Vol. 104 No. 8
I move:—
That Dáil Éireann is of opinion that the Government should set up a tribunal, or other authority, to inquire into the cost of production of all farm produce with a view to ensuring that farmers shall obtain an economic price for such produce.
I should like to know the position with regard to Motion No. 4.
The position of No. 4 is that it follows No. 3.
Therefore, I am entitled to three hours on Motion No. 4? I want to be pretty definite on this. Am I entitled to three hours for my motion?
That is a matter to be settled with the Ceann Comhairle. So far as I can interpret the matter, both these motions cover the same subject and both can be discussed on the one motion. We cannot have more than one motion before the House at the same time. Deputy Halliden's motion will be put and then Deputy Corry can move his. In the meantime, he can discuss all he wants to discuss within the scope of Deputy Halliden's motion.
If Deputy Halliden's motion is being taken by itself, I stand on my rights and demand three hours for my motion as is allowed to any other private Deputy.
Is there any precedent for that ruling?
For the ruling of the Chair?
For Deputy Corry's ruling.
For the ruling that two Private Deputies' motions can be merged without the consent of the Deputies.
It is always the privilege of the Chair, when the same matter is covered by two motions, two Bills or two amendments, to say they will be joined together and that there will be one discussion, with two decisions, if necessary.
That is all right for public business.
The precedent is very old.
It is older than this House, apparently. The British House?
I understand from the ruling of the Chair that No. 4 follows No. 3 and the inference from that is that No. 4 is a separate motion which stands on its own legs and there is no question of its being an amendment to No. 3.
What procedure is to be followed in this case?
So far as I know from precedent and from my own experience in the Chair, the procedure is that the two motions will be discussed together and two separate divisions taken on them. I do not think the Chair would allow two separate discussions, each of three hours, on each motion.
I stand on my rights as a Deputy. That motion was handed in to the Ceann Comhairle's office, was accepted as a motion and has been on the Order Paper for six months. I have the same rights here as every other Deputy and I am taking them. I am not going to have the time for my motion cut down to an hour and a half or discussed in company with any other motion.
I have given my ruling which I believe to be in accordance with precedent and procedure. If he wishes, the Deputy may take it up with the Ceann Comhairle. In the meantime, I propose to allow Deputy Halliden to proceed with his motion.
If I may make a suggestion which will ease matters for all Parties, I may say that I am quite willing to have my motion discussed as an amendment to Deputy Halliden's motion.
That can be done. As a matter of fact, it should have been done in the first instance, because it is more or less an amendment to Deputy Halliden's motion.
I am not responsible for the mistakes of the Ceann Comhairle's office.
There must be no reflection on the conduct of the Chair.
Can the matter in question not be settled by agreement?
There will be no trouble about it. Deputy Corry's motion will be taken as an amendment to Deputy Halliden's motion.
The agricultural industry is our main industry. It is the main source of wealth of our people, the great majority of whom are engaged in it. In spite of that, it has never been raised to the dignity of an industry, with the result that we have many shortages at present—shortages of milk, butter, bacon, eggs and even bread—and these shortages seriously affect the health and economic outlook of the whole community. The object of the motion is to get this industry raised to the status of other industries. When a company or speculators set out to establish an industry, they make an estimate of the cost of building and machinery, investment of capital, wages, and so on, and, in addition to all that, they leave a margin of profit. That initial cost, plus the margin of profit, regulates the price which they put on the manufactured article.
In the case of the farming industry, the position is quite different. The farmers have to take what they get. Very often, notwithstanding serious overhead charges, the prices they are to receive are pegged down. Notwithstanding the services rendered by the farmers to the nation generally, and particularly in emergencies such as we have just gone through, when they extracted the last ounce of food from the soil and did it well, it is obvious that they are not getting a fair deal. The result is that I am afraid there is now what we call a sit-down strike. The farmers are not encouraged to do the work which they are otherwise inclined to do.
We ask that a tribunal should be set up to inquire into the costings of the various products which the farmer produces from his land and that the farmer should get for that produce, not only the cost of production, but also a decent profit which will enable him to work efficiently, employ proper, labour and pay his workers properly, have something for the rainy day and, if needs be, make provision for his family. A great deal of the work on the farms at present is done by the farmers' own families with very often little reward. We know that the sons and daughters work on the land day in and day out with very little compensation for their labour. When they come to the age of 22 or 23 and they find they are getting very little for their labour, there is nothing open to them but the emigrant ship. The result is that we are sending out of the country every year 29,000 or 30,000 people to make a living abroad.
I think that the price of farm produce should be related in some way to current wages and to the overhead charges which the farmer has to bear in order to carry out his work effectively. Since 1914 we find that agricultural workers' wages have risen by 500 per cent., but the prices of the commodities which the farmer produces have not risen by that high percentage. We find also that the price of fertilisers has gone up by leaps and bounds.
For instance, a few years ago superphosphate could be bought at £3 per ton and is now costing £10. The price of nitrate of soda and of sulphate of ammonia has doubled or trebled, thus increasing the overhead charges on the farmer. In the case of milk, we know that the price is pegged down and, from figures produced to us by Professor Murphy of Cork, we know that for years past farmers have been producing milk at a price far below the cost of production. There has been no appreciable improvement in that connection and we are looking forward to the time when the farmer will be paid a decent wage for the work he is doing.
I do not want to stress the matter further, because the Minister has already told me that he has on hands proposals for the establishment of such a tribunal as this motion asks for. He has also given me an assurance that he is going on with that Bill as quickly as he possibly can. I appreciate that and accept his assurance that he will leave no stone unturned to have the tribunal set up at the earliest possible moment. I have, however, to make a very serious request to him—that during the time that tribunal is sitting and producing its findings he will reconsider the price of milk in the light of the White Paper issued by the Government, which states that the price of milk would be raised or lowered according as the cost of production increased or decreased. My contention is that the cost of production has gone up very considerably in latter years and that, therefore, the time is ripe for some improvement in the price of milk. I would ask the Minister to investigate the whole matter and not allow the dairying industry to reach a state from which it cannot be resurrected.
