If that Magazine Fort raid had happened three months later, this country would have been tied up in the war, practically of a certainty, and the will of the people to remain neutral would have been completely defeated by a minority, so that I am mentioning the matter as indicating the need for co-ordination in the general direction, both in respect of problems at the moment, such as the meat problem and the general situation ahead, the problems which arise in relation to the general world picture.
In that regard, I should like to commend certain things to the attention of the Taoiseach in exactly the same spirit in which I commended them to the Minister for External Affairs, and with the full qualification in regard to the necessary tact and reticence which sometimes has to be associated with foreign relations, and, of course, in asking these questions, I am, on this occasion anyway, completely content, so far as an answer is concerned, to leave it to the discretion of the Taoiseach, but it does suggest a problem of co-ordination. The Minister for External Affairs, in his speech, referred to isolationism. He remarked that isolationism would be impossible in any future conflict and I couple that with remarks about a United States of Europe and the surrender of sovereignty. I think these were the words he used. Unfortunately, the printed report has not come to hand, and I speak subject to correction. There, obviously, the Minister is thinking of matters of the greatest and deepest import for the future of this country albeit they are problems which, once resolved in any particular way, may remain so resolved for ever, or, if not, for a very long time. Therefore, these problems in regard to external affairs in that connection obviously bring up problems which intimately touch the Government and the Taoiseach in his proper capacity as such. I would commend them, too, for scrutiny and careful co-ordination.
This is no place to go into the policy of the Minister for Finance, but the Minister for Finance is something more in a way. Financial policy is something of the Government as a whole and the general overall policy of the Government here has been a seeking for economy by a method of restrictions, a method by which heretofore, I am sorry to say, the Government have not brought very many benefits to the community beyond giving cheaper entertainment and cheaper drink. In this, I wonder is Government policy sound. Here is what you are doing. You are attempting the classical remedy for inflation in a localised area here which is only a small part of a large sterling area. So long as you remain at the par level with sterling, you are only a relatively microscopic portion of the sterling domain, and any perturbation you introduce here is unlikely to affect the trend of your currency as a whole, because your currency, because of the link, is the currency of that whole living space. Any perturbation you introduce here has its concomitant disadvantage. It is an almost invariable law of nature, or of politics, anyway, that any austerity remedy or adjustment of social matters nearly always brings some disadvantage, so that, in the long run, you are trying to choose the best means.
In the case of finance, here we are trying the classical remedy, the so-called austerity or restriction remedy, for which there may be a certain amount to be said in theory, without being able, by that remedy, to affect our currency because of this, so to speak, absence of a lockgate to wall in our own territory. Therefore, is it really wise for us to suffer all the disadvantages, when, in such a situation, the austerity programme is not going to give you the currency adjustment necessary to give you the relief you seek? It would be all very well if you are adopting this or any remedy which is pushed through logically and has some rational basis in company with everybody else over the whole area. Then the different units co-operating together might get some result, but is it wise to adopt the austerity remedy here when we were so much better off relatively in fundamentals than the big area next door to us, England, when, in regard to fundamentals of food and way of living generally, we were actually better off, though we were feeling the pinch, too? Does not the adoption of such a remedy mean voluntarily throwing ourselves from a relatively advantageous position into a general level of difficulty? Is that good policy? Is that good co-ordination policy? Further, read the papers to-day and you see that, whatever remedies are being adopted by the people on the other side, the cost of living is going up there. We are throwing ourselves into the melting-pot, so to speak, with them. We are only a small part. Quo vadis?
It is very easy for me to throw up the problem. I have tried to put it fairly, realising that the Taoiseach and the Government have the difficulty of solving it but, as against that, they are the Government; they are charged by the House and the people with that responsibility; and I think it is a legitimate function of a member of the Opposition to demand that that responsibility be discharged. I think I had better leave it there.
I could expand further on the economy argument, on the particular financial policy here. It seems to me, looking at it from one point of view, that the logical thing for the Minister for Finance to do, if he wanted to carry on on the line he was carrying on, would be to go the whole way with Clann na Poblachta and put in the lockgate. That would give him some possibility of getting some result. That would be added to the general level of the whole sterling area. Whether he would get a better or a just result, I am not prepared to say at the moment, but I realise that the problem of breaking with sterling at the moment is a very difficult one and would be a peculiarly difficult one, perhaps, at the moment. I do not want to go into it. You have three possibilities. If it is not at par, then it overvalues or devalues. In either case you have certain real difficulties that would have to be got over. Again, I am not the Government. I have not their information. I have not the facilities of staff for examining the problems and I am not going to imitate certain irresponsible people by pretending that I have the omnibus remedy to give. I have not. The problem is there and the Government has the information and it is the Government's duty to deal with it.
Incidentally, on the sterling question, I was applauded by the far side. I once propounded in public, and it was duly printed, the difficulties of that problem. I never got an answer. However, I leave it so. There is no use in this "hear, hear" business. The unfortunate Government of any country at this day has its problems. We will not help with doctrinaire approaches. We will not help with criticism that is aimed at merely criticism. We can help by examining the problems and realising them. It is in that spirit that I recommend what I have said to the Taoiseach, but, again, I repeat, the reins are in his hands and the hands of the Government and action is needed.