I regret that it was not possible for me to be here last week.
Vote 41—Local Government and Public Health (Resumed).
Debate resumed on the following motion:—
That the Estimate be referred for reconsideration (Deputy Hughes).
You will, before I am finished — very much so. I have read the only copy of the Official Report available to us, containing the opening part of the Minister's speech of Wednesday last. Unfortunately — or perhaps, fortunately — Thursday's Official Reports are not yet available. I do not know where to begin on this Estimate and I doubt if I can indicate where I will finish. I read the Official Report closely, and, having read 18½ columns, I went back to the beginning of the Minister's speech to find out whether the Standing Orders of the House had been suspended to enable the Minister to make the speech he made extending over 18½ columns. It was not until he had filled 18½ columns, that he came, or brought himself, within the rules of order of the House. The Minister had no intention at any time during that speech of conforming to the rules of order and he stated so emphatically on two occasions.
On a point of order, I thought the Deputy had vacated the position of Leas-Cheann Comhairle some years ago.
That is as good a point of order as was ever made by a gentleman sitting in this House for 19 years, and Deputies will appreciate how good that is. The Minister is so well known to the House that it is not worth my while to deal further with that point. Let me quote this little tin-hatted cardboard dictator:
"I must be allowed to make my own case in my own way."
That appears at column 1716 of the Debates of 12th June. At column 1720, he said:—
"I submit that the Minister is entitled to present his Estimates in whatever form he likes."
When the Ceann Comhairle asked: "Despite the Chair's ruling," he said:—
"If the Chair wants me to sit down and leave the Estimate to the House without explaining it, I can do so."
We have 18½ columns devoted not to the only period which the Minister under the rules of the House is entitled to discuss, but to an Estimate of 14 years ago, and 18½ columns devoted to twisting and turning, and, in every way possible to the mind of the Minister, giving a false suggestion to the whole of these Estimates of 1932.
The Minister, apparently, in seeking figures to cloud the issue, reviewed the Estimates over many years. Might I ask him if he reviewed the Estimates for the years 1922-23 and 1923-24? Will he tell us that? Will he tell us what he found in the 1922-23 Estimate with regard to housing? He will not, but, of course, the Minister at that period was not interested in building houses. He boasts here, as he tried to do in Cork, that nothing was done for housing in this country until the present Government came into office. Let me remind him and the House that, when he was little concerned with building houses, one of the first Acts of the first Minister for Finance in the first Irish Government of this State was to make available to the local authorities a sum of £1,000,000 as a free grant — 66 per cent. of the cost of building the houses. At that time, as I say, the Minister was not concerned with building.
He ignored the fact that if he had looked at the Estimates for 1922-23, he would have found a sum of £600,000 in grants, and in the Estimates for 1923-24 a sum of £700,000. Perhaps those two sums could have been four, five and six times as great if, unfortunately, there had not to be provided in the same Book of Estimates a sum of £10,380,000 for property compensation losses and £10,600,000 in the 1923-24 Estimates for a National Army. These two sums put together would have built a lot of houses, but the Minister does not want to go back so far. He has the audacity and the effrontery to come in here and say: "It is quite clear that Deputies are very uncomfortable about their past"—addressing Deputies on this side of the House. The tender spot in the Minister's anatomy is not his neck. "I know it is a terrible thing to be living with skeletons in a cupboard, like Deputy McMenamin." The Minister has a lot of skeletons in his cupboard; whether he lives with them or not I do not know. "I am not going to ask Deputies, whose consciences are now so tender, to look at the Estimate for 1932-33. I think it is a painful subject for them." And further on: "The plain fact is that when the Opposition were in power — and they will criticise this Estimate now — we might have had less taxation but we also had more starvation." That is untrue; and the man who uttered that statement knows that it is untrue. But what is he seeking to do? He is boasting of the fact that in this year of 1946 he has to provide double the amount that his predecessors had to provide in order to deal with tuberculosis. Is not that something of which he should be ashamed? Is not that something of which the whole Government should be ashamed after 14 years of Fianna Fáil administration? We know — and the reports are available, and the Minister will bear it out himself — that there has been a steady growth in disease in this country, due in the main to malnutrition; and that, in turn, brought about by a cost of living which has increased by leaps and bounds and by wages that are pegged back by the Minister who is supposed to be responsible for the public health of the people of this country. He pays cheap lip sympathy to the people who produce the fuel on the bogs for the county councils of this country—lip sympathy from the very man who pegged back their wages to a starvation level.
Fourteen years of Fianna Fáil and the Minister, who is responsible, has the audacity to get up here and talk about housing. There is a greater hunger for housing in this country to-day than there was 14 years ago. I saw slums in the City of Cork last week that I did not believe existed in any part of Europe, much less in the second city of this State; I saw human beings living in and under conditions of which we ought to be thoroughly ashamed. That is the position after 14 years—an unbroken period of 14 years of government — without anybody from either inside or outside the House to challenge their right to deal with those conditions and to put them right. They are the gentlemen who 14 years ago walked into offices that were running smoothly, with all the national and local services at their command, and with a House here that was prepared to give them anything they asked for or required. But the man who talks about his "progressive mind" has been so progressive that, after 14 years of Fianna Fáil, we are now presented with a review of the housing situation in this small State, with an ever dwindling population and an ever increasing emigration, in which we are told that we require at least 60,000 houses in order to give our people any sort of decent conditions in which to live. It is no wonder that he preferred to talk about 1932-33 instead of talking about 1946-47. All the members of this House and the public outside may not have as long memories as some of us, and the Minister, perhaps, may hope to get away with it.
He talks about roads and he suggests that there was not one single decent road in this country until he became Minister for Local Government — until Fianna Fáil came into power. May I remind him, as I reminded him about housing, that his predecessors made available a sum of £2,000,000 in order to make decent roads in this country when the Minister's only interest in roads in this country was to make them impassable? May I remind him that money which might have been spent on building houses, both by this House and by local authorities, had to be spent upon the rebuilding of bridges?
I think the Deputy might leave out the civil war.
Sir, I am not leaving out civil war. I claim I am as much entitled to discuss the Estimates of 1922-23 and 1923-24 as the Minister for Local Government is to discuss the Estimates for 1932-33.
Quite, but the Deputy was discussing the civil war.
And why not bring in the Black-and-Tan war?
I am afraid if he brought in the Black-and-Tan war the Minister would not figure very highly in it.
I want to make it clear, once and for all, in this House that there is not going to be one law for the Minister and one law for us.
The Deputy is not getting bad law from the Chair.
I know that. It is perfectly clear to you, but I am trying to make it clear to the Minister for Local Government; you and your predecessors have been trying to make it clear to him for 19 years and they have never succeeded. Will the Minister, once and for all, get it firmly into his head that, instead of boasting about his so-called social services, he ought to be ashamed of them? Will he get it into his head that if his 14 years of government had been fruitful the only people for whom social services would need to be provided to-day would be those unfitted for work by reason of disease or physical incapacity?
The Minister talks about the progressive social policy pursued by himself and his Department. They are so progressive that when the Most Rev. Dr. Dignan did produce a progressive and up-to-date social policy, he was insulted by the Minister for daring to suggest that he or anybody else should advance one step beyond the halting gait of the Minister and his Department. This sort of business is not going to get the Minister anywhere— not in this House. He may succeed in throwing dust in the eyes of certain people in this country. Unfortunately, he has succeeded to some extent. But, when the Minister prides himself on his efficiency, as he puts it, compared with that of his predecessors, let me say this to him, that if he devoted a little more attention to the duties of Minister for Local Government and less attention, while sitting in the Custom House, to work that should be done in the Fianna Fáil headquarters, perhaps the results of his efficiency and his careful supervision might be other than they now appear to be in many respects. No matter how much he may darken the glass to fool himself, the Minister is living in a huge glasshouse. The Minister is very vulnerable as a Minister and if some of us had as little respect for the decencies of public life as the Minister himself has we might make him grovel in the seat in which he is now sitting.
I want to make it clear to the Minister for Local Government that he is free to continue making an ass of himself, that he is free to continue to come in here and go on with his play-acting and his cheap gibes in order to cover up his own inefficiency and to cover up the results as we see them of 14 years of Fianna Fáil. Remember, he is not going to get away with it. When the Minister tries to gibe at men whose shoes he was not fit to clean, he is going to get it back every time, with interest, and all his cheap gibes are not going to stop us from doing that. I was foolish enough at one time to hope that with advancing age the Minister might — I will not say improve —but become a little less objectionable than he was. He has not succeeded. Every time I listen to the Minister for Local Government and Public Health, either inside this House or outside, I see one good reason for Partition — one good reason for the Border. Thank God, he is the only one. He is not going to get away with all this cheap gibing. Let the Minister make his mind easy about that. Let the Minister realise that this House as a whole represents the Irish people, that to this House and, through this House, to the Irish people, he is supposed to give at the end of a year, when he is looking for a sum of over £2,000,000, a strict, accurate and impartial account of his stewardship and of the expenditure of this very large sum of money, and that he is not fulfilling his duty to this House or to the people when he indulges in vulgar abuse and lying abuse of his predecessors.
I do not like to interrupt Deputy Morrissey in this very relevant speech of his, but I should like to draw your attention to the fact, for the good conduct of this House, that he has accused me personally of public lying.
Will the Minister speak up, please?
Deputies should not accuse the Minister of lying.
And I submit to you, Sir, that the Deputy should withdraw that remark.
The Deputy should withdraw that remark.
I do not require to be asked by the Minister. It is sufficient for the Chair to ask me and I withdraw it unreservedly, Sir.
Very good, proceed.
I withdraw it unreservedly. May I hope that in future on the many occasions on which he is bound to commit himself the Minister will as readily and as fully obey the Chair as I have now done?
Deputy Morrissey has dwelt on the astonishing irrelevance and hysterical character of the Minister's speech. His hysterics first created the impression upon my mind of a man who is very conscious of the cracks that are manifesting themselves in the political machine which has kept them in office so long, and the foreknowledge that those cracks are going to wreck the fabric that he and his colleagues have so painfully built up, and that they may be called upon at an early date to face the country on their merits and not by the other means which they have hitherto so successfully employed. With that prospect before him, who in this House will blame him for hysterics? Even bravest hearts must swell in contemplation of an experience such as I think he is fated to go through. When he compares his record with that of the leader of the Opposition, it is not surprising that he should try to intoxicate himself with 18 columns of eloquence to show that he is as good as those who went before him. But, when a man is reduced to filling 18 columns of the Official Report with self-justification, experienced observers will be moved to say that if he was not beginning to doubt, he would not take so long to assert.
His speech led me to another experience. I went down to-day and took out the Official Reports of the proceedings of this House for 1932 and 1931, and I was constrained to peruse the speeches then made by the Minister and his colleagues when they sat in the front Opposition bench — by the Taoiseach, by the Minister here present, by the then Deputy Leader of the Opposition, by Deputy Lemass, as he was then, and by Deputy Derrig — and, for concentrated, shameless, indecent hypocrisy and fraud, I have never read their equal in the official report of any Parliament in the world. There we read whirling words.
The Ministers were not responsible to this House until they became Ministers.
They are not responsible even now, Sir.
On an Estimate, the Deputy will confine himself to the speeches made by the Minister whose Estimate is being considered.
That is what I am doing, Sir.
I understood the Deputy to quote at least six Deputies whose speeches he referred to.
I said I had the disagreeable experience of reading them, Sir.
Perhaps I misunderstood the Deputy.
Yes. I do not advise any other Deputy to read them because it is a very disgusting experience, but they are there for those who have the curiosity to inquire into them and they will find the present Minister for Local Government and Public Health expressing grave solicitude at the increase in the number of civil servants and at the conspiracy that was afoot to deprive local authorities of that autonomy without which free democracy could not function in this State.
I thought the Deputy understood me. Speeches made by Deputies before they become Ministers are not quoted when the man is a Minister. He was not responsible to this House as Minister at the time.
Perhaps if the Chair will refer to the Minister's speech—God knows, I do not blame him if he has not read it through — he will find a large part was devoted to a comparison of the number of civil servants in his Department now and the number there in 1932, and he adduced this as evidence of his diligence. It is unnecessary to follow all the ramblings of the Minister. I propose to devote myself to a specific point, of which I have given him notice. At column 1724, on 12th June last, the Minister delivered himself of this pleasing declaration:—
"Now I assume — and I think I am entitled to assume — from the speeches on the Budget that it is the policy of the Opposition to close down on housing, to dismiss the 82 officers, and to save this £525,000; and, as a natural corollary, to condemn no less than 60,000 families to continue to live in festering slums and condemned houses until disease and death solved the housing problem for Fine Gael."
I had to withdraw the word "lie".
The Minister went on:—
"I can only say that may be the policy of Fine Gael, but it is emphatically not the policy of this Government."
At column 1725, the Minister said:—
"It is not our policy to let the children die, just because Deputy Hughes wants us `to reverse engines', or Deputy O'Higgins seeks to intimidate us by alleging that in framing the Budget for this year— the Budget which is intended to cover the Estimate—the Minister for Finance was thinking in terms of figures and not in terms of human beings."
It is not our policy, said the Minister, to let the children die. I want to tell the House a little story about what happened in this city during the last 12 months. There were a man and woman living in a tenement room. The Minister knows their names and where they live and he knows all the circumstances surrounding their case. They had four little children. The husband was unemployed, through no fault of his own, because the industry in which he normally worked had been much reduced as a result of scarcity of supplies. In due course it was discovered by a social worker that one of the children was suffering acutely from rickets. It then emerged, in the course of the inquiry, that the mother of those children, after the birth of her last infant, had contracted puerperal fever and diphtheria and, suffering from those two grave conditions, was removed to Cork Street Hospital, where she was treated and cured.
As the House will readily understand, the mother of a poor family, having been through such illness, was not physically able to do as much hard work as a mother of four normally has to do, if a tenement room has to be kept reasonably decent and with four young children to be properly looked after. When that social worker first called upon her, that mother was able to drag herself about the room by holding on to the few articles of furniture that were in it and she was then grappling with the problem of looking after these children and feeding them out of the exiguous income her husband derived from children's allowances, outdoor relief, unemployment benefit and certain other sources.
After a time the baby, the infant who had been kept by its grandmother while the mother was in Cork Street and returned to its mother when she came home, got ill and, after suffering from diarrhæa for from four to six days, it was laid one night in its pram with a bottle of milk and it was found dead in the pram in the morning. The father notified the Guards and the Guards attended. The Guards notified the coroner and he decided there was no need for an inquest. The local dispensary officer, who is the registrar, was notified of this decision and, in accordance with the ordinary provisions of the law issued the usual death certificate, without stating the cause of death. But an answer given to me here by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government expressed the view that the child had died of gastro-enteritis. I would have expected, from the description I had heard of the magnificent system of social services that obtains in this city, after 15 years of Fianna Fáil administration and expenditure— which all will agree has been on a princely scale and should be sufficient to assure us all that the poorest creatures in the country would not go unaided were they in distress — that when the medical officer of the district in which these people live had been made aware of the fact that the baby was dead, that its brother was rickety, that its mother was recently released from Cork Street Hospital after enduring the rigours of diphtheria and puerperal fever, there would be somebody to go to that home and ask that woman: "Is there anything your neighbours can do to help you to tide over the difficult period that lies ahead while your surviving three children are being rescued from the threat of death in the night that overtook your infant?" So far as I know, nobody ever went. That infant was shovelled into the grave and, so far as the social services of this country are concerned, forgotten. The incident was closed. The child died of gastro-enteritis. What could you do about it?
I want to ask the Minister did any officer of the public service, any officer concerned with public health, any person concerned with the welfare of the poor, go into that room to find out if any of the other children were so suffering? Did it ever occur to any of them that diarrhoea in an infant could probably be a symptom of gastro-enteritis or that it may be a symptom of half-a-dozen or more infantile ills, many of which are easily communicable to older children? Are the social services, of which we are so proud, content to hear that an infant has died unattended by doctor, nurse or anyone else in the middle of the night in its room? Are they content to shovel it into its grave and forget about it? If they are, I do not think much of the social services, I do not think much of the 1,824 officers, I do not think much of the Minister who presides over them; I do not think much of the whole set-up which regards an incident of that character as the normal, nothing to get excited about. It might happen to-morrow; it could have happened before and it should not be made the subject of any particular comment by anybody anywhere, any time!
Do the Deputies of this House know that is the way social services work? Do the Deputies know that after all the money we spend, all the officers we have, and the diligent Minister for ever labouring in the Custom House, that it is not a matter for comment in that august establishment if an infant child should die in a tenement room in Dublin in the circumstances I have described? Now, mark this well. I bring no allegation of carelessness against any of the officers who actually acted in this matter. So far as I know, the statutory duty of the medical officer of health, the dispensary doctor of that area, was no more than to issue on request a certificate in the specified form, once the coroner's certificate had reached him. So far as I am aware, the coroner in the exercise of his absolute discretion had a right to determine whether or not there should be an inquest. Mind you, one must be very careful before one presumes to usurp that absolute discretion because were the coroner to insist on an inquest in every case of a death from natural causes, far from doing a useful public service, he might cause an infinity of unnecessary distress. But what is wrong is that when these facts were communicated to the public authority over which the Minister for Local Government and Public Health presides, there simply was not anybody whose business it was to intervene.
On a point of order, if the Deputy ascribes to me control over the public health services of Dublin, that is not correct, Sir. The Dublin Corporation have control of their own public health services and the Deputy must know that.
Let me quote the Minister's speech:—
"It is not our policy to let the children die."
