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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 8 Mar 1950

Vol. 119 No. 10

In Committee on Finance. - Flax Act, 1936 (Suspension) Bill, 1950—Second Stage.

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time. This Bill is, in effect, a Bill to do now what the 1947 Flax Act, 1936 (Suspension) Act then did, with this additional feature, that the Flax Act (Suspension) Act, 1947, suspended the 1936 Act for a limited period, while this Bill would suspend the 1936 Act for an unlimited period and the 1936 Act would not come into operation hereafter unless and until an Order to that effect was made by the Government for the time being. The purpose of the original Act in 1936 was to promote the cultivation of flax in the country. It fixed the minimum prices and it was hoped thereby to evoke in certain areas of the country about 5,000 acres of flax.

In fact, the provisions of the 1936 Act never functioned because the minimum prices which it was thought expedient to fix under it never reached market prices, which were consistently in excess of the minima fixed. Then, with the outbreak of war, a variety of factors operated which made it highly unlikely that the provisions designed to promote the cultivation of flax would be necessary and it was deemed expedient to suspend the Act. That situation obtained until 1948, which was the last year in which the Board of Trade in Great Britain made itself responsible for buying the entire flax crop of this country. When the Board of Trade in London withdrew, the future market of flax grown in this country by our people became a matter between the growers and the Northern Ireland spinners. The Northern Ireland spinners, as the House will remember, suggested that a lower price than had been paid in 1948 should be acceptable for our growers in 1949. Their final offer was to buy 2,000 tons of flax at 32/6 per stone for grade 5. That was a reduction of 2/6 on the prices paid for the 1948 crop. I advised the spinners that that was not a proposal that I considered myself justified in recommending to the growers in this country in view of the fact that contemporaneously the Northern Ireland flax spinners not only proposed to maintain but to raise the prices payable to the growers in Northern Ireland. Subsequently the Association of Flax Spinners in Northern Ireland met representatives of the growers and agreed to purchase 3,000 tons at prices ranging from 26/6 for grade 6 to 34/- for grade 1 with an additional 1/6 a stone for turbine scutched flax. Arrangements, I understand, have been made in respect of 1950 for the sale of 3,000 tons. The prices agreed on show a further reduction of 3/- on the prices ruling in 1949 and are 10/- per stone less than the growers in Northern Ireland will receive. The House should know that in respect of the flax crop in Northern Ireland an arrangement has been arrived at whereby the spinners will pay a basic price and the Northern Ireland Government will pay a subsidy under the Flax Act, 1949. I have a copy of the Flax Act (Northern Ireland), 1949, and in the First Schedule to that Act there is an interesting declaration. The First Schedule contains the growers' agreement.

"Whereas the cost of growing flax in Northern Ireland exceeds considerably the world prices of flax of equivalent quality and whereas it is important that the growing of flax in Northern Ireland should be encouraged and the quality improved..."

It then goes on to set out that a subsidy shall be made available to the growers by the Government. Inasmuch as the Government of Northern Ireland, recognising that the price provided by the spinners is inadequate to give the growers of Northern Ireland a tolerable and acceptable standard of living and that the growers could not be expected to accept it, feels constrained to subsidise the crop in order to produce the raw material of one of its principal industries, Deputies of this House will readily recognise that an Irish Minister for Agriculture could not accept the implication that growers in Ireland should gladly accept from the spinners of Northern Ireland a price 10/- lower than that which the Government of Northern Ireland considers to be a reasonable price for the growers of Northern Ireland. In those circumstances, as I do not anticipate that the fixing of minimum prices is likely to be requisite in the early future because I would not recommend a flax crop to our people except on the basis of their receiving from it a standard of living and a measure of reward for their effort in its cultivation commensurate with the minimum which is thought suitable for the farmers of Tyrone, Fermanagh, Armagh and Derry, I ask the House to suspend the Flax Act of 1936 unless and until at some future date it appears necessary to invoke the powers of that Act in the interests of such sections of our people as may desire to engage in the business of growing flax in Ireland.

