This Bill deals with a problem which has already been before the House and has been discussed at considerable length and I do not want to travel in detail over the ground which has already been traversed. As the Bill is now presented to us, we are asked to express our opinions thereon, so I want to put again, perhaps in a new form, the viewpoint of those who earn their livelihood by operating hackeny cars or taxis. Those of us who know the pattern of life for the taximen, whether in Dublin or Cork, and for the hackneymen in the small towns and rural areas, know perfectly well that they work hard and get only a very frugal living. Not only are they obliged to work at all hours of the night and day in order to earn their livelihood but they very often operate under circumstances which compel them to depend in large measure on being paid subsequently for trips which they undertake without prepayment in order to convenience those who live in the vicinity and with whom their domestic lots are cast. It seems to me, therefore, that before we are justified in imposing additional taxes on these two classes of the community, we ought to be satisfied that they are capable of bearing these new burdens. I think we have selected the worst of all years to demonstrate that hackney owners and taxi owners, as a class, taken together, are capable of bearing the new burdens which this Bill will impose upon them.
Not only are they getting, like the rest of the community, the full impact of higher prices consequent upon the recent Budget, but they are getting also the impact of higher prices in respect of the commodities which were not subsidised, but in respect of which there has also been an increase in prices. They are getting the impact of a recession in employment, as is evidenced by the fact that we now have nearly 11,000 people more unemployed in the country than we had 12 months ago.
These things necessarily impact upon those who earn a livelihood operating taxis or hackney cars, but in respect of these two classes, the taximen and the hackney owners, we have subjected them to the special hardships which will be visited upon them by the introduction of a Bill which immediately increases the cost of running cars for them, as exemplified in the fact that they will have to pay increased road tax in order to continue to operate their cars.
If they had no other problems but to meet this increased charge for operating their cars, the problem would be difficult enough but, as Deputy Cowan has rightly said, they have other problems as well. In recent years in particular there has come into the hackney-owner class a number of people who are not legitimate operators of hackney vehicles. They are persons who are in the nature of "pirates" in the business. That is, they come in and they get, as they get easily under the ineffective law which we have at the moment in this matter, a small public service vehicle licence.
Having got that, this class of person operates the car for his or her own use but enters into keen competition with the legitimate hackney owner if they see any creamy traffic available but they will not take the short runs. They will not take the night runs and they will not take the hard runs. All they will do is to operate in such a way that they will get the softest traffic. This operates to the serious disadvantage of the legitimate hackney-car owner who is doing his best to make a livelihood for himself and his family.
The law is wide open to anybody who wants to pirate in that way on the legitimate hackney owner and we ought to have from the Minister an assurance that some steps will be taken to close the gap there so that those who genuinely earn a livelihood by operating hackney-cars will not have to contend with the unfair cutthroat competition of those who are in the business to skim the cream off it and make it harder for the ordinary hackney owner to earn a reasonable livelihood.
Then there is the further question of the type of cars that are operated as hackney vehicles. Unless we do something to put the taxi owner in a position whereby he can meet his responsibilities and earn a reasonable livelihood for himself and his family we are likely to get any type of vehicle used as a hackney vehicle. We know that types of hackney vehicles can be used which leave much to be desired. We ought to try and put the hackney owners in a position by the avoidance of heavy impositions on him whereby he can operate a decent service in the form of decent vehicles and by that I mean a vehicle which will take, let us say, four passengers and the driver.
If we press the hackney owner by the extraction of additional revenue from him to such an extent that he cannot purchase or even continue to own a decent-sized vehicle the tendency will be to push him back to the small and, perhaps, quite unsatisfactory vehicles. To that extent we are losing revenue for the Exchequer because the smaller car will consume less of the taxable fluid, petrol, than the larger car will.
Then there is the overriding consideration which has exercised the minds of this House, the imposition of additional taxation on hackney owners and taximen. Whatever you might say about the justification for that in other circumstances I urge the Minister that 1952 is not the year to select, having regard to the hardships already inflicted upon the working-class section of the community in particular, for the imposition of these additional burdens on taximen and hackney owners.