In my portion of the dairying counties dispersal sales of dairy cattle are being held week after week. I can tell the Minister that a very valuable herd of dairy cattle was sold recently and that those in-calf cows were taken to the canning factories.
There is also a widespread rumour——of course, rumour can be a lying jade —that even two-year-old heifers in calf are being taken to these canning factories. That is a matter which I should like the Minister to investigate in order to find out whether it is true or not. But the dairy herds are being dispersed or reduced in numbers. There is a shortage of milk and butter, and, in that way, the most valuable of all human foods is being denied to the community. That is why I appeal to the Minister, during the period between now and the issue of the report of the tribunal, to see if anything can be done to encourage farmers and workers to raise the dairying industry to the position which it always enjoyed as the key industry of the country.
We were glad to notice in the public Press to-day that the Minister has decided to restore the issue of fertiliser vouchers for the wheat crop, which is tantamount to an increase of 2/6 a barrel for wheat. I am afraid, however, that that is not sufficient, because I know from experience that, while six or seven years ago we could produce perhaps a ton or more of wheat to the acre, we find now, for want of fertilisers and owing to the depreciation of the soil, that that yield is practically reduced by half. Consequently, I think that the price of wheat at present is not attractive enough. In appealing to the Minister for an increase in the price of wheat, as well as in the price of milk in the interim period, I think I am voicing the views of the great majority of farmers who are anxious and willing to help in every way they possibly can. I say that they need encouragement, that they need something for their time, something to meet the extra cost of living and to compensate them for their overhead charges. I feel that I am pushing an open door and I have great confidence that the Minister will do his best to make the position what it ought to be and to raise our great industry to the status of other progressive industries.
I second the motion. I am aware that Deputy Corry's motion is now being taken as an amendment. I have no serious fault to find with that amendment. There is another amendment standing in the name of Deputy Heskin requesting that pending the result of this inquiry the price of wheat be increased to £3 per barrel. That is a very moderate request, a very reasonable one, having regard to the enormous increase in the cost of production. I appreciate that the Minister has gone some distance to meet the demand made in this amendment but it would have been a more generous gesture on the part of the Minister to have conceded the entire demand, which was reduced to the most moderate dimensions. There is only a difference of half-a-crown between the demand contained in the amendment and the present offer of the Minister. We farmers are not in the habit of haggling about sums of that kind and I do not believe any farmer will hesitate to grow the maximum amount of wheat possible, irrespective of whether the demand is granted or not. Farmers will realise the national need and will rise to meet it, regardless of whether the price of wheat is increased or not. But taking a long-term view of agriculture I think it would be better if the Minister paid more for wheat.
The motion demands that a tribunal be set up to inquire into the costs of production of farm produce. It goes further. It asks that that inquiry be made for the purpose of ensuring that farmers will get an economic price for their produce. We have been told that the Minister intends to introduce a Bill for the purpose of setting up machinery to investigate farm costings. We should be told a little more. We should be told whether it is definitely the policy of the Government, having ascertained the cost of production, to ensure that the farmer will be paid that cost and perhaps a small margin of profit.
That is the point on which we want definite assurance from the Minister. Does he merely intend setting up this tribunal, spending a certain amount of money on investigating farm costings and pigeon-holding the statistics ascertained in his Department for the information of future generations and the guidance of future commissions of inquiry? That is not the object we have in view. That is not what is required.
Agriculture passed through a very difficult period, from 1920 until the outbreak of the war, not because of any difficulty in regard to production but because of great difficulty in finding a favourable market. Since the outbreak of war, agriculture has been through a very difficult period, not so much because there was no market, but because the problems and difficulties of production were intensified one-hundredfold. We trust the world crisis in food supplies will pass in the course of a year or two. Will agriculture in Ireland then face the same crisis as it had to face after the first world war? Will farmers be compelled to hawk their produce from market to market, and find it spurned and despised and unsaleable? We must guard against that.
I am not expressing any view that I have not expressed in the past. Since I came into this House, in 1938, I have asserted repeatedly that it is the duty of the State to ensure that the farmer gets a reasonable price for his produce. That has been denied in many parts of the House. We have been told that the obligation does not rest on the State, that the State has nothing to do with the fixing of prices for primary produce, that it is purely a matter governed by the law of supply and demand. I believe the majority of this House, the majority of the people of this country and even the majority of the people of the world are coming around to the viewpoint that the remuneration of those engaged in primary production should not be left to the law of supply and demand, should not be left to chance and, perhaps, to the manipulation of speculators who, without producing anything, would seek to control the remuneration of the primary producer.
Now a step is being taken in the right direction. The Minister has stated that at least he will investigate costs of production. That is a valuable step forward. When farmers' associations, individual farmers, farmer Deputies make demands for fair prices for their produce, for increases in the price of various products, they are frequently told that they are already getting a fair price, and that they ought to be able to derive a good profit out of the prices they are getting.
If the farmers put up figures in regard to the cost of production, they are told that these figures are not official, that these figures are one-sided, that they are only the farmers' figures and do not carry any weight. But, if the Government, on behalf of the community, investigate the cost of production; if the Government set up machinery to ascertain what it costs to produce potatoes, wheat, oats, a gallon of milk or a store beast, then we shall have figures which are at least official; we shall have figures which must be regarded as not being one-sided, at any rate. On those figures we can decide whether the farmer is making a reasonable or an extravagant demand for what he produces. That step, once taken, will end for all time the frequent assertions that the farmer is battening on the rest of the community, holding the rest of the community up to ransom and making excessive demands. The cost of production will be published in regard to every item, or at least all the main items, of agricultural produce. The public can see what it costs the farmer to produce and what profit he derives.
