Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 9 Nov 1949

Vol. 118 No. 5

Military Service Pensions (Amendment) Bill, 1949—Second Stage.

Minister for Defence (Dr. O'Higgins)

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time. In moving the Second Reading, I might point out that the main object of this Bill is to allow persons who were refused service certificates under the Military Service Pensions Acts, 1924 and 1934, to appeal against those refusals and, if necessary, to have their claims reinvestigated. As Deputies are aware, under the original Act persons refused certificates could appeal to the Minister for review on the ground that evidence not previously available was then available. Such appeals were made to the number of 1,294. That number of cases was reopened and the result of reopening 1,294 cases was that 654 persons who had been previously refused succeeded in getting the certificate and obtaining the pension. I mention these figures in order to let every Deputy appreciate what has been the result of having cases reopened on appeal. Something more than half the cases reopened on appeal succeeded in getting a certificate and a pension. If it were not for that right to reopen on appeal, more than half that number of people would be suffering under a distinct and continuing injustice.

That was the situation up to the Act of 1945. Section 5 of the 1945 Act removed from disappointed or rejected applicants the right of appealing to the Minister and took from the Minister the right of asking the board to review their cases. The result was that the work of the board was terminated in 1946. Since that date, from various sources, here and there, it has been alleged, and it continues to be alleged, that there are very many people with meritorious service who would have succeeded in having decisions reversed if Section 5 of that Act had not been passed and who would enjoy pensions if the right of appeal had still been left with the Minister. This Bill reopens to anybody, subject only to the opinion of the Referee, a right to appeal to have cases reopened. I do not think that, generally speaking, there will be any grave objection to that particular proposal. Statements have been made that many of these persons failed in their original application because of the dissension and political controversy that existed in years gone by and that people in opposite camps would not certify or substantiate the claims of political opponents. That statement has been made to me in a great number of different areas by a great number of people. I have been listening to statements of that kind for years. As long as there is any doubt on the point, I think it would be the responsibility and the duty of the Minister to clear the air and to give all such people a right to appeal and a right to a rehearing, subject only to the power of the Referee to come to the conclusion that there is or is not sufficient material to allow a rehearing of the case.

In this Bill it is proposed, so as to remove any suspicion of political favouritism or political prejudice, that the power of reopening cases or directing that a case should be reopened will no longer rest with the Minister. It is not just a simple repeal of Section 5 of the Act of 1945. Under this Bill, if it meets with the approval of the Dáil, the power to reopen or to decide not to reopen will not rest with the Minister but with the Referee appointed under this Bill and the Minister's power to request a review is not revived in this Bill.

The procedure under this Bill is simple. The applicant has to state the grounds on which he considers that his claim should be reconsidered, and if he makes out a case then the Referee must investigate the claim. If such a case is not made, the Referee will reject the appeal, but it is intended to make regulations whereby the Referee will inform the applicant of the proposed rejection and will give him reasonable time to produce any other evidence he may have in support of his appeal. The power of review here is much broader than the power of review that did rest with the Minister prior to the Act of 1945. Prior to the enactment of Section 5 of the Act of 1945 the Minister could only direct a review of a case on appeal if he was satisfied that there was available new evidence of an important nature which had not been previously available. The Minister had not power to reopen a case on the ground that new evidence was available which could have been available to the applicant when he was making his original application. Under this Bill power is left to the Referee to reopen a case if additional evidence is available even if that evidence was previously available but was not produced or was not forthcoming. Any Deputy can understand that that opens a much wider field and a much easier course to succeed, at least, in having the appeal reheard.

The machinery in this Bill is the same type and design but not necessarily in personnel as obtained under the previous Act. The Referee will be assisted by a committee of four members, two of these being members of the I.R.A. and one representative from each of the Departments of Finance and Defence. For appeals under the 1924 Act the Referee will be assisted by two members of the committee which will constitute a board of assessors.

The Bill does not provide for new applications but only for appeals from those who already applied and were refused certificates. It is not intended to extend the date for fresh applications but power will be taken, by regulation, to admit new applications from persons who can produce satisfactory reasons why they did not apply within the statutory time limit. Any fresh certificates granted under the Bill to appellants or persons applying for the first time will commence from the date of the passing of the Bill.

In connection with the powers taken in this Bill, by regulation to allow of a case of a new applicant who did not previously apply, we have to relate that to the political conditions that unfortunately existed in this country for a great number of years back, where there was a number of people who possibly had as good pre-Truce and post-Truce service as very many enjoying pensions but who for political reasons of one kind or another would not apply under the 1924 Act or under the 1934 Act until the date for applying or appealing under those Acts had passed. When we are reopening this matter at all, I think it is sound and fair and reasonable that such persons should at least have the right to apply and, by regulation, we propose to give the right to apply to such people.

Pensions under this Bill will only date from the date of the passing into law of this Bill. I am anticipating, perhaps, some portions of the debate when I call attention to that particular fact. There will be criticism, there will be, perhaps, divided opinion, as to why pensions are paid only from the passing of the Bill and why pensions under this particular Bill are not made retrospective. Retrospective is a simple word in itself, but, when you convert that word into pounds, shillings and pence, it amounts to an amazingly large sum of money. According to any estimate I can get—and, of course, an estimate is only an estimate—under this Bill, the increased volume of money that will be distributed amongst old members of the I.R.A. will be approximately £50,000 per annum. Appeals under this Bill will, some of them, date back to the 1924 Act and the balance will date back to the 1934 Act. The 1924 Act is 25 years ago and the 1934 Act is 15 years ago. If we take £50,000 as the amount of extra money that will go out annually under the Bill and if we take the average of 25 and 15 years, the average number of years over which these pensions would have to be made retrospective would be 20 and 20 times £50,000 is £1,000,000. That is the lump sum that would have to be found in order to make these new pensions retrospective.

I wonder if that £1,000,000 were piled up on the table here and if we left it to the House to say: "We can either give this £1,000,000 in back money to the new cases who will get pensions under this Bill, or we can devote it to some other useful national purpose" whether the vote would be to give the £1,000,000 in back money, particularly when we take it that the big end of new pensions under this Bill will be for people who could have applied under either of the existing Acts, but, for one reason or another, did not apply and the balance line-ball cases of people who had been previously rejected and whose legal entitlement at the present moment is the large sum of nothing per year. Under this Bill, if they succeed in their claims, we are proposing to give them a pension from the date of passing this Bill.

These are the figures, but figures in this case can be supported by facts and by precedent. Under the 1934 Act, we did give a right to 1924 Act people to appeal against the previous decision or verdict, so that, when the 1934 Act was passed, people who had been rejected under the 1924 Act and at that moment were entitled to no pension, were given the right to appeal, but they were given the right to pick up their pension only from the date of the passing into law of the 1934 Act. I think that was a generous Act at the time. It gave the possibility and opened up the avenue to giving pensions to people who had previously been rejected, but neither the Government at the time nor the Dáil at the time would consider making those pensions retrospective.

That is the particular precedent that we are re-enacting in this Bill, but the volume of money which would be earmarked in order to make pensions under this Bill retrospective would be staggering, and the fact of the matter is that it would not be possible to find it or to pay it. As the Minister responsible for the introduction and formation of this Bill, I have no hesitation in saying to the Dáil that, if I sought from the Government permission to make this Bill retrospective and if I were to ask the taxpayers to find, in addition to the £50,000 per year extra money which I am asking them to find, a lump sum of £1,000,000, then definitely, frankly and candidly, there would be no Bill.

Mr. S. Collins

How does the Minister arrive at the figure of £1,000,000?

Dr. O'Higgins

Appeals under this Bill will go back to 1924 and 1934. The 1924 Act is 25 years ago and the 1934 Act is 15 years ago. The average of those two periods is 20 years and multiplying £50,000 by 20 gives £1,000,000.

Mr. S. Collins

That is not a sound argument.

Dr. O'Higgins

It is sound mathematics.

Mr. S. Collins

How many new pensions will be granted under the Bill? It relates only to new pensions which may be granted under this new measure.

Dr. O'Higgins

As I said earlier in my statement, all I have to go on is an estimate. The estimate I have before me of the extra cost under this Bill is £50,000 per annum.

Captain Cowan

In other words, 1,000 people get £50 per year each?

Dr. O'Higgins

Or 2,000 people get half. To make it retrospective, the lump sum which would have to be found would be approximately £1,000,000. That is the estimate. The claim for retrospection, at least in the cases of the great bulk of them who did not apply before, when they should have applied, would not be a sustainable case. The case with regard to the others might be based on the fact that they got a raw deal in the past, that, for one reason or another, the pension that should have been given was not given and that, now that they were getting a pension, it should date back for at least 15 years, if not for 25 years. My answer is that the Government and I, as Minister, would not be prepared to look for £1,000,000 cash, plus what it is proposed to give under this Bill, and the alternative was to give pensions from the date of passing the Bill or to leave people just as they are without a pension at all.

Captain Cowan

Does the Minister think there will be in fact quite a number of applications from people who would not recognise either the 1924 or the 1934 Act?

Dr. O'Higgins

Yes, I do. I may be wrong, but I believe that will be so. It is difficult to arrive at an estimate of the number of new or fresh claimants under the Bill, and in that respect we can only work on figures with regard to the past. Under the 1924 Act there were 21,000 odd applications, of which 3,906 were successful and 17,000 failed. Under the 1934 Act there were 60,852 applications, of which 11,862 succeeded and 48,000 failed. It will be seen from these figures that roughly one-fifth or one-sixth of the applicants succeeded in their claims and four-fifths or so failed, under each Act. There are, therefore, a possible 66,000 persons who could apply under this Act, but as the requirements of the Acts regarding the service necessary to qualify are now better known than when the original Acts were passed, it is estimated that only about 25 per cent., that is, roughly, about 17,000, will actually appeal. How many of these will succeed is again a matter of conjecture, but from the information available it would appear that not more than 2,000 could succeed and that the cost would be approximately £50,000 a year.

In this Bill also occasion has been taken to extend certain provisions of the parent Acts. Thus Sections 8 and 12 vest in the Minister the power to restore forfeited pensions and Sections 7 and 13 vest in him power to review the refusal by himself to grant service certificates where persons have been sentenced to imprisonment of three months or more. These are briefly the main outlines of the Bill.

