Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 26 Apr 1944

Vol. 93 No. 11

Estimates for Public Services. - Vote 52—Lands.

Minister for Lands (Mr. Moylan)

I move:—

That a sum not exceeding £677,983 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1945, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Offices of the Minister for Lands and of the Irish Land Commission (44 and 45 Vict., c. 49, sec. 46, and c. 71, sec. 4; 48 and 49 Vict., c. 73, secs. 17, 18 and 20; 54 and 55 Vict., c. 48; 3 Edw. 7, c. 37; 7 Edw. 7, c. 38, and c. 56; 9 Edw. 7, c. 42; Nos. 27 and 42 of 1923; No. 25 of 1925; No. 11 of 1926; No. 19 of 1927; No. 31 of 1929; No. 11 of 1931; Nos. 33 and 38 of 1933; No. 11 of 1934; No. 41 of 1936; and No. 26 of 1939).

Owing to the restriction of activities which has been imposed upon the Land Commission by emergency conditions, the Estimate for Lands has become virtually stereotyped and few of the sub-heads call for particular comment. The increase of £10,854 under sub-head A for salaries, wages and allowances is due to the increased bonus granted as an emergency measure to the lower paid civil servants. The salaries and bonuses of the staff of the Land Commission on loan to other Departments are still mainly borne on the Vote. A note on page 234 of the printed Estimates explains that the Estimate for Lands includes provision for £74,773 in respect of officers on loan, of which only £1,740 is recoverable.

The sub-head of most public interest is sub-head I—Improvement of Estates, etc. This expenditure is bound to reflect the reduced rate of land division and the amount to be provided for the coming year is down by £23,052. That this Estimate is still as big as it is may be regarded as largely due to the fact that much of the improvement expenditure in a particular year arises out of sanctions made in previous years. Owing to the increased cost of labour and materials a smaller return is obtainable. During the past year a sum of £228,461 was expended and the Estimate for the present year corresponds approximately to that figure.

The sharp increase of £2,250 under sub-head N is due to exceptional provision for repair of an embankment in County Waterford. The decrease of £4,400 under sub-head P is due to the winding up of the most of the remaining proceedings under the Land Acts of 1903 and 1909. The small changes occurring under other heads scarcely require explanation, not being out of the normal. Several of the sub-heads of the Vote represent nominal amounts provided for contingencies unlikely to arise. The difficult position of the Land Commission under prevailing conditions appears to be still widely misunderstood. It is very hard to get the public fully to realise that with a greatly depleted staff, with grave difficulties of transport and shortage of materials, fresh proceedings for the acquisition or resumption of land for equipment and division into holdings are virtually precluded.

The skeleton staff remaining in the acquisition and resales division have been employed in completing the purchase of lands in respect of which commitments had been already undertaken, or in effecting exchange of holdings. It is to their credit that approximately 80,000 acres have been acquired for division during the four years from 1st April, 1940, to 31st March, 1944, despite the growing emergency difficulties. The obstacles have been even greater in the division of land, as many of the trained inspectors have had to be seconded to the Department of Agriculture for tillage inspection, while those remaining lack proper transport facilities and can cover only a very small distance daily, their operative power being diminished on that account by about 60 per cent. Building and fencing materials and machinery for pumps and so on are scarce, and their transport is also difficult and slow. It has been by great efforts only that some 79,000 acres have been divided in the four years since 1st April, 1940.

The figures for the past year have fallen to some 10,000 acres acquired and some 12,000 acres divided, and there is likely to be a progressive decrease during the continuance of present conditions. It cannot be otherwise. The policy of group migration, which offers the best hope of relieving congestion where relief is most required has also been affected by present difficulties, and in the past year it has been found possible to transfer, under the group scheme, only nine migrant families to the midlands, all coming from County Kerry.

The vesting of tenanted land in the tenant-purchasers, and all the varied work of the purchase division associated therewith, are equally hampered; and rearrangement work has had to be almost completely postponed. Only 169 holdings of tenanted land were revested in the tenants in the past year and only 492 holdings on Congested District Board estates were resold; 522 turbary rights on bogs on these estates were vested in the tenants and 332 parcels of untenanted land allotted under the 1923-39 Acts were vested in the allottees.

In spite of the difficulties which have to be contended with the Land Commission continue to be deluged with correspondence urging fresh acquisition of land all over the country, and the speeding up of the division of particular estates, with sundry complaints of delay and neglect. Such correspondence is often useless, and tends to defeat its own object by further clogging the already overloaded machinery of the Land Commission and wasting the time of the staff in futile research and investigation. It would be really helpful if Deputies would refrain from urging fresh proceedings, as some so often do, which they should know to be out of the question, and from complaining of delays which they should realise to be inevitable. The Land Commission are doing their best to cope with a great volume of accumulated work under trying conditions, and while these conditions continue there is no hope of increased progress. This may seem a pessimistic conclusion, but it is necessary to face facts. Not until the Land Commission staff is restored and conditions improve can we take up again with vigour the work of land settlement.

I would like to take this opportunity of reminding the House that a great deal of the work which the Land Commission is committed to perform, and which is still very far from completion, originated over 30 years ago, in regard to the problems that were inherited from the Congested Districts Board, and over 20 years ago, in regard to the purchase and resale of tenanted land coming within the provisions of the Land Act of 1923. The main job of the Land Commission in the west is to deal with the congestion problem. After the assimilation of the Congested Districts Board by the Land Commission in 1923 there was a general demand for concentration on the acquisition and division of untenanted land and pursuance of that policy also took from the amount of attention that could be given to the relief of western congestion. There are still on the Land Commission's hands some 15,000 holdings of land purchased 30 years ago by the Congested Districts Board for the purpose of improvement or rearrangement and enlargement before resale, and resale should, in the ordinary course, have followed without undue delay.

It is estimated that there are also about 30,000 holdings in a similar position among the tenanted land holdings on estates lodged in the Land Commission for purchase and resale under the 1923 Act. The investigation and preparation of all these holdings for resale, after improvement and rearrangement, together with the settlement of turbary rights, etc., entail work similar to, and in continuation of, the activities begun by the Congested Districts Board. Real progress in this task would result in great economic advantage to the tenants and sub-tenants, and in a corresponding increase in agricultural stability and production to the national advantage. In addition to unsold holdings and parcels, there are also on the hands of the Land Commission some 800 migrants' holdings which are being let under grazing arrangements to between 2,000 and 3,000 temporary allottees. Some of these have been on the Land Commission's hands for over 20 years. Under ideal conditions neither the Land Commission nor the Congested Districts Board would have lands on hands for indefinite periods. Their function is and was to settle other people in ownership, not to become owners or landlords themselves.

I regard it as particularly unfortunate that this work has had so many serious setbacks, and I have been advised that if the present emergency had not arisen in 1939, arrangements which had then been made by the Land Commission and were about to fructify would have resulted in substantial progress. The frequent breaks in the continuity of the task of dealing with this problem have given rise to greater difficulties and expense in its ultimate solution. Migrations have been taking place from the vicinity of a great many holdings in congested districts in the West for which rearrangement schemes were in course of preparation but work on these schemes has had to be suspended because of the transfer of inspectors to more pressing emergency duties in other Departments.

Rearrangement is tedious and difficult even under the most favourable conditions, such as if it were performed soon after the removal of the migrants. The longer the migrants' holdings are permitted to remain on the hands of the Land Commission under letting agreements the more difficult it becomes to deal with the tenants. They, naturally, come to regard the parcels as their own property, and the bargaining value of the vacated lands tends to disappear. I am satisfied that this work requires considerable experience and the exercise of sound judgment and tact on the part of the inspectors concerned, and I intend that its discharge shall have prior claim on the Land Commission inspectors when they again become available in sufficient numbers to tackle it once more.

Out of over 105,000 holdings of tenanted land coming under the provisions of the Land Acts 1923-39, about 74,000 remain to be revested in the tenants. The listing under the Land Act, 1931, of 80,000 holdings for vesting in the Land Commission had to be rushed, and considerable time has been involved since in the amendment of the lists which, owing to the furnishing of incorrect or incomplete information by landlords, contained numerous errors.

When dealing with property of this kind every possible safeguard has to be taken against error. In order to implement the policy of past years which was centred on the expedition of land division, the attention of the Purchase Branch was focussed to a great extent on the resumption of tenanted land holdings with a view to their division and a great deal of effort which might have been available for revesting had to be devoted to matters not directly connected with that process. Before revesting can be accomplished the holdings have to be surveyed so as to determine their boundaries occupancy, appurtenant rights, etc., and inspections must also be made. The loss by transfer of trained staff has caused an almost complete stoppage of revesting output since 1940, and the existing staff of the Purchase Branch are barely able to cope with the most pressing problems such as repairs to embankments, turbary, drainage, sub-divisions, release of guarantee deposits, etc., and only a small portion of their time can be devoted to replying to correspondence which continues to arise from, and on behalf of, parties interested in other Land Commission proceedings.

It has been a serious drag on the Land Commission to have to maintain a large staff in the Purchase Branch for the conduct of a large volume of correspondence and work which would come to an end with completion of revesting, and I have under consideration representations which have been made by the Department with a view to having that work accelerated as soon as possible. The Land Acts were designed to transfer all the rights and responsibilities of ownership to the tenant occupiers, and the sooner that transfer can be accomplished the better I would be pleased. In passing, I would like to remind Deputies that the Land Commission's current responsibilities and work in relation to the position of the 74,000 unvested tenant purchasers are considerable.

My predecessor called the attention of the House last year to the fact that the amount of work falling on the headquarters of the Land Commission after the division of untenanted land is considerably greater (by two to one, I am told) than that involved before or in the course of the division. That fact is again mentioned to show that the decks are by no means clear when lands are acquired and divided in parcels among allottees sanctioned by the commissioners. Indeed, the most tedious and most troublesome work arises when the allottees have been put into occupation—questions affecting boundaries, fences, rights-of-way, water supply, improvements, and general requests and complaints of a varied character. There are about 45,000 parcels of untenanted land allotted by the Land Commission awaiting revesting in the allottees. Many of these were allotted between ten and 20 years ago. Each additional year that passes renders the work of revesting more costly and difficult, while the addition of every parcel or holding to the unvested category entails additional responsibility and labour for the Land Commission in its capacity of landlord.

The general experience of the Land Commission has emphasised the conviction that the division of untenanted land is a process that has to be performed with meticulous care, especially in regard to the selection and approval of allottees. Such examination as has been possible up to the present of the use to which allotted parcels have been put has disclosed disappointing results in a great many instances. The Land Commission propose, when staff becomes available for the purpose, to exercise their powers of recovery of allotments when the conditions under which they were given are not being strictly observed. In that connection I regret that my Department is not now in a position to give greater attention to this important matter.

The one bright spot in the present situation is the continued improvement in the collection of land purchase annuities, which seems to indicate an increase in the prosperity of farmers generally. The arrears for all gales since the enactment of the Land Act of 1933 represented at 31st January last only 2.7 per cent. of the total annuities collectable. It is something of an achievement to have collected over 97 per cent. of the outstanding payments and such a result definitely enhances the financial credit of our country.

A word may also be said about turbary lettings from bogs in the hands of the Land Commission. In the past year approximately 150,000 tons of turf were cut under such lettings and a sum of £44,600 was expended on turbary development by the Land Commission. Every effort is being made to effect this year the maximum increase in production. To this end special attention is being paid to the construction of roads and drains, where necessary, to make available further areas of bogs for turf cutting and tenants are being encouraged to cut turf on their allotments for sale in addition to their own requirements.

Mr. Roddy

I agree, of course, that there is bound to be a certain amount of unreality about the discussion on this Estimate, because of the fact that the main task of the Land Commission, namely, the acquisition and distribution of land, has practically ceased owing to the transfer of such a big proportion of the staff to other Departments. I am sorry that the Minister did not tell us the amount of money provided for salaries in this Estimate which is really payable to members of a staff transferred to other Departments of the Government. I assume that these salaries have been shown in the Estimates for the last four years, and I think that after four years it is time the salaries of the men of the former Land Commission staff should be shown in the Estimates for the appropriate Department.

After all, it seems misleading to the members of this House to see £354,896 in the Land Commission Estimate for salaries, wages and allowances, whereas it appears that less than half that amount is payable to the actual Land Commission staff at the moment. The balance is payable to former members of the staff who are now on other Government work, and it appears to me to be false accountancy that the salaries should not be shown in the Estimate for the Department to which they are now attached, so as to give the members of the Dáil an opportunity of knowing exactly what amount is being spent at the present moment by these different Departments of Government on salaries, wages and so on.

I do not know whether the Minister can do anything about it, but if this war continues for another year, or two or three, I assume that according to the present arrangement, members of the Land Commission staff who are now attached to other Departments will still continue to be shown in the Land Commission Estimate. It is unfair to the Land Commission and to the members of this House that we do not know exactly what the total amount of money is actually being spent on the staff of the Departments to which they were transferred.

It appears to me that there was no justification whatever for stopping the division of land. I know perfectly well that an Order was made by the Government some years ago that land division was to stop for the duration of the emergency, but I can only assume that the Government, when they made that Order, did not contemplate that the war would last so long as it has lasted. If they had thought that the war would last six or eight years, they would never have made such an Order. It is unfair to congests and small farmers who are looking for additions of land that such an Order should have been made. In view of the tillage regulations, an addition of land would be a wonderful boon to many of these small farmers. They are obliged to till their holdings up to the hilt under extremely difficult conditions, lacking, as they do, artificial manures, with the result that their little farms will be so exhausted at the end of the war that it will take many years to restore them to their original state of fertility. If additions of land were given to these people during the war years, it would make a wonderful difference to them. The Minister should insist that the members of his inspectorial staff now engaged on tillage operations be returned to his Department for the purpose of resuming their proper duty—the inspection and division of land purchased by the Land Commission.

There should now be a sufficient number of well-trained juniors in the Department of Agriculture to undertake the duties which these men have been discharging. If they have not a sufficient number of qualified juniors in the Department of Agriculture, they should be able to get personnel from the staffs of the various agricultural colleges and institutions. Every farmer realises that while the war lasts he has to till a certain area of his land. In view of the many prosecutions which have been instituted and in view of the propaganda conducted by members of the Government over the radio and in public speeches in the country, every farmer realises his obligations and I do not think it is necessary to have so many inspectors operating exclusively on tillage work. In the interests of the small farmers, particularly the congests, who are looking for additions to their holdings, the Minister should secure that his inspectors return and resume the duties they should properly be discharging even during the war years.

While the Land Commission has ceased to purchase and distribute untenanted land, there has been wholesale speculation in land in several districts. In some areas, land is fetching fabulous prices. Men who never thought of speculating in land before are buying land at extremely high prices at present, with the result that farmers who might have had an opportunity of buying some of this land are debarred from doing so because of the high prices. Traders and merchants are entering the market for land at present. Many of them are doing so because of the huge profits they are earning in their business and because they want to avoid the payment of income-tax. I realise that, under existing legislation, the Minister cannot stop that. Some of these people may retain the land simply as a speculation during the war but others of them will work the land for the purpose of recovering the money paid for it. As a result of intensive working during the period of occupation, the land will be so exhausted by the end of the war that it will be of very little use to the Land Commission or to the unfortunate allottees who will, eventually, get it. That type of speculation may continue for the duration of the war. I suggest that the Minister should examine this matter to see if it is possible to devise ways and means of limiting the scope of these speculative operations and exercising some type of control over them. Even some tenants who had land vested in them recently by the Land Commission— land which was purchased at the taxpayers' expense and presented to them free—sold their holdings at the high speculative prices prevailing. We may assume that many more of them who have had parcels of land vested in them during recent years will enter the market while these high prices are available. It is regrettable to think that the unfortunate taxpayer has had to meet the cost of buying land for people who avail of the first opportunity to dispose of it at a high price.

As regards the size of holdings given to allottees, I think that the limit is about 25 statute acres. I wonder if the Minister is satisfied that that represents an economic holding and that it is possible for a farmer on a holding of that size to make a decent living and support a wife and family. I suggest that the Minister should examine that question in view of the change brought about by the war and the conditions likely to prevail when the war is over. I understand that the 24-acre standard applies to every part of the country.

The small farmer in the West who has been accustomed to live on a small holding, might be able to eke out an existence on a holding of that size, but the man in Meath, Wicklow, or Wexford would not dream of living on so small a holding. Agriculture is becoming more mechanised, and by the time the war is over it will be more mechanised than it is to-day. In view of that change, I suggest that the Minister and the Land Commission should consider giving to allottees larger holdings than they have been in the habit of giving in the past.

I remember reading a suggestion in a newspaper of the advisability of the Minister making an examination into the results achieved by land purchase; what use people who got land were making of it; how many had succeeded in making good, and if it would not be necessary to do something more for them than to hand over substantial parcels of land. During the period that I was in the Land Commission I felt that its functions should not merely stop with the division of land.

Take the case of a landless man who got possession of a farm of 20 or 25 acres, who needed further help from some other Department, and who, in some cases, might need some capital in order to make the best use of land. I had the idea at one time of linking up such attempts with another Government Department, from which a man could get expert assistance to enable him to use land to the best advantage. I often wondered if it would not be advisable to devise some form of credit to give further assistance to men of that type. Every Deputy is aware that when land is given to a landless man, or when a small farmer gets an addition to his holding, he may have to let that land in order to realise a sufficient amount of money to stock it. As the letting may be for an indefinite period, such an individual may never be really able to use the land in the way that the Land Commission intended. I suggest to the Minister, now that his mind is not over-occupied with the problems that his predecessor had to deal with, that he might devote some serious thought to the question of providing additional assistance from the Department of Agriculture, or even from the Agricultural Credit Corporation, for people who were put into possession of new farms or given an addition to existing holdings, so that they might be able to make the best use of them. It always appeared to me to be waste of public money to put people in possession of land if they could not utilise it to advantage. There has always been a blank in our land legislation in that respect. The Minister is extremely energetic, and he understands conditions in the country, and for that reason I suggest that that is a problem for his serious consideration.

With regard to migration, I understood from the Minister's statement that it has practically ceased. I was outside the Dáil for a number of years, but my recollection is that group or colony migration was first undertaken in 1935, for the dual object of relieving congestion in the Gaeltacht areas, and preserving the Irish language. I always felt very sceptical about the success of the second object. I would be curious to know from the Minister if he is satisfied that these migration schemes have been a success. I have no definite information on the subject. I heard many stories about the manner in which some migrants manage their holdings. I know perfectly well that they were assisted in every possible way by the Government, but I always felt that it was a mistake to transfer people from their original environment to some of the best land in eastern counties like Meath and Kildare.

I believe that it would be far more economical, from the point of view of the Land Commission and the State, to migrate big farmers and to give their land to smaller people who would then have a better opportunity of succeeding in life. The Government embarked on very costly schemes, involving a three-fold migration, and after eight years' experience I should like to know if the Minister is satisfied that the experiment was worth while and that the money spent was really justified. I do not know what truth there is in the report that some migrants have returned to their original homes, and abandoned the farms they got to other people. There is an opportunity during the war, on account of the high prices prevailing, for these men to do better than they did previously, but I should like to have the Minister's views as to the success or failure of these migration schemes. I am perfectly satisfied that, from the standpoint of preserving and extending the use of the Irish language, these schemes have not been a success. It was always considered to be a fatal mistake to try to extend the language by taking people away from the real home of the language, and putting them into a purely English and foreign environment, where it was inevitable that they would succumb to such an environment. I understand that they have gradually succumbed to such influences.

As far as I can recollect the Minister did not mention anything in his statement about reclamation, but at one period the Land Commission was very enthusiastic about such schemes. They undertook a big reclamation scheme in County Galway, another along the Donegal seaboard, and another in County Mayo. I wonder if these schemes are still in operation and, if so, what measure of success they achieved. It appears to me that this is an opportune time to extend schemes of reclamation of as much of the waste land in these areas as it is possible for the Land Commission to deal with. Turbary is a subject that is in the minds of the majority of the people at the present time. It is a subject, of course, that is a very frequent cause of dispute and now on account of the very high prices prevailing for turf these disputes are more numerous than they used to be pre-war. There are many cases where the Land Commission took over bogs many years ago and put them in charge of trustees. While, of course, the trustees probably exercise a certain authority over the people using these bogs during later years the people getting turf in these bogs have refused in many cases to recognise the authority of these trustees and they went out and deliberately took possession of banks of turf without any authority whatsoever. So long as the war continues and the high prices prevail for turf you can rest assured that you will have that type of vandalism, as I suppose I must call it, going on in these bogs administered by trustees. I do suggest to the Minister that with a view to ending the disputes and exercising efficient and effective control over these bogs and assuring that the best use will be made of the land, the Land Commission should take over possession completely and divide up the bogs in proper proportion among the tenants. I am interested in one particular case and I have been writing to the Land Commission about a bog that is almost completely waterlogged although it is supplying turf for 25 or 30 families. I will supply the Minister later with the details of the particular bog in which I am interested.

