Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 25 Feb 1959

Vol. 173 No. 1

Committee on Finance. - Vote 67—Remuneration.

Minister for Finance (Dr. Ryan)

I move:—

That a sum not exceeding £987,000 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1959, for payment of certain remuneration.

In my Budget statement last April, I announced that I had agreed to extend the National Wages Agreement of September, 1957, to the arbitrable groups in the civil service and to certain other public servants. This Supplementary Estimate makes provision for additional expenditure arising from that decision, account being taken of savings otherwise on the existing provisions for remuneration. Since the original Supplementary Estimate was prepared, the Government have accepted the findings of the chairman of the arbitration board for secondary teachers on a salary claim made on behalf of the secondary teachers and a revised Supplementary Estimate, including the necessary provision, has accordingly been circulated.

Agreement was reached under the conciliation and arbitration machinery for increases to civil servants coming within its scope by reference to the 10/- a week increase set out in the National Agreement. These increases date from 1st April, 1958, and the cost, without taking savings into account, is estimated to be £597,000 for the current year.

Similar increases have been accorded to the Defence Forces at a cost of £195,000, and to the Garda Síochána, at a cost of £156,000.

A claim by vocational teachers was settled by conciliation agreement on a similar basis. A proportion of the increase falls to be recouped to vocational education committees by Exchequer grants, and the extra cost to the Exchequer this year is estimated to be £22,000.

The increases accorded to national teachers are the result of a finding by the arbitration board for national teachers. The chairman of the board recommended new salary scales, with effect from the 1st September, 1958, and this recommendation has been accepted by the Government. Its effect is, broadly, to increase the salaries of national teachers by 6 per cent. The cost this year is £226,000.

The increases accorded to secondary teachers likewise result from arbitration. The chairman of the arbitration board recommended new incremental salary scales, with effect from the 1st September, 1958, and this recommendation has been accepted by the Government. Its effect is, broadly, to increase the salaries of secondary teachers by 6 per cent. The cost this year is £56,000.

Health authority employees, 50 per cent. of whose remuneration is paid out of State grants, obtained, in common with other local authority employees, increases similar to those granted to civil servants. The cost to the Exchequer in the current year is estimated at £112,000 but, as sufficient savings are available in the existing Vote for Health, no provision is made for health staffs in this Supplementary Estimate.

The 1955 pay settlement for the Civil Service provided that the increases on 1948 basic rates should be 37½ per cent. on the first £250 a year, 22½ per cent. on the next £715 and 17½ per cent. on anying in excess of £965. I have now agreed to allow the same percentage increase on pay above £965 as applies on pay between £250 and £965. The officers primarily concerned did not receive the increases granted to the arbitrable groups but they are getting an increase of 5 per cent. on the portion of their pay in excess of £965. This arrangement, which has effect from the 1st April, 1958, is estimated to cost £19,000 in the current year, and the necessary provision is included in this Supplementary Estimate.

The figures of cost which I have given for the classes covered by this Estimate total £1,271,000. By the utilisation of savings, the additional money required has been reduced to £987,000, the figure set out on the face of the Estimate.

General Mulcahy

What is the figure over the whole 12 months?

Dr. Ryan

It is a full 12 months, except in two cases, the national teachers and the secondary teachers. It is only half a year, roughly, in each of those two cases.

Mr. Dillon

This Supplementary Estimate, which appears on its face to be for £987,000, should be considered in the light of what the Minister has said. It is, in fact, a Supplementary Estimate for £1,250,000, offset by adventitious savings on other subheads. Now, it is the view of this Party that these adjustments in salaries and wages are equitable and fair, because they are consequential on the increase in the cost of living created by the positive act of the Government. However, it is no harm for the House to pause now and look a little more closely at the significance of this Supplementary Estimate. This is one of the Minister's birds that are coming home to roost, consequent on this Government's decision to tax bread, flour and butter.

When I was young in politics and we discussed Budgets, we were always solicitous to differentiate between what were called hard taxes and soft taxes. It is true to say that, in one sense, no tax is a soft tax, but for comparative purposes, we used to say that a tax which affected only a luxury could be legitimately regarded as a soft tax, since it was open to those who used the luxury to forego its user, if they did not choose to pay the tax. On the other hand, if you put a tax upon a thing like bread or butter or tea, that is a hard tax, because in the circumstances of our society, particularly in regard to the poor, many people have no alternative but to use tea, bread, flour and butter—except perhaps to sink to a level in their standard of living which this House has never sought to impose upon any of our people, that is to say, to bid them give up tea and to eat margarine instead of butter. Therefore, we were always concerned to avoid hard taxes, unless in extreme and dire necessity, because we felt that they bore heavily on the poor and those least able to bear them. That was the ordinary humanitarian approach of Oireachtas Éireann as long as I remember it.

There was another consideration which always affected our judgment. If you taxed essential foodstuffs, you undermined economic stability by radically changing the cost of living for the people and there ensued, upon a decision of that kind by the Oireachtas, a perfectly legitimate agitation by those who were organised to protect themselves. That agitation occurred for a corresponding adjustment in remuneration and the trade unionists offset the increase in the cost of living by getting increased wages. That happened 12 months ago, when the wages went up by 10/- a week for the Civil Service, the Army, the national teachers, secondary teachers, vocational teachers and the Garda Síochána. They all lined up and they got their increase; and in this case it amounts to £1,250,000 per annum.

Then Oireachtas Éireann was confronted with the problem of the old age pensioner, the widow and the unemployed and was brought face to face with this fact, that the increase in the cost of living—which according to this Estimate required an adjustment of 10/- a week in the case of civil servants, the Defence Forces, the Gardaí and several other categories of persons, and of all trade unionists—was deemed to have been met by an increase of 1/6 in the old age pension.

Mr. Corish

A shilling.

Mr. Dillon

A shilling. I think the adjustments envisaged by this Supplementary Estimate are fair, but I ask the House to consider the feeling of the old age pensioners, the recipients of widows' and orphans' pensions and the recipients of unemployment allowances, who are far more dependent on bread, butter and tea than are the categories of persons mentioned in this Supplementary Estimate. Vis-á-vis all those people, comparatively, in any case, who get 10/- a week to meet the increase in the cost of living consequent on the increase in the price of bread, butter, tea and flour, the old age pensioner who is practically living on these four comestibles gets a shilling to meet that charge.