I do think that the one point on which there will be an amount of discussion will be the question as to whether pensions should be retrospective or not. I think the other sections of the Bill in the main will be agreed to as being reasonable and just. I merely want to reaffirm, on the question of retrospective application of pensions, that the Bill would never be considered or would never have seen the light of day in this Dáil under the present Government if it were associated with the finding of a lump sum of £1,000,000 in order to make it retrospective. As Minister for Defence I was approached by very many organisations in very many counties, representing the Old I.R.A. and sections of the Old I.R.A., who were disappointed in the past in regard to pension claims. To every single such deputation and delegation I made it very, very clear that if I did get authority to introduce a Bill of this nature, it would be without retrospective effect. On every single occasion, without exception, as long as the Bill was merely in the air and not on the Table, all such deputations and delegations agreed wholeheartedly that they would not ask to have retrospective application given to that particular section. Not only that, but, as most Deputies are aware, the one application that was made to me from every Party was, not to go as far as this Bill proposes to go at all, but merely to repeal Section 5 of the Act of 1945. I have made the position as clear as I can. I hope the Bill will be discussed in the light of the information I have given to the Dáil and, above all, in the light of the information that was given to me by representative associations before the Bill came to the Dáil.

Mr. Traynor

The figures which the Minister gave us in his opening remarks I think refute the suggestion that there were injustices inflicted under the 1934 Act. He gave the figures in respect to appeals—the number who appealed and the number who succeeded in their appeals. The fact that a number of applicants could succeed was, I think, proof that the Referee and his advisory board were prepared at all times, if evidence of the character which they sought could be supplied, to give an applicant justice. The Minister has been in office for a period of 21 months, and it is reasonable for me to assume that he has acquired a fairly extensive knowledge of the Acts for which he is responsible to this House. Among these Acts is the Military Service Pensions Act of 1934. I am of opinion that, of all the Acts for which the Department of Defence was responsible, the 1934 Act is perhaps the most controversial. It was not only developed in a controversial way but it developed a form of acrimony in this House that, to my mind, was regrettable. The debate on the Act, and on the Estimate which arose out of it, began in a rather leisurely and peaceful manner but as time went on and applications poured in, Deputies were being compelled by a number of applicants to demand greater speed in dealing with the applications. The efforts to secure the speed which was demanded brought about the introduction of a regulation which, I presume, the then Minister had power to make to allow the Referee to act in the manner in which he did eventually act—to get the members of the advisory board to separate to examine claims and, having examined them, to make certain recommendations to him in respect of them. It must be borne in mind all the time that the Referee was there as an executive officer, as the judge, who alone would give a decision in respect of these applications.

Another stage developed as time went on. Many of the applicants were under the impression that all the Referee had to do was to examine their particular applications and make a decision in respect of them, these applicants always believing that their applications were prima facie applications and that their examination presented no difficulty. It was then that pressure was brought to bear on Deputies and that Deputies were being told hard luck stories and stories of alleged injustices that had been inflicted. Many Deputies, accepting these stories without the proper examination which they should have been given, began to make statements in this House about this person and that person not having been given the measure of justice to which they were entitled. I at all times endeavoured to refute the suggestion that there was anything in the nature of injustice done to any applicant and I think the figures which the Minister has given in respect of the appeals support me in that claim. The Minister told us that of the 60,000 odd people who made application under the 1934 Act some 48,000 failed in their application. I suggest that these 48,000 provided a magnificent field for politicians in this House to sow the seeds of discontent, seeds which they hoped they would harvest at some time and eventually bring about the downfall of the Government of the time.

I have a very distinct recollection of a speech made by the present Minister for External Affairs during the election campaign in 1948 in which the Minister said:—

"What we had no information about and could not get was the number of cases wherein pensions were granted which should not have been granted."

I am quoting from the Irish Independent and, on the same date, the 27th January, 1948, he also said:—

"If Mr. Traynor wishes, he could supply me with the names of some of these cases."

When I saw that particularly dirty charge—that is all I can describe it as —I replied to it as follows:—

"Would it be at all possible to get Mr. MacBride to come down to earth and speak in terms of fact and give me or the public at large, to whom he has already confided his charge in rather vague terms, I must say, the names of persons to whom the Referee or Referees gave pensions to which they were not entitled? The public have a right to be protected against maladministration anywhere, especially if it would cost them money, as it would if Mr. MacBride's wild accusations were correct. Will Mr. MacBride give that protection to the public now as an earnest of his sincerity and prove that he is not talking in terms of general propaganda?"

Although he stated that he would be prepared to give me the names of the persons who got pensions to which they were not entitled, from that day to this I have not received any such information. I do not know if Deputy MacBride, since he became Minister for External Affairs and a member of the Government, with all the information at his disposal to examine that particular statement which he made then, has done so or if he has asked the Minister for Defence to have these charges investigated.

The Minister for Defence, who is now in charge of the Department, must know, as a result of his experience in that Department, that these statements were false and without any foundation whatever. The Minister must know that Section 10 of the 1934 Act makes it mandatory on the Minister to accept the decisions of the Referee, whether the decisions are nil awards or whether they are grants of pensions or service certificates, as the case may be. He must know that there is nothing which can compel the Referee to produce any reason for his decision or to give the evidence upon which he based it. No tribunal or no person can compel the Referee to give that evidence. Having come to the decision, the decision is final, conclusive and binding on all persons and tribunals, and that naturally includes the Minister, the Government and the courts of justice.

I should like to think that when Deputy MacBride, as he then was, made that statement, he made it in the heat of an election campaign. I should also like to think that, even at this stage, now that he has the experience and the wisdom which I hope has been added to his experience as a result of becoming a Minister, he will have the courage and the manliness to come into the House and express his regret for that statement or, failing that, give this House a proof of the statement which he made on that occasion and, if necessary, get the Minister for Defence to set up an inquiry to investigate the charges and the suggestions contained in that statement that pensions were given to people who were not entitled to them.

I want to say, and I said it on that occasion to which I have referred, that that was not in any circumstances a charge against the Government, although it was intended to be. It was a charge against the Referee or Referees who had been appointed and, at that particular period, at least four gentlemen had occupied that position. To my mind, it was a charge against these gentlemen, three of whom were judges of the Circuit Court and one of whom was a lawyer of not less than ten years' standing. That was a rather serious charge because, if that charge was made then, it could be made in the future. There is no reason that I can see why disappointed applicants for pensions in future will not be in a position to make similar statements and charges.

Under the 1924 and the 1934 Acts, over 80,000 persons applied for pensions and only 15,000 succeeded. That leaves 65,000 persons who failed in their application. These 65,000 persons, minus those who are deceased, may apply for pensions. My own impression is that it would be more reasonable to argue that the 30,000 odd persons who appealed their cases are likely to reapply and that the balance who failed to appeal against the decisions were probably people who had little faith in their applications. If we put the number who will reapply at 20,000, that would be 5,000 more than those who succeeded in getting pensions under both Acts. Are we to believe that these 20,000 persons are likely to succeed?

I hardly imagine they will, and, if they do not succeed, is it not possible that the doctrine which Deputy MacBride was disseminating in 1947 and 1948 is likely to have effects now that the Minister is providing means for all these disappointed applicants to apply again? I rather imagine that in the examination of these appeals— I suppose that is what they will be, appeals under the 1934 Act and that the machinery, so far as the Referee is concerned, will be practically the same as under that Act—the standard of service will be the same. If it is, I rather think that the number who will succeed will not be very great.

During the period in which I was responsible for putting the Army Pensions Estimate through this House I never at any time, in the course of discussions on that Estimate, suggested that everybody who was entitled to a pension had secured one. I was quite certain that there were large numbers of people who were very close to the borderline that had been set up and failed to get over it. Some failed, I think, by reason perhaps of their inability to make their case in the manner that other people were able to do it, or perhaps, to express to the Referee, in the language that would convince him, that they, too, were entitled to a pension. I have no doubt that quite a number of people were ruled out on grounds of that kind. I feel, from the point of view of a rehearing, that this will go some way towards removing any discontent that these people may feel in that respect, but, as I have said, it is opening the field that we have been going through here over the last ten or 12 years, and it is quite possible that we are going to have a recurrence of all the debates that we have had in the past, with all the acrimony of the past. I am pretty certain that it will not be all on one side either.

With regard to the Bill itself, I can hardly see any reason why it should be brought before the House with an operative date fixed when it becomes an Act. The Minister has made it very clear that the question of discussing the operative date is taboo: that we can talk about it as much as we like, but that no matter how much we talk about it he is not going to be moved from that particular date, and the reason he gives is pounds, shillings and pence. All that I can say is that pounds, shillings and pence should not be allowed in the way of doing justice to any individual.

Mr. O'Leary

Why did you not give it?

Mr. Traynor

We gave pensions to those who were entitled to them. We brought in a new Bill. This is not a new Bill. If the Deputy will examine it he will see that it is only an amending Bill.

Mr. O'Leary

What about the closure?

Mr. Traynor

We brought in a Bill, and this is only an amendment of it. As regards whatever is contained in this Bill, the applicants at least are entitled to the amount of money that the original Bill made provision for, the original amount of money being got by retrospectiveness to the date 1st October, 1934.

Dr. O'Higgins

Is it not your attitude at the moment that they are entitled to nothing?

Mr. Traynor

The Minister has said that he is not going to be moved from that date, and he has given us the reasons why he is not going to be moved, reasons which, no doubt, will appeal to large numbers of people— that is, because it would mean taking money from those people by way of tax. The fact is that the Minister cannot get away from this, that if justice is to be done to those individuals it should be done in full or not done at all. If those men were so close to borderline service as we have heard here from time to time in the course of discussions in the House—and God knows we heard enough about it— then very little would have prevented them from securing pensions under the 1934 Act. If they had succeeded at that particular period they would have been entitled to all the retrospective payments for service under that particular measure. I say that under that measure—and this being only an amending Bill—they are entitled to full retrospectiveness. However that may be, the Minister made it very clear to the deputation that waited on him that he was not going to be moved from that, and that they could have that and nothing else, and they accepted that rather than nothing else. If that is being regarded as the form of justice which this Bill meets, I am not going to argue about it. If the Minister is satisfied that he is going to get it through, well that is that.

