Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 10 Mar 1955

Vol. 149 No. 3

Committee on Finance. - Vote on Account—Motion by the Minister for Finance (Resumed).

Mr. Childers

When progress was reported I was dealing in some detail with the character of the Book of Estimates, and saying that, with the exception of some five or six items, the changes made were only marginal. There was no evidence of a new outlook on Government expenditure, no evidence of their determination to slash expenditure in the same manner in which it was promised at the time of the general election. I was dealing with various Votes in different categories. I took Votes where there was an increase in expenditure in the Book of Estimates for last year, and a decrease for this year. I pointed out that most of the large decreases were related to the reduction in the wheat subsidy by a purely fortuitous reduction in the Local Government Estimate, to a windfall, and the ending of contributions to the Primary Teachers' Fund, a reduction of £750,000 for public works. This formed the major part of the Votes where there were increases in the previous year and decreases this year.

There were some 14 other Votes in which the total reduction amounted to some £200,000. There were 16 Votes in which there was a decrease both last year and this year. They include the Vote for Health Services, £1,000,000 less, and while the present Government has, I think, unwisely reduced the amount available for the Hospitals Fund, the cause was due to reasons which they have given, that the actual physical building was not being undertaken sufficiently to cover the whole expenditure. There was a reduction in the Estimate for Transport and Marine Services of £384,000. Apart from those there were 15 Votes on which there were reductions totalling under £150,000. If you take the Votes where there were increases in both years in 1954-55 and in the present year they amount to no less than 15. The amount of the increase, £750,000, is not very much, but if you examine the Estimates you will find that there are a number of Votes where increases were unavoidable, and have continued this year as in last year.

Let us examine the increase in that particular group. For agriculture the increase was £500,000 last year and in the present year it is £1,100,000. After allowing for certain deductions and certain increases being met by the purely fortuitous arrival of part of the Marshall Aid Counterpart Fund there is a net increase of some £154,000. The present Government in spite of their efforts to prove that they were being economical managed to increase eight Votes which had been decreased by us in the previous year. The total comes out at about under £500,000. The more you examine these Estimates the further you get from finding any evidence that promises made in the general election were going to be kept.

Having shown that this saving of £1,500,000 in current Supplies and Services is of no great measure, and arrived at by a change in some four out of 63 Votes, I would like to deal, in conclusion, with the statement made by the Taoiseach when he said that the Fianna Fáil Government had done irreparable damage to this country through the 1953 Budget. We deny that, and I would ask the Minister for Finance, when he closes this debate, to give the House the main facts. I would like to see the Minister for Finance prove the Taoiseach's contention from that Statistical Abstract, that yellow volume which has been authorised by the present Government. Let him tell the House what the position is and compare it in comparison with other years, how much we have produced, exported or imported, how much the people were able to spend on amusements and reasonable enjoyment. Let him quote the figures. Let him take his own volume passed and approved by his own Government and give the House proof of the serious irreparable damage which was supposed to have been done to this State. In every one of those figures he will find that the story is good, that the people do spend money freely, that they exported more than ever before and imported more than ever before, that their personal savings were four times greater — not bank savings, not commercial savings. Let him prove the contention of the Taoiseach. Let him prove that we have discouraged people from spending money on the necessities of life and on the ordinary pleasures of life. I will be interested to hear him prove that.

I prophesy, moreover, that the year 1954, for which the present Government cannot take responsibility, will show still further progress in the development of the national income. The figures for exports have already been published, and the figures for national expenditure and personal expenditure. When the Government will be forced to authorise publication of these facts prepared by the Statistics Office, and which show in a general way how the people of this country live, they will be forced to admit once more that there was no evidence of irreparable damage that was part of the propaganda in the last election. It was this upon which the present Government managed to secure election by the people in the city districts, who believed that everything could be blown up, that Government expenditure could be slashed, that prices could be reduced, not marginally in five penny units, but in such a way as to make a great and material difference in prices. An examination of the present Book of Estimates proves that it is most unlikely that the Government can fulfil the extravagant promises they made.

