people we are when, on the admission of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, the bottom would fall out of farming if it were not for the subsidies for bacon, butter, wheat, etc.? I am surprised how we all lived before we had these great men to subsidise everything. I cannot understand how the farmers lived years ago. Yet they managed to live; and it is questionable if their position was not much better then than it is to-day.

The Minister did not tell us that all these subsidies are increasing the cost of living for the farmers as well as every other section. What is the difference between a man having £3 or £5 to spend at one period and having £1 or £2 at another period, with which he could buy as much? What use is the extra money to him if you are taking it from him in the extra cost of his purchases? That is an aspect of the matter which seems to have escaped the notice of Fianna Fáil Deputies. They think it is a great thing to give a man an extra shilling and to take two shillings from him indirectly by increasing the cost of living.

What have you done? You have increased the cost of living on those people who are not earning sufficient at the moment to give themselves anything approaching a decent standard of living. Remember—the one thing that must be borne in mind when discussing this aspect of the economic position is that the unemployed man cannot go into a shop and buy a lb. of bacon at one-thirty-second part of a farthing less than the man with £1,000 a year. That is the point that must be remembered. The poor unfortunate unemployed man has to pay the same for his lb. of rashers as the man with £200 a year, £300 a year, £400 a year, £500 a year, £1,000 a year. The unemployed man has got to pay the same, and do not forget that fact when you are talking about these things. Do not forget that the ordinary worker has to pay 1/8 for his lb. of rashers in this country, for which John Bull, under the beneficent reign of our present Government, has only to pay .

Again, let us take the wheat scheme. The Minister says that we subsidised the wheat scheme and gave the farmer a good price which enables the farmer to put in a profitable crop. That is all right up to a point, but I hold that that scheme originated as a result of our dispute with Great Britain. That was when the wheat scheme was started here. It may have been thought of beforehand, but certainly it was accelerated as a result of the economic dispute between this country and Great Britain. When you are speaking of that wheat scheme, and particularly in regard to the employment that might be given as a result of that scheme, do not forget that most of those who, perforce, had to go into wheat production, went into that as an alternative to whatever agricultural economy they had been pursuing previous to the dispute with Great Britain. That is the reason why there has not been that great increase in employment, in so far as numbers are concerned, in this country, by reason of the wheat scheme.

I made a statement here on a previous occasion, and I say it again now, just to show the absurd and silly statements that are used in this House from time to time. I remember distinctly when the wheat scheme was going through, the Minister for Defence—a colleague of my own, from the County Louth, with whom I very seldom have anything to say—and this was the gist of his remarks which happened to stick in my memory—with regard to the wheat scheme, that it was bound to be good for the farmers of this country. He said, as far as my memory goes, that for every 20 extra acres of land that would be put into wheat production an extra man would be employed on the land. He assumed that, on the basis that it would take something in the region of 800,000 acres of land to supply all the wheat and, incidentally, all the flour, that would be required for the people of the then Free State, taking the employment on the basis he had already mentioned— that is, one extra man employed on each 20 acres—that would mean 40,000 extra people being employed on the land as a result of the wheat scheme. That is the figure he arrived at. On that occasion he stated here that up to 40,000 extra agricultural labourers would be employed as a result of the introduction of the wheat scheme. I am not repeating that by way of criticism. No man would be more delighted than I if those 40,000 extra agricultural labourers had been employed as a result of the wheat scheme. I am always ready to give credit where credit is due, and if the Government could claim that, as a result of that wheat scheme, 40,000 extra men were employed on the land, no man would be more pleased than I; but such, alas, is not the case. As far as I can understand, no extra men have been employed as a result of the wheat scheme. In fact, it seems to me that employment on the land has decreased rather than increased, as a result, quite possibly, of the wheat scheme, but certainly as a result of the Government policy. At any rate, no matter what may by the cause, employment on the land has not increased.

That is very easily explained. It was very foolish to say that there would be extra employment on the land as a result of such a scheme, because anybody who knows anything about farming—and I admit, as I have said already, that I know very little about it—knows that, in the case of the majority of farmers, and particularly in the case of the majority of small farmers, they can cultivate three acres, four acres, five acres or six acres extra, of any crop, without having to employ an extra man, or without having to employ an extra boy of even 15 years of age. Any man knows that if he goes into a field to cultivate it, it does not matter whether he takes three or five acres, time does not matter to the farmer if the weather is good. It seems to me that it is quite easily explained why there has not been increased employment on the land as a result of the wheat scheme. At any rate, whatever may have been the merits or demerits of that scheme, there is no doubt about one thing, and that is that that scheme has increased the cost of living immeasurably on the people of all classes in this country. Take the case of a poor working man in this country, with a family. Take what the difference in price would mean to him per week, and multiply that by 52 weeks in the year, and you will see that it is no question of taxing the rich alone, but a question of taxing the very poor also. One could go on enumerating all the different items that have been increased as a result of the policy of the present Government in the last few years.

