Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 1 Jul 1952

Vol. 132 No. 14

In Committee on Finance. - Vóta 47—Tailte.

Aire Tailte (Tomás Ó Deirg)

Tairgim:—

Go ndeonfar suim nach mó ná £986,710 chun slánuithe na suime is gá chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfas chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31ú lá de Mhárta, 1953, chun Tuarastal agus Costas Oifig an Aire Tailte agus Oifig Choimisiún Talún na hÉireann (44 & 45 Vict., c. 49, Alt 46, agus c. 71, Alt 4; 48 & 49 Vict., c. 73, Ailt 17, 18 agus 20; 54 & 55 Vict., c. 48; 3 Edw. 7, c. 37; 7 Edw. 7, c. 38 agus c. 56; 9 Edw. 7, c. 42; Uimh. 27 agus 42 de 1923; Uimh. 25 de 1925; Uimh. 11 de 1926; Uimh. 19 de 1927; Uimh. 31 de 1929; Uimh. 11 de 1931; Uimh. 33 agus 38 de 1933; Uimh. 11 de 1934; Uimh. 41 de 1936; Uimh. 26 de 1939; Uimh. 12 de 1946; Uimh. 25 de 1949; agus Uimh. 16 de 1950).

Tá méadú sa mhór-iomlán de £38,450 thar mar a bhótáladh i gcóir na bliana seo caite.

Is faoi Fho-mhírchinn I (feabhsú tailte 7 eile) agus A (Tuarastail agus a leithéid) atá na méaduithe is mó le rá.

Siad na nithe is mó a rinneadh i rith na bliana seo caite ná go ndeachaidh Coimisiún na Talún i seilbh ar 22,800 acra; gur leath-roinneadh 22,500 acra; gur tugadh gabháltaisí nua do 75 imircigh; go ndearnadh gabhaltaisí tuairim's 250 sealbhóirí d'athriaradh; agus go ndearnadh 8,023 gabhaltas agus 4,706 paiste talún d'athdhílsiú.

Isé athriarú na ngabhaltaisí neamhthairbheacha sna ceanntair chúnga an chuspóir is mó atá roimh an gCoimisiún anois. Meastar go bhfuil thar 12,000 gabháltas dá leithéid le socrú go fóill. Chuige sin caithfear líon mór imirceach a thógaint go dtí gabháltaisí nua san Oirthear. Tá curtha i gcéill agam don Choimisiún gur cóir dóibh díriú gan moill ar na tailte is gá chuige sin d'fháil san Oirthear, agus líon na gcigirí atá ag obair san Iarthar ar athriarú a mhéadú. Obair chostasach agus obair channcrach í seo ach ní féidir é shéanadh.

As seo amach is ar imirceacht a bhraithfidh leasú cúngracht níos mó ná ariamh. Déanfar, dar ndóigh, féachaint chuig pé cúngracht atá thart ar thailtí a thógann Coimisiún na Talún, ach, thairis sin, úsáidfear an fuíollach chun gabháltaisí nua a chur i réir do imircigh ón Iarthar. Usáidfear na seanghabháltaisí chun chaoí maireachtana níos fearr a thabhairt do no sealbhóirí atá ag braith ar phaistí beaga a bhionn go minic fite fuaite le chéile.

Ní fuiriste do dhuine ón Iarthar ná ó aon aird eile scaradh leis na daoiní a tógadh thart timcheall air. Fágann san nach féidir sealbhóirí d'fháil a bheas toilteannach feirmeacha nua a thógaint san Oirthear mara mbíonn na feirmeacha san sáthach maith. Ní féidir feirmeacha nua a bhunú ar an abhar san ach ar talamh maith. Tá costas ithreach dá leithéid ag meadú go mór. D'íoc Coimisiún na Talún £22 in aghaidh an acra, idir mhaith agus dona, ar ar thóg siad i rith na bliana seo caite. Dar ndóigh, h-íocadh i bhfad níos mó ar an talamh méith.

De ghnáth ní féidir an praghas a híocadh ar an talamh a chur ar an imirceach agus caithfidh an tír an chaillúint a íoc, maraon le leath na blianachta, a gearrfar ar an bhfeirm. Caithfear freisin foirgintí nua a thógaint, bóithre, claidheanna agus eile a dhéanamh, agus is ar an gCoiste Poiblí a luíonn furmhór an chostais seo uile de gnáth.

Is é beartas an Rialtais teacht i gcabhair ar shealbhóirí gabháltas neamh-thairbheacha mar go bhfeictear dóibh gur ceist náisiúnta agus ceist sóisialach atá le socrú acu é. I ndeire na dála, ní práinní tithe nua a thógaint do dhaoine atá ar droch—bhaill nó atá nó atá ina n-eagmuis sa chathair ná athriarú agus méadú a dhéanamh ar gabhaltaisí aindheise tionóntaí sna ceanntair agus i ndáiríre anois agus ní féidir ceisteanna airgid a thabhairt isteach sé, má leantar don bheartas seo béidh sé ar mhaithe leis an náisiún uile i ndeire na dala mar cuideoidh sé go mór le méadú táirgeachta.

The net Estimate of £1,738,470 for Lands for the current year represents an increase of £38,450 over the total amount voted last year; that total was made up of the original Estimate, a separate provision for increases in remuneration and a Supplementary Estimate for expenditure on improvement works.

Sub-head I—Improvements, Etc.— Last year the amount originally voted for sub-head I—Improvements of Estates, Etc.—was £390,000 and I found it necessary to have that amount increased by 1/6th, or £65,000, so that the Land Commission improvements programme could be achieved. The net amount of the Supplementary Vote was £25,000 as sums totalling £40,000 were provided out of savings on other sub-heads. The increased total of £455,000 voted last year for sub-head I was fully expended and it represented the highest annual outlay on improvement works since 1940-41. It is hoped to maintain the output of improvement works this year at the high level attained last year. Accordingly, this year's Estimate for sub-head I stands at £480,000 which represents an increase of £90,000 on the amount originally voted last year and an increase of £25,000 over the combined amounts voted in last year's original and Supplementary Estimates. This increase of £25,000 is necessary in view of increased costs. Improvement works are an expensive but essential part of Land Commission activities.

Sub-head A—Salaries, etc.—Last year's Estimate provided for the sum of £465,016 under sub-head A. This was supplemented by the sum of £75,260 out of Vote 71, which was passed last year specially to provide for increases in remuneration over the whole of the Civil Service. Out of the total of £540,276 thus available, £523,000 was expended. This year a sum of £532,701, an increase of £9,701 over last year's expenditure, is proposed under sub-head A. This increase arises through the prospect of early recruitment of 15 new inspectors and also through normal increment increases in salaries and wages.

In the details of inspectorate staff shown in the Estimate the apparent reduction of 30 inspectors as compared with last year relates to vacancies. These vacancies had remained unfilled for many years and were formally written off under a reorganisation that took effect on the 1st April, 1951. When the 15 new inspectors take up duty, the number of inspectors actively engaged on Land Commission work will be the highest since before the emergency.

Sub-head E—Solicitors' Expenses, etc.—Sub-head E shows an increase of £2.000 which is attributable to the expansion of acquisition and resumption activities and to the higher legal fees and costs which have to be borne by the Land Commission.

Sub-heads H (1), H (2), H (3), H (4) —Deficiency in Land Bond Fund, Etc. —Almost half the entire Estimate for Lands is allocated to sub-heads H (1), H (2), H (3) and H (4) for making good certain deficiencies in the Land Bond Fund. These deficiencies arise from the halving of annuities and from other State aids to land purchase, e.g., costs fund and statutory bonus to vendors of estates over and above the price repayable by the tenantpurchasers. The payments in respect of interest and sinking fund on land bonds are recurring charges. As the land settlement programme proceeds, additional charges are created which result in increases in sub-heads H (1) and H (3); the estimated increase in sub-head H (3) for the current year is £11,500.

Sub-head N—Maintenance Funds— Sub-head N shows a decrease of £5,502 in the capital sums to be advanced for the establishment of funds for the maintenance of embankments and other works. Expenditure of this nature is non-recurring and the requirements fluctuate; last year's figure was exceptionally high.

Sub-head R—Open-Market Purchases —Cash for the purchase of land at auctions and by private treaty is provided under sub-head R. The estimate of £20,000 for that sub-head is the same as last year's original provision from which an estimated saving of £11,610 was deducted in connection with the Supplementary Estimate. Five holdings containing 191 acres were purchased last year and the proceedings for the purchase of a further five holdings containing 125 acres were in course of completion at the end of the year. The open market has not so far proved a fruitful source of securing land for Land Commission purposes.

Sub-Head S—Compensation for Ex-Employees—Last year's estimate of £3,500 is repeated for sub-head S under which gratuities are provided for persons displaced from employment by Land Commission operations. Gratuities amounting to £2,217 were awarded last year to 21 ex-employees. From the passing of the Land Act, 1950, to the end of March last 32 persons had been awarded gratuities amounting to £3,616.

The other sub-heads of this Vote vary (if at all) to a very small extent from last year's provisions and they do not seem to call for any special comment at this stage.

Having dealt with the sub-heads of the Estimate that appear to call for comment, I should now like to refer briefly to last year's land settlement activities. An area of 22,800 acres was acquired, resumed or otherwise taken over in all of the 26 counties. An area of 22,500 acres (including 14,200 acres in the congested counties) was divided among 1,425 allottees, of whom 851 received enlargements to their uneconomic holdings, 75 were migrants, and 225 had their holdings rearranged and enlarged. In all over 250 holdings, comprising some 11,000 acres, were rearranged. The slight drop in allotment figures last year was due to unavoidable difficulties, such as inability to get possession of lands before 31st March last. This is evidenced by the fact that in April, which is not a normal month for allotment, 3,500 acres were allotted to allottees, of whom 25 were migrants; 788 turbary rights, as distinct from 184 turbary plots, were also provided in 1951-52; 8,023 holdings were vested in tenants and 4,706 allotments were vested in allottees. In addition, 1,667 rights of turbary were vested in 18 counties, bringing the total number of vestings to 14,500 approximately.

Deputies will also wish to have some indication of the operations in course of completion or the work in hands of the Land Commission at the beginning of the current year. Acquisition or resumption proceedings had been instituted for an area of 68,800 acres on 787 estates and holdings in all 26 counties. Inquiries or inspections had been carried out for 117 estates containing 16,500 acres and were awaiting decision, while a further area of 142,000 acres on 992 estates and holdings had been noted for investigation. It must be realised of course that only a proportion, possibly one fourth, of the area that receives preliminary consideration will eventually come into possession of the Land Commission. The pool of land available is gradually decreasing. This is particularly noticeable in the case of holdings for resumption in the eastern counties where the vesting of the holdings in the tenants is nearing completion. In fact, in the whole 12 counties of Leinster there are now only 2,400 holdings of tenanted land awaiting final vesting, i.e. far less than one single county of Connaught, viz. Mayo, which alone has more than 10,300 holdings awaiting vesting. The corresponding figures for Galway and Donegal are 5,600 and 9,700 respectively.

Apart from barren lands for which there is no demand, the area on the hands of the Land Commission for allotment was some 25,000 acres of which less than half was arable. Delay in allotment is frequently unavoidable because the disposal of the land so as to secure the maximum relief of congestion cannot be achieved pending the erection of buildings, execution of other improvements, acquisition of adjoining lands, migration of tenants, rearrangement of holdings, etc.

About 35,000 holdings and 20,000 allotments remained to be vested in tenants and allottees. Good progress has been made with this work in recent years and the peak of annual output has been passed. As the majority of the outstanding cases involve various time-consuming difficulties, a decline in the rate of vesting has to be faced. Arrears of annuities at the 31st March last amounted to £170,000, or less than 4 per cent. of the total amount collectable since 1933. That is a further improvement on last year's satisfactory position.

Of the problems confronting the Land Commission, perhaps the greatest is the rearrangement of lands held in rundale, or intermixed plots. A few typical estates taken at random will illustrate the position. On a County Donegal estate of 1,898 acres and commonages, there are 97 holdings comprising 406 plots. While the average is four, the number of plots per holding ranges up to 20. An estate of 2,205 acres in County Mayo comprises 107 holdings in 416 plots and 16 of the holdings are in more than seven separate pieces. In a single townland in County Galway, 24 holdings containing 301 acres are divided into 172 plots, or an average of seven per holding, apart from commonage shares.

It will be necessary to conduct a full and up-to-date survey, which is already under way, before it can be stated how many holdings require rearrangement, but it can be said that more than 12,000 unvested holdings at any rate will need to be rearranged. These include some 4,500 holdings on estates purchased by the former Congested Districts Board. There are, of course, some vested holdings which could be improved by rearrangement, but the more pressing needs of the unvested holdings in this class must receive priority as they have been awaiting attention for an unduly long period. The acquisition of additional land is normally an essential prerequisite to successful rearrangement. Want of untenanted land has long held up rearrangement and subsequent vesting of these holdings. If relief is to be afforded to the thousands of unvested tenants whose holdings require to be rearranged, and to the many other uneconomic holders whose lands need to be enlarged, every available acre of untenanted land must be disposed of to the best advantage.

The rearrangement of rundale holdings into compact units usually involves the rehousing of many tenants and the provision of fences, drains and accommodation roads. As Deputies are well aware, those works have become very costly. Successful rearrangement depends upon the goodwill and good sense of the tenants concerned. Their co-operation is essential. Prolonged negotiation is often necessary before unanimous agreement can be obtained. Thus, it may happen that much of the inspectorate work on rearrangement in any particular year does not bear fruit until some years later, and in the meantime any untenanted land available must be kept on hands until an acceptable rearrangement scheme can be put into operation. The fact that such land may be on hands for a considerable time is not due to inactivity on the part of the Land Commission, but is inevitable having regard to the thorny local problems with which it has to deal.

Despite the exercise of the utmost tact and skill by inspectors, obstruction by certain tenants is frequently encountered in the preparation of rearrangement schemes. Such tenants, by their unco-operative attitude, deprive themselves and, worse still, they deprive their neighbours of the substantial benefits and manifest advantages of rearrangement. Inspectors cannot continue negotiations in such cases indefinitely when so many thousands of other holdings are in urgent need of attention. In future, it will be necessary to drop the rearrangement proposals completely where obstruction is persisted in.

