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Dáil Éireann debate -
Friday, 7 Nov 1952

Vol. 134 No. 9

Agricultural Workers (Weekly Half-Holidays) Bill, 1952—Second Stage.

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time. In promoting this Bill, I am bearing in mind that the Oireachtas, by the Agricultural Workers (Weekly Half-Holidays) Act, 1951, has already approved, in principle, of the granting of a weekly half-holiday to agricultural workers. But, as I have previously stated in this House, the 1951 Act, while it requires agricultural employers to give a half-holiday each week to agricultural workers, was not framed in a sufficiently clear and workable manner. For example, while one provision of the Act gave the Agricultural Wages Board power to prescribe rates of pay for the half-holiday, another section actually laid down how rates of pay for the half-holiday are to be computed. Moreover, the Act conferred no power on the Agricultural Wages Board in regard to its enforcement.

When I decided some time ago that the Wages Board ought to be made responsible for the administration of the half-holiday legislation for agricultural workers, I examined whether it would be possible to amend the 1951 Act, but I came to the conclusion that to put it on a proper footing would require so many amendments that it would be far more convenient for everybody to repeal it entirely and replace it by a new Act.

In this Bill the most important new provision is the provision similar to those already contained in the Agricultural Wages Acts and the Agricultural Workers (Holidays) Act, 1950, whereby officers of the Wages Board may take proceedings on behalf of a worker who has been underpaid, or not paid at all, in respect of work done on the half-day. I have also provided that in fixing rates of minimum wages the board shall act with due regard to this Bill.

There is another provision in the Bill which I would like to mention specifically, and that is the requirement that, before a worker is entitled to the half-holiday, he shall have completed 45 hours' work in the previous five week-days. I think it is only fair that, before asking a farmer to give a worker a half-day, that worker should normally have completed his full quota of work on the previous five days.

I am retaining in the new Bill the principle that the worker may, if he wishes and with his employer's consent, remain at work on the half-day, provided the employer pays him for it at a rate not less than a rate to be prescribed by the board.

I have also included in the Bill a provision that, where the day on which the worker is to be allowed a half-holiday falls on a day on which he takes a day's annual holidays under the Agricultural Workers (Holidays) Act, 1950, or on a Church holiday or public holiday allowed to him by arrangement with his employer, or on a day on which he is otherwise absent from work, he will not be entitled to a half-day in that week.

I have also included in the Bill a provision which will be for the benefit of workers, such as dairy workers who normally would have completed more than half their day's work before 1 p.m. Under this provision a worker who has completed five hours' work on the morning of the day on which he is to get his half-holiday will then be entitled to the half-holiday without waiting until 1 p.m.

I have also provided that this Bill when enacted will not be brought into operation until a day which I shall appoint by Order. It is necessary to do this, because the Agricultural Wages Board will require a certain amount of time before they can prescribe minimum rates of payment for work done on the half-day, and make any other necessary arrangements in connection with the operation of this Act. From the day when I bring this Act into operation, the Agricultural Workers (Weekly Half-Holidays) Act, 1951, will stand repealed. I commend this Bill to the House.

I regret, first of all, that the Minister did not give an indication of how many people this Bill will affect. We should like to have got an authoritative estimation of the number of agricultural workers who will be affected by this Bill. The Second Reading of this Bill this morning affords a very good example of the changes which time brings. Those of us who were in the House at the time have a very clear recollection of what happened when the Bill which is now being repealed, that is the Act of 1951, was before it. We have a very good recollection of what occurred on the occasion of the passage of that Bill through the House.

That Bill sought to establish, for the first time in this country, the right for agricultural workers to be treated in the same manner as all other workers in the Republic, and to be allowed the very simple amenity of a half-holiday in the week. The working week stood at 54 hours: nine hours per day and six days per week. Reasonable people and reasonable employers of agricultural workers in Dublin, Meath and other counties had long agreed that just as industrial workers had already got entitlements inclusive of a half-day the lowly agricultural worker was also so entitled. But we could not get that accepted here in Dáil Éireann nor could we get it accepted by the Fianna Fáil Party.

We passed it for you.

It will be remembered that when the Act of 1951 went to a vote following the Second Reading the Fianna Fáil Party abstained from voting in the belief that the free vote of the House which was permitted on the Government side would defeat the Bill. In fact the reverse happened. Those of us who were associated with the promotion of that measure and who had been associated over a considerable number of years with the struggle to establish for farm workers a weekly half-holiday had the satisfaction of seeing written into the Statute Book their right to this very simple amenity.

It may seem to some Deputies, it may seem to many people outside this House, that this Bill is of relatively little moment or that the question of a half-holiday is not one which agitates the minds of the men who have to work for wages on the land, but any person who takes that view is merely betraying his ignorance of the minds of the rural workers in this country. I have been associated with rural workers over a fair number of years and I have been associated with men who spent their lifetime in the service of rural workers—I refer to men such as the late James Larkin—and I and all others who sought at any time to improve the lot of agricultural workers were always agreed that the agricultural labourer felt strongly that he should get on some day in the week, preferably on Saturday like other workers, the right to a short day when he could go home to his family or go to the village or town if he wished to do the shopping for his family just as all other employees in the country have for some time been entitled to do-though we in this country were very tardy in ensuring them that right by law.