Now, again, the Minister for Industry and Commerce spoke about the increase in the Army Vote, and he asked the House whether or not we were opposed to increasing the Army Vote. In my opinion, reading his remarks, he spoke rather provocatively, and said to the Deputies on this side of the House that, possibly, we would rather see the British Army defending this country than our own Army. I do not think he can claim that he alone is Irish of the Irish, any more than the people on these benches here who have Irish blood in their veins. He might not hold that at all, but I do know that one of the questions he used to ask the Minister for Defence, when he himself was in Opposition, was: "What was the Army for in this country and what functions did it carry out?" The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Hugo Flinn, also stated to the House that the whole thing that annoyed him was to try to find out what the Army existed for. That was at about the same time. New, however, the Army that only cost about £1,000,000 in 1928 is going to cost £3,000,000 or £4,000,000 this year; and possibly that will be £7,000,000 before many years have passed over.

I should like to ask the Minister for Industry and Commerce—who seems to have donned the garb of the republic this evening for reasons well known to himself; it may be seasonable at this period to don the republican garb which he and his Party have discarded for the last few years—to answer a straight question and to tell me whether it is in co-operation with Great Britain that the Army in this country is going to fight. Possibly he will tell us whether it is a fact, as many of the public are of opinion, that as a result of an agreement made by the Taoiseach with the Prime Minister of England—

An Ceann Comhairle

On the Budget, the details of Army policy, which have already been discussed on the Estimate, may not be reviewed.

Mr. Coburn

I thought I would be entitled to know to what use the Army was to be put, following the increased expenditure. The Minister for Industry and Commerce to-day made what amounted to very disparaging and uncalled-for remarks in regard to the ideas held by certain Deputies on this side on the Army, and I was anxious to get a reply to that question. There are a large number of people in the country who would like to put the same question, and I should like the Taoiseach to be here to answer it.

An Ceann Comhairle

That question was raised on the Army Vote, and by several Deputies.

Mr. Coburn

I do not remember that question being answered, in the first place; and, in the second place, I respectfully submit that I am within my rights in asking for an explanation as to the functions of the Army, especially in view of the increased expenditure. However, if the Minister is silent on that point I do not intend to press him; but there is that feeling throughout the country, and it is one of the things which the people would like to have cleared up in as short a space of time as possible. The Army is useful. The Army which served no useful purpose in 1928-1929, 1930 and 1931, is very useful to-day. It is a fine Army, which is going to defend the rights of Irishmen, won after such a hard fight, as Deputy Meaney of Cork said. Who is going to attack those rights? Deputy Meaney did not tell us. I can see nobody attacking those rights or taking away those liberties, although the Minister for Industry and Commerce seemed to suggest that England would attack us. Does he, the Minister for Finance, or any Fianna Fáil Deputy, seriously suggest that England is going to attack this country? And if England is not going to attack us, who is? Is it the Shah of Persia, or the Rajah of Abyssinia? Why the increased expenditure? However, it is good to recognise that the Army is useful and that the Fianna Fáil Government can do something. As Irishmen we are all proud of our little Army, and why should we not be proud? Irishmen have always given a good account of themselves, not alone in this country, but in any land in which they have fought, and I am sure that our Army can give a good account of itself at home. I should like to see the position in that respect clarified a little more, and I certainly should like the Taoiseach to be here to answer some of the questions I should like to put to him in regard to this extra expenditure. There are a great many people who would like to put the same question.