Erosion is going on all along the seaboard. I do not know if the Minister has given any thought to the matter, but personally I cannot see how it is possible to find a remedy because erosion is going on not alone in this country but in most European countries and even in some of the central parts of the United States. In some parts of the western seaboard of this country it has become a very serious problem. I think the Minister has had numerous applications for abatement of Land Commission annuities because of the erosion which has been going on over long years. I do not know what the attitude of the commission would be but I do suggest that in all fairness to the tenants the Minister should consider their claims sympathetically and give them some abatement, because I think that in strict equity and justice they are entitled to some abatement. I cannot see myself there is any solution for this problem of erosion unless we build a huge concrete wall all round the coast of Ireland, and I suppose that is an utter and absolute impossibility. However, erosion is getting much more serious in some parts of Ireland during recent years. I have one particular area in mind along a stretch of seaboard, and I saw it myself a few months ago and I was amazed after visiting it to discover that so much land had disappeared in two or three years. It is a serious problem, particularly for farmers who live along certain stretches of the western seaboard. I am glad to learn from the Minister that annuities are being paid up so promptly. It is an indication, I assume, that the farmers are in the happy position of being able to meet these payments promptly. I hope that happy position will continue. The Minister, I think, also mentioned that there is still a balance of 1903 and 1909 Land Act cases to be dealt with, presumably to be vested. I was under the impression before I left the Land Commission that all these cases had been dealt with. Presumably, I was under a misapprehension. One last point with regard to the old Congested Districts Board holdings. I have written about one case. I am not going to mention it now, but generally in certain western counties I have received numerous complaints about the rearrangement of holdings. I realise that the delay is due to the fact that the Land Commission is trying to acquire adjoining land for the purpose of making a scheme. I am afraid in some cases it is very hard to justify the delay because in one particular case the tenants were assured in 1926 that immediate steps would be taken to acquire an additional portion of land in order to carry out the rearrangement of their holdings. So far the land has not been acquired and these unfortunate tenants are in the same position now as they were in 1926 and the years prior to that. I do suggest to the Minister now that he has breathing space he should get rid of these rearrangement schemes and Congested Districts Board schemes and that these tenants who are waiting so long to have their grievances redressed should receive special and sympathetic consideration.

Mr. Murphy

We are, of course, in the peculiar position, in discussing this Vote and in discussing the administration of the Department, that its main and primary function is suspended, non-existent, to a very large extent. That, of course, reduces the compass of this debate to very narrow limits, because the main subject for discussion on this Vote would be a subject we cannot discuss now in view of the fact that that function has ceased. I want to add my voice to what has been said by Deputy Roddy. I think the policy of the Land Commission in this particular matter, or the policy of the Government which has become the policy of the Land Commission, to cease all activity of this kind in the matter of land division, can hardly be defended. I think there is a good case for this in view of the drive for compulsory tillage and better and more general use of the land throughout the country. I know no better way by which that drive could be helped than by proceeding with the work of dividing the land. I understood the Minister to say that the question of settling the people on the land involved the building of houses and other things and that that was impossible of attainment at the present time. I do not think that that would entirely justify what has happened. There are some rather peculiar cases that serve to illustrate the point I have in mind. In portion of my constituency of West Cork that was once part of the constituency in North Cork and was represented by the Minister, a case was brought to my notice some time ago where a man held two holdings of average size for the county. He made no effort to carry out any tillage for a period of nine years and had consistently refused the approaches made to him by his neighbours for the use of the land on conacre or for any facilities for planting potatoes or other crops of a food-producing nature. In conjunction with the farm he had a turf bank and he refused to make that available. I recognise that this is not an average type of person and that he is an exception, and that the person concerned was probably not representative of the average farmer in the county. In fact, I know positively that he was not. But up to this year no steps were taken. I presume that this man is now being dealt with in another way by the Department that concerns itself with compulsory tillage, but I could imagine very much better results in that particular district of which I have some personal knowledge if the Land Commission was put in a position to exercise its ordinary function and make sure that the local people who were willing to use the land for a considerable time would be given an opportunity of doing so. I want to be very brief and only to refer to a couple of more points—delay in the vesting of holdings. I want to discuss this matter from the angle of a number of people who are concerned in sub-tenancies. The sub-tenancies are sub-tenancies of very small holdings. I have in mind some people who live in labourers' cottages.

They have sub-tenancies of lands that are close to their cottages. The vesting proceedings that would enable them to become the owners of these lands have been delayed for a number of years. That puts those people in a big difficulty. Presumably, they are getting the benefits of the reduction in rents to which sub-tenants are entitled, the reductions, I take it, being in proportion to the reductions which the people, to whom they pay rents, receive. One, if not the only, advantage, which the present Cottage Purchase Act gives to the tenants of labourers' cottages is this: that tenants who also possess small holdings are given facilities by which the small holding and the cottage tenancy may be amalgamated. A number of those people, so far as I know, cannot avail of the terms of the cottage purchase scheme. The number is not very great, but I think it is important to have it mentioned here. The reason why they cannot do so is because the vesting proceedings in regard to the holding on which they are sub-tenants are being held up. I would ask the Minister to look into cases of that kind, and see whether, without any serious departure in the policy of the Land Commission or without any fear of certain awkward precedents, cases of that kind might not be picked out and given attention.

I should like to know from the Minister the number of people actually employed at the moment on work of one kind or another by the Land Commission, such as gangers and labourers, and what their rate of wages is. I have an idea that the rate of wages paid by the Land Commission in the past was not entirely satisfactory, although I have a recollection that the hours of labour were good, comparing favourably with those operating on public works generally. I am not making any positive complaint except to say that I have a recollection that things were not exactly satisfactory in that respect in the past.

I want to say from my own personal experience that, in a limited way, what the Minister has said about the payment of arrears of Land Commission annuities is so. I had the rather pleasant experience in the last year or two of seeing a number of people who had been in difficulties in that respect for a number of years, steadily overcome those difficulties. I want to express my thanks to the Land Commission for the facilities they have given to people of that kind in the past, facilities which enabled them to keep their homes and to be able to get an early release from all their financial difficulties. I have had 21 years' experience in approaching officials of the Land Commission in regard to the collection of annuities. I have always received from them the fullest consideration that I could possibly expect. I found that the people for whom a reasonably good case could be made always got very fair consideration. There are many people in the possession of their holdings to-day who have been able to overcome all their difficulties, judging by the comfortable circumstances in which they are at present, people who, possibly, could not have retained their holdings if it were not for the considerate policy adopted by the Land Commission towards them. That, I think, is something that ought to go on record and I gladly say that.

Mr. M. O'Reilly

I should like to assure Deputy Roddy that, so far as the migratory schemes in the County Meath are concerned, that very few, if any, of the migrants have left the county and gone back to the county from which they came originally. The scheme seems to be a success and the people concerned seem to be able to work their holdings reasonably well. They have some difficulties, of course. They consider that the holdings are too small. That is a matter that it will not be easy to get over now. I think I am correct in stating that the Minister said that there were something like 74,000 holdings that were not vested. I did not think that the number was so big. I certainly do know that there are a large number of tenants who hold their land as mere tenants from the Land Commission. I always feel that when tenants are not vested, notwithstanding what the Land Commission may say, they do not feel that they have any sort of security in their holdings. Once a normal tenant is in that position he is not inclined to risk very much capital in his holding or, in fact, to put very much of his labour into it. I think I am correct in stating that was the feeling all over Europe: in Germany, Holland, Belgium and other countries in which feudalism was destroyed at an earlier date than it was destroyed here. I should say that one of the causes of the success of farmers in those countries was the security they had in their holdings. It is a human trait. The objections that I hear from the Land Commission in regard to vesting are small objections. They are concerned with machinery, the difficulty of transport at the present time, and that inspectors have other duties, and so on. Somehow or another, I feel that the tenants are under the impression that the land is simply State-owned. Such land may, of course, have its advantages, but in a country like this State-owned land is not a thing that will satisfy the aspirations of our farmers. I would be glad if the Minister, when replying, would go into that matter in some detail.

We have a good deal of land still in the country that has not been vested. Some land, I think, under the 1903 Land Purchase Act, is not yet vested. The position is that when the nominal owners of this land, because that really is all they are, come to make wills before they die, all sorts of complications are raised as far as the Land Commission is concerned. I believe myself that a bigger effort should be made to vest that land, or at least some satisfactory reason should be given as to why it is not being vested. The Land Commission, of course, has made extraordinary progress. None of us will deny that. Some time ago I happened to be reading a book that gave some particulars about land in the County Meath up to the year 1870. The book revealed that in that year there was one landlord in the county who owned 60,000 acres. There were many others with huge holdings. Practically all of them have now disappeared. At the present time, when land is becoming extremely valuable and people are looking to it as the means of producing food, the division of it is being stopped. We are not able to go on with land division any more than we are able to vest land. I think we should try to do one thing, and that is to vest the lands that have been recently divided. We do not expect, of course, that retained holdings would be vested. It may be the policy of the Land Commission to retain these holdings for future division, but certainly, as regards the tenants for whom I have been speaking, the vesting of their lands should be proceeded with.

Deputy Roddy raised the question of credit. We have all sorts of patchwork credit systems in this country. I do not think there is any country in the world that has as many credit societies as we have. We have banks, post offices, the Land Commission and the Agricultural Credit Corporation lending money, but every day I get a letter complaining that there is no credit. That should be rectified, which could be done by allowing the tenant to sell his holding or to borrow money from the ordinary banks, for seeds, etc. There is the same objection to this co-operative banking system amongst farmers as there is against borrowing: one farmer does not want to state his position to another. When he seeks a loan from the county council, he has to get several other farmers to "back the bill", and has to expose his position. That is objectionable.

Notwithstanding all the credit bodies, I do not believe we have any legitimate credit. If these tenants were vested, there is no doubt they would pay their annuities and be able to pay them. The deficit in annuity payments is only 2 per cent, which shows that the tenants are people who meet their commitments. I understand that the banks are prepared to lend small sums to farmers whose lands are vested; but if they are not vested they will not do so. That being so, we should give the banking system a chance of proving its worth, by giving the tenants a chance to borrow money with confidence. No one would deny that there is a great dearth of money amongst farmers, in spite of what is said about there being £25,000,000 belonging to farmers in the banks here. That is a nominal amount, and there is no segregation, so we do not know who owns that money.

As far as I can see, there is a dearth of working capital. The banks are not averse to advancing money, provided the farmers can give legitimate security. The new farmers, especially the man who has started without much machinery and with very little capital, are in the greatest difficulty and need that money most. I recommended one farmer to the Agricultural Credit Corporation, but that body being fairly well tied up in a steel jacket, will lend only to the fellow who can get money from the bank more easily and with less publicity. We should try to vest as many tenants as possible and, even if one tenant sells land to another, there should not be any great objection. It may mean getting a better tenant; or a tenant may sell because of ill-health or because a particular district does not suit him; and, therefore, by vesting and allowing free sale, people would eventually find themselves in more natural surroundings. I do not see any great danger in doing that. I plead ignorance to the exact reason for its not being done, and hope the Minister will tell the House the exact reason. The farming community wish to have the land completely within their own power and possession. That would help progress and cause a greater flow of capital to the land. There is great necessity to do that for this most important of our industries.

Mr. Hughes

In the stress and strain of war and when blockades have operated against essential food supplies for most countries, the dominant consideration has been the expansion of food production in each individual country. In doing that, the respective Governments have paid far more attention than we have to the equipment and the education of agriculturists. In Great Britain, for instance, farmers have been graded into three classes: A, B and C, and the man who does not reach grade C is dispossessed. Under the peculiar system of tenure there, it is quite easy to dispossess a man. That system is definitely making for far more efficiency.

If we believe it is absolutely essential to export substantial surpluses in the post-war period, we must realise that we will have to face that efficiency then. We will have to compete against the British farmer in his own market and operate under certain handicaps and difficulties which he has not to experience. Even at the present time, the British farmers appreciate that the competition from outside sources in the post-war period will be something they must seriously consider now.

Much has been written on this whole matter. Sir Daniel Hall, late Director of Rothamsted, has written a very interesting book on Reconstruction and the Land. When Great Britain, Denmark and other countries have concerned themselves with this problem, surely it is time for us to do so, in order to develop a better type of agriculture and improve the disposition of land generally, in regard to how it is held, the type of people who hold it and the qualifications of those who own and use it. We have not attempted to develop a proper land policy per se.

I suggest that the activities of the Minister's Department are merely nominal and I am not inclined to agree that circumstances have forced that situation. I question the wisdom of dropping land division and the settlement of the problems arising out of congestion. New vested interests will have been created in the interregnum between the dropping of activity and its restarting, whenever that is likely to take place. There must be respect for those vested interests and that will give rise to further problems.

Deputy Roddy referred to the amount of speculation in land. It is extraordinary that we have not yet taken control of that. Such speculation is undesirable from the national point of view, if we believe implicitly in all the things we say and profess regarding the value of our agriculture. We seem to have ignored that speculation and the type of people who are now using the land. Big business people with substantial capital, feeling that sterling was very shaky, went down the country a couple of years ago from the City of Dublin and bought farms, in order to secure something of material value. Some individuals bought a number of farms but those individuals had no roots and no long-term interest in the land. Farmers who have reared their families on the land and who still have two or three sons remaining, whose love for the land is real and who obviously respect the fertility of the soil, are ideally suited to use the land in the national interest. Such men, however, possibly with an eye to enabling the eldest son to get married and settle down on the farm, now find themselves in competition against big business magnates from the city, who are interested merely from a speculative point of view in securing themselves against the threatened fall of sterling and who are prepared to pay any money in order to secure something of material value. The farmer there was beaten from the word "go"; he could not compete because he had not the capital resources like the other fellow and he was knocked out.

One of the reasons why the Scottish farmer is such a success is that the whole system of tenure in Scotland makes for successful agriculture. It is a type of system which weeds out the inept farmer and encourages the best. Operating a system like that over a long period has secured for Scotland some of the finest farmers. I am not advocating that system, because it is a landlord system. Great Britain has the same. At the same time, that type of system has this advantage, there is no capital involved in the first instance. Very often a man taking over a holding of land in this country is mulcted for a big capital outlay and that is a millstone around his neck for the rest of his life. That is one of the disadvantages, but there are advantages, too. In Scotland if a man shows that he is an active, efficient farmer, at the end of seven years his lease is renewed, and he gets probably double the amount of land that he got in the first instance. If he does not show that he is a successful farmer, he simply retains the original holding. If he shows that he is a bad farmer, he probably will not secure a renewal of his lease.

Just as in our own case, there is a system of peasant proprietorship on the Continent. Take Denmark, for instance. Denmark has certainly taken precautions to ensure that no one is in possession of land unless he is fully equipped educationally, technically, and in every other way, and unless he is a man who has a real taste for working on the land. In that way Denmark has almost led the world in her agriculture. She advanced from a very low state after the Napoleonic wars to her present high position.

When Bishop Grunfeld started the folk high school in Denmark he inculcated in the people a love for the land and a high standard of honour so far as liabilities are concerned. He encouraged a love for their country among the people and corrected whatever deficiencies there were as a result of their primary education. The young people do not attend the folk high school until they are 18 years. There is a gap between the period when they leave the primary schools and enter the folk high schools. There they get a practical outlook on life. They attend a sort of university. There is no examination; there is free entry and nothing is compulsory. Compare that type of education with ours.

Deputy O'Reilly referred to the provision of credit and the use of land as collateral security. There is no collateral security required in Denmark, because a man's word is his bond and the honour of the Danish farmer is so high that he is given whatever credit he needs. The amount of credit given in Denmark, we were informed recently through a very able paper read by Professor Beddy, is something like £25 an acre. Indebtedness is far higher there than here, and yet there is no difficulty in collecting debts, because a man's honour is so high that his anxiety all the time is to be in a position to meet his liabilities.

This land question ought to be examined by some sort of commission. It may be asked whether it is wise to allow that sort of thing. I know it is revolutionary to talk like that, but we all realise that around every town in rural Ireland there are individuals, big businessmen who are inclined to grab the best farms. Nationally it is not wise to permit that because the utilisation of land is undergoing a complete change. The war has changed the whole outlook in this connection. When a man has a good way of living otherwise, he should not be permitted to enter into the occupation of large tracts of land. This land question will have to be very carefully examined.

Another point arises as to whether 20 acres could be regarded as an economic unit. We have been pursuing that matter for years. Now that there is a breathing space, a pause in our efforts so far as the land problem is concerned, I think it would be advisable to have the matter examined in a constructive way. We should set up a commission which would take suitable evidence and see if we are pursuing a wise policy in regard to land utilisation. As regards the 20-acre unit, the people in Western Ireland have a different outlook from those who live in the eastern counties. Some impartial body should determine who is right and who is wrong.

In this national Assembly we ought to have a common land policy. There ought not to be political issues involved. There is an inclination among economists and agricultural experts towards a bigger unit, a feeling that in the post-war years there will be little room for the smaller farmers, that competition will be keen and that modern equipment will be essential. Apart from the tremendous material destruction attending the war, there is always arising out of wars an accumulation of new ideas, new means of production, new technique. This war has had precisely that effect in other countries. I do not know if it has affected us to the same extent. That is what I am worried about and what is agitating my mind is that if we do not wake up now we may not be able to meet the rivalry of outside countries in the post-war period. Our duty now is to prepare and equip our people for the competition after the war.

I am one of those who believe that in the post-war world, with the development of machinery, with power on the farm, the bigger unit that will be more economic from the power point of view will be the better unit from the national point of view. But in our circumstances, taking into consideration the amount of land available and the number of families living on small holdings, something will have to be done towards helping the people in a far more definite way. I have suggested that we ought to help the small farmers by getting them to co-operate to a far greater extent. There has been a certain amount of voluntary co-operation where land settlement has taken place under migratory schemes. But, as that is voluntary, very often it breaks down because there is no proper control. Where a number of individuals enter into an arrangement to share machinery it will inevitably raise trouble as to who will get priority and all that sort of thing. If we had a system in operation set up by the State, under which a committee would be elected which would control the operation and maintenance of machinery, I think that difficulty would be got over.

I suggested to the Minister's predecessor on more than one occasion that, for experimental purposes, he should avail of the estate unit, once it is divided. If you divide an estate of 400 or 500 acres and settle a number of families there you should try co-operation on the unit as a whole in the provision of modern machinery, tractor equipment, etc., and set up an elected control committee. I suggest that the tenants should get an opportunity every year or every two or three years to elect their committee of control and that that committee of control should direct the operations and the maintenance of the machinery. In that way the individuals would get the service of the machinery at exactly cost price, no more and no less. Credit facilities, of course, would have to be provided for the purchase of the machinery. I suggest to the Minister, if he is interested in this problem of making a real success of the division and resettlement of land, that where people are settled on the land in small units, which some of us are inclined to question the economy of, the only way he can hope to make it an economic matter is by an intensive system of co-operation. I believe that is possible, but I also believe that it is impossible to do it on a voluntary basis.

Again, I might say on this whole matter of the disposal and the occupation of land and the type of people who ought to occupy it, that obviously it is people who have roots in the soil who will make a success of the land. I think it is unfortunate that there is no association between the Department of Lands and the Department of Agriculture in this matter. As a matter of fact, I think the Department of Agriculture should control this matter absolutely, because there is a very definite relation between them and this whole problem of stepping up fertility and production generally and the type of people who use the land. The Land Commission have shown that they have no interest in the preservation of fertility, because they have grossly abused a great deal of land which has been on their hands for some years. That land has been set for cereal crops year after year after year. If you want to destroy the fertility of land, that is the one way in which you can destroy it. The Land Commission are setting a shocking example to the community generally by pursuing a system that is not a system of husbandry at all. It is a system of erosion, of undermining the surface of the land without regard to the future.