Mr. O'Donovan

I have sat through this debate nearly as much as the Minister for Finance has done and I rise now to make only one or two comments on certain aspects of the discussion. First of all I should like to say that the Opposition did not seem to know on which foot they were going to operate. They said that there were no economies, or that any economies there were had been produced, as Deputy Aiken said, by tricks. Deputy Lemass this morning referred to hoofling. All I can say to that is that a great deal of hard work went into the production of this £2,750,000 reduction as compared with last year. Of course, the new Government did not expect anything else. But the new Government believes, as Deputy McGilligan said this morning, that this trend will be continued and that it will be continued in relation to the people's incomes as the Taoiseach and myself promised in our election addresses.

What did this side of the House say during the two years from 1952 to 1954 following the Budget which was represented as a clear-cut one, but which, in fact, we felt was altogether too much of an instrument for bludgeoning the people? The Party opposite said they wanted to bring about a reorientation of the State's finances, in Deputy MacEntee's words. First of all we said there was no necessity for that policy. It was said that the intention behind that Budget was to save £11,000,000 on food subsidies. In actual fact, as it turned out, the saving in the subsidies eventually was only £6,000,000. Now one reason why the intention to save so much did not operate as fully as the Party opposite had hoped it would was the manner in which the price of wheat was increased. When the hoped-for economy of £11,000,000 turned out to be only £6,000,000 in 1952 Deputy MacEntee attempted to show that the reduced economy was due to increases in costs. The point is that for every £ they saved by this method of finance they put £3 in extra costs into the economy as a whole.

I know Deputy Lemass does not mind about costs and I should like to say that that is where we differ. He saw no difficulty whatever in signing Orders as they came in to him. I would have found great difficulty in signing them; in fact, I would only have signed the more urgent of them. We are being criticised here for the fact that we are continuing the system that the Party opposite started. But how are we to take these extra costs out of the country's economy? Are we to reduce wages? That would be a good thing for the Opposition because it might get them back in office quite soon. Another way of looking at the problem is to remember that the Estimates Volume has gone up from £85,000,000 to £105,000,000 in the past number of years. That is partly due to influences to which I have referred and it is partly due to increases in import prices. Take the amount of money we have in circulation in this country to-day — the amount of legal tender. It comes to about £70,000,000 it the moment. In 1951 it was £55,000,000 and in 1952 it was £60,000,000. Does that very fact not explain where the extra taxation which was imposed in 1952 went? When that year ended it was suggested that there was no surplus. There was no surplus because Supplementary Estimates to the tune of £9,000,000 were introduced.

I believe that the 1952 Budget, as the Party opposite had been prepared to operate it directly, had nothing to recommend it. I think I read it much more frequently than I read any other Budget ever presented, and the more often I read it the more appalling it appeared to me. Did not the events justify our view of it? In order to deal with the particular form of cycle which that Budget set up the Party opposite had to increase expenditure enormously at the end of that year. In fact those steps should have been taken in the spring of 1952 if they were to prevent the large amount of unemployment which hit the country at the time. Now we in this Party have set out systematically and slowly to try and improve conditions here in the country. Of course, we are grateful to the people not alone for expressing their confidence in us in advance but for the manner in which they have shown that they believe we can direct them in the way of improving conditions and particularly that we can bring down unemployment. It is no use bandying figures and comparing the autumn of one year with the spring of another. That has been tried by Deputies on the opposite side but there can be nothing at all to it.

If we take the figures as presented here to-day the obvious fact is that we were able to take £2,750,000 off the Estimates Volume although £2,000,000 was spent on the butter subsidy which would make the reduction £5,000,000. I do not believe we will have any more Supplementary Estimates during the coming year than we had in the last 12 months: in fact we may have less. Taking all these things into consideration the figure of expenditure for the coming year shows a reduction of 5 per cent. One of the daily newspapers which dealt with this question on Saturday morning last — the morning the figures were published — said it regarded this saving with grave disappointment. I do not know what they expected us to do. I cannot see the Party opposite being able to go as far as we went.