I want to drive home to the minds of Deputies on the far side that upon their shoulders rests the very great responsibility of bringing this country back to the position it occupied, not eight or nine years ago, but some 20 or 30 years ago. They will have to renounce all they stood for during the past 10 or 11 years. They will have to go back on all they said and did during the years before they formed the Government. They will have to tell the people that this country cannot afford to do what is being asked of it, that it is a poor little country, mainly agricultural, with something less than 3,000,000 of a population, and that there are no millionaires in it to rob, as Deputy Corry and other Deputies suggest. The fact is that we have not got half enough rich people here. What I should like to see is a couple of loads of millionaires being landed at Dublin quays to settle in this country. It is absolutely necessary that the people be told the truth and not, as Fianna Fáil has been telling them, that it is a good policy to rob the rich in order to give to the poor. It is necessary that they be told that the people from whom to get the money are not there, that the reservoir from which they have been drawing these millions is rapidly drying up, as was foreshadowed by the Minister when he was Deputy MacEntee eight or nine years ago, and that you cannot continue taking so much money from industry and expect industry to flourish and to continue to give employment.

You have, in fact, to decide in the very near future whether you are going to go in wholesale for a policy symbolic of the policy which at the moment prevails in Soviet Russia, that is, take over all the resources of the State. If that were done, there might be some slight hope of success, but there can be no possible hope of success if there is continued interference to the extent of at least 50 per cent. with people who are carrying on the business of the country, if one of a man's hands is to be tied behind his back and he is to be expected to carry on as if he had the use of his two hands. It cannot be done and you have to decide as to whether you will take over all the resources of the State, all the avenues of employment, and form a big institution and dole everything out as it comes in. That is the position you are fast approaching. That is what you have to undo. You have to tell the people that it is not possible to maintain a standard here which prevailed during the Great War, when the income of the country was four times as large as it is to-day.

We all speak here as if no world existed previous to 1914 and not one Deputy goes back beyond 1914. That year saw the creation of the world, so far as many Deputies are concerned and so far as many people in the country who profess to be leaders of the people are concerned. The four years from 1914 were the start of the history of the country—four accidental years out of 2,000—and we want to mould our lives in accordance with the standard of that time, when the farmer got 40/- for his barley, 30/- for his oats, 80/- a cwt. for his beef and £10 to £12 a ton for his potatoes, as against 10/- for his oats to-day, £2 a ton for his potatoes, 35/- a cwt. for his beef and 10/- for his barley. That is the position I want to put to the economists who are talking about what can be done with this little country. That is what you have got to consider and that is what I have told the people down the country at election times. I have told them the truth and have got the votes—mainly from the workers and labourers. Truth may be shamed but it cannot be blamed. I would do the same to-morrow, because I want this little country to exist, as I think it is the best in the world. It is impossible to break down the small farmers, who will stick it when everyone else has failed. It should be recognised, however, that there is a limit to their powers of endurance, and there is a limit to what this country can afford to do. I am sure the Minister will realise why I opposed the salaries here although I was one of the men who could least afford to do it. The Minister will recognise the thoughts that were running in my mind in that particular period. I was thinking of the thousands of people who have to exist on much less than £360 a year and support a family at the same time. That is what we must come down to. Some attempt should be made to improve the position of thousands of our people who at the moment are living in a state of semi-starvation. I am not saying that to make little of the efforts of the Government, but I know for a fact that there are thousands of people forming a decent element, who will not come out and parade their poverty in public. These people are very much affected by the high cost of living at the present time and it is up to the Government to do all that they possibly can, consistent with efficient government, to reduce the cost of living so far as the plain people are concerned.

To take £35,000,000 out of an income roughly estimated by the Minister as in the region of £90,000,000 in 1928, even assuming that that income is the same to-day as it was then—which I very much doubt—that is to say, to take one-third of the estimated income of the country, in order to run a Government is, I say, to take too much. The Minister stated on that occasion that taxation per capita here was £7 1s. 5d., as against £6 in the Six Counties and £15 in Great Britain; although the earnings per capita were about £30 here, £45 in the Six Counties, and £86 in Great Britain. I think the Taoiseach said here on one occasion that the ratio of taxation in this country to that of Great Britain was 66 to one. If you multiply 66 by even £35,000,000 you will find a sum well over £2,000,000,000. That is what taxation should be in Great Britain this year on that basis, and it is nothing approaching that sum. We are much higher pro rata. £35,000,000 is a very big lot of money, and I sincerely hope and trust that the Minister and his Government will do their best to reduce that amount, especially in view of the indisputable fact that increased taxation does not solve the problems which we thought it would solve. Not-withstanding the fact that so many extra millions have been taken, we are in the same position to-day as we were five or six years ago. I am sure the Parliamentary Secretary, if he were here, would say the same thing with regard to unemployment. He starts at the hills of Kerry and finishes up on the hills of Donegal, and on finishing in Donegal he finds they are knocking at the gates again, and he has to start all over again.