That is plain; I take it at its face value. That child died, and when the Minister hears of its dying, his reaction is to get up in this House and call for water to wash his hands, to call on his neighbours to witness that he has no responsibility for its death. It was someone else let the child die! He has compared himself favourably with his predecessor in office because it is not his policy to let the children die but when I tell him here of a child that dies, his answer is to ask the Dublin Corporation. Now, either it is not his policy to let the children die or it is his policy to let them die until he is found out and when found out to disclaim responsibility. I believe Deputies of this House assume that the Minister for Local Government and Public Health, when he boasts of the social services provided by the Government, when he boasts of the grants that are made for this service and the other, that at least we have a minimum of guarantee that children will not die and be shovelled into their graves and forgotten on the ground that it is a common occurrence, that it has happened often before, that it is likely to happen again and that one should not over-dramatise this. That a child should have died and that the Minister should have remained indifferent is in itself a scandal. That in this city a woman should have borne her grief alone and faced the prospect of struggling against a like fate for the members of her family in consequence of the malnutrition that had come upon them, without any evidence whatever from any agency of the social services set up by this House that there was anyone ready to come to her aid, that there was anyone willing to visit her except a member of the Gárda Síochána to ascertain if there was a case for criminally prosecuting her, is to my mind a nauseating discovery. Let me say this lest it might seem that in mentioning members of the Gárda Síochána I suggest they went there in any querulous or offensive spirit: nothing could be further from the truth, because all the testimony is that the two members of the body who went there were sympathetic and kind, that there was nothing they could do beyond taking particulars and communicating them to the coroner in the course of their duty. There was no agency on which they could call.
Come then, let the Minister tell us if it is not his policy to let the children die, if some other infant is to die in a tenement room in Dublin, what does he propose to do about it? Wash his hands or say that the Minister is struggling to provide the wherewithal to fight this disease? Apart from that scandalous aspect of this story, I want to direct the House to another side effect of the procedure followed. We are building up for the City of Dublin a reputation that it is a kind of cesspool of infantile gastro-enteritis. It is a very grave disease. It is a very grave reflection on the sanitation and public health administration of this city before the whole world that the incidence of gastro-enteritis is said to be higher here than in almost any other city in the world. The fact is that the statistics of gastro-enteritis in this city are fantastically false because it has become a practice to accept as conclusive the certification of gastro-enteritis as the cause of death in almost every case of an infant dying in Dublin, showing as the principal symptom syndrome diarrhæa. Yet any competent practitioner in the city can tell you that of every 100 infants he is called upon to visit, and who are really sick, seven are exhibiting symptoms of diarrhæa, and of these seven, not five in a hundred can be said to be truly suffering from gastro-enteritis. It may be pneumonia, meningitis or a wide variety of infantile ills arising out of that particular symptom, but if the end is fatal it is covered under the general heading of gastro-enteritis. There are other diseases that kill infants exhibiting the symptoms of diarrhæa, which if not treated readily in the case of an undernourished child, rapidly bring about destruction. These other diseases also exhibit that symptom. I believe that proper inquiry and correct checking on these casual diagnoses of gastro-enteritis might materially alter the view of those responsible for the administration of public health, and would condemn the incidence of that disease amongst the infant population of this State.
I invite the Minister when he comes to answer this debate, to turn back to column 725 of the Debates where he stated "it is not our policy to let the children die", and to tell us what he did for the child who died, and what he proposes to do for hundreds dying at this moment who are fighting for their lives in filthy, verminous, rotten tenement rooms in this city. That is the principal matter I wanted to touch upon in discussing this Estimate, because I think it is a problem to which attention should be directed. Many people think that if you spend sums of money, and that if you beat the drum you must be getting somewhere. The policy of the Government of Russia is to describe the superb public parks, the magnificent social services, and the incomparable facilities provided for the people of the Soviet Union, but you find that what is described as a superb public park, with a bust of Lenin over the gate, could in fact, be stolen out of the Rotunda Gardens, that the incomparable houses provided for the emancipation of Russian serfs would, in fact, compare unfavourably with the reconverted houses in Lower Gardiner Street, while the superb social services which the Russian people to-day luxuriate in, approximate barely to the provisions of the Poor Law of 1843 here, but, by constant shouting about, they begin to persuade not only their neighbours but others that everything in the garden is lovely.
We are continually shouting about the millions of money we are spending on social services, and we have begun to think that, in fact, there is nobody who can be hungry or cold or destitute, because if there should be, our great machine of social services would go into operation to clothe them, to feed them and to comfort them. But ask those who frequent tenement houses in Meath Street parish, or in the ProCathedral parish around Marlborough Street, as they pass through filthy tenement rooms, where their duties call them, if that is their practical experience. I venture to say that they will undertake to lead you in half a day to a thousand rooms in Dublin where, at this moment, there are people cold, hungry and half-naked, because they are too poor to get fuel to warm themselves, to cook food or to buy clothes to cover their nakedness. When I hear the Minister for Local Government and Public Health repeating this hypocrisy, swelling his chest with pride, glorying that he is not as other men, and proclaiming that it is not the policy to let the children die, I begin to ask myself if he has any sense of shame at all. How can he face the poor in the city? How can he swell like a turkey cock on the floor of Dáil Éireann or weep like a crocodile at the corner of a street as circumstances require? That wretched corrupting dishonesty, that fraudulent claim to sound whichever tune the situation demands, is destroying, not only the morale of his Party, but of all those who follow it. It is fraud of the kind that the Minister for Local Government and Public Health was responsible for in this House a few days ago that has turned the country into what it seems to be now. If they have no hope of changing their own. soul, please let them not corrupt the people.
There is one matter of minor importance, relating to my constituency, to which I directed the Minister's attention before, on which I do not seem to be able to get any satisfaction. I am informed by the people of the town of Ballybay that the sewerage system is in a most highly unsatisfactory condition. I am informed that adverse reports on it have been made by Dr. Nolan and Dr. McCormack specifically. I am informed that from some of the houses the sewage is being deposited into an open creek, and that in warm weather there is a disagreeable smell, and, over and above that, there must be a standing menace of a typhoid epidemic in a considerable town like Ballybay, where there is no piped sewage for certain houses. It ought to be possible to ascertain with some degree of accuracy what the true situation in regard to that problem is, and I put it to the Minister that it is a scandalous thing that, once his attention has been directed to circumstances of that character, he should remain inert and decline to bring any pressure to bear on the local authority to do their manifest statutory duty, that is, to abate any latent threat of a typhoid epidemic, and I suggest that the discharge of sewage to open ditches in a populous town does constitute such a threat.
If the Minister doubts the facts as I report them to him, I suggest that one of the inspectors of his Department ought to go down and see, because, if there is an outbreak of typhoid in that town, he will have to send an inspector down in double quick time, only then it may be too late. Fortunately, no irretrievable damage has been done so far, but there is a standing threat to the people of the town, and I think they are entitled to demand of the Minister, if they cannot persuade their own local authority to take sufficiently energetic measures in regard to the matter, that he will examine it, and, if need be, issue mandatory instructions for the carrying out of the minimum measures requisite for the safeguarding of the public health in that area.
It is quite apparent to my mind, reading the Minister's speech when introducing this Estimate, that the Minister had his eye entirely on Cork, and that, instead of dealing with the Estimate and rendering an account of his stewardship for the past year, he felt he was on the hustings and must address his remarks to the Cork electors. I only wish he had remained in Cork and had made the speech he made in this House last week in Cork, when both Deputy Morrissey and I would have given him very effective answers. He chose in our absence to refer to the lawyers on these benches in very scathing terms. I do not know if the work of these lawyers in the courts in upsetting the plans and the legislation of Government has got into the Minister's hair or whether it is the effective opposition displayed by these lawyers from these benches that has ruffled the Minister. I do not know whether it is because, on occasion, the Minister and his colleagues have to resort to the lawyers on these benches to get themselves out of their legal difficulties or whether it is the success of these particular lawyers in defending the miscreants of Fianna Fáil that has ruffled the Minister, but whatever it may be which caused him to refer in such terms——
On a point of order, this seems to be an oblique reference to particular people.
I am dealing with the references the Minister made. I am answering these references and I submit I am entitled to answer them.
The Deputy has referred to miscreants. Would the Deputy confine himself to the Minister whose Estimate is before the House?
I am not accusing the Minister of being a miscreant.
If it is not the Minister, it is someone else, who does not arise.
The whole world knows to whom I am referring.
It seems to me, Sir——
I resent, on behalf of the lawyers on these benches, the references made by the Minister to us as men whose capacity for practical affairs is smothered in a lawyer's wig. I also resent the references made by the Minister to these men as men who, taken from their musty precedents, would stand like bats blinking in the light of day at the progress of the world around them and who would want the Government of Ireland to stand still. I quote from columns 729 and 730 of the Official Debates of 12th June, Volume 101, No. 13. I want to say on behalf of the lawyer profession, whether they sit on these benches, on the opposite benches, or on the Labour Benches, that the tradition of the Irish Bar is higher than the tradition of any other profession in this country. Whether we stood with the Government or against the Government, with Labour or against Labour, with Communists or against Communists, with the Republic or against the Republic, we always played an honourable part. The lawyer profession can call upon a long line of lawyers who have contributed to the practical affairs of this country over a long number of years. I can go back and give the Minister a long list of lawyers who, whatever their politics may have been, always stood high in the estimation of the Irish people. I will not go back to the misty past, as the Minister has done, but I go back as far as Henry Grattan and Henry Flood. I give him Wolfe Tone and Dan O'Connell; I give him Gavan Duffy, Isaac Butt and John Redmond. I will even give him Patrick Pearse.
And Lord Clare and Judge Norbury. Give me those, too.
I am talking of the Irish lawyers, not of the ascendancy lawyers. I am not speaking of Castlereagh, either.
Give him Castlereagh too. He has spoken of him as well.
I fling these names back in the teeth of his profession, if he is a member of any profession other than the political profession.
The Deputy is now going into personalities.
The Minister started it.
Whatever lawyers we have on these benches have qualified themselves for their positions and have their degrees. So far as I am aware, the Minister is degreeless. He is but a crypto-engineer, a pseudo-engineer.
These are personalities.
There are only four members of the lawyers' profession on these benches and these personalities were hurled at us in our absence. The Minister is a master of tactics—tactics which are very offensive when the enemy is in the offing or not on the field and the masterly activity that looks for the enemy in the wrong direction, as Sir John French did in South Africa long ago. He is a master of the art of covering up a bad case with abuse. He is a master of the tactics of knowing that the best line of defence is attack, when he has no defence. I want on behalf of my colleagues to resent every word and every line which I have quoted. I protest against the use of this language about men, colleagues of mine, who are honourable in their profession, who have never in their professional careers done anything to cause the finger of scorn, of contempt or ridicule to be pointed at them, men, some of whom are at the peak of their profession and who, some of them, are at the disposal, as I have said, of the gentlemen on the opposite benches.
I have said enough on that score. I want to register my emphatic protest. This type of tactics is very uncalled for, and, instead of having to resent these things and to protest against them, we should be doing the business for which we are here, the business of discussing local government and local government administration on its merits. The Minister, however, saw fit, instead of introducing his Estimate as it should have been introduced, as an account of his stewardship, as an indication of his policy for the future, to deliver himself as if he were on the hustings.
I was in Cork with Deputy Morrissey for a week. I found the most appalling conditions in Cork that I have ever seen in any city, and I have had experience of a number of cities. I found old people and young people living in the most shocking slums. There is nothing in Dublin to compare with them. I issued a challenge in Cork to the Minister for Local Government to come with me and see some of the hovels and flats that Deputy Morrissey and I inspected. They baffle description. There is no light. The light of day does not penetrate into some of the flats that I visited. The stench, the filth, the sanitation was appalling; and that after 14 long years of Fianna Fáil administration. I am not going to take the excuse from the Minister that there was a war on for six of those years and that materials were in short supply. Cork needs 4,000 houses to-day and the Minister himself has admitted the situation in Cork is very unsatisfactory. What is he offering this year? Two hundred houses. At that rate of progress, as I told the people in Cork, they will be grey-bearded old men before they can ever hope to become the tenants of modern houses.
I want to put it to the Minister that the rate of progress in Cork must be intensified tenfold if results are to be achieved. If that is not done there will be something in the nature of a red revolution down there. The people are desperate. There are two-roomed hovels in Cork without water and without sanitation, and some of them without light. I am not going to go into details now; but I invite the Minister to send the experts in his housing Department down there in order to see for themselves, and let them report back to him. I challenge contradiction that they will find there people living in the most abominable condition it is possible to imagine, and, again I say, that situation after 14 years of Fianna Fáil administration and 14 years is a long time in the life of a people, not to talk of in the life of a Government.
Another matter which I found in Cork and which I think comes within the administration of the Minister's Department and I may as well deal with it now, is old age pensions. The old age pensioners of Cork are in a state of rebellion because of the method employed by the Minister's staff to prune their pensions by way of the means test. I found old women living in one-roomed hovels in Cork whose pensions have been reduced from 10/- to 5/-, to 4/- and, in one case, to 1/- per week. Why? Because the son, or daughter, who was away in England was sending them weekly or monthly remittances. Why should our people here in the Custom House, or the investigators in Cork, take advantage of the fact that John Bull sends us a paltry remittance now and again to keep the wolf of starvation from the door? The manner in which the old age pensions are administered down there calls for a thorough investigation; and in the interest of these old people, whom Deputy Morrissey and myself saw, I would ask the Minister and his Department——
On a point of order, I suppose even the Deputy ought to know that investigation officers are not officers of the Minister for Local Government and Public Health. They are under the control of the Revenue Commissioners.
He is talking about investigation officers.
Surely the appeal is to the Minister for Local Government; and is not the local committee, or the local authority under the control of the Minister for Local Government?
On a point of order again, in respect of the appeal, the appeals officer functions strictly in accordance with the terms of the Act and is bound to do so by the law of this House.
Is it not a matter for the Minister's Department?
It is not a matter for the Minister's Department.
On a point of order, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government and Public Health made a regulation as to how the investigation was to be made.
Not the investigation.
Will the Minister please let me make my point? The Minister is not on the hustings now. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government and Public Health has made an Order that investigation of old age pensions was to take place in the following manner: the Minister is responsible and he cannot disclaim responsibility.
Is not the Parliamentary Secretary responsible to some extent for old age pensions?
Only on decisions on appeal.
No, Sir. The Parliamentary Secretary is not responsible for decisions on appeals. The only thing the Parliamentary Secretary has done has been to regulate the method of approach by members of this House to the appeals officers.
And he has no other function in the matter.
No other function. He is appointed by me to hear appeals.
Is it not the function of the committees of the local authority to grant pensions? Does that not come under the control of the Minister's Department?
The Minister has no control over the local authority committee.
The Revenue Commissioners are responsible for old age pensions.
Then, if a letter emanates from the Department of Local Government and Public Health saying: "I am directed by the Minister" or "by the Parliamentary Secretary to inform you that a pension has not been granted"— is that letter wrong?
That is from the appeals officer, who is under the jurisdiction of the Minister for Local Government.
The Minister disclaims any responsibility then?
What is the function of the old age pension section of the Department of Local Government and Public Health in charge of an officer named Mr. Burke? I would like to be clear about that.
That is merely communicating the Minister's decision on appeal. The general administration of pensions is a matter for the Revenue Commissioners.
Surely, if an old age pensioner is aggrieved by reason of the Revenue Commissioners reducing his pension and he appeals to the Minister, the Minister has some responsibility in the matter.
For deciding the matter rigidly and strictly in accordance with the terms of the Act.
The old age pensions appeals section is under the administration of the Department of Local Government.
Of course it is and I am entitled, therefore, to comment upon the manner in which the investigators carry out their work.
No, the investigation officers are under the control of the Revenue Commissioners.
Then I shall leave it over for another day. To come back again then to the question of housing in Cork, the houses that are already erected there are being let at rents varying from 16/- in one place — Shandon Park — to 18/- in another place, and to as high as 23/6 per week in a place called Gurranebraher. I want to put it to the Minister that it is futile to build houses at such excessive rents for workers and that there is no worker in Cork, outside the very highly skilled tradesman, whose income will enable him to afford a rent of 23/6 per week. These workers have gone into these houses and they now find themselves in this position—that under threat of eviction they have to find the rent, whether they like it or not; and every Monday morning the pawnbroker comes to the rescue. These unfortunate people are continuing as tenants in these houses while denying themselves and their families food and clothing; in many cases they are unable to clothe their children properly in order to send them to school. I put it to the Minister that in any housing scheme under contemplation anywhere in the country it is essential that the rents of the houses should be related to the incomes of the workers who are going to occupy them. In Cork I went to the trouble of calculating the averages in these schemes and I found that the average rent bears a relation to income of something like 25 per cent.—one-quarter of the income, therefore, goes in rent. I hold that is too high a percentage and any worker or artisan who is compelled to pay one-quarter of his income by way of rent can only do so by denying himself the ordinary necessities of life.
I submit to the Minister that unless housing can be provided for the workers in which there will be a proportion of one-eighth rent to income it is futile to attempt the housing of the working classes. If that is not done you are going to create a new social disorder which will in its own time breed further discontent. I was glad to some extent to find the Minister stating in his speech introducing his Estimate that in the supplementary grant from the transitional development fund three factors will operate— first of all, the tender for housing must be a reasonable one; secondly, the rent at which the house will be let will have to be a reasonable one having regard to the wages being paid in the locality; and thirdly, that the local contribution will be reasonable. It is essential that the tenants of these houses should get the benefit of whatever savings may be effected by local authorities by the reduced rate of interest on housing loans.