Ministers have their difficulties and Parliaments are inclined to deal with specific problems pragmatically, but we ought to try to bear in mind that if, by our act, we deliberately increase the chasm that is opening between the poor and the well-to-do in this country, we will undermine the whole basis upon which our society stands. I believe in a free society, but if a free society is to survive, there must be some standard of justice between one section of the people and another. I was reading recently a speech by Mr. Khrushchev, who says that he envisages the emergence of a society in Russia where there will be no taxes, a 40 hour week for everybody, guaranteed employment for 100 per cent. of the population, security from hunger, exposure and destitution.

I can well imagine a lot of people, suffering under great stress, yearning for such a development and oblivious of the fact that it is to be found in the City of Dublin, by anybody who wants it—in Mountjoy Gaol. There he will get three square meals a day, 40 hours a week employment, a secure roof and a warm bed. Provided he is prepared to accept the conditions in Mountjoy Gaol, he need not travel to Moscow to enjoy the amenities promised by Mr. Khrushchev for his whole population.

However, if by the positive act of this Parliament, we increase the cost of living on the people on a large scale, which imposes on us a duty to give every employee of the State 10/- a week extra to offset that increased cost, and if we go to the unemployed, the old age pensioner, the widow and the recipient of home assistance and say: "You will get only 1/- and do the best you can on that," we are doing all in our power to make Mr. Khrushchev's alternative to freedom more attractive than it ought to be to free men.

That is not the end of the story, Sir. In addition to considering where this money is to go, we must ask ourselves where this money is to come from. Of course the money which is to pay this extra remuneration, and a great many other charges, is to come from the taxes on butter, flour, bread and tea, or rather on butter, flour and bread, which the Government have drawn into the Exchequer by the decision taken when they removed the subsidies on these commodities. That has several direct and readily identifiable results, but it also has some remote results as well. I see a notice in to-day's paper that the rates in the City of Dublin are to go up by 2/- in the £ and that it is largely the result of increased remuneration made necessary to offset the increased cost of living. The rates in every county council in Ireland are going up partly for the same reason, partly because the cost of maintaining people in county hospitals and other county institutions is increasing as a result of the increased cost of flour, bread and butter.

Picture the feelings of a ten acre farmer in County Monaghan or County Mayo. He eats bread; he buys butter if his family are to be maintained on a tolerable standard of living. He sees every civil servant in the country, every civic guard in the country, every soldier, every teacher— secondary, national and vocational— every trade unionist in the country, every railway worker, everybody who has the protection of a trade union, getting an increase in his wages of 10/- a week. The small farmer—and when I say a small farmer, I mean a man with less than 20 acres of land— who has to buy bread, butter, and flour, has to pay the extra price for these things which provides the money to meet the charges envisaged in this Supplementary Estimate.

When he asks: "What compensation am I getting to help me to bear this increased burden," he is told: "You get no increased compensation at all. Far from it—you will get less for your creamery milk, less in the guaranteed minimum price for your grade A pigs, less in the guaranteed minimum price for your barley, and less in the guaranteed price of your wheat, if you grow any." He asks the question: "Am I going to get any more income, from any source, to meet these increased costs?" and the answer is: "No, but, in so far as you are paying rates on buildings, you will have to pay more rates as well."

Is it any wonder the population is simply disappearing from Mayo, Galway, Donegal, Roscommon, Leitrim, Clare and Kerry? I warn this House that they are wiping out the population of the West of Ireland; they are creating a situation in the West of Ireland to-day in which the whole system of land tenure is breaking down because the society built on the family farm is ceasing to be viable. It used to be the case that on 20 to 30 acres an industrious family in the West of Ireland could maintain a very modest but tolerable standard of living, which they cheerfully accepted, because they preferred to be masters in their own home rather than to become the salaried employees of others.

It is true that 100 years ago, Lord Lucan, the great exterminator, told them that they were wrong in desiring to own their own holdings, and that he would bring in Scotch overseers, evict them all into the Castlebar workhouse and, when he had consolidated their holdings, he would hire them, give them good wages and regular employment, and that they would not have to worry any more—they would be working for him. They rejected that ultimatum and they put Lord Lucan out of West Mayo. They became the owners of the land themselves and so they remained for close on 100 years, never rich, but comfortable, but we are creating a situation to-day in which the burdens created by Estimates of this character, and the legislation out of which the necessity for this Estimate arises, are making all these small holdings in the West of Ireland hopelessly and irremediably uneconomic.

It is time the House paused and asked itself this question: was the policy of seeking to keep the cost of living down in this country, and maintaining stability on the basis of stable prices for essential commodities, a better one than the policy of letting the cost of living go sky high, with consequent inflationary compensation for the well to do, and an effort on our part to close our eyes to the consequences on the poor of this decision? I do not profess now to be an authority on conditions obtaining in the City of Dublin—I knew as much as anybody did about them 30 years ago but now I am more familiar with circumstances obtaining in rural Ireland—but I am told that at the moment on some of the new housing estates around the City of Dublin, in West Cabra, in Ballyfermot and in Crumlin, there are families living in new houses who are on the very borders of destitution, and in which hunger has reappeared.

The plain fact is that 35 years ago in the tenement rooms of certain parts of the City of Dublin, hunger obtained. There were destitute people in them, and I always regarded it as one of the things of which this country could be proud that, for the first 35 years of this State's existence, no section of this House did rest easily so long as that continued to be the situation in the capital city, and any other part of this country, and that we were prepared to resort to any and every remedy requisite to ending destitution and hunger in any Irish home.

I want to say that I believe the policy of which this Supplementary Estimate is born may include provision for compensation of the well-to-do, but it has completely ignored the consequences for the poor, and those for whom this House ought primarily to be concerned. I see a number of Dublin Deputies here representing the people of Dublin, and I think it behoves them to say—Deputy Haughey and Deputy Booth—what is their knowledge of the conditions in Dublin. Can they correct me? Am I wrong when I say that in a number of housing estates in this city at the present time, never mind the tenements, there are families who are hungry, who are not getting enough to provide their children with sufficient food and that that is in some measure due to the phenomenon referred to by Lord Rank at the meeting of the Rank Company last week in Limerick, when he said that from the day the Fianna Fáil tax was put on bread, the consumption of bread suffered a catastrophic fall from which it has never recovered?

