I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time. As I mentioned when submitting the Estimates for my Department in April last, certain increases in the rates of charge for inland telegrams are inevitable, but require new legislation. The reason is that inland telegraph rates are subject to certain statutory limits last fixed in 1915 for Press telegrams and in 1928 for ordinary inland telegrams.
The Telegraph Act of 1915 prescribed inter aliathat the rates for Press telegrams should not exceed 1/- per 60 words, day rate, and 1/- per 80 words, night rate, and that the charge for each additional copy of the same telegram transmitted to another address should not exceed 3d. The Telegraph Act of 1928 provided that the rates for ordinary telegrams within the State should not exceed 1/6 for the first 12 words, plus 1d. per extra word, and that an additional 6d. might be charged for telegrams handed in on Christmas Day, Good Friday or Sunday.
At the moment, the Press rates mentioned in the 1915 Act are in operation, but the ordinary inland rates are less than the maximum rates prescribed by the 1928 statute, being 1/- for nine words, plus 1d. for each additional word. These latter rates were fixed in 1937. I need hardly say that both the existing rates and the maximum rates I have mentioned are altogether out of line with current costs.
It is fairly well known that the telegraph service has been a losing one for many years, but by way of background to this Bill I propose to refer again to some of the principal features. The net deficit in 1939-40 was £141,000; in 1949-50 it was £283,000; in 1951-52 it was £403,000; and for the current financial year the loss is estimated at £430,000 on the basis of existing charges.
This difficult position has been created by a number of factors operating together over a number of years past. Firstly, there has been a progressive increase in operating and maintenance costs—they have approximately doubled since 1944-45 and more than trebled since the current inland rates were fixed in 1937. Secondly, there is the downward trend of telegraph traffic. It was stimulated by war conditions but it has been declining since. The extension and improvement of the telephone service has no doubt contributed to this. Operating, maintenance and overhead costs are fairly rigid, in the sense that they cannot readily be adjusted to declining traffic. Hence these swollen losses.
We are not, of course, by any meansunique in having a losing telegraph service. Practically every country in the world has had the same problem, but our difficulties are accentuated by having a sparse and scattered rural population. In Great Britain, with its far denser population, the loss per telegram is of the same order as here.
My Department is taking all practicable steps to try to reduce expenditure on the telegraph service—in particular, by abolition of morse working as soon as possible, by provision of teleprinters at the larger centres, by greater use of the telephone for voicing telegrams and generally by closer integration with the telephone service. It would, however, be idle to hope that we could reduce a loss of £401,000 very substantially or very quickly in this way.
On the revenue side, charges have not been adjusted at all to help to meet the increased costs. The present Press rates have been in operation since 1920: the present ordinary inland rates have been in operation since 1937, when they were reduced below rates fixed in 1928. I would be surprised to hear of any other service which has not increased its rates during this period. I shall not labour the point that increases in telegraph rates are warranted. Clearly, increases are fully justified either by reference to the losses on the service, the change in the value of money, or any other standard.
The purpose and scope of the Bill has been explained in the White Paper which has already been circulated to Deputies. Briefly, it proposes to repeal the statutory limits on inland telegraph rates and Press telegraph rates contained in Section 1 of the Telegraph Act, 1928, and Section 16 of the Telegraph Act, 1868, as amended by Section 1 of the Post Office and Telegraph Act, 1915, and so enable these rates to be adjusted from time to time in the light of the costs and general finances of the service. The telegraph service has for years been heavily subsidised by the taxpayer and/or by the users of the other services and while it will probably be necessary to continue to do so to some extent there is no goodreason why the users of the telegraph service should not pay telegraph rates which bear some relationship to the vastly increased costs.
At one time statutory limits similar to those which the present Bill is designed to remove applied to a number of other Post Office charges but they have been removed from time to time, the remaining limits on the postal side being repealed in the Post Office (Amendment) Act, 1951, which was prepared by the last Government. There is no good reason why telegraph charges should be in an exceptional position and it is, therefore, proposed to bring them into line with other Post Office charges by repealing the limits and with other charges, such as E.S.B. charges, passport fees, etc., thus obviating the necessity for further amending legislation of this kind. Of course, the statutory regulations providing for changes in telegraph rates, like similar regulations for postal or telephone charges, will have to be laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas, so that the control of the Oireachtas in this matter will not in any real sense be impaired.
A provisional announcement was made earlier this year indicating certain increases in rates whose effect would be to reduce the deficit of £430,000 by 14 per cent. in a full financial year. Circumstances have delayed the passage of this Bill. I have decided that it would be inadvisable to make any decision on rates until I have received the report of the expert committee now examining telegraph administration——
Notice taken that 20 members were not present; House counted and, 20 members being present,