I want to let the Minister make his reply, but there is one other point to which I might refer before I finish. It is a very important matter which would take a great deal longer than a few minutes were the time available. It refers to the very important steps which the Minister has made to keep the rate of interest on overdrafts at the level of 5½ per cent. When it has gone up in Britain. In an interruption Deputy Allen said: "What good is it going to do in the future?" Deputy Childers said it was very easy to talk vaguely about interest rates. The fact is the Minister did not talk vaguely about interest rates, and let me emphasise this lest there should be any doubt about it.

I believe that the people who direct the banks here, to give them their due, have made no serious difficulties about keeping the rate of interest at 5½ per cent. Does anybody really believe that in modern monetary conditions 5½ per cent. is not high enough? It is 1 per cent. above the British bank rate, a rate intended to cure a certain condition in Britain at the moment. But is it not high enough? Is it seriously suggested here that the Government should have looked on with equanimity while the rate went up to 6½ per cent.? Had the Government believed that it would create serious difficulties for the banks in their finances, the Government, of course, would have had to think long and seriously about keeping the rate at its present level. Our banks will get 1 per cent. extra now on the short-term money they have in London. The general results last year of the banking system here show an exceptionally good run.

Whatever difficulties might possibly arise in relation to the transfer of deposits — difficulties which I believe are not likely to arise — is it not obvious that the Government here would have been lacking in a sense of duty if they had not taken the step they did in view of the many firms here which depend for their working capital on bank advances, a condition which was aggravated because the former Minister for Finance in the last Government paid 5 per cent. for money? He pushed a large number of firms, which would otherwise have had public issues, into the banks for overdraft accommodation. Does it not make a difference to a company running an overdraft for £100,000 whether it pays 5½ per cent. or 6½ per cent. for its money? Of course it does.

Mr. Sweetman

This debate over the last three days has run on different lines at different times. Before I deal with any matters arising out of the debate itself, I would like to make one personal observation. This is the first debate in which my predecessor has felt himself sufficiently physically recovered to take part since the change of Government last June. No matter whether we may disagree with the views he expresses, or even at times perhaps with his manner of expressing them, on behalf of this side of the House I want to welcome him back again in his full physical health. I think it is a good thing that he should come back even for the purpose of expressing views with which I do not agree. I do not want in any way to detract from that welcome when I say that some of the statements he made will be extremely useful to us on this side of the House.

Many of the matters raised here were raised on individual Estimates, following the pattern set by Deputy Aiken in the beginning. Perhaps I should deal, first of all, with some of these individual items before coming to the question of general principles. Deputy Aiken, and other speakers as well, referred to the fact that on this occasion there was a reduction in the Book of Estimates, 1955-56, in the amount being provided for grain storage loans.

In referring to these detailed comments on reductions by Deputies opposite, I want to stress how inconsistent they were because at one time they were saying that there was no reduction at all and, the next minute, not indeed just another Deputy but actually the same speaker, referring to a particular reduction that had been made.

Deputy Aiken, however, referred to the grain storage loans. He said the reduction was brought about because we on this side of the House, and the present Minister for Agriculture in particular, were antagonistic to grain storage. The facts are, and I am quite sure Deputy Aiken is well aware of them, that this arrangement and the heads of the Bill which ultimately became the Grain Storage (Loans) Act were submitted and thought out, not by the Fianna Fáil Minister for Agriculture, but by Deputy Dillon when he was Minister for Agriculture in the first inter-Party Government. It was suggested that the same provision should have been made as was made under the Act of 1951, by virtue of which guarantees were given to ensure that the very grave deficiency in our grain storage would be made good. Deputies on both sides of the House can remember the discussions over the past years in respect to that deficiency. Likewise, they will remember that the first effort really made to cure that deficiency was made by Deputy Dillon in the first inter-Party Government. The Bill was his child, so to speak, but the general election of that year prevented him finally putting it on the Statute Book.

In connection with the Department of Agriculture also, Deputy MacEntee last night, and Deputy Aiken the previous day, commented on the method of accounting in relation to the Marshall Aid Grant Counterpart Fund. In case there might be any misunderstanding or misinterpretation because of Deputy MacEntee's comments last night, let me say that we on this side of the House, not merely now but on many occasions in the past, indeed right from the beginning, have expressed the appreciation of the Government and the people of the unparalleled generosity of the American Government and the American people in the Marshall Aid arrangements. No suggestion should be made here by anyone that the method of accounting adopted in respect of the Grant Counterpart Fund is in any way a diminution of our appreciation of the generous gesture, of the generosity of the American people. It is, of course, in fact the normal and proper accounting procedure.