There are other anomalies in the whole of the Land Acts code, not only on the legal side but on the financial side as well. So far as redemption and the cost of redemption is concerned, it seems to me an extraordinary anomaly that where land is acquired by a public authority, or where a tenant is desirous of redeeming whatever amount of the loan is outstanding, that is calculated on the price of bonds which are purely fictitious, because these bonds have been discharged under the 1938 agreement. There is an appreciation in the cost of redemption, probably from the 17 to 20 years' purchase, because there is a pro rata increase in the value of the bonds at present. As the bonds have already been discharged, it beats me why it should be on that basis. There is a sum to be voted to make good the land bond fund. I suppose it is a matter of accountancy and book-keeping. I should like the Minister to give the House some information on that matter, because I thought that these bonds had already disappeared.

Mr. Norton

There are two matters I want to raise on this Estimate. One is the policy of the Land Commission in respect to migrating people from northern, western and southern areas to eastern areas. I have some experience of the Land Commission's policy of migration so far as Kildare is concerned. Whatever may be the good intentions of the Land Commission from the standpoint of endeavouring to migrate people from areas where there are uneconomic holdings and very little soil, the operation of this scheme so far as persons in Kildare are concerned works out very inequitably. The Land Commission have migrated persons from the west and south to lands in Kildare which were acquired by the Land Commission for division. The local people, who live in the vicinity of these estates, have long been looking forward to the acquisition and division of the lands as their hope of securing land for their own maintenance and the maintenance of their families only to find that, when the Land Commission acquired these estates, it has in many instances handed over the lands to migrants from other areas. I can sympathise with the Land Commission's general policy of endeavouring to migrate people, but I do not think that that policy ought to be pushed to the extent of inflicting hardship on people living convenient to the divided estates.

I have an example of one case at present in Kildare. This particular estate is probably the only one for a couple of miles around that is likely to be divided. The local people expected that they would be considered for holdings on the estate. The Land Commission has decided to put migrants on the estate and the local people, therefore, who have been looking forward to getting holdings on the estate find that their needs will not be satisfied. Even if any further land is divided in the area, they live so far away from the land which may be divided in future that there is little likelihood of their being considered in connection with the division of such land. One can understand transferring migrants from western and southern areas to eastern areas if there is land available in eastern areas. But it seems to me to be a very serious hardship on local people, who have worked on estates, who have been reared in the vicinity of estates, who have been expecting that the division of the estates would provide them with the land they were anxious to obtain, that they should see the estates divided up amongst people who have no association with the place, who have no roots in the place, and, as a result, a number of local people forced to leave the place because of their inability to secure land which is the best anchorage one can have in a particular place.

I suggest to the Minister that in this matter the local people are entitled to consideration, to fair and sympathetic consideration, and that he is not in any way solving the problem of migration by transferring these people from western and southern areas into eastern areas where the effect of their transfer is to cause considerable local agitation in those areas. If there should be land available in eastern areas which is not required for local persons, one could quite understand and sympathise with the idea of migrating people to such land. But I, for one, strongly protest against local people's claims being passed over when the effect of passing over their claims is that they are not likely ever to secure land, unless they are in a position to buy it in the open market, which is an impossible proposition so far as the generality of agricultural workers are concerned. I want again to plead that the claims of local people should receive sympathetic considera tion, and that the Land Commission ought to recognise the natural and understandable desire of locals to be considered for holdings on estates which are being divided in the areas in which they live.

The second matter with which I want to deal is the policy of the Land Commission in respect of lands which it already holds. I have been endeavouring to get the Land Commission to divide lands which it has on hands for a long time, but for some reason or other the Land Commission seems to be unwilling to divide lands. I know that in some areas the Land Commission has been letting lands year after year for the growing of cereals, and, as a matter of fact, some of these lands have been quarried because of the manner in which the Land Commission have been letting them for a number of years. I know of no insuperable difficulty in dividing lands which the Land Commission has on hands. The Minister may say that he has no staff, that he has relayed his staff on to the Department of Agriculture; but I do not think the problem requires such a large staff, or that the difficulty is wholly a staff difficulty. For some reason the Land Commission apparently prefers to hold the lands it has. Very little action of a tangible kind is being taken to divide the lands which they have, and I should like the Minister to say what is the policy of the Land Commission in respect of lands which it holds.

It seems to me that there should be no difficulty in dividing these lands. There certainly should be no difficulty in dividing the lands they have on hands for years. There is a substantial area of land in County Kildare in the hands of the Land Commission. There is a keen local demand for these lands, but instead of the local people getting the lettings of these lands pretty well-to-do people can manage to come in and get the lettings, and the local people who might be considered for holdings if the lands were divided are being shut out from the prospect of getting that land on conacre from the Land Commission because of the claims of better-off people and their ability to get the lettings. I raised this matter on this Estimate last year, and I then understood that the Minister proposed to take steps to accelerate the division of lands which the Land Commission had on hands. I do not know what steps the Minister has taken in the meantime, but, whatever they are, they have not manifested themselves to any extent in County Kildare. I should like the Minister to have the matter further examined, with a view to accelerating the allocation of lands which the Land Commission have on hands for quite a substantial period.

Mr. Beegan

I agree with Deputy Norton and Deputy Hughes that the land in the hands of the Land Commission for a number of years should be divided as soon as possible. I understand that there is a difficulty in that the staff has been taken away, but the fact nevertheless remains that, in the constituency from which I come, there is more undivided land in the hands of the Land Commission than at any previous period. The Land Commission has to conform to the tillage regulations. Three-eighths of the arable land have to be cultivated this year and the appropriate quota had to be cultivated in previous years, with the result that for the past three or four years the same land has been growing cereal crops and is being run out. That is the chief reason why the Land Commission should try to dispose of the lands it has on hands.

So far as the acquisition of land is concerned, there is no use in our making any representations at present, although I believe it is the greatest worry which Deputies from the West of Ireland of every Party have. Continued representations are being made to them to bring pressure on the Minister and his Department to have estates acquired, due to the fact that there is acute congestion, which is even more acute at present because our imports have been almost cut out, and, where there is congestion of that kind and large families, it is a terrible hardship and strain on the people to have to go several miles to a conacre field and pay prices from £4 to £14 per acre for land on which to grow a crop to provide for themselves and their families. That has accentuated the desire of the people to force on the notice of the Land Commission the necessity of acquiring land. We, of course, understand, but it is very hard to explain to the people why the Land Commission has decided on a different policy.

Deputy Hughes spoke of the post-war policy of the Land Commission and what it should be. I do not propose to follow the arguments he put up, but there are, all over the country, farmers with very large tracts of land. A number of these are undoubtedly a decided asset to the State in the present emergency. They are working and tilling their land in the correct way and keeping it up to a proper state of fertility; but there are a number of other farmers with as much land, and, in some instances, more, who are not capable of tilling their lands, and who are setting it, and in some cases it is now of very little use to them. They hand it over to the auctioneer, who does his best to get as good a price as he can, but, owing to the fact that it has been in conacre tillage for a number of years and that there is no desire on the part of the people getting the conacre to bring manure into the land and grow a green crop there in one of the three years, that land is also deteriorating.

I hold that people who are not capable, at an important time like this, of working the land they hold should be marked out by the Land Commission as the first people from whom lands will be acquired in the post-war period. There is no reason why they should be left an almost unlimited area of land which they are not capable of working, which they are not working properly and which is not being worked properly even now, despite the fact that it is let in conacre because they do not seem to be in a position to fence off portions of it, and consequently they have to continue letting the same land year in and year out.

There is a good deal of talk about turf production, and we are all very anxious to see turf production speeded up. The Land Commission in my county have bogs in hands for a number of years which they have not divided amongst the people. I cannot understand why these bogs have not been divided. I am sure the Land Commission will put up the argument that it thought it had more important work to do in dividing out the land, but it gave holdings to people years ago and promised, turbary for the holdings. These people have not yet got the turbary promised to them and the turbary is locked up and is not in production. If turf production is so important as we believe it to be, that is one of the first problems, in the West of Ireland, anyhow, which the Land Commission should tackle. In addition, the Land Commission have a staff of gangers and supervising gangers, who, I believe, know much more about turf production than any other staff of men, whether county council gangers or others. A number of these have been laid off work owing to the restricted operations of the Land Commission. I do not see why the supervisors and gangers of the Land Commission, who are mainly farmers' sons with practical experience of turf production, should not be organised and sent out in charge of gangs to produce turf on the bogs held by the Land Commission. I believe they would produce turf of a quality far superior to anything that has been produced by any other body, because of their practical experience.

Finally, there is one other matter, a local matter, to which I wish to direct the Minister's attention. The Irish Land Commission inspected about 1,100 acres on the Ashtown Estate at Woodlawn, County Galway, a few years ago, the record No. of which is S. 9,443. They decided after inspecting the land, that, roughly, 142 acres of that land were suitable for Land Commission purposes. The remainder, I understand, has been handed over to the Forestry Branch for afforestation purposes. Now, I am not by any means averse from afforestation, but I am told by the people in the vicinity that there are 40 statute acres of the land on which the Forestry Division propose to plant trees, which have been growing crops for the past three years. That land immediately adjoins the lands that are in the hands of the Land Commission. It has given a return, so far as wheat is concerned, to the extent of eight barrels per statute acre, for the past three years, which is not a bad return at all, and I believe that it has given an abnormally high yield for barley. Now, if that is so, I cannot understand the Land Commission handing over land of that kind to the Forestry Division. There are also, on the other part of the land in the hands of the Forestry Division, at least 200 acres which, I am informed by reputable people, is also arable land; and they hold, and I hold with them, if that is true, that it would be put to a much better purpose by dividing it up amongst people concerned and using it for the growing of food crops rather than planting it with trees which, after all, will not give a return for the next 50 years.

I wish to say, in passing, that I have been in communication with the Minister and his Department, and also with his predecessor, for the last three years on this matter, but I have always got the reply that the Land Commission did not consider the land suitable for their purposes. Deputy Donnellan, a few weeks ago, put down a question dealing with the matter, pointing out that it had been reported to him that certain portions of that land had been producing crops for the past three years, but the Minister's reply was that he was not aware of that. Since then I checked up, and was told what I have already stated about the part of it that did produce crops for the past three years.

Of course, rumours are flying about fairly freely, and very often they are not reliable, but there is one rumour going through that particular district of Woodlawn, and that is that when the Land Commission was taking over this land, Lady Ashtown and her son, Mr. Trench, made an arrangement with the Irish Land Commission whereby an assurance was given that a certain part of the land would not be divided, as they did not want houses to be erected within view of their mansion. Of course, I am not at all asserting that that is true, but I should like the Minister to be in the position to state definitely that no agreement of that kind was entered into, because I do hold that, after all, the ordinary tenants have just as good a right to have their homesteads and holdings laid out in a suitable place as the owners have. They have as good a right, and perhaps a much better right, to decide where they should be placed after the land has been handed over. That is all I have to say, Sir, except to express the wish that the Minister will investigate the cases I have mentioned.

Mr. F. Lynch

I was very much interested, I must say, in the speech made by Deputy O'Reilly, and I endorse everything he has said. I was glad also to note that, in connection with the matter he raised, the reinvestment of holdings of the Land Commission, the Minister devoted a good part of his opening statement this year to that question. We are inclined to lose sight of the fact that the primary purpose for which the Land Commission was set up, and the primary purpose of all our Land Acts, was to make the tenant farmers of Ireland the fee simple owners of their lands. Now, so long as we fail to achieve that purpose, or in so far as we fail to achieve it, we are not carrying out the objects of the Land Acts or the objects for which the Land Commission was set up.

The Minister has told us, and, indeed, the last Land Commission Report shows, that since the passing of the Land Act of 1923 the total of the tenanted land that is vested in the Land Commission under the Land Acts up to the 31st March, 1943, comprises 105,288 holdings, and we are also told in the report that out of that number of 105,288 holdings only 29,917 holdings have been revested in the tenant purchasers up to the 31st March, 1943. Now, that means that after 21 years only about a quarter of the number of holdings that have been taken up and vested in the Land Commission have been revested in the tenant purchasers, with all the consequences to the tenants that Deputy O'Reilly has pointed out, such as difficulties in obtaining credit, and so on, and, in the case of the allottees, the much more serious difficulty that they have not the right of free sale. The right of free sale remains, I think, in the case of most of the tenant owners of land: that is, the tenant who was an ordinary tenant prior to the passing of the compulsory clauses of the Act of 1923. Such a tenant retains the right of free sale, even without the sanction of the Land Commission, so long as he is selling the whole of his land and not subdividing it. The case of the allottees, however, is different, and going back ten, 15 and almost 20 years, a number of these persons who have been given portions of land without having the land vested in them, still find that they cannot sell their land without the sanction of the Land Commission, which is very difficult to get, even in some extraordinary cases.

Now, I do not blame the Land Commission at all for adopting the attitude that it would not lightly allow a man, who was given an allotment of land only a few years ago, to turn that gift of land into cash. I think it is perfectly right that the man should have the land for a certain number of years, but I think it is unreasonable to keep a man waiting for, say, anything over ten years before giving him his full rights as fee-simple owner of the land. I have one particular case in mind which I came across professionally—it is not a case in my constituency at all—of a man who got land about nine years ago—ten years ago, I think. That man was a very hard-working farmer who used his land to very great advantage and made a bit of money out of it. He had some capital in addition to what he made out of the land. On the farm which he was allotted there was no dwelling-house and none was built for him because he was living in a house adjacent, which belonged to his father. The father died intestate, but now that man wants to get married and he wants a house of his own because his sisters and another brother are residing in the old family house. In order that he might be in a position to get married he bought a farm about four or five miles away on which there was a dwelling-house, paying something like £1,300 for it, and, of course, he was counting on the sale of the holding which he had to meet portion of the purchase price. Sanction to that has been held up for at least three months. I think that is a case where sanction should be given without delay, because it is not a question of a man turning a grant of land into cash. It is a question of a man who was given land improving himself in his landed position, as it were, getting a better holding and a more suitable holding to enable him to bring up a family. It is an entirely different position from that of the man who gets land this year and, in a few years' time, says he will go off to some other form of undertaking, invests in a public house, for instance, and sells the land and turns the grant of land into a public house. I would have no sympathy with that kind of person but, certainly, where you have genuine sale by a man who sells for the purpose of putting up part of the purchase money for another farm, I think that is a case which automatically should be sanctioned. I think sanction ought to be granted every time in such cases.

The question of vesting arises on this whole matter. There seems to me to be no real excuse for the prolonged and inordinate delays that have occurred in revesting holdings in the tenants. The popular cry in our constituencies is "Insist on more acquisition and more division," but now that acquisition and division are set aside for the moment it would pay us well to concentrate for a period and devote whatever staff is left in the Land Commission to that very essential matter of having the holdings that have been acquired by the Land Commission revested in the tenants. Indeed, even at any time I think Deputies might concern themselves with that question. It is every bit as important as going on with more acquisition and more division. The other thing seems to be more important. It meets the outcry in a man's particular constituency to put down questions, and so on, but in fact I think it is more important that the work of revesting should be undertaken now more promptly rather than that further acquisition and division of land should be continued. When the Land Commission does get back its staff, I think it would be no harm if it were to forget further acquisition and division for a while and concentrate on getting rid of the abnormal amount of holdings vested in the Land Commission and get them vested in the tenants.

The number of migrants' holdings that the Minister mentioned as being still in the hands of the Land Commission is, I think, far too high. I think the Minister said that something like 800 holdings of migrants from the western counties are in the hands of the Land Commission and are being let out in conacre or some way for grazing for quite a number of years. Perhaps I took him up wrongly. It seems to me to be abnormal. It seems to me to be an amazing position that in congested areas the Land Commission should retain those lands for a number of years without doing something about them. There seems to me to be no excuse for that. Here you have areas where there is an absolute outcry for rendering uneconomic holdings economic. The means are there; the land is there in the hands of the Land Commission; and it is doing nothing about it. I think that is a matter of primary importance.

The Minister should concentrate in getting something done about the allocation of these migrants' holdings in these congested areas, that he should concentrate as soon as possible, when staff becomes available, on seeing that all these holdings vested in the Land Commission are vested in the tenants.

An Ceann Comhairle

Deputy Cogan.

Mr. Cogan

I will give way to the other Deputy who has risen.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy may not do so. He may give way, but the Chair selects the next speaker.

Mr. Cogan

On the last two occasions when this Estimate was before the House I suggested that advantage should be taken by the Minister and by the Government of the lull in the distribution of land to consider the whole policy of land settlement over the past 20 years. There is no doubt whatever that our whole agricultural economy depends to a large extent upon our system of land tenure. I do not agree with Deputy Hughes' suggestion that farmers should be graded, so to speak, like pigs at a bacon factory into grade A, grade B and grade C, but I do hold that agricultural policy and land policy demand that the State should exercise rights over land tenure. In this House, I have been persistently advocating fixity of tenure for farmers and it might be taken by some people as a suggestion that the State should have no right whatsoever to acquire land for the relief of congestion or any other essential purpose. I do not hold any such view, but I do hold that the farmer who works his land not only himself and his family but to the best advantage of the community, should be secure in the possession of his holding. Under existing legislation he has no such security and that is the view which I have frequently expressed. At the present time, when land division is not in active operation, it should be the duty of the State to see how far land division has been successful in the past, to see how far it has contributed to a better agricultural system in this country. Various views are expressed in regard to the size of an agricultural holding. There is the view that no holding should exceed 30, 40 or 50 acres. There is another view that no holding should be less than 30, 40 or 50 acres. I think practical experience in other countries has shown that a wide variety of holdings is desirable. In Denmark, for example, the size of holdings corresponds to a great extent to the size of holdings in this country and I do not think that anyone could say that agriculture in Denmark has not been highly efficient. I am not of the opinion that ruthless sub-division of land into small holdings will make for greater efficiency. Neither am I of the opinion that the abolition of small holdings and their consolidation into large units will increase efficiency. There is room for the small farmer and there is room for the big farmer and I can testify that we have efficient farmers in each category.

I have practical knowledge and experience of one particular holding of over 1,000 acres, upon which there are practically 100 men employed, and on that holding the standard of output is higher than on many of the small holdings adjoining. In addition to that, the standard of remuneration of those 100 employees is higher than it would probably be if the estate were divided amongst them.

I think that, in considering land policy generally, the policy of the Department of Agriculture cuts very much into the operations of the Land Commission. I was reading an Irish legend recently which might have some bearing on this question. It may have been in the realms of mythology but, strangely enough, it dealt with a certain individual who was known as "The Long Lad". One of his feats was to take two decrepit ladies, heat them on a blacksmith's fire and weld them into one beautiful young woman. I am not going to alarm the Chamber by suggesting that the Taoiseach might attempt a similar operation with the Minister for Lands and the Minister for Agriculture and make one good Minister out of two bad Ministers, but I do suggest that he might well consider such a step in regard to these two Departments because, as Deputy Roddy and Deputy Hughes pointed out, the operations and the activities of the two Departments are closely inter-allied and as time goes on they will tend to become even more closely allied. One of the functions of either the Department of Lands or the Department of Agriculture, or of a new Department in which both these Departments will have been merged, will be to see that land is efficiently worked whether the holdings are large or small. To suggest, as some people suggest, that there is something evil or undesirable about small holdings, on the one hand, or large holdings on the other, is altogether wrong and undesirable, and it is not a tendency which should be encouraged in future.

In regard to lands which have been divided by the Land Commission, one aspect often strikes me, and that is in regard to the justice of the present system of land division. Recently my attention was drawn to an estate which had been divided mainly amongst uneconomic holders in a certain district. Two particular uneconomic holders were applicants for allotments on that estate. One of them, by his industry and thrift during the past 20 years, was able to purchase a small piece of land at a fairly high price in the open market. By consolidating that with his former holding, he brought his valuation to the limit beyond which it was not possible, under existing regulations, for the Land Commission to give him an additional holding. The other small holder, although he was also an industrious and useful citizen, had not acquired additional land. The result was that the man who had not acquired an additional parcel of land in the open market was entitled to, and received, a substantial allotment, whereas the man who had invested all his life savings in acquiring additional land was debarred from benefiting from the distribution by the Land Commission. I want to know is that system going to continue and if so, what steps the Land Commission will in future take to avoid inflicting injustice, as injustice there certainly is in a system of that kind.

