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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 20 Jul 1949

Vol. 117 No. 10

Committee on Finance. - Vote 3—Department of the Taoiseach.

I move:—

That a sum not exceeding £14,450 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending the 31st day of March, 1950, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of the Taoiseach (No. 16 of 1924; No. 40 of 1937; No. 38 of 1938; and No. 24 of 1947).

For some months now we have been discussing in great detail, but not at unreasonable length, the various workings of Government policy in connection with finance, social services and general economic matters. This Estimates traditionally provides an opportunity for discussing general Government policy. Each year there has been a difficulty in ascertaining the precise scope of a debate on that particular topic. If I might put it this way: we have been discussing the details of the picture and this Estimate now gives us an opportunity to stand back, look at the picture as a whole and see the underlying structure and the principles underlining the details which comprise the entire picture. Perhaps I might help Deputies this year by departing from the usual procedure. It has been the general practice of the Taoiseach, so to speak, merely to throw in the ball and let the various Deputies worry the ball and throw it back and forward and, finally, the Taoiseach wound up on the various matters mentioned.

I propose to give some general indication of the principles underlying Government policy which may possibly give a line to those Deputies who are, perhaps, a little bit doubtful as to the kind of matters which may be discussed on this Estimate. At the very outset I want to refer to a change of a rather significant character which has been made in the course of the year in my Department, because it is something of significance in the direction of general Government policy and the outlook of the Government on policy as a whole. There has been created, by administrative Order of the Government, a new office attached to the office of the Taoiseach, a new central statistics office, which forms part now of the Department of the Taoiseach. That decision was come to because of the fact that the Government in framing, designing and endeavouring to carry out their policy, found that, by reason of the greatly extended scope of the responsibility of Government under modern conditions, it was difficult, if not impossible, properly to frame general policy and carry it out without up-to-date statistical data and information. By reason of the complex nature of the compilation of statistics, by reason of the fact that we have not had any up-to-date estimate of national income, we were quite unable to follow the general trend of policy in its working out, and, in order properly to chart the course of Government policy, it was necessary that there should be an office charged with the responsibility for producing an up-to-date, timely, full range of official statistics.

It has been stated that the best indicator of the economic health of the country is the level of its national income. There has been no really official compilation of estimates of national income since the year 1946. To use a phrase employed recently by a distinguished Irish economist, those people who are considering economic policy and the trends of trade, investment and national income are really working, as he put it, in the shadow of a somewhat considerable statistical darkness which has rested on our affairs since the White Paper on National Income and Expenditure for the years 1938 to 1944 was made available in 1946. We desire to dispel that darkness. We wish to have a modern, scientific compilation of the national income so that we could have from time to time the best possible information as to the trend of our economic life, the nature of our economic health. We felt that, although it was natural that the Statistical Office as it has existed up to this should have emanated originally from or found its birth in the Department of Industry and Commerce, yet that up-to-date, timely statistics were of such vital importance in modern conditions and the subject matters to be handled by such a Department were so complex that it required a separate office with considerable independence of every Department, which would be an organ of the Government as a whole, to deal with the compilation of official statistics and particularly estimates and statistics relating to the national income.

Accordingly, we have set up this new office attached to my Department, to underline its independence, to emphasise the importance which we attach to this work and to give the office real freedom and scope for the compilation of those statistics which are of such vital importance to those people who are charged with the conception, design and carrying out of Government policy.

The first time and, indeed, the only time when any really authoritative estimates of national income were published was the occasion of the publication of the White Paper which was published in the year 1946. The preparation of such a document as that involved a high degree of competence on the part of the compilers. Prior to that we had unofficial estimates of the national income. Professor Dunean had prepared for the Banking Commission an estimate of the national income for the year 1929 and Dr. Kieran, in the Economic Journal of March, 1933, had prepared an estimate of the national income for the year 1926. Various people interested in and qualified to write upon such matters contributed papers to the Statistical Society of Ireland, which has done so much useful work, and that work really provided the background and the groundwork of the work that was done officially by the publication of this White Paper in 1946. There has been no White Paper on the national income since that time. We felt that it was vitally important that there should be, at the earliest possible moment, such a White Paper produced.

We have given this new office a status and an independence of other Departments or of any particular Department which, we believe, will give them freedom to do the work that is required to be done and which requires to be done urgently and in a very timely manner.

Since the Statistical Branch of the Irish Government Service was set up, the reputation of Irish statistics has stood high nationally and internationally. We are fortunate in having had as directors of that office men of ability who have won fame for themselves and for their country in their particular scientific calling. We are fortunate in having a director at present who himself is outstanding in his profession. We were fortunate also in securing the services of a professor of University College, Cork, who gave up his Chair to become Deputy Director of the Statistical Office. In addition, through the medium of the Civil Service Commission, we have secured four young people, three men and a lady, who are highly qualified in statistics and the science of statistics, mathematics and economics, who have joined the Government service in this new office and we are again indebted to the generosity of the United States through the funds that they have placed at the disposal of nations wishing to avail themselves of their service. At least two of these four new statisticians who have joined the Irish service will be given the benefit of training at the expense of the United States Treasury in the United States of America.

The office will be charged with compiling every type of statistical information, while, of course, its primary and possibly its most important function and its most urgent task will be the compilation of figures of national income and expenditure. The office will have the surveillance of any statistics that may be left with particular Departments to prepare themselves, but generally it will be the duty of this office to compile all Government statistics and where the office does not undertake that duty the director and the staff will have the right to direct and survey all statistics that are prepared by any particular Department.

An inter-departmental committee will be appointed to co-ordinate the statistical work of administrative Departments and it is intended that for the purpose of giving advice on statistical matters a statistical council will be set up under the Statistics Act of 1926.

I mention these matters although the Minister for Finance gave an outline of the reasons for this new Department when he introduced the Estimate for the office some few weeks ago. We hope that with the foundation of this branch of my Department we will have available to all Departments and to all Deputies and to all economists really up-to-date information on the statistical developments of this country. I have emphasised the desirability of getting an up-to-date survey and estimate of national income and expenditure, because I think it will be agreed that the aim of all Government financial and economic policy must be to increase the national wealth. How far the efforts of a Government are succeeding in doing that, to what extent it can be seen whether or not a Government is in its policy travelling along the right lines, can only be determined by reference to official statistics of national income prepared in a scientific, up-to-date manner. We have, therefore, set out, as the fundamental basis of our Government policy, to increase the national wealth. All our financial policy, all our economic policy is directed to that end.

Every Deputy knows the demands that are being made, and that are increasingly being made upon the Government for bounties and for services of one sort or another. Everybody knows, or should realise that these demands of necessity result in increased expenditure by the State. Everybody must realise the necessity for keeping down taxation and the burden of taxation on the people. In existing circumstances, that burden is far too great.

If we are to do what is required to be done, and even the minimum of these requirements, we must increase the national wealth of the country if we are to avoid a crippling burden of taxation on the people. By increasing the national wealth, increased revenue can be secured without increased taxation. I should interpolate here for the benefit of Deputies who, perhaps, do not realise it, that the burden of taxation, of high taxation, enters very largely into the cost of living. Deputy Cowan has referred to the fact that he intends to raise the cost of living on this Estimate. I would direct his attention, when considering that aspect of Government policy, to ponder upon that aspect, which is very often forgotten, that high taxation enters very largely into the cost of living. If we can increase the national wealth, we can get more revenue without extra taxation; we can get more productive work and thereby save the State from the claims which are being made for unemployment insurance benefit and for all the social services that, of necessity, a modern State must maintain.

So far as our financial policy is concerned, it has been stated and restated. It is not necessary for me to underline it again. We wish to keep down high taxation; we wish to curtail, so far as is reasonably possible, Governmental expenditure. Our general policy on that has been stated—to save public moneys that might be spent better and more productively. A little over 12 months ago, on the 26th May of last year, I addressed the Dublin Chamber of Commerce on certain aspects of the problems that appeared to us at that time to be awaiting solution by the Government. I stated, in the course of that speech to the chamber of commerce, as follows:—

"The two main long term economic problems confronting this country are the necessity for greatly increased agricultural and industrial output, and the rectification of the unhealthy condition of our balance of international payments. The first of these problems is the more important. If we can solve it, we will have gone a long way towards improving the balance of payments position as well."

In other words, it appeared to us at that time that we were not producing enough or selling enough, and that we were buying too much, and that Government policy had to be directed in order to increase the national wealth of the country, to secure conditions within it to increase agricultural and industrial production so that greater productive employment would be obtained, the adverse balance of trade rectified, improved social conditions obtained, and the highest possible level of prosperity for all sections of our people.

I can assure the House that that was the headline we set ourselves 12 months ago. I think we can claim that, with that headline before us, we have made, at least, some substantial progress towards solving those two problems to which I adverted over 12 months ago. We set ourselves out to increase agricultural and industrial output. We had not at that time, nor have we even yet, recovered in this country from the impact of the war upon us. We are still depending, to a very considerable extent, on the success of the efforts that are being made in Europe and elsewhere throughout the world, to restore the disequilibrium of international trade and give some sort of stability in particular to European economic conditions. We can only do a certain amount towards helping the recovery of European economy, and because we cannot escape in this country the effects of the disruption that came upon European economy as the result of the war and in consequence of the peace following the war, we have given throughout the last 12 or 16 months that we have been in office, every possible assistance that we could towards the amelioration of European economic conditions and to the success of the United States European Recovery Programme.

We cannot, even though we are isolated to a certain extent from Europe, hope to escape the effects of the economic disturbances in Europe or even further afield, but there are certain things that we have within our own power, and with our own materials we set ourselves out to increase the capital value of our own economy and to create conditions within which industrial and agricultural production could be achieved and our balance of payments position ameliorated.

Over the last 50 years there has been practically no opportunity for determining a long-term policy for the economic recovery of this country. Other countries have suffered from certain economic ills which have passed us by. There have been, perhaps, in England and other places, industrial fluctuations and normal unemployment: industrial fluctuations due to a falling off in the demands for particular commodities or unemployment because of a falling off in the demand for a variety of products. That is not our problem here. Our economy has been relatively unproductive and relatively under-invested. We have to face the fact that we have an economy which has a great potential source of wealth for the people and which has not yet really been developed in the way that it should have been. Our economy has suffered from what has been described as chronic under-investment. We have had the position here in years gone by where we have had resources available to us for the development of our own economy, and those resources in land, in labour and in capital have been left idle here at home or else have been exported abroad: a position where Irish labour and Irish capital have been used for the development of countries other than our own. Our policy generally in that respect has been a policy of constructive development of our own economy. People have invested their moneys abroad and men have gone to work for other peoples abroad. In connection with our land, which is the real source of the wealth of this country, and in connection with our agricultural industry, it is in those respects that our most valuable resources have remained completely idle and unemployed.

We have been suffering from a condition which has been described by economists as under-employment, a condition in which labour, capital and land have been either not used at all, or not used in such a way or in such a combination as will increase the national wealth. We have set ourselves out to see that all our resources, so far as possible, are invested in this country, both labour and capital, and that the land, which is the greatest source of our potential wealth, will get a chance it has never got before. We believe that large-scale investments of our own moneys will produce better dividends for the Irish people, if invested in the land of Ireland, than if invested anywhere else. Even before the war years, even before the impact of the war on our agricultural economy, agricultural output was stationary and it is merely a truism of Irish economics to say that everybody in this country, directly or indirectly, relies for his prosperity upon a prosperous agricultural industry.

Accordingly, to deal with the situation of under-investment that is such an outstanding feature of our economy in connection with our land and our agricultural industry, we have decided to invest the greatest amount of money available to us in increasing the fertility of the land and developing the land as our best source of potential wealth. In doing so, we were not concerned at all with increasing the wealth or the prosperity of any individual farmer. The whole purpose was to develop the agricultural industry by means of the investment of Irish capital to increase the fertility of the land, so that our national income might be increased and general prosperity produced throughout the country, productive employment given to our people and this greatest national asset of ours, the land of Ireland, developed to the fullest possible extent.

We have debated here on a number of occasions the policy underlying the land reclamation scheme of the Minister for Agriculture. I do not intend to develop that any further than has already been done. I mention it for the purpose of showing that that scheme is perhaps the outstanding example of the Government policy of constructive investment in our own economy, an investment designed to increase the national wealth, to increase agricultural products for export, to increase the productivity of the land and to give genuine productive employment to our people on the land and, through prosperous conditions on the land, to our industrial workers.

Through the operation of the trade agreement which was negotiated and signed last year between this country and Great Britain, we have brought stable conditions to the agricultural industry, and in the course of the various debates on different agricultural topics that have taken place here within the last few months, it has been demonstrated that our agricultural production has increased to a satisfactory extent.

We rely upon an increase in our agricultural production, upon the export of our surplus agricultural products, to a very large extent to meet the second problem to which I referred and which I quoted to the Chamber of Commerce last year, namely, the rectification of our balance of payments. I hope in a few moments to refer to what has been achieved in that respect. So far as that very serious position has been tackled and, to some extent, if not solved, at least put into the course of solution, it has been due to the improvement in our agricultural industry and to the increase in our agricultural exports. While that is the general policy for agriculture, and while we assert it as our fundamental policy, because more than half of our people are employed on the land, and because nearly everybody in Ireland depends directly or indirectly for his well-being on a prosperous agriculture, we have directed all our efforts primarily to creating the conditions whereby a prosperous agricultural industry can be achieved and a greatly increased productivity in agricultural products secured.

We recognise that there must be a balanced economy in our country, and I think we are entitled to claim that we have, in the course of the last 12 months, achieved something towards the development of industrial employment and our manufacturing industries as a whole. We have, as Deputies are aware, given an indication of general Government policy in reference to our secondary industries by the setting up of the Industrial Development Authority. That authority is at present functioning and it will be given statutory form and effect if and when the Bill which has been introduced into this House is passed into law. The main purpose of that is to see that we have our manufacturing industries built up in a coherent, co-ordinated fashion; that that is not done merely in a patchwork way; that new industries will be fostered and given every possible encouragement, and that the development of Irish industry will be upon a coherent, welldirected, well-ordered line; that if one industry is protected or given certain advantages, that those advantages or that protection will not be given at the expense of other industries, and that the impact of all manufacturing industries on our agricultural industry, when they are producing the goods we expect them to produce, will also be carefully watched and the inter-action of Irish industry and our agricultural industry will be watched and safe-guarded.

I have stated that we have succeeded in increasing greatly our agricultural production, thereby helping towards the rectification of our balance of payments. We have also been able to show during the past year a steady improvement in industrial activity, industrial productivity and industrial employment. May I give a few figures to emphasise and underline these matters? As regards industrial employment, in the year 1938 there were 166,000 people employed in Irish industry; in the year 1947 there were 177,000 people employed; in 1948 there were 184,000 people employed, so that within the last year 7,000 additional people were employed compared with the year before. That is the position as regards people put into employment in Irish industry. There was a 4 per cent. increase on 1947 and an 11 per cent. increase over the year 1938. The year that has just ended was a year in which the highest level of industrial employment in the history of this State was achieved.

So far as industrial protection is concerned, the figures are equally revealing and satisfactory. In 1948 the volume of production for all industries was 16 per cent. above the 1947 volume. It was 28 per cent., above the 1938 volume. Since February of last year the Minister for Industry and Commerce has approved 104 new industrial projects, in 24 of which production has already begun. There are 77 proposals for new industries in process of advancement towards completion.

The year 1948, in addition to being a year where the highest level of industrial employment in the history of the State was achieved, was also the year in which the highest level of industrial production was achieved. That year was remarkable, too, for the increase in our export trade. Deputies are aware of the difficulties that had arisen in connection with the interpretation of one of the clauses in the trade agreement entered into between Great Britain and this country in the year 1938. In the year 1938 our industrial exports were of the value or order of 2.1 millions. In 1947 they were of the order of 6.2 millions. In 1948—that is last year—they were 8.2 millions. During last year, in addition to achieving a record in industrial employment and industrial production, our exports of Irish manufacturing products increased by £2,000,000 on the figures for 1947, a 32 per cent. increase on those figures, and increased by 6.1 million, or 290 per cent., on 1938 figures. I think, therefore, that we are entitled to claim credit that we have gone at least a considerable way towards the solution of the first of those two problems to which I adverted in May of last year when I addressed the Dublin Chamber of Commerce.

We have greatly increased agricultural and industrial output. When I said that we were able to solve the first of those problems, the second of our problems—the rectification of our balance of payments—will follow as a matter of course. I think we are entitled to say that in the 12 months following on that speech we have made considerable progress in solving those problems. While I say that we have made considerable progress in solving those problems, I do not wish it to be stated that we are merely asserting these matters in a mood of smug complacency. We are fully alive to the difficulties that still confront this country. We are quite keenly appreciative of the problems we still have to tackle and to solve. But we are, at least, entitled to say that at the end of this 12 months progress has been made and we appear to be on the right lines so far as our agricultural, industrial and financial policy is concerned.

The balance of payments position, which was the second problem to which I adverted last year, shows a trend that, while we cannot again regard it with smug complacency, is at least satisfactory in its general direction. We had last year when we came into office a condition in which the unfavourable balance of trade had reached rather extraordinary heights. It is, perhaps, right that it should be mentioned and appreciated that the high excess of our imports over our exports in the year 1947 was probably due to the necessity for stocking-up following upon the decline in imports during the war years.

The figures which I would like the House to consider in connection with our balance of payments and our balance of trade are as follows: For the year 1947 our exports were £39,500,000; our imports were £131,300,000; for that year on the balance of imports and exports there was a deficit of £91,800,000. As against that, crediting ourselves with invisible items, the balance of invisible items amounted to a figure of £62,000,000 approximately; so that, taking our exports, our imports and our invisible items into account for the year 1947, the unfavourable balance against us was a sum of £29,800,000. In the year 1948 our exports were £47,500,000, an increase of £8,000,000. Our imports were £136,700,000, an increase of something over £5,000,000. Now, our adverse balance of trade on these two figures of exports and imports amounted to £89,200,000. As against that we had to take credit for the invisible items of a figure of £74,000,000, leaving our unfavourable balance last year at £15,200,000. Therefore, during last year we had reduced our unfavourable balance of payments from a figure of £29,800,000 to £15,200,000, leaving a reduction of £14,600,000.

We endeavoured to check the trend as revealed by those figures by reference to the figures available during the first five months of this year as compared with the first five months of the year 1947. For the first five months of the year 1947, from January to May, the export figure was £13,000,000 and the import £40.82 million, leaving an unfavourable balance for those five months of £27.82 millions. For the first five months of 1948 our exports were £17.05 million and our imports were £63.91 million, leaving an adverse balance for those five months of 1948 of £46.86 million. For the year 1949 the exports for the first five months were £22.70 million; in 1947 the figure was £13,000,000; in 1948 £17.05 million and for the first five months of this year our exports were, as I have said, £22.70 million, an increase of £5,000,000 over the first five months of last year. Our imports during the corresponding period were: in 1947, £40.82 million, leaving for the first five months of that year an unfavourable balance of £27.82 million; for the year 1948 the imports were £63.91 million, leaving an unfavourable balance of £46.86 million; for the first five months of this year our imports were £53.81 million, leaving an unfavourable balance of £31.11 million. For the first five months of this year the unfavourable balance of trade has been reduced by £15.75 million as compared with the first five months of last year. In the first five months of this year the total exports were increased by £5.65 million and the total imports were reduced by £10.10 million as compared with the first five months of 1948. I do not want Deputies to think that we place any more reliance on those figures than we ought to place on them. We are entitled to say this, that if the trend indicated by those figures continues, as we hope it will continue, during the next few months and the next few years, then we will have gone very far to lessen the gap between our imports and exports and our payments out and our payments in.

Deputies will have noticed that in those figures there is one item of very considerable importance. Hidden away in the item that is referred to as "invisible items" there is, of course, the amount of money that comes into this country through the tourist industry. We hope that American visitors will come here in increasing numbers. Our American tourist trade is one of the ways in which we can earn dollars which are so necessary for us to earn, by reason of the necessity for importing goods from hard currency areas. Many of our kith and kin are coming from America this year and we hope they will come in increasing numbers. Some of the American visitors merely regard the Shannon airport as the French call it, pied-á-terre—a spot where they can rest and refresh themselves before they pass on to the Continent or elsewhere. However, even those visitors can be made the source of the earning of much needed dollars for us. We have also had an influx of visitors from Scotland, England and Wales and we hope that that trend will continue this year.

It is down this year.

The tourist trade from Great Britain, from America and other countries is one of the utmost importance to us. Our policy generally will be to foster and maintain that industry. Whatever our political differences may be with the Government in Great Britain, English people may be assured, as they have always been, of a good welcome in this country.

I have spoken on the general aspects of Government policy in connection with industrial productivity, increased agricultural productivity and the rectification of our balance of payments. I mentioned that underlying all that is a policy of constructive investment in our own economy, the realisation that the greatest asset we have in this country, the source of our potential wealth, the asset that is really relatively underdeveloped, is the land of Ireland. Our policy is directed towards increasing productivity and that work which will increase the well-being of all sections of our community, if the agricultural community increases in prosperity as it has done in the last 12 months.

After the land of Ireland, our Irish workers are the next most fruitful source of our wealth. We realise that and our policy, so far as increasing the national wealth is concerned, has been directed towards ensuring, so far as Government action can ensure it, that where work is provided for our workers it shall be of a character which is productive and which is not merely casual. The work that we shall give to our workers, who are one of the greatest sources of our wealth in this country, will be work which is productive in character and which adds to the wealth of the country. We have had frequent attacks and many complaints against the policy of the Department of Finance and the Minister for Finance for his parsimony in refusing money and the efforts of the Department to curb expenditure. So far as the present Minister for Finance is concerned, within reason, he has not refused and will not refuse money for productive work. We have had in this country for a long time the attitude that work or the provision of work for our people is an end in itself. That is not the policy that we have adopted or that we hope to bring to fruition. So far as Government policy can assure it, we are endeavouring to secure that Irish men and women will get, in their own country, decent work at decent wages and under good conditions and that the work that will be provided for them will not be merely casual but work of a productive character which will add to the dignity of the worker and the wealth of the nation. That is the general policy, so far as we are concerned, from the point of view of the provision of work for the unemployed here. Anything that can bring work to our unemployed people we will assist in every way, and endeavour to secure, so far as it lies within us, that that work will not be merely casual work, that it will not be a patchwork of emergency operations directed or carried on merely for the sake of giving work and palliating the emergency and not remedying it.

That policy of providing productive work and thereby increasing the wealth of the nation is the underlying principle of all Government policy. That policy is indicated by the high level of the capital expenditure which is provided in the Budget of this year. Most people regard the annual Budget which is introduced into this House as something which either imposes taxation or which they hope will decrease taxation. That portion of the Budget which deals with taxation, with the house-keeping element in our country's affairs, in fact, only brings within its scope something like one-fourth of the country's economic activity. That portion of the Budget is important in itself. You might refer to that portion as the Budget of expenses, the house-keeping portion. However, to get a comprehensive over-all picture of our national economy and activities you must look at the really important portion of the Budget which deals with the employment of public moneys, the capital schemes and capital expenditure. In this year's Budget the high level of capital issues indicates the extent to which our policy is being put into force, in the matter of providing work for the unemployed and those people who want work which will be of a productive character and which will add to the wealth of the country.

By means of the investment of this very large amount of money there can be no doubt that the national income of the country and the real wealth of the people will be increased. These figures have been given by the Minister for Finance on several occasions both in this House, in the Seanad and elsewhere. They have not yet, I think, been fully appreciated. For that reason I ask the leave of the House to refer to them very shortly so that the full amount of public moneys provided by the Government in pursuance of the Government policy to which I have adverted will be fully realised and appreciated. In the year 1946-47 about £2,000,000 was provided by the State for capital works. In 1947-48 that figure was raised to £5,000,000. In the year 1948-49, last year, the figure was something over £9,000,000. In the current year the State will, through the operation of the capital part of the Budget, if I may refer to it in that way, expend over £16,000,000 of public moneys, not including the moneys that will be spent on the land reclamation project. These moneys will be spent for the development of the telephone system, improved housing through the Local Loans Fund, for turf development, contributions to the Road Fund, for the development of electricity works, particularly rural electrification, and other works of that kind.

The expenditure of that large amount of money, over £16,000,000, not taking into account the moneys that will be spent either through the land reclamation scheme of the Minister for Agriculture or the Local Authorities (Works) Bill, must create work of a productive character. It will create assets for the community and will employ many of those persons at present unemployed. We have, as I have said, set out on a policy of productive employment, through the operation of the capital part of the Budget, through the capital moneys put at the disposal of these people for capital expenditure and the creation of new assets for the community. That money must be spent, as it is intended to be spent, on providing really productive work for our people. The scheme initiated and being put into operation by the Minister for Agriculture in connection with his land reclamation policy must give a very large amount of employment to the people. The Local Authorities (Works) Bill, which is now an Act, must also give employment to the people. I have already adverted to the increased figure of 7,000 people put into employment in this country in the last 12 months owing to increased industrial activity during that period. All this must indicate that the problem of unemployment is at least being tackled in a serious way and, if it is not in process of solution, at least serious efforts are being made to solve it in a serious way that will not be merely part of an unco-ordinated scheme of patchwork emergency works and funds.