A society has gone pretty far when the consumption of bread falls. It is a characteristic of an immensely prosperous community if it means that the standard of living is getting so high that the people are eliminating bread and substituting cake, but I do not think anyone will argue that that is the problem here. The problem here of a declining consumption of bread and flour derives from the fact that a great many people cannot afford to buy the bread necessary to give their families enough to eat. Is that not a shocking thing, if it is true?

Deputy Brady here is from Dublin and ought to know Dublin well. He represents big housing estates in this area and I assume he has fairly comprehensive knowledge of them. Are there families in these areas who are without the essentials? This catastrophic decline in the consumption of bread, I believe, indicates in Dublin an inability on the part of the poor to buy the necessaries of life. In rural Ireland—here I speak of things I know—it is an indication of the mass migration of the people. I live in a rural area, in Ballaghaderreen, which, when the Congested Districts Board was established in 1898, was reckoned to be the second most congested area in Ireland. More than 25 per cent. of the population have gone. That decline in the population of the area of East Mayo has taken place substantially since the war and the shocking thing is that they are going now in numbers just as great or greater than they went before. Heretofore, one felt justified in remonstrating with them that they were leaving something that was good to seek something, which if fully understood, was not at all as good, although its monetary reward might appear at first glance to be better. I do not think we can make that case any longer. We have raised the costs of essential foods in this country to a level which makes it impossible for a family to live a reasonable life on a small holding in the West of Ireland now and if we measure the increased cost per household by what it has been deemed fair and equitable to give to the civil servant, the teacher, the civic guard, the soldier and the trade union, will anyone argue that you would not be bound to give something in excess of that, if the small farmer is to be adequately recouped for the loss he has sustained?

I want to warn the House that the dialectic which has been opened by the disastrous decision to shatter the stability which had been established by our decision to maintain the price of bread, flour and butter at a level price is very difficult fully or intelligently to anticipate. I do not know where it will end ultimately but one of the great evils of that decision is that it is irreversible because, once you have made a change of that kind and introduced into the economic and social structure of our society the kind of adjustments that are envisaged in this Supplementary Estimate, you are leaving behind you a problem of poverty and destitution which I very much doubt we have resources in this country to handle. Yet, can we all here sit calmly in the knowledge that there are families suffering from hunger in this city and have no means to get the food to feed their children? I do not think we can but the cost of adequately meeting that situation will be a burden on our resources which I am not at all sure our resources can meet.

I very much doubt if any of the Deputies of the Fianna Fáil Party have considered this question at all. Am I unjust to the Deputies of the Fianna Fáil Party representing the city of Dublin if I ask them what is their view as to what ought to be done in regard to the families who are hungry in this city? Am I unjust if I ask the Deputies representing the congested areas of North Mayo what do they think ought to be done to meet the case of the small farmer who can no longer make ends meet, no matter how he works?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I cannot see how that point can be discussed on the Estimate before the House. The Estimate deals with the question of remuneration. There is nothing in it about small farmers.

Mr. Dillon

Exactly. There is nothing in it about small farmers, but they have to foot that bill.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The debate must be confined to what is in the Estimate.

Mr. Dillon

Surely the person who is to pay for it——

Mr. Haughey

Order! The Deputy has been out of order for the last half-hour.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

It has been the practice to confine the debate to the purpose of the Estimate.

Mr. Dillon

Yes—£987,000.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Exactly.

Mr. Dillon

Who is to provide it?

General Mulcahy

Has the Chair taken notice of the suggestion by Deputy Haughey that Deputy Dillon has been out of order for the last half-hour?

Mr. Dillon

Do not mind Deputy Haughey. I do not blame him. If I were a Fianna Fáil Deputy for a Dublin constituency, I would think it was out of order to be asked the question what I thought ought to be done for the people who are hungry because they are not getting any 10/- under this Supplementary Estimate.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair is ruling that that matter cannot be discussed since there is no reference in the Estimate to the people referred to by the Deputy and, as I have already pointed out, it has been the practice of this House to confine the debate to what is in the Estimate.

Mr. Dillon

Oh, blessed standing Order. Let us just wipe them all out. Let us not think of them any more. They do not exist, but they are there. I think I have asked the questions that ought to be asked of Dublin Deputies who promised the voters that if they voted for them, they would have employment for them that would provide them with a decent standard of living.

There is 10/- a week here deservedly appropriated for teachers, Guards, civil servants, the Army. There is 1/- for the old age pensioner, the blind, the widow and the unemployed.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The question of any increase for those people would necessitate legislation. The Deputy is out of order in advocating legislation on the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Dillon

There is nothing for the other sections of the community to whom I have referred—the hungry and the small farmer. Is it not time Fianna Fáil began to ask themselves if they were justified when they taxed bread, flour and butter in order to provide the revenue to meet the charge that will come in course of payment as a result of this Supplementary Estimate which makes no reference to the poor, the hungry, the old and the blind?

Mr. Haughey

Deputy Dillon has challenged me to answer some questions which he put. I should not like to follow him down very many of the by-ways he has travelled, but he asked specifically if, in my experience or in our experience as Dublin Deputies, we were aware that in the new housing estates around the city there is destitution. I can give him the simple straightforward answer that, in my experience, there is not in all these working-class houses on the perimeter of Dublin any suggestion either of destitution or hunger to which there is no solution——

Mr. Sherwin

There is, in Ballyfermot and Finglas. You will see them with their orange-boxes.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order! Deputy Sherwin should allow Deputy Haughey to speak without interruption.

Mr. Sherwin

He does not represent that side.

Mr. Haughey

I do not agree. To my knowledge, things in those areas now are at least about 50 times better than they were in the dreadful winter of 1956 when the stagnation and despair and unemployment which were rife in Dublin city at that time led practically everybody in the city to the point of almost throwing in the sponge. I can assure Deputy Dillon that, in fact, practically everybody who has considered the situation is agreed that the turning-point after that black winter of 1956 came with the 1957 Budget and that things have definitely and consistently improved since that time.

My main reason for speaking is to appeal on behalf of a particular section of the community: I think this is the appropriate occasion. The Minister has very many claims being made upon him and very many appeals are submitted to him. He would need to have far greater resources at his disposal than he has if he were to meet them all. Nevertheless, it is only right that I should put forward the case of Civil Service pensioners. A considerable number of my constituents are in that category. They have great difficulty in making ends meet on the fixed pension on which they have to subsist.