The same injustice operates in the case of landless men. There are, for example, two small farmers. One of them succeeds, as a result of thrift over a number of years, in purchasing a holding, say, for his second son, whereas the other does not bother to make any provision of that kind. Then it is held that the son of the man who has purchased the additional holding is not entitled to land whereas the son of the other man is. Injustice seems to be inherent in that system, and the question naturally arises whether the present system of land division is fair and just. I think that question will have to be considered right now before land division on a large scale is resumed. My own personal view is that any person who receives land through the Land Commission or otherwise should receive it on payment, over a time or otherwise, of the same amount as he would pay in the open market. The function of the Land Commission should be to facilitate desirable and suitable persons in acquiring such land and their function should end there.

There is one other matter with which I should like to deal. The Minister referred to the great improvement in the collection of arrears of land annuities outstanding. It is hoped that in the course of another year or two all outstanding arrears will be wiped out, and that the Land Commission can then start with a clean slate. In this connection, I should like to express the hope that never again will any political Party in this country bring the question of the payment of land annuities into the arena of political strife as the Fianna Fáil Party did in 1928 and 1929. They set an example then which was followed by other Parties. I hope now that the question of the payment of land annuities will be removed entirely from the political arena. The point I want to make is that if conditions in agriculture should become difficult in future, the Land Commission should not be required again to act as a credit institution in regard to agriculture. That is a function which the Land Commission was never fitted to perform. If special credit facilities are required by farmers they should be provided from some other source than through the Land Commission. What I mean is, that if farmers in a certain year, whether in the near or distant future, find it difficult to meet payments to the Land Commission, some other credit institution should be provided from which farmers can obtain money to pay the Land Commission and that the Land Commission should have no function in deciding whether a person is able to pay or not. In that way, the Land Commission will be relieved of a very difficult task, and a task they were never fitted to perform.

There is another small matter in relation to land division to which I want to refer. That is the method of fencing land which has been sub-divided and allotted to tenants. Very good sod-bank fences have been erected by the Land Commission. In many cases, they have been efficiently erected. My experience in my own constituency is that the work has been fairly well done. But no quicks or plants are being planted upon those ditches, and the result is that those sod fences erected a few years ago are crumbling away. That is, perhaps, more noticeable in County Kildare than elsewhere. One still sees the old fences covered with good, whitethorn hedges, whereas the new fences erected by the Land Commission are absolutely bare, and are crumbling away. There may be some administrative difficulty in the matter, or there may be difficulty in obtaining quicks, and this may have debarred the Land Commission from taking the necessary precaution of providing hedges on its fences. The absence of such plantations has resulted in the waste of an enormous amount of public money, because these fences will last only a few years.

Another matter brought to my notice is, I think, quite common in connection with the allotment of new holdings. In one case, the number of out-offices was slightly in excess of what the Land Commission thought necessary for the tenant and they proceeded, at very considerable expense, to pull down very good out-offices. The pulling down of useful out-offices on an agricultural holding was a hopelessly undesirable activity for a Government Department. It is very hard accurately to estimate the number of out-offices required on an agricultural holding. On the average holding, we have not half enough houses for live stock, implements and all the things which require out-office accommodation. In Denmark and other countries which have been mentioned, the number of out-buildings on farms is three times the average number here. It is ridiculous for a Government Department to send out men to pull down existing out-offices.

Mr. Keyes

The previous speaker and others have stressed a very laudable point—that persons utilising their land properly should not be interfered with in connection with the division of land. But there is no good point which may not be unduly stressed and I feel that the weight of this appeal from Deputies on this Estimate and on previous Estimates must have permeated the minds of the Land Commission to such an extent that it resulted in evoking a standstill Order in connection with land division and consequent paralysis of this activity. If Deputies argue that a man who utilises his land well is, notwithstanding the size of his farm, not to be interfered with, I wonder where the land is to come from for people who have no land and who are potentially useful land-holders. Are they to be denied any possibility of getting a portion of land because existing holders, irrespective of the size of their farms, are working the land to the best possible advantage?

We have had previous discussion on this matter and Deputy Cogan adverted to it just now. He said that nobody should argue against the utilisation of any particular type of holding, large or small. I am arguing for the provision of holdings of a suitable character for suitable tenants who are at present denied the right to get a piece of land. There are considerable numbers of them in the country. Considerable numbers of them have left the country because of the failure to provide them with an opportunity to get into farming. They include farmers' sons and good agricultural labourers. The paralysis of land division is attributable to a considerable extent to the economic crisis through which we are passing, but I want to repeat the argument of several other speakers, that land already taken over by the Land Commission, land that has, so to speak, been caught in the Land Commission machine for several years, should be divided. I do not think that anybody would argue that there should be a standstill in respect of land caught in the Land Commission machine. We got an assurance from the predecessor of the present Minister that, while not inclined to expand land division in the present emergency, they would go on with the division of land which they had acquired or were in process of acquiring. In the county I represent, there are several holdings which were in process of acquisition four or five years ago and which are in the same position now. I think that, the emergency notwithstanding, there is a duty devolving on the Land Commission and on this House to let the people know that we have not fully abandoned land division, that it is to be the eventual policy, and the best way to do that is to proceed to divide the lands already in possession of the Land Commission.

Another point with which I want to deal, not for the first time, was adverted to. I hope that when the Land Commission get into their stride they will attend to it. I refer to the regulation of the distance within which uneconomic holders and landless men must live from an estate in order to obtain land on that estate when it is under division. The distance was reduced from a radius of two miles and one mile to one mile and half a mile for uneconomic holders and landless men, respectively. If there was any sensible view behind that change, the aim should have been to make the land more available for economic working. If there are several landless men, otherwise suitable, living five-eighths of a mile from an estate which is being divided, they are not eligible to receive a holding on that estate. I have cases in which men were definitely ruled out from participation in the allocation of an estate because they were five-eighths of a mile from the estate. The next estate being divided there, will, probably, be in the next county, and, when that is dealt with, there is no chance during their lifetime of another estate being divided in their proximity. If a man be a suitable tenant for the land, it is nonsensical, because he does not come within the magic circle of half a mile, to rule him out, considering that it is the last chance he will ever have of getting a portion of land. Similarly, in the case of uneconomic holders, they must reside within an area of one mile. Formerly, it was two miles. I wonder what happened the uneconomic holder that he could not make the two miles which the Land Commission thought him capable of formerly. I think that the distances of two miles and one mile were very conservative, and I ask the Minister to look into that point so as to see if he could not allow men who come within the former ambit to participate in land division, bearing in mind that I have umpteen cases to prove that because men lived five-eighths of a mile from the place of allocation they have been ruled out.

Whatever allegation may be made against the Land Commission of being slow in their methods, I always believed that they were very quick to recover anything belonging to them. I have, however, to complain that they have been dilatory in taking possession of something that is their own. An estate in County Limerick—the Danaher estate—has been the subject of litigation over a number of years. The owner won the first round and the Land Commission the second round. Having proceeded to get possession of that estate, the Land Commission gave the owner 12 months to get rid of the stock. At the end of 12 months, they gave him a further period of 12 months. Pressure was brought to bear in this House by some Deputies— pressure may have been brought to bear in another direction by other Deputies—and the land was vested in the Land Commission on 6th January. This gentleman still declines to be disturbed. The court messengers ordered to take possession must be moving on crutches. If I owed a debt I would have the sheriff's officers at my door within 24 hours. They have not reached that place yet. A considerable number of men are hungry for the division of that estate. A scheme was prepared in 1936 but the owner has been able to evade the Land Commission ever since. Although the Land Commission got possession over a year ago they might speed up the matter now because this man continues to defy them. There is turbary on the land which was made available to his friends by this gentleman. I am not sure but he is making it available this year. The turbary would be useful to the people in the locality at present. If a new scheme is necessary for the division of the land it would be useful if the people could get turf there this season. I ask the Minister to make a note of the case to see if anything could be done about this case.

Captain Giles

I come from a county that is very much affected by land division and that has many grievances in that respect. The people feel that they got a raw deal over land division. For a number of years there has been land division in the county, but in my opinion there was a great deal of slackness in the selection of applicants, with the result that the Land Commission is now pestered, trying to get money out of tenants who are not even living in the houses they got. I hold that the Land Commission was at fault when political pressure was tried, because a large number of those selected for land should not have got it. Many of them never had a penny and are living on home help. That type of person is not suitable for the land, and that is why I blame the Land Commission for not giving more consideration to the rights of local applicants. In my opinion, the migration schemes were a dismal failure. A few of the people who came with the first colony are a credit to themselves, but many of the others have not the slightest idea about working of land, of public decency or of respect for the feelings of others. They spend a good deal of time in the courts because of trouble they create in the streets. I am glad to say that the Land Commission is now selecting a better type of applicant, and that those who have come from Donegal, Clare and Kerry seem to be a decent respectable class. They are making good progress.

I am definitely of opinion, however, that the migration schemes are not a success, inasmuch as the farms that the people have to live on are too small. Most of the migrants who got land are helped by relatives in England who send money home to them. The average farm is from 20 to 25 statute acres and if there is depression at the conclusion of this war many of these people may be in dire straits. It will then be a case of selling out many of these holdings. The size of farm that might be economic in Mayo would not be economic in Meath. People with land in Mayo are assisted by relatives in England and by fishing, but in Meath, where they have no other income, they could not make a living on such farms. But for the war many migrants would have returned to their former districts. If there is to be further migration I ask the Minister to see that those who are brought up will be made to respect the rights of the people of Meath and Kildare. Many farmers in Kildare and Meath have capital but they got no chance of investing it in land. I asked some time ago concerning the part-purchase of farms. Many farms remain in the hands of the Land Commission for some time before being allotted. I ask the Minister to give farmers who can put down a couple of hundred pounds a chance to get land, because if these men put money into holdings they will make a success of them. If there was a scheme catering for people of that type we would have a class of farmers who would be a credit to themselves and to the State. The present Minister is an energetic man and I ask him to give consideration to the claims of such people. There has been a good deal of speculation in land in Meath in the last few years. It is unfortunate that the Land Commission did not get possession of some large farms that changed hands at good prices. I hold that farms which have recently been purchased should be divided and that an eye should be kept on them by the Land Commission. Some of these holdings changed hands two or three times in a few years.

Some Deputies spoke about the vesting of land. I hold that the Land Commission has been slack in that respect. I am living on a holding that was divided 16 years ago. I raised a question on several occasions as to when that land will be vested. I have raised the question two or three or four times of when they are going to vest some of these holdings and the answer is always the same, that they have not been able to reach it owing to the pressure of work. I have made a success myself of my own little holding. I hold it is double the value of what it was when I got it. That was done by hard work, by honest work and it is the same with many of my neighbours. They find themselves completely handicapped for want of capital. They cannot go to the bank and say: "I want money to buy stock," because they will be asked: "Where are the title deeds of the farm?" The tenant has to hang his head and say: "I have not got them." You have only a tenancy and can be put out at 15 days' notice. That is holding up a vast amount of work in Meath and there is no earthly reason why the Land Commission should not make an effort to vest these holdings in the tenants who have made a success of them. I know there can be no such thing as a man expecting the Government to vest land in him after two or three years. I would not believe that myself but after five or eight years the Land Commission should see who is making good and the man who is making good should be given a chance to acquire his holding.

The vesting of land is a burning question in my county and it should get speedier attention than anything else. Fixity of tenure I hold also is a burning question, but I hold that cannot be dealt with until land division is completed and the sooner it is tackled in a proper way, in a really revolutionary manner, the better, so that it can be got through in five or eight years. You can have no fixity of tenure until then. I have another grievance in connection with the migrants. They are continually coming up complaining of the way they have been treated by the Land Commission. They said they were told they were getting special facilities, a farm and certain assets. They were to get certain stock and the Land Commission came to them down in the West and gave them a form to sign, and they say that the forms they signed were very different from the transaction the Land Commission carried out afterwards. They told they were to get two or three yearlings and other things, and others were to get a cart and a horse and when they came up the Land Commission did not provide them. That is very unfair to the migrants. If they signed a statement the Land Commission should stand over that. If they had to sign statements, the statements should be read over clearly to them by the inspector so that these people will know what is to be expected. I am convinced that many of these men cannot read at all. Many of them are old people and if they sign, they sign sometimes more or less blindly. They come up expecting a land of milk and honey and instead of that they get miserable patches of scraggy land in Meath with perhaps an old Kerry cow. They got a very bad deal, a very raw deal. More attention should be paid to them.

As regards the water supply, I hold the Land Commission has treated the people badly. Take the land in Meath. The Meath man was ready to do anything to get the land, but when he gets into it he sometimes cannot use it. I hold that if a farm is divided it should be provided with water. We know what happens. They must have a lot of old barrels, and sometimes they have to bring the water a long distance. When it is a question of the Land Commission sinking holes for water, they go down 15 or 20 feet and then they get surface water, but when June comes along the pump goes dry and it is no use. There should be provided a system of water. It is no use putting down a pump two or three feet because when the dry weather comes, the pump goes dry. There are places in County Meath where you cannot get water for a depth of 60 feet, and in others you have only to go down ten feet. I ask that when the Land Commission is sinking pumps it will sink them properly and see that there is a constant supply of water there. I do not think I have much more to say at the present moment, but I would like to see the Land Commission more energetic in taking over the estates. There is no reason why we should not get on with it. In future I would ask that the rights of the Meath people would be respected. We have no objection to the migrants coming to Meath. There is room for both migrants and Meath people, but one of the mistakes is the herding of 15 or 20 migrants together. That tends to bring about hostility and to make them a colony on their own. They look down on the Meath people and the Meath people growl at them. Migrants and Meath people should be put together as neighbours. If the migrants were brought up for the purpose of spreading the Irish language I say that the scheme is a dismal failure. Not a word of Irish is spoken in the district. Every one of them that comes up comes up with the purpose of acquiring a proper knowledge of English. The first thing they want is to get a proper grasp of English, and when they have got it they go across to England to look for big money. If the purpose was to relieve congestion I hold that it would be far better to do as Paddy Hogan suggested, and take a larger landholder from Mayo. Meath, Kildare and Westmeath are the natural gateway to the British market. Take Athenry, Ballinasloe, Roscommon and other places which are living by the sale of cattle and sheep they send to County Meath, Kildare and Westmeath. The West of Ireland would be the most dismal failure without Meath. It would be cropped. The amount of money that goes down from County Meath to the West for store cattle, sheep and ewes is simply enormous, in order to bring them to Meath, in order to carry on the economy there. I would ask the Land Commission to think very seriously of this. I want to say the successful farmer in County Meath will not buy a Meath store bull because of what the change of land will do. It is far better to buy in the West. They would not buy a Meath store bull. They get them from the West.

I think that is the right economy for Meath and the West. Meath is able to absorb live stock from the West, but if you carry on the policy of bringing uneconomic holders from the West, planting them in Meath, you will intensify the problem. You are killing the natural markets and the export trade. Go back to the old policy of Paddy Hogan and take the larger farmer from the West and give him 80 or 70 acres of good land in Meath. He will be an asset to Meath and an asset to the country. The men who get the land he has left behind him will be assets in the surrounding districts. We have gone too far in this blind alley of migration. The migrants are good, honest men, and what I have said on their behalf is true. They have been put on small holdings and left until they have found that what we say is the truth. I ask the Minister to give the farmer's son in County Meath a chance to buy land. He may have a couple of hundred pounds in the bank, and if he has not his father will help him. When men are brought from the West, put them on decent holdings in County Meath, and then you will have something worth while in the country.

Mr. Dillon

I have heard a lot of people in this House advocating the acquisition by the Land Commission of any large farm that is put up for sale. If that policy is prosecuted, it means that you are going to destroy, as you have very largely done already, free sale in this country. If you destroy free sale, the land of this country will deteriorate steadily, for no one will put his savings into land which he knows cannot be realised if and when the necessity for so doing arises. Speculation such as that outlined by Deputy Giles in land should be stopped. Nobody in this country wants to see land made the subject of speculation. Whether the farmer be large or small, whether he is cultivating ten acres or 1,000 acres, if he is living on his land and living by his land, he should have fixity of tenure. He should have free sale, and he should have a fair rent which, in our modern times, does not come within the ambit of the Minister's authority, because a fair rent means exemption from excessive rates, and that is a matter that we can take up with the Minister for Local Government and Public Health. But free sale and fixity of tenure both come within the Minister's purview. The accursed Land Act of 1933 destroyed them both, and the desire to have that Act worked in its worst possible interpretation is liable to do steadily increasing damage. Deputy Blowick shakes his head when I say that free sale and fixity of tenure were both destroyed by the 1933 Land Act. If the Deputy had studied that Act as closely as I have done, and the principles enshrined in it, he would see that it did destroy both. I am not going to argue that question now. I do warn the House against the destruction of free sale. If you destroy free sale, then you are going to destroy the land of Ireland.

I am going to speak on something that must be present to the mind of every Deputy in the House, and I dare any Deputy, on any side of the House, to get up and address himself to it. How long are we going to go on buying land through the Land Commission for £100 an acre and selling it to the farmers for £50 an acre? The money of Midas will not pay the bill if we go on doing that for long enough. I always think that the land annuities racket was one of the most shameful rackets that our people ever engaged in. We got away with it. We duped the English out of the money that we had undertaken to pay them.

Mr. Tunney

Thanks be to God for that.

Mr. Dillon

There may be some people who may be proud of that performance but there are others of us who are not. Whether we are proud of it or ashamed of it, it is true that we made something out of it. We got our pound of flesh. That is past history. In the 1933 Land Act we inserted the provision that all land annuities hereafter would be reduced by 50 per cent. That means that we go out—when I say "we" I mean the community—and we buy a holding for £1,000. We divide it into five holdings, the price of each to the purchaser being £200. We improve the holding out of revenue and we charge the incoming tenant nothing for the improvement. We then fix the annuity. Remember the basis on which we fix the annuity. Under the land code, the annuity is primarily intended to redeem the principal and interest for the term usually of 60 years, but if the holding is of such a character that it will not bear the full economic annuity, plus a reasonable livelihood for the man living on the land, then the annuity is abated by so much as will bring it down to a figure which will enable the farmer to pay it and have for himself and his family a reasonable living out of the land. Having ascertained what the annuity shall be, we then halve it and we charge one-half of the total price to posterity, and the purchaser gets the land for half what it cost the community.

Is it any wonder there should be land hunger? Suppose we started to buy public houses and sell them at half the price they cost us, would there not be a hunger for public houses, or supposing we started to buy race courses or dog tracks or any other piece of property and sell them to purchasers for one-half what they cost, would there not be a hunger for any such property? There is hunger amongst any reasonable body of men for anything that you can buy for one-half of what it costs. How long are we going to go on doing that? The Minister knows the magnitude of that problem just as well as I do. Every Deputy knows how utterly impossible it is for this community to go on deliberately buying land and selling it at half its cost. There is no Deputy who will get up and speak his mind on this. Do Deputies believe that the deadweight debt of our community should be allowed indefinitely to grow in order to finance that absurdity? I think that the farmers who used to be on the land in this country, if you made that proposition to them—that they ought to agitate in order to ensure that land purchase would be conducted on the lines that the farmers would only be asked to pay one-half of what the land cost—would have laughed in your face and despised you. But, faith, it is the most popular piece of legislation that was passed in this House in the generation in which we live. People in this country used to be proud of paying their way, but soon we are going to have a situation in which everybody in the country will be either a pensioner on one fund or another, or else will be acquiring his homestead at a price one-half of which is being defrayed by the community.

I would be glad if the Minister would tell us: is it intended for ever to go on buying land at a cost of £100 an acre to the community and selling it to the incoming tenant for £50? I want to put to the Minister a specific question which, perhaps, he will find it convenient to answer in a categorical way when winding up the debate. As I understand the situation, the reduction of the land annuities by 50 per cent. in no case altered the term over which they are to be paid. That is to say, that if there was a 60-year annuity under the Wyndham Act, which was £20 prior to the passing of the 1933 Land Act, that annuity remains a 60-year annuity, but that instead of paying £20 a year you now pay £10 a year. Would the Minister be good enough to tell me when the annuities under the Ashbourne Act, under the Wyndham Act, under the Hogan Act, and under the 1933 Land Act will come to an end in relation to the date of the several purchase agreements made?