There is no use in Deputies stating that high taxation—especially the policy of taking money from the rich— is going to solve the problem of unemployment. Undoubtedly, it is not: the facts are all against it. Where one man is given employment in one direction possibly a man is disemployed in another direction.

That is the position of affairs at the moment, and I hope and trust that the Minister and his Government will see their way to reduce this burden of taxation which stands in the region of almost £35,000,000. Let us hope that it will not be necessary to spend the largely increased Vote on the Army this year, and in that event, the Minister will have a nest-egg for the next financial year whereby he can reduce his Budget. I hope that that happy state of affairs will come about.

General MacEoin

There are a few points I would like to make upon the Budget. It has been said here this evening that all the speeches from these benches were gloomy. There is good reason for the gloom, if gloom there be, but the source of any gloom that may be in our speeches is in the Budget statement of the Minister for Finance. This is the Budget after we have won the economic war, and therefore ought to be a Budget of joy and success. It is the Budget we have as a result of winning the war. Have any of the Fianna Fáil Deputies asked themselves what would have happened if we had lost that war? My colleague from Athlone-Longford declared in the House that it was a great victory—the success, I take it, of winning the economic war. Deputy Meaney, from Cork, said that there was an attempt at sabotage from these benches. I would advise Deputy Meaney, Sir, that before he comes to the House and makes a speech like that, he should read "From the Republic Back into the Empire," by a Judge of the Supreme Court of the Irish Republic, to wit, Mr. Crowley; and then he would know exactly where and when and how sabotage lies.

There are bound to be gloomy Budgets, because the cost of governing the country—or of misgoverning it—is yearly increasing. The taxation per head of the population is yearly increasing and the income of the population is yearly decreasing.

The Minister has told us in his speech that the net dead-weight debt of the State has increased. I am taking his dead-weight debt just as it is—the gross—because you will get the same net figure if you reduce it accordingly. The dead-weight debt has increased from £22,000,000 in 1932 to £37,000,000 in 1939, and the local dead-weight indebtedness has increased from £15,000,000 in 1932 to £28,000,000 in 1939, and that upon a reduced national income. In 1932 the net income per head of the population of the country was approximately £90. To-day the income per head of the population is reduced to £50. Therefore, the Government is adopting the tactics of every spendthrift that was ever in a farm, a business or anywhere else—they reduce their earnings and increase their debt.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce here this evening said that this country was a business concern, and that the business of the nation should be run on business-like lines. I wonder, if any director of a company turned up with a balance sheet like that to his shareholders, what they would say to him or what they would say if he told them they were gloomy because of the figures he presented to them. I know thoroughly well what any intelligent set of shareholders would do with that director. He certainly would not get re-election unless, of course, he had something in hand by way of proxy votes. He could never get it on an honest-to-God, straight vote.

Well, Sir, I can tell you, from experience, that every farmer that I know, that has an overdraft from the bank at the moment, is trying to effect a settlement with the bank, because he is not able to meet his liabilities. I have had experience of that for the last four or five years only. Prior to that they were able to meet their bank charges. To-day they are not, nor for the last four years have they been. Of those 496,000 farmers, there are 3,422 without a beast on the land that the sheriff or the registrar can seize for land annuities or for rates or for anything else. Yet we are told that agriculture is in a flourishing condition. And at a time when agriculture is in this state, the Minister for Finance increases taxation. He says that he is putting it upon income-tax. With that I have no dispute, because it is a reasonable thing to put a tax upon people who have an income— because if there is no income there is no taxation. But putting 2d. a gallon on petrol is certainly going to affect the farmers' overhead charges.

Any Deputy coming up here to Dublin on a Monday or Tuesday meets all the commercial travellers tearing down the country for all they are worth in their cars. They are not going to bear the increased cost of transport. It will be passed on to the goods they are selling to the merchant. Neither the railway company nor the firms who own lorries are going to bear the increased cost of delivering stuff by road. That increased cost will be put upon one person and one person only, that is, the consumer who buys the stuff. As the majority of the consumers of this country are farmers, the net result of that tax is a tax upon the farming community. The result is that, instead of coming to the rescue or assistance of the farmers in any particular way, the Government puts a further burden on them—the Government that promised to increase the income per head of the population by £8 per annum, according to the Fianna Fáil plan. This is the result.