Of course the Act of 1951 was sabotaged. Whenever a meeting took place where there existed any degree of anti-Labour political animosity in this country we had the lay lawyers explaining to agricultural labourers that of course, the Act of 1951 was not really in operation at all, that it had no force and that until it was amended the agricultural labourer was not entitled to a half-holiday. We had the interested saboteurs at work. What prompted them it is hard for me to know. I can never understand the mentality of such people no matter to what Party they belong—and I do not specify that they belong to any particular Party. I cannot understand the mentality of the people who, although they know or must have known that the right of the farm labourer to a half-holiday was, undeniably, and is at the moment undeniably, written into the law of this country, nevertheless by whispering, by calling meetings at various places, by writing letters to the Sunday newspapers, strove—and succeeded to some extent—to create in the minds of agricultural labourers the illusion that they were not entitled to this half-holiday.

The Minister has said that this Bill will make certain alterations in the law. I am glad to see that he has admitted the fact that the principle of the half-holiday is already enshrined in law by virtue of the Act of 1951. It is as well to remember when the Minister refers to what are alleged to be defects in that Act that it was a Private Members' Bill and was not promoted by the Government of the day. I have already described the manner of its passing. I have already described the miscalculation and bad tactics of the Fianna Fáil Party who sat on the ditch secure in the knowledge—as they thought— that the inter-Party group would defeat the Bill themselves. It is as well to place on the records of this House the knowledge that the sponsors of a Private Members' Bill have, under the Standing Orders of the House, no authority to include any section or subsection which would entail the expenditure of State moneys. By virtue of that regulation, the sponsors of that Bill were prevented from including any clause imposing upon the Agricultural Wages Board the enforcement of the Bill. It will be noted that no amendment was then put down on the Order Paper by those who now seek to perfect the Bill.

Mr. Walsh

It was in Select Committee, was it not?

Yes, the Minister was a member.

Mr. Walsh

That is what I thought.

The Minister must share to some extent in responsibility for the Act of 1951 if there were defects in it.

Mr. Walsh

Yes, but I am not responsible for its non-enforcement. That was a matter for the Coalition.

Such an amendment would have been out of order, as the Deputy knows.

We have the records of the Select Committee and I am glad that the Minister reminded me about that because it had slipped my memory.

There are certain advantages in the present Bill and certain disadvantages. These are matters of detail with which I propose to deal by submitting amendments on the Committee Stage. I do want to say that in so far as the present Bill cements the already existing right of the agricultural workers to a half-holiday I welcome it, but in so far as it is a Bill which imposes qualifications which were not imposed under the Act of 1951, it must be condemned. I daresay that every piece of legislation that comes into this House is improved upon with the passage of time. It is inevitable that that should be so. I was amazed at the difficulty which we of the Labour Party had when this sponsored Bill was propelled through the House by that Party.

No matter what smoke-screen may be thrown out now, nobody will be deluded as to why this measure has been brought in. I do not like to accuse the Minister of any ulterior motive in repealing the Act of 1951. I accept what he says, that it is easier to repeal it than improve or amend it. However, no matter what attempt may be made to mislead agricultural labourers, they will not be misled. Very often the mistake is made by persons who regard themselves as highly intelligent of thinking that agricultural workers, because they are at the bottom of the wages scale and because their living conditions are at the lowest level, are thereby inferior in intelligence to other types of people, whereas of course the exact opposite is the case. The agricultural workers by reason of their occupation and of the relatively isolated nature of their work are a much more mentally well developed section of the working people than any others in the country and much more observant and keen and can see through subterfuge and hypocrisy more quickly than any other group can. For that reason most of them support the Labour Party.

I wanted to refer to that because there is a popular misconception about agricultural workers in that regard. I hope the Minister will not fall a victim to that misconception, that when he goes back to his constituency in the future and is talking of the achievements of the present Government and seeking votes in Mullinavat or Kilmacow or some other places of that kind he will not have the temerity to include in that list the half-holiday for agricultural workers.

Mr. Walsh

Except to say that I cleaned up the mess.

He will leave it to the agricultural workers.

He can do that, but whether he leaves it or not, their minds will be brought to bear on it and they will have no doubt about it. When the Minister is telling them that he cleaned up the mess, I hope he will also tell them that he was one of the cooks who made the mess in the Select Committee.

Mr. Walsh

Certainly not.

As I say, we welcome this Bill for what is good in it, and as to the defects which are apparent in it, we shall take such steps as are open to us to improve the Bill on the Committee Stage.

I congratulate the Minister on having brought in the Bill.

We cannot hear the Deputy over here.

