I note the Minister's reference to the Agricultural Institute Bill. I should be glad to know whether the Minister considered this matter. What does he intend to do about it? I said earlier that there is no approach to any problem relative to agriculture in this country too radical if it should prove to be the right one. I hope that in regard to this matter the Minister will not hesitate to be radical if he believes it to be his duty and I hope he would bear in mind most emphatically my declaration of loyalty to the radical principle if justice can best be served thereby.
I agree with the Minister for Agriculture, when in regard to the Department of Agriculture he says it is desirable that, in spite of ministerial changes, there ought to be certain coherence and continuity of policy. I tried to put that principle in practice and I am glad that the Minister for Agriculture expresses the same intention.
I remember on the occasion of introducing my first Estimate for Agriculture my predecessor in that responsible office conceived it to be his duty to speak for six hours on the Estimate. What purpose he hoped to serve by doing that God only knows. Deputies are in possession of an informative White Paper which will give them a very fair review of the activities of the Department of Agriculture. If they want any confirmation they can go down and look at the photographs outside the Library in Leinster House and they will see there further evidence of the useful work the Department has done and is doing. If that fails to convince them, they can repair to the countryside and look on close on 1,000,000 acres of land which a few years ago was producing little or nothing and which to-day is almost all producing abundant crops.
In that connection, I think it is time for the Minister to lay one ghost. Deputy Allen from time to time intervenes in our debates and rejoices in saying that money was wasted in the land rehabilitation project, that on some land £500 an acre was spent. I do not believe that is true, but I know there was one farm in Wexford on which the Department of Agriculture entered during the administration of my predecessor, the late lamented Deputy Walsh. I know that on that farm unexpected circumstances arose which involved the Department in expenditure which they would never have undertaken had they foreseen the nature of the problem that lay before them. Had I been Minister for Agriculture at the time, exactly the same mistake would have occurred, because it was the kind of error that no vigilance on the part of the Minister or on the part of the supervisory officers of the Department could have avoided.
But I have always made this boast: never, while I was Minister for Agriculture did I make the claim that we would make no mistakes. We made many. But I did claim—and I challenge anyone to disprove this—we never made the same mistake twice. That is the measure of my boasting and remember this, and mark it well: if each great project in this country is to be rendered absolutely watertight against all possibility of mistake before it is launched, nothing will ever be launched in this country. You could sit down forever in contemplation of some formidable enterprise and listen to the possibilities of error that could arise and never get anywhere.
I was never afraid of making a mistake once. I would have been ashamed to make it twice. I was always prepared to avow that anyone in this country could put his finger in my eye once. If he did it twice, he was a better man than I was, Gunga Din. A lot of people make the fatal error of trying it on. I rejoice to think that none of them ever came back a third time.
There is no use concealing the fact that I am very proud of the Department of Agriculture in this country. I once drove the know-alls in this country, the boys who never earned an honest day's pay in their lives, almost daft, by saying that I thought our Department of Agriculture was the best in the world. Every agricultural expert in Ireland who never grew a dandelion in his life nearly burst a blood vessel. I have seen more of the world than any of them.
I have seen the work the Department does, has done and is doing and I want to say quite deliberately again that, while the Irish Department of Agriculture is not proof against mistakes— and I have never claimed it was—the experts notwithstanding, I consider it to be one of the best Departments of Agriculture in the world. I want to rejoice again in the recollection I have during last year and many years before in representing this country at international conferences that the very officials of my Department, as at the time it was, who in their own country were derided by some of the numskulls they had to listen to with patience as incompetent, were sought eagerly by every international organisation that I attended.
They were sought to co-operate in the work of O.E.E.C., F.A.O. and many other international organisations of that kind. My embarrassment was that, as Minister, I had frequently to inform international agencies that I could not give them the services of some of the men they wanted from our Department of Agriculture because we had not got the staff to permit of their release from the work they were doing for their own country.
I do think it is time—and I do not doubt that the present Minister substantially agrees with me—that we should get out of the habit of belittling our own. It is a great mistake to overestimate our own importance, our own competence, our own efficiency, but at least we should not cry down that which is Irish and that which is esteemed all the world over. Self-criticism is a very useful thing, but it can be carried too far; it can be carried to the point when it can undermine the devotion and the enthusiasm of the best of men.
We have something of incalculable value in this country. That is a devoted and competent body of public servants who have a great tradition of service. Whatever Government may be in office, their sole concern has been to find out the Minister's policy and faithfully to carry it out to the best of their ability. They are not always right or perfect, but I think they are about as good as any country can boast about. We have every right to be proud of them and it does no harm occasionally to say so.
That is all I have to say on this Estimate this year. It may be that it will appear that I have erred on the side of refraining from criticism. There is a very simple explanation for that. I prepared this Estimate and the Minister has been very circumspect in his speech introducing it; he gave me very few pegs on which to hang my hat.
I have no doubt he will be in office for 12 months. That is one of these sad facts which, being a realist in politics, I reconcile myself to. When I see his first year of administration, we may find ourselves differing more emphatically than we may appear to do now. Politically, that may be a blessing to the Minister; but, in the meantime, I simply want to reiterate at the end what I said in the beginning: I wish him the best of luck. I hope he will be a most successful Minister for Agriculture. If I had to pass over the Department to any member of his Party—which I did with great reluctance—I have the least anxiety in passing it to him.