Mr. Dillon

I take it, Sir, that this is strictly in order?

Mr. Haughey

I shall bow to the ruling of the Chair, but I think the Supplementary Estimate deals with the remuneration of civil servants and that class of persons generally.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I fear the particular point mentioned by the Deputy is not listed in the Supplementary Estimate. That being so, the Deputy is not in order in referring to it.

Mr. Haughey

Very well. It seems that the degree of relevance permitted to me is to be much more limited than that which was permitted to Deputy Dillon.

Mr. Dillon

It was Deputy Haughey who started shouting "order, order".

Mr. Haughey

Not until the Leas-Cheann Comhairle had gently intervened in Deputy Dillon's case. However, if I am out of order, I shall conclude by asking the Minister, if at all possible, in the great number of claims and appeals made to him, to consider favourably this particular section of the community.

Mr. Corish

Most of what I want to say on this Supplementary Estimate would, I suppose, be more appropriate on the Vote on Account and therefore I propose to be brief. I was amused by Deputy Haughey's reply to Deputy Dillon. He talked about the gloom that pervaded this city in 1956 and then attempted to demonstrate how that gloom was lifted consequent on the 1957 Budget.

I suppose it would not be in order to follow Deputy Dillon's line and plead for the old age pensioners and others. I agree that these increases are justified to teachers, members of the Defence Forces, civil servants, Garda Síochána and the rest. What strikes me is that the Minister now asks the House for a round £1,000,000 and, with a snap of the fingers, we propose to give him the £1,000,000. The Minister spent a short while, when introducing the Supplementary Estimate, in pointing out that the total cost would be £1,000,000. It has often been pleaded here that the old age pensioners should get an increase of 2/6 a week. The conservative Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social Welfare, abetted by the Minister for Social Welfare, throws up his hands and says: "Do Deputies realise that if we gave another 2/6 a week to the old age pensioners, it would cost £1,000,000?" However, we do not seem to have any difficulty in finding £1,000,000 for the people listed in this Supplementary Estimate. I suggest that the Government should bend their efforts towards getting some money to give an increase to people such as the old age pensioners.

If gloom was lifted by the Budget of 1957, one might ask Deputy Haughey what the position is of some of the people living in Ballyfermot, Crumlin and West Cabra. Has their position been improved since May, 1957? The person who was on sickness benefit in September, 1956, received 30/- per week and that is the sum he receives to-day.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy must get another opportunity——

Mr. Corish

I am replying to some of Deputy Haughey's statements. The old age pensioner who received 25/-per week in June, 1957, still receives 25/- per week, despite the fact that food has gone up in price by 12 per cent. I do not think that Deputy Haughey can substantiate his allegation that things have greatly improved. We still have these people in the same financial position and we still have something like 83,000 or 84,000 unemployed.

Mr. Sherwin

It is rather difficult to keep from mentioning the unemployed and the old age pensioners on this Supplementary Estimate, because, as the last speaker said, we are being asked to vote £1,000,000 for certain people who have a fair income and we are seriously asked to agree to all this. It is very difficult for those who represent the poorer sections of the community—and I am one of them— not to say a single word about the people who are not to get £1,000,000. I shall not say very much as it is out of order, but I just want to refer to the statement by Deputy Haughey that there is no poverty. The city estimate covering housing this year is up by several thousands because we expect a greater number of vacancies——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

There is nothing in the Estimate relating to housing. The Deputy must relate his remarks to the Estimate.

Mr. Sherwin

I am making a statement of fact that we expect things to be worse this year in housing due to vacancies caused by people leaving and it has some relation——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

It has no relation to the Estimate and the Deputy must relate his remarks to it.

Mr. Sherwin

They have all taken liberties and may I take a little?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I think the Deputy has taken a little and he must now come to the Estimate.

Mr. Sherwin

In the past year, we have had a greater number of vacancies than ever on our housing schemes, due to poverty. That is my answer and that throws the statement back in Deputy Haughey's face. There are people living in Finglas who have no property, but just a few orange boxes——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy must relate his remarks to the Estimate.

Mr. Sherwin

I would ask the Minister to remember that when he is bringing in his Budget. He should remember that the increase in bus fares alone took away 1/-.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy is getting away from the Estimate.

Mr. Sherwin

I want to draw an analogy between what he proposes to give to people with money and deny to people without money.

General Mulcahy

It is interesting to see how Deputy Haughey, Deputy Booth and Deputy Brady got away from the Estimate. They cleared away from the House.

Mr. O'Sullivan

This Estimate provides the House with the first opportunity for two months of saying anything on the economic situation of the country. Before Christmas, the Government had such a meagre programme that Deputies were brought here for one day per week and then told to go home. There were no matters of sufficient consequence to provide a Government programme of more than one day per week, but the Dáil was brought back at an unprecedentedly early time to deal with a measure intended to cost the Exchequer some £80,000 and it is only now that the House is being given an opportunity of coming down to bedrock and dealing with the fundamental conditions of the country as they exist to-day.

This is a formidable sum that the Minister asks the House to vote. It is necessary, but it is necessary only because of the Minister's financial policy. The recipients of every penny of this £987,000 will not be one penny better off when they get it than they were two years ago. They will be worse off, because the independent gentlemen who sat on a tribunal examining the impact of the cost of living on the wage earners found that the impact on the ordinary household was not less than 15/- per week. The first to come to the assistance of those who were adversely affected by the Government's financial policy was the private sector of the community. Every day the people of this country tuned in to Radio Eireann, there was an announcement, repeated week after week for months on end, that such and such an organised labour body had secured an increase of 7/6d., or 10/-, or 12/6d. per week in their wages in order to meet the impact of the increase in the cost of living.

The Government who preceded this Government were fully conscious, and they were daily conscious, of what the impact would be on the Exchequer, what the impact would be in human suffering and in destitution, if some control were not maintained over the prices of the necessaries of life. If that Government had no other point in their favour, nothing else to record beyond the fact that for the three years during which they were here in office, by no act of theirs did they spark off any single point increase in the cost of living, by no single action of theirs, or indeed by their entire policy, did they spark off a situation in which it was necessary for the private employer, necessary for the public authority employer, or necessary for the State as an employer, to come to the rescue of the people by giving them an increase in their incomes so as to combat something that occurred which was caused by that Government, they would have justified themselves. In fact, they came to the rescue of the people—those classes for whom Deputy Dillon and Deputy Corish appealed this afternoon—when they were adversely affected by conditions completely outside the control of the Government at that time.