When it becomes an Act, it will have the force of law and it will be capable of being operated. It will not be like the last half-baked Bill which was brought in here and which was found to be defective in law as Deputy Dunne knows.

That Bill was not found to be defective in law.

It was found to be defective in law by the Judiciary and was incapable of being operated.

That is wrong.

Deputy Dunne is not so innocent as he pretends. When he brought in the original Bill he was then a member of a Party which had three Ministers and one Parliamentary Secretary in the Government, and he boasted often in the country of the influence of the Labour Party on the Coalition Government. Deputy Dunne and his colleagues were not without knowing at the time that without being enforced by the Agricultural Wages Board the Bill was not worth the paper it was written on.

He charges the Fianna Fáil Party with not supporting the original Bill. The Fianna Fáil Party, through their spokesmen at the time, the present Minister for Local Government and the present Minister for Agriculture, explained to the House that, as it was an important measure which affected the lives and interests of a large section of the community, the Fianna Fáil Party felt that the responsible Minister for Agriculture and the responsible Government spokesmen, should take responsibility for the Bill. We said that until the Minister for Agriculture or the Government spokesman took responsibility for the Bill, or until the House decided otherwise, we were taking no action on the matter.

Almost half the population of the country were being seriously affected in one way or another by that Bill. The agricultural workers were to get a half-day. Nobody on this side of the House ever denied their right to that. The farmers were to have put on them a severe extra charge. They were to be seriously inconvenienced in many respects because of the nature of their calling. It must be appreciated that under this Bill which the Minister has introduced, the farmers will be seriously inconvenienced in very many ways. That is not saying that the agricultural workers are not deserving of a half-day. If it can be so arranged and worked into the economy of agriculture, as the workers on the roads and all other types of manual workers have a half-day, I do not see any reason why the agricultural workers should be denied it.

The Fianna Fáil attitude when Deputy Dunne introduced the 1951 Bill was that it should be the responsibility of the Government because the lives and interests of more than half the population were being seriously affected. Their attitude was that the Government of the day should take responsibility for measures which affect the lives and interests of the community whether adversely or otherwise. That has always been our attitude. We have always been prepared to take responsibility.

Why did you not vote for the Bill then?

We helped Deputy Dunne, as he will admit, to improve the Bill. At the time, Deputy Dunne was aware that the Bill would be a failure. He knew quite well when it was going through the Special Committee that if it could not be operated by the Agricultural Wages Board or some similar body on behalf of the Government the Bill would be a failure. But with two Labour Ministers in that Government he failed to get sufficient influence with that Government, and the Labour Party fell down and let the agricultural workers down. They were trying to pretend to them that they were going to do them a service by passing that Bill through the Dáil when they knew it was not worth the paper on which it was written, and the courts in this country decided in that respect.

Which courts? Deputy Allen's constituency only.

And in other constituencies also, in the constituency of Dublin. Deputy Dunne and his organisation did not challenge that decision although they had a way of doing it.

Suppose we talk about the present Bill.

Or suppose we ask Deputy Allen is it only now the agricultural workers have these rights? Why have they not got these concessions since 1932?

Let Deputy Allen come to the present Bill.

That is a brilliant idea.

It would be no harm to hear why it is only now they are taking interest.

We have no doubt that Deputy Blowick's influence in a former Government prevented the proper provisions being put into that Bill in 1951.

I voted for the Bill, what the Deputy had not the courage to do.

Let the Deputy go back over his Labour colleagues in that Government.

Deputy Allen will please come to the present Bill.

As the Minister for Agriculture pointed out, he has recommended the present Bill to the House with the full authority of the Government. I have no doubt that given goodwill it will be successful. I want to suggest to every section of the House that when this Bill becomes law it will need an amount of goodwill from both workers and farmers to bring it fully into operation. I would, therefore, appeal to both sections of that great agricultural community to accept it in the spirit in which it is introduced here and that is, for the betterment of the agricultural workers who have down through the years and down through the centuries been part and parcel of the great agricultural community and the great agricultural industry. We have no doubt that when this Bill comes fully into operation it will be for the ultimate benefit of the agricultural community, both farmers and workers.

The Second Reading of a Bill in this House is confined to considerations of the principle that underlies the Bill. The principle that underlies this Bill has already been accepted by the House. So far as the Fine Gael Party is concerned, therefore, we feel that the principle having been accepted by the House, regardless of what anyone may have done then, it is the duty of the House now to clear up certain voids and certain difficulties that arose in the working of the previous Act. Deputy Allen seems to think the previous Act was defective in law. I do not think it was and I do not think any courts of competent jurisdiction found it was defective in law. But it was not adequately capable of operation. If we want to cast that around as criticism, then I think every Minister who has ever been in any Government will be subject to the criticism that he brought in a Bill at some stage or other that was not adequately capable of operation and for that reason had to bring in an amending Bill.

I do not think, therefore, that that of itself is any valid point for anybody to throw across the House from one side or the other. When it comes to Committee Stage there will be certain questions of detail in the working out of the principle upon which no doubt our Party will have certain views to put forward. But so far as the principle of the Bill is concerned it is merely carrying through a principle accepted previously, putting it into operative effect, and so far as we are concerned the Second Reading must be supported.