I do not charge the Government with being unnational, but I do say they have lost any regard for the national welfare of the people because, if they had any true regard for it they would look after the people's interests in such a way that they would give them relief where required and help to increase agricultural production in the country. They would thereby increase the farmers' revenue and the people's revenue then, as a result. Instead of that, because of the impositions they are putting on, the revenue of the people is decreasing daily and Government expenditure is increasing.

I know a little bit more about the bacon trade than the Minister. I know a bit about iron; the Minister knows a bit about wire. I also know a bit about the bacon trade. Of course, that is a very useful red herring to throw across, but, getting away from that, taxation has been increased and the income of the farming community has been reduced. At this moment, when you are increasing taxation, there is no section better entitled to assistance than the agricultural community. That assistance could be given without any difficulty out of the present taxation, and without increasing it by a shilling.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce was pompous as usual. Deputy Davin described his speech as bluff. Therefore, I think it has been fairly dealt with. I would like to say this, however, that when the Minister was speaking of the Opposition he said—I wonder is it necessary to quote it, but I suppose it is—when speaking here on Friday last—the quotation is from col. 2369 of the Dáil Debates, 12th May, 1939—that the Opposition had been talking humbug "and fraudulent humbug. I think they are trying to ‘cod' the people." Well, down the country we have the saying "a guilty conscience." It is a good idea, when judging your neighbour, to take your own life as a kind of standard.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy is judging now. Be careful.

General MacEoin

The Minister for Industry and Commerce judges us. He says that we are trying to ‘cod' the people." He takes the line that offence is the best form of defence, and he charges us with what he himself carried to a fine art—and what is worse, got away with it—for nine or ten years—for six years anyway, and at three elections. Of all the humbug that was ever put before the people, there surely was never anything like "the Fianna Fáil plan,""work for the unemployed," and "a reduction in taxation." Here is the man that I have heard speak scores of times on what his Party could do if they were returned to office. He now charges us with humbugging. The only other thing that comes near his charge was the charge of sabotage that was made by Deputy Meaney. That was just the other angle.

I would not like to get the votes of the people by humbugging them. God forbid that I should. There is only one way in which you can have honesty in public life, and that is by putting the hard facts before the people. There is no doubt Cumann na nGaedheal in 1932 could have painted a rosy picture, but they could not outbid Fianna Fáil, I admit, and they did not. The programme that Cumann na nGaedheal laid down was a hard programme. You had the Minister for Industry and Commerce here this evening justifying the programme that the late Minister for Agriculture put before the people. What was that programme? More production. He put it before the people in a simple way: "Another sow, another cow, and another acre of tillage." The Minister for Industry and Commerce told us this evening that if the country is not able to carry out that programme, then the Minister for Finance is going to be worried to death. But at that particular time, what was the charge made? "Another sow, another cow and another acre of tillage for John Bull: to make Ireland a market garden for him." And yet the Minister for Industry and Commerce says that we are trying to humbug the people. Who is humbugging? The late Minister for Agriculture or Fianna Fáil?

There is no question but that the policy of hard work was put before the people. The people did not like it because they had the Party led by Mr. de Valera telling them that they could turn this country into a regular Utopia: into a land flowing with milk and honey, a land which would grow beans, beef, barley, peas and the rest, and that would increase the net revenue of the people by £8 per head. But before the Party opposite were three months in office they had started to reduce the income of the people, and before they were three years in office they had succeeded in reducing the farmer's income. They had succeeded in reducing the whole income of the country by precisely the amount that they proposed to increase it. Of course, it was only befitting that they should be 100 per cent. out in all their calculations.

The only luxury that the poor man has is his pipe of tobacco, and that is being taxed. On former occasions I made an appeal on behalf of the pipe smoker: that the taxation on tobacco should be reduced, and that under no circumstances should any attempt be made to increase it. One may say that the only solace the poor man has is his pipe. This increase means that he will have to pay 4/4 per annum more for his tobacco. The standard rate of wage in the country for an agricultural labourer was 27/- a week, if he is able to get it, so that this extra 4/4 a year is going to mean a lot to him. It means that he will have to reduce the amount of tobacco that he has been accustomed to smoke. The result of that will be dissatisfaction.

