When speaking on this matter last night I pointed out that it was impossible to have sufficient land to satisfy the needs of all the uneconomic holders. The land is not there. Some Deputies seemed to take umbrage at that. There are 152,000 so-called farmers under 15 acres in the country, and to give them farms of 30 acres each would involve over 4,000,000 acres of land. Where are we to get that acreage? I quite admit that the Mayo Deputies have a very definite case in respect of 12,395 hen-roosts—I can call them nothing else—in Mayo.
Committee on Finance. - Vote 52—Lands.
Debate resumed on the following motion:—
That a sum not exceeding £750,640 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending the 31st day of March, 1947, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Offices of the Minister for Lands and of the Irish Land Commission (44 & 45 Vict., c. 49, Sec. 46, and c. 71, Sec. 4; 48 & 49 Vict., c. 73, Secs. 17, 18 and 20; 54 & 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) (Minister for Lands).
More shame to the Government.
We have seen some of these gentlemen from Mayo being shifted down to Meath, and recently one of them sold out in Gibbstown for £1,100 and two others have applications in to sell out at £1,000 each. If I could go to 12,300 of my constituents in Cork and tell them I was going to make the Land Commission or the State hand over to them £12,000,000 worth of property, they would vote for me, too. The question is whether the four-acre farmers who were mentioned last night can be regarded as farmers at all. One of the leaders of the Labour Party here, Deputy Larkin (Junior), described any man with less than 15 acres as a joke and Deputy Everett told me here in the House, when I alluded to farmers with under 30 acres, that they were not farmers at all but road workers. There are 242,000 of these fellows. Let us examine this in a sane way and see whether it is possible to call these people in the hen-roosts of four-acres in Mayo farmers at all. I suggest it is not. The point is whether these people deserve to be shifted.
Are they not Irish citizens?
Let them get out and work. I do not know whether they would work if shifted down to Meath. There was one bunch of them shifted down to Gibbstown——
Deputies on the Farmers' Benches must allow Deputy Corry to make his speech.
Surely it is not necessary for Deputy Corry to put such determination into his speech.
I admit that my facts may not suit the Deputies, but they are facts and they will have to swallow them. I am quoting from the returns and Deputy Commons can have them if he wishes. There are 12,000 so-called farmers with hen-roosts in County Mayo.
So much shame for the Fianna Fáil Party.
I will give Deputies an illustration. I do not believe there is any farm labourer in Cork County who would swop his job as a farm labourer to-day for any 30-acre or 20-acre farm put up by the Land Commission. The Deputy said that if they got the land, they would work it. I am giving a specific instance in the colony to which a lot of them were shifted from Mayo to County Meath a few years ago, and, as I say, one of them has now sold out for £1,100—he did not intend to work the old farm for too long—and two more have put in applications to the Land Commission to shift out at £1,000 each.
They were fishermen, with political pull.
They were on four-acre hen-roosts with £2 valuations.
They were fishermen and not farmers. They were picked by the Fianna Fáil cumainn in County Mayo.
I want to know where is the limit to be fixed. There are something like 20,000 men in Cork County who have been in possession of a house and an acre of ground for 40 years and who have been working on the land for 40 years. I hold that these men have a better claim to any land which is put up in Cork County than any migrant from any four-acre hen-roost anywhere. There are these 12,000 people in County Mayo alone for whom the Minister has to make provision, and there are 34,000 in Connaught. I have a certain amount of sympathy with the position of these Mayo people, but I want to point out that there are 786 farmers with over 200 acres in Connaught. There are 2,700 with over 100 acres. I do not know if we are to proceed on the basis of the suggestion made by Deputy Cafferky and Deputy Commons with regard to putting out every fellow with over 30 acres.
We did not say any such thing.
That was the suggestion.
I challenge the Deputy to find that in the Official Report.
Deputy Cafferky mentioned 37 acres——
I said that my father possessed 37 acres.
——and he suggested that this acreage should be taken up and divided amongst two fellows with four acres each and another with five acres. Will anybody suggest that the Land Commission should spend money in order to create three uneconomic holdings of 16 acres each, because that is what it amounts to?
Are they not doing it?
I suggest that the Land Commission should not consider establishing any holding of less than 30 acres and there should be a proviso that the man who gets the 30 acres will have it as his means of livelihood and will not go out in competition with labour afterwards.
Now you are talking sense.
To come back to the Connaught boys, if we are to accept the suggestion of Deputy Cafferky and Deputy Commons, we should take the land from these 2,700 people who have over 100 acres and divide it up amongst the boys on the hen-roosts. Is Deputy Cafferky prepared to stand over the eviction from and taking over of the land of 30,000 farmers in Connaught? Is he prepared to say to these 30,000 farmers: "Get out. We want your land for the boys with the four acres"?
We will start at the top and work down.
And when you have dealt with the top, you will go on to deal with the next, and so on down along. Where are you to stop? I doubt if you will stop at all. I admit quite frankly that it is a pretty good bait for election purposes to say to 12,000 men: "I will get from the Land Commission £12,000,000 worth of property to divide up amongst you". It is a good bait, as good as ever I saw held out by anyone. Deputies opposite must take their bit of medicine.
If Deputy Corry would address himself exclusively to the Chair, it would be better.
I cannot help it. I am trying to keep them quiet. I assure you I interrupted nobody last night. I took it all then. Those are the figures I ask the House to consider fearlessly. There are 152,000 so-called farmers of under 15 acres. To suffice all their needs you want 4,000,000 acres of land. From whom are you going to take it?
The Aga Khan.
The Duke of Westminister.
I must appeal to Deputies Cafferky and Commons. If they do not want to keep order in the House, they can leave but I cannot continue to have the debate carried on by a series of interruptions.
Does the Chair not consider that the Deputies to whom he refers have been provoked by Deputy Corry?
I take it no one suggests that Mayo should get all the land; that it is the only county which should be considered? For instance, there are a few thousand farmers in Cork County of under 15 acres and they have a claim, too. They are men who have been working on the land for the past 40 years, living in labourers' cottages on one acre and the valuation is about the same as in the Mayo hen-roosts of four acres. These men in Cork County should have a better claim than any other county. Let us get down to business and see what the policy of the Land Commission is in regard to those things. Are they going to find four million acres for division amongst farmers of under 15 acres? If so, let them be frank and tell us where they are going to get it. Secondly, who qualifies for land? Does the man who is working on the land, as I pointed out, living in a cottage with an acre of ground, qualify more than the three-quarters fisherman, one quarter road-man, one quarter work-on-the-land man?
Has the Deputy discovered five quarters now?
I suggest to the Deputy sitting on the Farmers' Front Bench that he should sing dumb.
Would the Deputy address the Chair?
I want to know the policy of the Land Commission in regard to this. Whom do they regard as farmers? Is an uneconomic holder entitled to land? Or the man who has been all his time working on the land as an agricultural labourer living on one acre of ground and a labourer's cottage? Has he as good a title as the man with four acres who does not work on the land at all in reality? Does anyone here suggest he earns his livelihood on the four acres? He generally works as a road worker or in some industry in the district, or as a fisherman or something else. Which of the two has the better claim? We want to know that. This is a very serious problem which we want to have thrashed out. Are we going to see migrants coming in from other counties as they came to Gibbstown in County Meath for so many years and realising now £1,000 a man and walking off with that £1,000 present per man from the State in their pockets? It is pretty good compensation.
For being a supporter of Fianna Fáil.
I have made this question as plain as I can and do not intend to go further into it. I want to take up a statement by Deputy Hughes in connection with the taking over of land by the Land Commission and the manner in which they used it during the emergency. It was difficult to know what they could do. The primary function of land here is to provide food for the people. That is a dictum accepted by all Parties. If there is an owner of land who has not done his duty during a period when no food could come into this country, it was the duty of the Land Commission or the Department of Agriculture to take over that land and see that it was tilled. The Land Commission also had some thousands of acres on their hands during that period. They were at least supposed to show an example as far as producing food on that land was concerned. They had not the advantages possessed by ordinary farmers. First of all, regarding the fellow who did not till his land and let it be taken over, I have no sympathy for him. He did not do his part in producing food and deserved what happened to him, which was not half enough. As far as the land in possession of the Land Commission is concerned, we have another story. There was roughly six years of an emergency period. We all know that, if you take crops out of land year after year and do not put in fertilisers or farmyard manure, it is bound to deteriorate. We also know that the Land Commission had got neither farmyard manure nor fertilisers for that land. Where were they going to get it? Was Deputy Hughes or Deputy Corry or any other farmer Deputy prepared to give up any portion of his quota of fertilisers to the Land Commission? I am sure we were not. That land undoubtedly deteriorated badly, but I am afraid we cannot lay responsibility for that on the Land Commission.
What prevented them from dividing it?
