Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 1 Jun 1955

Vol. 151 No. 4

Committee on Finance. - Adjournment Debate—Kilkenny County Registrar.

Mr. Walsh

A Cheann Comhairle, when I heard the Minister's reply to-day to Question No. 26 on the Order Paper, I informed you that I was not satisfied with it. The county registrar in Kilkenny was appointed in 1926 and he reaches the age limit on the 20th June, 1955. He made application to the Minister for an extension so that he might get the full 30 years' service which would enable him to qualify for full pension. For some reason or other the Minister has refused to grant that extension. This action of the Minister is unprecedented. This is the first time in the history of the State that an extension recommended by the Department was refused by the Minister. It is obvious that when the Act was being framed provision was made to have this matter left in the hands of the Minister—to give him full discretion.

The reason for that is obvious because the position of county registrar requires a very suitable person, a person who is tactful, resourceful and of the highest integrity, and we know it is very difficult to find a person with all these qualifications under the age of 35 years. Consequently, in many cases when a registrar is being appointed, he is over 35 years of age. In order to give that man an opportunity of getting a full pension the Minister has been given the discretionary power of extending his years of service. If, for instance, this man had been guilty of any offence—not an offence, maybe, but perhaps dereliction of duty in his office—and if there is any reason why his services should be terminated, then the Minister is perfectly right in refusing to grant the extension. But no such case is being made here. Over the past 28 years this man has given entire satisfaction to successive Ministers for Justice.

Now, what qualities had this man in the first instance to qualify him for this position? In 1917 he was a very young solicitor and when Mr. William T. Cosgrave went to Kilkenny to contest a by-election in that year there were nine or ten solicitors practising in the city but there was not one of them who would volunteer to act as Mr. Cosgrave's election agent. Mr. Kearney stepped into the breach. There was no much kudos for doing that in those days. Again in 1921, in the May elections of that year, he was again election agent for the Sinn Féin candidates. Being an election agent at that time was tantamount to carrying a gun. That was shortly prior to the truce. In 1922, Mr. Kearney acted as election agent for the late Mr. Patrick Gaffney of Carlow, a Labour candidate who received the greatest number of votes ever received in the Carlow-Kilkenny constituency.

All this shows that this man was prepared to take risks, first of all in 1917 and later in 1921. What is his recompense? He was offered this position in 1926 by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government of that day. Now he wants 12 months to entitle him to his full pension—he wants an extension to the 1st day of September, 1956. He qualifies for full pension then, but in the meantime there is some greedy person looking for his job who is denying him the right of qualifying and the Minister is being pushed. Who is pushing him? From where does this push come? I doubt very much if the Labour organisation in Kilkenny has made the recommendation that he should be dispensed with. I doubt it very much because in his earlier years, when he was practising as a solicitor, Mr. Kearney was the one solicitor that the Labour organisation could rely on to fight their case in Kilkenny.

Anybody who wishes to go back on the records of County Kilkenny for the period I have mentioned will find that I am telling the Minister the truth. I know that there is no victimisation from the point of view that the Minister is perfectly entitled to refuse this extension, but I know also that in no case in the history of the State has a man in his position been dealt with in this way, for the obvious reason that some greedy person, somebody not prepared to wait 12 months for his job, is pushing the Minister. Is this person who is looking for the job afraid that the Coalition Government will not be in office in 1956? Is the Minister afraid that he himself will not be there to give the job?

Mr. O'Leary

Is this man up to the age limit or not?

Mr. Walsh

I should like to tell the Minister that there is nobody looking for the job from our side of the House. It is the Minister's prerogative to fill this position, and if he believes he will be Minister in 1956 nothing, except selfishness and greed is compelling him and pushing him from dispensing with Mr. Kearney's services at this stage.

Mr. O'Leary

Good propaganda for you, Deputy.

Mr. Walsh

There is no propaganda; there is just a question of justice—the justice that has been meted out by Fianna Fáil to every registrar irrespective of who appointed them down through the years. Has any case been made against any registrar in any county? When the 1926 Act was passed these appointments were made by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government. How many of these registrars have been treated in the way the Minister wishes to treat Mr. Kearney? Look back over the years. Of course I have no way of knowing whether any man was dispensed with or dismissed. Possibly there were men but is there any case where a man who was tactful, resourceful and of the highest integrity was not given the chance of qualifying for his full pension? There is no case on record where that happened. Is it not the ambition of every public servant, not matter what position in the service of the State he occupies, to qualify for full pensions? Are people to be denied that now?