The Government now in office cannot say that they were not warned. First of all, they had the experience of what occurred when they slashed the food subsidies in 1952, when the country had to bear, in the years that followed, a heavier impost in public expenditure and in private expenditure because of the slashing of the food subsidies. The country was quick to record its opinion of the Government's policy in those days. The people were warned but unfortunately they ignored the warning. They did not heed it and they were warned that if the Party now in office got control of the Government again, not alone would they repeat what they did in 1952, with consequences similar to the consequences that ensued then, but they would completely wipe out the food subsidies. That went home to the point that the Taoiseach took himself off to the West of Ireland, to Deputy Calleary's part of the country, and no doubt Deputy Calleary was sitting behind him at the time and nodding his head in approval when the Taoiseach announced that he would not remove the food subsidies.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy O'Sullivan must confine his remarks to what is in the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

Certainly, but the Supplementary Estimate is necessary because the food subsidies have been removed. That is the reason for the Supplementary Estimate. It proposes to compensate State servants for the impact on their incomes in consequence of what the Government did in their Budget of 1957. We warned the House and the Government that there were many thousands of our people on limited incomes, people in the category for whom Deputy Haughey appealed a few minutes ago, the retired civil servants who did not get anything to meet the impact on their cost of living in consequence of the withdrawal of the food subsidies. We know that throughout the country to-day there are many thousands of people, such as those on limited incomes, who are finding it extremely hard to face up to the difficulties they are encountering this moment. Reference has been made in particular to the old age pensioners and in recent weeks when the Sunday Independent made a case for a modification of the means test for old age pensioners and when it made a case for an increase in the old age pension——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Supplementary Estimate has nothing to do with old age pensions.

Mr. O'Sullivan

If I may develop my point——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The matter is not relevant on a Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

I hope to make it relevant. If I am allowed to complete what I am saying, I shall make it relevant. What I am leading up to is that the Minister for Health—he did not say that these were not necessary, or that they were not just—said: "Where would we get the money?" He could get it where he is getting the £1,000,000 to-day.

When this dramatic increase was deliberately sparked off by Government action, we warned the House that it was the people in the lower income groups who would be most seriously affected. To-day we are asked to give £1 per week extra to those with a salary of £1,000 per annum. There was a time when the Taoiseach said that no man in the country was worth £1,000 per year; he secured office on that assertion among others. He now proposes this Supplementary Estimate to give a man with a salary of £1,000 an extra £50 a year to meet the increased cost of living.

The man in the £1,000 a year salary class has meat three times a day; he is not interested in the price of bread; his wife or housekeeper never bought a stone of flour in her life and she does not care if it was 3/6 or 3/7 a stone as in the inter-Party days, or 7/9 a stone as it now is. She is not interested in the fact that butter was 3/9 a lb. when the previous Government were in office and that it is 4/3 to-day. The people who have lunch at mid-day and dinner in the evening are being provided with an extra £50 a year in this Estimate to meet the increased cost of living, at a time when the Minister for Health says that it is impossible to come to the rescue of the old age pensioners, the blind, the widows or the unemployed.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

These matters would require legislation; it is not in order to refer to these classes.

Mr. O'Sullivan

But the point has been made by a Minister that it is impossible for the Government to find the money for these classes. I am making the point that they can find this £1,000,000; where are they getting it? They are getting it, I submit, in various directions, from certain taxes or levies on certain unorganised sections of the community. I shall point to one and I shall produce evidence of a tax that was unheard of until last year.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The question of taxation does not arise, nor how the moneys are collected.

Mr. O'Sullivan

Surely before the House votes money they are entitled to ask where it is being found?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Might I point out that before the House there is a Supplementary Estimate dealing with the remuneration of certain classes which are listed? Anything outside that is irrelevant and does not arise on the Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

And we say these classes are entitled to it, but there are other classes also entitled——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy will get another opportunity of putting that case forward. It would be irrelevant on this occasion.

Mr. O'Sullivan

No doubt we shall have that opportunity shortly, but we are entitled to say that among the classes that have been levied are the small farmers. The document I have here is the annual report of the Co-operative Creamery Society in Bandon. Last year for the first time in history, the audited accounts show that £13,097 4s. was charged for producing milk. These people get no increase in income to meet the increased cost of living.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy is certainly getting away from the Supplementary Estimate. How the money is collected does not arise and cannot be debated on this Estimate.

Mr. Coburn

On a point of order, when a Supplementary Estimate is introduced, is it not in order for a Deputy to refer to the reasons for its introduction and to refer to its contents and, under a third heading, to the effects that the contents will have? Surely all these aspects of the Supplementary Estimate are relevant?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Matters relating to the contents of the Estimate are in order. The Chair is ruling that Deputy O'Sullivan——

Mr. Coburn

Surely, under Standing Orders——

Mr. Rooney

On a point of order, are Deputies not entitled to inquire where the £1,000,000 is to come from?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

There is nothing before the House but the Supplementary Estimate and it has been the usual practice here all down the years to discuss what is in the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

We got fresh evidence from the Minister for Finance when he was introducing this Estimate. We got information we did not have until he spoke and my remarks are directed to the consequences of the information he gave to the House. He said not alone would we require £987,000 but that was not the entire impact on the Exchequer; that there had been considerable savings in various Departments and that money must now be added to the £987,000 bringing it to £1,271,000; and that, in fact, in some categories it was not for the entire 12 month period.

When the food subsidies were abolished, the Minister and the Government assured the House and the country that this expenditure was unnecessary in our circumstances. In fact, when the previous Government redeemed the award to the State servants which the Fianna Fáil Government could not see their way to implement, members of the present Government alleged that it was wrong to implement that award, that it would cause inflation and that unknown other evils would flow from what the Government in office then did. We are entitled to ask what the consequences of this will be. Surely, as public representatives asked to vote such a formidable sum as £1,271,000, which the State servants are entitled to receive, we can attribute the necessity for the Vote to the Government's financial policy, to the fact that they failed so miserably to protect the ordinary people from the impact of the increased cost of living. They were warned, and ignored the warning, that this would be the consequence of what they were doing. We were assured this was a strong Government that could withstand any pressure and that in the course of time the taxpayers would be relieved in consequence of not having to meet the cost of subsidising necessary foodstuffs.

