On the section, would the Parliamentary Secretary tell us when the legislation foreshadowed by the Tánaiste in relation to the establishment of a prices tribunal will be introduced?
Committee on Finance. - Supplies and Services (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1946, (Continuance and Amendment) Bill, 1950—Committee Stage.
Sections 1 and 2 put and agreed to.
SECTION 3.
Sooner than you think.
That is not an answer. I have asked a civil question and I am entitled to a civil answer from the Parliamentary Secretary, who is in charge of the Bill.
It may not be necessary to introduce any special legislation under this Bill. It can be done by Order.
Was the reference then to the advisory committee to which this section refers?
It was.
Will the Parliamentary Secretary explain what powers, if any, this advisory committee will have to require the attendance of persons for the production of documents for their information?
It will have powers under an Order to do it. If it is necessary to define the powers expressly, then an Order will be made. But there is power to compel the production of documents under the Supplies and Services Act as it stands at the moment.
Will the Parliamentary Secretary refer me to the section of the Act which authorises the making of an Order conferring these powers on the committee?
I cannot refer to it offhand.
There is no such section. Is that not correct?
I cannot refer to it offhand.
There is no such section.
I cannot refer to it offhand, but from recollection I think it is contained in an Emergency Powers Order which is carried on by the Supplies and Services Act.
There is no power under the Act to confer such powers as I have mentioned on an advisory committee. The powers will have to be exercised by the Minister. Is that not so?
My recollection is that there was an Order made in 1939, or certainly very early in the emergency, which is continued by the Supplies and Services Act. Under that Order there is provision for the production of documents, the examination of witnesses and so forth.
Am I correct in saying that the Minister under that Order has power to require people to give him information?
And he can give that to the tribunal.
Under what section of the Order? There is no such section in the Order. The whole thing is a bluff. Is that not true?
If anyone does not produce it—is that not the answer. If they do not want to produce it the Minister and the Government have ample powers to fix prices, even in the absence of documents.
The advisory committee will have no power?
The Minister retains the power to fix prices.
And the advisory committee will be merely an advisory committee?
It never purported to be anything else.
It purported to be a tribunal.
Has the Minister power to disclose to this advisory committee of unofficial persons, because that is what they will be, documents relating to private business enterprises which he procures under an Order and information which is confidential?
There is no confidential information.
The Parliamentary Secretary will be allowed to answer. This is of primary importance to every person engaged in business. There was an occasion here when a Minister for Finance attempted to get legislation through for the purpose of compelling certain concerns to disclose confidential information in relation to their businesses; that attempt was defeated. I am putting this question to the Parliamentary Secretary: Will the Minister acting under an Order which enables him to compel a person engaged in private business to disclose to that Minister confidentially, because that is in the Order, information relating to his business, be enabled to abuse that confidence and submit this private information to the members of an advisory tribunal or to the public in the Press?
If people represented at this tribunal do not want to make the information available, then the Minister will, and can, fix prices irrespective of whether the information is or is not given.
The position then will be that since he cannot disclose this confidential information to the members of his advisory committee, he will abuse the powers given him under Order and fix prices irrespective of the merits of the case?
I did not say that.
He will fix prices without any reference to the tribunal?
I did not say that. I said that if a person does not want to produce evidence or facts which the Minister thinks are essential to the proper examination of a case, the Minister can then fix prices. He still retains that power and if a person does not want to produce the facts he considers essential to a proper examination of the case the Minister will still have the power.
I take it the weapon the Minister proposes to use is that if persons engaged in private business refuse in the conduct of their own private affairs to give to a body, here described as an advisory committee, confidential information relating to their business for publication in the Press the Minister will punish them for that refusal by fixing in their case prices which are obviously unjust and uneconomic?
The Deputy is, of course, aware that the Minister can confer on anyone that he regards as an authorised officer power to get information which is essential in any matter covered by the Supplies and Services Act. There is very wide general power in the Act.
I am not prepared to argue with the Parliamentary Secretary what the term "authorised officer" in that context might connote but surely the Parliamentary Secretary does not expect the House to confer on him powers which would permit him to appoint private individuals who are not in the Government service as authorised officers for the purposes of enforcing an Order.