That is a valuable step forward, but it is not a new step. In the first world war the British Government set up machinery to investigate costings in agriculture and they made very useful surveys over a very wide number of farms. But, when the war was over, when agricultural prices began to collapse, and when our own Government saw that it would be very difficult to do anything about the matter, they dropped their machinery for investigating costings. If that machinery had continued in operation during the 20 years between the two wars, it would have revealed an appalling condition as far as those engaged in agriculture are concerned—an appalling condition in regard to the margin of loss which they had to suffer trying to feed the nation.
However, the powers that be decided that agricultural costings should not be continued and no machinery was maintained to ascertain them, with the result that farmers had to make their claims as best they could and, seeing how they were misrepresented, they possibly had occasionally to exaggerate their claims. That condition will, I hope, be brought to an end. It is a welcome sign to see that one big industry, the sugar manufacturing industry, has decided, in co-operation with the representatives of the growers, thoroughly to investigate costings. The experience which they will gain and the investigations they will make will be of immense value to the Department of Agriculture in the work which they propose to undertake to implement the terms of this motion.
I hope we will not be disappointed when the Minister intervenes. I hope he will not tell us that it is his intention merely to make an investigation and that nothing further will be done. If that is the sole intention of the proposed legislation, it will be a mere waste of money and of time to a very large extent. It is inevitable that world production will increase in the post-war period. It is inevitable that that increase will have an effect upon agricultural prices and, unless the primary producer here is protected by the State, it may happen that he will be forced back to the conditions under which he had to labour during the period between the wars.
I think public opinion is, to a very great extent, being prepared to condone a serious reduction in agricultural prices generally, because we have it asserted from a thousand platforms and from a thousand organs of opinion— pamphlets and newspapers—that the farmer has done remarkably well out of the war, and an attempt will be made to convince people that if he gets into a bad period it will be his due, as some recompense for the good times he enjoyed while the war was on.
I wish the House to consider what these good times amounted to. The national income is estimated at £250,000,000. Of that amount the agricultural income is estimated at about £88,000,000. About half the population are engaged in agriculture. Divide between them that £88,000,000. Divide between the other half, not engaged in agriculture, £163,000,000. You will see that the half not engaged in agriculture enjoy an average income twice that received by those who are so engaged.
That is a fundamental fact, an incontrovertible fact. It is a fact which is borne out by the anxiety of every farmer to get his sons into some occupation other than farming, to get them away to business or some other job. It is borne out by the anxiety of the young people themselves to get away from the farm even when the farmer tries to keep them. It is borne out by the very remarkable fact that you hardly ever hear of a farmer dying and leaving a large legacy to distant relatives or for any charitable purpose. He is lucky if, when he comes to die, he has sufficient capital accumulated to pay his funeral expenses. On the other hand, we read in the papers of large sums being left by people engaged in commerce, in the professions and in other walks of life—by everybody except the farmer. That, of course, could not be otherwise when we consider the low average income of those engaged in agriculture.
It is said that our position has improved enormously. Has it? Prices of agricultural produce are from 100 to 120 per cent. higher than they were in 1914. How much higher are the costs of production? We have no official figures, but we know that wages alone are 300 per cent. higher than in 1914. That is a very significant figure. The farm worker in 1914 was compelled to live on a wage which was one-fourth of the wage paid the average agricultural worker to-day. No one will object to the wages paid to the agricultural workers at present. They are not high wages and they compare very unfavourably with the wages paid to people in other occupations, but they also create a difficulty when we compare the wage increases with the increases in prices since 1914. They create a problem for the farmer which only the Institute of Cosmic Physics could solve, namely, how a farmer with costs of production increased by 200 per cent. can make a profit in view of the fact that prices are up by only 120 per cent. The Institute of Higher Studies could worry over that problem for some time and might possibly arrive at a solution which nobody but themselves could understand.
We must bear in mind the fact that we cannot revert to the conditions which prevailed before the war. We cannot allow our national economy to go back to those conditions. Things have changed and they cannot be unchanged. We have two policies which we can consider in regard to agricultural prices. We could adopt one method and leave these prices to be fixed by the ordinary laws of supply and demand, let the price of every commodity find its level, but if you are going to adopt that policy you will be forced to repeal certain legislation. You will be forced to repeal the Agricultural Wages Act and allow the wages of agricultural workers to be governed also by the laws of supply and demand. Does anyone contemplate, taking such a step?
I believe we cannot put back the hands of the clock. A revolutionary advance was made when the wages of the agricultural worker were fixed. To follow that legislation to its logical conclusion, you must fix the remuneration of the farmer. You cannot, as the Minister for Industry and Commerce pointed out, take five naggins out of a pint pot. You cannot take more from the farmer than he is able to earn as a result of the prices which he obtains. Therefore, having fixed the remuneration of his employee on the land, you must follow that step to its logical conclusion and ensure that the farmer is placed in a position to pay such wages. I am not going to suggest in detail how this should be done but it must be done. There are of course two ways by which it can be done. The State itself here can do it or it may be achieved by international co-operation. Steps are being taken by agricultural organisations throughout the world to ensure that the remuneration of the primary producer shall not again be seriously reduced. Those steps may or may not be successful but whatever is done, it is the duty of the State here to secure that the primary producer is protected from the storms which may sweep over the world as far as the price of agricultural produce is concerned. We all know that the main causes of serious depression in agricultural prices all over the world are the fluctuations in the world output of grain. Some steps may be taken internationally to control the distribution of output and these steps may have a very important bearing upon agriculture. Whether that is done or not, the home Government has a duty to the primary producer and that is to see that he is amply rewarded.
There are people who give expression to foolish platitudes on this question. They say that this is a country whose economy is based on agriculture and that because of that the State can do nothing for agriculture, because if any increase is allowed in the price of agricultural produce or any help is given to the agricultural community, it merely means subsidising agriculture at its own expense or, in other words, feeding the dog on its own tail. It is time to get away from that mentality.