The prevention of sub-dividing was largely caused—Deputy Hughes will pardon me—by the Deputy's action and that of other Deputies during the first two years of the emergency, in making excuses for men who were not doing their part in the tilling of the land. Men had to be taken from the Land Commission and handed over as inspectors to other Departments, to see that farmers did their duty in tilling their proportion of land, so the inspectors were not there for the purpose of sub-dividing. Deputy Hughes knows that just as well as I do. We have to face this frankly, as I have to face it. I know what happened on a couple of estates in my constituency. I know very well that that land is worth very little now. Any land where three or four crops are taken off in succession without anything being put into it is bound to deteriorate. The Land Commission would have a problem in handling over that land. I suggest that the ordinary method of fixing an annuity on the rates, as it were, and handling it over then, will not do, because that land will not pay for the rated annuity on it for at least three or four years after it has been handed over to the tenant owner. It will not pay him, because the body has gone out of it. I suggest the Land Commission should tackle that problem early.
I do not intend taking up the time of the House on this Vote at all, but when I heard the arguments put up by Deputies in connection with the claims of this person and that person for land, I had to intervene, on account of the knowledge I had of what was done with the land they got. I admit that in many cases the Minister for Lands has a problem that I should not like to tackle. I should not like in the morning to face the position of having 152,000 people, supposed to be farmers, living on holdings of under 15 acres per family, and to have to find additional land for these people. The Minister has stated that he has 40,000 acres ready for division. That amount of land would go only a very small way; it would satisfy very few of the 12,300 hen-roosters in County Mayo. It would mean three acres a man, divided among the 12,300. That would not take into account the claimants from the remaining 25 counties.
Why would the Deputy not give some of his 500 acres?
The Deputy has not 500 acres, and let me say that any man working for the Deputy would not swap his job for any 25 or 30 acres that the Land Commission would hand over; he would be a damn fool if he would, unless he could do, as some of the Mayo boys have done, sell out a week after getting the holding and clear away with £1,000 in his pocket. However, this matter is too serious for joking. We shall have to get down to business and I would like to hear from the Minister what the proposals of the Land Commission are with reference to the 152,000 so-called farmers with holdings under 15 acres. The official Labour Party might call them that; they might say that the 15-acre farmers are only a -joke. That was Deputy Larkin's statement here.
The National Labour Party, speaking through Deputy Everett, said that any farmer with under 30 acres is not a farmer at all, he is only a road worker. That is the statement he made when he was discussing holidays for farm labourers. If any man with under 30 acres is not a farmer, what are the Land Commission doing, making 22-acre and 20-acre holdings? If the Labour Party are right in saying that those men cannot claim to be farmers, why is that policy pursued? Even the Department of Agriculture, when they brought in the compulsory tillage scheme, did not recognise any farmer with under ten acres.
Yes, they did.
For the purpose of compulsory tillage, all holdings of ten acres and over had to have so much under wheat and other crops, but there was not a word about the four-acre hen-roosters in Mayo.
Ten acres of arable land.
The Deputy stated here yesterday that those people for whom he was speaking had only four acres of arable land. He said there were two holders of four acres, one of five acres and one of three acres, all claimants for 37 acres from some unfortunate man whose farm will be split up among them. One had a valuation of £2 5s. Od., another of £2 15s. Od. and a third with a valuation of £3— just the type of valuation that would be on a labourer's cottage and an acre in any other county. Putting forward claims for such people for 1,000-acre farms in the County Meath, is surely a bit of a joke. If there are Deputies here who are prepared to bolster up that type of claim, let them go ahead. I should like a statement from the Minister on those matters.
I look upon this Estimate as a very important one. Very little can be added to what was said here recently during the debate on the Land Bill. I was very pleased to hear from Deputy Corry that the Minister mentioned he had 40,000 acres available for distribution among suitable applicants. I think that will be very welcome news for people who, for some years past, have been waiting for the Land Commission to awaken from their slumbers. As Deputy Corry pointed out, there are several small-holders, uneconomic holders, who are anxious for the Land Commission to resume their duties. I am glad to see that a step is being taken in the right direction and that the Land Commission are resuming the division of some of the lands which they have listed and for which schemes have been prepared.
I believe Deputy Everett was quite right when he stated that any citizen with a holding of less than 30 acres could not, in the real sense of the word, be described as a farmer. It is impossible for any citizen, in any part of the country, to live on 30 acres, to rear his family, school them and educate them. He would have a miserable existence on 30 acres, simply because a portion had to be retained for grazing of live stock, and a portion for tillage, so that by the time the rent, rates and other demands were cleared off, he would find himself, at the end of the harvest, in debt. Assuming that that man had five sons, he could only leave the land to one of them, and he would have a miserable existence on such a holding, while the other four would have to emigrate, or seek land elsewhere.
When the Land Commission is allotting land I believe they should not give less than 40 or 45 acres. There is no use in giving small holdings to allottees, because it means that their position will be very little improved so far as getting a decent livelihood out of it is concerned. I am strongly opposed to a practice that has grown up recently of allowing Englishmen to come over here and purchase large tracts of land. I hope the Minister will take serious notice of it. A great Leix man, Fintan Lalor, stated that the soil of Ireland belonged to the people of Ireland. It is the duty of the Government to object to titled gentlemen coming here and putting money into large tracts of land in the Midlands. They are not purchasing land in the interests of this nation, and they are not interested in the production of food for man or beast; they are simply gambling in land to see what they can get out of it. The Government should take serious notice of Englishmen and aliens coming here and purchasing large tracts of land.
If the Government were doing their duty, these large holdings would not be available to foreigners, who are depriving Irish citizens and small farmers of their rights in the division of such land. Deputy Corry referred to the number of holdings in this country containing less than 15 acres. Would it not be to the advantage of the people on these 150,000 holdings if those Englishmen who have purchased large holdings were requested to go elsewhere so that they could be divided amongst uneconomic holders? I am sure the Government realises that the Irish people are better entitled to that land than aliens who come here, not with the intention of producing more food but to gamble in land.
Migrants have been the subject of debate in this House. I represent a constituency in which there are several large ranches, and I will oppose in the strongest possible terms any people from the West coming to the Midlands to occupy farms there. I hope the Department, when formulating schemes for the division of land in my constituency, will make every effort to make it available for local smallholders, landless men, cottage tenants and Old I.R.A. men. It is most unfair to bring people from Mayo and Galway into districts where they will not have the goodwill of their neighbours who have a claim to any land available for division and who are fully equipped to work it. I believe that that state of affairs has existed in certain parts of the country.
When dividing land in the Edenderry district, where I understand the Land Commission have vested a number of farms for occupation at an early date, I hope the claims of the people of Rahin and Croghan will be considered. In order to avoid any trouble which might arise later, I strongly recommend that the fullest possible consideration be given to the claims of people in that area when they are suitable applicants and in a position to finance and work land. In Killeshin, on the borders of Carlow, there are estates which have been the subject of agitation for many years. These holdings have been allowed to change hands on numerous occasions, and the Land Commission has not taken any steps to acquire them.
I would be obliged if the Minister would arrange to have these estates inspected and something done in the way of dividing them amongst local people. There is suitable land also in the parishes of Arles, and Ballickmoyler, convenient to Carlow. Deputy Norton was on a deputation with myself and others to the Minister last week in connection with the Kilmorney estate, convenient to Athy. A certain amount of uneasiness has been created amongst people in that district because the Land Commission had had the estate on its books for a long period. The owners decided to sell recently, and as the local people had the land taken on conacre for years it was the sole means of livelihood of many of them. Recently, an auctioneer from Athy called on them at midnight, and asked them to put down from £400 to £600 with which to purchase portion of the land, as otherwise it would be sold. It was impossible for them to comply with the request in the space of ten minutes, and, as a result, a local farmer who already has three farms and lives alone, Mr. James Owens of Ballyroe, purchased the estate. I called on him with other local people and I asked him what business he had in butting in, seeing that his action was likely to prevent the land being divided amongst the local people. He gave an undertaking that if the people wanted the land, he would not stand in their way. When such an offer is made to the Land Commission by owners who are willing to sell, I cannot understand why undue delay should arise. In another part of my constituency, in Durrow, a number of farms has been listed for acquisition, and the owners have written to the Land Commission to have them taken over. The Land Commission appear to be slow in moving in that respect.
When I spoke on this Estimate a year ago I criticised the Land Commission very severely for being subject to political influence in dividing land. I do not know whether the strong words I used have borne fruit, but I am happy to say that two farms have been recently divided, and I am quite satisfied that no political influence was used. I have conveyed to the officials the intimation that I am quite satisfied that in the dividing of these farms in my constituency the Land Commission have given land to the most deserving applicants, and on the merits, and that no political influence whatever was used. A secretary of a local Fianna Fáil cumann was greatly disappointed that his son did not secure a farm on one estate. I am fully satisfied that, although every effort was made to secure it for him by the local Fianna Fáil T.D.s, the commissioner, whoever he was—I never saw him—did his duty and did it well in the division of the Luttrell estate, quite convenient to the town of Stradbally. It is about time that when estates are being divided they should be divided without political interference whatsoever.