Dr. O'Higgins

It is the same justice as that which is in Section 16 of your 1934 Act.

Mr. Traynor

What is Section 16?

Dr. O'Higgins

Section 16 gave line-ball cases from the 1924 Act the right to appeal, and if they carried their appeal there was no retrospective pension.

Mr. Traynor

I want to correct the Minister on that. Under the 1934 Act, the applicants who could apply for service under the 1924 Act were people who were not allowed to apply under the 1924 Act by the Government of that day by reason of the fact that they were suspected, or found guilty, of being in communication—something like that—with the Volunteers who were opposing the Army.

Dr. O'Higgins

Could no one be rejected under the previous Act?

Mr. Traynor

If I am wrong the Minister can correct me.

Dr. O'Higgins

If I am right you are wrong, and if you are right I am wrong.

Mr. Traynor

So far as I remember, if a person to whom the 1924 Act applied was turned down, he had no right to appeal under the 1934 Act. We are not opposing this Bill. Anything we can do to expedite it, we will do. We would like to see the Bill put through as quickly as possible, so that the long-drawn-out matter of examination of applications will begin at once and those who are likely to be successful will, in the shortest possible time, receive whatever amounts they are awarded. I take it the Minister will not be moved by any appeal I make with respect to the operative date.

Captain Cowan

One of the regrettable things about recognition of service during the pre-Truce period is that those people who, under the different Acts obtained pensions, should be thrown into what I might call the vortex of Party politics. Deputy Traynor has mentioned some observations of the Minister for External Affairs when he was engaged in the last election campaign, but that was only an extension, if you like, of what happened in connection with the 1924 Act. Every one of us saw the placards all over the country about the roll of honour. Those pensions that were granted for service were held up by means of posters and placards to humiliate people in their own localities. The very same thing applied subsequently in connection with the 1934 Act, and apparently it will be done also in relation to this legislation. I think that, having gone through the fight for freedom in this country, people who received official recognition of their services by means of a pension should not be made the playthings of Party politicians.

One fundamental mistake was in those Acts, the 1924 and 1934 Acts, and it is also in this measure. The first thing an applicant must do is to succeed in getting a certificate of service, and a certificate of service will not be granted him until he is entitled to a pension. I think that was a fundamental mistake and it has caused a lot of the trouble we have had under the 1924 and the 1934 Acts. If it is allowed to remain it will cause trouble here, too.

A certificate of military service should be quite independent of a pension. As regards those persons in receipt of certificates of military service, if this country wants to be generous to a proportion of them and grant certain financial payments to them annually, that is a matter that ought to be covered. Where the trouble has been caused is this. A number of people applied from a particular area for a certificate of military service— because that is what the application is for—and the board or Referee examining that case decided that a certain proportion of them were entitled to have a certificate of service and, because of that certificate, to a pension. Other persons who rendered as good service are refused the certificate. I know quite a number of people who are more annoyed at being refused the certificate of service than at being denied the pension that follows it. That was one of the fundamental mistakes.

I sincerely hope the passing of this measure will mean that all people who have just claims will have those just claims examined and determined justly in accordance with the law. Those persons who will be entitled to receive pensions as a result of that inquiry will not, it is hoped, be pilloried in the future. I think it is a shameful thing, almost 30 years afterwards, that people who were then heroes should now be held up to ridicule by the country for which they fought. I want Deputies to realise that there is a very big volume of opinion outside that is nauseated with this continual repetition in the Dáil and elsewhere about pensions for past service to the country. Men and women who should be held in honour are not held in honour because of the peculiar way things have gone on here.

I understand that the board that will examine these applications will be a board on which there will be two officials, one representing the Department of Finance, and the other the Department of Defence. What standard have those two officials in regard to the examination of this point: is this a person who is entitled to a certificate of military service? It has been commonly stated in the past that the function of the representatives of the Department of Finance and the Department of Defence on that board was simply to say: "We can award this year pensions up to £30,000, £40,000 or £50,000 as the case may be and we cannot go beyond that." That is quite a common criticism one hears throughout the country—that this is their function, to force, in so far as they can, refusals when the number of persons considered as entitled to pensions goes beyond the limit laid down for expenditure on pensions that year. I could not imagine that that should be so, but that is the common viewpoint.

I would like to see the board reconstructed so that persons, capable persons with experience, who were at the hub of things in the pre-1921 period, would examine into those applications and deal generously with them. There ought to be what I might call the humanitarian, the reasonable approach, but where you have officials of a Department, particularly officials of the Department of Finance, they are concerned only with the very sharpest letter of the Act dealing with the matter. That is why I would like to see a reconstructed board so that this thing will be finished once and for all and we will not have to come here possibly some four or five years hence, when this Act is being administered, to reconsider whether injustices have been done to a lot of people or not.

I did not like the Minister's reference to the question of what it would cost to make these payments retrospective. I think such observations, even though the position was made clear to the deputations that met him, are entirely wrong. Where a matter of justice is concerned, the fact that it costs £500,000, £750,000 or £1,000,000 should not be a determining factor one way or the other. I believe that it is justice that should count and not the cost. If a large number of people were wrongly refused pensions in the past and this new board decides that they were wrongly refused, I think that ordinary justice demands that they should be paid as from the operative date of the Act under which they made their applications in the first instance. These men did not consider their own future at the time; they did not consider how their actions might affect their future. The country either owes something to these people, or it does not. If it does owe them something, then it should pay; if it does not owe them anything, then it should clearly say so and be done with it.

I believe the country does owe them something. I think it is our duty to ensure that any person whose claim has been unjustly turned down should not continue to suffer because of that unjust decision. I was surprised to hear the Minister say that it was anticipated that quite a number of the people who would not apply under the 1924 or the 1934 Act would now apply under this Act and that to them would go the bulk of the estimated £50,000. I think that is a different case. Again, it is a matter for consideration. To me it certainly appears to be a matter for the consciences of these particular people. If they declined to recognise the 1924 Act and the 1934 Act, what has happened recently to make them recognise this Bill? That is an entirely different matter and I do not think any support could be given to a plea that the certificates and the pensions should be granted from a date prior to the date of application. I was surprised by that statement of the Minister. I thought this Bill would deal in the main with people whose applications were turned down and who felt that they had been unjustly treated. If the Minister's estimate that the bulk of this £50,000 will go to people who did not apply under either the 1924 or 1934 Act is correct, the amount left for the people appealing from decisions under those Acts will be very small. Only one in 100 will have a chance of getting a pension under this Act. It is just as well that should be made clear.

Dr. O'Higgins

I do not think the Deputy heard me properly on that point. I did not refer to the money at all. I referred to the possibility that the great bulk of the applicants would be people who had not applied before. That is quite a different thing from saying that the bulk of the money would go to those who had not applied before.

Captain Cowan

I think it comes to the same thing because if we take the Department of Defence estimate of £50,000 and an average pension of, say, £50 a year——

Dr. O'Higgins

£20.

Mr. S. Collins

£15.

Captain Cowan

I merely take that as a figure. In a document which I have got I see that the number of privates who got pensions is very small as compared with the number of officers who got pensions. I merely take £25 as an average. Working on that basis, that means that 2,000 people will benefit on an average of £25 each. If 1,000 of those are people who never applied before because they did not recognise either the 1924 or 1934 Act, then we are left with 1,000 out of the 66,000 that have been rejected. That is, one in 66 has a chance of getting a pension under this Act. I think the Old I.R.A., who have organised themselves in different associations for the purpose of getting this Bill through, should appreciate the true position. I think we should make it perfectly clear to them that the number who will benefit will be very small. The Minister thinks—and I think Deputy Traynor is of the same opinion— that the 66,000 will not apply. I interjected earlier that "hope springs eternal" and the first applications in will be from those who have no chance at all. The really genuine ones will come in slowly and hesitantly. The big bulk of those 66,000 applications will come in again. How long will the investigation take? It will certainly continue on past the next general election. There is no doubt about that. It will probably reach the election after that. It is a question then for the Minister to decide, as each case is determined, whether the applicant will be informed or whether, if there happen to be 1,000 rejects in the year immediately preceding the general election, that 1,000 will be held over until the election is over. That did happen in the past. It was unwise to announce it prior to a general election. I hope that the board that will examine into this will make their announcement right away—that they will endeavour to carry through this with expedition —because it will be a source of worry to everyone until it is finished.

There are some matters in this Act which I think are very wise—the power the Minister is taking to grant a certificate where that certificate has been refused and, in the case of pensions which have been revoked, the power to reissue them. I think those are wise provisions and I think it is certainly a good thing that they are included in the Bill. Deputy Traynor mentioned this. There will be no solution of this problem until the definition of "active service" in the Act is dealt with. "Active service", in my view, was interpreted too narrowly and in too restricted a manner. It was interpreted so that if a person did not actually fire shots he was not entitled to be considered as on "active service." If a man was engaged in an operation, perhaps a mile away from the scene of activities, where he might have come under fire, where he might have gone into action, I understand that it was held that he was not on "active service." If that old definition of "active service" is to be maintained and if the Act is to be operated on the basis of that old definition of active service, then the number of people to whom it will apply will be pretty small.

Another point that has been mentioned to me is the matter of the inquiry. The investigation of those claims should be done in the open. It should be done in a court as near as possible to an open court. Each person ought to be entitled to go there, to bring his witnesses, to have them examined, to examine them; in other words, to conduct his case and to put it forward in the best way he can. I have some experience of the operation of the Acts and, certainly, the investigations were not held in the open, as they should be. There was documentary evidence and there were certificates there but the applicants left feeling that they had not had a fair chance at all—and then, there were thousands of applicants who never saw anybody, who simply saw their rejection slips. I hope the Minister will be able to arrange that these applications will be heard in open court as it were and that the board will, if necessary, travel round the country so that local evidence, if available, will be presented to the court.

