In addition to the ordinary work, under Vote 67, in connection with unemployment, relief of distress, and such additional work as the emergency may throw up for that particular purpose, the Government recently transferred to me responsibility for the production, distribution, and price of turf, and for all matters ancillary thereto, in the coordination of the activities of the different Government Departments which might be concerned in it, and that transfer included the control of the Turf Development Board, Ltd., for the duration of the emergency. In pursuance of the latter decision, the necessary orders have been made for the transference from the Minister for Industry and Commerce to the Parliamentary Secretary of the necessary powers of that Minister in relation to turf, and the Dáil have already approved of a revised Estimate for the Department of Industry and Commerce which makes provision for the expenditure of the Turf Development Board in respect of the period from the 1st April, 1941, to the 12th June, 1941. It is now necessary to make provision for the expenditure on turf production and distribution for the remainder of the financial year, together with provision for miscellaneous schemes, to provide employment or to meet distress arising from the emergency; and, in addition, to include various schemes which can only doubtfully be provided for out of the Employment Schemes Vote, because either they are not related to the relief of unemployment in the ordinary sense, or the relationship is of a remote and indirect character.
Broadly speaking, the title of this Vote describes its purpose, it is an emergency Vote. The first, or A Group, of sub-heads, refers to the expenses arising out of the operations of the Turf Development Board as from 13th June, 1941, the date up to which provision has already been made in the general Vote of the Department of Industry and Commerce. Sub-heads A (1) to A (5) in the Estimate correspond to sub-heads L (1) to L (5) of that Vote; and sub-heads A (6) to A (8) are explained in Part III of the Estimate. The Dáil is already familiar with the history of the Turf Development Board, its policy and the nature of its operations; and it is only necessary for me now to say that the general policy will be continued as heretofore except to whatever extent changes may become necessary or desirable to meet the exigencies of the emergency fuel situation which at present confronts the country.
It might be well, however, if I refer more particularly to sub-head A (7), £35,800, and say that the Turf Development Board are now undertaking the drainage and preliminary development of 14 large turbary areas with a view to their subsequent utilisation for the production of machine-won turf on a large scale. The drainage and preparation of these bogs are estimated to cost £228,900, and the work will cover a period of three years or more. Owing to the amount of employment for unskilled labour provided in development work of this kind, it was at first intended that two-thirds of the cost should be borne by the Employment Schemes Vote, and provision for a first instalment was allocated out of the Estimate approved by the Dáil. The House will remember that I mentioned this matter during the discussion on Vote 67 in May last. It is now considered more fitting that the whole of the cost of the development works should be brought within the scope of the present Vote, and the sum previously allocated from the Employment Schemes Vote for the same purpose will now be made available for employment schemes of the more conventional type.
The next sub-head is sub-head B— £250,000. This provision is for the making of drains and roads and other necessary work to open up bogs for the production of hand-won turf during the emergency. The work will be carried out through the Office of Public Works and the county surveyors; and grants will be made for individual drainage and road works on the certificate of responsible officials. It was pointed out, at an early stage, that, in order to encourage development, even in the case of private persons and groups of persons, or in connection with bogs developed by the county councils and local authorities, where it was shown that development works of this kind were necessary and would, in fact, be directly effective in producing an amount of turf which would be commensurate with the cost, the charges would be largely borne by the Government. About £100,000 has been sanctioned this year already for schemes of this character; that is to say, bog roads and drainage and development, which are intended to produce saleable turf in 1941 and 1942.
Sub-head C deals with Miscellaneous Fuel Production Schemes. Portion of this provision is intended to encourage voluntary bodies in the production of emergency turf. Repayable advances have already been made in a couple of cases. Other portions are assigned to guarantee certain local authorities against loss incurred in turf schemes which they are undertaking and in which inexpert urban labour is being employed on an experimental basis. I cannot, at this stage, inform the Dáil exactly what loss, if any, may be incurred by the Government in either of these two types of schemes, but the experiments are necessary in connection with plans for a much increased production of turf in the coming year. A certain contingency might arise in relation to loss in connection with the provision of firewood, and that also is covered in this. The House will recognise that this is a contingency Vote, and that all sorts of things, which we do not know now, may come up to be dealt with. This is an attempt by the Department of Finance to give a certain fluidity and flexibility to finance in relation to this emergency, so that, when things come up which cannot be dealt with in the ordinary way, and which may be a little bit unconventional or off the lines of common procedure, they can be dealt with on this line. That is largely, the spirit and purpose of this Vote.