Major de Valera
Is it the intention to appoint members of the commission authorised officers and if it is, could not the Parliamentary Secretary have appointed so many members authorised officers, without the bluff in this Bill? I am asking the Parliamentary Secretary.
You are worried about the effect of the tribunal.
Major de Valera
Because it is all bluff.
The advisory committee.
Is it a tribunal?
Major de Valera
We want to see is there anything worth while in it.
Now that we have got certain things clear, will the Tánaiste explain what he meant when he intervened to say that a Bill to establish a tribunal would be introduced sooner than we expected.
You are at the old game of defending the business men.
What does the Tánaiste mean?
Will the Parliamentary Secretary realise that in spite of Deputy Vivion de Valera's and Deputy MacEntee's obvious interest in protecting their big business friends, what the people of the city and of the country are concerned with, is that prices should be fixed and that the public should not be fleeced? That is the issue. We are not concerned with the subtleties of debate that Deputy MacEntee tries to introduce in an effort to protect his big business friends or to give a false impression——
An roibeal ag cainnt anois.
I had interrupted the passage of the Bill through Committee with the intention merely of getting some information on a point which appeared to be in considerable doubt and, in view of the allegations which have just been made by Government Deputy Lehane, I think that some further reference must now be made.
Are you breaking the agreement?
The powers which the Government now exercise to control prices are those which they possess under the Supplies and Services Act. That Act they inherited from their predecessors. I was not satisfied, when Minister for Industry and Commerce, that it was desirable to continue the attempt to control prices under those powers and consequently a Bill was framed and produced in the Dáil in 1947 to establish a prices tribunal, a prices tribunal with very definite powers, not an advisory committee, such as is referred to in this section, with no powers. That Bill secured a Second Reading from the Dáil. It was opposed by the members of the Fine Gael Party on the grounds that the powers it proposed to give to the tribunal were excessive. The Bill, although it secured a Second Reading, with the support of the Labour Party, was not enacted before the general election and consequently did not become law. It is still available to the Government.
If Deputy Lehane has one iota of sincerity in his professed desire to secure effective machinery for the control of prices, he will use his influence with the Coalition Parties to secure the reintroduction and enactment of that Bill. He will have, I presume, to reckon with the opposition of Fine Gael. They opposed it in 1947 and presumably they will oppose it still but for any Deputy realising the ineffectiveness of the existing powers, realising that these existing powers are being discarded by the Government, to assert that the effort we are making to get the Government to establish effective machinery in the matter of prices is inspired by some desire to facilitate those who are benefiting by high prices is just dishonest.
It is known to the House now that the main use which the Government made of its power under the Supplies and Services Act during the past three years was to prepare and implement Orders to decontrol the price of 36 different groups of commodities. It is quite true that since these commodities were decontrolled prices went up. The prices of some have been rising continuously and now that they are up, there is some vague talk of freezing them at the present high levels. If there is in any section of the Government Coalition a sincere desire to secure effective machinery for the control of prices, then a Bill to establish the machinery is in print. It can be produced and enacted before Christmas if necessary. So far as we are concerned it is an agreed measure, but it is mere hypocrisy and dishonest for any Deputy to suggest that there is on this side of the House a desire to relax price control or to have it operated for the benefit of any persons who would profit by the cessation of prices control. We think that in present circumstances, and in the circumstances which are likely to exist in the immediate future, more effective machinery than now exists is required. We do not think that this advisory committee is anything but a fraud. We do not think the Government introduced it for any purpose except to delude the public and the most simple-minded members of the Coalition groups like Deputy Lehane. It is for that reason that the advisory committee was blown up by the Tánaiste into a tribunal. It is not a tribunal and it is not intended to be a tribunal. It can have no powers. It can work only through some process——
Your Prices Bill gave power only to the Minister.
It gave power to the tribunal.
Nobody but the Minister could fix prices.
Will the Parliamentary Secretary tell the House how many price inspectors there are now in the Department? Are there two?
That is irrelevant.
This is not a Second Reading speech.
The Deputy knows that his own Prices Bill gave powers only to the Minister.
It gave power to investigate and it provided ample machinery.
And nothing else.
We did not come in with a fraud of a Bill backed up by a misrepresentation such as Deputy Lehane has been guilty of.
