With regard to the motion for the adjournment of the Dáil, it has been intimated to the Chair, orally, that the chief topics for discussion on the Adjournment Debate are to be unemployment, production, supply, defence and, possibly, censorship.
Adjournment of the Dáil (Motion). - Position of Éire.
Question proposed: "That the Dáil do now adjourn."
I move the Adjournment of the Dáil. It was originally my intention to talk generally about the situation and to refer to a number of matters which, really, have been discussed here in advance by means of replies to the questions. That also applies to the Government's attitude with regard to these matters, and therefore I think that at this stage, it is not necessary to go over the ground again. The Dáil was called, not so much for any immediate business that had to be transacted. A Bill has been introduced for the purpose of creating a Department of Supplies, and that we could have probably postponed, although it is advisable to put the matter on a formal basis quickly. However, as I say, we could have postponed that for some time and, probably, have waited for the Dáil to meet in the ordinary course of events, but in the previous debate, when certain emergency powers were granted to the Government, there seemed to be, on the part of Parties in Opposition, the desire that the Dáil should meet again before the date that had been fixed upon originally. There is an advantage in the Dáil meeting, provided every Deputy that comes here shares with the Government, as he should, the full responsibility for his actions and for any public damage that might possibly be done by trying to make public that which, in the general interests of the community and in the general interests of the State, should not be made public. If it were otherwise, as I said a few moments ago, it is quite clear that the State could not carry on. If we have to publish things that other States do not publish as being against the public interest and which common sense dictates as being against the public interest, then it would only mean that we would become every day more and more vulnerable.
I thought that it was the general agreement, on the last occasion we met, that although we were not engaged in this war, there was going to be a very serious situation for our country as a whole, and that, it seemed to me, certainly on the last occasion, inspired Deputies generally with a feeling of responsibility. I hope that there is not going to be a departure from that, because no Government could carry on here if the type of cross-examination, which seemed to be thought as natural in the case of some Deputies to-day. were to be indulged in. In times like these, you have to give large discretionary power to whatever Government holds office. For the larger questions of public policy you can hold them accountable, as well as for the smaller matters, but ultimately you have to make up your mind as to whether you want your Government to function properly or not, or as to whether the-interests of the community should be properly safeguarded or not, or whether, in fact, you are going to use the difficulties of a situation which is dangerous for the people as a whole for the purpose of what I might call petty politics.
Deputies, on the last occasion, it seems to me, approached the matter in the proper spirit, and I only request that, in the discussions that take place here this evening, they would resume that spirit, and will realise that it is not the fate of a Government or of a Party that is involved, but that it is the fate of our whole people that is involved. I did say, then, on the last occasion, feeling that that was the spirit which animated every Deputy in the House, that we should try as far as possible to come here and explain, as far as was possible in the public interest—as we conceived it, anyhow—as far as the public interest would permit, what was being done, the difficulties that were being encountered, and so on. This meeting of the, Dáil, then, was called to give an opportunity to Deputies to ask questions and to direct the attention of the Government to any particular matters that seemed to require attention, and to give an opportunity to Deputies to assure themselves, as they have a right to do, that any particular matter which affected the public interest was not being lost sight of.
This type of emergency is a new one for our people, as I have said At the time of the last Great War this country was included as a part of the British State. Measures that were taken by Britain to safeguard her own interests were also taken, in general, as far as this country was concerned. Our own people had no Government to look after their special interests. Now, however, you have an Irish Government, independent and responsible to the Irish people; but their very independence and separateness has brought about problems and difficulties which were not experienced at all during the last war. In the main, of course, the difficulties, or at least the major difficulties can be foreseen, but it is not so easy to proscribe remedies. Some of the questions that were asked a short while ago to-day seemed to suggest that it was possible, by Government action, to save our people completely from the consequences of this war. I do not think that that is possible. This war is going to affect, just as other wars, and certainly the last Great War, affected, the neutral States to an extent only slightly less and, in some cases even greater, than the belligerent States. It is true that our people are not going out to offer their lives or shed their blood in this war, or to participate in this war, but the consequences of this war are going to be felt here. There is going to be a complete disruption of the ordinary methods of trade and commerce.
The ordinary methods of supply are largely being interfered with already and we have to do the best we can to make new channels, to make new arrangements so that the activities of our people will not be interrupted more than is beyond our power to help. It requires merely a casual examination of our economic life, of our trade and our industrial position, to realise to what an extent we are dependent on outside supplies for fundamental industrial activities, notwithstanding our policy which, I think, has reduced to about one-half our dependence on outside supplies. That being so, and remembering that some 50 per cent. of our imports come through Great Britain, which is one of the belligerent States, and that some 90 per cent. of our exports go to the same belligerent, which country, being involved in war has changed its industrial and trade activities largely for the purpose of war, it is clear that we are going to be affected, and affected very vitally.
As I have said, we were able to foresee some time ago what was likely to happen in the case of a conflict of this sort, and immediately it seemed that a conflict was at all possible, we began, in the first instance, to plan a section for supply. That section was retained as a section, and was initiated by the Department of Industry and Commerce. The business of the section was to try to foresee as far as possible what our needs would be, and, so far as it was possible in advance, to make plans for the new arrangements which would have to be made if the conflict arose. Now that the conflict has come, it has become necessary not merely to have a section of a Department dealing with this important matter, but to devote a whole Department to it, and on the success of that Department will largely depend how far we shall be able to escape the larger evils which are consequent on the general disruption caused by this war.
I think every Deputy will agree with me that the former Minister for Industry and Commerce, with his knowledge of the needs obtained over a long period of years in contact with the various industries, was the obvious person to put in charge of that Department. He had, accordingly, to be removed from the Department of Industry and Commerce because now this Department of Supplies is a whole-time job. It will be, in fact, the central planning department for our economic life. Through it will be co-ordinated in regard to agricultural requirements, in the first place, the work to be done by the Department of Agriculture in providing supplies from our own resources here and in supplementing these by the supplies we are able to get from outside, to whatever extent we are able to get them from outside. So far as the agricultural industry is concerned the Department of Supplies, taking stock of the situation and seeing what our needs are, will have, on the one hand, to stimulate, through the Minister for Agriculture, our own supplies, and, on the other hand, to supplement them by supplies from outside to the extent to which it is possible to get them, and also to get from outside whatever is required by the agricultural industry.
In the same way, with regard to the manufacturing industries, the Department of Supplies will have to take stock of their requirements, these requirements either being communicated directly through the various industries to the Minister, or indirectly through the Minister for Industry and Commerce, and as in the case of agriculture, having taken stock of our requirements of manufactured goods, it will have to try to stimulate increased production here in the manufacture of the goods we require to the extent to which such stimulation is possible, and also to try to get the requirements of these industries, in so far as it is possible to get them from outside in war conditions, and over and above that, to supplement by imports from outside these manufactured goods which are required and which our own industries are not able to produce. That is quite obviously a whole-time work, and it was necessary to put into the Department of Industry and Commerce somebody to carry on the ordinary work of that Department, and to do, in fact, everything that used to be done by the Department of Industry and Commerce except this particular new function which has properly been assigned to a separate Minister.
A survey of our requirements has been made to a certain extent, and, questions have been asked of the Minister to-day with regard to some of them. A complete survey has not yet been possible, and it is not even yet possible to determine with anything like accuracy what are the quantities of goods we may hope to get from outside, because, in most of these cases, it is rather a hope than a certainty. Nobody can predict the course of this war, and, therefore, nobody can predict how circumstances may change from time to time, and make it quite impossible to realise to-morrow the hopes that may be entertained to-day. As we go on, however, the survey can be made more complete than it has been possible to make it up to the present, and the likelihood of realising and hopes that have been entertained up to the present with regard to supplies from outside can be better judged. No doubt, at some stage in this debate, the Minister himself will speak to the Dáil on the matters with which he is immediately and directly concerned. All I want to point out is that the Government fully realise that this war situation is going to involve a great deal of dislocation in our economic life, that it is going to make it extremely difficult to avoid large-scale unemployment, and that it is going to make it extremely difficult, accordingly, to get from our community the production which is absolutely essential in a situation like this. We must aim at increasing production, if it is at all possible, and at increasing it in whatever direction is possible. Naturally, the minds of Deputies will turn to the possibility of increasing our agricultural production. It is a strange thing that, notwithstanding the high prices during the last war, our agricultural production, certainly our agricultural exports, did not increase in volume. It is an astonishing fact. The reasons for that are very difficult to find.
Very easy.
The fact is that the volume of production, of the amount that was exported—I am not talking of value, because, of course, with increased prices you had an increased total value—but the volume of our agricultural production did not increase during the last war. I doubted that very much; I questioned it again and again, but it has been given to me as a fact that that is so. I know it is a fact that our agricultural production has not generally been increasing. But it is an extraordinary thing, unless there is some mistake in it which I have not been able to find so far, that during the last war, with the encouragement which increased prices would naturally give, our agricultural production—the amount we had for export at any rate—did not increase.
For export—that is easily explained.
I do not think it is so easy. The first explanation that occurred to me was that it was owing to increased consumption at home. But even that, though it would explain perhaps the lack of increase in exports, does not explain the lack of increase in total production. As I say, the first thing at any rate that one would naturally think of is an increase in our production. Whether there is an error there, which I have not been able to discover, or not, common sense would seem to suggest that we ought to be able, with effort, at any rate, to increase our production here now. The first effort naturally should be to try to increase agricultural production in the community, not merely to provide to the fullest extent possible for our own needs, for human needs, but also for animal requirements—feeding stuffs for such cattle or other live animals as we may export. It will be the business of the Department of Agriculture to try to stimulate that production in every way possible. It is obvious that we ought to increase, our tillage for example. I think the Minister for Agriculture may find he has sufficiently advanced his plans in regard to a tillage policy to be able to indicate, in general anyhow, to the House in the course of the debate what he proposes to do so as to see that we have an increase of tillage. As to the extent to which it will be possible to increase production in other industries, I do not know if the Department of Supplies or the Department of Industry and Commerce will at this stage be able to tell, but in that case also obviously the aim should be to increase production. In the main, these are the ways in which, in the first instance, we should try to meet the present situation. Increased production, in so far as it will involve further employment, fresh employment, would to that extent offset unemployment which is almost certain to take place in other directions through the lack of supply of the necessary materials.
The policy which the Government have pursued in regard to our whole economic life is undoubtedly of great assistance at the moment. But we still have a good distance to go before we would arrive at such a degree of self-containedness that a war like the present one would not strike us badly. We have gone, as I have indicated already, a very great distance. It is a source of satisfaction to us to find at the present time that we have gone that distance, because going the distance we have gone is going to relieve us from many difficulties which we would otherwise have to face. It would be a great mistake to think that we have been able to get so far that there is not still left a difficult problem or series of problems to be dealt with. Having referred to more production in general, I believe that the best way to do that is to pursue that general line of policy, to try to build up here, so far as is possible, an economic condition in which we will be to the largest extent possible independent of outside trade. I believe it is possible to go very much farther than we have been able to go up to the present. This may not be the very best time, from a certain point of view to make the effort. The effort probably could have been made better and with a certain amount of advantage, because of the accessibility of certain raw materials, at an earlier time. Indeed, if we had not begun our policy of trying to get the manufacture here of a number of articles which formerly were brought in from outside we would find we would be in a rather dangerous position to-day. But we ought to work on that general line of policy and to increase our industries and our power of supplying our own needs so far as it is possible to do that with the raw materials which will be available.
Our difficulty there is the possibility that certain raw materials that may be necessary at the first stage of our advance may not be available. As I said, the most immediate problem that will arise from the present situation is the problem of unemployment. We will have to try to the utmost extent to find for those who will be unemployed alternative methods of employment. At any time that is difficult. If people are prevented from carrying on their skilled trades and occupations through a closing down of supplies, it is not easy to take these people and put them on to other occupations of a similar character in which their skill will be able to be utilised. In many cases it may not be possible to get anything like commensurate employment for them. In the case of unskilled labour it is somewhat different, though even there there is going to be a difficulty. There are certain directions in which, for general public purposes, use may be made of unskilled labour. But skilled labour, particularly labour located in the cities, is going to be a very serious problem indeed for the Government and, fundamentally, for the country, because that is a matter in which not merely the Government or the members of the Dáil are concerned, but in which the community as a whole is concerned.
These conditions are also, of course, going to bring about serious financial conditions, because with the restriction of certain industrial activities, with the diminution of production in certain directions, and with an increase in unemployment you are going to have added financial difficulties.
In view of that, of course, it is the duty of the Government to watch very carefully and see that any money that spent, is spent only in a profitable way, profitable from the point of view of the good of the community as a whole. We are asked, for example, in that connection: "Why have you mobilised the Army; is it going to be expensive?" It is going to be expensive. But again, the very people who ask why do we mobilise the Army or why do we put ourselves into a position of defence and increase the expenditure by so doing, would be the first to criticise the Government if, through lack of taking the necessary precautions, we were driven from our present position of neutrality, or if the national interests were seriously damaged in any way. Every one of the small States in Europe has had to face the expense of the mobilisation of an Army many times greater than our Army. I do not know if there is any other State in Europe that has had such a small standing army as we have been maintaining for years past. But of this I am certain, that there is no State in Europe to-day that is not maintaining a force many times the size of the force which we are maintaining, and having to bear the cost of it, too. Why are they doing this?
Because they are on the frontiers.
No. They are doing it because they value their national sovereignty, their national independence, and they know perfectly well that if one side is allowed to infringe their neutrality, the other side will do it, and they will become a cockpit. They are doing it and bearing that cost as a measure of national insurance. If there was a complaint to be made from the national point of view with regard to the forces which we are maintaining at arms at the moment, that complaint would be that we are allowing financial considerations so to affect us that we are even running big risks by not having a much stronger force.
The point that we were formerly vulnerable only from one direction has given many people in this country a false idea of the present situation. We are not now living in the Europe of the 'nineties, or the Europe of the early years of this century. We are living in quite a different Europe. The methods and engines of attack are very different to-day from the methods and engines of attack which were available then. We are, in fact, in the centre of a theatre of war. There is war all around our coasts. We are in the centre of a theatre of war, and if we want to maintain our neutrality and to prevent our territory from being used by the belligerents in their own interests, thereby involving us as a cockpit, we must have some force, and the bigger we are able to afford the better. We must have some force to see that any attempts upon us will not be made with impunity, and it will be clear to everybody that we will have a force which will be able, under ordinary circumstances, to protect our neutrality.
The Government would much prefer not to have to put the country to the expense that is involved in that policy, but we are not prepared to take the responsibility of leaving this country in a worse state in the matter of defence than we have at the moment. Were it not for financial considerations, and these alone, the force we would have would be much greater and the protection of our interests which that force would give would be very much greater than it is possible at the moment to have. As was explained in reply to a question to-day, our standing Army was nothing but the nucleus for the Army which would be required for national defence and, although we do not want to give the specific numbers, we do not mind confessing here to the Dáil that it is a smaller Army than we would like to have from the point of view of the general national protection.
The trouble is that our people think they are secure and that they need to take no measures to preserve their security. They act sometimes as a person might act if there was a riot in a street. That person might think that because he was a harmless individual going about his business, he was safe from the missiles that would be thrown or the batons of the police who might be charging down the street. We cannot afford to take that view. We have to take measures of protection to the extent, which our resources will permit. In regard to this matter the Army, the opinion of the Government is that, far from having a fore; more than is required at the moment and bearing the expense of it, the force we have is not sufficient to give us that guarantee of national defence which we think is desirable.
The same wrong idea about our situation and our dangers is responsible for a good deal of the misunderstanding with regard to air raid precautions. You were told in the answer to a question to-day that the main purpose of these precautions and any orders that may be made is to reduce the vulnerability of our State, to put us in a better position to resist any pressure that may be made upon us to depart from the policy which we think is desirable in the national interest, namely, the policy of neutrality. If we have an open city here which can be bombed, and there are no precautions taken, and no plan for the protection of the citizens in case the city were bombed, what resistance do you think could the Government put up against any claims? Does not everybody know that this city is the most vulnerable point in the whole State?
What is your plan?
If the Deputy will just wait and let me talk, he will have several hours in which to ask questions —he can do so in the course of his speech. To-day two hours were devoted to the asking of questions. I think the Deputy ought to allow me to make my statement without interruption. As I have said, if there are no plans there can be no resistance to pressure, and the extent to which a Government would be able to resist if they had to resist is the extent to which we are not vulnerable in any direction. The plans must be all aimed at reducing our vulnerability, whether it he from the point of view of having an army able to resist attack, to the extent, again, which our needs permit us, or the point of view of having plans and arrangements that this city and other cities and large centres of population may not be vulnerable, and that their vulnerability may not be used as a method of pressure on us to retreat from a position which it is in the national interest we should maintain.
In every neutral country there have boon black-outs. I have been in Switzerland and have seen them for years past. The population there have been accustomed to take and to practise certain measures, which would be necessary for their safety in case of a possible attack on the country. Switzerland does not desire to change its neutrality, and yet it had to do these things. Its people had to practise measures which would reduce losses that there might be if, on any account, some State were to infringe their neutrality or attack them. We have to do the same thing. We have got to accustom our people to practise those measures which will be of value to them in case there was any attack made upon us, or any attempt to interfere with us from outside. As I said, other States have been practising for years. Our people are not accustomed to do so, but we have got, step by step, to accustom them to those measures and to make an organisation which will enable them to put into practice plans which are calculated to reduce losses in case of attack.
I say that our greatest danger here is our complacency in regard to this whole matter, a complacency begotten by the fact that in the past we had not to defend ourselves directly, as that responsibility lay with another people and another country. Now we have the responsibility for freedom, and we have got to defend ourselves, and any help that may come in any way from outside for our defence will come in the interests of the other people, and not in our interests. We have got to see to it that we are in the best possible position to defend our own interests. It is new to us, mainly because this particular responsibility for freedom was not in our power to exercise before.
Again, the question of censorship arises. It is often asked: "What is the meaning of this? We are a neutral country. Why do you want any censorship?" We want censorship for our own security here. In times of war there is a certain ferment, and forces which in peace time are negligible become dangerous then. The methods by which they propagate their ideas, and which might be tolerated in peace time, cannot he tolerated in a time of war. Therefore, attempts that might be made to use the present situation for the destruction of our community here will have to be safeguarded by a proper censorship. We want censorship also, just as other neutral countries want it, to prevent our neutrality from being brought into question, to prevent the belligerent States complaining that matters which they have forbidden, and have kept out of their Press, for example, should be made here available for the other belligerents. It would be of great value to a number of Deputies, and indeed to the people as a whole, if a study were made of the difficulties which the neutral States experienced during the last war. If that study were made, there would be a much greater understanding of the measures which the Government has to take here. Do not forget that our neutrality imposes upon us obligations, in some cases obligations of a very stringent character, and that in order that we may be able to meet these obligations, as well as the protection internally of the State otherwise, we have to do things which may seem unnecessary to people who think that as neutrals they are completely immune and that by saying: "We do not want to be in this fight" they will be free from interference by the belligerents. They will not be anything of the kind. I think the example I have given of a riot in the street, and the fact that a person going about lawful work is not protected from the consequences, should be sufficient to show us the position we are in.
We have then the problem of defence, and to meet these problems of various kinds we thought it advisable to set up a Ministry for the co-ordination of various defensive measures. There was a special reason for that, because with the increase in the size of the Army it was desirable that the Minister for Defence should be in as close touch as possible with the Army and its condition. Questions were asked the Minister for Defence to-day which were right questions to be asked with regard to the conditions of the men called up, and so on. It was right that everyone should be interested in these conditions, and that there should be one person responsible for looking after those conditions, but he cannot do it if he is distracted by a number of other things. Therefore, it was decided that the Minister for Defence, at a time like this, should be free from other duties which might fall upon him, with a view to devoting his attention more closely to the Army and to its immediate requirements. To give us a Minister free to do that and, at the same time, to have someone charged with the general co-ordination of defensive measures, we asked the former Minister for Defence, as we asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce, to leave his immediate Department and take on wider spheres of activity. It is clear that the man who has been doing particular work for a period is the desirable person to put in charge.
I have spoken of the problem of the special organisation which is being set up, both in regard to our economic life and general national defence. I do not know that there is any other particular direction in which Deputies may require further information. If any particular points are raised in the course of the discussion I hope to be in a position to deal with them at the close of the debate. I take it, generally, that the purpose of this debate is to enable Deputies to assure themselves with regard to the measures that were taken in the national interests. In regard to supplies from outside I must say that that question requires much closer contact with the sources from which these supplies come, namely, largely from Britain, than was necessary up to the present.
