I move that the Estimate be referred back for re-consideration. This motion has been put down because the members of the Labour Party are not satisfied that the money asked for in this Vote will be spent for the purpose for which it is intended by the House at any rate. If this House is to be asked, as it has been from time to time, to agree to the establishment of commissions of inquiry, it certainly should not do so except on the very distinct and definite understanding that the reports of such commissions, for which the taxpayers have to pay, will be furnished to the Deputies and to the public for their information. I realise probably as well as anybody sitting on these benches that the present Government is a Party-minded Government. I was listening to the head of the Government when he said here some time ago that he welcomed constructive and helpful criticism from the Opposition. I say that it is impossible for the members of the Opposition to give useful advice or advance constructive criticism unless they are furnished with the information which they are entitled to receive as members of the House.
In that respect I consider that it is very unfair on the part of the Government to hold up the publication for a long period of reports of a number of these commissions. It is nearly two years ago since the House agreed, on a motion moved by the then Minister for Industry and Commerce, to set up the Transport Tribunal. I am not going to repeat what I said in this House before concerning the case made for the establishment of that tribunal by the then Minister for Industry and Commerce. He indicated to the House that the question to be considered by the tribunal was of such urgency and importance that he expected the report of the tribunal would be furnished to the House at the beginning of 1939, two months after it was established. That very valuable report is still locked up in some secret pigeon-hole in the Department of Industry and Commerce or some other Government Department. I contend that it is very unfair to expect this House in future to agree to the establishment of tribunals of that kind and to spend the taxpayers' money in conducting the inquiries when the Government refuses to give the information contained in the report of that tribunal to Deputies and to the public.
The Minister for Finance was responsible a number of years ago for setting up a Drainage Commission. According to a reply given to a Parliamentary question by the Minister for Finance, that Commission submitted its report in October last. Although we are asked by the Head of the Government to submit constructive proposals for the solution of the difficult pressing problems that require to be dealt with by the Government and by the representatives of the people, we have been so far denied the information which would enable us to submit those constructive proposals and suggestions. I ask the Minister for Finance, who was responsible for the establishment of the Drainage Commission, to tell the House why he has held up the publication of that report since last October; or to give any good reason why Deputies should not have access to the report of a public commission of this kind, or why the public at large, who are more deeply interested probably than any Deputy in the report of that Commission, should not have the information at their disposal. I assume that many civil servants have access to the reports of these tribunals and commissions. I personally deny the right of any civil servant to have access to these reports while Deputies, who are the representatives of the people, and who, in the name of the people, have agreed to the establishment of these commissions and tribunals, are refused access to them.
There is another and much more serious case in which the Government have up to the present withheld the publication of the report of a certain body which was set up under the Industrial Courts Act. It is a long time ago since the Dublin Bakery Trade Inquiry was set up as a result of a motion submitted by the Minister concerned. I understand that the report of that body was submitted to the responsible Minister in February last. I also understand that there is an obligation on the Minister concerned, or, at any rate, on the Government, under the Industrial Courts Act to publish the report of that inquiry.