This proves that the State must, of necessity, follow the actions of the private sector of the community who were the first to adopt what the Government are now adopting at a late stage. When the private individuals and companies awarded employees increased wages, they did so because it was necessary to protect their employees against the sudden and dreadful increase in the cost of living. That was followed by the local authorities who gave their workers increased wages throughout the country and rate-payers at large are now called upon, as in Dublin City, to meet increased rates for the same reason as lies behind the introduction of this Vote to-day.

There is also the impact on the Exchequer of the cost of running all our public institutions. This is not a new Supplementary Estimate, but it is the largest we have met so far. Each Minister has had to come in here in turn and ask the House for more money for his Department because he found the original Estimate insufficient in consequence of increased wages and salaries these Departments now have to bear. This is merely a continuation of what this House has experienced ever since the Government took that fatal step and since they sparked off round after round of wage increases, increases which were bound to follow their action in causing the cost of living to increase.

Not alone did the people expect that the cost of living would be kept down; not alone did they expect that our public servants would be sufficiently rewarded for their services to the State but they were led to believe that the Government proposed to reduce the cost of running the Civil Service. Many civil servants believe that if that could be done, they would secure better incomes and better conditions. What do we find? Far from this being met by economies in the Civil Service, despite the assurance by the Minister in his Budget Statement that he would effect such economics, and despite the fact that that was followed by repeated articles and statements that the Minister was burning the midnight oil in his efforts to reduce the running cost of the Civil Service, we now find that he could secure only a fraction of the cost of meeting this arbitration award by economies and that he is now compelled to ask this House to vote almost £1,000,000 for this purpose. Furthermore, we are asked to do it without inquiring where the money is coming from. The first to inquire, I allege, was the Minister for Health when he was forced to make a case as to why the Government could not come to the rescue of the people who are more adversely affected at this time.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy has already referred to that.

Mr. O'Sullivan

All the Deputies on the Government side—and I am sure many of them must be quite familiar with the conditions that exist at the moment—agree with us that the Garda, the teachers, the Army and the Civil Service are fully entitled to what we are giving them here to-day, but those Deputies will never secure from their Government justice and equity for those who are worse off among us if we are to have the type of contribution which Deputy Haughey made here this afternoon. Deputy Haughey informed us that in consequence of the Minister's 1957 Budget, the people of Crumlin, Finglas and Ballyfermot are 50 times better off to-day, that the old age pensioner who got 1/- to meet the increase in the cost of flour, butter and bread is 50 times better off than he was before these increases took place. Will anybody on the opposite side support that contention? What hope have they of impressing upon this Government the desirability of doing something and doing it quickly to assist those people when we have statements of that nature being made?

As the Chair has reminded us, we shall have other occasions to bring this point home, but surely we could expect that, in consequence of the situation which forced the Government to introduce this Estimate, they would realise, as the first inter-Party Government of 1948 realised, that the first concern of that Government should be the more needy sections of our people. At that time, the inter-Party Government came to the rescue of the old age pensioners and the poorer classes who needed additional means of sustenance. They were the first people they thought of and after that they provided the arbitration machinery which makes it possible now for State servants to secure legitimately, without having to resort to what State servants have to resort to in other countries, what they are entitled to as a result of the Government's deliberate policy, as well as the Government's failure to control the cost of living for the past two years.

When will we come to the end of the litany of Supplementary Estimates and of the permanent charge in the years to come like the permanent charge on the Exchequer in years gone by in consequence of the reduction of the food subsidies in 1952? Deputy Dillon pointed out what Lord Rank had to say last night about the reduction in the consumption of flour and bread in the country. In my constituency, it was brought home more forcibly to us when a big mill had to close down and when some 40 employees in the town of Mallow were dismissed.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy may not embark on a discussion of economic policy on the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

I agree, but I should like to make my remarks relevant by saying that when we approached the Department of Industry and Commerce to look after those people who were dismissed, we were informed that the millers could not maintain that industry because of the reduction in bread consumption. In the dairying industry, we know what has happened in relation to butter consumption, and that as a result of the Government's policy, the consumption of a cheap substitute for Irish butter has been noticeable.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy might come to the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. O'Sullivan

Certainly. We agree that this Supplementary Estimate should be passed by the House, but we say that many among the recipients are not as adversely affected by the cost of living as other sections of the community. This is a large sum of money, the expenditure of which will not put one man or woman into employment, the expenditure of which will not save one boy or girl from emigration. It is merely an additional impost on the Exchequer in consequence of a rash action and one of the greatest mistakes made by any Government since the State was founded in sparking off round after round of salary increases and leaving the recipients no better off than before the Government took that action.

Consequently, this is no surprise to us in Fine Gael, because line by line we challenged the Government, when they introduced that Budget of 1957, as to whether they would secure the reduction in expenditure they said they would produce by cutting the food subsidies. We are adding on thousands of pounds to the local authorities and hundreds of thousands on to the private sector of the community who are able to pass that on again to the consumer, 1d. on one thing and 2d. on something else. They are able to recoup themselves within a matter of months, so that what is reflected in the actual cost of living does not fully indicate the impact on the public in consequence of the spiral set up by the Government's action two years ago.

They should wear sackcloth and ashes when they ask the House to vote this sum of money. The Minister for Finance blandly said that it is desirable that we should do this, that in fact it is necessary that we should do this. However, it was quite understandable that he did not go into any details and did not submit to the House any reason for it or advance the circumstances that made it necessary for the Government, whom the dustmen of Dublin brought to their knees, to ask us to give them this £987,000, with the country howling out that something be done in relation to unemployment and emigration and that something be done for the poorer sections of our community.