The Minister claimed a whole lot of things for his Department. He claimed that the increase in births during the past couple of years was due to Fianna Fáil. I agree that it might be. The Minister did not segregate the figures for us and tell us what percentage were legitimate and what percentage were illegitimate. I do not know. It may be that a percentage were due to the Fianna Fáil Administration.
The Deputy would not claim any responsibility?
I think Wexford could hold the record there. He also claimed that a reduction in the number of deaths was actually due to Fianna Fáil. So, the born have to thank Fianna Fáil and those who escaped the grave have to thank Fianna Fáil. Next, I suppose, he is going to save our souls and we will have the complete job done by Fianna Fáil. Fianna Fáil will take us from the cradle to the grave and look after us in the Great Beyond. That is the only claim the Minister has not made in his introductory statement. The Minister also gave figures for Limerick and Waterford. He says that in Limerick something like 2,000 houses will be needed. But, only 42 houses are planned at the moment, if I read his statement aright. He attributes that fact to the absence of the manager—"Do not blame me; blame the absence of the manager." But, in Waterford, where 987 houses are required, and where there is a scheme for 750, only 46 houses are planned, and we have a manager there, and a very efficient manager. During the past year, he told us, something like 696 houses were built in urban areas and of these 656 were built in Dublin, whether in Dublin County or Dublin City, I do not know, but there were no houses built in Cork, Kilkenny, Waterford or Limerick. Of course, the Minister represents Dublin in the Dáil and I suppose his constituency receives favoured treatment. I want to put it to him that in Kilkenny there are 800 families looking for houses, 800 families living in slums almost as bad as the Cork slums and, as far as I am aware, no progress is being made by the Minister's Department towards providing houses for those 800 families. The extraordinary thing is that materials are being made available for other less necessary buildings. Materials are being made available for military barracks, for various public buildings of all kinds, which I submit could wait until the housing needs of our poor were supplied. I put it to the Minister that it is essential that he should fight the Minister for Industry and Commerce for priority in building materials for housing schemes for the poor and for the workers. Until that is done, I see no hope of any of the Minister's schemes fructifying for a very long time.
I mentioned on the Local Government Bill and on this Estimate last year and I want again to put to the Minister that some limit must be drawn, somewhere, sometime, to the amount of rates which the ratepayer is called upon to pay. Already, we have reached saturation point in central taxation and already it is clearly indicated by Government policy that the intention is to look for further taxation, not from the taxpayer, but from the ratepayer. Already, in many localities, we are arriving at a position where the amount paid in rates is the equivalent of the annual rent. I am talking of the person who is renting a house. The amount of rates at the moment is reaching almost the equivalent of the annual rent and, according to the plans adumbrated by the Government and which, to a certain extent, are being forced on local authorities and many of which the local authorities have no voice whatever in resisting, there is every indication from which to conclude that rates will soar higher and higher. The Minister and his Department and the tied Press organ behind the Government Party are quite complacent about this matter. On the 6th March there was an article in the Irish Press to the effect that if there is further demand for services, particularly social services, if the people want them, why not have them; that the only people who grumble about paying rates are the big fellows; let them grouse, what about them, they are only a small minority. That is the effect of the article in the Irish Press of the 6th March. The Minister, apparently, sees no reason to disagree with the Irish Press. In fact, he comes into the House with this Estimate in the mood: “My Department is going to cost £2,000,000. I have no apology to offer for it. Grumblers may grouse and complain but we have these services to maintain and we are going to maintain them and, no matter what criticism you offer across the floor of the House —and I am going to anticipate that criticism—it is not going to get you anywhere.”
When rates and rent reach a position of equality then it is time to look out, then it is time to ask ourselves where are we drifting. When rates exceed the annual rent then we are reaching the position in which the middle-class ratepayer cannot carry on. The Minister's Department has been responsible, taking the country as a whole, for piling something like £2,000,000 additional rates on the ratepayer since the beginning of the war and £1,000,000 additional rates on the urban rate-payer—the £2,000,000 through county councils and the £1,000,000 through corporations and urban authorities. In 1932-33 rates were approximately £4,250,000. Last year, rates were approximately £8,000,000. This year a fair estimate would work out at somewhere in the neighbourhood of £9,000,000. I ask the Minister, is there to be any limit to the amount which the middle-class ratepayer is to be called upon to bear? If this trend in rates continues I can see a position being rapidly reached where the middle-class owner will probably, have to sell out in order to keep going, that the ordinary salaried official and higher class wage-earner will find it impossible to carry on. An additional £5 or £10 a year is a considerable handicap to that man and is something that cannot be faced with complacency.
As a member of the Dun Laoghaire Corporation, I have gone into this matter and I am quite satisfied that, whereas our rates are 20/6 in the £ this year, within the next five years, they will reach between 28/6 and 30/- in the £ if we are to meet the commitments that are to be made upon us by Government policy. At the present time we have a revenue of £300,000 and have to find £168,000 to meet statutory demands made upon us by outside bodies over which we have no control. I put it to the Minister that we are reaching a very dangerous position in this country, having regard to the fact that, under the new local government legislation, the Minister will have power, where the local authority refuses to strike a rate, to compel the local authority, through the manager, to strike that rate. The power of the purse has been taken by the Minister from the local authority and if the Minister wants a higher rate and the local authority, in its discretion and wisdom, refuses that demand of the Department of Local Government, then that local authority will find itself in the position that the Minister can strike the new rate and collect it over the heads of the local authority. That is a very dangerous tendency, particularly in view of the upward tendency of the rates. I hope it is not the Minister's intention to use that weapon for the purpose of increasing the rates. It is a dangerous weapon to place in the hands of any Minister at any time, but it is a particularly dangerous weapon to place in the hands of Ministers who have shown such dictatorial powers in the past.
Mention has been made of dictatorship and bureaucracy, and I think I am entitled to refer the Minister to views he formerly held on these subjects. At column 1722, 12th June, 1946, the Minister said:—
"He knows that when he does that, he will be subjected to much ill-informed criticism and gross misrepresentation; and that he will be required to listen patiently to reiterated clichés about the growth of bureaucracy and swollen taxation."
Then he proceeds in another place to anticipate the criticisms and answer them himself. I want to express some views with reference to managerial control and bureaucracy, but I shall first remind the Minister of what he said in 1929 on the Second Stage of the Local Government (Dublin) Bill. At column 1192 of Volume 33 he said:—
"But the manager may have no local ties or traditions whatsoever to guide him. He may be a mere bird of passage, fluttering down to Cork to do the behest of the Minister there, and, if he pleases the Minister in his administration of the smaller municipalities, he may be promoted to greater responsibilities. That man cannot have the same regard for the civic amenities as those who take a pride in their city, because it is the city of their birth."
Who said that?
Deputy MacEntee, in 1929. I want to emphasise that.
That has nothing to do with the Estimate.
It has, because the Minister referred to reiterated clichés about the growth of bureaucracy and swollen taxation.
The Minister was a prophet then.
The Minister has been an absolute prophet because, under his Department, we have nothing in local government to-day but birds of passage. In the Dun Laoghaire Corporation we have come to regard ourselves as the nursery for the training of officials for other local authorities. Within the past few years four of our best officials were taken on promotion. I am not denying these men their rights to promotion, to better themselves, but I object to the system which deprives us of efficient managers, accountants, secretaries, town clerks, storekeepers, or whatever they may be. I like to see these men remaining with the local authority until they have a thorough local knowledge of the area in which they serve. We are in the position that we have men from Cork to Donegal or Kerry administering the affairs of the borough in Dun Laoghaire, men who may take years before they have the local knowledge required to deal with local problems.
In that alone I see a great defect in the present system, and I am glad the Minister was so far-seeing in 1929 as to put his finger on this defect. It is a very serious defect in our system because, whether the Minister likes it or not, I say emphatically that a number of these officials have their eyes on the Custom House and not on the local authority. They may in law and theory be appointed by the local authority through the Local Appointments Commissioners, but they are looking for their future to the Custom House, and they are not inclined to serve the local authority to the extent that they are prepared to serve the Custom House. Some of them have sufficient independence and integrity to stand up to the Custom House, but they are not 1 per cent. of the managers in this country.
It is high time this system was stabilised and that officials should be compelled to serve a given number of years with a local authority before they are transferred, even on promotion. A new man coming in has to start work all over again. He may be in harness with a new manager, a new accountant or a new town clerk. The three of them may be new, and you then get an appalling situation. They may be the most efficient men, but without the local knowledge they cannot be effective local administrators. I want to see the system stabilised so that there will not be unnecessary removals up and down the country. I have seen men jump from Dun Laoghaire to Cork, Wicklow, Leitrim and Roscommon—all over the country in a few months. That makes for considerable unsettlement and lack of continuity and it is a grave handicap to efficient local administration.
The Minister, when dealing with this managerial system, used these extraordinary words:—
"A manager wearing the jackboots of the Minister will be able to walk rough-shod over their desires and their opinions and, as I said, there is no man in the corporation or outside the corporation, in the streets of the city, or within the city hall, will be able to say him nay."
Again, the Minister showed a most prophetic vision when he quoted those words. I ask him to reconcile the extraordinary views he there expresses with the still more extraordinary views he expressed quite recently in the House.
We are told the managerial system is on trial. I sincerely hope that is so, because the managerial system as it functions in this country is stifling local democracy and, when you stifle local democracy and representation, and when you get to the position that decent businessmen or professional men will not touch local administration because they feel they can do no good, you ultimately stifle democracy in this House; you will get a representation here which will be merely a paper representation of yes-men; you will get to the position when independent thought and opinion, strong, honest, decent opinion will be stifled locally and eventually nationally.
The managerial system is killing democracy here. If democracy were to function properly, our local authorities should be the nurseries for the future representatives in this House. At the present time, with the limited authority which a great number of these men have, they feel they serve no purpose in going there any more. As someone said in the course of this debate, the local authorities are little better than debating societies. It was all very well to divorce the details of administration from the people, but the Minister and the Government have gone too far. They have so cut the line between the proper functions——
Again on a point of order. The Minister and the Government have not gone too far in this matter. They are bound to obey the law. The functions of the managers and the elected representatives are prescribed by an Act of the Oireachtas and the Deputy is quite out of order in criticising that Act.
I am answering the Minister's statement.
On that point, the Deputy would be quite correct in referring to the administration of the Act but he cannot argue whether it was right or wrong to pass it.
I am criticising administration.
The Deputy has not cited one instance in which, so far as the Minister is concerned, the administration of this Act is not strictly in accordance with the law.
I have referred to the constant chopping and changing of officials and the interference with local administration.
I have nothing to do with that.
I shall tell you why——
The appointment of officers of local authorities is regulated by the Local Officers and Servants Act of 1926.
There is nobody more aware of that fact than I am but whether it is the Minister's responsibility or the responsibility of some other Minister——
The Deputy is now advocating legislation.
I am referring to the effects of the administration carried on. In any event I am only answering the Minister's statement when he was referring to bureaucracy in 1929.
I think we have heard enough of that.
We have considerable difficulty in trying——
The Deputy wants to go back to 1929.
The Minister quoted 1929 in his debate. He quoted Deputy Mulcahy——
The Chair did not agree with everything the Minister said.
The Minister was allowed to go back to the debates of previous years. Until Deputy Morrissey protested the Minister was allowed to say anything he liked in defiance of the Chair. However I shall not trouble with any more quotations after this. The Minister said in 1929:—
"This Bill is the very deification of bureaucracy. Under it not only the manager but the heads of the various administrative heads of the city are going to be placed in the position of so many Mikados."
Since that time, the County Management Act has been passed. The Deputy is now criticising the Minister——
I am criticising the Minister who now defends bureaucracy and dictatorship and who in 1929 was so vehement in his denunciation of bureaucracy.
The Minister was not Minister then. He was not even in the Government then.
I submit that I am entitled to reply to the Minister's own statements in this debate. He says: "that he will be required to listen patiently to reiterated clichés about the growth of bureaucracy and swollen taxation." I want to give him back in his own words——
The Minister's attention was drawn to the fact that he was anticipating trouble in referring to past years.
Well, I think I have the right to give him the trouble now.
The Deputy may criticise only administration.
I have only one more quotation to make and then I am finished with this aspect of the matter. This has a very definite bearing on the point raised by Deputy Corish in which he referred to the ukase issued by the Minister directing that officials of local authorities must not have any contact, direct or indirect, with the people's representatives, either local or national. This is a further quotation:—
"Under this Bill these officials are not, if I might express the mind of the Minister, to be corrupted by contact with those debased individuals whom the citizens have chosen to represent them. As I said, this Bill and its principles are the very deification of bureaucracy. The bureaucrats, whether they be the bureaucrats of the Government or of the municipality, are to be set in a class apart and hedged round, and the ordinary citizens or representatives of the citizens are prevented from having any communication with them."
It is an extraordinary thing to find the Minister who in 1929 gave expression to these words, in 1946 threatening the officials of the local authorities that, if they have any contact with local representatives or Deputies of this House, they will suffer disciplinary punishment. I say the Minister was most prophetic in 1929.
I want finally to strike the note which Deputy Morrissey struck — that it is no credit to Fianna Fáil to defend these palliatives, these sops, these doles, these allowances — call them what you like. I do not want to be taken wrongly by the Minister in this and misrepresented as he misrepresented Deputy Mulcahy's figures for housing in this debate. While the condition of things that operate in this country continues, I see no alternative to having these sops, palliatives and doles — all the free milk, free boots and so forth. But we on these benches want the Government and the people behind them to face up to the serious situation of this country. You cannot solve the national problem by tinkering with doles, palliatives and temporary expedients. You cannot solve the problem by a stop-gap or simply by plugging the leak when there is a leakage somewhere. You have got to face up to the position that the country is being denuded of its population. If the shores of America were open to our people to-morrow, not only would we have an exodus to Great Britain but we would also have an exodus to the United States, because the people cannot find full employment at home. We want our people to stay on the land. We want our agricultural production developed to such an extent that our people will be employed in increasing numbers on the land.
We want to see more houses built on the land for our people so that agricultural production will be made possible. We want to see the staple industries of the country developed to such an extent that the surplus who cannot live on the land and the urban population, will be absorbed in employment, but we hold that you will never reach that position by the present policy of temporary expedients and the creation, if you like, of mushroom industries. Let us attempt something more worthy than that. Let us attempt to bring our investments abroad home so that we shall be able to establish worthwhile industries here. Let us not fool ourselves into thinking that in bringing a few aliens into some backyard to employ a few girls at 15/- or £1 a week, that we are doing something for Irish industries. Let us face up to this situation together and not bicker about it. That is the difference between us and Fianna Fáil, that Fianna Fáil are content to bolster up the present system by temporary palliatives of all kinds. That may tide them over their difficulties for a short time but it does not solve the problem of finding employment for our people at home. As I said last year and as I shall continue to say until Fianna Fáil becomes a memory——
That will be a long time.
Not long. That day is not long now and thank God for it. The Deputy talked of the daylight that the lawyers could not see. We have come through some hours of darkness; already the fissure is open and the daylight is coming through. Not only is the fissure opening wide but it is so wide that some of the gentlemen sitting on the benches opposite would want to be very wary in their walking if they are not to fall into the hole.
We could not do that when we have guardian angels like you.
You want more than guardian angels. You will want handcuffs and pistols. I do not want to say anything on matters that are sub judice but we were challenged in this House because we opposed certain sections of the Public Health Bill. I think subsequent events justified that challenge and that opposition. Not only did we succeed in moving the Minister to introduce 157 amendments to meet the points we made but we had developments since which forcibly suggest to us and to the country that no member on the benches opposite should be given dictatorial powers. I will not say any more than that our attitude was quite justified. We are being criticised by the gentlemen on the benches opposite because we offered constructive criticism. We offered nothing but constructive criticism on that Bill. We felt that the Bill was going too far. We felt that the powers were over-reaching for one man to have. Subsequent events justified us in our opinion. I hold that the business of those on these benches is opposition. Opposition is the business of an Opposition. I do not see why the Minister, whose record is such as I have read out here, should complain. If Deputies look back to the 1922 or the 1927 period, and see what was said then, they should be the last in the world to complain of opposition.
You should be.
They should be the last to complain of intelligent opposition. We are giving intelligent opposition.
The murder gang.
We continue to give constructive opposition. Let that not be mistaken merely as opposition for opposition's sake. Our efforts are national, in a truly broad national sense. We intend to keep to that rule, and we are certainly not going to be silenced by the back-benchers from Drogheda. I want to say that, despite what the Minister said, the administration of his Department is extravagant. The Minister is credited socially with having Lucullan tastes and, whether the Minister's tastes in food and dress, and socially, when it comes to the administration of his Department——
He does not go around drunk, brawling in hotels.
Is that so? We were waiting a long time for that.
I must ask the Minister to withdraw the insinuation he made.
Would the Minister make that statement outside the House?
I have listened patiently to a volume of vituperation from the opposite benches. I do not know what my personal tastes in food or dress have to do with this debate.
I can tell you.
I do not know what my personal tastes in food or dress have to do with it. Apparently it is quite relevant. If so, the conduct of other people in this House must be relevant also.
The Chair will hold against you, that you have been insulting to the Deputy by insinuation. The Minister will have to withdraw it.
If that insinuation can be applied to the Deputy, I withdraw it.
If it can be applied. It is qualified.
It does not matter.