The Minister for Agriculture was asked about the arrangements that were being made by his Department for the sale of our produce to Britain. There is going to be a centralised system in Britain, and they will only buy through a central organisation, apparently, here. Our duty is to try to make such an arrangement as will be satisfactory, if possible, to our people. Like every other arrangement where there is a question of negotiations each side tries to get that which is best for itself, and very often there has to be a compromise between the different viewpoints. Deputy Belton said we should hold up all our cattle. I do not want to make the obvious reference to the attitude which he would have taken on a previous occasion.
I do not think the Taoiseach is quite correct in the statement which he has attributed to me. I will repeat later what I did say, and explain what I meant.
The point is that we have to negotiate, in the interests of our country, arrangements for which the Minister for Agriculture will be immediately responsible. He will be responsible for trying to negotiate such arrangements as will be to the benefit of our people, and to get for them the best he can. I think he has indicated that no arrangement has been made up to the present with regard to the fat cattle; he stated that we could not agree to the proposition that has been made. What will be the end of it I do not know. Clearly, if Deputy Belton's method would succeed, all our people would expect us to adopt it, but the question is whether it would or not. If we feel it will succeed, well I suppose the Minister for Agriculture may be expected to take it. But that would be a matter of judgment and opinion. When the Minister for Agriculture has gone into the position, he will have to decide whether or not he will agree, or whether it is in the national interests here to agree to any proposal that may be made. I think our farmers as a whole would prefer to have the old system of selling their live stock and agricultural products operate. But we cannot force other people to do that unless we are prepared definitely to take the line which has been suggested by Deputy Belton. There are two sides to this question. There is the question of the disposal of our produce, and there is also the getting of the supplies which we need.
Hear, hear!
There are two sides to it—there is the give and take, and we have to do the best we ran in the circumstances. We have to make the best bargain we can for our people. That is the attitude that will be taken by our Government—the attitude that will be taken by the Minister for Agriculture. With regard to supplies, we will have to enter into arrangements and try to get the particular supplies we want. There are shipping and other difficulties that will be involved. The result is that the present situation involves much closer communication with the British Government and the British Departments which are now going to control their whole economic life, than has been necessary heretofore. I mention that matter because I want to point out to the people who may not realise it, the position with regard to this question of imports and exports.
I think that I have already said that about 50 per cent. of our imports come directly from Britain—one of the belligerent States—and about 90 per cent. of our exports go to that country. These, are now being centralised. As one party in the centralisation is the British Government and the Departments it controls, it is obvious that we here must have a method of communication and contact much closer than has been necessary up to the present. In this matter I am now dealing only with the larger points. I think the questions that were asked here to-day and the answers given relieve me of what would otherwise be a large part of my duty in this debate. I already promised that, if there were any other questions left over, or any other points raised in the discussion, I would deal with them later, and this I will do.
The leader of the Opposition will, at a later stage, intervene in the debate and deal with certain views arising from the financial position and the economic life of the country. In the meantime, I want to make a few observations on certain urgent problems that arise in connection with agriculture, with the maintenance of supplies, and with profiteering. But before embarking on those questions I think there are two things requiring to be said. The first is that there is a great deal of lamentation amongst the supporters of the Government about the inconveniences to which they have been put by their inability to get supplies of this and supplies of that raw material. Has it ever occurred to them that the Chancellor of the German Reich has provided Fianna Fáil with that one thing which during the past seven years they have been professing to seek under the leadership of the Taoiseach? Fianna Fáil had not been able to get that one thing in a period of over seven years. But the Chancellor of the German Reich got for them self-sufficiency in a fortnight. And they do not like it. The Fianna Fáil Party has been crying out for self-sufficiency for more than seven weary years. We, on this side of the House, have been telling them that they could not get it, or that when they got it they would not like it. Now somebody else has got it for them and the welkin rings with their lamentations. I met one of the Taoiseach's most hardened supporters this morning. He had a face like a wet week. He said he was trying to get supplies for his industry, that he was unable to get them and he was afraid his industry would have to close down. It was because he was unable to get these supplies that he was afraid he would have to close down. I could not resist saying to him: "Hearty congratulations on your success in getting self-sufficiency. You have been looking for it for years past and now you have got it and you are not happy." He looked at me more in sorrow than in anger, said "Goodbye" and hurried off in the opposite direction. I wish the Government the best of good-will in their struggle to get out of self-sufficiency.
We are into it.
You are into it, and the further you get out of it and the quicker you get out of it the better pleased I will be. Any help you require to get yourself out of this appalling mess in which we all are we will give to you with a heart and a half. Never be afraid to call on us. Never be afraid to look to us for advice or help. We will advise you all the advice you want. But, Fianna Fáil is the Government of this country. It is a Government chosen by the majority of our people in as free an election as ever was fought in this country. It is a Government with a clear majority. It is a Government that is absolutely secure in its ten years of office, and on its shoulders rests the responsibility of carrying on the Government now. Those who complain about the hardships in which they are involved as a result of the mess that this Government is making of the situation let them bear this in mind—that it was the people themselves chose it. We told them they were incompetent seven years ago, six years ago, two years ago and one year ago and, in spite of that warning, the people chose that Government. They made their bed and the people have got to lie on it. It is a rough, prickly couch.
Without blankets.
Without blankets, as Deputy O'Higgins says, but they will have to content themselves with it.
But there is some wheat and some beet all the same, in spite of the Deputy.
And you are going to feed the wheat to pigs. You will have every pig in this country with dyspepsia of a character that will reduce the population of pigs in this country far more than it has been already reduced. You do not even know that much about producing supplies.
I want to say a word in defence of the Government. People are very unreasonable. Everybody is complaining bitterly now that the Government is making a moss of the situation. What did you expect them to make of the situation? Did you not know they were incompetent 12 months ago? Did you imagine that because a European war broke out they would all become competent overnight? They are incompetent. They are the most incompetent Government that has ever been in this country. But the people chose them and the people have a perfect right to choose an incompetent Government if they want one. If the people are suffering from the consequences of their own choice that, is their democratic privilege to suffer and they are going to be fully indulged in it before this war is over. Of course they are incompetent and they have made a mess of almost everything that they have put their hand to. Now is our chance to make hares of them through the country and we can do it easily if we want to. I do not believe it is in the interests of this country to do that now. I look forward with enthusiasm to doing it at the conclusion of this war —and I have not the slightest doubt that we will—but it is not expedient to do it now. There is no use spending Parliamentary time pointing out to these men what egregious mistakes they have made. All I am concerned with now is to tell them how to correct urgently some of the worst mistakes they have already made and how to avoid falling into the same kind of error in the difficulties with which they are going to find themselves confronted in the future.
I believe in plain talking and I am not trying to talk on Party lines. I believe that a great deal of the apprehension that has been raised by the British Government price regulation in regard to fat cattle is unnecessary in this country because you may try to regulate prices what way you like but when the British people want beef they will pay for it. They will make all sorts of lofty rules and regulations to keep prices down in order to keep the Labour Party's mouth shut in Great Britain and to keep Deputy Norton's mouth shut in this country but, when we want food for the people or when the British want food for the people or when anybody wants food for the people and the people are hungry you have got to pay for it if you want it. Anyone who makes excess profits or great fortunes will lose them in the inflation that will take place at the end of this war and you may as well make your minds up to that now.
So far as I am concerned I am not one bit uneasy about our farmers being mulcted in the price of their cattle by any regulations the British may make. There may he a few weeks, or a few months, of difficulty while the British are vainly struggling to impose a rigid system of control on cattle such as has already broken down in regard to fish in Great Britain but, sooner or later, we are going to get on to the only sensible basis in regard to the matter and that is, if you have a fat beast you will sell it to the highest bidder. My advice to the British Government, for what it is worth, is to face that fact now and the sooner they face it the less trouble there will be.
So far as the production of cattle is concerned, I grieve to say that to stimulate production of cattle and to increase the cattle population of this country immediately is virtually an impossibility—a thing that cannot be done—but, if the prices are satisfactory, the cattle population of this country will be increased as rapidly as it is humanly possible to do so, provided our Government will do one thing—and I want to impress upon the Government at once the urgency of this matter—that is, to provide the men with land and knowledge and skill, with liquid capital to get going. Mind you, we as a Party raised here on the previous occasion the question of capital for agriculture, but in that we envisaged something different from what I am thinking of now. We were then asking for long term loans for farmers to re-equip their farms and to equip them with foundation stocks. Now, I am asking that the man who has land and could use it for the production of pigs or the production of cattle, but who has no stock, should be given facilities to borrow money in order to buy stock, or to till land in order to plant cereals and grow crops, because, if they do not, and if you do not do it now, next Spring may come and thousands of acres of this country's land may go unproductive because the men who owned it had not got the money to put it into production. That is an urgent matter. These will be short-term loans. This will be working capital which will be turning over very rapidly and, if that is forthcoming, my advice to the cattle men of this country would be: "Produce all the cattle you can, and do not worry about people telling you you will not get a good price for it." In the fair of Strokes-town last week any man who went into the fair with any kind of a forward bullock had his coat pulled off him by the buyers trying to buy from him. There were three buyers for every beast. My advice to the farmers of this country is to go out to the fair with their cattle and be as stiff as they like. They will get a good price for their cattle, and any man who has cattle is going to make money on them. Any man who produces cattle is doing a national service and a service to his own pocket at the same time, and he deed not be one bit afraid that any attempt to regulate the price of his cattle by this Government or the British Government, short of complete confiscation by our own Government, will prevent him from getting a good return on his work.
I think, both for our sake and the sake of Great Britain, our Government should go to them now and say: "Do not start making regulations which can be exploited in Éire as good reasons for not going into production now. Do not differentiate between our produce and the produce of Northern Ireland. What you want in Britain is food, and we are prepared to deliver the goods. Do not make our task of getting those goods produced more difficult by making differentiations between the produce of Éire and the produce of Northern Ireland." We do not ask—and no reasonable man can ask—that Great Britain should pay us more for our goods than she pays to her own people in Great Britain. We should say to the British Government that we are not asking for any better price than the farmers of Great Britain are getting. I am not saying that they are now giving us the same price. What I am saying is that we should go to the British and say to them: "So far as you can, make it clear that our farmers are going to get the same price as your farmers. That done, we will do all in our power to produce the maximum output and ship it over to you for a fair return." I want to say this here—and I have no doubt I will get into trouble with some of my own colleagues for saying it—that there is no use asking the Prime Minister to go over and put a pistol to the head of the British Government. There is no man who likes to take a handful of feathers out of the Prime Minister's tail more than I, but there is no use asking the Prime Minister, at this juncture, to go over and make a bluff we are not prepared to have called. God knows we made a bluff once before and it will take 20 years to recover from it. We started one economic war with Great Britain. God forbid we should ever start another. That is plain truth. Let us not be telling the Prime Minister that he ought to go over and take Mr. Chamberlain by the throat and say: "No cash, no cattle."
The boot is on the other foot now.
On whatever foot it is, let us leave it there. Let us not try to put on John Bull's boot and let John Bull not try to put on ours. Let each of us wear our own and treat one another as two rational people living together. Let us adopt the attitude to one another that on the one hand there is a willing buyer, and on the other there is a willing seller. Let us remember always that a hard bargain is a bad bargain, and let us not pretend that if we can put on the screws we will do better. We will not; we will learn to our cost that we cannot do that. All we want is a fair and reasonable bargain. Let us remember that the British people may have many shortcomings but that they are a fair and reasonable people. There is no use in asking the Prime Minister to do what is not possible. All we can do is to ask him as a reasonable man, to make a reasonable deal with the British Government in a spirit of good-will and co-operation and, if he does, we will produce the stuff and the British wil1 fee what they want—which is food.
He should not ask us to do anything that is unreasonable.
I do not want him to. All I want——
What about the wheat?
I am not going to grow wheat to feed the Deputy's pigs. I want Deputies to bear another matter in mind. I do not know whether they have noted that the Danish Government has begun to request that her produce delivered into England be paid for in kroner and not in sterling. If that demand is persisted in, and if the British Government grants it—and they might have to grant it—there can be but little doubt that sterling will depreciate in terms of kroner. Otherwise, the Danes would not ask for that concession. As sterling depreciates, the value of our merchandise is going to rise considerably, which is another reason for anticipating that any, inequality in prices will tend to disappear as time passes on. Let us get on with the job of producing and keep the Government in tow to get for us the wherewithal to produce. It is not the danger of price that confronts us. It is the danger that we may not get the supplies to produce the stuff. That is the real danger. Let us not say to the Government: "If you do not get us the stuff we will produce nothing." If we did that, we would be "done for". On the contrary, let us say: "We want to produce three times as much as we have produced before, and it is your job to get us the supplies to enable us to do it."
We ought to face this problem. We cannot increase immensely in a short time our output of cattle, for the plain and simple reason that it takes a cow nine months to have a calf. In the same period the pig can have about 24 offspring. We should approach the problem, then, with two main objectives in view: one is rapid production and the other is long-term production. In the field of long-term production we might include cattle, and in that of rapid production we might include pigs, poultry and dairy produce. because we can turn heifers into cows and increase the cow population. I hope the Minister will take every available means at his disposal to bring home to the minds of the people that pigs, fowl, eggs, poultry and milk are worth their weight in gold and any man who commits himself to doubling his output in produce of this kind is going to make money. Any man who fights shy of the work and who holds back is going to be the loser, because, by the time that he is ready, the opportunity will have passed. What is needed now is a good publicity drive.
One must have cattle food. You cannot feed cattle on publicity.
I am walking about pigs, fowl, poultry, eggs and milk. You can feed pigs. These are spheres of production in which we can approach something like self-sufficiency, and that was the strength of the policy of the late Mr. Hogan. Provided you give credits in order to enable people to build up stocks, you can get on with the work. You can grow barley for the feeding of pigs; you can grow oats for the feeding of fowl, just as we have always advocated; you can grow roots to supplement the ration of dairy cows. If we get going now in breeding the necessary stock and preparing for sowing suitable crops in the next spring, we can produce an almost unlimited quantity of the five commodities which I have mentioned: provided, that our people are prepared to take the risk. They need reassuring to do that, and since. they want that reassuring, now is the time to start persuading them to make ready so that they will be in a position to produce the stuff when it is wanted.
That brings us to the question of supply. I mentioned earlier to-day that we were all told to sow catch crops, consisting of vetches and rye, but when we went to look for the seed we found that there was none to be had. Since then I discovered that vetches are to be found in Dundalk and rye in Cork. This means that the man in Dundalk has no rye and the man in Cork no vetches. The Minister for Supplies, the Minister for Agriculture and the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures could not find out that there are vetches in Dundalk and rye in Cork. Those ought to be exchanged so that there will be vetches and rye in both districts. Hundreds of acres which ought to be under catch crops now have not been so sown because the man who could get vetches could not get perennial or rye grass to sow with them and the man who could get rye could not get vetches. That does not reflect credit on the Department responsible.
I have already referred to the extraordinary folly of forbidding shopkeepers to purchase flour during the month of August. What naturally happened there was that the Minister for Agriculture was so obsessed with his home-grown wheat scheme that he did not want flour to be in store in people's shops prior to the 1st September, when he proposed to increase the admixture of home-grown grain; and he, therefore, organised things in such a way that, on the 1st September, there was virtually no flour in the country at all so that the mills could not start milling in the increased quantity of home-grown grain.
Unfortunately for the Minister's calculations, on the day that he had set apart for the introduction of this scheme, the European War broke out. He then discovered that there was a general shortage of wheat, and that there was a panic in the country. People wanted flour; everybody went to buy flour at once, and it became quite impossible to get the flour out to the country at all, with the result that a whole illusory scare started regarding a shortage of flour. All that could have been avoided and a very substantial amount of wheat could have been stored in the country if the Minister had not been guilty of that egregious folly.
We now come to one of the most alarming facts which we have got to face. It is hard to believe it, but it is true. Not one stone of Indian corn was stored in this country prior to the war. The new Indian corn out of the Indian mills started to arrive in this country from the River Plate last May. There were the months of June, July and August in which you could have bought any amount of maize and stored it here with perfect safety, building up a 12 months' supply of foodstuffs. Not one bag was laid by, and in the course of the last fortnight two ships laden with corn for this country were sunk in the Atlantic; so that we are now faced with a shortage of corn for the next six months. It is said that we are going to feed pigs on flaked wheat. That means we are going to feed them on flour, but covering it up by the name of flaked wheat. That is the co-ordination of supply!That is a very grave situation, one which, I think, it will be hard to remedy. However, the thing to do now is to ask ourselves how we are going to remedy it.
The best method to remedy that situation is to do two things at once. One is to lay plans immediately for acquiring 12 months' supply of corn. The Government cannot do that easily, but they ought to buy corn wherever they can. They should be on their guard against being tempted into buying large quantities of South African white corn, which will not keep, and which they might be induced to purchase owing to the scarcity of good, hard Plate corn. Millers will explain that to the Minister. There is a great deal of soft white corn which is good feeding stuff, if it is used in a short time, but it cannot be stored because it sprouts, heats, and goes back. The second thing is to start now telling the people that barley will feed pigs almost as well as Indian corn.
It is about time that was said.
Let us not open up on every discussion we have had for the past ten years now. If I am compelled to open up on that, the Ministry will regret it. The best substitute we can get for Indian meal is barley, and now is the time to tell the people that, but, for heaven's sake, let the Government not make the same mistake they made about other crops. Try to find out now from the agricultural instructors what areas will not grow barley. There is some land in this country on which it is virtually impossible to grow barley, and he would have to be a very highly skilled agriculturist who would make a success of the crop in these areas. Do not tell all and sundry, "Plant every acre you can with barley," but intelligently survey the country and address your publicity to those counties where barley can be successfully and economically grown.
There are 300,000 acres for next year whether you like it or not.
The next difficulty with which they are confronted is the comparative, the almost complete, scarcity of linseed, crushed flax-seed and oilseed. I do not know where Ministers are going to get supplies of them. I think they will find it extremely difficult. In addition to the suggestions I have already made, I want to make this last suggestion, and I think it is important. The Prime Minister has pointed out that we are going to get the bulk of our supplies from Great Britain.
It is the only place from which we can get them. We ought to go to Britain now and say: "Your primary requirement, is food. If you bring maize or flax-seed into England, you are bringing it there to convert it into food. If you lose a ship full to the gunwales with corn, that cargo would be worth £l2 a ton, but if you lose the same ship full to the gunwales with bacon, that cargo would be worth £112 per ton. Instead of bringing cargoes of bacon from abroad through the perils of the high seas, bring us cargoes of corn and we shall produce for you cargoes of bacon. We shall deliver to you, perfectly safely, its equivalent in bacon the value of which will be £112 per ton."
At our risk?
Devil a much risk there will be crossing the Irish Sea. If the submarines can dominate the Irish Sea we might as well throw our hat at it. It is the German markets we should then have to seek for our bacon. There is no more danger of submarines dominating the Irish Sea than there is of my going over to Germany to cut the moustache of Adolf Hitler. We have a perfectly safe sea around these islands, thanks not to ourselves, but thanks to God and the British fleet, and across that safe stretch of sea we shall send all the bacon we can. We should say to the British Government: "We are not approaching you to do anything benevolent; we are putting a business proposition before you. Send us a cargo of corn at £l2 per ton and we are prepared to convert it into a cargo of bacon which will be worth £112 to you."
The only snag in that is that it takes 6 cwt. of corn to make 1 cwt. of bacon.
But there are ships in which corn can be carried in which you cannot carry bacon. Corn does not require a refrigerator.
You could carry salt bacon.
Devil a much salt bacon the Minister ever ate. It is only the poor lads down the country who have to eat salt bacon. People who have £1,700, or even £480 a year, do not eat much salt bacon, I can tell you.
You might be glad to get it some time.
I remember the day when if I made a reply such as the Minister has just made to me now, the Minister would say: "Sabotage!You are selling me out to the British; you are putting arguments into the mouth of the British Government to outdo me." However, the Minister has put the case so badly that I need not deal with it, as I believe the British could make a much better answer themselves. I consider that if I went to negotiate on these lines, having considered this question carefully, I could make a good case for their supplying us with corn for conversion into bacon. If they supply us with corn we shall be able to produce all the foodstuffs they require and at the same time provide some money for our sorely-tried farmers. You cannot, however, produce crops without artificial manure. Are steps being taken now to secure supplies of basic slag, superphosphate and nitrogen, because it is going to be very hard to get them? The slag we should have in November. The phosphates we must have in Spring, and the potash and the nitrogen in June. There is only one place from which we can get them, and we ought to try to get them now.
