Before the Deputy proceeds, would you allow me to say a word, Sir,——
Committee on Finance. - Vote on Account, 1942-43 (Resumed).
Mr. McGovern rose.
——about the remarks made by Deputy Corry in the course of his speech. I heard his statement, and I intended to say something about it when winding up. I thought it probable that I might be winding up to-night, but it has been conveyed to me that people on the Front Bench opposite think that I ought to say whatever I have to say on the matter now, and I have no objection to doing so. I think the statement made by Deputy Corry was most uncalled for and grossly improper and should not have been made, but I would not like to place too much importance on anything Deputy Corry would say. Everybody in this House knows his importance and it is very little. I agree with what Deputy O'Higgins said about him, that if people knew outside, they would pay very little attention or give very little notice to what he said, but those of us here know what value his statements have and how often he plays the buffoon. I am sorry he made the statement and I certainly do repudiate the grossly improper sentiments he expressed.
I think, as regards the Minister's statement, that if it had been made earlier, the suspension of Deputy Byrne would not have taken place. I do not know if this is the appropriate time to move it, but would I be in order if I were to move that an apology from Deputy Byrne be accepted and that the suspension that has taken place be removed?
With regard to that I would say that disorder of that kind should not be permitted by anybody, and that the occupant of the Chair, when he stands up, should be respected.
I agree with that.
This Vote on Account is an extraordinary Vote. Since 1933 there has been an increase of 50 per cent. in the total Estimates, and I do not think this country is in a position now to bear this enormous increase. It is true that a great part of it is due to the necessity for increased expenditure upon defence. I admit that, but I do not think the Government can claim to be free from responsibility in this respect. When there was a change of Government the policy was adopted of opening the jails and letting out certain people. Hopes were raised then which have now been dashed because those people have been returned to jail. Therefore, we have an increase in the Estimate for jails, as well as for the Army and the Garda, three services which Fianna Fáil were most eloquent in promising to cut down to little or nothing. Unfortunately we know now that that cannot be cut down, but the Government were responsible to a great extent for the necessity for increasing the Votes for these three particular items. During the emergency, of course, it is easy to find an excuse for increasing the burden on the taxpayer. But there has not been a year since I came in here in 1933 in which the Government did not find just as plausible an excuse as they have in 1942 for increasing the burden. Step by step they have continued to increase it until there is no margin of safety left for the nation and we are now at the point when anything may happen. We have been warning the Government from these benches during all these years that they were recklessly plunging into expenditure and making no effort to economise. I think that the Government are beginning to realise, certainly the people are beginning to realise, that the burden is more than the country can bear.
There is another Department in which there is a considerable increase and that is the Department of Supplies. I heard the Minister for Supplies speaking the other evening and he was very eloquent about the value that we were getting from that Department. Certainly, there is part of that Vote which provides for an increase in the price of wheat. That, of course, would be valuable if it had been done in a proper way. Unfortunately, the Government did not move when there was time to sow plenty of wheat to the best advantage. In autumn last the Government should have given a decent price which would encourage farmers to grow wheat, but they gave it when it was too late, and I am afraid they will not get sufficient wheat. The State has to pay the money, but they certainly will not get as much as they would have got if it had been done in time.
There is an increase of £25,000 over last year for the staff of that Department. Before this money is voted, I should like to know what is proposed to be done in that Department with this increased staff and this increased expenditure. The Minister for Supplies and his Department have done nothing to regularise the position with regard to supplies; either to provide the supplies or to provide for an equitable distribution of such as we have. While the Ministers of other countries in the years before the war, countries which were in a much safer position than we were with regard to shipping, laid in large supplies of essential foodstuffs and raw materials and looked ahead, our Minister failed to lay in adequate supplies for this country. Not only that, but he did something worse. He announced that a shortage was coming and that anybody who could pay for the supplies we had in the country should secure them and hide them, and they did. Every profiteer in the country was out buying up supplies and hiding them and these people are now creating a black market.
People who acted on the hint the Minister threw out and created at that time an artificial scarcity by hiding those supplies, are selling them now at an enormous price, so that people who have heaps of money can get an abundance of anything they want and are getting it, while others can get nothing. That is a terrible state of affairs.
What is the function of this Department? We have been asking that question in this House for the last 12 months and we cannot get an answer. I know that it is not fair to expect the Minister for Finance to give an answer to that question. But I asked the Minister responsible what was the function of that Department and what a person who had a tea card and could not get supplies was to do, and he did not answer. I asked him what was the purpose of these rationing cards and I got no answer. I have been in communication with that Department for the last six months and I have got no satisfaction whatever.
In the district where I live, owing to a certain set of circumstances in connection with the supply of flour in 1940, a number of traders, through no fault of their own, have only a flour quota of about 25 per cent. of what they would be entitled to on the basis of the number of registered customers. The Minister for Supplies knows all about the circumstances in that place, which is close to the Border, and that there are individual traders who have a very small quota. We had been pressing the Minister and his Department in regard to the matter and, at the end of six months, they did move a little but they did it in an inequitable manner. In October last they allowed a certain increase in the supplies of flour.
Certain traders perhaps got sufficient flour, but others did not get half enough. At the present time there is a general shortage in that district again, and some traders are only able to give about half a pound of flour per week to each registered customer. That is all a great number of people are getting. I got into communication with the Department of Supplies last week and tried to get an increase for that district, but I did not get any satisfaction. I have got a reply to-day stating that the matter would be looked into, and that is as far as it went. That was the position last summer. In the month of September I got a reply to a letter I wrote in June. The same thing is going to start now. People may starve, so far as the Department of Supplies is concerned; nothing will be done. Is it any wonder that some of us would protest against voting money to that Department until there is some satisfaction, until at least we get replies to our communications?
There is only one way of dealing with this matter, and that is to ration all commodities that are scarce. The Minister tells us that it is impossible to ration some things. That is ridiculous. He says it is impossible to get ration cards printed and sent out— that it will cost too much. I suggest it will cost 20 times as much to try without a system of rationing, to try to deal with individual cases. That cannot be done. I suppose that is why this Department is becoming so expensive and that probably accounts for the increased expenditure of £25,000 on staff. Everyone in the country is writing to the Department of Supplies and the Department acknowledges the letters but does nothing effective. There is only one way to deal with this thing and that is to lay down a rule and see it is obeyed. In that way everyone will get a fair supply.
I suggest that a simple remedy the Minister could adopt, if he does not want to ration flour, is to see that each trader gets a proper quota in relation to his registered customers, and that can be arranged through the parish councils, the Gárdaí and the flour traders. Certain information in the possession of the flour trader could be checked by the Guards and a system worked out by the parish council. That would save the Department of Supplies an immense amount of trouble. If the Minister does not want to print and send out ration cards, he should adopt my suggestion, because I believe it would be effective and would save a whole lot of trouble. I am sure the same thing could be done in other parts of the country. The parish councils, the Gárdaí and the flour traders would be only too glad to co-operate and they could end this trouble once and for all.
The same thing applies to tea. There is no proper regulation in the Department with regard to tea distribution or, indeed, several other commodities that are very scarce. Many people have cards but can get no tea on them, and the Minister for Supplies has no answer to make on this tea question as to why he sent out ration cards. I should like to mention the cases of two people who were dealing with a certain tea merchant for at least 25 years. He asked them for ration cards for tea, and they applied formally to be supplied by this trader. He supplied them with tea from April last until the 19th February of this year. On the 19th February he wrote: "We regret having to return your tea ration card as our van has ceased to travel in your locality. Probably you will be able to get your local grocer to accept your card." He refused to supply these two families; he rejected their cards, but he is still supplying their neighbours.