In the review of the flax situation—I would say the misleading review—to which we have listened, the House has not had from the Minister any statement showing whether or not he accepts as Minister for Agriculture the responsibility of negotiating with the Six County spinners the price that flax growers in the Twenty-Six Counties will receive for their crop. He has stated that when the fixing of prices was a matter for the British Board of Trade such a discussion took place between our Department of Agriculture and that British Ministry. When, as he states, in 1948 the prices to be paid for flax became a matter for the Six County spinners talks apparently took place between officials of the Minister's Department and the flax spinners regarding last year's crop. I take it that the fact of these discussions between our Department and the flax spinners being initiated was an acceptance of the responsibility by the Minister and his Department to continue the practice that had been in vogue when the fixing of prices was a matter for the British Department.

Following the failure last year of the Minister and his Department to reach an agreement with the Six County spinners, we had a discussion here. In the course of that discussion I said what I will now repeat, that there was no justification whatever for the Minister's failure to reach agreement on that occasion. At the time I was conscious of the fact that, from the way in which the negotiations opened up, a certain difficulty was presented to the Minister and the Department inasmuch as the Six County spinners made their first offer for the 1949 crop prior to making any agreement in regard to the price to be paid to Six County growers.

I will concede this much, that any man who is charged, as the Minister was charged then, with handling that matter for the growers here, would naturally be entitled to be suspicious that he was being used by the Six County spinners to effect an agreement in the Twenty-Six Counties that would prejudice and that would reduce the price they would be obliged to offer to the growers in the Six Counties and, as a result, he would naturally conclude that he and his Department should not allow themselves to be put into the position of negotiating with the spinners and accepting a price that would then be used by these spinners, who are keen businessmen and who want to get the raw materials as cheaply as possible, against the Six County growers.

I would say it was because of that fact that the spinners agreed to take 4,000 tons at the rate of 31/3 for grade 5. The Minister, in his wisdom, decided to reject that offer and before any further negotiations took place the spinners arrived at an agreement with the Six County growers which provided, as has been explained, for a price to be paid by the spinners, plus a bonus to be paid out of taxation by the Northern Government. Having secured an agreement with the Six County growers for a larger quantity than they perhaps originally anticipated, the spinners came back with an offer to our Minister here, not of 4,000 tons of flax, but of 2,000 tons at a slight advance in price.

I will concede that any man as responsible as the Minister was might fall into that mistake, might fall into failing to make an agreement on the original offer, suspecting that there was behind the offer the purpose which I have stated. If he did fall into that trap, could he not have come back to the growers, the people concerned in this business in the four counties, have some discussions with them, place his cards on the table, show the way in which he had been endeavouring to do his best for them and try to find a reasonable solution out of the new situation which had arisen?

What approach was made instead of, as I suggest, that reasonable line of approach? The spinners came back with the renewed offer reduced by half to 2,000 tons with a slight increase in price. The Minister then flew into a temper. As he explained in this House, he was not prepared to do business with three gentlemen from the Six Counties with Lancashire accents. As a matter of fact, he admitted here— as will be found in the records—that he told these gentlemen to go to blazes. It was after that display on his part that the growers decided they would do something themselves—the growers and the millers with the spinners of the Six Counties.

As you have been told, an agreement was reached covering 3,000 tons of flax. Every Deputy realises the importance of an agreement having the backing of a State Department. Every Deputy realises that a flax grower will place much more value upon an agreement made between his own Department and the Six County spinners than upon an agreement arrived at in a loose and casual way, with no powers of enforcement behind it, and arrived at in the manner in which last year's and, as we have been told now, this year's agreements have been made.

But it was not enough, apparently, to give this demonstration of failure. The Minister, having failed, was too proud to admit his failure and, following that demonstration, in every conceivable way he set out to depress the growing, to discourage the growing, of this crop, not only in his own constituency, but in the whole area in which flax has been a cash crop for many years.