The cost of governing the country has been increased. It seems to me that the Government have given no thought whatever to the problems that are facing the ordinary people. Inside the last 14 days I had to effect settlements between farmers and the registrar in the Land Commission to prevent seizures. I would remind Deputies that these are not big farmers. They are small men—£4 and £5 men that always kept their heads up and would not admit to anybody on the face of the earth that they owed a shilling to any man. That is the class of man who is being hit at this particular time. The settlement of the economic war brought success, and is bringing it, to the big man with capital who is able to stock his land. But the man who got broken, who was not able to get in stock or was not able to keep stock on his land until the settlement was made, is now feeling the pinch. He is far worse off than the big man. No matter what anybody may say to the contrary, unless relief is given to the agricultural community you are going to have this situation—that the best people on earth will be broken.

The day you break the small farmers, and the middle-class farmers, that day you smash this country. It was they who fought the Anglo-Irish war and won everything for this country. Without them no headway could have been made. As I pointed out on the Vote for Agriculture, they were the people who produced the best brains. If you break them you break this country. What all the British forces could not do Fianna Fáil has gone closer to doing than anybody else. I do not say that in any disparaging sense, except to point to hard facts. I can point to the situation as regards rates, but there is no necessity to go into that now. I advise those who think that the position of the agricultural community is improving to read the report of the Minister for Local Government. That shows that there has been a yearly increase in the amount of rates irrecoverable in each country since 1932. That is a better index of the situation than anything else.

Mr. McGovern

We have been warned from the opposite benches by Ministers and by Deputies that we should be careful of the way we speak, as otherwise we are likely to do harm to the credit of the country. Their policy has gone a long way on the road to bankruptcy and is more liable to damage the credit of the country than anything else. I am afraid they are beginning to fear that people will pay more attention to speeches from this side of the House than they did in the past. The Minister, in introducing the Budget, made a very gloomy speech. As reported in several of the newspapers it was stated that the Minister started on a gloomy note. Anybody could see that the Minister started on a gloomy note and that he proceeded on that note.

The Minister deserves credit for doing so. He told the House that there was a decrease in the turnover under various heads, a decrease in the value of stamps, in the Corporation Profits tax and in excise duties. The Minister's speech was a gloomy one, and looking across at the Fianna Fáil Benches, Deputies on this side could see the gloomy expression on the faces of the Deputies there, That was much more eloquent than the Minister's or any speeches from these benches in the way of convincing people of the gloom that prevailed. Even Deputy Thomas Kelly did not let himself go until the Minister was over the last obstacle in the race, and had passed the winning post. Not until then could the Deputy applaud the Minister on his victory.

There is no use in pretending that speeches can affect the credit of this country. The first place that I saw the credit of this country questioned was in financial papers published on the other side of the Channel. It is not speeches in this House out speeches made by Ministers and such people that are noticed. Sound, honest criticism of the conduct of the Government is much better than anything else. Bankers and people who control finance do not pay attention to the speeches made in this House, but they do to the acts of the Government. However, the Minister finished his gloomy speech on a very light note. He turned to jesting about the farmers, thus adding insult to injury. We had some respect for the Minister as a man with responsibility, and as one who knew something about finance, but that respect has not been increased by the Minister adopting a Roddy the Rover attitude on such a serious occasion as the introduction of a Budget like this. The Minister supplied a Budget statement and in Table 8 included figures that were never intended to be taken seriously. They were intended only to throw dust in the eyes of the people whom they have been deceiving for the past eight years. The Government still wants to deceive the people, but the people are waking up and are able to see through their little schemes. The farmers have sufficient intelligence not to be humbugged. In this Table the Minister in all seriousness claims to have increased the benefits to agriculture by £8,085,000, compared with 1931-32.

The first item on the long list of benefits is an increase of £220,000 for the Department of Agriculture. Certainly the money was spent. Fianna Fáil always boasted of all the money they are expending. They are certainly expending the taxpayers' money. But how are they expending it? Is it to any good purpose? Does the Minister seriously tell the House that the Department of Agriculture is giving services that are worth £220,000 more to agriculture than were given under the previous Minister for Agriculture? Will he ask farmers; even Fianna Fáil farmers, which Minister served agriculture best? I think it will be admitted that the former Minister, who was known as the "Minister for Grass," knew his job, and that this Government could learn from him. They are learning, and are coming around day by day to adopt the slogan of the former Minister. Even though the process is slow, and took seven or eight years, they are beginning to realise the truth of what the former Minister said, that it was only by encouraging mixed farming that this country could carry on, and that agriculture could prosper. Instead of agriculture benefiting by the extra £220,000, I believe it would be a very conservative estimate if I said that agriculture had lost £1,000,000. It would not be extravagant to say that farmers have lost £2,000,000 as a result of the change of Ministers, but I prefer to be on the conservative side, and I would put the loss down at £1,000,000 by the change.