If his van was not travelling to the particular district concerned, those people could recognise that as a good reason for discontinuing their supply of tea, because the expense of sending round a van was rather big, and they told him that they were prepared to accept the tea by post and they sent him back the ration cards. He kept the cards for a month, but sent them no tea by post and eventually he returned the cards saying that he was sorry he could not supply tea. These people tried everywhere they could think of, but no one would accept their cards. There are hundreds of people in that position. They cannot get tea unless they are fortunate enough to be able to go to a black market. It is not everyone who has money enough to get tea in the black market.
What are these people to do? This question has been put again and again, privately and publicly, to the Minister and his Department, but no satisfactory reply has been given. What are the people to do who cannot get flour? What were the tea cards printed and sent out for? In many cases, they are of no value. Nobody is bound to recognise them, or to recognise the Minister. It is just like a lot of the orders made by different Ministers— there is no regard for them, because there is neither head nor tail to them. So far as these orders are concerned, there is nothing in the way of an equitable distribution resulting from them. There is no justice with regard to price or fair dealing and nobody will bother about them. That is an unfortunate state of affairs. That is why the black market is flourishing and everything is going topsy-turvy, because the Minister will not pay attention to people who try to co-operate and do things in a right way. Unless Government Departments, and the Department of Supplies in particular, mend their hands they will turn this country —I really do not know what they will turn it into, but the people will not be good law-abiding citizens; they will not have respect for the law.
There is very little use in the Minister hoping that the traders throughout the country will distribute commodities regularly. It is his job to see that they do it. He should make them do it. In any case, with the best will in the world, and however anxious they may be to co-operate, how can some distributors distribute what they have not? The Minister's responsibility is to see that everybody gets a supply, whatever the commodity is, a supply related to the number of customers to be served. It should be an easy matter to arrange that all customers are registered at the various shops. If the parish councils and the Gárdaí were asked, they would see that registers were supplied. The Gárdaí would see that everything was in order, that the population was fairly represented and that no one was registered twice. The Department would then have had no trouble, and it could cut out all unnecessary correspondence, as commodities would be available and everyone would be satisfied.
Of course rationing is the only solution. The next best thing would be to see that fair quotas are given, according to the number of customers registered. Anything would have been better than the present system, or lack of system, that is creating all the trouble. I asked the Minister for Agriculture whether he would encourage the growing of potatoes for human consumption during the emergency as a precaution against famine; whether in view of the difficulty, owing to uncertainty of seasons and shortage of manures, of ascertaining what amount would be required as human food next season, he would encourage the maximum amount of potatoes, whether he was aware that the most effective means of securing maximum production is to make it possible for farmers to recover the cost of production by feeding any surplus potatoes to pigs; and if he would take steps to have pig prices restored to what they were before the last cut in prices. The Minister in reply stated: "As the Deputy is aware, a widespread propaganda has been conducted for an increase in potato production for human consumption. The use of potatoes for this purpose must have priority over their utilisation for pig feeding. I am satisfied that the existing pig prices will permit of a sufficiently remunerative return to growers for the use of surplus waste potatoes for pig feeding, and I am not prepared, therefore, to adopt the Deputy's suggestion."
I am afraid the Minister does not understand the effect of the recent cut in pig prices. If he did he would have thought twice before carrying it out, and, when it was brought to his notice, he would have paid more attention to those who tried to help him, just as they tried to help the Department of Supplies. The Minister did not increase the price of wheat when he was first asked to do so. He increased it when it was too late. He will also increase the price of pigs when it will be too late, because it will be too late to plant potatoes for sale. The Minister does not seem to understand the relation between the growing of potatoes and pig-feeding. I think the best service I can do is to explain that relation for the benefit of the Minister and eventually, I hope, for the benefit of the country. Who supplies the City of Dublin with potatoes? Is it not farmers who grow potatoes for sale and not those who grow them for their own use? Many people grew potatoes last year on the advice of the Minister, because they were assured that they would have a good market. They went to considerable expense in doing so. It is a crop that cannot be grown without a great deal of expense. A very high content of that expense goes in labour, as the crop provides good employment. It is, in addition, an assurance against famine. As the Minister knows, it was a prolific crop last year, and those who had a surplus over what they needed for themselves wanted to sell them. In Cavan potatoes can now be bought at £4 per ton, but they could not be grown under £8 a ton. Owing to a shortage of manures farmers know that they will be under a disadvantage in growing potatoes this year compared with last year. People I have been speaking to have halved the acreage they intended to grow since the Minister made the order concerning the price of pigs. I am not going to grow half as much potatoes as I grew last year, so that I cannot blame others if they do not do so. I could not undertake to grow potatoes at £4 a ton.
I remember selling potatoes in Cavan before 1914, and that was a long time ago, for exactly the same price that they are making this year, although it costs four times as much in labour now to grow an acre of potatoes. People get a quarter of the work done now for the same amount of money. It should be remembered that some 60 or 70 per cent. of the cost of growing potatoes goes in labour. For that reason I think the Minister has made a great mistake in issuing his order. Farmers are not as shortsighted as the Minister. They have to look ahead and they will not risk growing a crop for such prices. There were fairs held yesterday in two counties on different sides of the Border. In Cavan bonhams, which are generally sold in pairs, realised £4 5s. and in Enniskillen £9 10s. The man on the Fermanagh side of the Border got £10 for each acre of potatoes that he grew, and 100 per cent. more out of them afterwards when fed to pigs. Owing to the cut in the price of pigs farmers find that it does not pay to feed pigs or turn them into heavy pigs. and so have to offer potatoes for sale at £4 a ton or at 7d. per stone retail in Cavan. They are not going to be caught the second time. The Minister should announce at once an increased price for pigs and give some encouragement to farmers who otherwise would not grow potatoes for sale. Farmers in other counties will act in the same way. That may cause a famine in potatoes next year owing to shortage of manures and owing to the uncertainty of the seasons. No farmer, unless he is a fool, could grow potatoes under present circumstances.
The Minister is only wasting his breath and petrol in going down the country advising people to grow potatoes under these conditions. Unless they are fools, they will not do so.
People are prepared to make sacrifices and to co-operate, but such co-operation will not be forthcoming if the Government takes up the attitude: "We are going to insist that you produce so-and-so and we are going to take steps to see that you do not get the cost of production. We shall compel you to till the land. We shall take the land from you and jail you if you do not do what we tell you." Very well, let them do so if they wish. These people will go to jail; men went to jail in this country before for less cause, but this sort of bullying will not compel the farmer to do something which he considers is against his best interests. If you want the farmers to produce food, you must do as is being done on the other side of the Border and let them get, at least, the value of that food when it is produced. People are not going to be bullied or frightened in this way; they would not be Irishmen if they were. I hope that in this matter the Minister will do the right thing, that he will do it in time and not do it when it is late, as in the case of wheat. Deputies on the other side of the House know what I am talking about and I think they should put the position to the Minister for Agriculture, for he never seems to understand what is fair or right with regard to the farmers. The policy, apparently, is to trample upon the farmer and the worker upon the land. It is no wonder they are being driven off the land. They are flying from the land and they will continue to fly from it. Now they are being told that they will not be allowed to leave the land and that they are going to be clapped into jail. Of course they will not be put into jail but the country will go hungry, and that is much worse.
While there is so much of a difference between prices on both sides of the Border, is it not obvious that we, on our side of the Border, are selling our produce 50 per cent. less than the world price? When you compare the position of the farmer with that of the industrialist, you find that the industrialist is getting at least 50 per cent over and above world prices, whilst the farmer for his produce is getting 50 per cent below world prices. That means that, taking world prices, for every £100 worth he produces the farmer gets £50 whilst he has to pay the industrialist £150 for every £100 worth of commodities which he has to purchase. In other words, value for value, he has to pay three times as much as he gets. Then we wonder why people are going off the land. Is the Government, by their policy, not doing everything in their power to clear people off the land? I wonder what they intend to turn this country into? Are they not making a desert of all the rural areas? That is what their policy has brought the country to.