I was reading at the time, following the discussion here, a statement made by the Minister and reported in the Irish Independent of 26th March, 1949, at a meeting in connection with the parish plan. The Minister is reported as follows:

"Warning to farmers. Beware of crops for which there is only one market," the Minister continued, "for if those who control that market desire to exploit you, they can present you with an ultimation any day they like that you must take for your crop less than its value, and if you reject that offer you have nothing else to do but be at the loss of it all."

That advice to the farmers, coming from the present Minister for Agriculture, is surely interesting. I would like the Minister to say is the advice consistent with his many other statements in connection with quite a lot of other agricultural products for which he has committed us, so far as it is possible for him to commit us, to one purchaser? In what way does he contend that the argument holds good that, because we were offered a lesser price here for our flax, such price should not be accepted here? Is it not a fact that, in relation to quite a number of other items of agricultural produce, we receive a lesser price than the farmers of the Six Counties?

But the Minister having failed—he was a businessman, of course, and was trying to make the world, and this little world especially, believe that he was competent to handle all these business problems thoroughly—was not the type of person who would admit failure, and he set himself out to ensure that, as far as possible, the area under flax for 1949 would be considerably reduced. Mind you, I do not think that he actually stopped at making statements which would result in that position. During the sowing season I happened to pass through his constituency, which adjoins my own. The one thing I noticed during my travels was that on every hoarding in the County Monaghan, in every town and village and at every Garda station, there were flashy notices displayed, headed "Warning to Farmers". The warning to the farmers was this: that if, as a result of action on their part in releasing water from the retting pools, damage was caused to our fisheries, they would render themselves liable to the penalties set forth if such a charge could be established against them.

Surely that is administration.

I am raising it in order to indicate, briefly, the efforts that followed the Minister's failure. Those who had been growing flax for years and had been receiving for it a price that was negotiated for them by their own Department were being intimidated by the Minister so that he would be able to say at the end of 1949: "Did I not tell you that the farmers would not grow flax at that price?" But, in spite of all those efforts, it transpires anyhow that the farmers of Monaghan grew somewhere around 5,000 odd acres last year; that the farmers of Donegal grew somewhere in the neighbourhood of a little less than 6,000 acres; that the farmers in my own county grew roughly half that quantity and that the farmers in County Cork grew somewhat less than 2,000 acres.

I want to ask in all seriousness the Deputies who are supporting the Government, is it going to be contended that, in the case of those farmers who are growing flax, a crop which they grew last year in spite of all the obstacles that were placed in their way and in spite of the uncertainty arising out of the way in which this matter was handled, it is reasonable that our Minister and the Department of Agriculture should wash their hands completely this year of responsibility for the initiation of discussions again, even though they failed last year, with the representatives of the flax spinners in the Six Counties, in the hope that these small farmers who grew 15,000 odd acres of that crop would at least have behind their effort the security of an agreement as to price and quantity negotiated for them by a State Department?

I thought, in fact we were told that when the Minister for Agriculture declared the Republic on his holidays in Paris some time ago, a new situation was going to exist here, a new approach to such matters as those which we are now discussing, and that we were going to have closer relations with our neighbours. I thought that our Minister for External Affairs was going to see to it that in matters of trade and business, of education and all the rest, we were going to have friendly talks and discussions with our neighbours, that we were not going to talk to them in such terms as: "Go to blazes, I do not want to talk to you about flax or anything else because you have a Lancashire accept and you are only a Quisling." We were led to believe over the last two years that our approach to problems such as this, which is a purely business matter, was going to be altogether different from what it had been in all the years that have passed. In the demonstration given here to-night by the Minister in his misleading review of the whole flax situation, we had the admission that not even once this year did he attempt, on behalf of the growers of these 15,000 odd acres of flax, to make contact with out northern neighbours to see whether any agreement of the type I have referred to could be reached.

There are times in this House when men speak here perhaps not with that full feeling of conviction with which I am now speaking as to the manner in which this matter has been handled. I am not going to contend that the flax crop, some time or other, might not prove profitable or that world conditions and circumstances might not force our farmers out of the growing of it. I am not contending that it is possible for a Minister or a Government here to ensure that this crop will last for all time and will provide for those who grow it a remunerative market; but I do contend that it is a crop which is suitable to our farmers; they have a knowledge of it, they have been at it for years, and it has been regarded by them as a paying crop.