There are in this country two sets of people, those engaged in agriculture and those not engaged in agriculture. The people engaged in agriculture at present enjoy an income which is half that of those not engaged in agriculture. Surely it is not feeding the dog on its own tail if the people not engaged on agriculture make some contribution towards levelling up the price of agricultural produce so that the farmer and the agricultural worker will obtain 50 per cent. of the national income? Since there are 50 per cent. of the population engaged on agriculture, that is not unreasonable. It might be said that this would lead to a lowering of the conditions of those not engaged in agriculture. That does not follow. The guaranteeing of a just remuneration to the former will inevitably have the effect of increasing agricultural production. An increase in agricultural efficiency will increase the standard of living for all sections of the community. That is a consideration that must be borne in mind. It is suggested that farmers are trying to better themselves at the expense of the rest of the community. The whole community can enjoy better conditions, provided the farmers are given the opportunity and the encouragement to increase output. I should be glad to hear the Minister deal with that aspect of the question when replying. No doubt he will give us some outline of the machinery that he intends to set up to investigate costings. It is desirable that, as the new Minister for Agriculture, he should give the House some outline of his views in regard to the right of the farmer to fair prices based on his costings. It is the duty of the State to see that the farmer gets that.
The Chair would like to make this matter quite clear. It is obvious that the motion in Deputy Corry's name could not be taken now as a separate motion. It would mean that the same ground would be covered in debate, though Deputy Corry's proposed motion is somewhat wider, and would, therefore, be taken as an amendment to the first one. The amendment would run:—
"To delete all words after the word `opinion' in motion No. 3 and substitute the words `That a permanent tribunal, etc.' "
as in Deputy Corry's motion, be substituted.
I wish to object to that ruling. My motion has been on the Order Paper for the past six months. There has been no amendment proposed to it, and there is none on the Order Paper. Therefore, I think I am entitled to claim the right that my motion should be discussed for the full period.
But any Deputy is entitled to put in an amendment.
I doubt the sincerity of it. I am seeking to have my motion treated as a separate motion. It has been on the Order Paper for six months. There is no amendment to it on the Order Paper. There are amendments on the Order Paper to other motions—Nos. 4, 5, 6 and 7, but none to mine.
Perhaps this point may appeal to Deputy Halliden—that the amendment will be put before his motion.
Put as an amendment to the motion.
Apparently Deputy Halliden wants his motion to be put as an independent motion.
But surely the Chair has some discretion in the matter and cannot allow, on Deputy Corry's motion, another full debate on the same subject.
That is not Deputy Halliden's fault. Could they not be put as two independent motions?
They could be discussed together and put separately. I am using my discretion in accepting the amendment.
I said before that it is not my intention to put my motion to a vote because of the promise made to me by the Minister. That promise was made to me verbally in the Minister's room, and I want it to go on the records.
If the Minister does that in his reply, will it get over the difficulty?
I am at a loss to know what all this is about. Deputy Cogan wants me to discuss a measure which, in reply to a Parliamentary question, I have undertaken to introduce as soon as possible. He wants me to give a general discourse as to what I think should happen in relation to any recommendations that may be made when the tribunal is set up. I do not know whether the Deputy used the word "efficiency" when dealing with these matters, but surely there should be some efficiency here. It seems to me that it is a pure waste of the time of the House to be discussing a motion or motions dealing with a matter on which the House has already got assurances. The House has been assured that certain proposals will be presented to it. When they are presented Deputies can discuss them to their hearts' content.
May the Chair take it then that neither will be put to a vote on the Minister's assurance?
If the Minister were to speak now perhaps it might expedite the business.
I have spoken.
All that I was anxious about was to get the Minister's assurance on the record.
Let Deputy Corry make his speech, and I suppose we may take it that his motion will not be put to a vote.
I am satisfied.
Does that solve it?
I agree.
What I am afraid of is that somebody might think that what is proposed in Deputy Halliden's motion is what is required by the farming community. On behalf of the farming community, I am thankful for every convert that I make to the point of view that the farmer is entitled to his costs of production, plus a profit, and that the agricultural community should be treated on exactly the same lines as every other industry, namely, that we are going to have a tribunal set up before which the agricultural community can go. The difference between Deputy Halliden's motion and mine is this: Deputy Halliden has some idea with regard to a tribunal or commission that would take evidence and then make a report—something like the Post-War Commission on Agricultural Policy about which nobody could agree, or the proposed arbitration court on beet some years ago. In that case, the few professors and hobby farmers called in said: "Oh! It is quite all right." I want none of that. I want a tribunal set up before which the agricultural community can give proof with regard to their costings, and from which they will get the costs of production plus a profit. I want a permanent tribunal. Deputy Halliden wants a tribunal of some sort that will make a report.
The Deputy ought to know what my intentions are. They are set out in my motion.
There is the saying that hell is paved with good intentions. We have Deputies rushing in with half-baked motions. They want to cash-in to-day on things to which they gave very reluctant support in other days. Our first job when the Government came into office and decided to help Irish industry was to see that the agricultural industry, which was entitled to the full home market, got that market. We secured that, despite all the shouts and noise which was made for Australian bacon, Chinese eggs, and all the rest. Our next job is to see that the agricultural industry —the greatest industry in the country —is treated on the same lines as every other industry. I first expressed those views in the House on the 17th May, 1945. Right along from that period. I had to carry on my campaign. I welcome with open arms those who now see my point of view and who support it. On the 18th May, 1945, speaking on the Vote for the Department of Agriculture, I related my experience in the following words:—
"I had a rather amusing experience about a month ago in that connection. Some constituents of mine asked me to go with them to the Department of Supplies. They are milk retailers in Cork City and they were looking for a larger margin. I went with them, they put up a case and I thought the situation was rather funny. Those men, who filled the gap between the producer and consumer, could go to the Department to get an increase of their margin; they could go in and put up their case giving their costings. I was in the position that I was one of the producers of the milk that they were selling and yet I possessed no right to go before any tribunal, or any other board, to have a price fixed on my costings, plus profit."