I am glad that this Bill has been introduced and I am glad to see those sections to which I have referred included in it. However, I do think that the Minister's statement in regard to what it might cost to do justice is a statement that ought not be made by any Minister nor, in fact, by anybody else in Parliament. That is not the basis at all on which that matter should be decided. We run into an expenditure of £70,000,000 or £80,000,000 a year. We can do justice to many types of people—whether they are shareholders of bankrupt concerns or otherwise. We ought to do justice to this particular body of men although I readily admit that were it not for the fact that there has been a change of Government, were it not for the fact that we have a new Government, this Bill would not have been introduced at all. There is that much to be said in its favour but, having said that, I must repeat, in conclusion, that the principles of justice mean that justice should be done and it is not a question of whether we are able to pay for it or not that should concern us. The matter is to do justice.

Mr. S. Collins

Like many other Deputies in this House, I am glad to see this Bill introduced. However, I am afraid that, possibly, the Minister is only storing up a future of trouble if not for himself at least for his successors who may come into that office in the years to come. I have a feeling, looking objectively at the whole I.R.A. question—and I feel I can do it because I am too young to have had any active part in it myself or to be actively influenced by partisan considerations that might have arisen—that this is a problem that will have to be dealt with finally in a courageous and in an audacious manner. I do not think this Bill is doing it. I find myself in the extraordinary position of wholeheartedly agreeing with Deputy Cowan——

Mr. Moylan

Amazing.

Mr. S. Collins

——that justice should be done and that, if this Bill is to serve the purpose that I feel we all would like it to serve, then justice must be done and whether that is going to cost £100,000 or £1,000,000 or £2,000,000 should not influence this House, because we purport to make that payment to the people who, above all others—and I say this without qualification—above all others, have merited the consideration not only of this Parliament but of this country. It may be that many things affected the decisions in the past with regard to pensions but one kernel must remain—whether or not the service was rendered to this State that the person alleged was rendered, and if that service was, in fact, rendered and is so established, it does not matter how you cover it up or what excuse of lack of money you make, justice is not being done to the person who, but for some technical hitch, but for some political hitch or some victimisation, could have and should have enjoyed 25 years of this pension. No justice is being done to him if you turn round some day during the next 12 months and grant him a pension as from that date.

We do not want to get into a political discussion on this matter at all. I do not care who was right or who was wrong in the past. If there remains a nucleus of people—and I am certain there is such a nucleus—who have been excluded for any reason under the 1924 or the 1934 Acts but who are in justice entitled to that pension, then I say that justice cannot be done unless the pension is made payable from the date on which they were entitled to have it, the date the service was rendered. I am not in the least anxious to embarrass the Minister or the Government. I am standing on my two feet to say in fairness to a generation of people who have suffered many things that they should not have suffered that there is no body of people to whom the bulk of the people of Ireland should more gladly or willingly pay what is due than the Old I.R.A.

We are inclined at times to take the realisation of freedom in this country too lightly, and it is deplorable. I hope that the day is soon to come when we will not have queer quips or questions put down here about anybody's pension. I hope that in the public life of this country we will come to respect the judgments given and the assessments made under the Pension Acts, and accept that the people who have been so awarded pensions are justly entitled to them. Not only are they justly entitled to draw their pensions but they are justly entitled to, and more than worthy of, the respect of the nation because it is their sacrifice that has made it possible for a free Ireland to pay pensions to anybody. I know perfectly well that the Minister is facing a difficult situation of a Finance grasp, but I say to him in all sincerity in relation to the pensions that will be paid under this Bill that there is no more deserving section of the community than the people he will have to deal with and that he should ruthlessly lift the cruel hand of Finance off their back. I want a position where the people who have claims either actual or imaginary will have them dealt with once and for all. I want the matter wound up once and for all. It is a heartbreak to the older Deputies and it has become a terrible problem to me in the constituency I represent where, despite the crack once made by Deputy John McCann in this House, there was a fair bit of fighting and a fair bit of nationalism at all times. Representing such a constituency, I say that there are a number of people who feel they have genuine claims and they should at least have the right to a full, thorough and final investigation of them. If in that thorough, final and full investigation it is found that they are entitled to a pension which was denied to them under the 1924 or the 1934 Act they should get it from the date on which they were entitled to it. The measure of justice done will ultimately enhance the position of the Government to a greater extent than the denial of their right. It is easy to be penny wise and pound foolish. In dealing with people upon whom the very foundation of this State is built, no matter what their present political views may be, it ill behoves us to be niggardly.

There are features in the Bill which are very welcome and which will give great satisfaction. With the exception of the retrospective end of the pensions I think the Bill will give admirable satisfaction to all sections of the community, but I feel that we will only increase the political feelings with regard to Old I.R.A. pensions by such a piece of legislation as this because we are only opening a door to having this question thrashed out again as long as any people who fought in that period may survive. What we have to analyse is the question of a person who will now be awarded a pension, a person who applied under the 1924 or the 1934 Acts and was rejected. It may be that at the time of the rejection the people who rejected him acted perfectly bona fide. That claim now comes before this new board on the constitution of which I will have a word to say in a moment. This new board, again acting completely bona fide, decides that he is entitled to a pension. I feel that the man who gets a pension in 1950, say, that he should have been entitled to in 1934 or 1924 is going to be a lot more bitter than if he got no pension at all. I think it is only rubbing the salt into the wound if he gets a pension from 1950 and from that date only.

It is difficult to decide what would be an ideal tribunal to deal with the question of pensions but it is very easy to visualise people who would be absolutely unsuitable to sit on such an appeal tribunal, and I think that such people would certainly be officials of either the Department of Defence or Finance. I think this question must be taken outside the realm of officialdom altogether. The interests of the State can be protected by a Referee. That is what he is there for. Like the case of the ordinary criminal who is entitled to trial by a jury of his fellow men I feel that all the surrounds to the Referee should be people who know a little about the period with which the Bill will deal and who themselves served the cause of freedom of the country. Through their experience and an innate instinct of comradeship they would give more humane and sympathetic consideration to the question than any official would be capable of giving.

With the best intentions in the world a senior official of either the Department of Defence or Finance who has had a long tortuous passage up the ladder to reach the stage of being sufficiently competent to be drafted on to such a board has long lost his flexibility and all capability of any thought outside the rigid orbit of Civil Service routine. I do not think that is the type of mind that should be addressed to a period of our history marked by the generous enthusiasm of youth and a lack of consideration of the consequences that the effort might bring. I think that the best type of minds to deal with that problem would be people who were wholeheartedly and absolutely within the movement and who since then—if it is possible to find them—have in the main kept out of the realm of violent Party politics or any violent partisanship.

I disagree completely with the suggestion made by Deputy Cowan that certain people who, for reasons of conscience or of belief, or actuated by honest conviction, found it not to their liking to apply under the 1924 or 1934 Acts, should not change their minds now. If those people, in a new political situation, in a new era and in a new drive towards general unity, decide they will apply now under this Act, I think no odium, no stigma or anything like that should be attached to them. We should welcome the fact that bitterness can be sunk to such an extent that we can give everybody an opportunity now to have fair play.

Might I say to the Minister, in conclusion, that that fair play can be had only on one basis—and I am stressing this because it is something on which I personally feel very strongly—that is, on the basis of justice? In the case of a man who was refused for any reason a right or entitlement that is found in 1950 to be his, relative to something that happened in the pre-Truce or immediate post-Truce days in connection with that service, he can have justice only under one shape and one form, that is, the full measure of justice that will give him his pension retrospective to the day he earned it.

Mr. Colley

This Bill deals, in the main, with people who applied under the previous Act and whose claims were rejected. It makes no provision for altering the procedure that existed under the 1934 Act, as far as I can see. It accepts what was embodied in the 1945 Act, though we had great criticism of it from these particular benches here at that time. This Bill now accepts all that. Therefore, the only people who can make good their claims under this Bill are some who, through some accident or calamity, were not treated fairly at the time of their last application. For one minute I do not think that the referee or the board dealt unfairly with any applicant. They dealt, I believe, as fairly as their nature could allow them, on the facts before them. If anybody was turned down at that time, it was due to some other cause.

There is one type of case that strikes me as one which could be rectified under this Bill. It is that of a man who, at the time of his original application, could not produce certain evidence, though it was available in the legal sense, as he could not find the particular people he wanted and who might be able to do that to-day. If I read the Bill correctly, that man's case can now be put right. I can see only cases similar to his making good under this Bill.

I do not for a minute accept that there is any number of men who were ruled out through failing to be certified on political grounds on any side. It has been one of the features of the Old I.R.A. movement—let those who have not been in it say what they like —that, no matter what side men took in the past, as far as certification under these Acts went, or as far as comradeship went, their present politics never count. On both sides, to their honour be it said, men have certified their greatest political opponents just because they were doing justice in recognition of what those men had done in the past. I do not believe there are many cases on which any of the allegations that we have heard in the past could be based. Because of the fact that it deals mainly with men who have suffered injustice in some form—as I have tried to put it—in the past, I think there is a perfect case that these men, if now certified, should be paid the pension from October, 1934.

Dr. O'Higgins

Why not 1924?

Mr. Colley

There is a perfect case. The fault is not the man's and there is no reason why he should be made suffer. In all fairness to him, as between him and his colleagues he should be paid from the same date. There is no analogy between this Act and the 1924 Act. The 1934 Act dealt with a class of person who was not entitled to a pension at all before that date. This Act is simply an amendment of the 1934 Act, opening the door for people who, it is alleged, were not treated justly under it. If that is the case and they succeed now in getting justice, there is no reason why they should not get full justice, as Deputy Collins has just said, and be put on proper parity with the others.

Mr. O'Leary

Why did you shut the door against them in 1945?

Mr. Colley

I have no intention of answering any interruptions from the Deputy.

Mr. O'Leary

The Deputy cannot answer that one.