The limited amount of land available in the vicinity of congested holdings renders migration inseparable from rearrangement and absolutely essential if we are to make any real progress in dealing with congestion. This position has long been recognised. The original powers of the Congested Districts Board were very limited as regards the enlargement of holdings, but in 1903 the Estates Commissioners were established, and they and the Congested Districts Board were given wide powers to purchase estates for the enlargement and rearrangement of holdings. In the years that followed, landholders frequently were migrated from congested districts so that their lands would become available for the enlargement of adjoining holdings.

In those early years migrants generally were slow to move considerable distances, and of some 5,000 tenants migrated by the Congested Districts Board and the Estates Commissioners, the vast majority remained within a reasonable distance of their original holdings. Since 1923 some 715,000 acres of land have been allotted in the congested counties. It follows that, as the untenanted land in the vicinity of the congested holdings is used up, the work of relieving the remaining congestion becomes much more difficult and can only be accomplished through migration.

The Land Act, 1923, gave the Land Commission power to acquire compulsorily any untenanted land (except certain specified categories) required for the relief of congestion. This power included the provision of holdings for migrants whose surrendered lands were required for the enlargement of uneconomic holdings and has been widely exercised. By migrating the larger tenants, wherever practicable, the maximum amount of land is made available for relieving congestion with the minimum of disturbance.

In 1935 and subsequent years schemes of colony and group migrations were operated for the benefit of uneconomic holders in the Gaeltacht and other congested districts. The object of these schemes has been to migrate groups of neighbouring tenants, whose holdings are required for rearrangement, and settle them on adjoining farms in the new areas. More than 390 tenants have been migrated in this manner up to 31st March last and 23 more have been installed in new holdings since then.

Since 1923 some 4,000 tenants have surrendered their holdings in exchange for other lands. About 700 of these have been migrated from one county to another and many others have been provided with new holdings at a considerable distance from their original holdings but within the same county, e.g., from West Galway to East Galway.

The relief of congestion will depend on migration to a still greater extent in the future. Wherever land is taken over, so much of it as is not required for the enlargement of local uneconomic holdings must necessarily be utilised as far as practicable to create holdings for migrants, and thus help to alleviate the living conditions of the thousands of congests whose small holdings are rendered less profitable than needs be through being held in rundale or intermixed plots.

In order that tenants may be induced to migrate they must be offered sufficiently attractive holdings, and for this purpose good quality land is required. The cost of land has greatly increased; the average price per acre of land for which prices were finally fixed last year was £22. That is an average figure and, of course, the cost of the better quality land works out substantially higher—sometimes up to £60 or £70 per acre. It is usually impracticable to recover the full cost of the land from the migrants and the State has to finance the full amount of the loss so incurred, in addition to paying half of the annuities. The equipment of new holdings with buildings, roads, fences, drains, etc., throws further burdens on the Exchequer.

Congestion is an acute national and social problem and it is the policy of the Government to take every practicable step for its relief. The work of rearranging and enlarging congested holdings and providing new holdings for migrants is no less important in its own sphere than that of slum clearance in the towns and cities. It must be tackled in a realistic fashion and the question of cost cannot be allowed to stand in the way of eradicating the evil. Personally, I like to look on the cost of relieving congestion merely as a long-term investment which will be amply repaid by increased production and national prosperity. I can assure the House, however, that every £ voted will be spent to the best possible advantage.

General MacEoin

I am glad that the Minister appears to be satisfied with the progress made by the Land Commission, but I feel that there is much ground yet for complaint. I agree that the relief of congestion and the establishment of migrants on good farms is very sound policy, and I admit that the Minister is correct in saying that it is a good long-term investment, but yet, owing to the conditions and traditions which exist in many parts of the country, migration meets with very great opposition, and I do not know that it is as successful as either the Minister or his predecessors would like us to believe. Where fairly substantial holdings have been acquired in the counties where large holdings are principally available there are always a good many local claimants for that land and may I point out to the Minister that these men know how to work it while in a number of cases, I regret to say, the migrants do not? The land is not the type of land which they have been accustomed to work and they find it extremely difficult to make it pay. It is a costly system and a large number of migrants who have got new holdings which are undoubtedly very valuable and have cost the State and the ratepayers a great deal of money have not themselves the necessary capital to work them and are handicapped at the start. We are aware that no sooner have they been allotted a farm than they apply to the Agricultural Credit Corporation for a loan for machinery and the various other items which they must procure in order to work the farm properly. Instead of working for themselves and their families, therefore, they see the profit they make on the land absorbed by the Agricultural Credit Corporation, the bank or financial institution which has advanced them money. Therefore, I think, that more care will have to be exercised by the Department of Lands in the choice of migrants.

People with a tradition of agriculture or who have sent their son or sons to an agricultural college to take a course in modern agriculture are the only type of people who should be chosen. On the other hand the people adjacent to the acquired holdings have knowledge of the land and know the manner of husbandry which is best for the particular area. Again of course, I must admit that lack of capital means in a great many of these cases that they too are failures. Although they may have a fair amount of capital they find it insufficient to furnish a house and buy all the things which are required about a farmer's house. The result is that they find themselves in debt at a very early stage. Farmers' sons with a fair amount of capital should be chosen rather than people without a tradition on the soil or a good knowledge of agriculture in the particular area.

The problem of employees on an estate is a very difficult one to deal with. I am surprised that the amount of compensation paid is so small. I think that there must have been some slip-up in the investigation because in nearly every case where employees have lost their employment through the acquisition of an estate they find no further employment for a considerable time. The sum of £2,207 in gratuities in a year to employees is a very small one and I would like to hear what the standard is by which the Minister arrives at these figures. Very often, nearly always, these people had good fixed employment at a fair rate and had amenities which are now of very great value and which they have no longer when the estate is acquired. £2,000 is a very meagre figure and I am surprised that it is so low. I would like to know the method of computing this compensation.

I am still satisfied—and I have asserted this for years—that when the Land Commission build a new house for a migrant, congest or anyone else it should at least at this time of our life have all the modern amenities. There is no reason in the world why the Land Commission—a State body— should build just four straight walls up and a range of out-offices and provide no amenities whatsoever. There is very little difference between this sort of house and the house built 200 years ago. These houses should contain all the amenities of life so that the Land Commission might at least set a headline and show what a modern farmhouse should be. We complain—and rightly—about the rural population leaving the countryside and coming to the towns and cities. There they have all the amenities of life from baths up. It is an astounding fact that the Land Commission will build a house to-day in the country without even a sink of any description. It may be that they think that the farmer is not accustomed to them but I think that for the future all these amenities should be provided in new houses and in cases where the Land Commission has already built houses, these additions should be made if such amenities have not been already provided. It could be done, I presume, under the housing schemes operated by the Local Government Department but, as these are Land Commission houses, I think the Land Commission should have responsibility for seeing that they are properly equipped.

I should like the Minister and the Land Commission to consider seriously, although I know the Minister has very little responsibility for it, the type of allottees to whom land is given. Notwithstanding anything the Minister or any of us may say to the contrary, nobody believes that some degree of partisanship does not enter into the allocation of land. It is rather strange that at various times and in various areas supporters of one political Party do seem to get a very great number of these allocations. It may be that these people are likely to prove the best allottees. I am not going to argue that they are not as good as some applicants whose applications are turned down but it is rather significant that in certain areas there does seem to be a favour or a bias towards a certain political organisation. Whether there is good salesmanship by a particular organisation in certain areas when the inspector comes around I do not know. The inspector, of course, is only human and he is obliged to make inquiries amongst the people in the neighbourhood in order to satisfy himself that the best type of allottees are selected. He uses the old method of approach and the old type of investigation to find out the best types and frequently efforts are made to influence him.

On the question of rundale and the congested areas, I think that a series of talks by various influential people, such as Churchmen and solicitors—I do not know that solicitors would help very much because this system of land tenure is sometimes a very great source of income to them—might be arranged; in fact, everybody who is interested in the peace and good order of the district should encourage the people affected to agree to a satisfactory settlement or rearrangement of their holdings so as to get over the difficulties that exist in many of these districts. I know that this system of rundale exists only in a small way in County Longford but disputes about these small plots lead to untold trouble and hardship and create bad feeling between neighbours. Sometimes they give rise to lawsuits that are very costly to all concerned. I think it would be a great blessing if the system could be eliminated and steps taken to ensure that there would be no recurrence of it. Of course, I am aware that no subdivision can take place without the consent of the Land Commission but some queer things still happen and arrangements are sometimes made which are a long time in existence without the knowledge of the Land Commission.

The Minister gave expression to an important fact when he said that the pool of land suitable for division is being considerably reduced. I think it would be a great satisfaction to all concerned if we could say that the day had arrived when land division was finally completed, because it does create and has created a great deal of dissatisfaction all over the country. When a holding comes on the market for sale an agitation is organised to have it acquired. The Land Commission can now buy it by auction and the result is that nobody will compete against them for the land because the belief is that when the Land Commission looks at a holding it is as good as gone. Sometimes, awaiting the decision of the Land Commission, the whole affair remains suspended like Mahomet's coffin. I think that the Land Commission should come to a speedy decision in cases where they have inspected a farm—that they should say within a reasonable time whether or not they will acquire it, and that when they do make such a statement they will let it be known that they mean what they say and that no further representations by any club —Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Clann na Poblachta, or any other organisation— will induce them to reopen the matter once their decision is given. I am aware of a number of cases in various parts of the country where the settlement of holdings and the sale of them are held up because of the failure of the Land Commission to announce their decision. I appeal to the Land Commission, through the Minister, to eliminate these fester points, because that is what they are.

I am glad that the work of vesting holdings is also coming to an end. I have not the previous figures, but it strikes me from what the Minister has said that the vesting of land under the Roddy Act has been successful and that a greatly increased number of people now hold their land as vested holdings. It is desirable that the number of holdings that still remain to be vested should be vested at an early date. Similarly, where a farm of land has been given to an allottee or a migrant, vesting in that person should take place at a fairly early stage. I know that such a course has its dangers and that it may lead to an early sale of the holdings by the allottee. At the same time I think that the effect of giving him security of tenure in the holding and the advantages of having full ownership would outweigh any disadvantages or dangers. I know that many allottees who got land have not made proper use of it, and a section was inserted in one of the Land Acts under which the Land Commission could resume a holding if it was not being properly worked or properly attended to. That section, I think, has not been very widely used. In the course of my travels throughout the country I hear complaints about holdings that have not been properly used. In some cases these holdings were given to single men and houses were erected for them on the understanding that they would get married but they have not observed that understanding with the result that the houses are vacant. I think that in such cases the tenants should be notified that, if the conditions are not complied with, resumption will take place forthwith or perhaps within a short time after giving them an opportunity of carrying out the undertaking which they gave to the inspector of the Land Commission when they secured their holdings.

The question of the improvement of estates is one of the matters which I could never fully understand. However I presume, as there is so much money spent on it, we are getting some benefit from it, but it must be in other parts of the country besides Longford and Westmeath. I would like to know from the Minister how many people with holdings in Longford and Westmeath got grants or assistance under the scheme for the improvement of estates.

Mr. Derrig

Not very many. These apply more in the western counties.

General MacEoin

I would like the Minister to know that there are some holdings in the Midlands which are just as badly in need of improvement as some of those which have got assistance in the western counties. If this assistance were provided for holdings in the Midlands, an addition could be made to the houses, with provision for a bathroom. That would be of value to the occupier with the other amenities which I have been speaking of.

I am of opinion, from what the Minister has told us, that the purchase of land by public auction has been a total failure. I feel that there has been no real effort made to use that particular section in the Act. I gathered, from what the Minister has said, that about five holdings have been purchased in that manner and that the area of land involved was about 105 acres. Now that would not make one good farm. Yet we had all the machinery of the Land Commission employed over a year purchasing five holdings by public auction, the total area being 105 acres. I think that any ordinary person could do better than that, but I suppose we will have to give this provision a further trial.

I was glad to hear from the Minister that outstanding arrears have fallen to the figures which he quoted. I think that indicates a considerable improvement in the economic condition of the agricultural community. Of course, the fact that arrears still exist shows that a number of our farmers are not just as well off as some people seem to think.

I wish the Land Commission success in their programme. I ask them to be fair. I am sure they try to be fair in the distribution of land, and I would ask them not to allow themselves to be swayed by political considerations or by the Minister in any way. I know that the Minister, at all times, disclaims any responsibility for that but, at the same time, we know that, over a number of years, a whisper was as good as a minute on a file any day, and maybe better.

Mr. Derrig

If the Deputy knows that, I do not know it. It is an important pronouncement.

General MacEoin

I know thoroughly well—I knew several Ministers for Land—and, though I do not know how it was done, I do know that people got land who were not as well entitled to it as others in the district.

Mr. Beegan

That was alleged against every Party.

General MacEoin

May I say that it was rather peculiar that it happened?

Mr. O'Leary

It is happening to-day as well.

General MacEoin

I am asking the Minister to see that, as far as is humanly possible, it will not happen again. That is as far as I will go. I am not going to say that, if a person is Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael, and is a good applicant, he should not get land. I am not saying that should disqualify him, but I do say that great care should be taken in this matter. When people get land they are getting a very valuable consideration from the State and should appreciate that. They should be made feel that, when they get it, the State, their neighbours and the ratepayers in general are providing them with something in a very big way. That is all I have to say on this Vote.

Mr. M. O'Reilly

Deputy MacEoin suggested very neatly that there was a good deal of political influence used with the Land Commission, especially I suppose when a Fianna Fáil Government was in power. I think it is extremely unfair that such an accusation or statement should be made. Deputies, no matter what Party they belong to, have been listening to that for years. I think I can say that any Deputy who tried to use any influence with, or make suggestions to, the Land Commission found himself up against a stone wall, and that nothing happened. As far as I know the Minister, to a large extent, has just the same power as a Deputy with the Land Commission——

Mr. O'Leary

You are an innocent Deputy.

Mr. M. O'Reilly

——except in one case that I was surprised to fall up against. I do not understand it to this day, and I will have to ask the Minister to clarify the position for me. If what I am about to say is a fact, then there was undoubtedly undue political influence used against certain people. I discovered, quite recently, that four or five tenants in the County Meath had signed agreements to exchange to other holdings which had belonged to Meath people, and that the exchange could not take place because the former Minister prohibited it. These tenants, as I say, had signed the agreements. I thank God I do not know anything about law, but, if there is any fairness at all in law, then in my opinion an action should lie against somebody, possibly against the Land Commission. Those tenants had bad houses, so bad that they needed repair every month or two in order to keep them standing. Having signed these fictitious agreements, these tenants believed that everything was right and that they would be going into their new farms and into good houses on the 1st March last. But that never happened. The houses are down and the land was set lately.