I have given some sort of indication to the House of general Government policy, in so far as it concerns industry, agriculture and employment. So far as our political policy, our housing policy and our social policy are concerned, these have been dealt with in the course of the debates and discussions on the various Departmental topics relevant to these matters. But I should just like to mention one matter while we are speaking on the subject of unemployment. All these moneys will be spent throughout the country and must produce their effect on the unemployment problem. While we are providing these moneys for these various schemes in the hope that they will provide productive employment, create new assets for the community and increase national wealth, there is one matter that we must keep in mind. Again I insist that at the basis of Government policy is the development of agriculture. We must keep our agricultural workers producing and working on the land. While we are providing for rural unemployment schemes and while we are trying to get work in the cities through our manufacturing industries and other productive works financed through public moneys, we must always ensure that those who have been trained on the land, who have the tradition of the land, the agricultural workers who are really specialised workers, must not be invited or drawn away from the agricultural industry or from the necessity for producing more agricultural products which are so vitally necessary for the economy of this State.

I referred to a variety of these matters merely in passing. I have dealt with agriculture, industry and unemployment. These in a sense are material considerations, very vital and very important, but there is one other matter to which I wish to refer in conclusion. While we are concentrating on our material advancement, we should not, I think, neglect matters of the spirit. We should not neglect the effort to foster, and if necessary to create or recreate, a proper national tradition in art, and the necessity that there really is and the scope there is, for the application of art to industry, the revival of handcrafts and the old arts and crafts for which the Irish were so famous in years gone by. There is no money in this Estimate for the topic to which I am referring but as it is a matter of Government policy I think it is proper that I should refer to it here.

We have in this country great treasures of art. They are not sufficiently recognised or appreciated by our own people. We have in our own people here a people with an artistic tradition and artistic instincts. We have buildings which are architectural gems; we have architects who are trained here in this country and who can hold a place amongst any of the best architects in the world. We have lost, or nearly lost, the old crafts for which our people were famous in years gone by. We wish to revive these crafts and arts if we can. At all events we wish to encourage art and the application of art to industry. Accordingly, the Government has been fortunate in being able to secure the services of an outstanding personality to advise us and the people in these matters to which I have referred. We have engaged the services of an Irish-man who has won fame and distinction for himself and brought credit to his country, by his work in England as Professor of Fine Art in the Barber Institute in Birmingham—Professor Thomas Bodkin. We have through the courtesy of the Barber Institute been able to secure the services of Dr. Bodkin to advise us on certain aspects of our art, the application of art to industry and the development of the crafts generally, in connection with art development in Ireland. He has come here and I would ask any people who have any contribution to make towards a solution of his problems and the advancement of his labours to co-operate with him and assist him in every way they can. We have given him terms of reference to inquire into the condition of art in Ireland and have asked him to examine and report on the following matters:

1. Upon the constitution and working of institutions concerned with the arts in Ireland, in particular the National Museum and the National Gallery.

2. Upon the facilities available in Ireland for education in the arts both from the historical and from the practical aspects, at elementary to professional levels, with particular reference to the teaching of art and art history in the schools, the universities, the National College of Art and the provincial art schools.

3. Upon the existing relations between the arts and industry in Ireland, including such activities as technical training in craftsmanship, the provision of industrial designs and of appropriate advertisements for tourist development, and upon the steps that might be taken to arouse the public interest and the interest of manufacturing industries in the importance of design in industry.

4. Upon the advisability of establishing an organisation or organisations for the purpose of encouraging and spreading a knowledge of the arts in Ireland and of Irish culture in foreign countries.

5. Upon the advisability of establishing an organisation or organisations concerned with the preservation and acquisition by the State of sites and buildings of national importance and with the maintenance of aesthetic amenities in future building projects.

6. Upon the advisability or otherwise of extending such services as those referred to above and of co-ordinating their administration.

I feel that the inquiry is an essential one which will, when we have the report and are able to put the recommendations into practice, bring spiritual good and material advancement to this country. It will be inferred from the terms of reference that, not merely is there emphasis upon the cultural aspect of art and architecture, but that there are references to very essential and very important aspects of art in industry and the development of craftsmanship. If we can get proper designs for our industrial products, we can develop a tradition of art and a practice of craft amongst our people. It may be that along those lines we may find employment of a useful character for the people upon the western seaboard and in districts in the country where our people are living upon a bare subsistence level. Therefore this inquiry has both a spiritual and material aspect and is one which the Government were well advised to embark upon. I would ask the co-operation of all interested in it to assist Dr. Bodkin in his inquiry and in his work.

I move that the Estimate be referred back for re-consideration. The Taoiseach would probably regard it as discourteous if I were to suggest that his knowledge of the elementary principles of national economic policy was acquired within the past year or year and a half. If, however, we have, in courtesy, to assume that it is of longer standing than that, I can only say that we would never have suspected it. The philosopher Carlyle stated that it is one of the greatest tragedies of life when a man who is capable of knowledge dies in ignorance. I am glad that the Taoiseach has been spared that fate. If we can associate with his present knowledge of the principles of sound economic policy an enthusiasm for their practical application, then I think we will be able to feel that the long weary hours which we spent in the past trying to lead his Party along that road will have been rewarded. When, however, he was recounting the improvements which have taken place in the productivity of agriculture and industry and in the volume of our exports, I think he might in fairness have added that between 1947 and 1949 the world passed from the scarcities and difficulties of war time to the plenitude of peace.

In examining these figures one is far less impressed by the expansion that has occurred than appalled by its smallness. During the years of the war, during the period of difficulty, when a contraction of all economic activities was made inevitable by international conditions, we looked forward to the post-war years, to 1948 and 1949, when supplies difficulties, fuel difficulties and transport difficulties would all have passed, and planned and hoped to secure in those years an enormous expansion in the level of productivity maintained with difficulty during the war, an enormous expansion in the economic activity of our people and in the employment available here for them. If we have not got, and the figures show that we have not got, in those years results commensurate with the alteration in conditions, can we suggest that it may be due to the fact that many of the Taoiseach's colleagues have not yet acquired a sound knowledge of the elementary principles of economic policy which he has just enunciated?

I am proposing to the Dáil that they refer back the Taoiseach's Estimate for reconsideration and I am asking the Dáil to do that as an indication of disapproval of the manner in which the Taoiseach has discharged his functions during the past year. I do not propose to discuss the Taoiseach's functions as head of a small Department, even though it has been extended to include the Statistics Office, but rather his functions as head of the Government, as captain of the Ministerial team. If we have evidence of bad team work, then the Taoiseach cannot complain if we hold him responsible for that, and evidence of bad team work there has been in plenty, irrespective of what particular object the team has been trying to achieve or what particular game it has played, about which we have not got very reliable knowledge.

I have the utmost sympathy with the efforts of the Taoiseach to produce a good team out of the material provided to him. It is very hard to win a match with a team all the members of which want to play full-back and some of whom are not very familiar with the rules. Even assuming that he has been doing his best I want to point to the fact that effective action by the Government on any policy is impossible unless all the members of the Government understand what that policy is, approve of it, and support it in public. They must be all pulling in the same direction to get anywhere, and I assert that all the public indications suggest that that team work has been absent. The primary function of the Taoiseach as head of the Government is to keep his team together, to keep them pulling in the same direction, to ensure that, whatever their internal differences, they say the same things in public and endeavour to provide the public with a clear indication of Government policy and the Government viewpoint on important matters.

The Taoiseach, of course, claims that he has discharged that particular function properly. He said at a public meeting on Saturday last at Galway— and in this he was supported by the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs— that there were no divisions within the Government. "Even our opponents," he said, "will not now dare to suggest that there are divisions amongst them." I am going to dare to suggest it. Not that I pretend to have any inside information of the working of the Cabinet. I am going to suggest it because of the public declarations of Ministers and the consequences of these declarations on the Government's work as we know it. It may be that Ministers speak with different voices in public because they are agreed. I must admit that possibility. It may be that the conflicting statements which have appeared in the Press have come from men who are agreed in secret but who are speaking in different voices in public for purposes of deception. Certainly, if that is not the explanation then it is impossible to reconcile Ministerial assertions that there are no divisions amongst them with the vacillating course of their policy.

Dare I refer to the White Paper on social services? Venturing greatly, I will remind the Taoiseach that the Dáil was promised that declaration of Government policy 12 months ago. We have been assured that the delays in producing it are due to practical difficulties, that the Minister for Social Welfare is not at fault in that regard and that the Government have agreed upon the desirability of proceeding upon some lines towards the establishment of a comprehensive social welfare scheme. But Ministers have not been saying that with a unanimous voice and within the space of a few weeks, early this year, we had two Ministers speaking on the same subject almost simultaneously and expressing widely divergent views.

On 19th March the Minister for Finance addressed a meeting at Jury's Hotel, at which he said that social services are not good in themselves, and added that he wished he could get the opinion expressed at meetings where social services were claimed as being something good that they are not anything of the sort. That was the 19th March. The Minister for Social Welfare, reading that declaration of his Ministerial colleague in the Sunday Independent, rushed off to a meeting at Drogheda and, according to a report subsequently published, announced there, on 20th March, that it was part of the Government's policy to introduce a comprehensive social insurance scheme which would enable workers to provide, through the medium of a State insurance scheme, against risks which they were unable to provide against from their own resources. The Minister for Finance, who may have hoped by his earlier declarations to dissuade his colleagues from that course, then accepted the fait accompli and on 11th May again referred to the subject, this time in the Dáil. “When that measure,” he said—that is to say, the measure to which the Minister for Social Welfare referred—“is brought before the House it will be a matter demanding very serious consideration. I wonder whether in the end the exaction of very heavy contributions from the community for social services will be an advantage to them. I think they will probably find in the end that they are not getting as much in services.”

I do not know if Deputies will agree that these Ministerial declarations are to be taken as evidence of a conflict of view between the Minister for Social Welfare and the Minister for Finance. What we do know is that, whether there is evidence of a conflict or not, there is no evidence of action. Now, it may be that the absence of action is due to the practical difficulties to which the Minister for Social Welfare referred. It may be due to his desire to have such a perfect scheme that he delayed it in his Department until he was satisfied of its perfection or it may be because the conflict of viewpoint expressed in these public speeches by these two Ministers has reappeared in the Cabinet and that the scheme is begged down there.

I am sure that members of the Labour Party have noted, as we have noted, that the comprehensive social welfare scheme of the days of the Party's independence has shrunk to a State insurance scheme confined to persons engaged in employment under a contract of service. The exact significance of the changed designation may not be known until the long delayed White Paper has emerged but that a change has occurred has been evidenced by the emphasis which the Minister for Social Welfare is now putting upon the word "insurance" in the new title and his references to contracts of service.

I want, however, in this connection to ask the Taoiseach if there has been no division amongest them, if during the whole 18 months in which the Government has existed there has not been a single difference of opinion, as stated by the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, what is delaying the publication of the White Paper. I have asked that question before.

Again I want to remind the Dáil that I am not asking for the production of a Bill; I am not asking for the production of detailed proposals. What we have been promised and what we are asking for is a short, simple statement in plain language of what the Government has decided on. That is what the Minister for Social Welfare anticipated he could give to the Dáil 12 months ago. That is what we have not seen yet.

You were told it is coming.

We were told that 12 months ago.

Will you vote for it?

I will not commit myself on that. Unlike the Deputy, I prefer to see it before making up my mind. Last February, the Minister for Industry and Commerce announced that the Government was going immediately to acquire all public transport systems other than those of the Great Northern Railway. That announcement of the Minister for Industry and Commerce followed the now famous leakage of information as to the Government's decision to the Irish Independent. The announcement was made and nothing has happened since. It is true that the Dáil was asked to give a First Reading yesterday to a Bill which it may or may not see before October, but immediately following the announcement of the Government's decision, the Minister for Finance thought it was again desirable that he should make his position clear and explain in public his attitude to nationalisation. He said he had “an objection to nationalisation of services, for as long as people knew the public purse was behind them there was a tendency to extravagance, and there was no test of insolvency in the background.” Again, I suggest there is evidence of conflict or, at least, of a desire of Ministers to speak with different voices in public, perhaps hoping to hold, in support of the Government, people who do not agree upon aspects of policy upon which the Government has got to take decisions. If there is no conflict in this matter, if there is, as we have been assured, agreement amongst all members of the Government, agreement so complete that never once in 18 years was there a single difference of opinion amongst them——

All right. We will be here for 18 years. Do not worry.

The Minister for Posts and Telegraphs referred to the 18 months which have passed—then I think it is rather extraordinary that the announcement of the Minister for Industry and Commerce to acquire immediately the shares of these undertakings—the announcement had such an effect upon stock exchange transactions that dealings in these shares had to be temporarily suspended—the announcement that he thought it necessary to make in February last has not been followed by action until July and is apparently not going to be followed by further action earlier than October. I suggest that the announcement of the Minister for Industry and Commerce was made prior to his efforts to convince all his colleagues of the desirability of that course as one would naturally infer from the subsequent declaration of the Minister for Finance, and that the absence of division in the Government was due to the fact that the Government never got an opportunity to divide on this issue.

The Deputy might make that but it would be wrong.

The Taoiseach has spoken about industrial recovery. I am sure that the appreciates as well as I do that any significant development of industry here will arise, not so much as a direct consequence of steps taken by the Government, but from a general policy which creates conditions of confidence amongst those who will have the task of formulating and directing industrial enterprises. If there is one thing which will destroy confidence, stifle enterprise and create a climate hostile to progress it is evidence of Ministerial hostility to industrial development in general or industrial development through private enterprise in particular.

I say that the Taoiseach will agree with me in that because he has already made known his views in public and he made them known because his deputy, the Minister for Social Welfare, was indiscreet enough to go to a labour meeting in County Kildare and there attack, in a rather unfair way, those who are engaged in industrial enterprises here, describing them "as a small group of unscrupulous people lining their pockets thicker and thicker with money raked out of the pockets of the consuming public". That was on the 21st January, and so the Taoiseach, realising probably or being advised of the damage which was being done by this reckless declaration by a presumably responsible Minister, thought it necessary to repair it if he could, and so he made a speech describing the same group of citizens whom the Tánaiste had referred to as "a small group of unscrupulous people" in the following terms. This was on the 18th February. "This is an age in which the businessman has become a popular target for frequent criticism and, not seldom, uninformed chastisement". That was telling the Tánaiste where he got off. "Too often he is depicted not as an amiable and human personality, as they know him generally to be, but as a predatory hard-faced self-seeker differing little, save in dress, from the anti-social spectres alleged to have haunted Manchester before the first Reform Act" I wonder could we find an explanation of the difference between these declarations from the head of the Government and the deputyhead of the Government in the fact that the Tánaiste was addressing a Labour meeting in Kildare, while the Taoiseach was speaking after a dinner given to him by the Federation of Manufacturers in Dublin?

We have had the spectacle of Government policy changing in relation to aviation, the development of broadcasting services, mineral development and a multitude of other matters. The Taoiseach spoke here about the Government's appreciation of the need for economy and of their approach to the economic problems of this country on the lines of saving money for the purpose of spending it. I suggest that he knows quite well that when his Government came into office last year they went around looking for every project, every scheme, and for everything which Fianna Fáil had devised and for which Fianna Fáil might get the credit with the intention to tear it down if they could, and it was only after they had done the damage, and evidence of the reality of the damage was brought home to them by deputations of unemployed workers and public representatives, that they began to regret their hastiness, and then decided to reverse decisions and tried to repair again the damage they had needlessly caused. I mentioned here last week that miners in the County Wicklow were unemployed for no other reason except that the Government took a decision to suspend all work on mineral development and when they found they were wrong reversed their decision and decided to start it again but because of the delay the equipment which was required was not available and the men who are now drawing unemployment assistance at the local labour exchanges are paying the penalty for the Government's blunder in that regard.

We had the Minister for Finance coming to the House talking about the short-wave broadcasting station and expressing his regret that he did not get into office soon enough to stop the expense of erecting that station earlier. We had the Minister for Agriculture who, to pay him a deserved tribute, was always consistent in his opposition to these developments emphasising again the Government's delight that they were able to get into office in time to stop that development. Then the Government began to think twice, but apparently the need for avoiding divisions in the Government makes it impossible for Ministers to inform their colleagues of changes in plans of that kind, and so we find that, apparently, after the Government had decided to reverse its decision of scrapping the short-wave station and, instead, to proceed with it, the Minister for Lands, addressed a public meeting in Ballina boasting of the fact that the Government had saved the squandering of public money on the erection of a short-wave station, and within a few days of the Minister having made that speech in Ballina, the Government Information Bureau issues a formal announcement that the whole matter had been reconsidered and that the short-wave broadcasting was going to proceed.

I do not know what Deputies opposite feel concerning the decision to suspend the development of air services across the Atlantic. Probably they have not yet come round to the realisation that that was the greatest blunder of all made in the first rush of their decision last year to destroy Fianna Fáil projects. I know that decision was forced upon the Government by the Minister for Finance. He has, in fact, taken public credit for it. But I hope that I am rightly interpreting more recent declarations of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who has direct responsibility in matters of air development, as meaning that he at least is coming to realise the magnitude of their blunder and is trying to lead his colleagues back into a position in which that blunder can be remedied.

I do not know what the attitude of the Government as a whole is in relation to the provision of capital for industrial development and general economic expansion here. As I understood the Taoiseach's declaration here this afternoon, he does not anticipate that any scarcity of capital will limit our progress. A declaration made by the Minister for External Affairs in March, when an agreement relating to the exchange of workers was signed with Switzerland, would seem to imply that he shares that point of view. He declared then that we have all the money we require and need only men with the "know-how". But the Minister for Industry and Commerce does not know that, and one would think that, as the man charged in a special way with industrial development, he should be given the benefit of the advice of the Taoiseach and the Minister for External Affairs, because he has been speaking on the subject of industrial development in a manner that suggests that he contemplates proceeding here mainly with the aid of American and other foreign capital.

In New York, in January, he undertook that we would give all facilities possible within the scope of the Control of Manufactures Act to any manufacturer—that is, any American manufacturer—who wanted to retain control of his investment in Ireland. Later, speaking to the Galway Chamber of Commerce, he said that if the enterprise needed—that is to say, for establishing industries—was not forthcoming from our own nationals, the Government would not look with disfavour on the introduction of external capital and technique. I have no particular objection to the introduction of external capital into Irish industry, provided it brings with it no political complications. The Control of Manufactures Act was designed primarily to prevent industrial development here taking the form of the establishment of branch companies by English concerns, following the imposition of tariffs or other trade restrictions.

We must recognise that we have a problem which is not without duplication in other parts of the world, a problem which will always confront a small country seeking to develop its industries when it is in close geographical proximity to a great industrial State, in securing that the development which occurs will be of a kind beneficial to ourselves and of a kind that our citizens will always control. If there is to be any relaxation of the barriers which were imposed in 1933, barriers designed to ensure that industrial development here would take place in the main under the guidance of our own citizens, then it should be in consequence of a full examination and discussion of the problem here, and not because of any hasty decision of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, a decision which, I suspect, is induced by his irritation at the fact that progress during his first year of office has been less substantial than he hoped. We could always have got for more substantial industrial development if we had been prepared to proceed through foreign capital and under foreign direction, and we deliberately took the choice that we would prefer to go slowly but along the right lines rather than show immediate results of the wrong kind.

Perhaps, however, the most serious of the divergent viewpoints which have become evident amongst members of the Government was revealed last week by the Minister for External Affairs. I could multiply examples of lesser importance very considerably. I note, for example, that the Minister for Lands last week-end was promising the people of Galway the development of deep-sea fishing fleets. He obviously had not heard the speech the Minister for Agriculture made on the same subject in the Dáil a few weeks previously.

But, to go back to the more serious matter affecting the Minister for External Affairs, I want to direct the Taoiseach's attention to the fact that I endeavoured to find out from the Minister in the debate on his Estimate last week whether the line of policy that he followed at the recent Paris meeting of the Organisation of European Economic Co-operation was known to the Government and was approved in advance by the Government. This is not a matter upon which I want to retrace the ground I covered last week. The public were entitled to think they knew what was the policy of the Government in relation to the efforts of the British authorities to preserve the gold and dollar reserves of the sterling area which are in their custody, and the sterling exchange rates. They were entitled to assume that from the positive declaration made last year by the Taoiseach when proposing to the Dáil the ratification of the trade agreement then made.

I suggested last week that the Minister for External Affairs had taken at Paris a line which the British believed to be detrimental to the success of their efforts to protect these dwindling reserves or to preserve the value of sterling. I asked for an assurance that he was taking a line decided by Government policy and I asked, if that was so, to have some justification for that policy given to the Dáil. I got merely a jeer in reply. I got no information as to whether the Minister was acting with the knowledge and approval of the Government. I got no elucidation of the Government's viewpoint on these matters. The Dáil was told—I am quoting from column 1037 of No. 7 of the Parliamentary Debates, the concluding speech of the Minister for External Affairs—that I to a certain extent was advising them that "we should if necessary tie ourselves around the neck of Britain and the sterling area and sink with it".

I want to direct the Taoiseach's attention to the particular form of words which the Minister for External Affairs used and to ask him to elucidate to the Dáil what exactly the Minister meant by interpreting my remarks as advice to the Dáil that we should tie ourselves around the neck of Britain and the sterling area and sink with it. I do not know if the Taoiseach is satisfied that we should be represented at important international conferences dealing with finance by a Minister who has very little knowledge of the subject and who, when he addresses himself to it, has revealed a point of view which is certainly not in accord with that of the Minister for Finance, whom one would think would normally and properly be the person chosen as the Government delegate to such conferences. I want to know what he thinks of the desirability of having this State represented at international trade conferences by a Minister who knows so little about our external trade that he denied here in a most formal way that there was an extraordinary, almost a spectacular, increase in our imports from the United States of America in the first five months of this year as compared with last year. We know that this year we are financing our dollar imports by borrowings under the Marshall Plan. We know that any unnecessary expansion of our imports is adding to the burden of debt that we shall some time have to repay. I asked for an assurance from the Government that that matter was being considered and that the expansion of imports from the United States was, in their view, necessary and desirable to our economic development or to the maintenance of our standard of living. I want some explanation other than the denial that it took place at all because that, I take it, was the significance of the rather confused figures which the Minister for External Affairs read out when concluding the debate.

I ask the Taoiseach to realise that, as a result of all these conflicting statements and divergent policies of Ministers, there is real confusion in the public mind, a confusion which is holding up our progress and a confusion that will not be removed unless some clear and categorical statement can be given of the Government's policy upon matters on which Ministers at the present time appear to be divided.

That is not the only function of the Taoiseach. He has not merely to keep his team together and pulling in the same direction, and not merely has he to take responsibility when they do not pull in the same direction, but he also has to see that they do their work and that whatever policy the Government is agreed upon is carried out and that whatever impediments to its fulfilment may exist, because of divergent views amongst Ministers or because of red tape or personal laziness, are removed.

The Taoiseach boasted at Galway that the Government had completed its ten-point programme, the programme which constituted the basis upon which it was formed. Now this is a fair occasion upon which to ask the Taoiseach why it is that so many of the ten points in that programme have been forgotten. I am quite sure he will not try to pretend that they have been fulfilled. They were to reduce the cost of living. It has not been reduced. The utmost that the Minister for Finance would undertake in his Budget statement of this year was to express a hope that the cost of living would not increase in the coming 12 months. There was to be—and Labour Deputies will remember this point because they probably were responsible for its insertion—taxation of unreasonable profits. The only alteration which has occurred in the tax law since this Government came into office is a reduction in income-tax. Did they intend that heading in the 10-point programme to convey a reduction in income-tax? Did their supporters and followers throughout the country read it to mean that? Do they accept that that particular point in the programme has been fulfilled?

I have already referred to the fact that the comprehensive social welfare scheme has not emerged and, judging by the declarations of the Minister for Social Welfare, has shrunk from a comprehensive social welfare scheme to a State insurance scheme. The council of education was another one of the ten points. Does it exist? Will any Minister attempt to suggest that it has been formed in secret and is meeting in secret and that only the Dáil does not know about it? The national drainage plan was another point. Has anything been done in fulfilment of the national drainage plan except to carry out the one scheme that was ready to begin when the change of Government took place?

The Taoiseach said that the Government is spending a great deal of money upon capital projects and that, of course, the expenditure of that money must have some results. Of course, it must. But let us tabulate the results to date for the purpose of asking ourselves the question whether we are entitled to be satisfied with the results? I put in the background of the figure I shall give the Dáil now the fact that there were employed on turf production alone in the year 1917 no less than 15,000 workers on the 1st July of that year. The total number of people employed on 1st July, 1949, under all the heads under which capital is being expended was 13,100. In the Land Commission—where the number employed on 1st July this year was 600 below the number employed on 1st July last year —in afforestation activities, in construction and maintainance of the telephone system, in the building of the power stations of the Electricity Supply Board, in the completion of the rural electrification scheme and by Bord na Móna the total number employed on 1st July this year by all these organisations and under all these heads was 13,100.

The capital expenditure to which the Taoiseach referred is undoubtedly having some results and we can attribute to it the fact that there are 13,000 employed in these activities. Far be it from me to suggest that any one should discourage the Government from proceeding further along these lines. What I want the Government to know is that their achievement to the 1st July in promoting activities of that kind has still left in rural Ireland a debit in employment which will have to be wiped out before even the level of 1947 is achieved.