I want to deal with the extravagant display by the Minister's Department from 1932 onwards—a period which he has brought under review—as manifested by the gross figures in the volume of Estimates. In 1937-38 the Minister's Department demanded £1,227,643 and the amount demanded now is £2,006,800 or an increase of over £750,000. On that fact alone, I think there is ample evidence to warrant us demanding the strictest scrutiny. Year after year there has been a progressive increase in the demands made by the Department on this House and on the country. Some of the demands may, undoubtedly, be due to the fact that there has been an increase in the social services to the people, but a great deal of that has been wasted in unnecessary administrative personnel. I do not think the Minister has anything to pat himself on the back for, when he cheekily proclaims that his Department has increased by, I think, 255 civil servants of all kinds. In fact the personnel has doubled since 1937-38, certainly since 1932. I think there is ample evidence to indicate that there is looseness in the administration at the top, and that the Minister for Finance is not exercising an effective check on the demands of the various Departments. There is no need to go into details. They are well known to every Deputy. Where will the line be drawn? When will a halt be made? What do they consider reasonable limits for the ratepayers to be called upon to pay? Is it to be 30/- in the £, is it £2 in the £ or is there to be no limit? If the Minister wants to introduce personalities into this he can have them——
But the Chair will not have them.
——either inside the House or outside the House, preferably for me outside the House. As one of those lawyers——
Now, Deputy.
I am not going to be personal. I have been charged with not being practical or something of that kind. I want to say that I was one of the first men who went up for Dáil Éireann in the first Republic, and one of the first to be associated with Mr. Cosgrave in the setting up of the Department of Local Government, in organising and making a success of it when some of the gentlemen on the opposite side were bungling their Departments. I make no apology to the Minister or to anybody for being in this House. Thank God, I can go back to Kilkenny at any time despite Fianna Fáil and can and will always meet Fianna Fáil there. I want to say in conclusion that I have come to the definite opinion that there are two gentlemen on the opposite benches, that there is a dual personality, a Jekyll and Hyde, a man who, in the social sphere can be a gentleman, but who, when he gets on the hustings, is not a gentleman.
The Deputy should not make such a remark.
The big problem I see at present is the large increase in the cost of housing. This Estimate makes provision for over £600,000 for housing, the vast bulk of which concerns local authorities, and the balance to assist private enterprise and building societies. The kernel of this problem is the fact that the cost of building in all its aspects has doubled since prewar. Anyone acquainted with the building trade and with any knowledge of the materials used in building knows that almost every component, and particularly timber and cement, has increased in price, and, that being the case, it makes a far larger problem for the Department as well as for private builders and local authorities.
The situation, as I see it at the moment, is one in which the Department, through grants to local authorities, and local authorities through the rates have to provide not alone for the vast number of people for whom they have always made provision, namely, those who occupy subsidised houses and whose salaries and wages are regarded as low and certainly insufficient to enable them to maintain a family and pay the economic rent of a house, but for quite a large number of people who were formerly able to provide housing accommodation for themselves, either by renting or purchasing houses, no longer in a position to do so, due to two causes, one being that people higher in the social scale or with larger incomes compete with them for cheaper houses and the second that these other people are competing with the renting classes as a consequence.
The problem has been considerably aggravated by the lack of building materials in recent years. There is a vast number of houses which are now controlled by the Rent Restrictions Act. That Act is essential in order to keep rents within reasonable bounds, but it has this disadvantage—and Rent Restrictions Acts elsewhere have been found to have a similar disadvantage— that in the normal way houses which are controlled would continue to be rented, but, as a result of the operation of the Act, the situation develops that landlords are no longer prepared to provide houses on a renting basis. The moment the houses are completed, they are put up for sale. This results in the difficulty that people who could rent these houses are forced either to borrow from a building society or some other source, and, with whatever small savings they have accumulated, purchase a house of this character or look for a flat. The Act now extends to flats, but it makes the problem far more difficult than heretofore in that at present a large number of people who formerly rented houses cannot get them to rent. They must purchase them or devise some means of securing alternative accommodation.
In consequence, a number of people who formerly rented houses but who are unable to purchase houses now by means of a loan or from their own resources are driven into what might be regarded as the artisan type of house. In this respect, they compete with the higher-paid manual worker or tradesman, and, being in a better position, are able to pay a higher rent or to pay off a loan more quickly. Consequently, the better type of tradesman's house is placed at their disposal and then the better paid artisan or tradesman competes for the type of corporation house which, in the normal way, would be rented by what might be described as the medium paid workers.
The position then is that each class is depressing the available numbers of houses and raises the amount which the class below is called on to pay for a house. This is a problem which the Department must face. People who formerly had saved £100 or £150, who put it down as a deposit and who were able to rent the artisans' dwelling type of house or the type of house provided by building societies are no longer able to raise sufficient money, or, if they are, there are people who are better off competing with them for these houses. Some consideration will have to be given to this problem from that angle. In addition, large numbers of newly-married couples are anxiously awaiting proper accommodation. They are existing in rooms or flats and paying excessive rents for that accommodation. These rents are controlled, but in the light of the available accommodation, while the actual rent, according to the definition in the Rent Restriction Act, is not excessive, it is excessive from the point of view of this particular class, and I suggest it is a matter on which private builders particularly are expecting some information.
The Minister, with the local authorities, is primarily responsible for the provision of housing for the lower-paid workers, but, over and above these, large numbers of people in receipt of wages or salaries in excess of the income of people for whom these subsidised houses usually cater are forced to look for accommodation which is not available. It is a problem which, I suggest, merits very close and careful attention, particularly in view of the gravely restricted building of the past few years.
Another matter connected with the building problem which is giving considerable difficulty to builders is the rapid increase in the price of a number of commodities. I understand that recently the price of British drain-pipes was increased by the manufacturers by about 20 per cent. and that, in the near future, that increase will be passed on to the builders. While this is probably a matter strictly for the Department of Industry and Commerce, it does impinge in a vital way on the activities of the Department of Local Government, and I suggest it is a matter which must be dealt with taking not alone the point of view of the subsidised classes, the classes aided by grants from the Department and from the rates, but of the classes immediately above who at present are in the unfortunate position of being unable to pay for the dearer type of house and of being ineligible for houses in the lower rented categories provided by the local authorities.
The Minister referred to planning and to the fact that a section of his Department was dealing with planning. If that is so, I hope attention will be given in the future to the very considerable extension of building which has taken place on all the main roads leading to the City of Dublin. It is obvious that Dublin is extending not alone to districts just outside the city but as far as towns which formerly were three, four and five miles outside the city. The prime cause of this is that building land with roads, drainage, sewerage and water facilities is not available nearer to the city and builders consequently build along the main roads. Any Deputy who looks in any direction from the city— Stillorgan, Sandyford, Chapelizod, Finglas, Glasnevin — will see Dublin shooting out.
If planning is designed, as I understand it, to make houses available within easy reach of the city and with the various amenities which a city normally provides, that situation should not be allowed to develop. If the section of the Minister's Department dealing with planning turns its mind and its attention to the problem which has grown up, and it is part of the problem which has grown up that you find at the present time Dublin extending with lengthy arms into all the neighbouring small towns and along all the main roads. Leaving out entirely the problem which presents itself to inhabitants of these areas that shops are not available and, in many cases, churches are not available, and the various other facilities, these people are living quite a long distance from the city and they have to either provide their own transport or wait, with considerable delays, on the long-distance transport provided for people coming in from the country in the normal way to business.
The city is sprawling all over the county and I suggest to the Minister that this is a problem which merits the attention of himself and his Department in order to restrict and control the absolutely undisciplined development of planning which has gone on in the past. In connection with that, I think it is worthy of comment that at the present time there is quite a number of foreigners, or aliens, buying up land in and around the city. On almost every main road leading to and from the city these speculators have gone in and bought up land with the result that if private builders, or local authorities, propose to acquire land for their purposes they are forced to purchase from these speculators and they are then faced with the problem that they will have to build there at greatly enhanced prices. I suggest to the Minister that is another point in connection with planning into which investigation ought to be made—the fact that speculators are allowed to purchase at the present time considerable quantities of land and are then allowed to resell that land at greatly enhanced prices to local authorities or private builders. While I admit that this is something which may need legislation, I think it can properly be regarded as coming within the scope of the section which deals with planning. If this policy is allowed to continue and if these speculators are allowed to force up prices to private builders or local authorities, then, as far as I can see, the housing problem in both Dublin County and City will never be solved; there will be continued enhancement in the rents and in the values of the properties and unless some check is put upon this it is obvious that the price of land to the local authority and the private builder will be far in excess of what it normally should be.
In connection with Dublin County Council, I would ask the Minister when he expects to have the report of the inquiry into housing which started some months ago. Under that inquiry the Dublin County Council proposed to build 1,400 houses. I think that any Deputy in either the city or the county cannot but be gravely concerned with the housing situation. Dublin County suffers from the outflow from the city. In many cases people who fail to secure accommodation in the city go out to the county and they thereby aggravate the situation in the already overcrowded county areas. I would suggest to the Minister that no effort should be spared to expedite the findings of that inquiry and to expedite the programmes in relation to the erection of houses. In the villages I have mentioned, and particularly in the south county, and in the towns in the north county, the housing problem is acute and every effort should be made to bring that inquiry to its conclusion and to assist the Dublin County Council to start work on the erection of houses.
There are a couple of other matters to which I wish to draw the Minister's attention. One is a water scheme for Newcastle; I would be glad if, in this connection, the Minister would say what the present position is. If this scheme has not been completed I would ask the Minister to do everything he can to expedite it. I understand it is a general scheme for Leixlip and that the two counties are involved. If it is put into operation it will bring water supplies to Leixlip, Celbridge, Newcastle, Rathcoole, and Milltown. Another scheme which is under consideration, but on which no decision has yet been reached, is that for Tallaght. There the situation is extremely acute; there is no water or sewerage. The only water supply comes from a pump. A similar difficulty exists in Naul. The problem in these areas is greatly accentuated during periods of drought, such as we have experienced in some past years.
Finally, I want to refer the Minister to the position in regard to the Dublin County Council. Under an Act which was brought in last year the Minister was given power to extend the period of office of the county manager to a year, and by a further period of two years if he so desires. Under that, the term of abolition of the Dublin County Council has been extended. The Dublin County Council has now been abolished for a considerable time. In many respects the work formerly done by the county has been admirably carried out by the commissioner. The situation now is that after three or four years there is a possibility of a further two years being added to the period of abolition of the county council. If that situation is allowed to continue, without any indication being given as to the proposed changes in the administration of County Dublin, the citizens of County Dublin will find themselves entirely inexperienced in affairs of local administration. After a very lengthy period of absence it is more than likely that, when the election comes on, considerable changes will take place in representation and I think it is most undesirable that the citizens of the county area should be left in ignorance as to what the proposed changes are. I would be glad if the Minister in his concluding speech would give some indication to the House as to what the administrative changes are likely to be in the county council area. It is a difficult area to administer because it is divided into two parts. The north county and the south county are almost completely divided from one another by the city.
I would suggest to the Minister that a decision one way or another as to the future of the county council and as to the future of the Rathdown Board of Assistance and the Balrothery Board of Assistance should be promulgated in as short as possible a time, so that the citizens of County Dublin may be in a position to decide for themselves the future affairs of the county area. I would also suggest to the Minister that it is placing an unfair burden on one man to have him responsible for the whole county area — acting in place of the county council — and also acting as chairman of the National Health Insurance Society. I think that is unfair to the county council, to the commissioner, and to the National Health Insurance Society; no one man should be expected to carry two important jobs, particularly at a time when administrative changes are being proposed and when, in the normal way, it is reasonable to expect that the commissioner for Dublin County Council would be devoting his energies and time, not alone to the ordinary routine affairs of the Dublin County Council, but also to certain aspects of the proposed changes. I suggest to the Minister that the sooner a definite decision as to the future of the Dublin County Council and its administration is given, the better it will be, not alone for the officials, but for the residents of the county at large.
I was very glad to hear Deputy Cosgrave's speech because I had been puzzled all the afternoon as to whether we were on the Estimate for Local Government or were experiencing the reactions to the Cork by-election. I throughly agree with Deputy Cosgrave in regard to housing. That is the biggest problem that the House and the Minister have to face. There is a very considerable shortage of houses everywhere. There is continuous demand for labourers' cottages. I would like to know from the Minister what exactly is the cause of the delay in getting arbitration to settle the matter of the price paid for cottage sites. In County Meath there are something like 63 houses ready to be built. The contract has been set out for the second time. I am told that the matter is held up pending the appointment of an arbitrator. I am not sure that the Minister is responsible for that but I hope he will make inquiries with a view to having an arbitrator appointed by those who are responsible for his appointment as soon as possible.
The building of houses at any time during the last 20 years has been a difficult matter. Rents have been increasing. I suppose it is much more difficult to-day notwithstanding the fact that Deputy Coogan and even Deputy Dillon see no trouble in relieving the distress that exists in Cork and Dublin and consider that the war made no difference. They tried to insinuate that it was more or less the laziness of the Minister that prevented houses being set up overnight. Everybody else, of course, knows that the war is not yet over and that its reactions are being felt here, that there is great scarcity of materials for building purposes, that the cost of living has increased, that wages have increased. The Minister for Finance has made every effort to reduce the interest rate on money but that will not achieve everything. The Minister for Local Government has followed that up, in an effort to reduce the rent of houses, by offering a very considerable subsidy. I hope that these measures will be effective because I agree with Deputy Cosgrave that where rents are too high, especially in respect of houses for labouring classes, and where an unduly high proportion of income goes in rent, there is not sufficient left to purchase food, especially milk. I do not know what is the position here but I have read something of the position in other countries where, it is stated, the health of the people in the new houses became somewhat worse than it had been when they lived in the slums. It is therefore very important that any houses that we build should be let at an economic rent. I do not know whether we have at present a position of inflation. If we have, it is all the more important that the rents should be economic because, if deflation should occur, wages will fall. We are therefore passing through a very difficult period which demands a good deal of consideration and co-operation. It calls for more co-operation than we can get in the Dáil. In the building of houses for the labouring classes, there should be co-operation not only from the Dáil but from the contractors and those who work with them so that the houses may be erected at such a cost as will ensure their being let at a reasonable rent. That may be an ideal or a dream but I believe we are public spirited enough in this country to get that done. In my opinion that is the only remedy we have.
There is another point that I should like to emphasise to the Minister. We are promised in the Public Health Bill enormous efforts for the prevention of disease. There is, however, little development on the veterinary side. I do not think any Deputy would suggest that the health of animals is what it should be, but everybody will agree that if we do not do something to improve the health of animals we cannot expect to improve the health of the people. Therefore, there should be a good deal of co-operation between the Minister for Agriculture and the Minister for Local Government. There is increased demand for milk and very elaborate precautions are taken to ensure hygienic production of milk, that cows are healthy and that there are proper transport conditions. That, of course, refers to milk supplied to the towns, but I feel that that is not done throughout the country. There is no supervision in regard to the production of milk that is sold or given to the farm labourers' children. It is very difficult in country districts to procure milk for infants because many farmers object to supplying that milk for fear there would be too many visits from officials. The situation is not at all satisfactory and the whole matter should be reconsidered, because milk is the most important of all foods.
While I am on that subject, I would point out to the Minister that for the last eight or nine years almost half the County Meath has gone into milk production. The result is that the supply of milk to towns like Navan, which has a very considerable population, and Kells, has almost come to an end. The tendency is to supply milk to the Dublin dairies and not to supply it to the towns, possibly because of extra expense in distribution. That will become a very big problem in the very near future.
Those people who supply the milk to Dublin do not want to be bothered by supplying small quantities to people in the district, to neighbours or workers. They are quite busy enough in the morning trying to get the milk away and they do not feel like attending to anybody else. As Deputy Cosgrave pointed out, the City of Dublin is developing very rapidly and the amount of milk coming into it is increasing daily. That will present a very big problem, indeed. In fact, I can see it finishing up in this way, that the children and the people in the city will have any amount of milk while the children and people in the country will more or less be deprived of milk. That is the danger I can see. I should like the Minister to consider these points. He should be determined to see that whatever houses are erected will be let at a rent that the people will be able to pay, not in the coming year but in the years to come. It is very likely that the position will not be the same, that money values will not be the same and that wages will not be as high as they are to-day.
I shall confine my remarks to the housing part of this Estimate. I think the Minister was not very helpful in the way in which he introduced the Estimate, but perhaps that is a matter of opinion. The Minister went back to 1932. I suppose houses now cost twice as much as they did in 1932. The Minister said a good deal about the Estimates and about his predecessor, but I do not intend to go into that; I think we have had that fully debated. The Minister's Estimate has been left with a good deal of items that require explanation. In 1932 there were 20,000 houses required and now there are 60,000 required, and they are twice as dear as they were in 1932.
I wish to direct the Minister's attention to the transition development fund. Speaking as an ordinary individual, I have not yet been able to fathom how this fund will be brought in on the houses. As I understand the Minister's remarks, if he approved of certain schemes in all respects, they would get a grant from the transition development fund, which would help to reduce the rents of those houses more or less to normal level. I do not know why the Government approached that matter in this way. I suppose they will tell us we are passing through very abnormal times, but if the Minister is hugging the delusion that in two or three years' time we will be back to pre-war conditions, I for one cannot accept that idea. I think we are passing through an abnormal state of affairs which will, as it were, become normal for some time and I do not see why the Minister could not have added the transition development fund to the Vote for his Department and describe it as so much money for local authorities or approved societies that fulfil certain conditions. We would then have something to calculate.
The Minister says that he has speeded up housing. I would like to suggest to him—I will not contradict him in any statement he has made— that if he likes to make that statement he has certainly, as regards private enterprise, lost what he contends he gained in connection with public utility society and local authority building schemes. Years ago private enterprise had beaten the local authorities and I do not see why the Minister should not let those people have a try at solving the housing shortage. The Minister has, in effect, said to private enterprise: "Stand aside; I do not want your assistance." I will tell you how he has done that. He has done it through the power of the purse. He has left the private builder in the position that he has to build a house and he does not know what amount he will get, or whether he will get anything, from the Minister until it is finished. Is it any wonder that private enterprise has gone slow?
