I do not know if I am to gather from Deputy Cosgrave's remarks that he is seriously proposing that the rationing of drapery goods should have been the subject of ordinary legislation. That is what he said, and I ask Deputies to try to imagine what would have happened if we announced our intention to pass legislation, which would become operative a month or two months hence, for the rationing of drapery goods or any other non-perishable product. Do they think it would have been possible to prevent the complete exhaustion of stocks, to prevent a rush upon the shops during that period which would have completely disorganised sales for months and years to come? That would have happened.
Surely, Deputy Cosgrave appreciates that when it becomes necessary to ration or control the distribution of some non-perishable product, it must be done without notice, that a control has to be brought into operation which may be modified subsequently. All our controls were modified subsequently-following consultation with the interested parties, but it is inconceivable that we should go to the people directly interested and say: "We are giving you warning that in a week's or a month's time we are going to impose these controls, and you have all that period in which to forestall the results which the Government wants to secure." That would not be a serious way of doing the nation's business. I am quite certain that if the Government had attempted to introduce the rationing of drapery goods in that manner, members of the Fine Gael Party and other Parties in the House would have denounced them, and rightly denounced them, for having approached the problems in an incompetent manner and made a mess of it.
We got the control into operation. I announced on the wireless the coming into operation of a rationing system the next day. I announced that any parties, whether representatives of manufacturers, distributors or any other class affected by the Order, who wished to make representations concerning its provisions were welcome to make such representations. There was no difficulty about having these consultations after the control had been brought into effect. We recognised that modifications would become inevitable following consultation, and modifications were made following consultation when they appeared necessary and desirable. I think it is entirely incorrect to say that in any other country they gave notice in advance of intention to ration drapery goods or non-perishable goods of that kind. In Australia, I read in the Press, they actually closed the shops by order for several days, so that there could be none of the forestalling which did to some extent occur here.
Orders had to be printed and instructions had to be given to a large number of officials, and inevitably rumours leaked out that rationing was coming. Everybody knows what happened. There were queues outside every shop. People were rushing to buy, and those who had long purses were able to forestall the introduction of the scheme to some extent; but what occurred was insignificant in relation to what would have occurred if we came here with proposals for legislation to be discussed on Second Reading, on Committee Stage, on Report Stage, and then to be sent to the Seanad and enacted after all that process had been completed, with everybody knowing it was coming. I do not think it can be seriously suggested that that would have been the right way to do the thing.
The suggestion is frequently made here that there is an absence of consultation between the Department of Supplies and Industry and Commerce and business interests, whether manufacturing or distributing. That is entirely incorrect. The standard complaint made to me by the heads of business concerns is that they have to spend far too much of their time attending conferences in the Department either as members of committees advising on particular matters, or at conferences called to discuss particular problems. These conferences are held regularly. There may be, and frequently is, complaint by individuals that the advice given by particular interests is not acted on, but that is an entirely different matter. These manufacturers, industrialists and distributors naturally give the advice in closest accordance with their own interests, but we have to consider a wider interest than theirs, and it is frequently impossible to take their advice; but there is no serious complaint voiced by any section of the community that there is not full and ample opportunity given to them for consultation. If the Deputy will make inquiries, either amongst the distributive and manufacturing trades, or amongst the representatives of the workers, he will find that in relation to all these Orders brought into force from time to time, there is full and frequently protracted consultation whenever it is possible and before the Orders are made.
The only other point I want to refer to is in connection with Deputy Cosgrave's reference to prices. Prices have risen. It is a preposterous suggestion that there is any action which we could have taken which would have prevented a rise in prices. There is published periodically in official statistics published and made available to the Deputy an index of import prices. That index shows that the average cost of imported goods has risen since 1939 by 150 per cent.
To the knowledge of every Deputy here, the prices of agricultural produce have also risen by about 80 per cent. These increases in the cost of imported goods and in the cost of all home-produced foodstuffs have inevitably resulted in a rise in the cost of living, a rise in the price of goods sold in shops. We have to try to check that rise as best we can. It was impossible to do so in the early months of the war. There has been no appreciable increase in the cost-of-living index for the past nine months, which would suggest that the forces which operated in the initial period to force prices upwards have spent themselves or have been checked. I do not say there never will be another rise in the cost-of-living index, but for the time being these forces have been arrested, and the cost-of-living index has, in fact, been stationary for the past nine months. But it would have been completely out of the question for us to hope to prevent any increase in the cost of living during the war. Prices have risen in every war in every country. The rise in the cost of living has been off-set in some countries by heavy subsidisation of food prices. We have been able to do that only on a limited scale, but we are doing it to the extent of several millions a year. It is true that to that extent there has been a rise—a rise, however, which is attributable mainly to causes outside our control. In so far as it was due to causes within our control, it has been checked and, in fact, arrested for some considerable time.