That was the distinction which was made between the manufacturing end and the middleman end of Irish industry and the primary producer in our greatest industry—agriculture. I have kept on the fight. That was on the 18th May, 1945. I have searched the records of this House as well as I could to find out when I first got the support of my friends. I find that, on the 23rd May, 1945, Deputy Halliden, speaking, I presume, on behalf of his Party, said:—
"When we put up the demand that the price should be increased to 1/- per gallon for milk all the year round, we were told `The price we are paying meets the cost of production.' We think it does not meet the cost of production and that, instead of the Department asking us to produce our costings, the Department should produce their costings. Therefore, I support Deputy Corry's proposal that we should have a costings board so that we would know exactly what it cost the farmer to produce a particular commodity."
That was the first time I obtained support from my friends in this House. There is a wide difference between asking the Government to come and find costings and what I want done. When I first got a guarantee from the then Minister for Agriculture, Dr. Ryan, at the end of 1945, that this tribunal would be set up, I immediately set about putting our house in order. Last September, we reviewed the position of farmers supplying milk to Cork City and commenced to prepare official costings which would give us the cost of production of winter milk. Next May, we shall be able to give guaranteed figures to the Minister for Agriculture regarding the cost of production of winter milk and we shall be able to go before his tribunal. Meantime, I headed a deputation to the then Minister for Agriculture, Dr. Ryan, regarding our position. We had taken what I may call unofficial costings before then. We took them over to the Department and Mr. Breen said: "You produce more milk than that," and turned them down. We are getting something now that he cannot turn down. On our costings, we succeeded in getting an increase of 2d. per gallon. When we finish with our costings next May, the increase will be somewhere between 8d. and 1/- per gallon.
I found the same position in regard to the production of sugar. The price of beet was fixed in 1943. Various Bills were brought into the Dáil since then which completely changed the aspect of affairs so far as the production of beet was concerned. On the 28th May, 1946, on the Vote for the Department of Industry and Commerce, I said:—
"Some few years ago a Bill was passed here giving a fortnight's holidays to industrial workers. All the boys came to the Department a few weeks afterwards showing the cost to them and that was quietly passed on to the fellow who cannot pass it on to anyone else, the individual farmer. At present, when you buy a half ton of artificial manure, you have to pay for the bonus and the holidays for Goulding's workers and for the railway workers as well."
The farmer has to pay all these charges, but he cannot pass them on. His price was fixed in 1943, before those proposals were brought before the House. We were then left in the lurch. However, we succeeded this year in getting a joint board set up between the Irish Sugar Company and the Beet-Growers' Association which will go fully into the cost of production of beet. These costings can be laid before the Minister's tribunal when it comes to operate and we can get our cost of production plus a profit.
At present we have the amazing situation in an agricultural country that butter is rationed, sugar is rationed, bread is rationed and milk is practically rationed. I say, with all respect to the Ceann Comhairle, that none of them should be rationed, that none of them need be rationed and that none of them would be rationed had the farmers been treated in the same way as other industrialists and allowed their cost of production, plus profit. No man is going to grow a crop at a loss. The greatest outrage you can do a man is to compel him to produce an article at a loss. That is what is being done at present as regards wheat. The primary duty of agriculture is to produce sufficient bread for the people of the country. I regard that as the first duty of agriculture. Rightly or wrongly, the Government brought in a compulsory wheat-growing scheme under which every man is required to put a certain proportion of his land under wheat. The Government does not know what it costs to produce an acre of wheat. There is a very wide margin between the farmer with poor land who will get from four to five barrels of wheat per acre and the farmer who will get a ton to the acre. If you are to compel the farmer who will get only four or five barrels to the acre to put a certain amount of his land under wheat, you must pay him the cost of production, plus a profit.
Nobody in his senses will say that it is fair to go to the farmer who can get only four and a half or five barrels of wheat out of an acre of ground and say: "You will have to put five or six acres of that ground under wheat, at a price fixed at random by the Department of Industry and Commerce plus the Department of Agriculture". It is unjust and wrong; it is something no one would dare do with any other industry. Something like 25 per cent. of our wheat last year was grown by farmers who grew over the quota, on good wheat land where they were getting eight to ten barrels and more. Farmers getting about eight barrels went out of their way to grow it. Maybe it was on national grounds, in order to supply the people with bread, and they saw it was their duty. The price was fixed in 1943 and there have been many changes since then. Agricultural wages have gone up; the price of artificial manures has gone up; the price of farm machinery has gone up 150 per cent., but the price of wheat still remains as of old. That is why I want a permanent tribunal set up, before which the farmers can go. There can be a notification that the beet growers are going before them this year on account of the increase in so-and-so, or that representatives of the Wheat-Growers' Association are going before them in connection with the price of wheat; and that tribunal, after examining the costings and finding that prices have gone up or down, may recommend to the Minister that the price be increased or lowered. That is what is wanted, and I am very glad we have got that guarantee from the Minister.
Have we got it?
Certainly. But we have this idea of trying to cash in on other men's brains, and the sooner we forget that in this House the better.
Before we can be sure, I would like to hear the Minister say it.
Deputy Cogan does not know what he wants. After considering all this carefully, I am of opinion that Deputy Halliden's motion is unsuitable, as it would mean having a tribunal to go into it and then report back.
The Deputy was in a hurry, and did not read the motion properly.
The Deputy is trying to cash in on someone else's brains.
We do not do that.
That is what happened.
Nonsense.
This is the first occasion on which any member of that Party expressed himself in favour of my proposal in regard to costings.
We expressed it long before we came into the House.
If Deputy Halliden can find any other occasion on which he expressed it, I would like to hear of it.
Jealousy has the farmers where they are. We see plenty of it here to-day.
As one who always grew more than my quota of wheat, whether it paid me or not——
Joke.