Mr. Blowick

The Minister, in asking the House for this £987,000, is merely doing bare justice to the classes that will receive this remuneration; but when all is said and done, the real reason for this Supplementary Estimate is, as other speakers have said, the action of the Government. It is due to the fact that, two years ago, they went back on promises made in the election a short time before, principally that the food subsidies would not be touched. The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste made these promises—one in Belmullet, the other in Waterford— a few days before polling took place. I am sure the Government realise now it was bad management. The few million saved on food subsidies cost much more, if we take into account the impact it had on local authority officials as well as Government officials. Nobody would the Guards, the teachers the Army and the civil servants—all doing an excellent job in their own fields—a fair and just remuneration.

Before the Minister can pay one penny of this sum, he must get the permission of this House. I submit it is not good enough for the Minister simply to ask the House to give £987,000 without any debate. It is not the Minister's money nor the Government's money. We must consider two classes: those who receive it, and those whose pockets are being picked to provide it. On the question of those who are to receive the money, as I have said, I agree they are fully entitled to this remuneration. The blame for this heavy expenditure must lie on the Government's shoulders. It is because of their bungling and particularly because of their fraudulent going back on election promises two years ago.

Not alone must we consider those who will receive the money, but we must consider those being bled to provide it. There are many classes in the community who will not get any remuneration or assistance in meeting the increased cost of living that has made this Supplementary Estimate necessary. It is because certain classes are organised—and more power to them for it —that they are able to get these things. But it is most unfair and unjust to blister people who are not organised and have little or no chance of raising their voices against this imposition and other impositions like it due in the next week or ten days.

In regard to the people at the receiving end, we do not hear anything about them emigrating; but we hear about those who are being blistered and whose pockets are being picked to provide this money. We see them leaving in train loads every day of the week and every week of the year. Apart from the fraudulent promises which brought about the necessity for this Supplementary Estimate, it was shockingly bad management. The last speaker, Deputy O'Sullivan, said those who are now receiving this increase will not be 1d. better off than they were when the inter-Party Government were in power. That is a perfectly true and accurate assessment of the situation. The people receiving this remuneration are merely getting bare justice, but the number of people covered by it are small. The remainder of the people must bear the cost of it. Neither the Government nor the Minister has private funds to meet an Estimate like this. It is for those at the paying end, the "bleeding" end, that a voice should be raised. Those who cannot raise their voices effectively and are not organised deserve to have somebody raise a voice for them here. I would be completely out of order in mentioning the old age pensioners and certain other classes, but I shall have another opportunity of doing so.

I want to comment on a statement made by Deputy Haughey when he referred to the "black winter" of 1956 and the "bright spring" that came when the present Minister for Finance introduced his Budget in 1957. Does Deputy Haughey think that the people here are all fools or that his own constituents are fools? He calls the winter "black" at a time when bread was only half the price it was after the Minister for Finance removed the subsidies. If that is the kind of brightness Fianna Fáil have brought to Dublin, it is the same brightness Deputy Calleary has brought to North and South Mayo and all the West of Ireland, and we do not want any more of it. If bringing in a bright ray of sunshine means increasing the cost of living by 12 per cent. and doubling the price of butter and bread—two staple items in the diet of the people— if that is their idea of dispelling the gloom of a "black winter", to quote Deputy Haughey, then God preserve us from such rays of sunshine as he describes.

Mr. Kyne

I should like to say that I welcome the increases granted under this Estimate. In fact, they are belated, if anything. But I think it is only right that we should look at the need for this Estimate as well as the fact that it is being given. Most of us are aware that when the proposal to abolish the food subsidies came about, those of us connected with the trade union movement warned that we would, by the might and force of our organisations, secure for our members the right to be compensated. It is well known that private industries and the trade union movement met together in a national effort and agreed on a formula for a wage increase, amounting to 10/-, to offset the increased cost of living. All credit to the trade union movement and the private industries for making that effort to prevent the country's economy being totally upset at the time. There was grave danger of such an upset because of the removal of the food subsidies without any warning and without any time being given for adjustments to be made. All credit to the trade union movement in Dublin, which forced the Government to recognise the right, both of local authority employees and Government employees, to a national wage concession. I welcome the fact that it is now being given to the civil servants.

I should like to ask the Minister why it is considered necessary that certain female employees in the Civil Service do not get the full award of 10/- but get 7/6d. I would suggest that, at the direction of the Government, that is being followed in local authorities and that certain female employees are getting only 7/6d. As this is a cost of living award and not a wage increase, it is only right that whether these people are adult male or female or juvenile male or female employees, they should receive that remuneration to meet the increased cost of living, irrespective of what scale they are on or what grade they are in. It is unjust to have this perpetrated on our local authority employees at present.

Having referred to the duty of trade unions to fight for their members' rights, it would be unfair for me, irrespective of whether the Chair feels I am right or wrong, not to mention that a number of the poorest people in the country were left without protection. At that time, we appealed to the Minister for a concession for them. That concession was given in the form of a modest shilling, which is very different from the 10/- increase for adult workers which private industries agreed to as compensation for the increased cost of living, following the Government's abolition of the food subsidies. This was being done at a time when our industries were being appealed to to prepare for an export market. I protest that this wage increase, this bonus which is being passed on, much as it is deserved, is not being passed on to those who most deserve it, namely, those within the social welfare groups.

Mr. Lindsay

We, on this side of the House, agree to the passage of this Vote. For my part, I do not agree with any wild acclamation. I agree to its passage with what I hope to show will be a logical measure of protest.

The introduction of this Supplementary Estimate is yet one more of the many blows being struck not at our economic stability, important in its own way in the life of the nation, but at the stability of public morality, without which no nation can endure and without which people despair. Once that degree of despair is reached, hopelessness impels the people to leave; some will leave a situation in which perhaps they see no future and no hope of an adequate reward and others will leave because they see no future of any kind before them. That is the kind of result which follows on the weakening of public morality and the weakening of the faith of the people in the utterances of public men.

This Estimate is necessary by reason of the fact that the Budget of 1957 brought hardship upon all sections of our people. This Estimate selects certain sections of our people for compensation to help them over difficult times. It is by reason of the selectiveness, the justice of which I do not question, that I want to register a protest. As a result of unexpected and ruthless changes of policy, particularly in relation to the years 1952 and 1957, moneys must now be made available through the medium of this House to meet eventualities directly attributable to that policy.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Might I point out that general policy is not debated on a Supplementary Estimate? The debate is confined to the items constituting the Estimate.