We know that 40,000 emigrated last year. We know that emigration has not stopped. There was no single subject upon which the Parties now comprising the Government Coalition waxed more eloquent when they were seeking support from the people than the subject of emigration; and, rightly so, because any Government, any administration, any political Party must have its approach to the basic economic problems of this country judged by the effectiveness and genuineness of its plans for curtailing emigration. But what do we get from these parties when they find themselves in a position to form a Government? We get a Commission on Emigration, and that is all. Will the Taoiseach attempt to say, or any Minister, that there has been behind any act of any Department which they control the sole purpose of contracting the outflow of emigrants or are we to understand that all effective action to that end stands suspended until this commission has reported? We know that the Minister for Social Welfare, in his earlier optimism, anticipated that the commission might report in three months. To-day, he informs the Dáil that he does not know when they will report.

I do not think that many Deputies opposite can be satisfied with that position and they will join with me in saying to the Government that rather than spend our time doing nothing in relation to this acute problem of emigration until this commission chooses to report, we would sooner scrap the commission altogether and get down to practical action, even though the ideas that would occur to individuals might not necessarily be related one to another. We could at least get something moving in the rural areas from which the outflow of emigration is strongest.

I must confess that I have been disappointed with the extraordinary and unexplained delay of the Government in producing its proposals in relation to transport. I criticised the Minister for Industry and Commerce for his inactivity last year. I went so far as to allege that that inactivity was predesigned to produce a financial crisis in our main transport organisation which would enable him, for political purposes, to represent it as bankrupt. When he appointed an expert to advise him, I felt at least that he would take action at once when the report of that expert was submitted to him. He did not. Months after the expert's report had been published there was still no knowledge of what the Government intended and there was a great deal of "marking time" in transport developments. Subsequently the Minister issued a brief statement which indicated that, in regard to the most important question of all, he was not accepting the expert's recommendation. However, that brief indication of the intention to introduce legislation here was not followed by any action until yesterday. Yesterday, we got to know the title of the Bill which has not yet been drafted and which the Dáil may not see for months yet.

I do not know whether members of the Government think that we in this country have got time to waste in facing up to these urgent economic and administrative problems of ours. We have only now emerged from a war situation. Most of our problems were accentuated or created by that war situation but the time is running on and we cannot afford to proceed in this leisurely manner in producing proposals for dealing with them that the Dáil could consider. Every time that I have ventured to refer to transport matters here, the only retort from the Government Benches was some abusive personal reference, generally to the former chairman of Córas Iompair Éireann who is not here to defend himself. I think the time has come when the Government should understand that they will not be taken seriously in their assertions that they have a transport policy, unless they can produce something more solid than this tendency towards personal abuse.

In so far, therefore, as the Taoiseach has a second function of keeping his Ministers active in producing the results which they themselves thought to be practical in their ten-point programme upon which they stated their Government was formed, I say that he must be censured by the Dáil because there is no evidence that he has succeeded.

He has also a third function, I submit, and that is as head of the Government to protect democratic institutions and their reputation from unfair attack, particularly the function of ensuring that his Ministers do not, by their conduct, seek to bring these institutions or the normal democratic practices under our Constitution into contempt. I feel sure that the Taoiseach is himself disgusted by the tactics which some of his Ministers and supporters in this House resort to in political controversy. I feel sure that he realises that there is no useful national purpose served in implying that the members of any Administration elected by the Irish people are likely to be, in any circumstances, personally corrupt or to allow their Departments to be administered in a corrupt manner. Is it not about time that the tactics which may have won a few votes for individual Government Deputies before the election when their sole concern was to get votes irrespective of the damage they might do to the national dignity or prestige of our political procedures, should be dropped?

There was, of course, in the first days after the Government came into office, a number of suggestions, particularly by the Minister for Agriculture and I think also by the Minister for Social Welfare, that an examination of Government files had revealed that allegations of corruption were justified and they promised that there would be revelations. There have been no revelations and there can be no revelations. Nobody knows better than the Ministers in charge of individual Departments, who have now been there for 18 months, that all that rotten suggestion that there was some maladministration under their predecessors will not bear investigation. Therefore, I ask them, because of the desirability of promoting amongst our people respect for political institutions, for the establishment of proper practices in the day-to-day politics of the country, to drop these tactics. I was disgusted to see them reappear after they had 12 months in which they had to carry the heavy and important responsibilities of members of the Government. I was disgusted to see them resorting to the same tactics again, the same mean suggestions.

The Minister for Agriculture spoke at Cavan and endeavoured to imply that when the Fianna Fáil Government was in office nobody could get an old age pension except they were a member of a Fianna Fáil club or could get the influence of a club working on their behalf. Do the members of the Government or their supporters think it is desirable that the public of this country should be led to believe that, under any circumstances, political influences can determine the award or the withholding of an old age pension? Ministers know, and most Deputies know, that the old age pension code was framed so as to exclude completely the possibility of Ministerial influence being used in the determination of old age pension cases. If there is a suggestion of maladministration under that code it is a suggestion against the honour of the public officials who are entrusted with that task and not against the individuals who from time to time have held the position of Minister in that Department. Do the Deputies opposite not realise that, in order to eliminate a possibility of there being any suspicious created by their remarks in that regard, the Minister for Local Government endeavoured to ensure that Deputies would not even make representations to his Department except in a formal way and in writing?

Or through the Fianna Fáil club.

That, of course, is a repetition of the suggestion which I have just said is contemptible. Apparently, I have touched a sore spot there. There are some Deputies opposite who are not going to give up that weapon. The Minister for Education, who spoke recently at Ennis, suggested that in the administration of the Military Pensions Act there was a political preference for the supporters of Fianna Fáil.

Of course there was.

What does Deputy O'Higgins know about it?

I know there was victimisation.

If that is so, is it not the Government's responsibility to expose it? My challenge to the Government is that if they are not content to rely on insinuations, they have the power to expose the truth of these allegations if they are true. Why do they not do that? I challenge them now to set up a formal investigation into the allegations made by the Minister for Agriculture about old age pensions, by the Minister for Education about Army pensions, or by any other Minister in relation to any matter. We welcome the fullest investigation. I say that if you continue these allegations while denying those against whom they are directed an opportunity of having them investigated, it is the meanest thing you have ever done. Is that clear enough?

Let me say this. The Minister for External Affairs and his colleague, the Minister for Health, are probably the worst offenders in this regard. Does the Taoiseach think it is good national policy or that it served any useful purpose for the Minister for Health to allege against a very honourable member of this Party that he was a Quisling and a traitor? Does he know that the Minister for External Affairs in the by-election campaign in West Cork spoke about steps taken by the previous Government to suppress crime as if the Government themselves were the criminals? We can rake over old fires as well as anybody else but I suggest that we should try to establish here some higher standard of decency and keep to it. If the Taoiseach will make an effort in that direction, an effort to get his own colleagues to conform to some elementary standards of decency in political controversy, we shall gladly co-operate with him.

Including the "Dáil Reporter" in the Irish Press.

Including everything. I know that, in raising some of these matters, I am merely exposing myself to a tirade somewhat similar to that which was delivered here last week by the Minister for External Affairs but I have hopes that the Taoiseach does not suffer from the paranoic tendency to regard all criticism of himself as evidence of personal animosity. I have hopes that he will take criticism in a somewhat saner fashion. I know that he has in public represented all criticism of his Government as a form of obstruction. I deny emphatically that Government business has been obstructed here on any occasion since this Government came into office. I say that, time and again, when the Government Whips came to us and pleaded consideration of urgency or any other good reason why the passage of Bills should be facilitated, they were facilitated. Nobody knows that better than the Taoiseach and it is most unfair of him, in a week in which special facilities had been given to the Government to clear up business towards the end of the session, to allege that Government business was being obstructed.

We never regarded criticism of any kind as obstruction. If the allegation is that business could have been disposed of here with greater expedition, I ask Deputies who were in the Dáil on Friday last to recall what happened when the Minister for Local Government was dealing with the Housing Bill. He rose six times to wind up the debate and on each occasion he was prevented from speaking by the fact that Deputies sitting behind him rose to take part in the debate. Were those Deputies causing obstruction? Most of them added very little to the debate. In any event anything they said was probably going to be said by the Minister for Local Government. As a result of their intervention, an unnecessary intervention, the debate was protracted for a much longer period than the Whips on either side had anticipated. If there has been obstruction of the discussion on any Estimate, it is not attributable to the Deputies on this side. I challenge the Minister to get his Central Statistics Office to calculate the number of Deputies who spoke in these debates and the length of time they occupied and to see whether there were more speakers occupying a longer time from behind Ministers than in front of them. It was most unfair of the Taoiseach to allege that there was obstruction from this side of the House because, if he did not know it himself, a casual inquiry to his Parliamentary Secretary would have informed him how often and how generously the Government was facilitated this year and last year in the discharge of the business of the House.

I do not wish to protract this discussion any longer now. I do not believe that what the Taoiseach and the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs said last week, that there never has been disagreement in the Government, is true. I think if it is true, it must be an appalling Government. Certainly I can say of the Fianna Fáil Government that we had many disagreements, and even protracted and heated discussions, before we emerged at the ultimate decision which we announced to be our policy. Any body of men who hold views strongly will, of course, argue their point of view and only gradually relinquish it as the weight of argument from some other quarter convinces them that they are incorrect. We are not children to believe fairy stories of that kind. Even the Taoiseach reinforced that by telling us that if the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs left the Government he would have to resign. I hope the audience at the meeting fully understood the reason for that announcement.

What did the ex-Taoiseach say.

If there is no evidence of division in the Government, there is certainly no evidence of division in the Dáil. The Taoiseach was inclined to disparage the Party Whips for one failure. I want to congratulate them. There never has been since the Dáil was established such a perfectly-machined majority as we have in this Dáil. Most of them dare not open their mouths. Those who do dare to express any criticism of the Government have reason to repent of that very quickly, and to prove their repentance in the Division Lobby.

The only member of a Government Party who ever dared to take an independent attitude was shot out of his Party so quickly that nobody even saw him go. At the end of the session, I want to pay that tribute to the Party machine of the Coalition groups and their Whips. They have certainly flogged their Deputies into obedience and I am quite certain their flogging will produce the defeat of this motion. It will be defeated because of the rigid iron-bound discipline they have established, and not because many Deputies opposite do not believe the criticism I have expressed here is well-founded.

Deputy Lemass has covered a considerable amount of ground. I have no intention of going over that ground nor have I any intention of approaching this Estimate in the way he has approached it. I was influenced to a large extent by the speech of the Taoiseach. The speech which he made this evening was the speech of a statesman. It was delivered in balanced and even tones. Many of us who had the honour of knowing him before he became Taoiseach were aware of his abilities, but I think we all have seen a very substantial increase in the stature of the Taoiseach during the past 16 or 17 months. I was very pleased that he should introduce his Estimate to-day with the facts and figures which he gave us. Those facts and those figures indicate that there has been an improvement in the national situation over the past 16 months and the Taoiseach justifiably referred to statistics to establish that improvement.

I have, however, as a representative of a city constituency, a particular responsibility for and a particular interest in three matters which, I indicated to-day, I would raise on this Estimate. I am concerned with the matter of housing, and housing has loomed large in our discussions over the past 18 months. From figures given by the Minister for Local Government recently, it appears that the number of houses built in the Dublin City area during the past six months was 600, and we need approximately 25,000 houses to solve the very serious housing situation in Dublin City. I want to say to the Taoiseach that this Government will be judged very largely in the City of Dublin by the efforts it makes to solve the housing problem. We have the Department of Local Government dealing with it, we have the Dublin Corporation dealing with it, and I want to suggest to the Taoiseach that one of the matters that he must immediately consider with his Cabinet as a whole is whether or not the very serious housing problem in Dublin City can be solved by a continuation of the machinery now available. I suggest to him that it is a matter of the highest policy on which the Government may stand or fall in Dublin City at the next election and that it must receive the full consideration of the Government as a whole.

People in my own constituency and in every constituency in Dublin City are living in horrible conditions; and they have been living in those dreadful conditions for many years. We promised them that we would direct all our efforts to the abolition of that slum problem and to the building of decent houses for them, and I almost feel ashamed, after being 18 months in this House, to go back and make excuses to these people for not doing the things we promised we would do. Just as the late Minister for Local Government was personally concerned about this problem, the present Minister has every sympathy with the unfortunate people who have to live in those conditions. But, as I have said before in this House, sympathy is not sufficient. We want more than sympathy.

I want the Taoiseach to declare the housing situation in Dublin City an emergency situation to be dealt with by emergency measures under the direct control of the Government so that the houses we need for our people may be made available at the earliest possible opportunity. The Taoiseach will understand that every Deputy representing the City of Dublin, including himself, has those conditions brought to his notice day after day by unfortunate people whom it should be our duty to assist. I want the Taoiseach to give to that problem all the energies that he personally can make available and that his Government can make available to solve it. If we can make decent progress with it within the next two years, and certainly before the period of the next election, none of us will have any hesitation in going before the electorate for election to this House again.

The Taoiseach has pointed out that there has been an increase in industrial employment and that there must be an increase in employment in the rural areas because of the fact that £16,000,000 has been made available by the Government for capital expenditure in the country. I agree that there must be an increase in employment provided in that way. But the difficulty in regard to employment is that there are growing up in every house in this city young boys of 16, 17, 18 and 19 years of age and their parents are anxious to get them some employment. There is no employment available and those fine types of young Irish manhood have no alternative but to take the emigrant ship or to take a Great Northern Railway train and cross the border and join up in the British armed forces or endeavour to find employment in Great Britain, America, or elsewhere. It is a serious situation that those fine young energetic people should have to leave the country because employment is not available for them. They can only be employed in industry of one kind or another. The employment that is and that will be available in rural areas is of no use to them. Industrial employment must be provided.

I think the Minister for Industry and Commerce has approved 104 new industries and that 24 new industries have started. That progress does not appear to have affected the unemployment situation very much. The Government, with this new industrial development authority will have to consider whether industries directly run by the State and directly under State control cannot be established for the purpose of giving employment to the types of people I have mentioned. There is a responsibility on each of us and a very serious responsibility on the Taoiseach and the Government.

I agree with what the Taoiseach has said with regard to the cost of living, that to a large extent it is affected by the burden of taxation and that unless we increase the national wealth we will not be able to reduce that burden. I agree with that principle but a considerable number of items that enter into the cost of living are items which from the time of production to the time of sale to the consumer increase in price beyond all bounds. The suggestion I have to make to the Taoiseach, and which appears to be the only sensible solution, is that the whole question of profits in distribution must be considered and that where those profits are excessive they must be controlled and reduced and where there is unnecessary handling and unnecessary people or agents brought into distribution they must be eliminated. In that way a substantial reduction can be effected in the cost of living.

I said that I would speak on this Estimate for the purpose of drawing attention to those three items. As I know there will be many items discussed on this Estimate, I feel I should not delay the House or endeavour to lessen the time that may be available for other Deputies to speak. I would, however, say, in conclusion, that if the Taoiseach and the Government can get down to a serious consideration of these problems and if they will avail of all the help they can get in this House from Deputies who support them and from Deputies who oppose them, I am quite sure they will be enabled to make appreciable improvement as far as these matters are concerned.

As I said at the beginning, I was very pleased with the restrained and statesmanlike way in which the Taoiseach introduced this Estimate and I hope that the latter part of Deputy Lemass's speech will not induce the Taoiseach to hit back in the way that type of speech could be attacked.

There has been reference to the way in which the recent debate on a Bill introduced by the Minister for Local Government was conducted. Every Deputy who took part in that debate put forward his suggestions constructively. I hope that on this debate Deputies will put forward constructive suggestions and that their criticisms and suggestions will be accepted by the Government in the spirit in which they are offered. However, I am very pleased that we have seen the second Estimate introduced by the Taoiseach and that we have been able to see from the figures he has given the substantial improvements that have been effected during the 18 months the Government of which he is the head has been in office.

I listened with the greatest interest to the Taoiseach trying to disentangle his original policy and indicate some clear road for the people to follow, and I notice that his policy as now developed is to a very large extent a compliment to the policy pursued by Fianna Fáil. In almost every single respect he has gone back and adopted the policy practised by Fianna Fáil, especially the industrial policy. Unfortunately, during the period in which that policy was not acceptable to the Government, which was the first year of the Coalition Government, quite an amount of harm was done in this country which will take a considerable time to repair. As far as I see one of the greatest injuries done to this country was the loss of confidence created by the original policy that was pursued by the Government. Young people began at once to think of taking ship in the belief that the future here was hopeless. It was largely due to that fact that emigration is so abnormally high. One would think that in a county like Meath, which is sparsely populated, emigration in the ordinary course of events or in normal times would hardly be noticeable. Unfortunately, that is not the case. In every town or village, with the one exception of Navan, it is quite noticeable that emigration is taking place. That was one of the greatest mistakes made by this Government. I know that it is due to certain, perhaps, peculiar circumstances, certain intentions that did not materialise. That might explain a good deal of the difficulties in which the country now finds itself.

It is not possible to please two peoples. In the early stages here every effort was made to please the British Government. We had continual visits to the British Government, many unnecessary, and quite a number of visits from them. We had the Minister for Agriculture expressing the greatest sympathy for their misery and hunger and telling them that he would choke them with eggs.

"Drown them with eggs" was the expression used.

For some reason or another that has all disappeared. He even went so far as to say—and it was definitely stated—that industrial development would not proceed at the pace or on the basis that Fianna Fáil had proceeded with it. Everything was done at that period to try and satisfy the British people, or perhaps I should say the British Government. Then suddenly there was a complete change. In fact, everything has now changed. We are now going to develop the peat industry. We have had a good deal of talk here in this House about turf. A new Bill has been introduced which I have not read yet, but the development of turf is to be revived.

Good turf.

I think Deputy Spring will agree with me that that is a very excellent thing.

Good turf is an excellent thing.

As long as we produce turf here we will get cheap coal from the British, but once we begin to talk about it as filth and as being a useless fuel—we are doing away with it now at £1 a ton—the British will increase coal prices. They are good business people. The boot is now on the other foot, and so we are going to develop the peat industry and supply very excellent fuel to the people. In my opinion the turf that is lying in the Phoenix Park is the very best of turf. I went to the trouble of looking at it. I hope that, in the next six months, the people in the City of Dublin will not be in the position that they will want it badly. There is nothing wrong whatever with the turf that I saw in the park. I notice that it is now going down the country. The type of policy that was pursued by the Government about turf must have given a headache to the Taoiseach. I had to admire the way that he wriggled out of it, but being the good lawyer that he is he was able to wriggle out of it. He must be convinced now that the policy the Government are pursuing with regard to turf is largely the policy of Fianna Fáil, and that it is the right one to pursue for this country.

Will you get people to buy the turf?

I got some people to buy it.

The public will not buy it.

I am sorry for the public. Perhaps the reason is that they have too much coal. If coal gets any dearer, people may be very glad to buy the turf.

Why did not your Party give the people good turf during the emergency?

I suggest to Deputy O'Reilly that he had better ignore the interruptions.

Following on what Deputy Cowan said I rose mainly for the purpose of discussing housing. On that question I am sure that the Taoiseach is doing his best but at the same time I think a good deal more could be done. I really thought when the late Minister for Local Government —God be good to him—went over to England and spent a week there learning how to build houses, or, perhaps I should say studying the organisation of building houses, that when he came back houses would go up like mushrooms. But really they did not. In my opinion the position in regard to housing is worse than it was. Everything possible should be done to provide houses for the people.

I think I mentioned before that I have noticed quite an abnormal amount of private building going on. Private houses seem to be going up rapidly. When the Estimate for the Department of Local Government was before the House, I mentioned that on a 40-mile journey from Clonee, which is on the borders of the County Meath, to Dublin, I noticed that there had been only one labourer's cottage completed, and that that was under an old scheme. I may tell the House that the area I refer to is a very thinkly populated one. On the same journey I noticed that four or five new private houses had been almost completed. The walls for three houses for workers were up in the town of Trim, but I could see only one labourer's cottage that had been completed. The delay in providing houses is one of the causes of emigration. I know five, six or seven young people who emigrated because they could not get houses and because the conditions under which they were living were impossible. We have as many as nine and sometimes 14 people living in the one house. I think it is essential that every step possible should be taken to see that that position is corrected.

I listened to the Taoiseach give some figures relating to the deficit in the balance of trade payments for the years 1947 and 1948. He indicated how high the deficit was and how much we were purchasing from outside. I think he wanted to indicate that ours was a spendthrift policy. I think that is not right or fair. In our time there was a world war that went on for six years. Goods simply could not be procured during that period. As soon as the position became easier, householders and others made every effort to replace articles which had become worn out during the war. I wonder whether the Taoiseach is right in the way that the looks at this problem. When goods are purchased they must be paid for in some way or other. If we had not made big purchases of raw materials from outside it would mean that our factories would not be working. The bulk of our payments went for raw materials. It was better that we should purchase those raw materials than have our factories idle. As far as I could gather, the Taoiseach seemed to want to indicate that the position which was created was a sign, perhaps, of a want of economy, or perhaps a sign of bankruptey. I do not think that is the way to look at the matter at all. The Taoiseach told us of all the new factories that had been erected. I do not remember the number he mentioned. I still doubt if it is a healthy sign to see the figures relating to the deficit in trade going down. I think that if these deficits were higher it would be an indication that our factories were functioning properly unless, of course, they were able to carry on with supplies of native material.

I think that the Party opposite did a good deal of damage in their time to the tourist traffic, and that, if it had been developed as it should have been last year and the year before, the deficit in the balance of payments would be a small one. I think we are entirely wrong in not trying to cater better for tourist traffic. We have not ourselves any great supplies of raw materials, and, therefore, we are going to find it difficult to develop our industries. I do not know that tariffs are going to be of much use to our industries. When Britain gets stronger some day she will be in a position to control supplies of raw materials to this country. She generally sells these to other countries at about 20 per cent. above the price at which she sells them to her own nationals. I think tariffs are often deceptive in their effects, and that if we had some system whereby there was a prohibition on the quantities of foreign goods that could come in here it would be better than tariffs.

At the same time I think that the tourist industry should be developed. We have huge numbers of our people in other countries. In our time, we did our best to set up an air service that would bring them here on holidays. I think it was very foolish on the part of the Taoiseach to have sold the aeroplanes that we had purchased. People have to travel by ship now. I think that if the air services had been kept on and developed they would be the means of earning a lot of dollars for us now. They would also be the means of keeping us in more intimate touch with our people abroad. It is my opinion that we should try to cultivate the greatest possible intimacy with our empire abroad, because we have a fairly strong empire abroad. It has not any ships or guns, but it is a powerful empire, and if we could induce more communication with those people we would be a lot stronger and we would not have to be scratching our heads to know what to do next. If we had these people behind our backs we could have more courage and face things with more determination. Obstacles would not be surrounded with so many entanglements.

We have what is possibly the last big question between Great Britain and this country to deal with, and that will not be solved easily.

The Deputy must not deal with the solution of it on this Vote.

I just wanted to mention it. From the point of view of industry, apart altogether from politics, if we had more communication with our people abroad, if we had more of them moving backwards and forwards, we would be a good deal better off. Many of those people are industrialists in other countries and they could give us a great deal of useful knowledge. It is a pity that we are not able to keep in touch with them. Of course, we have repentance at the last moment; we have the short-wave wireless station being set up. That in itself will help to keep us in touch with our friends and relations abroad and in that way I believe we can do a great deal for this country.

I am a bit puzzled over statements made about the cost of living. Quite a number of people speak to me about it. Any person who has a family will realise that all this talk about the cost of living is very deceptive. We have sugar on the ration and yet you can buy sugar at 7½d. on the black market. I do not think that that should be allowed. I think the rationing system was a great system and was very economic. Now that the 7½d. black market sugar can be got there will be a lot of blackberry jam and stuff like that to be made. Really the cost of living has gone up although it is not indicated in the cost-of-living index figure.

Many people who depend on the cost-of-living figure for bonuses are deceived. You pay 7½d. for your sugar and you can also buy tea—it is, there to be bought. If somebody eats up the ration the householder has to get more. That is a wrong system and any normal Government would not agree to it. Whether or not this is a source of revenue, I cannot say, but the Government should do something about it. It is unfair to the community that any shopkeeper can sell sugar out of a sack at 4½d. and later dip the shovel into the same sack and sell it at 7½d. There is something really wrong about that and it should be stopped.

To my amazement, listening to the Taoiseach, I discovered he did not avail of this opportunity to express any opinion as to the possibility of a near solution to Partition.

Already we had a full debate on that.

The other night, when speaking here, I was upbraided by the Minister for External Affairs because the former Taoiseach, when introducing his Estimate, did not utter a single word about Partition.

As Minister for External Affairs?

The former Taoiseach was also Minister for External Affairs.

He was Minister for External Affairs as well as Taoiseach, and he had two Votes.

I think I am entitled to make some comment on the lack of policy on the one national objective remaining. Having listened to the Minister for External Affairs and the Taoiseach, it really looks to me as if there has been no policy formulated by this Government regarding this problem.

We had a full debate on that matter on the Vote for the Department of External Affairs.

And the Deputy spoke at great length on it.

It is the Taoiseach's responsibility, as captain of the ship. It would be much easier for us in the North, on each side of the Border, to fight this evil if we were encouraged by the formulation of some definite policy which would guide us.

This is merely a duplication of the debate.

