I am glad to hear Deputies say "hear, hear," because when our Government did what it thought it should do, it came in for a measure of unpopularity. There is no doubt about it, and the propaganda which led up to the election largely hinged on that. But that was done because the Government at the time believed it was its duty to do it, because the Government found there was a financial position there which was becoming increasingly dangerous. I know the way in which we were attacked at that time. I was sitting over on those benches and I saw the glee, you might say, the joyful rubbing-of-hands, as they heard one burden after another coming out on the people in that Budget. Do you think we enjoyed it? I think I was one of the first speakers to get up and support that Budget. I think I was one of the very early speakers to follow the Minister and support him. Do you think I enjoyed it? Do you think I or any other member of the Government that framed that Budget enjoyed it?
There were suggestions from the present Taoiseach and others here at that time that we were sadistic in rubbing it in, and I think the present Minister now listening to me rather indulged in that approach too, that we were enjoying it. There was also talk about a surplus of £10,000,000 unnecessarily put on, all of which proved to be so much hot air in the end, and so much so that if all the things that had been said at that time were correct, if everything that Deputy Costello and Deputy Norton at that time said were correct, there would be absolutely no excuse for them now that they are Taoiseach and Tánaiste respectively for not having prices back to the 1951 level already. The trouble is that what they said was not correct and now they find themselves facing reality and their predecessors had to face reality. And the reality their predecessors had to face was the reality which arose from the drift in co-ordinating — the drift in the same Government that is there now — when in office before. I will excuse them inasmuch as it was their first experiment in inter-Party Government, and we know the stresses and strains that are there, but I do not think a repetition of such a situation would be so easily condoned now.
I was talking about butter. That is what led me to say: Do you think that any responsible people are going to deplore the advantage that is given? I will give the Minister and his Government full credit for that in one sense. In another, I am wondering is it wise for a Government to do the type of thing they did? They simply hit on butter as one item before they got into office. It was taken in isolation without reference to the fiscal and other problems involved. It would be a very good thing if it could be done and if it could achieve the results it was designed to achieve. Nevertheless, I question whether it would not have been better to have co-ordinated that move in a general programme.
The same remark goes for Deputy McGilligan's promise to give the back pay to the civil servants. I am not quarrelling with that in itself but, again, it was a thing done in a disjointed way — and we should have had some definite policy if definite policy there can be.
Could there be a definite policy to deal with this question of prices, this question of the cost of commodities, the balance in regard to the consumer, which reminds me of a most significant and important part of Deputy Larkin's speech, the problem of the balance of incomes and living costs? Is there any policy by which we could approach this? Has the Government any positive policy to offer on this or is it going to be a question of dealing with problems as best we can as they arise?
Has the Government got a definite policy for dealing with this question of price control and the question of costs? For instance, the checking of the rise in the price of tea, the decrease in the price of butter, the giving to the civil servants of the back money, the reduction in the price of wheat to the farmers — are all these actions co-ordinated in pursuance of any particular policy? When I say definite policy, it is not enough to say: "Our policy is to reduce prices." I could demolish that statement very quickly. Is there a definite programme, a well-thought-out line of approach? If there is such a policy, could it be clearly defined so that we could grapple with the problems as they arise? That is a very relevant question.
Fine Gael said they had a policy which could deal with the urgent problem of the cost of living. Just before the formation of the present Government, the Fine Gael Party issued a manifesto in which they purported to speak of a policy. Where is this policy? Is it going to be a repetition of 1950 all over again? I am beginning to wonder.
On the policy in regard to prices, Deputy Larkin talks about the Prices Advisory Body and price control. What is our experience of price control? I know the Deputy is present and will correct me if I am wrong in the impression I got from his speech. I got the impression from Deputy Larkin's approach that he has come to the conclusion that the way to deal with this problem, as far as the actual level of prices is concerned, is to have some machinery such as a Prices Advisory Body or some quasi-judicial tribunal which will investigate the cost to the consumer and ensure that the consumer or public interest is adequately represented and in that way, strike the fairest balance that can be achieved between the consumer, the producer and whatever middle element there may necessarily be in the chain. I further got the impression — and again, if I am in any way misrepresenting the Deputy I would be only too eager that he should correct me — that the Deputy has come to the conclusion and that it is his approach that that would have to be a State body, a body governmentally controlled.