I wonder did the Minister, when introducing the Vote, announce the all-important news that one of our ancient offices of State has ceased to be and has been transferred to his Department since this Estimate was last before the Dáil. The Quit Rent Office has ceased to be and has now deteriorated into nothing more than a section of the Minister's Department. Such an announcement would have had this interesting consequence—that, whereas the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee has been asked every year for the past eight years to explain what the Quit Rent Office is, that pleasing duty will in future devolve upon the Minister for Lands. I can assure him, from painful experience, that it will take a good deal of trouble to work out a formula adequately to explain the Quit Rent Office, to secure the comprehension of the members of the committee.

I remember one of the tours de force of Deputy Aiken when he was Minister for Lands and was putting through the House the introduction of the “Land Commission Warrant”. This was to be a simple procedure, designed to save everyone trouble and largely designed to protect the rights of the county council in regard to tenant purchasers. Of course, it has since been an instrument of oppression, designed to withhold from them the simple right to go into court and argue with a creditor as to whether some claim is due or not. I know that, in a great many cases, the warrants have been addressed to the proper people for the proper amounts; but I have come across cases in which the sheriff has issued a warrant against a man for his neighbour's rent and there were no means of holding up the proceedings. If a man did not pay, not only the rent claimed but the costs endorsed on the warrant, the sheriff's bailiffs came out and took his cattle.

I remember getting in touch, on one occasion, with some section of the Land Commission and pointing out that the warrant was addressed to the wrong man. I was informed that nothing could be done about it once the warrant was issued, that there were no means of stopping it and that it was better to pay up and look cheerful and do his best to recover the amount from his neighbour. I suppose he had some right in civil law to sue his neighbour, if he could prove to the district justice that he had been the victim of a warrant which should never have been issued against him; but to describe that as a simplification is to hurl an insult at the tenant purchaser. It is ludicrous and, in my opinion, rotten in principle and ought to be stopped. The ordinary process should be restored whereby, if the Land Commission wants to sue people for their rent, they have to go to the courts in the same way as any other creditor.

I would again stress the point with which I opened: if fixity of tenure, free sale and fair rent are not restored, the land of Ireland will deteriorate to the condition in which it was in 1879, before which these things were not won for our people. The natural cupidity and folly of our people have been exploited to turn everybody in this country into a land grabber and an emergency man. I do not mind those who are brought up by land grabbers and emergency men failing to comprehend the wicked iniquity of their action in destroying free sale, fixity of tenure and fair rent, but those who are born of small farmers, who knew the struggle that our fathers made in order to secure these things—and the bulk of the Deputies of this House belong to that class—should be able to appreciate that their fathers were not fools. They had experienced the absence of fixity of tenure, free sale and fair rent. They knew the misery of living without these things and were prepared to sacrifice everything in order to get them. The generation to which we belong grew up in the enjoyment of these things. Many families in this country saw, in two generations, their people rise from destitution to a reasonable degree of prosperity and comfort; but, like fools who would abandon liberty because they were born into, it and have never known what it is to suffer under tyranny, some people in this generation would throw away fair rent, fixity of tenure and free sale, in order to open to themselves the possibility of grabbing their neighbour's land.

There was a time when an emergency man or a grabber was boycotted until he let go. There was a time when the sons and descendants of such creatures were marked and remembered as people whom no one should trust, as people deserving in their community of nothing but toleration. The conduct that brought those sanctions down on people's heads 50 years ago is, in the new Fianna Fáil dispensation, the epitome of patriotism. The grabber who is forever agitating at the doors of the Land Commission to get his neighbour's land distributed, the emergency man who is prepared to grab his neighbour's farm—these are the honoured callers on the Land Commission now. God be with the days when such people would not dare to show their faces there, as they would run serious risk of getting their necks broken if they did.

I want to see returning the days when the Land Commission and the Congested Districts Board were recognised by every decent tenant purchaser and farmer as a friend of those who wanted to work their land and did not covet their neighbour's farm, who were not prepared to stop to subterfuge, in order to get that which did not by right belong to them. I grieve to see, in many parts of the country, the Land Commission looked upon as the agent of the grabber and the emergency man. Unless we resist that tendency and restore the old philosophy, the land will suffer, the people who live upon the land will suffer and, if that is let come to pass, the things we are supposed to represent will suffer bitterly as well.

Mr. Hogan

Deputy Dillon's eloquence was worthy of a better cause. His peroration leaves me ice-cold. I do not think any reasonable people are perturbed in the least that their lands will be seized or that emergency men and grabbers will take them over.

Mr. Dillon

They have done it.

Mr. Hogan

Who are the emergency men and grabbers to whom the Deputy refers?

Mr. Dillon

Largely members of the Fianna Fáil clubs.

Mr. Hogan

Let us introduce a little commonsense into this.

Mr. Dillon

Loud cheers from Fianna Fáil benches.

Mr. Hogan

I am not looking for loud cheers from the Fianna Fáil benches, but I am not trying to play to the gallery by saying a thing exists when it does not exist. What happens in regard to the distribution of land? A piece of land is vacant in some area. In the main, it has not been worked for some considerable time, perhaps, and the landless men and uneconomic holders in the area make representations to the Land Commission to take it over and divide it up equitably amongst these people. Unfortunately, the Land Commission does not divide the land immediately, in a great many cases, but leaves it there for a considerable time without division. It is out of production and sometimes is a burden on the county council, as the rates are not paid on it. The ordinary small farmer, middle-sized farmer or large farmer has no fear that anyone will go in and take over his land.

Mr. Dillon

Even if he puts it up for sale?

Mr. Hogan

Yes.

Mr. Dillon

Indeed, he has that fear.

Mr. Hogan

I know as much about land as Deputy Dillon does, and I have never seen any attempt to force out of his land, in order to distribute it, any man who was using it economically and usefully. I never saw any effort made to prevent a man from selling his land in the open market if he wanted to.

Mr. Dillon

Throth, you are an innocent boy. Go bhfóiridh Dia orainn.

Mr. Hogan

I know as much about land as Deputy Dillon, and I know as much about the country as Deputy Dillon, and I know that sort of thing does not happen except in the heated imagination of Deputy Dillon.

Mr. Dillon

Go bhfóirdh Dia orainn.

Mr. Hogan

Tá níos mó eolais agamsa ná atá agatsa.

Mr. Dillon

Is féidir é.

Mr. Hogan

Tá fhios agam go bhuil, bíodh fhios agat.

Mr. O'Donnell

He will become a back bencher if you say much more.

Mr. Hogan

My grievance with the Land Commission is that they are not distributing land at all. I know the Minister may say that he has not sufficient staff. Perhaps he has not sufficient staff for the preparation of plans for the distribution of land, but there is nothing to prevent him acquiring land with the object eventually of giving it to the uneconomic holders and landless men in the area. I know districts in County Clare where there are hundreds of acres of land that could be acquired. We heard Deputy Giles speak of people going from County Clare to County Meath. We are aware that people are coming from Meath to purchase land in County Clare.

Mr. O'Donnell

You are good shots in County Clare.

Mr. Hogan

We may be, but we do not do that now. We know that men from County Meath and other counties who have large sums of money and who can well afford to take over land, have been coming to County Clare for that purpose, and if that sort of thing continues the uneconomic holders and landless men in these areas in Clare will never get an opportunity of acquiring a stake in the soil of their county. There is no use in the Minister saying he cannot do anything in this matter. The Minister ought to know that in County Clare there is a good deal of dissatisfaction in regard to the manner in which fairly large tracts of land have been disposed of. They were sold under the noses of the landless men and the uneconomic holders. Those unfortunate men cannot get an opportunity of making their holdings economic. They have not a proper opportunity of growing crops because the land goes to the well-to-do people who come from outside areas.

I was interested to hear Deputy Dillon talking about the way the land annuities are being adjusted. Evidently Deputy Dillon would like the land annuities to be doubled. He said they were halved, and posterity would have to pay one-half and the present land annuitant the other half. I was about to raise the question of the land annuities, and to ask the Minister how much of the money originally advanced has been redeemed by the efflux of time. I cannot find an account of that anywhere; I cannot get information indicating how much of the money advanced has been redeemed through the payment of land annuities.

Deputy Cogan said he hoped nobody would drag the land annuities into the arena of politics again. I do not know what he meant by that, and I would like him to develop that point. Is it his idea that the land annuitant should pay the land annuities indefinitely? Is there to be no time limit? Will the amount advanced ever be repaid? I have made some investigations into the amount of money advanced to one land annuitant. Let me take the case of a man who bought under the 1891 Act. This is a real instance—it is nothing I imagined or a case coming from a fevered imagination like the type of thing we have had from Deputy Dillon. I will give figures relating to one definite case. A sum of £200 was advanced in 1891 to a small farmer. His land annuity was £8 16s.—£4 8s. per half year. Several sections of the 1891 Act affected the payment of the land annuity, and when the 1896 Act came into operation this man was allowed three decadal reductions. At the end of the decadal reductions his annuity was £4 4s. 2d. In 1933 the annuity was halved, and it now works out at £2 4s. 4d. per annum. I went to the trouble of making a hurried calculation as to what the man paid with respect to the £200 advanced in 1891 and I find he has paid at least twice the £200.

I wonder how Deputy Dillon would defend that method? He found fault with the land annuities being halved, but he did not deal with the Land Act of 1891 or the Act of 1896, and he did not explain to us how they worked out in a case of that sort. I should like to hear from the Minister how many of these advances have been redeemed through the efflux of time. I should like some definite information on that point, and he might tell us whether this land tax, for that is all it is at the moment, will continue indefinitely or will it stop when the amount advanced for the purchase of the land is repaid.

References have been made to the division of land and the erection of houses, but there is one matter that has been only lightly touched upon, and that is that there is very little use in giving land and houses to people unless you can give them some credit upon which to operate. The Land Commission do not seem to appreciate the difficulty of people in that connection. They do not seem to realise that people have to carry on when they enter into a new holding, and that they are faced with considerable expense. When you see an allottee endeavouring to dispose of his property, which he acquired possibly five or ten years ago and which he is not capable of working, do you realise that he has to dispose of it because he has not sufficient money to work the holding successfully? The Minister and the Department do not seem to realise that difficulty.

We are told that land is not being divided because there is not sufficient staff, and that they are not erecting houses and distributing plots because they have not adequate staff or cannot get the material. I put it to the Minister for Local Government on a former occasion and I will put it to the Minister for Lands now, that there is a considerable amount of material at our very doors if we will only use it. I have seen cement being brought in for the erection of houses on allotments where, by simply digging the soil, you could get the best of stone with which to erect dwellings for the allottees. There is no reason why the allottees could not get houses erected of good stone which could be quarried and prepared, and there would be no necessity to wait for material to come in. The Minister may tell us that it is necessary to wait for the material in order to proceed with house erection, but I suggest that the quarries might be used to advantage.

I will repeat what I said with respect to the division of land. In County Clare nothing has been done within the last ten years in the way of land division. When large tracts become available the Department allows men with a couple of thousand pounds at their disposal to buy that land right under the noses of the landless men and the uneconomic holders. I have a letter here from a resident in North Clare and it might interest the Minister to hear what he says. He says that "since Mr. de Valera came into power not one acre of land has been bought in North Clare." That is a very sorry testimonial, but unfortunately it is too true. There has been very little land, practically none, bought for distribution in that area.

If we are to have increased production the only way to secure it is to give a man a piece of land so that he may cultivate it usefully and take an interest in it. The only way to achieve that is by dividing the ranches and preventing the people with thousands of pounds at their disposal from buying land and leaving the landless men and the uneconomic holders idle on the plains where they were born.

Dr. O'Higgins

One would be tempted to get into a discussion with regard to the financing of land in this country and the finances of the Land Commission. I am one of those who will not be tempted to enter into any discussion of the kind, because I frankly admit that the financing of land division in this country is a complete mystery to me. Now that the period within which Ashbourne purchasers should have relieved themselves of financial responsibility is running to an end, like many other Deputies I have got a number of queries as to what is the position of these people. Some of them claim that their financial responsibilities in the way of payment of annuities came to an end in 1939; that they are still receiving demands for annuities and that they are still paying annuities. It may be that some of these people are not aware of the fact that the decadal deductions extend the period. However, I have asked a number of people, those with a close knowledge of land purchase and those with a deep knowledge of law, and I cannot find anybody who will give an answer which they say is based on conviction and knowledge. I hope that at the end of this debate that matter will be dealt with, and dealt with clearly, by the Minister. I have listened to two Deputies of different Parties, both of them with great knowledge of land and both of them with a knowledge of law, and each of them seemed to be equally puzzled as to what the position is in such cases.

With regard to the policy of land division in this country and the necessity for fixing the farmer firmly on his holding, without any uneasiness and without any instability, with the right to go to the bank with the title deeds of his land and raise money up to a percentage of the value of his holding, just the same as a business man, superficially those two policies are in conflict and have been in conflict nearly through the whole period of the life of this State. When I was a boy, and when the Nationalist Movement in this country was rallied behind the three F's, and, at the same time, the planting of people from the land on the land was part of the national demand, there was no paradox, there was no contradiction. The lands that the people wanted divided were the huge estates of thousands of acres, and it was the holders of such estates who were regarded as ranchers. The wheel went round. The larger estates, so far as it was economic to take them over, were taken over and divided. Still we have the same cry—the land for the people and drive out the ranchers. But the rancher of to-day is not the man with thousands of acres. In many counties, the man who is pointed out as the rancher and whose land everybody is after is the man with 100 or 150 acres. If that man's position is to be rendered unstable and insecure—the successful farmer, the working farmer, the man who is living entirely out of the land and by the land, the man who hopes to leave portion of his land to one son and another portion to another son, hoping that, by hard work and perseverance and economy, they in the course of time will expand these bits of holdings so as to raise other families on them—then I think there is no future for agriculture as a whole in this country.

Now, with this kind of contradictory policies, both in themselves desirable and defensible, I think we have reached the time for a survey of each country, for a firm declaration on an ordnance map as to what lands may be the objective of the Land Commission and what lands will remain immune even from the threat or the fear of land division. If a farmer makes good in land and, by reason of health or any other reason, wants to retire, he should have the same right to sell his property in a free market as the man who bought stocks and shares or the man who has put his money into a business. There can be no stability about the whole agricultural life of this country unless some principles of that kind are accepted. The Land Commission, as such, can only carry out whatever the policy of the Government is, in accordance with legislation passed. I have found the Land Commission always a most exemplary Department and always most obliging and willing to help. But I do think the time has come when there has to be some clear declaration as to what is the State policy with regard to land generally.

With regard to those who get land, I do not agree with other speakers that, because a man has no money, he must get no share in land division. But I do think that no interference should take place with inspectors and commissioners in the division of land. I have met very many inspectors in a great number of counties and I have spoken privately and intimately to them and, in many cases, they have no doubt whatever as to who is the right type of applicant and, if they are left alone, the right type of applicant will get it. A man should not be ruled out because he has no money. The man who has worked on the land, who understands farming, who has a love for the land, who has a serious outlook in life, who they know is going to get married and is hoping to build a home, that type of man should be considered. The man who has no land and who has made a livelihood by renting land from others and has put by a bit of capital, that is the type of man who should come first. But the fellow from an urban area who may have no association with land is unlikely ever to make good on land.

I would recommend to the Department of Lands something like the Scottish system. If you put a penniless man into land, he may be a deserving person; he may be the kind of fellow who will make good, but, if he has not a penny in his pocket, no credit behind him, there should be a linking up between the Land Commission and the Agricultural Credit Corporation so that that man would start with a piece of equipment, with a few sticks of furniture in the house, with perhaps a little foundation stock, even though that has to be costed on to his annuity and will make his annuity a bit higher. When the first-class labouring man, the ploughman, gets a holding in Scotland, he walks into a holding furnished and equipped. He must get a farmer to back him in the bank for one year's rent, and a farmer will not do that except the man is of an outstanding type, except he is a labouring man who has pulled to the front. But that man starts with the necessary implements. He starts with a house furnished in a meagre way. He is in a position to put the plough into the land and to start being a farmer from the day he turns the key in the door. When the penniless man takes over, what can he do? He has no capital to buy implements, equipment, furniture and stock. He can only set the land until he gets together a bit of capital. Four or five years of that and he realises that he is getting so much soft money, that he is getting more by letting the land than he has to pay by way of annuity. He is carrying on his job on the roads or working as a labourer, and he looks on this as an annuity or pension. There is no incentive to him ever to become a real farmer. He was spoiled in the lazy years when the policy of the country forced him to set his land. Any man without money who is going into land should be equipped by the State.

There are one or two points about Land Commission activities to which I should like to draw attention. When a house is built by the Land Commission, a pump is generally sunk, and I doubt very much if there is ever any analysis of the water before the pump is sunk. After the pump has been sunk, when the water is examined and found to be polluted and the attention of the Land Commission is drawn to it, nothing ever happens. The people are left to drink the polluted water. The pump is sunk into a polluted well; the annuitant pays the cost of the pump; and is then left without a pure water supply. I come up against that in my professional work once a month. I do not know why the same practice as is operated by a board of health cannot apply, under which the water supply is analysed before the pump is sunk, and, if found to be polluted, the same authority which sinks the pump pumps out the well, treats the water and gives back a pure water supply to the person concerned.

There is another matter with which one does not like dealing in a public way. A great number of, if not all, Land Commission houses are built without any sanitary conveniences. We know that the acres are broad and the hedges are sheltered, but surely, in 1944, we should have progressed beyond that. One out of every three Land Commission people who take over holdings nowadays go in for dairying, and before they can offer milk for sale for human consumption, their premises are subject to a very strict medical and veterinary investigation. One of the first things they are asked is: where do you get rid of the human excreta? Is it in one of the stables? Is it where you milk the cows and is that the milk you propose to sell? The smallest labourer's cottage is built with such conveniences, and I do not think the extra cost of giving modest sanitary conveniences to people going into Land Commission houses should be regarded as prohibitive.

We all understand that, during this emergency, the Land Commission is in fact a non-functioning Department. When the cat is away, the mice will play, and the Minister is already aware of the fact that, whether it is a syndicate which is working or whether it is one or two individuals of unlimited wealth, something unnatural is going on with regard to land. In one of the two counties I represent, four or five huge estates have been bought by one individual, an industrialist, a man who is not going to work the land or live on the land. I consider that unfair to people in that neighbourhood. In another county with which. I am familiar, the same thing is going on, and mansions with the estates that go with them have been purchased by non-nationals who had never any association with the land. Speculation, unequalled in stock exchange circles, is rampant in Irish lands, under the noses of the people and the Land Commission stands by idle and inactive.

These lands, after being despoiled of residence and all the rest, are divided up into big parcels and sold to the highest bidder, irrespective of whether that bidder had any association with the land or not. I suggest to the Minister that if speculators of that kind are to plunge in and the Minister has no power to buy or to compete in the buying, he should at least take powers to see that speculative sub-division of land does not take place during the emergency, and let the person who buys the land in order to sell every article of value on it—timber, stone, lead piping, glass, doors, and everything else—hold the baby when the emergency is over. Something will have to be done by the Government. If not you are leaning back and provoking the people to do something themselves. That would be a tragedy and it would be a very serious backward step. The matter is universal enough and grave enough at present to require Government examination and some serious grappling with it. I do not think it reasonable, in a country where the State is committed to a policy of land division, where people have waited quietly and patiently, knowing that such and such a place will be divided some day, that they should see an emergency come upon them, should see the Land Commission callously inactive and a person from goodness knows where, who merely happens to have immense money or immense credit, wading in and taking these places from under their noses.

The Land Commission is one of these great departments which get hidebound in their own regulations and tripped up by their own red tape. There is a working rule of thumb that no land will go to a person outside a certain distance from the divided land. That is all right if you are dividing land in every parish every month, but when you come up against the situation where, perhaps, outstandingly the most deserving claimant in a parish or in a county happens to live in an area where it is never likely that there will be any land division, or at any rate any land division within five miles of it, where that man is making good, and very good, by taking land, and where all his people before him have been in land, surely there should be an exception to such a rule. Surely, no rule is worth while if there is not an occasional exception to prove the value of the rule; but I find a kind of rigidity that results in injustices, and when you bring up a specific case, everybody admits that an injustice has been done, but you are told: "What can we do? The rule is there". And it is just a matter of putting a compass on a map to show that the man lives outside a specific district, and that, therefore, the rule must be enforced. Surely, these rules are not designed with a view to doing injustices? In any kind of Departmental rules and regulations, the power should lie somewhere to make a decision with regard to the waiving of a rule or taking an elastic view of it.