What the Government is actually doing is coining the sweat of the farmer and the agricultural labourer and putting it into the pockets of the profiteer, because it is not the consumer who is getting the benefit of the control of farm produce. There was no reduction in the price of bacon when the price of pigs was reduced nor was there any reduction in the price of oatmeal when the price of oats was controlled. People are able to buy oats in the black market and manufacture it into oatmeal in circumstances which make it impossible for them to do anything but profiteer. The same remark applies to the bacon curers. They are converting pigs into bacon, and the Minister has so arranged matters that they can put huge profits into their pockets. They cannot do anything else. It is a terrible state of affairs that the big men are allowed to become bigger while the poor men are becoming poorer.
It is about time that ceased. In a time of emergency like this, when all are called upon to make sacrifices, there should be justice all round. The people who are the backbone of the State, who have grown food to support the State, should not be persecuted at this time. It is only a few months ago since members of the Government went round the country and from every platform they were singing the praises of the farmers because they produced so much food. I think the farmers deserved such praise, but now the Government refuse to pay them for that food, by making orders to turn the money that should go into the pockets of the farmers into the pockets of the profiteers. Recently, we had a visit from the Taoiseach in County Cavan and he expressed confidence that the farmers there would do their part all right. The farmers there are anxious to co-operate with the Government, but they, on their part, want co-operation and a lead from this Dáil. They ask that the Dáil should give them that lead.
I observed a few days ago that the Bishop of Galway had asked the Government to give a 100 per cent. lead to the country and, on the other hand, he asked the country to co-operate with the Government. I hope the Government will give that 100 per cent. lead. I should like to read a letter which I received recently from the organised farmers of County Cavan:
"Dear Mr. McGovern,
I am directed by my executive committee to request that you take steps to give effect to the following resolution adopted by them:
`That in view of the fact that Ministers and Deputies have toured the country telling the farmers of their duty to produce sufficient food for the nation, and in view of the sacrifices farmers are making to do this, especially without the aid of artificial fertilisers, we suggest that Ministers, Deputies, Senators and all highly-paid officials should set a headline to the rest of the community by foregoing half their salaries during the period of the emergency.'
Yours faithfully,
P. REILLY,
Secretary."
I think that is a reasonable request. Of course they do not threaten to put us to jail if we do not accede to it, but I think it is up to us to set a lead in the matter of making sacrifices, because the farmers are asked to make enormous sacrifices. I think that at least those who call for sacrifices from others should make some little sacrifice themselves. Deputy O'Higgins made a very strong protest against the increases in expenditure, and I hope the Minister will look seriously into this matter, if the Government is anxious for the co-operation of the people and wants sacrifices to be made. Sacrifices are at present being made by every class down the country, especially by the Local Defence Force and Local Security Force. All these people are giving up their time, their only desire being to serve the country. What are we doing? Are we worthy to represent these people? I think that, if we are, we should give them a lead and follow the advice of the Bishop of Galway. I would ask the Government to give a lead and I hope that we shall get an assurance that something will be done to give effect to the demand which I have just read. While Deputies may not be prepared to go the length that this resolution suggests, I would suggest that we should at least revert to the position we were in before salaries were increased. Then we could with some moral force go out and ask other people to make sacrifices. We should get out of the glasshouse before we begin to throw stones at others. When Ministers and the Taoiseach threaten people with jail, unless they are prepared to market their produce at less than the cost of production, I think it is up to these Ministers to give a lead. They should be prepared to make sacrifices themselves before asking others to do so at the peril of going to jail.
I would have thought that the Minister, in introducing this Vote, or at least his colleague, the Minister for Local Government in the contribution that he made to the debate, would have adverted to some very notable and disturbing features of our life at the present time.
I would have expected that we would have had from the Minister and his colleague some reference to the mass emigration from this country which has taken place for the past couple of years—emigration on a scale and under circumstances that have scarcely been equalled or known since the time of the famine. Surely that emigration is a frightful indictment of conditions in this country at present? The Minister and his colleagues must surely have heard of all those pitiful pilgrimages to the railway stations of mothers and sisters, brothers and children, bidding good-bye to people leaving this country to take up employment in England. They must have heard of all the bread-winners who have gone on that trek to get a living, and it is not enough for anybody here or outside to say that large numbers of people have left this country for a brighter life, a more varied existence, in another country. Anybody desiring to face the facts knows the new conditions that people leaving this country have to face and there can be but one reason for it— the reason that poverty has been driving them out.
Surely 20 years after this House was set up, that is a frightful indictment of conditions here, and while we are discussing a vast sum of money here this evening, as we discussed it last week, in connection with our public services, it is very notable and very significant to find a blank silence regarding the matters I have mentioned on the part of Ministers in their contributions to this debate. Not alone are the bread-winners whose wives and children are left in this country going, but thousands of young marriageable men are leaving the country, and, at the same time, the schools are being closed and amalgamated for want of pupils and teachers are being degraded in their positions because they have no children to teach. Surely that is such a disturbing state of affairs that it might have merited some attention in this House? It has got a good deal of attention already from social workers and it has got a good deal of attention from the authorities of the Church in this country, who regard it as a very menacing position.
What answer has the Government to give in regard to this very alarming position? What is their attitude to it? Somebody said, on an occasion some years ago, that it was a natural sort of thing that we should always have emigration. Do the Government think that it is rather a convenient way of solving unemployment to export our unemployed people and to allow them to become absorbed for the moment in whatever war employment is available in Great Britain? Have they now any thought for the situation that is likely to arise when all people in that position are bound to return to this country to take up the threads of their existences here again? What frightful problems will such a situation bring, and have our national leaders anything to say about it to-day? I should have expected that the Minister for Local Government, who was so vocal last week, would have told us something about this matter, and, before this debate closes, we ought to hear some official statement on the attitude of the Minister and his colleagues in the Cabinet to this very disturbing and very alarming position.
I should have expected, too, that we would have heard in the course of this discussion some recantation of this disastrous low-wage policy with which the Government has been so consistently associated. Emergency Order No. 83 is the child and creature of the Minister for Finance. It was first heard of in the Budget statement made by him, and anybody who desires to face the facts of the moment must admit that this anti-wage Order No. 83, this notorious order, has been entirely condemned by the circumstances that have arisen and that have been proved since it was put into force. So great has been the clamour against this order, so manifest has been the injustice of this order, that late in the day the Government have been compelled to make some kind of watery and miserable attempt to reduce its operations by adopting the old device of referring its operation to a commission for examination in the light of hardships created in certain employment. What answer has the Minister to give to the inequality of a position which causes road workers in Cork county, who, in the opinion of the chairman of the Cork County Council, an honoured member of this House, do not earn more than 24/- a week, to be refused a very modest increase granted to them by that council, while the banking institutions of the country, with their millions in profits and dividends, have been able to get virtually whatever they demanded in the matter of increased charges from the people?
How can the Minister justify such a position? How can this self-styled poor man's Government justify such a position? How can they justify a position in which they have permitted the Electricity Supply Board, a semi-State concern, to charge increased prices for electricity, in many cases being paid by people in whose wages they have refused to permit any increase, because very many of the consumers of electricity are people who are victims of Emergency Powers Order No. 83, while, on the other hand, these people are bound to submit to the terms of an order which precludes any increase in their wages? The newspapers have been permitted to increase their charges. The profiteers in this country have, in large measure, gone unchecked, while the poor are being plundered, in many cases, in the price of commodities sold retail. I want to say again that the Minister ought now to have the decency, as he was the author of this order and the person who introduced it in this House, to take the earliest step—the generous step—of completely withdrawing it, and of seeing that some measure of justice, as regards a reasonable increase in wages, must be permitted in view of the height that living costs have reached.