—since 1943, or since 1939, when the emergency was first declared, I was completely at sea this year as to what the Government's requirements were regarding wheat. There were plenty of nationally-minded farmers who did not know what was wanted either. What did the Government do? They reduced the price of wheat by £1 per ton, as the 2/6 a barrel in manure vouchers was taken off. There was something else besides. They increased the price of barley by 50/- a ton. That made men like myself think it was not wheat the Government wanted but barley and made us decide to give them barley.
They had to increase the price.
Why?
It was increased before the official price was announced. Barley was worth £2 last season when the official price was only £1 15s. 0d.
I am not worrying about black-market prices. If the Deputy wants to make a speech of his own, let him do so.
I certainly will make a speech.
There is plenty of time —three hours. In the meantime, I will deal with this matter from what I have seen. I am not dealing with prices here, there and elsewhere, on the black market or otherwise, but with the prices laid down by the Government for certain commodities. They have withdrawn the manure vouchers of 2/6 a barrel, thereby reducing the price of wheat by £1 a ton. I am glad to see that the representations which I have been making to the Minister have already been successful, and I see in this morning's paper that we are getting back the vouchers.
The army is being led from behind.
The Deputy was always behind, but that is not our fault. I am very much afraid that the situation will lead, not to an increased acreage, but to a reduced acreage of wheat this year. That is something we cannot afford. I say frankly that, even with the extra half-crown, the price of wheat to the majority of farmers who have to grow it is very definitely an uneconomic one. If the Government requires bread for the people, the Government must be prepared to pay the cost of production, plus a profit. There is no reason why we should be treated in any different way from the Cork Milling Company or the Mill Owners' Association.
The earliest we can expect this new Bill to become law is about April or May next. In the meantime, the farmers are compulsorily sowing wheat this week and will be sowing it next week—every day they can get. I ask the Minister if he is satisfied that he is going to get a sufficient acreage of wheat grown this year to render bread rationing unnecessary next winter. If not, why not? That is the kernel of the whole situation. There is no other means of approaching it. The people want bread; the farmers are prepared to supply that bread, on one condition, and it is a fair condition, that they be treated the same as every other Irish industry and that they get the cost of producing that wheat, plus a profit.
I have gone very carefully into the figures. I have taken 12½ acres of ground which I have been preparing for wheat this year. Next harvest, when I finish with that 12½ acres, it will have cost me somewhere around £250, between ploughing, harrowing, liming, manuring, seeding and harvesting. If I get a ton to the acre, I will get £270, that is, £20 profit on 12½ acres. How many farmers last year got a ton to the acre? How many farmers got four barrels to the acre? Is it right, therefore, that the agricultural community should be asked to put 400,000 acres under wheat to be grown at a loss?
That is the question the Minister must ask himself, and, from my knowledge of him, he is not a man to be led away by anybody. He will come to his own conclusions, and I hope that the day when the Minister's advisers, as we used to call them, possessed so much power is gone. The Minister will come to his own conclusions, and, in his own hard-headed way, fight the thing out and make his decision, but I say here definitely that in an agricultural country like this the scarcity of milk in the cities, the rationing of butter, sugar and of bread should not exist, need not exist and would not exist if the principle which is now being accepted in relation to setting up a tribunal to examine agricultural costings had been in operation since I first asked for it in May, 1942. We would have no rationing of bread to-day in those circumstances.
I do not say that because I want to say: "I told you so". I say it as one who regrets every day seeing somebody going short of an essential article of food, and these are essential articles of food. We have got the Minister's assurance and I ask him, as the responsible Minister, closely to examine the cost of production of wheat. He is compelling every farmer to grow a certain acreage of wheat, and, when the Government compels anybody to produce an article, they need to make very certain that that article will give the man who is compelled to produce it his cost of production, plus a profit. I submit that the present price of wheat very definitely does not do that.
I was glad, as I say, to read in the morning's newspapers that the foolish step taken by the Department of withdrawing the manure vouchers this year and reducing the price of wheat by £1 per ton has been withdrawn. I am glad that has been done, but, at the same time, I did not expect, and I do not think anybody in the country who went through the emergency without seeing bread rationing, expected to see bread rationing this year. We all know the kind of harvest we had. Does the Minister think it a wise step, after that kind of harvest, after the losses the agricultural community had to suffer as a result of that harvest, to reduce the price of wheat for the coming year? These are the matters I am anxious the Minister should deal with.
The same position prevails with regard to milk. Certain areas have been fixed for the supply of milk to Dublin, Cork and other cities. These areas are not supplying that milk. Why? Because 25 per cent. of the farmers who kept cows have gone out of them, owing to the uneconomic price fixed by the Department of Industry and Commerce for milk, the completely uneconomic price for winter milk, and owing to the policy of the Department of Agriculture for the past 20 years of producing beef rather than milk. It is well to remember in these days a wise saying. I remember the first year we took over here as a Government in 1932, seeing the late Minister for Agriculture, Mr. Patrick Hogan, God rest his soul, standing up here and saying:—
"There is one warning I want to give my successor in office. If the Live-stock Breeding Act is worked as it has been worked in past years under my control, we will have very fine looking cattle in this country, but it will be impossible to get a cow that will give a decent bucket of milk."
That seems to be outside the scope of this debate.