There are plenty of parallels. Deputies, for example, can take up the present Book of Estimates and they will see there, in relation to Appropriations-in-Aid under the Vote for the Department of Agriculture at page 130, similar appropriations in respect of the Local Taxation Grant and the Church Temporalities Fund. They are dealt with in exactly the same way and have always been dealt with in exactly the same way. They are dealt with like that, not for the purpose as was suggested, of hiding anything, but for the purpose of ensuring that there would not be double accounting or a double entry in the accounts. That is the normal accounting procedure and the moneys referred to by Deputy MacEntee have been dealt with purely in accordance with that procedure. The differences in relation to this Volume of Estimates on foot of the receipt of Grant Counterpart Funds during the coming year, funds which we hope will come to hand, are differences arising partly in relation to items which have already appeared in the Estimates on previous occasions and partly in respect of new items, offset by the Appropriations-in-Aid, of which the main ones are the provision for the eradication of bovine T.B. and the pasteurisation of milk supplies.

Mr. Aiken

Will the Minister tell us if there is any precedent for an inter-Government sum of that kind being shifted in as an Appropriation-in-Aid? It had the effect of reducing the figure on the face of the Book of Estimates by £933,000.

Mr. Sweetman

Deputy Aiken knows, as well as I do, that there is no precedent for the unparalleled generosity of the American Government and the American people.

Mr. Aiken

Or for the hoofling way in which it was dealt with.

Mr. Sweetman

And Deputy Aiken is merely trying, by the way in which he is speaking now, to hide and cover up the fact of that American generosity.

Mr. Aiken

We all admit the American generosity but the thing is that, if they give generous gifts, they should be acknowledged in the ordinary way, in the Budget.

Mr. Sweetman

It is about time you did. Deputy Lemass, when speaking this morning, almost at the end of his speech, referred to the minerals development work at Avoca. Reference also had been made by Deputy Aiken to that matter, suggesting that in the Vote for Industry and Commerce we were providing less for minerals development than last year, with the implication, if not the stated fact, that the amount was less than the Fianna Fáil Government would have provided if they had been in our position. What are the facts in respect of that? The facts are perfectly clear and are on record for every member of the previous Government to know, not merely Deputy Lemass, who was the Minister in charge of the Department of Industry and Commerce.

This time last year, Deputy Lemass, as Minister for Industry and Commerce, brought to the Government of the day a memorandum dealing with minerals development at Avoca — brought to the Government a proposition by virtue of which the exploratory work at Avoca would terminate at the end of February, 1955, and that all the men who were employed on that development work would be let go at the end of last month, with the exception of some 22 men who would be kept on a maintenance basis. That was the proposal that was brought by the then Minister for Industry and Commerce to the Government of the day and that was the proposal that was accepted by the Government of that time 12 months ago. On that proposal there was not going to be any figure whatsoever for minerals development in the Book of Estimates for 1955-56.

Mr. Aiken

For Avoca.

Mr. Sweetman

For Avoca, yes.

Mr. Aiken

What about the other places?

Mr. Sweetman

If Deputy Aiken will contain himself a little bit he will discover where he is. The position was that, in respect of the development that was proposed for Avoca, the then Government made up their mind that they would not go on with any exploratory work after the end of February, 1955. They provided for that exploratory work for the current year the sum of £74,000. In fact, we have, as the Tanaiste said in answer to a question to-day, decided to expand somewhat that development work. We have decided on that expansion, on the necessity for that expansion and the necessity to finance it, to provide an additional sum of £15,000 for the current year and, in addition, to provide a sum of £40,000 for next year, part of which will be for further development work, part of which will be for maintenance work. That is the exact position in respect of Avoca. The previous Government had intended to end the development at the end of last month but we are carrying it on at the same time as we have entered into discussions, to which the Tánaiste referred to-day, with a view to its permanent commercial exploitation.