I am calling these few things to the Minister's notice, because I think it is time that his attention was directed to them. With regard to the general expression of discontent in connection with land policy in this country, the commission is not responsible for that. We are debating at the moment Acts that were passed ten, 12 or 15 years ago. It is a case of making the best of the legal powers that exist at the moment, and it is from that point of view and in that spirit that I have been speaking.

Mr. O'Donnell

Agricultural Ireland seems to me to be divided into two classes at the moment: the rancher and the "chancer". Anybody owning about 40 Irish acres or over, in the minds of many people, is a rancher, and I suppose we can gauge for ourselves what the "chancers" are. The "chancers" remind me very much of that well-known character, the Vicar of Bray, whose boast it was that whatever monarch might reign, or whatever Party might be in power he would still be Vicar of Bray. In the same way, no matter what Party may be in power here, you will always have the "chancer". The Vicar of Bray was a clergyman, a Catholic clergyman, in Bray, which is a little place in Lincolnshire, England, and is not to be confused with the place in Ireland of the same name, and when Henry VIII was Defender of the Faith, which was the Holy Roman Catholic Faith, the Vicar preached the doctrines of that Church. I suppose, however, that the strings or bonds with Rome were not tightened up as much in those days as now, and so, when Henry VIII did a volte face, and broke with Rome, the Vicar still remained in his position by now following Lutheran doctrines. Then, when the eldest daughter of Henry VIII, who was a Catholic, succeeded Henry, the Vicar reverted to Catholic teachings again, and when another daughter of Henry succeeded the eldest daughter, the Vicar followed her in her Protestantism. So it is with the “chancers”. Whatever Party is in power they will follow that Party, and so long as the Land Commission or the Government continue in their present policy you will always have Vicars of Bray and “chancers”. I might even have a little bit of a grievance myself if I were to see my little place of about 20 Irish acres surrounded by “chancers”.

There is a good deal to be considered in regard to the apportioning of these lands. I am connected with the land, and at least three generations before me have been connected with it. I know Irish history and the history of the land struggle here, as I heard it at the firesides in the country and as I learned it in the National Library in Dublin during a residence here of more than 20 years. I know the problem that exists, but this matter of the division of land seems to me to be a very peculiar thing. Suppose that an estate is to be divided, and you have 100 claimants for pieces of land on that estate: how are you going to divide it fairly among these claimants? How do you pick them out? I can understand the man who took part in the late campaign being given a preference in the division of land. These people got grants of land, and justly so, but now the next thing you have is that if you are a speaker of Irish you will get the preference. I do not know Irish, beyond some such phrase as "Cad tá tú a rá", which I picked up, because I did not get a chance of learning the language, but why should preference be given to these people, just because they know Irish? I think that there should be some other test of merit when it comes to apportioning land. Why should a man get a grant of land for any other reason than that of pounds, shillings and pence? Is he going to be subsidised by the State? We know that you are taking a lot of land off the planters. There might be a good reason for that, and yet is there? But how do you pick 20 men out of 100, leaving, as you are bound to do, the other 80 with a grievance. I suggest that the proper way and the only way to find out the value of land is, when you take it over, to put it up for resale by public auction. If a farmer's son, or even a tradesman with land traditions, who has gone, say, to America, and made a bit of money, returns to this country and wants to get 10 or 20 acres of land, he will not get it, and I hold that 20 applicants out of 100 should not be privileged to get the land, because it only means that you are creating 80 malcontents, and such a procedure is not based on either justice or honesty. I do not want to indulge in destructive criticism, but I do suggest that there should be equal honesty and justice for all when it comes to the distribution of these lands. I am pointing out that, whatever Party is in power you will always have the "chancers" and, like the Vicar of Bray, it will be a case of: "Whatsoever King may reign, I shall be Vicar of Bray." Whether a Labour Party or a Fine Gael Party, or any other Party comes into power, you will still have the "chancers" and you will still have equity and justice not being properly observed in the distribution of land.

Now, I was very glad when I saw this proposal of restricting speeches to 20 or 30 minutes being introduced, and I hope that the rule is being observed, as it will be a check on some of the windbags here. I am still behind the clock, and the few more words that I have to say will finish me. I believe in the advice of an old priest in Maynooth who said: "If your sermon is not prepared, do not speak for 15 minutes, and if it is prepared do not speak for more than a quarter of an hour." The question of water supply is a very important one in connection with this matter of land division. I think that you may have heard me twice before speaking on this matter, and at the risk of appearing to join the ranks of the windbags, I am referring to it again. At a meeting of the county council in Clonmel last June I proposed a little resolution which was what we would call in county council circles a snowball resolution, the effect of which was that a national survey of the water supply situation should be undertaken with a view to putting a proper water supply into every house in rural Ireland. I have very kindly feelings towards Deputy O'Higgins because of those three F's which have been referred to. I remember when the Land Act was passed. That is a long time ago, and I remember the three phrases: fixity of tenure, fair rent, and free sale, which gave rise to the phrase, the three F's. That clause in the Act was known as the Healy clause, and Gladstone congratulated Healy on what he called the three F's, because of the alliteration. It was a beautiful phrase and was described as the Magna Charta of the Irish farmer, and I felt great pride in listening to Deputy O'Higgins to-day, a nephew of Tim Healy, when he spoke in connection with this business of a water supply.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

We are only concerned here with water that is supplied by the Land Commission, and not with the question of water supply generally.

Mr. O'Donnell

I suggest that it is of the greatest importance at the moment, in this matter of the division of land, to see that when houses are built on these lands a pump should be sunk in connection with every one of them. That is the point I am coming at. The sinking of a proper, modern pump in every farmyard is of the greatest importance. I am not referring to the kind of pumps which were relics of hydraulic inefficiency and inconvenience, as depicted by Brinsley McNamara in The Valley of the Squinting Windows. Such pumps are out of date and unhealthy, and they certainly should never be passed by any board of public health. Around my part of the country, where we have the Suir flowing through—it flows through the town—you can see barrels used for holding the water, and pools also being used for drinking water.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Land Commission have nothing to do with that.

Mr. O'Donnell

I am suggesting that in this country we should see that proper and modern pumps are sunk, as has been done in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, because the only way of getting a supply of clean and pure water is by installing the best kind of pump that can be sunk. Deputy O'Higgins was quite right in saying that in many cases the cattle are allowed to drink out of these old pools, and you have cases of the water being contaminated by the droppings or excreta of the cattle. I suggest that, next to housing, the most important thing is the sinking of modern pumps. Our county council adopted the resolution, and since we will shortly have the matter of arterial drainage coming along, I suggest that the two things should go hand in hand, because the provision of a proper water supply is of the very greatest importance and, therefore, I think that, when we come to deal with these matters, the question of the sinking of a pump in every farmyard should be included.

Mr. Bennett

A great deal of the debate has been taken up with the consideration of two particular matters, namely, the division of land and fixity of tenure of the owners. On the face of it, it is rather difficult to reconcile the two things but I believe it can be done. I have been as ardent a fighter for the rights of the farmer to fixity of tenure as, I believe, any Deputy in this House. For 17 years, since I entered this House, I have been fighting for that right. When the 1933 Land Act was introduced, I strenuously fought for that particular principle and I referred to the Bill as an eviction cum plunder Bill because, in my opinion, it interfered with the rights of the tenant farmer to own his land. It did away, as I said then, with the results of the fight of generations for the three F's, to which Dr. O'Higgins and the last speaker referred, and it substituted three other F's—the power of the Land Commission to fleece, filch, and forfeit.

That was the result of that Act. I believe I have turned out a true prophet, judging by the results of the last 11 years. Nobody knows better than the Minister for Lands what has taken place in the last five or six years and what is taking place now. The Minister sees every day a desire on the part of some of the allottees to sell their lands, to cash in on the generosity of this State, to cash in at figures that would seem impossible. I know of a case where an allottee has applied to the Land Commission to sell a farm for which he is getting £3,000. I do not know whether he has got permission or not. I know the figure the original owner of that land got, but I wish the House knew it. I do not want to mention where it is, but it is a case in point. I believe that until we have fixed the farmer on his land with the right to own it we will never have settled conditions in this country.

Reference was made a moment ago to the provision of capital for the new tenants. I agree with that principle, but I want to provide capital for the old tenants, and until there is some certainty of his ownership, he is denied that capital. There was a bank director listening to the debate up to recently, and I wish he were here now. I know of no bank in any county that would lend any individual farmer in this State 10d. on the security of his land alone. If any Deputy knows a bank manager more generous than those I know, I hope he will tell me about him and I will be with him to-morrow or the day after. I know no bank manager who would lend as much as would jingle on a tombstone on the security of land alone, because the farmer has no title to his land, and the bank knows it. The land is not his. It may be taken from him to-morrow or the next day, and then the banks could whistle for the money owed to them. Until that is remedied, there can be no settled conditions of agriculture in this country. How is it going to be remedied while at the same time preserving the right to the Land Commission to divide lands?

It might be argued that anybody who speaks for the rights of the farmer to own his land is opposed to land division. I am not, definitely. I say we must have fixity of tenure, with certain limitations, if you like, and the limitations must be (1) that no farmer with an average holding, up to 200 acres of land, will have his land taken from him except in very exceptional circumstances, and if in exceptional circumstances the State thinks it right to resume or to take that land the farmer must get the full market value for it. He has not been getting it. He must get such a sum that, if he wishes, he can go into the market in some other county or the same county and buy another farm. That is the first condition. The second condition is that no farmer, big or small, will be relieved of his land as long as he is farming it under proper conditions, providing all that any Government could expect in the way of food and other things for the people and employing sufficient labour. With those two provisos, I think we should leave every farmer in this country settled on his land.

I believe the State should approach the question of land division as they approach every other question. If they are to give the full value of the land, it is difficult to give it to the incoming tenant at a fair rent. The State in regard to land division—I am repeating what I said on a number of occasions—must proceed in the same way as they do in connection with any other social service. If they want to benefit one section of the community they should not do it at the expense of another. It must be done at the expense of the State. If there is any loss involved in the purchase of land from one farmer and the distribution of it to another, that loss must be borne by the State, let it be great or small, and there should not be a loss to the unfortunate individual owner.

Having come to divide the land, and having paid dearly for it—because I hope the Government in future will pay a sufficient price to the owner— and recognising that the State must lose a good deal in the division, care must be taken that it is given to the proper people. That has not been done in the past. I am not blaming this Government alone. The previous Government were as bad in that respect. Land was given to people who should never have got it, who never made proper use of it and would not make proper use of it if they were there until they were as old as Methuselah. The present Minister for Lands, who, I believe, is anxious to do the right thing and is going to make the allottees do the right thing, is not responsible for that.

The question of the vesting of land was referred to. Let the land be vested properly in the owner. Let the land be vested in the new owner also, but not for a period. I suggest that land should be given to people in much the same way as it is given in other countries. I was an allottee of land. I got free land in another country— Canada—30 or 40 years ago, but I got it on conditions. I was presented with 160 acres of land, and the Government said: "If you do such and such, in three or four years we will give you a title to it, but if you do not fulfil these conditions you will not get the land." Half the people who got the land never got a title to it, because they did not fulfil the conditions. If any State wishes to be generous to individuals and to encourage them to work the land, and if the State spends money on such a scheme, it has a right to say: "Do such and such a thing and then we will give you title." I believe that is the way in which we ought to proceed. I believe the Government should say: "We will give you 20 acres or 30 or 40 acres"—I hope not less than 20—"but we will enforce conditions—you will have to do such and such before you get title." A period of four or five years might be fixed within which the tenant should fulfil the conditions laid down. Then, on the fulfilment of these conditions, the State could give him a title and vest the holding in him. Of course, conditions might arise in later years in which that man might no longer be able to engage in farming. He then should have the same right to dispose of his holding as any other farmer, and the Land Commission could see, if necessary, that the incoming tenant also made proper use of the holding.

In regard to land division generally, I think that the proper type of men have not been selected as tenants. I know many men who worked hard in the United States, and, having accumulated £300 or £400, came back here with the Irish instinct to own land, but they never got a sod. Such men may get land now under the new Minister, because he looks at things in their proper perspective; but they did not get it under former Ministers, even when my own Party was in power. Whenever I tried to put forward the claims of such men, men with a small capital of say £300, who could make good use of land, I found that the Land Commission attitude was "Oh, that man can afford to buy land." Well, everybody knows the amount of land you can get for £300. I suggest that that is the type of men who should get the land, men who could make proper use of it.

Deputy O'Higgins referred to a few matters with which I should also like to deal. One was the case of annuities on lands purchased under old Land Acts—the Ashbourne Act and others. There is a doubt in the minds of many of these tenant purchasers as to when their annuities will cease. I was talking to a man only within the last four days who wanted to know how he stood in this regard. He purchased under the Ashbourne Act and, as far as he knows, his annuities should have ceased or should soon cease. He never availed of the decadal reductions, but he believes that the 49 years should have now drawn to a close. He has written to the Land Commission several times on the matter, but he has never been informed when he will be free from the obligation of paying annuities. That is a position that should be rectified, and I hope the Minister will be able to tell us that at some time these annuities will terminate and that he will be able to say when that time will be.

Another matter to which I wish to draw attention, I have often referred to before. Deputy Cogan referred to it this evening. That is the question of the erection of fences in connection with the division of land. In the last ten or 12 years, both in connection with the Land Commission Vote and the Vote for the Local Government Department, I have frequently referred to this matter. I always call these fences "governmental fences", whether they are put up in connection with land division or around the half acre allotted by the Local Government Department in connection with cottage schemes. The fences that are put up are ridiculous. They consist of a narrow bank about four feet wide at the bottom, tapering to a width of about four inches at the top. In 99 cases out of 100 the fences crumble before six months, and there might as well be no fence there at all. I suggest that whatever is done with regard to internal fences, boundary fences should be of such a character as to be permanent. There is no use in putting up fences that will crumble when the neighbour's cow looks at them, because one can almost say that that is what happens. The cow has only to rub her side against the bank and it disappears. That is not the type of fence that should be built as a boundary. The ordinary farmer who has to erect fences around a tillage plot would not be satisfied with such fences. I again suggest to the Minister that a little extra money expended on this work at the start would serve a useful purpose and would obviate many disputes between tenants.

Some Deputies referred to the system of land tenure in other countries —the Scottish system and the Danish system. I hope we are not going to follow systems which obtain in other countries—whether of individual ownership or of Governmental ownership. The system of letting land from year to year on the lowest term gives a man no guarantee that he will be allowed to retain his holding. We tried that system in this country; we had it here and the people rebelled against it, defeated it and broke it. As I said at the start, the tenant farmers fought for and won the right of free sale, fixity of tenure and fair rent. They won that through our predecessors, men who had an interest in this country and surely we are not going to abolish what they fought for and won? I hope this Government or some Government will settle that question finally and give the farmer once and for all the fruits of what generations fought for so nobly and won. I hope that the Minister will look into the question of annuities and the question of fences to which I have referred and that, when the next debate on this Vote takes place, we shall have some better declaration of future policy in regard to land division. I hope the Minister will indicate that it is intended to give land only to such people as the Government feels will use it properly, that a preference will be given to men with some capital, so long as they are not millionaires—the sons of farmers, workers and landless men who have proved by taking conacre and grazing that they can make proper use of land. These are the type of people we want to attract to land and settle there if possible.

Mr. Donnellan

A statement was made in this House during this debate that we robbed the British, so to speak, in taking the annuities away from them. I think that speeches such as that tend to go back to the past rather than to look forward to the future. As a matter of fact, the same Deputy who said that this was robbery said that what is happening in this country is that we are paying £100 an acre for land and giving it to people at £50 an acre and that this country could not exist if that continued. His idea apparently was that the annuities should again be doubled to get back this £100 per acre. So far as we people on the land are concerned, I want to make our attitude very clear. We believe that the land annuities should be wiped out entirely. We believe that they are only a hindrance and that we, who had to carry on the fight in the economic war, won these concessions. We were the people who had to suffer and in many cases we were victimised. That struggle cost us a certain amount of money but we won it and we think it unfair that our own Government should hold half of what we won in that fight.

Part of Deputy Giles' speech might be summed up in this way: "Come on ye people from Connaught to the wide plains of Meath; you are welcome there," but he wound up his speech more or less by saying that it was a mistake to send people from the West there at all.

Captain Giles

Uneconomic holders.

Mr. Donnellan

Quite right. He made one rather serious statement when he said that certain promises were made by the Land Commission to these people, promises of a certain amount of stock, and that these promises were not fulfilled. Many of these come from my area. Some of them are friends of my own as a matter of fact, and if the promises were not kept it was not the fault of the present Minister because he was not in office then. I think it was rather due to a mistake in the Civil Service. I have a list of what they were promised—of course it was prepared by a civil servant. Here it is: a horse, a cow, two yearlings, ten hens and ten cocks. The civil servant who drew up that list had, apparently, a terribly high sense of morality, but when it came back to the Department, naturally enough older heads wiped out nine of the cocks. That was the only change and I do not think there is any great complaint about it. The only thing that was withdrawn from the list in the first agreement were the nine cocks.

To turn to more serious matters, it is all right talking about taking over land in Meath but it should be done. Where a man has a large farm and is not using it to the advantage of the country, it should be taken over. But there is land to be taken over in the West of Ireland as well as in County Meath. It is not long since I put a question to the Minister in connection with an estate in County Galway. The Land Commission took over 700 acres of the Ashtown estate. They have turned around and handed 500 acres of that estate to the Forestry Department. I asked the Minister then if he was aware that this was arable land, that it grew crops last year, and he told me that that was not the case. That land was wired in for forestry although there were many applications from landless men and uneconomic holders for it. Not later than last Sunday I was in that area and I saw that land. Forty acres of it, which definitely grew oats and wheat last year, are now fenced in for forestry purposes and taken from the people who wanted it for tillage. I defy contradiction by the Department or anybody in this House of that statement, and Deputy Beegan will bear out what I have said.

We hear a good deal about the question of fair price. I agree that a man should get a fair price for his land when it is taken over by the Land Commission. But there are other things to be considered. I have worn holes in my boots going across to the Land Commission about a certain farm which was supposed to be acquired outside Tuam. Notice was served on the owner. By some underhand arrangements, he sold this farm of 60 acres of bad land—bad because he was not able to look after it. He obtained £800 for it. Although notice was served on him that it was to be acquired, he got twice what the piece of land was worth. The Land Commission have consented to the buyer being the tenant but they have told me that they will acquire it no matter who is the owner. If they do not pay £800 for it, they will be told that they are not paying a fair price. I believe that arrangements were made and that that price was put on it so that, when the Land Commission would take it over, they would have to pay twice the price of the land. In parts of the West of Ireland—the Minister need not go as far as Meath at all—there is a great deal to be desired as regards land division. I expect much from the new Minister. I know he is a most energetic man. I want to tell him that 20 and 22-acre farms are too small. I believe that we must go to from 30 to 40 acres to enable a man to exist. Of course, Deputy Giles tells us, more or less, that people from the West are not suited for land at all. He says that their children live by going over and back to England, by fishing and that sort of thing. That is what I gathered from Deputy Giles' speech. For years, that was the case but we are looking forward to better conditions and we trust that that will not be necessary while there is land the owners of which are not using it advantageously. To go back to the Ashtown estate, there is a rumour, which may be either right or wrong, that Lady Ashtown went to the Department and got a guarantee that, instead of dividing this arable land amongst landless men and uneconomic holders, it would be planted. If such a guarantee was given, it was such as the British would give in days gone by to prevent our people getting a living.