Not a bit, because these are the things that count in the cost of production of milk. If you breed to get the hind leg for beef and the middle for milk, as the Department of Agriculture have been doing for the past 20 years, you will not be paying 1/- a gallon for milk but 10/- a gallon, because the old cow will not milk a quart. That is what is wrong. These are the things we have to thresh out and consider. I can assure the Minister that the organisations with which I have the honour to be associated will be ready with their costings as quickly as possible. We will be prepared to lay our costings before this tribunal as soon as it is established. In the meantime, I ask the Minister to deal with these two problems as urgent ones which cannot wait for the tribunal's findings. If the Minister waits for the findings of the tribunal with regard to the price of wheat, it will be no good for a farmer to know next May that he is to get 10/- per barrel more for his wheat, because he cannot sow the wheat then. Now is the time for the Minister to decide, not next May. It is already nearly too late for a decision. If the people are to be supplied with bread next winter, the Minister must make a decision now. He must take a bold step in order to ensure that there will be sufficient bread for the people next winter. There is only one way to get that, and that is to pay the people who are compelled by law to produce the wheat the cost of production, plus a profit. As I said, he is losing the 25 per cent. over the quota which some people used to grow. They were people who were getting eight to ten barrels an acre and that is a severe loss. I appeal to the Minister to do his duty in this matter.
I second Deputy Corry's motion.
It is not being taken as a motion.
I understand it is being taken as an amendment.
It does not matter how the Deputy takes it; there will be no division on it. The Deputy may take it as an amendment.
Deputy Corry reflected very much on Deputy Halliden's and Deputy Cogan's motion. He described it as a half-baked motion. The same description could be applied to his motion. It is possibly half-roasted instead of half-baked. I would not be satisfied with this sort of thing. I believe that what Deputy Corry will get is a Civil Service tribunal which will put him on the spot and give the Government an excuse for saying: "There is your price. You gave your evidence, you had your tribunal, and that is all about it." If I were putting down a motion like that I certainly would make some attempt to prescribe the sort of tribunal I wanted. I would want a tribunal independent of the Civil Service and Government control. I would not want the Minister whispering to the personnel of the tribunal that he wanted such-and-such a price fixed.
If Deputy Corry wants machinery of this sort and wants to reflect on the attempt of other Deputies to make a suggestion as to the type of machinery that might be provided, and if he feels he has completed the picture in his motion, I am afraid I am not in a position to compliment him. He talked about the average cost of production and compared the average cost of production with what the industrial people in this country are getting. He seems to forget that the millers are guaranteed a profit of 6 per cent., based on the working of mills in the most remote and inconvenient parts of the country; not mills near a port, but those placed in the worst position from the point of view of milling and securing supplies. The Deputy accepts that for the millers, but he wants the average cost of production for the farmer. He is not worried about the farmer working under adverse conditions on a mountainside or on poor thin soil, possibly highly acid, which it would take more than the skill of Deputy Corry to get anything like average results from.
Deputy Corry should be a little more realistic about this. He talked about four barrels to the acre. Surely the consuming public cannot be expected to pay what may appear to be an economic price to the individual who can only get four barrels to the acre. The man who only gets four barrels to the acre must turn to something else, to something more economically suitable. There is no use in saying that we can grow large areas of wheat in this country regardless of cost. The consumer must have a say in the matter and we must have some regard to that if we are to have security.
What does Deputy Corry grow?
Ask Deputy Corry what he grows. I do not know anything about that. He will probably give you some useful information. There is a great deal of talk in Great Britain at present about this whole matter. As a matter of fact, the primary producers of the world are concerned about security and stability to which they are entitled. There is a new concept in the world in that respect. There is an Agriculture Bill before the British House of Commons dealing with the whole matter of security and stability and an attempt is being made during the emergency to provide a fair margin for primary producers in Great Britain. It has produced results; it has encouraged production and has stepped up production by 70 per cent. According to the Budget statement, our production fell by 10 per cent. Machinery has been in operation in Great Britain. The National Farmers' Union have been producing costings and the methods adopted there for the fixation of guaranteed prices is by consultation between the National Farmers' Union and the Minister of Agriculture. Can anyone believe that the sort of machinery suggested in this motion will be effective and that you will get satisfactory and acceptable results from it? Will the majority of Deputies listening to me agree that, in the last analysis, you will find that, having set up that machinery, it will be all fixed by haggling in the end? The problem is very difficult and highly complex. It is not nearly as simple as Deputy Corry feels it is.
The Deputy adverted to the joint machinery set up by the Beet-Growers' Association and Comhlucht Siúicre Éireann. I am not at all enamoured of that. I think it is a highly complex problem. It is almost impossible to segregate the activities of farmers and to cost each one. Costings must be kept over the whole phase of their activities. For instance, it is almost impossible to cost a horse in relation to a particular crop. It must be on the basis of cost over the entire year, cost of his food, capital cost, depreciation and replacement, the number of wet days on which he was standing idle in relation to the various crops, and so on. Weather conditions and good and bad seasons must be taken into account. The costings must cover a period of years to produce anything like average results. The cost must be found in relation to the individual, the group of farmers he falls into, whether he is in the category of farmers of 1 to 20 acres, 20 to 50, 50 to 100, 100 to 150, and so on. That has a considerable bearing on production. It must be considered whether his circumstances are such as to produce the most economic results; whether his holding is just big enough to maintain two horses and to engage them all the time and not to have them standing idle on a fine day when they ought to be working. The type of soil the man is working will have a profound effect on the results of his activities.
It is well that our attention should be directed to this whole matter. The attention of the world has been directed to it. The Hot Springs Conference was the first international assembly to deal with this matter. Possibly they read something about Deputy Corry's activities here. I do not know, but they did get the idea.
They will not read anything about a shadow-Minister for Agriculture who is too lazy to do anything.
Who is he?
It is your work I have to do.
I will compare my work with Deputy Corry's any time he likes, and I think the comparison will be favourable to me. Both of us are growing wheat and we can compare the results over the last five or six years. If he wants results, we will let him have them.
Certainly. I am talking about your results as shadow-Minister for Agriculture.
I am talking about real results and I will show them to the Deputy any time he likes.
Deputy Hughes is overshadowing Deputy Corry in any case.
In the last analysis, the best way to help the farming community, in this or any other country, is by showing them how to increase production.
More power to your elbow for that work.