There has been no reference, in the statements made from the Ministerial Benches, to the widespread unemployment that we have at the present time. Even allowing for all the people who have gone out of the country, our unemployment problem is increasing daily, and there is insecurity, to a most alarming degree, in whatever employment remains. There is all this miserable, degrading and depressing situation surrounding the labour exchange queues and the pilgrimages to them to obtain assistance. There are all the signs of decay in the whole national life of the country in that particular respect. We have no evidence and no indication that there is any policy to meet that situation. The Government must stand condemned— completely condemned—in the eyes of any honest or just section of the people as long as that condition of affairs remains.
A position of that kind is causing, as it inevitably must cause, tremendous discontent in the country. We see the working people getting steadily poorer. The position of the people who are drawing the only income they can get —from the labour exchanges—is becoming steadily more unenviable. A teacher, speaking at a meeting of the school attendance committee in Cork City yesterday, said that for the first time in many years he saw a number of children coming barefooted to his school, and in the weather that we have had over the last few weeks. He said the only remedy for a situation of that kind was to make an appeal to the children in more fortunate circumstances to give their worn boots or shoes to those who had none. Another remedy he suggested was that the children who came to school with bad boots should take them off and dry them at the school fire and remain barefooted while attending class. Apart from the fact that a number of the children came to school with boots, the position of others revealed a condition of poverty that this teacher had not seen for some years. Surely, this House cannot be insensible to a situation of that kind. There is no good in talking in this House or outside of it about national unity, or in invoking shibboleths of that kind as long as we have this frightful injustice of inequality and insufficiency of the things that go to sustain life amongst large sections of our people.
It is a disturbing and annoying situation to find that, while large numbers of our people are steadily being reduced to a more degrading degree of poverty, the records of this House contain a fairly large list of Government retainers, who are attached to commissions or boards or bodies, and are supplementing their allowances as members of the Oireachtas by fees drawn in that particular way. I say that is a bad symptom at the present time, and that the Government are pursuing a wrong and a dangerous road in allowing a situation of that kind to develop: in allowing it to develop on the Turf Board and on the Agricultural Credit Corporation, and in allowing the same situation to exist in the case of the Agricultural Wages Board and of other organisations. I hope that, at least, we will have some gesture to indicate the ending of a situation that is a source of widespread comment in the country, and that is causing a good deal of discontent and dissatisfaction amongst people who are in very straitened circumstances at the present time.
The Minister for Local Government and Public Health asked us to suggest where economies might be made and dared us to touch the Defence Estimate in our search for economy. I suggest to him that he might examine into the question as to how far his colleague, the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures, justifies his existence in this House. I say it is ridiculous and absolutely ludicrous, in a small portion of this country, that we should have at the present time an office known as the Office for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures. I think that if the Government had any sincerity or any desire to minimise in any way what the Minister for Finance so modestly described as the respectable sum of £13,000,000 when applying to the House for this Vote, that that would be stopped. I think that at the present time in Great Britain, the headquarters of a vast Empire which is at war all over the world, there is no office of a Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures. I certainly think that no defence whatever can be made for the retention of an office of that kind. The fact, I think, cannot be questioned that whatever functions are discharged by the Minister in that office could be well and adequately discharged by the Minister for Defence.
I observe that while there is a large decrease in the amount provided for unemployment assistance, there is an increase of about 50 per cent. in the amount to be afforded to the Tourist Board for the coming year. I would have no objection to expenditure on matters of that kind in normal times, but at a time when we are told that transport may have to come to a standstill in a short time, I think expenditure of this kind would seem to require more justification than has been offered to the House for it. The amount in question is not very considerable, but it is a strange sort of expenditure at the present time.
I desire to add my plea to what has already been said by other Deputies, that some straightforward effort should be made for a trading agreement with Great Britain in regard to certain commodities. I would like to know what policy the Government have in this connection. Have efforts been made within the last 12 months to find a basis for a trading agreement in regard to the exchange of commodities? How often have they been made, and would the Minister say whether we are going to have an announcement that an effort of that kind will be made again in the immediate future? I think there is a very good case for it. I believe there are many members of the House who have yet to be convinced that some useful ground could not be covered in that connection if a genuine effort were made, and made in the right spirit—with the desire to reach results.
There are many other matters that one might touch on, and that would be worthy of discussion, but I will conclude by asking the Minister to tell us what the official policy is in regard to the widespread emigration from this country, in regard to the continued low-wage policy in this country, in regard to the repressive measures that have been taken against wages in this country and, generally, in regard to what is apparent to anybody who wants to face the facts—the complete absence of any national lead from the Government in a time of national emergency.
Mr. Crowley
I wish to say a few words on the subject of supplies, particularly in reference to supplies of cotton, linen and canvas cloths. There is a serious shortage in the country at the present time. I in no way connect the Minister for Supplies with that shortage, but intend to put forward a few suggestions which may be helpful and may ease the situation.
Before the war, in the cotton and linen industry, we had 2,000 people employed directly in weaving the necessary cloth. At present there are only 1,000 and they are on half time. Before the war, our supplies came from Ulster, Lancashire, France and the United States. To all intents and purposes we are getting no yarn, either cotton or linen, from Ulster; we are only getting 15 per cent. of our pre-war supplies from Lancashire, and none from France, leaving the United States the only place open. Last January the Irish Linen and Cotton Manufacturers' Association put forward a suggestion— they asked for accommodation of 100 tons per month in the bottoms of our ships, so that they could carry on the machinery and re-employ 1,000 men who had been paid off. 100 tons per month at that particular time would have re-employed the 1,000 paid off and continually employed the 1,000 engaged at present. Unfortunately, however, since that date in last January, the supplies from Lancashire have been still further reduced, so that the position now is that, if the Government give accommodation for 125 tons per month, the Irish Linen and Cotton Manufacturers' Association will have their figure brought up to the pre-war standard of 2,000 men.
Apart altogether from the linen and cotton trades, the clothing manufacturers, shirt manufacturers, sack and bag manufacturers, shoe manufacturers, mattress makers, the wholesale and retail drapery trade, the transport concerns are vitally concerned. The fact of the matter is that the wholesale clothiers, if they do not get linen and cotton cloth for linings and trimmings, cannot carry on, and in that trade alone there are 12,000 employed. In any case, as a temporary measure, I strongly suggest that the wish expressed by the Irish Linen and Cotton Manufacturers' Association be granted, namely, that they be granted a tonnage in our boats of 125 tons per month. I only suggest that as a temporary expedient. There is a better solution.
First of all, however, I want to emphasise one fact and one peculiarity to the industry in this country. In England the cotton trade is completely isolated from the linen trade—in fact, in every other country except ours, the linen industry has no connection with the cotton. In this country, the linen and cotton industries are dovetailed. In one loom they may be weaving linen and in the next one cotton, and possibly in the next loom it may be half cotton and half linen. In the strict sense of the word, that means there is no such thing as a pure linen industry or a pure cotton industry, as you can either switch your machinery on to linen and stop any production of cotton, or vice versa.