If I am right in that, is it not fair to ask just what has our experience been in regard to such controls in the past? We know that during the years of the emergency there was price control, that that, coupled with price control, there was wages control, but neither of these two controls proved very popular to say the least of it, that neither of these controls was altogether effective in their ultimate object and that by the end of emergency and particularly in the immediate 1946-47 transition period, we were all as anxious as we could be to get away from those controls. The co-operation of the organised trade unions had enabled the wages control end to be worked fairly smoothly and it was taken off smoothly with their co-operation. But the controls having been taken off, the prices problem became even more aggravated and the whole cry was for decontrol. Fine Gael were most vociferous in that regard.
The Minister for Agriculture, then Deputy Dillon, intervened in debates on that question to say that he did not want Government interference or control. I confess that perhaps I am one of those who would be bracketed amongst those who are anxious to avoid central and governmental control as far as possible. The whole outcry was against it. The system did not work satisfactorily. There was a torrent of complaints that certain people were being penalised and only certain people were being caught. There was the abuse of smuggling. I think some Minister objected to a reference to that in connection with tea. Unfortunately, that is a problem that has to be taken very much into account and is one of the abuses that can occur.
One of the big problems about control is: How can you make that control justly effective and ensure at the same time that it is not tyrannical and that it is generally fair? It will never be popular nor am I am going to put popularity up as an argument to Deputy Larkin. However, I will say this to Deputy Larkin — I am addressing my remarks rather to him than to others because I think he takes a more responsible approach than many others. I would ask him, what system can you devise? How can you devise a workable system here that will be free from the abuses and the objections that attached to the efforts at that time? There was a policy of decontrol for which Deputy Lemass up to 1948 was severely attacked. My records show here very clearly that although there was talk about better price control in the 1947-48 General Election and as the policy of this Government when in office before, the whole trend of the policy of the Tánaiste and his colleagues in that Government was away from control. I think commodities were taken out of control by Deputy Norton's Government — it was Deputy Morrissey who was Minister at that time — just as fast as ever they were taken out.
I asked a question at that time and in the answers that were given, I think, to other Deputies, there was a kind of suggestion that the Minister had no function now because during the past three years Deputy Lemass had decontrolled certain commodities. Whatever the fine points of this argument may be, we have the fact that when Deputy Norton's Government was in power before, and right up to date, the tendency has been towards decontrol. And I do not see Deputy Norton showing any particular desire to invoke a tight price control system and I am sure it is not for want of the desire — I would be doing him an injustice if I were for a moment to suggest that he was being merely indolent about it. The principal factor governing this thing is that there are very good reasons why such problems cannot be dealt with as facilely as they can be talked about. We remember the 1950 thing which I recalled already involving Deputy Cosgrave, Deputy Lemass and myself.
Deputy Cosgrave said the cost of living had not gone up and we gave him the list and there was a certain amount of furore. Deputy Norton, who was then Minister for Social Welfare, rushed in next day with proposals about price control. They had still six months to go as a Government at that time. Did price control result from that? Deputy Norton knows — I grant he had not the power that time since it was outside his Department and I could not fix the particular immediate responsibility on him — that he was a member of the Government and he obviously had the weight to force his will if he wished to do so and I am sure he did wish to do so. But why did it not happen? Deputy Norton still had six months left but they still kept going in the opposite direction so to speak. Why? Certainly the proposals for control were there and I can recollect having treated the resulting situation a little bit lightly and humorously because it really was rather funny to have had such a dramatic declaration in December, 1950, and to come along later and to compare the declaration with the results.
Now we come to Deputy Larkin's talk about price control. I do not want the Deputy to misunderstand me. This is a problem we should tackle, but I ask both him and Deputy Mrs. O'Carroll is the way to tackle this problem the way of the Prices Advisory Body? Up to a point, yes. But will it solve the problem? I am afraid from experience I have had that I do not think it will. I do not think any tribunal will solve this prices problem unless the whole overall State structure is overhauled. In fact I cannot see any such body solving the problem of prices unless the whole of the productive and distributive aspects are, so to speak, mobilised or regimented in some way under the State and, therefore, controllable by such a body. I do not know whether that is what Deputy Larkin had in mind, but that is where my logic would bring me. As long as we have the present system of private enterprise — the present system which we are trying to operate, and I shall not go into its merits or demerits — we shall always be up against this problem.