May I remind the Minister that we have in this country an Industrial Research Council, and my information is that the Industrial Research Council has discovered that very valuable quantities of potash can be extracted from kelp? I am told that there is widespread unemployment in Connemara and on the West coast of Donegal, the traditional kelp-producing areas. I think that we should say to the kelp-burners that they should get to work now. I am told that the extraction of potash from kelp is an operation that does not require elaborate machinery, which we might have difficulty in procuring. It is largely a tank process which we can conduct without any serious expenditure on machinery or without incurring any undue delay by waiting to get machinery from abroad.
Again, I am told that we can get glucose from carrageen and I understand that our stocks of glucose have completely dried up and that England will not supply us with a pound of it. If, as I am told, large quantities can be produced from carrageen we ought to get a commercial unit operating immediately for the production of this very valuable commodity, and see if it can be further developed in these times of crisis. I understand that in the production of wrapping paper there is a pulp used of which carrageen contains 30 or 40 per cent. If that is so, it would be of enormous assistance because if we cannot get a supply of wood pulp in Britain, a very serious problem will be presented to this country in the near future If we could get 40 per cent. from carrageen the sooner we put our hands to the development of that work the better we will be. I remember very well the savage indignation that swept the ranks of Fianna Fáil when I suggested that the cement factory was manned by human beings and not angels. There was an indignant outcry among Fianna Fáil at the suggestion that there could be any one on the board of this beautiful Irish factory we were going to build who would use dirty nasty foreign cement. But it now comes about that a large part of the cement that has been sold to citizens of this country by Cement Limited is Belgian cement. The only difference between it and the cement that I used to import from Belgium, is that the cement which Cement Limited is bringing in from Belgium is sold at 15/- per ton more. When that source of supply is cut off, we cannot get cement. The Minister reassured us to-day, in answer to questions, that we will be able to get normal supplies. If that is true, why is it that normal supplies were stopped when the Belgian supply, coming into this country, was put an end to by Belgium? I do not know, but it docs not speak well for the Minister responsible for the co-ordination of supplies.
I have said already that the Leader of the Opposition will deal with the financial aspect of the situation which requires consideration. I have no doubt that the Government will try to derive considerable revenue from tariffs in order to meet the demands that will be made on the public purse of the country. I put it to the Government that never was there a time when it was more important that tariffs should be taken off the raw materials of the agricultural industry. We ought to hold out before the people of this country the inducement of profit to produce agricultural produce. Remember, we cannot hold out the inducement that they are producing food for their own needs. We have plenty of food for ourselves. They are producing food for export. What we have got to hold out to the farmers of this country is their duty to the State of earning national income by selling agricultural produce profitably, and it will be a help to them to do that if we take off the tariffs and the quotas from the raw materials of the agricultural industry now. It is to be remembered that Great Britain may be very slow to sell us raw materials which she wants for her own factories, but it is of vital interest to Great Britain to maintain her export of manufactured goods. She wants to sell agricultural implements and galvanised buckets, and I believe she will be willing to sell concentrated foodstuffs. Let us get these, and if we are able to get them from Great Britain at the lowest possible price our farmers will be offered the highest possible inducement to produce and that is what matters now. As I see the problem, it is not a question of price. We need not worry about the price because that can settle itself. It is a question of production. If the farmers of the country take advantage of the prices that now obtain they can make a good livelihood and help to make a contribution towards the success of a struggle that is vital to the interests of Christianity in this country—a contribution to victory in that struggle.
The other matter that I want to refer to is profiteering. I am sorry that the Minister for Supplies is not here. I think he might have spared the time to attend this debate. What is profiteering? It is not a charge which should be lightly bandied about. I think profiteering is asking from people who stand in need of things vital to their survival, a sum in excess of the just price. I believe that a person who exacts from a needy citizen a sum in excess of the just price for the vital necessities of life, is as much bound under the moral law to refund that excess as he would be to refund a sum of money which he stole out of that person's pocket and put in his own. That is profiteering. I think that a person who for coal, flour, bread, sugar, milk or essential foodstuffs, uses a temporary scarcity for the purpose of extracting from a poor poison one penny more than the just price for that article is bound, in justice, to seek that person out and give it back to him, just as much as if he had taken £1,000 from a bank or sixpence from a poor woman. I think that persons who bandy about charges of profiteering against every merchant and shopkeeper in this country sins just as gravely against justice as the person who robs the poor. They have no right to rob a man of his character or slander him without any regard for the justice of the charge they lay against him. Many people—Deputies in this House, and I am looking now directly at Deputy Norton—would say that it is wrong, and profiteering, for a merchant to sell his goods at replacement prices. Let me explain that. Suppose a merchant has in his store a dozen buckets the retail price of which is 1/-, and he finds when he inquires the price from his supplier, that the price has gone up to 1/6, Deputy Norton, I think, would say that the merchant should be selling his buckets at 1/- until all his buckets were gone: that it was only when he bought in the new supply that he would be entitled to increase the price to 1/6. I wonder did Deputy Norton ever ask himself this question——
That is your own thesis. I never put forward that immoral practice.
I see that I have succeeded in frightening the Deputy from propounding it. Let me put this to the Deputy. At the other end of the period of price, this same merchant has in his shop two dozen buckets, the price of which is 2/6. The price falls to 1/-. Will Deputy Norton go around among the customers of that man and encourage them to go in and buy those buckets from him at 2/6, buckets which another man down the street is offering at 1/-? Deputy Norton is a professional man, a theorist, who is completely out of touch with the normal everyday problems of the commercial man's life. You cannot hop into business on a Monday, hop out on a Wednesday and hop back again on Friday.
The Deputy appears to be getting very vexed about his own theories.
I am at the views that are being created in the public mind by irresponsible people about a grave evil. I would like to marshal public indignation against true profiteering. I say that if the word "profiteering" is loosely used to describe perfectly legitimate practices and at the same time to describe scandalous and illegitimate practices, the public indignation that should be used against the illegitimate practices will be dissipated in incredulity when people discover that what had been a perfectly legitimate thing to do was being described by irresponsible people as profiteering. It has been acknowledged and recognised by responsible people that, if a merchant is to carry on his business, he has got to sell his goods at replacement prices.
That principle, Sir, was recognised in the last War, because a merchant must build up reserves now against the day when the inevitable slump comes. If he does not, he will go bankrupt. Deputies will remember that during the last War excess profits duty was levied on your entire profits, but at the end of the war you were asked: "What have you lost in the two slump years"? You were refunded, out of your total contribution on excess profits, the sums you had lost in the two slump years. That is a rational and reasonable arrangement to make. I think that ought to be recognised by the Government, and that the grotesque system of attempting to regulate prices which is at present in operation should be promptly abandoned.
Where did the 26th August formula come from? That was born in, a civil servant's mind, if anything was ever born in a civil servant's mind. The new formula is that everything is to be sold at the same price at which you were selling it on 26th August. That rolled about the Government Department, and the more it rolled the more deliciously vague it looked. That was the kind of thing nobody could hang anything on. Eventually, intoxicated by the success of this formula, an order issued forth this morning. Everybody selling dungarees has to sell the dungarees at the same price now that he was charging for them on August 26th. What is to prevent me from going through my stock of dungarees and sewing one glass button on the bosom of every dungaree? It is then a different dungaree from that which I was selling on 26th August, and I can charge what I like for it. The fellow who buys the dungaree can cut the button off, but it is not the same dungaree I was selling on 26th August. If you want to establish that it is the same dungaree, you will have to bring it to the Government testing station; you will have to satisfy yourself that its tensile strength is the same as the tensile strength of the dungaree sold by me on 26th August; you will have to satisfy yourself that the dye is the same, that the work done on it is the same, that the finish is the same, that the material is the same, that the buttons are the same, and that the number of buttons on each dungaree is the same. That is the kind of order that brings the law into contempt.
What then is the proper way to regulate prices? The proper way to regulate prices is first to say: "Let there be as little inconvenience as possible." What we are concerned to do is to prevent any poor person being deprived of the necessities of life by an attempt to charge him more than he is in a position to pay. Pick out coal, flour, sugar, bacon, and Indian meal, to begin with. Go to the producers of those goods and say: "You must lay down an ex-factory price for each of these commodities. Having done that we want you to go to the railway company and work out a flat freight rate for every station in Ireland, and the fixed price of your commodity , whether it be Indian meal, coal, flour, sugar or bacon, will be so much per cwt. delivered at any railway station in Ireland. We will then fix the retail price for that commodity within one mile of that station, and another retail price for that commodity sold anywhere outside a radius of one mile from that railway station." That is going to cause some little inconvenience to certain individuals—no regulation you can make will avoid doing that—but it is going to provide certainty for the shopkeeper, certainty for the consumer, and an absolute guarantee against exploitation of the poor.
The average shopkeeper in this country does not give two hoots what price you fix, provided he knows what that price is, but what drives him to distraction is to be told to relate his price to some hypothetical figure that existed six weeks ago, the exact nature of which he does not know, and from hour to hour and day to day ho does not know whether he is breaking the law or not. All the average merchant wants to do is to live. If he is given a chance to carry on, that is all ho asks. It is ridiculous, in times of stress and difficulty such as this, to increase his burden out of all proportion by making orders with which no man on God's earth can comply, no matter what his goodwill.
Let me say this perfectly frankly. An order was made relating to the price of Indian meal at Ballaghaderreen. The effect of the order was to require merchants at Ballaghaderreen to sell Indian meal at 4/- a ton less than they paid for it. I must say that when I drew the attention of the Minister for Industry and Commerce to the matter I got a letter by return saying "Disregard the order", but I was told to disregard the order within 48 hours of its having been made, with all the resulting inconvenience and annoyance which it had given me and other merchants on finding ourselves constrained either to sell the produce at a loss or else to break the law. That is not business. Let me impress upon the Minister that, in fixing prices, the vital necessity is certainty. Let everybody know what the price is. Do not be afraid of creating a little inconvenience. No matter how you make an order you will create that, but the greatest and most intolerable inconvenience you can impose upon consumer and producer alike is to leave him in doubt as to what the position is. Let there be certainty above all things, and then we can get on with the job.
I have spoken of profiteering, and before I pass from that I want to mention one thing. Perhaps the Minister would make a note of it. Petrol is being rationed generally, and the special requirements of Deputies, doctors, clergymen and others are being considered. Might I ask the Minister to make a special note of a small class of people who are nevertheless threatened with a very great difficulty. I am referring to those people who live long distances from a railway station. Take a person who lives half-way between Belmullet and Ballina. Take an individual who lives at a distance from a railway station in Connemara, and whose house is nowhere near a road on which a public conveyance normally passes. It is true that that man could get a horse and trap and drive 15 or 20 miles to a railway station, but, once you have got out of the habit of doing that, it is extremely difficult to adjust your life to that mode of locomotion again. I put it to the Minister that he ought to consider the special case of the person who lives more than seven miles from a railway station, and consequently uses a car for the purpose of getting in and out.
While recognising the necessity for strict control of the prices of essential commodities, I want to ask the Minister—I should like to ask Deputy Norton also—does he think there can be profiteering in luxuries? I do not think there can. I think if a person is fool enough to spend his money on geegaws and luxuries which he really does not want, and if some shopkeeper who has been wise enough to lay in a stock of those things finds such a person who is foolish enough to go in and spend his money on them, well, that is just too bad for that person.
You have got away from the just price now.
No. I said that a just price relates to an article which a person must buy if he is to survive—an essential commodity. I think there is a just price readily ascertainable for that, but in the case of an obviously luxurious article like a bird of paradise plume I do not think there is any just price for it. If anybody is cracked enough to spend money on it, I think the just price is the highest price you can knock out of him. What is a just price for an extravagant emerald ring? I think a just price is the highest price you can knock out of the fool man who is going to buy it for the woman.
I think you have religion of your own.
I am throwing that out as my humble view. I should like to hear Deputy Norton's view on this question, but I do not think I am far wrong. I think I am about right. I think it is ridiculous to try to apply the same rule to transactions of that character and the transactions of a woman with five children who goes in to buy the necessaries of life for them. I think there is a moral obligation resting on the person who supplies her, whereas in the case of the other type of customer, the quicker he is put in the bankruptcy court the better for everyone.
I would invite the Minister and his colleagues to bear this in mind. A lot of people imagine you can go to a distributor and tell him he is to charge the same price for his goods as he was charging on 26th August, but do the Ministers forget that that distributor's costs have gone up all along the line? The bank rate has gone up 2 per cent., which means a substantial addition to the cost of an overdraft in the bank. Petrol has gone up a penny a gallon, which means a substantial addition to his distribution costs. Where, heretofore, he bought six tons of flour on a wagon and got the wagon-rate for his goods, now he is lucky if he gets one ton. If he gets that ton he has got to pay the scale rate. Where he got a large consignment heretofore, he got the lowest rate available. Now he can get only a small consignment, and he has to pay the scale rate, which may be four or five times as much per ton as the wagon rate. I am glad to see the Minister for Supplies arriving at the eleventh hour.
Better start again.
No. I shall leave it to Deputy Norton to tell him about the matters to which I have been referring. I put it to the Minister that he must bear in mind that there have been very substantial increases in the prices of almost every commodity purchased in Great Britain. There is no use in telling the average merchant is this country that he must not increase the price of galvanized buckets if the English producer's price has been increased by 20 per rent., and the Irish producers of galvanized buckets will not sell you any. He has to tell the people either they cannot have galvanised buckets or that they must pay 20 per cent. more for them than they paid a month ago. The same is true of thread, rubber goods, all metal goods, and practically everything you buy. In addition to that, in these times of stress and difficulty it appeared to me that the chief job of a merchant in this country was to get for his community the best supply he could without upsetting the national economy, and he spent his time on the long-distance telephone and sending wires to England and everywhere he thought he could lay his hands on stuff. All that cost money.
Take the case of the man selling coal. The bags he uses cost 2d.; now they cost 4d. Although that increase does not appear when you are reviewing the price of coal qua coal, the man distributing the coal has to buy bags into which to put it. Take paper and string. Both have gone up steeply. You cannot sell a parcel of goods to anybody without putting paper and string on it, and both of these are additional charges which the shopkeeper has to meet. Let us not bandy about the charge of profiteering. Let us recognise that those in the distributive trades have a difficult task to do. Let us be vigilant to ensure that anybody who does take advantage of the scarcity for the purpose of mulcting the poor will be held up to the full public odium that he deserves, and that, by no confusion of thought, will anybody be found to come forward and defend him. If we continue indiscriminately to call everybody who is forced to raise prices, by the irresistible march of events, a profiteer, ultimately the odium attaching to that word will disappear, and people will cease to think of profiteering as a thing of which one ought to be ashamed.
What I have said can be summed up under four proposition's. Prevent profiteering ruthlessly—when you have made up your mind as to what true profiteering; means—but do not, in your zeal to control wires, smash every shopkeeper in the country. If you do not go about this business in the right way, that is what you will do. There are two problems involved—a city problem and a rural problem. If the Minister does not want to consult persons with whom he has no political associations, let him consult a man like Senator McEllin, who knows the way country business is done, and he will find—I am sure the Minister has other supporters and friends who have some knowledge of business as it is operated in rural Ireland—that it is very different from business as it is operated in an urban centre. If he asks these men what is the special problem which they are meeting, they will explain it and tell him how he can get rigid and effective price-control in which every shopkeeper in the country will be anxious to co-operate and, at the same time, make it possible for these men to carry on their legitimate trade and discharge a necessary function. They should be enabled to continue to employ the men already working for them. That is the terrible danger. A great many merchants are finding themselves in a position in which they have no stuff to sell, and the fellows working behind the counter are being let go. Nothing is more heart-breaking to a fellow who is getting on well, who is half way through to having a business of his own, than to be thrown out of employment, because it destroys the whole tenor of his progress and his ambition from the day he became an apprentice. Whatever savings he gathered, which he ultimately intended to invest in a business of his own, will be dissipated during a long period of unemployment. There is a danger of people getting thrown out of jobs in this way in the country. I do not say that the shopkeepers are all faultless in this regard. When a shopkeeper cannot find goods, he sometimes gets panic-stricken and dismisses his hands, whereas, if he took things easy and if he got a little encouragement from the Minister, he could, by holding on, get things straightened out and find work for his employees. There is a real danger of unemployment of this class if steps are not at once taken to make the life of the shopkeeper tolerable. As shopkeepers, we do not care what the price of stuff is. If the Minister's price is 16/- and the mill's price is 15/-, or if the prices are 18/- and 17/-, it does not matter to the shopkeeper so long as he knows what the price is. If the Minister says that a customer is to get as near as possible half the supply of a commodity that he got last year, that can be done, but the great requisite is certainty. There is no use in telling the people that they are to get stuff at the same price as they got it on the 21st August. Who knows what the price of pepper was on the 21st August ? Who knows whether or not the price in question was for the lowest grade of black pepper de-hulled to make it look like white pepper? Nobody. To make an order of that kind is absurd. find out the average grade of pepper sold in the country, and say that the price of pepper on such a day will be, say, 3d. If you want to control pepper —and I think you would be silly to do so—to relate the price back to the charge on another day makes the task of the shopkeeper impossible and upsets the whole machinery. If you fix the price, as you did in the case of flour, and say that the price delivered at every station will be such a, price, and that it will be 1/- per cwt, more in the town, retail, and 1/6 per cwt. more retail in the country, that simplifies the whole thing. If you control things in that way, the minimum of inconvenience will be caused, and the most effective co-operation will be got in enforcing the price.
Secondly, do not worry about getting stuff produced by the farmer. The farmer will produce all the stuff it is possible for him to produce if the price is right. The price is right now, and is getting better. What the Government must do is enable the farmer to get supplies so that he may produce. I appeal to the Government most strongly to take the tariffs off the raw materials of the agricultural industry, even if they do that only as a war measure. Open up every avenue of supply. Let me and every other shopkeeper try to wangle a few tons of Indian meal out of Belfast, Liverpool, or anywhere else. If the Minister gets a cargo of maize, well and good; I may be able to get a parcel of Indian meal in Glasgow and, so long as there are no obstructions to the importation of it, I will be looking out for it. Every other merchant will be looking out, too, because they will want to sell it and make a profit on it. But if you are informed that you will not be allowed to take it in, there is no use in looking for it. In the last war there was no shortage of flour here. The price of flour went sky-high, but we picked up parcels of flour in Montreal, Chicago, Scotland, Liverpool—wherever we could get them. I remember seeing in Ballaghaderreen a special train arrive with stuff, because everybody was on the qui vive and trying to get supplies for his own community.
And we got them. I admit that the price of flour was allowed to go mad during the last war. I do not think it should be allowed to do so during this war, but it certainly did have that effect during the last war, and all through the last war flour could be got, but there was one time when the price of Indian meal was dearer than the price of flour and the people started feeding flour to the pigs.
What I want to convey to the Minister is that, while you have a free market, you will have called to your aid a whole lot of what I might call privateers, who will be trying to supplement the Minister's efforts to get supplies, and that, in addition to the Minister's efforts to get supplies, these privateers, as I have called them, will be helping him, not alone to get what he is trying to get, and that is the bare sufficiency that he is able to secure, but a comfortable surplus over our requirements. I beg the Minister to make his plans now and not to wait for some months in order to start a campaign for our supplies. We do not know how long this war may last, and, in my opinion, it may be a long war. We hope that it will not be a long war, but in view of the fact that it may be a long war I think that we ought seriously to embark on experimental work in connection with ensilage. Some of the people in the Minister's Department know what is being done in Denmark and other places in connection with this matter of ensilage, and I suggest that, if we could do that also we would go a very far way towards relieving our difficulties here. I know, and I am sure some of the members of the Minister's Party and of his Department know, the views that have been put forward by an expert in these matters here. It is possible that he may be wrong, but if he is not wrong, why is he not sent for now and told to go to it, and arrange for the turning of the grass of this year into ensilage for next year? I know the man concerned, and I believe that, if he were given a chance to do the job himself, he would be prepared to risk his reputation on it. I admit that there are high experts in the Department of Agriculture who do not agree with him, but if what he says can be produced, and is being produced, in Denmark and Scandinavia at the moment, can be produced here, it would be worth its weight in gold now. Why not call that person in now and tell him that he has five or six months in which to experiment? Nobody, of course, can get ensilage going in this country straight off, because the farmers do not know anything about it and because the farmers, who might be persuaded to practise it at first, will probably make a mess of it, because they are without training in that matter and, therefore, a prejudice might be created against it, but if a period of a few months were given for the necessary training I suggest that the experiment would be well worth while making.