I shall get away from the pigs lest they create trouble. These Cork pigs are always troublesome wherever they are. I now come to the Dairy Produce (Price Stabilisation) Act. We are supposed under this Act to get the benefit of £666,000. I live in a split parish, one half in Northern Ireland and the other half in Eire. The milk is the same price on both sides of the Border. Where, then, does the benefit of the £666,000, which we are supposed to get, come in? Where is the use in the Minister throwing away money unless it reaches the farmer?

I suppose, since agriculture has been reduced to the position of an invalid, it costs more. An invalid always costs more to keep than a healthy person. Go to the worst hospital and a man will have to pay more there than in the best hotel, because an invalid is always more expensive to keep. If agriculture had been left alone, it would now be healthy and it would cost much less. It would be robust instead of being treated as an invalid in this fashion. As the Minister for Industry and Commerce pointed out this evening, agriculture cannot carry on without a subsidy. There is no industry in this country able to carry on without a subsidy. That is the position the Fianna Fáil policy has brought every industry down to. Where are all the subsidies to come from? That is going to be the problem very soon. I hope the Minister will be able to solve it. We on this side will be prepared to give every assistance, to make suggestions and render help. It must be done eventually, but I am afraid the Fianna Fáil Party have not shown much indication that they are prepared to go the right way about doing it.

As regards eggs, we are supposed to get a benefit to the extent of £290,000 from eggs, although two-thirds of the trade has been killed, just like the pig trade. The egg and poultry industry has been killed by the maize meal mixture scheme and the general increase in the price of foodstuffs. After almost killing the industry, the Minister now claims a certain amount of credit in regard to it. The industry has been killed, one might say, and we are now meeting the funeral expenses. There was not much service done to the egg industry. I do not think the Minister claims that any money was spent on it, but he does claim that the regulations and the meddling are worth over £200,000 to the egg producers. That is not my opinion about this meddling with everybody's private business in the fashion the Government have adopted. The majority of the people have found out that the Government's meddling has done more harm than good.

Another item is the amount received from tobacco. Wherever the money for tobacco is going, it is certainly not going to County Cavan, where it is a halfpenny an ounce dearer. The £11,600 goes somewhere, I expect, but I never knew that a penny of it went to county Cavan. I am here as one of the representatives of Cavan and I may say that we have not got any of that benefit. The next two items are beet sugar and wheat. With regard to the beet sugar scheme, the Minister told us that agriculturists got £1,050,000 from it. So far as County Cavan is concerned, we paid £11,400 extra in regard to the price of sugar last year. Not one penny of the £1,050,000 has come to County Cavan because there was not an acre of beet grown there. Deputy Sheridan will bear me out in that connection. Instead of getting our share of the £1,050,000, our portion of the £450,000 that was paid extra for sugar would be £11,400. The same applies to the wheat scheme. We are told we are getting a benefit of £1,900,000 from wheat. The consuming public are paying £1,500,000 extra for their flour and Cavan's share would be £38,000, on a population basis. Instead of Cavan getting a share of the benefit, it is paying £38,000 extra for flour and £11,400 extra for sugar, and that brings us almost to the figure of £50,000. What we spent extra on tobacco brings the amount well over £50,000. That is the position for that county with regard to the alleged benefits under these schemes.

There is a debit against the Minister instead of a credit. Instead of the credit he claims in regard to agriculture, there is a debit of £5,056,000. Now let me deal with the limitation of markets, to which the Minister for Industry and Commerce referred this evening. He says now we have not a market for all we produce, that we have a limited market. That is the work of Fianna Fáil. The Minister can put any figure he likes on that. I have no figures to guide me, and if I mentioned any figure the Minister might say I was overestimating. Let the Minister for Industry and Commerce tell us by how much our market has been cut. Before Fianna Fáil came into office we had an unlimited market for all we could produce here.

Progress reported, the Committee to sit on to-morrow, Wednesday, 17th May.

The House adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Wednesday, 17th May.

Dáil Éireann debate - Tuesday, 16 May 1939

Committee on Finance. - Resolution No. 10—General (Resumed).

A Deputy

Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 16 May 1939