That is the problem which in broad terms boils down to this: At what price can a producer economically produce his product — whether it is wheat by the farmer or boots by the industrialist. By economic price I mean a price that will pay the cost of wages and everything else connected with the output of the product, plus, if you like, the little bit extra that is required in order to give a reasonable profit and to provide for depreciation and so forth. After that you have the costs of distribution. Mark you, if you have the answer to those things you will be in a fair way to getting the answer from the consumer's view point, because quite obviously the price the consumer must pay cannot be less than the algebraic sum of the two — the cost of production and the cost of distribution. I am simplifying things very radically; I think that from the point of view of the student of economics I am indulging in over-simplification, but I think it is not a bad way of putting it. In other words, when dealing with the price chargeable to the consumer you are dealing with something that is already largely determined — almost completely determined — by two other groups of costing which have to be added. There is, of course, the point of going below the economic cost by adding something in the form of subsidy.
Now the function of a Prices Advisory Tribunal operating without interference or compulsion of the State is to sit down and say: "That article costs so much at the factory. It costs so much to put through the distribution chain. Is its present price fair — in other words is too much profit being made on it? Is the margin maintained at a level regarded as reasonable and no more?" If so there is nothing the tribunal can do. The Advisory Body cannot go any further. And that is the position that holds at the moment. All the body can say at the moment is that they have got the cost of production and whether it is fair. They have also got the cost of distribution and they regard that also as fair. Then they come to the price of the retailer and they say he is entitled to the margin of profit he has claimed. Having done that the Prices Body finds a price below which it cannot go and it then becomes a certifying stamp to the Minister and the unfortunate Minister is in the position that there is nothing more he can do as things are at the moment except act as a rubber stamp.
Let me make the qualification that this happens as things are at the moment. I grant that the Prices Advisory Body would be a most useful thing if it were a case of investigation of excess profits — in other words if there was a profiteering ramp. Deputy Larkin did talk about profits both this year and before and I think we joined issue on this, but I should like to point out that if there was anything really substantial in the suggestion contained in the part of Deputy Larkin's speech in relation to profits it would have shown up long ago even under the present prices advisory method. The Prices Advisory Body are able to find the costings. Maybe Deputy Larkin would say that the present method is not sufficient and so forth and so on, and there I would join issue with him again. But if he says that I have to examine his argument to see whether he is right or wrong.
Under the method the Prices Advisory Body has been operating to date there has been a lack of evidence of excess profits which seems to be proof positive that margins are reasonable and that they will be maintained and even the Minister, in admissions made here to-day, referred to these profit margins and by inference I take it that the Minister is satisfied that the profit margins in question are both maintained and reasonable. Anyway he has made no move and it is within his powers to make a move. He has not done so about these profit margins and Deputy Norton is the leader of the Labour Party for whom Deputy Larkin talks authoritatively. I, therefore, assume that Deputy Norton as the Minister responsible has assessed these profit margins and has found them reasonable. That, I would suggest, leads one simply to this conclusion: that the Prices Advisory Body is fulfilling as much of its function as is possible under present conditions and that the crux of this whole problem is the cost of production and the cost of distribution — what I might call the economic costs of the various commodities and articles concerned.
It is that more than anything else which is determining the price to the producer. That being the situation, to my mind the Prices Advisory Body, or any similar body or board, cannot do very much to alleviate the burden that the people and the present Minister have to carry at the present time. I say that specifically in relation to present circumstances. I certainly grant to Deputy Larkin that under another system of organisation, if we could, for instance, organise a strong central government of the type in some other countries where one would have a strong central control which would brook of no contradiction and where one would have power to draft labour and control labour, and so on and so forth and where everything would be integrated into almost a totalitarian State, then the role of such a judicial body would be correspondingly enhanced and more effective.
For instance, if the present Prices Advisory Body was in a position to say that a particular labour unit should work at a particular rate — in other words if you integrate with the Prices Advisory Body the functions of the present Labour Court and give that body authorative powers for controlling labour costs and the purchase of raw materials; and in the case of raw materials, the purchase price is largely dictated by outside, as the Tánaiste told me at Question Time to-day — if one takes that approach, then perhaps one's Prices Advisory Body may mean a lot more. But, as things are, I fail to see that that can give the present Minister any real, or any great, relief in this problem which is vexing him and has vexed his predecessors; indeed, if I may be pessimistic enough to say so, it will probably vex his successors and, perhaps, all of us for as long as we live because it is one of the fundamental problems of living that we can never quite satisfactorily solve for, if we did, we would have Eden on earth once more.