Last year, we sent out of this country the produce of 16,000 acres of flax. We are giving a guarantee that we are going to send the produce of 25,000 acres of flax this year, and in return we have not yet got any promise from the Northern manufacturers or the British Government that we are to get any linen yarn in return. I suggest to the Government that they take control of the produce of that 25,000 acres of flax, which, when converted, would give 2,810 tons of linen yarn. Then we could bargain with the Northern Government or with the British Government for a supply of 1,500 tons of linen yarn. If we get the 1,500 tons of linen yarn, we could keep all our looms going and keep the pre-war figure of 2,000 employed, with a definite gain in materials to the wholesale clothing industry, to the sack and bag people and to the other industries I have mentioned. Now, the permanent solution of this problem is that we install a preparation plant and a spinning plant for linen yarn to spin at least the very coarser yarn styled eights and right up to No. 36. The fine yarns could be imported as they form only about 25 per cent. of the trade.
Coming down to the bag and sack industry, we find ourselves in a very serious position, due to the shortage of jute. We used to get our raw jute from Calcutta and the House will quite realise the difficulty of getting jute from Calcutta at the moment. It is practically out of the question now. We have a substitute, and that is linen. If we use the coarser fibres of the linen yarn, we can get it spun, possibly, by Messrs. Goodbody, as the linen industry and the jute industry are closely related.
I think, with a few adjustments in the machinery and a few additional machines, Messrs. Goodbody would be able to produce all the coarser linen yarns we need for sacks and bags. I admit that, in normal times, the linen bag would be dearer than the jute one, but I venture to say that, at the moment, the linen bag is no dearer than the jute on account of the scarcity and the impossibility of importing jute. I suggest that we use our coarser linen fibre for the manufacture of substitute bags for jute bags. The same would apply to ropes and twines. Flax can again be used as a foundation in these cases, to replace sisal or other fibre used in the manufacture of ropes and twine.
Another point I wish to deal with is that of wool. We have two large establishments in this country manufacturing worsted yarns. These two firms are fully equipped and have installed combing and preparation plants. Wool from Australia and New Zealand is generally used in the worsted industry in this country, but we have a certain percentage of South Down wool and finer qualities, which could be used by Mahoney's, of Blarney, and Dwyer's factory in Cork. I suggest that the finer qualities of wool be not passed for exportation until examined, graded and certified that they could not be used in those two Cork factories.
About a year and a half ago, I had reason to speak on a very important matter—the installation of a plant which would produce potato flour. I spent at least three-quarters of an hour elaborating the importance of installing such a plant, showing that it had been installed in England and that 25 per cent. of potato flour could be mixed with the wheaten flour. I again repeat that we have a certain amount of machinery in this country, and that we could at least steam potatoes. We may not have the drying plant but we have the crushing plant, and I suggest we should pay particular attention to that.
One other suggestion is this, which I mean to be helpful. As I visualise the future, I believe this war will last for from four to seven years, and I think that transport as we know it to-day will not be with us in four or five years' time. We will be forced back on our own vehicles, and we should see that the native timber for building railway trucks, wagons and carts is preserved.
I have only one comment to make, having listened to a few speeches made in this House. I have known Deputy O'Higgins for a long time. I was astonished at the speech he delivered, especially in regard to the manner in which he dealt with the subject of defence. I cannot understand how he can justify his attitude to-day on the subject of defence with his position on the Defence Conference. I would ask the Deputy from Cavan who spoke about the agricultural prices prevailing in Ulster in comparison with the agricultural prices here, to compare the price of wheat in this country with the price paid in England. Possibly he would not then be so severe in his criticism. I do not want to be patting anybody on the back. Probably I criticise the Government more than any other Deputy on this side of the House, but I do say that, in 1939, a Government that had 275,000 acres of wheat grown deserves to be patted on the back, and that the farmers deserve much more to be patted. If we had adopted the policy outlined by certain Deputies ours would be about the most humiliating position any nation was ever placed in, namely, that of living in a land that could grow wheat with any country, while we had to beg wheat from a country that was absolutely steeped in war.
Some Deputies have referred to the alarming increase in this Estimate, and I would like to add my voice to theirs because, there is no doubt about it, there has been a gradual and progressive increase in these Estimates over a series of years. One thing I think the Government have overlooked is the precarious position of a very great number of taxpayers. There are people who draw a certain proportion of their income from abroad. Many have lost that income. There are others, representing all sorts of interests, whose position has been profoundly changed. People who have been paying taxes now find themselves in the position that they do not know where they are going to find the money for the taxes. I think the Government have not paid sufficient attention to that matter when framing the Estimates that are now before us.
I would like to refer to the wheat position. At the present time there appear to be three factors that have upset the wheat calculations, and I am surprised that the Government have not told us quite frankly what has produced the difficulty. I understand the estimated supply represented a shortage of 100,000 tons— now reduced to 80,000 tons. Surely the person who made the estimate for the Government ought to have estimated it on a conservative basis. It is very difficult to understand how such an error could have crept in. We have heard that some of the farmers are feeding grain to their stock. I do not claim to have very much knowledge about farming, but I did ask one farmer about it and he admitted that and said, "We could not leave our beasts to starve." I wonder did the Government consider the possibility of that occurring?
Another factor which apparently has cut down the supply is the unfortunate strikes that occurred in the ships that are bringing goods from abroad. I do not suppose the Government should be blamed for that, but they ought to look into it very closely.
The present system of rationing for many commodities is most unjust and most inequitable. Some traders seem to have customers and no supplies; others have supplies and no customers. Is it any wonder, with such a system in vogue, that a lot of goods seem to get into the black market and are retailed back to the people, having passed through several hands? I do not know whether they are camouflaged as having been brought in over the Border or what it is, but certainly anybody who is prepared to pay two or three times the ordinary price can get anything he wants. It seems we would all agree that the most just and the most equitable way, when supplies run short, is that some rationing system should prevail whereby people would get commodities according to backs and stomachs, and not according to purse.
I would like also to refer to turf. We had a long explanation from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance on the turf question. We were practically told that it is only people who bought turf from a coal merchant in the city here who would have any remedy for bad turf. A lot of the turf got through the parish councils has been very poor, and I would suggest to the Minister that some effort ought to be made during the present national emergency to get turf on a proper basis as a permanent fuel in this country. What is wrong at the present time is that most grates or ranges that are constructed for burning coal will not burn turf satisfactorily, especially wet, unsuitable turf. I would suggest to the Government that they should try to produce a supply of good turf that would, at any rate, be a great deal drier than the turf we get at present. Otherwise, it simply means that when coal is available you will not be able to dispose of turf, even if you put money on top of it, or if you were to give it away.
Turning to the industrial side, I think everybody knew there was a war coming. The Government knew that, too. As to where and when and how, I think they were perhaps no more at sea than some other people. The laying in of stocks was an elementary precaution. To my mind, the Government were faced with a radical change in their policy, which they were very slow to make. We had been going through a period when the Government, very properly, were trying to promote a number of industries. To support those industries, they put on tariffs and quotas and import licences. Before import licences were granted, letters had to be obtained from the manufacturers to the effect that they could not supply the goods. That, during the period when the industries were being fostered, was probably very commendable, but there came a time when a radical change was called for. Most of the industries that had been established could manufacture only at a certain rate. That rate was certainly not calculated to supply the demand of the distributive section in the country who were trying to lay in stocks. The position was that there was a manufacturer or a small group of manufacturers in each of the industries.
They were manufacturing only at a very slow rate—perhaps, to be fair to them, I should say a peace-time rate. England was still an export market, and supplies could be got from there and from America. The distributive section was faced with quotas and import licences. The consequence was that proper stocks were not laid in. Comparing this war with the war in 1914, the position is that, while we have more manufacturing capacity, the distributive capacity was not made use of to the fullest extent, so that I am afraid we lost on the swings what we gained on the roundabouts. Another point in that connection is that, although the Government has now taken off a number of those restrictions, nobody seems to know for how long they are off. Are they off for the duration, or for a period after that, or what is the position? Probably the Minister will tell us that he cannot make up his mind. Well, if he cannot make up his mind, the people who are endeavouring to supply the country's needs cannot make up their minds either, and I suppose the country will have to do without a whole lot of things in regard to which, if the Government gave a clear lead, it would be in a very much better position.