Perhaps it is easier to play politics, inter-Party politics, without a policy than with one. I would like to assure the Taoiseach that so far as the conditions of the people in the North are concerned, political and religious discrimination are becoming intensified.

I think the Deputy heard me say that it is a duplication of the debate to discuss Partition on this Vote. There was a lengthy debate quite recently in which the Deputy participated.

I think the sooner that we down here realise that the political vitality of our people in the North is being slowly but surely sapped, the better.

I think the Deputy should realise what the Chair implied—that this matter is not in order.

All right. I merely say that as regards Partition, the sooner we realise that time is not on our side, the better.

I listened carefully to the Taoiseach and was very pleased with his remarks. I listened later to Deputy Lemass when he slandered Deputies on this side of the House. We voted for the Government and the Taoiseach 18 months ago because the last Government failed to do what we wanted them to do. How many times did we put down motions looking for increases for our old people? How many times did we ask for some relief for the distress that existed then in our country? The Fianna Fáil Party, led by one man, for 16 years ignored all our requests. This is a Government of a better type. It is a democratic Government. We can criticise freely and express our views. For 16 years we had one Party in office, led and said by the one individual. To-day there is freedom for all Parties who comprise the Government and all Parties in the Government work as one. Improvements have been made in the last 18 months. Increases have been given to the old age pensioners and to the widows and the orphans. Those increases have come about as a result of the change of Government. I am proud to belong to that Government.

Some part of the ten-point programme has been carried out despite what the Opposition says. Deputy O'Reilly talked about the cost of living and said that it had not gone down. If this Government had not removed the taxes imposed under the Supplementary Budget introduced by Fianna Fáil on beer, tobacco and the cinemas what would the cost of living be now? The Standstill Orders were removed. They might not have been removed had Fianna Fáil remained in office. We are carrying out the promises we made to the people who elected us. Fianna Fáil slandered us during that election. When the general election was over but the election had still to take place in Kilkenny they indulged in low, mean tactics against us. The people whom I represent in Wexford are quite satisfied with the progress we are making.

Mention was made of turf. Had Fianna Fáil remained in office only machine-won turf would have been available to-day. Deputy O'Reilly said the price of coal was due to the fact that we are not producing turf. Why did Fianna Fáil import coal from South Africa and other countries? It has been deteriorating in the dumps in the Phoenix Park all the time. That was wilful waste. Our Government had to sell the timber at half its value rather than let it rot.

Workmen's compensation has been increased. There will be more increases in social services generally when the White Paper is introduced. Deputy Lemass is worried about the comprehensive social welfare scheme. We are not worried about it. We know that it will come. It was Deputy Lemass's Government that turned down the bishop's proposal. His Party did not want social services. Deputy Dr. Ryan said the Government then could not afford more in old age pensions. Has the present Opposition forgotten all that? If we were as long in office as they were and had done so little during our 16 years as they did I would be ashamed to get up and talk as they do. They had a majority for 16 years. Why did they not do in their 16 years all that they want us to do in our 16 months?

Who is worrying about the short-wave station? Certainly the workingclass people are not worrying about it. Deputy O'Reilly talked about black marketing. The bacon is back in the shop windows now for sale to the people. Where was it when Fianna Fáil were in office? It was under the counter. They allowed that black market to go on.

I think that the Opposition could give us more co-operation. The Opposition Deputies seem to have been told to prolong the debate here. They even prolonged the debate on the Works Bill. Deputy Lemass spoke for two hours here to-day. He said the Government Deputies were holding up the business. It is not a crime for any man to express his view. That is democracy. There can be no democracy under a dictatorship. The County Management Act will go and local government will be given back into the hands of the people. That will do away with the increase that had to be made in the rates to pay the salaries of county managers. That was a burden upon the ratepayers. Fianna Fáil never adverted to that. I am a member of a local authority and I know what is happening. Deputy Lemass says there was no corruption, but I know that there was.

Would the Deputy come down now to the general policy——

Pensions were to be given to ex-Ministers.

Would the Deputy come down to the general policy——

I am coming to it.

——of the present Government.

Deputy Lemass wanted facts. He said there was no corruption. I know where two people were given old age pensions and the claim of another person 100 yards down the road was disallowed. I made investigations and I discovered that the pensions were granted to the first two because Fianna Fáil held meetings in their house.

That is proof?

That is proof all right. During the last election I.R.A. pensions were given to Fianna Fáil followers.

The Deputy might come down now to the policy of the present Government.

Deputy Lemass wanted proof. I am proving now that there was corruption right through all the Fianna Fáil clubs all over the country.

Anybody would take your word for it.

I would not in the ordinary way reply to some of the statements made by Deputy O'Leary but I think, in fairness to the decent, honest officials in the Department of Local Government, who were in charge of the old age pensions appeal section, it is just as well that I should reply to his allegation of corruption. I happened to be in charge of old age pension appeals for two years until the Department of Social Welfare was created and I can only say that neither the Minister over me nor I myself ever, in the course of our administration, ordered any single person to be given a pension or to have a pension withheld from him. I would also say that if we had, the group of officials, including the two chief deciding officers of the Old Age Pensions Appeals Department, were men of such calibre that they would have come and said that on the facts stated this individual should be granted a pension or should not be granted a pension. They would have had no fear in coming forward and speaking to me or to the Minister for Local Government on that matter.

Who decided it?

I would further say that the custom was that the deciding officers in connection with old age pension appeals had what might be described as a non-legal judicial authority; in other words, there was nothing in the Act which said that they were dependent on the Minister. They had, in fact, been placed independent of the Minister. Appeals received from Deputies of all Parties were treated with the utmost consideration by the officials concerned, and the proof that they acted leniently towards the community in general may be found if Deputy O'Leary will look at the percentage of appeals allowed from every constituency, those where the Government had a big majority and those where we were in a large minority. He will find that, as compared with 1932, the percentage of cases in which questions raised by applicants were listened to, were given a fair hearing and were granted an increased pension was very much larger. That process went on continuously through the whole 16 years of the Fianna Fáil administration.

Can we take it now that the debate on the Taoiseach's Estimate has opened on this plane?

I have allowed Deputy Childers to speak because he said he was replying to a statement made by Deputy O'Leary about unfair decisions.

I think I have said sufficient to protect the reputation of honourable men in regard to this matter. On this Estimate I would like to refer once again to the failure of the Government to reduce the cost of living. They have failed to slash the cost of living, to bring it down to a point where the workers could feel that they had a greatly increased purchasing power. The promises made as far back as February, 1947, were not that if workers' wages went up by 10 per cent. and the cost of living did not rise, that was sufficient. The promises made were related to statements that the cost of living was grossly inflated, that an enormous number of rich business men who were bribing the Government with contributions to the Fianna Fáil war chest were charging prices, not 10 per cent. too high but 20, 30, 40 and 50 per cent. too high; that the whole economic life of the State was in a state of inflation and that it was due to the failure of the then Government to protect the interests of the worker. The position as a result of Government action is well known to people in this House. The only noticeable decrease in the cost of living took place three months before the Fianna Fáil Government left office when, with the aid of supplementary subsidies to certain important foods, the cost of living was reduced by 3 per cent. and the tide of inflation was stemmed. A great deal of what was then hot money was syphoned away by processes known to economists in half a dozen European countries. From then onwards no noticeable reduction took place. The cost of living in December, in fact, rose to 99 points, where it has remained ever since, from 97 points at the lowest period, November, 1947.

The excuse that certain wages have been increased without a corresponding increase in the cost of living is not a valid one, for two reasons. First of all, there have been cuts in the prices of certain imported raw materials but not of others and, secondly, so far as I know, whole groups of workers have either made demands for further increases of wages on the grounds that they are not able to bear the cost of living or else they have been restrained by private negotiations from so doing. The facts pointed out to them are similar to those pointed out to workers in Great Britain by Sir Stafford Cripps, Chancellor of the Exchequer, the usual facts obtaining in a condition of inflation whereby, under certain circumstances, if wages go up, prices automatically go up. As I have said, the Government has failed to carry out their promise in regard to the cost of living. It may be that in the course of the next few months certain prices may come down due to the fact that conditions are getting more normal. It will not be the result of Government action. It will be the result of world conditions over which the Government has no control. I might add that as a member of Fianna Fáil I am proud of the fact that, regardless of the peculiar circumstances we had to face, out of 73 countries, according to statistics, the cost of living went up here during the war less than in all of them save about ten. In those ten there were several factors to account in a large degree for the fact that they succeeded in maintaining the cost of living at a slightly lower figure than ourselves, such as the granting of lower subsidies, with a consequent imposition of a higher taxation than we ever had to face in this country. I am proud of that record and I am willing to face the electors over and over again on our success in that matter.

In regard to social services the Government's achievement in increasing old age pensions has been adverted to. It is just as well to remind the House that Fianna Fáil gave free, at no cost to the contributor, an increase of 50 per cent. in national health insurance, widows' and orphans' pensions, and unemployment assurance at the end of the war. Increased contributions are now being asked for from employers and employees and the cost of those increased contributions would largely meet the increase in the old age pension grant made available by the present Government. If certain other savings under the head of social services are taken into account, such as the abolition of the contribution to local authorities for certain allowances, it will be found that the actual net increase while it may exist, is nothing about which the Government should boast.

I would next refer to the question of full employment. The Labour Party and the Clann na Poblachta Party got into office largely on the promise that there would be full employment. They did not make any reservations about it. There was no suggestion that it was going to take ten years to bring about. There was no suggestion that it was have to wait until the effect of injecting large State capital into various national schemes would produce more employment. They got into office on those grounds and the only other ground was simply dislike of Fianna Fáil and a desire to change the Government. The most specific promises were made in that regard. The promises made were that the entire financial system must be changed, that the State must be prepared at any time to inject such financial assistance into the life of the community that, no matter what conditions existed, there would be no dole paid to any able-bodied man able to work. They promised that emigration would be cured by the immediate application of large-scale reconstruction schemes all over the country. There was to be no delay for any reason. The promise was made, definitely and beyond all doubt. We now know the results of the Government's action. They have had a year since July last to pursue their policy and the increase in employment in connection with the Department of Lands, the Department of Forestry, the Telephone service, rural electrification work, hydro-electric stations and Bord na Móna is precisely 781 persons in 12 months. I wonder what sort of reception Clann na Poblachta Party would have received throughout the country, if they had said to the people that the application of large scale capital schemes to secure employment, to end unemployment and the payment of dole would result in the year 1949, after a period of 12 months, in the employment of only 781 persons? That would be a magnificent achievement, an increase of 781 persons employed out of a total of 12,354 who were in employment on 1st July, 1948. I wonder by what remote principle Clann na Poblachta can justify the non-fulfilment of their promise to the electors having regard to that figure? You can add if you like 2,000 or 3,000 more people employed on houses. You can add a couple of hundred on national drainage and the question still is not answered and the promises still have not been fulfilled.

Because of your obstruction of the Local Authorities (Works) Bill.

You can even treble that figure of 781 and the promises still have not been fulfilled. They are never likely to be fulfilled so long as the orthodox system of finance pursued by the present Government is maintained.

Would you agree to change it?

These were the promises made. We know that the Fianna Fáil Party during the 16 years they were in power, did their utmost to solve the problem of unemployment by the injection of State money into certain enterprises. We tried to create employment in industry by protection and in agriculture by encouraging tillage. We gave employment to upwards of 15,000 to 20,000 persons a year outside the activities which I have indicated, by special employment schemes. We knew the problem was so very difficult that it would take a very long time to solve, that the solution of the problem is a long-term matter. Now all these promises of the Clann na Poblachta Party have been ruthlessly broken. I wonder how the Clann na Poblachta Party account to their craobha when they speak to their members for the speech made in January by the Minister for Industry and Commerce to the effect that if people were willing to work as hard at home as they are abroad, fewer would have to emigrate? I wonder if Clann na Poblachta have investigated the statement made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce that the registers in the unemployment exchanges had been swollen by political agitation? I have searched County Longford and County Westmeath and I could find no evidence that a Fianna Fáil club in any part of the area had induced additional persons to register. Indeed to me it is a most shallow excuse, but then again the tune has been changed since the Government came into office.

Again we had Deputy Norton, speaking in this House in 1947, saying:—

"We are settling down to a policy of exporting them (the Irish people) to Britain at a rate greater than in the war years. I do not blame these unfortunate people for seeking employment in Britain; it is the only alternative to the workhouse or a beggarly pittance."

Yet, so far as I can recall the rate of emigration in 1948 was up to the highest level ever recorded in the war years. We have had complaints that workers cannot be found to work on Bord na Móna schemes. Everybody knows that during the 12 months which the Government took to make up its mind to increase development grants, a huge number of turf workers migrated to Great Britain and the pool of workers, available for Bord na Móna has largely decreased because the Government failed to put into operation the plan left ready for them by the previous Government to offset the unemployment occasioned by the ending of the production of hand-won turf. I believe that more should be done to encourage the turf industry. I think that the Government have had sufficient experience now to know that the depression that has taken place in the retail business in the turf areas, which is well known to everybody, is due to the fact that the hand-won turf industry brought money and cash to people who needed it and that that source of income is no longer in existence. I say that no matter what reclamation scheme is carried out, no matter at what expense you increase agricultural production, these schemes will not replace the cash that was made available to small farmers and workers throughout the turf area during the war years.

I myself believe that with coal at its present price the Government should re-examine the whole question of turf production and see what can be done to increase the production of turf. I know that in Dublin at present machine-pressed turf can be bought, although the quantity is insufficient, at something like £3 11s. Od. per ton. Hand-won turf can be brought also from the bogs in Westmeath to Dublin and a mixture of machine-won turf and hand-won turf in the less cold months is a most adequate form of an inexpensive fuel and bears favourable comparison with coal except in one matter—that it leaves a lot of dust for the unfortunate housewife to clean up. I realise also that mixtures of any type of turf for use in tenement houses is not a very suitable type of fuel. Where, however, you have room to store it, a totally different situation emerges, but in the tenements storage is difficult and any type of turf must crumble and lose its calorific value.

This is certainly an apportunity for the Government to think over its attitude to turf production, now that they have had experience of the decline in purchasing power of the community in the turf-producing areas. I do not believe that the land reclamation scheme, while I welcome it, is going to make that essential difference. It may be helpful to the people but it will not restore the prosperity to the turf-producing areas that was brought there during the war years when turf production was at its highest. The present situation is a challenge to the Government to use its initiative and its inventive powers. During the 16 years we were in office we used our inventive powers and our initiative for the benefit of the public. It is up to the present Government to do the same thing. We all of us know that the injection of capital by the State into enterprise may or may not increase unemployment to any degree that would be noticeable. In many cases, the expenditure involves the importation of expensive raw materials and equipment and the actual proportion of money spent on labour may be very small. In other cases, the results may be successful from the point of view of the employment given in the right place at the right time.

I mention again the fact that unemployment is a particularly serious problem in this country because it is both local in character and seasonable. I suppose that labour is less mobile here than in a great many other countries with a similar national income to ours. We have to recognise that fact. It is all very well to say that workers cannot be got to work on Bord na Móna schemes or on hydro-electric schemes. We had a rule that unemployment assistance could be paid to men if the work offered to them was more than a certain number of miles away—I think four miles. We had that rule because we were faced with the general problem of immobility of labour, due partly to traditional reasons and partly to lack of houses. It is a problem for the Government to face. There are places, I am quite sure, in this country at the present time where, even with reduced tillage, with reduced agricultural employment, work could be found for workers who migrate from the West to England and Scotland if they had houses. It is a permanent problem because the local county councils are not supposed to build more houses than are required for the local inhabitants and the problem still remains of providing housing accommodation for migratory workers. It is a serious problem. It should be dealt with on its merits. It is existing in the central areas where tillage is a tradition.

I should mention the fact in relation to the 781 persons more employed on these services than on July 1st, 1948, that there were, if I remember rightly, from 11,000 to 15,000 persons employed on turf in 1947, and there is a tremendous amount of employment to be given if that figure is to be achieved. As I said, the figure of 781 does not seem to relate to anything that Clann na Poblachta promised. I want to make quite clear the difference between the present Government's policy and the Clann na Poblachta policy and to point out how far their policy is in abeyance.

The Government have some plans for investing capital in various enterprises. A great many of these plans were in operation before the Government came in. Many of them have been slowed down for want of raw materials and equipment. Some of them may be new, may be novel in character. That was not the Clann na Poblachta policy. Their policy was that at all costs, a sufficient amount of money must at all times be injected into the life of the community on national schemes and that the effect of it would be definitely to employ all the unemployed and to relieve the problem of emigration. There was to be no limit. If, for example, Fianna Fáil were to have an annual budget of £1,500,000 for special employment schemes, that was insufficient. The budget must be unlimited. The money must be borrowed on the credit of the nation. There was even a suggestion that the character of sterling should be altered and, if it were altered, it would be possible to borrow this money without increasing taxation, without making the rest of the people already employed pay any tax for paying these workers who were engaged on these special schemes. That was the point. It was so far removed from the present Government's programme that there is no comparison. To that degree, Clann na Poblachta has broken one of the principal pledges which they made to the electors and the people are well aware of it.

I notice that there are some 658 fewer persons employed by the Land Commission at the moment as compared with 12 months ago. If I remember rightly, both Clann na Poblachta and the Labour Party indulged in agitation of a most serious kind throughout Westmeath during the election with regard to the failure of the Government to divide land, calling on the Government to abolish the Land Commission, to alter all the old alleged out-of-date rules in connection with Land Commission administration and to divide immediately large numbers of estates, including estates where there was an adequate number of persons employed to put the estates fully out of the running so far as the Land Commission was concerned. But they were all included by Clann na Poblachta. Practically all estates of 300 acres or over were to be divided immediately. All you required to do was to abolish the Land Commission or to remove the officials who were there, to alter the regulations, and then the work could go ahead. Now we have, after 12 months, 685 fewer people employed by the Land Commission on works of land improvement.

We had also the promise made to cover tens of thousands of acres of land with forests. The principle was not that of acquiring forest land wherever it could be acquired in the ordinary way. It was even giving more for forest land than Fianna Fáil gave. It was not growing seedling at a greater rate than they were grown by Fianna Fáil. The principle suggested was that whole areas should be acquired for afforestation with ancillary industries attached and that the land must be acquired compulsorily, because it could never be acquired otherwise. If there were farms in the areas to be acquired, the people must be transferred and new land found for them. In these great forest belts of thousands and thousands of acres new wood industries would arise. That would certainly employ a lot of people if the policy were carried out. But we now see that during the year the number of people employed in forestry has only gone up from 1,904 to 2,094.

Of course those who talk glibly about afforestation employment have always to bear in mind that, like so many other kinds of State enterprises, the employment, unfortunately, is given largely in the summer when the problem is not at its greatest. If you take any unit of afforestation, for every 30 workers employed in the summer the number will be reduced to 10 in the winter when you want it exactly the other way around. That is not to say that we should not do afforestation. But afforestation is not a major method of employing men in the winter months when they need it. Although it would largely leave a residue of people employed, the main employment is in the summer in the relation of 30 to 10.

There are certainly no more persons employed on the roads at present. There are certainly no more persons employed in agriculture at present. If there should be any slight variation in the figures, it is not very much one way or the other. We have to wait until the winter comes to see the effect of the deeline of tillage on agricultural employment generally. We have to wait also to see what the effect of the reduced road grants will be on road workers employment, to see the final result. The local authorities' works scheme is, I understand, coming into operation. We have to wait to see whether as many persons will be employed on roads and on the local authorities' works scheme taken together as were employed previously on roads. It would be very hard for the Government to find the necessary £2,000,000 to bring that state of things about—that the number of persons employed would be the same as a result of this new form of local government activity. So far as the land reclamation scheme is concerned, it is not yet in operation and we are unable to judge the effect on the level of employment.

As I have said, my main contention is that the promises of the two small Parties aiding Fine Gael have been broken and the fundamental basis of their policy is not being adopted. What is being adopted is a policy which has no relation to what they suggested. I shall leave to other speakers the question of agricultural policy, but I want to make that point. People in my constituency know well that there is no hope of bringing into operation the Clann na Poblachta or Labour Party policies as they were understood by the electors. They know that they have gone beyond recall and that they are never likely to see the Government measure the unemployed, measure the rate of emigration and then proceed to borrow enough money or to get enough money to carry out such employment schemes as will absorb all the people who are unemployed, in the areas where they are unemployed, at the time they are unemployed, and in the occupation which they wish to follow, which is the problem of unemployment in this country.

It is rather pathetic to find somebody like Deputy Childers, who purports to have a reasonable degree of economic knowledge, meandering into a sea of pre-election promises to try to make a case for himself. Pathetic might be the proper way to describe the situation in which he and his Party now find themselves. After 16 years of stewardship of this nation's affairs this Government was forced into a situation where it had to stop wild extravagances, stupendous expenditure on wild-cat schemes and at the same time orient the country towards an economic era of balance where capital investment would be made in schemes and in land that would ultimately show a recoupment to the nation.

It is interesting to watch the divergence of views expressed on the Fianna Fáil Front Bench now. Deputy Lemass, in typical Deputy Lemass truculence, was trying to make divisions where he had hoped they might be found. The real gall and the real bitterness that poor Deputy Lemass is suffering from is that the divisions that he and his colleagues, secreted so often in their chamber at the other end of the House, hoped for and wished for, have not come to pass. He is gradually realising that the hope that he was able to give in a desperate kind of way to Fianna Fáil supporters throughout the country that the Government would split has gone and that he now must face the isolation that he and his Party have earned by 16 years of gross, stupid misgovernment.

I am saying this not to give the Taoiseach a slap in the back but because I feel my constituency wants me to say it to him that we are proud of his captaincy of this ship of State and proud of the achievements of his Government in the last 12 months.

Fianna Fáil come in here and bleat about unemployment. Two schemes of major national importance came into this Dáil within the last couple of months and, thanks to Fianna Fáil rambling stupidity, neither of them has become effective law yet to enable employment to be given to people whom they say need employment. No amount of speech-making in Dáil Éireann will change the country's honest belief that both the Local Government (Works) Bill and the Land Reclamation Bill could be in full steam but for Fianna Fáil's stupidity and but for the fact, in particular, that they were directing personal spleen and invective against a man who has proved to be the success he is in the Department of Agriculture. No amount of talking is going to get you out of it. You were never able to do anything constructive and I suppose we can expect nothing but destruction from you. It is ingrained in your very foundation and in your very development.

The Deputy might use the third person.

In the Party's very development.

It is very hard on you, a Leas-Chinn Comhairle.

Deputy Little will have to bear a bit more before I am finished, because he is not a monument of intelligence to the last Administration. I want to say that, looking at the picture after 18 months, looking at it with the eyes of a young man, in common with people of my age, I can now see a genuine hope for a future in this country for ourselves because we are getting down to the problem of increasing basically the national wealth. As I have often said, it does not matter what avocation one follows, we are ultimately and in the final analysis dependent on the one real wealth, the actual land and the produce therefrom. The sanity and wisdom of investing our own money to improve our own property, our own land, cannot be questioned by any economist. It is rational, it is reasonable, to put money into something which gives complete security and in which you have the nation's resource and the nation's labour effort to ensure reasonable return for the investment, not to any particular section of the community, not to any particular type of parasite, but to the nation as a whole and in general.

It is rather interesting to listen to economic theories such as are sometimes advanced by Deputy Childers, but there is one thing that the Taoiseach can rest assured of, that is, that those who are the mainstay of this country, the farmer and his labourer, are satisfied now that they have a Government that is putting them in the forefront of the picture, treating them, not as menials or mendicants but as the keystone and the centre-piece in the rehabilitation and redevelopment of the national economy. I say "treat him as he should be treated, as the person who is, always has been and always will be, with God's help, the keystone of all Irish development, economic or national". I can say to the Taoiseach without hesitation that the people are feeling already, in every farmyard throughout the length and breadth of Ireland, the benefits that have accrued to them through the wisdom of his Government's attitude in the conclusion of the trade agreement with Britain.

More chickens.

You stick your cart in the gap where you could not put a gate and you let your wife do the farming.

Is that addressed to you, a Leas-Chinn Comhairle?

The position is this: that poor Deputy Walsh can cackle all he likes about the chickens, but the women in the farmyards of Ireland know that, if Providence had not taken the hand of Deputy Smith off the Department of Agriculture, they would be lucky if they could get 1/6 a dozen for their eggs next month. That will never sink into the cranium of poor Deputy Walsh, but it has already been acknowledged and acepted by the Irish farmer's wife as something sound and sensible which Fianna Fáil would never have been capable of. I was surprised that when Deputy Walsh interjected "chickens" that he did not interject "bacon", because we now see bacon in the country for the first time for a long time, and we have not to ask a Fianna Fáil T.D. "could you get a bit of it for us?"

Let me come back to major Government policy and say this in no spirit of criticism. I would like the Taoiseach to know that in my constituency we are anxious that his schemes should be pressed forward as rapidly as possible so that sneers or jeers at a hiatus between the Local Works Bill and the cut in the road grant can never be made. I want to warn the Taoiseach that Fianna Fáil have done their best to obstruct the Works Bill. I am only urging him now, as a supporter of his Government, that he should use his good offices to see that that Bill is put into top gear as quickly as possible because, as I said on the Second Reading of it: "As soon as it gets working it is going to give Fianna Fáil the works."