The fact that the reduction in the acreage as between 1948 and 1949 was only a matter of 5,000 acres, in spite of all the bungling and mishandling to which the business was subjected last year, is proof, in my opinion, that if our farmers were given a reasonable chance and reasonable encouragement, they would continue to grow it as a cash crop, and that it is very valuable to them from that point of view. I want to say that the farmer-Deputies who know this problem, as I know it, and who are supporting the present Government have a duty imposed on them to see that this method of handling their business will cease. I am sorry that none of the Deputies to whom I am addressing my remarks are now in the House, but for many years they showed great interest and great enthusiasm for this industry in the counties that I have referred to. The growers have their own organisation and they were always alert, led by some of those here who now claim to be farmer spokesmen. I am amazed at the silence which has prevailed in their ranks in this House for the last 12 months in regard to this question. I do not expect that they should go along and say to the Government: "We are not giving you our support any further." I think, however, that they should be able to secure by legitimate pressure that a different sort of approach would be made to this matter.

We would have liked to get from the Minister much more information than he has seen fit to give us on this subject. I have here the figures of the acreage of flax grown last year. I have told you of the reduction of roughly 5,000 acres which took place as between 1948 and 1949. The Minister took advantage of the Agricultural Workers (Holidays) Bill yesterday to tell the House of the enormous improvement that has taken place in the yield of crops since the advent to office of this Government. I should like to hear in what way that result has shown itself in regard to the flax crop. I should like the Minister, if he is really interested, to tell us what was the average yield last year and what are the prospects; to give us a general review of the seed position and what he has been doing in that regard; to tell us what has become of the flax board which was in existence in the Department for many years, encouraging our people to grow that crop, helping them in many ways, and helping the owners of mills to equip these establishments in order to handle the crop grown by our farmers. That is what we should like to hear and are entitled to hear from the Minister responsible, not the sort of review that is designed, as far as he is concerned, to depress still further this business of flax growing.

I do not suppose that anything I say would induce the Minister even now to change his attitude towards flax growers. As I say, it might fade out in the ordinary way if world conditions changed to such an extent that flax would no longer prove to be a paying proposition. It is regarded as such even yet by many farmers in those districts who will continue to grow it this year even at the price to which the Minister has referred. I want to say in that regard that, when I was Minister, I was obliged to accept a price in respect of the 1948 crop less than the price available to Six County growers. I tried to get the same price as they were getting for our flax growers and I struggled mighty hard to secure it for them. Prior to 1948, there was a differential of 2/6 per stone. I succeeded only to a limited extent in reducing that differential to 1/6. But because I was not able to secure the same price as was being offered to the Six County growers it did not follow that I was going to say to these people: "Go to blazes. I do not want to do business with you because you have the wrong kind of accent." Because we are not able to secure from the Six County spinners prices equal to those offered to the Six County growers, plus the subsidy or bounty paid by the northern taxpayers, is no reason for the Minister's refusal to face up to his responsibility to a section of our farmers. If he refuses to face up to that responsibility because that situation exists, then he will have to admit that, not only does it exist in relation to flax, but in relation to eggs and a great quantity of the agricultural produce we are selling in the British market.

It is totally irrelevant to this Bill.

I hope I shall continue to be conscious of the necessity for preserving complete order in this Assembly. I am fully conscious of that. I will, when reminded by the Chair, try to make myself amenable if I have transgressed in any way. I say then to Deputies from Cork, Donegal, Monaghan and Cavan that we should provide the best possible opportunity we can for those who grew 15,000 acres of flax last year. Why should we try to rob them as a result of our pride or prejudice? Why should the Minister or the Department try to rob them of the opportunity they have had all down the years and that they will continue to have if there is a proper approach? On coming into office, the Minister accepted the responsibility in the new situation that arose of discussing with northern spinners the fixing of the price of the flax crop. He failed in that, but his failure in that year does not in any way justify his refusal this year to open up the discussion again in the hope that he will do better. He has failed to do that. He has, as it were, bowed himself out of the whole business. He has tried to depress and discourage by word and action those who want to continue to grow flax in spite of the policy of his Department, and the manner in which this little industry has been handled within the last two years is deplorable.