In addition to that matter, there is the question of the cereal crops, and I think special attention should be given to barley and oats, and indeed I think that very particular attention should be given to the cultivation of Swede turnips in this country. There are certain varieties which will give a greater yield than the common type, and I think due regard should be had to that fact. Lastly, I would beg the Minister to start a publicity campaign at once with a view to getting the people to concentrate on butter, pigs, eggs, fowl and milk products. If you take care of these things, I think the cattle trade will look after itself and will go along as fast as is possible; but what the people need to be persuaded to get into now is the production of butter, pigs, eggs, fowl and milk products, as I have said before. Every person who has accommodation of any kind ought to get two good sows now and rear the bonhams. Every farmer's wife in the country ought to be setting eggs now, and I am told that the eggs which are brought into the kitchen and kept warm produce the best results. If we start now and concentrate on the production of butter, pigs, eggs and so on, and keep our young heifers here, we can substantially increase our output, and we ought to tell the people that there is no risk in doing so and that the taking part in such industry is as good a speculation as possible. That is the advice that should be given to the people, but if they are to take advantage of that advice, some of them, at least, must be provided with working capital.
When I speak of working capital, I am not talking of long-term loans or anything of that sort, but of the provision of a chance for a man of the type I have mentioned to go out and buy sheep or pigs. I suggest that the provision of working capital for the farmer is vital to the whole question of supplies. What I am suggesting is entirely different from what was suggested in the Seanad by Senator Counihan and others as to long-term credits. This is a question of short-term credits.
It seems to me that we have got a long and ghastly ordeal before us, and I say again that opportunity after opportunity presents itself to us to embarrass the Government by pointing out their shortcomings, but that we do not wish to avail of these opportunities. They have made some ghastly mistakes, but I am prepared to say that others might have made the same mistakes had they been presented with the same problem. However, whether it may be good politics or not, I believe that the best service that all Parties in this House could give to the Government would be to offer to the Ministers concerned whatever information Deputies may have, and to offer that information in open debate, as here to-day, so that our difficulties may be made known to the Government and so that such remedies, as we have learned in practice are practicable, may be made available to the Government. Such knowledge as I have, I have put before the Minister, and I do urge him to seek the advice of the distributive and other trades such as I have suggested in this country, and I also urge him to avail of the services of the farmer members, both in his own Party and in this Party, by addressing questions to them as to what are their views, and I am perfectly certain that, if he does so. Deputies like Deputy Hughes and others, who have information on these matters, would be glad to give the Minister information designed to increase supplies. I am sure that they could give him valuable information, and I beg the Minister to avail of that opportunity.
There is one last word I have to say, and I shall say it, knowing that it may involve me in the risk of being charged in the country with advocating a national government, but I want to make this perfectly clear—speaking for myself now, and not for my Party—I think that a national government would be a great mistake. The Government that we have here at the moment is a Government that has been chosen by the majority of the people of this country. It is a Government that has an absolute majority in this House and is absolutely secure. There is no question of a snap division defeating the Government in this House, with the majority they have. There is no question but that they are a clear majority Government. That is the fact. In my opinion, they are incompetent. I have said so before, and I still believe that they are highly incompetent, but none the less they are the majority Government, chosen by the majority of the people of this country, and between us all I think we ought to be able to prop them up and give them some show. However, whether we like it or not, the Irish people chose them and they represent the Irish people, and though, in the ordinary course of events, our job would be to try to knock the props from under them and urge the people to place another Government in power, we have announced now that, during this period of emergency or this war, we are not going to do that, because we believe it would be in the national interest to let such Government as the people chose do the best they can. Instead of knocking the props from under them, we are going to try to do all we can to prop them up, to protect thorn from as many errors as we can, and to help them to do as little damage as possible. It is in that spirit that we approach this discussion, and I feel sure that the Government will be well advised to approach the business we have in hand in that spirit, too. They cannot shake themselves free from the heavy responsibility which has descended upon them, but, if they are wise men, they will accept all the useful help that is made available and do the best they can in a difficult situation. If they approach it in that spirit, they can depend, so far as the Opposition is concerned, and, I believe, so far as the Labour Party is concerned, on getting such help as we are in a position to give them, and such advice and such suggestions as we think may help in reducing the impact of this disaster upon our country to the minimum possible.
When Parliament meets on an occasion like this, and in an emergency such as that through which we are now passing, there is necessarily imposed upon every member of the House an obligation to speak cautiously and to review matters prudently, and I think that Parliament and the nation as a whole will probably benefit more if we pay advice to virtues of that kind in our deliberations here. Even though we are a neutral country, the reactions of the international situation are such that they will affect our trade, our customs, our habits, and our whole methods of life. Here is a small community, an outpost of Western Europe, and we for our part must endeavour to plan our life and fashion our methods in such a manner as will obviate, or, where that is not possible, mitigate, the worst evils of the international situation. I think there is an enormous responsi- bility on the Government to-day, and transcending that responsibility is an obligation to net in the most prudent manner possible—to take the people into their confidence, to tell them why things are being done, and what objective is being sought, and generally to encourage the nation to adjust itself to the now situation. I think that if the Government from the outset will develop its mentality along these lines, it will be possible to win the co-operation and the goodwill of the people rather than by vexatious regulations begetting the resentment and opposition of the people.
I want to endeavour to get some information from the Minister, and from the Government generally, on a number of matters which I think are of vital importance to the nation in the crisis through which we are now passing. It has been said by the Taoiseach, and the fact is, of course, recognised by everybody who knows the inadequacy of our supplies of raw material, that one of our greatest problems in this crisis will be our ability to obtain raw materials for the maintenance of our secondary industries. I than useless to ask why the Government are not doing this or that in the matter of obtaining raw materials. Governments with much greater commercial and military resources are not able to get the supplies of raw materials they need for the maintenance of their secondary industries, and a Government without a mercantile marine of its own is not in the position to do better than other Governments who possess such mercantile marines can do; but I think that there is, nevertheless, on the Government a very heavy responsibility to endeavour in every way it possibly can, bearing in mind that this is a neutral country, to obtain from other neutral sources, or even from belligerent sources, supplies of raw material which are essential for our industries here.
I know that it will not be easy, but it may be easier now than it will be if this war continues, because, as the war progresses, we may find that relatively harmless commodities to-day will be listed as contraband and it will be within the right, as conceived by themselves, of belligerent powers to destroy ships carrying goods which, in ordinary times, would be regarded as peace time necessaries. I think, therefore, that at this stage the Government should exercise all its power and influence, and exercise that power and influence particularly in neutral countries, to try to obtain other supplies of raw materials which are essential to our industrial position here and to the maintenance of our secondary industries, because not only are these essential for the supplying of our own home requirements, but they are essential if we are going to prevent a serious dislocation of the employment position within the country.
Building is an industry to-day which employs a substantial number of people. It is one of the industries which offers employment exclusively to male labour, and one of the industries in which, happily, the wage rates are reasonably good. It is, therefore, an industry which we ought to maintain, even on sheer economic grounds. It is an industry the continuance and expansion of which have enormous social the same time, one of the industries which is likely to be very seriously affected by a shortage of materials. A goodly number of the commodities used in the industry are metal goods, and if we cannot get the raw material, there is bound to be a shortage of metal goods. It may be possible, of course, to evolve substitutes of a kind which could be replaced subsequently when the war had concluded, but there are certain types of goods which cannot be replaced, and, therefore, I think it is necessary again, particularly in respect to that industry, to try to obtain as much of the raw material, or of the finished article, as we can buy, whether within or without the country.
A commodity which is used extensively in building is timber. Statistics show that we have no great stock of timber in the country, and inquiries disclose that the position in respect of timber suitable for use immediately in house-building operations is not quite satisfactory. I know that possibly nobody can be blamed for that situation, particularly which it is remembered that it is only at certain times of the year that timber can be purchased from Scandinavian and Northern European sources, but, again, it is highly desirable that every possible effort should be made to obtain supplies of timber, from either Northern Europe, or the America Continent, suitable for use in the house-building industry, and that a warning might well be sounded even now against the improvident use of timber for any purpose in view of the possibility that the source of supply may dry up so far as we are concerned, and that it may be difficult for us to obtain these commodities at a later stage.
The question of food supplies is another matter of tremendous importance to our people. So far as certain basic foodstuffs are concerned, we are in a happy position. Meat is not a problem that need worry us, and neither need potatoes, barley, corn, or, possibly, to some extent, wheat, because we have a fertility of soil here capable of supplying these and other requirements, but these commodities, essential though they be, do not by any means exhaust the full lists of foodstuffs which our community uses. A considerable quantity of our food supply comes from outside, and particularly is that true of what one might describe as the smaller foods, such as fruits, tinned meats, tinned fruits and condiments of one kind or another. The sources of supply in this case are outside this country. It may be possible to evolve substitutes for them here, but, in the main, the sources of supply are outside the country. I should like to know from the Minister whether there has been any inventory taken of the food supplies in the country; whether there has been even an approximate ascertainment of the stocks in hands; whether it is anticipated that there will be a shortage of these commodities in the near future; or whether there is a reasonable certainty of an adequate supply being available for a substantial period of time. If there are stocks available for a substantial period of time, it may then be possible to plan to get alternative sources of supply or to provide substitutes for the commodities which we cannot import.
The whole question, of course, of the supplies of raw materials and foodstuffs from outside brings us right up against the shipping position. We have a very small number of Irish-owned ships, and we have a very small number of ships on the Irish shipping register, Recently we saw some of these ships go off because, I understand, they were requisitioned for service with another Government. They have been, I am told, substituted by ships owned by a subsidiary of the company which transferred the ships from the Irish to the British register. But in the course of time we may find, since these ships are owned by companies incorporated elsewhere, that other ships may go off the Irish register. We may find, in the course of time, that these ships will not be subject to Irish control. We may find, in fact, that our next-door neighbour, Great Britain, may commandeer ships for use on her behalf in the event of an intensification of submarine warfare. What is our position then? The foodstuffs and the raw materials which we may require for use in this country must be carried here by ships either of neutral countries or of belligerent Powers. It is not likely that one of the belligerents can give us the commodities. It is possible for the other belligerent to supply the commodities. But, if we try to get the foodstuffs or the raw materials from neutral sources, we will find that not only will the cost be enormous, because they will be carrying a one-way cargo, as we have nothing to sell in return because they do not want what we have to sell, but with the demand for ships, we may find it impossible to get goods from these neutral countries unless we are prepared to take them on a cash-and-carry basis. In other words, we may be able to get our materials in Norway, in Sweden, in America, and in Canada provided we send for them and take delivery of them. What are we going to do in the matter of sending for and taking delivery if there are no ships under the control of Irish nationals and subject to the authority of this Government?
I make the suggestion to the Government that that is a difficulty which it is not desirable to ignore. I think that there are quite considerable possibilities in the fact that we may wake up one day to discover that we have no ships, or a negligible number of ships, on the Irish shipping register owned by Irish nationals. At this stage, before ships reach a premium, before the worst effects of the war at sea are discernible, it might well be desirable for the Government to consider the possibility of inaugurating something in the nature of a State mercantile marine for the purchase of ships which would be available to go to places for the commodities we require, and to ensure in that fashion that at least we will be able to obtain the commodities by providing our own means of transport. In the long run, the ships will be of value. So long as they carry our flag and we are neutral, so long as they will be likely to escape with other neutrals entanglement in sea battles, the speculation may be good from a national point of view. It will at least ensure that we have transport to get the goods and, at the end, if the ships are not required for that purpose, they will still be assets to any Government which has invested money in them.
I think, therefore, that even at this stage the Government ought to give serious consideration to the question of ensuring that there is an adequate supply of ships available for the purpose of conveying to this country and from this country the goods which we have for export, on the one hand, and the goods which we require to import into this country on the other hand. After all, it might be very much safer for the export of our surplus goods to Great Britain to have these goods carried in Irish-owned ships, flying the Irish flag, rather than having them carried to Great Britain in ships flying the British flag and probably being convoyed outside Irish ports back to British ports. Those ships are going to be a target for submarine attack and the possibility of the loss of entire cargoes cannot be ruled out in this war any more than in the List war. While on the question of shipping, I should like to refer to what, at this stage, so far as I am concerned, are rumours, but some of the rumours will I think, unfortunately, be confirmed within the next 24 hours. I have a report to the effect that the Burns-Laird line, which had a regular weekly service from Sligo to Scottish and British ports, has decided to discontinue that service, thus throwing out of employment 60 or 70 dockers, carters, and lorry drivers in Sligo. Apparently, there are to be no more sailings by that line in connection with the port of Sligo. It is stated, too, that there has been a serious curtailment of the passenger traffic by the suspension of boats between Cork and Fishguard. There are indications, too, of changes in respect of Fishguard and Rosslare. It has been stated anyhow —and I should like the Minister to deal with this matter when replying—that an effort will be made to have merely three channels of communication by sea with Great Britain. One, it is alleged, will be the Larne-Stranraer route; another will be the Dublin-Dun Laoghaire route; and the other will be the Rosslare-Fishguard route. There may also be a very serious reduction in the number of services at present between Great Britain and this country.
Is the Deputy referring to passenger services?
Yes. I should like the Minister to give us some indication as to whether anything is contemplated in that direction; whether there is to be a restriction of services on these three routes; what is the purpose of it; whether it is for the purpose of merely adjusting oneself to an abnormal situation; or whether any portion of it is for the purpose of having British registered ships convoyed on parts of these routes? Another matter to which I should like to direct the attention of the Minister, because I think a considerable tendency in that direction has been discernible for some time past, is a disposition to consign goods from this country to Great Britain through the North of Ireland and to get goods into this country from Great Britain through the North of Ireland. That is obviously giving a very distinct preference to the Six Counties which area is not an essential part of the route and not an essential principle in the transaction.
I think the Minister should insist that, as far as possible, goods intended for export from this country should leave the ports of this country, and goods intended for consumption here should come in through the ports in this country and not be using a route of a kind which may well be calculated to cause international difficulties in another connection.
The question of the control of prices has been raised this evening and Deputy Dillon dilated for some time on a just price. Apart from the dialectics of the issue involved, I think everybody will realise that there is inevitably a tendency in time of war and commotion and in time of panic for prices to rise either because of a scarcity, real or artificial, or because of panic through selling and buying. It is within the knowledge of every Deputy here and, indeed, everybody throughout the country, that since the commencement of the war there has been a serious shortage of certain commodities. In my own constituency a fortnight ago, in a large town, it was impossible to buy a pound of sugar or a stone of coal. Subsequently, when the position improved slightly, the people were told, possibly in order to clear an abundant supply of tea on hands, that they would get a, pound of sugar if they bought a half pound or three-quarters of a pound of tea, as if that was a normal mixture of these two commodities. While that was the position there, certain people were able to get substantial quantities of sugar in the City of Dublin.
Wherever there was a shortage, there was an inevitable increase in price. Sugar, where it could be obtained in this town, was being offered at twopence above the normal price. Coal and flour also increased in price, all this indicating that advantage was being taken of a panic position in order to exploit the people who were compelled to buy in small quantities. A situation of that kind is a very serious one because of the mentality it creates throughout the country. A system of rationing food is far preferable to a position of that kind. I know cases in the City of Dublin and in the County of Kildare where persons with five and six children, going to buy their weekly sugar requirements, were offered a half pound as the only quantity that could be given. And all this was at a time when we were assured by the Minister for Industry and Commerce and his Department that there were adequate stocks of sugar in the country.
There may be adequate stocks—I have no official information on that matter —but I think the Minister should clear up the situation and he will render a valuable service if he tells us what is the precise position in respect of stocks of sugar. Is there an adequate supply? If the public can be assured on that point, anything in the nature of panic can be stopped. I think there should be definite statement made by the Minister on that particular subject. At the present time one does not know whether the stocks of sugar are adequate and people can only give way to the temptation to buy whatever amounts they can wherever they can get it. The effect of doing that would be to cause a very severe shortage in other places. If that position is to continue in respect of flour and sugar, I think the Minister ought to introduce a rationing scheme in relation to these commodities. Under a rationing scheme you would at least be assured of getting a reasonable quantity of sugar, whereas at the present time it is only the well-to-do who can buy and the poor are left with very little sugar when they go to make purchases.
There has been evidence of increases in the prices of many commodities. Some of these have been legalised by the Minister, but traders have been known to increase prices even after the standstill order was issued. The Government should take very definite action and not permit any increase in prices except where the increases can be justified by events. I do not suggest that scarcity of a commodity is sufficient to mean an increase in price or that the difficulty of obtaining a renewal of supplies is sufficient. The Minister has to take a long view and he must realise that every increase in price means, in fact, a reduction in the wages of the workers. If there is to be an increase in price over a whole range of commodities, then the purchasing power of the workers will decrease, and if that goes beyond a certain stage you are going to have a legitimate demand for further increases in wages in order to meet the shrinkage in the purchasing power. There might be more stability imported into the general position if the Minister were not to be deflected, except by very grave considerations, from such a course as this: "We are going to maintain prices at existing levels where these are reasonable unless we can be shown that a very substantial case can be made for increasing the price of commodities. "
I warn the Minister that if there are to be wholesale increases in prices over a wide range of commodities, essential commodities particularly, you are going to have as a natural corollary a widespread movement for an adjustment of the purchasing power of wages to compensate for the shrinkage caused by the increase in prices. I should like to ascertain from the Minister what his general plan is for curbing profiteering and steadying prices. One method is the setting up of local committees to watch price movements and check overcharges. Valuable service could be rendered by a local committee composed of responsible people, not people who would make a complaint every time there is a slight increase—some increases might be quite understandable—but a committee of responsible people who would watch price movements, report overcharging and take a general interest in co-operating with the Minister and the community in keeping prices at a reasonable level. The Minister ought to give us some idea of his intentions with regard to price movements, price control and a scheme for ensuring that there will be supplies in reasonable quantities of such commodities as those of which we have adequate stocks.
It has been mentioned in the course of utterances by Ministers that the Government intend to embark on a polity of increased tillage. At any time that would be a desirable policy, but it is imperative for us to adopt it in existing circumstances. I would like to get some information as to what the Government's intentions are. Is it intended to insist that a percentage of arable land must be cultivated? Will there be a choice within that area of the commodities to be cultivated, or will the person be compelled within his area of tillage to cultivate any particular commodity, or will he have free choice so long as the land is devoted to tillage purposes? I would like to know what percentage of arable land the Government intend to apply compulsory tillage to as a minimum. I would like also to ascertain whether it is intended to guarantee a fixed minimum price for all the commodities grown or for certain of those commodities. Is it intended to fix a minimum price for wheat, barley or oats, taking these to be the staple crops grown under a tillage scheme?
Is it intended that there would be guaranteed prices for these commodities? If on a scheme of intensive tillage, a situation arises in which fanners, having harvested the crops, find themselves as they did in the past, in a difficulty about disposing, for instance, of barley and oats, a difficulty which was experienced almost into the following year's harvest, are there any facilities so that the barley and oats will be purchased from them? If they are able to store crops, can they get any advance, either from the State or from any organisation that is to be created, against the commodities which they stored for sale at a later date? A farmer may be able to cash wheat at the minimum price, if he gets the guaranteed price, hut if there is no guaranteed price for barley and oats, it is quite possible that he will sell a substantial quantity because of the demand, but nevertheless may have to carry over for a long time quantities of oats and barley for which there is no demand, and if he is not possessed of adequate storage facilities he will probably lose heavily in the end. Is it proposed to provide any storage facilities? Is it proposed to have an organisation to buy barley and oats, if minimum prices are fixed, or what is intended in respect of a possible residue of barley and oats which would not be sold within a reasonable period after being harvested?
It is recognised, I think, in respect of persons who have very little land under tillage now, that a swing-over from a grazing to a tillage holding, or to a substantial tillage holding, inevitably involves heavy expenditure, so far as farmers' domestic budgets are concerned. Implements have to be purchased, horses have to be purchased, manures fertilisers, and various other expenses have to be incurred which are not necessary in purely grazing operations. How is that going to be done? Many farmers are in a very, serious position financially. Their greatest difficulty for the past few years has been to get credit facilities. They cannot get credit facilities from the banks. They were unable to get them in recent years. It may be that the banks will evolve a policy somewhat similar to the one they adopted in 1918, but so far as indications go, the banks, apparently, do not intend to go back to the policy of indiscriminately handing out money to farmers. Farmers cannot get money through the banks to-day. They are about as welcome in them as a burglar. Where then are they to get money to finance their operations? There should be some organisation created to enable farmers, who want to work their land in the fashion of husbandry, to obtain credit facilities in the form of working capital so that they may comply with the compulsory tillage regulations. In the long run it should be a profitable scheme for them and for the State if there were facilities of that kind. It is a matter that should not be ignored by the Government if they want to ensure the success of the tillage policy.
