We discussed on the Second Stage the difficulty of finding one's way through the maze of amending Acts with regard to housing. Can the Minister hold out any hope of a consolidation of these Acts in the future or at least that there will be something in the nature of a handbook or memorandum so that members of local authorities, apart from Deputies, can understand the relevant provisions? I think the Minister will agree that it is very difficult for members of local authorities to find their way around and know what the position is and something in the nature of simplification would be welcome if it is possible to do it.
Committee on Finance. - Housing (Amendment) Bill, 1952—Committee Stage.
Question proposed: "That Section 1 stand part of the Bill."
I understand that my Department is about to engage in that work and it is possible that I may make a statement on the matter in the course of the discussion on my Estimate. The announcement that a start has been made on work of that nature does not mean that it is likely to come to a conclusion at a very early date. But I suppose a start has to be made before you conclude anything.
I would not expect it at an early date.
Is this the Money Resolution?
The Money Resolution has been agreed to. I put it twice.
I stood up.
I put it twice.
I stood up and the Minister stood up and I thought he was answering a question by Deputy Sweetman.
I thought Deputy Sweetman was raising some matter on the Money Resolution. I asked him and he said he was not. I put the Money Resolution twice.
I assure you I stood up. Then the Minister stood up and you called him again.
Deputy Davin can raise any matter he wishes to raise on the relevant section.
The trouble is there was such a din nobody could hear what was happening.
The House has agreed to the Money Resolution. I cannot go back on that.
I wanted to deal with an important matter arising out of that Money Resolution. What will be the probable effect on rents and the cost of building of the increased loan charges arising out of the increased rates of interest under the Finance Bill?
Surely the Deputy can find some section on which he can raise that. I will facilitate him as far as possible.
With your co-operation, I will probably be able to raise it.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 2.
I move amendment No. 1:—
In the definition of "relevant grant" to delete all words after "enactment" in line 15 and substitute the following:—
"(being an improving grant), or a grant made, in whole or in part, after the 1st day of August, 1950, under the said Section 3 (being a building grant), and for the purposes of this definition, a grant (other than a building grant under the said Section 3) shall be deemed to have been made on the date on which the first instalment thereof was paid;".
I find it quite impossible to know what is happening.
I express regret for starting off in a noisy atmosphere. I do not see any tendency towards improvement. This amendment is designed to meet a point raised by Deputy Mrs. Crowley.
I am afraid the Minister has not explained the purpose of it. I will not say that the Minister has treated us with scant courtesy, bearing in mind the atmosphere in which I want to discuss this Bill, but he has treated us somewhat cavalierly in giving us these amendments late last night. I received my copy in stencil form about 8 o'clock last night. Knowing that they were to be discussed this morning, I think the Minister might have given them to us a bit earlier.
Perhaps I did not treat myself too fairly in the matter, either.
Because they were given to us at such short notice, I am afraid there will have to be a somewhat fuller explanation than there might have been had we had more time to study them and see the implications of them. The Minister will appreciate that.
The point made by Deputy Mrs. Crowley was that in certain Gaeltacht areas it was and is the practice to extend the Section 7 grants to the recipients of these Gaeltacht housing grants and these recipients would be suffering a disadvantage inasmuch as the instalment of the grant paid prior to 1st August, 1950, would debar such Gaeltacht recipients from the Section 7 local authority grant. I am putting down this amendment for the purpose of bringing the Gaeltacht areas into line with other parts of the country.
Amendment agreed to.
Question proposed: "That Section 2, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
On the section, in relation to the definition of a relevant grant this appears to be the appropriate place to get some information I want. As between the Kildare Country Council and Naas Urban Council, there has been a considerable difference of opinion as to what is the official interpretation by the Minister's Department of the commencement date under the 1950 Act. Originally we understood that the relevant date for consideration was the date of the signing of the Act, which was either 1st August, 1950, or 31st July, 1950. We thought that no house in respect of which a grant had been allocated before that date, or a house commenced before that date, could qualify. We then discovered that that was not the official interpretation. The official interpretation was that the house should not have been started before 1st March, 1950, and so far as the grant was concerned the relevant date was the payment of the last instalment.
I had occasion recently to read certain correspondence addressed to the Naas Urban Council. In a letter from the Minister's Department to the Naas Urban Council that body was advised that they ought to go back to 1st November, 1947, which was the relevant date under the 1948 Housing Act. There definitely appears to be some confusion and I would like on this section, because it does affect the whole interpretation of Section 7 of the 1950 Act and Section 9, 10 and 11 of this Bill, to know from the Minister the power a county council has to make a grant under Section 7. Were they entitled to make their scheme in respect of any house commenced after the 1st November, 1947, or whatever the relevant date was? Were they entitled to make their grant in respect of a house even though the ministerial grant had been allocated or the first instalment paid before the passage of the Act or even the second instalment paid before the passage of the Act? What was the position? Undoubtedly there is some confusion.
I have here a copy of the circular which issued to local authorities the final paragraph of which reads:—
"Finally the Minister wishes to make it clear that no provision should be made in any scheme under Section 7 for the payment of a supplementary grant in respect of any house for which a State grant was allocated before the 1st August, 1950."
The word "allocated" is the important word in that paragraph and the way in which we interpret that word is "paid".
All the instalments paid?
Yes.
Some local authorities are under the impression that it means "approved of for a grant" not that the first instalment should be paid. I agree with Deputy Sweetman that it is very necessary to make that clear. I know that some local authorities have refused to pay any supplementary grant on the grounds that a house was approved of for a grant before the 1st August, 1950. Cork County Council brought in a scheme which specified anybody who had not got the final grant in April, 1950. If that was the case, not "having paid the final grant before August, 1950"——
Does the building of the house affect the case or is it purely the payment of the Government grant which affects the case?
That is the interpretation which we have placed on the operative word in that paragraph. The amendment which the House has already accepted intends to apply a procedure to the Gaeltacht areas whereby where an instalment of the grant was paid prior to the 1st August, 1950, but the final instalment was not paid then the Section 7 local authority grant may be made. This goes to establish that according to the procedure we have been following and the interpretation we have been placing upon the matter raised by Deputy Sweetman it is the date of the actual final payment which decides the procedure to be followed.
According to the amendment we have just passed the grant shall be deemed to have been made on the date on which the first instalment was paid. I understood the Minister now to state, however, that it is the date on which the last instalment was paid.
Furthermore, the Minister says that the word "allocated" means "paid". How can you accept that interpretation when "allocated" and "notified" must be read together? What is the meaning of "notified"? If it is paid there is no necessity to notify it.
The final grant cannot be paid until the house is completed and occupied.
If a person got the first part of the Government grant for the erection of a house in July, 1950, and the second half in August, 1950, he would be eligible for consideration for a supplementary grant under Section 7. Under the Bill as drafted if a person in a Gaeltacht area got a Gaeltacht housing grant for a new house he is eligible for consideration for a supplementary grant under Sections 9 and 10 only where the first instalment of the Gaeltacht grant was made after the 1st August. Under the Bill as drafted that was the position and the amendment which the House has accepted clarifies that and places these people in the same position as people in other areas. Therefore, according to our interpretation it is not a matter of when the erection of the house began but of when the final instalment was paid.
The Minister might make available to me a copy of the circular to which he refers.
Can we take it from the Minister's statement that anybody who built a house and had received the final instalment of the grant prior to August, 1950, would still qualify for a supplementary grant?
Yes.
Take the case of people who build houses under the Gaeltacht Act; would they get the same concessions under the amendment?
They would be eligible for consideration for any scheme drafted under Section 7, but each local body remember had its own scheme and I have not got the different schemes before me. All I can say is that any scheme prepared by a local body under Section 7 could be so framed as to permit of the payment of a supplementary grant where the first instalment of a State grant had been paid before the 1st August and the final instalment had been paid after the 1st August. It does not follow, however, that all schemes were drafted in such a way as to permit local bodies to do that.