In conclusion, I should like the Taoiseach to know that throughout the length and breadth of the country there is a gathering force behind his Government. The people know and appreciate not only his own individual sacrifices but the sacrifices made by many of his colleagues in their efforts to govern this country wisely and well for the benefit of the people as a whole. There is a welcome warmth there to let us know that this nation realises now that there are men running it big enough and able enough to put the country before any other consideration. I want to say to him in all earnestness: Steer your ship as well in the future as you have in the past; we are behind you, we are proud of you and our nation is only waiting to acclaim you.

I take it this is the only opportunity we have of examining what the Taoiseach has been doing during the preceding 12 months. As Taoiseach or captain of the team, he has responsibility for every member of the team. Those of us who have any connection with teams know that, unless you have all the team pulling together, you are not going to have a successful team. As regards the team we have here under the leadership of the Taoiseach, I think it will be agreed that all of them do not pull in the same direction. In addition we have as members of that team men who are misfits in their jobs. Last year, when speaking on the trade agreement with Britain, I think I told the Taoiseach that, unless he made a change in the Department of Agriculture, he would ruin agriculture in this country. Now, to a great extent my words have come true as far as tillage is concerned. As many Deputies know, there is a feeling of unrest and uncertainty amongst tillage farmers. We have people who, when the emergency had ended, and who had made money——

Surely that is not Government policy.

I was waiting to see what point the Deputy was going to develop.

I am going to develop a point with regard to agriculture.

You are developing the policy of the Minister for Agriculture.

If Deputy Dillon is in control of agriculture without any responsibility——

The Deputy should differentiate between Government policy and the policy of a Government Department.

Can I not discuss the policy of the Government with particular reference to agriculture?

The policy of the Government, yes.

That is what I am doing. There is this uncertainty that has been created by the Minister for Agriculture. It is one of the matters which I want to deal with.

The Deputy should not go into details of the policy of the Department of Agriculture.

I will brush them aside so. The Taoiseach does not like to be reminded of all the things that the Minister for Agriculture has done during the past 12 months, and does not want to take responsibility for them.

I glory in what the Minister for Agriculture has done, but I am not here to answer in this debate for the Minister.

The Taoiseach is answerable to this House for every act of every Minister sitting on the Government Front Bench.

The Deputy is making a mistake. The Taoiseach is responsible for general Government policy, but not for the policy of a particular Department, whether it be the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Industry and Commerce, the Department of External Affairs or any other. There is a particular policy in respect of each Department, but it is general Government policy that the Taoiseach is responsible for.

Am I not at liberty to take every Government Department and discuss it?

No. The Ceann Comhairle pointed out, when this debate opened, that that could not be done.

I think I have a responsibility to remind the Taoiseach of some of the things which the Minister for Agriculture did during the past 12 months, and of some of the speeches that he made during that period. Take the question of tillage. Take Government policy at the present time as it has been enunciated by the Minister for Agriculture. The farmers who produced wheat and beet to feed the people during the emergency and made money, and who, notwithstanding the gibes and the sneers during the emergency and prior to it from the people now sitting on the opposite benches, were in a position to buy machinery. What are these people to do now with the machinery which they have?

That is a detail of agricultural policy.

It is only one detail.

It is a detail, anyway.

What certainty have those people——

Will the Deputy address one question to himself. What is he going to do about conforming to the rules of the Chair and not be asking questions?

Am I not permitted to discuss agriculture on this Vote.

If I am not to be permitted to discuss any Minister, then I will sit down.

The Chair cannot make it clearer to the Deputy that he must only discuss general Government policy. The matter he is endeavouring to discuss arose on the Vote for the Department of Agriculture. That was discussed in detail when the Minister's Estimate was under consideration. If we are to go over all the Departments on the Taoiseach's Vote, clearly we will have all the Estimates discussed again. That is what has to be avoided, and the Ceann Comhairle made that clear this afternoon.

The Taoiseach, when he was reading his statement, made certain references.

I did not read my statement; I read no statement.

I am sorry, I did not mean it in that way. The Taoiseach had some documents in his hand and he gave us figures relating to various aspects of production, agricultural and industrial.

I did not give a single figure about agriculture.

The Taoiseach gave a series of figures, some of which I took a note of.

I gave figures relating to industrial production, but not to agriculture.

The Taoiseach referred to trade pacts, which have a specific relationship to agriculture. Surely, Deputy Walsh is entitled to refer to the advantages or disadvantages, as he sees them, arising out of the trade pact to which the Taoiseach referred?

I did not interrupt Deputy Walsh on that. He talked about machinery that was purchased and, clearly, that was discussed on the Vote for the Department of Agriculture.

We will get away from that for the time being.

Until next year.

I will mention more about machinery, and that is in connection with the amount to be spent in rural areas under the two measures that were introduced here, the Local Authorities (Works) Bill and the Land Reclamation Bill. The Taoiseach referred to the amount that would be spent in rural areas as a result of these measures, but he forgot to mention the amount withheld by the Government from the rural workers when the grant of £2,500,000 was taken from the roads. In the coming 12 months the only provision made under the Land Reclamation Bill is for £1,000,000, thereby indicating that the people in the rural areas will lose £1,500,000. If I cannot discuss agriculture, I do not see any purpose in standing up here to talk. Agriculture is the one thing I want to refer to. Other Deputies dealt with the industrial situation, but nobody yet has had a chance of discussing the agricultural policy of the Government.

Except on the Minister's Vote.

There was no policy discussed by the Minister or his Vote.

On the Vote for the Department of Agriculture.

Is not the Taoiseach responsible for the Government—has he not collective responsibility?

It is no use finding questions like that at me. I endeavoured to tell the Deputy what the Taoiseach is responsible for—for general Government policy. But that does not mean that a Deputy can traverse the field already covered in respect of every Government Department.

When the Taoiseach was introducing his Estimate, did he not link it up with the question of agriculture—that we were preparing vast schemes for the improvement of agriculture? He was nearly a quarter of an hour on agriculture.

I did not stop Deputy Walsh from talking about agriculture in general way. It was only when he came to the details and connected them with the Department that I intervened.

I take it I cannot discuss agriculture in detail, but what is the agricultural policy of the Government? Is there any special policy for the tillage farmer? This Government, through the Minister for Agriculture, have fixed a price for wheat for five years. All they have done in that case is that they have extended the period over which that price will be paid. There is no price guaranteed for barley, oats or potatoes and there was no increase granted in the price of milk. The present price of milk was fixed in 1947 by the then Minister at 1/2 and 1/4 a gallon. Since then there have been increases in labour costs and the cost of production generally. Do the Government intend to do anything to compensate milk producers for these increases? We have been told that agriculture is in a more flourishing condition than under Fianna Fáil. I deny that. The only thing that has improved is the price of beef and store cattle.

And of barley.

Who was responsible for that? Not the Government. Do not take any credit for it. The people know very well who is responsible for the increase in the price of barley. The Beet Growers' Association are, and not the Government. You would like to chime in on it, but I know you cannot. You will not get away with that. There is no guarantee for these commodities. We have had experience of the Government policy also in taking away the subsidy from farmers' butter.

That is the subject of a motion that is under consideration.

I will not discuss it; I mention it in passing as part of the policy of the Government. There is no use in the Taoiseach telling us there has been an improvement from the agriculturist's point of view. There is no improvement. He has no stability or security, such as he had under the Fianna Fáil Government. If he is a tillage farmer he does not know whether he will have a market for his crops. We had experience in relation to potatoes and oats last year. There was an advertisement issued last spring showing how the farmers could help.

That, surely, is Departmental policy.

The advertisement was issued with the authority of the Government.

It is Departmental policy. The Taoiseach is not responsible for leaflets issued by the Department; he is not responsible for administration. The Deputy should differentiate between administration and policy. The issue of leaflets is surely an administrative act.

The Taoiseach and many of his supporters said that because of Fianna Fáil those two new schemes could not be put into operation until now. In what way did Fianna Fáil obstruct the Government in putting these Bills through the House? They actually helped to have them put right. The Minister responsible for them accepted amendments from this side without discussion. Did that prove there was obstruction? Did it not prove there was help given in putting them through? I heard Deputy Collins talking about obstruction from this side. There has been no obstruction, and if there has been criticism it was constructive criticism.

We heard many wild statements made here and through the country by Deputies opposite. We know the hypocrites who went through the country shedding crocodile tears and we know the trickery and deception that have been put across the people.

Would you give us an example?

I will give you plenty of them. For one thing we have the cost of living. Prior to the election we were told that it would be reduced by 30 per cent. What is the result? Has the cost of living gone down?

Have wages gone up?

How much has the cost of living gone down? It is three points lower than it was in 1947 and the only reductions made since 1947 were those made by the Fianna Fáil Government when they reduced the price of tea by 2/2 per lb., sugar by 2d. per lb., bread by ½d. per lb. and flour by 1/- per stone. What has this Government done? It has placed unsubsidised flour and sugar on the market—flour at 7/- per stone and sugar at 7½d. per lb. You cannot hoodwink the people. That is mere trickery and deception. It will not work. The people are not such great fools as the Deputies on the Government Benches think they are.

Some of them must be.

They were never so happy.

If the Deputies on those benches are any indication of the happiness that exists in the country it shows the happiness there must be when you have to cling together in order to remain over there. It does not show a terrible lot of happiness.

It must be since they changed the Mayor of Cork.

I take it the Taoiseach will accept responsibility for his Ministers and the members of the various Parties constituting the Goveernment when they go around the country telling the people what they are going to do. For example, down in West Cork the Minister for Lands stated that if Bill Murphy was elected he, the Minister, promised the full support of the Land Commission to the people of West Cork.

What has the Taoiseach got to do with that?

Is it not Government policy? Surely, it was Government policy there because they all came together in order to elect Deputy Murphy.

That is a statement by an individual Minister.

Is it a fact then that the Taoiseach has no longer any responsibility or control over his Ministers once he leaves the precincts of this House?

The Chair is endeavouring to explain to the Deputy what the responsibility of the Taoiseach is.

I am afaid I have failed to get the Deputy to appreciate——

The Deputy appreciates that he will accept no responsibility for his Ministers.

I warned the Deputy before that he will not imply that the Chair has said things which the Chair has not said. The Chair neither implied nor said that the Taoiseach does not accept responsibility for his Ministers.

It was also said from Government platforms in West Cork that the Land Commission was empty of land and that there were no farms to be divided when this Government took over. During the past 12 months I have sent in a list of farms in my own constituency and in every case the reply has come back that these lands are not required.

From whom?

From the Land Commission.

You are discussing Land Commission policy now.

That is Government policy.

That is Land Commission administration and not the policy of the Taoiseach's Department. If the Deputy continues on these lines I shall have to ask him to resume his seat.

This debate is becoming very restricted. Am I allowed to discuss the wheat and beet policy? We have the Minister for Agriculture talking about wheat and beet. We know what he said about them in the past. I would like to know if the Taoiseach stands over the following statement taken from Volume 106, column 2042 of Dáil Debates of 18th June, 1947.

Who made the statement?

"Some day I am convinced——"

Who made the statement?

"Some day I am convinced that after——"

I think I am entitled to know whom he is quoting.

On a point of order. Surely it is not fair to barrack a Deputy like that. Surely he can say who made the statement afterwards just as easily as before.

I take it the Deputy will give us the name of the speaker.

Certainly I will give you the name. The statement was made here on the 18th June, 1947. It is reported at column 2042 of Volume 106 of Dáil Debates.

It seems to me that this is something somebody said before the Taoiseach became Taoiseach. I submit the Deputy should give the name of the person he is quoting.

The Deputy has given the reference and any Deputy who wishes can check the reference and see who made the statement. The Deputy has also promised the Chair that he will give the name of the person who made the statement.

"Some day I am convinced that beet will go up the spout after peat and wheat." There is hardly any necessity for me to tell Deputy Timoney or anybody else, who made that statement. Does the Taoiseach stand over that statement? Does he stand over this statement: "I want to say again with emphasis that when one ton of wheat from abroad is available to this country again I would not be seen dead in a field of wheat on my land in this country because I know that that whole rotten fraud in fact was invoked to permit the Rank interests and the other milling interests in this country to charge our people 30/- a cwt. for flour when they were selling it in Liverpool for 19/-. I will not have to worry because the wheat scheme is as dead as a door nail."

On what date was that statement made?

18/6/1947.

That is before the Taoiseach took office.

Therefore, the Taoiseach cannot be responsible for that statement and the Deputy should not have read that statement.

I want to know if that Minister has changed his mind and if he has given any indication to the Taoiseach——

The Deputy will please sit down. He is defying the Chair.

On a point of order. It is hardly fair to a Deputy who is not familiar with the work of the House over the year to make fine distinctions between policy and details of policy.

Fine distinctions?

With regard to what the policy was as expressed before the election and what it is after the election.

Deputy Little must realise that the Chair gave Deputy Walsh every opportunity. I did not close him down until I was compelled to do so. He is clearly endeavouring to get past the Chair in some of these matters.

I quite appreciate that it would not be reasonable to expect the Taoiseach to deal point by point with the various matters raised in this debate. I feel, however, that there is one matter with which he must deal when he comes to reply. He will not mind my asking him to do so because it is a matter of very great importance. It was dealt with specifically by Deputy Lemass when he complained about charges of corruption made prior to the general election. One of the examples which Deputy Lemass gave was the allegation that people who were not affiliated to Fianna Fáil and who did not make their applications through the Fianna Fáil Cumainn had very little chance of being granted old age pensions. Deputy Lemass, as is to be expected, denies that the affiliations of any particular applicant had any effect whatever on his prospects. Accepting unreservedly Deputy Lemass's denial, I have to say that it was the custom to cash in upon the influence which it was believed Government Deputies then had. Supporters of the then Government did not deny that Government Deputies had more influence than Opposition Deputies in their dealings with the Departments. I am merely giving that as an example and I think it is necessary to go into that detail to try to make my point.

The declaration which I want to suggest is that representations from any Deputy, irrespective of Party, will receive the same consideration from the various Departments. It is important that there should be that confidence in the impartiality of the Government and it is important that the people, the majority of whom are behind the Government and have put their confidence in it, should have it made clear to them that it does not matter what Deputy makes representations, those representations will receive identical consideration. I think it would be a very healthy thing for the present Government to have such a declaration made. It would dispel that atmosphere of suspicion and would make every public representative feel that he had the same weight as other representatives behind representations which he made. I think it would be a very bad thing, from this Government's point of view, if it were believed or said throughout the country that more heed will be paid to the representations of a Deputy on the Government side than will be paid to the representations of a Deputy on the Opposition Benches. I should like it to be known that any of the Deputies opposite could go on the same assurance that their representations would be attended to.

That is the only point with which I want to deal save to compliment with genuine sincerity the Taoiseach on the manner in which he has managed the Government of this country for the past 18 months. As one of the other Deputies said, from the political point of view he has certainly grown in stature. Great tribute was paid to him 18 months ago and after a year and a half we can still state that he has proved himself fully worthy of the confidence and trust placed in him by the people's representatives here. The peope themselves have endorsed that confidence and trust placed in him.

I was glad to hear from the Taoiseach this afternoon a statement to the effect that they had woken up at last, that a number of the foolish statements they had made in days gone by and up to very recently were now changed and that the Government were prepared to adopt some better type of tactics than they have in days gone by. I think that now the Dáil is finishing up this particular session and going away on a long holiday they are entitled to have from the Taoiseach some reasonable explanation that perhaps he should have given to-day but which he may give when he is replying to this particular Vote, as to what immediate steps are going to be taken by the Government by way of relieving the unemployment position that exists throughout the country and by way of solving the emigration problem.

In so far as even this new departure from the old policy of the Government regarding peat production is concerned, that in spite of all the statements they made regarding the damage that was done to the Phoenix Park, they are now prepared to go ahead even on a much larger scale than Fianna Fáil with peat production, in my particular county this year there will be much less employment given on peat schemes than there has been for a long time past. I have also noticed that in spite of the statements made by the Minister for Lands regarding the speeding up of land division throughout the country, to-day there are 700 people less employed by the Land Commission than there were a year ago. To my mind that is not an indication that the Government are making any reasonably decent effort to speed up land division. We have, for a long time past, been listening to various statements made regarding the putting into operation of the arterial drainage scheme. No matter how the present Government try to boost up their particular work in that direction, I am afraid that anybody in this country who is looking forward to work in the near future on drainage or to any effort being made by this Government to give effect to the Arterial Drainage Act, is not alone misled up to the present, but there does not seem to be much hope of any work being done in the future. The only thing that has been done is that the Taoiseach, having been presented with some sort of a whistle, blew it down at the Brosna scheme which was, of course, prepared and ready to be put into operation when we were going out of office.

Do not talk nonsense.

Deputy O'Higgins is always very sincere in what he is talking about. I think the facts in connection with the Brosna scheme have been made pretty well known to everybody throughout the country. Even the Parliamentary Secretary has clearly admitted that the scheme was prepared, so he must know something more.

I should like to get the quotation of that.

I should like to hear the Deputy without interruption. There are no appointed censors of Deputies' speeches here, except the Chair.

It is a natural reaction to nonsense.

I do not think the Deputy was appointed as the judge of nonsense in this House.

Every Deputy in this House clearly realises and understands that this question of drainage is one of the most important problems confronting the Government, no matter what Party is in office. Some decent effort must be made to solve that problem if it is ever to be solved. For a long time past questions have been put to me time and again down the country in connection with this matter. Some months ago an announcement was made that the Parliamentary Secretary was to give a broadcast on drainage but at the eleventh hour that broadcast was cancelled. I do not know what was at the back of it.

It does not arise here.

I think that the Taoiseach must be responsible for it.

I certainly am not.

The cancellation of a broadcast does not arise in a debate on general policy.

I hold that this broadcast was cancelled because the Government were not prepared to go ahead with the schemes which we thought were in contemplation. We are entitled to a certain amount of suspicion when something like that happens behind the closed doors of Government offices.

He might have had a sore throat.

I do not know. Again, we have been listening for the last 12 months to talk about a White Paper on social services. The Minister came along practically a month ago and told us that it was presented to the Government for consideration. Here we are going to pop away on a long holiday and that means that this question will be again held up until the Dáil reassembles. We have had many promises made by the Government since they took office, for instance, in reference to the question of teachers' salaries. That is another problem that has not yet been solved. We had an Old I.R.A. Pensions Bill introduced. but that is all any of us knows about it. However, I suppose it will keep the people quiet for the time being. So long as the Government can keep the people quiet by promises they are quite satisfied to carry on from day to day.

We had a good deal of what I would describe as cheap talk from the Taoiseach to-day in connection with the Government's agricultural policy. A scheme has been introduced which is going to be operated in a few counties only. I notice that the West of Ireland has been completely left out. If there is any part of Ireland in which the land is deteriorating, it certainly must be the West because the vast majority of the farmers there are small farmers and, being small farmers, they are compelled to till the same fields year after year. Speaking for my own county I expected that Galway was one place that might have been considered when the question of priority was being settled. There is one suggestion that I should like to make to the Taoiseach in connection with the scheme for the improvement of farms throughout the country. We are trying to improve land at the present time for the purpose of obtaining a better output but in the West of Ireland there is the peculiar problem that many farmers live a considerable distance from the main roads. They live along old boreens which are a mile, a mile and a half, or in some cases, two miles from the main road. They are good farmers and produce good crops but their difficulty is that they cannot get their produce to the market because of the condition of these boreens.

That is not general policy and it was raised on another Estimate.

I think it is a matter that the Taoiseach should take up with some other Department because it is one of the most urgent problems confronting us in the West of Ireland. I am putting the suggestion to the Taoiseach that something might be done to bring about an improvement in the condition of these farmers. We heard of course again this afternoon from the back-benchers of the Government Party allegations as to the influence Fianna Fáil Deputies had in different Departments. It was not exactly put in that way but it was called political corruption while we were in office. I think Deputy Lemass made the position quite clear in his statement from this side of the House in that connection. I think that any Deputy who tries, even in the cute way that Deputy Timoney did, to convey the impression that Fianna Fáil Deputies had an undue influence in the Departments is just casting a reflection on civil servants.

I said it was stated over there.

We all recollect the efforts made by Fianna Fáil to cut that out. I remember when the Land Commission policy was to give land to men who had money and to leave the small uneconomic holder without any if he was not in a position to get some capital. We had to get over that by tightening up the Land Commission machinery to see that people with small valuations got land irrespective of their political affiliations.

Why was the 1946 Act brought in so?

Deputy Killilea must be allowed to make his speech without interruption.

Deputy Killilea is making one statement that he is prepared to stand over and that is that we were the Party to control the activities of the Land Commission in so far as we made them deal with holdings of £10 or £12 valuation before they dealt with any others. I think that has worked out fairly satisfactorily. The same question arises in connection with old age pensions.

In connection with old age pensions, we left the doors wide open to every Deputy to make representations, because the Fianna Fáil Government always had in mind giving the poor sections of the community every opportunity of having representations made on their behalf by everybody who wished to make them, whether he was a Deputy or not. So far as I know, these representations were always received and dealt with in a satisfactory manner by the Department concerned. The funny thing about it is that we have Deputies trying to use the argument to-day that it was only Fianna Fáil Deputies who could get an old age pensions for anybody at that time. Yet Deputies who are now behind the Government and who were then sitting on the Opposition Benches made statements at that time that if persons wanted to have their old age pensions looked after properly they would have to go to an opposition Deputy who would get a better hearing in the Department. The impression is still being created throughout the country that the only way to get a minor improvement scheme or a bog development scheme carried out quickly is by going to somebody who sits behind the Government. That is entirely untrue and is only trying to create a false impression in order to capture votes. The people fully realise that every Deputy has the same opportunity of making his case in any Department and that these representations always receive due consideration.

A number of Deputies have put up the case from time to time that it is nearly time for the Taoiseach to insist on his Ministers being of one mind in connection with Government policy. Time and again they have cited cases where different Ministers advocated a different policy in connection with some matter. It is nearly time to have a clear understanding from the Government on that matter so that the people will know where they stand. The Taoiseach himself is one who has blundered more than others. Statements made outside this country relating to national policy did not come well from the head of the Government. Statements on national policy should always be made inside this country and, as a matter of fact, inside this House. It would show more respect for this Assembly and for the country as a whole than making statements in Ottawa and other places which to-day are the cause of a lot of controversy throughout the country.

We are adjourning now for a long holiday. It is our hope and wish that some of the promises made will be given effect to before we come back, that is, if some of us come back at all. The suggestions made from this side of the House should be given effect to, instead of the Government coming along in 12 months' time and realising that they should have been carried out, in the same way as the Government have come to realise that a lot of the work done by Fianna Fáil in days gone by was of great benefit to the people. The Government now seem to have recognised, in connection with the short-wave broadcasting station and other schemes, that they were foolish when they made silly statements about these matters and they are now prepared to put these things into operation. We all welcome that and hope that in the future the Government will be a little more reasonable.

Were it not for the line pursued by Deputy Lemass and Deputy Childers in this debate I would not have intervened. Criticism of a most unjust kind was levelled at our Party, especially by Deputy Childers. I think it is only right that, as a representative of a rural area, I should reply to the suggestions contained in the speech of Deputy Childers. We have been attacked left, right and centre by the members of the Fianna Fáil Party for failing to implement the complete policy put up by Clann na Poblachta prior to the election. We have not changed one white of that policy. We are, however, working in conjunction with other Parties in this Government on a ten-point programme. We hope to see that ten-point programme carried out and, at the rate at which it is being tackled, I have no hesitation in saying that not alone will that ten-point programme be achieved, but much more work will be done as well. I should like to compare the achievements of the past 16 months and the policy pursued since this Government came into office with that of its predecessor.

Would that be the policy of the present Government?

As a comparison. Since the present Government came into office efforts have been made in the field of social welfare. Increases have been given to the needy section of the community, increases that are not as much as we would like them to be, but increases on what was given by Fianna Fáil. A great land rehabilitation scheme has been passed in this House after undergoing severe criticism and definite obstruction from Fianna Fáil. The Local Authorities (Works) Bill was passed in spite of the obstructive tactics adopted by Fianna Fáil. There can be no denying that the tactics of Fianna Fáil in regard to that Bill were nothing else but obstruction.

That is not true.

We had a large number of amendments to the Bill tabled by Deputy MacEntee and Deputy Moran.

Protecting the individual.

They talked for hours on end. At that time the West Cork election was being fought and they knew that the Local Authorities (Works) Bill would be an issue in that election. When word came back to the Fianna Fáil bosses that their obstruction to this Bill was meeting with the disapproval of the farmers in West Cork, they dropped their obstructive tactics like a hot brick and let the Bill go through.

Deputy Childers tried to insinuate that a slur was cast on the officials responsible for determining the rate of old age pensions and widows and orphans pensions. As has already been stated, a breath of fresh air came into Irish political life since Fianna Fáil went out of office. Prior to the present Government achieving office, it was a wellknown fact in every rural constituency that the local tin goods of the Fianna Fáil clubs whispered throughout the areas "If you do not vote for Deputy So-and-So, your father and mother will not get the old age pension. If you do not vote for Deputy Killilea or Deputy Boland, your son will not get work on the roads. If you do not vote for Deputy So-and-So, when that farm of land is being divided your father or your mother will not get a holding of land." Those were the tactics pursued by Fianna Fáil in order to stifle political opinion in rural Ireland.

Nonsense.