So much for the suggestion about the Prices Advisory Body. In relation to this factor of prices, I think it is no harm to face up to something else; that is, the cost in the production of these commodities. Now these costs — and with them, the price to the consumer — are dictated by both internal and external factors: internally, because we have to consider that cost in relation to goods produced at home from materials grown at home, and, externally, it is dictated by foreign factors or external prices. In the case of something that is purely within the home economy we have much more scope to argue and, perhaps, more scope for adjustment. In the case of a commodity like tea, however, the price paid by the community is dictated completely by something outside our control, dictated by something completely outside this country, and we can do nothing about the price of that commodity in bulk to us.
All we can hope to do, if we can do anything at all, is to alleviate or distribute the burden to the individual consumer recipient. But we have to face the problem that, taken as a community as a whole, if we want tea or oil and the price of tea and oil goes up to us abroad on the world market, we, as a community, will have to pay a higher price for that tea or oil, and there does not seem to be any escaping that. Ultimately we, as the community, will have to pay that price. Mark you, we will have to pay it on the nail as far as the community is concerned and that burden will ultimately fall on the individuals, be it on all the individuals in the community, if it is completely distributed, or only on some. We will have to bear that burden. It is a question then of what is the best way of bearing that burden? What is the best way of bearing the burden in a case like that?
To revert for a moment to the internal situation before I come to deal with the external constituents; in relation to the cost of bread, in forcing the farmer's price down we have to take into account such varied factors as the increased costs of production, if fertilisers, for instance, go up in price at home. The farmer will have to grow the wheat; if, at the same time, the price of fertilisers goes up while the price he will get for the wheat he produces goes down, quite apart from his profit margins there is a business problem for him. That has to be weighed up and one has to determine in the overall position what is the best thing to be done in the interests of the community as a whole. The farmer's labour costs may go up. One of the problems in regard to agriculture in the past has been labour. Indeed, that has presented itself as a vicious, double-headed problem because of one particular factor, namely, the increase in the cost of agricultural labour to the farmer. That has meant an added burden to the farmer's already heavy costs and naturally reflects itself in increased costs to the consumer ultimately.
From that point of view, therefore, there is a strong argument to keep the farmer's costs down and an equally strong argument to suggest that, as far as possible, wages and the cost of labour to the farmer should be kept down. On the other hand, as soon as one attempts to keep down the cost of labour to the farmer, the labourers simply refuse to stay. Who can blame the agricultural labourer for not staying to work for the farmer when he can do better for himself elsewhere? The result is the flight from the land. But the flight from the land in turn tends to have a further adverse effect on the situation. However, I will not attempt to unravel that but merely use it as an indication of the complex reactions of these problems, one upon the other, where the just, and the very just, right of the agricultural labourer to get the highest standard and the best standard he can have finds itself in conflict with the interests of the community as a whole in relation to this fundamental industry. That is the type of problem that has to be resolved. It is not an easy problem to resolve. Sometimes one is between the devil and the deep blue sea and when a solution is ultimately found, there is always someone to say that the solution is wrong and someone to argue the other way, if so minded.
The same is true of many industries. Take the cost-of-living problem. Deputy J. Larkin in the course of his speech — mark you, I am not complaining about this statement because it is a statement I feel I should make myself if Deputy Larkin had not made it — pointed out that it is the relationship between costs and wages which renders the problem a difficult one where the ordinary worker is concerned. I hope I have not misquoted the Deputy. If I have not completely quoted him perhaps he will indicate that and I shall be glad to read the whole thing verbatim.
Deputy Larkin made the point that wages always lag behind increased costs. Income tends to lag behind costs. That is only too true and, consequently, it is the weaker sections of the community who too often suffer in such circumstances. He said it is better to have stability and, if the situation is not corrected, inevitably the workers through their unions — and the unions are the only protection the workers have — will move for higher wages and another reorientation of the whole economic condition. Let us face that. I think Deputy Larkin is quite right in pointing that out. When we want to keep down the cost of living the Minister wants to keep it down also. If the cost of living still goes up, as it is going, and nothing is done, as Deputy Larkin pointed out, you will have this movement to increase wages, and this means another spur to an increase in the price of commodities. If wages in a boot factory are increased, and unless there is a much larger production, and a bigger market found, it is hard to escape an increase in the price of boots. The same trend will be there, I believe, and it means in effect that it will shove up the cost of living much higher.