Can we take it that a person building a house in the Gaeltacht who received the final grant before the 1st August can now receive the same concessions?
It depends on the conditions of a local authority scheme already prepared under Section 7 and approved of by the Minister. All I can do is to ensure that where a scheme so permits these things can apply.
The difference between the date of allocation and the date on which the grant was paid should be clarified. Very often the payment of a grant is delayed: in the normal way it becomes payable but it is not paid. Apparently now unless either the first part or both parts of the grant were actually paid the person does not qualify.
That is not so at all. You are approaching the thing from the wrong angle. If it has not been paid before the 1st August that is all right and no question could arise. The point raised by Deputy Sweetman was this: since the operative date for the 1950 Housing Act was the 1st August, 1950, he wanted to know whether an applicant for a supplementary grant, who had begun the erection of a house maybe in 1947 or 1948, but had received the first instalment of the grant in respect of the house only by the 1st August, could be included in a scheme prepared under the Act of 1950 which would not come into effect until the 1st August. I have tried to show that if the local authority so designed their scheme, such a grant could be paid by them.
I understand quite well now what the Minister said, but that was not appreciated by local authorities and, with all respect, I do not think that it was appreciated by the Department at the beginning of the operation of the Act. Certainly, we, in Kildare, were led to believe that we were not entitled to go back further than the 1st March, 1950. Where the date, "the 1st March, 1950", arose we were never able to discover, but we were told that the building of the house had to commence after the 1st March, 1950. We had some light on the matter only subsequently, quite recently, after the correspondence addressed to the Naas Urban Council, which was to the effect the Minister has just stated.
I quite appreciate that the Minister under this Bill cannot make local authorities deal with the matter, but I want to say that where there was a genuine misapprehension, as there was quite definitely in our case, as to the date from which we were entitled to get our scheme to commence to operate, nothing in the Bill should prevent us now from putting through an amending scheme to cover it. Now that I know the position, we will have an opportunity of dealing with it when we come to amendment No. 22, but I want to urge on the Minister that nothing should be done in this Bill which would prevent local authorities from rectifying the position as they were led to believe it existed.
I am quite satisfied with regard to the position in the matter of grants under Section 7 in my county, but there is another side which is giving trouble. I should like to know from the Minister if it is competent for a local authority to withhold grants under Section 7 in cases where people have borrowed money under the Small Dwellings Act and to credit the amount of these grants to the liquidation of the loan. That position has developed in my county and is giving rise to great annoyance. Where people have built houses with the assistance of loans under the Small Dwellings Acts, the officials have now decided that the amount of the grants under Section 7 will be applied to the reduction of the loan.
I never heard of such a procedure in my life.
It is being done in my county. It is being done only in cases where the maximum loan has been borrowed, but the method of calculation is not what I understood to be the method intended. I always understood that under the Small Dwellings Act you could borrow up to 90 per cent. of the value of the house, but a system has been devised now of getting the deputy engineers to value the houses and to value them at a very low level in order to bring practically all the houses erected under this within the ambit of the scheme, and people who built their hopes on making use of grants under Section 7 find now that, instead of drawing the money, which would amount to almost £100, they have to leave it with the county council to be applied in reduction of the loan.
It is a type of case about which I have never heard anything before. I do not know that such a matter could arise, but the Deputy is aware that local bodies have considerable freedom in the matter of the conditions they attach to moneys provided under the Small Dwellings Act, and although, as he says, they are free to advance so far as the law is concerned a very high percentage of the entire valuation of the house, very few rural local authorities—it would not apply in the case of the Dublin Corporation, or Cork or Limerick, or some of the big built-up areas—make loans under the Small Dwellings Act up to the amounts they are entitled to make.
That is a pity.
In a way it is, but they have their own reasons for adopting these practices. If, in Roscommon, for example, a man is getting a loan under the Small Dwelling Act and a supplementary grant from the same authority and if he is getting what is regarded as a very large loan, having regard to the value of the house, the local authority could stipulate the conditions that the Deputy has referred to. I am not going to express any opinion, because I do not know the details sufficiently well, as to whether they are wise in doing so or not, but that they have the right to do so I have no doubt.
My purpose in raising the matter was to direct the attention of the Minister and the Department to the system adopted with regard to depressing the value of the house. We find that the value of the house is estimated by the county council official at a figure considerably lower than what would be the market value. A house which would normally fetch £1,100 or £1,200 is valued at £700 in order to bring it within the sphere of operation of this condition.
Might I ask if that is a regulation made by the county council or by the manager?
It is done in the Dublin Corporation.
The local council adopted Section 7 of the 1950 Act and the officials of the council were asked to devise a scheme. They said that, in cases where persons had availed of the maximum loan, they would apply the amount of their grant under Section 7 to the reduction of the loan. We did not object to that, where persons had availed of the maximum loan, because we thought they were referring to the 90 per cent. loan, but now we find that the maximum loan is calculated by the council engineers on the basis of the purposely depressed value of the house. It is calculated by the addition of the amount of the State grant, plus 5 per cent., and that is considered the maximum grant to-day.
I was informed by the accountants of the Cork County Council that they were allowed to advance only 80 per cent. of the value and that that was the condition on which they got the money to make advances.
I think there was a variation of that.
It is only a month or so ago that I was told that.
As I understand it, the way in which the grant may be paid in cash or allotted in reduction of a Small Dwellings Act loan depends on the proportion of the loan to the value of the house. Under the 1950 Act, a person building a house valued at £1,500 must contribute 5 per cent. himself, which is £75. He gets £275 by way of Government grant, on the assumption that it is a water and sewerage house, which makes £350. That leaves £1,100 and, in Kildare, we give him a loan up to £1,150. If he takes a loan, not of £1,150, but of £1,100, when it comes for us to make a supplementary grant under the definition here, we give him 50 per cent. in cash to bring him up to £1,150 and write off £225 of his loan.
As we understand it, we are not entitled to pay such a sum as, with the Government grant and the 5 per cent. and the amount that there is on the loan, will exceed the value of the house. Whether the supplementary housing grant is paid in cash or by way of writing off the loan must depend on whether the payment in cash would bring the applicant in over the 5 per cent. limit or not.
That seems sensible.
Does he pay interest on the supplementary grant?
No. How could he pay interest on the grant? Does the Deputy mean: does he pay the fine for redemption?
If he borrows £1,100, he has to pay interest at 3¾ per cent. on £1,100. Later on, you give him £50 and you reduce the loan by £225, the amount of the supplementary grant. He originally paid interest on £1,100. Does he have to continue to pay interest on £1,100 or on £1,100 less the £225?
No. The £225 is paid. It operates in exactly the same way as if a man walked in with £225 of his own money and redeemed that amount of the loan. Therefore, as he has paid interest on it up to the date the council grant is transferred over in reduction of the loan, as from that date he does not pay any further interest. He has to pay the fine that the Local Loans Fund exacts for paying back before the due date, but that is a trifling thing.
Question agreed to.
SECTION 3.
Question proposed: "That Section stand part of the Bill."
It always takes a long time to get housing regulations out, and I would like public confirmation of what I feel already is going to be a fact, that until such time as new regulations come out we will be working on the old regulations and that the old forms may be accepted, so that people who wish to apply for grants for the erection of new houses or for purchase grants or reconstruction grants may continue to use the existing forms. This was the practice, but there seems to be some doubt about it.
At least one local authority has finished printing the older forms and sets of directions. As a result, people who desire to avail themselves of these small dwellings loans have no forms to complete. I was informed that the reason was that they are waiting for this Bill to become law so that a suitable set of forms could be printed. It would be advisable that some direction be given, as people who desire to apply formally cannot do so, as there are no forms and they can only apply in handwriting.