Deputy Smith seems to be very apprehensive because of the flax-growing situation in Cork. I represent a constituency which has been a very considerable flax producing area over a period of years. I have not fallen into the error into which Deputy Smith has fallen of either deliberate misapprehension or arrogant stupidity. The flax growers in my constituency appreciate in no uncertain fashion, because of their experience during the first world war, that flax-growing is primarily a war-time crop.

My purpose in intervening to-night is not to follow in the wild flood of misrepresentation of an irate ex-Minister, but rather to put what I consider to be reasonable suggestions to the Minister. Deputy Smith has described in his own inimitable way the spectre of depression that the Minister is casting over the flax-growing industry. On the one hand, he charges the Minister with responsibility to the farmers. On the other hand, he discredits the Minister for facing this responsibility. In some extraordinary way he tries to make capital out of a statement to the effect that the Minister has suggested to the farmers that it is, at least, unwise to grow a crop for which there is only one market, particularly when the people in control of that market can quite deliberately depress the price. I can see no difficulty in accepting that proposition. I think the Minister was facing his responsibility when he adverted to that fact as far as flax was concerned. What could the Minister do? He could not buy it. He could serve no purpose in buying it. He did, however, take the very necessary step of doing his duty as a Minister. On the one hand, Deputy Smith says he does not do it and, on the other hand, he castigates the Minister for doing it. The Minister did take the responsibility of pointing out to the farmers the difficulties that existed in the situation. It may be that the Minister's own temperament led him to make an emphatic and dogmatic statement to the northern spinners. I think if we were a little bit more reasonable in our analysis of the principles that underlay that statement, we might not find quite so much in it with which to contend.

If Deputy Smith could eradicate from his soul the deep personal bitterness that he feels against the present occupant of the office of Minister for Agriculture, he might not be so unrealistic, so nebulous or so unconvincing in the arguments that he propounds and tries to put across in the House. The situation with regard to flax is quite a simple one. The Minister has to face either of two problems. He must either get the farmers into something else that will pay them better or provide them with something in the nature of an established linen industry to act as an absorbent for the flax that is grown.

I represent a constituency that has made a considerable amount of money out of flax. I urge upon the Minister to encourage, direct and advise the farmers to get out of flax unless he, as a responsible Minister, can find for them and their goods a safe, secure and profitable market. I want uncertainty removed once and for all. I do not think contributions, such as those made by Deputy Smith, are helpful. I think the efforts made by Deputy Mrs. Rice and Deputy Dr. Maguire last year were ill-timed, because we were left in the position of having the crisis break too soon and in a manner that could not react favourably to the Minister who, at that stage of the operations, was at least actively negotiating a price. I do not subscribe to the beliefs to which Deputy Smith subscribes. I believe there is as much contractual obligation between growers and spinners as there is between the spinners and the Department of Agriculture should they see fit to enter into a contract. I do not think Deputy Smith has succeeded in making any case. He has only offered us further evidence of his own stupidity because a contract, whether it is entered into by the State with the northern spinners or by the growers with the northern spinners is equally a contract and equally enforceable. I think Deputy Smith is transgressing in his misguided enthusiasm upon a field of contractual obligation which he does not understand and to which he should not advert.

The flax situation is one in which the Minister has a duty. It is his duty to indicate clearly, succinctly and deliberately to the farming community the difficulties inherent in the situation and to warn them of the perils they may face if they continue to grow the crop. On the other hand, if the Minister can envisage the possibility of a permanent flax-growing industry I urge upon him the desirability of reporting to his Government with a view to establishing a proper linen mill to absorb the flax we grow. It must always be remembered that we can grow in this country flax as good as that grown anywhere in the world.