As a Deputy said, if a race starts it will be to the detriment of the workers concerned. That is why I am pressing the Minister in order to know what his policy is. Is it the policy of the Minister and his Government — if I can put it that way through the Chair — to implement a policy of stabilising essential prices at the moment by a subsidy, as the Labour Party's programme stated? Is that the Minister's policy? It is not the policy that we operated. We took a somewhat different view in 1952, and you are entitled to take that view and implement it. Let us say that, and let us then join issue on the other matters. Is it the policy to try and deal with these things as they arise?
To-day I had answers to a number of questions. I asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce whether he had sanctioned the increase in the price of chocolate. Other Deputies asked similar questions, and all the answers were: "No". In other words, the Minister did not sanction any increase in these prices. The Minister must be aware, as well as we are, that in addition to such essential commodities as bacon and things of that nature, and cocoa and coffee, that these other commodities have gone up in price. Is the Minister disclaiming responsibility for that? I think I can find in his answers the suggestion that they were decontrolled by his predecessor. I think I can quite legitimately say to the Minister: "Look, you are there now. It is not good enough to say that your predecessor did such-and-such. You are there now. What are you going to do?" Do the answers given to us to-day mean that these prices went up without the Department being even concerned? Is that what it means? Or if it does not mean that, is the Minister bowing to the inevitable and saying: "Well, these prices have to go up, and we cannot control them." Mind you, it is not that I do not sympathise with the Minister in this problem, because he cannot do on every occasion what he did in the case of tea. We must realise that. The funds are not inexhaustible.
Let me come to the question of tea with which I was earlier challenged to deal. I think, Deputy Dillon, the Minister for Agriculture, gave me an awful lot of questions to answer, but I have mislaid the sheet of paper on which they were written. I think I have answered one, and that is on the question of tea. What is the situation? Deputy Norton, and in this particular case I think it was Deputy Norton who was responsible for the action, not his Fine Gael colleagues, saw that the price of tea in Ceylon had gone up. Left to itself it meant an increase in the price here to the consumer. There was no escape from the effect it had in this country. Tea Importers had to buy the tea and had to put up the price because of current world market prices. If I understand the Parliamentary Secretary's résumé of the situation, the position is this: The Government then assumed that probably the price of tea would go down again, and they would average the thing out, so to speak, the reduction at some future date would compensate for that, and if they took a long enough period, things would average out all right.
The whole thing was purely a question of judgement. One has to say that it is a question of whether the Minister's judgement was right or wrong. The serious question is: is it likely that the price of tea will go down soon enough to wipe out the overdraft and interest created in that way, or to put it more realistically from the point of view of the consumer, can this adjustment take place say in whatever form, whether it is taxation or an increased price, or anything else from which the consumer can be insulated in the net? If there is a likelihood of the price coming down, then we would have no hesitation in saying, if it works out in that way, that the Minister was right. But if he is not right, supposing the price of tea was to stay at that level indefinitely, or worse still, increased in price, then the Minister will find himself in very serious difficulty. If it were to stay for any considerable time at that level, or worse still, increased in price, then one is faced with a mounting charge about which action of some sort will have to be taken. That is the problem as I see it. Was it wise that the Government should have taken that gamble? In other words, it is a gamble. We had gambles before. We had gambles before when the Coalition Government was in office, gambles on various things happening which did not happen, and the result was that in the 1952 Budget, in one form or another, became inevitable.
If we are raising questions on the price of tea it is not because we are in any way sorry that the price cannot be kept at its present level. We very much welcome that. It is because we want to see that there is no build-up that can result in another 1952 Budget becoming inevitable. We have had our experience of the 1952 Budget which was to a large extent inevitable as a result of the 1948 Budget brought in by Deputy McGilligan as the Minister for Finance. Is a certain technique being used again that Deputy Dillon has already referred to in regard to wheat, in the course of this debate? It was the averaging out and the non-realisation of certain expectations which resulted in the 1952 Budget.
It is the desire to see that a 1952 situation and Budget will not result from the present Government's policy that evokes references to that matter in this debate from these benches. But, if we can with due safeguard of the future and, particularly, if the Parliamentary Secretary's view of the situation is correct, then I should imagine the Minister has considerable justification for the course he has adopted and it is a very good thing to see some positive action being taken in regard to the matter of prices anyway.