There is no justification at this stage in selecting them for a double dose of taxation such as they are getting under this Bill and under the Financial Resolutions which preceded it. I could face up to voting for a Bill of this kind imposing even heavy taxation on the large mechanically propelled vehicles used on our roads which are not fit to carry those vehicles if I could see the Minister recognising that it is unfair to taxi owners and hackney owners to penalise them in the manner in which this Bill does.
Deputy Cowan was quite right when he called attention to the fact that under this Bill they will have to pay additional taxation for the road licences, but as we all know a very small minority of the hackney owners can afford to pay their annual road licences in one instalment. They are compelled to get the licences in instalments over the year and because of the fact that they cannot pay for the licence in one instalment they have to pay 20 per cent. additional payment in respect of each quarter's instalment.
In other words, over a whole year the hackney owner who operates his car by paying from quarter to quarter for the licence, because he cannot afford the money to pay for the entire licence in one instalment, has to pay not merely the additional rates but 20 per cent. more because he is not able to pay in one instalment. That will happen in the future as it is happening to-day but he is going to pay the additional 20 per cent. on the additional charges which are being imposed in this Bill. In other words, the poor fellow who is doing his best to earn a living for himself and his family by operating a hackney car will have to pay, because he is short of money, a road tax which the ordinary person can pay in one instalment. That works out in this way, that the man who pays in quarters has to pay almost the cost of 15 months' road licence in order to operate the vehicle for 12 months because he is not able to pay for it in one instalment.
It is most unfair to ask those who earn a livelihood by operating a motor-car, as hackney owners do, to pay this additional percentage on the ordinary rate of taxation. Again, I think that some steps should be taken to ensure that those who operate vehicles for a living would not be asked to pay that additional impost. It seems to me and to every fair-minded Deputy that to ask a person to pay an extra 20 per cent. because he is too poor to pay his year's licence in one instalment is to ask these folk who have slender resources to pay too high a tax because they are compelled to take out their licences in instalments.
That is an aspect of the matter which the Minister could remedy speedily by legislative action or by legislation which would command the ready support of all sections in the House. I urged the Minister, and so did other Deputies, that, so far as this Bill and the Financial Resolutions which preceded it were concerned, he was asking hackney owners and taxi owners to bear far too heavy a burden. Even Deputies in the Minister's Party spoke in favour of some easement of the burden on hackney and taxi owners, although these Deputies, having expressed lip sympathy with the position of the hackney and taxi owner, subsequently went into the Division Lobby and voted against the grant of any concession to these two classes. Having been appealed to by all sections of the House, I put it to the Minister that he ought not to try to steamroll this Bill through the House and that, instead, he ought to leave the matter to a free vote so as to ascertain the real views of the House on a matter which is so important to two large sections of the community, the taxi owners and hackney owners.
I do not know whether the Minister will do that or not, but Independent Deputies do not need any permission from the Minister in exercising their right to demonstrate that they are Independent Deputies, and there is no obligation on Deputy Cowan or on any other Independent Deputy to follow the Minister's lead in this matter. I take it that they would resent it if I suggested they were members of the Fianna Fáil Party—If they are not— and I am quite prepared to accept their view that they are not formal members of the Fianna Fáil Party—they ought to demonstrate here on this Bill that they are independent and can vote freely, that they have no obligations to the Party in power, that they are completely free of entanglements and at liberty to demonstrate not only to their constituents but to their own consciences which keep constant watch over them, and in particular to those of their constituents who are affected by this legislation, that they have the right to decide, untrammelled by the Party Whip, and that they will do so on this occasion in order to show that their real sympathies lie with those who are being squeezed by the Bill the Minister has put before the House.
The Minister, however, might face up to it in a more broadminded and understanding way by saying that he wants this Bill to be the conviction, based on its merits, of the House, and ought not to try to press the House and even members of his own Party to do what he knows is offensive to their consciences, namely, to impose heavier taxes on two sections of the community who we know are not financially equipped to meet the impact of these taxes.