My real objection to the present Bill is the long delay between the time when the Minister announced that he would amend the Bill and the actual taking of the Second Stage. I would like seriously to question the motive of the Minister in the long delay. When an amending Bill was introduced here by Deputy Dunne in February of last year the Minister promised and satisfied a majority in the House that he himself would amend the Bill. That was February last and this is November, that is a period of roughly eight or nine months during which there is still the alleged confusion about the granting of a half-day to the agricultural workers of this country. Now he glibly announces that whilst the Bill may be passed this week or next week he must give the Agricultural Wages Board time enough to gear up their machinery to operate this particular Bill. I presume that will be another long delay, possibly another three or four months.

Let it be known to the agricultural workers that, despite what Deputy Allen says, if this is the perfect legislation to grant a half-day to the agricultural workers, it has been dragged out of this House. I do not except one side any more than the other: it has been dragged out of the House by the members of the Labour Party. It is very dishonest of Deputy Allen or any other Deputy from any side of the House who would allege that it was the intention of the Labour Party and has been the purpose of the Labour Party to try to cod the agricultural labourers over the years. I do not think anybody could question the motives of the organisation of which Deputy Dunne is the secretary. If the Act was defective the Minister and the members of the Fianna Fáil Party, the Fine Gael Party, in fact every member in this House, must take responsibility for it as well. The Minister made one clear admission and I am glad he made that admission and that was, that in the last Bill the principle of granting a half-day to agricultural workers was accepted. Since 1922 it had never been accepted until Deputy Dunne and, I think, Deputy Desmond and Deputy Kyne introduced the Act which the Minister in this Bill now proposes to scrap.

What is the real attitude of Fianna Fáil towards granting a half-day to agricultural workers? When I came into this House first I remember a motion or a Private Member's Bill being tabled by members of the Labour Party to grant a half-day to agricultural workers. My fellow Deputy, Deputy Dr. Ryan, who was Minister for Agriculture, spent a solid hour telling us that the agricultural workers could not get a half-day and that view was subscribed to by every single member of the Fianna Fáil Party at that time. The Minister may have a different view on it. I do not know. He was not in the House at that particular time when we all knew the attitude of Fianna Fáil towards granting a half-day to agricultural workers. Like Deputy Corry, a lot of other rural members in the Fianna Fáil Party said the agricultural workers should get the sun, moon and stars. They would love to give them two days off in the week but they never attempted to give them anything.

They have done it now.

They tried to play off, and always have played off, the farmer against the farm workers. "We would like to give it to the farm labourer but it would ruin the industry." It was deplorable to hear the excuses given on one occasion by the then Minister for Agriculture, Deputy Dr. Ryan, for not granting the agricultural workers of this country a half-day. Now we have Deputy Allen trying to give the Fianna Fáil Government and the Fianna Fáil Minister the full credit for the granting of the half-day. Did we not see the Fianna Fáil Party, headed by Deputy Dr. Ryan as he then was, Deputy Lemass, and the present Taoiseach sitting there, as Deputy Dunne said, waiting to see if the inter-Party group at the time would themselves defeat the Bill? When they saw there was no chance of that they voted on the Fifth Stage for the passage of the Bill.

It was a sad reflection by a farmer's representative to say that if the Bill were not operated by the Agricultural Wages Board it would be ineffective. Does that mean that we have to invoke the aid of some State Department or some such machinery as the Agricultural Wages Board to force the farmers of Wexford or of any other part of this country to give what has been laid down by law, a half-day to their workers? Is that what some of the farmers traded on in respect of the last Bill, that they knew that the worker who was not given a half-day could not, because he had not the money, invoke the District Court or the Circuit Court or some higher court? If that was the only defect in the last Bill, it was a very small defect.

No matter what lip service may be paid to the agricultural workers, we know the record of a majority of the members of this House. The weekly half-holiday was given grudgingly. I think it was the Minister for Defence, who said at the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis that nobody in the last Government raised his voice for the Old I.R.A., that that was done only by members of the Fianna Fáil Party. It would be true to say that the only people in this House who have ever spoken, and spoken fearlessly, without having regard to support from a certain section, for the agricultural workers, have been the members of the Labour Party.

The Agricultural Workers (Weekly Half-Holiday) Bill that was introduced in 1950 was given grudgingly. All sorts of calculations were suggested from one side or another. People talk about the flight from the land and how to make rural life more attractive. We deplore emigration; we deplore the drift to the towns; we deplore the fact that Dublin is becoming over-populated. Reference is made to parish halls, cinemas, wireless broadcasting. Every Deputy knows in his heart that the only way to keep the agricultural worker in rural Ireland is to pay him and to give him good conditions. Nobody would suggest that even at the present the agricultural worker enjoys good wages or good conditions but we have this body, the Agricultural Wages Board, on whom the responsibility and the onus is thrown.