I should like too to refer to the fact that the Government seems to wait until the very last moment to do anything. We are told that the wheat is there, and, as a measure of precaution, the barley in the hands of distillers and maltsters is not allowed to be used, causing great dislocation in that particular trade. The Deputy who preceded me talked about potato flour. Nobody seems to know why the Government did not make some experiments with putting potato flour into the bread. We do not know what the objections are, and the Government ought to tell us. We have a surplus of potatoes, and at least potatoes would be very much better than nothing. We heard some of the farmer Deputies complaining that the potatoes ought to be taken off the farmers' hands. Surely, by this time the Government ought to have made up their minds as to whether the wheat can be—I will not say "adulterated", that is an unfortunate expression—mixed with potato flour. At the earliest possible moment they ought to find out whether that is practicable, because certainly it would result in a very substantial improvement of the situation. When the alcohol factories, were put up, surely somebody ought to have foreseen that, in a time of crisis like the present, we might have to eat the potatoes instead of making alcohol out of them. Another extraordinary matter is that it is only a short time ago since we gave a sort of blessing to the idea that the Electricity Supply Board should use peat for generating further supplies of electricity. If the Electricity Supply Board were at present in full blast supplying electricity from one of the bogs, I can imagine that an agitation would be very soon in progress to get that stopped, and to go back to something that is leaving the country without giving any notice at all of its departure, namely, the water of the rivers.
In conclusion, I want to say that, when we used to export cattle from our grass lands, we heard many complaints about the uneconomic use of those lands. Now, we are exporting men, women and cattle. I think some of the people of this country would be in a very bad way were it not for the substantial remittances sent back by those who have gone across the water. The Government have set up a Department of Supplies and they seem to be congratulating themselves that everything possible has been done to get supplies. Let me take the analogy of a business firm and compare this country with a business firm. After all, this country is just an aggregation of businesses. What would one think if he heard that a firm, say a manufacturing firm, had only two possible sources of supply left and that the purchasing agents or the directors, whatever you like to call them, who were in charge of the business, had quarrelled with both those sources of supply? That is the position of this country. I think the Minister for Supplies never saw the people who hand out the goods on the other side. I do not know how far that applies to America, but certainly it is neither good for business nor for the country.
I was not a bit surprised when the Minister indicated that there will be increased taxation. What is the hall-mark of the Fianna Fáil policy all during its period of office except increased taxation? How can we expect a reduction of taxation when we have so many wild, extravagant and foolish policies carried on by the Government? Most of their proposals have brought heavy taxation in their train and we are now reaping the harvest of all their foolish ideas. We are now landed in a vicious circle and I believe that the present Ministry are not able to take us out of our troubles. They have got us into a vicious circle of red tape and to unwind us out of it will require the efforts of greater men than we have on the Front Bench opposite.
One thing is certain, and that is, that it has been proved that doles and sops never made a nation of free men. We have learned much since we got control of our affairs and I hope we have forgotten a good deal, too; I hope we have forgotten a good deal of what was said in the past. I hope the lessons we have learned will bear fruit in the minds of those who so foolishly brought about the blunders of the last ten years. Unfortunately for this country, it has been run not as a small State but as a budding empire. It would seem to me that the Government took their ideas from the people across the water, with the result that we are up to our ears in want and misery.
Many of our present troubles are due to the Government's very foolish extravagance in trying to imitate others. They seem to have forgotten that the historic Irish nation should be well able to lay its own foundations without looking outside its shores for any ideas. Is the Minister satisfied that his ideas to-day conform to the ideas that Arthur Griffith and the other Sinn Féin leaders of 25 years ago preached? He sits over there a sadly disillusioned man. I agree that many good things have happened since this State came into being, but at the moment we are fast going down the slippery slope, largely because of the incompetence and the lack of vision of the people who now occupy the Front Benches of the Fianna Fáil Party.
It is my firm conviction that nothing but a revolution will alter the existing conditions in this country and put us back on the road we aimed at years ago. I hope that revolution will not be a bloody one. I believe such a revolution could be brought about, but big men will be required to fill the gap and such men are not on the Government Benches to-day. We need a big upheaval to bring our expenditure back to a reasonable plane and to reduce taxation to a level in keeping with the ability of the people to pay. It is time that we realised that we are on the wrong road and that we have reached a national crisis.
Honesty is being killed in the struggle to survive. Money never made a nation; it is the spirit of the people that counts, but unfortunately for our country money seems to be the whole consideration and at the moment nothing else counts. The poor are being overlooked and the wealthy people are to-day in the saddle, and they are as firmly entrenched as they were 25 or 26 years ago. Does not that prove that we who took part in the national struggle have definitely failed to do what we set out to achieve, and that is to make the Irish nation free, independent and Christian? What have we to-day? Is it not a fact that instead of being a healthy, Christian nation, we are nothing but a nation of racketeers and place-hunters? The whole national effort has been set aside and the survival of the fittest seems to be the order of the day.
I would like to see a better spirit amongst the people. A large number of our young people are as irresponsible as they can be. Some of them do not give two hoots what happens to the country so long as they can get something for nothing or something at the expense of someone else. Pleasure-seeking is the order of the day. All round the country we never had a more irresponsible spirit than we have to-day. Comfort and pleasure are the aim of all. That is the position at a time when the country is confronted with a situation of the most serious description.
There has been too much bungling on the part of the Government, too much hypocritical nonsense preached and no proper headline set by the men at the top. All that is required is an honest endeavour, hard work and a definite lead by the Government and, indeed, by the whole Dáil. We are asking the people to do this, that and the other; we are telling the farmers that if they do not till their land it will be taken from them, but all the time we refrain from giving them a proper lead. Was there any lead given by the Government? There was not. What did we do to show that we were genuine in our appeal to the people? We imposed heavy taxation on people who have been taxed to the hilt for years. We have put heavier burdens upon them. We brought them into a struggle with an Empire and we found ourselves in misery. Then the Government made a patched-up peace and we were told it was a great victory. We were told we had whipped John Bull. The fact was that we were really lashing our own farmers and the welts are on their backs to-day and will be there for many years to come.
In my opinion an honest dictatorship would be far better for this country than a bungling Government. Although I hate the idea of dictatorship, I think such a thing would help to take us out of the unfortunate position in which we find ourselves to-day. I appeal to the Taoiseach to form a new Ministry, a decent Ministry. We find it difficult day after day to keep our patience with a Minister such as the Minister for Supplies, who does nothing but bungle. When a Deputy asks for information here the Minister snaps at him and then tells him things which he knows are deliberate nonsense, all in order to evade his responsibilities. Many of our people are over-burdened with misery and many of our young people are leaving the country. They are flying almost into the face of death and yet they prefer that rather than face the position at home.
In order to save agriculture the Government will have to float a national loan. What does anything matter if the nation goes down? What can money do if misery and famine stalk the land? We must feed our people. It is the duty of the Minister for Finance to put our farmers in such a position that they will be able to supply the requirements of the nation and so save the people from extinction through starvation. Go, at least, and float an honest loan, and if you do not do that, at least take the burden of rates, rents and taxes off their shoulders for the present agricultural season. We are asking these people to do so much at such cost to themselves, and does not everybody know that what we are asking them to do is entirely beyond their capacity? Of course, the city mentality is to say: "Do not mind the farmer, he is too damn well off, and we always knew it." I think, however, that it will be found now that the shoe will pinch in another direction.