We are not concerned about application forms in respect of small dwellings acquisition loans. That matter is entirely one for the local bodies. As far as the other forms mentioned by Deputy Sweetman are concerned, we will meet as best we can the point of view to which he has given expression.
People may carry on and apply?
Yes.
Dublin Corporation are very anxious to transfer the ownership of tenant houses to their tenants by way of a tenant purchase scheme. I have mentioned here on several occasions that we have at present 30,000 tenants occupying corporation houses, and the corporation feel that it is desirable, from a social point of view, that as many of these tenants as possible should be encouraged to purchase their houses under an approved scheme. It was indicated to us in the corporation that this Bill might be availed of by the Minister for the purpose of giving sanction to local authorities to sell their houses to the tenants. I do not know whether that is necessary in the Bill or not. I am simply asking whether it is proposed under this section to make regulations whereby such local authorities would be enabled to prepare schemes for the transfer of ownership under a tenant purchase scheme. The Minister will agree that that is desirable and I think this may be the right opportunity to get the necessary sanction for the adoption and operation of such a scheme. I know how difficult it is to bring that within this section.
Is it not under the 1936 Act it would have to be done, not the Housing Acts?
The Minister might avail of the section to make a statement.
According to the information which has been given to me, no such provision is necessary in this Bill to achieve the purpose the Deputy has in mind. I understand that the power to effect the sale in the manner described dates very far back, and that, if local authorities desire, they are free to prepare such a scheme. I am not expressing any personal view at this stage as to what the attitude should be now in regard to questions of this nature. Schemes have been submitted to me and to my predecessor and while, as a general principle, all of us might be favourably disposed to that idea, there might be circumstances, and perhaps at the present time these circumstances do exist, in which one would not look so favourably upon implementing a scheme as they would in circumstances that were different. Let me not go into that side of the question at all but merely say that there is no necessity to provide here for such a thing, since the law permits of its happening already, and if the local authority wishes they can do so, with the approval of the Minister.
I am perfectly satisfied with that, as there was some slight difficulty—I will not say obstruction—and we were not able to make the progress we could, on the suggestion that some statutory authority was still necessary. I am very glad the Minister has made it so perfectly clear that within the law as it stands at the moment local authorities can do that, with the sanction of the Minister.
In this amendment, reference is made to applications received——
We are discussing Section 3, not amendment No. 3.
Am I entitled to speak on Section 3?
Yes.
I would like to point out, in regard to schemes submitted by the Kerry County Council to the Department, that we had several amendments to these schemes. It was some months before the Department finally sanctioned them.
We are dealing with Section 3 and not with amendment No. 3.
I want to raise this point about schemes.
I cannot allow the Deputy to raise it on Section 3.
Question agreed to.
SECTION 4.
Question proposed: "That Section 4 stand part of the Bill."
I think this is the section upon which one should discuss the delay that there is at present in the payment of housing grants, and to express the hope that in future, under this Bill, there will not be similar delays. This is the section which grants the expenses of inspectors who deal with this matter. I think that Deputies on all sides, from what I hear in the way of gossip around this building, find that in some cases there is great delay. Sometimes, quite frankly, the delay is not the fault of the Department's inspector, nor is it due to departmental action very often after a report is made. I think it is unfortunate that there is not an earlier inspection before a person wants to start a house, especially at this time of the year. It is unfortunate that there is delay sometimes in the appointment of the local engineer who is employed for the purpose, but it is much more unfortunate that there is delay in the payment of the final grants where that delay does not arise through the Department. The delay in regard to inspections can only arise because the inspector is not satisfied with the work that has been carried out and because he requires something else to be done.
I think there is a great lack of clarity in the statements by inspectors all over the country as to what is to be done. It would very much facilitate applicants if the deficiencies in regard to housing, and in respect of which the payment of the grants must be held up, were more clearly pointed out. I hope that, when this Bill becomes law and when the Minister is getting expenses under Section 4, he will make every effort to ensure that the delays which exist at present will not only be obviated, but removed. Everybody knows that those who are engaged in the trade of supplying building materials are pressing for the payment of their accounts more quickly than they were inclined to do some time ago. That means that there is further pressure on the applicant who is building to meet his accounts more quickly. All that emphasises the fact that applicants need to have these grants paid to them promptly. I think every section of the House would welcome a statement from the Minister that he will ensure that there will not be delays in the future. I remember the Minister saving, only a few weeks ago, that he had been through the position and had found that, in his opinion, there was not delay, and that the position was reasonably satisfactory. All that I can say in regard to that is that the reports which are given to the Minister by his Department must be entirely different from the experience of every member of the House.
I should like to support what Deputy Sweetman has said on this section. Some of these reconstruction grants have been held up for a couple of years. I think that, as far as Cork is concerned, the inspector has too much to do, and something should be done to expedite the payment of these grants.
I should like to support what has been said by Deputy Sweetman and Deputy McGrath in regard to greater expedition in the payment of these grants. I do not know what is the reason for the hold-up at present. I often wonder whether it is due to the fact that the inspectorial staff for Cork County is not sufficient. Many people who have completed the work have to wait a considerable period before the inspector is able to visit the houses and make an inspection. I am receiving representations every other day from people telling me that the houses are now completed and asking me to try and get the inspector to call on them. In some cases they have to wait for a couple of months, and the result is that they cannot get payment of the grants due to them.
I am afraid that the Minister and some of the officials in the Department are not fully aware of the annoyance and inconvenience that is caused to many of these applicants for housing grants. They have to employ carpenters and masons and have to get materials on credit. Naturally, when they have the work completed they press for payment. In the cases that have come to my notice their complaints have been quite justified. Perhaps the Minister, when replying, would tell us whether or not he is satisfied that the inspector who is operating at present in the County Cork is capable of carrying out all the work that has to be done, particularly in view of the fact that it is a very big area and that he also has to travel to County Kerry. You have a very large number of applicants for construction and reconstruction grants, and it may be that he is not able to get around to all the applicants within a reasonable period of time and that some assistance should be given to him. At any rate, everything possible should be done to remove the annoyance and inconvenience caused to applicants for grants by the over-holding of payments.
I am afraid there is a bottle-neck here. There has been criticism of the Department in respect to delay in the payment of grants. My experience has been that the delay is not in the Department but on the inspection side. I would frankly ask the Minister to check up on that. The inspectors doing Donegal live in County Leitrim. I hope I am not telling any stories out of school when I say they got three reminders in regard to inspections and yet did not carry them out. If I were the Minister myself I would have disposed of those gentlemen, certainly in regard to cases that came before me. There is only one conclusion that one can come to in regard to these cases. It is that these inspectors, who are architects or engineers, apparently have their own private work to do, and then take on housing inspections, in respect of which housing grants are payable, in adjoining or further away counties. When it comes to the evening, having done so many inspections, they clear back to their own county and leave other inspections undone. That is causing very grave dissatisfaction.
The Department is being blamed for not paying the grants, whereas it cannot pay the grants until the houses are inspected and notification given to the Department that the house is satisfactorily completed. In my opinion, that is where the bottle-neck is. The Minister should see that the moment an inspector accepts an appointment—it does not matter who or what he may be or whether he was politically appointed or appointed on his merits —he should carry out the duties he undertook to the Department because, as Deputy Sweetman pointed out, builders' providers cannot now remain long without their money. They are pressing these people to supply the goods night and morning in order to pay the accounts. The man who has built the house cannot do anything because the inspector will not come to inspect his house and he cannot get paid until the inspector inspects the house.
A lot of the odium that is being passed on to the Department really lies on the inspection side. I think the Minister should take immediate steps to see that those gentlemen, whoever they are or whoever they may be, will discharge the obligations of the office which they understook from the Department. When they are looking for the appointments they are quite active about that. They will be on the spot immediately but apparently, when the appointment is got, it is got just simply as extra padding to their professional duties. The two things do not fit in.