The Minister, maybe, on some festive occasion when he becomes bountiful and generous, suggests that the agricultural labourer should have— or did he say, will have—a rate of wages comparable with that paid to the builder's labourer.

Ten shillings more.

I do not see anything being done about that.

Rates of wages do not come into this Bill.

We are talking about conditions of agricultural labourers generally.

You cannot discuss wages and conditions of employment.

The Minister will tell us when winding up when he is going to give £7 a week in Dublin to farm labourers?

Is it not a fact that if a Bill to give a half-day to farm workers had not been introduced by Deputies Dunne, Desmond and Kyne, we would not at this stage be discussing the present Bill?

Mr. Walsh

What reason have you for saying that?

It has been forced out of the Fianna Fáil Party.

Mr. Walsh

Nothing has been forced out.

We have but to look at their attitude towards such a measure a few short years ago.

Mr. Walsh

By our votes we made it better than the Bill as introduced.

I am talking about a motion or Private Members' Bill that was introduced about a year before Fianna Fáil left office, in 1948. I think it was about the year 1946, when Deputy Dr. Ryan, sitting where the Minister now sits, spent a solid hour telling the House why farmers could not or should not give a half-day to their workers. Do members of the Fianna Fáil Party remember that? Does the present Minister remember that? It is for that reason that I suggest that if the Labour Party had not got this House to accept the principle of granting a half-holiday to farm workers, the Fianna Fáil Party would not be displaying the alleged interest that they are displaying now.

This Bill is coming into the House straightforwardly, not being backed in as the previous Bill was backed in by the inter-Party Government that operated at that time.

With your support.

It is difficult to know whether it was incompetence, stupidity or political cleverness that was responsible for the fiasco that the previous Bill was. It will be recalled that the Bill was introduced by back-benchers of the Labour Party. There were two or three Ministers in the then Government who flatly refused to bring in that Bill.

Deputy Cogan was anxious for it?

Oh, yes.

The Bill was violently opposed by the leading members of the inter-Party Government.

The Deputy had better specify.

An opinion has been very forcibly expressed in a prominent newspaper in this city, the Dublin Leader, which claims that the key-men of the inter-Party Government were Costello, McGilligan, Dillon.

Who wrote that article?

These key-men did not identify themselves with the Bill, and one of them went all out to kill it and would have succeeded in the final analysis but that the then Opposition Party supported the Bill on the Fifth Stage.

It is admitted by Deputy Mac Fheórais that this Bill sets out to clear up the mess—he did not use the word "mess," but he did say that it sets out to clear up the errors in the first Bill. Whether those errors were deliberate or inadvertent does not matter much now. We hope this legislation will work.

This Bill continues the provision incorporated in the last Bill on the Committee Stage but which did not appear in the Bill as introduced, that the worker can opt to work during the half-day if he so desires and if his employer so desires and can be paid at the standard rate of wages. I opposed very strongly the compulsory half-holiday as embodied in the Bill as introduced in 1951 because I thought it was wrong to compel a man to remain idle for a half-day on Saturday without any proviso by which he could work if he so desired and be paid for it. That defect was remedied on the Committee Stage and on the Fifth Stage I indicated, therefore, that I would not call for a division on the Bill. Nevertheless, the Chief Whip of the Labour Government, Deputy Davin's Government, came in and challenged a division.

It is no harm to laugh? It is not an interruption to laugh?

It is a good thing, now that the whole thing is over, to laugh at the antics of the various Parties represented in the then Government, who conspired together to cod the farmers and the agricultural workers— by giving the workers a half-holiday which could not be enforced and by telling the farmers they would not have to grant it. They were going a little bit of the way with everyone and fooling them all for a little while, but it did not work in the end. On the Fifth Stage I said I would not force a division in view of the reasonable attitude of the Labour Party on the Committee Stage, but Deputy Sweetman forced a division and the Bill would have been defeated but for the intervention of the Fianna Fáil Party.

We are now clearing up the bad mess that was caused——

Who is "we?" You are only one man, according to yourself.

The House. I can claim to be a member of the House and this Bill is being accepted unanimously, even by Deputy Sweetman, to rectify the impossible position created, deliberately or unwittingly, by the former Government. This half-holiday question has been causing considerable confusion amongst farmers and workers. It is being settled now in a reasonable way. The farmers are accepting that it is inevitable. It means an increase in his outlay and it is coming along with many other increases. I hope the community will also accept that the farmer's costs of production are being increased under this Bill and that there is an obligation on the community, generally, to see that the farmer is allowed some small margin of profit on his produce to enable him to carry on. If there is a demand by him for better prices, arising out of these increases, I am sure they will be sympathetically considered by all Parties, including the Labour Party.