The demand for houses seems to be more and more for a particular type of house. A corporation house in a slightly different locality with a garage attached will sell to everybody else who is not included in the working-class demand for houses. In other words, there are only two types of houses required. I think the Minister ought to acknowledge that when anybody erects a house in Dublin and sells it to some people to live in, they in turn vacating a house, that helps to relieve the housing shortage. One of the things that acted as a cushion in the rising demand for houses was the fact that 25 years ago there were hundreds of houses to let. Those houses gradually deteriorated into tenements and they served a useful purpose in cushioning the demand for houses. But there is one thing certain, that the Rent Restrictions Acts, necessary as they may have been at the time, have contributed towards aggravating the housing shortage and people who have given up building houses and letting them for profit have left the housing position in the state in which it is at present.
I suppose the Minister would tell me that he could not have left these houses uncontrolled and let the rents reach any figure. probably not, but this policy has carried its own nemesis in that it has cut off the supply of houses for letting. Everybody knows that there are no houses to let as an investment in this city for years past. In other words, there are no more houses coming on the market for letting. Even before the emergency there wre parctically no houses on the market to be let a an investment. In the past, the fact that such houses were available for letting helped to solve the housing problem considerably. In my humble opinion, the Minister by this trnasition development fund has created an extraordinary precedent. I can only liken it to teh stockpot which used to be kept, and possibly is still kept, in a kitchen and out of which soup was ladled and flavoured in various ways. I suggest that that is an extraordinary way of dealing with the housing problem. Perhaps local authorities will have a supply ladled out to them, or perhaps they will not, but certainly the private builder is unaware of whether he is going to get any grant from this source. The Minister, in my opinion, is deliberately cutting himself off from one of the main sources of supply so far as housing in the past was concerned. He may tell us that his scheme is all right and that it will produce houses, but I should like to put it to him that the present housing problem is so acute that it demands the co-operation of everybody who may be able in any way to assist in its solution. I believe in building a type of house which will either serve the working class of the class immediately above it. Reference has been made to the needs of "newlyweds" and people just above the working class, what might be described as the balck-coated workers. houses for these people wer provided in the past mainly by the private builders, and I would like to suggest to the Minister that what has happened is that what he has gained on the swings, if he has gained, he has lost on the roundabouts.
I do not know exactly where I shall start in discussing this Vote but I should like to sympathise with the Minister for the moment, because he has had a hard time. He is a little man who has had a very busy day. I have no desire to carry on the attack but I must assert at the same time that the attack that has been made upon him is largely of his own making. I should prefer to approach the various matters which arise on this Vote from the point of view of their utility with a view to ascertaining whether we are getting a good return for the money voted for this Department. There are a huge number, of questions that one could ask if one were inclined to be obstreperous, as obstreperous as the Minister, but I shall not ask them. I leave them to be answered by the Minister because he knows very well what the problems of local government and public healh are. He must, in my opinion, carry out an examination of his own conscience to see whether the service that he and his Department have been giving is worth all the money we are asked to vote now. When one looks at what we are going to pay for that service, one feels that it is really substantial. We are going to pay the Minister £1,700 inclusive. I do not know exactly what it includes but I do know that the Minister has a car and other allowances.
There are two Parliamentary Secretaries, each receiving £1,200. I should like to know what service this country has got for such payments to these two general officers commanding, who are chiefs of staff in the running of this very important Department. The Minister is put into the unfortunate position of having to defend himself because we are a democracy. He is challenged in this House to show that he is worthy of the hire that the labourers get, and those who employ them, namely, the people, are entitled to ask the labourers about the nature of their service. I think the easiest thing I can say about the Minister's statements is that he was not discreet. We have reached a stage when there must be discussion by Ministers, by Deputies and by everybody concerned. If we have not a sense of justice in our hearts what we are really going to do is to wreck those things that we hold dear. I should like the Minister when he gets up either in this House or on the public platform, to have some sense of discretion in his language. I am not going to attack the Minister. I should like to say that I have met the Minister in his office on a few occasions, and I must bear testimony to this fact, that every time I met him in his office he was a gentleman, but when I met him on the crossroads it was not so. I wish the Minister would retain his office qualities at all times.
Many people ask what we want roads for. People who own motor cars cannot get petrol from the Department of Industry and Commerce until they tax and insure them. The amount of the tax is supposed to go into the Road Fund, yet there are roads that motor owners cannot travel on. As a matter of fact, the condition of the roads is nearly as bad as we tried to make them in 1920-21. At that time we tried to dig holes in them and to make it impossible to use them, in order to stop enemy forces operating in this country. Without any activity on the part of illegal organisations, our roads are now potted and pitted and yet there is a huge sum of money going into the fund that is under the Minister's control. Is it not reasonable to ask the Minister, when he has control of the Road Fund, to give us decent roads and to try to save springs, tyres and parts that will break because of the holes in the roads?
I know that there are farmers who say that roads should not be made at all, that their horses cannot travel on them, and so on. But the Minister is trustee of the Road Fund and it is his responsibility to see that those who subscribe to that fund get value for their money. Otherwise it is his responsibility to report to the Minister for Finance and to stop the collection of taxes, but the Minister is charged with the responsibility of administering the Road Fund and he must see that those who subscribe to it are given good service. If he does not do so, then some people will have a word to say.
I was not at the crossroads in Cork, so I will not argue on that basis. The Minister's responsibility is the same whether he is in Cork or in this House. He assumed an extra responsibility and he thought when doing so that it was a very happy one. There is a responsibility on local authorities to make roads and drains on bogs for the purpose of having fuel produced. If the Minister was wise he would have let the Office of Public Works and the Minister for Finance look after their responsibilities. He took over that responsibility. Of course he transferred it to the county surveyors or county managers.
Again we find ourselves with this extraordinary situation that under this Vote he is going to pay £42,500 for the draining of bogs. We could understand if some expert who knew anything about roads into bogs was charged with responsibility but the Minister took it. I want to know what benefit we get for this sum of £42,500. Of course the Minister will say that he did not appoint anyone and had nothing to do with it. What I want to know is what service was given for that money. I want to know how long more must the taxpayers pay it.
I heard Dublin Deputies speaking this evening about housing. I am glad that Dublin Deputies challenged the Estimate and talked about producing more houses in Dublin. I am also glad that they tried to have more flats and other amenities made available, but I am sorry that not one of them, even of the lawyer Deputies, dealt with the conditions under which agricultural workers and farmers in rural areas have to live. It is true that the Department of Local Government has an excellent housing scheme as far as it goes. How far does it go? It is also true that the Land Commission has an excellent housing scheme as far as it goes. Again I ask how far does it go? The Minister for Local Government is charged with the responsibility of housing and everything that is related to public health. We had a Parliamentary Secretary going so far as to say that he must be vested with certain powers and that he was going to vest the Civic Guards with certain powers but the Minister is allowing the Land Commission to build houses as they were built 50 or 100 years ago with four walls but without any of the amenities that are provided in the poorest quarters in Dublin.
I have no control over the Land Commission.
You have control over the labourer's cottage which will be built to-morrow.
Not over a Land Commission cottage.
When I say you have control, I mean that you must not allow the Land Commission to build a house which is a danger to public health, and it is your task——
The Minister's task?
It is the Minister's task to do his job well, as there is provision in the Estimate for paying him £1,700 a year. I assert that it is his task to see to it that not even the Land Commission will be allowed to build a house which is a menace to public health, and I further assert that he is allowing houses to be built which are menaces to public health, because they are as out-dated as if they were built 100 years ago. We are in this difficulty, that when a Deputy like myself makes representations, he gets the answer that this is all we had years ago and it is good enough for us now. I challenge investigation on that point. Therefore, when the Minister, who comes down here from the North of Ireland with all the strength of character he should have, starts slipping, I do not think we should pay him that sum of £1,700 a year. I will not vote against it this year, but I promise him faithfully and truthfully that, if he does not mend his ways within the next 12 months, I will see to it that not a halfpenny will he get this time 12 months.
The reconstruction of houses is a favourite point of mine. There is this problem on the reconstruction of houses. The Minister has decided— perhaps it is the Minister for Finance who put down his foot—that any person over £25 valuation will not get a reconstruction grant. I agree that, when Fianna Fáil took the step of providing these grants, it was a good step. They have done well in that respect, but I ask the Minister to review the whole position with regard to these grants. I suggest that he should make a regulation abolishing the limit altogether, so that the owner of a farm of whatever valuation will be enabled to get a grant. If the Minister says that it is not a matter for his Department, I ask him to make representations to the appropriate Department in the matter.
Local Government administration touches on every aspect of the normal, everyday life of the citizen and it is hard for a Minister to do everything well and to make no mistakes with regard to it. I do not suppose it is possible because if the Minister were so good, he would be a Gobán Saor or a Solomon. He denied to-day that he had any responsibility for old age pensions and I suppose he would also deny that he had any responsibility for widows' and orphans' pensions.
Old age pensions are under a separate Vote. The extra 2/6 arises on this Vote.
I assure you, Sir, that the Minister is looking for £6,622 under sub-head A.
We have a certain responsibility as an appeal tribunal, but we have no responsibility for the general administration of the Act.
You are asking for a sum of £6,662.
I am not denying it.
Will you please not interrupt me? You are asking us to vote that amount and I am within my right in arguing that you should not get it. When you start interrupting, you are trying to get off on a soft road. I take it, Sir, that it is not permissible for us to have a crossroads discussion on this Vote?
I thought so. The Minister is looking for this amount, but he denied all responsibility to-day. What is your responsibility under that sub-head?
The Minister's. Deputies are getting into the habit, and it is a dangerous habit, of using "You".
I do not want to interrupt the Deputy or to divert him from the point he wants to make. I merely want to make it quite clear that we have no responsibility for the general administration of old age pensions. Under the Act the Minister for Local Government has been appointed as a sort of appellant tribunal and appeal can be made either by the applicant or by the Department administering the Act—the office of the Revenue Commissioners—to the Minister for Local Government, who has then to act as an arbitrator between the two parties, but strictly in accordance with the law. That is my position and I am not running away from it.
And you then drew up a set of rules or regulations by which that approach is to be made?
Not to me; to the appeals officer, who is appointed by me.
Now, there is no question of doubt about it. There was a document issued from the Department of Local Government and Public Health and it was signed by a Parliamentary Secretary, acting under the authority of the Minister for Local Government and Public Health. Is that right or is it wrong?
That is true. I have the document here.
What exactly did that do? The Minister assumed unto himself all the power. He decided to become a little Napoleon within his own office and he got two gentlemen to fight with him. We are asked now to vote this sum for what is, I submit, the worst service this State has given. To-day we find the Minister for Local Government and Public Health deciding an old age pension case within this section and stating that he directs, or, the Parliamentary Secretary, who is under his control, "directs that a pension has been granted" in certain counties which come within his particular authority. I contend that neither the Minister for Local Government and Public Health, nor anybody else, has power to grant it. It is the Minister for Finance who has the power to grant it under the law. Yet, his Department sends out these documents: "I am directed by the Minister for Local Government" or "I am directed by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government". I say that we are voting this money for the administration of something over which the Minister has no control. I would like to know how the Minister can defend that procedure. If he wants to defend it he may do so. If he does not defend it in a reasonable way I presume I shall not be allowed to discuss it here on his own Vote, but I shall discuss it later under the Vote for the Department of Finance.
The same applies to widows' and orphans' pensions. Here again, the Minister shouldered a very heavy responsibility when he took over the administration of widows' and orphans' pensions. In order to make a success of that he would need a world of experience; yet, he will insist on doing everything. He will insist upon adjudicating in cases. He is entitled to do so. He will give a judgment under his own name, and under his hand and seal, which deprives the widow and the orphan of something to which they are entitled because of some minor factor in the situation; that minor factor may be that somebody—a son, a daughter, perhaps a son-in-law or a daughter-in-law—makes some gift in money during a certain year. Because of that the Minister will deprive that person of a pension. Might I put it in this way— for the man who lives to 70 years of age and the woman and the child who have been struck by adversity the Minister should remember that charity is very great and that the quality of mercy is still greater? The Minister who exercises the powers vested in him in this respect has a very heavy responsibility and he should administer them in the broadest possible manner.
That brings me to my final point. The Government of this country decided to take certain steps in relation to public health and they established the National Health Insurance Commission. Some of us took a poor view of it at the time but everyone of us who had employees subscribed promptly and correctly in relation to those; and the people whom the Minister appointed to discharge this trust discharged it to the best of their ability. One of them, a Bishop, in the discharge of his responsibility, felt that there was need for something more to be done and he felt that he should report to the Minister and inform him as to what he thought of the situation. Now, there may have been some technical error in his method of approach to the Minister. Apparently, the Minister took a very poor view of it. I am not going to quote the Minister's statement because I do not think it would serve any useful purpose. I am, however, of the opinion that the Bishop and the entire board made a very complete report which was worthy of the most careful examination and attention. It certainly deserved more than the Minister gave it. The Minister, for some reason or other, instead of sitting quietly in his office and dealing with it there went down to the crossroads and became, as I said before, not the gentleman of his office but the "Mary Mullarkey" of the crossroads. This country deserves more than that from a Minister to whom we are paying that salary and if the Minister is going to continue in this we should discontinue payment.
I ask the Minister to make representations to the Government to have the matter of old age pensions, widows' and orphans' pensions and public health dealt with with the depth of vision and strength of character displayed by the Most Reverend Bishop of Clonfert. If he does that, then I think he would be worth the money that we are voting to him. If he does not, he will be the worst servant that this or any other country ever had.
When Deputy Dillon referred to-day to the sad case of a child who died under very pitiable circumstances in the City of Dublin, the Minister interrupted and said: "What about the Dublin Corporation?" As a member of the Dublin Corporation, I would remind the House that dispensary doctors and relieving officers are under the control of the commissioners of the Dublin Board of Assistance. The Dublin Board of Assistance has nothing whatever to do with the Dublin Corporation, except that the ratepayers of Dublin pay for the Dublin Board of Assistance, but they or their representatives have no control over the actions of the Dublin Board of Assistance.
There is a body of professional employees of this State known as public health nurses. This State has no more worthy servants. They work very hard and perform their duties extremely well. They are well educated and highly trained women and are a credit to this country. A very considerable degree of dissatisfaction exists among them. Approximately two years ago they made representations to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government for an increase of salary, uniform allowance and various other matters connected with their profession. The scale was to be increased to £175 per annum, rising by annual increments of £5 to £200 per annum. That increase was not what it seemed to be, because a very large proportion of the nurses were in receipt of that basic and maximum salary. I know that the question of increases in pay is very difficult at present but, having had experience of the work that these women do and the way in which they do it and, knowing that there is a great deal of dissatisfaction among them, I suggest that it is the duty of the Minister to do everything in his power to satisfy them. They feel that they are being badly treated. They have suggested a salary of £225 per annum, rising to £300 per annum. They have also asked that consideration be given to the question of postgraduate courses for public health nurses. I think I am correct in saying that the Minister has said that that matter is still under consideration. I urge the Minister to look into this matter as soon as possible. I would remind him that we are all finding it increasingly difficult to get trained professional people, owing to the higher rates that are paid in England. However much we may deplore the fact of Irish people leaving this country, the very much higher rates obtainable across the water and in English speaking countries generally are always an attraction to our professional people. We in Dublin would be very alarmed at anything that would deplete the ranks of public nurses and I would therefore ask the Minister to consider the matter and, if possible, to come to an agreement with this body.
There was some discussion to-day about town-planning and, as a member of the Town Planning Committee, I want to refer to this matter, because town planning operates under Acts administered by the Minister for Local Government. One of the difficulties which we have come up against on a few occasions is the contumely and contempt with which the Town Planning Committee and its body of experts are treated by various Government Departments. In one instance, in Dublin, one of the finest examples of Georgian plaster work in existence was pulled down without a word to the Town Planning Committee. They knew nothing whatsoever about it. Sites for statues have been chosen by the Government without prior consultation with the Town Planning Committee. There have been occasions when we found that the Department of Local Government showed no great desire to listen to the advice of the body which they set up as the arbiter of planning for the City of Dublin. I do not want to go into that matter too closely or at great length but I would remind the Minister that one of his little chickens is receiving very poor treatment from some of his brother Ministers, and indeed he is not entirely without blame himself in the matter.
If a big business in the City of Dublin were administered as the county council of which I have been a member for the past four or five years has been administered, it would be bankrupt in a very short time. If the county councils had not the ratepayers at their backs, they could never keep going. The administration in my county was hopeless for some years, but during the past year it has improved. Within the past four or five years we had a sad experience. We had one county commissioner, three county secretaries and three county managers. The result was that the administration of affairs in County Westmeath was not very satisfactory. If a big business place was run on the same lines it would have been bankrupt long ago. In the county estimate last year we had an item for £3,000. We asked where it came from. It was found by our new county manager somewhere in the public health items and it was not accounted for. Luckily, we had honest people dealing with it. Also, in one of our county manager's orders, we had a long list amounting to hundreds of pounds for the maintenance of patients in the county hospital. That could never be collected. The people were never asked for it. Numbers of the items were hopelessly out of date. Some patients came from Belfast and others from Dublin and other parts of Ireland.
Westmeath, for the past seven or eight years, must have been a white elephant to the Department. I defy contradiction of that. Why was that the case? We had one secretary for one and a half years and another for a similar period. Then we had a manager for one and a half years and also a temporary manager. That type of thing continued and there was nobody to look after the affairs of the county for any reasonable period of time. Thank God, at last we have a manager and secretary who are putting the affairs of the county on a sound basis.