I shall not make the same mistake as Deputy Smith did by expressing amazement at the Minister's callous treatment of the whole flax business because, since the first occasion on which he had an opportunity of dealing with it, his attitude has been one of complete indifference. In fact, he has encouraged flax growers to cease growing the crop. Deputy Collins has referred to the question raised by Deputy Mrs. Rice and myself. He said that we intervened a bit late in connection with the negotiations in relation to the price for the 1949 crop. I want to assure Deputy Collins that the question in connection with this matter was put down quite innocently.

I have not questioned your bona fides.

I know that. What amazes me is the fact that the Minister, who himself represents a constituency in which flax is a traditional cash crop, should not appreciate that we also represent that constituency and are entitled to evince an interest in the price for that crop. Why should we not evince such an interest? What amazes me even more is the fact that the Minister, finding himself confronted with only one buyer for our flax, practically told that buyer in so many words to "go to blazes". I think he actually amended that expression later by saying that he told them to "go and take a running jump at themselves." That is all very well. Admittedly, in the intervening period, he changed his political outlook and he was trying, perhaps, to lead up to that change. What I should like to know is why, in connection with the original negotiations for the price of the 1949 crop, they commenced in June and why did we hear nothing further in connection with them until December? What was the Minister doing from June to December in the matter? I admit, of course, that he was very usefully employed in America advising the American people on the best way to achieve the invulnerability of Britain. The Minister completely omitted to cater for and to protect this cash crop which, unlike the flax crop in West Cork to which Deputy Collins has referred, was not a wartime crop but one on which the people of County Monaghan depended to a very great extent for the payment of their annual bills. It was the duty of the Minister to foster this cash crop in County Monaghan.

Will the Deputy answer me a question? I am not putting it in any contentious way. Will he tell me how much flax was grown in Monaghan in 1936, 1937 and 1938?

Last year we grew 5,000 acres, despite the reduction in the price, whereas in West Cork you grew 1,200 acres last year.

That is not an answer to my question. What about 1936, 1937 and 1938?

I have not the figures at the moment but they were at least in keeping with the figures of last year.

I think the Deputy is very much misinformed.

They may have been less—3,000 or 4,000 acres. The price of flax will require to be a lot less before it ceases to be a traditional crop in County Monaghan and even then, as Deputy Smith pointed out, a number of people will be prepared to grow it. Instead of fostering it, as it was his duty to foster every branch of agriculture in the country and particularly the crop which counted so much in the constituency which he represents, he sabotaged it. But, of course, that is typical of the attitude of the Minister in the Department which he governs.

I think Deputy Dr. Maguire must be under some illusion if he thinks that flax has in recent years been a customary cash crop for his and my constituents prior to the advent of war. Perhaps the Deputy has forgotten the acreage of flax in the whole of Ireland in the years 1931 to 1934. The average flax crop in the whole of Ireland where the writ of this Government runs, for three years, was about 700 acres. The Deputy has, I think, overlooked what happened. Up to 1936 flax was practically not-existent in this part of Ireland.

In what part of Ireland?

In the Twenty-Six Counties. The Government of that day —inasmuch as beet was a subsidised crop and wheat was a subsidised crop and that these crops were not readily available to many people who were engaged in mixed farming in North Monaghan, parts of Cavan and traditional areas where flax used to be grown—conceived the scheme of promoting the growth of flax in those areas as in some degree compensating farmers in those areas for their inability, owing to the nature of their soil, to avail of the other subsidised crops. But the Deputy may take it from me, as I have no doubt our colleague Deputy Mrs. Rice well knows, that in 1933 there was virtually no flax. It had all disappeared.

There was no wheat either.

There is a lot more since you left.