I do not understand what has taken place. Somebody has suggested to me that it is a matter of policy. If it is, then, in my opinion, the sooner that kind of thing stops the better. Meath has been extremely patient as far as migration is concerned. If that sort of thing goes on, and if this mean, frivolous pin-pricking is started, then I am afraid the Land Commission will not be as successful in the County Meath as they have been hitherto. All the migrants who came there were welcomed and got every opportunity. This is a mean low trick to exclude deserving Meath men from getting exchange of a small farm. I hope the thing has been remedied by this.

The next thing I want to say is that I had expected that, with changes of Government and with changed times, we would see something better in the way of Land Commission houses than we see to-day. There is nothing more monotonous than to look at the Land Commission houses and at the same time see alongside them excellent labourers' cottages. All over the County Meath the same thing is happening. Just outside the borders of Dublin you will find that it is less than a year since the Land Commission built a number of houses, while not far from them are excellent labourers' cottages with two doors, neat fences and everything that could be required, they being short only of baths. I think the Land Commission could improve a little on that position.

I admit quite candidly that the Land Commission has an extremely difficult job. Land has gone up greatly in value in recent years. I knew some of the migrants and others who sold farms which were vested in the County Meath and got £1,500 and £1,700 for them. They are fetching that to-day. That is an enormous attraction and it is no wonder that some of these people are anxious for land. It is a good thing to see them anxious for land and I am puzzled at all this talk about the "flight from the land". Every day there are numerous applications for land, while on the other hand you read in the newspapers that someone is bewailing the flight from the land. Apparently some people are anxious to get land and others are flying away from it.

I believe that people are quite anxious to get land and that a number have been turned down by the Land Commission who, if put on land, would certainly make good. I notice that in County Meath and some other counties like it, quite a number of farmers' sons who have gone to agricultural colleges have found that there was no hope for them as they were not eligible to get a farm of land and a lot of them emigrated. That is a loss to the country. I have always thought that if there is any value in the agricultural training they get—and there must be some value in it—and if we want increased production, those are the people we should put on the land in certain districts. The result would be that they would pass around the education they have got and that would induce their neighbours to do what these young men were taught to do and so make for more effective production.

Everything possible should be done to relieve congestion. In North Meath there is quite an amount of congestion. I discussed this on many occasions but nothing ever came of it. I pinned the previous Minister for Lands down to it and he admitted that that was so, that in places there are three acres, two acres and five acres of extremely bad land; and he finished up by saying it was so bad that if the Land Commission bought it no one else would take it. I would like the Minister to make inquiries into that. What I am telling is true. It is a sheer wonder how these people eke out an existence on some of that land. Any migration that took place in County Meath is there for everybody to see. Some of the farms are along the road going into Trim and into other towns. If you want model farms set up by the Department of Agriculture—well, if those farms are examined and inspected I think one must come to the conclusion that they are better model farms than any farm the Department of Agriculture could set up. Those people should get every opportunity. Some of them came from that marly ground, spewy yellow blue clay. The result of the work is to be seen outside Trim. Anyone can see what they did. They are a credit to themselves, to their county and to the whole country. I would ask the Minister especially to look into that whole position.

Mr. Dillon

I take it the Deputy is recommending increased migration into the County Meath?

Mr. M. O'Reilly

Inside the County Meath.

Mr. Dillon

Not into the County Meath?

Mr. M. O'Reilly

We have congests in the county just the same as they have elsewhere and they have to struggle just as hard or harder and they have not been touched. Quite a few of them have made good and it is only reasonable that, where we are so generous as to welcome in migrants, we would get a little opportunity ourselves to see how congestion can be really relieved. I am not saying that we could relieve them all—there are too many of them, though the Land Commission may say there is not—and I would be satisfied if a certain number could get relief.

The next point is that of water, which is a precious commodity in this fairly hot weather, when the rivers are fairly low. In Rathcarne some 50 or 60 houses have been built as a colony near Athboy and I never hit across there without hearing a complaint about water. In the whole lot I think there are only three wells and three pumps and of the three two are continually out of order. As a result, they have to dig water out of the ditches or go miles to draw it. That is nothing unusual there. It is the same thing in quite a number of other places. I know that the Land Commission had some difficulty. Some of their inspectors did not understand how you could have such big fields in the County Meath. Those fellows I know were warned about that on previous occasions. These fields were made extra big because of water difficulties. In order to have access to a well the landlord himself, having sunk several pumps which were all failures or where the water turned out to be unsuitable, did up the ordinary wells and these fields were made big in order that there would be water available. I know that that is a big difficulty. I want to point out to the Minister that it is a very serious thing, especially in dry weather and when you have to try to haul water for live stock. I am not in a position to suggest what should be done about it.

That is all I have to contribute as far as this Vote is concerned. I would like to repeat that the Minister should try to adjust the position regarding these tenants who signed for an exchange of holdings some time last January or February and who, as they had signed for a renewal, let the old houses fall into disrepair. Then they found in March that they could not get them exchanged because of some slimy, rusty old policy on the books of the Land Commission.

Mr. Cafferky

My interest in this Estimate is not as to whether the migrants are Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil but as to how soon the Land Commission will be able to solve this problem of land congestion. Hearing the Minister read his brief, I think I am correct in saying that Deputies who have been here over a period of years have listened to something similar over the years. I must admit that the progress made is very slight indeed. I do not suggest that I am capable of memorising the figures given by the Minister on this occasion, and even if I were I do not intend to do so. I must admit quite frankly, however, looking back over the past 20 years, that in the county that I come from and to which the Minister originally belonged, we cannot boast of a lot of progress having been made in regard to rearrangement or in the easement of congestion as we know it and as it exists at present.

I am sure the Minister has not forgotten the conditions which exist in his native county. I saw him drive through the town of Swinford a few days ago. It is a pity that he did not delay a little and take note of the conditions which prevail in the neighbourhood of Swinford. He would have seen certain conditions which would have been of benefit to him in the preparation of his introductory speech on this Estimate. He drove through the town of Swinford in a highpowered car as if fearing that he might meet a swarm of the congested tenants living in the neighbourhood of that town. He must have felt uneasy until he reached the urban district of Dublin where he now resides. Whatever the Minister's reason for his sudden exit from the town of Swinford, I am sure he is aware that the situation there is such as I have described.

I do not think there is any hope that in this Estimate or in any Estimate which will be presented in the near future we shall reach the solution of the problem. I understand that the Land Commission is not a permanent institution. We hope that, in due course, the purpose of the Land Commission will come to an end. The Land Commission was formed for the purpose of the ending of congestion and the rearrangement of certain estates.

I listened to the speeches made by the Minister, Deputy General MacEoin and Deputy M. O'Reilly The Minister tried to convey to the House that the pool of land available for acquisition is becoming less and less every year. He would like us to believe that land is becoming so scarce for acquisition purposes that the time is not too far distant when no land will be available for acquisition. The Minister is making a big mistake if he thinks that some of us in this House will accept that statement.

The Minister was in the happy position that, for quite a number of years, he did not have to pay anything for transport. I am sure that there are very few of the Twenty-Six Counties which, at one time or another, he has not had the honour of visiting. The Minister is well aware that thousands of acres of land in the Midlands, Leinster, Munster and parts of Connacht have not been utilised to the best advantage and could be utilised if they were acquired and given to people who are only too anxious and willing to utilise and till and cultivate them.

The Minister must be aware that since the end of the war people from other countries have come to this country and purchased large estates which are now being utilised for various experiments, while on the other hand some of the best of our citizens are leaving this country because they have not the means of making a living. Those Irish citizens have to emigrate to the country from whence the people to whom I have referred came and bought estates in this country. I do not want to prevent people from purchasing land in this country if the position is such that we have no congestion in this country. Self-preservation is the first law of nature. We should be concerned about the welfare of our own people before we permit people from abroad to purchase estates in this country. Most of the men who migrate are the sons of very small farmers and they would be only too willing to remain at home and work on the land if they were given an opportunity to do so. Seemingly the Minister and his predecessors are not very interested and have not exhorted their Department to make these estates available to Irish citizens who are only too anxious to work and cultivate them and to produce the essential foodstuffs about which we have heard so much talk for years past.

Deputy General MacEoin spoke about an evil. He mentioned that when a holding of land or an estate is put up for sale an agitation starts immediately. He considers that that is a very bad thing. Might I ask Deputy General MacEoin why the agitation starts? It starts because the Minister and the Department have refused to hear the appeals of the tenants on the estate over a period of years. They have become inactive and disinterested in the appeals and representations made by committees and Deputies representing the tenants living on the estate which is up for sale or public auction. In these circumstances the people feel obliged to take the law into their own hands. Directly or indirectly the Minister and his Department are, in fact, responsible for the agitation because they have failed to acquire those large holdings for the purpose of relieving congestion.

The Minister is mistaken if he thinks that he can convey to some of the Deputies on this side of the House that the pool of land is reducing annually. I desire to bring home to the person responsible for the administration of the Department of Lands the need for a speedy reorganisation in this connection. The Ruttledge estate is just outside the town of Swinford. There is the most extreme congestion in that area. I do not believe that the powers which the Land Commission have at present are adequate for the purpose of dealing with rearrangement and migration. I realise that it would not be popular to advocate that, in the matters of migration and rearrangement, it should, in the final analysis, be left to tenants to migrate or to accept the plan or scheme drawn up by the Land Commission inspectors. No matter what may be said about the liberty of the individual and infringement on the rights of the people, I believe we must be very wary as regards any step we may take and as regards the thin edge of the wedge. However, hardly a day passes that you do not move slightly in that direction and for much less reason than the settling of the situation as we know it in relation to rearrangement and migration. Human nature being what it is, we do not expect that it is possible to satisfy every tenant on an estate. Surely however, we could not agree that one or two tenants should be permitted to prevent the rearranging of an estate which would bring happiness and prosperity to 100 or 150 tenants.

It is ridiculous to argue along these lines. It is ridiculous to expect that legislation should not be introduced or that the various Land Commission Acts should not be made into one comprehensive code to enable the Land Commission to acquire the essential powers with that view in mind. I can see nothing unchristian about that. I can see everything Christian about it. I can see everything good for the people and the nation in securing the essential power which would deal with those tenants who are deliberately obstructing the plans and schemes so often drawn up by the Land Commission— drawn up, in my opinion, without any political influence. I do not believe there is any political influence.

I knew of one particular case during the time of the inter-Party Government in which the Minister for Lands himself was asked to make representations to the Land Commission, and another important person in this Government was also asked to make representations. All the representations a Deputy might make were made but they were turned down by the Land Commission because they were not feasible. They just carried out their duties as Deputies, but the Minister could do nothing about the matter. I do not believe there is political influence.

I am prepared to co-operate with any Government or with any head of the Department of Lands, no matter what label he may wear, if there is the tendency, in any scheme or plan, towards the final arrangement and the ending of this situation as we know it. I feel that next year the Minister may come here again with a similar Estimate to what we have before us but progress will be nil. The Estimate may seem a lot in figures but when related to and compared with the conditions it is intended to remedy it is nil.

It is because of that I beleive there is no hope towards a solution of this problem. Those of us who come from and reside in that area know the difficulties, the disadvantages and the hardships which these people endure, hoping, trusting and looking forward to this House to ease the situation. Yet, no tender hand of mercy is extended towards them. All they get is promises at election time, promises such as they got on this occasion and which they will get on other occasions.

Has the Minister ever been in Midfield? Deputy Moylan, when he occupied the position now occupied by the present Minister, was there, and he told me in the Lobby that he never believed there could be anything like the conditions which existed there. He was horrified at the conditions, and said he got out of it as quickly as he could. He could not believe that conditions could be so appalling.

I know the Land Commission had good intentions, but there again you had the obstruction of the tenants. It is because of that obstruction that I feel the Land Commission and the Minister are bound at some date, if they are really serious about introducing a comprehensive scheme, to do something once and for all, no matter what anybody may say about inroads on the liberty and the freedom of the individual. I think you are doing much greater harm and injury to liberty and the freedom of the individual if you leave such slums, such congestion and such bad arrangements as exist at the present time. As I say, to leave such conditions would be a greater evil than to introduce legislation to ease the position and wipe out these conditions once and for all. Surely no Minister in his senses or no Department would say it was better to leave these slums there and leave these conditions existing than to introduce legislation to remove them. It is no use saying that if we introduce legislation we may be the cause of doing something else. That is ridiculous and idle talk, and is really building up an excuse for the failures of various Governments and various heads of the Department of Lands in the past.

In the parish of Bohola, village of Toorroomen, there are ten or 12 houses untenanted for years and the people who reside there are not allowed to rent the land from the Land Commission. People are brought in from miles outside and given that land instead of allowing the local people to have it.

I believe they are starting in Irishtown at the present time. Irishtown is the district where the Land League was started but it is only now, some 50 or 60 years after the death of Michael Davitt, that they are thinking about easing the conditions there. Does that not clearly prove the failure of the Department of Lands?

I was not a member of this House when the Department of Lands was established. It was established with a view to ending the conditions to which I have referred and when it had done that work there would be no further necessity for it. I myself feel that it was a very big mistake to do away with the Congested Districts Board. I do not know whether the Undeveloped Areas Act will prove successful or not but I think that, sooner or later, the Land Commission and the Minister will have to set up an authority with the specific purpose of ending the congestion such as exists in the West of Ireland.

In the parish of Midfield, near the town of Swinford, a Land Commission house was built, and I remember writing to Deputy Blowick on that occasion telling him it was a waste of State money. I still believe that. That house cost something in the region of £1,000 or £1,300. There is no arable land there. The land there would not be even graded Z, let alone A, B or C. You cannot put a plough on the land or use a mowing machine on it. All you can use is a spade.

The Minister should realise that the day of the spade in rural Ireland is gone. The young boys do not wish to have anything to do with the spade. The hard manual work which was carried out when the Minister was growing up as a boy in Westport and during my own time, which is only 20 years ago, is gone. That day is gone and thanks be to God it is gone for ever. The days when the menfolk and the womenfolk had to go out and cultivate so-called arable land with the spade and shovel are gone.

While I am in agreement with the rearrangement of estates, I am not in agreement with the expenditure of money on estates if the amount of land does not justify the expenditure and if the inspector in charge in the locality is not able to convince the Department that there are nine, ten, 11 or 12 good economic holdings with at least 15 acres of decent quality land. I do not say arable land. I understand there is no arable land in these places.