In the area in which they live they have their own professional private work to do and then they have the public work to do in the adjoining county. Those things clash. They know the housing scheme will come to an end and that they will have to rely on their professional work. They will thus pay attention first to their private clients. There is no doubt but that is where the bottle-neck exists. The officials of the Department are not to blame at all. In my opinion, the weak link is that of inspection.
I agree with the Deputies in regard to the delay in the payment of the grants. This has a slowing-up effect on housing in the rural areas. People building their own houses get credit notes from public utility societies but merchants are reluctant to accept these notes and supply the materials owing to the delay in payment.
I know people who are living in their houses and to whom the grant has not yet been paid. Nor has the merchant been paid. He is continually looking for his money. The situation is most unsatisfactory from that point of view. In my opinion, you cannot blame him for not supplying the materials when he is so long without his money. This delay is slowing up housing in the rural areas and I would ask the Minister to look into the matter.
I would like to support the other Deputies who have spoken on this matter. I have experience over a very wide area and I find that the delay arises from a number of causes. Sometimes it is, as Deputy McMenamin pointed out, a lack of sufficient inspectors.
I did not say that. I said it was neglect of the duties by their inspectors which is causing this thing.
I say it is, perhaps, lack of sufficient inspectors. I would not make the other charge unless I personally found it so.
I hear complaints from builders of slowness in inspecting the houses. There is also the fact that at times the money is undoubtedly not made available to the local authority. Therefore, the local authority has not the money to pass on to the individual builder. That has resulted at times in very serious situations arising, especially now with the tightened type of financial conditions which operates at this moment. That is liable to have a very serious effect on the individuals concerned.
I would urge on the Minister to bring pressure to bear on the Department and on local authorities to see that the grants are made available as soon as possible. The delay has an effect on the whole country quite out of proportion to the amount of money involved.
In the building of houses there are so many different interests involved— business interests and the interests of wage earners, for example—that any fall down or slowness in the paying out of the money means a very great hardship on occasion for a very large number of people.
All Deputies have received complaints in regard to delays in inspection. I was surprised to hear Deputy McMenamin say that this may be due to inspectors having other duties and not being whole-time workers. I was under the impression that they were whole-time workers. I thought the delay was mainly due to the fact that they have very large areas to cover.
I know that in Leinster the areas allocated to particular inspectors are very large and that even in the case of whole-time officers it would be rather difficult for them to cover the entire area.
There is another complaint which I have received and that is in connection with the delay in paying the full grant because of inspectors' reports in regard to persons not actually residing in the houses. I have one particular case in mind of a man who actually resided in the house he built. He is a tradesman with very limited means. Yet. practically 50 per cent. of the grant is withheld from him. Apparently, the inspector came to the conclusion that he was not residing in the house. Being a single man, of course, he had not very elaborate furnishings or anything else in the house.
He was out working when the inspector called.
He was out working when the inspector called.
It is very hard to know the details in these circumstances.
I do not think that man should be penalised. At least, the inspector should have taken a little more trouble to check up before sending in a report which deprived him of practically 50 per cent. of the grant. These are matters which the Minister should look into.
I agree with the Deputies who have spoken about the delay in the payment of grants on subsidy houses. I can speak with a certain amount of authority in this matter. Delays of well over six months have occurred in the payment of grants. I can definitely state that local authorities can pay a sum of £1,800 to a tenant in half the time it takes the Department to pay the grant of £275.
There is the question of the payment of final grants on houses. Where interim grants have been paid, the final grant will not be paid on a house at the present time unless the house is occupied. I suggest that this final grant should be paid when the house is completed on an undertaking by the proposed tenant to move in at the earliest possible date.
You have a lot of people in this country who are planning to get married and who will not make final arrangements for their weddings until they see the house finished and until they have time to prepare to furnish and decorate the house. The unfortunate builder must wait until the man is married and back from his honeymoon before he gets his money.
I think there is an undue delay caused by certain overlapping of inspections of these houses, particularly for grant purposes. Practically all subsidy houses at the moment are being built as a result of applications for a small dwellings loan. Local authorities, through their buildings surveyors and housing engineers, are inspecting these houses, from the foundations up, at every stage of the development of their building.
When the house is completed and certified for habitation by local authority engineers and, in the majority of cases, for the Small Dwellings (Acquisition) Acts loan, another two inspections must occur for the purpose of paying the grant. All these inspections occur, the final one definitely, when people have been living in their house, possibly, for three or four months. I can quote one particular case where a man with six children was living in a house for five months before it was inspected. The payment of the grant was withheld because the locks on some of the doors were loose and because of some other minor details—damage for which the owner of the house blamed his own children. These are small matters which cause a lot of dissatisfaction amongst people who are buying houses amongst people who are interested in the building trade.
I would urge the Minister to examine the method of the payment of the grant. This grant is paid to a person to help him to buy his own house, but I cannot see why, if prior application is made, this money could not be paid direct to the builder. The client has to be admitted to the house. Otherwise the final instalment of the grant will not be paid to him. There have been several cases, throughout Dublin, at any rate, where the client has got the final instalment and refused to pay it to the builder. The builder can do nothing in such cases because the client has not got any money. I am in the building trade myself, and what I have related above happened to me on three occasions. These are problems which I feel, could be dealt with under this Bill. The remedying of them would make the running of the Act easier.
Everybody will agree that these inspections are a safeguard to the person occupying the house or purchasing the house. At the same time, there are considerable complaints everywhere because of the delays in making payments. In many cases, those delays are due to the fact that the inspector is not notified that the house is ready for inspection. Where there are delays in that regard, people sometimes bring their grievances to the Deputy representing them, and he attends to the matter. However, those people who have not approached their Deputies are just as entitled to have their grievances remedied in the normal way. Therefore, the channel through which the inspector is notified ought to be looked into. Sometimes the delay may occur in the Department due to the fact that some little technicality has not been complied with. At any rate, the channel should be explored and the inspections expedited.
The problems referred to by Deputy Belton are different from those that have been mentioned here by other Deputies. I have heard about the delays that are, from time to time, caused for one reason or another all through the country in the payment of grants to private persons, both for reconstruction purposes and for the building of a new house. As the saying is: even if a man is a Minister, he has to earn his living as a Deputy. He too, hears complaints in his own constituency about the delays that occur in the carrying out of initial inspections and so forth.
It is not so easy to deal with this matter as some people would have one believe. An inspector is assigned to two counties, where it is thought he will have just about sufficient work to keep him going. However, the volume of work may increase at some particular time, and arrears will grow up. The inspector establishes a practice for himself of dealing with so many cases per day or per week, and he sends the results of those inspections to his Department. There would not be sufficient employment in his district for a second man all the time, and temporary relief is sought in order to clear off the arrears. This occurs from time to time in Deputy McMenamin's county, in Deputy Murphy's county and in many other counties; an additional inspector clears off the arrears, and, perhaps, those arrears may occur again 12 months subsequently.
I do not believe that we are likely to achieve the results that we wish to achieve by simply trying to make everybody believe that all the blame is on the inspector's shoulders and on the Department's shoulders. Naturally, public men are inclined to take the side of the person looking for the grant against the authority paying the grant. Anything that is said by any of us in favour of the individual applicant, however negligent he may have been in performing his side of the contract, will go down far better than if we take the other line.
Here is the other side of the picture: the applicant makes an application for a reconstruction grant. However, he does not describe on his application form what he wishes to be done, and the inspector is at sea. He arrives at the man's house to find, very often, that the man is away. Sometimes there is nobody at all in the house, but even if the man's brother or sister or some other relative is at home, they do not know what the applicant has in mind, and they are not aware of the extent of the work or the nature of the work which he wishes to be carried out. The inspector is expected to come back again in a week's time or in a fort-night's time, but it may not be possible for him to do so. The same state of affairs applies in the case of the original inspection, but it applies especially in the case of the final inspection for a reconstruction grant or for a grant for a new house, the applicant is away and he has not even gone to the trouble of leaving a note saying: "You will find the key at such-and-such a house."