Mr. Colley

The Minister, from the figures he gave us as to the estimated cost, does not seem to think that a very large number of the 48,000 rejected applications under the 1934 Act or the 17,000 under the 1924 Act are going to succeed in making good their case now. He told us that the bulk of the £50,000 a year estimated cost would go on new applications. Therefore, even taking it on Deputy Cowan's figure of an average of £25 a year, there will not be a large number or, at any rate, it is not estimated that a large number will succeed. That, to my mind, will create exactly the same position as we have had up to now of agitation by the remainder of the thousands of applicants that there was political influence against them. It will not relieve that in the slightest. If it does succeed in remedying even a small number of cases of injustice it will be all to the good. The number who appealed under the 1934 Act and succeeded in their appeal is proof that the board were acting conscientiously. I do hope that an end will be put to the charges that were levelled against the former Minister of giving pensions to his colleagues and political friends. As he pointed out here to-day, he had no function whatever under the Act except to carry out the award of the Referee. Anyone who reads the Act can see that he was in exactly the same position with the Referee as the Minister for Justice is with the courts and I wonder what people would think if the Minister for Justice were to interfere with the judges in the courts and tell them how they were to decide certain cases. I do hope that we will have an end of these charges, although I am afraid we will not. At any rate, here in this House we should have an end of them. As a beginning, I hope the statement to which Deputy Traynor referred this evening that was made by the Minister for External Affairs during the last election will be either proved or withdrawn.

Mr. Keane

I wish to pay a tribute to the Minister for Defence for introducing this Bill. Undoubtedly, mistakes were made in the past under the 1924 Act and under the 1934 Act. I classify them as mistakes but I cannot say the same in regard to what happened in the case of certain soldiers of the I.R.A. who appealed against decisions and who were flatly turned down in 1945. On an Estimate here in 1948 I mentioned four names. A present Deputy of this House received a deputation that I introduced some time about 1938. He listened to the case being made by one of those men. I do not know whether he assumed that the man took a certain line in the civil war or not. He asked him, "Is that all", when he came to deal with the Truce and post-Truce period, before the civil war. "No", was the reply, "I was in the attack on Urlingford Barracks, I was in the fight at Mary Willie's and I was in other small engagements in County Tipperary." The Deputy, who is listening to me now, put down his pen and said, "Tell me, is it possible that you did not get a pension," and the answer was "Yes." I must say that that Deputy did his very best to have justice meted out to that applicant afterwards but he failed.

The applicant appealed again in 1945. He had pre-Truce column service, he had served in ambushes, and had served during practically the whole Truce period and civil war period. He was captain of a certain company in the Second Cork Brigade. His appeal was rejected. There were other people who appealed at that particular time and it was the first time that I realised that some other factors were at work besides those which up to that had operated in putting pension cases before the board. I know very well what flimsy and fictitious statements certain people brought before the Referee and the board after 1945. I was a witness on a couple of occasions before that board and I do believe that it was the proper and only way to try pension cases. Nobody was precluded from going into that court. Every witness and every applicant went in on oath and much good work was done by the board. Where, however, the applicant did not get past the bastion of Defence, where some civil servant with practically autonomous power for either rejecting or approving, was putting every claim under the microscope, that board did not get the cases that were rejected and, of course, had no function in the matter of deciding whether these cases were genuine or not. It is just as well to let the dead past bury its dead.

The present Bill is undoubtedly an act of justice. It is not an act of generosity; it is merely an act of justice. I personally am agitated, so far as the retrospective effect of this Bill is concerned. When we are embarking on the giving of a certain measure of justice, why should we not give 100 per cent. justice? If some people who applied under the 1924 Act and who were turned down come forward under this Bill and are accepted as being genuine applicants, why should they not get what was honestly due to them, by reason of their services to this country when the services of men were required? We should not be perturbed about what a certain element will think of any generosity which we are supposed to extend through this Bill. It is not generosity. These men are not looking for charity. They are looking, as soldiers of the Republican Army, for what they believe they are entitled to and what many of us believe they are more than entitled to.

The same thing applies to the 1934 Act. If a man who was turned down under that Act comes forward now with his case and somebody finds that an injustice was done to him, 100 per cent. of that injustice should be done away with and he should get 100 per cent. justice. The only way to do that is by making the payment retrospective from the date on which the application was first made or from the date specified by the Act as the qualifying date. In both Acts, and particularly in the 1934 Act, the definition of "active service" was left very vague. I know soldiers of the Republican Army who went before the board. They found themselves in an atmosphere that was more or less strange to them and they may have developed a complex which many lads from a country district develop when they come to the city and go before such a board as that which sat under the Act of 1934. They make certain statements and I know of a statement made by one man—he was comparatively young at the time of the engagement—who was in an ambush. He held a shotgun and when asked what distance he was from the actual firing, said "1,000 yards". That man did an injustice to himself. It was proved conclusively after that he had been holding perhaps a very important position and was not more than 100 yards from where the lorry was attacked. Still, he was bound down by his statement, although anybody who knows the range of a shotgun would laugh at it.

Some consideration should have been given to that young man at the time he was giving his evidence. The peculiar thing is that he was not called under the 1945 amending Act. With regard to the setting up of this tribunal for deciding the claims of the people who will reapply and those people who will be making their first applications, I have a very strong objection to any body setting itself up as a brigade advisory committee or a battalion advisory committee. I was not concerned under the 1934 Act, but some of my comrades were, and they asked me on several occasions about the advisability of participating in these advisory committees. I said to them that they were perhaps very good, but I pointed out the snag—it is only human nature—that the people comprising these boards, in some cases, although not in all, feathered their own nests first and then proceeded to feather their friends' nests. I do not want that to be taken as having been general throughout the country, but it happened in part of the area I represent, and there are Deputies on the Opposition side who are conversant with what happened.

If any aspersion were to be cast on Referees, it certainly would not be cast by me, because there were systems introduced by some certifying officers who were acting, or supposed to be acting, on the advice of these committees which resulted in these officers being a greater barrier to pensions being given to applicants than the representative of the Minister for Finance sitting on the Board of Referees. They turned themselves into watchdogs to look after the finances of the country and to see to it that no man got what he was not entitled to, but they took very good care to give it to themselves. I believe that the board set up after 1945 could be copied by the Minister with very good results when setting up his new tribunal—trial in open court, with witnesses and applicants on oath. I found, with one exception —and I do not hold the board completely to blame for it—in all the cases in which I was a witness that they were 100 per cent. just.

I hope the Minister will remember my words when setting up this board and will set up an open board before which everyone concerned will hear the evidence given on his behalf or against him, because I am afraid that the old French system was introduced at one time into the various pension boards that sat both in 1924 and 1934, the system of letters de cachet—a good letter of reference followed up by a letter of poison, liquidating the applicant. I am afraid that too much notice was taken by certain people of those letters.

There are a certain number of Republican soldiers who are salaried officials under the Government and in the service of local authorities, receiving pensions and there is in operation against them an abatement system. I cannot very well understand why this system was introduced the first day. There may have been very good reasons for doing it; I have a certain suspicion of the reasons why it was introduced but I have no hesitation in stating here to-night that all these reasons have gone by the board now and I think it only fair to put the position of these men before the Minister. I am not concerned as to whether they are £1,500 or £1,000 officials or whether they are receiving just £250. I believe that all these men should be paid salaries commensurate with their work and responsibilities, and that whatever pensions they were allowed under the various Acts, they earned by taking an active part in the fight for Irish freedom.

I do not see why these pensions should interfere with their salaries and why there should be any abatement of their salaries as a result. "Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's." These men are earning their salaries at the moment by doing their work, but back in the halcyon days from 1914 to 1923 they earned their pensions by risking their lives and their liberty in the fight for freedom. I think the Minister should be generous and should blot out that abatement system. Some people may say that these men are getting sufficient salaries. I believe that on principle, irrespective of what they are getting, there should be nothing deducted from their salaries or from the military service pensions which they receive under the various Acts.

In conclusion, I should like again to emphasise the injustices that can be carried out under an act of justice. Perhaps it may not be too late to suggest to the Minister, so that he may suggest it to the Cabinet, that in order to ventilate properly the feelings of this House, we should have a free vote on this matter. Some of us are not concerned that a lot of "shoneens" will say throughout the country in the morning that we are going to run the country into bankruptcy. After all, there would be no bankruptcy or no opulence in this country, were it not for the men for whom this Bill is intended to provide. I do not mind being called a spendthrift. I would prefer to be called that any day than to be called a "shoneen" or a reactionary. I believe that in implementing this Bill we should make it retrospective to the 1924 and 1934 Acts and give those men what they are entitled to get. Again, I should like to reiterate my gratitude to the Minister. I am satisfied, although he may not satisfy any one of us, he has gone a certain distance and I hope that by giving consideration to the cases put forward by my colleagues Deputy Cowan and Deputy Collins and also by Deputy Colley, he will go still further along the road than he intended by making this Bill retrospective.

Mr. T. O'Sullivan

I am sure that the Minister will find that all Parties in the House are satisfied as to the necessity for this Bill. As one with a certain experience of the working of previous Acts, I am satisfied that mistakes were made both under the Acts of 1924 and 1934 and that this Bill is needed to remedy these mistakes. It would be a great pity if the experience gained in the administration of the 1924 and 1934 Acts were not brought to bear now in an effort to ensure, so far as it is humanly possible, that the mistakes will not be repeated under this Bill. I am not at all satisfied with the figures given by the Minister as to the number of persons likely to benefit by this Bill. I feel, from the knowledge that I have, that these figures are too low. I am sure that as time goes on the Minister will find out that the expenditure under the Bill will amount to more than £50,000, and that in order to rectify the mistakes of the past the Bill will have to provide for more than 2,000 persons. After all, there were about 80 brigades in the whole country, and I feel sure that the minimum number who would have a prima facie case under this Bill would be 25 or 35 from each brigade.

The first and most important step to be taken in connection with the administration of this has been referred to by three or four Deputies, and that is, the setting up of this board and the taking of evidence. For a number of years past there has been much talk through the country about the words "active service". The people dealing with these matters and mentioning "active service" do not seem to know what "active service" means, nor has it ever been defined. I feel that it would be impossible to define these two words in connection with the services given by the I.R.A. because, no matter where a volunteer was, whether in a shop, in the street, or on the hillside, he was always on duty no matter what his occupation was and ready to grasp any opportunity which would arise. If membership alone and being, as you might say, in the country where the operations were being carried out constituted active service for other armies, it should constitute active service for our Army.

I would prefer to have these two words cut out completely in connection with the consideration of these claims and that the board and the Referee should evaluate the military value of the services rendered by the applicant rather than setting up any standard. Standards varied in different brigades in the country and what was very easy in one brigade may have been very difficult work in another brigade. Taking the local circumstances into account, I submit that the board should try to arrive at the military value of the applicant's activities rather than having any standard of active service.