The farmer is as patriotic as any other man in this country, but he has seen too much place-hunting and racketeering going on in this country during the last eight or ten years, when he was the butt of every Tom, Dick and Harry, when he could not get even the cost of production, and when he had endless rates and taxes imposed upon him, and the sheriff put at his door because he had not the money to pay and because he was not able to borrow it. He could not go to the bank and get the money. Those are the people to whom we are crying and sighing now, begging them to take us out of the rut. They have often taken us out of the rut before, and, thanks be to God, they will take us out of the rut now and produce the food that is required for the nation, but you will have to pay the farmer, and if you do not pay him you will not get the food, and rightly so.
It is only right to tell the Minister that he is treating the farmers meanly and rottenly. As regards the wheat position, I say definitely and without fear of contradiction that one of the most unhappy sights to be seen in the country at the present moment is the small amount of wheat that has been sown all over the country. Why is that? It is because the Government spent six months quibbling and niggling about an increase of 5/- a barrel for wheat. Then, when the season was almost out, the Minister said that he would give the farmer what was wanted. The time to have done that was last August, so as to give the farmer a chance to make his land ready for tilling, but there was not the slightest effort to do that until it was too late. You have all these inspectors from the different Departments going down the country, prying and seeking out who was doing this, that, and the other, but the farmer always did his job right and he did his job right without any need for inspectors. If you pay the farmer a reasonable price, he will produce the goods, but you will not pay him, although you pay everybody else.
It is time that the Government should recognise that the people are up in arms against them and that they are fed up with them, and the people who are most incensed against the Government are the people who were formerly their loyal supporters. Go down the country to your political clubs that you think so much about, and ask the members of those clubs what is the position to-day, and they will soon tell you that you are living too damn well-off in Dublin. I see that in a case of national emergency in the City of Dublin people are to be evacuated down to Meath. Around my own part of the country a large number of people are to be shipped down there, although we have not enough for ourselves, and there seems to be no provision for supplying them with mugs, tea, or anything else. That is the type of government that would sicken anybody, and it is the type of government that will land us in the lurch in the very near future.
There is only one hope for this country, and that is to give back to the people some of the responsibilities that you took from them eight or nine years ago. Go back to the parish council, go back to Muintir na Tíre that the great Father Hayes has founded. Give the people of this country full responsibility and do not be niggling and quibbling about it. If you give them back their full responsibilities you will not need the services of all these place-hunters who are seeking jobs. The parish councils will do the job, if you give them official responsibility, signed by the Government. Do not be asking people to resurrect this, that, and the other kind of thing. That is no use. You must give back their responsibility to the people to settle things in their own way. Father Hayes's Muintir na Tíre organisation is showing the light, and it is the only hope of this country. Why, then, are the Government sidetracking it, and why are they afraid to face up to this matter? If you give to the parish councils the responsibility which is rightly theirs you will raise in the hearts and minds of every young and old man in this country the proper spirit. At the moment, the only idea they have is to survive as best they can, but give them the responsibility of doing something for themselves and there will be a new life and spirit in them, the spirit that animated us 25 years ago to do and dare all to save our country, the spirit that brought us through terrible times, and we to-day are a glorious and a free people because of that spirit, and not because of money. We fought a revolution without a penny, and fought it in poverty and misery. There is a revolution here to-day also, and I ask this Government and this House to give the people back their responsibilities, and to ask them to do for themselves what we here cannot do for them. Let us ask them to tackle the job themselves, and I am certain that they will do the job much better and be more hardworking and self-sacrificing in the doing of it than as a result of anything the Government may do.
We are giving money to all classes of place-holders to-day, and all that these people want is just to hold their jobs and to see if the jobs are pensionable. These people do not want a temporary job; it must be a permanent job, and pensionable, if possible, and every Department of State has brought in a horde of new officials, with the result that half the people of this country are living in luxury and grandeur at the expense of the other half, whom they are holding down and who are a far grander people, namely, the agricultural community. Why are our farmers' sons coming up to Dublin and going across to England? It is because they cannot get a living in their own homes. Is it not a shame for any Minister to shout about nationality and patriotism when these things are allowed to happen? Why did we fight, and what did we win freedom for? It was thought that we would be able to bring our people back to the land from the large cities and from England and from America, so that they could be placed on the land of this country. What is wrong with the land? The thing that is wrong is that you have taken away the reserves that left us happy in the past. In former days every farmer had a nest-egg in the old stocking; he had that even in the worst days of the British regime. What has he to-day? Nothing but bank debts. Was it for this that the great Pearse died? What would he think, if he could only come back here and see what has happened, and see the great, noble nine on the Front Bench opposite sitting there smiling, with their big high powered cars, their large salaries, and pensions when they go out of office? I say that I am horrified and disgusted, but I am proud that I am able to stand here in an Irish Parliament and say what I want to say. I am disgusted with these people over there, who have fooled the finest type of people in this country, the agricultural community. They formed political clubs and so on all over the country, but out of these has come misery, and out of that misery will come revolution, and out of that revolution will come the Irish-Ireland idea that we fought for and that our comrades died for. It is the Irish people by themselves who are saving this country, and not the Government. If you do not give a lead to the people, then get out, and, if you do not get out, the Irish people will put you out.
In the course of the discussion on this Vote, the rights and interests of various sections of the community have been stressed by various Deputies. The claims of the farmer, the worker, the industrialist, the consumer have all been stressed and put forward. I should like to say a few words on behalf of the unfortunate taxpayer, because, whatever the future may hold for this country, if the financial policy of the Government, as embodied in this Vote on Account and outlined in the Book of Estimates that has been put into our hands, is given practical effect to, there can be no doubt that the taxpayer of this country is going to bear a crushing and crippling burden in the coming year, and we will probably find ourselves in the position that, head for head of the population of this country, we will be over-taxed to an extent greater than the ordinary individual in Great Britain is taxed at a time when a great Empire is fighting for its very existence. We will find ourselves in that position without any return for our money. It is that aspect of this Vote on Account that I wish to stress because there is at least an opportunity at this time to warn the Government against their policy of further and increased taxation. When the taxpayer is spoken of, of course most people think that it is the income-tax payer that is referred to. For all Governments the income-tax payer has been fair game. He has been pursued and harried by the present Government and their officers during the last ten years in a way that, I suppose, no Government in any country have pursued taxpayers.
During the course of the discussion on a Finance Bill some years ago I made an appeal to the then Minister for Finance to deal fairly with income-tax payers, for the reason that, if the ordinary people who pay taxes were assured that they would get a fair deal in the matter of their income tax and in the manner in which it was extracted from them, there would be a better chance of encouraging the growth of a spirit amongst taxpayers so that they would perhaps, not gladly or cheerfully, but at all events willingly pay their taxes honestly in the belief that the burden was being properly and fairly spread amongst all sections of the community. Now I think that the present Government have regarded that section of taxpayers known as income-tax payers as fair game, because they are politically of no importance to them. If we are to have an increase in the income-tax this year, as was foreshadowed some time ago in a speech by one of the Ministers, then I think we will have a very serious situation indeed. When I speak of the incidence of the burden of income-tax, I am not speaking on behalf merely of that comparatively small number of people in the community who do pay income-tax, but of the general taxpayers who indirectly pay income-tax. Practically every section of the community, from the old age pensioner up to the richest member of Fianna Fáil, pays income-tax, however disguised it may be.
The last Government were attacked at every cross roads because they reduced the old age pension. The present Government are far too astute politicians to reduce the old age pension directly, but anybody who has experience of people trying to get their old age pensions knows the methods adopted by the present Government to extract taxation from the old age pensioners. Every device of an administrative kind is resorted to in order to create a fictitious income for those people who have claims to old age pensions. For that reason I say that even old age pensioners have to pay their income-tax. It is not merely that the ordinary group of citizens who do pay income-tax will have an increased burden to bear directly, but the unemployed will feel the impact very heavily indeed in further increased taxation.