Would not the Minister agree that it would be better if the inspector wrote to the applicant informing him that he would be coming to inspect the premises on a certain date?
Deputy McGrath is a very sympathetic man, but his sympathies are all on the one side. It is not so easy for an outdoor inspector or for an inspector of any kind to make such a notification. I have no idea what it must be like, but it is not always feasible for an inspector to write to an applicant and to say: "I will be inspecting your premises at 2 o'clock, 3 o'clock or 4 o'clock on a certain date."
It would hardly be necessary for the inspector to go into such detail; he need not name the hour at which he would call; all that would be necessary for him would be to name the day.
If an inspector, in a place like Cork, tried to prepare a plan for himself by which he would notify applicants of his movements in advance, it would entail a good deal of thought and trouble, and might result in his not being able to get in the amount of inspections which would otherwise be possible.
Too much office work.
It is a matter that has not existed merely inside the last three, four or five years. Since I came into this House, since Housing Acts were the order of the day, that has been the case.
There is the further point in connection with people building houses. If a man waits until he has his house completed, he may say to himself that the inspectors will hold him back for a month, six weeks or two months. Therefore, he says: "I am coming near my journey's end and I will write in advance of the work being done". Perhaps in that case the inspector will arrive sooner than he thought he would have arrived and he will not have a door painted or he will not have some windows painted or he will have some other work to complete. The inspector cannot give him a final certificate and that also means that the inspector is obliged to make a double journey.
Those are not the type of difficulties that were referred to by Deputy Belton but they are the type that arise for the appointed officer all through the country who has to deal with individual applicants here, there and yonder. They present not only the inspector but the suppliers of materials, as Deputy Dockrell has pointed out, with difficulty. They would like to help these people as I am sure many other traders would like to help them. They are engaged in other work at certain seasons of the year. They will do building work for a month or two at a slack period, then they will lie off maybe for two or three months and then go back to it again with the result that when the trader supplies him with material he is out of his money for a very long time. I have received an appeal from traders asking me to try to do something for them because of the amount of money which was owing to them in the country. It was not that they had any doubt as to their being able to collect it ultimately but the fact that a man is going to secure the money in a year or two does not suffice for the present time.
The bank manager would take a poor view of it.
These appointed officers are the nominees of the local bodies and they are very often people acting as assistant engineers, and so on. I am not foolish enough to say that you have no delays that are occasioned by men who are negligent. I am not even prepared to say that delays are not caused sometimes by a Department, by a section or by an individual dealing with a matter of this kind because of being a bit careless in letting a thing lie round for a week that could be handled sooner. I am saying, however, that in the main as far as these rural problems are concerned there is a particular difficulty because of the fact that the people who are building these houses, and very often constructing them largely by their own work and their own effort, are people who have to earn their living otherwise and they just cannot carry on as would an ordinary builder who starts a scheme of work and finishes it, and expects to be paid according to the clock.
I will certainly do what I can to eliminate any delays. We have had from time to time conferences with these inspectors. We do keep a check on the amount of arrears that are growing up in a particular area and we do try to control that and keep it inside manageable limits. We will continue to do that but even doing your best you will find that, having regard to these factors and to many others that I can cite in this whole matter, it is quite impossible to devise any scheme that will be so satisfactory that no complaint will be heard from any quarter.
I would like to point out that the cases the Minister has quoted are exceptional cases. I am more interested in the general cases of delay. In this connection, I wonder is the Department of Finance free from blame about the delay in making money available to the Department of Local Government?
You are over-suspicious.
I am not. It is because I have been informed of so many cases and have received so many complaints that I am inclined to believe that the cases you are making are exceptional.
They are the general rule unfortunately.
No later than last week, I heard the case of a man living in his house for the last two and a half months who has not yet got the final grant. I inquired from the Department why this man had not got the grant. I got the reply that the matter had been referred to the Department of Finance and that he might get it in ten days. He has not got it yet.
I would like clarification on a few points. Is there an obligation on a person who desires a housing grant to wait until the appointed officer calls before proceeding with the work? Secondly, in the case of applicants for the reconstruction grant, the Minister has spoken of the difficulty of the inspector in informing applicants as to the time of his visit. But there is also grave difficulty on the side of the applicants themselves. I know applicants in my own parish who applied last February for reconstruction grants and made arrangements with the local tradesmen in expectation that in the course of a month or two they would require their services. Everybody knows tradesmen are scarce and that it is difficult to obtain their services, especially during the summer months.
In this particular case the inspector has not yet called and these people are afraid to commence work in case that when the inspector would call he would turn down the work because he had made no prior inspection and because there was no approval given for such work. The Minister will appreciate that a person who applied for a reconstruction grant last February ought reasonably to expect to commence work in May and that he has grounds for being annoyed, particularly in view of the fact that these people have made arrangements with tradesmen and have to break these arrangements again and again. Would the Minister tell me now what is the position of these people when the inspector calls? Having waited for four months for the inspector to visit him, if he proceeds with the reconstruction work on his own account, particularly when he has tradesmen employed for a given time, will he get no credit for that portion of the work which is done previous to the inspector's call?
The position is set out in the explanatory memorandum which accompanies the application form.
But it is not set out in that that he is going to wait for five or six months. That is the length of time which has elapsed in the case I have mentioned because I handed in the application form at the beginning of February; now it is the 11th June and the matter is still in abeyance. Supposing the inspector does not call for the next 12 months, must he continue to remain in a dilapidated house or has he any redress? It is outrageous that a person should have to wait so long. Two months should be quite sufficient time to elapse between the date of the application and the inspector's visit.
Question agreed to.
I move amendment No. 2:—
To delete sub-sections (2) and (3).
I suggest to the House that perhaps we could leave over discussion on this and some other amendments until we reach amendment No. 22.
I agree with the Minister. As a result of the Minister's amendments, I have handed in, only this morning, amendments to amendment No. 22 and I would prefer to agree with the Minister's suggestion. I take it that we are agreed to deletion at this stage and to have the discussion on amendment No. 22?
Yes. There are a number of other amendments here that could be left over until amendment No. 22 also.
Amendment agreed to.
I suggest that all the amendments to Section 5 should be left over to amendment No. 22.
Provided we can discuss them on that section.
Yes. You will have the widest possible discussion.
Amendments Nos. 3, 4, 5 and 6 not moved.
Section 5, as amended, agreed to.
Section 6 agreed to.
SECTION 7.
Question proposed: "That Section 7 stand part of the Bill."
On Second Reading I asked the Minister to elaborate in his reply—and he missed doing so—the difference between the grants that the Minister is providing under this section in rural areas and the grants that are provided under the land project for bringing water to a farmhouse. As I understand clause (a) of this section, it must have reference to a rural area and must, therefore, have reference to a farmer's house, not exclusively to a farmer's house, but it must include a farmer's house. There are already arrangements under the land rehabilitation project by virtue of which a water supply can be brought to a farmer's house and I think there are arrangements also for it to be brought out to farm buildings. As I suggested then, I thought it too good to be true to expect that the person concerned would get both grants, but I would like the Minister to indicate the delimitation of his grant and where the other will commence.
It is not the intention to give them two grants but, as far as I know, you cannot get a grant under the scheme operated by the Department of Agriculture to which the Deputy has referred for the actual installation of water in the house itself or the establishment there of the conveniences that are desirable. Therefore, this grant here will extend to that type of work and is, therefore, different from the grant which is provided by the Department of Agriculture. I must say that I did raise with the Department of Agriculture the desirability of handing over that portion of any scheme that they operated which referred to dwellinghouses. I think it would be desirable if these were operated by the same Department. That has not happened, so far at any rate, and what is being provided for here is that a grant will be payable for the provision of water in the sense that I have tried to describe.