But this man is being denied that right simply because there is somebody looking for his job and because the Minister, I do not know for what reason, is afraid it will not be within his power to give the job in September, 1956. We are asking only for the same concession as has been given to the men who have acted as county registrars heretofore. Why should this man be made an example of? It is unprecedented in the history of this State that a man should be treated in this summary fashion by any Minister for Justice. I would appeal to the Minister to change his mind on this question, and to review the decision that he has already given, having regard to this man's record down through the years in that no charge has ever been made against him. He is still active physically, and with all his mental faculties as good as they were when he was appointed. Yet, he is to be thrown on the dust heap.

Is this a saving of money for the taxpayers of the country? Already we have a pensioner in connection with this position. We have a man who was handed over by the British régime and who was retired in 1926. He is still drawing a pension of £900 a year. Are we to put another £900 a year on the taxpayers in order to create a job of £1,500 a year for some greedy individual? This is a question of unnecessary increased expenditure on the taxpayers of the country and you are doing it deliberately to create a job for somebody else.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy is repeating himself.

Mr. Walsh

If I am I am sorry, but the position is tantamount to what I have said, that a new job is being created and that does not mean any saving to the taxpayers in money. Actually, it will put additional expense on the taxpayers because Mr. Kearney, as I have said, is perfectly well able physically and mentally to do the job that he has been doing for the past 28 years. I would ask the Minister to review the decision that he has given in his case and to grant the extension.

Mr. Boland

When I was told about this by Deputy Walsh I told him, frankly that I did not believe it, and I advised him to go and see the Minister personally, because I knew of no case in which an extension was not given where the Department was satisfied that the person concerned had given good service. There were two cases——

An Ceann Comhairle

I hope the Deputy is not going to go into qualifications or to mention the name of any person.

Mr. Boland

I am not going to mention any name. The Minister justified his action to-day, when answering the question, by saying that his predecessor —that is me—had in two cases refused an extension. I shall try to deal with them without mentioning any names.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Chair does not want their qualifications brought in.

Mr. Boland

All I will say about the two cases in question is this: the Minister has full access to the files and he must be aware of the reasons why the extensions were not given in these two cases. He must be aware of that, and I will leave it at that. One of them was a personal friend of mine, appointed by our Government. I must say that he is a man for whom I have the highest personal regard. The other was appointed in the time of Mr. Cosgrave's Government. The Minister knows, apart from these two cases, that during my 11 years as Minister for Justice, I granted extensions, although I agree that pressure was brought to bear on me, very severe pressure by some of our own people not to extend the time for county registrars, because there were undoubtedly on our side solicitors who wanted these jobs. I said: "Let them take their time; this practice has always been followed and I am going to follow it, and when the time expires we can consider the other people."

The very remarkable thing here is the change of attitude on the part of the present Government. When they were in office before, the position was that district justices were required to retire at the age of 65 years. As a matter of fact, in 1946 a Bill which I brought in was passed through the House with the special support of the Labour Party requiring that even Dublin district justices would retire at 65. That was for new appointments, but I think the position with regard to Cork City was different. That Bill was passed. When it came to the case of one particular justice—I had better not attribute any motives—who never had the right to an extension, a Bill was brought in to make it possible that he would get an extension from year to year until he reached 70 years of age.

That is the law at present. We have a reversal of that now. The practice had always been to give these county registrars an extension up to 70 years if their health and services were satisfactory. Now, apparently they are to go. I do not know if this is going to apply to the remainder of them, but anyway it is a new departure, and there is a reversal of engines. It went so far on one occasion, when a gentleman was 70 years of age, that a special section was put in a Bill to extend his service to 72. Now, we have quite the reverse process taking place.

I do not know the gentleman in this case, but I think it is a great pity that this should be done because county registrars have the right to expect an extension. It is specifically mentioned in Section 35 of the 1926 Act that the Minister may do it. I think that gives a man appointed to this position the right to expect that he will get that extension if his services and health are satisfactory. I join with Deputy Walsh in asking the Minister to reconsider this, and give this county registrar an extension sufficient at least to enable him to qualify for a full pension. That is all I have to say.

This afternoon, when this matter was before the House, the Minister for Finance made what I consider to be a very serious reflection on my character, on my conduct of affairs in the Department of Justice. He made some innuendo that I did not understand. I hope he will be more explicit. If he goes through the files of the Department and finds that I did anything wrong in my time, I hope he will be explicit about it. He said something about cars.

An Ceann Comhairle

That is extraneous matter which does not arise on this.

Mr. Boland

It was a serious reflection on me as Minister for Justice. The Minister should come out and say what I did.

Minister for Justice (Mr. Everett)

I made no reflection on the Deputy.

Mr. Boland

It is a serious thing to have an innuendo like that made by the Minister for Finance.