No manager or secretary of any county council should be allowed to leave his position until he has served five years in the county. It is not fair in any county that a man should be allowed to leave before he has served five years. At the present time an official is scarcely appointed until he is looking for a better job and his mind is not on his work. Only by great persuasion was our county secretary prevented from going back to Cork. He is a capable man, a tip-top official and under his guidance the county affairs are being better supervised. The whole position for some years has been a shame and a disgrace and a reflection on the Department. If a big business place was worked on the lines of our county council, it would be smashed long ago. Thank God, we are not in debt. We have a credit balance.
The system of administration of county councils generally is hopeless. The managers have no power; they are only the tools of the Local Government Department. People say the manager is all-powerful, but he really cannot do a thing without the Minister's permission. The Westmeath County Council spent days thrashing out schemes. The manager was helpful and agreeable. We heard nothing about these schemes for six months and then we were told they would not be sanctioned. We have tried to do good for the county, but we got no encouragement. We saw our people dying from tuberculosis. Mothers and fathers and their children died from that disease, and they could not be taken away for treatment. The members of the county council decided to spend up to £50,000 on a scheme to take sufferers from their homes and thus prevent the spread of the disease. The Department encouraged the county councillors and allowed them to negotiate for the purchase of a house. Inspectors came down and encouraged the council in every way. After the lapse of 12 months the council were told they would not be allowed to buy the house and that there was a Bill being introduced, providing for the erection of sanatoria. That was 12 months ago and still no sanatorium has been built in our county.
Why were we allowed to waste our time at county council meetings? Could the Department not have told us that they would undertake the building of sanatoria? The members of the county council were unanimous in their decision to spend any money necessary to treat sufferers from tuberculosis and prevent the spread of the disease. The manager and everyone helped. The manager cannot raise hand or foot without leave from the Minister.
We had a circular informing us that our policy with regard to the Managerial Act would be considered, but we do not believe our ideas are receiving the consideration to which they are entitled. This year we decided to spend £10,000 on repairing labourers' cottages, but there are no surveyors or engineers to look after the work. The Minister may say we have too many engineers. Take the assistant engineers in our county. Their whole time is taken up from Monday to Wednesday checking the books dealing with the labouring men, which they get from the gangers on Saturday or Sunday. There is no engineer available to look after cottage repairs on these three days. The engineers have to make a careful check in order to see there is nothing wrong in the payments to the labourers who work for the council. The whole system is wrong. Now the assistant surveyors have an extra burden in connection with the rivers. It is utterly impossible for one man to walk hundreds of miles to look after the rivers.
Arrangements have been made for carrying out repairs to labourers' cottages, but there is no engineer to see that the men are working. We noticed all that at the county council meetings and we asked for a new engineer, but it took the Department four months to sanction an appointment. Now the new engineer starts looking after the cottages when half the money has been spent. The Department should arrive at a quicker decision. That is the sad experience of County Westmeath. There should be more engineers and the districts should be smaller and there should be some other system than having the whole county council staff checking the wages of the direct labourers.
The whole time of the engineering staff is taken up looking after the wages and seeing that the council is not being robbed. Seeing that such a large expenditure is involved, I think that more engineers should be appointed, even though it would entail additional cost, and the districts made smaller so that there should be more supervision. It is humanly impossible for one man to look after all this work. In addition he has to supervise the rural improvement schemes, turf production schemes and various other schemes. The system is utterly wrong and the Minister who is responsible for it should be ashamed of himself. I speak from experience and I defy contradiction. Another problem that arises is that all our engineers have to get holidays so that one engineer is employed for six months in relief work while the others are on holidays and £80,000 or £90,000 is being expended without anybody to look after the work. Eight or nine years ago an effort was made to reorganise the county surveyor's office. It was only quite recently that one part of that reorganisation was brought into operation. The time of three managers and three secretaries has been taken up in that reorganisation and it is not yet completed.
I think that no one manager could possibly manage all the bodies for which our county manager is responsible. He has to manage the Westmeath County Council, the Mullingar Mental Hospital, the Longford County Council, the Athlone Urban Council and the Granard Urban Council. No one man could possibly do it. I want to stress this because honestly I do not sleep at night—I am Chairman of the Westmeath County Council—thinking of the way the ratepayers' money is being squandered. There are men who are supposed to be repairing labourers' cottages. They are supposed to commence work at 7 o'clock old time, that is 8 o'clock new time. The people are not up when they call to the cottages and they do not let them in until after 10 o'clock. There are no windows in any of these cottages. It is not the engineers' fault because they cannot possibly supervise all this work.
About a fortnight ago the manager in our county invited tenders for spectacles under the public health scheme. He got only two tenders and he accepted the lower one. That, however, was not sanctioned and word came back from the Department that he was to get another tender. What is at the back of that? The other tender was 2/- or 3/- per pair higher. As far as I know, the lower tender came from the man who had the contract in other years. Why should the county council be expected to pay 2/- or 3/- per pair more for glasses for the poor children of the county? I know that the Minister's Department pays part of the cost but we also pay our share. I understood the law laid it down that the lowest tender in all cases must be accepted.
In regard to the reconstruction of houses I should like the Minister to raise the valuation limit beyond £25.
Why not take it away altogether?
There are many houses in a very bad way but the people occupying them are not able to reconstruct them without the assistance of a grant. Some of these houses are built on holdings with a valuation of over £25, perhaps only a few shillings over £25, but that has the effect of excluding them from the benefits of these grants.
I should also like to make some reference to the system under which National Health Insurance is paid. One of my workmen became ill about three months ago and he had to wait about nine weeks before he got a penny. I am told that complaint is general. Were it not that I came to his aid and paid him, the man would be starving. Poor people with a family should not be exposed to that danger. I believe that the system is totally out of date. Some time ago there was an allegation in our county that a boarded-out child was badly treated and on the county council going into the matter 18 months ago we found that there were only four home assistance officers in the county. We realised that it was impossible for these four men to render assistance to all the people in the huge area which they have to cover and we recommended that the number of home assistance officers should be increased to six and that the districts should be made smaller but still nothing has been done. Children here in Dublin may be all right but there are poor children living down in the bogs who could be starved during the year and a half that this matter has been under consideration. Why has our recommendation not been carried out?
As regards the manager, I think the Minister would be very wise if he arranged that the manager should have only one county to attend to or else appoint an assistant manager for Longford, because no one man can attend to all the work that has to be done. Speaking of cottages, some of these cottages are costing as much as £60 or £70 to repair. That is all due to bad administration. We have spent £30,000 or £40,000 for the last three years. It was not a good time to spend money in that way because in my opinion the timber is bad, but we have got to do it. If the administration had been right for the last seven or eight years the cottages would not have fallen into such a state of disrepair. We find that when the auditor comes round he surcharges the county officials, but that is no good. When an ordinary individual is surcharged, the surcharge is usually remitted. Another matter which I want to mention is that the accounts of our county council were not audited for seven or eight years, and at present they are audited only up to 1943. If a person robbed the county council, say in 1944, he could be in Timbuctoo since without being discovered. I think that the administration of county council affairs in Ireland is not at all a credit to the Local Government Department.
I am sure that the House will agree that this has been a most interesting debate and a most revealing one. It might be unique in this respect, that never before, I think, in a Legislative Assembly, have there been found so many politicians to be so openly and so bitterly ashamed of their own past. If I had been Minister for Local Government in April, 1931, the reference to which opened so many floodgates of vituperation in this debate, I should think there was something to be proud of, and I certainly should not have been annoyed, if any person had tried to make a comparison between what was being done now and what was being done then. I should have had something to boast about; I should not have had anything to be ashamed of. I should not have been trying to make excuses for my failure. I should not have put myself in the puerile position of a former Leas-Cheann Comhairle who never, during the period from the day when he was appointed to the office by Cumann na Gaedheal, found a single item to criticise in the Vote for the Department of Local Government during the five years from 1927 to 1932.
That is absolutely untrue.
During that period, the Deputy never once criticised the Vote of the Minister.
That is a lie.
I pass that. I am not asking the Deputy to withdraw it. It is fitting from Deputy Morrissey. During the whole period from 1927— and I took the precaution to look up the Official Report in this matter— Deputy Morrissey never once voiced a serious criticism regarding the Estimate of the Department of Local Government and Public Health, and I think that only on one occasion did he ever, even for five minutes, participate in a debate in that time.
As a matter of explanation and correction, may I simply say that if the Minister looks it up, he will see I was not Leas-Cheann Comhairle of this House in 1927? The Minister said I was and that he had looked it up.
I think the Deputy became Leas-Cheann Comhairle in October, 1927.
Not in 1927.
Early in 1928, shortly after a colleague of his vacated his tenure of the chair when conditions were sought to be imposed on him which would have prevented him from doing his duty to his constituents. I do not want to go into that.
I kept you in your place during that time.
I do not want to go into that, except to say this, that Deputy Morrissey tried to justify his inaction, after he had been impugned like the rest of the supporters of that Government for inactivity during that period which was just as serious as any since—it was a period of great depression—and we were told that in this debate by saying that, after all, if they were to provide twice as much money for the assistance of persons suffering from tuberculosis as was being provided in the year 1931, that was due entirely, as he suggested, to the fact that there was a difference in the cost of living.
I did not mention the cost of living.
The fact of the matter is that there has been a wide extension and expansion in the services providing assistance for persons suffering from tuberculosis. In 1931, people suffering from this dread disease were just as much in need of protective foods, eggs, butter and milk, as in 1946, but there was no provision made by the Government, or by the Party whose votes appointed Deputy Morrissey Leas-Cheann Comhairle, in the Estimate for those suffering from that disease who could not otherwise secure a supply of the protective foods which are supposed to be essential in order to ensure that persons suffering from it will recover. Neither was provision made with local authorities to ensure that persons suffering from tuberculosis would at least have peace of mind in regard to the position of their dependents. There was no provision in the Estimate for 1931 for the payment of sustenance allowances, either to persons suffering from the disease or to their dependents, and there was no provision made for supplying them with proper clothing, bedding or proper accommodation in their own homes. These are the things we are doing. It is because we are doing these things that the amount of money required for departmental services has mounted from £114,000 in 1931 to over £265,000 in 1946. When one remembers the reasons for the increase, and when one remembers also that people who are in contact with persons suffering from the disease know what is being done for them now as compared with what was being done then, one begins to realise why it was so necessary for Deputy Morrissey to come into this House this evening to open up with a cataract of vituperation and abuse such as, I think, has scarcely ever been heard in it. It was a torrent of abuse worthy of the record of the Deputy who made it.
I challenge the Minister to say something about my record.
The Deputy will not.
He would, but he is afraid. I challenge him to say it either here or outside.
Deputies should leave out personalities and if the Minister would come down to this year's Estimate, he would avoid a lot of interruption.
Mr. MacEntee rose.
If the Minister would allow me. On an Estimate, Deputies are supposed to discuss one year's administration and money for the forthcoming year. The Minister did not do that in his original speech and Deputies replying naturally did not confine themselves to that year, but it might be done now.
I naturally have to bow to the ruling of the Chair in essential matters concerning rules of order, but the technique of the Opposition in these matters is well known. When an Estimate is submitted by an Administration such as ours, which I have already reminded the House is a progressive Administration, the technique of the Opposition has been invariably to get up and criticise us on two grounds, first, that we are extravagant and, secondly, that we have expanded the permanent Civil Service unduly.
In order that the truth of that argument can be tested, it is necessary to have some standard. To my mind, the fairest standard one could take would be the standard set up by our critics when they were in power in 1931. Therefore, in submitting my Estimate to the House, in order to justify it, in order to justify the demands I was making on the public purse, I think I was quite entitled to take the figures in the Estimate of the year 1931-32, to contrast them with the figures in my own Estimate and to explain to the House why it was that we required so very much more money this year than was required then.
I cannot see how that can be outside the rules, because the purpose of a Minister in speaking to an Estimate is to explain it and to justify it. I explained it and I justified it. I justified it to such an extent that I have so annoyed the Opposition that, coming back here—I was going to say "flushed with victory"—pale with vexation after their experience in Cork last week, they could find no other way to spend public time than to vent that vexation upon my innocent head. There is one thing about me: if I give medicine I am not afraid to take it.
You always squeal.
I do not allude to where members of this House came from. I come from Belfast and I have nothing to be ashamed of in that fact. I came down from Belfast in 1916 when Deputy Morrissey had never been heard of.
And you took good care you stayed down.
I came down here on a number of other occasions, and I am proud to say that I have been elected to this Dáil by a Dublin City constituency, and I do not think I have any reason to be ashamed either of the place where I was born or the place I represent.
The place where you were born has reason to be ashamed of you.
I know that 1921 is a sore period in our history for some Deputies. I do not wish to go back to that year and I do not wish to refer again to Deputy Morrissey. I come now to Deputy Dillon. Deputy Dillon's was perhaps the most extraordinary performance of this whole debate. It is a sad thing when a child dies amid poverty-stricken surroundings and dies apparently from neglect of one sort or another. It is a sad thing and naturally will touch all our hearts and perhaps carry us beyond the bounds of discretion into statements and actions which would not otherwise be warranted; but it is a sadder thing when a Deputy, in the name of humanity, tries to make political capital out of such a tragic occurrence.
The Minister for Local Government and his Department have no immediate responsibility for the administration of any single service in the City of Dublin, whether a public health service, a public assistance service or a housing service. The immediate administration of these services is the responsibility of the local authorities, of the Dublin Corporation, in some instances, and, if Deputy Dockrell likes it, of the Dublin Board of Assistance.
The Minister appoints the commissioners administering the duties of that board.
Perhaps the Deputy will bear with me. I am not responsible for the immediate administration of any single service in the City of Dublin. Deputy Dillon knows that as well as I. Some time ago, it was brought to the notice not only of Deputy Dillon but of another Deputy that a child had died in Grenville Street, Dublin, in particularly distress-lon' ing circumstances. The two Deputies wrote to the Minister for Justice and both of them received replies from that Minister. Apparently the first question they raised was the question of the circumstances in which the coroner's certificate was issued. Deputy Dillon received this reply to his inquiries from the Minister for Justice on 11th April, 1946:—
"A Chara,
I have made inquiries regarding the death of the child —— about which you spoke to me some weeks ago. I have ascertained that this case was investigated by the Gárda Síochána and that the full facts were reported to the coroner who decided that an inquest was not necessary. The Gárda Síochána came to the conclusion that there was no evidence in the case to support a prosecution. I regret the delay in replying to your inquiry. It was occasioned by the absence on sick leave of the officer who was dealing with the matter.
Mise, le meas,
GERALD BOLAND,
Minister for Justice."
Apparently, when this matter was first mooted, Deputy Dillon was concerned more with the question of a prosecution being brought against some person, because the Minister for Justice states that the Gárda Síochána came to the conclusion that there was no evidence in the case to support a prosecution. A prosecution against whom? Against the parents for whom his heart was breaking to-day? Against the parents about whom he appeared to be so solicitous to-day? Against the parents who had been shamefully neglected by the local authority concerned in this matter? That was apparently Deputy Dillon's first approach, an approach which was made prior to 11th April, 1946.
The next development in this business came some weeks after Deputy Dillon had been notified, first, that the coroner did not think it necessary to hold an inquest, having, I assume, ascertained all the facts from the Gárda Síochána, and, secondly, that the Gárda were of opinion that the evidence in the case would not sustain a prosecution. The Deputy put down a question to the Parliamentary Secretary on 1st May, 1946, three weeks after he had got this reply. The question was "whether the Minister for Local Government and Public Health will make inquiries into the circumstances surrounding the certification of the cause of death of the infant, Francis O'Brien, who died on the 17th September, 1945, and whether the procedure adopted in this case is approved by him." Now, you will note that Deputy Dillon first addressed himself to the Minister for Justice, who is, of course, responsible for the conduct of the coroners of this country. The Minister for Justice was fully satisfied that the coroner had acted properly and Deputy Dillon himself had to admit here in this House that life would be quite intolerable for a very great number of bereaved people if, on every occasion upon which a death took place without medical attention, a coroner's inquest were to be held; and the question as to whether a coroner's inquest would be held, or not held, is a matter within the full discretion of the coroner.
So far as the present coroner of the City of Dublin is concerned, I have never once heard it alleged—and even Deputy Dillon himself did not allege it —that he is either remiss or lax in any way in the discharge of the duties of his office. But Deputy Dillon comes along here and he puts down a question—and I submit that that question should never have been addressed to the Minister for Local Government—as to whether the procedure adopted in this case is approved by him. The Parliamentary Secretary, Dr. Ward, replied to that question in these terms: "It is clear from inquiries which have been made in this case that a certificate of the cause of death could not be issued for the reason that the registered medical practitioner was not called in to attend the child during his illness." Now, on that first point, who is responsible for the failure to call in the doctor? Surely it is not alleged that the Minister for Local Government is to be held responsible if parents do not call in doctors to attend to their children when they are ill; or, if parents who have been on a number of occasions visited by representatives of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children do not bring in doctors? Let me say that that seemed to be one of the suggestions behind Deputy Dillon's speech to-day—that either the Minister for Local Government, or one of his Parliamentary Secretaries, was in some way responsible for the failure of the parents of this child to procure medical attention for it. The reply proceeded: "On receipt of the coroner's certificate that an inquest was unnecessary the registrar was under a statutory obligation to proceed to register the death." Here is the relevant regulation in regard to that matter. It is headed: "Regulations for the Discharge of the Duties of Registrars of Births, Deaths and Marriages and of Assistant, Deputy and Interim Registrars," and reads: "It must be distinctly understood that the non-production of a medical certificate of the cause of death will not, except when a registered medical practitioner has been in attendance, or in the case of sudden death, or death by violence, or under suspicious circumstances, justify a registrar in refusing to register a death as many persons die without medical aid in their last illness. If, therefore, an informant states there was no regular practitioner in attendance on the deceased the registrar will, unless further inquiry as above alluded to seems to be necessary, enter the cause of death upon the best information he is able to obtain from the informant on the subject. It is undesirable that the cause of death should be entered as unknown whenever any indication of the principal cause can be obtained." The registrar, therefore, was bound to register the death in the column headed "certified cause of death and duration of illness." The registrar recorded that there was no medical attendance.