Coming to the question of censorship, I want merely to refer to it. I think every sensible person will agree that in a time of war, particularly when we are trying to preserve our neutrality, when one belligerent is trying to pull one way and another belligerent is trying to pull the other way, there is need for restraint in the language used. There is need, probably, for prudent censorship of matters which would, in the ordinary course, appear in the daily papers, and while I am not, therefore, objecting to censorship as such, if reasonably and prudently applied, I am objecting to a type of censorship which is not censorship but suppression. I am afraid that is what we are getting to-day. A very elaborate notice has been issued to persons who have any connection with the publication of periodicals, newspapers, etc. There is a lot of very sensible stuff there, for instance, a direction not to refer to the location of defence forces, not to refer to foreign air, naval, or military forces, not to make reference to persons connected with foreign naval, air or military forces and the necessity of maintaining neutrality.
There are other statements in the document that do not seem to me to have any meaning for this country. For instance, one is advised that references to weather reports and weather forecasts should not appear, and there should be no reference to meteorological conditions. I do not understand what necessity there is for carrying censorship to that stage. After all I do not see anything very serious in the position. I see greater seriousness in what has happened during the week. A journalist of a humorous turn of mind and with imaginative pen wrote an article about the weather. I consider it a most harmless article. The article was duly set up and sent to the censor who declined to allow it to be published. That is not censorship. That is unadulterated suppression.
The Deputy appreciates the military value that might be put on these reports.
I appreciate a certain amount of it. I will read a portion of the article to which I referred so that the House may see what we are suppressing. The correspondent wrote:
"The publication of weather forecasts in this country has been prohibited. By whom it is not stated. Perhaps it was the Minister for Local Government who objected to the constant warning against local showers. Or was it the Minister for Industry and Commerce's dislike of the too frequent reminders that deep depressions were travelling rapidly from the East or from the West that led to the prohibition? Whatever the reason, weather forecasts are now illegal. I may be arrested any morning as I leave my suburban residence, if a passing policeman hears me say to my wife, `It looks like rain.' "
Or lá breágh.
The article went on:—
"Even to state that it does not look like rain makes me equally guilty of publishing a weather forecast and thereby contravening the regulations so made and provided.
"The more I think of it the more serious the matter appears. For merely wearing spats or carrying an umbrella some Parliamentary Secretary or higher civil servant runs the risk of summary arrest and a fine or imprisonment unless he can prove to the satisfaction of the court that he habitually suffers from cold feet and that the umbrella is to be used only as a walking stick."
That is a sample of a comment on weather conditions and the censor gravely took the view that our neutrality would be affected, and the whole moral tone of the nation seriously upset, if a comment of the kind appeared. I think a comment of that kind is good for our people, particularly at a time of war. I think the more of that comment is offered to the public the less they will be likely to remember the other difficulties they have to put up with. That is not censorship. I heard a story during the week, for the accuracy of which I can absolutely vouch, that a very cautious, prudent, newspaper—one on which the Government has a number of friends, and amongst the directors of which the Government has friends—sought to publish as part of the leading article, a statement made by the Taoiseach on neutrality. Portion of the Parliamentary Debates containing the very sensible statement of the Taoiseach on neutrality was deleted. I think the statement was a perfectly sensible one. It was not taken out of its context. Now we have got to the stage when even the Taoiseach's speeches in the Oireachtas cannot be quoted. I do not know whether it is because they were embarrassing. I am sure they were not. I think it was a perfectly sensible statement, but the censor came along and said that the Taoiseach's speeches on neutrality, in the Dáil, cannot be quoted. I do not know why it is necessary the 24th or 25th day of the war to get into that panicky situation in a neutral country, and I hope there will be no more of that kind of unreasonable censorship.
We discovered in our newspapers on Monday morning a report of scene& that took place on Sunday last in O'Connell Street, and of baton charges. Because of the baton charges, apparently, we were not allowed to know what the meeting was held for. I never saw so many people in O'Connell Street on a Sunday. Thousands and thousands of people actually saw the incidents and they went home by trains to all parts of the country carrying these incidents in their minds, but old ladies in various parts may still not have got information about the meeting because of the censor's handiwork in the emaciated account of it that appeared in Monday's newspapers. What harm was there in telling the people there was a meeting held in O'Connell Street? Meetings have been held in O'Connell Street on Sundays as long as most of us can remember. There have been baton charges there in the past, and there will be baton charges there again, but not giving a reason for holding a meeting is carrying censorship to an absurd extent. The manner in which the censorship is carried on also prevents us correcting fantastic rumours. I happened to be in the country last week and I spent a good deal of my time denying rumours that the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence was in Arbour Hill. I saw him on Monday, congratulated him and told him of the services I rendered him down the country.
Then there was the story about Lord Mayors and Mayors being in jail or under open arrest. Cannot somebody tell the public that that is not so? It is much better to tell the public that these things are not true than to allow people to carry around those stories. The sort of person who wants to retail that sort of thing is immensely assisted by the censor. His best friend is the censor because such a person can go round to anybody and say: "You know, of course, there is a censor and he will not allow these things to appeal-in the Press; I got this first-hand and I know it is true." It is the existence of the censor that makes it possible for these stories to be carried about. It is the existence of the censorship that is assisting in having these stories spread around. I am sure the members of the Government Party heard of these rumours. It does not seem clear to me why the Government Information Bureau could not have said something on this matter or why the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence could not be pushed into public life somewhere to show that he was a free man instead of being a guest of the Government in Arbour Hill.
I hope that, if the censorship is to be carried on and if we are to have things censored, the censorship will be of a reasonable kind and that the censor will not lose his head because this man or that man wrote something about the weather. When we give powers of censorship they will be, I hope, exercised reasonably and prudently and newspapers will not have their whole organisation upset by unreasonable restrictions. Let newspaper editors, newspaper workers and proprietors be allowed to carry on their profession in a reasonable way. Let us say that we will trust the newspaper people in the matter of using their own discretion in a reasonable way and in a way it has a right to be used, only let us bear in mind that we are anxious to preserve our neutrality.
The next matter to which I wish to refer is the question of unemployment. This is an extremely serious question and one that is going to loom largely in this House in the next few months. The present position is serious. We had a week ago over 75,000 persons registered as unemployed and, when the Employment Period Order expires in the course of a few weeks, that number of unemployed will rocket up to 120,000 or thereabouts, if its relationship now to the position in previous years is any indication. Let us observe the tendency that we see to-day. On the 18th September there were close on 76,000 unemployed. Of that number over 20,000 were in receipt of unemployment insurance benefit. That is a fact of most serious significance as to the position of unemployment in 1939. For the corresponding week in 1938 the figure was 69,000 and of these 17,000 were receiving unemployment insurance benefit. If we take the corresponding week for September, 1936, we find that there were 67,000 unemployed of whom 13,000 were in receipt of unemployment insurance benefit. That shows that our total number of unemployed has gone up by 9,000 at this time of the year compared with the figure for 1936. The number of persons drawing unemployment insurance benefit has risen from 13,000 odd in 1936 to 20,000 odd in 1939. That 20,000 is as high a figure as was reached for a very long time. These were the figures for the week ending 18th September, 1939.
The paper reports this evening that the local authorities are rendered desperate by the demands for assistance by persons who are returned as immigrants from Britain. The full effect of the return of these immigrants is felt in the unemployment figures which reveal a very serious situation. It would be difficult for the Minister to provide employment for our people in peace time. It is going to be still more difficult to find employment in times of war or in times of national emergency through which we are now passing. But there is an obligation on the Minister to work even harder at that task and to try to adopt methods which he would have declined to adopt at other times. The present situation demands these methods. I would like to know from the Minister what steps have been taken to prevent the displacing of workers in industries cither due to a desire on the part of manufacturers to contract their activities or due to a shortage of raw material?
I would like to know if any effort will be made to compensate for loss of employment in private industry by the expansion of Land Commission or other schemes of public works? I have been told that the Land Commission is faring up to the position by not acquiring any more land; I have been told that they do not know what to do with the lands already acquired. Does that mean that the Land Commission Improvement Schemes are to close down? If it does a very valuable source of employment will be lost to workers in rural areas. What is to be the position with regard to house building? Is there to be a restriction on local authorities in the matter of finance? Will they be able to continue to get money and will they he encouraged to proceed with housing schemes? Will their activities in this matter be conditioned only by the availability of the necessary materials for the erection of houses? I would like also to know whether we are to have an abandonment of these minor relief schemes that have been a feature of the Board of Works' activities in recent years? Is there going to be a restriction on general relief schemes? These are matters on which we should have a declaration from the Government. I hope that as this is the only opportunity we will have for the next three weeks that the fullest advantage will be taken of it by the Minister to give us the necessary information and thereby to ensure the House and the whole country that the position is not as bad as many scaremongers would have us believe it is.
I think it is desirable that I should intervene at this stage for the purpose of dealing with some of the matters that have been raised by those who have taken part in the debate. This is, of course, a general debate and, consequently, references have been made to a wide number of problems any one of which would afford sufficient material for a full-dress debate without bringing in at all the related or unrelated matters to which reference has also been made. It is inevitable that Deputies will desire to refer to all the problems that we have experienced or that they anticipate and to make suggestions in relation to them. It is, I think, impracticable in the time at our disposal to have any full discussion of all these problems and certainly impossible to indicate in any manner a clear cut-and-dried solution for them.
It is, I think, all to the good that members of the House and members of the public should be made to realise that in our circumstances there are many grave problems, such as have already arisen, and many equally grave problems which may be anticipated in the future. It is only when there is a full and clear public appreciation of the dangers of our position and all that it may involve for our people that we can get the co-operation in whatever plans may be adopted and the acceptance of whatever restrictions may be found necessary that will enable us to see our way through. I think it is undesirable that there should be conveyed the suggestion which, I think, underlay Deputy Norton's speech, that many of the problems could be removed if the Government exerted itself.
I think the Government is exerting itself as energetically as possible in getting the facts relating to these problems marshalled and plans for coping with them prepared, but it is idle to pretend that they can be removed entirely or avoided altogether. That will not happen. No matter how energetic the Government is, no matter how carefully and skilfully it may plan, no matter how the Dáil and the people may co-operate with it, many of the difficulties to which Deputies have referred will not end and many of the hardships which we fear will not be removed. The war will inevitably mean a period of difficulty and the only thing we can hope to do is to lessen the hardship, minimise the difficulty. We cannot hope to avoid either altogether.
I think the first decision we must come to is that our plans should be based on the assumption that it is going to be a long war. It may not prove to be a long war, but I think it would be folly for us to gamble on the prospect of its ending early. If we are sound in basing our plans upon the assumption that the war is likely to be of protracted duration then certain consequences follow on that. It may involve our imposing restrictions now which would not be necessary if the war was likely to end in six months' or 12 months' time but which will protect our position in the event of our assumption being correct and the war lasting for a longer period than that.
It may be that some of these restrictions will not appear immediately necessary, that the circumstances that give rise to them are anticipated rather than actual and, on that account, people may question their wisdom, but I think that if we are to plan well we must plan upon that basis and upon no other. We have, to give an example, a supply of wheat. We must try to avoid using that. We must try to ensure that the normal day to day, week to week requirements of our people will be met by home production or imported supplies and that the iron ration we have in store will be kept against a period of greater difficulty than hag yet arisen. That, perhaps, is not the very best example because, in relation to wheat and, consequently, flour, there does not appear at present to be any prospect of a real difficulty arising but the reference will serve to illustrate to Deputies what precisely is in mind.
We can proceed on the assumption that we can use our available resources without restriction, hoping that by the time they become exhausted the war will be over or that circumstances will have arisen which will avoid our being involved in difficulty, or, we can proceed upon the alternative and, in my opinion, the wiser basis, that the war is not likely to be over soon, that we must conserve these resources even though that means some restriction upon our activities, some curtailment of our standards at the present time.
Whether we consider the problems the war gives rise to in relation to the maintenance of supplies from abroad or the organisation of production at home, the same question arises, the same decision must be made as to the possible duration of the period of emergency. If we are to plan increased agricultural production, as was so strongly urged by Deputy Dillon, then I think we must also do so on the basis that the emergency is not going to end next year. If we could contemplate the war ending next year clearly our policy in relation to agriculture would have to be modified, or, at any rate, prepared upon a different basis than if we faced the possibility of the period of difficulty extending over two or three years. Planning over a longer term will in some respects simplify our problems; in some respects it will make them harder; but we can, I think, contemplate our being more easily able to deal with the new difficulties that might be created by an early termination of the war before various plans had been brought to maturity than being able to deal with the difficulties that we would inevitably meet if the war continued whereas we had planned only against a short campaign.
The matter of increasing agricultural production is one, of course, to which the Government gave first concern when the war situation developed. Inevitably in this country the expansion of our agricultural activities is a matter of primary importance, not merely because of the necessity of maintaining exports and thereby acquiring the means to purchase the goods that we must import, but also because of the need for expanding internal activities that create employment. But, it is necessary to take into account that any plan for increasing agricultural production will, in the circumstances of the war, be much more difficult to execute in many respects than it would be in times of peace. There are matters of supply about which obvious difficulties will arise.
When one considers the problem of agricultural production one must think not merely in the terms of export markets, of guaranteed prices and of encouraging farmers to undertake new activities but also of the difficulties that will inevitably be experienced in enabling farmers to do so. Reference has been made here already to the absence of any supply of maize in the country. It is perhaps not necessary to go into any explanation of the position as it now exists. I think that any such explanation would necessarily be an involved one and would not, perhaps, satisfy Deputies. We have, however, to realise the fact that neither in this country nor in Great Britain is there any maize to be procured, nor any prospect of procuring maize for at least some months to come and even then only a limited supply will be available. We can—and we are— planning to substitute for maize other forms of feed and I think we can say with certainty that we will he able to maintain an adequate supply—even on the basis of increased production of pigs and poultry—of the necessary food stuffs. But they will not be the feeding stuffs that the farmers would naturally prefer to get, because it will not be possible to make these available in the quantity that they would require them; and from time to time the plans may have to be changed.
So far as maize is concerned, I think it is desirable that the position should be made clear. Arrivals of maize in this country will be below normal for some months ahead and we have, consequently, arranged to make immediately available a supply of flaked wheat to supplement the supply of maize meal for feeding pigs and poultry. It is possible that we will be able to procure some barley later on towards the end of next month, but we can in any event see our way some distance ahead to meet requirements with flaked wheat until the next consignment of maize arrives in our ports, sometime about the first week in October.
Might I ask the Minister if he is in a position lo make any statement as to the amount of oil cake now available?
Let me deal with these matters one at a time. I was asked what was the position regarding the supply of flaked wheat. Arrangements were made for the maize millers to commence production from this morning and supplies will be available as from to-day. The price will be comparable to that ruling for maize meal from time to time. We can, I think, release from our reserves the wheat necessary to enable flaked wheat to be substituted for maize without undue concern. We have substantial reserves of wheat. We have as yet experienced no difficulty in purchasing wheat abroad and the portion of the reserve stock which was being used for that purpose can, I think, be replaced so that the total reserve will not be diminished in consequence of wheat being used for that purpose. There are other feeding stuffs concerning which there will inevitably be difficulties. The output of bran and pollard in this country has always been short of our requirements and these were imported from Great Britain. The export from Great Britain has now been prohibited; in fact, there is a shortage in Great Britain also. There is, so far as we can discover, little prospect of our being able to supplement our own production by imports from abroad.
I am unable to answer Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney's question. There is immediate difficulty in procuring supplies of oil-cake, but arrangements are being made to establish an organisation here which, I think, will facilitate our being able to import whatever quantities of oil-cake can be procured from time to time. It is impossible to guarantee any continuous supply, but by means of the organisation which we propose to establish, we will be able to take advantage of any opportunity that may offer from time to time to purchase parcels of that and similar feed.
I mention that one matter merely a an indication of some of the difficulties. I think it is inevitable that we cannot maintain our supply of fertilisers. Some of the fertilisers which are used here are of course unprocurable, because the sole source of supply is located in one of the war areas. But, taking the more common form of fertilisers which are produced here from imported materials, or imported, it appears inevitable that we will not be able to maintain the full production, the full requirements of the country, much less effect the increase in the amount required for any substantial expansion of the tillage area.
That would not apply to Moroccan phosphates.
It would.
That is Spanish territory.
Nevertheless, there are substantial problems of shipping, and there is also the fact that there are other people buying besides ourselves. The indications are that we will be able to get substantial quantities of phosphates from Morocco, but not sufficient to produce all the super-phosphates we require.
Your tariff policy prohibits that.
There was never any tariff on that.
Do we understand from the Minister that the supply of fertilisers will not be greater than the supply which has been available for the past few years.
So far as one can see now, it will not be possible to increase the supply of artificial manures or fertilisers over the quantity which was being imported.
And which was substantially below normal requirements.
That is a matter of dispute. Certainly, the quantity of fertilisers available at the moment is less than our needs. There is no use baulking that fact. There may be some way round the difficulty, we may discover some means of increasing production or some means of getting supplies from abroad; but, from present information, I must tell the Dáil that the supply of fertilisers cannot easily be expanded as Deputy Dillon suggested for the purpose of facilitating an expansion in our tillage area.
I cannot deal at the moment in any detail with the matter of agricultural seeds. There appears to be an ample quantity of seed, with the exception of one or two classes, available in the country to meet immediate requirements; but it may be that there will be some difficulty in that regard also. That is a problem that is being discussed by the Department of Agriculture, with a view to the taking of action which will eliminate the difficulty in that regard in the future.
There is the important problem of agricultural machinery. There are classes of agricultural machinery made here and in respect of such classes some problem of the supply of parts or of steel may arise, but they have not arisen yet. There are other classes, not made here, and there is some prospect that their export from Great Britain will be prohibited and there will be difficulty in getting them in from other countries. We hope, however, to be able to meet the essential requirements of the country. I refer to these matters merely to make clear to Deputies that it is not all plain sailing in the matter of expanding agricultural production. There will be difficulties. These will have to be overcome, by such methods as we can devise for the purpose of maintaining supplies of requisite articles, or by makeshift methods adopted by the farmers themselves. I would not like the House gaily to decide on encouraging increased tillage or increased agricultural production, without realising that there are going to be special difficulties which will have to be met by methods which may not always find approval.
I do not want Deputies subsequently to blame the Government or the Department of Supplies if there are difficulties in getting agricultural machinery, fertilisers or seeds which in fact the circumstances are such that no action we could take would remove the difficulties. Nevertheless, I think I can say that the Government will be able to assist and to encourage a substantial expansion of agricultural production. We have decided in principle on compulsory tillage. The actual details of the compulsory tillage plan will be announced later by the Minister for Agriculture.
Mr. Morrissey
Does the Minister mean in this debate?
I could not answer that question.
Mr. Brennan
Might I ask the Minister a question before he gets away from the subject of fertilisers? Did I read aright in to-day's paper that a quota order had been made prohibiting the importation of artificial manures beyond a certain quantity?
What the Deputy saw in to-day's paper was the making of an additional quota order which extended by some 300 per cent. the permitted limit of imports——
Mr. Brennan
But they are still restricted.
——and putting that limit far and above anything, that we might require or could possibly import.
Mr. Brennan
Why should there be any limit?
The order in to-day's paper removed all restrictions on the import of fertilisers.
Mr. Brennan
The Minister is in the hands of a ring who will not allow him to do it.
Let me say this. This is something on which we can all agree. There are about 1,000 people engaged in the production of fertilisers here. While undoubtedly we must procure all the fertilisers our farmers require, we must not do so in a manner that will jeopardise the livelihood of other people.
Mr. Brennan
What other people?
They are in employment now and it is as much our task to keep people in their employment as to find new employment in other directions.
Where are they employed?
In the manufacture of fertilisers.
Mr. Brennan
They were there before the Minister came into office or before ever a quota order was made.
The Deputy can take that line if he wishes. I am merely mentioning the fact that there is, in fact, no limitation on the importation of fertilisers except we can get an abundant supply which is highly improbable, and that employment now given here in the production of fertilisers is jeopardised in consequence.