This Bill is finding a reasonable basis of agreement between all sections. Members of the Labour Party have said that the only demands and the only real steps for the improvement of the conditions of the workers were taken by the Labour Party and by them alone. There is no truth whatever in that suggestion. One of the most important pieces of legislation for the improvement of the conditions of the agricultural workers was the Agricultural Wages Act of 1936, which set up minimum standards of living in agriculture. Though farmers might resent it and feel annoyed at its provisions, I think that, in the main, it was beneficial legislation, as it put a floor under the agricultural wages.

It put the agricultural workers on the floor.

They would be much further down below the floor if we had a reversion to the conditions prevailing in 1932, to which Deputy Blowick wishes to refer—the time when Deputy Blowick's present leaders were declaring it was not for them to solve the unemployment problem.

We cannot go back indefinitely.

He must be allowed to deal with Deputy Dillon every time he talks.

The Chair will endeavour to deal with that. Deputy Cogan may not go back into agricultural history indefinitely. There is a Bill before us with a proposal in it and the Deputy should deal with that.

Before you took the Chair, Deputy Blowick referred back to 1932 and it is no harm to remind him of the conditions that prevailed then amongst both farmers and agricultural workers.

I do not think Deputy Blowick spoke on this measure at all.

He did—by way of interruption.

The Deputy should keep to the terms of this measure.

The Bill provides that the worker may work for the full six days if the employer so desires. That is a fundamental improvement on the first Bill as introduced by the Labour Party. There is also an important improvement, in that there is a fixed minimum number of hours which he must work in order to benefit by the Bill. It would not be reasonable to expect that he would receive a half-holiday in a week in which he worked only one or two days.

That is an improvement in the Bill, you suggest?

Yes. It is only reasonable that to receive a half-holiday per week you work at least the greater part of the week—perhaps not entirely.

And if you are out sick for a day or two?

Deputy Cogan should be allowed to make his speech without interrogation or interruption.

That is a reasonable provision. I do not agree with Labour Deputies who have said that farmers were not giving the workers the benefit of this Bill over the last few years.

The majority of the farmers in my constituency were, in effect, giving their workers the benefit of the previous Bill over the last 12 months. The effect of this Bill and the last one was to add 5/-, 6/-, 7/- or 8/- per week to the workers' wages provided they worked out the full period of six days. In effect, most of the employers in my constituency at any rate, particularly in the dairying industry, were giving 4/-, 5/- or 6/- a week in excess of the wages paid by the Agricultural Wages Board. Actually, they were giving the workers the benefit of this Bill all along. So that the passing of this measure does not represent——

A revolution.

——a revolution.

Would that be Carlow?

I am referring to both Carlow and Wicklow, two very progressive agricultural counties in which a great many people are engaged in the dairying industry, where they have competent and capable workers and where a wage in excess of the standard wage fixed by the Agricultural Wages Board is given.

I think it is a good thing that we now, in a friendly, good-humoured way, have agreed to this Bill. We agree that it gives a concession to a very deserving section of the people and that it imposes an additional burden on a number of farmer employers who may not be very prosperous and who will, perhaps, find it difficult to meet this demand. We cannot hold up reformative legislation of this kind.

Hear, hear!

We have got to recognise that outside the agricultural industry most workers enjoy a half-holiday. We have got to extend that principle as far as we can. On the initial stage of the last Bill I suggested that there were, perhaps, other concessions which could be made to the agricultural community which would be of more importance than compelling them to remain idle for four days a week. I hold there are other concessions which could be made to the agricultural community which would benefit them much more than the concessions embodied in this Bill. Since the workers' representatives demanded this particular type of concession, I think it is only right to let them have it. The only section of the people who do not enjoy a half-holiday, any minimum standard of income or any minimum conditions of employment are the working farmers of this country. I hope that in some way it will be found possible to raise their standard of living to that of the agricultural worker.

It is generally admitted that the principle of this Bill has been accepted for some time past but I want to raise one point. We all wish to see every section of the community advance and to see their conditions of life improving. I do not see anybody making the slightest effort to do anything for what I describe as the largest class in the community. I refer to the small farmer, the man who is described as a small farmer. Would the Minister tell us what is the difference between the agricultural labourer and the small farmer?

One gets wages and the other does not.

The proper answer to that question is that one gets wages and the other is a slave. Would the Minister endeavour to do something for the small farmer who cannot be treated as if he were self-employed and who is tied to an insufficiently sized holding to make a living on it? He works the seven days of the week during the 52 weeks of the year. He works 16 hours a day and there is no half-holiday for him. He is not even free on Sundays and he cannot get the few days' holiday in the summer or the autumn which most workers get. I think this Bill is incomplete when it does not include something for that type of person.

Will the Deputy move an amendment on the Committee Stage?

I think the Bill cannot be said to be complete as it deals only with one section of the community. I should like to see the Bill big enough to embrace a larger section of the community than that of the agricultural workers. If recourse is had to the Statistical Abstract it will be found that out of 383,000 farmers all over the country almost 300,000 are farmers under £10 valuation. I do not think that the most bitterly opposed to the farmers in this country can claim that the man with £10 valuation of land has sufficient land to make a living on it.

Why did the Deputy not wake up before now and do something about it?