The next item is sub-head D. This provision is necessary to pay the remainder of the grants in respect of last season's Farm Improvements Scheme and to enable the scheme to be continued for another season. As Deputies are aware, the works carried out under the Farm Improvements Scheme cannot be closely related to the relief of unemployment in proportion to the needs of the areas in which the expenditure takes place. When this scheme was first produced and financed out of the Employment Schemes Vote, I warned the House that that difficulty would arise and that, in all human probability, these schemes would be most common in the areas in which there was least unemployment and that, very often, it would be quite impossible to show a relation between their unemployment relief factor and the amount of money which was spent on them. These schemes are, in themselves, essentially desirable. They are a very proper way in which the State may spend money in the encouragement of agriculture and in getting over a certain difficulty, and experience has shown that they cannot be brought into reasonable conformity with a normal distribution of money which is intended to go to people who are in necessity, in any proportion to their necessity. For that reason, it was considered that money should come right out of the Employment Schemes Vote and come into this Vote. Another of the purpose which was behind the creation of this Emergency Vote was the fact that we were continually running up against an experience of that kind in which works, which, in themselves, were desirable, and for which the only possible provision then for financing them was out of Vote 67, were almost border-line cases and, in many cases, wholly unjustifiable within that Vote.
As to sub-heads E and F, with regard to seed and lime distribution—£55,000 and £40,000 respectively—provision for similar schemes has previously been made out of the Employment Schemes Vote but, as they cannot easily be related to the relief of unemployment, they are, like the Farm Improvements Scheme, being included in this Estimate. Broadly speaking, those moneys go to necessitous people, but you could not get the same degree of proportionality, nor the same degree of control over them that was necessary for a specifically Employment Schemes Vote. For that reason again, I think wisely, they have been transferred from that Vote to this one. They have always in practice been administered by the Department of Agriculture. They used to make an estimate of what they required. We did not administer them, but we did satisfy ourselves that, broadly speaking, they went into areas and were used by people who should be helped in that particular way within the purpose of the State.
As to sub-head G—Miscellaneous— the provision of £150,000 is intended to meet charges arising out of emergency measures and unforeseeable contingencies of whatever kind in all those cases in which such charges cannot appropriately be included in any of the normal Votes of the Department, as, for example, a sudden increase in the number of the unemployed requiring the provision of additional and special employment schemes. I allude to that particular item in relation to it in order to explain that the sum of £150,000 does not limit the capacity of this Vote. It will have to be extended as and when circumstances of emergency arise, to deal with whatever kind of emergency may arise. As the House knows, a good deal of the work which we are now doing in my particular Department does cross the ordinary conventional lines of other Departments and, in so far as it has to be done hastily and rather energetically, it may have to violate in many ways the customary conventions under which State finance is guarded.
Everyone who has had any experience of dealing with State finance knows the extraordinary number of securities, guards, and protections which are put on the expenditure, and the extraordinary and inevitable delay which occurs in the fulfilling of those particular precautions. Many a good cause undoubtedly has been broken by delays of that character which are inevitable within the system, and unless some degree of flexibility and fluidity could be introduced into State finance in dealing with emergency measures, then it was impossible and would be impossible that emergency measures would be carried out with the celerity and energy which would enable particular emergencies to be met as they arise. I am giving notice to the Dáil that that is the spirit in which this Vote will have to be taken. In relation to any Department whose border lines I, unfortunately, have to cross in regard to any of the unconventional things which I ask them to do under this Vote, I will be responsible. If there is anything wrong, a mistake, or trouble of that kind, the trouble comes to me. The purpose and spirit of this Vote is that it shall be an emergency Vote, that it shall fill gaps which cannot conventionally be filled in the ordinary way and that someone shall be here to take responsibility for any consequences of those unconventional actions.
This Vote is accounted for, like the Employment Schemes Vote, by the Office of the Minister for Finance. One of the chief objects of that is because this Vote, and Vote 67, which is so administered, will be so closely interrelated that it will be necessary in work of this kind that the closest possible co-operation should be maintained between the Department of Finance, which provides the money, and the officer who administers it; that there should be the closest possible co-operation, conference, and understanding in the spending of that money. Most of the items in this Vote are familiar to this House. We have the Farm Improvements Scheme, road works, and the rest. What has happened is that we agreed to have a new Vote, one into which we can put things which previously were on the border line of justification within the Employment Schemes Vote and into which we can put claims and necessities which are of an emergency and, at the moment, incalculable character, and out of which we can get that fluid and flexible finance which will enable those to be done properly.