I feel that the people should move en masse out of these districts, and that the land should be used for afforestation purposes only. During the past five or six years the Land Commission spent thousands of pounds on this land. I am certain that before I have reached the age of 70 there will not be a door open in these districts; all the inhabitants will have gone elsewhere. I am well aware that the young men in those areas to-day are remaining at home only out of respect for their parents. The intention of the young people is to emigrate to England or to America when the old folk die. They have told me that they have no more intention of staying in their present abodes than they have of committing suicide. That is a true picture of the situation in the West of Ireland. In my view, it is a waste of State funds to be reallocating holdings there and for people to be building houses on such holdings. The young men of to-day do not want the slave labour carried on by their forefathers. If they take on the duties of married life and are blessed with a family, they wish to give that family a better standard of life than they enjoyed themselves. They are aware that they cannot realise that hope on their little holdings—holdings where one could not even plant 100 of cabbage without coming in contact with either a rock or a block. They look to America, Australia, New Zealand or South Africa for the realisation of their objective. On the good land of those countries they will be good servants to the State, bring up their families properly and produce essential foodstuff.

Travelling by car from Ballina, by the Swinford-Frenchpark, Longford-Mullingar, Kinnegad route or the Athlone-Kilbeggan route, to Dublin, one sees hundreds of thousands of acres of land without a single house— vast tracts completely uninhabited. Yet the Minister makes certain statements in this House for which he gets co-operation from some Opposition Deputies. These people know deep down in their hearts that there are thousands of acres of land in this country which would provide the young men I have mentioned with a decent livelihood. If they got such land, it would not be necessary to introduce a compulsory tillage Act to make them work. They would produce essential foodstuffs and bring up a family which would be a credit to this State. If some people in this House think that, by the rearrangement of holdings of land, which is really only fit for afforestation purposes, they will achieve our objective, they are mistaken. The sooner they realise that the better it will be for this House and for the country.

While I do not want to delay the House, I feel I should say that it does not matter whether or not the man who migrates to Westmeath shouts "Up Dev". The fact of his getting a holding in Westmeath will relieve the congestion in his native place. It does not matter what his politics are. My duty as an elected representative is to try to bring home to the Minister and to the House the importance of this question. There are various State schemes which cannot be of benefit to the people in the West of Ireland. I have in mind the farm improvements scheme, the land rehabilitation scheme, the grants-in-aid for the erection of out-offices, the grants for the reconstruction of dwelling-houses and other schemes which I cannot bring to memory at the moment. Although the people in the West of Ireland are taxpayers just as the richest man in Dublin is, the richest man in Dublin can avail of the amenities provided by the State, but the poor people in the congested districts cannot benefit by these schemes.

There is no proper method of fencing on the holdings in the congested districts. A turned-over sod is the only indication of a division between one man's plot of oats and another man's plot of potatoes. I know of cases where children have to remain at home from school in order to prevent the cattle from straying from their father's holding into the neighbour's holding. This is all due to the fact that the State has not done its duty in the matter of providing proper fences. If our country was still occupied by the British and if the elected representatives had to sit in Westminster, picture the cries we would raise, and picture how we would humiliate the British Government for not doing their duty in this regard. Yet, after 30 years of native Government, such provision has not been made. On the other hand, look at the improvements that have been carried out in cities such as Limerick and Cork. Magnificient pavements have been provided, and the Dublin Corporation are even allocating money for the hanging of flower-pots on the lamp-posts. Yet money cannot be found for improvements in rural Ireland. After 30 years of native Government, the Minister for Lands finds, when he visits his county of origin, that conditions are nearly as bad there in so far as the division of estates is concerned as they were 30 years ago. These are the matters on which we must examine our consciences. We must ask ourselves what progress we have made along these lines. Do not think for a moment that I am blaming the Minister. A colleague of my own held the office of Minister for Lands for three years and four months, and he made very little progress. The present Minister for Lands held his present office for a number of years in the past and he made very little progress. The Minister for Lands during the inter-Party Government's régime made very little progress. The House should not think for a moment that, if Deputy Blowick occupied the Minister's position now, he would not fall in for the same criticism.

When the Minister is replying, he need not say that I levelled criticism at him as a result of ill-feeling for Fianna Fáil. The Minister would be mistaken if he thought that that was my reason for criticising him. I have spoken thus because I feel it my duty to do so. My duty is to try to bring home to whatever Minister is in power and to each Department that has any connection with the lives of the people —in particular to the Department of Lands—the need for the eradication of the evils I have mentioned, so as to retain the present population in Mayo and in the counties affected.

That is about all I have to say with regard to this Estimate. The increased figure of £38,000 is insignificant. If one had time to study this Estimate, and it would take quite a lot of time to do so, one would find that a big percentage of £1,738,400 is being spent on salaries and so forth. One would have thought that a good deal of that money would be spent on the rearrangement of estates, on the acquisition of land and in the solving of problems which we would like to see solved.

Deputy Seán MacEoin and Deputy O'Reilly referred to the type of houses. I am not going to waste time saying anything about that beyond mentioning that I am in full agreement. If we are going to build Land Commission houses let us build them with all modern amenities. If we are going to build out-offices let us build out-offices. I live on a very small holding of land myself so I know the conditions under which these people live. Feeling, however, that perhaps I was wrong, I have often spoken to young men for the sake of securing information and getting their point of view. You can always learn from others no matter how well you know your job. If you have technical experience you can get further experience through inquiry. I have been asking these young men: "How is it that you will not stay on the land? Why are you going away?" They simply tell you: "There is no future in the little bit of land." I would say: "Is there not a good grant?" And they say: "But look what it costs to build a house." They have to spend £400 or £500 more along with what the State actually gives. Look at the out-offices, built here, there and everywhere. There is a cow-house here and a hen-house there, very badly constructed, completely out of date and not in keeping with modern agriculture from the point of view of dairying or from the point of view of health. I am not concerned only with the dwelling-house but with the type of house for cattle, hay, corn and so on. Many of the young men who left Ireland, and particularly those who worked among the farmers in England and have seen the accommodation and the amenities provided there, know that their own farmyards at home compare very unfavourably with them. When they see the difficulties and the extra labour involved because these amenities are not there they become fed-up. For the first time in their lives they have discovered that they are almost at a standstill when they relate their position to the development and the progress the farmers across the water have made.

If we do build a Land Commission house, we should provide a hayshed and a modern out-office. I do not believe in having two or three rooms in a small farm. Your cattle, your pony, your implements, your cornshed, all these things could be under one roof and the water from that one roof would provide an ample supply for your toilet and bathroom in your new Land Commission house. It would be a great advantage to make these amenities available in the farmyard and the dwelling-house, plus electricity, which is becoming a common thing and spreading rapidly.

It would be a great source of encouragement to the young men and women to settle down on the land if, along with these amenities in the house and in the farmyard, you had a reasonable acreage. The Minister knows that nothing less than 30 acres are sufficient to eke out a livelihood at the present moment. He knows it is fantastic to ask a tenant to build a house, to go to all the expense of reconstruction for the sake of three acres of arable land where you can rear only two cows and a couple of calves. You cannot even keep a pony to plough. It is a waste of money. Something must be done. We must approach the problem differently and we must face up to the situation.

With regard to migration to the Midlands, I appreciate the point of view of Deputies from the Midland counties. I know Deputies from the Midlands are faced with a difficult situation when migrants go to their counties or to their constituencies where, perhaps, there are one or two people who are seeking land themselves. They are asked why they are permitting this to happen. Nevertheless, the purpose of the Land Commission is to settle this question of congestion. People from Westmeath and other counties where arable land exists must appreciate that we have a claim on that land. We have a right to that because, if we are living under the conditions in which we are living in the West of Ireland to-day, it is because we were driven into those conditions hundreds of years ago.

We have been waiting patiently down the centuries hoping for the day to dawn on which a native Government would be able to redress the situation and redeem us from that slumdom into which we were forced. The tragic and sorrowful point is that 30 years of native Government have passed and we are still in the slumdom into which we were forced. The peculiar thing is that Deputies living in those constituencies where the land is available not in acres but in thousands of acres, sometimes stand up in this House and try to force the Minister or Ministers down the years to prevent the migration of tenants in those districts in the West of Ireland. I hope that we will hear a changed note and have a different outlook in that direction. I am in agreement with any Deputy, whether he be of the Fianna Fail Party or the Fine Gael Party who will defend this migration. I would go into any constituency and vindicate him if he was attacked or misrepresented because he welcomed those migrants, whether it be Galway, Sligo, Donegal, Kerry or anywhere else.

I would ask Deputies to give the Minister their support to solve this problem in as short a time as possible. I hope that if I am still here next year and if the Minister is still at the head of his Department he will be able to present a different picture from that which he has presented this afternoon. It is only when you relate this Estimate and the sum provided and the activities we are entitled to assume will take place that we realise how inadequate and paltry a provision is being made. When you relate the provision made to the magnitude of the situation with which we are confronted then you realise that you have no hope of solving the problem in my lifetime or in the lifetime of the youngest Deputy here even if he lives to a very old age. There is very little hope of worth-while progress being made in the light of the programme that is outlined and which was presented by the Minister in the Estimate.

Mr. Cogan

I intend to be brief on this Estimate. During the past four or five years there has been witnessed in this country a great upsurge of effort on the part of our young farmers to improve their methods of farming and to acquire additional knowledge of their particular vocation. That, to my mind, is the most welcome thing that has happened for a long time, because it is through the aspirations and ambitious efforts of our younger farmers that we can hope for eventual progress in agriculture. Because of that it is desirable that the Land Commission should take note of the efforts which those young farmers are making to improve their technical knowledge and skill in agriculture, and the Land Commission should set out deliberately to reward those efforts by apportioning to any young farmer who does not possess a holding of his own a parcel of land and a home as a reward for his efficiency. That may seem to be a revolutionary proposal, but it is not new. It has been mentioned by the many people who have considered agricultural development in this country. It has been mentioned by the Minister for Education recently, and it is about time that serious note was taken of it by the Minister for Lands. He has and will always have at his disposal a considerable amount of land. He has power to acquire land in the open market and by negotiation and agreement, and as a last resort he has power to acquire land by compulsion. We can therefore anticipate that the Land Commission will always be in a position to allocate land to deserving people. In the allocation of that land we must, I think, have regard to something more than the ultimate relief of congestion. We must have regard to the permanent improvement of the agricultural industry. I do not know of any more effective way in which to achieve that permanent improvement other than by rewarding the young men who are engaged in agricultural production and who show themselves to be both diligent and outstandingly efficient in their work.

It is the practice to award scholarships to brilliant and diligent students during their educational course. I think some similar effort should be made to award the young men engaged in agriculture who show themselves to be diligent, ambitious and highly efficient. These awards should be made available both to farmers' sons and to agricultural workers. Any boy who has the advantage of attending agricultural classes and who applies the knowledge he acquires there in the operation of his father's farm or on specially approved farms under the control of the Department of Agriculture should be in a position to obtain a certificate of efficiency enabling him to a grant of land in return for that efficiency. I think that suggestion ought to be considered. It should be clearly understood that the grant of land awarded to such a young man would not be given to him in perpetuity. He would have to serve a term of probation in the running of that land before he would be entitled to become the owner of it. In that way he would become as it were a pioneer of the most efficient type of farming in his district. Farms awarded to such young men might be known as "pilot farms" and would serve as a basis upon which to build a higher output in agricultural production generally. I think some development along that line is long overdue and some Government must tackle the matter as soon as possible.

When a young man goes into business he can look forward, if he is diligent and hard-working, to becoming the owner of a business premises himself in the course of time. If he goes into agriculture as an ordinary employee under present circumstances he can never hope to become the owner of a farm. He enters into a blind-alley occupation and one in which it is difficult for him to improve himself. The young people to whom Deputy Cafferky referred have very little hope of becoming owners of farms capable of supporting them in ordinary decency and comfort. If the suggestion I have made were adopted a young man could in time become the owner of a farm. During the probationary period he would merely be the potential owner and during that period he would have to carry out the conditions implied in the grant of that holding to him. He would have to manage the farm with outstanding efficiency. It would not be sufficient that he should be just as good as the neighbouring farmers in the district. He would have to be a pioneer in modern efficiency methods.

The operation of such a scheme would, of course, demand close cooperation between the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Lands but I have no doubt that any administrative difficulties that might exist would be smoothed over easily enough. The important thing is that in that way the farmers' sons would be offered an opportunity of advancement. In particular, farmers' sons in the congested areas would be offered an opportunity of bettering themselves. That is important because it may take many years before congestion is eventually relieved.

In Britain and in other countries where the tenant-proprietor system does not exist to the same extent as it does here, some of the large proprietors of land encourage landless young men and agricultural workers to become owners of small holdings by granting them ownership of land under lease. The idea is that these potential farmers must prove themselves before they are appointed full owners or are given larger tracts of land to husband. No such system as that obtains here. I think we should alter the position.

Much of the work done by the Land Commission over the last 50 years is tantamount to ploughing the sands. The principal object has been to relieve congestion by establishing economic holdings. Frequently before many years have passed these economic holdings become merged and the newly-established holdings disappear. I have in mind one case of which I have personal experience. The Land Commission divided a large farm into three separate holdings. Houses and out-offices were provided on each of the three. In less than 20 years these holdings have been merged under the ownership of one man. He does not reside in this country. How can that type of expenditure of public money be justified? Can we afford to go on creating holdings which will disappear after some years through the ordinary process of purchase and resale?

Can we not try to do something bigger and more far-reaching? I think we can. We ought to make this effort, particularly now that it is receiving the approval of at least one Minister, to give land as a reward to men who prove themselves highly efficient, on the condition that they continue to be efficient and thus become leaders of agricultural development and progress in their respective areas. That is a scheme which I put before the House and which the Minister ought seriously to consider. He can and must continue the ordinary operations of the Land Commission in regard to the relief of congestion and the elimination of uneconomic holdings. That process must continue. But in my opinion, the results for which those who have advocated that policy have hoped will never be completely realised. Over the last 30 years we have not had the results that we have been hoping for. It is true, of course, that a great many new holdings have been created which have proved satisfactory but the results have not been satisfactory in all cases.

It is important that those who receive a grant of land should have a knowledge of modern progressive methods of agriculture and should be anxious to use such methods. Land that is efficiently worked will produce at least twice as much as land that is worked according to mediocre methods. That is accepted. That being the case, why not offer some incentive to young men to acquire a knowledge of the best technique in modern farming and to put it into operation? I would like to see opportunities being extended not only to the second and third sons of farmers but also to agricultural workers. In particular the agricultural worker's son, who is keen and ambitious and who studies modern methods of farming, should be given an opportunity to become an owner of a small holding after some probationary period.