The Minister, of course, has denied certain charges that I made in the House. I think it was this time 12 months when he said:—
"Surely, when we did not take Deputy Flanagan seriously seven years ago, when he was a Fianna Fáil secretary, we are not going to take him seriously to-day."
As far as I am concerned, I care not what the Minister thinks or does not think. The Minister may claim to have a great record, but I have a record of good service to my constituents and in any recommendation that I make to the Land Commission I have to satisfy myself that the applicant will give the Land Commission every satisfaction before I recommend him, and I may tell the Minister and the Land Commission that I refuse to recommend as many applicants for land as I could recommend, simply because I believe they would not be successful if they did secure land. As a Deputy, I refuse quite frankly to recommend them.
Great charges were made in my absence by the Minister when he was referring to statements that I had made here about political influence being used in connection with land. He denied it. My word is as good as the Minister's and I speak from experience. The Minister got the full and wholehearted support in his charges against me, in my absence, from one of the Fianna Fáil Deputies for my constituency not so long ago. That Deputy knows as well as I do that political influence was used to secure land and the Minister knows that political influence was used to secure land. I was asked in this House to give proof that political influence was used. Would the Minister be surprised or astonished to learn that the Deputy who said that no political influence was used in land division, that is, Deputy Gorry, who stated that the Land Commission did their duty in a straightforward, in an upright and in a honest and sincere manner—they were the words used in this House when he was speaking on the Land Bill—did not tell the House that he secured the best part of the O'Shea estate in his area, that he handed over a swamp to the smallholders in the district and got the best of the land himself? Surely it ought to be sufficient evidence of political influence, when we saw that it was the Minister's and the Land Commission's intention to cater first for the needs of the local Fianna Fáil T.D's. I am sorry that I had to make such a statement in the House but I only want to give the House ample proof that the statements I made were correct. Any citizen who sees a Fianna Fáil T.D. getting the best portion of land in his area would come to the conclusion that political influence was used. In connection with the same case, people from the area tell me that the Deputy had interviews with the Land Commission inspector concerned and that he handed over to the Land Commission a swamp and secured the best tract of the O'Shea estate, thus depriving citizens who were duly entitled to the land, as uneconomic holders, of securing a portion thereof. If there were any farmers' sons in the district who could be regarded as landless men, who would be in a position to work the land, I believe they should be the persons to get the best of the land, not a man who already was in occupation——
Of a swamp.
——Of sufficient land, that he would be able to farm at his ease and secure a decent livelihood.
Was that within the year covered by the present Estimate?
No, Sir, it was not.
Then it is out of order.
I am pleased to be in a position to make the statement that in connection with any land that has been divided in my constituency within the past 12 months, no political influence was used and I hope that in future, when land is being divided it will be divided in the same manner and that political influence will be completely ignored. I should like to see every man getting a fair crack of the whip, provided he came within the term, uneconomic holder, and would be suitable in the opinion of the Land Commission, irrespective of his political outlook. On several occasions I have recommended my bitterest political opponents for tracts of land simply because I believed that if they got it they would be in a good way of living and were deserving and would work the land to the entire satisfaction of the Land Commission. The Land Commission are now resuming land division and I wish them every success and good luck. They have my wholehearted support and co-operation, at whatever value the Minister may estimate it. I support him in every way and I am glad his report may be considered as fairly favourable. I would ask him to introduce legislation——
That is out of order.
—— which would empower him to deal with cases where farms are changing hands. For instance, the Minister is well aware of the fact that when a farm is listed for land division, if the farm is sold, within the meaning of the Land Acts, there is nothing to prevent the Land Commission from negotiating with the purchaser as with the original owner. In my constituency there have been cases where those who purchased the land divided it amongst themselves and proceeded to sell it to the highest bidder by public auction, thus excluding those who were not sufficiently financed. I believe the Land Commission should prevent such sale of land, that is to say, it would not be sold in the best interests of the community but for the purpose of making a profit. In other words it would be gambling in land. The Land Commission should not authorise subdivision in such cases because that is making it very difficult for the Land Commission to carry out their programme of land division. I have had considerable experience of such cases in my constituency and the Minister's attention has been drawn to it. Every effort should be made to prevent the new owners of large estates that have changed hands from selling the land out in small lots to the local people, making it more difficult for the Land Commission to discharge their duties when it comes to putting into operation a scheme for the division of the lands in question.
I would ask the Minister to consider the position of the estates in all the Midland counties because I believe that in many areas there is very great congestion. The Minister has before him the case of a number of very large estates convenient to the town of Birr. While there are large tracts of land in the area, there are cottage tenants and county council workers who have to graze their cow, if they are lucky enough to have one, on the high road. There is the case with which the Minister is very familiar, of an estate at Croghan, near Edenderry, where the owner has denied the cottage tenants their right to have any portion of it by conacre. In cases where they had conacre for a year or two, he put them off it and they had to sell their cow or donkey because they could not graze it on the roads. I think it is a disgraceful state of affairs. Where you have smallholders doing the best they can to rear families and to eke out an existence on the land, every encouragement should be given to these people to remain on the land. I hope that sympathetic consideration will be given to such cases and I am sure that already the Minister has those cases under consideration.
I should like to remind the Minister that there is very little use in giving an allottee, who has not the finances, 45 or 50 acres of land without some capital to work it. I think that the Land Commission should have some scheme under which, if an applicant for land is considered suitable and is not in a financial position to work the land, they would advance him some money to start him, or assist him by providing implements for the working of the land. Deputy Corry pointed out that people from the West who secured land had sold the land. I believe that the reason they sold the land and the reason a lot of other people are selling the land is because of the rent, rates and taxes which they have to meet. I think they are doing a wise thing in selling it, because otherwise they would be in the workhouse and would lose the land anyway. When allottees are given land, some scheme should be put into operation to put these people in a financial position to work the land. If they are in a financial position to work the land, I am sure they will not give any trouble to the Land Commission or any other Department. If funds were placed at the disposal of the Minister for Lands to allocate on loan to such people at low rates of interest and to be repayable with the annuity, I believe it would help them to work the land to the satisfaction of the Land Commission. There are lands which are not being tilled to the fullest productive capacity. That is due to lack of capital. I trust the Land Commission will see fit to formulate such a scheme whereby people who are suffering from lack of capital may be put into such a financial position that they will be able to work the land to the satisfaction of the Land Commission.
I welcome the Minister's statement that he has 40,000 acres ready for division. That shows anyway that there is an improvement and that the Land Commission, which is a very big body and moves slowly, is beginning again to perform the duties for which it was established. I hope that the Minister in presenting his Estimate next year will be able to report that he has even a greater acreage of land available for division. I hope also that he will give consideration to the question of providing capital for those allottees who want it, because, as I pointed out, it is impossible for any allottee to work the land properly if he is not in a financial position to do so. I know a few of them, such as those who are going to be victimised by the Land Bill recently passed here and are going to be deprived of their holdings. There would be no need for the drastic action proposed under the Land Bill and the removal of these people from their holdings if the Government had put them in a financial position to work their holdings. They were not in a position to purchase live stock. They could not purchase horses to do their farm work owing to the enormous prices prevailing. It was impossible for them to get agricultural machinery in a great many areas. Even if it were available, it was impossible for them to purchase the machinery. All that was due to lack of capital.
I know small farmers and people who secured land from the Land Commission who are put to the pin of their collar to meet the demands on them. They find it impossible to employ labour because they are not in a position to pay the wages set out by the Agricultural Wages Board. The agricultural workers are entitled to these wages which, according to the law, farmers have to pay them. If the farmers were in a position to pay, if their farms were turning over a profit, there would be no need for any compulsion to make them pay the standard rate of wages. Farmers in the Midlands are only too anxious and willing to pay the highest wages possible to those engaged in the important work of food production. But, as the old saying goes, you cannot get blood out of a turnip. We cannot get money out of the agricultural industry unless there is some way of putting it into it first. As I say, there should be some scheme to assist people who secure land to stock that land, to furnish their houses, and to procure agricultural machinery. If a genuine case is put up to the Government, sympathetic consideration should be given to it. Such persons should be given every help and every financial consideration by the Government to assist them in carrying out the important work on the land.
If encouragement were given in that way, I believe that many of our young men who are neglecting land, or who are fleeing from rural Ireland to get positions in malthouses and factories in the cities and towns, or trying to get to England to earn a living, would have no reason for leaving the land and that the question of emigration would not arise. Leaving out the cities and towns, I believe that over 170,000 young men from the rural districts have emigrated. I think that a great deal of that could have been avoided if the Land Commission had in operation the schemes of land division which they had to curtail during the emergency period. If encouragement were given to the young people by providing them with a holding of 40 acres, or not less than 30 acres, as Deputy Everett pointed out, these people would be only too anxious to remain at home and work on the land. Every man who leaves the land is a loss to the community. I know that the Government have been considering this matter very seriously but, unfortunately, without successful results so far.