I would appeal to all Deputies, who, I know, are imbued with the same desire as I am, to have any mistakes made rectified under this Bill, to be careful in the suggestions that they may make. If we profit by the experience of the other Acts, I have no doubt that any board set up under this Bill will also profit by that experience and will have before them all the records and files in connection with the matter. I feel that this new board will be guided also by the speeches made by Deputies and that they will seek to discover, by reading through the Official Debates, what the spirit of the Act is meant to be. It is for that reason that I ask all Deputies who speak on this matter to try to interpret the real spirit of this Bill as we see it. I feel it is the unanimous wish of this House to have an opportunity given to these people who believe they can qualify under either of these Acts.

I am whole-heartedly in agreement with the Deputies who asked the Minister to reconsider the question of making the awards retrospective. Deputy Collins, Deputy Keane, Deputy Cowan, Deputy Traynor and Deputy Colley have put that matter very forcibly. I should like to add my voice to theirs and I believe that the Minister, with the unanimous voice of the Dáil behind him, will have sufficient strength to see that these awards are made retrospective. It may be that the bill would appear to some to be too high. As other Deputies have mentioned, I believe that no bill of that nature which is likely to be presented will be refused by the Dáil and that the money will not be begrudged by anybody in the country. I am satisfied that, having the Dáil unanimously behind him, the Minister will reconsider that matter.

I submit to him that the number of awards to be made retrospective under the 1924 Act would be very small. I am aware that, for various reasons, some people were not able to apply under the 1924 Act and that would represent the longest term. On the Minister's own showing, the number he expects to qualify under the 1934 Act would be very small also. I am satisfied, however, from my own information that that number will have to be substantially increased. However, that remains to be seen. I therefore join with other Deputies in requesting the Minister to reconsider this matter of making the awards retrospective.

Mr. J. Flynn

I appreciate the efforts of the Minister in bringing in this Bill and I welcome it, but I believe that certain amendments will have to be accepted before it will meet our requirements on behalf of the Old I.R.A. members throughout the country. Like Deputy O'Sullivan, I fail to see how the figures given by the Minister were arrived at. He said that 60,850 persons applied under the 1934 Act and 11,000 succeeded. The Minister anticipates that 66,000 will apply under this Bill and that 2,000 will succeed.

Dr. O'Higgins

It is thought that 17,000 will apply.

Mr. J. Flynn

If I have made a mistake, I withdraw it. These were figures which I took from the Press reports at the time that Deputy Traynor was Minister for Defence. I refer to the time when the 1934 Act was amended, and when Section 5 was introduced. The Minister at that time admitted, unless my memory is at fault, that there were between 2,000 and 3,000 border-line cases. In other words, that under the 1934 Act there were that number of cases which should have succeeded. If that were so, and if these men are still in the country, how can the present Minister assume that only 2,000 new applicants can succeed under this Bill? When one bears in mind the admission that was made by the former Minister for Defence and the number that will apply now, together with those border-line cases, I, like Deputy T. O'Sullivan, am of the opinion that the number to be estimated for annually will be between 5,000 and 6,000.

I am of the opinion that the proposals in this Bill should be retrospective. If necessary, I will table an amendment to that effect. The difficulty that we in the country are up against at the moment is that we have men who were turned down on a technical point under the 1934 Act, men who should have succeeded in the ordinary way. They were turned down through no fault of their own, but simply because they were not able to supply dates and all the details required by the board. I believe that the test as regards "active service" should be drastically amended. It appears to me that the Minister, in view of the number that he estimates as likely to qualify under this Bill, is taking the same line as his predecessor, and that he is going to appoint the same type of board and the same type of referee. If that is so, it is a waste of time for us to mention any man's case. The board at that time acted within the strict letter of the law. In fact, it had a man there from Finance —I am not going to mention any man's name—but he was a regular tyrant.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That kind of thing should not be done.

Mr. J. Flynn

Well, he did it.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

No civil servant should be indicated in any fashion.

Mr. J. Flynn

He was there for the purpose——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy can criticise the administration and show why there should be a fresh administration, but he should not indicate anybody.

Mr. J. Flynn

Am I not entitled to mention that in order to suggest that a similar procedure should not be adopted now?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy should not indicate in any fashion a person who is a civil servant.

Mr. J. Flynn

Coming back to the question of the board, I would appeal to the Minister to set up another type of board or tribunal: to have, say, a court in each provincial centre, as was suggested by other Deputies, before which an applicant could appear with his witnesses and make his case. He could be examined there and let the court, if necessary, give full publicity to the evidence submitted. Heretofore, the onus was on the applicant to prove active service. That all depended on the interpretation which was put on a particular section of the Act by the board. They interpreted "active service" as meaning a major engagement. They came to the conclusion that, unless a man actually carried arms and took part in important engagements, he was not on active service. But, in every other country in the world, when a man dons uniform and takes a rifle in his hand, he is held to be on active service, even though he is 100 miles away from the scene of action. The board that operated in this country under previous Acts took the line that I have stated, so that their interpretation of "active service" was quite different from that which applied in Europe or America. That is the snag in this, that if the same line of procedure is followed under this Bill, as was followed under the previous Acts, it will be a waste of time for men to apply under it.

I see nothing new in this Bill in regard to a definition of "active service", or as regards the machinery to be set up for dealing with applications. Is there simply to be a review of the evidence again in the case of men who were turned down under the 1934 Act and who now make fresh application under this measure? Are the old files which have been there since 1934 to be dug up, and is the applicant to be examined on that same evidence? I should like the Minister to say if there is to be a departure from the line of procedure that was followed under the 1934 Act. Are we to take it that the whole thing comes down to this, that there will be another review of the evidence which a man submitted in 1934, that it will be taken into account again and examined, and that, unless he submits additional evidence not then available, his case will be rejected? If that is the type of procedure that is to be set up, then this Bill is not very much good to us.

There are a few other points that I have to put before the House. As regards the constitution of the board, it was mentioned here that some man, other than a civil servant, would be welcome as a member of it. I agree with that. An ex-member of the Republican Army who has had experience would, by reason of his knowledge of procedure, be an asset on such a board or tribunal, but by all means have a representative of the Department with the legal assessor as well. We believe that very few will qualify under this measure. Assuming that the last Minister for Defence was correct when he said there were between 2,000 and 3,000 border-line cases that in justice should have qualified, I ask the Minister to accept that position and say, for a start-off, that those border-line cases that should have qualified will now qualify.

Dr. O'Higgins

I wonder did he say that?

Mr. J. Flynn

So far as I remember he did. The Minister should also, I suggest, make it possible for the men who were rejected under the 1924 and 1934 Acts to have another opportunity of submitting evidence about their active service. I ask him not to adopt the drastic interpretation that was adopted by previous boards. I know several cases of men who got a pension, while their brothers or neighbours who had the same type of active service were turned down under the 1924 and 1934 Acts. If we can show that certain men had the same service as others who qualified, will the Minister accept that position and permit them to make a case? Will he give another chance to those who were turned down through a technicality? If the Minister will accept that position it will go a long way towards getting over this crux about active service.

I appreciate the Minister's anxiety to do something for those men who were left out and who got a raw deal. If he accepts the principle of doing justice to these men, I would like him to go further and, despite what people may say about cost, he should make this retrospective. We have assisted civil servants and other people in various ways. Why not assist the men who helped to make this State? They went out never dreaming that they would be entitled to anything; they did not expect it. They went out unselfishly to fight for their country. They never imagined they would get a monetary reward, but it is only justice to them now in their old age that they should get some recognition. Some of those men are now 50 or 60 years old. As Deputies Cowan and O'Sullivan have said, it is not a matter of money but of justice and we should make these payments retrospective. I desire to thank the Minister for his assurances.

Mr. O'Leary

I read this measure very carefully and I listened attentively to the last Minister for Defence and Deputy Colley and other Deputies on the Opposition Benches. They should remember that in 1945 they closed the door to the Old I.R.A. men. I welcome this Bill and I will give it every support. The Old I.R.A. are not demanding pensions; they are merely demanding a fair hearing of their claims. They were denied this by the last administration. Deputy Colley said the referee gave a fair trial to every man. Perhaps Deputy Traynor can tell me why men in the country were sent a circular by the Department of Defence and when they could not attend at Griffith Barracks on a certain day their claims were turned down? How could the referee say they were not persons to whom Section 8 (1) of the Act applied? There was something wrong with that decision on the part of the referee.

Certain statements were made by Deputy Traynor as to what the Minister for External Affairs said about pensions during the last election. I know that people got pensions on the eve of the 1948 election because they threatened not to support Fianna Fáil if they did not get the pension. That can be looked up in the records.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy should not make charges against the referee in that may. The referee made a decision.

Mr. O'Leary

How could he come to any decision when he did not hear the claims of those men? That is what the Old I.R.A. men complain about-that they were turned down and never got a chance of going before the referee. Some of them were in America and others were in England, all genuine Old I.R.A. men. I come from a town that took part in the Rising of 1916. It is now very much in the news, in the Sunday Press. There are in that town genuine fighting men who were in prison and went on hunger strike and they were turned down as persons to whom the Act did not apply although their next door neighbours qualified. All those men had the same active service.

Enniscorthy was one of the towns that took part in the Rebellion. There are men there to-day who are getting old and they were put to the expense of hiring motor cars and going to Griffith Barracks and then they were told the Act did not apply to them. If you had not got sufficient pull you were unsuccessful. If you were not a supporter of the Government of the day your application was turned down because you would not be certified as having taken an active part. The keynote was "active service," as Deputy Flynn said. I know one man who was out in 1916 who was turned down. I know two members of the Cumann na mBan who applied; one applicant was successful, the other was not. There is no doubt that political influence had a good deal to do with it. Deputy Traynor, in answer to a question of mine, said that the certification was a matter for the officers concerned and that he had no function. If there were no grievances in this respect, would the Old I.R.A. associations now approach Deputies to have these grievances remedied? Thousands of applicants were refused. On the other hand, thousands were successful to whom awards should never have been made. I am sure every Deputy has received a copy of this circular from the Old Comrades Association in Cork. One can see from it that there was injustice done.

Mr. Traynor

There was a remedy for that.