Mr. O'Leary

The problem of land does not arise in Wexford to the extent that it arises in the West of Ireland. Some years ago I put down a question in connection with White's estate, Ballywalter and Ballinoulart, Gorey, the owner of which resides in America. The lands are in the hands of the auctioneer. This holding is in the Maccamore area. Generally, the land in that area is bad but in this particular case it is fairly good. The farmers in that area take this land by conacre. Deputy Dr. Esmonde and I had a meeting with the farmers in that area. We want to get the Land Commission to take action in the matter because the farmers are badly in need of land for tillage. The Land Commission are not moving in the matter. The fact that the auctioneer maintains that he is in fact the owner, whereas the owner is in America, is creating a grievance among the farmers. The owner resides outside the State. Something should be done with regard to that.

There is another farm, Murphy's farm, at Finchogue, Enniscorthy, lying idle. I put down a question with regard to that some months ago and was told that it would be divided in the near future. It is rumoured that the farm has been given to an old age pensioner. There are young farmers in the area who are very anxious to get land and to work it. If the Land Commission have given this particular farm to an old age pensioner and his wife, the sooner the Land Commission get out of Merrion Street, the better.

I would ask the Minister when he is replying to give me some information with regard to the two matters that I have mentioned. As a Deputy, I am constantly meeting people who are applicants for this land. If this land has been allocated in the manner that it has been suggested it has been allocated, the Minister should examine the matter and should ask the inspector that he sent there to interview applicants to examine his conscience. Some of the applicants for this land are good young farmers who have small holdings and who are anxious to get good land. That land outside Enniscorthy is lying idle while the emphasis here is on production.

We have met the farmers in the Maccamore area and they have asked us to urge the Land Commission to divide that farm. I do not know for how many years acquisition of this land has been held up while the farmers there have to pay high prices to an auctioneer for conacre. That position should not be tolerated. The Minister and the Land Commission should examine this matter.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture (Mr. Beegan)

Listening to the discussion on the Estimate for Lands over a number of years, one would imagine that a number of Deputies would realise the position and would discuss the Estimate for Lands in a more practical manner. Listening to Deputies to-day, one would imagine that we had taken over some large tract of uninhabited territory out of which we could make all the provisions that have been asked for by the various Deputies who look at the problem merely from their own doorstep and do not regard it in a broad, national way, as the Minister for Lands, or any Minister for Lands, must regard it.

I am one of those who, at all times, stated in this House that division of land would never be a solution for the problem of congestion. The solution of an acute problem is quite different from relief of an acute problem. As far as the problem of congestion in the West of Ireland is concerned, land division will never even half solve it.

Deputy Cafferky talked about the desirability of giving 30-acre holdings to congests in the West of Ireland. The number of congests in Donegal, Mayo, Galway and Kerry would be something over 20,000. If each of them was to get 30 acres of arable land which Deputy Cafferky suggested would be an economic holding and nothing less, I wonder where the Land Commission would find the land. Then we had Deputy Cogan and Deputy O'Reilly suggesting that young men who got an agricultural education should be selected and also be given holdings. If you do that as well as dealing with the congestion problem, I wonder where we would find all the land. If you gave it to one of them you would have thousands of others with equal qualifications and there would be no room left for the congests, they would be completely cut out.

It is easy to understand Deputy Cafferky's interest in this matter as he comes from a constituency where the congestion problem is very acute. Anybody going there would find it very difficult to understand how the people exist on the small holdings they have. It was suggested by Deputy MacEoin that migrants from the West did not make good tenants in many instances. I believe that the people who reclaimed patches of bogland in Mayo, Galway, Kerry and elsewhere and who are now growing the finest vegetables you will see anywhere would make very suitable tenants. There is no fear that they would be failures and they have not proved to be failures.

It was also suggested that when the Land Commission gave holdings of land, after a few years you would find three holdings merged into one. More land was divided in my county than in any five counties in the State over a period of 50 years. I can take people to various estates which 50 years ago were a plain and show them that the houses are there still and that 99 per cent. of the families allotted holdings have worked them to the utmost capacity. They are quite prepared and willing, also, to take instruction from the agricultural instructors and to avail of every Government scheme to improve their holdings.

Deputy MacEoin repeated the statement which has been trotted out so often in this House, that there is some undue political influence working with the Land Commission. That accusation has been made against every Government. It was made against the Cumann na nGaedheal Government and against the Fianna Fáil Government and I expect it was also made against the inter-Party Government. Whatever chance there was to use political influence prior to 1933 there is no hope for it now. The Fianna Fáil Government saw to that. Section 6 of the Land Act of 1933 provided that all powers regarding the acquisition and division of land were to be taken out of the Minister's hands.

Mr. O'Higgins

The Ten Commandments did not stop the committing of sin.

Mr. Beegan

That may be so, but I wonder if the Creator of the Ten Commandments had any hand in having them broken. That is the implication in the statements made regarding undue influence.

Mr. O'Leary

The same thing should apply to the rate collectors in Galway.

Mr. Beegan

If you want to bring that into it we can talk a lot on it, but it is not relevant.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

It does not arise on the Estimate.

Mr. Beegan

I think the Land Commission have done a very good job and have always been very careful. Many people supporting Fianna Fáil after the passing of the Land Act of 1933 used to ask: "Why did not the Minister hold on to the authority that he had before?" I do not think that even previous to that there were many instances in which a Minister exercised his authority so far as the selection of allottees of land was concerned. It is only a very foolish person who would interfere in that way. After all, it is not a wise thing to go too far in pressing the claim of any individual at the expense of a number of others, because it very often happens that the individual concerned will let you down. There is not a Deputy who has not had experience of that happening. Deputy Cafferky refuted the statement made by Deputy MacEoin and said that he would not mind if it were Fianna Fáil supporters who were taken out of Mayo. I am sure he was quite sincere in that and that he would be delighted if every Fianna Fáil supporter was taken out of South Mayo and North Mayo because his return at the next election would not be in doubt.

I am glad that there is an increase in the sub-head of the Estimate dealing with improvements. At the same time, I agree with Deputy MacEoin, Deputy O'Reilly and other Deputies that in erecting dwelling-houses in these modern times it would be better to have modern amenities installed rather than at a later stage having another Department of State giving a grant for their provision. The best time to do that is when the house is being erected. I should like to endorse the remarks made by the various Deputies who mentioned that.

I am also very pleased with the statement made by the Minister that 15 new inspectors are being recruited. I could not quite follow his statement, however, that there were 30 vacancies on the 1st April, 1948, I think it was, and that these were, so to say, written off. I wonder if that meant that there would not be any further appointments so far as the 30 vacancies were concerned. If that is so, it was a clear indication that when people were telling us about all they intended to do in connection with the Land Commission there was very little if any meaning in it. So far as my district is concerned, we were deprived of inspectors during the three and a half years of the inter-Party Government. We had three Land Commission inspectors in Ballinasloe. First one was taken away and then another, and we were left with one in an area where there is yet a considerable amount of land to be acquired and of land which has been acquired to be divided. I hope that the East Galway area will get back the inspectors which were taken from there. Perhaps they were taken away in order to do very important work in regard to the rearrangement and vesting of land in the really congested areas. Even if they were taken for that work, their places should have been filled if the people who took them away were sincere as regards continuing the work of land division.

Another matter which was mentioned, and rightly mentioned, by Deputy MacEoin was the question of gratuities to employees. That was introduced in the 1950 Act and a very strong case could be made for it but at the same time, in many respects it could be argued against equally strongly. The compensation which has been offered to some individuals in my district is no compensation at all. I know one man who worked for 28 years on an estate. I think he was a ploughman on that estate, but at any rate he was a foreman labourer and he was offered the sum of £167 10s. Another man who worked for 22 years on the same estate was offered £156. How that compensation can be sufficient in the eyes of the Land Commission is something I cannot understand. I know that, in many instances, employees who were given land made very bad use of it, but they were given permission by the Land Commission to sell that land and they sold at a very enhanced value. Some got as much as £1,800 to £2,000 for their holdings and were called upon to pay back only the amount of the grant they got towards the erection of the house. The difference between £1,500 and £167 or £156 is very great and I do not think it is fair at all to the people who are now penalised because of the section in the 1950 Act which makes provision for it. When compensation is being calculated, they should at least get fair compensation, something that will be adequate reward for the loss of their livelihood, as they certainly have lost their livelihoods through the land being taken over.

Migration is very necessary, and if the Land Commission stand on the rule of getting the big landholder to migrate, I feel that, in very large areas of Galway, Mayo and other counties, congestion will not be solved. I know that it is a good principle to try to get the largest landholder in the place to go, but it is equally a good principle to get large landholders in any part of a county to go and to bring the congests from the congested portion into their holdings. We have not got land enough in Galway, Mayo, Donegal or Kerry to permit that principle to be carried out to any great extent, and consequently I believe that, if we are to have migration, it will still have to be on the colony system, the system of taking from ten to 20 people out of an area and then making the best job possible of providing for the people who remain. That is what has got to be done, and, even though it is costly, I should say that it would be worth while. The people whom I have in mind will make very good tenants, and I believe that the percentage of failures will be very small indeed.

In a number of cases, the Land Commission take over land and take over possession of the land. In the old days, when the Congested Districts Board acquired land in that manner, and when they found it was not possible to have a scheme of allocation prepared within any short time, they sent a representative there to take in stock on what might be termed the "collop" system, by placing a value for six months on whatever type of beast the grazing was sought for. There was so much left on a yearling, a one and a half year old, a two year old and a two and a half year old, but the position is entirely different now. What the Land Commission are doing now, and have done in my area within the past 12 months, is to take over land from a landowner and reset the greater portion of it back to him. In other instances, where they did not relet to the landowner, it was some very big farmer or some person who was half business man, half farmer, who was given the benefit and privilege of getting the entire grazing of that estate. That is not right or proper.

The old procedure followed by the Congested District Board is the procedure that should be followed. If the small farmers who require grazing for even six months of the year get it for that period, from 1st May to 1st November, it will enable them to close some of their own small holdings for meadow. That would be a more proper line to follow than to hand it over to some well-to-do man whom one might term a grazier or rancher. The small people should be given the benefit.

Notice taken that 20 Deputies were not present; House counted, and 20 Deputies being present,

Mr. Beegan

I well appreciate the very great difficulties the Land Commission are confronted with in many respects, and particularly with regard to the whole problem of migration. They find it very difficult in many cases to get people who are willing to migrate, and, even when they have a scheme prepared, they find that the very people who agreed, in the first instance, to migrate refuse to do so. That also retards progress. The migration and congestion problem is a most acute one and a very difficult one. Everyone must admit that as a result of land division the amount of land has contracted very much and is very small now. Consequently, in my opinion, it is nothing short of deception to hold our false hopes to unfortunate congests by telling them that land division will solve their problem. It will not. It will relieve their problem to some extent and the Undeveloped Areas Act will help very considerably taken in addition with land division. Only both together can solve the problem, and it will not be solved in one, two or three years. It will take some time yet, with the best will in the world a much longer period than these people have been led to imagine.

I should like to deal with another matter, one which has two aspects: turbary. The Land Commission have divided estates and taken in migrants from considerable distances, migrants who had pretty valuable turbary plots with their own holdings. They promised them bogs and in some instances pointed out to them the turbary allotments, but there the question remains. The Land Commission promised to develop the bogs and make the necessary roads and drains, but they have been left as they are for 15 years and nothing has been done. Those people have to try to procure turbary from individuals at very high prices even though they are paying annuities for the turbary allotments which were pointed out to them. This should not be allowed to continue. When a bog is to be developed on the division of an estate it should be properly done. It cannot be done in one, two or three years. It would take five years properly to drain any of the bogs in the West of Ireland. They must be opened and drained the first year and then drained the second year. That must continue until the work is properly done, but it is not being done by the Land Commission. There is an instance in my own county where turbary was given to people almost 50 years ago and is now vested with their holdings. The Land Commission say they have no further responsibility, but that means that some other Department will have to spend State money to develop that bog and enable the people to produce turf. Although it would make the work a bit slower and less spectacular from the Land Commission point of view, these things should be carried out in the first instance and not in this piecemeal fashion.

Mr. O'Higgins

It is important that Deputies should appreciate that we are again discussing in 1952 the perennial problem of land settlement in this country and I do not think that the Minister has been able to satisfy the House that any substantial progress has been made in the last 12 months towards its solution. The Minister is in that respect in no unusual position because it is the same story that all Ministers for Lands since the late Paddy Hogan have had to tell the House. I think that sooner or later some effort should be made to overhaul the entire machinery of land division.

By that, of course, I mean the Land Commission. No matter what enthusiasm may have been behind the Land Commission at the commencement of its task, no matter what work may have been done during the last 70 or 80 years, I do not think that it is indicative of any great success for a temporary body—it was established some 80 or 90 years ago—still to be engaged on the solution of the problem of land resettlement. It indicates, to me at any rate, that there is something wrong in the method, in the policy and in the machinery. It may be, of course, as the Parliamentary Secretary seemed to intimate, that the problem is insoluble. That may be so, but if it is surely it is a conclusion which should have been arrived at many years ago. I do not believe that it is insoluble, but I do think that the land division machinery wants a complete overhaul and a considerable shaking up. I know that that view has been expressed by other Deputies from time to time. I know that the view has been held by different Ministers for Lands before they became Ministers, but unfortunately the situation never seems to change. We still complain on the yearly Estimate about delays in the Land Commission, about areas that are unattended to and that nothing appears to be done. The same complaints are renewed year after year. Surely that should cause the Minister some uneasiness as to whether the machinery he has at his disposal is the machinery best suited to the solution of the problem of land settlement.

I do not want to bore Deputies by referring to the many causes of complaint. They have already been far better expressed in this debate by other Deputies. We heard the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance talking about his particular problem in the West as we have also heard Deputy Cafferky. That is a problem, if you like, that remains as a heritage to the country from history. While there are congests to-day in the West of Ireland, the poorest of the poor, owning a few miserable scattered acres there is at the same time available to the Land Commission, owned by them, a quantity of unsettled land which has been for the last 20 years— in one case I know 25 years—year after year let in conacre to the richest landowners in the Midlands. This land is not let for tillage, not let to produce anything, but let to the man with the large purse who can buy it at auction from the Land Commission each year.

Mr. Derrig

Would the Deputy give the name.