Deputy Aiken asks me now, what about other development? I mentioned, and it is mentioned in the memorandum to the Government on January, 1954, that the sum of £74,000 was the amount proposed by that Government to provide for development work at Avoca. It seems an extraordinary thing that, if there was any minerals development work that would be undertaken other than that at Avoca, the previous Government provided nothing in their Estimates other than the £74,000 for Avoca.

Mr. Aiken

When the Mineral Company wound up Avoca and handed it over to a new company they should go ahead and prospect other places. Are there no prospects of minerals in any other part of the country?

Mr. Sweetman

Deputy Aiken is, apparently, without shame. He is prepared to come in here to complain to this House that we are not providing as much funds in respect of Avoca development and, when he is caught out on that, he tries to change his feet.

Mr. Aiken

Mr. McGilligan made exactly the same change in 1948.

Mr. Sweetman

The difficulty is that Deputy Aiken disclosed prematurely on Tuesday the line that Deputy Lemass was likely to take to-day and, as a result, I was able to turn up the facts before replying. Deputy Aiken probably got his hands smacked for letting Deputy Lemass's alleged argument out of the bag before he should have done.

In respect of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs the suggestion was made that there would be less development on telephone installations next year than this year. Deputy Aiken was one of the people who made that suggestion and Deputy Lemass referred to it also to-day. There has not been, as was suggested, a reduction of £22,000 in the salaries and wages of the Post Office Engineering Branch. In fact, there has been an increase of £14,000 in the gross total. The Deputy may have been misled perhaps in taking the wrong total. The staff will be employed to a greater extent than last year on work chargeable to telephone capital funds and, appropriately, a smaller proportion of the gross total is being borne from voted moneys. I think that possibly may have misled him.

Similarly, in respect of installers, the remarks that were made on the other side of the House took that one grade out of its context with the remainder of the labour force. There are considerable increases in the numbers of grades above installer and in the number of labourers. There is an increase, in fact, in wages and the actual reduction in the number of installers is due partly to regrading, partly to reorganisation of work and partly to variation in the works programme. The Deputy and the House can rest absolutely assured that there will be no diminution in the volume of work to be undertaken in the Engineer-Branch.

I agree at once with Deputies on the other side of the House that it would be a retrograde step not to continue to install as many telephones as possible so that those who are without telephones and who require the telephone service will be able to get them as quickly as possible.

When we came to the lands group we got an even more diffuse pattern of criticism. In the provision for Gaeltacht Services, Deputy Aiken suggested that there was £40,000 less actually being provided in this Book of Estimates. The Deputy is wrong. There has, in fact, been provided in this Vote an increased sum. The effect of the estimated provision for next year is that there is an increased sum available and, if the Deputy would refer to the Vote itself, he will see that he took his deduction off the net total, after Appropriations-in-Aid had already been made. In other words, he made his deduction twice. In fact, the position is that next year the gross total of the Vote is some £61,000 more than the gross total for the current year and that, therefore, far from there being less provision for that service there is a gross increased provision of over £60,000. Workers' wages for example, if I may mention one item, will be £131,300 next year compared with £112,000 this year, an increase of £19,300.

Mr. J. Lynch

How much of that increase is due to the replenishment of stocks, could the Minister say?

Mr. Sweetman

The position is that there is an increase of £19,300 in workers' wages.

Mr. J. Lynch

Will the Minister admit that as a result of stockpiling at the end of 1951, there was a considerable amount of stocks that were not required to be renewed for the past few years?

Mr. Sweetman

I understood from the Deputy and his Party that there was no stockpiling in 1951. That was the whole argument when they introduced the White Paper of that date.

Mr. J. Lynch

I argued that myself in introducing the Estimate.

Mr. Sweetman

Even allowing for a difference of approximately £42,000, there is a sum of £19,300 more to be paid out in workers' wages in the service next year as compared with the Deputy's provision this year.