Whatever the future may hold for this country, it is quite clear that there will be a very serious increase and a greatly accelerated increase in unemployment in the forthcoming months. A businessman told me yesterday that he could not see how his business could last under present circumstances more than the next two or three months. The Government have recently developed a new technique, a technique of pessimism, and over the radio, in speeches in the country, when they do make speeches, and in the Press, when they do manifest themselves in the Press, they are full of gloom and pessimism and they call on the people to make sacrifices. I may say, in parenthesis, that our people have readily responded to every appeal made to them by the Government and by other Deputies in this House to make sacrifices in the period of emergency through which we have gone. A tribute ought to be paid to the poorest section of the community who have put up with the greatest hardships at the hands of the Government during the last few years. But when they appeal to the people to make sacrifices, they themselves ought to give the lead in the matter of sacrifice, and I think it can be stated without the possibility of contradiction that the Government have made no single sacrifice in connection with the effort to keep the country going.
When we look at the Book of Estimates which has been circulated, we find that there is not a single item in the entirety of that bill for nearly £40,000,000 where any effort has been made, or, at least, any substantial effort, to effect any single economy. They are running this State in the same way as Fianna Fáil ran it after they came into power, running it solely for their political ends. At a time when we are facing the worst period of the war, every single service created by the Fianna Fáil Government in order to curry favour and gain votes is still being run at the expense of the suffering taxpayers. The Government that asked poor people to do with half an ounce of tea per week, that asked them to put up with less bread and with increased unemployment, have made no single contribution to the general sacrifice that is asked of the community.
We have had an appeal made here by Deputy Cosgrave, supplemented eloquently this evening by Deputy Murphy, that a genuine effort should be made to enter into a trade agreement with Great Britain. Have the Government made any sacrifice of their political faces in that connection in order to secure that very desirable end? Have they not rather tried to "cash in" for political purposes on the anti-British feeling that is fostered by some people in this country? There is only one way in which such a treaty, call it what you like, a trade treaty or other treaty, can be made between this country and Great Britain. There is only one way in which the advantages we have to offer to Great Britain can be "cashed in." There is only one way in which we can save this country in the forthcoming period of stress and strain, and that is by some members of the Government—if possible, the Head of the Government—taking their political courage in their hands, meeting English Ministers face to face and making a bargain for the benefit of the country. There is no use in sending civil servants. When we were the Government we had experience of the futility of bargains between civil servants on both sides. No conclusions, or no agreement advantageous to this country, can ever be reached in that way. It is only on broad political lines, by Ministers on one side facing Ministers on the other side across a table to settle the big issues and the broad claims and to decide the advantages that have to be given and exchanged, that anything can be obtained. Do you think that sacrifice would be made by the Government? They ask poor people to make sacrifices, to do with a little tea, a little sugar, less bread, and practically no fuel while facing continued and continuous unemployment.
The present Ministers would not sacrifice their political future or the votes they might lose. If they had the courage to go to England to face English Ministers across a table to gain a trade treaty it would be of advantage to this country in a time of strain, stress and emergency. We have had it pointed out in the course of the discussion by Deputy Cosgrave, by Deputy O'Sullivan and by Deputy O'Higgins that the staffs of Government offices have been largely increased. It will probably be the experience of Deputies who do not belong to the Government Party that not a single person was able to get a temporary appointment in Government Departments unless backed by Ministerial influence in the claim for such an appointment. The taxpayer is paying for votes for Fianna Fáil in a time of war, and is being asked to bear a burden which he is unable to bear. Ordinary people are asked to make sacrifices, which they would willingly make if it were for the nation's good, and would more willingly bear if they knew that all sections of the community were bearing their share.
One of the matters that has been exercising my mind for some time past, as one who is not in any way an expert on finance, is the extraordinary fashion in which the British people are giving their savings to the British Government for the prosecution of their war effort. I have not heard of any single appeal to the Irish people from any Minister in this Government to exercise thrift, or to give their savings to the Government. All that this Government knows how to do is to spend, and to get money from the people to spend. There has been no effort to create either an opinion or a situation in which thrift could be advocated or fostered. I presume that at some time or other this war will end and, when it does end, we will be in the position of having bankrupted this country, having no assets in the way of savings to fall back upon.
The grasping hand of the Government is ever out, but there is no scheme by which the money of the country could be placed at the disposal of the Government, in such a way that it will be there in the form of savings, or that it will be spent or used by the Government for necessary purposes during the period of the emergency, and be available afterwards to the people in a time of further want. We are going to have, as far as I can see in the forthcoming year, nothing but increasing and crushing taxation, with no constructive policy, with no effort whatever for thrift, or to spread the burden equitably between various classes of the community.
Side by side with increased taxation we have this country a happy hunting ground for people who are making fortunes surreptitiously in the black market. I know that it is very easy to exaggerate the activities of people operating on that very fertile soil, now popularly known as the black market, but from what has been brought to my notice by businessmen, the position appears to be this, that in every essential industry, and in every business that has been trying to carry on in very difficult times, it is practically impossible to get supplies, and will be completely impossible to get any supplies in the next few months, from ordinary sources. I think Deputy Dockrell stated to-night that on the other hand people could get supplies of anything they wanted in the black market. That is the position and it is being fostered at the expense of ordinary traders who pay rates and taxes. There are people now going into business who were never engaged in business in this country. I am told that there are people coming down from Belfast to exploit the needs of business, industry and trade. People engaged in the motor trade are having a very stiff and a very difficult time. They are trying to keep the industry going in order to keep employment going, but I am informed that individuals who have no connection with the motor trade are purchasing motor cars at what are known as "list prices" from the motor trade. Motor traders cannot sell motor cars under the list prices without incurring certain penalties from their Federation, but private individuals can charge three, four or five times the list prices to people whose business makes it necessary for them to have motor cars at any price.
The same is happening with regard to motor tyres. Motor tyres that were bought at comparatively low prices, for £3 or £4, are now being offered for sale at £20. One individual told me within the last few days that a proposition was put up to him, in the stress in which he found himself in connection with a truck for which he wanted tyres, that it would cost £200 or £250 for tyres to keep that truck on the road. I wonder what the Government are going to do about that situation. They have done nothing so far. If one looks at the newspapers it will be seen that they are full of advertisements for that class of article. If the Government are going to shift taxation on to the people, if they are not going to bring about unemployment—and they will undoubtedly bring it about if they increase taxation any more than it is at present—and if they are going to call on the people to make further sacrifices, then they should give a lead and a headline in the way of sacrifice. The first thing they should do is, either to take the Book of Estimates and to go through it, not with a pruning knife, but if I might mix the metaphor, to cut right into it, and to cut down all schemes that are not essential, in order that expenditure could be cut down instead of increased. In that way ordinary people would be enabled to face the difficult situation which now faces them, and unemployment would not be increased. People who never knew what unemployment was might not then be faced with the grim spectre that faces them, unless something is done in the way of economy on the part of the Government.
Speaking at a dinner which was held in the early part of December last, the present Minister for Supplies gave his point of view with regard to the war in this sentence: "Between the irretrievable past and the unknown future lies the unattractive present". It is proper on an occasion like this to examine how far the Minister who made that comment is himself responsible for seeing first of all that certain of the defects of the past were unretrieved, how far he is responsible for making the present so unattractive, and how far he is deficient in his duty in not being able to put before the House some better forecast of the future than he has done. I move to report progress.
Progress reported; Committee to sit again.
The Dáil adjourned at 9.30 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, March 12th.