Now, why was Deputy Dillon so concerned in this matter? He came in here posing as a friend of humanity and the protector of the infant children of the City of Dublin. Why was he concerned in this matter? I am beginning to think that Deputy Dillon is much more of a politician in regard to this whole matter than either a philanthropist or an altruist because I have a suspicion that he aimed to hit one of three persons, or all three—the coroner, the registrar who entered the cause of death, and the Parliamentary Secretary. The death of this child occurred sometime in September, 1945. Six months afterwards, when the Public Health Bill was going through this House, Deputy Dillon put down this question—apparently an innocent one—and got a full and correct answer. Then he proceeded to expatiate on the matter to the extent of three columns of innuendo and insinuation—innuendo and insinuation against either the coroner, the dispensary medical officer for the district, or the registrar. It may, or may not, seem significant in that latter connection that the dispensary medical officer for the district happens to bear the name of Dr. James Lynch, who did his duty strictly in accordance with the regulations—a fact, however, which did not safeguard him against this covert attack by the friend of humanity whom we had here weeping crocodile tears over the death of this infant.
We were told about an infant shovelled into a grave. What were the facts? A lady, who had interested herself in this case and who described herself as a member of the Social Services Tenement Committee of Trinity College, Dublin, in whose house the parents of this child had one room arrived there, apparently, and found the child dead. Shortly after her arrival a Gárda, together with a sergeant of the Gárda, arrived at the house and inspected the child and investigated the circumstances in which it had died. The mother told them that the child had been sick for six days with diarrhæa and both the parents of the dead baby admitted that it had not been attended by a doctor; and both gave as their reason for not calling in the doctor the fact that the baby was teething and that when their other children were teething they suffered from diarrhæa also and got well when given hot milk. There you have the fact that on the morning on which this child died, while it was still in the bed in which it had died, you had this lady visitor arriving at the house and you had two Gárda officers who were able fully to report upon the circumstances. Not only that, but this family had been visited on a number of occasions by an inspector in the service of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. I understand also that the family had been visited by the officers of the domiciliary visiting services of the public health section of the City of Dublin. Every endeavour, I understand, was made to get the parents of the child to avail themselves of the services that are provided by the City of Dublin to ensure that children in these circumstances will get proper attention. They failed to do that. I am not going to ascribe to them the reasons for their failure. The mother, apparently, was in weak health. The father does not seem to have been physically very strong either.
He had been in the Army for a period. He had left it. He had been in almost constant employment for the year before, at least from May, 1944, until June, 1945, and when he became unemployed the family were in receipt of quite a considerable amount of cash from various public assistance sources —I think 47/11 or 48/- per week—as well as free milk and free bread daily from the St. Vincent de Paul Society.
These are the circumstances in which this child died. Deputy Dillon has endeavoured to place the responsibility for the death of that child upon the Minister and the Department of Local Government and Public Health. We did not come into this from beginning to end. So far as there was any immediate responsibility in the matter, there was the immediate responsibility of the public assistance authorities who, as I have shown, were discharging their responsibility with reasonable generosity. The total cash income of this family was 47/11 or 48/- per week, a family, the father of which had been in employment, I think, from May, 1944, to June, 1945. In addition to that, one of the other members of the family had been, I think, in hospital for some time and had then been released. So far, therefore, as the public assistance authorities were concerned, they had done their duty. I have no reason to believe that the public health authorities of the City of Dublin have not done their duty, but I do know this, that so far as the Department of Local Government and Public Health is concerned, it had no responsibility, direct or indirect, in this matter, because we have given to the Dublin Corporation every encouragement to expand its maternal and child welfare service.
Therefore, one is quite justified in believing that when Deputy Dillon opened this matter in this debate he was moved more by political animosity against my Parliamentary Secretary, Dr. Ward, than by any desire to ensure that the services which are provided for the relief of the poor, the needy and the destitute in the City of Dublin will be enhanced or improved. I think Deputy Dillon's act was a ghoulish one.
He said that the Minister in this matter had called for water to wash his hands. That was a carefully thought out phrase. It did not come out on the spur of the moment. Most of Deputy Dillon's impromptus smack of the midnight oil. I do not suggest that Deputy Dillon will wash his hands in water. I do not think that Deputy Dillon can wash his hands in this matter. He has shown himself perfectly prepared to make political capital out of the sufferings of an unfortunate family and the death of an unfortunate infant in Dublin and any man who does that will find it very difficult, not only to clean his hands, but to clean his conscience.
Deputy Dillon, proceeding from the particular incident of the death of this child, went on to make the general statement that our statistics for gastroenteritis here were fantastically false. That would be a grave statement and a weighty statement for a person to make who was qualified to make it but I do not think that Deputy Dillon would get any qualified person to make it. But, then, of course, fools rush in where angels fear to tread and Deputy Dillon, one of the barristers sitting on the other side of the House, one of these men so touchy about their personal reputation, has no difficulty whatever in making it and in suggesting that the professional men and public officers who are responsible for the compilation of these statistics are deliberately falsifying them in order that in some way or another we may find exculpation for our alleged failures by ascribing what is due to our neglect to the ravages of this particular disease. That is what Deputy Dillon wanted to convey—the gentleman who is so tender about his own reputation.
What is the fact? If these statistics are not precisely right, if they should not in fact be a true record of the incidence of this disease, the Department of Local Government and Public Health is in no way responsible for that, because we have done more than any other public authority, more than any other Government that I know of, or that my advisers know of, to try to ascertain the true nature of this disease and, by ascertaining its true nature, to be able to ensure that our records of its incidence will be correct and true also.
Let me detail to the House what we have already done in regard to it. It is a disease which has wrought a great deal of havoc among babies in this city. It is a disease which admittedly is to be found more often in poor surroundings than in those of better-off people, but it is a disease which is to be found in all sorts of surroundings. We have set up a commission of inquiry into the incidence of the disease. We have employed under the Medical Research Council two whole-time research workers. We have established St. Clare's Hospital with 104 beds for the treatment of enteritis. It is the only one of its kind in the world. We are instituting a further drive into enteritis by research methods and in this connection the Medical Research Council is being asked to assist. An American expert has been invited to come over here to assist us in these investigations. A special milk study has been carried out. We have had a special conference of paediatricians and we are making at this moment a special statistical analysis into the 1,300 cases that have been treated in St. Clare's Hospital.
These are the things that we have done in order to establish the nature of this disease and to combat it, and yet Deputy Dillion suggests that for one reason or another we have deliberately falsified the statistics for gastro-enteritis so that, as he says, they are fantastically false. I do not want to say anything that would hurt the tender skin of Deputy Cogan.
Deputy Coogan.
I beg the Deputy's pardon. I must remember his name is spelled with a double "o". I am not going to talk about the Deputy—his dress, drink or anything else; these are matters related to his private life and are his private concern. I doubt whether, in view of his acute sensitivity, I should even venture to deal with him as a politician. It was as politicians that I dealt with his bewigged colleagues, because it is true that the men who most often attack and criticise the Fianna Fáil policy happen to be lawyers.
I am not impugning their conduct as honourable professional men when I say that, while they may be good lawyers, steeped in the law books, they are bad politicians and they are bad statesmen. They are not, in general, practical men of affairs. They are advocates who try most often to make the best of a bad case. It has a rather demoralising influence, I grant you, upon the mental processes of people who are always compelled to speak from a brief. It often leads them, in discussing public matters, to quite forget that they are not dealing with Acts and judgments, but with human beings and with practical affairs and practical concerns. I have no doubt that is why one eminent lawyer, a former Attorney-General, an eminent man in his profession——
He has proved that in the courts.
——is obviously quite unaware of how rapidly the world is progressing. He has been attacking the Government because of what it has done to develop the position of this country in the world of aviation.
What has that to do with local government?
It has something to do with Deputy Coogan's speech.
We had not to go to the House of Lords for a precedent for the Cork Street inquiry, like the Minister—and a very far-dated one at that.
I have not suggested the Deputy is a good lawyer, or that he is a bad one either. I am keeping off the Deputy.
You have a few lawyers behind you who may not be steeped in the law.
Deputy Costello criticised the Government because of its aviation policy—just in the same way as Deputy McGilligan criticised us because we are trying to develop a holiday-making industry in this country.
For whom?
Of course, we all know the record of the eminent lawyer who practises down in Ballaghaderreen in regard to wheat, beet and peat. If we had taken the advice of these gentlemen we should not have proceeded to develop the resources of this country.
What about local government?
I am coming to that. If we had taken the advice of these gentlemen we should not have had a town planning section or a Town Planning Act, because they do not realise the practical requirements of to-day.
If people took their advice we would not have the Minister either.
Of course they did not—that is precisely it. Their wisdom and their judgment are in conflict with the common judgment and prudence of mankind.
God help us.
That is why the people took their advice for what it is worth; and left them where they are to-day. That leads me to town planning. It is strange, but there were one or two rather sensible speeches on town planning; at least one or two with a modicum of sense. One Deputy —Deputy Giles—after he got over his initial annoyance at having being reminded about what his Party had done or failed to do in 1932, and what his colleagues had been saying a few weeks ago on the Budget, talked quite an amount of commonsense in relation to town planning, among other things. We have set up this town planning section to administer the Town and Regional Planning Acts and in asking the House to vote this money I want to make it quite clear that, so far as I am concerned, this section will deal only with physical planning, and that the administration of the Acts will be undertaken in a realistic and practical way.
I propose in administering these Acts to have regard to three principles. Firstly, I am not prepared to permit local authorities to use the Town and Regional Planning Acts for doing something which they are empowered to do under other codes, even if those other codes appear to provide a less expeditious and, from their point of view, a less troublesome way of exercising their powers or giving effect to their intentions. Secondly, I am not prepared to allow the powers of the local authorities under the Town and Regional Planning Acts to be invoked simply for the purposes of serving existing trade interests from competition. If there are two or three garages along a road at reasonable intervals or even at unreasonable intervals, I am not going to allow the Town and Regional Planning Acts to be invoked to prevent the erection of a fourth garage, provided it does not block the thoroughfare or a proposed thoroughfare or does not destroy the amenities of the particular area in which it is to be erected. Thirdly, so far as the exercise of my powers under appeal are concerned, I am not going to allow the Town and Regional Planning Acts to be used to restrict the activities of private persons in order to facilitate schemes to be undertaken by the local authorities unless there is a reasonable prospect that these schemes will be carried out within a reasonable period.
In the light of these principles, I would say that Deputy Giles was quite entitled to criticise any proposals which would prevent a farmer from improving his home or his out-offices because, at some unknown date in the distant future, a road might be driven through his farmyard or through his house. I say to the local authorities concerned that so long as I am administering the Town and Regional Planning Acts, I shall have no use for nebulous schemes and that the right of the private individual to utilise his own property will be carefully regarded by me in any case in which the local authority is not able to satisfy me that at some reasonable date they propose to apply a reasonable plan to the property whose use or development they desire to curtail or restrict.
I find it difficult to traverse all the ground that has been covered in this debate. There were not only unreasonable speeches on this Estimate but there were also reasonable ones. Perhaps I should take note, first of all, of those which were made to-day. With a great deal of what Deputy Cosgrave said in relation to the Rent Restrictions Acts and their effect on building I agree, but the difficulty of the present period is that, if we did not enforce the provisions of these Acts, rents, of course, would become fantastically impossible for the great majority of the people who at the moment are renting houses. I agree also that we shall have to give consideration to the position of middle-class people who are looking for houses and, perhaps, when I introduce the next Bill dealing with the extension of the existing provisions for housing, I may take the opportunity to deal with that problem also. The same remarks apply to the question of newly-wed couples.
With regard to the considerable extension of building on main roads to which he drew attention, it is difficult to deal with that in the absence of proposals from the local authorities concerned for regulating building in their areas. It has been suggested that to some extent it is due to the absence of water and sewerage schemes in convenient localities. The Commissioner for County Dublin is giving that matter his immediate attention. A number of water and sewerage schemes have already been prepared and are being pushed forward as rapidly as possible. The Deputy asked about Tallaght. In Tallaght there are a number of possible plans, the most likely being to link Tallaght with the Poulaphouca scheme. A number of difficulties have cropped up, but the scheme I am told is having the constant attention of the Commissioner for the Dublin County Council, the Dublin Corporation and the Department. With regard to Naul, Naul is a purely rural area and I am afraid we cannot promise that there will be a water supply there in the near future. It may be some years before it is possible to provide it. In the case of Newcastle, the planning of this scheme is well advanced and it is awaiting Ministerial sanction. The Rathcoole and Saggart scheme will be submitted to the Department, I understand, in the near future.
I do not know whether the Deputy regards it as a function of mine to control the price of land. He suggested that people were being allowed to buy property and to force up the price of land for building. I think it would be very difficult to justify the Minister for Local Government going in to take action to depress the price of land against owners. After all, land around the City of Dublin has been always reasonably dear. People have had to pay big sums in rates and taxes on it for a considerable number of years. I think there would be a great outcry from landed interests in this country if we were to go in and artificially depress the price of land in order to ensure that people who wanted to buy land for speculative building would get it at a reasonable price.
I meant speculation between the owner of the land and the builder.
Free commerce is based on free speculation. What can we do? We cannot have free economy if we are to have rigid control. With regard to the report of the inquiry held into the proposed acquisition of certain sites in Dublin, that will be issued within a very few weeks. I may say that some difficult questions have arisen in that connection which require close consideration before a final decision can be given.
With regard to Dublin County Council I am very anxious that we should restore the elected authority there for a number of reasons; first, because I believe it is the normal and proper thing to do, and, secondly, because the present commissioner is very badly wanted for other things. A number of difficulties have induced me to postpone the constitution of the county council for a further period.
Decisions in relation to a number of water supplies, which the Deputy mentioned, have still to be taken. There are negotiations going on with the Dublin Corporation. I am anxious to see the new programme launched in the county, but more important is the overriding fact that within, I hope, the next 12 months the Department of Local Government and Public Health will no longer be a dual one. We shall have the new Ministry of Health set up and simultaneously all those public assistance functions which at present are attached to the Department will be transferred not only from the Ministry of Health but also from the Department of Local Government to the new Ministry of Social Welfare— to give it that title which perhaps it may bear.
The setting up of these Ministries and the expansion of their services, not as wholly independent services because they would be co-ordinated later, but services to be separately administered under the authority of separate Ministries, will involve the constitution of new local bodies to administer them. I felt that it would be rather a stultification to have Dublin County Council elected within the next 12 months and within a very short period after to be reconstituted, perhaps, on wholly different lines. For that reason, I think we will have to content ourselves for another year with the administration of the county under the commissioner system. I do not say that we may not have to make other changes.
I do not think I need go in detail into all the other matters that were raised on this Estimate, but perhaps I should say one or two things about the county management system. Deputy Corish made what I thought was one of the worth-while speeches in the course of this debate. He said that he expected a review of the work of the county managerial system. I am afraid I did not think such a review was necessary.
I have endeavoured, in speeches on the Estimate, by circular letters and White Papers which I have issued from time to time, to describe the principles upon which the managerial system is based and how these principles could be given effect to.
And I think I am justified in saying that these educative efforts have borne fruit and that on the whole the managerial system is now working smoothly in most counties. Indeed, with the exception of Deputy Commons, there was no suggestion from any Deputy that the Act would not fulfil our expectations and give us a really democratic system of local administration which could effectively discharge the much wider and more complicated duties and responsibilities which have been imposed upon the local authorities in recent years.
Deputy Corish said that the manager should be manager to the council and not manager of the council, by which I take it that the Deputy means that the manager's functions should be under the council to give effect to a general policy laid down by the council, and that he is not in a position of authority over the council. I emphatically agree, and I have done everything I possibly can to state that principle in the clearest terms. In that connection I should like to direct the attention of Deputy Corish, and the attention also of Deputy Commons to the circular letter which I directed to issue on 2nd February, 1946, on this very matter. In that letter I said, inter alia.
"As pointed out in the Circular Letter of the 27th January, 1944, the representatives of the electorate are the controlling element in local affairs and it is for them to formulate policy and in association with the manager to consider local problems. ..."
I then went on to say:
"Towns Improvement Committees, Development Associations, Parish Councils and voluntary bodies are as a rule interested in improvements and other works in their areas, and it may be anticipated that representations and suggestions in regard to such works will be forthcoming from time to time from such bodies. The public representatives returned to the council by the electors are the proper channels through which the proposals of their constituents should reach the council. When local voluntary bodies express a wish to appear by deputation in order to press their views in regard to the execution of works or the provision of services, they should be advised that the proper procedure is first to consult their representatives on the council who can arrange, if the council consents, for the reception of the deputation by the council. The manager should not himself receive such deputations without the prior authority of the council. Moreover, if he is instructed to receive a deputation, he should be careful in discussion with them not to undertake to follow any line of action which would prejudice the council in the exercise of their powers. The necessity for this procedure will be appreciated in the light of the council's powers regarding expenditure....