Personally, I thought I understood this section until the Minister spoke. Do I take it now that the purpose of this section is to provide a necessary addition to the scheme under the Department of Agriculture, where the water is brought only to the house, and that this money is to be provided for the distribution of the water through the house, so to speak?
That is the distinction.
Do I understand that it is to supplement the other provision? There are houses, with all due deference to Deputy Sweetman, many houses, in rural Ireland which are not farmhouses and have no piped water supply.
I did not say that it was only for farmers' houses but that I understand that this did not deal exclusively with farmers' houses but included farmers' houses.
I suppose it could, but I assume the State is not going to give two grants for the same purpose. I understood from the section that what it was trying to do was to provide for houses in hamlets and small villages where there is no water supply and that the agriculture scheme provides for farmhouses. The Minister has gone on a different line altogether and it will depend on the regulations he makes. As the section reads, it does not do anything at all about these regulations. I think the Minister should make the House very clear now as to his intention. Unfortunately, his intention is not here. Are we to understand that he will make a regulation which will include provision for those who have got a piped water supply in the farmhouse under the Department of Agriculture scheme, that they will now be able to get an extra £50, or up to £50, from the Department of Local Government in order, say, to put in a bathroom?
I have made that clear. I have said that in no case will the two grants be paid.
Not for the same work. That is obvious.
I understood the Minister to say that this was an extension; that the other scheme only brought water to the house, and he was going to provide money to put the water through the house for different purposes. Is that not intended?
I did not say that. I did say that the grant given by the Department of Agriculture will not be provided in certain circumstances.
There is just one other point. There is a phrase in clause (a): "no public piped water supply or sewerage scheme has been provided or is being provided". How wide is that "is being provided" held to be? For instance, if a local authority has a large water scheme on paper, which everyone knows will not materialise for many years because of various difficulties, is that to be considered a scheme which "is being provided" or does the phrase "is being provided" mean at the time that the actual work is in hands?
I wonder would the Minister give us an answer to a specific case, which is the easiest way of dealing with it. If a farmer, under the Department of Agriculture scheme, gets a water supply to his kitchen, I understand that under the Department of Agriculture he will only get the water supply brought to one point in the house.
That is right.
If he gets the grant to bring the water to the kitchen and if he has brought the water to the kitchen and if subsequently he wants to put in a bathroom and a sewerage system in his house, will he get his grant under Section 7 to do that additional work? I think that is the net issue.
I have made the case that where a grant was paid from the Department of Agriculture, it was not our intention that a grant under this Bill, when it becomes an Act, will be paid in the same case and I want to say also that no grant for the provision of water will be paid under the Department of Agriculture scheme in respect of any dwellinghouse towards the construction of which a State grant had been paid at all.
To which any grant has been made?
That relieves us of discussion of many of the problems that Deputies seem to think arise out of this proposal.
The maximum grant for a similar type of water supply so far as farms are concerned is £100 and the £50 here appears to be a very small grant for this type of scheme. I have in mind people in villages where there is considerable difficulty in connecting up with whatever water scheme is available. I suggest that this grant will be found to be inadequate. Bearing in mind that the maximum grant for a similar type of water supply so far as farms are concerned is £100, I would appeal to the Minister, if at all possible, to increase that £50 to a sum something like the sum provided in the other case.
It appears from the Minister's statement that this grant will be of no benefit whatever to farmers because a farm water supply grant would be of more benefit. From what he said it is quite clear that a farmer cannot take advantage of this scheme if he proposes to initiate a water supply for his farmhouse. Under such a scheme he would at least be assured of getting water to his house but the £50 grant which it is proposed to give here might only finance such a scheme to a limited extent. If a full grant is available under the water supply scheme, so far as I can see the provision in this section would not be of any advantage to a farmer.
The Deputy has taken no heed of the explanation which I have already given, that a farmer who builds a new house and gets a State grant in respect of it, cannot get a grant from the Department of Agriculture for the purpose he has stated. Agriculture will not pay a grant for the provision of water in respect of a house towards the erection of which a State grant has already been paid.
It is old houses I am interested in, not new houses.
The Department will not give a water supply grant in respect of any house towards the erection of which a State grant has been obtained.
I know of some people who have experienced tough luck in regard to the provision of such water supplies. These people, when applying for grants for new houses, did not go in for the extra grant of £50, but when the house was completed they changed their minds and went ahead with the installation of water supplies. They then made application to the Department for the extra grant and were turned down on the ground that such work was not included in the certificate of approval. They were also turned down by the Department of Agriculture on the ground that the grant was available in the Department of Local Government and that they should have applied for that. I wonder would the Minister consider the case of people who carried out works such as these?
I am afraid they must remain as they are. We cannot make retrospective provisions for cases of that kind.
Would the Minister clear up the point about the meaning of the phrase "is being provided"?
Will Deputies not admit the undesirability, in cases of this nature, of endeavouring to get me to explain something that will have to be covered at a later stage by regulations? All I can do is to reveal as best I can what is in my own mind as to the sort of thing that will be covered by these regulations. I think it would not be desirable that I should be called upon at this stage to make definite statements. In fact, if I were, I could not make myself as clear as some Deputies would want me to be. I do not think it would be a desirable thing, anyhow, because when we come to draft the regulations I might like to see these regulations drafted in a manner that would give the Department more freedom than any statement I might make here would permit or vice versa. All I can say is that this grant is being provided for rural areas, for areas in respect of which no public piped water supply scheme is likely to be provided in future.
That is going much further than what is in the Bill—"likely to be provided in future."
Do we not all know that there are thousands of places where there is not the slightest possibility of a public piped water supply in future? That is the type of case this provision is designed to meet. When the regulations are being drafted, I hope they will be drafted in a manner to give the greatest possible scope in reason to those who will have the task of operating them.
So far as the type of place that Deputy Sheldon mentioned is concerned, the Minister suggested that this section is to be restricted to cover places in which it is not likely that the local authority will provide piped scheme. That knocks the bottom out of this section so far as the vast majority of rural districts in the country are concerned. Most progressive local authorities have in their minds schemes, or perhaps I should say plans, to introduce water schemes throughout the area of their authority as time goes on, but one cannot yet say for certain whether these schemes of local authorities will ever come to fruition. If the Minister takes the view that the test is whether such a scheme is likely to be provided or not, without any regard to the point of time, then so far as the rural hamlet is concerned this section will be of no use at all.
I hope candidly that, with the development of rural electrification and the development of automatic electric pumps, we shall have a system in the rural areas where ultimately there will be a small water tower and an automatic electric pump that cuts in automatically, without the necessity of employing caretakers or attendants. That will be the method of providing water supplies for hamlets, possibly in the very distant future in certain areas. If we are considering the lay-out of a long-term development scheme in the Kildare County Council, because I happen to mention that it might be possible to provide at some far distant date such a scheme for the village of Carbury, according to the statement which the Minister has made just now, nobody can get assistance to put in sewerage or water supplies in Carbury under this Bill. The effect of such words as "likely to be provided" will mean that local authorities will not investigate the possibility of providing such schemes until they are right up against it. It will, therefore, discourage planning in advance and discourage enterprise by local authorities.
I think the Minister should reconsider his views on this section. I have a sort of suspicion that the reason the Minister is trying to hedge on this section as to what he means by it is because the famous words go into the beginning of the section "with the consent of the Minister for Finance". I have a suspicion that he is trying to defend his colleague, the Minister for Finance, and that there has not been an agreement between the Department of Local Government and the Department of Finance as to what exactly will be covered in this section. I think the Minister is fighting a rearguard action in this connection and I have a certain amount of sympathy for him.
I am still not clear, under this section, as to where the Minister begins in respect of the farmers' grant and where the Department of Agriculture ends. I appreciate the point in regard to new houses. Let us take an old house to which water has been brought, say, by a ram with the assistance of a Department of Agriculture grant and has been brought to one point in the house—the kitchen, the scullery or whatever it is. Let us assume that, having got his supply of water perhaps a long way to the house with the ram, the farmer then wishes to put in the amenities of a bathroom, flush lavatory and a septic tank. Does he or does he not get a grant to do that work under this section?
