I am possibly the last of the newcomers to this House and I waited very specifically for this debate to make this, my maiden speech. I naturally had a very specific reason for waiting for this debate, it being that I come from an area which is described as the premier dairying county in Ireland, Limerick. I felt very pleased on Friday last when I heard the Minister for Agriculture paying a tribute to the former Minister, Dr. Ryan, for introducing the farm improvements scheme. I appreciate that very much. As a working farmer in West Limerick, with a practical knowledge of this scheme, I should like to tell the Minister and Deputies that more drainage under this scheme has been done in County Limerick than in any area of its size in the State. The Department's figures, I am sure, will bear this out, which goes to prove that the part of Limerick I come from is not wholly or solely in the Golden Vale.
In selecting the farm improvements scheme as No. 1 on my programme, I do so for the purpose of appealing for a 60 per cent. grant towards the total cost as against 50 per cent. of the labour cost of five years ago, when wages were 25 per cent. lower. I think the Minister and every Deputy will admit that drainage is the most reproductive of all the works under this scheme. More manual labour and more skill is required than in the case of other works. In the congested area of West Limerick from which I come, it takes an average of 16 to 18 perches for main drains and 60 to 70 perches of minor drainage to the statute acre. In support of my appeal for 60 per cent. rather than 50 per cent., I should like to bring to the notice of the Minister this very important fact. Many farmers, to my knowledge, quarry stones and cart them six or eight miles for this work and pay 3/- to 5/- for each horse load at the quarry. It takes two good loads of stones to do three perches of drains which gives an idea of the cost, apart from the labour of excavating and closing.
I am sure that every Deputy will admit that we had practically no field drainage in this country for the past 30 or 40 years, until this scheme was started, and in fact I will say that the farmers had almost lost the art of drainage. Were it not for the six or seven years' constant instruction and supervision by the Department's officers, hundreds of our farmers would have lost the art, which in itself is an answer to the Minister in the matter of inspectors going inside the ditches and boundaries of our farms. I should like the Minister to take note of this fact, which I repeat: the art of drainage was lost, were it not for the fact that officers of the Department of Agriculture were there to instruct and supervise. The work now done is far superior to any work done for the past 50 or 60 years. I heard the Minister pay a tribute to the old Board of Works, but I say that the work done in the past five or six years is far superior to any work done by the old Board of Works, or even by the old landlords. If my words are doubted I invite any Deputy to come down to West Limerick and see for himself the work which has been executed west of the Mullach an Radhach range on the low-lying land around Newcastle West and Drumcollogher.
I come now to the point which Deputy O'Reilly made with regard to potatoes. This has been my own experience in West Limerick. I have seen from ten to 12 tons of potatoes per acre produced on land which was drained under the scheme and which formerly had been useless. If we are to balance our economy I see no better way than to reclaim the thousands of acres that could be reclaimed so as to feed our pigs and poultry instead of looking for uncertain supplies of maize from the Argentine and the United States. When the dollar pool has been drained we must then come back again and drain the cut-away bogs to feed our live stock. The policy of the pig in Ireland and the plough in the Argentine is a bad policy. It is an unwise policy. It is a most uncertain policy. Many of my neighbours have increased their cows by 20 or 30 per cent. by reclaiming land and have been able to have more winter feeding per head than formerly.
I would like, for purposes of comparison, to mention one point and to bring it home very forcibly to the Minister, especially in connection with the new scheme which he recently initiated for the Counties of Mayo and Galway. The grants paid for drainage under what we will call the "Dr. Ryan scheme" usually cost the State about £8 per acre and the work generally costs the farmer from £20 to £25. I wonder will the drainage in Galway and Mayo cost the State £30 per acre and will it be as well done? Farmers have told me that they would not let unskilled men in to drain their land, even if the Minister for Agriculture paid them. I will tell the Minister why. A badly made drain or a burst drain will definitely leave the land in a worse state than it was formerly. There is no way in which intensive drainage can be so efficiently and so economically carried out—I am sure the Minister will agree with me—as under the supervision of the owner with labour selected and employed by him.
I hope I am keeping within the terms of the debate. I am trying, this being my maiden speech, to do the best I can. Probably I waited too long but it never harms a man to sit, to listen and to learn. I got the point from Deputy O'Reilly about feeding pigs on a ration of maize and skim milk. I will deal with that later.
The Minister, with the aid of his experts and the officials of his Department, can challenge me now or later in this House, but I would like to tell him that 12 tons of potatoes from one reclaimed acre will fatten ten pigs and there will be enough seed for another acre. It will take three tons of Argentine maize, paid for by dollars, to feed the same number. Is that any guide to our future economy? If the Minister is prepared to abandon his wheat quota, he might replace it with a potato quota secured from the reclaimed land, not alone in West Limerick, but in many other counties in Eire.
I wish to deal with another matter under the heading of farm improvements. Fences, of course, are a most necessary part of the work of land reclamation. They provide shelter as well as drainage in addition to the ordinary uses associated with them. I have listened to the discussion on the Estimate for the Department of Lands and I have seen Deputies on my right, especially Deputies from Mayo and Galway, who struck me as being completely absorbed by one main subject, namely, land. I listened also to the debate on forestry. I heard very few Deputies giving any indication that they were greatly concerned about forestry. The Minister, as I have already indicated, paid a very well-deserved tribute to Deputy Dr. Ryan. I appreciate that. But we who live in rural Ireland would like that, in conjunction with the farm improvements scheme, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Lands would agree that for every £10, say, given in the form of a grant for farm improvement there would be a grant of £1 at least for the purpose of putting down shelter belts. The Minister has told us that he has at his office about 35,000 to 36,000 applications under the farm improvements scheme. If we could get 35,000 farmers in any financial year to plant 35,000 shelter belts, the Minister would be surprised at the transformation that would take place in many very barren areas. We should all be united in that common purpose. Whether we are Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael or anything else, the important thing is to improve the general estate, which is Eire.