Well you know it is not nonsense.

The aim of Fianna Fáil was to insert the tentacles of its octopus organisation into every section of the community and every sphere of national life, to bind the country people to their organisation either by intimidation or cajolery. The last general election proved that they can never again hope to cod the people as they did for 16 years.

Criticism has been levelled at the attempts of the present Government to solve the problem of unemployment. The solution Fianna Fáil had for the problem of unemployment was the emigrant ship. All through the war we had the spectacle of people with labels around their necks, emigrating from this country and Fianna Fáil thanked God that they had that solution to the problem. I am not throwing bouquets, or anything like it, at the present Government for their efforts to end emigration or unemployment but there can be no doubt whatever that they are making a genuine attempt, first, with the Local Authorities (Works) Bill, to provide work of a productive nature in rural Ireland, not to give three weeks or six weeks work on a petty minor relief scheme. The only thing Fianna Fáil could promise rural workers was six or seven weeks work in winter on a bog road and keep them on the dole for the rest of the period.

The question of turf was referred to. I do not want to go into that in detail. I do not want to open up a discussion as to who is responsible for the cessation of the hand-won turf scheme. We know perfectly well that the decision to abandon that scheme was taken by the Fianna Fáil Administration prior to this Government coming into office but they insist on saying that they were not responsible for that and they will repeat that ad nauseam in the country in the hope that they will dupe their followers who are dwindling in numbers every day.

I want to see the Government policy in regard to Bord na Móna implemented. There is no doubt whatever that were it not for the war we would still be in as bad a way as every with regard to turf production. It was the lesson of the war years that drove home to Fianna Fáil the vital necessity of developing as far as possible our natural fuel resources. They are to be commended in that respect in spite of the fact that it took a war to teach them the lesson. We must not revert, under any circumstances, to the position that obtained when coal was imported in preference to using native fuel. No coal should be allowed outside the City of Dublin into the rural areas. It is an established fact now that machine-won turf is equal in value and power to the best coal that can be got in England to-day. That is recognised and I see no reason in the world why our industries and business concerns should not use machine-won turf for fuel in preference to coal. I think the Government should give very serious consideration to that aspect. There are numbers of large bogs, especially in the West of Ireland, that can be developed successfully for the production of machine-won turf and that would be one other means of ending the unemployment problem.

Deputy Killilea, to give him his due, stressed the need for more work and more productive work in the West of Ireland. It is an awful pity something was not done about it in the last 16 years. He had to wait to ask the present Taoiseach to do the work his ex-Taoiseach did not do for 16 years.

Deputy Lemass referred to the team, as he described it. He described the present group of Ministers as a mediocre team. He said they were not pulling together. I would like to point out that even a mediocre team is far better at any time than a one-man team.

I want to refer to one other remark made by Deputy Lemass in connection with remarks that were made both by Deputy Norton and the Taoiseach with regard to certain industrialists in the country. It is a well known fact that certain of these gentlemen were not all they should be and Deputy Norton, in my opinion, was quite right in stating that publicly. Now we have the Fianna Fáil Party coming in here whinging on behalf of the so-called gentlemen that were insulted, mar dh'eadh, by Deputy Norton. It is a big change in the Party that went down the country 12 or 18 months ago and described themselves as the poor man's Government, that they should now cry out on behalf of the big industrialists who put the large sums of money into what Deputy Childers described as the Fianna Fáil war chest. These are the people who are anxious to see Fianna Fáil going back into power. Yet the Fianna Fáil Party went down to rural Ireland and described themselves as the poor man's Government.

Deputy Killilea referred to the question of national arterial drainage. I think I may say a few words on that on the Taoiseach's Estimate. Deputy Killilea said that the first scheme, which was the present scheme, was prepared under the Fianna Fáil Administration. We know that there was an Arterial Drainage Act of 1945. Between 1945 and April or May, 1948, not one single effort was made to get that scheme into operation. There was no machinery on the market in this country and no attempt was made to buy it, except in Britain. No attempt was made to get from foreign countries suitable machinery for dredging.

Marshall Aid was not available.

The Taoiseach would not have been in a position to blow that whistle for another 18 months if the present Government were not in power. I want to see further drainage schemes put into operation as soon as possible. The fact that the Brosna scheme has proved such a tremendous success and has reclaimed so much land has made the whole country conscious of the vital need for drainage. Every effort should be made abroad to purchase machinery. Get the machinery at any cost, because if the land is reclaimed and drained, it will repay the cost of the machinery one hundred fold. We will have the land rehabilitation scheme going full steam shortly. But there are several areas in the country where it cannot be put into operation until the national arterial drainage work is done first. I suggest to the Taoiseach that he should do everything possible, by going into every country where machinery is available, to try and purchase the latest dredging equipment.

Is that not for the Minister concerned?

I suppose it is a matter for the Minister for Industry and Commerce. I think that national arterial drainage is a problem of national importance.

Quite. I did not stop the Deputy from referring to that, but when he goes on to deal with the purchase of machinery, that, surely, is a matter for the Minister concerned.

As I have said, a lot of useful work in connection with the land rehabilitation scheme will have to be postponed until the national arterial drainage work is got under way. I am definitely criticising the attempts that have been made so far to get it under way. I have heard the forecast made here that it will take from 15 to 20 years to reach certain parts of the country so far as that scheme is concerned. I am not prepared to accept that estimate from anybody. On previous occasions, I have heard the opinion of experts quoted in this House. On one occasion I proved that the experts' opinion in the matter of drainage was wrong. Therefore, I am not prepared to accept the estimate given here that it will take 20 years for the national arterial drainage scheme to reach certain parts of the country. That is the type of excuse that would be made in order to keep this work going on forever. It reminds one of the policy pursued in the Land Commission, that it is a body that is not there to finish a job but to stay there for all time. I do not propose to make any criticism of the Land Commission except to say that there are quite a lot of big farms and estates yet to be divided.

The division of land is a matter for the Land Commission.

Am I not in order in asking the Taoiseach——

To administer the Land Commission?

——to give all possible help to his colleague, the Minister for Lands, in this work of national importance? The land question did not start to-day or yesterday. It has been going on now for quite a considerable period. At the rate at which it is being pursued at present, I can see it going on into the next century. However, if the Chair rules that it is a matter for the Minister for Lands alone, I do not propose to take up the time of the House any longer.

Mr. de Valera

Is that a ruling? Surely, that is a very wide question, the question of land policy. If, for instance, I were talking I certainly would be inclined to talk about it.

The question of dividing large farms in the West of Ireland was discussed on the Estimate for the Land Commission.

Mr. de Valera

One of the fundamental parts of our programme was to try and put as many families as possible on the land, to make as many farms as possible economic and to put as many families as we could in security on the land. That is one of the widest questions of policy that could be discussed.

May I say that, if the debate broadens out on that line, I would like to reply to it?

You want another Departmental Estimate.

I would welcome a broadening of the debate.

A question was put to me about land division by the Land Commission. As I have said, the Deputy was not prevented from saying that land could be divided, but that he could not discuss the division of large farms in the West of Ireland.

Mr. de Valera

I do not want to argue with the Chair.

I do not mind argument. The statement I made to-day was that all the Estimates cannot be reviewed now and every Minister and every Department dragged in again, a Minister to answer criticisms which he has already answered on his own Estimate. That, obviously, is not a matter for which the Taoiseach is responsible.

Mr. de Valera

The whole question of Government policy is under review.

Mr. de Valera

The question is, what is Government policy with regard to land division? I think that any Deputy should be able to put forward a view in the debate and say: "I know that there are a large number of farms, very large farms, in the West of Ireland, which are not distributed but which ought to be."

The Estimate for the Department of Lands was referred back, for what purpose? To discuss policy. If it is discussed again on this Estimate and the same Minister gives the same answer, that is the difficulty.

Mr. de Valera

I see the difficulty, but I want to argue this: what is the meaning of discussing Government policy, which is carried out through a variety of Departments, unless you can do it on this Vote? When the Taoiseach himself was speaking to-day he spent a great part of his time dealing with matters which, naturally, come under the Department of Industry and Commerce and others under the Department of Finance. It is inevitable, of course, on the Taoiseach's Vote, that Departmental policy, which is carried out by the Departments, would come into the discussion here. I cannot see how it could be otherwise.

It went on all right up to this.

Deputy T. Walsh was not allowed to discuss certain matters. He did not get half a chance.

Listening to Deputy McQuillan—I am sorry he has left the House—during the earlier part of his references in this debate, made me take a note of what one of my colleagues said: "A new generation has arisen that knew not Joseph." Deputy McQuillan told us, first of all in defence of Clann na Poblachta, that the policy of Clann na Poblachta has not changed one whit and then he told us that Clann na Poblachta is in association with the Coalition Government on the ten points. Surely to goodness, the Deputies who now have some experience of what the nation can or cannot do, and who had, before they came in here, announced a policy which they now know it is not possible to fulfil, should at least be reasonable with themselves. Instead of attacking us for having done nothing in this, that or the other direction, they might, at least, admit that the dreams they had about what could be accomplished were only dreams. Let me refer to a few items to which Deputy McQuillan did not refer, but which are referred to in the policy of Clann na Poblachta. The Taoiseach told us to-day that this nation valued the tourist trade and that he hoped that millions of people from America and cross-Channel would continue to come here; that, as far as he was concerned, they would be welcome; and that they would be attracted here, as far as we could attract them, to the greatest possible extent. Compare that statement with the policy announced by Deputy McQuillan's Party, that the tourist trade was to be abolished and that tourists were "spivs" eating the bread and the butter of the poor of this country who had nothing.

Some of them were. The Maximoes were.

The Deputy cannot have his cake and eat it. Either that is the policy of Clann na Poblachta or it is not. The leader of the Clann na Poblachta Party, on his Estimate, indicated that he valued the millions of dollars that would accrue to this country from tourists who came here from the States. It was the policy of the Clann na Poblachta Party tightly to close down the tourist trade.

That is not correct.

I say it is. There was a further item of Clann na Poblachta policy. Clann na Poblachta actually gave figures as to the extent to which they could bring about extended reafforestation. That also has to be abandoned because it is now found not to be possible and the policy of the Government, as evidenced by the Minister for Lands to-day, is to carry out reafforestation as speedily as possible, but there are certain limits within which one has to act, as to the number of acres that can be acquired and planted within a year. The Minister has not stated that it is Government policy that reafforestation shall be on the basis of unlimited acquisition of land and unlimited planting of trees, finally adopting the Clann na Poblachta policy of making our own petrol out of the surplus timber that will be available.

That is no dream.

Does the Minister seriously suggest, that it is the Government's belief that, at the rate at which we will be able to plant trees on the acreage available we can look forward to the time when we will have our own petrol from our own native timber to the exclusion of petrol from America or anywhere else? Surely the Minister does not believe that?

Is the Deputy saying that you can get petrol from timber?

The Minister stated it. That was the policy of Clann na Poblachta, and surely they should now realise that is not possible. Deputy McQuillan stated that the Fianna Fáil Government started turf development only at the outbreak of the war. There are Deputies in the House, not all on this side, who know that is absolutely incorrect. The development of turf started as far back as 1933, under the administration of the late Deputy Hugo Flinn, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance. I remember the jeers and jibes from the Opposition at the time at what they considered the preposterous idea of attempting at the any time to bring about the winning of turf in any form so that it could be used as a native fuel.

Deputy McQuillan ought to be instructed to make more correct statements. If he likes, he can criticise this Party as an Opposition, or when they were in Government, but at least he should confine himself to statements that are correct. Many Deputies will remember that, in order to get the people turf-minded, members of the House travelled all over the country getting the people to understand the value of the turf scheme. When war broke out very considerable progress had been made. Deputy McQuillan now says he does not care what any experts say about drainage. If the experts say it will take 20 years to complete the drainage, the Deputy says they are wrong. Even the limited drainage that had to be undertaken for the purpose of turf development took years, and it will be a long time yet before the bogs can be properly drained to be suitable for working, particularly with machinery. Yet the Deputy could say that nothing was done by Fianna Fáil in the direction of turf development until war broke out.

You converted the coal merchants for the time being.

Of course they were converted. Deputy Davin got up long before the war and questioned the amount of profit to be allowed to the coal merchants in order that they would be induced to handle turf as soon as it could be made available. Deputy Davin knows that that was long before the war. I will not deal any more with Deputy McQuillan's remarks.

I will now refer to certain matters mentioned by the Taoiseach. He gave us figures for certain years, primarily to indicate the position with regard to the balance of payments. He said that for the year 1947-48 we imported goods to the value of £131,000,000, and as regards physical exports, goods exported by us, we exported to the value of £39,000,000, approximately. There was a deficiency, so far as visible exports and imports were concerned, of £92,000,000. The Taoiseach also indicated that we had a very valuable invisible export, and here I would like to indicate to the members of Clann na Poblachta that of the £62,000,000 invisible exports in 1947, £36,000,000 were attributable to the tourist trade, but there was a net deficiency of £30,000,000 in the balance of trade that year. In 1948 our imports rose from £131,000,000 to £136,000,000. Our exports rose from £39,000,000 to £47,000,000, but our net adverse balance, without taking into account the invisible exports, had now been reduced by £3,000,000 from £92,000,000 to £89,000,000. But the invisible exports in 1948 increased from £62,000,000 to £72,000,000, reducing the net gap from £30,000,000 to £15,000,000.

Will the Taoiseach give us any further elucidation of those figures, because they are of interest and of value to enable us to understand certain trends and to make up our minds in relation to certain things. The Taoiseach may not be in a position to do so to-day, but perhaps he will some other day. Was there any change in the quantity of goods to account for these figures? In other words, did prices fall or did more goods have to be imported or exported in order to reach these figures? Did the situation occur where, in a number of cases, the same amount of goods may have been exported but at a higher price? It is important to know if that is to any extent related to these changes in prices.

I would also like to know whether, included in these figures of imports, there are any calculations for goods coming to this country under the Marshall Aid scheme. Are there imports of American goods? I know that in 1948 there could not have been much, but there might have been in the first five months of this year. The Taoiseach gave figures for the first five months of 1947, 1948 and 1949, but he did not give us, in connection with these figures, any information with regard to the invisible exports in those periods. He told us that in 1947 for the five months' period our exports were to the value of £13,000,000 and our imports £40,000,000, and there was a net deficiency in the balance of trade of £28,000,000. For the purpose of making it easier to refer to them, I have rounded these figures to full millions. In 1948 our exports for the first five months increased from £13,000,000 to £17,000,000, and in 1949 to £22,000,000. Our imports increased from £40,000,000 in 1947 to £63,000,000 in 1948 and had fallen to £48,000,000 in 1949. Is it still possible for the Taoiseach to make available to the House — I would be grateful if he could give it to us—the invisible increase for those five months in each of those years, and, further, whether or not in this period any goods under the Marshall Aid scheme are calculated and, if not, to what extent, therefore, they can be added to these figures?

From that point of view I wonder if the Taoiseach relates these statistics to the House purely for the purpose of showing achievement or improvement and is that the beginning and the end of the reference to these figures? I wonder whether there are not some members of this House who might subscribe to the idea that when the war was over and we found ourselves with a very substantial sterling credit balance, viewing the question of sterling as some of us have viewed it in the light of whether it will be loosened up or taken out of its frozen situation when some people might consider that its purchasing power might be less, it might have been a wise thing to try to transfer as much as possible of that credit balance into goods of all kinds, including consumer goods. That is a point of view to which certain people subscribe. It is a point of view against which certain other people argue. I merely refer to it from the point of view that it may not be wise just to advert to a reduction in an adverse balance in present circumstances as if it were an achievement as distinct from what may happen possibly in a year or two.

In this morning's paper—I am sure the Taoiseach saw it too—there was a suggestion made in England that the whole of the debt due to India should be cancelled. That is seriously suggested in this morning's paper. As far as we are concerned we must consider what the position is likely to be. It is uncertain. Nobody can give a complete answer. It is a matter of opinion. The other day Deputy Lemass indicated that it might be dangerous for us to detach ourselves from sterling. He pointed out that more obligations were involved in doing that than just getting away from it. To a great extent our standard of living depends upon our continued trade with our next-door neighbour.

If we break away from sterling and continue to trade with our next-door-neighbour, subsequently we may find ourselves back in the position of having re-created the same situation. I am not arguing as to whether that might or might not be good. I merely relate this to the figures the Taoiseach gave the House in order to show that there was achievement because of the reduction in the adverse trade balance. I do not say that is wrong but, at the same time I am not prepared to subscribe in toto to that view. I believe that in the circumstances of the present time where all the sterling we own is spent in England and controlled by the Board of Trade, which regulates to what extent we can spend our money even in England, it might be a good thing to transfer some of our assets into certain commodities. It is true that it would be a very wise thing to convert some of our sterling assets into steel which is so badly required for building purposes here. But it is also true that at the present time delivery of that steel might take two or three years. Therefore, we cannot convert sterling into steel even though we need the steel so very badly. I would be glad if the Taoiseach would give us the invisible figures for the first five months for each of the three years for which he gave the other figures. I would like him to consider, too, whether it would not be wise to give serious consideration to the question of what we ought to do as distinct from carrying on merely bookkeeping transactions in inter-trade in accordance with what is now recognised to be the antiquated Manchester School of Economics.

The Taoiseach gave us another series of items. From time to time appeals are made to us for co-operation. We hear appeals made to us for constructive criticism. When criticism is made, without being constructive, it is described as a waste of time, holding up business and destructive. Some credit ought to be given where credit is due. Some credit should be given to the present Opposition for what they accomplished when they were the Government and for the steps they took which has made it possible for this Government to accomplish certain things.

The Taoiseach read out the amount of capital expenditure on productive schemes for the years 1946, 1947, 1948 and 1949. Does the Taoiseach think that was a fair comparison? Why did he not go back and take the three years immediately prior to the war? After all, when Fianna Fáil came into office they had to put over here certain plans for certain developments. It took time for those developments to come about. This Government will find that a great many of their schemes will take time, too, before they reach the position of being properly implemented in relation to getting things done when the spade-work has been completed and the initial difficulties overcome. Why not give us the credit that is due to us? I think the Taoiseach said that capital expenditure on all the schemes for this year had reached a figure of something like £17,000,000.

£16,000,000.

Included in that is a very large expenditure on rural electrification. Will the Taoiseach agree that the plans for that rural electrification had been made by the Fianna Fáil Government some years back? Will be agree that it is only now possible to put these plans into effect because of the fact that up to this materials were not available, nor were the technical men necessary available? Both are now more readily to hand.

I do not think it was the fault of anybody in this country that we inherited from the British Government two very serious problems, our slums and a lack of hospitals for our people. Immediately after 1922 a beginning was made in respect of providing hospitals for our people and getting rid of our slums. It had reached a certain point of development; but from the years 1933-1934 onwards a rapid development took place in respect of housing and in respect of hospitalisation. A good deal of abuse has been hurled at us because it is alleged that we did nothing in connection with hospitalisation. I put a question down recently in regard to that and I was surprised to find that Fianna Fáil had built and completed new hospitals to the number of 37 in a period of six years at a cost of £4,000,000. I want to suggest to the Taoiseach and to the Minister for Health through him, that it would be very foolish for them to continue this line because the chicken will come home to roost. The Minister for Health to-day has even a more awkward position to face in that regard than we had. The Minister for Health to-day cannot get building done at the same price as we got it done in our time because materials are dearer and building costs and wages are higher. If he can, in the lifetime of this Government, show that he has built half that number of hospitals at twice the cost of the 37 built by Fianna Fáil, I shall be the first to say he has done a good job. I want to warn him that it is easy to condemn us and to criticise us without making a full disclosure of the things that we have done. But if you overdo the unfair criticism, when it comes home to roost, you will find very little sympathy. We know, on this side of the House, that there are 37 places available from the hospitals' point of view. There are groups of people in each of these areas who know these places were not there three years ago and who see them there before them now. When they hear this talk of nothing done they do not know what to say or what to believe. It is not to the credit of people who are members of this House and who can seriously examine things to, as I say, criticise things that you think we should not have done. At least give credit for things that were done and do not come into this House like baby Deputy McQuillan who does not know anything about yesterday and tell us that we did not do this or that and did not start turf development until immediately after the outbreak of the war.

I can go further. This capital sum that the Taoiseach has also mentioned, of £16,000,000 is a very substantial sum for the development of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. In the Department of Posts and Telegraphs there were plans which could not be proceeded with because there were no materials and no men. Even to-day, with the easing of the situation in the supply of materials I am aware, as every other Deputy is aware, that the Post Office could proceed even faster than it is doing to-day if it could get more skilled electricians, men who understand the technical side that is needed in post office development. We are all anxious to see telephone development going on but we are prepared also, if there is a good reason why rapid progress cannot be made, to admit that and not to find fault with the Government for something which is beyond their control. At least, if we are asked for co-operation let there be some example from that side that you are prepared to admit that certain things which are now becoming possible, would not have been possible at this particular moment if the groundwork had not been done, if the plans had not been laid and if the scheme had not been generally passed by this House in the period of the last Government.

I remember—apparently some people do not remember—that under the Fianna Fáil Government, either when the war was coming to an end or immediately after, this House introduced a Bill to make available to the Electricity Supply Board a sum of £20,000,000 for electrification with particular reference to rural electrification, £10,000,000 of which was to be subsidised by the State. I remember the Fianna Fáil Government, realising the uncertainty which would arise immediately after the war with regard to matters of finance and matters of costs, created a fund of £5,000,000 which was to be used for the purpose of subsidising further the question of building over and above the subsidy which the State gives and which the local authority gives. I suppose it may not be useful to appeal to the members of the House to recognise and to consider things as they actually are in accordance with facts.

Deputy Timoney got up here this evening and made certain suggestions after he had heard Deputy Childers denying absolutely that there was ever any interference in the administration of the old age pensions either by a Minister or a Parliamentary Secretary and saying that there were the same civil servants in charge to-day as there were then. As Deputy Killilea pointed out, we do not believe anybody who would suggest that those Deputies on the Government Benches would be in a position to do to-day what they accused us of having done yesterday. We say we do not believe it because we believe the Civil Service is above that, and it is only an attack on the integrity of the Service to suggest that.

The Deputy did not accuse the Civil Service.

Deputy Tiimoney asked the Taoiseach to clarify the position; he was not satisfied with what Deputy Childers said and possibly the Taoiseach will do so. I am only referring to it in passing. I am indicating to the members that make up the Government Benches, the Coalition group, that those of us on this side who have any experience at all of the administration of Government Departments, are quite satisfied that we will never level across the House at you people charges of corruption in the administration of any Department of State because we are satisfied that members on all sides of the House get equal justice and equal consideration from the Departments of State.

One would imagine from the way debates are conducted in this House that either we are still out on the husting getting ready for the general election which came off some 16 or 17 months ago or that our whole history began in 1945 or 1946. Nobody in this House seems to have heard of the fact that there was a world war which upset everything in the world including conditions here. Nobody gives credit for the fact that it was the Fianna Fáil Government which kept this country out of the war.

Do you make that claim?

The people would not let you go to war.

Under the Fianna Fáil Administration this country was kept out of the war and in addition to that this country was kept fed.

That is a good way back.

It comes in this way.

I do not think it does.

Charges were made here that when this Government took over they found the goods lying around which had been purchased at exorbitantly high prices and for which there was nothing but the scrap heap to-day, and that Fianna Fáil had by that method earned a reputation of squandermania to which there was no explanation.

What is the explanation of the Argentine wheat?

Mr. de Valera

A very good explanation of the Argentine wheat has been given time after time.

Time after time certain people on that side of the House are given explanations as to why certain things happened and why certain things arose and they will not believe them. I do not know what Deputy Rooney's question was, before. Every time I look at Deputy Rooney and I hear him interjecting I find it difficult to continue listening to him because I do not expect an intelligent question or an intelligent interruption.

I said the people would not let you go to war.

The people know——

It has nothing to do with this debate.

What I want to say is that arising out of that situation certain precautions had to be taken. There was a time when certain supplies were not available at all to this country. Is it to be expected that the Government was not allowed in emergency conditions to take emergency measures and, having done so, and having brought the people safely through a period that people outside this country never believed we would get through, that they are to be judged by their actions, as if they were normal conditions and normal circumstances comparable with what we want to do as we hope to get nearer to normal conditions?

The Works Bill was cited as evidence of our holding up the work of the Government. Deputy Collins said that if there was any waiting time, from the period when the road grant money would be expended until schemes under the Works Bill could be undertaken, we were to take the blame. There is a simple way out. First of all the Works Bill was criticised from this side of the House. A number of amendments were suggested and a number were accepted. That could not be called destructive opposition. If an amendment is accepted, it is accepted because it is believed to be an improvement on the Bill and therefore it is constructive opposition. There is, however, as I say, a way out. If Deputy Collins feels that the putting into operation of the Works Bill and the employment that will arise from it are going to be delayed, why not give an additional road grant to enable the workers to carry on road work for the period of three or six months that may elapse until schemes under the Works Bill are ready for operation? You will not be spending both sums of money at the one time so that that can be easily got over. Surely we are not going to examine legislation passing through this House merely from the point of view of getting it through quickly in order that employment will flow from it without any regard whatever to the rights of individuals affected by it or the rights of communities under the Constitution?

I am glad, in any event, to have heard certain statements from the Taoiseach. I am glad he has made it quite clear that the policy of the Government is to do everything possible even further to increase the tourist traffic. That is one item in respect to which we shall not hear any criticism when the next election comes around, because we are now all united on it.