I hope that the future policy of the Land Commission will be to give portions of land to uneconomic holders in order to make their holdings economic, and in order that these people will be in a position to live decently on the land and to discharge their obligations. There is very little encouragement being given to farmers' sons to remain on the land and I trust the Minister will do the best he can to make life in rural Ireland more attractive by embarking on large schemes of land division and by establishing as many families as possible on these large estates. I trust he will also give some consideration to the matter of financing those who are unable to carry on and who will eventually have to dispose of their holdings, either by surrendering them to the Land Commission or selling them. Otherwise, the Land Commission will have the job of taking them over and putting them up for sale. If these people are not in a sound financial position, in a condition in which they are able to work the land properly, they cannot be described as farmers. Their life is one of misery and they live from hand to mouth. I trust the Minister will do something about it and that a scheme for financing those people whom the Land Commission regard as suitable and deserving citizens to place on holdings will be devised.
I would not have intervened in this debate but for a speech made by a colleague of mine on these benches, Deputy Corry. I wish emphatically to dissociate myself from the references he made to the congests in the West of Ireland. There are congests in Galway and in Mayo, and the foundation of the Land Act of 1903 and of every subsequent Land Act was the relief of these people. I am not so foolish as to pretend that if all the land available in the country were taken over, it would bring a full measure of relief, but what it certainly would do is to ease the problem considerably. All I am sorry for—and I am sure it is a matter of regret to every colleague of mine from the West of Ireland—is that progress in that respect has not been much more rapid.
The first Land Act for the acquisition and division of land was passed by a foreign parliament, under pressure, of course, from our representatives in that parliament and from the people of this country in 1903. A period of 43 years is a long time in which to deal with the problem, and I would be much more happy in standing up here on the Land Commission Vote if the acquisition and division problem had been settled and if we had only to debate the question of rearrangement and revesting. I quite agree with the Minister that the problem of rearrangement is a very pressing problem and that it is also a very slow procedure, but I do not think that revesting can be placed in the same category as the acquisition and division of land. It is not nearly so important. People who have holdings and who are still unvested are in the happy position that they have at least good, or fairly good, holdings, and if they are not, in the strict sense, the legal owners or legal purchasers of their holdings, it does not make very much difference. Some people may argue that the fact that they are not vested deprives them of certain privileges in that they are not able to get credit on the security of their holdings, but I hold that the industrious, hard-working farmer is credit-worthy, no matter what the tenure by which he holds his land, and, while it may be a pressing problem, I want to submit to the Minister that it is nothing like as important as the acquisition and division of land.
I quite understand the difficulties in the way of the Land Commission arising out of the emergency, and while the lack of materials for building purposes is a very big consideration, there is an equally big consideration which makes it difficult for them, save in cases in which land is offered voluntarily, to negotiate for the acquisition of land, that is, the inflated price of land at the moment. We all know that if land is purchased by the Land Commission, the owner has the right of appeal to the price-fixing tribunal and that they will relate the price to be paid by the Land Commission very closely to the existing market value. Consequently, when the Land Commission are allotting that land, they have to proceed on that basis. They have to take improvements and so on into consideration and to fix what would be the normal rent or annuity. When the land is purchased at an inflated price, undoubtedly an inflated annuity must be placed upon it, and even though that annuity is halved as a result of the 1933 Land Act, in normal times it is still fairly high, while, at the same time, a very large burden, much larger than should be passed on, is passed on to the taxpaying community. I am sure these are the two main reasons, or should be the two main reasons, for the slowing down in the acquisition of land.
There is one matter on which I should like to have information. The peak period of land division since the passing of the 1933 Land Act was in the years ending 31st March, 1935, and 31st March, 1936. In each of these years, over 100,000 acres of land were divided. There was no war situation in 1937, 1938 or 1939, and I should like to know the reason for the slowing down. Was it that the number of inspectorate staff were changed over to rearrangement, and, if so, was there a great speeding-up in rearrangement in the years 1937, 1938 and 1939 as compared with the years 1934 and 1935? I think that is a fair question to ask, when I know that the number of staff were not decreased in any way and that the Government were prepared to make provision, and had made provision, to make available sufficient money to keep up the pace set in the years 1935 and 1936. When the emergency came, I know that a considerable number of the staff were taken over by other Departments, but, at the same time, there was a fairly large staff there all the time, and there was a good deal of useful work other than land acquisition and division which could have been proceeded with.
One of the faults I find with the Land Commission—it is a fault which has existed for a very long number of years—is that when an estate is taken over and allotted, improvement works are carried out, but in many instances a sufficient estimate was never given or made available to complete the improvement works, with the result that many very necessary improvements still remain to be carried out on many estates divided several years ago by the Land Commission. This is particularly true of turbary. Where people were given holdings, turbary was promised in some cases, but although the bog was available, it has never been given to the people since. In other cases, the bog was allotted and roads and drains were marked out, but neither roads nor drains have ever been made and the bog is deserted because the people to whom the bog was allotted could not avail of it, with the result that they have to pay a very high price for domestic fuel That is one of the things which should have proceeded apace and the staff was not big enough to deal with them. The maps were there and they need not look for men with very high academic qualifications. So long as they had the maps, they could get good practical men, such as supervisor gangers, to carry out the work. It has not been carried out as rapidly as it should have been.
Furthermore, when it comes to the question of turbary, turbary is given far too cheaply to the allottees, in my opinion. A man gets four, five or six perches of a face bank of turbary and, even with a normal rent fixed on it, it is not £1 a year. That could be trebled if the proper improvements were carried out and the increase would help to pay for proper drainage and roads into the holdings. During the emergency period, plans should have been prepared for resuming the normal activities of the Land Commission at an accelerated speed in the post-war period. The congestion problem is still very acute in the West of Ireland and, while I do not hold it ever can be completely relieved, it can be considerably eased. I know of instances where land was taken over during the emergency, but because of certain restrictions no division was carried out, even to extend the holdings of the adjoining congests. That also could have been attended to. I do not intend to mention any specific cases, but I know that in County Galway there were congests adjoining an estate taken over by the Land Commission and it was still left to the owner. He had to carry out the tillage on it by putting it up for auction and get the highest possible price for it. The adjoining congests, who were not able to give that high price, had to travel several miles in order to get tillage. That could have been solved easily had they been given the portion of that land to which they were entitled and which would have brought their holdings to an economic standard. I hold there should have been staff enough to deal with that part of the work, in any case.
So far as the West is concerned, I am sure the Minister will admit that 43 years is a very long time to be dealing with the acquisition and division of land. There should be a time limit set for the work of acquisition and division west of the Shannon and it should be settled once and for all. There are some very large areas of land west of the Shannon, particularly in my constituency, and in dealing with them the Land Commission should take into consideration those who have large areas and who, in order to comply with the compulsory tillage scheme, had to set that land by auction during the emergency. That is a clear indication that those people have more land than they are capable of working. I do not want to fix any figure as to the maximum holding, but in the West of Ireland and Connacht generally, any person who has 150 acres of fairly good land can be regarded as in a fairly independent position as a reasonably big farmer. Anyone with land in excess of that, save in very few instances, has much more than he is capable of managing and working properly.
Deputy Corry referred to the hen-roost farmers of £4 valuation in Mayo, but he should not forget that those people clung on to their hen-roosts and it is a good job for the Irish nation that they did cling on to them. There were attempts made, both by intimidation and inducement to get them out of it, but they still clung on to them. Despite the fact that legislation was passed to enable them to improve their lot, are they still going to be left in the wilderness? I am sure that is not Fianna Fáil policy and I am sorry that Deputy Corry should have taken that line. I hope he has no such ideas in his mind. After all, they clung on to that land under immense difficulties. Even though the Land Commission would not be capable of giving them all 30-acre or 25-acre holdings, their lot would be considerably improved. Although I believe a fair-sized holding is necessary in present circumstances, if we develop our industries the time may arrive when a very much smaller holding would give an equally high standard of living. That is what should be aimed at. If it is not capable of giving that standard here, how is it that it was capable of giving such a high standard to the people of Denmark, many of whom have holdings under 15 acres?
Deputy Flanagan, of course, resents any congest from the West of Ireland coming into the Midlands. He is one of those people who puts very awkward questions here sometimes to the Minister for External Affairs and one of the people, I am sure, who talks a lot outside about our failure to undo Partition; but he wants to create 32 more partitions, in addition to the one we have, by trying to create a barrier of ill-will against the congests from the West being brought back, in many instances to the land from which they were driven. I stand for settling the local congests first; but when there is land available outside the needs of local congests—and in this I am supported by the Deputies of all Parties who are interested in the best possible solution of the land problem—then other congests living in slums in the West, the South and the North of Ireland are quite acceptable and will be regarded as Irishmen and not merely as strangers because they cross a county boundary line.