In regard to forestry we also heard a very large variation of criticism, most of which appeared to be based on a misunderstanding of the position. The amounts that have been spent on forestry, going back over a number of years, have been showing a rise from the post-war period — during the war we accept that there was, of course, difficulty in obtaining netting wire and so on and it was not possible to work — but I must say I think it is rather peculiar for Deputies on the other side of the house to suggest now that they are entitled to take forestry to their bosom as one of the developments for which they can rightly claim credit. If we go back over the years, we will find that the provisions prior to the advent of the inter-Party Government in 1948 were very meagre indeed. It is not, however, the provision in this year which is the real question for us to consider now. As I indicated originally in my speech introducing this Estimate we regard forestry as a service that has two advantages — it builds up a capital asset for the future, and in addition to building up that asset it gives substantial employment. The total Vote this year for forestry shows a substantial increase and it was increased by us specificially for that reason.

I mentioned before, and I will repeat now, that we approached these Estimates from the point of view of cutting down expenditure where it was not going to show any results. At the same time we were not prepared to cut expenditure merely for the sake of cutting and we were prepared to consider items on their merits. Where it was desirable to produce more money to get better services we were not afraid to take that course and carry it through.

The criticism that was made in respect of the Forestry Department in particular — that the provision we had made in this Estimate did not permit the purchase of sufficient land — is without foundation. The amount that is provided in the Estimate is a realistic provision; it is a provision that will permit us to buy next year at existing prices at least as much as was bought this year, even somewhat more. It is a realistic provision. It is not going to be a provision such as was made by our predecessors merely for the purpose of show without using the Grant-in-Aid. There was for that subhead in the Vote an accumulation, and the effect of the accumulation with the amount to be voted now in this Book of Estimates, will mean that there will be available about £20,000 more for the purchase of land in the coming year than will be spent in the present year. The amounts that have been spent on land acquisition for forestry over the years have grown partly because of the increased prices but more because of the expansion of the forestry services, an expansion that will in the years ahead produce, we hope, some really positive results. It is on services like this that we think it is desirable there should be increased spending. I did not, for example, hear in the course of this debate any criticism in regard to the arterial drainage programme. The fact is that we estimate expenditure under the principal headings in that regard for next year at a total of £734,000 compared with the revised estimate of what is to be spent this year of £576,000. That is partly in respect of increased construction works and partly maintenance work which is coming in now. Again, that is the type of service upon which we think it is worth while that public moneys should be spent and which will produce within a reasonable time an improvement in our economy and will, in addition to doing that, remove much hardship with which our people have had to contend.

I was also told during this debate that the provision we are making for schools was less than last year's and, by implication, less than what a Fianna Fáil Government would have provided. Again, the facts do not bear out that criticism. New schools are things that are vitally necessary in many parts of the country. In the year ended 31st March, 1954, the total grants that were sanctioned for the provision of new schools, for enlargement of existing schools, for major improvements to existing schools and for minor improvements were £1,130,000. The sanctions this year are some £350,000 higher at £1,480,00 and, of course, Deputies can appreciate that it is on the rate of sanctions in a year that the building programme for the following year will be based. The position in respect of this also is that it is not the amount that is voted that is really the operative figure but the amount that is spent. We are in the position that in the year ending 31st March, 1954, the amount that was spent on the provision of new schools and the reconstruction in the manner I have mentioned, was £1,071,000, and that in the nine months to the end of 1954 the amount was £859,000. Taking it very roughly that that was for nine months of the year, it would appear that the figure for the full financial year is likely to run at somewhere about £1,150,000. That was pushing on that work as fast as we could push it since June. The figure we have provided for next year — the realistic figure — is £1,398,000, which is £250,000 more than is going to be spent on work in the present year.

We had also discussions in respect of the figures that were included for health. Certain Deputies endeavoured to suggest that we had by deliberate design cut down the programme of hospitalisation. I do not think one Deputy who made that suggestion yesterday or the day before, in his calmer moments would repeat it; I was referring to Deputy Lynch. I think that was just something he said in the heat of the debate and that otherwise it would not be a suggestion he would make.

The position is that we believe that in the current year the expenditure that will be required as a subvention to the Hospitals Trust Fund for the building of hospitals will be in or around the region of £2,000,000. Physical difficulties in respect of that building programme are all that is holding it up. Far from there being any deliberate intention to restrict in the way that was suggested, our activity was to ensure that good value would be obtained for the money and that the work would be pushed on as hard as possible. However, physical difficulties have prevented more than £2,000,000 of voted moneys being spent this year. Next year we are providing not £2,000,000 but £2,250,000 because we hope we will be able to get over those physical difficulties and step up that capital expenditure.