In reply to Deputy Sheldon, I would say that I have expressed the view that it would be undesirable for me at this stage to strike a firm line for myself as to what the regulations to be made under this section will include. I think the demonstration we have had from Deputy Sweetman is a proof of the wisdom of my taking that course. He drew attention to the expression "likely to be provided", and laboured that expression to show that it might mean that the rural hamlets would be neglected and that that would be relied upon by the Department to say: "The Kildare County Council contemplate a water scheme. It may take 15 or 20 years." There is no such intention. The expression "likely to be provided" does not mean anything of the kind.
In our family, we have our rows before we come to this House and not afterwards. We do not do the financial business of the country in the manner suggested by Deputy Sweetman. Whatever we may come into this House with, and whatever it is going to cost, we try to determine in advance what the sum is going to be. As I say, there is no tendency on our part to pull these quick ones, one over the other.
When it comes to the drafting of regulations under any of the sections included in this Bill I can only say that we will endeavour to draft regulations that will give the utmost freedom to those who are operating them so as to ensure that they will serve as fully as possible the purpose for which they were intended. I have stated that it is not likely at all that a grant could, in any circumstances, be provided in respect of the house that Deputy Sweetman has cited where a grant had already been received from the Department of Agriculture.
I think I heard the Deputy at Question Time some time ago cite the case of three farmers who might desire to pool the amount of the grant under the agricultural scheme and bring a sort of common pipe-line to serve three houses which might be fairly adjacent to each other. I was deeply interested when I heard the Deputy's supplementary questions and, maybe, like himself, I was disappointed with the reply. In the discussion of a section like this, it is impossible to state exactly every type of case that will arise and how it will be covered. All I can do is to assure the House that I cannot for the life of me see that, under any circumstances, we can give two grants in respect of the same house. Subject to that condition, I want to assure Deputies that when these regulations are made they will give the utmost freedom to those who are operating them.
If you are not going to pay two grants to the same premises would it not be better to put it in the Bill so that everybody would know the position?
The Department of Agriculture will not pay a grant as far as new houses are concerned.
I am happy about new houses.
Then the only case that could arise would be the case where an individual would apply for a grant for the provision of water. He can get a grant from the State in respect of the provision of water and also a grant from the local body. He can do that under Sections 9 and 10.
He will get it under this measure.
He can, if the local body so desire. They can also give a grant under Section 9.
There is no power at present.
There is power to the local authority to prepare a scheme to do that.
At present there is not that power.
It is in this Bill. Deputy Sweetman cited the case of an individual who is the owner of a house in respect of which no grant had been paid and who applies for a grant to install water. If he has already received a grant from the Department of Agriculture in respect of that house I am merely saying that I see no possible way of covering him with the secound grant.
This grant will not apply to a farmer unless he gets the water to his house. The farm (water supply) scheme is designed to get the water to the house. Having got the water to the house, this grant would enable the farmer to fit the piping within the house.
It is a grant both to take the water to the house and to install it.
Yes. However the existing farm (water supply) scheme does not provide for the provision of piping within the house. It provides only for the bringing of water to the house. Here is a grant now to a farmer or any other person to fit the piping within the house. But if he avails of the water supply scheme to bring the water to the house he cannot avail of the grant to provide the piping within the house. He cannot get two grants.
I think that the statement that the local authority can make a grant available is wrong.
They can under this Bill.
Has it been passed?
We are doing our best.
I should like the Minister to review—I do not mean now— this matter of the two grants. I fully appreciate that two similar grants should not be made even from two separate Departments. The Minister should re-examine that position with regard to a farmhouse which has a grant to bring water to it under the Department of Agriculture scheme. I do not think it is quite fair that a person who has that grant should be debarred from this one. This is to provide not only a water supply but also sewerage facilities. I am sure the Minister will agree that his concern in this measure is not the same as that of the Department of Agriculture. The purpose behind the two grants is different.
I am not suggesting that the Minister should now give a hard and fast opinion, but I should like him to review in his own mind the question of the possibility of a farmer getting this grant even if he has got the Department of Agriculture grant. It does not seem to be fair that farmers should be deprived of this just because they have been energetic enough to proceed under the other scheme. I think the Minister should give sympathetic consideration to this point when he comes to make his regulations.
On the question of what is likely to be a scheme or what is a scheme, the Minister appreciates that we are all concerned to see just what value this will be to the rural community. I admit it is not fair to expect the Minister to come down to a hard and fast line as to what regulations he will make, but I think he should be able to give some general indication of what is in his mind about this question of a future public supply. I admit that I am arguing from the particular to the general, but what I am thinking of is something in my own constituency, the Finn Valley regional water scheme which has been rather pruned but there is still there the skeleton of a scheme to supply a very wide area. All I want from the Minister is an assurance that where there is that type of scheme in view which has not any prospect of being concluded in a reasonable time he will not sit down and make regulations because there is a reasonable chance of a scheme with the result that a whole area will be cut off.
It would have to be in an advanced stage of development before it would be regarded as an obstacle to block a grant under this section.
I am not interested in this matter from my constituency point of view—there are no farms in south city—but I am interested in the justice of the case and I should like to put this before the Minister. Suppose there are two farmers, A and B, whose dwellings are an equal distance from a road along which the main water supply goes. Suppose A brought in the water to his house under the agricultural scheme and got a grant of £20; in other words, the cost of bringing in the water supply did not absorb the whole of the sum he could have drawn. He now has water to his house but not through his house. His next door neighbour, B, brings water under this scheme to his house and it costs him £20. He is now able to have in hands £30 more towards getting the water circulating through his house. It seems to me that he is placed in a more favourable position than his next door neighbour just by pure chance. Would it not be possible, where the full amount of the grant was not drawn under the agricultural scheme, for the farmer to draw the balance under this scheme?
I must say I do get the Deputy too clearly, but I can see how awkward it could be in certain cases when you examine this problem of the provision of water in private houses by individual owners and how unfair it would appear to be also. For example, under this grant for the provision of water you may have a farmer who would first have to get the water. Perhaps he would have to sink a pump or erect a tank to collect the water from the roof and he would have to incur considerable expense. He would then have to install the water in the house itself.
You have the case of a man where the water is there in sufficient quantity to serve his purpose. He will have a far less expensive task in connecting his house and providing himself with certain amenities. There is no means by which we can get over that. Where a man has got a grant from the Department of Agriculture to connect water to his house the operation may be a very expensive one; it may be so expensive that one must have sympathy for him since he cannot get any help or encouragement from the State. I am certain that cases will arise in which one would like to make some contribution but when we come to frame the regulations, no matter how open we may make them, we shall have to adhere to the general principle that a grant will not be paid from two different Departments in respect of the same work.
I agree that there is some difference but when a man receives a grant from the State to connect water to his house, if he is really deeply interested in the job, he will go ahead and complete it. If he does not do that, I do not see any possibility of our giving him a second grant under any circumstances for that purpose.
I want to put a particular instance to the Minister. Take the case of two farmhouses in one of which the occupier is lucky enough to have a water supply within a few feet of his house. Now, prior to there being any State grant at all that man was able to put a tap in his kitchen from a well outside very, very cheaply. His neighbour, on the other hand, had to go 400 or 500 yards to get water and until the State grant was instituted he was unable to have a tap in his kitchen. Would the Minister not agree that it is rather harsh that the first man, who was so fortunately situated, is now in a position to get a grant of £50 to go on with the job while the second man cannot?
I agree it is harsh but these are problems that arise in every walk of life.
That is true and all I ask the Minister to do is to view the matter sympathetically.
I see the Deputy's point. It is not an easy matter to find a means of dealing with it.