Mr. O'Higgins

I will refer to one area at Spink near Abbeyleix into which the Minister can very easily inquire. I think it would be invidious to mention names but that place and others of which I know are continuously let by the Land Commission year after year. The place I mentioned has been the subject of quite a number of parliamentary questions asked by myself, by Deputies Flanagan and Davin and I think probably by Deputy Maher, but there the matter remains. The Land Commission do not mind, they are impervious to criticism, they have heard it all before, they have heard Deputies for the last quarter of a century shouting themselves hoarse in this House about the continual annual lettings of land, delays and all the rest of it. Some of the Deputies have gone; the Land Commission is still there. The Land Commission is impervious to all criticism.

I do think that complaints of this kind should indicate to all sides of the House that there is something seriously wrong with our approach to the entire problem of land resettlement. It is not for me to suggest what should be done but I think that minds should be turned towards finding some better and more efficient method of dealing with land division. I cannot understand, for instance, why it is always necessary to allow a claim for the division of some particular place to remain in the air while young men become old men, while tempers become frayed, while what starts as a peaceful agitation develops over the years into a bloody riot. In my own constituency, at the moment, law-abiding people have to face quite a serious agitation which has grown up as a result of delay by the Land Commission in coming to a decision. I do not think that is fair to the people concerned or fair to anyone that that kind of procrastination should be there. I know well the system dictates caution.

I know well that, over the years, the rule has been to look at a case to-day, bury it, and look at it again in six months' time. Perhaps that kind of caution has prevented mistakes in the past, but it has also led to some very bad situations. I suggest to the Minister that, if he is going to take his position as Minister seriously, some form of Cabinet inquiry should be held into the present method and machinery of land division. I think it should have been done before. If it were done, possibly some better way could be devised. I do not know what staff is available to the Land Commission, but I do know that they started by occupying quite humble quarters in the city. They now occupy one side of a central street in the capital of the State. Building after building is now being acquired by the Land Commission and I suppose they are necessary, to accommodate the vast tomes of paper and files that must be associated with any machinery for land division and land resettlement.

There has been this huge machine of writing reports, preserving files and all the rest of it, right through the years. What is it producing? In this month of July, 1952, are we any nearer to the desired end—the abolition of the Land Commission—than we were this day 12 months ago? I do not believe we are. I believe the problem is just as acute in the West as it was 12 months ago. I think it will be just as acute in 12 months' time as it is now. Under the present system and machinery I do not think that anyone now has a serious policy for land division. The great days, of course, are gone, the days that enabled the Hogan policy to be announced and put into operation. The occasion which rendered it possible has gone. We have not now any large class of landed people in the country, and perhaps the present policy cannot be as imaginative as land division could have been a quarter of a century ago, but do not let us get ourselves into thinking that we can afford to have no policy. I think that is a point of view which seems to be shared by both sides of the House. Deputies seem to think: "Well, the land division machinery is there; it may be old and creaky; it may be a little dust blown, but it is there. We cannot think of any better way of solving the problem of land settlement."

I do not think that is quite enough because arising from congestion, arising from the entire Cromwellian legacy in this country and associated with it, there is the problem of emigration. Emigration has its source and mainspring in congestion. Whether it is a question of leaving rural areas and going into a town or city, or leaving the country altogether, the mainspring of that kind of emigration is the lack of any livelihood in the rural areas. We are told by the Government, and the view is shared by the Opposition, that emigration is one of the big economic problems which face this country. It faces it now, and it has faced it for many years past, and therefore land division is associated with the solution of one of the big economic problems which face this country. Nevertheless, no one seems to be unduly worried about it. Here in this House at the moment there has been less than a quorum for most of the day, so few Deputies have bothered about this Estimate. It is one of the secondary Estimates that face this House from time to time. It is a thing we do not regard as important. Mind you, if we changed our views in that respect and devoted more time and some constructive thought to land division, we would find very quickly that many of the economic ills about which we complain, and which are dealt with by other Ministers, would not be just there. If you could resettle the people of Ireland in frugal comfort on decent holdings, then you would not hear so much about emigration, the cost of living, and many problems of that kind. These problems are there, and will continue to be there so long as there is no punch or policy behind land division.

I wish to be as helpful as I can, and I suggest to the Minister—I hope he will not think me impertinent when I say this—that if he is going to take his job seriously, as I am sure he will, he will have to turn his mind to the consideration of the machinery that is available to him. I do not think that that machinery is adequate. I do not think it has had a chance of being adequate. I know that the staff available to the Land Commission, if properly organised, if they had a clear aim and a clear policy, would be the finest staff available to any Minister in the solution of a difficult problem.

Nowadays, the Land Commission is merely a title-registering body. It is merely a body that registers the interests of the allottee, temporary or otherwise, in a holding, collects the annuity from him and puts it into the Central Fund. The punch is gone completely from the Land Commission. I think that is a very undesirable state of affairs so long as we still have west of the Shannon and, indeed, in my own constituency in the Midlands, serious congestion and a lack of decent holdings.

Now, added to that, may I just repeat again what I have said about conacre lettings by the Land Commission? I regard that as something which is incapable of satisfactory explanation, a view which is, I think, also shared by the Minister, because when I said it the Minister seemed to be rather startled. The fact is that a considerable amount of unsettled land is held by the Land Commission and is available to them, land about which they could not arrive at some satisfactory scheme for settlement in the past, or it may be for other reasons. But such land is available and is held by the Land Commission. It is let by them each year at auction to applicants for land. The people who take these lettings, more often than not are those who can afford to bid the highest price for the letting. The person who can afford to do that is the person with most money available. These yearly lettings by the Land Commission, in fact, benefit those who have no call for assistance from the Land Commission. I think that is something which is incapable of a satisfactory explanation here. I can understand, of course, when an estate is acquired or when some difficulty arises, a letting takes place for one year or two years, but I do suggest to the Minister that a course of conduct should not be established whereby year after year the same parcel of land is let to tenants.

That is one kind of conacre letting which I find it hard to understand. There is also the other case where, for some reason or another, the Land Commission terminates a caretaker's agreement under which the allottee is still merely an allottee and not a tenant of the land. Perhaps he had not lived in the house before it was vested, paid his rent or something of that kind. When a holding, such as that, is taken back it sometimes takes ten years before the Land Commission decide on a new tenant for it. What happens in between is that for 20, 30 or perhaps 40 years, that holding is let each year in conacre, and, again, the claims of deserving applicants for a holding such as that are left unattended to. I think that matters of this kind do suggest to Deputies that the entire machinery should be examined.

Finally, I do not know whether it was Deputy Cogan or some other Deputy who mentioned the giving of a holding as a prize for efficiency to young farmers. That is a matter which the Minister can deal with, but it is not so absurd or extreme as the Parliamentary Secretary might think, because there is this element of sense in it, that land division, or land settlement, is or should be associated with, and interwoven with, agriculture. I would like to see, if it were possible, the Department of Agriculture charged also with land division. I do not think there is any good sense in having on one side of Merrion Street a Department of Agriculture laying down an agricultural policy and pursuing a certain course of action, and, on the other side of the street, the Land Commission that may and does follow a policy that is diametrically opposed to the policy of the Department of Agriculture. Both are, so to speak, dealing with the very backbone of the country—the land, the men who work on it and occupy it. I think there should be a closer connection between the work of these two Departments. I suppose it is not possible to discuss that question in any more detail on this Estimate, but it is certainly a point of view that should be considered if the Minister would, as I am sure he will, take my advice and consider the overhaul of the available machinery for land resettlement.

I was not here when the Minister introduced the Estimate and, therefore, had not the advantage of hearing his speech. I would, however, like to know from him what use has been made by the Land Commission of its statutory power to acquire land in the ordinary property market. That particular power was opposed by some Deputies when it was incorporated in-the Land Act of 1950. There were two points of view about it, and I should like to know from the Minister what has been the experience of the Land Commission in relation to the exercise of that statutory power. Has it been successful? Have they tried it and, if so, how has it worked out in practice? I know that in Laois, in one particular case I have in mind, the Land Commission could have rendered considerable help to a quarter of that county by using that power and they did not feel disposed to use it. I do not know of any case in which it was used in either Laois or Offaly. I would like to know whether it has been used anywhere in the country. It is only by trial that one can settle the argument regarding power of that kind. If the Minister has not already dealt with that point in introducing the Estimate, he might refer to it when he is concluding the debate.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I have only a few words to say—which is a miracle, of course. I realise the Minister has a hard job to try to satisfy everybody regarding land division. Even if he came down from the high-up places, he could not satisfy everybody. He must use the land at his disposal to the best national advantage. There are some things I am still not pleased with the Land Commission about. The time is long overdue when the Land Commission should do something about the roads they make into holdings where there are three or four families placed on the land. They make a kind of road in and then the tenants say they cannot bring in threshing engines or other farm machinery and the milk will not be collected on those roads. You try to get them to adopt the rural improvements scheme. Two or three families will adopt it and will agree with four or five, but then you are back again to the same old circle, when the other fellow says: "I am living on the end of the road and it does not affect me." I would suggest to the Minister that he should have that vexed question reviewed.

Over the years that I have been in public life I have made representations to all the Departments dealing with the road position left by the Land Commission. Even if there were a co-ordinated effort between the various councils and the Land Commission to take over a road after a particular time, we would get somewhere. No later than yesterday I had a deputation of six farmers complaining about a road, and I suppose they have complained about the same road for a long number of years. Some review is long overdue, and I appeal to the Minister to see what can be done to settle that very important question once and for all.

There is another matter. While the Department of Agriculture is doing certain things with reference to water, I would like to see the Land Commission also with money at their disposal to deal with this vexed question, even in the uneconomic holdings. In the summer time, especially, there is a lot of disease amongst cattle, which I attribute to bad water, especially when the rivers and drains are dried up. Water is a very important thing on land, and I would appeal to the Land Commission, where applications are made for the sinking of pumps, and the case is proved that there is no water on those lands, to give grants for that purpose.

The question has been put up to me on a few occasions, even during the reign of the former Minister, that where a holding is vested they cannot do anything with the holding, although the tenant is still paying the rent.

Mr. Derrig

Half the annuity.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I hold that the Land Commission is a very important department in the life of our country and in rural Ireland. It is time we became more rural-minded. Some of the difficulties of the farming community could be eased a good deal if we had funds enough at our disposal to do all these things. I appeal to the Minister to deal with the points I have put up, and see what can be done about them. Farmers have complained to me on a number of occasions about water. I hold, wrongly or rightly, that the Land Commission are the owners of the land, and as such should contribute their share to see that the tenant of that land has water and a proper way into his land.

I do not wish to go into other matters this evening, as I have beaten all the other things nearly white over the years. One plea I do make to the Minister is this. I know that he and the Land Commission must look on land division as a national problem. While each Deputy will consider the problem in his own constituency as a good deal worse than that of any other, the fact remains that each constituency has it own problems. I have mine in County Dublin. In the county there is very little land to be divided, but the Land Commission have succeeded in getting some land there. Recently, there was a big dispute about land division in that particular area. On top of that, strange as it may seem, I have a large number of uneconomic holdings in County Dublin. There is a most peculiar thing about it. They are not being considered favourably by the Land Commission, although certain families to the third generation have lived by conacre farming. These people are not being favourably considered, I understand, because they do not come into the category of uneconomic holders, notwithstanding the fact that for the third generation they have succeeded in working the land by conacre. I do not suggest that my area is worse than any other area, but I put it that I have that uneconomic problem in County Dublin also. I know that in the part of the country from which I came there is a huge problem which the Minister has to deal with there. There is no use in making one area worse than it is and trying to create a slum area in an area where there is a number of uneconomic holdings already. Having made these few points, I want at least to stand by the promise I made at the beginning.

Mr. O'Hara

On this Estimate I will be rather brief.

Notice taken that 20 Deputies were not present; House counted and 20 Deputies being present,

Mr. O'Hara

The greatest problem we have in Mayo is the problem of congestion. That fact will not be denied, I think, by any Deputy in this House. In the village in which I live, the average valuation is approximately £4 10s. to £5. Very recently the present Minister, Deputy Derrig, visited my native parish among other parishes throughout North Mayo and Deputy Burke who has just spoken also visited that area. I must say that I was very glad that they did so, because now the Minister has seen for himself the conditions under which our farmers live in that part of the country.

The problem of congestion exists throughout almost the length and breadth of North Mayo. I should like to impress on the Minister the importance of remedying the situation as soon as possible. Deputy O'Higgins and other Deputies stated in this House that very little has been done throughout the years to improve the lot of the small tenant farmer in Mayo. That statement is quite true. Because of that, there is large-scale emigration from that area. It is the main reason why so many young boys and girls migrate and that situation will continue unless something is done to improve conditions in that area. It will be readily understood that a farmer of £4 or £5 valuation cannot hope to rear a family in reasonable comfort and provide for his wife and himself. The father or some members of the family have to emigrate to Britain. That has been going on down through the years and nothing worth while has been done to remedy the situation. To some extent, but not to a very appreciable extent, the Blowick Act of 1950 improved the position.

Mr. Killilea

It destroyed it.

Mr. O'Hara

Some holdings of land in my district were acquired shortly after the 1950 Act and some of the local farmers—very few, in fact— benefited by the acquisition of those lands and the rearrangement of the holdings. It is a great pity that the work of land acquisition and rearrangement is not speeded up. Until it is speeded up, emigration will continue.

As I have said, both Deputy Burke and the Minister have paid a recent visit to Mayo. They have seen mountainy holdings and fields covered with grass. Poor people must eke out an existence on those mountainy and rocky holdings. I realise that the acquisition of land is rather a big problem, but I agree with those other Deputies who said that the Land Commission have not gone the right way about tackling the problem. The Land Commission officials in Ballina, Swinford, Castlebar and the various other towns are all men of a very fine type. They are good, sensible, sound men who understand their work and the problem which has to be tackled. Somehow or other, however, it seems to me that they do not get the cooperation from the head office of the Land Commission or from the Minister which they should get in order to do their work successfully. That applies not only to the present Minister, but to the other Ministers for Lands whom we have had down through the years. We all know that very little has been done.

The late Deputy Ruttledge and myself visited the Minister and expressed our anxiety in regard to certain areas such as Attymass, Bonniconlon, Glenhest, Achill and Erris among others, with particular reference to Glenhest. Recently, I brought to the attention of the Minister's Department the fact that certain small holdings of land in the area near Newport, County Mayo, were being offered for sale on the open market. It is a shame that people with £500 or £1,000 are permitted to purchase uneconomic holdings in those areas, thus depriving the present congested owners there of any opportunity of enlarging their holdings. In such cases, I think that, as far as possible, the Land Commission should step in and acquire those holdings and carry out a general rearrangement of the plots of land. At present many people return from England with, perhaps, £500 or £1,000, and purchase small-holdings in those areas. They have not a hope of making anything of those small-holdings and, after a few years, they are forced to migrate. They cannot make a living for themselves on the holdings which they purchased and they have deprived their neighbours of an opportunity of benefiting from some enlargement or rearrangement of the plots of land.