There are some large tracts of land which the Land Commission inspects on some occasions, and I fear that they come to a decision not to acquire them on the ground that the land is inferior. I hold if it is inferior for acquisition for the purpose of land division, it might be quite suitable for afforestation. As far as the West of Ireland is concerned, with the schemes that have been initiated and put into operation as a result of Government policy for the reclamation and improvement of land, I suggest that land should be of a very inferior type before the Land Commission refuse to take it over. The people I have in mind, the congests and those others, would be very glad to get a fair holding of it and, by their sweat and labour, I guarantee they will reclaim it just as they have reclaimed some of the patches they have already. I think land should not be turned down in that way.
Another thing that I think undesirable is, when the Land Commission take over a tract of land on which there is a mansion, that mansion should not be handed over for somebody to tear it down and sell the slates and timber. If there is profit in it for the individual, the profit should be equally there for the Land Commission, and they should have people competent enough to demolish such mansions and hold on to the land and divide it. As to cases where a scheme is prepared, I have one particular case in mind in County Galway, where a scheme was prepared about seven or eight years ago. The scheme was on the lines that the people in a certain area, on barren land, were to be migrated into new holdings and any bit of good land in their old holding was to be left to them, the remainder to go to the Forestry Branch. For some reason that I cannot understand, the Forestry Branch has refused to take over that land, even though that is the only solution of the congested problem there. In my opinion, no more suitable scheme could be prepared than the one that was prepared to relieve those people. I think there should be a better understanding between the two sections of the one Department in matters of that kind.
I am sure it is not the intention of the Minister for Lands, or the Government, to pay much attention to the ideas propounded by Deputy Corry, or Deputy Flanagan either. If they do, as far as I am concerned, the day that happens they can have both these gentlemen, but I am one they will not have.
Ní raibh fonn ormsa focal a rá ar an mBille seo go gcuala mé an Teachta Máirtín Corry ag caitheamh ar mhuintir an Iarthair. Is maith liom ar chaoi ar bith gur sheas aon fhear amháin de lucht Fianna Fáil suas ina aghaidh, an Teachta Ó Bíogáin. Is é sin a mbeadh súil agam leis an Teachta Ó Bíogáin, taobh istigh den Teach agus taobh amuigh den Teach, mar áit ar bith a gcastar dhuit é tugann sé cothrom na Féinne do gach duine.
Dúirt an Teachta Corry nach raibh againn in iargcúil Chonamara agus Mhuigheo ach áiteacha cearc, nár dhreamanna le talmhaíocht sinn; ach dream suarach atá ann adeir sé.
Céard a chuir annsin muid ach Cromail agus a dhream agus nach raibh muintir Queenstown agus Kingstown agus muintir gach town eile mar sin i chúnamh dhó agus más fíor a bhfuil ráite ní fada amach ó oighreacht na ndreamanna sin muintir Chorry féin. Na daoine sna ceanntracha sin d'íoc siad a mbealach ariamh le allas a gcnámh. Ní cáineadh ar bith a bheith bocht. Má tá tú bocht cneasta féadfa tú t-éadan a thaspáint d'éinneach, ach ní mar sin don té bhíos go holc is go bocht ina dhiaidh. Ní go dtí na bailte móra ná go dtí lucht na dtaltaí móra a chuaidh an Piarsach nuair a theastaigh uaidh síol an Tighe seo a chur ag fréamhú acht siar go dtí na ceanntracha iargcúla a bhfuil an Teachta foghlamta, séimh Corry at tromachan ortha anois.
An méid a fuair na daoine annsin choinníodar é ar chuma ar bith; choinnigh siad an teanga agus choinnigh siad an creideamh agus níor ceannaíodh iad le sórt bribeiál ar bith.
Tá mé cinnte nach bhfuil an tAire antsásta leis an Teachta O Corry, mar ón méid eolais atá agamsa air tá an tAire chomh Gaelach nó b'fhéidir níos Gaelaí ná mórán sa Teach seo. Ach níl aon mhaith sa seanchas níos faide.
Like other Deputies, I have to protest against the statement made by Deputy Corry. I suppose Deputy Corry is to be excused when he talks about the people of the West of Ireland and refers to them as hen-roosters and that class of thing. I excuse him for his ignorance because he does not realise who these people are or where they came from. Perhaps some of them came from the county the Deputy represents. When Cromwell came with his crowbar brigade, in days gone by, and drove the ancestors of those people into the West, when he said: "To hell or to Connaught", those people had to go to the bogs or to Connaught. I suppose they thought it a little better than hell. It is not much better, I regret to say. The position of those people is very bad. The Land Commission have completely ignored them and it is no wonder when you have a member of the Fianna Fáil Party, such as Deputy Corry, referring here to them as hen-roosters.
That view is not shared by the Fianna Fáil Party.
I said a member of the Fianna Fáil Party, and I believe Deputy Corry is one.
We repudiate that statement.
Is he one?
He is one. We do not approve of the statement.
He has asked the Minister to say are the hen-roosters to remain on as they always did. Are the very people who upheld the nationality of this country, the people who held the language for this country, the people who went out to the mountains, whose ancestors gave their blood, blood which was spilt in the grass of this country for the sake of the nation, still to be the hen-roosters? Are we still to know them as labourers or farmers, or as spalpeens or beggarmen? That is the idea that Deputy Corry has put forward. That is his view. I do not believe it is the view of the Fianna Fáil Party. It is not the view of Deputy Beegan. It is not the view of the men I knew when I believed Fianna Fáil was right. I do not believe it is the view of five per cent of the members of the Fianna Fáil Party. These men are often spoken of as failures. It has been stated that at least one of them in Gibbstown had to sell out, at £1,000, the land he got. Surely in every walk of life we find a failure? Deputy Giles who is no great lover of the people from the West of Ireland, any more than Deputy Flanagan, admitted that in the main these people were a success.
Deputy Giles is learning.
Deputy Giles admitted that the remainder of the migrants are a success. It is well known that they have been a success. I resent what Deputy Corry said, that because one man had to sell out the whole thing was a failure. Of course Deputy Corry wanted to get a lash at the South Mayo people, but the answer that the people of South Mayo gave was given on account of the way the Land Commission had carried on there. Time will prove that that feeling will expand in the West of Ireland. I hate to have to make these statements. Let me point out that if Deputy Corry thinks this country is depending on the shoulders of lords and ladies, graziers or grabbers, he is making a grave mistake, because that crowd was imported, and if our people, or as he calls them, the hen-roosters of Galway, Mayo and Kerry do not count, he is making the greatest mistake he ever made. The people will cling on and live here as they did in the past. They will do it for love of Ireland and will keep on with their efforts to improve their conditions. I regret to have to speak in this strain, but I was compelled to do so.
I was delighted to hear it stated that 40,000 acres are to be divided, and that it is hoped the division will be made soon. In my constituency certain land has been in the hands of the Land Commission for many years. I do not know why it is not being divided, seeing that there is no need to build new houses there. Within a mile of the place to which I refer there are uneconomic holders who have been waiting for land. I ask the Minister to give it to them as soon as possible. I wish to point out that these lands have been cessed for tillage for the past three or four years by the Land Commission. I do not object to that. When land is given to people it is often in bad heart. Generally those who get land which is divided are not wealthy, and for that reason some consideration should be given to them in the way of a grant for artificial manures or something like that so that they might bring it into heart again. I am sure the Minister and everybody who knows anything about land realise that when three or four corn crops are taken off land, it is practically pauperised. When those who have it are not wealthy, and are not in a position to put heart back into it their position for many years will not be improved.
Many statements have been made as to what is a reasonable holding of land. As one who has to depend on land, my belief is that to put a man into a holding of less than 30 Irish acres is putting him in to face starvation. To give a man a smaller holding means that he will be living, to use Deputy Corry's words, as if he were a hen-rooster.
It has sometimes happened in my area that additional land is given, but at a distance of two or three miles from where the tenant is living. I think that is a great mistake. An addition of seven or eight acres of land to an uneconomic holder, three miles away from where he lives is, I am afraid, of no use to him. Naturally he will not refuse to take the land, seeing that he has been looking for it all his life, but his time is wasted going and coming to look after it and eventually he has to sell it. I believe that a mile radius should be the limit. What should be done in such a case is that a man should be taken from a congested district and the holding divided amongst those in the immediate vicinity.