Mr. Corry

A number of rather strange statements were made on this Vote. We had Deputy's Dillon's statement demanding that 50 per cent. be put back again on the farmers. Only a few years ago Deputy Dillon came in as sub-leader to the Parnell of 1932, to look after the farmers, and apparently the manner in which he is looking after them now is to demand that their annuities be increased by 50 per cent., and that we get back into the old rut. He has fallen so much in love with John Bull that he wants to hand him back the annuities again, according to his statement. Deputy Bennett talked about fixity of tenure. Anything taken from fixity of tenure was taken by the Act of 1923, and I should like to see anybody endeavouring to take land off the farmers. That is about the most ridiculous statement I heard. Then, the Deputy went on to ask that one set of farmers be made permanent in their holdings while the farmer who gets land from the Land Commission is to have no permanency and is not to have any claim or right. These are rather ridiculous statements. I cannot agree with the statement of my friend, Deputy Donnellan, about the land annuities being completely wiped out. When the question of the division of the money, rightly held here by the Irish people, was approached under the Act of 1933, we had to remember one thing: We could wipe out the annuities completely in the case of the farmers who purchased their land prior to 1923, but if we were to do that there would be no more taking over of land. The farmers who came under the 1923, 1927 and subsequent Acts would have to pay their full annuities, because their payments were not involved in the struggle. The annuities withheld from Britain were the annuities due before 1923. No annuities arising under any Act of the Oireachtas were involved.

There was the choice of wiping out annuities in the case of men who purchased prior to the Act of 1923, and to let unfortunate people be held down by landlords until compulsory power was given by the Dáil to take over their land. These people would get no relief and would be compelled to pay the full annuities. The 50 per cent. being paid by those who purchased under the old Act goes towards half the annuities of these people as well as paying for land taken over for division. I must agree with Deputy Donnellan in some of the things he said. I do not believe 22 acres of land is an economic holding. Any man who gets 22 acres from the Land Commission, if he is going to remain on the land, must go out and work for his neighbours. He could not make a livelihood on a holding of that size. There is no good in pretending that he could. It is as well for a man to be a beggar in Galway as to be a beggar in Meath.

Dealing with the taking over of estates, it is many years since I raised the question of taking over the Flower estate in County Cork. It consists of some 420 acres and is held by an absentee tenant who lives in Birmingham. The Land Commission took over 40 acres. They did not notify any of the people who were demanding a division of this estate, but held a kind of court in Cork to which nobody but the solicitor for the owner was admitted. The following week an advertisement appeared in the Cork Examiner stating that 380 acres of the rich land of Cloyne were to be let on the 11 months' system. It has been let on that system ever since. There are applications for land from all parts of the country. There were 380 acres there held by an absentee, and after an inquiry, as they would put it in the Land Commission, they came back from their tour and decided to take 40 acres. Even the tillage portion is being let still. Until compulsory powers were brought in ordering the growing of ten per cent. under wheat the tillage on that estate was let under a regulation which prescribed that no wheat was to be grown. That regulation was made by the man living in Birmingham. The parishes of Cloyne and Aghadoo were planted. The smallest holdings in these combined parishes would contain about 250 acres. The planters are still there and are quite happy. When the attention of the Land Commission was drawn to the position an inspector went down and the result was that 40 acres were taken. If the Department took the trouble to get the daily newspapers for three months, and if they looked up the lettings of land, both for tillage and grazing in that area, it would be realised that there is plenty of land there to be taken over and divided amongst the people whose ancestors were driven from it. Apparently, the Land Commission are not prepared to do that.

I believe that there is no use in dividing up land into 20 or 22-acre farms. I consider that to be waste of money. No man could rear a family on a holding of that size. It means he becomes an agricultural labourer who has to seek work in competition with ordinary labourers in the neighbourhood. It is a wrong policy to create uneconomic holdings. I inspected holdings in Meath, and if I were in charge of the Land Commission at the time estates were being divided, those responsible would not hold their positions very long. I saw 2,000 acres divided up on the Gibbstown estate. It consisted of a castle, 50 box stalls for horses, 120 stalls for cows, hay barns and other buildings. The Land Commission carved the estate up, but left only 196 acres of land with the house. I looked over the 196 acres and considered that only about three acres were fit to stick a plough in. The castle and 196 acres were left there, but 50 yards away the Land Commission built cottages that cost £300 or £400 each for new allottees. If the intention was to leave a decent holding in which a farmer could be established, and on which he could keep a bull, and other machinery for the convenience of small allottees, the place should have been divided fairly and the money spent on buildings saved. The Minister laughed when I mentioned keeping a bull there.

Mr. Moylan

Machinery.

Mr. Corry

What farmer could keep a bull on a holding of 20 acres? My opinion of what occurred there was that it was a scandal. I think when the big estates of that description are being divided, and where the land that is being allotted is definitely insufficient for the allottee to have a livelihood for himself, his wife and his family without having to go outside, the least you would expect would be that the Land Commission would leave some fairly big holding where these men could get employment, and where such things as a reaper, binder and mowing machine would be for loan to the smallholder. There is nothing of that description. I saw the manner in which these things were done, because I took another trip down there to have a look at them and see how they were getting on.

I am more than anxious to see unfortunate men who are living in the bogs and on the mountains taken and put into decent land, wherever it can be found for them. I went down to see how they got on. I would like to hear from the Meath Deputies how many of these men are making a success on the 20 acres, or is it going back to the old system under which the fellow that was put out gets it back for grazing? That is a thing I do not know. I think in that respect the Department will want to inquire into it. I hope it will make further investigation in my constituency into the holdings that are left there without being tilled, on which there is neither tillage nor grazing, which are held year after year by purely absentee tenants. I would like to have the Minister look up the file of the Flower estate and see what reason the Land Commission were able to give for not acquiring the whole of that estate.

Mr. Meighan

It seems to me rather amusing to hear some of the Deputies asking the Government to increase by a certain amount the acreage given to new allottees, in order to make them more economic than they usually would be. I gather from Deputies Donnellan and Corry that nothing less than from 30 to 40 acres is sufficient. I agree with them. I have known the Congested Districts Board in my own area to give ten acres of land to people that were taken from the West of Ireland from congested areas and from places in Roscommon. They were absolutely unable to live on that land exclusively, that is, if they had a family. They lived on it and made well on it, but it was by the women doing the work in the fields and the men going out on the roads or going across to England. The amusing thing is to be asking the Government to do these things in view of the instance I have here. I am going to quote a case now. It is in Mayo, and the representative of the owner was his sister. The son of the family happens to be in America. I am informed that the valuation of the holding was only 5/-, and in 1925 there was an addition made to it of three acres. The family circumstances, due to a number of deaths in the family, became pretty acute, with the result that the young man that had intended to settle down found himself in difficulties and emigrated to America. I am also informed that he is now in the American Army and is unable to return. Notwithstanding that, the Land Commission has served notice on him and on his sister to give up this three acres that they gave in 1925, leaving the old place with a valuation of 5/- for this young man to come back to and settle down. I approached the Land Commission on the matter, and I was informed that if I could satisfy them that he intended to come back they would stay their hand.

I went home and consulted with the representative and she has satisfied me that he has the intention of coming back and produced a letter. It was dated back some time. I assured the Land Commission, as I assure the Minister and the House, that if I did not really believe that he intended to come back I would have nothing to do with the case. However, the representative had an affidavit sworn and produced a letter from her brother in America saying that he did intend to come back. Evidently it is impossible for him to come back at the present time. The case was put that the land was not being used properly, but I have been assured by the sister that she was quite prepared to give the land for tillage to any people in the area until her brother would return. I also pointed out to the Land Commission that possession of the land was not to be taken until the 1st August and asked what would be done about the tillage. They could give me no information but that the possession would be taken on the 1st August. If they were anxious to comply with the tillage regulations one would fancy that they would take it over so that the tillage regulations could be complied with. However, the sister has made arrangements and the whole little lot has been let and cultivated, I think, in oats. Well, as I have said, I would be very slow to take up the case if I thought there was no intention of the young man coming home. I think it is a great hardship and a bad proceeding for the Government to take from a little farm which they have made economic the land that they gave to them and to leave it uneconomic. The Minister will understand that I said I am informed that the valuation of the old place is 5/-. I appeal to the Minister even at this late hour to use a little clemency in the matter. I am sure that he is aware, as most people are, that little holdings like this have great sentimental value for the family. For these reasons and other reasons I think it is a very great hardship for the Land Commission to insist on proceeding as they intend to do. With regard to the division of estates, I can understand the fact that a large number of the staff of the Land Commission has been transferred and their duties in the way of land division must be curtailed. At the same time I have complaints to make to this effect, that I think that the division of land is not taking place in order.

In view of the great outcry there is for the production of food and the representations that have been made to me by farmers around Castlerea, I am satisfied that the division of the Castlerea estate or the lands around there would be of great help. I am informed that the Land Commission found it hard to let some of this land because its fertility has been so reduced, and that the tillage carried out on it by the Land Commission was not very profitable. I think that even at the cost of a little sacrifice the Minister would be well advised to hurry up the division of this land.

There is also an outcry for land in the Knockcroghery area where the people are noted for the excellent way in which they cultivate their land as well as for their anxiety to produce all kinds of food including wheat, barley, oats and potatoes. All the Deputies for the county have been requested to urge that the division of land there should be speeded up. Some Deputy said that if big farmers are not able to fence their land it should be taken from them. Deputies are aware of how difficult it is to fence land at present since it is practically impossible to get wire, and in many parts of the country there is no substitute for wire.

I am satisfied from personal experience, in regard to the bogs that have been divided by the Land Commission, that parcelling them out in statute acre plots does not produce the best results. You may find one man who will cut a bank at the wrong spot where there is no outlet for the water. He will cut there, and you may find ten other people who will not. In one or two years' time you may have ten, 12 or 14 people held up in their effort to cut turf and all because of the default of this one man. If the Land Commission took over the bogs themselves and set them at a yearly rent they would be able to ensure that a man who rented a bog would start to cut it where there was a proper outlet for the water. People should get notice to the effect that if they did not comply with the rules and regulations of the Land Commission they would not get turf banks. I say that because of what has come under my personal observation.

I think that if my suggestion were adopted, it would be the better way of handling these turf banks. I know bogs that were divided by the Land Commission nine or ten years ago, and I am certain that 50 per cent. of the people who would desire to cut turf on them find it impossible to do so for the reasons that I have mentioned. I am also aware that, while they are paying a little rent for turbary to the Land Commission, they are also taking banks which are being let by private individuals. The trouble there is that since the emergency when coal got scarce, there has been a great demand for turf banks. We find that people who had already got allotments are not cutting turf on them but are taking banks from private owners, thereby depriving people who have no turbary rights of being able to cut a supply of turf for themselves. If the suggestion which I have made were adopted I think it would help to remedy that situation.

The bog roads made nine or ten years ago are very much neglected. No repairs have been carried out on them so that people find it hard, except during a very dry season, to get out the turf. Last season the people were so busily engaged in saving the harvest that at the end of it, when the weather broke, they were not able to get out the turf so that most of it remained on the bogs. That was a loss not only to the individuals concerned but to the nation in general.

The grants given for the repair of these bog roads may not be the concern of the Minister, but perhaps I may be allowed to make a short reference to them. Unless there is a certain number of unemployed in an area, the grants are not given. I have known that to happen in my area. The result is that the grants were lost although these bog roads were very badly in need of repair. If it is within the Minister's sphere, I would ask him to be sympathetic in trying to have these roads attended to.

Sir John Esmonde

I would like to refer to a certain class of tenant purchasers who have already been mentioned by several speakers. A considerable amount of anxiety exists in their minds as to what exactly their position is under the present administration of the Land Acts by the Land Commission. Before I come to the actual point in question, it may be well to point out to the Minister—I am sure he is aware of it—that he is administering a code dealing roughly with three different sets of purchasers under the various Land Acts. He is administering the code as one code when perhaps it should be administered as three distinct codes, all being part of a large general code. The first class of purchasers are those who had entered into arrangements with their landlords and had taken advantage of the land purchase facilities that existed prior to the passing of the Land Act of 1923. This is the class with which I am particularly concerned. The second class is composed of those who were generally brought in under the 1923 Act, tenants already in occupation of their holdings, but who for one reason or another were not tenant purchasers. The third class is composed of those who came into being under the various Land Acts and includes landless men, persons holding under fee farm grants and long leases, to whom the original code was never applicable.

So far as these three different classes are concerned, of course the earliest, from the point of view of time and date, are those owners with whom I am concerned at the moment, those who were actually tenant purchasers at the time of the passing of the 1923 Land Act. I think there were roughly about seven or eight or perhaps more Acts of Parliament which granted them facilities to purchase. I do not want to enter into any controversy about the land annuities or the halving of them, but the case which these tenant purchasers make is that, as a result of whatever legislation exists at the moment and of whatever administration is being carried out, their situation is likely to be very seriously jeopardised.

I am not in the position to work out the calculation of what the position would be. Some of them feel that, previously, there was a fund—not a Government fund—into which their annuities were payable from time to time, and, as a result of the original bargain which they made— there was no question of compulsion in it—after a certain length of time the debt would be eventually paid off and they would become the owners in fee simple of the holdings which, generation after generation, their families had worked and improved. Their fear is that, because they are now brought into the general scope of the system of collection at present in operation, and because of certain sections in the Land Act of 1933, which have been referred to as those which abolished fixity of tenure, they will be overpaying the amount they originally contracted to pay. I am not able to furnish the Minister with the figures and mechanical details, but I am sure he will appreciate the point.

These people fear that, as a result of the administration of the code, in this way they will suffer. They are people who, I suggest, should receive the most favourable treatment, as the original beneficiaries under the code. Some of them put it that the annuity which they are paying at present was never intended to be paid into the State, but was to go into the fund which provided the capital sum. By paying it into that fund, they believe that they have now repaid the original advance. The Minister would be doing a great deal of good if he would make an authoritative statement on the subject, in order to make these people realise—if it is a fact—that they are in no way prejudiced by the present administration of the code, and that they will come out of it at the proper time, having kept their bargain, without any additional burden placed on them as a result of the Act of 1933.

The Minister will realise that those people who went through the land agitation two generations ago voluntarily agreed to pay a certain figure, and undertook to pay that figure by annual instalments, on the basis that they would have discharged their complete liability in a certain period. They would have a distinct grievance against our native Government if, having entered into a bargain with representatives of another Government, and being prepared to carry out that bargain, they should find that, as a result of something our Government has done, they were now placed in a worse position. I think that is the last thing the Minister would wish to happen.

The purchasers go back many years to the original Land Purchase Act and, from time to time, these people must be coming to the end of their particular payment periods, so the matter will be becoming of more importance from day to day. It has been mentioned here by various speakers and a considerable amount of confusion of thought exists in many people's minds regarding it. I would like to be frank with the Minister and tell him that I, personally, have looked into the matter and cannot make out exactly what the position is, except that there seems to be a case that, under the working of the code at present, these people are likely to suffer grave financial disadvantage.

Perhaps, if this is a new point to the Minister, with which he is not ready to deal now in the authoritative way I would like him to deal with it—and I am sure he, as Minister for Lands, would wish to deal with it in that way —he could make some statement later on the subject, explaining the exact position of these people. That would allay a considerable amount of public anxiety as regards this matter.

The question of the size of small holdings has been discussed here. That concerns a new class of allottees, who are being given holdings, for which public money is being made available. I mentioned in the debate on agriculture that, where public money is being advanced for the provision of farm holdings for deserving members of the community—a system with which I am in thorough agreement—one of the principles which should underlie the operations of the Department is, besides ensuring that the person is suitable, to ensure that the size of the farm will be such as to provide the greatest benefit to the State, which is bearing the cost of providing the money to enable these people to receive and work the land. The question of the most suitable size of a small holding is extremely important, under the circumstances. This is a matter which I should like the Minister to look into.

I have previously expressed my views during the debate on the cost of living and the agricultural position. I have come to the conclusion that the most suitable type of farmer is the man who gets most out of the land, who makes a profit and who wins for the community some extra food. I confess I am not one of those, as I do not get as much out of it as a smallholder does; but I think the small holding, adapted to be worked by the ordinary family—that is to say, by the farmer himself and, perhaps, one member of his family—will give the best advantage to the community. The Land Commission can decide the most suitable size of holding according to that principle. I know there are two lines of thought on that point. Someone has mentioned the Land Commission's figure as 25 statute acres. There will be disagreement on that point but, if the particular beneficiary is given suitable equipment and suitable credit, on a holding of 25 acres of really workable land, I think that is the proper economic basis to start on.

The matter is more important than people generally realise. There are many more persons who have to be suited with land, as the agricultural labourer is gradually going out of existence as such. He is turning into an owner of the soil and a small capitalist in his own way. The difficulty exists of reconciling farmers' costings and profits, but they are generally recognised as providing only a poor living wage at the moment. We certainly cannot go back again, even when prices go back, with the result that a large body of people who are at present employed on farms must, in order to solve our future economic problem, in turn become owners of farms themselves. There is only a certain amount of land to go around and, if I had a say in the matter, I would come down on the side of the small holding.

I do not think there is any violent criticism to be directed at the Minister with regard to the administration of his Department. We all realise he is working under considerable difficulties. It is well known to anybody who has anything to do with the Land Commission that his staff is robbed to man other branches during the emergency and the Minister is doing his best under the circumstances. I would be glad if he takes note of the points I have mentioned and deal with the classes of persons to whom I have referred, persons who are increasing in number from day to day. If he is not in a position to deal with that matter to-day, perhaps he will do so in the near future.

Mr. Blowick

In reply to a Parliamentary Question some time ago, the Minister for Lands informed me that the Land Commission had on hands in the County Mayo, undivided, approximately 12,000 acres, of which 6,000 acres are arable. I should like him to explain why the Land Commission has some of these lands on hands since 1915. In one instance to which I drew the attention of his Department, there are three holdings in the townland of Kennewry and the tenants were migrated as far back as 1915. It seems very queer that the Land Commission has kept these holdings on hand and has not done something with them; surely they could have found some scheme in which they could work the holdings or utilise them for the purpose of increasing the holdings of other tenants in the immediate vicinity.

In another case not very far from my district, as far back as 1917 or 1918, there was a farm of about 60 to 80 statute acres bought and it has been let for grazing every year since then. At a rough calculation, the Land Commission must have recovered more than the money they paid to the owner. That seems very queer conduct on the part of the Land Commission, to hold land in a highly congested area when it could easily be split into holdings of an economic size, thus relieving congestion. Something similar is happening all over County Mayo. The usual answer Deputies receive is that, owing to the emergency, the staff of the Land Commission is on loan to other Departments, principally the Department of Agriculture. I suppose that is necessary in a period of emergency, but at the same time there must be a sufficient skeleton staff left to deal with cases such as I have referred to and thus prevent people getting the notion that the Land Commission has become nothing more than a big landlord.

I suppose my townland is the one that suffers most from the point of view of uneconomic holdings. If there was an average taken of the whole county, I suppose the valuation would scarcely reach £7. Deputy Giles defended his own constituents pretty well. I expect they are mostly big farmers. I speak for a county which was densely populated back in the time of Cromwell, who forced the Irish people to hell or Connaught. That dense population has remained there ever since on very poor quality land. I have seen, in the Kilkelly district, men trying to make a living on six or seven acres of land of such wretched quality that, when sowing potatoes in the springtime, they have to hack the furrows between the ridges in order to get enough mould to cover the potatoes. The same is true of most holdings along the western seaboard. There are Deputies in the Minister's Party who can give him the same information.

I come now to some of the estates in Mayo that have not yet been dealt with. I communicated with the Minister's Department on several occasions in connection with certain estates. One is the Peyton estate, near Castlebar, which is worked on the rundale system. I cannot understand why something is not done with that estate. It is said that when some Mayo people are asked to emigrate, they seek to strike their own bargains; they want this holding or that farm and they will not go. Surely there must be some method which the Land Commission could devise, with all the machinery at its disposal, to overcome a difficulty like that. I will quote one instance of the working of the rundale system on that particular estate, which is within sight of the county town of Castlebar. One man owns seven statute acres and he tries to make a living out of that land.

The seven acres are divided into 27 unfenced plots. I am sure most Deputies have some idea of the rundale system.

There are estates in the Louisburgh area which should have been dealt with long ago. I suggest that there is a deplorable lack of efficiency on the part of the Land Commission in relation to the Peyton estate, near Castlebar, the O'Dowd estate at Louisburgh, and other estates in different parts of County Mayo. I have called frequently to the Land Commission about these estates, and the usual answer is that because of understaffing at the moment they cannot do anything. It would not require a full staff to divide an estate such as the Peyton estate. In connection with that estate, there was a farm of 80 statute acres and the tenants offered to buy the land if the Land Commission would permit them, and divide it amongst themselves. Permission would not be granted. I suggest that that is clearly pointing to inefficiency in the Minister's Department, inefficiency that should be set right with the least possible delay.