Mr. O'Leary

To-night we hope there will be a remedy. You provided no remedy when you were in power. We all hope that justice will be done. Every Fianna Fáil Deputy in the House is clamouring for retrospective payment of these pensions. Were it not for the change of Government that opportunity would have been denied to them. It took a change of Government and a sympathetic Cabinet and Minister to bring in this measure. The Opposition is in the position that it cannot vote against it. I hope that these men will get fair play. I hope there will be no secrecy about it. These men are looking for justice. They are taxpayers like everyone else and they are just as anxious about the taxpayers in general as is any member in this House. We had £7,000,000 for defence during the emergency. We ought to be able to find £1,000,000 now for the men who helped to establish the State.

Mr. Corry

I welcome this Bill as one who is aware that there are a number of cases throughout the country which are, not only border-line cases, but over the Border as well. I admire the manner in which this Bill has been met by both sides of the House. In the atmosphere created here to-night we ought to be able to approach this problem in a proper way and do justice to all concerned. If we can afford millions for others who are not perhaps as much entitled to it as those men who have first claim upon the State, surely we ought to be able to find sufficient for them. Judging by the speeches up to the present, the Minister appears to be in a minority of one in relation to the clause governing retrospective payment. Why deprive a man, if he is entitled to a pension under this Bill, of the arrears of pension he should have been enjoying under either the 1924 or the 1934 Act?

As Deputy Captain Cowan said, no question of finance should stand in the way of seeing justice done. Anyone who has battled through these cases knows very well that in a large number of them the applicants were knocked out, not on any statement made by the certifying officer or anyone else, but on their own statements. Ordinary country men were brought up here to Dublin and marched in at 11 o'clock or 12 o'clock in the morning before three or four gentlemen who fired questions at them. It was only natural that they would make mistakes. Deputy Keane gave instances of several mistakes that were made. These things are bound to occur. I know three men who were captured three weeks before the Truce. They were released three days before it. They were asked the apparently simple question: "What did you do when you were released?" They replied: "I kept out of their way." Because the answer was not that they had reported back, they were knocked out on the ground that they were not on active service on the date of the Truce. Their officers went in and gave evidence that they did report back and did serve actively up to the date of the Truce, but it was no use. These are the injustices that must be remedied.

It is no use approaching the problem in any other way. The Minister has the entire House with him in this matter. I quite realise that, when he is putting something across the Department of Finance, he must start at a small figure and keep the figure low for the purpose of getting it through. The Minister knows that he will have far more than 2,000 cases to meet. Knowing the position in my own county, I would say frankly that there are far more than 2,000 cases in County Cork alone. If the Minister were to open a list in Cork City to-morrow I am sure he would get over 2,000 cases within a week of men who are, in fairness and in justice, entitled to a pension and to their certificates. There is no doubt about that and there is no use in approaching this matter from the point of view of cheeseparing. There should be no cheeseparing.

You have, then, the position as regards the definition of "active service" and what is "active service" and what "active service" will consist of. The vast majority of the men who took part in the struggle for freedom are now men in their 60's, you might say, who will not be a trouble in the natural course of events to this country much longer. In decency, and for the sake of the decency of this nation, the nation should treat them fairly and decently now.

Mr. Hickey

This is rather a long time after the event.

Mr. Corry

It may be a long time after the event but we know the difficulties that we had to meet in that situation the whole time. Is it because it is very late after the event that they will not do it?

Mr. Hickey

I did not suggest that at all.

Mr. Corry

Let us deal with them now and let me say that if the attitude now is to be on the same tight line as previously you are not going to settle it now. You are going to have even more dissatisfaction, when this Bill is finished with, in two, three or four years' time than you had before. Take, for instance, the case of the two men whose applications were turned down on what I consider a technicality. On the other hand, their comrades have been enjoying their pensions since 1934. These men are now going to get their pensions. We had cases as late as 1944 and 1945. I remember getting three cases from Mourne Abbey, near Mallow, in 1944. Those men only got through then, but they got their ten years' back money. Now, if they come along under this Bill as it stands they are not going to get any retrospective money at all. They will start off now. We all know that the average pension paid to the average volunteer in this country is somewhere between £10 and £25 a year. That is not going to be such a big financial obligation, considering the few thousands that peg out every year in the natural course of events and that the most of those men will not, in the natural course of events, be drawing it very long. Certainly, in fairness, I would urge the Minister, in view of the opinions given here from all quarters of the House, to make a decent gesture. If he does that I think he will have the whole House with him and not only the House but the nation. We are anxious to finish this once and for all. We are anxious to finish it decently now. Let the Minister make one decent gesture and say: "Very well, we are finishing it off."

What is the position going to be? You have the trouble still in regard to the definition of "active service" and what "active service" means. I was brought up against several cases. Take, for instance, a barrack attack. A dozen men were in the attack. Altogether there were 18 men summoned on the job. Some were put on this road, watching a mile outside the village, to block the road and stop reinforcements from coming in. Similarly, in perhaps two or three other roads in the vicinity. The board held that the only men who were entitled to be considered as on active service in that attack were the men who were actually fighting in the barrack, though the other men were, you might say, in a far more dangerous position if the reinforcements came, and it is only a matter of luck that they did not come. The question is, what is now going to be the definition of "active service". Let us face that problem. Are these men who were ordered to watch the roads on that attack to be taken as men on active service on that occasion, as compared with previous decisions? That is a door that I think will certainly have to be opened in fairness to everybody. I cannot see, for the life of me, how you are going to confine this thing to a point where, if the Minister is correct, he is going to have 17,000 applications and only 2,000 are going to get pensions. What about the other 15,000 men and what are they going to get? We are going to have more dissatisfied people at the end than there were previously unless, once and for all, you do the decent thing and say that any man who was an active Volunteer and who obeyed all the orders of superior officers from 1916 to 1921 is entitled to a pension. That, to my mind, is a fair and honest definition of "active service". Anything less than that is only cavilling and is only going to keep out one brother, one comrade, from the other and create dissatisfaction. The time has arrived now when the decent thing should be done and when we should end this bickering once and for all. You have men here who served together at one period, who fought with one another afterwards and who did not agree with one another ever since but, at the same time, you have that common feeling, if you like, for the satisfying of the grievances of old comrades who were with us. That is something that should be faced up to now and it would help to get rid of this bickering.

I know what is going to be said down the country. It will be said that if £1,000,000 can be afforded for the teachers surely the Minister can afford a couple of hundred thousand for the Old I.R.A. People will say that if we can afford to provide pensions for all the doctors down the country surely the Minister can afford pensions for the Old I.R.A. After all, it is not going to take so much money to end this now. I, to be honest about it, felt quite happy to-night when I heard Deputy Seán Collins, Deputy Seán Keane and other Deputies from all sides of the House get up and voice the one viewpoint in this connection, namely, that financial interests or the question of finance should not be let stand in the way of seeing justice done.

Captain Giles

The most humiliating thing to us in the Old I.R.A. to have to listen to over the past ten years has been the question of pensions. We in the Old I.R.A. never sought pensions in the past. They were brought in to get the first Government out of a dirty mess and if the first and the second Governments had done their duty there would be very little trouble in this country as regards pensions for the Old I.R.A. I am satisfied that there is a minority of Old I.R.A. in this country who have suffered an injustice over the past 25 years. It is only right that this injustice should be remedied and although it may be 25 years too late— better late than never. If the first Government brought in a proper pension Act for the proper period, 1916 to 1921 and no further, all this trouble would be ended. We who fought between 1921 and 1924 in the regular Army were paid for our services and that should be enough. If the period had been fixed from 1916 to 1921 all the Old I.R.A. men, whether they were pro-Treaty or anti-Treaty, could go before a pension board; justice could be done to them and there need be no wrangling at all over the past 25 years. I have no apology to make to anyone because we are pressing the claims of the Old I.R.A. who have had an injustice done to them over the past decades in this country. It has been said that the Fianna Fáil Government were the cause of certain men not getting their pensions but I do not believe that. Under the 1934 Act however a certain number of mean vindictive men throughout the country who should have given evidence to support certain people refused to do it. There were other mean vindictive men who gave wrong evidence in order to deprive others of their pension. The cause of that was the civil war mentality. I hope that that has gone and that under this Bill a clean manly effort will be made to fill the gap and give justice to the survivors—there are not many.

I would also make an appeal to have these pensions retrospective. There are men who have suffered a grievance over the past 25 years in poor miserable circumstances. Most of the men who fought were the sons of poor workers and small farmers who never had much of this world's goods and who have not much of this world's goods to-day. It is only right that we should vindicate them. I agree with Deputy Collins and other speakers who said that this Bill will not remedy the injustice unless there is a proper definition of "active service". That was one of the cruxes over the past 25 years. If it were defined I am satisfied that justice would be done to many men who gave active service. I know men who were not in major operations but who blocked roads, cut trees, carried despatches and had lorries ready for their leaders but who were put down as not having been on active service and were deprived of their pensions. That is a desperately mean state of affairs and I hope that the Minister will rectify it at the earliest opportunity for otherwise he will have endless trouble. A large number of men will apply under this Bill and unless that point is defined he will be in as bad a way as the last Government were. Men who should have got pensions before will come up with the same evidence as they gave at the last court. They cannot produce new facts. They will give the same evidence of service as they gave when they were turned down and they will be turned down again.

There is no use in people insulting the Old I.R.A. by dragging them up to Dublin and asking them to wait upon a board if we are not going to do something definite and get down to brass tacks about it. I am satisfied that we have been humiliated over 25 or 30 years. I could never find out exactly how many men fought in this country but it is a small number and not the huge number who have applied for pensions. The first Government is the cause of all that trouble because they did not define the period as being from 1916 to 1921. From 1921 on we were paid in the regular Army and the men who fought and were called the Irregulars made well by robbing banks and shops so that the people on each side on the Civil War were well paid.

Mr. Hickey

That is not fair.

Captain Giles

We should not be paid for fighting each other. It is right to be paid for fighting our traditional enemy but we should never have got pensions from the Government of the day who held office through the efforts of a small body of men. They should be big enough to give a decent gratuity, £500, £700 or £1,000 to each man for his services. If that were done we should be satisfied.