That is the fairest and straightest answer I can give Deputy Dillon when he asks me a certain question about the price of tea. That, I think, is the only sober way of looking at this problem of the price of tea.
The Minister and his Government may, when it comes to Budget time, bring us back to 1951 in regard to bread prices. The first move appears to have been made in that regard, the reduction of the price of wheat both in the world market and to our own farmers and the consumers in the cities particularly are hoping that that is what will result. There is one thing that a Party like Deputy Larkin's should bear in mind and that Deputy Larkin and myself should bear in mind, that the approach to these problems must be balanced, that the interest of the nation as a whole must be balanced in this matter, that looking at it exclusively from the farmer's point of view or the townsman's point of view will not give us a useful solution to the problem. We have to look at it from the point of view of balance and the claims of the farmers and of the townspeople have to be balanced in these matters.
I have said the main things I want to say, with this exception: what of the future? The Parliamentary Secretary Deputy O'Donovan, is free to commit himself to certain views of the future. I would not be at all too keen on committing myself. I think there is a certain question mark about future trends over all. He has mentioned inflation. I fear that he may be right in that. There are corrective financial measures being taken in England. What their repercussions here will be remains for the future. I am referring to the bank rate. There are internal factors as well. I think the evaluation of these should take up our time rather than throwing the type of stuff that has taken up most of the time of the debate in this House.
The Government should give us a lead in this. There was a Deputy talking about policy and what Fianna Fáil did in 1932. Well, Fianna Fáil and the Labour Party, in 1932, started off with a positive policy and I will pay the present Tánaiste and the older members of his Party the tribute of having played a very important part in initiating one of the successful eras of our history but there was a definite, positive policy there and there was a Government there that was giving a lead, not only politically, against a stagnant and somewhat reactionary Fine Gael Party here at that time.
There was a positive political lead. I do not want to go back on all that. What I want to point out is that there was a policy, a political policy, from the getting rid of the Oath to the ultimate that was achieved but it was definite. There was an economic policy. We were going to do certain things in regard to bogs, in regard to tillage. There was something definite about the policy. There was a lead being given by the Government. During the war years there was a lead being given by the Government and, whether we were popular or were not popular, there was a definite line taken by the Government in 1952. Whatever you can say about that Government in 1952, at least it made up its mind as to what should be done and did it.
Now, we want a lead from this Government in a situation which is difficult and, reading Deputy Larkin's analysis of the situation, I would almost say menacing. Can we have something definite to clinch on in this matter of policy? There is no use in saying: "Our policy is to reduce prices". Very good, if you can achieve that in individual things. I do not want to be small and take away whatever credit is due in this matter of tea or butter but, over all, this problem is big. The answers to questions here to-day were not encouraging. What is the policy of this Government? When I ask: "What is the policy of this Government", a blanket answer, "We intend to reduce the cost of living" is not enough.
We want to know how will you do it, what is the line of approach. Is it to be through the Prices Advisory Body, as Deputy Larkin suggests, and all that implies, as I suggest, from the organisation of labour and production and everything into a nicely tight-fitting State controlled scheme, or is it some other approach or will it be done within a private enterprise economy and, if so, how will we do it? All these questions are questions of the moment and the whole field of discussion in this House could be narrowed down very much if the Government came out positively and gave us a line. Then we could say whether we agree or disagree. Perhaps much of it would be a question of judgment. Fair enough. The trouble at the moment is that we appear to be drifting in a way that is to some extent rather reminiscent of three years of drifting before.
Deputy Mrs. O'Carroll last night made certain statements in regard to Fianna Fáil and mentioned a number of commodities that went up in price. I have a certain amount of sympathy for Deputy Mrs. O'Carroll. Deputy Mrs. O'Carroll undoubtedly committed herself up to the hilt. She said she was talking on behalf of her Party. She committed herself up to the hilt to reduce the cost of living for the housewife. I am not at all challenging or impugning the Deputy's sincerity in the matter but I am just wondering how it will work out and I am wondering if she is talking authoritatively for the Labour Party, as-authoritatively as Deputy Larkin is stated to have talked authoritatively, in the words, I think, of Deputy Desmond. If she wants to tax cosmetics — if you could do it — I have not looked into the figures — I do not know — there are all the administrative difficulties — she is honest enough to say so. If she wants to put £2 an acre on land, she is honest enough to say so but I, for one, question whether that would give the result and the money that is necessary.