These are the facts. As Deputy Collins has pointed out, during the war there was an artificial stimulus given to flax. Prior to 1914 flax had been a crop which was extensively grown in Donegal, Cavan, Monaghan and West Cork—but that is going back a long way. I am quite at a loss to understand the outlook of Deputy Smith. I was approached by the Northern Ireland spinners. Deputy Smith says that in his last negotiations with the British Board of Trade he disliked having to accept a price for Irish flax lower than that which the Board of Trade was prepared to pay for Northern Ireland flax but that he made the best bargain he could and that he succeeded in reducing the disparity from 2/6 a stone to 1/6. Deputy Smith seems entirely to have overlooked what I have repeatedly told the House. When the Northern Ireland spinners came to me in the autumn of 1948 the proposal they had the impudence to make to me was that on the same day that they wanted to reduce the price for our growers they were going to raise the price for the growers in Northern Ireland.

Six-County growers, you should call them.

What would Deputy Dr. Maguire have said to people who had the impudence to come in and tell him that his neighbours in County Monaghan were to take 2/6 a stone less, at the same time as the spinners——

Mr. Maguire

He would have thought over it for a bit.

I doubt it.

——in Northern Ireland proposed to raise the price in Northern Ireland? I said to these men: "Listen, I think that is quite inequitable. I am content, if the price remains the same for our growers, to abstain from any inquiry into the price you propose to pay the growers of Northern Ireland——

That had not been the same for years.

"——but I will not be party to an agreement which arrogantly reduces the price for our growers at the same time as you raise it for the growers of Northern Ireland."

Why not have consulted our growers before you took a decision?

I said in this House that I regarded a proposal of that nature from the Northern Ireland spinners as impudent and insolent and that I told them to go and take a running jump at themselves. "Now," I went on to say, "if, in doing that, I misinterpret the feelings of our people then I must ask them to get another Minister for Agriculture for I will not go to beg scraps on behalf of our people when I know that our people are well able to live, and live well, if these Belfast linen spinners never existed."

Mr. Maguire

You told our growers go to blazes.

What followed? I went to Monaghan, to my own constituency —and remember Monaghan was the county in which the most flax was grown of any county in Ireland——

On the occasion referred to by the Deputy——

The acreage last year in Donegal was higher.

On the occasion referred to by the Deputy, I went to my own constituency and I took occasion to recapitulate all that had passed. I said to them: "Now I am going to suggest to you, realising that so long as you remain flax growers you are in the hollow of the hands of these people, you should so far as it is humanly possible, get out of flax and go over to oats and potatoes"—and the farmers of Monaghan, Cavan, Donegal and West Cork are probably the best growers of these crops in all Ireland——

That was long after you made a "snafu" of the whole thing.

Deputy Smith, as he had a perfect right, went and expressed advice in the exact opposite sense, but if the flax growers had only taken my advice and put their 15,000 acres under oats and potatoes, I could pay them at this moment £8 a ton, at least, for every acre of potatoes they had. I could pay them 30/- a barrel, at least, for every oat they have and probably more.

You are giving the French 45/- a barrel for it.

There you are. And our unfortunate people are going to sell flax off that ground to the Northern Ireland spinners for several shillings a stone less than the spinners are paying in Northern Ireland and I have to go to France to pay fancy prices for oats that could have been profitably produced here. What blame is on me? I advised the people to grow oats and potatoes. Deputy Smith advised them to grow flax.

I did not.

I advised them to grow oats and potatoes and Deputy Smith's advice——

I had no responsibility in that regard.

I advised them to grow oats and potatoes. Deputy Smith did not say "yes" and he did not say "no". If the people had only taken my advice, instead of paying fancy prices——

Mr. Maguire

They are past the stage of ever taking your advice.

Instead of paying fancy prices for oats and potatoes in foreign countries, I could buy every cwt. of oats and potatoes produced on those 15,000 acres at prices which I think would leave the people living there ample profit. If they did not want to deal with me, they were in a position to say: "We are feeding pigs or fowl or live stock. We are quite independent. We will sell to you if we want to sell to you. If we do not, we can dispose of it without doffing our hat to anyone." That is what I want to secure for our people, for every farmer in Ireland, that they can earn their living independent of everybody and that they do not have to doff their hats——

To England.

——or beg their way from England, Belfast or Fianna Fáil.

Up the Republic every time.

You are learning that very quickly.