I would remind the Minister, in particular, of the Glenhest area and of the Dickens' estate in the Achill area. I appeal to him to try to improve the position of the ordinary tenant-farmer in those areas. We hear a lot about increased tillage. I can safely say that throughout the length and breadth of Ireland there are no people more hard-working than the people in the area which I represent. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Beegan, expressed a similar view. He expressed the view that the people who turned the mountain sides and the bogs into land and who reclaimed it were certainly the type of people that were safe to migrate to the best land of this country. I share that view and I was glad to hear Deputy Beegan, on behalf of the people of the West of Ireland, expressing that view. If you migrate a good type of tenant who is accustomed to working on the land you will certainly find, when he goes to a county like Meath or Westmeath, where the good lands are, that he will be a credit to his native county and a headline to the local farmers of the county of his adoption.

People say there is no political pull in the Land Commission. I share that view. We all know that people are inclined to say hard things when there is a land rearrangement. Maybe one farmer gets only a couple of acres but, perhaps, he does not take into account that that small parcel of land may be better than the land which his neighbour gets. He is ready to suggest that the Minister or some person in the Land Commission favours somebody. I, personally, have the greatest of confidence in the Land Commission officials. One of the difficulties seems to be that we have not enough of the good type of official who was, perhaps, himself reared on an uneconomic holding and who understands the whole problem.

There is another problem to which Deputy Burke also referred, the question of roads. Land has been acquired by the Land Commission down through the years and it is divided among certain tenants. I have in mind a road at a place called Cloongee outside Foxford. When dividing those lands among the tenants in the Cloongee area many years ago, the Land Commission promised to make a road. It is true that they mapped out a road but that is all they did. For a long number of years the people have been struggling to try to get their hay and other crops out of the meadow lands there. Anybody who visits that area in the summer-time can see for himself that the farmer's cart sinks down to the axle when trying to tug the hay out of such places. It is very unfair of the Land Commission to promise to do this road and then slip up on their business. As they had promised to build this road, they should have carried out their promise immediately and done this bit of work for the people who are struggling hard to live. I would now impress upon the Minister the importance of putting this work in hand at an early date.

I have listened to other Deputies referring to the question of the Land Commission having vast areas of land in their possession and auctioning them out every year to certain people. By doing that, the Land Commission are themselves showing very bad example. These lands are in possession of the Land Commission who should now be in a position, after a long number of years, to divide them amongst the tenants of the uneconomic holdings. It is most unfair and most wrong that the Land Commission should set such a headline. We all know this country is in need of food. In the efforts to produce more food, the Land Commission could co-operate in a very big way by allocating the parcels of land to tenants who would put them to good use. It does seem ridiculous that the Land Commission should themselves be the very body to show bad example.

Having disposed of those few points, I want to impress upon the Minister, even at this late hour, the necessity of doing something to relieve the burden on the uneconomic holders in the congested areas. If he does that he will be doing a very good day's work.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Beegan, referred to the Undeveloped Areas Act. When that Act came before the House, I did not try to ridicule it. I stated then that I hoped it would confer certain benefits on these areas, and I renew that hope. If it does it will be a great thing. After all, the land of Ireland is most important, and the farmers of Ireland are the most important section of the community. If the land of Ireland is reclaimed, drained and improved it will show a return at a very early date. It will safeguard this nation in times of war. It will help to make us less dependent on the foreigner.

I would again appeal to the Minister to do what he can to get a bit of a push behind the Land Commission. Let the Minister give the Land Commission a bit of a shaking up. He should make them realise that they have done very little down through the years in order to improve the land of the plain people of Ireland, with particular reference to the people of North Mayo.

Mr. Corry

In the first place, I want to congratulate the Minister for Lands for, apparently, the Opposition have decided that the land of Ireland is quite safe in his hands. Proof of that is to be found in the complete disappearance from the House of the Labour Party, who surely have some interest in the land, the disappearance, with the exception of one lone duck, of the Fine Gael Party, the complete absence of the Clann na Poblachta Party, and the absence of the Clann na Talmhan Party, who are represented by only one Deputy, who has returned to the fold. For once, at any rate, they must have decided that the land of this country will be looked after properly.

Mr. J. Brennan

The elections are over.

Mr. Corry

I want to know, in the first instance, what steps the Land Commission intend to take to end the new plantation and the influx of foreigners who buy large portions of land? A few minutes ago a Clann na Talmhan Deputy spoke of the Blowick Act, but there is one Act by which the late Minister for Lands will be remembered for a long, long time. In my constituency, there is a holding known as the Smith estate, which contains some 500 acres of the best land in East Cork.

It is land from which in other days some hundred families were evicted. That farm was put up for sale. Notification was immediately given to the Land Commission. In fact, the list of the descendants of the original tenants was sent to the Land Commission. Notwithstanding that fact, an Englishman came and purchased that farm. The matter was raised in this House, not merely by one but by the three Deputies for the constituency. Apparently, Deputy Blowick decided that these 500 acres are not even required by the people in the congested areas of Mayo. At any rate, that Englishman has possession ever since. I think it is about time he moved out. There are several other cases. I look with a certain amount of alarm upon the number of very large holdings that are being replanted by the foreigners.

I would like also to bring to the Minister's notice the state of the road on the Rostellon estate. Apparently, the Land Commission think that when they have divided an estate amongst 15 or 16 tenants, they can throw a couple of rocks along a passage and say: "Now you have a road." They think that they have then done their job. I would like to congratulate them on the type of tenant amongst whom they divided up the Rostellon estate. They are hard-working and decent tillage farmers. These unfortunate people have to cart their milk out to the main road for a distance of practically a mile to have it picked up by a creamery lorry. No lorry could travel over the road provided by the Land Commission to this estate. It also is almost impossible for them to get their grain removed, and they have to cart out their beet and heel it on to the side of the road to be picked up later by the beet lorry. The Cork County Council engineer sent an estimate for putting the road in proper repair to the Land Commission. The county council are prepared to take over the road, if the Land Commission put it in any kind of order, but the Land Commission are not prepared to do anything of the kind.

For close on seven years I have been agitating with the Land Commission about the water supply in the Ballinvarrig estate, Youghal. The 12 or 13 tenants in that estate have no water supply. The Land Commission sank a pump there which supplied water for about two months of the year. No attempt has been made by the Land Commission to deepen that pump so that the tenants whom they have put into the estate will be enabled to get a proper supply of water.

The next matter which worries me is the large number of derelict holdings in my constituency. A new problem is being created there by the Land Commission, with malice aforethought, I might nearly say. Some Old I.R.A. men got holdings in my constituency in 1935 and 1936, and they have remained unvested ever since. We all know what happens when an estate is divided. In every branch of industry there are efficient and inefficient men, and the same holds as regards farming. There are some farmers who will work their holdings; they are go ahead men who will make a success of their work, but there are also the ne'er do wells. Is it because a man has worked his holding successfully, extended his business and bought another bit of land that he is to be put out of the holding he got from the Land Commission? I have in mind the case of a man who got some 25 acres from the Land Commission. He worked for a number of years and then bought a holding of 40 acres, and because he went to work on the 40 acres, he was put out of the 25 acres which he got from the Land Commission. There were a number of these holdings, and one of them, of which I have a knowledge, has been lying derelict for the last 23 years. During that period about ten jokers have taken it over and tried their hand at the running of it. However in each case they have cleared out of it after a couple of years. The Land Commission have not got any annuity from this holding for the past 23 years.

On several occasions attempts were made to settle the matter by putting tenants into it. But the Land Commission, relying on the strong hand of the law, said: "No." It is the ratepayers who have to pay the annuities on such holdings, and I would suggest that the time has come for the Land Commission to mend their hand in this respect, particularly in cases where, as I already mentioned, tenants are not being evicted for the non-payment of annuities. A very simple and easy remedy is to vest the holdings and to give the men who have worked them for 16 or 17 years an opportunity of getting some of their own back out of them.

I think it is high time that such matters should be remedied. The present Minister came originally, I understand, from a congested area. I had hopes, when Deputy Blowick from Mayo was Minister for Lands, that he would cock up his ears—as my colleague on the opposite side of the House did a short while ago—when he heard about the Englishman who came to this country and took over 500 acres of land. I had hopes that, in such circumstances, Deputy Blowick would have thought about all the uneconomic holdings in Mayo. The 500 acres I have mentioned could be divided up into a good many economic holdings. However, apparently, there was no budge from Deputy Blowick. It seems to me that the Englishman is more welcome to the land of this country than the uneconomic holder, if we are to judge by the way the Land Commission carry on. Large tracts of fertile land in Limerick are being taken over for exclusive stud farms instead of being used to produce food for our people. It is time this thing stopped. If the Land Commission do not stop it I will introduce a Private Members Bill to put an end to the occupation of the land of this country by aliens. Every decent farm which is up for sale in this country at the present time is bought by an Englishman.

The sale of large farms is not advertised in the Irish newspapers, but it is advertised in the British newspapers. Nobody in this country knows that these farms have been up for sale until it is noticed that Englishmen have taken them over for something called money which, in my opinion, is next door to valueless for that land. I feel that the Land Commission should take steps to end that system immediately. I would not advise the Land Commission to go into competition with them because they know the value of the paper they are dishing out; apparently the people of this country do not.

Mr. Derrig

I think the Deputies who are interested in individual cases of complaint against the Land Commission in respect of the making of roads, provision of water and so on, will pardon me if I explain that I have not the material readily available. Sometimes it is not possible to identify the particular case accurately from the Deputy's remarks and, consequently, it requires some time to examine the case. We have such splendid advocates—like Deputy Corry—here that when they make their case with all their eloquence and fervour, it takes even the Land Commission a certain time to get down to defending themselves against such a strong advocate for his case as Deputy Corry. Of course, he is only one. However, I will look into the individual cases that have been raised and try to give Deputies a reply. If any of them feel that they have been squeezed out of the debate or have not been able to be present, if they communicate with me I will try to give them as full answers by correspondence as I would here in the House.

One of the complaints that has been made is that the Land Commission hold very large areas of land which they, I might almost say, maliciously and with intent persist in holding instead of having them allotted, and the result is that conacre lettings continue for long periods. I doubt if there can be more than a very few cases—and there must be very exceptional reasons for these if land has been continuously in the hands of the commission over a period of years.

When a question was put down here by Deputy Corry on 13th February, I pointed out that the Land Commission had on hands about 25,000 acres of land described as agricultural but of which approximately only 12,000 acres are believed to be arable. They had then about 50,000 acres of bogland, about 6,500 acres of mountain and nearly 8,000 acres of waste. There was, in addition to that, it is true, an amount of land, of old Congested Districts Board estates, but about half that land was also bog, mountain and waste; the half amounting to, roughly, 25,000 acres, which could not be so described has, in fact, been let to tenants who are most likely to become allottees. In this case the land is simply awaiting rearrangement in the manner I described in my opening statement.

Deputy O'Higgins referred to land being held in County Laois. I have tried to identify the particular case that he mentioned but I may say now that in the whole of County Laois the Land Commission, on the 31st December last, had only 422 acres of agricultural land. They had also about 346 acres of bog. Therefore, it does not look as if in County Laois there is very much foundation for the complaint that the Land Commission is holding considerable amounts of land in hand.

With regard to lettings, it is the policy of the Land Commission, as far as possible, to encourage lettings to small-holders and potential allottees. In fact, the Land Commission would prefer that land should be allotted finally and permanently as quickly as possible so as to render the continuance of conacre lettings unnecessary. The reason for that is obvious. It would be better, less costly, have more finality and save everybody trouble in the long run if the land could be allotted as quickly as possible for the people for whom it is finally intended. So long as lettings are made, obviously the persons getting those lettings consider they have certain rights.

As a matter of fact, when claims are being finally determined by the commissioners, there is no proof that by virtue merely of having a letting the conacre tenant is going to have any special claim. He will have to be considered on his merits like the other uneconomic holders or small people in his area.

Early this year we sent out a circular asking the inspectors to do everything possible to see that land was let for tillage and that as far as possible small-holders should be facilitated. That may not be possible in every case. I do not think anyone will deny that no body of officials in this country understand the rural conditions or the requirements of those people who would be taking land under those lettings better than the Land Commission inspectors. Does anybody suggest that the Land Commission inspectors have not a sufficient sense of duty and of responsibility to try to give those people to whom it may mean so much fair play in the lettings they are making? It may not be possible to satisfy them. In fact, in some cases, these people have been rather unreasonable. There is no reason why they should think that because they are dealing with the Land Commission inspector, who happens to be a State official, they can get land at half the price that they would have to pay for it elsewhere. However, generally speaking, I think the Land Commission inspectors try to meet the local demands.

Mr. Cafferky

With regard to land belonging to migrating tenants, would the Minister indicate to his inspectors that the people adjoining those untenanted holdings should get first preference as regards the letting of conacre?

Mr. Derrig

I think they will do that mostly but it would be quite impossible to issue a general instruction. We can tell the Land Commission inspectors what their general policy should be but we have to rely on their discretion and take the local circumstances into account. As the Deputy would be the first to admit, what might be very excellent and very necessary and what we might all agree upon in one particular case might not at all suit in another case. The general line of policy is laid down for the inspectors and it is for them to do the best they can to follow that line. If it should happen that it would not be just or fair, I do not think we could expect them to carry the preference for adjoining tenants to extremes.

Mr. Cafferky

I instanced the case of the townland of Tooroneen in the parish of Bohola where tenants have been unjustly treated over a period of years.

Mr. Derrig

We can examine the question. With regard to the purchase of land in the open market I looked carefully into the points put forward by Deputy O'Hara. It is true that the purchase of land in the open market has been rather limited. As far as my recollection goes, when the Bill was going through in 1950, there was a fairly general expression of the opinion that the power that the Department of Lands was getting to go out and purchase land should be used cautiously and judiciously, and that the Land Commission should not go out on a wholesale campaign to purchase land irrespective of the requirements of others who may in a bona fide way and in furtherance of their ordinary business be potential bidders. The view was, as far as my recollection goes, that the Land Commission should not just go out and buy up land wherever it happened to suit that body to do so irrespective of the needs of other potential purchasers. The amount of money that was set aside has been limited. This is a matter that has given me a good deal of concern. I would like to see more done than has been done, but I realise that we are faced with the position that there may be in these areas, as Deputy O'Hara has said, small people who have come back from working in England and who have enough money to enable them to buy a particular holding and establish themselves upon it. It is a nice question as to how far policy should go in depriving these people of the opportunity of making a deal for themselves.