An Ceann Comhairle

This is not the appropriate time to raise it. The Deputy should have raised it then.

Mr. Boland

I did, but I am entitled to do so again.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Minister concerned is not present.

Mr. Boland

I am sorry for that. I wish he were, but I shall probably get an opportunity later to do so. I mention it now because the thing is hot— it happened to-day.

Mr. Everett

I want to disabuse the mind of Deputy Walsh in regard to what he has alleged, that the secretary to the Department had recommended the retention of this gentleman. I want to state publicly that the secretary to the Department made no recommendation, but on the contrary drew my attention to the fact that in 1953 a serious reprimand had to be made to this gentleman in connection with the state of his office. For that reason—and Deputy Boland is well aware of what had taken place in 1953 —I have decided that as he is going to receive a pension of practically £1,000 a year, he was not satisfactory, and that therefore it was time to call on him to resign.

In 1953, Deputy Boland, as Minister, with the concurrence of the Department, had an inquiry which reprimanded this gentleman in connection with the sad state of affairs of his office. This is the man that I am being asked to retain for another year or two. I am at a loss to understand why there should be such a request made for an extension.

County registrars are the most pampered officials in the whole Civil Service. As Deputy Boland is aware, there is no other civil servant, and not even a resident medical officer, who gets an opportunity of retiring on full pension after only 30 years' service. Under the 1926 Act, I think, provision was made that county registrars should retire at 65 years, but the Minister has power, where he is satisfied that the work is being performed satisfactorily, to extend the age limit. But Deputy Boland now asks me to explain, when he refused to grant an extension to two men. I am not going to go into the details of that. There is no doubt about it that Deputy Boland refused to give any reason for it.

Mr. Boland

I cannot recollect it I must say.

Mr. Everett

I can show the Deputy the files. He can accept my word for it. You had good grounds for not granting an extension of one gentleman's time. I agree with that, because, if I or any Minister had been in a similar position, we would have done the same as Deputy Boland. In the second case, he gave no specific reason whatsoever for refusing to grant an extension.

Mr. Boland

I hope the Minister will give me an opportunity of going into that later on.

Mr. Everett

I have no doubt at all, and I agree with the Deputy. With regard to the officer concerned, his work was not considered satisfactory, and his continuing in office beyond the normal time for retirement would not be in the public interest. I prefer not to go any further in this case. I am not going into its merits. I am satisfied that if Deputy Walsh and Deputy Boland cast their minds back to 1953, they will see that they have not justified a case for bringing this matter up. As I said, this gentleman is retiring on practically £1,000 a year. I believe it is in the public interest to get him to retire at the present time, and thereby have no further complaints from the Department in connection with the administration of his office.

Deputy Walsh got very vocal, and alleged that somebody is greedy for the job. I have not been pushed, other than by the information I get in the Department. I know of nobody looking for the job and, up to the present, I have not been approached. I do not know whether anyone in Kilkenny is aware of it. Probably, when it comes to an appointment, Deputy Walsh's forecast will not be correct.

Mr. Walsh

I have not made any forecast yet.

Mr. Everett

Deputy Walsh says that this man was appointed by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government and that he was also an election agent for a member of the Party of which I am a member. If there was any concession to be given, without interfering with public administration, you would imagine that, if influence had been brought to bear on me, it would have been with the support of the Labour Party instead of Fine Gael. Of course, I would have been influenced to extend his time had I been satisfied that it was in the public interest.

I am glad that Deputy Walsh pointed out that it was not a political case. It was also pointed out that he was a member of the Cumann na nGaedheal Government and of the Labour Party. Had I been able to find any reasonable excuse at all, I would have retained him in office, but as Deputy Boland must know, the work of the county registrar is very important. It may be that there will be cases in future when I will refuse to continue men in office in the same way. There are other men who are doing their work satisfactorily. I am not worrying about their politics. So long as they give satisfaction to the public, then the Minister has power to grant an extension to entitle them to a pension.

There might be a case made if this man was aged when he went into the position, and was retiring on only a few hundred pounds of a pension per year, with a young family to rear. But here is a man with whom, I am sure, no Deputy in the House will show any great sympathy, nor consider it a grievance that he should be confronted with retirement on practically £1,000 a year. I think other civil servants would be pleased and delighted to get an opportunity of retiring on the pension of this gentleman, after service in the administration. I want to say to Deputy Boland that I have acted in good faith. But what happened in 1953 shows that the gentleman concerned has not been satisfactory, and for that reason alone, I decided, in the public interest, not to extend his period of service.

The Dáil adjourned at 11 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 2nd June, 1955.