Perhaps it is more from chagrin and a feeling of frustration that she says it, but she mentioned a number of commodities that she says went up in the time of the Fianna Fáil Government. I am sure they did. I am asking her and the Minister and all Deputies here to take the hard facts of life and to see what commodities have gone up under successive Governments and what the prices problem is and to grapple with it realistically. It is very interesting to compare Deputy O'Carroll's list with the list for this Government when in office before and when in office at the moment. I find that, on my pre-1951 list, the Coalition had effectively increased the price of tea through the off-ration device to 6/6. Coffee went up then and I think it has gone up since. She mentions butter as having gone up. Butter went up under them before. It has gone down now by specific action, but when they were in office before, it went up. Cheese went up, and sweets and chocolate. Chocolate has gone up again. She chose to mention chocolate last night and apparently it has gone up again, though the Minister says to-day that he has not sanctioned it. I have a list here of commodities— sweets, chocolate, jam, butter, petrol, oils, all of which went up under the inter-Party Government before and it is a rather curious parallel to her list which is: sweets, chocolates, peas, beans, paraffin and cocoa. It has gone up again. What is she talking about?
She talks about public inquiries. Has a public inquiry or a private inquiry made any difference in any of these matters, of itself? No. In the case of tea, the Minister directly intervened, but, in the case of these other commodities, no. I could waste the time of the House talking about these matters, but we are out of office and that list of hers is dead and gone. They were in office before, but I can match and cap and crown her list with the performance of the inter-Party Government before. What is more, when the Deputy was talking in that way, securing votes in that way and making these promises, that record was there behind her and now she can ask for herself what is happening now and what is her position in this. From her point of view, it must be: "A plague on all your houses", but that is poor consolation.
Is it not better to say: "We have enough of this propaganda about prices merely to get into office or to keep in office. There is enough of this talking about it in that sense"? Can we not get down to dealing with these problems realistically, as I admit Deputy Larkin has tried to grapple with them, which in all their ramifications are complex and difficult to deal with? So much for that end of it. I am very much afraid that when it comes to a question of the polls again, if certain people who are talking about promises continue in that way, there will be people saying at the next general election, as we said at the last but one: We are not indicting them or criticising them for not doing the impossible. They, any more than we or anybody else, cannot work miracles, but we are indicting them and legitimately criticising them for false promises, pretence and drift, because the promises now alleged, if made wittingly, and persisted in, in the light of our experience, must be assumed to be false, unless something positive can be done at this late hour after at least six years' talking about them. If the pretence is going to be kept up that we can do something that we cannot do, people are leaving themselves wide open to attack on that ground.
Lastly, if there is going to be drift which can only result in damage to us all, again I think I can take it where I left off and condemn them. No matter what you can say about the Fianna Fáil Government, at least you cannot say that they drifted. They faced the problem and tackled it. They were beaten hard enough and round about by all the Coalition Parties, but at least they did not drift. Let this Government do likewise and we will try to remember our own experience and be kind to you, but, for goodness' sake, do something about something. That is the way I would put the plea.
One last point which is a matter of correcting the record, and I want to do it as politely and as nicely as I can, seeing that the Minister and I, according to the record, were not as polite to each other as we might have been at an earlier stage of the debate. There was a little interchange between us about cocoa and coffee, to the effect that Deputy Lemass had approved the recommendation of the Prices Commission. I interjected that he did not approve, and I think the facts will be found to be as the Minister subsequently stated, that the recommendation was before Deputy Lemass, but that he did not approve of it, and that it was left for the present Minister to deal with on the change of Government. Is that not the position? That is, as I am informed, the position.
I am coming back to it merely because of the reiteration by the Minister for Health at a subsequent stage of the debate and, in the interest of accuracy, I should like to ask the Minister am I correct? If I am, let us record it on the record and leave it there. If I am not correct, I am not correct, but my information at the time was, and it has not been changed since, that the recommendation was before Deputy Lemass, as Minister, that he did not approve it and did not decide it, so far as I know, but that it was left to his successor. I hasten to add that I am not suggesting he would not have done so. I do not want to put the thing so far — he probably would — but, in the interests of economy——