There is another important heading under the farm improvements scheme, that is, the provision of grass silos. I said in my opening remarks that more drainage has been done in County Limerick than in any other county of its size. I go further and say that more grass silos have been erected in County Limerick under the scheme than there have been in a dozen other counties put together. The grants for these, I think, should be increased by 50 per cent. There is no better way of helping the dairying industry and helping the rearing of calves. The Minister will readily understand that most of these silos have been filled during the past few weeks. When artificial manures become plentiful, I look forward to there being a silo on every farm of eight to ten cows. Some farmers in portions of West Limerick have two or three silos already.
All County Limerick is not blessed with a great rainfall. In my place we get a break from the Brandon Mountains and possibly have too much water, but there are some parts, immediately west of the Mullach an Radhach range, where for years dairy farmers have been seriously handicapped through lack of water. Under this scheme, there are water tanks for the storage of rainwater. Tanks to hold several thousand gallons have been put up in Drumcollogher and other areas bordering County Cork. They never went up until the scheme came in. In dry periods I have seen two or three men employed daily with horses and carts in carting water. The grant was not sufficient to buy the cement, but notwithstanding that, it was largely availed of.
Farm roads have been built under this scheme which would be a credit to any county council, often in remote places. The grants for this were only 10/- per perch. I know men who quarried and carted stones two or three miles and paid £3 10s. per day to the owners of stone crushers to make the roads. I waited specially for this particular Vote in order to subscribe to this farm improvements scheme, as I realise that it has been of tremendous importance to the people, especially in West Limerick. In view of the increase in agricultural wages and materials and the great reproductive value of this work, I appeal to the Minister to extend the good work of his predecessors and increase the grants under all the headings I have mentioned.
I would recommend to the Minister this grand and glorious statement, leaving it to his own judgment to guess the author. It has a very direct and important national application to our country:
"Remain faithful to the earth: it will always give something to eat to those who work it."
I come to the burning question that has been debated in this House for years before I came in. The farmers in County Limerick sent me because they believed, not alone in my sincerity but in my fighting ability, no matter who was in power, to try to do something to improve the condition of the dairy farmers in the County Limerick. On Friday last and yesterday, I listened to Deputy Smith making what, notwithstanding what Deputy Madden said about him last night, I thought was the finest speech ever made in this House. It lasted four and a quarter hours. I thought the record of the late Miss Mary MacSwiney of Cork would never be broken, but I am glad to say that if anyone broke that grand and glorious record of the scorching attack on the Treaty in Dublin in 1921 and 1922, it fell to the lot of Deputy Smith.
Deputy O'Reilly drove home a very hard and true fact when he interjected in the speech of Deputy Smith that it was costing the Government £2,250,000 to subsidise our dairy industry. The Minister should be prepared to ask his Government for a further increase to subsidise dairying. I make no apology as to where the money can be got, so long as I can, in my own way, make a decent effort to improve the lot of the dairy farmers in Limerick. I am a believer in the golden rule that the customer should pay for everything.
Deputy Madden said last night that he was tired of visiting the former Minister, Deputy Smith, and prior to that Deputy Ryan, on behalf of the dairy farmers of Limerick. I am surprised the Deputy did not tell this House, so that we could have it on record and publish it in the Limerick Leader or the Limerick Guardian, that quite recently—some time in the month of May—a very respectable deputation of the dairy farmers of Limerick was introduced by Deputy Madden to the Minister. The Minister is pretty well aware that at least four-fifths of that deputation, who came up from that dairying county of Limerick, were 100 per cent. Fine Gael adherents. They came up—I will give the men their due —to make a decent fight—they themselves being dairymen—for the dairy farmers.
I hope I am not misquoting the result of the findings of that interview. If I am, I have the man who led them sitting here on my right. Notwithstanding the fact that the Minister is a very busy man he entertained the deputation for two and a half hours. My information is that he simply lectured them on what they should do in the County Limerick to improve dairying conditions. By way of preface, I should say that before Deputy Madden brought up the deputation from the County Limerick, the Limerick County Committee of Agriculture, I understand, on at least two occasions, had invited the Minister down to Limerick. He refused to go down to discuss dairying conditions with that committee which represents the premier dairying county in Ireland for the reason that he was a new Minister and had not time to go.
I could be critical and say things, but I do not intend to do that, because, in my opinion, you never get any dividends from doing so. Anyhow, the Minister did not go down. The deputation came up and the Minister started off by severely criticising the county committee of agriculture and Deputy Madden for being so unreasonable as to expect him to go to Limerick at all. At the same time, he emphasised that he was a very busy man since he had assumed office, and that he had no time for the grievances of the farmers in the County Limerick in regard to the price of milk. He then lectured the deputation and he tried to convince them that he was a real champion of the agricultural interest with an absolute knowledge of agriculture and of the dairying industry from A to Z. In other words, he assumed to himself that he was the dispenser of knowledge and the dispeller of gloom.