When Deputy Fanning has done as much for the small farmers as I have done he can shout. It would be more decent and far straighter for him to keep his mouth closed and say nothing until then.

The Deputy did very little.

If the Deputy spoke to any of the farmers in Connacht I think he would discover what they told Fianna Fáil about Deputy Blowick at the last general election.

The Deputy should deal with the terms of this Bill.

When Deputy Fanning makes an ignorant interruption or one that is intelligible only to himself, I can scarce refrain from infringing the Rules of Order. I want to ask the Minister what he proposes to do in regard to approximately 300,000 farmers with their wives and families. The Minister or the Chair may say that such a matter is irrelevant on this Bill.

The Deputy has anticipated me very well.

Might I be permitted to do so again and say that I hoped the small farmer was an agricultural labourer?

Unfortunately or fortunately, it is I who has to decide that on this occasion.

Let us say "fortunately."

I believe the Deputy is travelling outside the scope of this Bill.

That is arguable. However, if the Chair rules that it is outside the scope of the Bill I will not dwell on it, but I think this is an appropriate place to raise the matter as I hold that the small farmer is as much an agricultural labourer as the agricultural labourer referred to in the Bill.

The Deputy will have an opportunity of discussing that on another occasion with very few limits.

I think it is not inappropriate to ask the Minister to include in the Bill the people to whom I am referring.

I cannot allow the Deputy to discuss the conditions of small farmers on this Bill.

I think the Chair is not treating me fairly. We should be allowed to impress upon the Minister that he has left a serious vacuum in this Bill which he should fill by including in it the class of whom I have spoken.

Does the Deputy want to give them a half-day?

The Deputy should not make a joke of them. A number of people are long enough doing that. The Deputy should have some sense of shame and decency.

That is what the Deputy is advocating.

I am advocating that they should have the same conditions as any other section of the community.

The thought of the Fianna Fáil Party and their attitude on the general question of a half-day for workers is well-known. For juveniles looking for employment Fianna Fáil ensured, by the establishment of Part V of the vocational system, that they should get a chance of education so that they might improve their prospects in life subsequently. On this question of the half-holiday for agricultural workers, while it was easy and, I presume, more readily applicable where you could switch over the machine and so on at a certain hour of the day, it was argued that the operation of the sun, moon and stars, the succession of sunshine and shadow and day and night were beyond man's control and that it was these things that made for the success or otherwise of the operations of the agricultural community.

It is recognised that agriculture, generally speaking, has lagged behind in this matter of the organisation of agricultural life generally and the amenities of the workers in particular. We all remember in the old days that when the 25th March came many agricultural workers through the country had to take their families and furniture from the farmer's house, to which no land as a rule was attached, to get work for the following year. Many progressive farmers at that time gave a half acre of land to their workers and gave them other amenities such as milk and similar products from the land, together with grazing for a few sheep and so on. As time went on, the Fianna Fáil Party was responsible for the building of numerous labourers' cottages in the rural areas and to these an acre or half an acre of land was attached.

Deputy Dunne said that the giving of this half-holiday will enable the agricultural worker to go shopping, but he has now a very important work to do in that he has this little acre or half-acre of his own on which he can occupy himself for the half-day and help the general productivity of the agricultural community, just as if he were working for a farmer. In this case, he is working for himself, building up his home life, with advantage to the nation generally. It was not so easy to organise this system of half-days for agricultural workers. Varying weather conditions in the past were responsible for a system whereby the farmer and his worker co-operated. If there came a day on which he could not work outside but had to sit in the cowshed, when the harvest was ready, he worked a longer day, often from dawn to dark. There was that co-operation between them, and the worker ate at the farmer's table and was not placed in any menial position in most parts of the country, although there may have been exceptions.

We are all glad this progress is being made and that the agricultural worker, through the instrumentality of Fianna Fáil, backed by the various organisations which cater for operatives in these lines, is being put in the same position in life as his fellow-workers in any other line of industry. We have now reached the stage where the agricultural worker has to be more skilled and have a better knowledge generally of the various types of work which, from season to season and day to day, he is called on to perform, and of the various types of machinery he is now called on to operate. This Bill will clarify the position, but, as Deputy Allen said, no matter how strict a law may be made, the operation of the law is largely dependent on the goodwill and the approach of the people concerned to it.

The agricultural worker has lifted up his head after years of struggle, just as the farmer has done. The farmer in the past suffered under various systems of landlordism. It took him some time to establish himself, and, as Michael Davitt said, to get a firm grip on his homestead. The progress being made in the agricultural life of this nation is a matter for congratulation and joy for the whole country because on it rests the fundamental prosperity of this nation. When the workers and farmers feel that they have their rights established, they can, by goodwill, vary the conditions to meet the varying circumstances. I congratulate the Minister on bringing in this Bill and helping in this further progressive step towards improving the community life of the rural population.

