I asked the Minister yesterday if he would state the reasons why he decided to reject the recommendation of the Dublin District Milk Board that the price of milk to producers be increased to 2/8 per gallon. The Minister said he had nothing to add to a reply which he had given to Deputy Hughes on the previous Wednesday. I asked the Minister was he prepared to take responsibility for a serious shortage of milk in the City of Dublin during the coming winter and the Minister said that he would take responsibility for any decision that he arrived at. I think this is a decision which the Minister has arrived at without due and proper consideration.
The Milk Board is representative of producers and wholesalers. They have close and intimate knowledge of milk production and distribution. They know the costs of production and they ought to have a thorough knowledge of the whole subject. When we have the position that the wholesalers concur with the producers in their claim that the price they are asking is not excessive, there is a prima facie case for investigation by the Minister. The Minister was asked on what information he based his decision to reject the recommendation of the Milk Board and he said that he based it on the advice given to him by his technical advisers.
The House is entitled to ask who are the Minister's technical advisers and what practical knowledge have they of milk production and what investigations or practical experiments they have carried out in relation to costings. It is inconceivable that the Minister would fix a price without some investigation of costs of production. If he has carried out such investigation, the House is entitled to have the figures of what it costs to produce a gallon of milk on the average. No figures have been produced to the House and the Minister says, simply, that he is relying on his technical advisers.
The producers have gone very carefully into this matter of costings. One figure which they produced last March showed the cost of production at 2/4 per gallon. Costs have increased very considerably since then. Why has the Minister failed to give us the basis upon which he has fixed the price? By reason of the inadequate price paid for milk, milk production has declined very considerably in the production areas. In 1946 the quantity of milk produced in the Dublin supply area was 16,142,000 gallons. In 1947 it was down to 15,630,000 gallons. That deficiency is made up by drawing supplies from the creamery area.
The Minister yesterday indicated that over 2,300,000 gallons, approximately, were received from the creamery areas. We must realise the serious position that that creates. Milk is being taken out of creamery areas, where it is produced under conditions which are not as hygienic or not the same as conditions under which milk is produced in registered dairies in the Dublin area. Further, there is a reduction in butter production in those areas. Not only is there a shortage of milk at the present time, there is also a very serious shortage of butter. The amount of milk diverted from creamery areas to Dublin would, it is estimated, produce about 800,000 lbs. of butter. That withdrawal of milk from these areas represents a serious drain upon the butter supply. The serious feature of it is that the Minister calmly ignores the costs of production and assumes that he will get the milk even though the price is inadequate.
We must remind the Minister that a similar attitude was adopted by his predecessor in regard to pigs and the result was that in the course of a few years the community was left without bacon. There is no justification for the Minister ignoring all advice and all reliable information in regard to the production costs of a gallon of milk. As long as the Minister continues to ignore that information, it must be anticipated that supplies will continue to diminish and that he will have to draw to an increasing extent on supplies in the creamery areas, thereby reducing supplies of butter.
We have a Milk Board. We are entitled to ask what is the function of that Milk Board, since it is not permitted to fix the price of milk. The Milk Board must cost the community between £2,000 or £3,000. I do not know what it costs but there is a chairman costing, I think, over £1,000 a year, a secretary costing over £500, and various other officials. As far as the ordinary member of the public can judge, the Milk Board seems to serve only as a kind of smoke-screen behind which the Minister can operate and dictate whatever price he thinks fit. If the Minister has not gone into this question in a really efficient manner and discovered the cost of production, he ought to accept the producer's costings. If he cannot accept them, he should rely upon some independent tribunal.
In one of his letters to the milk producers, the Minister said that he had got independent advice in regard to the price which would pay, but he has never disclosed the source of that independent advice. It would appear that the Minister is relying solely upon the advice of his officials. This is serious enough for the producers, because they, in the main, are comparatively small farmers. They are farmers who are working efficiently and industriously to supply this commodity. Their capital outlay is enormous; they have to keep the best possible dairies, cowsheds and equipment and have to invest large sums in dairy herds.
It is an intolerable thing to see these people being driven out of production —and they are being driven out. That the people who are in production are being driven out every year does not appear entirely from the figures, as each year there are small, new, inexperienced producers coming in. That invariably happens when prices are inadequate. Advertisements may be seen in all the papers for the last couple of months of wholesalers appealing for producers to come over with supplies of milk and some new, inexperienced producers are coming in, but they will not remain in the business if the price is not remunerative. It is time that the Minister should face up to this question and meet the producers in a reasonable way.