Mr. Pattison

Is it right that any Deputy should suggest that the men who fought for the freedom of this country were robbers? They were accused by Deputy Captain Giles of robbing shops.

An Ceann Comhairle

If a particular person is mentioned he will have to withdraw his charges. Unfortunately it is not the first time it has been said.

Mr. Moylan

It is all right. It will be said again.

Mr. Pattison

I think that he should withdraw it.

Captain Giles

If it is insulting I will withdraw it. But is it not a fact that the men who fought at that time walked up to banks with guns in their hands and got away with the swag and the money? The Minister has promised the Old I.R.A. that he will see justice done and I know that he is a man with a big enough heart to see that justice will be done.

The old Cumann na mBan are also people who got very little justice. There is a vast number of them who gave far more service to the cause of freedom by the valuable work they did than many who got pensions although they did not carry guns. They went through the streets of Dublin and many of them were forgotten when the work was over.

As has been pointed out, the Old I.R.A. organisations in the country could do important work in finding out what people are entitled to. We have an active Old I.R.A. organisation in my part of the country which brings together members of the Old I.R.A. from all sides. We sit in council and are happy and content to forget politics and these people want to help to remedy the grievances of those who are left. We in County Meath can get proper evidence to see that justice is done. That is the type of men who should get the evidence, the officers and men who knew the men concerned in the past.

It is very hard to ask a man who cannot write his name, a poor country gám as he is called, to come up to Dublin. He hardly knows his way to Griffith Barracks and when he gets there he is asked to wait at the gate shivering. He stumbles at the first question and flops at the second. He goes home and waits for two or three days and then he is told that the Act does not apply to him whereas if he could bring these men up with him to give evidence, evidence on oath, he would get his pension. A poor man is confronted by legal luminaries and you know what any poor devil is when he comes before legal luminaries, he is not what he would like to be. If he wishes justice to be done the Minister will have to get this administered in such a way that surviving officers of the Old I.R.A. can give evidence. If he cannot do this there is no use in calling those unfortunate people up before a board here because they are going to flounder. Those people do not remember the day and date they gave their service. They are 50, 60 or 70 years of age now waiting to hop into their graves and are glad that that day is coming because they get little justice while they are living. I hope that this is the last time we will have to stand in this House to ask for justice. The first Government failed, the second Government failed and I hope that the third Government which is a combination of all the brains in the country will not fail.

Mr. Moylan

I am surprised at the Minister's statement that the greater portion of the money which will probably be spent as a result of this Pensions Bill will go to men who had never applied under any previous Act. If that is the case, it seems to me that they must be all generals. From my experience, I think the Minister need not be so worried about the number of men who could apply and qualify and who have never applied under any other Pensions Act. This country is full of heroes, generals who did everything, whose reputations in their own districts are magnificent as soldiers, but who will not take the chance of going before a pensions board which would investigate their claims. The Minister need not be worried about those at all.

I would not intervene in this debate were it not for some statements that were made by some advocates of the I.R.A. claims. An attack was made here on the brigade committees which were formed to try to help with the administration of the 1934 Act. That Act could not be administered if those brigade committees were not set up. The men of those committees collated records, they collected evidence, they gave evidence before the board, without prejudice against those who were their friends or those who were their enemies. Those brigade committees were formed in true democratic fashion, as a result of the calling of conventions publicly, where delegates were appointed by each company and where the men finally selected were the choice of those with whom they served during the period of hostilities.

I do say, Sir, that the 1934 Act could not have been administered without the help of those men. I have had to certify specifically for one brigade and in special cases for many brigades; and I have no objection to those cases for which I gave evidence being held in the open, and I have not the shadow of an objection to the presenting by the Minister to any applicant of any evidence that has been given by me in any of those cases. And what I say can be said also on behalf of every certifying officer whom I know. I think it was Deputy Colley who said that men who had parted in 1922 forgot any enmities that might have remained in 1934 and, irrespective of the side they took in 1922, gave straightforward and fair evidence in regard to any particular applicant.

I do not see how the Minister is going to extend the area of successful applicants if there is not some change in the administration. At one particular time during the period when the 1934 Act was being administered, there was a demand for a brigade record and I know one brigade which supplied that record. I wonder how many more did so. I suggest that no Pensions Act can be properly applied without the submission of a brigade record by every brigade. I do hold that where any success attended the efforts of a brigade in 1920 or 1921, a good deal of the success depended on the battalion commandants and on company captains; and in a brigade area where, during every week from September, 1920 to July 11th, 1921, a major attack was made on the British, then surely in that brigade area the company captains and the battalion commandants were entitled to be regarded as on active service? I think that there might be some reference, by whatever administrative committee is set up, to some words at least spoken in this House in regard to the question of administration and the records of men and the records of the brigades. I have listened to one Deputy talking about a man who did not qualify for a pension although he was 1,000 yards away from an ambush with a shotgun. He was like Mr. Dooley, 3,000 miles behind the guns and wishing to God he was 3,000 more.

Mr. Hickey

I would not apply that to all of them.

Mr. Moylan

It is quite possible that a man unused to cross-examination, unused to debate, might make a foolish statement which would be in line with that comment; and if it were not for the certifying officers who tried to correct those statements, irrespective of what the man's political opinions were and what theirs were, there would be far fewer getting pensions to-day. I do not think it would be helpful to have cases heard in the open. I have not a shadow of objection to their being held so, but I think the persons most embarrassed by the open confession would be the particular applicant himself and not so much the certifying officers. Whatever the results of this Pensions Bill may be, I hope that no Deputy on any side of the House will be getting up here and asking for the names and addresses of the poor devils who were successful in getting pensions. I cannot see the Minister telling the Referee or the administration board how they shall decide. I do not think any Minister of any Government here would like to do that. We have, in the Land Acts, Section 6 of the 1933 Act specifically taking out of the hands of the Minister any authority to do certain things. In the same way in this Act, as in all the Pensions Acts, the Minister must give away any authority of administration or decision. If he did not do so, it would be quite dishonest and there would be no use in blaming the Minister afterwards for the success or otherwise of the Act.

I disagree also with the statement made in relation to the composition of the board, that it should be composed merely of members of the I.R.A., men who had service and knowledge of the I.R.A. I think it would be wise also to have on that board men who are by their experience capable of interpreting legislation and familiar with legislation because, if they are not there, certainly, as one I.R.A. man, I would not like to be a member of the board. I know what would happen.

Mr. B. Maguire

This Bill is welcomed by every part of the House, which indicates a feeling that it is a necessary attempt to apply the elements of justice to the various applicants who were unsuccessful, under previous Acts, in sustaining claims before the various boards that had been set up. There has been a great deal of discontent amongst the general public who recognised that many people who were well known to have played their part in the war periods were refused pensions while others in the same locality received some reward. That feeling of discontent has been manifest in many ways and indicates that the general public advocate the general application of justice. Where they see injustice in operation, no matter what the authority or administration may be, they show resentment. Therefore, the present Bill is welcomed by all. Various hopes are held out that it will to a large extent remedy the existing faults.

Personally, I feel the approach is very narrow. I believe that the Minister has done serious injury to this Bill as an instrument by which successful results would ultimately be attained by indicating, as his estimate of the cost, £50,000 approximately, and, as his estimate of the number of successful applicants, approximately 2,000. That would indicate to the board that is to be set up the manner in which the Minister intends them to interpret the Bill. That is a great mistake. I do not think the Minister had any right whatever to prescribe the limits. That statement will be interpreted by the board as the manner in which they are to administer the Act. I cannot see that the Minister had any right to make that statement. I am sure he went through the files and read the various applications that had already been before the various boards with a view to arriving at an estimate of the number who could sustain a claim under the new Bill. We must, therefore, assume that it is intended that the new Act will be interpreted on the same basis as previous Acts had been interpreted, and that border-line cases, to which the ex-Minister referred, will be brought within its scope. He indicated that there were some 2,000 or 3,000 border-line cases.

If that be the purpose of this Bill, it is a hopeless effort and it would have been better if it had never been introduced. If there is to be a limit prescribed by the Minister to the number of people who may succeed and the amount of expense involved, then the whole thing is largely a farce. It would have been much better if the Minister or the Government had decided to deal with the applicants on the basis of their applications already before the various boards and decide once and for all that that number of border-line cases would be given some reward or other. Personally, I am convinced that the introductory statement by the Minister has injured the Bill in advance. I would suggest that he should take the earliest opportunity of withdrawing that limitation. No individual can determine who is entitled to a pension. It is for the court or referee or whatever body is set up to decide who shall be entitled to a pension and who shall not. If there is to be a long process over the next year or years and if it is the Minister's intention that about 2,000 people shall benefit, we can only assume that the purpose of this Bill is much the same as the purpose of previous Acts, that it is intended as political propaganda to hold the people in anticipation over a period of years and thereby to have influence over those people. If that be the purpose, and it has that implication as it stands now, then it is a disgraceful piece of legislation. There should be no attempt on the part of any Minister to determine in advance what the commission appointed by him should decide.

Dr. O'Higgins

If that were the purpose, if we were trying politically to deceive the people, instead of giving a figure of 2,000, would not the Minister hold out hopes of 30,000 pensions?

Mr. B. Maguire

I cannot hear the Minister.

Dr. O'Higgins

If, as the Deputy is assuming, the intention in giving a figure of 2,000 pensions was to delude people in order to get political support for a number of years, would not the Minister say 30,000 rather than 2,000?

Mr. B. Maguire

No. I would say the Minister, first of all, had no right to indicate to the court he proposes to set up that the number of applicants would be so many and the expenditure would be limited to approximately so much.

Dr. O'Higgins

I must be candid with Deputies.

Mr. B. Maguire

The Minister must have had some investigation and examination made before he made these statements.

Dr. O'Higgins

The Deputy was not here when the Minister was speaking. The Minister arrived at that figure by a calculation which he read out and that calculation indicated that the Minister had not perused a single file but was going by the percentage of successful applications and unsuccessful applications under the previous two Acts. That is the build-up and that was my statement.

Mr. B. Maguire

On the calculation of successful and unsuccessful applications under the previous Acts, the Minister drew a line and determined that a certain amount of money would be expended on the number of pensions granted under this Bill. I move the adjournment of the debate.

Debate adjourned.