We were told also that it was by the deliberate action of this Government that expenditure heretofore met out of the Central Fund had now been put on the ratepayers. Deputy Briscoe was particularly vehement on this point when he was speaking here on Tuesday. Deputies who look at the Health Act of 1953 and, in particular, who look at Section 15 of that Act — that Act which was not passed when we were the Government — will find that in Section 15 (1) there is provided:

"A health authority shall, in accordance with regulations, make available institutional and specialist services for the persons specified in sub-section (2) of this section."

Sub-section (2) of that section states:

"The persons referred to in subsection (1) of this section are the following persons and their dependents:

(a) persons insured under the Social Welfare Act, 1952."

That is a statutory, mandatory direction to the local authorities, to the Dublin Corporation, to the county councils throughout the country.

Mr. Briscoe

When was that put into force?

Mr. Sweetman

The present Minister for Health, Deputy O'Higgins, then provided that persons who had formerly been carried under the Social Welfare Vote should be dealt with——

Mr. Briscoe

That is not a true picture. When was it put into force?

Mr. Sweetman

Deputy Briscoe cannot blow hot and blow cold. Deputy Briscoe knows as well as I know that he has been rampaging — I was going to say around the country but perhaps I will say the city, that being his territory — to the effect that every section of the Act should be brought in at the earliest possible opportunity.

Mr. Briscoe

The full Act, not parts of it.

Mr. Sweetman

Every section of it and now what is wrong with him is that because the section, or parts of it, represents something that he does not like he is not going to be enabled to say that it is the action of the present Minister.

Mr. Briscoe

The Minister knows the Act was postponed except for those parts.

Mr. Sweetman

I know all about that and I know also the difficulties in which the present Minister for Health found himself when he came into office thanks to the mess that had been left behind by the previous Minister, because I happened to be at the conference getting information to see what the position was. Deputy Briscoe is not going to be able to divert me from the facts in that respect any more than he was able to do so in respect of the special works programme last year.

There was also a suggestion by the Deputy that there was a new provision in respect of existing hospitals, existing treatment, peculiar and particular to Dublin Corporation. There again the position is that that was created by Section 10 of the Health Act, 1953, that it was Section 10 of that Act which transferred the liability from the two public assistance authorities which there were in the Dublin area to the Dublin Corporatión and that it was that transfer which changed the basis of maintenance previously existing, to the arrangements already existing in respect of every local authority outside Dublin. The arrangement that was in respect of local authorities outside Dublin by which patients were paid for at the rate of £5 12s. a week was not prior to the 1953 Act operative for the City of Dublin, but Section 10 of that Act had the effect of bringing it into force for Dublin and it was only under Section 10 that that was done.

Mr. Briscoe

What date was it decided? What was the date of the Minister's Order?

Mr. Sweetman

His Excellency the President signed the Act on the 29th October, 1953.

Mr. Briscoe

When did the Minister give his Order, last August?

Mr. Sweetman

Deputy Briscoe knows exactly the situation and he is trying to avoid the consequences of his own Government's actions. We had a discussion also on these Estimates in respect of the employment position. When he was speaking to-day Deputy Lemass, in one of his usual positive statements, said that every year since the establishment of the records there has been an increase in industrial employment — of course, I am not going to make any point about the war years, that is understandable — but I challenged him at the time and having got the figures I find I am correct. There was one year in which there was not such an increase, in which there was an actual decrease and it is a rather peculiar fact that the year in which that took place was the year 1952 when Fianna Fáil had come in and introduced a new plan and a new policy. In 1951, there were 226,000 people in industrial employment. In 1952 as a result of their policy that number dropped by 5,000 to 221,000 and it took the year 1953 to get back again to the position in which they found it.

I want also to make it clear that the position in that respect has been over the years far from satisfactory because contemporaneously and concurrently with that increase in industrial employment there has been a decrease in agricultural employment more than offsetting the increase that we have got in industrial employment. In that position no Government could possibly be complacent as was suggested by Deputy Lemass. We are not in the least complacent about the position, but we are satisfied that we have by our quiet methods improved the situation and will improve it still more as the months go on.