Coming from the county of Galway and not being ashamed of it. I have had to go to the Land Commission on several occasions during the year in connection with many knotty subjects. I should like to take this opportunity to say that the officials were most courteous and helped in every way to do the best they could for me. I must say that in all fairness to the officials of the Land Commission, both in the office, as well as the inspectors in Galway and in the West of Ireland. They helped in every way they could. There was one special matter in my area, which I brought before the Land Commission and before Mr. Kelly, the inspector in Galway, which I find it necessary to refer to it on this Vote. A huge bog on the Redington estate was taken over at Kilbannon by the old Congested Districts Board. It was known as the Red Bog. Tenants in the area got a division but tenants on the adjoining Dick estate and the Lune estate, the landlords of which would not give turbary, made application to the Congested Districts Board and were allowed in when the other bog was divided. Later on, under a native Government, the Dick and the Lune estates were bought and, as a result, the tenants who were brought from the Redington estate got the share they were entitled to on their own estates. Now the tenants on the Redington estate have objected and have more or less said to the outside tenants, "You have got bog on your own estates and why should not this bog be the property of the tenants on the Redington estate?" The Land Commission say it is now part of the holdings of those people but it is very unfair to the tenants on the Redington estate that they should be put in that position. The position is that the tenants have said that outside tenants have bog portions on their own estates and, since the days of the Congested Districts Board, they have been given plots in this estate, with the result that the tenants on the Redington estate have been put out.
I do not know whether or not it is in order on this Estimate to refer to that matter, but I would ask the Minister to give it his serious consideration. I certainly protest against the statements made by Deputy Corry, and I was delighted to hear Deputy Beegan, a member of his own Party, objecting to and protesting against such statements. It would be well, once and for all, that we should put our foot down on such things. If sections of our people, the people who have that real blood in them, have been downtrodden and if we have failed in our duty for 20 years to help them as we should have done, the least we may do is not to speak disrespectfully of them. I am more than grateful to the officials of the Land Commission for the manner in which they helped in any case I put before them during the year.
Tá áthas orm a thabhairt faoi deara go bhfuil An Teachta Ó Domhnalláin agus An Teachta Giles ar aon-intinn amháin ag moladh lucht na nGaeltacht i gCo. na Midhe agus ag rá, d'aonghuth, go bhfuil ag éirí leo. Is maith an scéal é. Molaimse go ndéanfar scéim cosúil leis an scéim a rinneadh cheana, go gcuirfear na pairceanna bó bun in aice na mbailte. D'éirigh le na scéimeanna i gCo. na hIar Mhidhe acht amháin in áiteanna iargcúlda.
I am very glad that Deputy Donnellan and Deputy Giles are agreed that the migrants are a success. It is a great day for Ireland that the two Deputies are of the one mind that these men have made a success of their holdings in Rathcarne and in Gibbstown. The Minister has stated that he has 40,000 acres of land for distribution and that he is going to devote it to migrants. I do suggest that he should examine the position in these two colonies. He will find that a number of young men, farmers' sons, have got married and that a new congestion has been created there. I suggest that he should take them into consideration when he is allocating farms in County Meath, a county I have the honour to represent. In the debate on the Land Bill I spoke about the success that these people have been in Gibbstown and in Rathcarne. I pointed out that, since the war, a fleet of lorries leaves every day with potatoes and other farm produce for the Dublin market. I indicated that the hard work and industry of these people in the Gaeltacht have brought wealth and abundance to Gibbstown and Rathcarne. The married sons of these farmers have proved themselves worthy claimants in any future scheme of land division in County Meath and I suggest to the Minister that when he has his migration policy on foot he should take into account the claims of those who are on the spot.
I have said that the Minister should consider the extension of the cow-park scheme. The cow-park scheme in Westmeath has been a complete success. I cannot tell off-hand the number of cow-parks in the county operated by the county council but I suppose I would err on the conservative side if I said there were 12. The nearer they are to the towns the greater success they are. The poor man can have his cow, his calf, his ass and his pony in these cow-parks at a very small fee. The Westmeath County Council, by resolution, and other councils have asked that wherever there is an estate divided near a town portion of the land should be set aside for a cow-park and, further, where there is no estate in the vicinity of the town, a farm should be acquired for the purpose. No better thing could be done. They have proved a success, except where the cow-park has been established in a remote area, such as the cow-park which was established about 12 miles from Moate, of which no one was availing because all their requirements were met in land division. Nothing but dry cattle were being put on this cow-park, with the result that the county council had to appeal to the Land Commission to remove that cow-park. That should not damn the scheme. Where the cow-parks are established near towns or villages, at Killucan, Delvin and other places, they are a complete success. The Westmeath County Council and the General Council of County Councils have advocated the continuance of the policy of establishing cow-parks and I advocate it here.
Deputy Beegan referred to the neglect of work on the part of the Land Commission in years past. Under the 1903 Act they divided an estate; they started to make a road into it but they did not complete it. Deputy Beegan urged the completion of the work and I second him in that. The same applies to turbary. In relation to the question of turbary, for years I have asked for a list of the allottees on certain estates who got turbary. I have been refused. I have been told that it is not the policy of the Land Commission to give such lists. There should be a reversal of that policy. What has happened in my locality has proved that I am right and that the Land Commission are wrong. On the Wilson estate, a huge tract of bog was divided. I think some people got an acre of bog. During the emergency, for the last six or seven years, the allottees have gone into competition with people in the towns. They have built up turf banks and knocked the poor people out. They have cut, not only for their own use, but for commercial purposes. They were put out from one bog on the Clonturk estate and the result was that last year some of them went to this bog on the Wilson estate and began cutting the virgin bog that they had left intact for the last five or six years. I think it is in the national interest that the Land Commission should reveal who are the allottees on that virgin bog which has remained practically intact since the emergency, while other bogs are being cut away.
Deputy Beegan also referred to the acquisition of estates and set a headline for estates on which no tillage was done and on which the Department of Agriculture had to enter for the last seven years. I second him in that suggestion also. There are a number of estates south and west of Mullingar on which the inspectors of the Department of Agriculture had to enter year after year and on which they are entering this spring to do the tillage which should be done. Some of the owners are non-residential. A few of them have had influence for the last 20 years and have resisted all attempts to acquire and divide the land. I advocate in the post-emergency period the immediate acquisition and division of these estates.
I asked a question in the Dáil to-day about a certain allocation of land and got a reply from the Minister. I am not going to throw any bouquets at the inspectors and staff of the Land Commission, because I never got a fair crack of the whip from them. So far as I am concerned, and I have a right to speak here as a Deputy without being personal, their attitude seems to be that whenever I advocate a thing which appears to be just, they do the opposite. There should be one rule in connection with the division of lands in the Midlands. If they give a holding to a person in the Midlands, no matter who he may be, they should not translate him in a few years to another holding. If they peg out an Old I.R.A. man out of his holding, they should not take somebody else and give him an exchange of holding within a period of a few years. No matter what his politics are, there should be a fair crack of the whip for the ordinary man in the street. There should not be one rule for a few favoured individuals in the Midlands and another rule for "Paddy from Ireland". The sooner the Land Commission establish fairness and equity in their dealings with people in the Midlands, the better.
The Minister finished up his introductory statement by introducing a bone of contention when he referred to the reduction of outstanding arrears as a proof of prosperity. Deputy McMenamin was inclined to contest that matter with the Minister and to assert that the £350,000 outstanding is a proof of considerable destitution amongst the agricultural community. I do not think either view is correct.
I beg your pardon, I did not make any such suggestion. I drew a contrast between the outstanding arrears in 1931 and the arrears on the half annuities in 1945.
The inference I drew was——
You cannot draw any inference from the statement itself. It was a perfectly plain statement.
It was a perfectly plain statement and I think it was made for some purpose.
No purpose whatever, except to draw the contrast.
It certainly is a more contentious bone than I thought it was. I shall leave it at that. I hold that these figures, which show a considerable reduction in the amount of arrears outstanding, do not disclose any condition of prosperity amongst the agricultural community. They certainly disclose that the farming community are honest and upright and, when they get a reasonable chance, that they endeavour to meet their liabilities to the best of their ability. That is what they are doing.
Another matter to which the Minister referred was the 40,000 acres of land which he has on hands at present. I hope Deputy McMenamin will not be offended—I think we would want to be very careful about what Deputy McMenamin says—when I say that he was rather suggesting that the Minister for Lands was guilty of bad husbandry in regard to a large amount of that land. I am inclined to agree with that viewpoint. Bad husbandry is perhaps a term which it is difficult to define. Sometime ago I happened to slip into a public-house in the city to buy a box of matches and I heard two aged ladies discussing the news. One said: "I see where a farmer has been sentenced to three months for bad husbandry." The other said: "It serves him right. Wait until I write to the Government and tell them about my husband." Now that the legal gentlemen have got after the Minister for Lands, I hope that they will not be able to convict him of bad husbandry. I hope the wise and prudent advice given to him from all sides of the House will be taken, namely, to get this land off his hands at the earliest possible opportunity.
There is no reasonable excuse for the long delays which take place in regard to the allocation of land in the hands of the Land Commission. It takes years and years to find suitable allottees for the various estates which they are called upon to divide. It seems to me that the inspectors keep running round and round in circles until they eventually come to the right applicant. I think it is only a matter of luck, because, after all, there are in every district a large number of people who are more or less suitable and it is very difficult to find the best possible person. I think that no useful purpose is served by chasing round from one to the other and hearing the stories that one applicant tells about another. That only makes for delay and confusion and also creates a certain amount of bitterness.