Mr. Lehane
Where was the concomitant to go with it?
I want to put a couple of questions to the Parliamentary Secretary. The Tánaiste made a statement in regard to this Bill which has completely changed my attitude in regard to it. I want to know when it is proposed to bring under prices control those commodities that had been released from price control in recent months and when it is proposed to bring under price control the commodities that have not been under control up to the present.
The Deputy is making a Second Reading speech. This is on Section 3.
With all respect, I made a Second Reading speech and subsequent to my speech, the Tánaiste made a speech.
Which the Deputy would like to answer in Committee.
I am not answering it. The Tánaiste said in that speech that these certain steps could be taken. I want the Parliamentary Secretary to say when action as outlined by the Tánaiste will be taken. When will the steps foreshadowed by the Tánaiste be taken by the Government and by the Minister to reduce certain prices that the Government now find excessive? Having put these two questions I want to say that I have put down a motion of censure on the Minister for Industry and Commerce. I am satisfied that if what the Tánaiste stated to the Dáil will be carried out, what I had in mind with regard to the motion will have been met very satisfactorily by the Government, and, accepting that the Government intends to do what the Tánaiste said, I have no intention of moving any further in regard to that motion.
You are going to be fooled by a Government promise?
No. I must give them a chance.
Major de Valera
More narrowly on the section, here is the question: an advisory body is set up without powers. The Parliamentary Secretary, when pressed, says that the powers will be conferred by ministerial Order. It seems to me that the decision there would be exactly the same as if the section were not there and the Minister conferred these powers on a group of individuals to advise him, to carry out the investigations on his behalf, that is, if the Parliamentary Secretary is correct in his statement of the law, and that then the decision would be with the Minister. If that is the case, one can very well ask what is the purpose of the section. If the machinery is what the Parliamentary Secretary in effect proposes, namely, the setting up of a group of individuals nominated by the Minister, with powers conferred on them by the Minister through the medium of Order, then it appears to me to be absolutely unnecessary to have statutory power to set up this body. On the other hand, this body is set up and is simply given a statutory name; it seems to be given no powers. That leads us to the question as to how effective will that body be and we are entitled to ask the Parliamentary Secretary what powers they can be given. That is the net point at issue.
There are two questions. In reply to Deputy Lemass, I have here the Prices and Efficiency Bill, 1947. Section 23 of that Bill says:
"(1) The commission, on completing an inquiry, shall report thereon to the Minister.
(2) If the commission are of opinion that an order should be made by the Minister under this Part in relation to any person, commodity or service concerned in the inquiry, it shall be the duty of the commission to recommend accordingly in their report and to indicate the form of order that they recommend."
If the House accepts Deputy Lemass's contention that this advisory committee is a sham, then the only difference is that——
The point is that this advisory committee has no powers.
This Bill, with 76 sections and a Schedule, was a most elaborate sham, providing for a whole lot of matters, but in the end the Minister fixed the price.
In reply to Deputy Cowan's question about goods being brought under control, we are at present examining and have lists of different commodities. Some of them will be controlled in the very near future. In regard to some, we have not decided whether they will be controlled or not, because it may be that control is not the appropriate way to deal with it.
I take it the Parliamentary Secretary or the Minister, in cases where prices at the moment are excessive, will take appropriate steps to reduce those prices?
Undoubtedly.
May I ask a question arising out of the section which the Parliamentary Secretary has just read as to the tribunal set up under the Bill of 1947? Had not it power to investigate, to call for persons and documents, to require them to give all the information at their disposal or within their procurer in relation to their business? Is not that the fact which distinguishes the tribunal of 1947 from the advisory committee which the Parliamentary Secretary proposes to set up?
It had all the powers that Deputy MacEntee says, and it could take no action unless the Minister took action.
The point is that your advisory committee can take no action and cannot even recommend anything.
It has ample power. Even under the 1937 Act which is still law, the Control of Prices Act, there is power to make available——
What is the effect of putting in this section? Could not you have set up the committee without it?
I doubt it. No, we could not.
Question put and agreed to.
Sections 4, 5 and Title agreed to.
Bill reported without amendment, received for final consideration and passed.