Deputies have asked for a statement concerning supplies of food. I think I can say definitely that there is no prospect of any difficulty arising, so far ahead as we can see, in respect of any essential articles of food. As Deputies are aware, we are producers arid export a surplus of many of the most important foodstuffs. Taking those foodstuffs in respect to which public anxiety has beep expressed, the position is that we do not anticipate any difficulty. Take sugar. When war was declared a number of people, basing their actions on the experience of the last war, started to hoard sugar. Private individuals bought sacks of sugar and brought them home. Again, traders kept in their stores sugar supplied to them for their normal trade requirements and refused to supply their customers, having in their minds a vague idea that there was likely to be in this war, as there was in the last war, a shortage of sugar and a rationing scheme. There is no possibility, that we can see, of any shortage of sugar. As compared with the last war, there are now established and producing in this country four sugar factories which did not exist during the last war. These factories, on the basis of this year's acreage of beet, can produce more than two-thirds of the normal requirements of the country. Next year we hope that they will produce 100 per cent. of the requirements of the country. We shall be able to supplement the output of the factories with imported sugar sufficient to carry us right to the commencement of the 1940 production period. There is, therefore, unless some circumstance arises that certainly appears improbable at the moment, no prospect of a scarcity of sugar and there will be no need to ration sugar.
Deputies who spoke glibly about a rationing scheme for sugar did not advert to the consequences involved even as regards the cost of such a scheme. The cost of a rationing scheme is very substantial and it should be avoided if at all possible. The only grounds upon which a rationing scheme for sugar might be urged at the present time is that an immediate difficulty was created by the selfish action of individuals in hoarding sugar, action which was unjustified by any fact in relation to the supply of sugar. We limited the output of sugar to the wholesalers in this month in order to prevent more and more sugar being stored away and hoarded by people who did not know where their own interests lay and who might be inclined to act in that manner. Nevertheless, there went out to wholesalers during the months of August and September, much more than the normal two months' supply. Any scarcity that arose, with particular traders in particular localities, was due entirely to the circumstances I have mentioned, the hoarding of sugar by individuals to whom abnormal supplies were sold by their customary retailers, or the disinclination of traders themselves to sell sugar which they preferred to keep in store.
We fixed the price for sugar. One of the methods which was invented in the last war to avoid the fixed price for sugar was to require a customer for sugar to buy tea as well. Now, let me say here for the information of members of the House and the information of the public outside, that the only reason why a grocer will require a customer to buy tea at the same time as he buys sugar is the desire to profiteer. There is no other reason. The price of sugar can be easily detected as it is fixed, and there is a uniform price for all sugar. When the price of sugar is fixed, it is not possible for the trader to overcharge for sugar without being detected. It is different in relation to tea. There are infinite varieties of tea, and the price of one variety may be considerably different from the price of another variety. Consequently it is possible for a trader to conceal a rise in the price of tea without difficulty. I have made an order which makes it illegal for any trader to make it a condition of the sale of sugar that some other commodity must be purchased at the same time. I have made it realising that it may be difficult to enforce and merely for the purpose of indicating to the public that it is a practice they must discourage. I ask them to discourage it by transferring their custom from any trader who adopts that practice. I ask them to do that on the ground that traders who adopt that practice have one idea in their minds, and one idea only, and that is to profiteer at the expense of the customer. They do not adopt it for the purpose of getting rid of stocks of tea. They are much more concerned about stocks of tea than stocks of sugar. There is no difficulty to be anticipated at all concerning sugar. There might be, in exceptional circumstances, some difficulty in relation to tea. I may say, however, that we do not anticipate any such difficulty. There are ample stocks of tea in the country and, up to the present, no difficulty has been experienced in procuring fresh stocks from outside.
I have mentioned already that the position in respect of wheat appears to be very easy. Already, as everybody knows, we have substantial stocks of wheat in the country, but apart altogether from these stocks there has been in every country in the world a bumper crop of wheat in this year, and instead of the outbreak of war leading to a curtailment in the supply of wheat, there is, in fact, ample wheat on offer, and, consequently no difficulty is to be anticipated in respect of the supply of flour. That is the position as it is now, and as it is likely to be for a considerable period ahead. I can say with confidence that, so far as flour is concerned-no matter what happens next year or next year's crop, there will be no difficulty in respect of the supply of flour for two years ahead. That information may be of value to those people who have been disposed to do, in relation to flour, what others had done in relation to sugar, and that is to store stocks against a possible shortage. There will be no shortage so far as facts now indicate. It is, therefore, not necessary for us to introduce, in relation to any class of food supply, a system of rationing. We are, of course, taking steps to control the wholesale distribution of certain of these commodities, but merely for the purpose of dealing with difficulties of administration. There need be no general rationing system, involving individual consumers, for any class of foodstuffs for the present or for the future so far as present indications point.
We have also established a system of price control. Now, I think it is desirable that the public should realise that the machinery for controlling prices, which is at the disposal of the Department of Supplies, is as adequate as it possibly can be, so far as organisation is concerned. The Department has taken over the organisation of the Prices Commission, that is, the staff of the Prices Commission, including the inspectorial staff. While the Prices Commission is still functioning under the Prices Commission Act, that organisation, in relation to the Department of Supplies, is functioning under the Emergency Powers Act which gives it much greater powers than the Prices Control Act gave, and, particularly, powers to deal with retail prices.
Is it being controlled by the Minister now?
It is being operated by the Minister for Supplies. If members of the public who believe that they are being overcharged will communicate with the Department of Supplies, immediate action will be taken on their complaint. Now, it is true that we get quite a number of complaints which are unfounded and some frivolous, but we prefer to get complaints which are unfounded and frivolous rather than no complaints at all. These complaints will be investigated. There is ample machinery for dealing with any situation which an investigation may reveal. It is desirable that the Government should have the information which members of the public may have in their possession in relation to prices charged for commodities, because it is upon the basis of such complaints, and the information which inspectors examining the complaints will give, that decisions will be made as to whether any more general system of price control is necessary. In any event, individual instances of overcharging can be dealt with. Individual traders guilty of overcharging can also be dealt with. We are particularly concerned to get a body of information which will enable decisions upon policy to be made: that is policy in relation to price control.
We have at the present time fixed prices for classes of goods. We have also a stand-still order in relation to other classes of goods. I agree fully with Deputy Dillon that the sooner the stand-still order ceases to operate the better. We cannot, for all time, fix prices in relation to a period which is becoming further and further in the past as each day passes. We are, therefore, seeking to substitute for the stand-still order specific orders, where necessary, fixing maximum prices for the goods concerned. It is not possible to fix prices in that detailed way for all classes of goods, but wherever it can be done, and wherever the need exists, it is being done. In other cases, the control that is being obtained through the wholesale distributors will be extended, if necessary, to retail distributors.
Will the Minister say that he has the power now, if he wishes to exercise it, which will enable him to prevent profiteers, who have been overcharging in the case of certain classes of goods, from getting further supplies?
It would be misleading to say that I now have the power. I can get that power. In relation to some classes of commodities, we have established a greater degree of control than in others. Generally speaking, we have tried to avoid control unless where there was need for it. The need has only arisen in relation to a limited number of commodities up to the present.
There is more than the mere question of profiteering in price. There is a widespread belief in the country to-day that the wholesalers of many commodities are hoarding supplies and refusing to sell them to retailers, except at exorbitant prices. They are holding back stocks in the hope that there will be a substantial increase in price, and that this increase will be sanctioned by the Minister. I suggest to the Minister that is a very important matter which should receive his attention. Will he tell the House whether he has taken any steps to deal with it?
We have already taken steps to deal with a development of that kind in relation to particular commodities. I do not think the practice is as widespread as the Deputy's question would suggest, but we have had examples of a corner being made in some particular commodity. We can easily deal with any such development, because not merely have we the power to maintain a fixed price for the commodity, which will prevent the corner yielding a profit, but we have also the power, which we have on occasions threatened to use, to requisition supplies and undertake the distribution of them ourselves. I am not denying that, in the case of sugar and flour, there has been some hoarding by individuals on a small scale. I do not think we need introduce any general system of control by reason of their activities. I do not think it will be necessary——
I am talking about hoarding at the other end.
——because that will disappear as soon as it is obvious that there is nothing to be gained by it. The introduction of a general control system would be an elaborate and costly method for dealing with a purely temporary development. Where-ever real difficulties occurred in relation to stocks of raw materials or of other commodities, we have been able to secure their release and distribution by administrative action. There is power to deal with that situation if it exists and the knowledge that there is the power as a general rule makes it unnecessary to use it.
Under an Order published to-day, the Minister gives power to wholesalers to increase the price of certain drapery goods by 25 per cent.
Manufacturers.
But in the meantime the stand-still order holds in relation to the retailers and they, I understand, find themselves in a difficulty with regard to the stand-still order on the one hand and the Minister's order permitting the 25 per cent. increase to manufacturers on the other.
The stocks of manufacturers' goods in respect of which that increase in price will operate will not reach the retailers for some time to come.
They will reach them within a week or three days.
I think that within a week the stand-still order, as it now exists, will have disappeared.
On the question of cornering, has the Minister received any complaints from traders in small towns as to the difficulty they are experiencing in getting supplies from manufacturers and wholesalers? There is a general complaint that they appear to be holding up supplies until they think there will be a better price for them.
We have been in touch with most of the organisations that exist, catering either for manufacturers or traders, and whatever complaints of that kind have been made we have been able to get dealt with and removed by consultation and advice. If a serious difficulty arises we may have to take more drastic action, but no such difficulty has arisen so far. Let me admit at once that in relation to certain classes of textiles and textile yarns there is immediate difficulty in getting supplies.
I am not talking about yarns. I am talking about manufactured articles.
But it all comes back to the cloth and the yarns in any event. It is because of the disorganisation of the markets in other countries that those difficulties have arisen, and it has taken some period of negotiation and arrangement to ensure that supplies will be kept up, so that production may continue and a shortage here be avoided. I want to deal specifically with the case of building materials. There is no immediate shortage of building materials. There is no reason why any building activities now in progress or planned should not proceed. In relation to building materials, of course, we have a decision of policy to make. We can proceed merrily along, employing all the people we can and building all we can until we come to a full stop, until materials have run out and there is no more, or we can take into account the difficulty that may be anticipated in renewing existing stocks, and try to spread them out over a longer period, or even conserve them, utilising them only for the most essential and the most important purposes. Again, I think it is necessary to make it clear that we are in this country in a fundamentally different position in relation to most building materials from the position experienced in the last war. A very wide range of the materials required for building purposes is now produced here. In fact it is only in relation to timber that any real difficulty exists. I think we must inevitably face the fact that there is going to be real difficulty in procuring fresh supplies of timber from abroad. Because of that situation, we are contemplating establishing a control both over existing stocks and over any future supplies that may be procured.
We are also contemplating the establishment of an organisation that will be able to purchase timber whenever it offers in any part of the world, and arrange for its transportation here and its equitable distribution amongst existing users. There may be, therefore at some stage a difficulty in relation to timber. There is a stock of timber here now. It is not as much as I should like it to be. I do not want to be critical of anybody, but I think firms normally engaged in the importation of the soft timbers might have responded more enthusiastically to the requests which were made to them this year and last year to increase their normal stocks. Nevertheless, there is a fairly substantial stock of timber in the country, a stock which can be supplemented by Irish timber which is mature and available for cutting, a stock sufficient, as I said, to keep building activities going for a substantial period. The only consideration that we have to keep in mind in relation to its user is that it may be difficult to replace, and that consequently we may have to control the purposes for which it is used now so as to get the best advantages from it. So far as other building materials are concerned, there appears to be little danger of a shortage for a considerable period ahead. We have already arranged for consultation with responsible architects and others, with a view to discovering whether it is possible to effect changes in the architectural designs of houses and so forth so as to reduce the quantity of timber needed in house construction.
What about baths and plumbing goods? I am told there is no supply at all. I am not saying that, in relation to all the articles for the equipment of houses, there are supplies available in the country now, but there is no difficulty that we know of or have experienced so far in procuring supplies.
Could you not substitute oak? There is any amount of it to be had in the country for nothing.
I mentioned the fact that there is a supply of timber available in the country. This timber could not be used for some period after it is cut, and I cannot say of my own knowledge that it is all suitable for the purposes for which imported timbers are in fact used.
What is it proposed to substitute for plumbing material?
I do not know what is worrying the Deputy about plumbing material. As far as copper tubes and copper couplings are concerned, they are being made in the country.
From what raw material?
From raw copper.
Brought in?
Yes.
Is that going to stop?
No. It will entail——
Copper importation is not going to stop?
Up to the present there is no difficulty in procuring supplies. I am not saying that, in relation to many classes of building materials, we will not have difficulty in getting supplies in future. What I am saying to the House now is that those difficulties have not appeared up to the present except in relation to one commodity, and that so far as the great range of commodities is concerned there are sufficient supplies available in the country, or procurable, to enable building facilities to be continued. Deputies referred here to the question of proceeding with a building programme of an extensive kind. There are other problems than problems of supplies to be considered in relation to such a programme. There is the problem of cost. I think that is one which Deputies should give their attention to, because not merely is it going to affect at once the extent to which building activities can be undertaken, but it is, of course, inevitably going to have reactions right into the future upon the people who may purchase or rent the houses that are now built at an inflated cost. We have got to consider also in that regard the extent to which it is possible to impose upon the taxpayers generally in the country any additional burden because of that increased cost. Those are all problems which cannot be decided overnight.
It is of course our desire and our duty to try to preserve employment, particularly for the class of workers that would be most immediately affected by any cessation of activities of that kind. The real problem which this country will have to face, arising out of the war, is the problem of preserving employment. We have got an unemployment problem of some magnitude now, and the number of our unemployed is liable to be increased, perhaps even increased substantially as a result of the war and its effect upon our industrial and economic organisation generally. That is our problem. It is not possible I think to deal with the whole of that unemployment problem of ours merely upon a basis of schemes of public work. In times of peace, the solution for unemployment is to be found by increasing production, whether it is agricultural or industrial production, and thus increasing the wealth available to the nation, wealth which can be utilised for the purpose of subsidising public works or social services designed to relieve destitution arising from any cause. Our problem in time of war, so far as industry is concerned, is to preserve production. We may possibly, in one direction or another, effect an increase, but generally speaking our problem in relation to industry is to preserve production, and consequently to preserve employment. That is not going to be easy.
There are many directions in which it will not be possible at all. We can only hope to increase production in agriculture, and clearly the additional employment that may be created by increasing production in agriculture will be of little value in dealing with the problem of unemployment that is going to be created in industry, because the type of worker that is liable to become disemployed in industry is not likely to be absorbed in agriculture. Neither is that type of worker likely to be catered for by any programme of public works which we may devise. Undoubtedly, the provision of work in one form or another must be the Government's concern to the extent that we can finance it and to the extent that available supplies and resources make it possible to undertake schemes of that kind.
But it is idle to imagine that we have not got a serious unemployment problem, which may become more serious, and with which there appears at the moment to be no means of entirely coping. We cannot cope with it. We may try to minimise its effects and by means of social services to prevent unemployment from creating destitution and hardship. But we cannot, so far as we can see, now undertake to produce a plan which will remove it entirely. It is, therefore, necessary to ask the public and, particularly, employers to co-operate with the Government in preventing that unemployment from becoming serious. There is always a tendency on the part of employers to start economising at the beginning of a period of this kind by dismissing staffs, by anticipating shortage of materials and trying to forestall the shortage by reducing the employment they give. I ask employers not to do that.
Not merely are they injuring the national interest as a whole, but they are not serving their own interest either. It is in the interest of everybody, and particularly those in trade and industry, that ordinary industrial and commercial activities should be kept going as fully as possible and as long as possible. For that purpose, it is desirable we should get the co-operation of all employers in preserving the employment they now give, even if there is a temporary shortage of supplies which may involve curtailment of their activities, or some other difficulty which, if things were done on a purely commercial basis, might justify them in reducing their staffs. I ask them not to do so and I ask them not to postpone the placing of orders with producers or any constructional or similar works they had planned. We can make it possible for these works to proceed.
It is inevitable in a period of emergency, when difficulties have arisen and greater difficulties are anticipated, that individuals should try to save money. The instinct is to save money, to keep resources liquid, so that people may be able to deal with unforeseen circumstances as they arise. I think the people of this country learned a lesson in the last war. That lesson was that the most foolish way of attempting to conserve their wealth was by keeping it in cash. It is inevitable in time of war that the value of cash should tend to depreciate, whereas the value of goods tends to appreciate. My advice to people who have got money is to turn it into property, goods or assets of some tangible kind rather than keep it on deposit in the banks or in any other form of cash. By spending their money now, they are not merely serving their own interests but they are helping to keep the wheels of industry moving. It is important we should do that, that there should be no drying up of purchasing power and no commercial or industrial stagnation. It is difficult to procure results of this kind by mere exhortation but, with the experience of one great war only a quarter of a century ago behind us, we can learn the wisdom of proceeding as normally as possible and trying, each one of us, to keep things moving by spending our money, making our normal purchases, carrying on our normal business without seeking panic economies which can only react to the individual detriment.
What will a trader get by keeping the wheels of industry going if cash will not be any good to him?
I think I have explained that. If my ideas do not appeal to the Deputy, that is a matter for him.
May I ask a question?
I do not propose to be cross-examined.
I understood from the Minister that cash depreciates in value during a war. If that is the situation, what is the foundation for his appeal to traders to keep the wheels of industry going? It is obviously not cash because cash will depreciate. What are they, then, to get?
There may be some point in that statement but I do not see it. If the Deputy thinks that traders sell goods only to get cash——
I thought that was one of the motives of trade.
They only get cash for the purpose of making new purchases and, therefore, the advice I have given to the individual applies to the trader.
And the cash will be less in value.
The sooner he makes new purchases the better. If the obvious commonsense of the advice I have given does not appeal to Deputies, I cannot do more. It appears to us that it would be folly to advise the public to curtail their expenditure now or in any other way to curtail the amount of work they create by that expenditure. It is desirable by every means—exhortation and example—to encourage people to maintain their normal purchases, to give normal employment and to keep the commercial and industrial activities of the country proceeding as best they can under the circumstances.
More and more control will be necessary.
That may be the case but, so long as the public understand that such a policy is the best policy in the national interest and, therefore, best for the individual as well, we shall get their co-operation in whatever measures we have to adopt towards that end. It is not possible to answer in detail a large number of the queries which were put. We are dealing with problems that are changing from day to day. It may be that we could have had ourselves in a greater position of preparedness than, in fact, we found ourselves in on the 1st September. We cannot, however, judge the problems that existed in August or July last in the same way as those who had to deal with them in August or July had to judge them. If we had known that there was to be a war on the 1st September and that it was going to last for a certain period, we could have been ready. We did not know that and we had to strike a balance on the possibilities. If we had laid in large stocks which, ultimately, had to be disposed of at a loss, if we had made preparations which proved to be unnecessary because no war resulted, we would have been in a very difficult position when we came to explain our conduct to the public. We did, however, take all the measures which the circumstances of the time appeared to necessitate, and the circumstances of the time were such, as Deputies will remember, that while war appeared possible and probable, it did not appear inevitable. We know now that it has happened and we have got to deal with the position as created.
That position is somewhat different from what might have been expected. When we were considering the problems war would bring us before the war started, we had only the experience of the last war to go by. We had to assume that the problems of this war would be like those of the last war. In fact, the war has developed on somewhat different lines, and may develop on entirely different lines, creating new problems against which we had not planned at all and not creating the problems against which we had planned. We have, therefore, to be in a position to change our method of operation from day to day. We can at the moment say that, so far as essential commodities are concerned, we have been able to keep up a supply or to provide a reasonable substitute which enabled agricultural and industrial activities to be continued. In relation to some non-essential commodities, like rice, certain classes of preserved fruits, raisins and currants, difficulties which could not be overcome have arisen because supplies could not be obtained at all. These difficulties may disappear in the future but, so far as essential commodities are concerned, we have made or are making arrangements which will be adequate to see us through any reasonable period for which it is possible to plan. I do not want to be taken as saying that no difficulties will arise. Difficulties will inevitably arise. There may be periods during which essential commodities will be short.
However, so far as it has been possible for us to provide now, either by internal arrangements or by arrangements with parties outside the country, against these periods of shortage, we have done so; and I would ask the members of this House, when considering matters concerned with the Department of Supplies, to bear these facts and these problems in mind. When the Dáil meets again we shall have a better idea of the dimensions of these problems and we expect to have brought into much more effective working capacity the machinery for dealing with these problems. The machinery for dealing with these problems is, at the moment, a makeshift machinery, but it is working satisfactorily at the moment and, by the time the Dáil meets again, it will be working much more efficiently than it is at the moment.