There is another small matter which I raised last year. It is a matter which causes a considerable amount of contention amongst a small number of tenants under the Land Commission, and that is the liability for tithe rents. It is about time that tithe rents were abolished. They are not collected for the purpose for which they were originally intended and we know that the main function of the Land Commission, in regard to the collection of money, is to collect from the tenant-purchasers the necessary money to repay the purchase money on the holdings. I do not know whether these tithe rents come within that category. They are not utilised for the repayment of bond holders, but for various other purposes. I fail to see why a limited number of tenant-purchasers should be subject to this imposition which is a source of very considerable grievance in certain areas. It is not very widespread and because it is not very widespread, it is a problem which should be tackled and solved.
There is another small section who, I think, have not derived the full benefit of the Land Purchase Acts to which they are entitled. I refer to yearly tenants, tenants who hold their land under lease. There are a good number of such tenants throughout the country, and in most cases they have made application to the Land Commission for an extension to them of the benefits of the Land Acts, and I think it is a matter which should be speeded up. There is another aspect of that matter which recently came to my notice, that is, the position of such tenants when they are economic holders in relation to land which may be divided in their areas. Are such persons entitled to allotments from the Land Commission or to parcels of land to increase their holdings as if they were actually tenants of the Land Commission? That is a question which ought to be cleared up. It is a matter which does require attention.
I notice in the Book of Estimates that there are 60 temporary inspectors, and, as a matter of curiosity, I should like to know what is the purpose of such a large number of temporary inspectors. One would imagine, even from listening to this debate, that there is so much work lying ahead of the Land Commission that no official should be in a temporary position. There seems to be a lifetime of work lying ahead of practically the entire staff. Some claim that the Land Commission is understaffed and some suggest that it is overstaffed, and as a result they are getting in each other's way, but in an efficiently run Department practically all the officials of importance should be permanent.
One question which was dealt with, and rightly so, at very considerable length during this debate is the general policy of the Land Commission with regard to the acquisition and distribution of land. Deputy Corry, I think, was somewhat unwise in referring practically to the entire population of the western seaboard as "hen-roosters" and I think he will have a rather unpleasant time on the hen-roost of the Fianna Fáil Party for some time to come. There are some old roosters in the Party who are very dissatisfied with him and who are inclined to repudiate him and all his works and pomps. No useful purpose is ever served by insulting and abusing any section of the population and particularly a section of our people who live in humble but decent circumstances. It is not the fault of the people who occupy the Western counties that their holdings are small and that they are congested, and the fact that there is such an enormous amount of congestion in the western counties presents this Government and any Government which will take office with a problem of very great magnitude and very great difficulty. It is a problem which should be tackled impartially, objectively and without any bitterness or any display of extravagance of language or temper.
I have noticed a tendency in various parts of the House to regard any migrant or any citizen from any other county who comes into another county as an enemy who ought to be kept out at any cost. Even Deputy Flanagan who claims to be very progressive in his outlook and his ideas is inclined completely to exclude all migrants from his constituency, while freely advocating that the land should be broken up on a very wide scale amongst his own constituents. That is not a helpful attitude, and neither is it a helpful attitude to seek to set one type of farmer against another, to represent the small farmer as being immeasurably better than the big farmer and vice versa.
I travelled two days ago through portion of Deputy Flanagan's constituency of Leix, and I was struck and deeply impressed by the quality of the land and the high standard of efficiency displayed in its working. The crops were sown, the land was tilled to the very fences, the fences were well trimmed, and so far as I could see, there was not an inch of waste land. On that particular stretch, I estimated, from viewing the houses and the number of fields attached, that each holding was in or about 100 acres in area. They were exceptionally well cared for and well managed, and I do not think that anyone in any part of the House would suggest that such farmers should be dispossessed, or their land taken from them and given to anyone else either inside or outside that constituency.
That raises the bigger issue, of how far the Land Commission should go in regard to the distribution of land. I am satisfied that there is a vast amount of work to be done in relation to the acquisition and distribution of land, but I think there should be certain guiding principles which should be universally accepted. One principle which the Land Commission and the Minister should accept is that no farmer who works his land well according to the laws of good husbandry should be dispossessed of his holding in any circumstances whatever. That, I think, is the principle which should guide the Minister.
The Minister, on the recent Land Bill, agreed that he would not dispossess any allottee who was working his land according to the laws of good husbandry and who, of course, was residing in the homestead. He agreed further to accept an amendment from the Opposition Party by which he left it to the courts to decide whether an allottee was working his land according to the laws of good husbandry or not. When the Minister agreed to that amendment, I must say he grew six inches higher in my estimation, if that is of any advantage to him. Having accepted that general principle, the Land Commission can get by agreement all the land they are able to deal with, if they act in a business-like way. I know many farmers who have offered their land and who are still waiting for some action in regard to it. Land is urgently needed in those districts. I know also that there are many farmers who would offer their land if they were sure that, in the event of a disagreement in regard to price, the Land Commission would not step in and use compulsory powers to acquire it. If they would deal with the farmers in the same way as good businessmen deal with one another, they would get all the land they require provided they establish confidence between themselves and the people with whom they have to deal.
In the case of a farmer who has an out-farm, which may or may not be very big, and who is prepared to hand it to the Land Commission at a fair price, what is the position at the moment? He may have to wait for years before the Land Commission acquires it. Also, there must be a considerable amount of agitation in the district for the land. No farmer who has land like that to dispose of wants to go to the trouble of getting people to agitate for the possession of his land. That is a difficulty which can be got over easily by business-like methods. With the establishment of confidence between the Land Commission and the farmers, there would be in the future a greater tendency amongst the larger farmers to sell portion of the land, where they find they have more than they are able to work. That would relieve some congestion in their own particular area and it is a tendency which should be encouraged.
I believe that agricultural conditions will be rather difficult in the future. It is certain that, in the conditions which will prevail in the post-war period, the farmer who has more land than he is able to work efficiently will be forced to sell to somebody, since working costs in agriculture, and labour costs, too, will certainly be higher than they were pre-war. The tendency of farmers will be to meet the Land Commission fairly and give them their land, provided a reasonable price is offered. Therefore, the Land Commission should drop all this idea of compulsion and act in a business-like way. Otherwise, the farmer will go to the auctioneer—and very rightly—as he can put up his land and get rid of it in a month or two, whereas in dealing with the Land Commission the case might drag on for years. That is a consideration which the Minister should take into account.
I would like to see growing up between the officials and the farmers and people generally with whom they have to deal a spirit of co-operation and understanding. We do not want the farmer in the position where he simply fills in a form and then gets a reply, an inspector comes down after some time and takes a note of his grievance and another inspector comes some months or some years after that, and so on. There should be somebody appointed to deal with each particular case and take a personal interest in it. It is by establishing a human relationship between the Land Commission and the farmers that more progress will be made and more confidence will be established. I have in mind the case of a farmer who got into financial difficulties after the first world war and, as a result, agreed to the Land Commission taking over his place. He understood at the time that he would get a parcel of land on it. In making the allocations of the holding, the inspector found that he could not satisfy this particular farmer on his own holding, but he gave him a definite promise to see that he got a parcel of land on the first estate that would be divided in the area. That happened in 1934, but this particular farmer—or ex-farmer—is still waiting for his allotment.
There was a definite promise made by an official, which may not have been put into writing—I think it was not— the kind of promise that one farmer or businessman would make to another and the kind of promise that should have been honoured. There was no obstacle in the way of giving this man a small parcel of land. He was capable of working it. The fact that he got into difficulties on the larger farm was due to his having purchased it at a time of inflation during the first world war. He has hung on for more than ten years to a little stock that would enable him to set up on a new farm, if it is allotted to him. He is now getting old and, perhaps, the Land Commission might object to him on that point, but he could hardly be expected to prevent that occurring. However, he has grown-up sons who are prepared to help him. That is a kind of case where we should have a more human relationship between the Land Commission and the farmers. There should be a sense of fair play, of justice and of human understanding of the needs of each particular individual. We often hear it said that a corporation has no soul to be damned or body to be kicked. I do not want the Land Commission to get into the position that they can do a dishonourable thing on a particular individual and get away with it because they are a huge Government Department.
There are so many Deputies anxious to speak on this particular Vote that I had not intended to speak at all, but must do so in justice to myself and in fairness to the House as being the Parliament of this country. I am quite sure that Deputies who heard Deputy Flanagan speak some time ago are anxious to hear the other side of the story. I ask the Chair that I be given the same opportunity, in a decent fashion in this Parliament of our country, to put my side of the case truthfully before my colleagues in all parts of the House. Deputy Flanagan has the audacity to accuse me of political corruption and of using political influence for my own ends. I ask the permission of the House to bring this matter up, because it really is out of order.
Acting-Chairman (Mr. O'Reilly)
It has no reference to this at all.
It was outside the scope of the debate. By right, the Deputy should not have been allowed, but he got away with it.
It was true.