The Minister, in fairness, must be congratulated on one point—his being so highly successful in keeping Deputy Cogan on the round-abouts. He has turned around so much now that he has got dizzy and cannot get back to the ground in regard to which he advocated a certain line of action so much in the past. While I congratulate the Minister in that respect, I feel that great sympathy should be expressed with the Democrats in America that they did not have Deputy Cogan as their candidate, because, if they had had him as a candidate, undoubtedly the change in America would be noticeable, too.

That has no relation to this Bill.

None, except that I think it only right that we should give great credit to Deputy Cogan for his wonderful attitude here this morning.

We all appreciate the importance of this Bill and it is because we appreciate the importance of realising the necessity of providing a half-day for farm workers in rural Ireland that we say to the Minister that while the old saying "Better late than never" may be true, the Minister unfortunately is somewhat behind time in introducing the Bill. Some months ago, last February, when he opposed a similar Bill, we got an assurance that the measure to be brought in by the Minister would be before the House in a month.

I can understand that, in view of other important business to come before the House, it is not easy to arrange a time table, but members of the Labour Party who have consistently advocated the urgent necessity of providing a half-holiday for farm workers are somewhat disappointed, because this half-holiday could have been operated a long while back had this important measure been introduced before this.

Mr. Walsh

Deputy Dunne stated it was in operation.

I am sorry Deputy MacCarthy has left the House because I do not like talking behind people's backs. In many parts of rural Ireland, and I am speaking now in particular about the South because that is the area I know best, the large landowners took advantage of the opposition to Deputy Dunne's Bill and refused to give their workers a half-day. They said the law did not force them to do so and the unfortunate workers were penalised in consequence of that. It was the large landowners who did that. The small farmer is at all times willing and ready to co-operate. The large landowners said that when the Minister for Agriculture amended the Bill, as he promised to do, or introduced new legislation they would give the half-day.

Mr. Walsh

Was the other one a failure then?

If the Minister gibes he will get a little more than he likes. I am drawing attention to the fact that the farm workers were denied a half-holiday in County Cork because of the attitude adopted by the present Minister when he was in opposition, because of the hypocrisy of that opposition towards the measure before the House on a former occasion. If the Minister were as lively in introducing his promised Bill as he is in interjecting remarks we could have had this measure before the summer recess and the farm workers could now be enjoying the weekly half-holiday that has been denied them by a certain type of employer.

Some of the remarks made here were somewhat wide of the mark, but Deputy Corish touched on a vital point when he drew attention to the continuous movement of rural workers into the urban areas. The only alternative to that movement is to give the workers in the rural areas conditions on a par with those in the industrial areas. It may not be possible to do that right through. One advantage that could be given would be a weekly half-holiday. Some amenities of that kind will help to check the flow into the cities and towns. The Minister has himself drawn attention publicly to the importance of the agricultural industry, but agriculture can never succeed while it operates on one lung and while the only consideration given is for the benefit of the employer. We are all anxious that the employer should get a fair deal. Coupled with the advantages given to him, there should also be advantages given to his employees.

Deputy Cogan stated this morning that the result was inevitable and that we must move with the times. Deputy Cogan was very slow to move with the times. Deputy MacCarthy referred to something that used to cause abhorrence in rural areas. That was the movement on Lady Day, the 25th March, of the farm worker, his family and his bit of furniture. Times may have changed. When we were endeavouring to give the farm worker an annual holiday, I remember seeing the leaders of the then Opposition, including the present Minister for Agriculture, moving themselves, their families and their furniture into the Lobby marked "Níl." I can remember so well the attitude of the Deputies sitting in opposition at that period— their sulking, their refusal to go one way or the other.

While I prefer to face the future rather than fulminate against the past, remembering the way in which the Deputies then in opposition blew hot and cold, we have an obligation to remind them of their attitude in relation to this very important matter. There may be some things in this Bill which will need closer investigation and we will have an opportunity of discussing these points more fully at a later stage. We want to make this Bill as watertight as we can so far as the farm worker is concerned. Co-operation will be necessary in order to make the operation of this Bill a success. We are always ready to give the fullest co-operation we can in relation to measures of this kind. We know, too, that there are people who are always ready to evade their responsibilities. If, as the Minister has said, there was a flaw in the Bill formerly introduced, he has now had an opportunity of remedying that flaw. He has all the machinery of Government behind him in the preparation of this measure.

We are all anxious that when this Bill becomes law there will not be another hold-up. The longer it is delayed the longer the farm worker will be denied his weekly half-holiday. I sincerely hope the farm worker will get the benefit of this measure as soon as possible. If legislation enacted here subsequently finishes up in the courts that may be a costly procedure for the employer and for the employee. I hope that when this Bill leaves the Dáil and passes through the Seanad, it will be in such a form that there will be no technical faults in it and that Deputy Cogan will have occasion for rejoicing on his conversion from consistently advocating the rights of one section of the agricultural community as against the other. In that case we realise, as I have already stated, that the importance of this measure is the full amount of support that he gets in this House.

I move the adjournment of the debate.

Debate adjourned.
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