In that way you are helping not merely the individual, but the nation as a whole. We all live out of the pool of production and there is no use in suggesting, as Deputy Corry suggests, that a man who is producing four barrels of wheat to the acre should get an economic price. That is an absurd suggestion. The consuming public could not possibly afford to pay the price that that would cost.
He is compelled to grow it. He is growing it under compulsion.
By the Fianna Fáil dastards.
And the Deputy is responsible for that.
Deputy Corry spoke for 40 minutes and he ought to allow someone else to speak.
He does not like the medicine. I have the greatest sympathy in the world with the unfortunate people of this country who are compelled to grow crops that are absolutely unsuited to the conditions of their holdings. There has been no scientific application to this problem and the voice of the few agricultural scientists that we have is stifled and their advice has not been listened to. To be strictly fair, I must admit that yesterday, when he was addressing a food conference, the Minister gave way to some extent and inspectors are going to get a little more discretion. It is unfortunate, however, that the primary producers in this country have to accept civil servants walking into their yards, with discretionary power to say whether they should sow wheat in a certain field or not. In the tribunal that Deputy Corry is boasting about, those factors are completely overlooked. Soil and weather conditions which must affect the farmer's economy are completely overlooked. Deputy Corry apparently wants to regiment our people and, having regimented them, and having Civil Service control, we will have a tribunal of civil servants that will put the agricultural community on the spot. The price will be fixed by that tribunal and you cannot be critical any longer because you will be told, "There is the tribunal." If there is to be any machinery of that sort, the House ought to insist that an independent tribunal is set up, that it will not be a civil servants' tribunal.
There was a commission set up to inquire into post-war agricultural policy.
I have referred to the Hot Springs Conference and to the resolution that emanated therefrom. It simply said that the people of the world should be fed, that that was the right road to happiness, that huge nutritional problems in the world would have to be tackled; that the capacity of the world was sufficient to meet human requirements; that, in the words of Sir John Orr, farming should be married to nutrition; that that could only be done by ensuring, so far as the primary producers of the world are concerned, that they would get a fair margin of profit and were not forced to destroy nature and thereby cause the erosion that has occurred in many countries because of depressed conditions; that nature had to be repaid for what she gave; and that it was the duty of statesmen to ensure that the erosion that has been taking place for many years is stopped, because the acreage of the arable lands of the world is rapidly reducing.
I have felt for a long time that the whole problem of fair prices and reasonable margins for the primary producer cannot be solved in one country alone, independently. You cannot solve in Ireland the conditions that obtain in other countries. Markets in other countries inevitably affect and have repercussions in not merely the particular country but the world. If we want to solve this question and to ensure that the primary producer will in future be in a better position than he has been in the past, we must collaborate with other nations.
I am glad the Government decided to join F.A.O. and that they attended a meeting last summer at Copenhagen but I am not satisfied inasmuch as they sent a delegations of civil servants. If we attend F.A.O. in future we ought to send people who can speak for the primary industry, people who have a real, practical knowledge of the conditions in the primary industry in this country and who can tender advice on their experience as practicable farmers. It should not be impossible to find men in this country capable of speaking on behalf of the primary producers at such a conference. It is to be regretted that we started off by sending a delegation of civil servants. I am not reflecting on the ability of the civil servants who were sent but I do suggest that it is not their job, that it is the job of the primary producers and that they should be properly represented.
Is not the important thing to reduce the costs of production?
I move the adjournment of the debate.
I should like to remind the House that the Minister has agreed to accept the principle contained in these motions submitted by Deputy Halliden and Deputy Corry. In the circumstances, would both Deputies agree to withdraw those motions, so that they may be discharged from the Paper?
No, I decline to agree to that.
There are 101 minutes to go in the debate on this matter.
Give them a week, if you like.
When is it proposed to resume consideration of the motions?
The debate is adjourned to the next day for Private Deputies' Business, whenever that will be ordered.
Is the Minister in a position to say whether any day has been appointed?
The Minister has been silent all the time, and he intends to remain so.
I am not pressing the Minister on this matter, but the Parliamentary Secretary is not present and I was merely anxious to know if any date has been appropriated for the consideration of these motions.
I am not aware that any date has been appointed.
There are a large number of Estimates on the Order Paper. We are meeting on next Tuesday week, and I take it when these Estimates are finished that we will go on Private Deputies' Business. If these Estimates are not finished by 9 o'clock on Wednesday week, I take it Private Deputies' Business will then be taken?
It is a matter for arrangement.
If Deputies have no information as to what business will be taken in the next sitting week, it will be impossible for them to come prepared. Manifestly, there is no business on the Order Paper.
The Estimates.
They will not occupy a week of Parliamentary time.
You never know.
I do not believe they will.
It would not be a bad idea if, from time to time, a Minister knew what business would be taken. I understood yesterday that these motions had been withdrawn, but when I arrived in the House about five minutes before they were taken, I was informed that they were being moved.
That was as a result of the ruling of the Chair.
The debate will probably be resumed on Wednesday week. These are matters for arrangement between the Whips. The House will meet on Tuesday week and this debate will be resumed on Wednesday week.
Would it be possible for the Government to let us know, during the time we will be at home, say, during the week-end, what business will be taken at the next sitting?
It is the privilege of the Government to regulate the business of the Dáil each day it assembles.
Quite, but it also seems to be the privilege of the Government to keep the business to be transacted to themselves and particularly to keep it from the Opposition.
It is a matter that could be arranged.
But the point is that it never is arranged.
Why could not the Government Whips approach the Whips of the other Parties in that connection?
That is a matter for arrangement. Do not put the blame on the Chair. The Chair merely controls the proceedings in the House.
I understand that the reason why I have not been afforded an opportunity of raising certain matters in relation to the Board of Works to-day is that, to the regret of us all, Deputy O'Grady, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance, has met with a personal bereavement which made it impossible for him to be here to-day. That, of course, is a reason for postponing the matter and one to which I most readily concur and I take this opportunity of expressing my profound regret that Deputy O'Grady should be so bereaved.