We are here to try to find a means of dealing with it. I want to ask the Minister another question. Sub-section (1) provides that the grant may not exceed £50. Has the Minister determined the basis upon which he will make the amount of the grant available? Will it be a flat grant of £50 if both bath and flush lavatory installations are put in and a septic tank or will it be a grant like the reconstruction grant of 50 per cent. of the expenditure up to £50? Will it be like the excess £50 that is added in for a new house bringing the amount from £125 to £175 or from £225 to £270? Will it be a percentage of expenditure or a flat grant of £50 if by the installation the house is brought up to modern amenity standards?
Not exceeding £50 will be convered in the regulations in the same manner as that expression has been convered in relation to reconstruction grants.
Will it be a percentage of the amount expended then?
That has been the practice in relation to reconstruction grants.
Would the Minister be prepared to include a provision in the Bill to meet the point made by Deputy M.E. Dockrell? He pointed out that where it costs A and B £20 each under different schemes to connect up water, B then has £30 left with which he can bring water through the house while A only gets a grant of £10 from the Department of Agriculture after spending £10, making a total of £20. Could a provision not be included whereby a farmer who avails of the agricultural grant can qualify for a grant of £30 or £40 towards the cost of bringing water through his house?
That is where the amount is less than £50.
There is no proposed provision here which limits me in this respect at all. It will all come down to what we may decide the regulations should include.
But the Minister has said that there will not be two grants.
I have tried to give the House an idea, as I am bound to do, of what I think the regulations should cover.
If a local authority want to put in water and make their contribution, will the Minister, through this Bill, make a contribution to the local authority?
That does not arise on this section.
May I take it that the Minister's view is that he will frame his regulations to pay 50 per cent. of the cost, not exceeding £50?
Yes.
I may want to put in an amendment on the Report Stage as a result of this discussion.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 8.
I move amendment No. 7:—
Before Section 8 to insert a new section as follows:—
A grant (other than a grant for the provision and installation in a dwellinghouse of a private water supply and sewerage facilities) shall not be made under Sections 9, 10 or 11 of this Act in respect of a house in respect of which a grant is or was made under Section 7 of the Act of 1950.
This new section is necessary to prevent a person getting a grant under Section 7 of the 1950 Act and under Sections 9, 10 and 11 of the present Bill.
That is fair. Otherwise, the recipient would be getting two grants for the same work.
There is an amendment in the name of Deputy Desmond to Section 8. The Deputy understands that the Minister is now deleting the whole of Section 8 and substituting the new section.
I understand that. I am not convinced, however, that the matter is entirely clear in so far as the position of tenants of purchased cottages is concerned. We want some clarification of the position and that is why this amendment was put down. What will be the position of a tenant of a purchased cottage under a 20, 25 or 30 years' purchase agreement?
The Deputy will probably be able to raise that point on another section.
The Deputy can discuss the matter on Section 11, amendment No. 16.
I do not know if that will meet the case.
Anything that arises out of Section 8 can be discussed on that.
I will be satisfied with that at this stage. We will see how it goes.
Amendment No.7 put and agreed to.
Amendment No. 8 not moved.
Section 8 deleted.
SECTION 9.
Question proposed: "That Section 9 stand part of the Bill."
We decided that we would oppose this section as it stands on this stage of the Bill with a view to making such amendment in it as might appear necessary as a result of this discussion on the Report Stage. We were afraid that if we did not deal with it in that way there would be a danger of our being caught, as we were undoubtedly caught on the Tourist Traffic Bill in our amendments which were ruled out of order on the Report Stage of that measure.
We wish to put very strongly to the Minister that in relation to these grants to be made by local authorities the rateable valuation limits for the several percentages of grants set out by the Minister in Section 9 are altogether too low. There seems to be a desire on the part of the Minister to restrict the operation of these local authority grants, perhaps with a view to encouraging local authorities in certain areas to come in with a scheme where they have not already done so. In doing so, the Minister is undoubtedly penalising very severely those local authorities that have already come forward with schemes and had the schemes sanctioned and who will now have to reduce very substantially indeed the means limits that have operated.
In those counties where there is already a scheme in existence for local authority grants and where that scheme is being reduced and slashed, as the County Kildare scheme will be slashed by this section, this will undoubtedly have the effect that the provision of new houses by people will suffer a very serious setback. Apart from the actual cash reaction it is bound to have a psychological reaction. We in County Kildare take the view— and I would urge the Minister to take the view—that every house which is built—no matter what the size of the income of the person who built it is within very large limits—either directly or indirectly lessens the necessity for the local authority to provide houses for the people in the county. The Minister's figures restricting the 100 per cent. grant to farmers with a rateable valuation of £12 10s. are, certainly as far as County Kildare is concerned, entirely ludicrous. I have not sufficient experience of other counties to know whether £12 10s. might be a reasonable figure. Perhaps it would be in counties on the western seaboard or in parts of Longford for example. As far as County Kildare is concerned, however, it means in effect that no houses will be built by farmers which will qualify for the county council grant.
That is a situation which we are not satisfied to accept and which all of us on every side of the political field in County Kildare would strongly urge the Minister to amend. Our scheme in County Kildare has up to now been that we would pay grants to persons who derive their livelihood solely from the pursuit of agriculture whose poor law valuation does not exceed £100, a person who comes within the definition of agricultural labourer or a person whose income does not exceed £800 per annum. The income figure comes in more properly I think under Section 10 than under this section. To suggest that any person in County Kildare with a valuation of £35 or over is not a person who needs some assistance from the local authority to build his house is to show complete ignorance of the situation which exists in our county. I suggest that the Minister would be far better advised to make some high overriding limit and if a housing authority in an area where they have very much smaller land valuations than we have in South Leinster wish to bring down their limits in their area let them do so. But do not bring in a section which will penalise housing authorities which have adopted a progressive attitude, a section which will not merely penalise them but will have a disastrous psychological effect on people building.
One of the troubles to which we have heard reference earlier in this debate to-day and which is a trouble in most local authority areas is the difficulty with present costs of repairing local authority houses. In addition, all local authorities are finding a difficulty regarding the cost at which they must provide new houses. All of us will agree that it is much easier and cheaper for an applicant to build a house for himself than it is for a public body to do it. He can put in a certain amount of time himself and a certain amount of supervision which a local authority cannot manage even with the best possible clerk of works and above all when the house is built he can ensure that his repair bill will be kept within measurable bounds because when small repairs are required they can be done without waiting for the local authority's repair gang to come around. All those things make it incumbent upon local authorities and good business for local authorities to do everything in their power to urge people to build for themselves rather than sit back and trust to the activities of the housing authorities.
The Minister may say perhaps that the fact that farmers should build would not ease the position for ordinary agricultural labourers but of course it would. Every house which is built helps indirectly to ease the pressure upon the local authority. If he is going to throw this douche of cold water across counties which have adopted a progressive scheme then I am afraid that with these two sections the Minister will do a very bad day's work in retarding seriously the provision of new houses in those areas. It is good business for a housing authority to have houses erected because it indirectly eases the pressure on them. It is good business also because it means that the valuation of the county will be increased and that the local authority will get more money in rates in the long run.
If we sit down and compute what interest must be paid over perhaps 30 or 40 years on the loan which the local authority must raise to pay these grants, if we consider that on the debit side and consider on the credit side the rate which will come in from the new valuations which will be created when applicants build their own houses, we will find that the cost to the local authorities of every grant which means that a new house goes up is very small indeed. It would, I suggest, pay the Minister very well indeed, pay him handsomely, to adopt a less niggardly approach to the whole problem of local authority grants under Sections 9 and 10 and to give to the local authorities concerned a greater measure of freedom to meet the needs and the circumstances of their individual cases. This should apply particularly to counties where a scheme has already been in operation and where any diminution of the advantages of that scheme will have a psychological effect which the Minister will find it very hard indeed to overcome.
Progress reported; Committee to sit again.