Observe that I am taken to task for contemptuously rejecting such an offer from the Belfast spinners. The Belfast spinners for 1950 made a bargain to buy flax from our farmers at 10/- a stone——

Because you did not do your duty.

——less than the price which is described in an Act of the Northern Parliament in the following terms. Here is the description of the price paid to the farmers of Northern Ireland.

That includes the British subsidy.

"Whereas the cost of growing flax in Northern Ireland exceeds considerably the world price of flax of comparable quality, the Minister for Agriculture for Northern Ireland is prepared to pay to growers of flax in Northern Ireland in respect of flax produced from crops grown in the years 1949, 1950 and 1951 subsidies which the Ministry consider sufficient to make the growing of flax reasonably remunerative to growers in Northern Ireland."

What is the Minister quoting from?

I am quoting from the Flax Act, 1949, Schedule 1. I am called to task because I contemptuously refused an offer from the Northern Ireland spinners to our people of a price 10/- a stone lower than that which the Northern Ireland Government described as "reasonably remunerative" to growers of flax. Do they want our people to crawl on all fours up the streets of Belfast and to lick the boots of the spinners of Northern Ireland? Let me say again that any spinners that come to me asking our people to take——

On a point of order——

Deputies

Sit down!

On a point of information——

Deputy Smith will sit down please, unless the Minister gives way to him.

What information does he want?

The Minister may make statements which Deputy Smith may challenge and Deputy Smith may make statements which the Minister may challenge but we cannot have that see-saw all over the House. It is on the basis of disagreement that we reach decisions in a democratic assembly.

The Minister did not seek an offer this year.

I say anybody who comes to me to offer me on behalf of our people 10/- a stone less than what they themselves describe as a "reasonably remunerative" price, I shall tell them to go and take a running jump at themselves. I say to the farmers of Cavan, Donegal, Monaghan and Cork that they have a sure and profitable market for the produce of their own acres without dependence, good, bad or indifferent, on the Northern Ireland spinners. We lived without them for many a year and we will live after them for many a year as well.

Up the Republic!

I venture to prophesy that of the people who offered our people 10/- a stone less than what they considered to be a "reasonably remunerative" price hair or hide of them will not be seen in this country when the farmers of Cavan, Monaghan, Donegal and Cork are prosperous and prospering in the years that lie ahead.

Up the Republic!

What is to be done with the Flax Board? The Flax Board, says Deputy Smith——

It has gone up the spout, has it?

——was established to encourage the growing of flax and to help scutch millers to build and to repair their mills.

You are worried about them.

No board in this country will encourage our people to be hewers of wood and drawers of water for the aristocrats of the Belfast spinning mills. They do not have to be. They can get along without them and I am not Minister for scutch millers, and I never will be.

Give them hell—that is the business.

Our people will long remember the bargain that was made by scutch millers when 2/6 a stone less was accepted, provided the acreage was expanded. I wonder were the signers of that famous agreement primarily solicitous for the reward the growers might hope to get or for the fees which would be available to the scutch millers on the volume of flax destined to pass through their mills?

Were you not interested in the war effort at that time, too?

The Deputy is very welcome to tell the scutch millers that, so far as the Minister for Agriculture is concerned, his interest is in the farmers and he has no desire to persuade them to constitute themselves victims of either the scutch millers or the Belfast linen spinners.

Or the Quislings.

Deputy Smith's solicitude for the feelings of our fellow-countrymen in Belfast is quite touching. This general discussion. I suppose, was inevitable, but, as the Chair will remember, all that this Bill is designed to do is to suspend the operation of the 1936 Flax Act until such time, if such should ever arise, when it is desirable to revive the Act and the powers provided therein. If we have travelled over a somewhat wider field, doubtless no harm has been done; but I hope that this simple Bill may pass so that the administration of my Department may be somewhat simplified.

Question put and agreed to.

Would it suit the Opposition to give me the remaining stages now?

I do not think it would. I should have to consider whether an amendment may not be necessary at a later stage. I have far more to say on this subject yet.

Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 15th March.
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