Except on the further building of luxury hotels.

If the Deputy wants me to develop the point about luxury hotels I shall do so.

Talk about the Land Reclamation Bill.

Or selling 500 acres to an Englishman.

I have been asked a series of questions.

The Deputy might not answer the questions.

So long as the Minister does not consider it a discourtesy. I shall not answer them. I am glad to see certain changes taking place. We are apparently unanimous in this House now on a number of things— on the national issue and on the tourist issue. I hope when other Deputies intervene in the debate they will take the line of examining the Taoiseach's introductory speech and see can they suggest improvements in any of the matters that Deputies have in mind instead of taking this opportunity to attack Fianna Fáil. I hope they will get down to business and try to improve matters generally for the people and the country.

There are a few matters to which I should like to refer on this Estimate. First of all, I should like to express my own appreciation of the work which the Taoiseach, as Leader of this Government, has done for the country in the last few months. I think that there are few Deputies in this House who can, with any feeling of conviction, find fault in any way with the administration of the Taoiseach and the manner in which he has led not merely the Government Party but this country. There are many people outside this House and outside this country who, in the last three months, felt a thrill of pride when they heard the clear definition of Ireland's position in relation to outside countries, given by the Taoiseach in the words he uttered in O'Connell Street. I think the Taoiseach deserves the confidence of Deputies as representatives of the people for the manner in which he carried out his duties during the last 12 months.

We have had during this debate one semi-serious speech from the Front Opposition Bench, from Deputy Lemass, and a number of very silly speeches from back-benchers on the Opposition side. Of course we have come to expect from the Opposition in these days that blend of foolishness and ripe old age which shows a diversity of views in the Opposition. I was interested to hear Deputy Lemass refer, with a certain amount of mock gravity, to this country's position vis-a-vis the sterling area and asking for a definition and clarification of the Government's policy in relation to sterling. I do not think there is anybody, either in this House or outside it, who does not appreciate the gravity of that entire question of our sterling position and the policy that will have to be worked out in relation to it. At the same time, many of us realise that the working out of that policy may be something beyond our own ability to achieve. I was interested particularly in hearing Deputy Lemass, presumably speaking on behalf of the Opposition, voicing his doubts and expressing his own and his Party's defence of the sterling position. I know that, while in opposition, at times the memories of Fianna Fáil Deputies may be short but I remember in this House no later than last Thursday night two Deputies of the Fianna Fáil Party suggesting that they were against the link with sterling and apparently that it should be broken. I remember Deputy Dr. Maguire having the audacity to challenge the Minister for External Affairs, when he was replying to the Vote on his Department and saying to him: “Do not imagine that I agree with the link with sterling.”

There you had a Fianna Fáil Deputy giving his views in relation to sterling, and, mind you, he was not alone, because from the great protester and the great protector of sterling, Deputy Lemass himself, we learned on last Thursday night that a break in the link with sterling would have been carried out by Fianna Fáil long before if it could have been done. What is the use of Fianna Fáil pretending to fulfil the responsible position of an Opposition Party in this country if they express diverse and different views from day to day? What is their purpose in having two or three different voices and different minds on any particular item of policy unless it be their considered view that if you say one thing to one section of the people and something else to another section, you are going to get votes from all sections? Deputy de Valera laughs. I know he is a sufficiently long time in politics to realise that that sort of game just does not work. I am sure he appreciates after many years of political life that if his Party is to remain a political force they must, even as an opposition Party, have a definite policy. I used to hear years ago Fianna Fáil Ministers, as they then were, suggesting that different Parties opposed to them had no policy and, because they had no policy, they had no political future. I trust now that Fianna Fáil will bring those words home to their own minds, because it is perfectly clear so far as the country is concerned that in many things even the most loyal of Fianna Fáil supporters and followers are beginning to wonder whether they have any policy. Listening to debates here or at crossroads to Fianna Fáil speakers, they find that Fianna Fáil speakers trim their sails with each veering wind that blows and a new subject and a new policy spring up each year.

Will the Deputy come back to a discussion of the Estimate.

I am referring to the statement made by the opening spokesman on behalf of the Opposition in relation to our sterling position and commenting on the fact that from what that spokesman said there does not appear to be any policy in relation to the matter. From other speakers besides Deputy Lemass we have heard criticism, very trivial criticism, of the Taoiseach's administration during the last 12 months. From Deputy Briscoe we have had the picture of the penitent Fianna Fáil Deputy who is very worried about the position of his Party and very indignant that Ministers did not mete out sufficient praise for whatever was done by Fianna Fáil.

I do not intend to pursue Deputy Briscoe's line of argument in that connection, but I was interested to hear him say that the capital expenditure in relation to rural electrification was as a result of a plan in detail drawn up by the last Administration. I am quite certain that that is so. I have no doubt that such expenditure as may now be carried out is directly or indirectly as a result of plans laid down during the Fianna Fáil Administration. I would have thought, however, that when Deputy Briscoe raised that matter he would go a little further, that he might, perhaps, throw his mind back to the fact that the necessity for rural electrification arises from the commencement of the Shannon scheme, that rural electrification was part and parcel of the original scheme. Of course, it was opposed in those days by Deputies opposite on the grounds that it was some sort of a white elephant and could never fulfil a function here.

There is one matter I should like to refer to which has been referred to by Deputy Childers, Deputy McQuillan and some other Deputies, and that is the question of turf. I do not intend to reopen any of the discussions we have had in the past concerning turf, but I want to say to the Taoiseach that the question of hand-won turf is a matter of considerable importance to the country and of considerable concern to many Deputies representing turf areas. Any Deputy who knows anything about turf-producing areas appreciates that proper hand-won turf production is a sure means of maintaining a proper rural population in turf areas and that, consequently, attention to hand-won turf production must be part and parcel of the policy of any Government aiming at ending emigration and providing a better life in rural Ireland. That, I think, cannot be gainsaid by any Deputy. I am not blaming the last Administration in particular or any particular body or authority for it, but the unfortunate fact remains that a possible and potential market for hand-won turf produced in the bogs of Ireland was destroyed through faulty administration of the fuel industry during the emergency years. That has caused considerable damage and it is only now we are beginning to recover from the damage caused during those years, damage, let it be said, caused by people and by concerns that never were in any way engaged directly in the production of turf, but who saw in the production of turf a way of making easy money.

That is purely administration.

I am only referring to it as it has been raised by three or four Deputies. I would suggest to the Taoiseach that Bord na Móna, which was established under statute as an authority, not for the development of any species of turf, but for the development of turf as a national fuel, should define its policy in relation to turf production. We all appreciate the excellent fuel machine-won turf is and the excellent means of employment given by the production of machine-won turf. We all appreciate the great programme which has been announced by the Government and which is being followed by Bord na Móna in relation to the production of machine-won turf. I do hope, however, that from the Taoiseach will come this definition of Bord na Móna's aims—that machine-won turf as a fuel is going to be produced and sold to compete with and to drive coal from this country. It is as good a fuel as coal. It is a more economic fuel for the consumer, and I trust that that will be the object and the purpose of Bord na Móna's machine-won turf production programme. At the same time, I hope that, while doing that, Bord na Móna will help to develop and assist the cooperative turf societies and bodies of that nature which at present are engaged in hand-won turf production. As I understand it, that is part of Bord na Móna's activity. It should be part of their activity from week to week. At present, I regret to say, there seems to be on the part of Bord na Móna an antipathy against these cooperative societies engaged in the production of turf.

The Deputy has clearly drifted into the administration of Bord na Móna.

I just wanted to refer to these matters. I have dealt with them not as fully as I would like but as fully as I would be let and I can leave them now. One other matter has been referred to by one of the Deputies opposite. He chided the Government for what he alleged was their failure to reduce the cost of living. I do not think any of us here is in any way satisfied with the progress that has been made in reducing the cost of living. We realise that it is still a problem of very considerable concern to the people but we are proud to state that the vast majority of our people are in a far better position than they were before this Government took office and that many of the things which cost the ordinary citizen exorbitant prices during the last Administration are now at considerably reduced prices and within the means of ordinary people.

For example?

For example, the simple luxuries of the working man and many things like that which, during the last Administration, were becoming a special tax on the ordinary people. While there is that type of reduction in prices—I do not regard it as satisfactory but, nevertheless, it is there—there is this very important thing to be said on the credit side in relation to the Government's achievements, that those who have to pay for commodities like that have in the last 18 months received increases in their earnings and, to a certain extent, have been put in a better position to meet the legacy of high prices left by the last Administration. In the last 18 months, apart from such increases as the Government were able to give agricultural labourers, rural workers and those legions of citizens who, by reason of rising prices and fixed wages had been living on the very brink of starvation, there have been considerable wage increases for all sections of our people and despite those increases the Government have actually reduced the cost of living. I do not think there is any necessity for the Taoiseach or any member of the Government to be in any way ashamed about the progress that has been made in relation to that particular problem and I know that the Government's work in that connection is appreciated by the wage earners. That is as much as I want to say in relation to the debate so far.

I noticed that some Fianna Fáil Deputies were very indignant at suggestions made here that during the last 12 months they had obstructed in this House the work of Government. I am not sufficiently long in this House to judge whether, in fact, their tactics in opposition were obstruction or not, but I do remember in relation to the Local Authorities (Works) Bill that the spokesman who opened the debate on Second Reading on behalf of the Opposition, Deputy MacEntee, delivered a virulent attack on the proposals contained in that Bill and expressed considerable objection.

It was strong criticism, not a virulent attack.

Whether it was sound or not, it constituted to my ears a virulent attack on the proposals contained in that Bill, so much so that Deputy Corry got on his feet and told Deputy MacEntee where he got off. It was perfectly obvious that Deputy MacEntee jumped to his feet in a fit of impetuosity because this was a Government proposal——

Mr. de Valera

Because it was full of flaws which had to be amended.

——to express his opposition to the measure. He obviously did not consult Deputy Corry or other members of the Fianna Fáil Party who are closer to their constituents, perhaps, than Deputy MacEntee is to his, and Deputy Corry, of course, realised that the Fianna Fáil Party could not afford to oppose the Bill and told Deputy MacEntee that. Deputy MacEntee then, in my recollection, disappeared from the Dáil for a period of six or seven weeks.

That had nothing to do with the Bill.

Amendments that he had put down were moved in absentia. It does appear to me that in relation to that particular matter Fianna Fáil undoubtedly, either intentionally or not, delayed the passage of that measure.

And a good job for the measure, too.

It was not.

I do not know whether it was or not. That has to be seen.

Amendments were accepted.

I do know that that particular Bill was introduced at a time when certain Deputies were shedding crocodile tears about the unemployment situation, at a time when Fianna Fáil Deputies were pointing to hungry crowds of unemployed down the country. When the Bill was introduced Deputy Moran from Mayo made academic speeches here about the difference between "roadway" and "public road". I do not know whether it is correct to say that that type of opposition to that measure was obstruction or not but it is regarded as such by the unemployed outside who wanted a job.

Mr. de Valera

That is what the Deputy would like, is it not?

Deputy de Valera is very talkative to-night. The passage of that Bill was delayed nearly two or three months. It is now becoming law and I hope it will be availed of to solve the problem that it is intended to solve. In any event, on the question of these charges of obstruction, I hope the indignant denials made by Fianna Fáil Deputies to-night are suggestive of greater co-operation in the future because that co-operation is needed to solve the problems facing the country. If Fianna Fáil have constructive opposition to express, they have a clear duty to do so, but I appeal to them to do it with one voice and one mind.

The last speaker was very careful indeed not to commit himself to a very definite statement as to whether it was obstruction on our part or not.

What about Deputy Little's four and a half hours' speech last year? I am sorry, Deputy Smith's.

Deputy Little is entitled to speak without interruption.

I did not understand the interruption, but the Deputy who spoke, being a lawyer, must have known——

——that that Bill required to be examined with a microscope. These measures were very crude but the intention was good, and, in principle, Fianna Fáil was never against them. We were prepared to give every opportunity to enable them to work out properly, but the rights of the individual had to be protected, and as the Deputy knows perfectly well, when lawyers get down to the job, they have to do it with a microscope. The Deputy, I think, had his tongue in his cheek when he talked about it at all. It was some other Deputy who had less knowledge of law than the Deputy who made the charge, but it is not a charge which can be maintained at all. We can pride ourselves on having improved these measures immensely by our criticism and by the amendments which were accepted by the Government.

My own feelings about the speech of the Taoiseach to-day might be expressed in different ways. When the Government started out, it started out as a sort of experiment in the combining of incompatibles, a kind of conspiracy of minorities—minority Government instead of majority Government—and at the time it reminded me very much of the kind of experiments that are tried in other intellectual spheres, in art, for example, where you get pictures which are all crisscross lines and strokes, with all kinds of queer colours and circles, which people are supposed to admire. You get the same thing in music when a whole lot of discordant noises are introduced and people are supposed to admire it. Apparently the experimental period is over, and, having gone through the sensation of looping the loop in Government policy—a complete swing round—we find ourselves upon the solid ground of Fianna Fáil policy. I must say that it is with a sense of great satisfaction that I look back on the faith we had in Fianna Fáil and its policy. It reminds me of what was said of the ideas of Swift when it was said that he was not in office but was in power. That is exactly what is operating at the moment. Fianna Fáil is not in office, but certainly Fianna Fáil policy is in power.

So you are satisfied.

I am very uneasy, because I do not know what sort of aberrations may be indulged in. It is one thing to carry out your own policy and another thing to see somebody else carrying it out. However, we have to do the best we can. When the Government came into office, we said we would criticise them very severely for anything wrong they did, but that, in so far as they carried out Fianna Fáil policy, we would support them, and it is with a real sense of satisfaction that we look back on the faith we had in our own policy. It must be remembered that the Fianna Fáil Government was the first Government which really exercised fiscal freedom in this country, and, if some of the younger Deputies could have seen the Opposition we had to face, they would know what opposition really is. For my sins, I was Chief Whip in 1933 and 1934 and we used to have to bring in guillotine motions in order to impose a policy, a fiscal policy of putting on tariffs to protect our industries. It was only through those tariffs that we were able to build up industry, and, when the Taoiseach speaks of following a policy of building up industry, I hope he will do it on the same lines as those on which we did it, with protective tariffs and with all the machinery we used.

Later, we pursued a particular policy which is now being followed to a certain extent and to those who would say that we did nothing about Partition, I say that we had first to clear the way. We had to get the Constitution established and there again we had to do it in spite of something which was real obstruction. Let Deputies look back over the records if they want to know what obstruction really was. I do not want to dwell too much on the past except to point out that we did clear the ground and when the time came in 1938 to deal with the question of Partition the whole thing was blown sky high by the bombs which exploded in London.

The Chair has already ruled that a Partition debate is not in order.

I merely wanted to follow the line followed by other Deputies.

I hope not to disobey the Chair.

Certainly not. We have the satisfaction now of seeing that the Government realise the value of our tourist trade, which was so much abused. It puzzles me beyond measure why the Government should have cast aside the methods which were adopted by the tourist board, by which a company was to be established to purchase hotels and to carry on the business of hotels. Why that should be called a luxury I do not know, and now these hotels are being sold to people at prices which are really below their proper value. That is one aspect of what was for the time being the wrecking policy of this Government, which shut down on the short-wave station and announced their intention to sell it. The reason given the other day for the decision to sell the short-wave station was the most fantastic excuse I have heard. They said that the very fact that they wanted to sell it had the effect, through some queer international complication, of ensuring that they got a short-wave allocation. It reminded me of the story of Charles Lamb, who tells how the Chinese discovered a way to roast a pig by burning down the house. We had to attempt to wreck the short-wave station before we could get a wavelength allocation. However, we have that now, too.

Then again, in regard to other developments in the matter of tourist trade, the Government is changing its attitude. It is changing its attitude with regard to cultural matters and I would urge on the Government, as they are changing their attitude, that they should see the enormous advantage, from the financial point of view—and the Taoiseach emphasised that cultural developments have a financial aspect, from the point of view of tourist trade —in the scheme of building a proper concert hall in Dublin which could be used, as we intended the Rotunda to be used, for conferences and exhibitions and as a proper concert hall, such as is to be found in every decent capital in Europe. In that connection again, the excuse given the other day was that the contract was not signed. It was all but signed and it could have been only a matter of days before it was signed. The first sketch plans are in the Board of Works for the Government to follow up, if they want to.

Another scheme which was set aside was the building of a sports stadium which is also used in many countries as a centre of attraction for the tourist trade. In regard to all these matters, we should first look to our own people, to getting the Irish race here, and, after them, to other people. The first people, of course, are our own people here who should be given an opportunity of having holidays at home, and then the Irish race from America, and the development of such cultural activities as archæology, art, music, folklore and all these things in our traditions which are such an attraction. In fact, you very often find that the Irish people abroad appreciate these things far more than we do ourselves.

If it was only for the purpose of teaching our own people to appreciate these things it would be a good thing to bring these people in from other countries. I believe that until you have given the younger generation a love for these things—and I think the cinema should be exploited for that purpose because it has tremendous possibilities in relation to the education of our younger people—until you give them a love for these Irish traditions through the things I have mentioned, you will not really get them back to speak the Irish language out of a real devotion to it. I do not think mere coercion is going to work now, but if we develop that cultural side, if we can get people to think in Irish we will get them to talk Irish in a generation or so.

I should like to criticise the policy of the Department of Health. There has been such a concentration in dealing with the evil of tuberculosis—which concentration is good in itself—that I would suggest that, in so doing, other things should not be neglected. In my constituency we are suffering very severely from that, because a general hospital which was to have contained 100 beds has been completely put aside although about £9,000 or £10,000, I think, was actually spent on plans for that hospital. The whole project has been put aside in the interests of dealing with tuberculosis. I hope the Minister for Health will change his mind about that and give us a general hospital that deals with all kinds of sickness, in Waterford City—it is for the city and county.

The Deputy is rather going outside the scope of the debate. The Deputy is going into details.

I was dealing with the idea that there was too much concentration on one aspect of health. You can see that with the best intentions in the world it is very difficult not occasionally by way of example to descend to detail.

The Minister for Health made use of Foynes, anyway, which you left locked up.

Tugann an Meastachán sea caoi do gach taobh a dtuairimí ar pholosaí an Rialtais a nochtú agus obair an Rialtais i rith na treímhse atá thart a mheá. Ar na Meastacháin eile, do dhein an Dáil mion-scrúdú ar obair gach Roinne den Stát agus mion-phointí a bhain le gach Roinn a chur fé ghéar-iniúchadh. Fé mar a dúirt an Taoiseach i dtosach na díospóireachta seo, go dtí seo bhí mionphointí sa phictiúir á scrúdú ach, ar an Meastachán seo, táimid ag féachaint, mar a déarfá, ar an bpictiúir ina iomlán. Cad í ár dtuairim den phictiúir sin? Maidir linn-ne anseo i gClann na Poblachta, níl sé ró-dheacair an cheist sin d'fhreagairt. Tá mion-rudaí sa phictiúir a dhein an Taoiseach a lua, tá mion-rudaí ann nach bhfuilmidne sásta leo, rudai na taitníonn linn, ach maidir leis an bpictiúir ina iomlán, sé ár dtuairim gur fearr agus gur taitneamhaí é mar phictiúir ná an ceann a bhí ós ár gcóir anoiridh nó an bhliain roimhe sin. Tá rudaí anseo agus ansiúd a dhein an Rialtas nach ndéanfaimis-ne dá mba rud é gur Rialtas Chlann na Poblachta a bheadh anseo. Tá rudaí eile fágtha ar lár agus gan a bheith déanta ná fágfaimis-ne gan déanamh, ach táimid cinnte de rud amháin—tá an "job" atá déanta ag an Rialtas atá ann fé lathair déanta níos fearr ná mar a dhein aon Rialtas é le blianta fada, abair ó 1936-37.

I think that the Taoiseach chose a happy metaphor in opening this debate when he likened the discussion on his Estimate, in comparison with the discussion on other Estimates, to a person looking at a picture, having previously examined the details of the picture. We have examined the details of the Government picture in the consideration given by the Dáil to the various Estimates for Departments of State, and now when we come to the Taoiseach's Estimate we are looking at the picture as a whole. There are details in that picture which do not please us in Clann na Poblachta as fully, perhaps, as they might. There are details omitted from the picture that we should like to be able to say we saw in it, but, taking it by and large, we find it a good picture to look at.

The Taoiseach—and, surprisingly enough, I am supported even by Deputy Lemass in this—showed himself to be on sound ground economically when he declared that it was the Government's policy to increase the national wealth, and when he expanded that statement by an expression of his realisation and the Government's realisation that the main sources of national wealth are our land and the labour of our people. Perhaps, if at this stage I might interject a minor note of criticism, I might remark the Taoiseach's failure, as far as I could understand it, to refer to the importance of the manner in which that national wealth is to be distributed and shared.

The Taoiseach again struck a note to which we in Clann na Poblachta must make a sympathetic response when he expressed his belief that the greatest economic evils under which we labour nationally are those of under-investment and under-employment. If the Government realises that one of the things that must be stopped in our economic system is the export of money and credits, which are followed as naturally as night follows day, by an export of our labour; if credit and capital can be repatriated so that that credit which is being utilised in the interest of foreigners may be utilised at home, there will be no necessity for us to export our men and women after it and we will have commenced on a real solution of our economic ills.

The Taoiseach advocated, and quite rightly advocated, and expressed it to be the policy of the Government to procure constructive investment in our own economy. In that connection, I would again put to the Taoiseach and to the Dáil the necessity once more of considering whether it is wise to maintain our present link with sterling. We in these benches subscribe to the view that it is unwise. Many of us believe that, in the very near future, ample justification for that viewpoint may be forthcoming.

The Taoiseach dealt with industrial development. I would merely like to say that, in addition to what we did hear from him, we would have liked to have heard a statement of Government policy, that what we can produce in this country should not be imported. Pursuit of that policy, coupled with a plan for the decentralisation of industry, so that new hope and new life would be given to our smaller towns and so that the alarming growth of this capital City of Dublin would be stemmed, will carry us along the road on which, in my submission, lies our economic salvation.

There is another matter to which the Taoiseach referred and I hope he will forgive me if I underline it. I notice that, in his discussion of the Budget that was presented to the House this year, he made in his own mind a clear and definite distinction between that portion of the Budget which was devoted to what the Taoiseach termed our national housekeeping expenses and the portion dealing with our expenditure on capital investment. Some of us have held the view—I think I have expressed it in this House before and I know it has been expressed by members of the Government Party—that the time has come when, as a matter of policy, the Government should consider the introduction of a system wherin there would be not one Budget, but two —one dealing with what the Taoiseach himself described as our expenditure on national housekeeping and the other dealing purely with capital investment and the expansion of our productive capacity.

Another matter on which I would like to hear from the Taoiseach when he is concluding is a clear statement of the principle that this Government accepts the responsibility of ensuring that any citizen able and willing to work will have an opportunity of so working without being forced to emigrate.

I am sorry, also, that we did not hear from the Taoiseach some definite reference to a matter which has agitated the minds of some of us for some time past, namely, the question of granting a right of audience in this Parliament to the elected representatives of the people of the Six Counties. Perhaps, in conclusion, the Taoiseach may find time to refer to that. Charges have been made against Clann na Poblachta as a Party that we went before the people at the last general election with that as one of the main planks in our programme. Let me take this opportunity of assuring Deputies opposite that the according of that right of audience to the elected representatives of the people of the Six Counties still forms a main plank in the programme of Clann na Poblachta. If we have not been able, as yet, to get the Government as a whole to see eye to eye with us on that matter, it does not give any occasion or reason for Deputies opposite to taunt us with having dropped it. The whole tragedy of the situation, to my mind, is that the other Parties, on both sides of the House, cannot, apparently, be convinced of the reasonableness of this approach to reuniting our country cannot be convinced that our attitude before the nations of the world must be capable of misrepresentation when we in this House effectively stifle and gag the elected representatives of our people in occupied Ireland from expressing their opinions in this House and giving us the benefit of their views.

I know that the Leader of the Opposition suggested—it was the only answer he was able to make—when that case was put to him that it might lead to disunity amongst the Anti-Partitionists in the Six Counties who are at present united. I would suggest to him as sincerely as I can—I do not do this in any effort to make Party propaganda out of it—to reconsider his attitude on that matter and to give credit to those who at the moment hold the leadership of the Nationalist population in the Six Counties for a little more commonsense and a little more sincerity in their approach to the problem of ending the occupation of our country.

I hope I will not be accused, as my Leader was accused, of being a poseur, of being insincere, if I say to the House that the speech made by the former Tánaiste, Deputy Lemass, showed a complete lack of appreciation of what his duty was to the people who sent him here. I do not believe that any Deputy was sent here in order to allow himself the luxury of indulging in venting his own personal or Party spleens or prejudices. We were not sent here for that purpose. Deputy Briscoe, in one of the ablest speeches I have heard and one of the most sincere speeches, if I might say so, that I have heard from the Opposition Benches in a long time, made that very point, that we were sent here to do the people's work, and I do not see how Deputy Lemass can reconcile his conception of his duty to the people with utilising this Estimate for venting his spleen against his political opponents.

Mr. de Valera

For criticising the faults of the Government, is it?