I think it was Deputy O'Higgins who mentioned sanitation, and I was glad to hear him introduce that subject. He did not go far enough with the question of sanitation. That question affects the rural districts all over Ireland. It is unfortunately too common to see houses without proper sanitary accommodation. The Deputy mentioned cow-houses and the use they have been put to on occasions. That is quite true, and Deputies must be well aware of the existing conditions. When the Land Commission are building houses, I do not see why they could not instal proper sanitary accommodation and a system of hot and cold water. The whole thing would not increase the cost of the dwelling by more than £20, in my opinion. When the houses are being erected, that is the time to do it. In all rural Ireland there would not be a dozen houses in each parish.

This lack of sanitation is commented on in foreign countries. Visitors from India, with whom I was in touch not so long ago, commented on it and said that Ireland in that respect was far behind India. That is a pretty sharp indictment, and the Land Commission is to be blamed for that more than any other Government Department. They might have devised some system of grants by which the raw material could be provided and the people could be allowed to make use of it on the same lines as the farm improvements scheme. I ask the Minister to consider doing something like that. If he does he will be doing a good day's work. If he never did anything else during his period of office than provide suitable accommodation of that sort, he will have done a really good day's work. It is for the Minister's Department to devise some scheme of proper sanitation for every rural dweller and also a system of hot and cold water.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Minister for Lands has no authority to do that. There is nothing in this Vote connected with that.

Mr. Blowick

I am trying to couple that with the erection of new houses by the Land Commission. It would be a good day's work if they did it in connection with the building of new houses. I do not think I am suggesting to the Minister that he should devise some plan by which grants would be available from his Department for the installing of these amenities in existing dwellings. The slavery that women, in particular, in farmhouses, have to undergo for want of an easily provided system of hot and cold water is deplorable. A good deal has been said about the sale of holdings. I think Deputy Dillon said that it is as much as a person's life is worth to offer a holding for sale. There is undoubtedly a hunger for land. My experience is that that land hunger only exists in areas where the holdings are wretchedly small; where the size of the holding is not sufficient to enable a man to rear a family. I know many dozens of holdings where large families have been raised on seven or eight statute acres. There is no outlook for these families except emigration. I think it was Deputy Corry said that such a state of affairs makes these people seek work on the roads and elsewhere, thus depriving labourers of employment. This land question cannot be handled in a very rapid manner. But I would say that where farms, large or small, are for sale, the Minister should take them up and divide them and thus relieve congestion. In one portion of my constituency where the holdings are about 30 statute acres, there is no land hunger. The people are very contented. They have nice dwellings and they are working to a very high state of efficiency. But where there are holdings for sale, or where old people die without leaving any heirs, the holdings should be taken over. That would help to eliminate this hunger for land.

As to the question of fixity of tenure, I think Deputy Moran said some time ago that until fixity of tenure was abolished there would be no prosperity amongst farmers. I am not sure of his exact words, but I do not think I am misquoting him. I should like to ask the Minister if that represents the policy of the Government. Was Deputy Moran speaking only for himself or was he speaking for the Government when he said that? Deputy Dillon dealt with the question of the three F's. very ably. Until the question of fixity of tenure, free sale and fair rent is settled it is hard to expect a farmer to take an interest in his land or to be a good efficient unit in the community.

Deputy Donnellan pleaded for the wiping out of annuities. I am in thorough agreement with that. We have borne the burden of an economic war which is reputed to have cost some £82,000,000 and anyone who says that we did not buy out our land during that period has not much sympathy with the vast majority of the people of the country. I should like the Minister to clear up this matter of fixity of tenure.

Mr. Tunney

I must say that I am disappointed that the Government did not continue the good work that they were doing in acquiring all the large ranches. Deputy Dillon said here on one occasion that it was a pity the ranches had been broken up; that the store cattle in the West were purchased and brought to these ranches and that that should continue. God help this country if the ranches had not been broken up and we were depending on the ranchers to feed our population. I am disappointed that the Government put a standstill on the acquisition of the ranches and their division amongst people who would make use of them. On the question of the selection of tenants for these divided lands, on behalf of the people I represent in County Dublin, I have to object strongly to the way in which the last estate acquired in County Dublin was divided up. That is the Kelson estate at Oldtown, Co. Dublin. For years we have been agitating to get this estate divided amongst local people. That went on for years, but finally the estate was acquired and divided. But who received the biggest portion of the land? Two people from County Kerry. I am casting no reflection on people from County Kerry. As a matter of fact, I admire them. Every time I met people from County Kerry I found them to be of a good class.

But I do say that they have no claim to land in North County Dublin where there are competent local applicants who are in a position to take over the land and use it. I defy contradiction when I say that there are no better tillage people than the farmers' sons in North County Dublin. Why should any Kerry man be brought up and put on this land in Oldtown? This is the only opportunity we have to protest against such things. Where land is to be divided and there are suitable local applicants capable of making use of it for the production of food and the giving of employment, I do not see why any outsider should be brought in. I hold that the local people should have first claim. The people in North Dublin are quieter than people in other parts of the country, where they would not allow a stranger to come in and get land. I do not wish to stir up any agitation in connection with the matter, but I say that the people in North County Dublin are very quiet people when the land that they are in need of can be taken over in that way.

In connection with holdings given out by the Land Commission, I must back up what has been said by Deputy Giles. I am in favour of bringing in migrants where there are no local applicants. As a matter of fact, the Government have done very good work in that connection; but I cannot understand the idea of taking a small tenant farmer from an uneconomic holding in County Mayo or County Kerry or County Donegal, where those who came before him reared a family for the emigrant ship, and putting him on a holding in Meath where he raises a family for whom there is no future but the emigrant ship. What other future could there be for a family on 20 acres? It would be far better if the farms were double the size, when, of course, a smaller number would have to be given out, but so long as you take one man from an uneconomic holding and put him on another, the position is the same. The other points with which I intended to deal have already been dealt with and I do not propose to say anything except to repeat that I protest in the strongest manner against the division of the Kelson estate in Oldtown, and, as the prospective occupants have not yet gone in, I appeal to the Minister to find land for these people in some other part of Ireland and leave the land of North County Dublin for the deserving people of North County Dublin.

Mr. Flanagan

Deputy Tunney has made a protest, and probably rightly so, against Kerry men being likely to secure portions of land in his constituency. I am very much surprised that it is not Cork men who have secured that land, and I support the Deputy 100 per cent. in his protest. If it happened in my constituency, I must say that I would organise the people against it, because I am afraid the time is coming when the people must fight for what Almighty God has provided for them, the land.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy appreciates that he cannot be permitted to advocate the breaking of the law.

Mr. Larkin

He is only giving warning.

Mr. Flanagan

I am only giving warning, as Deputy Larkin says. The Deputy always comes to my assistance when I am in trouble. This is the place to settle the law so that it will suit the people. I am satisfied that the Land Commission is doing practically nothing at the moment, and it is a strange state of affairs that ranches still exist. I must admit that a certain amount has been done, but I have always held—Deputy Dillon does not seem to hold the same opinion—that the rancher has been the real enemy of the small farmer. The rancher is the very individual who must be attacked.

Certain Ministers came down to Laoighis and appealed to the farmers to give further assistance to the effort to produce more food. We were told that every farmer was to get out and do his part, as he is doing, and yet the Land Commission absolutely refused to divide lands in South Laoighis, in the districts of Killeshin, Arles and Ballickmoyler. The Minister must be fairly familiar with these areas, because I am sure there are piles of correspondence in his Department relating to these lands. The Land Commission allowed a stranger from the North of Ireland, or some other place, to come in, to stock the land and to work it, while people in the area who were equipped and competent to work the land were denied the opportunity of getting it. The Government would not come to their aid and put out the stranger so that the local people could get the land. When the local people protested, and, in spite of the Land Commission, went out and ploughed the land, they were arrested and tried before the tribunal in Collins Barracks and sentenced to a year in Mountjoy. That is what was done with people who in answer to the Government's call to produce more food for the nation, put a ranch under the plough. I say that was most unfair. The Government has stood over that action and the Minister's Department has approved of it by making no move in the matter.

We have numerous areas in the same county where there are small holders, landless men and agricultural workers. All these people are very anxious to get land to till it and to produce food for man and beast. Yet a gentleman like Davy Frame can come down and buy these farms over the heads of the local people, pulling down the mansions and making a good thing out of them, and then selling the lands in small lots when it is no good to anybody. Yet the Government are not in a position to make the Land Commission do its duty and have those farms acquired and given out to the people in the district. It is a terrible state of affairs that individuals should be able to go around the country buying up every place they can get and depriving the agricultural worker, the small farmer and those prepared to work the land in these areas from getting land. I was one of a deputation which approached the Minister in connection with certain estates which this gentleman took over in County Laoighis. He is making a usual practice of it. He is now going to Offaly, and I heard he was in County Westmeath lately, looking at what places he was going to buy. I understand that he has been active in County Dublin as well. He is a national hero for depriving the people of land. Yet the Land Commission have taken absolutely no steps to see that such procedure is prohibited, or to step in and divide these lands amongst the people best entitled to them, the local residents.

It is regrettable to see many of these mansions, such as the fine building at Brockley Park on the Cremorgan estate in County Laoighis, being tumbled to the ground, and this gentleman coming in and taking the land over the local people's heads. The Minister is quite well aware of these facts. He is also aware that the Land Commission are at present handling a farm near Rathdowney, called the Ross estate. Whether his inspector was influenced, or whether it was due to stupidity, or the fact that he did not know the grievances which exist in the area, he brought in to Rathdowney, where there are people anxious to get land to work, strangers who had recommendations, I am given to understand, from prominent members of the Government. It is deplorable that the local people cannot be satisfied first. I have no objection to a stranger being brought in. There is no man who would extend a heartier céad míle fáilte to the stranger than I, but I would insist on the local people being satisfied before such a stranger is admitted.

I have not heard anything in connection with the Ross estate, although I have written letters time and again to the Land Commission, requesting certain information about the manner in which those lands were set by the inspector who visited the district, and I hope that the Minister will make some reference to it in his reply. If he does not care to make a reference to it here in the House, I suggest that he be good enough to ask his private secretary to drop me a line and let me know the position.

While I am speaking on this issue I should like also to refer to the question of bog division by the Land Commission. Between the towns of Birr and Banagher there is a huge stretch of bog, and I understand that before the emergency the Land Commission were going to divide it. In that connection, it would seem to me that the Department of the Land Commission has suffered from the emergency more than any other Department in the State. No matter what suggestion you put before them, they always make the excuse of the emergency. In my opinion, they are using the emergency simply to blind the public, and that the real fact is that they do not want to go on with the work. Every letter that you get from them, in reply to any proposals or suggestions you make, is that they can do nothing because of the emergency. Everything is blamed on the emergency. If that is so, then why not close down the Department altogether for the period of the emergency? The Minister tells us that many of the Land Commission staff have gone over to other Departments. Some time ago, the Minister or his predecessor—I am not sure which—said that the vast majority of the people who had been dealing with Land Commission work had gone over to the Department of Supplies. For goodness sake, what would Land Commission officials know about the administration of the Department of Supplies? Who ever heard before of sending officials of one Department over to deal with the affairs of another Department, and particularly the Department of Supplies, of which they knew nothing? I would not mind if there was anything to supply. Surely to goodness, there are at least sufficient men with intelligence in this country, if the Land Commission really wanted them, to get along with the work, so that there would be no need for us to be eternally listening to the same old reply being drummed into our ears at all times: "We cannot do anything; we cannot go ahead on account of the emergency."

Deputies have made reference here to the size of farms or the amount of land that is usually given by the Land Commission to applicants for land. Now, I am of the opinion that the granting of 20, 25 or 30 acres of land is only going to put a man in a condition of slavery for the rest of his life. What use is 30 acres of land to a married man? Is he to be expected to get a living out of it and rear a family on it? And when his family is reared, what are his family going to do on 30 acres? Probably, they will be looking for more land, and even if they get it they will be in just the same boat when their own families are reared. As another Deputy has said, their only alternative will be the emigrant ship, because there will be no living for them on the land. We are constantly hearing of the flight from the land. There would even seem to be a hatred of the land, from some of the references that are made. Every time that Deputy Larkin gets up here to speak in the House he asks: "Why bring these people up from the country to work in the city? Why not keep them down on the land and provide work for them?", and rightly so, but neither the Land Commission nor the Government is doing anything for these people and, as a result, they have no alternative but to come up here to the city and do Dublin men out of work, or else take the emigrant ship from Dun Laoghaire or Rosslare and go over to England to eke out an existence there because they are denied an opportunity of a decent life on their own land.

I think that the giving of 20 or 30 acres is only putting these people into slavery. Take the case of a man who gets 30 acres of land from the Land Commission. Any economist will tell us—I am sure that Deputy Childers if he were speaking would tell us—that if a man has a horse it will take four acres of land to produce food for that horse, between hay, oats and other necessities for the whole year. If he has two horses, it means that eight acres will be devoted to producing enough food or fodder for the two horses, which means that the farmer is working for the horses instead of the horses working for the farmer. That is the position as I see it, and I am sure it is the position that the small farmers also see: that they are unable to live or exist on these holdings. Why, then, does not the Government take the necessary steps to cut out all this nonsense and give these people decent portions of land, so that their minds will be set at rest and they will be able to sit down to live in some kind of comfort and decency? They will never be able to do that so long as the Land Commission are proceeding as they are at the present time.

Perhaps I might be permitted to make a reference to the scales of pay which the Land Commission usually give to their workers. The Land Commission workers are very badly and very poorly paid, and I think that some steps ought to be taken to improve the conditions of the workers employed by the Land Commission. I understand that they have got some increases. I am told by workers in the Land Commission that they have received 33/- a week, and I should be glad if the Minister would give us some figures and let us know what increases these Land Commission workers have got, or if he is prepared to see that they will get a further increase.

Another matter to which I should like to refer is with regard to a farm in my part of the constituency. The Land Commission had been dealing with this farm for 14 years. Year after year, requests were made to have this farm divided, but the Land Commission did not seem to take any notice of these requests. They might send down an inspector when a general election was in the offing, and the people concerned would be told: "Oh, you are going to have this land divided up at any time now," as a result of which the Government got all the votes they wanted, but once the election was over nothing happened, and the inspector never appeared again until the next election came along. Eventually, I decided to take action in the matter. I attended an auction where the lands were going to be set, and I defied anybody to take the lands. I took the law into my own hands, as a matter of fact, and got away with it, but the result was that the Land Commission immediately bestirred themselves and divided the land. As a matter of fact, I think they even took too much. As I say, I took the law into my own hands there, but anything that this country ever got was not got through constitutional means, and I am afraid that if the Government do not act in accordance with the wishes of the people, the people will have to make them act; the people will be driven into it. I know very well what the Minister is thinking about me, in his own mind, at the moment, and I can guess what he would like to do with me, but I am convinced that the statements I am making are correct. They are quite in accordance with my own conscience, and I am satisfied that the lands to which I am referring would never have been divided if I had not taken the law into my own hands. Two months after the action that I took, the lands were divided.

Several complaints have come to me from time to time—I have referred them to the Minister—with regard to people in the County of Offaly who secured land elsewhere—probably, in Deputy Giles's constituency, County Meath—and I understand that the Land Commission undertook to provide them with an allowance to cover the cost of the removal of their livestock, furniture, agricultural implements, and so on. I am informed that in some cases farmers had five or six journeys to make in the removal of their goods, but the Land Commission gave them only a sufficient allowance to cover the cost of one journey. I think that when the Land Commission are transferring people from one place to another, the least they should do would be to give them an allowance to cover the total cost of the haulage of their live stock, furniture, agricultural implements, and so on, from one place to another, and not be putting these people further into debt. I would ask the Minister to give this matter very sympathetic consideration, because, after all, those people may not be in a position to pay for the transport of their goods, particularly at the present time.

I notice that the Leas-Cheann Comhairle is looking at the clock, and so, before he tells me that my 20 minutes are up, I think the best thing for me to do is to sit down.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Minister to conclude.

Deputy Beirne rose.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I am sorry, but I have called on the Minister to conclude.

Mr. Moylan

Deputy Flanagan is not by any means such a naïve or ingenuous child of nature as he pretends. If he thinks that by taking the law into his own hands and getting people in his constituency to take the law into their own hands he got better conditions in regard to the division of lands in that constituency, he is labouring under a great mistake. I have been an efficient law-breaker myself. I know the "ins" and "outs" of the minds of people like Deputy Flanagan.

Mr. Flanagan

You were a law-breaker at one time yourself.

Mr. Moylan

Deputy Roddy started off this debate by inquiring why the salaries paid to officials of the Land Commission on loan to other Departments were not shown on the Estimates. These salaries are properly shown in the Book of Estimates and, if the Deputy will look up the matter, he will find that we have not been lax in giving him the information he requires. This debate has ranged from that immaterial point over a very wide field. Deputies have visited many countries in trying to point out how poorly and inefficiently run the Land Commission was, how little it had the interest of the people at heart, and how ineffectual all its work was. There was so much talk about the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of the Land Commission and, incidentally, so much talk about Denmark, that I began to wonder if Hamlet had not the Land Commission in mind when he said:

"Tis an unweeded garden

That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature

Possess it merely."

Amongst the many matters raised in the debate were want of security of tenure, the three F's and the question of credit to farmers, all these things having a certain bearing on one another. There is no truth in the statement that farmers have not security of tenure. But it must be obvious to everybody that, if this nation is to survive—the fact that it has survived during the past few years under the conditions in which we have lived is proof of what I say—no man can have an absolute, all-embracing right, as against the people of the country, to his own land. If he had, the Government could not compel people to till in the particular way they wanted them to do. That could not be done if any farmer had the same right to his land that he would have to a chattel. In the final issue, it must be acknowledged that the people of this country own the land and have the right to the produce of the land. There is absolute fixity of tenure for any man who is working his land in a proper manner. If any man sets out to destroy land or to take it out of production, then that man is not entitled to any fixity of tenure. Fixity of tenure is something that is ultra-legal in this country. Fixity of tenure is really responsible for the fact that land here is not a good security for money. Bankers will not readily lend money on the security of land, not because the land has not been properly vested in the applicants, not because they have not proper fixity of tenure, but because there is what Deputy Meighan called a "sentimental feeling" in regard to the ownership of land. If a bank does lend money on the security of land, it is never able to realise its security.

Free sale has been raised as a question here. I think that the right of free sale has been preserved. Some Deputies suggested, in relation to free sale, that the Land Commission might interfere in regard to certain sales which are now taking place. They cannot have it both ways. The Land Commission has a definite commitment to the people in regard to the ownership, distribution and user of land. When the Land Commission divides up an estate and gives an allotment to any individual, it must not readily permit the allottee to sell the land whenever he likes to whomsoever he likes. Somebody said that the purpose of the Land Acts was to make the farmer an owner in fee simple. The original Land Acts, down from 1870, dealt with farmers who were living on the land. The later Land Acts have been dealing with men who did not previously possess a tenancy. The original Land Acts took the land from the landlords and transferred it to the farmers who had holdings on these estates. There is a difference in the operation of the original Land Acts and the later Land Acts. In giving land to any allottee, the Land Commission, acting for the Irish people, must have in mind that there is a duty imposed on the allottee properly to work that land and to enrich the nation. The Land Commission has a right to demand that. Where allottees have neglected to work their land, have not lived on it, have made no proper use of it and have utilised it merely by way of renting it and adding to their income and then come to the Land Commission— supported by Deputies of many Parties—and ask the Land Commission for permission to sell the land, to cash-in on the free gift the nation has given them, the Land Commission has every right not only to refuse permission but to tell those allottees that it is time to hand back that land to the Land Commission so that it may be given to people who will work it. Again, an allottee may be a reasonably good tenant, but I put it to the House that the Land Commission, having divided land, must try to function in such a way as will prevent the reconsolidation of farms. What is the use of expending money in purchasing farms, dividing them, making improvements and handing them over to particular individuals if, after a certain time, they are permitted to sell that land to a big farmer or to sell it back to the person from whom it was taken?

I move to report progress.

Progress reported. The Committee to sit again on Tuesday.

The Dáil adjourned at 9 p.m. until 10 a.m. on Tuesday, May 2, 1944.