The chairman of the council is the main link between the elected body and the manager during the interval between meetings of the council. The chairman has been accorded by statute the right to be kept fully acquainted with all matters affecting the council of which he is chairman, and it is, therefore, the duty of the manager to discuss with the chairman the various matters which arise at such times as may be mutually convenient, bearing in mind that while the manager may have to attend to the affairs of a number of local authorities and may not always be readily available in any one of them, the chairman as the senior public representative, will also have many claims on his time, and as a voluntary officer of the local authority may claim a deference to his convenience that, in the circumstances, will not be unreasonable.
The council will no doubt remember that the manager cannot devolve his own responsibility on it, or on the chairman, in the exercise of the executive functions of the corporate body. He must make his own decision. On the other hand, he should give the fullest consideration to the views of the council. Where action is taken that is not in accord with these views, the manager should never fail to make use of his right to take part in discussion with the council. This right is accorded to him not only that he may afford elected members all the information they may require regarding the business of the local authority but also in order that they may have the benefit of his advice and, where required, a statement of the reasons which have determined him in coming to a particular decision. ...
It is to be observed, however, that while the manager has direct personal responsibility for the discharge of the executive functions of the council, he does not stand on a footing of equality with the elected body, nor does he occupy a position in the discharge of public business entirely independent of it. With the elected body rests the determination of policy, the control of finance and the supervision of administration; these powers are of a higher status than the actual performance of executive functions in implementing policy and conducting administration. Moreover, it is in the corporate body that the statutory powers rest and the name of the corporate body should not be replaced by the title of the manager, for example, in advertisements inviting tenders or applications for vacant positions."
In the light of this letter, I cannot see, and I am sure that, on consideration, the Deputies who have raised this matter will agree with me, how there can remain any further room for misunderstanding on the part of capable Deputies like Deputies Corish and Commons. I think I have made it quite clear that the manager is an officer of the local authority, that he is not their manager, in the sense of being over them, but that he is under them and that they are over him. But he has, as I have pointed out, in the exercise of executive functions, his own particular responsibilities and his own particular discretion and freedom of action, though he must, if necessary, if called upon to do so, give to the council a full account of everything he does on their behalf.
If elected representatives remember that, though they have relinquished their executive functions, they have not relinquished their obligations to ensure that all the services of the county are properly and economically administered, and it is their primary function at present to see that this is done, they, I think, will find their proper day-to-day role in the whole system of local administration as it is now constituted. Apart from the fact that the important functions of financial control and the development and determination of policy rest with them, in accordance with the statutes passed by the Oireachtas, they have this important function of checking, by the use of their own eyes and intelligence, the manner in which the local services are administered, and of calling the manager's attention to any inefficiencies or shortcomings on the part of any officer which come to their notice.
They should behave, I suggest, in regard to the manager, in exactly the same way in which they behave in regard to the Minister. In my case, whenever they think there is any justification for a question or a reproof, they are never slow to put down the one, or to administer the other, and it is by the exercise of this vigilance on the part of the elected representatives that this system will work democratically and will be kept working efficiently. That, I suggest, is now their primary function—to see that the ratepayers, the people whom they represent, get proper value for the money, their money, which the managers are expending.
Are we, then, to understand that the elected representatives are in the position of an advisory body?
A supervisory body.
With no functions, except that of giving advice.
A supervisory body. They can call the manager to account for everything he does. They can determine policy. They can provide the money.
If a council suggests a reduction or an increase in the general estimate, or in part of the estimate, such as the roads estimate, the manager has the right to veto it.
The manager will not veto any increase, nor will he veto any decrease. He will call the attention of the council to the fact that, if his demands are not met, he will not be able to provide the services required. But remember this, too, that the local authorities are not sovereign bodies. They do not function in any matter of natural right. They are subordinate bodies set up by the Oireachtas, by whom certain responsibilities have been delegated to them and by whom certain duties have been imposed on them. They must function in accordance with the law of the land. They must do what they were set up to do. They must, in relation, say, to public health matters, provide certain services. They must do it. If they do not, they are breaking the law and, if they continue to break the law, they have to be dealt with as all law-breakers are dealt with. They have to be put to one side so that the public services may go on.
Are we to accept, then, that if a local authority comes to the conclusion that they are unable to get the necessary finance from the local ratepayers for the administration of a certain social service or social services generally, that the ratepayers cannot bear the burden, is the manager in a position to say that the ratepayers must bear the burden against the wishes of the local authority?
No, that is not the position. If a local authority comes to the conclusion that it will not raise the necessary money, that it will not provide the necessary funds, it will be in the same position as a taxpayer who comes to the conclusion that he could not provide the necessary taxes. He would have to be dealt with. That local authority would have to get out and make room for men who could raise the necessary money. The trouble about the local authorities is that, for one reason or another, some members of them think that they are independent sovereign bodies, which they are not. They are subordinate bodies set up for a narrow purpose, to administer the local services. So far as the general nature of the services to be provided for the people is concerned, that is determined by this House. We cannot have 27 independent republics functioning.
The Minister's policy is to deny them any authority.
The Minister's policy is to see that they do the job they are constituted to do, and, so long as he is here, he is not going to permit them to adopt a rebellious attitude. They will obey the law, or we shall find somebody to replace them, because the people must have the services.
That is a contradiction of everything you have said.
No.
Then I must be stupid.
No. I have said that in accordance with the statutes of the Oireachtas it is their job to see that these services are provided, and provided efficiently. Take it now in the other way: Suppose a county manager refused to provide these services—it is unlikely that he would do so or that he would prove as unreasonable as the elected representatives of the people, who refuse to provide these services— then it would be the duty of the elected body to pass a resolution compelling him to provide those services and, of course, binding themselves to provide him with the money to provide for such services.
But there is no obligation to comply.
He must comply if they pass a resolution and provide the money.
If they pass a resolution for an increase in the wages paid to road workers, is he bound to pay the increased rate?
No, because they have no control over the staff. The trouble about local representatives is that they cannot get away from the idea that their sole concern is to either get or make jobs in order that they may secure political kudos for themselves. That day has gone.
It has been transferred to Fianna Fáil.
As I am on this matter now I may as well deal with another matter which was raised by Deputy Cafferky. I think, as a matter of fact, that Deputy Davin raised it in the first instance. He asked me had I told the local county managers that there was no use sending me up resolutions passed by the local authorities asking for sanction for increases in wages to their employees. I said "yes", because it is not the function of the local authorities to determine the wages of their employees. That is the function and responsibility of the manager. I told the managers that if they sent me up resolutions from local authorities in regard to the remuneration of their servants without at the same time accompanying those with recommendations—recommendations for which they are prepared to take responsibility—I would disregard the resolutions; and I would have very little respect for any county manager who would send up such a resolution without a recommendation, because we have not appointed managers in order to enable them to try to push on to the local authorities what is their proper function and responsibility. The managers are responsible for the control and general administration of their staffs.
Mr. Corish
But it is the staff which determines the local policy, is it not?
No. The local authority determines local policy.
May I ask the Minister to name one function which the county representatives have, other than the selection of a rate collector?
That is the one power of appointment they have. Ministers have no power of appointment but that does not prevent them from being an effective element in the government of the country. We cannot appoint anybody.
You manage to do it all the same.
It is the Local Appointments Commission which makes appointments.
What about your KuKlux-Klan organisation?
That is the trouble with Deputies like Deputy Cafferky; they have only one idea in their minds.
The democratic idea.
On the contrary—the idea that by giving little favours here and little favours there they will thereby purchase political support for themselves. That is not the job of the members of a local authority.
It is a job for a Minister.
I presume the Deputy ought to know what the job of a Minister is. The Deputy ought to know that.
I do. I can give you a few examples.
And I am sure others have not forgotten one particular one, either.
I can give you one example.
Yes, I remember one, too—the story of the cuckoo.
Plenty of bark but afraid to bite.
I was pointing out what the duties of the elected representatives are. I was pointing out that their functions are very much more important than the merely executive functions which a manager has to exercise. A number of Deputies are beginning to realise that now and, as I have said, the Act has been working very satisfactorily during the past year. At the same time I think there is room for one or two amendments. Deputy Pattison, Deputy Hughes and Deputy Fagan suggested that it was an undue imposition on the powers of one individual to make him responsible for the administration of two counties.
It was suggested, I think, that in some instances managers have too much to do, and that this arrangement, whereby the same person acts as manager for more than one county, is unsatisfactory. As a matter of fact those are conclusions to which I have come myself, and the Government has now approved of the introduction of legislation whereby a county manager can be appointed for each county should the necessity arise. I am of the opinion that the mere appointment of an assistant manager would not solve the difficulty. I would prefer that whoever is exercising managerial functions in a county should not share his responsibility with any other officer. The responsibilities which managers carry are exceedingly important from the ratepayers' point of view. It is, therefore, of the utmost importance that the incidence of responsibility should be unmistakable. For that reason, I do not favour the appointment of an assistant manager except where it is not possible to adopt a more convenient method. In the case of Cork, for instance, the county is so large that an assistant manager is essential. The same applies to Dublin City. In the case of joint committees, such as Kilkenny and Waterford, Leix and Offaly, I think the solution to the problem there would be to appoint independent managers for each county. As I have said, I hope to introduce legislation shortly. It will not be introduced this session, but it will, perhaps, be introduced in the autumn in order to provide for that where the county desires it.
Now, two very serious matters were raised in this debate in relation to one county. They were raised by Deputy Bartley and by Deputy Lydon. Deputy Bartley alleged that the manager in Galway, in seeking to appoint a clerk of works recently, ignored the terms of the circular letter issued by the Department in 1934 regulating the way in which such appointments should be made. This matter had already been brought to my notice by certain Deputies, and it has been the subject of some correspondence with the county manager in Galway. I may say that in my view the procedure adopted by the county manager in this instance is in conflict, if not with the precise terms of the circular in question, at least with the spirit of it. I do not wish to say any more with regard to that particular matter at this stage.
The matter raised by Deputy Lydon related to the appointment of a number of temporary engineers. The Deputy read some correspondence and has sent me some papers which would go to show that there may be some substance in the suggestion that has been made that the competition for these posts, though apparently publicly advertised, was not in fact a genuine one and that in fact some previous understanding had been reached in advance as to the persons by whom these posts were to be filled. Like the case mentioned by Deputy Bartley, I should regard this allegation, if it were well founded, as very serious, so serious indeed that I would ask the Deputy not to expect me to make a final judgment on it now. Since, however, these matters have been ventilated in this debate, I should like, without any prejudice to the particular cases concerned, to state what my general attitude as Minister is in regard to the proceedings of the type now alleged.
The Oireachtas has taken out of the hands of members of local authorities the power of appointment to posts in their services. In the great majority of matters this power is now vested effectively in the Local Appointments Commissioners. In some very few important matters it has been given to county managers. In regard to the power to make appointments to certain posts which county managers exercise, this power, as I have mentioned, was originally in the hands of the members of the local authorities. By Act of the Oireachtas, that power now resides in the county manager. I am sure that no person will contend that when the Oireachtas took the power out of the hands of members of local bodies and conferred it on officers of those bodies that it intended to confer on these officers a right of private patronage. On the contrary, I am sure that the Oireachtas expected that the managers would discharge their functions without regard to any personal consideration and that they should act strictly in accordance with the regulations. If, therefore, an allegation is made to me that a manager in making an appointment disregarded the regulations or had any understanding with interested persons about the appointment which he should make, I am bound to take the gravest notice of such a charge. I am bound to take such notice because any action of this kind on the part of a manager would bring the whole system into disrepute and indeed would soon bring it to an end.
In very many quarters, as debates in the House have shown, the County Management Act is regarded with distrust and meets with strong opposition. It is regarded with distrust precisely because the popular belief is that once they are secure in office, county managers would lend themselves to this sort of thing. In my view, county managers and senior officers acting under them must be careful not to lend the slightest ground for suspicion in relation to a matter of this sort. They should be meticulously careful indeed, when a relative, a friend or colleague of themselves happens to be interested as a beneficiary in the appointments which they are called upon to make.
Finally, I want to say that if an allegation of this sort were on investigation shown to be well founded and proven there would be the gravest question in my mind as to whether the manager concerned in the proceedings should be permitted to continue in his post. I feel it necessary to say that and I want to say it as emphatically as I can because, in my view, the whole success of the managerial system will depend upon managers acting in matters of this kind with the greatest probity and with the greatest independence. They must be careful to ensure that every appointment which they make can be justified on its merits and will be above suspicion, and they should not, under any circumstances, allow their judgment to be overborne by personal considerations or by attempts to influence it in any way. If their appointments are challenged and it is clear that they acted in a bona fide way, I will stand over them, but I will not condone action on the part of the managers which I would condemn on the part of the elected members of the local authorities.
There are other matters which I think I should deal with. One of these is the difficulty which the Westmeath County Council has experienced by reason of the fact that the holder of the highest post in its organisation had been charged three times within recent years. That is a matter which has been causing me a great deal of concern, but I confess that I am unable to find a remedy for it which will be fully satisfatcory.
Deputy Fagan has suggested that a person who has been appointed as manager or secretary of a local authority should not be allowed to leave until he has served at least five years. He would seek to apply the same principle to engineers and county medical officers. I am not so certain that that is a satisfactory way out of it because if a man cannot work with his council, if he gets tired and wants to change, has some motive for seeking a change, he is not likely, if he is tied to a post, to continue to give it the full and undivided attention which it requires. Perhaps it is better if a man is not comfortable in his post and wants to go elsewhere to let him go. I think on the whole the local authority will get better service in that way. I know it is a problem for many local authorities in the present stage, but we are in a transition stage. The County Management Act has been in operation only since 1942. Most of the persons who were appointed originally as county managers were persons of long service. Many of them were county secretaries and some of them were secretaries of county boards of health, and so on, and some of them, like the first manager of Leix-Offaly, had been county commissioners for a long period of years. Most of them were elderly men. By reason of the fact that we have introduced an age limit for these positions and want to get younger men and better trained men, if you like, men with a better general equipment for their jobs, most of them are retiring. As they retire, naturally, other people in subordinate posts are appointed by open competition to succeed them and that is resulting at the moment in a sort of "general post", but it has also this great advantage, that it is bringing into the local service men with very high qualifications and men with a great deal of experience, even in commercial life.
Our county council had no secretary at all for a year and you appoint temporarily a man who is over 65 years of age.
Somebody has to be appointed to carry on a job. We have only power of temporary appointment and, as a rule, where that power has to be exercised the person appointed is a person who is already in the service of the local authority. There may be exceptions but, as a rule, that is the position. But, as I say, by reason of the fact that there is a rapid discharge, or retirement, of the men at the top there is this "general post" at the moment.
But remember, it has its advantages. Young people, well trained, well equipped and educated people, are beginning to realise that there is a career open to them in the service of the local authorities and they are prepared to come in at the bottom, because they can see that with the effluxion of time there will be rapid promotion for them to fairly responsible posts. There is developing what we were very anxious to have at one time, a national service for the local authorities.
The other point Deputy Fagan raised had reference to a lowest tender for spectacles which was not accepted. The explanation is that we had some reason to believe that the person tendering was not submitting a bona fide tender on his own account, but that he was a cover man or a man of straw for some firm whose business methods have been found highly unsatisfactory.
Was he not the contractor for two years previously?
He may have been, but we have had experience of that particular contractor in other areas and he was found very unsatisfactory. I do not want to say much about the man, but if the Deputy wants to see me, I will give him some confidential information that will satisfy him that what I have said is quite correct. I have kept the House long enough and I hope Deputies will forgive me if I have not been able to deal with all the points raised.
Perhaps the Minister will be kind enough to let me have at his convenience a note in regard to the Ballybay sewerage scheme?
The Ballybay sewerage scheme has been inspected, but we have not yet received the inspector's report.
Will the Minister, first of all, let me have a note, when it is convenient to do so, giving me whatever information is available? Secondly, may I inquire of the Minister if there is any regular inspection by his officers of the trunk roads to which, I understand, specific Government grants are made? I suggest to him that the vigilance requisite to keep these trunk roads in a reasonable state of maintenance—making every proper allowance for the difficulty in getting materials— in certain counties appears to me inadequate as compared to other counties. For instance, take the Dublin-Ballina road. Certain sections of it are utterly deplorable, whereas in other counties through which the road passes they are making a very good job of it, notwithstanding the difficulties with which they have to contend.
These roads are periodically inspected by our engineering staff. First of all, we have the shortage of materials to contend with. In the turf-producing counties we have a shortage of labour as well. The county engineers in the principal turf-producing counties were given instructions to concentrate on turf until the middle of June. After that they will switch staffs over to the roads.
Mr. Corish
The Minister, in reply to Deputy Fagan, said it was unreasonable to ask professional men, such as engineers or doctors or county secretaries, to remain with one local authority for five years. I should like him to consider compelling these people to stay for at least two years, because new officers are inclined to experiment in administration and it upsets a county to a great extent. I do not think two years would be an unreasonable period.
I do not think I said it would be unreasonable. I said it might not be a very effective way of getting efficient service from them if we tie them unwillingly to a job.
Mr. Corish
The younger officers are inclined to experiment in administration by introducing new methods and schemes.
Has the Minister considered inducing an officer to remain by stepping up his increments?
If we allow local authorities to compete against other local authorities for the services of officers, I wonder what the ratepayers will say in three or four years' time?
It is a serious problem for a lot of counties.
You are allowing individuals to use positions in the country in order to qualify for positions in the cities and elsewhere.
Question—"That the Estimate be referred back for reconsideration"— put and declared negatived.
Vote put and agreed to.