As he made the allegation, it is by way of explanation that I am asking you to let it in, as it did not occur during last year's Estimate.
It must have happened some time.
Acting-Chairman
The Deputy must allow Deputy Gorry to make his case.
Those are Deputy Flanagan's usual tactics. He even had the audacity to drag this matter up at a county council meeting for his own ends and to secure publicity. Thank God, I am able to look after my own character and I am able to look after my own deeds and I do not want the help of Deputy Flanagan. I do not want him to tell me what is right or advise me what is wrong. He put forward the case a while ago that I used undue political influence and corruption with the Land Commission and their inspector in order to get the best part of an estate which was being divided in my countryside. As a matter of fact, the estate, the O'Shea estate, lay alongside the farm where I was born, where my father before me was born, and where my grandfather lived. My family have been there during the last 100 years and, therefore, I ought to know something about that particular land and its history.
Did you not get some of it?
This estate came up for division and there were about a dozen applicants. It was part of a holding which had been sold. It was an out part of a neighbouring farm and the residential part was sold a couple of years before. As I said, there were about 12 applicants. The townland of Garrymore, from where the applicants came, was a very congested area. The holdings were grouped together in such a way that in one field you would find patches of half an acre or three roods. They were so interlocked that at the outset, on the question of making a good resettlement scheme in the district among my neighbours, and remembering that there were at least four or five cabins which had to be demolished and a new adjustment made, I suggested that all those people should voluntarily surrender all the land they held, lock, stock and barrel, to the Land Commission and allow the inspector to draw up a scheme, taking into consideration the migration of two or three of the tenants on to the O'Shea land into new houses and readjusting the various acreages among the remainder.
I also suggested, in order to make extra room, that a couple of the tenants who would be willing to give up, in one case, ten acres and, in another case, a smaller holding, should go to another estate that the Land Commission was dividing, that it would be all to the good and that the finished scheme would be a better one for the countryside.
There ought to be some regard for the Minister. I have been here all day listening to a lot of stuff that has nothing at all to do with the Estimate. There should be some observance of order.
Acting-Chairman
Deputy Gorry has the right to reply.
I bow in deference to the Minister, but I would like to deal with this matter because a definite accusation was made against me and it will appear in the provincial Press tomorrow or the next day.
Can you deny it?
I think at least the truth should be put on record. In this instance one of my neighbours, a man named Dunne — if any Deputies are interested in this matter and want further details I can supply them— had a holding about two or two and a half acres a mile from my place. His holding was approached down a laneway a half a mile in length. One corner of the O'Shea estate came within a 100 yards of the farm where I live. We held 17 or 18 acres right around where Dunne lived, about a mile from our place, and it surrounded him on three sides. Dunne had the privilege of grazing two cows with ours on that part of the land. His fowl were continuously on that part of the land, too, and also his donkey. In our time he had the said use of the land.
Was he not paying you for it?
I will stop if Deputy Flanagan persists in taking up this attitude. Those are his tactics and he does not want to hear the truth. He wants to get away with one side of the story, to his own advantage. The inspector came to the district and visited the people, my neighbours, who applied for a portion of the land. When he came to Dunne's place he asked Dunne who owned the land which surrounded his house and he was told it was ours. Dunne was one of the future allottees. He was bound to get land because his garden joins on to the O'Shea estate. It was suggested by the inspector to Dunne that it would be a better settlement if he would approach me to know if I would agree to exchange the land that surrounded him for the portion that the inspector intended giving to Dunne and which came within a hundred yards of our home. As regards Deputy Flanagan saying it is a swamp, I know what land is and there are many farmer Deputies and others here who know what good land is and what bad land is.
The man who got your land is in a swamp.
I challenge any Deputy to come to the district and see for himself the portions of the field which he and I got.
Oh!
There was one field divided between Dunne and myself and if Deputies wish they can see for themselves if there is any difference. At any rate, after the inspector had gone Dunne asked me would I consent to exchange. I said I would agree to have the matter considered by the Land Commission.
And the inspector went in for tea with you?
He did not—that is a lie.
Ah, ha!
The matter was considered and before the scheme was drawn up I was told that mischief-makers, such as we hear going on here, local mischief-makers, had suggested, wilfully and deceitfully, that I was getting land, that I got a sop from the Land Commission. They took pains to start the hare going, that I was getting land, but there was nothing about an exchange.
You gave the bad and got the good—that is the only difference.
I sent for Dunne and told him to consider his proposal off and to tell the inspector. Dunne came to me immediately and craved me not to upset my previous consent. I said I would not give consent to exchange unless all the applicants concerned were satisfied that the exchange was a bona fide one and that it was mutually beneficial to Dunne and myself. The day of the division came. The inspector met the allottees on the public road about half-a-mile from my place. I said there publicly that I would not agree to give consent and that the inspector could give the land that they had agreed to exchange with me to Dunne, that I would stay as I was if anyone objected. Every person there said it was mutually beneficial to Dunne and myself to have the exchange confirmed by the Land Commission.
Were they not afraid to say anything else because of what they were getting?
There was nothing to prevent Dunne and myself exchanging afterwards when the land was vested in us. So far as these interruptions are concerned, I must ask for the protection of the Chair. Deputy Flanagan is trying to waste time.
Acting-Chairman
These interruptions must cease.
Anybody who is interested in this matter can verify what I have said. Anybody who goes to that district can see that Dunne is a good neighbour. He is a man with five sons who has been farming all his life and who knows how to work land. Since he got land he has produced 17 or 18 barrels of wheat to the acre and from ten to 12 tons of beet. That is the best recommendation I can give him. I only wish that the Deputy could give as good an account of himself as Dunne. I wish Deputy Flanagan would have a bit of commonsense at this hour of his life and not be listening to the stories which some people tell him. The Deputy lives in Mount-mellick and near enough to Garrymore to make inquiries, but he prefers to draw red herrings into this matter for his own advantage.
There is one matter to which I wish to call the Minister's attention although it may not be possible to do anything about it during the coming year. I refer to the question of housing as it affects tenants who have purchased holdings from the Land Commission. No provision has been made for farmers with holdings the valuation of which is from £25 to £50 in the way of providing housing facilities or for the reconstruction of houses. In many cases the old houses are beyond repair. I mention the matter now because in some cases the tenants would not be able to face up to the expense themselves and if they went to the Agricultural Credit Corporation the terms for a suitable loan, even if available, would make it impossible for them to provide houses.
Now that the Land Commission is about to resume operations on a more extensive scale than was possible during the emergency, I should like the Minister to make it clear to farmers who may be timorous about their position what the future policy is to be regarding the acquisition of land. The Minister should make is clear to farmers, whether large or small, that as long as they work their land they will not be disturbed. Knowing the Minister as I do, I am perfectly satisfied that that will be his policy. Despite all the Land Acts that have been passed by foreign governments and by our own Government there are still some tenants who have not purchased. Deputy Cogan referred to yearly tenants but there are others which might be called line-ball cases and fee farm grants. They are not numerous. I brought certain of these cases to the notice of the Minister. I should like him to look into the matter to see if tenants who have not purchased could be helped to do so.
I listened to the debate on the Land Commission Vote and I must say that I heard some amazing speeches being made. Some of these speeches by Deputy Giles, Deputy Flanagan and Deputy Corry were the best speeches that could be made in favour of Partition. It appeared from them that Ireland would want to be divided into 26 separate parts. Any man who comes beyond the borders of Meath in the opinion of Deputy Flanagan or beyond the borders of Leix-Offaly in the opinion of Deputy Flanagan or beyond the borders of Cork in the opinion of Deputy Corry should be treated as a foreigner, as an enemy and as an invader. We had an amazing statement from Deputy Corry about the hen roosts in the West. It was a good job for the Deputy and for his colleagues that there were men in the hen roosts in the west. It was the men in these hen roosts who smashed feudalism in the past. The kernel of the land question in this country is to be found in the fact that our people would not accept feudalism.
The last migration to Connaught did not take place in the days of Cromwell. A very small acquaintance with Irish history would inform Deputy Giles that as late as 1750 migration took place from the Midlands to Connaught and that there was a clearance from the Midlands in 1850. There was also a pogrom in Ulster at the same period as a result of which many unfortunate Catholics had to go to Connaught. Deputy Corry made the amazing statement that men who were working as agricultural labourers in Cork for the glorious wage of £2 a week were so enamoured of their position and so pleased with their conditions that they would not take 30 acres of land if they were offered it. I am surprised that there should be such backboneless jellyfish amongst the the labourers of Cork. I met labourers from Cork, decent manly men who were not the cowardly jellyfish or the backboneless individuals who would prefer to be cleaning out the dog kennels of the local hunt rather than availing of the opportunity to become owners of small farms and achieve that much independence. I ask the Minister as far as it is in his power to proceed on the line that the problem of congestion does exist. It has its roots in a very bad background and in a very sad period of Irish history. I move to report progress.
Progress reported; the Committee to sit again.