I think it is scarcely right that, at this meeting of the Dáil —the first that has taken place since the outbreak of hostilities—there should not have gone out from this Government and this people a message of sympathy with that great nation that is suffering at the moment as a result of the outbreak of these hostilities. For centuries, Christianity and civilisation had a bulwark in Poland, down to its partition by three powerful empires. From the time of Stanislaus, down to Wenceslaus and down to Jan Sobieski, Christianity had a great bulwark there, and at the time of the regaining of the independence of that great country a message was sent here, rejoicing in its own liberty, and expressing its hope that this country of ours would also be shortly in the same position.
It was rather disappointing to-day— almost from the time of the opening of business—to hear the Government's explanation of the various steps that had been taken during the last three or four weeks, and one might have been reasonably puzzled in trying to find out for what purpose this meeting of the Dáil was called, until, in an evening newspaper, we found, perhaps, one reason for it, and that was the appointment by the British Government of a representative here, and the announcement that was made here almost simultaneously with the description of the appointment in the House of Commons over the water. It would be wise for the Government to be particularly frank with the people at this time and during the whole course of the war. They will get fair treatment, I am sure, from practically every section of the community, but I suggest that the community, at least, deserve the same treatment from the Government. For instance, in connection with the very first question that appeared on the Order Paper this evening, as to what was the meaning of the change in personnel of the various Ministries, I do not think the House or the country got a fair answer. The Minister for Industry and Commerce was appointed to a new Ministry, and that one appointment, apparently, occasioned the transfer of six Ministers, from positions which they had held, to other positions. Now, whatever may be said as to the manner in which these Ministers discharged their duties in those Ministries, at least it must be said that they had had seven years' experience of the work connected with the Ministries concerned; and now, in a time of war and stress, to suggest that the only explanation for these changes is that they were necessitated by reason of the change of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Mr. Lemass, to the new Ministry, and that this general post was necessary, is not convincing.
When one examines—not with any idea of finding fault—all the answers that were given to the various questions that were put here this evening, I suggest that it must give rise to misgivings. The Ministry cannot be unaware of the fact that, during the last three or four weeks—through various causes, for some of which, perhaps, the Government themselves are more responsible—various disquieting rumours of one sort or another have been circulating in this country. These rumours have been circulating, undoubtedly, and certain of them were amusing—amusing at least, to those who have had experience of administration—but whether amusing or not, they were certainly disquieting rumours; and when one considers that these rumours were allowed to circulate throughout the country during the last three or four weeks, without any reassuring statement from the Government or from any responsible Minister concerned with these matters, and when one considers many of the statements that were made here in the House to-day with regard to the question of censorship, and relate these statements to the question of these rumours, one is almost convinced that these rumours, amusing as some of them may have been, but also alarming in some cases, are but the precursors of much more serious rumours that will circulate during the next three or four months, or for whatever time the war is going to last.
This country is sensible enough to elect the representatives to this Parliament, and this Parliament is supposed to be sensible enough to elect a Government. If the people repose that confidence in their representatives, why not repose a similar confidence in the people? Take, for example, the question that was raised here this evening with regard to the strength of the Army. Does not everybody here know, within 5,000 or so, what is the strength of the Army? Has not every Deputy here had the Estimates for the Army for the current year before him, and can he not hazard a guess, within a few thousands or so, as to what is the strength of the Army? Does not every Chancellory in Europe, or every war department, in Europe know it? Apart from that, is it not well known what is the position of the equipment we have with regard to the numbers in our Army, and why is there need in this matter to endeavour to surround all this matter with secrecy? I hold that that gives rise to speculation, to rumours and uncertainty, and to a feeling of disquiet.
When one ponders upon the feelings that must animate every citizen of Poland and of its Government in their present difficulties, and when one compares it with the position of our people here, who have every chance to improve their position in these difficult times—when one compares that position with the statements that have fallen from the lips of our Ministers here to-day—one is convinced that our Ministers are too introspective and that they are not looking at the problems in the way in which they should be looked at. What is the statement that we have had? Neutrality. Are we on the run from the belligerent nations in connection with neutrality? Why is it that we could not have heard from Ministers some statement in connection with the matter of the sinking of ships that were bringing wheat, Indian corn, or other necessities? Is it too much to ask whether or not any belligerent has a right to sink them? The Minister for Industry and Commerce, or for Supplies, has told us that we ought to buy extensively, but what is the contribution of the Government towards that? They are giving employment and they could not give it more expensively than they are giving it. Surely if we are to consider the economic situation in this country and if we are to advise industrialists, manufacturers and other people to endeavour to stimulate whatever national economy we have, is it not the duty of those in responsible public positions and spending the largest amount of money available to any set of men in the country to spend, to give an example of careful spending, of good housekeeping, of economy, and to show results for the money they are spending? The most remarkable expansion of employment in this country is that provided by the Government. They are giving the most expensive possible employment, with inspectors, officials, restrictions, complications, difficulties and so on. Consult any body of businessmen one knows or hears about, and they will tell you that you must lessen overhead expenses and must keep them within reasonable limits, if there are going to be profits in any business you undertake, unless it be purely speculative, and then it is open to all the disadvantages which that entails.
We learn now that, notwithstanding all the efforts made towards self-sufficiency in this country, the two commodities which are essential to agriculture, maize and fertilisers, are not available in the quantities required, and, at the same time, we are advising people to go in for more production. I wonder has it entered the heads of Ministers that perhaps the extensive tillage beyond the capacity of the labour in the agricultural industry in this country may have been responsible for the shortage of turf last year and perhaps for some of the bad hay which had disastrous results in certain parts of the country? If, by reason of a special effort now to get people to do something beyond the capacity of the supplies available in the nature of raw materials, we are placed in that position, we will incur losses rather than make profits, and I think that before any definite pronouncement is made by the Minister for Agriculture, he should carefully consider what the resources are before we undertake expansion.
We have been speaking about an expansion of agricultural production from these benches for years. We would not recommend an attempt to expand agricultural production, if, by reason of that policy, those engaged in the industry were going to suffer loss. Similarly, during the last war, people were asked to break lands and to till lands that did not produce results and which entailed loss to the country and to the individuals employed. One of the disadvantages in connection with civil servants regulating business is that there is no attention given to the peculiarities inseparable from business, to those factors which prevent expansion and production and which interfere with the ordinary course of commercial relations that ought to be allowed to flow uninterruptedly and free from all this certification, regulation and regimentation which seem to be the lifeblood of the Civil Service.
For three successive years now, we have had unbalanced Budgets in this country and after the third, the Minister for Finance is either promoted or demoted, and that in a time of war or emergency. This is the time when we are increasing two services in the State —when we are at peace—and increasing them at enormous cost. Would not any manufacturer or businessman, with that information before him, consider in connection with his business whether or not it is advisable to keep on employment at its present peak? Mind you, I am in favour of their doing it, and I would advise them to do it, but I wonder would their accountants advise them to do it, and, after all, it is their accountants they listen to more than to a Minister. I find in connection with the censorship that it is quite possible that one of the items that will be included in the prohibition will be matters such as that. If, next year, by reason of this extra expenditure, we are going to do either of two things—increase taxation or add to our dead weight debt—what would the opinion of any businessman or manufacturer be? Is that the time for him to expand? You may persuade him to do it. You may, in some instances, succeed in persuading them, but you know very well that ultimately the auditor or the accountants will produce a balance sheet and ask if they are making any provision for what will happen next year. Supposing they do keep on men at a loss for any particular year, does it not follow that, unless there is an expansion in business in the succeeding year, there must ultimately be some reduction?
Our main consideration in connection with the events of the next few months, or few years, as the case may be, is, firstly, to endeavour to get more out of the land—something that will be capable of being sold—a profitable expansion of agricultural production, and secondly, to endeavour to keep the people in employment who are in employment, and to add to the numbers, if possible. Do you think it likely that you will succeed in doing that, assuming for the moment that every additional man put into the Army costs, as estimated last year, £110, and likely, by reason of the changed circumstances, to reach a figure of £150; and do yon think it likely that it would not be possible to spend that £150 better than on one man or on one family? What is the necessity for increasing the Gárda Síochána by 400 men at present? We are told it is going to cost this year only £62,000. Precisely; but next year, if the same number of men are kept on, it is going to cost £l20 per man, and the £62,000 will increase to £124,000.
In these circumstances, I think the onus rests on the Government to balance its Budget, to keep within the limit, to reduce this unnecessary, wasteful expenditure in which they have been indulging for the last few years, to lessen their interference with business, to go out on the radio occasionally and tell the people such a story as the Minister told to-night about sugar. Possibly, Ministers would prefer to address themselves to Fianna Fáil policy. Leave it alone for a while. It has been an absolute blister upon this country, and the Lord knows how many generations of our people will have to pay for it yet. Leave it alone. Deal with the matters concerning the people at the moment, and tell them there is no shortage of sugar, that you imported last year far more than was even taken out of bond, and that the sugar factories are capable of producing at least 50 per cent. of the requirements of the year. That is a very different situation from that which existed in this country at the commencement of the last war, and the price of sugar went, in a week or a fortnight, from 2d. to 6d. a lb.
When the Minister spoke to us to-night about the reduction which is going to take place in the value of money, I wonder if he was speaking speculative, or after consultation with other people. It is a particularly dangerous topic. The value of money is going to fall if the price of gold rises. The Minister is in a much better position now, by reason of the appointment made to this country which we heard of this evening of Sir John Maffey, of finding out what the British policy is in regard to that. It is only fair to the people of the country that we should know. While, just before the declaration of war, the price of gold rose, it is now at 168/-. A very big expenditure of money took place after the last war started. So far as the British are concerned, this time, they spent money two or three years before the war started. So far as they are concerned—and our economic system is very much bound up with theirs —you might as well compare the data of to-day with, let us say, two-and-a-half years after the war started in 1914. It is quite possible from the trend of events, that those who are advising the British Government do not intend that the £ will lose its value. If they do, there must be some indication of that policy, and it is important that the Minister should find that out and take the country into his confidence in connection with it. If, on the other hand, it is going to remain stable, and I suppose its stability is going to depend very much on the duration of the war, then we have a different situation.
The Minister would be well advised to discover for his own Department if it is possible to get the essential requirements for the secondary industries of this country, and also maize and fertilisers brought in in neutral ships. If, by reason of an expansion of our agricultural production, we can afford to pay whatever extra price would be incurred by reason of that expensive transport, it is better for us to have it. The Government, particularly, would be well advised, as I have said before, lo look to the present cost of government in this country and to reconsider their policy with regard to this sudden army expansion. You can lose a war in two ways—either in the field or by reason of your economic condition. When this war is over a very serious economic situation will face this country.
There, is a rumour circulating throughout the country that, so far as Government activity in connection with house building and hospital construction is concerned, it is to be eased off. If that policy lias to be adopted by reason of a shortage of material we could understand it. But I would very much prefer to spend £1,000,000 on housing than £1,000,000 on the Army at the present moment. If we are in the position that we have to fight two belligerents, then we certainly require a much bigger army than we are likely to be able to put up in this country. If only one belligerent, then we ought to know how many men we require for that purpose. But, above all things, do not let it get out through the country that the Government are in a state of nerves. Certainly, examining their policy during the last three or four weeks, it looks as if something like a nervous breakdown is affecting them.
If, by reason of the change in circumstances that is going to take place, certain Departments are not going to be worked at the same rate at which they have been working in recent years, would it not be possible to arrange that a Minister should take over two Departments? If, for example, it is not proposed to pursue land acquisition and distribution at the same speed we have been accustomed to during the last few years, what is the need for a Minister for Lands? It is more than likely that during the war period the Department of Education will not inaugurate any new policy, and the work of that Department will be merely administrative. Summing it all up, sooner or later a Budget will have to be balanced in this country, and the sooner the better. The sooner that confidence which business men, industrialists, manufacturers, and agriculturists get from the Government paying attention to what they insist upon other people paying attention to, namely, paying their way, the better for everybody in tins country.
The Taoiseach and the Minister for Supplies made some very serious and, to some extent, conflicting statements during the course of this discussion. In reply to a question by Deputy Cosgrave this evening, the Taoiseach indicated that the recent changes in the Ministry did not indicate any change in policy, whether social, financial, or otherwise. But, during the course of the speech delivered by the Taoiseach he made the statement that the situation created by the state of emergency which now exists would bring about serious financial conditions. He went on to state that, in his opinion, there would be a complete disruption of trade and commerce. Are we to understand that, although there will be, in the opinion of the Taoiseach, serious financial conditions in this country and a, complete disruption of trade and commerce, at the same time the Government, while realising that these conditions are going to be brought about, do not consider it necessary to change their existing policy? I think there is something to be explained by the Taoiseach, or by whoever replies on behalf of the Government, regarding the changes in Ministerial positions and their relation to the necessity for changes in Government policy.
Anybody who makes any kind of study of the present financial position arising out of the war that is going on elsewhere and the state of emergency which prevails here as a result of it must realise that the financial conditions are going to be changed here. I imagine, but I have no information on this, that the new Minister for Finance will lie confronted in the very near future with the preparation and presentation to the House of an emergency Budget. It is not unfair to anticipate that there will be a considerable reduction in tax revenue, especially revenue which has been derived for a considerable number of years from tariffs on imports. There will be also, I am sure, a reduction in tax revenue from other sources. It is quite clear from statements that have been made in the House, and from information that is in the possession, not alone of Deputies, but of every sensible citizen, that Army expenditure is going to be considerably increased, that expenditure in connection with the Gárda Siochána and expenditure in connection with the establishment of two additional Ministers will mean an increase, and we are confronted with the situation that there is going to be a considerable reduction in tax revenue from several sources. There is to be a big increase in expenditure. Will that, in the opinion of the Taoiseach or his colleagues, necessitate the presentation in the near future of an emergency budget, or will we carry on under the present budgetary position until the end of the financial year? If we are going to face up to the preparation of an emergency budget, which will mean increased taxation, surely that in itself means some change in financial policy and, therefore, no matter what the Taoiseach says, there is something in the recent Ministerial changes.
I sympathise with the new Minister for Finance who, I understand, in the course of a speech within the last couple of days, said he did not, want to leave the Department of Local Government, where he felt quite happy, and that he did not know why he was being changed. There is no doubt that anybody who understands the difference between the work attaching to the Department of Local Government and the Department of Finance must sympathise with him in the serious task with which he is now confronted going, as he does, to a new Ministry in the present critical period. The Taoiseach put a question to the House in the first or second sentence of his speech. He said: "Do you want the Government to function?" I am sure he was not addressing that question to the members of this House, having any doubt in his mind as to what the answer would be. He suggested that, if we want the present Government to function, then we should get away from criticism of the Government which is normally associated, to use his own words, with ordinary petty Party politics. I do not know any Deputy in the Opposition Parties who is not prepared to sympathise with the Government and give them every support that may be necessary in the present critical circumstances, but if we are to be asked to give the Government the support which they are entitled to receive, we are, on the other hand, entitled to know what is the Government's policy so that we can get that down to the people of the country.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce stated that we must plan on the assumption that the war is going to be a long one. In the concluding portion of his speech he suggested that the position is bound to change from day to day and, therefore, the policy must not be a long range policy, but rather a day to day one. Surely there is some reason for the Taoiseach getting his Ministers into the same room, even if the period is to be a long one, so that they can understand the policy, if there is a policy, or if there is to be a change in the policy arising out of existing circumstances compared with the circumstances when the Budget was presented last April or May. I believe that the Government, no matter what the Taoiseach has said, will be confronted with the necessity for making a more careful study of the financial policy for the future.
Nobody will go so far as to suggest that the financial policy of this State suitable to peace-time conditions could prevail in a neutral country in circumstances such as now exist. There is bound to be a change. The people who realise that such a change is necessary are the people who may be called upon to pay increased income-tax or other taxes which are bound to increase as a result of the existing emergency. To what extent does the financial policy of the Government affect the position in regard to the carrying on of housing schemes, public works schemes, minor relief schemes, afforestation schemes, land improvement schemes, or works normally carried on by the Government? We were told two or three months ago by the last Minister for Finance that, in spite of statements made here, the financial policy of this Government has no bearing on the financial policy of any other country. The day after war broke out the directors of the Bank of England increased the bank rate by 2 per cent. And two hours later the bank rate here was raised from 3 per cent. to 5 per cent. We will still be told by the last Minister for Finance, who is now Minister for Industry and Commerce, that we are not governed to any extent in our financial policy or bank rates by the policy of any other country. To what extent is the increased bank rate going to have any relation to the carrying on of housing schemes? A question which appeared on the Order Paper in connection with that matter was answered by the new Minister for Local Government. He indicated that contracts already entered into would be completed, and that is understandable, but he could not say, and I quite understand the reason, to what extent the housing policy would be affected in the future by the new conditions that we now know to exist. Of course they are going to be affected by the rates of interest which will be charged by the moneylenders to enable these and other schemes of a useful national character to he carried on. To what extent are we going to be affected in the future in the carrying on of land improvement schemes, public works schemes, minor relief schemes, and other useful schemes of the kind carried on within recent years through the various Government Departments?
Deputy Norton, and another Deputy speaking from the benches on my left, referred to the rumours that have been in circulation regarding the closing down of land acquisition schemes. I have been reliably assured that a Deputy on the Fianna Fáil Benches, speaking to his supporters, said that the reason why So-and-so's land cannot be acquired is that the Government have no money for the purpose. Is there any foundation for a statement of that kind which was made by a Fianna Fáil Deputy? If there is not, this is the place to contradict it. I was informed to-day by a Deputy, and there were other Deputies listening, that the inspectors of the Land Commission attached to the section dealing with land acquisition have practically ceased operations and some of the staff are being transferred to the new State Departments recently established. Is that a fact? What is the reason for it, if it is a fact? It appears to me that the increase in the bank rate alone is bound to affect the carrying on of all Government schemes, and for that reason the Government must seriously consider their financial policy if we are going to have a long-drawn-out struggle in other parts of the world, a struggle that is already affecting us so seriously.
I should, like also to find out to what extent the transport arrangements of this Country are going to be affected by the rationing of petrol. I assume that there will be a diversion to some extent of road traffic to the railways.
The reason I ask the question is that I want to know from the Minister responsible whether he is satisfied, if a big diversion of traffic takes place in that direction, the railways are in a position, financially or otherwise, to handle the situation. A transport tribunal was set up by the Government on December 8th of last year, and the then Minister for Industry and Commerce stated that he expected a report from that tribunal should be in the hands of the Department at some early date in February, when the Dáil was due to resume after the Christmas adjournment. When speaking on the debate, I stated that I could not see how any body of people—and there were certainly very good representatives appointed on the tribunal—could bring in an intelligent report in such a short period. At any rate, we know now that a report from that tribunal was handed to the Department about six weeks ago. I want to know from the Taoiseach, or from some other Minister who may be in a position to reply, whether the report of the tribunal, which naturally has great interest for every Deputy, for many interest outside the House, and for the public, will be circulated to Deputies in the near future. The Department has had six weeks to read and consider the report, and as the House has been responsible for the establishment of the tribunal, it is entitled to have it in its possession at a very early date, unless there are some very grave reasons of policy for withholding it.
Perhaps it was unfair to the Taoiseach, when I interrupted him, to ask if he could give any information about the air raid precaution plans of the Government. It is now many months since a measure was passed by the House handing over certain powers to the Minister for Defence in connection with air raid precaution schemes. People connected with various public utility societies were called up and given lectures by officers of the Department of Defence, and they were competent in the early part of the present year to give effect to any plans the Government had in mind in connection with air raid precaution schemes. I want to ask the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures if he takes part in the debate, to say whether it was intended in air raid precaution schemes to invite what are known as essential undertakings to prepare plans for the protection of the property of the different companies affected, and for the protection of the people working in these undertakings, and why it was that such invitations have not been extended to some essential undertakings. The reason I ask is that many public utility concerns or, if you like, "essential undertakings" as they are described in the Act, are in the dark as to the kind of reconstruction work that should be carried out in order to protect the property and the lives of the workers engaged in them. If they go on and act on their own responsibility, and incur a considerable amount of expense in the reconstruction of premises, they may find afterwards that they will not be able to get a refund, or recover the percentage they are entitled to recover from the State, if they had not got the previous authority of the Department concerned to carry out plans in accordance with any scheme that may be in the mind of the Minister or of his officials.