Wherever the land is available and can be used for local rearrangement schemes, for example, I would be entirely in favour of the commissioners making an offer. That does not mean that we might always be successful in that offer. In a certain number of cases in which offers were made we were not successful. In a small number of cases the commissioners decided they would not proceed. All these factors have to be taken into consideration in individual cases but this matter will receive my careful attention and I promise the House to go into it in order to see whether more can be done.

Deputy Cafferky seemed to suggest that the argument that the pool of land is getting smaller is not a reasonable one. The gross area of land taken over between 1923 and 1950 was 1,113,000 acres. The gross area divided was over 1,000,000 acres between 65,000 allottees. It stands to reason that in a country like this where so much has been done in the past generation and where so much of the land is held by small farmers who are either just below or very near economic level, the amount of land available is getting smaller. That is inevitable.

The question of user and the proper husbandry of the land was raised in reference to allottees who are not making proper use of their holdings. In relation to the remarks of Deputy General MacEoin, I would point out that of 808 migrants, whose holdings were inspected for user, all but 53 were satisfactory.

General MacEoin

That is not bad.

Mr. Derrig

That represents roughly 6½ per cent. Of 3,846 holdings allotted to landless men and ex-employees, 95, or 25 per cent. roughly, were unsatisfactory. Knowing Deputy General MacEoin's interest in national affairs, and presuming that he has a good knowledge of local conditions, being a countryman himself, I am rather surprised that he should suggest that migrants, such as those brought up to the midlands under the group migration and other schemes, might find themselves in debt to the banks, and that they would have to go to the banks to finance their operations. They were of course generously assisted by the State. They received substantial aid and grants, and the Land Commission has had no experience of migrants being unable to work their lands, and no experience of their having any difficulties by reason of lack of finance. Most of these migrants have families, and there is no shortage of family labour. They are industrious and hard-working. I think it would be a revelation to many of us, particularly Deputy General MacEoin, if we knew the financial circumstances of some of these migrants at the present time.

General MacEoin

On a point of explanation, I did not mention the group migrants at all. I merely said "migrants". There are other migrants besides the group migrants, and they did not get financial assistance. I did not mention the Gaeltacht or the group migrants at any stage.

Mr. Derrig

There may be particular cases but, generally speaking, for the reassurance of those who are interested it was the experience of the inspectors who surveyed these colonies that the people who were brought up had succeeded in their enterprise. These reports are available, and I am quite ready to show them to any Deputy who wishes to study them. Even though these surveys were made only a few years after the migrants had arrived in the colonies the inspector had not the slightest doubt that there was no question whatever but that they would be successful, and he gave convincing proof of that. As a result of the improvement in agricultural prices and the prosperity of the industry now and for some years past, I believe that the condition of these people is very much better. I think that is the position even in relation to some of them who came from the very poorest districts in the Irish-speaking areas.

General MacEoin

The Minister is building on a point that I did not make.

Mr. Derrig

With regard to the rate of compensation for employees, this is an excepted matter under the 1950 Land Act which is determined by the commissioners. Section 12, sub-section (2) (n) says: "the determination whether or not a gratuity is to be paid under Section 29 of this Act and if it is to be paid the amount thereof is a matter for determination by the commissioners." Deputies can make representations directly to the commissioners. If any representations are made to me I shall have them transmitted to the commissioners. I should imagine that the question of whether or not a herd or employee was full time, the amount of his remuneration and the length of service would all be factors the Land Commissioners would take into consideration. I know several cases have been brought to their notice by Deputies such as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance who was interested in a case. The Land Commissioners are the final authority in determining the amount of compensation to be paid. All we can do is to make representations to them.

I do not agree, of course, with Deputy MacEoin, that there is any bias on the part of the inspectors towards allottees of strong political affiliations. After many years' experience, inspectors, if they are wise men, are not likely to be caught out and political people also will probably know that for every person who receives land, who displays the usual ingratitude, and might be considered a potential friend, there are about 20 or 100 enemies made among the unsuccessful.

General MacEoin

That is the truth.

Mr. Sweetman

We will all agree about that part of it. There is no doubt about that.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social Welfare (Mr. Kennedy)

Even the fellow who gets it.

Mr. Sweetman

He has got all he is getting, then, and he looks for somebody else from some other place.

General MacEoin

It is time for him to change.

Mr. Derrig

The Land Commission supply gates, gate piers, approach roads and yards. They also sink wells. With regard to the provision of modern amenities, it is satisfactory on occasions like this to know that Deputies are not restricted in any way by considerations of expense or of the cost of the improvements that they would all like. In 1938, the average price of a dwelling-house of the usual plan was £250. In 1949, it was £750; in 1951, it was £850 and in 1952, in was £900, without any of the special amenities that we would all like to see.

General MacEoin

Why cannot the Land Commission, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Local Government co-operate with each other? The Land Commission acts as if there was no grant from the Department of Agriculture for the provision of water or anything else. They just forget all about it and go on by themselves.

Mr. Derrig

I do not know. It is the business of the allottee, if he is getting assistance from the Land Commission, to find out what further assistance he can get from the Department of Agriculture.

General MacEoin

The time when all that should be done is when the house is being built.

Mr. Killilea

It was the people opposite who brought in that legislation.

Mr. Cafferky

Would the Minister say what it is proposed to do in regard to the allocation of virgin bog to the tenants in the townlands of Manin, Ballina, Costelloe, Coogue and Shanvaghra?

Mr. Derrig

I cannot tell the Deputy that offhand.

Mr. Cafferky

It is a burning question in the South Mayo constituency.

Mr. Derrig

I will look into the matter and let the Deputy have a reply.

Deputy Burke and the Parliamentary Secretary, Deputy Beegan, raised the question of the provision of water and other improvements. Deputy Beegan also referred to the question of turbary. As I explained, in my opening statement, the organisation of the Land Commission for the past five or six years has been giving more and more attention to the vesting of tenants. When they are vested, we believe they are "off the books," so to speak, as far as the Land Commission is concerned. After that, it would not be reasonable to expect that we could continue indefinitely giving them the assistance that they are entitled to until vesting is carried through and they become full owners of their holdings. I do not think any Deputy would suggest that that position should be continued indefinitely. We can provide these improvements, water, housing, turbary, and so on, only for unvested tenants. It is up to the tenants themselves, before vesting takes place, to see about these matters. I admit that cases have occurred where there seems to have been a lapse or omission, where housing should have been provided and was not provided but, in the vast majority of cases, the position is well known; the allottees know very well what their rights are and when they are being vested the Land Commission does everything it possibly can to see that the books are ruled clean, so to speak, and that we fulfil all our obligations. There will be individual cases and anomalies but it is impossible to deal with every one of them.

Deputy Cogan raised a very important issue namely, the possibility of providing holdings for young farmers and also for agricultural workers. I should like very much if we had a scheme whereby we could cater for young expert farmers who require State assistance and who are not in a position to finance their own holdings, and agricultural workers of special skill and experience about whom there would be no doubt that, if the assistance were provided, they would make a success of the land that might be allotted to them. The position I am in is that with regard to the relief of the problem of congestion, there is not enough land available. Even if all the other difficulties in regard to the acquisition and division of land could be surmounted, and even if we regarded it purely as an arithmetical question, I fear that there is in fact not enough land to bring all the congests up to a reasonable economic level.

Since this work of land resettlement started under the old Congested Districts Board, it has been agreed all along that if in the Province of Connaught and the congested districts generally you achieve the target of bringing all the uneconomic holders under that valuation up to, say, £10 valuation, you would be doing very well indeed. Very few people in the eastern counties would admit that that could be regarded as an economic holding or that a man could bring up a family on it, but it has been done in thousands of cases. Good families have been reared on such holdings. Members of such families have gone into professions and so on. That was accomplished, as has been pointed out, by very hard work, by slavery, you might call it, but, nevertheless, it has been accomplished.

It is not fair to suggest that there has not been an improvement over all the years. If you have a machine like the Land Commission concentrating the main energy of its headquarters staff and its outdoor staff and the greater part of its expenditure on improvements in these western counties, it is very unreasonable to suggest that there is not something to show. There is housing. There is improvement in the standard of living of the people. Admittedly, there is not enough land available to do everything that we would wish. But within the resources available and with the powers at their disposal, I think it will be agreed that the Land Commission have done everything they possibly could. In fact, we have been blamed for spending too much money on migrants. It was undoubtedly very costly when you had to bring the smaller migrants. Now, with costs piling up, of course the argument would naturally tend rather towards taking the larger migrants. It would mean less cost in the long run. As the Parliamentary Secretary, Deputy Beegan, pointed out, we cannot put on one side the scheme of group migration either. If it were at all feasible, in certain cases nothing less than largescale group migration would solve the problem in some of the very congested areas.

I do not think then that it is possible for us to orientate, if I may use the word, towards a new policy, while we are not, as has been stated by many Deputies, as successful as we would all wish in regard to relieving congestion and dealing with that particular problem. But, if it is possible, and if there are areas being taken over for division, when the local needs and the requirements for migrants are satisfied I certainly fully believe that young farmers or agricultural workers ought to receive consideration. The point is, however, that there is not enough land to deal with the problem of congestion. I must also say honestly and fairly that the instruction is to deal with local small-holders first and after them with migrants and those who are not included in these classes must be satisfied with whatever is left in the local allocation when these classes have been dealt with.

Mr. Sweetman

Could the Minister give us any indication as to what he means by local congests; what distance, for example?

Mr. Derrig

They are supposed to be within one mile actually.

Mr. Sweetman

How is that ascertained, by inspection of the area or by inspection of the valuation books?

Mr. Derrig

By inspection on the spot, I take it.

Mr. Sweetman

There are a couple of cases in Kildare of which I will give the Minister particulars. There must be a Nelsonian eye on some occasions. It is not a political question, but a question of a Nelsonian eye.

Mr. Derrig

Deputy O'Leary raised the question of an old age pensioner getting land. If the old age pensioner were the father or mother of a family, the principle that the Land Commission operate on is that it is the uneconomic holding of the old age pensioner rather than the age of the owner of the holding which is in question. They have to regard it from the point of view of the holding and not the particular person whose name appears as the registered holder.

Mr. O'Hara

Would that particular type of old age pensioner be entitled to land?

Mr. Derrig

They come into the class of uneconomic holders as a rule. The Deputy also asked me about Ballywalter and Ballinoulart—the White estate. The land in this area, which has been under consideration, is described as being heavy and bad in the main. The commissioners considered the case about nine months ago and ruled that a congestion survey should be carried out before they would come to a decision as to whether they should take acquisition proceedings. The report has not yet come in. Deputy Cafferky would be interested to know that I visited the Midfield area. It was a rather hurried visit, but of course I know the area well. I know that the Land Commission are doing their utmost in the Swinford area. Some of these new inspectors will come into that area. It will take some time for them to become familiar with the rearrangement problem as it exists in Mayo and the other western counties but, with the experienced inspectors already there who will guide them in the work, I have no doubt that they will become familiar with it in a comparatively short time. Even apart from the fact that we shall be having these extra inspectors working in these areas, everything possible is being done by the inspectorate at present to concentrate on dealing with these rearrangement schemes.

Deputy O'Reilly complained about local migrants in Meath. I should like to say that over 90 migrants were taken from north-east Meath and about 85,000 acres have actually been divided and allotted to Meath men under the Land Acts since 1923. The commissioners have agreed to reconsider the cases of two local migrants. The cases had been before them on a previous occasion but they are to look into the matter again.

Mr. Cafferky

Does the Minister feel that the approach to this problem as described by me in the course of my speech and the approach of his predecessor are sufficient to bring about the ending of this situation, say, within the next 50 years?

Mr. Derrig

I have suggested to the Deputy that he should look at the arithmetic, the number of these 12,000 holdings which are in urgent need of rearrangement and which would, if we possibly could get extra land, be very badly in need of it in order even to consolidate them as they exist at present, without reference to bringing them up to what might be called an economic standard even as it is known in the West. If the Deputy looks at the amount of land that is available he will see the great difficulty. I should mention to him with regard to the Ruttledge estate that two budget estimates have been approved, and they are with the inspectors to submit resale and rearrangement schemes for both. One budget estimate covers the townlands of Curryaun and Knockranny. There are about 40 holdings, five of which have been dealt with, and it is expected that the balance will be rearranged shortly.

Mr. Cafferky

These tenants are anxious to migrate. Very little of that land is of any use except for afforestation. They must be migrated.

Mr. Derrig

Some work has been done in Cuiltybo. The inspectors will do their utmost. Early in the year there was a conference representing the inspectors who are dealing with the acquisition of land and the setting up of migrants in the eastern part of the country, and who are entrusted with the preparation of schemes and those in the west who are dealing with this problem of rearrangement and trying to eke out a sufficient quantity of land to have in hands to carry through the consolidation of schemes by resuming small-holdings locally. The two sets of inspectors discussed the problem from the different points of view. They have my benediction and encouragement, and I shall do everything I can to assist them in pushing ahead with this problem of rearrangement, of which migration and the acquisition of land in the eastern and midland areas also forms an essential part.

Mr. Sweetman

The Minister referred to the improvement or enlargement of a local congest's holding. Could he tell us this: in considering whether a local congest's holding should or should not be enlarged, is it purely the holding that is considered or is the personnel considered as well? In other words, does the Land Commission base its consideration on their appreciation of whether the man himself will make good or try to solve the geographical holding position?

Mr. Derrig

It is the holding.

Mr. Sweetman

That is what I understood.

Mr. Derrig

It should be only the holding, but even if the holding is extremely small and if the man is employed in some other regular employment—he should be deriving his livelihood from agriculture—of course, if he is to get proper consideration——

Mr. Sweetman

Suppose there is a holding next door to some land which is being acquired by the Land Commission and which is definitely uneconomic. Suppose it happens that the holding is in the possession of a widow. Does the fact that there is not a man to work the holding militate against it, or do you consider trying to make it an economic holding which, at some future date, will be worked by someone?

Mr. Derrig

In my opinion, she is entitled to full consideration. The only point is that, if there are other persons, a choice has to be made between them.

Mr. Sweetman

I was thinking of the local as against a migrant.

Vote put and agreed to.