For constructive criticism I have nothing but respect, but I am able to differentiate between what is constructive criticism and what is the utilisation of an opportunity for venting personal spites. It is particularly regrettable that we should have such an exhibition from Deputy Lemass. No man on those benches opposite is in a better position or has more ability to give the Dáil the benefit of constructive criticism than the Deputy to whom I refer. Those of us who disagree politically with him concede him ability far and away above the average, but when he utilises that ability not in doing the people's work. not in doing the job he was sent here for, but when he prostitutes it in order to make attacks on his political opponents, I say he is failing in his duty to the people.

Mr. de Valera

Deputy Lemass was doing his duty to the people for 20 or 30 years.

It is regrettable then that Deputy Lemass should have departed in this debate and in the debate on External Affairs from what Deputy de Valera says has been his practice. Any of us could vent personal bitternesses, did we conceive it as being consistent with our duty. As far as many of us in Clann na Poblachta are concerned, we started off nurtured—let us be frank about it —in personal bitterness against some of the people who sit on the same benches with us to-day. Many of us had bitternesses against the Party opposite—that is a matter for ourselves —but the people did not send us here to make this a sounding board for our personal bitternesses or to vent our personal feelings. It is a luxury that neither we nor the country can allow ourselves.

Deputy Childers, I understand, took Clann na Poblachta to task for the promises they had failed to keep. Of course between Deputy Lemass and Deputy Childers it is very difficult to present a consistent defence which will answer both of them because on the one hand the attack on myself and my colleagues and the Clann na Poblachta Party has been "Oh, you have been swallowed up by Fine Gael. You are more Fine Gael than Fine Gael themselves". And then if that record does not suit the other record is played and we are anything from anarchists to crypto-communists. Deputy Lemass finds fault with us on the matter that the Government is ineffective and inefficient because it is disunited. Five minutes afterwards in the same speech this evening he delivered a criticism of the Government and of Clann na Poblachta as part of that Government because they were too united. They could not possibly be a good Government because the Taoiseach said that there were no serious disagreements between them.

Deputy Childers took us to task about our failure to implement the policy upon which we went before the electorate at the last general election. Let me make Deputy Childers and every Deputy opposite a present of this: We have not been able to implement the policy we put before the electorate at the last general election. Of course we have not, but we have succeeded in putting important and substantial protions of that policy into effect. One of the promises that we made to the people was that we would assist in reducing taxation. That was a promise which was fulfilled when the luxuries of the worker were removed from underneath the heavy impost put upon them in October, 1947.

Another promise, one we were taunted about a lot, one in respect of which the famous "in abeyance" phrase was coined, was our promise to repeal the External Relations Act. When the Leader of Clann na Poblachta, the present Minister for External Affairs, stated on the 18th February of last year that that portion of our policy would have to be put temporarily in abeyance he was greeted with taunts, jibes and jeers from the whole of the Fianna Fáil propaganda machine, but we do not hear many of these taunts, jibes and jeers now, nor do we hear much about "in abeyance" because in that respect, too, Clann na Poblachta delivers the goods. It did not remain long in abeyance.

There are Deputies on the benches opposite and in the House at the moment who challenged me personally as to their belief in our sincerity that we would succeed in getting the External Relations Act repealed. We did succeed in getting it repealed. We promised the people internal peace. The people know now that there is internal peace. We promised the sick, the widow, the aged and the orphan increased social services, and, if we have not been able to implement that promise in full, we have gone a long way towards it. The increases that have been paid to the old age pensioners are in excess of those which two former Cabinet Ministers told this House and Seanad Eireann were increases which were beyond the capacity of the Irish people to pay.

I noticed that great portions of the speeches from the benches opposite were directed to taunts and criticism of our Party. I would just ask the Deputies opposite to consider this: are there any nine Deputies in Fianna Fáil —and, remember, there are only nine of us—who, if agreed on a policy, would be able to get the Fianna Fáil Party to adopt such a considerable part of it as has been adopted by the present Government, not grudgingly, but gladly and co-operatively? I would like to take this occasion to pay tribute to the manner and spirit in which the present Leader of the Government has not alone treated the Clann na Poblachta Party but all the Parties comprising the inter-Party Government.

References were made here to our failure to implement our afforestation policy. We have not been successful in putting into effect the policy of afforestation that we would have liked, but we have been successful in doing this: that, henceforth, the annual planting will be four times greater than that achieved in any year by Fianna Fáil.

Six times.

Mr. de Valera

Forty thousand acres?

Sixty thousand.

When were they planting 10,000?

I do not know if it is particularly hard on the Deputies opposite to have to listen to this, but I would merely like to make this point, that they should examine the facts before they taunt us about our failure to put into operation our complete policy on afforestation. Let them deny that there has been a substantial advance made. They cannot deny it.

There has been more planting this year than ever before in the history of this country.

Unfortunately, the position is that facts and figures are something which Deputies opposite are, I am afraid, prepared to ignore when it suits their book to do so.

In so far as turf is concerned, our policy for the development and utilisation of turf as a national fuel remains the same. In so far as we can urge it upon the Government we will urge on the Government that coal should be excluded from all turf areas. I am satisfied that the development of machine-won turf will receive at the hands of the inter-Party Government the treatment that it merits. We may have divergences of opinion as to the tempo at which this development should take place, but I am satisfied from the Taoiseach's statement to-day that we are at one in our policy in that respect.

I would ask the House, and particularly the Deputies opposite, to let us have the greatest possible degree of unity on major national issues. For a period it seemed as if it were possible to get that. It appeared to be possible to get it when Deputy Lemass, speaking at Rathfarnham in August, 1948, said that his only regret about the decision to repeal the External Relations Act was that by the result of the general election in February of that year Fianna Fáil had been robbed of the chance of doing it, because it had been their intention to do so in the coming session. I thought that when that statement was made by Deputy Lemass that we had unity on these matters. Unfortunately, Deputies on the opposite benches, former Ministers and those whom the people are entitled to regard as the spokesmen of the Fianna Fáil Party, have drifted very, very far away from the attitude expressed by Deputy Lemass in August, 1948. I thought that on Partition we would get unity. I think there is still a great degree of unity on it, and I would urge Deputies on this side of the House as well as those on the opposite side that on no occasion should an attempt be made to utilise Partition as a Party plaything. It is using it as a Party plaything—it is using it to extract mean Party advantage—by making accusations against others of doing so. I do not want to put it any further than that.

Deputy Briscoe complained, in the course of his speech, of the failure of Deputies on this side of the House to give credit to the Fianna Fáil Party for what, he alleged, they had achieved. That is a charge which Deputy Briscoe cannot make against some of us. I would be as critical of Fianna Fáil for many things they have done—and I make no apology for it—as any Deputy in the House, but I have never failed to give credit to Fianna Fáil for the advances that were made in the removal of the Oath, the retention of the land annuities, the abolition of the Governor-Generalship and the restoration of the ports. We have never been niggardly or mean in our approach to these matters. We criticised where we felt the criticism was due, but we never failed to give credit where we thought credit was due.

Deputy Briscoe appealed to Deputies to work in the interests of the country. I will endorse that appeal. That is what we were sent here for. I would ask Fianna Fáil to look at the picture— to return again to the Taoiseach's metaphor—but I would ask them before doing so to take off their Fianna Fáil spectacles which are aggravating their political astigmatism. If they do that, they will get a proper look at the picture.

It is rather amusing, after the speech made by Deputy O'Higgins about the diverse views of the Opposition, to hear Deputy Lehane tell us about "we of Clann na Poblachta" Party. Judging by Deputy Lehane's statement to-night, those who accused Fine Gael of having swallowed Clann na Poblachta and all the other Parties were wrong. I think it is Clann na Poblachta that must have swallowed the whole lot, if the Deputy's statements are correct.

We were also accused of obstruction. I heard that charge from a young Deputy like Deputy O'Higgins here, but I remember that for at least 12 or 15 years, when Fianna Fáil were in office, the Opposition at that period were so negligent of their duties that I had to act practically as official Opposition. They would not even bother to read a Bill, not to mind to criticise it, and they knew very little of what was happening in this House. They bothered very little about what was happening in this House.

There was also a sneer at the different attitudes adopted by Deputy MacEntee and myself towards the Works Bill. I gave the viewpoint of the ordinary countryman on the Works Bill. It is only natural that a Deputy who was a Minister in the same Department for a number of years, and who had been accustomed to dealing with these matters, would see the weaknesses and would endeavour to correct them here rather than have them coming back from the Seanad to be corrected. That is only quite natural.

What about the one man official Opposition?

I do not want any interruptions from any lawyers. We have enough of them. I believe you could earn more in an hour in the courts than you would earn here in a day. I believe you charge them £5 5s. 0d. an hour.

On a point of order. I noticed recently in the House that it has become the practice of some Deputies to talk in a disparaging manner of other Deputies, but more especially of those in the legal profession. Deputy Corry has made some references, not alone to the profession followed by Deputy O'Higgins, but to his charges. I think he ought to be made withdraw those references.

The Minister for Agriculture in the course of his speech talked enough about the lawyers.

A point of order has been made. There was no personal attack.

Is it in order for a Deputy to refer to the private profession of another member of the House?

I was answering a point of order when the Deputy interrupted me. I am not here to defend any class if a charge is made against them, but if a charge is made against an individual, yes. The Deputy was wrong and disorderly in referring to the fees paid to an individual lawyer.

In case it relieves Deputy Corry's mind, I may say that I take no exception to his remark. I certainly would not act for Deputy Corry for the sum of £5 5s.

The next interruption will lead to something else.

Take care it might not.

What I object to is that this Party that made so much noise about the power taken from representatives of the people down the country, the local authorities, the power taken from them in the managerial line and all that kind of stuff, should form themselves into an absolutely autocratic body with a set policy and should endeavour to remove from the local authorities the loyalty and honest service that they would expect from their employees. That has been done repeatedly by each Minister here who has any connection with the local authorities.

It is customary, for example, that when an official is dissatisfied with his lot, if he considers that he is entitled to an increase of salary, that he is entitled to shorter working hours or anything of that description, that that official would make an application to the local authority concerned. Instead of that—and I am not alone in my protest against this—what you have happening is that there are letters sent down to-day from the Minister for Social Service, to-morrow from the Minister for Health and the day after from the Minister for Local Government, each one of them couched in these terms, that the Minister considers that an increase of so-and-so should be given to a certain set of officials; the Minister considers that the hours should be shorter for another set of officials; and the Minister considers that so much bonus should be payable to a third set of officials. As a matter of fact, they tripped over themselves so far that we had a little bit of delay at a health meeting, because we had three letters together from the one Minister, each one suggesting a different set of salaries for the officials under his control.

I have no objection whatever to the officials of local authorities getting a fair do, but I certainly object to this set Government policy of removing from the local authorities the little right they had, and removing from them the loyalty that I expect they are entitled to get from their officials. That is happening constantly. One letter from the Minister for Local Government last week put an extra £11,000 on the ratepayers in County Cork. It was considered a reduction in the cost of living by removing it from one portion and putting it on to another.

I am sorry Deputy Con Lehane has gone away. I remember those loud speeches we heard, about people increasing their own salaries and the enormous salaries of Ministers, from the Clann na Poblachta people at the last election. We hear little about that now. In other days we would fix a salary for an official and send it to the Local Appointments Commissioners to have it advertised, and we would be told: "You cannot get the right kind of man for that money; you should give him a few hundred more." Above anything else I do not believe that you can possess a worse servant than one who thinks he is underpaid and who is dissatisfied with his lot. He becomes, in the words of some of my colleagues in Cork, when they are looking for an increase for some fellow, "a slovenly individual in his work, a man who will leave half his work undone and who has no interest in his work." I appeal to the Minister on these lines.

I have been surprised here during the past 12 months at the manner in which the Minister for Agriculture is carrying out his functions. We had trouble about the oats. We did not think much of the way in which he handled the flax problem. We are short 33,000 acres of beet this year. We are worried about the price of milk and home-made butter. We wonder what is happening. But all these things can be traced back to a statement he made here on one occasion. He repeated the statement very emphatically last night. He referred to his mangy, inadequate salary of £2,000 odd per year. I do not think the Taoiseach should leave it until the third time of asking. When the Minister for Agriculture alludes to his position as a Minister and describes the salary he is paid as a mangy, inadequate one I wonder what the members of the Clann na Poblachta Party think about it? I would like to hear their views on the matter. I am sure they would be enlightening, particularly for those who elected them to this House. They promised to reduce salaries when they were coming in.

Is the Deputy coming to the Estimate now?

I am dealing with Government policy as a whole. That comes under this Vote. I am dealing with the manner in which business in general is being done. After all, there may be something in the statement of the Minister for Agriculture, taken in conjunction with the letters we get down the country saying that one cannot get the right kind of man unless one pays a particular kind of salary. Perhaps that does account for all the blunders that have occurred in the past 16 months.

I suggest to Deputy Lehane that the time for statements with regard to principles is now ended. What we want now is a little action. He alluded to the statement of principle by the Taoiseach that what we can produce in this country must not be imported into the country. I wonder was the Taoiseach thinking of that when the Minister for Industry and Commerce raided the funds of the sugar company. I suppose the Taoiseach must have authorised that. That raid resulted in a reduction in productivity this year to the extent of 33,000 acres of beet. It will result in unemployment on the land and at the four factories concerned. It will result in a loss of income to Córas Iompair Eireann, freightage charges on 300,000 tons of beet. I wonder did that enter into the Taoiseach's mind when he said that what we can produce in this country should not be imported. I take it we shall have to import sugar to make up for the loss.

That policy seems to run right through. There is a reduction in the acreage under wheat and we shall have to call upon our very scarce dollars to pay for it abroad. One can travel right through the whole range of agricultural produce, from Deputy Rooney's tomatoes up to the glass houses, and one will find that production is rapidly declining under the methods adopted by the present Government. In that way one gets what Deputy Lehane described a short time ago as "a fair picture".

I do not wish to unduly delay the House, but these are matters of primary importance when one considers employment on the land and increased production. Is it for that purpose that the dice is being loaded? Is that the reason why the burden is increasing on the backs of the farming community month after month? Is that the definite, set policy of the Government? The increases, as a result of the letters to which I have already referred, reach something in the region of £34,000 in so far as South Cork Board of Assistance is concerned, in salaries alone over the past 12 months. There has been an increase of £35,000 odd in salaries under the mental hospital committee in Cork. There is a pro rata increase right along in every section. The increased burden on the ratepayers in County Cork amounts to 5/- in the £, roughly, this year. These ratepayers have no increased incomes to meet those extra burdens. Perhaps the Government thought that was a step towards bringing about increased production on the land. The burdens are daily piling on and we are faced now with the deliberate manoeuvre to prevent discussions on such matters in this House. Deputy Cogan's motion has been on the agenda for practically 14 months.

These are the matters on which I would like to hear something from the Taoiseach. If fair criticism is wanted, I am giving it now. Instead of this rush to adjourn to-morrow night, I think the Taoiseach should give two days next week for the discussion of Deputy Cogan's motion so that the agricultural community may know exactly where it stands and what the burden is likely to be in the next 12 months. I think that would be more important with relation to getting more production from the land than a protracted holiday for the poor gentleman who has to work on a mangy, inadequate salary of £2,000 a year.

I always like sitting-in when Deputy Corry is speaking, because I find it a great mental exercise trying to ascertain exactly what he is speaking about at any given moment. In the round-about to-night I was completely lost. Like Deputy Corry, I, too, would like to extend my sympathy to the Taoiseach, but for a different reason. The Taoiseach, being a man with a deep sense of duty and a deep sense of responsibility, may feel that he is under an obligation to make some effort to deal with the various points raised by Deputy Corry. I certainly would not like to have that task imposed upon me at any time.

A number of Deputies in the course of this debate adopted the Taoiseach's metaphor in opening the discussion of painting the entire picture of the Government structure and Government policy in dealing with this Estimate. I think it is true to say, as was remarked by Deputy Little, that one has in this Government—at any rate, one had when it was first set up—an experiment which is completely novel to the minds of all political thinkers in this country. It was a new idea and a new method being tried out. As the Taoiseach himself said some months ago, it has gone beyond the experimental stage now and it has become an institution.

I think we can claim, either those of us in the Fine Gael Party who were associated with an earlier Government or those who accepted the traditions of that Government, that the inter-Party Government, by reason of the very fact that it is broadly based and truly representative of all sections of the people, is probably about the best type of Government that this country has witnessed so far. It is certainly a very great improvement on the last Government which was representative of one section of the people only and which worked unashamedly in the interests of that section and who had Ministers going on record that they conceived it to be their duty in so far as the allocation of jobs was concerned to see to it that the jobs went to supporters of Fianna Fáil.

Deputy Lemass to-day complained about suggestions of corruption made against the Fianna Fáil regime. Deputy Timoney, in his speech on this Estimate, said that he accepted 100 per cent. the statement made by Deputy Lemass that there was never anything in the nature of corruption connected with Fianna Fáil. I do not accept that but I want to make it clear that I am not talking about personal corruption or anything of that sort. I believe that in the political sense Fianna Fáil werecorrupt and they did not know it themselves because they were so corrupt that they took it as the ordinary routine of Government and of political administration that a Government should be corrupt in that sense. I think Fianna Fáil Deputies would be surprised at some of the statements made by their own Ministers when they were members of the Government. They would be surprised at the indifferent and nonchalant approach made by Fianna Fáil Ministers, notably Deputy Boland and Deputy Moylan, in relation to this question. As I say, I am not in any sense talking about what might be described as moral or personal corruption in that sense, but I am talking about the Fianna Fáil political outlook in so far as the division of labour in the country is concerned.

I want to join with Deputy Timoney in suggesting to the Taoiseach that it would be a very great mistake if this Government allowed any backsliding in the principles which were enunciated by the Taoiseach himself when he took office first, when he said that one of the main principles of this Government would be to see to it that all sections of the people were dealt with equally by the Government, that in the giving of work, in promotion in services and that kind of thing, a man's political affiliations would have nothing whatever to do with it. I believe that the Government have worked on that principle so far, and, as I say, I join with Deputy Timoney in expressing the hope that they will continue to do so.

I have suggested that the Fianna Fáil Government unashamedly exercised political patronage and were so accustomed to it that it was nothing unusual to them.

Mr. de Valera

All that is as untrue as the charges of personal corruption.

I made no personal charges.

Mr. de Valera

There were charges of personal corruption made in the past, and that is as untrue as these others were.

Then why do you get so excited?

Mr. de Valera

Because I hate to hear untruths.

We merely give the facts. I will give Deputy de Valera an opportunity of refuting them if he can. In Volume 96 of the Official Debates, column 2143, Deputy de Valera, if he goes to the trouble of looking it up, will find there a discussion on the Estimate for the Department of Justice in the year 1945, when that Department was presided over by his colleague, Deputy Boland.

What has that got to do with the Taoiseach's Department?

I am talking about the general question of the approach of this Government, as distinct from the approach of the previous Government.

Mr. de Valera

You have been doing exactly the same. The present Government is doing exactly the same.

The Deputy will allow me.

Deputy de Valera has accused me of making untrue statements. I take it——

Now Deputy O'Higgins is reading and Deputy de Valera is interrupting. I want to know what has the Official Report of 1945 to do with the Taoiseach's Estimate of 1949.

Perhaps if I was permitted to read it, it would become clear.

The Chair cannot see how there can be any connection between the two. Surely it is going back too far altogether.

With respect, before you took the Chair, I was dealing with a speech made by Deputy Lemass in the course of this debate and that brought me on to this subject. Deputy de Valera has challenged the truth and accuracy of my statements. I am inviting him to consult that debate. During that debate, the present Taoiseach, then Deputy Costello, made some suggestions to Deputy Boland in reply.

I cannot see how this can have any reference whatsoever to what is before the House at the moment.

I am going to deal with——

If I am going to allow this to proceed, where are we going to get with everyone else doing the same?

On a point of order, this matter was raised specifically by Deputy Lemass on this Estimate in the course of his speech to-day and Deputy O'Higgins is dealing with matters that were raised by Deputy Lemass specifically by way of accusations.

Mr. de Valera

Is that accurate?

Of course it is accurate.

You can twist it any way you like.

Do not use the word "twist", now.

That is not an accurate statement.

What is the matter?

The matter has reference to the question of political patronage.

With reference to the present Administration?

With reference to the speech made——

With reference to the present Administration?

Yes, I can show continuity.

The Deputy must show how the present Administration is concerned with it, otherwise he must pass from it.

Very well. I take it I am permitted to say that when the present Taoiseach took up office he announced quite clearly that one of the main tasks facing this Government and one of the matters which he and the Government would address their mind to was the wiping out of political patronage which has existed in this country under the Fianna Fáil régime.

Not before?

That does not arise on this debate.

If it does arise, we shall go back to 1922.

You have made your speech.

So have you.

The Deputy must deal with the administration of the present Taoiseach.

I regret that I must pass from that. I always bow to the ruling of the Chair; but I take it that I shall be allowed to suggest to Deputy de Valera that before he finally convicts me as a liar he will take the trouble to read the reference which I have given to him.

Mr. de Valera

I know it well.

You know as well as I do that that was the time that Deputy Boland admitted——

The Deputy is not going to discuss this by a side-wind.

The debate so far has covered a wide range of subjects from the matters which Deputy Little raised and to which I regret I cannot reply, to the speech made by Deputy Corry a few moments ago. One speaker on the Fianna Fáil Benches, Deputy Little, surprisingly enough, said that this Government in all its actions to date was merely——

I did not say in all its actions. I said it was coming round to our policy.

I think actually what Deputy Little did was to describe the Government as a conspiracy of minorities which started off making discordant noises and that it had now climbed back to the solid ground of the Fianna Fáil policy. I think I am correct in that. Having claimed that this Government had climbed back to the solid ground of Fianna Fáil policy, Deputy Little would probably be surprised at the criticism which was directed against this solid ground of Fianna Fáil policy by subsequent and earlier speakers on the Fianna Fáil Benches. Deputy Little should at least remember that he cannot have it both ways. Either the policy of this Government is different from that which was pursued by Fianna Fáil for 16 years or it is not. If it is different, surely Deputy Little, as a person who was very closely connected with the Fianna Fáil Government for a long number of years, will be able to appreciate the difference.

The present Government is capable of anything.

It is capable of governing the country well.

That is a tribute from Deputy Little, even though a left-handed one. I think Deputy Little has possibly pointed out one of the differences which existed between this Government and the Government with which he was associated. He says that this Government is capable of anything. I was going to submit that the last Government was capable of nothing by the time it reached the end of its term of office. At any rate, if their policy is similar, if they are now back on the solid rock of the Fianna Fáil policy, I want to know why are all the Deputies opposite so very determined to criticise everything this Government does?

They do not.

I know that certain Deputies—the Leader of the Opposition for one and Deputy Briscoe for another—generally take the line of argument, in dealing with matters which this Government has done, of saying that they do not know whether it is a good thing or a bad thing. Deputy Briscoe spoke in that fashion at great length to-day. Deputy de Valera did that in West Cork in relation to the repeal of the External Relations Act.

Mr. de Valera

Will I be allowed to deal with that?

I will say very much "yes".

Deputy O'Higgins is allowed to deal with it.

Deputy Little should be careful in what he says about the Chair. I have not heard Deputy O'Higgins deal with it.

Unfortunately, it is only too true.

Mr. de Valera

It is taken out of its context, as usual.

Let us be quite clear. I am referring now to the repeal of the External Relations Act, which was referred to by a number of speakers. I am saying that Fianna Fáil, having supported the repeal of the External Relations Act, and Deputy Lemass having gone on record as stating in Rathfarnham before the repeal was introduced that the only regret Fianna Fáil had was that they were not left in office to introduce that Bill——

Mr. de Valera

On a point of order, will it be in order for us to go over all the statements that have been referred to by Deputy O'Higgins?

The Chair cannot give a decision on a matter that is not before it. The Chair will give its decision on these matters when they arise.

I do not know why Deputy de Valera should be so anxious to prevent me from touching on these matters. Remember that, without any objection from the Taoiseach or from anyone on this side of the House, the matters that I want to refer to were referred to at length and ad nauseam by Deputies opposite in the course of this discussion. I think we are entitled at least to deal with these matters such as they are. Deputy Briscoe will, of course, back up his leader when I say that Deputy Lemass did make that speech in Rathfarnham. I read out portion of that speech in the debate on the Vote for the Department of External Affairs. Deputy Boland later made another speech in which he described the repeal of the External Relations Act and the deterioration of our relations with Great Britain, as either the result of deliberate mischief-making or shortsighted, incompetent leadership on the part of the Government.

We shall get the quotation to-morrow.

Keep quiet. Deputy de Valera having supported the repeal of the External Relations Act in this House and Deputy Lemass having made that speech in Rathfarnham, Deputy de Valera went on record as saying eight or 12 months after the event, that he did not know whether it was a good thing or a bad thing.

Mr. de Valera

Will the Deputy give the context?

I am going to ask a plain question of Deputy de Valera. Will he say before this debate ends whether it was a good thing or a bad thing?

Mr. de Valera

I have said it a thousand times.

I am satisfied to take an answer to that simple question in the course of the debate. After all, it is a very simple question. We were told in the course of the debate by Deputy Little that all this great movement had started away back in 1932 and that it continued up to the introduction of the Constitution in 1937. I move to report progress.

Progress reported, Committee to sit again to-morrow.
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