The Taoiseach rather took the line that the citizens generally do not appear to know or to bother much about educating themselves as to the requirements of air raid precaution schemes. How many civilian respirators have been handed to the civilian population? How many civilian respirators have been handed out, despite the fact that it is well known that about 500,000 respirators are stored in barracks controlled by the Department of Defence since the beginning of this year or the latter part of last year? If that is true will the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures explain the need to keep these respirators in stores if, as the Taoiseach said, he wants the people to educate themselves on the requirements of air raid precaution schemes. If there was a raid in this. country to-morrow—and God forbid that such should take place—what percentage of the civilian population would know how to handle respirators? It is a disgraceful state of affairs, if it is a fact, that 500,000 respirators are stored in the barracks. Surely the Taoiseach and his colleagues cannot blame the civilian population for not educating themselves in the use of respirators if they cannot get them. I understand it is the duty of the Government to supply the civilian population with respirators for their protection and, on payment if you like, to supply workers in certain public utility societies, for the purpose of enabling them to carry on their civilian duties in the case of an air raid. I understand the Taoiseach, when interrupted, did not understand the position fully, and that, probably, was the reason he evaded answering questions put to him by me when he was speaking on the subject. However, I daresay he was more inclined to hand the matter over, and rightly so, to the Minister responsible for the preparation of plans for carrying out the scheme.
May I ask the Deputy when I blamed the people for not doing certain things?
The Taoiseach talked about the complacency of the people in matters of this kind. I am using words that the Taoiseach used when he was speaking. Perhaps, as I was responsible for interrupting the Taoiseach, he was not allowed to develop the point he wanted to bring out. In any case, I am sure the Minister who is now sitting beside him will be able to give the House more information than has been given to the public, to the owners of essential undertakings and to local authorities, because the people are entitled to information if they are to act in accordance with the wishes of the Government. I asked the Parliamentary Secretary when he was dealing with this question this evening, to say whether he was aware that a telegram had been sent to local authorities in provincial areas on September 2nd, in the name of the Minister for Defence, calling for a complete black-out. I know that on receipt of the information certain high officials of a local authority in my constituency went to the local Gárda Superintendent, and that the superintendent went round the principal town telling shopkeepers, private householders and others to put out all lights, yet we were told this evening that all that was required was a 25 per cent. black-out. At any rate, we are in the dark with regard to the requirements of the Government in this matter. If the Taoiseach and the Minister for Defence take the owners of public undertakings and members of local authorities more into their confidence, as to what is actually required, I am sure that all the assistance necessary will be forthcoming from citizens of the State.
The Minister for Supplies, in discussing the position of the building trade, talked about a shortage or an alleged shortage of timber. I remember reading two or three advertisements issued by the Secretary to the Land Commission in the daily papers within the last week, inviting tenders for timber that the Forestry Section were in a position to dispose of. I dare say the timber available for sale by the Forestry Section is not supposed to be suitable for work in the building trade.
In connection with that, I do not know whether there is a shortage of concrete in the country. Some people say there is. I do not know whether there is a shortage of the necessary materials for water works and sewerage schemes. I was informed by a highly qualified engineer recently that there is a shortage of the necessary material for the construction of water works and sewerage schemes. I wonder would the Government consider the advisability of allowing the use of stone and ware pipes instead of concrete pipes for the purpose of enabling the local authorities to continue carrying out water works and sewerage schemes. Thanks be to goodness there are plenty bricks in the country——
Mr. Brennan
Oh, oh!
——if the Government will only have the sense to use them in the building of houses. I certainly do not want to encourage Deputy Brennan to throw bricks at the members of the Ministry. I know a certain local authority in my constituency which for the past five or six years has always invited contractors to tender for the erection of houses in concrete, stone or brick. In every case this particular local authority, which I must say is a model local authority, has been able to build its houses with brick. The result is that they have helped to open up a brick-yard within a few miles of their township. I know that has happened in many places. In the case of articles that would otherwise have to be imported, it would be a good thing if we could establish industries here or help to establish them so as to provide materials for our building industry. I think we could afford to pay a bit more for the bricks made in our own country. and the same would apply to other things if we can get these articles at home.
I wish to ask the Minister for Supplies to state, when dealing with the question of profiteering, whether he thinks he has power at present to prevent profiteers getting supplies through his Ministry in cases where it has been clearly proved that such profiteers have been guilty of charging excessive prices. I think it would be a good thing if the Minister for Supplies had full powers to penalise profiteers in the way I have suggested. Perhaps it would be a most effective method of dealing with them. I would also suggest that price fixing legislation should be altered and amended. There is no use in bringing a profiteer into the local District Court and fining him 10/- or £1 because of his excessive charges. It is surely a cruel thing to see young people half-fed and ill-clothed and at the same time have profiteers charging poor people excessive prices. At present the only penalty imposed on them is the bringing of them into the local court where they may be fined 10/- or £1. If I had anything to do with that part of the administration I would see that these people were set to work making mail bags in Mountjoy Prison rather than have them, as at present, getting off with a nominal fine. The most effective way of stopping this sort of thing and the most deterrent punishment that could be inflicted would be jail without the option of a fine.
I have no fear for the future of this State through any trouble coming to it from those people who may be opposed to parliamentary government. Neither have I any fear of those people outside this House who refuse to recognise the Government of this State. These people cause me no fears at all because the citizens of the country are too sensible to pay any heed to their antics. The people of this country have already paid too dearly in blood and treasure in the past for the activities of those people to give ear ever again to anything they may say or try to do. My fears arise from the possibility that there may be an increase in unemployment. I have also fears, if we allow profiteering to go on, that undoubtedly trouble will come to us. I warn the Government to look into the question of price-fixing legislation. I suggest to them to fix penalties which will make it impossible, in the national emergency that now exists, for profiteering to go on for any length of time.
I do not know what the Deputies on the Opposition side are wailing about to-day. I would, however, say tins much: that, in my opinion, they are endeavouring to do more harm to the people of this country than has been done by any of the rumourmongers who were so active last week, and surely they were bad enough. The policy which Deputy Cosgrave said would come as a blister on the people of this country has been proved a great success. If was a very good job that the Ministers did not take the advice that was offered to them from the benches opposite during the past few years. In 1932 there were 21,000 acres under wheat in this country. This year there are 258,000 acres under wheat. That is, we have practically six months' supplies of wheat grown to feed our population at the start of the war. Were it not for the advice given by the Opposition we would this year have grown 40,000 to 60,000 extra acres of barley, and also extra acres of oats and beet. Deputies will realise, as the time passes, how great a loss it will be to the people of this State that we had not grown more crops this year.
Deputy Dillon is now advising the production of more wheat, more poultry, more eggs. The Deputy is on a very wise tack. It is all very well for us to start out producing as much as we can for export, but I think the first question we should ask ourselves is—if this war continues, as to all appearances it will, for three years, what provision is to be made for our people in the matter of supplies of bread and sugar—two essentials of life? It is all right to go out on a policy of producing more beef. No doubt there will be a ready market for it. I am sure we would succeed in getting a share of money back from the export of beef. But in my opinion, at any rate, there is no fear that the people will go short of meat. There is, however, a great danger of their going short of bread. I am satisfied that provision will have to be made in this country for the production of a 12 months' supply of wheat. In my view, that is what we will need to grow in the coming year. We will have to double the acreage of wheat grown this year unless we are going to gamble on the submarine warfare by the Germans being rendered ineffective. I, for one, do not believe that this would be a wise policy for the fanners at present at the rate they are going.
Deputy Dillon also was very anxious about getting plenty of barley grown. He need not bother his head. We fixed all that up about a fortnight ago and it will be impossible for anybody in this country to prevent somewhere between 250,000 and 300,000 acres of barley being grown in this country this year. They cannot stop it no matter how they try. There is a guarantee that 130,000 acres of it will be paid for at 2d. a stone more than whatever wheat will bring. That is the position as regards barley. Those are the requirements of the maltsters and that is the guaranteed price agreed to by Guinness for the coming year. Unfortunately, owing to the constant dinning into our ears that Irish barley and oats make rotten feeding stuff, there was a drop of something like 40,000 acres of barley and 40,000 acres of oats last year. That is a very unfortunate position in which to find ourselves at the start of a war.
The principal problem, to my mind at any rate, is the provision of bread. I do not mind by what means it is got hut, in my opinion, we will have to provide for an increase of at least 250,000 acres of wheat in the coming year. It is all very well to speak of what profit can be made in supplying the needs of England at this juncture but I think our first consideration should be to provide food for our own people here. That is, to my mind, a rather big problem. I have here a list of the changes in prices from 1913 to 1920, during the last war. There was rather an extraordinary position there. In 1913, the price of beef was 62/ and in 1920, it was 157/-. The price of beef is going to go up and up, step by step, and unless you have compulsory powers in this country for the production of wheat you are going to have large scale ranching instead of more tillage. That is quite natural. To my mind, definite provision will have to be made in regard to the supplies of bread and sugar. I do not think there is any other agricultural commodity of which you are going to be short.
The Minister for Supplies says we have enough for two years.
I am concerned——
With Glounthane and nothing else.
I wonder in what condition the policy that was preached from the opposite benches would have left us if it were in force at present instead of the "blister" that Deputy Cosgrave spoke of a few moments ago. I wonder how many Deputies here would like to go back to their constituencies now and find out how much bread they would have under their policy as compared with the present. That is, to my mind, the biggest problem we have to face.
There is also the question of supplies of petrol. I do not know what the-exact position is, but I have seen the notices or directions that were issued in connection with it. I think it would he a sad thing if ordinary transport and necessary transport in this country is to be held up at a later stage for want of petrol whilst petrol is at present plentiful for joy-riding and for running double services here and throughout the country. I called attention to it in the statement I made before the tribunal to which Deputy Davin alluded a while ago. At present there are 11 trains and buses running into one town, and that town is at a dead end, a cul-de-sac. If petrol is being freely used in that manner. and if next harvest the farmers in this country find themselves without petrol for their harvesting operations, it will be a rather sad condition of affairs. I think things like that should be looked after in time.
Deputy Davin alluded to the position as regards housing. Deputy Davin, I take it, knows the difficulty as regards timber just as well as any other Deputy in this House. I, for one, can see no slackness in the Local Government Department with regard to housing. As a matter of fact, sanction for tenders that were handed in recently were received by the South Cork Board of Health at their last meeting, which shows that, as far as they are concerned, there is no delay. The difficulty is, of course, as regards timber supplies, and that difficulty is there and will be there for the period of the war.
My main anxiety is in connection with our own people here. Keep them clear of the war despite all the anxiety there seems to be on the part of a certain class in this country to pull them in. That anxiety is there, and there is no doubt about it, very determined anxiety.
Deputy Dillon speaks of props and the kind of props they are going to give to keep this "incompetent Government", as they call them, in office. Props are not needed. The Government here have responsibility and I am glad to see them facing up to it, and from what I have seen here at the last meeting that was held of this Dáil and of this meeting to-day, I think, honestly speaking, that the biggest blessing that could be given to the people of this country would be to close down until the war is over.
That is an enlightened contribution.
I am sorry I cannot quite agree with the Taoiseach in his programme. There is something that appears to me to have been lost sight of altogether in the activities here. I am not a very nervous individual, and when I heard reports that have been circulating for the last three or four weeks I just said, "Do not mind that. Let it in one ear and out of the other", but I had occasion to be in a few towns at the end of last week and the beginning of this, and it is amazing to see the condition of intelligent people, the nervousness that obtained on account of those rumours. I want to say at the outset that, in my opinion, the Government would be well advised to reconsider their censorship programme with regard to home news. In my opinion, there should be no censorship with regard to home news. It is the nursery of false rumours. It is the nursery of these malicious rumours that have gone about the country.
If there were no censorship with regard to home news and if it were clearly understood in the country that there was no interference with regard to home news in the Press there would be none of these rumours going about the country. They could not live for an hour. I suggest seriously to the Government that they ought to reconsider the position as regards censorship of home news in the Twenty-Six Counties.
In talking about the precautions that we are taking here with regard to air raids, and so forth, the Taoiseach has instanced the case of Switzerland. I want the Taoiseach to come down 10 actual facts when he is making comparisons and to make his comparisons with some common sense or some parallel. Switzerland is more or less like the "no man's land" between the Maginot and the Siegfried Lines; so is Belgium, so is Luxemburg, so, perhaps, are Denmark, Holland, Rumania and those countries bordering on the belligerents. There is no comparison between these countries and ours. I would even say that some country like north-west Sweden or Finland would be more like ours. Are these people in danger of having air raids in their towns? We must remember, too, that this is not the first time that this country has had experience of a world war. There is, no comparison at all between our position to-day and our position in 1914: for the four years of the last war we were actual belligerents, this country belonged to Britain, our barracks, trains, cities, ships and so on were full of actual soldiers on active service. Yet, there were no precautions of the present nature and there was no necessity for them. To make an attack on these shores by means of aeroplanes would mean that they would have to fly over Britain in order to attack us, and there would be no more sense in attacking us then than in attacking Finland, North West Sweden or Portugal, or some of the South American Republics—the Argentine or other American countries—sending material to this country and sending it over to England. We aw not exporting contraband of war. Why should they attack us? I do not know.
Neither I nor anybody else can understand the reason for the ridiculous experiments that are being made in air raid precautions throughout the country. I can understand the making of a case for Dublin, but not for the inland towns and villages. Instructions were sent to every county council and to every corporation to arrange a complete black-out. There is neither sense nor reason in that; it is simply aping and playing—trying to attract notice instead of trying to be neutral. It is something like the drunken mouse or perhaps a flea wishing to dream that he is an elephant. There is no sense at all in arranging such black-outs down the country; there is no sense in people going around warning even the farmers not to have a light in their houses after a certain time.
In this war, ships are being sunk around the coast by U-boats, but U-boats cannot attack this country. They might attack some of the shipping going to England. I do not know whether they would attack shipping coming to our ports or not. The black-out and air raid precautions, however, will not interfere with the U-boats; the only thing the air raid precautions scheme will deal with is aircraft. There is only one explanation for all these precautions. I will not mention it, even though I am not quite in sympathy with the policy of the Government. There is one explanation, and there will be no need to censor my speech because I will not give away the idea that is in my head. If that is the explanation, I am quite satisfied.
Deputy Corry has made a case which was also made by the Minister for Supplies. He has decided on a campaign. of compulsory tillage and he talks about assistance to provide employment on the farm for the unemployed. There is no work in the country on the farms for the unemployed; they will not be employed on the farms, for they would do more harm than good. Many of the unemployed who want work can have it on the farms, but they do not want it, and even if they did they would do no good there, they would destroy tools and everything else, including the crop. Perhaps they want work in the towns, but certainly not on the farms. The increase in the Army will take a considerable number of men off the farms, men who were reared to farm work and reared to the use of tools. The young people from the, towns, however, never touch tools now, and have never done a day's real work; they will not do any good on the farms, and the people on the land do not want them.
Between censorship and air raid precautions, I suggest that the Government have concentrated on the- unnecessary things and have utterly neglected the things that are necessary, such as the supply of foodstuff's for our cattle. People come here and talk about a shortage of food. Was there any shortage of food in this country in the last war, when the German fleet was on the seas and the U-boats were in the ocean and when we were a belligerent nation? I never saw hunger during the last war: it was too much food we had. To-day we have wheat and potatoes, and there is no danger at all of us ever being hungry; we could not be hungry, unless we wanted a particularly choice white biscuit. It is ridiculous to talk about food shortage and starvation. There was none during the war, though there may have been some after the war, when people died in West Cork—years after the war —as they were not able to pay for food.
Reference has been made to credit for the farmers of the country to enable them to stock their lands. The effect of this at times has been that speculators have been taking the grassland, and none of the land is derelict unless it is bad land. The people are, however, carrying the weight of social services, a weight which they cannot bear. Much more good would be done for these unfortunate people by derating of the agricultural land, as in England or Northern Ireland, than can be done by short-term loans and such like. If these loans are given to enable people to meet obligations in the way of rates or annuities, it would be better never to give them—it is simply tying a millstone about their necks to enable them to discharge, their debts for public services that they should never have to bear. If that is what loans are for, I say we do not want them; people are better off without them. It would be easier to do justice to the people by giving them complete derating and enabling them to get on their own feet without any assistance, instead of making slaves of them, as they have been for the past 50 or 60 years or more.
I would seriously suggest to the Government that the censorship on home news will result in widespread malicious reports circulating without any foundation: it has already produced sufficient malicious reports with sense in none of them.
I do not know where Deputy Gorey got the idea that there is a censorship of ordinary home news or of news that people should get about the ordinary life of the country. There is no such thing. The censorship instructions which have been issued to the Press aim at preventing the publication of certain matters. The first of these——
I say the fact of its being there is being used to spread these malicious rumours.
In the Dáil we agreed that in this present stand-to position we, should have a censorship. The censorship instructions that have been issued to the Press cover generally, the following matters: Firstly, that the newspapers shall not publish information which would, or might, endanger the security of the State, such as information relating to the movement or the equipment of our defence forces or matters which are calculated to cause disaffection either amongst our defence forces or amongst the people or which might prejudice recruiting. In the second category, you have matters which are likely to prejudice the neutrality of the country. Thirdly, they are forbidden to publish matters which would or might prejudice our economic or financial security. It is publication of matters of that nature alone that is prohibited.
As I indicated in the answer which I gave this afternoon, the people can rely upon it that no information which is not definitely contrary to the general public interest will be withheld by the censorship Department. Of course, there will be papers who will try to play tricks. Deputy Norton, I understand, to-day alluded to certain matters the publication of which was prohibited in the newspapers. He quoted a certain instance in which a newspaper was advised not to publish a certain paragraph and he indicated that it should have been allowed, simply because in that paragraph there was a quotation from a statement by the Taoiseach. As far as the censorship is concerned, while I am in charge of it, the devil is not going to be allowed to quote scripture and a paper is not going to get away with any sort of treasonable statement simply because a quotation from the Taoiseach is included in it. I have no hesitation in quoting to the Dáil—the statement has already been quoted to the Dáil— the statement which the Taoiseach made. Because that statement was made, they went on to comment on it in a way which was altogether wrong. The statement of the Taoiseach was that a neutral State, especially if it is a small State, is always open to considerable pressure. They went on to comment on that. The Taoiseach has repeated that statement or a similar statement here to-day. He has been trying to bring that fact home to our people for several years past. We have got to realise that, in our situation, it is necessary to have a censorship. The Dáil and the people will have to trust somebody in regard to it. If the Dáil and the people are not satisfied with the persons who are entrusted with the carrying out of that censorship, the only remedy open to them is to get rid of the people who are in charge of it. For the security of our country and the security of our national policy, it is necessary to prohibit the publication of certain matters. If we were foolish enough to let everybody throughout the country publish wrong or misleading statements, or information which would get the country into trouble, it would be very dangerous. If we want democracy to survive here, we have got to have the institutions of democracy organised so that they will be able to protect the people. In the conditions in which we find ourselves at the moment, it is necessary that the Dáil should give certain powers to the Government and to Ministers over certain matters such as censorship. I think they are not trusting unknown men in regard to the censorship. They have seen how the Government have acted over a period of seven years, how they have been forbearing in all sorts of circumstances. They have that assurance at any rate that the Government will not abuse the powers which they have at the moment. If the Dáil does not like that, the only remedy for it is to get rid of the Government.
Apart from the censorship, there were a number of very interesting statements made here to-day which I hope the people will bear in mind for future reference. Deputy Dillon made bitter complaints that the Government had not a very big store of maize on hands. Deputy Dillon assured us here borne time ago, with all due solemnity and with a great number of gesticulations, that there was going to he no war and that we could rely on that. Yet he blames the Government to-day for not having a five years' supply on hands. If we had come to the Dáil a few months ago, asking for ten or 15 million pounds to put into the River Plate maize, about which he has spoken. Deputy Dillon would have said: "You fools, there is going to be no war; why are you spending your money like that?" To-day he says that we could have taken precautions of that kind.
There was one elementary precaution that any Government elected by the people should have taken in order to secure that the rights of the Irish people would be safe in all circumstances in matters of food, and that was to see that Irish soil would produce the food that was necessary to sustain life for man and beast. When this Government came into office in 1932, it did its utmost to stimulate production of cereals and other foodstuffs that would enable our people to exist even though war or other disaster should cut off foreign foodstuffs from our shores. Deputy Dillon made the complaint that we have not to-day a 100 per cent. supply of sugar. If his policy were in operation, instead of complaining that we had not 100 per cent. supply, he would be complaining because we had none. We have at least three-quarter pounds of sugar where he would have only one-quarter pound of sugar under the conditions which existed when we came into office. No matter what happens in any other country in the world, we are sure of that supply. In the coming year we hope to have a 100 per cent. supply from our own resources. We have 100 per cent. at the moment, because we have 75 per cent. home-grown and we have other sugar in reserve. I move the adjournment of the debate.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
Debate adjourned.
The Dáil adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, September 28th.