There has been play made here by Deputy Aiken and Deputy Lemass on the increase that there was in certain weeks in respect of claims for unemployment benefit. As the Minister for Social Welfare mentioned to-day the total claims for unemployment benefit for the 26th February was 1.1 per cent. more than last year; three weeks before that they were down by between 2 and 4 per cent. The phenomenon there is one that arose for two reasons.

First of all, I give full credit to the Deputies on the other side of the House. Under the Social Welfare Act of 1952, there are provisions by virtue of which it is easier to get benefit than before and in consequence there is an increased incentive to register. Quite apart from that the provisions now provide that a person is able to come into benefit after a period in casual work far more easily than he was able to do before. It follows, therefore, that the more the unemployment assistance cases contract, that is, the greater decrease there is in unemployment assistance, the more liability there may be, in a sudden period such as the appalling weather there was for county council workers the week before last, for people to have an unemployment benefit claim which they would never have had before.

I do not accept the contention that was put forward by Deputy Aiken and by Deputy Lemass that it is not desirable to look at the total level of the unemployment register and, in fact, I do not think they accept it either. Certainly, they were in a panic condition when it rose to almost 90,000 in 1953. The position so far as we are concerned is that we wanted to improve the position and to ensure that the increase in industrial employment that occurred in the third quarter of last year will be increased still further this year and that we will be enabled by the methods and by the means we adopt to ensure that as many as possible of our people will be put into permanent employment and that as many as possible of our people will also be utilised for productive employment by the State.

We had some references by both Deputy MacEntee last night and Deputy Lemass to-day to the question of banks and bank interest. I have very little to add to what I have already said. I made it clear last week that I had discussions with the banks, that I made it clear in those discussions that I considered that the appropriate thing to take into account was the national over-all position, that so far as I could see there was at the moment nothing in our economy of an equivalent nature to those signs of danger that the British Chancellor had seen in respect of the British economy.

In all the discussions I had and in all the discussion we had in this House nobody has challenged that fact. The most striking thing about the whole matter is that everybody is agreed that there are not factors here operative such as operated on the other side of the water. If there are not such factors operating here then surely it was right in our discussions that we should consider whether it was not better for us to take a different line to the remedy that was taken on the other side. Deputy MacEntee last night here took the direct line that interest rates did not matter at all, that it does not matter in the very slightest to a concern or to an individual whether he is paying 5 per cent., 6 per cent. or 7 per cent. As I interjected then, I would repeat now, if the fact is that interest rates do not matter at all why is it that the British Chancellor in the circumstances in which he finds himself has been at such pains to raise interest rates there to correct a tendency that exists there. Of course we all know that in fact they do have an effect, direct in one respect and psychologically in another. Perhaps the psychological effect might have been more operative then the direct effect.

I have nothing more to add to the statement I have made last week. I put to the banks that it was our national over-all position which should be uppermost in our minds in dealing with a problem such as this. It was not to be determined by the immediate benefits that there might be to any sectional interest. As I said, I am glad and appreciative of the fact that they accepted that that was my view and the view of the Government.

I will not hold the House up any longer except to say this: this Book of Estimates is a reduction of £2.77 million on the Book of Estimates brought in this time last year. It is not merely in that context that it should be considered but in the context of the picture painted by Deputy Lemass when he said that he could not see how the Book of Estimates would not be £10,000,000 or so up. We must think of the Book of Estimates not merely in terms of comparison of the figure on its face with that on the face of the Estimates brought in last year by Deputy MacEntee. We must remember what it would have meant to our people if the authors of a Book of Estimates in the line of prophecy made by Deputy Lemass a fortnight ago had not been moved by the people to the other side of the House.

Mr. Briscoe

The Minister did not answer my question about how it is possible to reduce the Government contribution towards the rates when the rates are going up.

Mr. Sweetman

Because more was provided last year than should have been provided.

Mr. Briscoe

It does not say so in the Estimates.

Mr. Sweetman

When the Deputy gets the Orders and figures he will see I am right.

Vote put and agreed to.

Vote reported and agreed to.