Mr. Lindsay

Very good. The civil servants were awarded a 10/- per week increase. The national teachers got an increase of 6 per cent. Might I suggest to the Minister that, when he is considering the financial situation in relation to these groups, he should consider the general application of a 6 per cent. increase, thereby avoiding a perfectly justifiable demand for a seventh-round wage increase?

Deputy Haughey with what I can only describe as the characteristic hardihood of members of the Fianna Fáil Party told us that the people were 50 times better off to-day than they were in the winter of 1956-57. He did not substantiate his claim in any detail. I do not think his statement can be described as anything other than an attempt at political barracking. I agree with him in his reference to the necessity of helping Civil Service pensioners. He was ruled out of order on that. I hope on another occasion to join with him when he makes the suggestion again that the Minister should keep these people in mind.

I should like to know from the Minister where the savings to which he referred come from. As a result of budgetary provisions on the part of the Government, we find it necessary now to help certain classes in the community. This Vote of approximately £1,000,000 will be distributed all over the country to civil servants, members of the Defence Forces and teachers— primary, secondary and vocational. Every citizen, directly or indirectly, will be making his or her contribution towards this sum. I do not really understand the selective nature of this provision. I do not understand why small farmers should be omitted. Some of these small farmers have to supplement their agricultural earnings by migration or by fishing. It will come as little consolation to people in certain parts of my constituency to know that the local social welfare officer is getting an increase of 10/- a week and that it is possibly because of that increase of 10/- per week that, with full Government approval, he will ruthlessly pursue to the very limit his examination into the means of small farmers, fishermen and others in receipt of social welfare benefits generally.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Such matters of administration do not arise on this Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Lindsay

I merely refer to the vigour which social welfare officers seem to have got as a result of the increase of 10/- a week. As I said at the beginning, I agree with the justice of this measure, but I disagree with the selective nature of it. Accordingly, I agree with it as a measure of justice for a selected few.

Mr. Cosgrave

I should like, in common with other Deputies, to draw attention to the effects of the policy which has made it necessary to introduce this Supplementary Estimate. When the Government reduced the food subsidies in 1957, it was argued that, in principle, subsidies were bad and that a good case could be made for charging the economic price for the commodities affected. At that time, some small increases were provided for the weaker sections of the community. One shilling a week, I think, was given to the old age pensioners, widows and orphans and other social welfare recipients. Now that the full effect of the decision to withdraw the subsidies is being felt, it is right and proper that we should examine what has happened and see where we are going.

I entirely agree that we should give justice and fair treatment to all sections of the community, but it seems to me, from this Estimate and from others which may follow, that those sections of the community who are organised or able to protect themselves are those which come best out of the decision to reduce the food subsidies. Civil servants, other State employees, organised workers, members of trade unions, all have received or will receive an increase in wages or salaries as a result of this Supplementary Estimate. When the cost of food and other commodities increased as a result of the Budget of 1957, the organised workers, in consultation with the Federation of Employers or through other means of negotiation, agreed on a formula of 10/- a week and so far as their interests were concerned, their position was safeguarded as a result of that agreement.

This Supplementary Estimate more or less applies that formula, with, probably, certain variations, to State employees, to members of the Civil Service, the Defence Forces, teachers, the Garda Síochána and so on, but what I want to ask the Minister about is the serious position in which the weaker sections of the community find themselves. It is not sufficient to say that we can ask the country and the House to provide a sum of almost £1,000,000 for a limited section of the community without taking into account the greatly worsened circumstances of the other sections that have been mentioned here, such as old age pensioners, widows and orphans, and leaving these aside, retired persons or those on fixed incomes, persons employed by local authorities or others on small pensions or dependent for their livelihood on fixed incomes of one sort or another.

I asked a question here on 16th December last and I got in reply the cost of certain items included in the Consumer Price Index between February, 1957, and November, 1958, which was the latest available date. It shows a staggering picture which can be seen in column 2198 and subsequent columns of the Dáil Debates of 16th December, 1958, Volume 16, No. 171. Taking just a few items which, as a result of deliberate Government policy, were increased in price, I find that bread increased by 58 per cent., flour by 79 per cent. and butter by 15 per cent. If you relate that to the 2 lb. loaf and 1 lb. of butter, it transpires that the 2 lb. loaf increased by 5½d. between those dates and butter increased by 7d. a lb. so that in the case of the old age pensioner who, in 1957, got an increase of 1/- a week, and those other social welfare recipients, leaving aside the whole category of other increases, these two items of food alone absorbed entirely if not exceeded, that increase of 1/- a week—and a 2 lb. loaf and 1 lb. of butter would not go very far even for an old age pensioner.

Some time ago in reply to a question in the House, the Minister for Industry and Commerce adverted to the fact that the drop in consumption of bread and flour was indicative of a rising standard of living and he quoted O.E.E.C. sources as an authority for that view, that the consumption of bread and flour had dropped not merely in this country but in other countries. I have here an extract from the report of Ranks (Ireland) Limited, for the year ended 30th August last which was published on 23rd of this month. Having pointed out that they had a trading loss of £2,018 for that year compared with a profit of £55,481 in the previous year, and that the ordinary dividend was reduced from 20 per cent. to 7½ per cent., the chairman pointed out in his review that the demand for flour and bread, which fell very steeply after the subsidies were lifted in May, 1957, never recovered and the full effects of this were felt during the whole of the year under review. The chairman said that the drop in consumption is believed to be due to the fall in population in the areas where the company has always traded.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I feel that is not relevant to the Supplementary Estimate which relates to certain classes.

Mr. McGilligan

Why are they getting it?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy is relating his remarks to classes outside those mentioned in the Supplementary Estimate. The debate must be confined to the purpose of the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. McGilligan

The purpose is to give more money to spend on bread and butter.

Mr. Cosgrave

I have already said that the category we provide for here, the civil servants, members of the Defence Forces, the Garda and teachers have had to pay more for bread, more for butter, more for a variety of other commodities, but for the moment I am confining myself to those who, as a result of the Government's policy, have sought and secured an increase in remuneration. In order to meet that increase the Government have introduced this Supplementary Estimate. How much more serious is the condition of those people for whom up to the present nothing has been done at all, who have no Civil Service organisation to argue their case, who are not members of trade unions or who are members of small unions employed in small concerns, who have received no recompense except the recompense I mentioned of 1/- a week which was entirely absorbed by two items alone?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The case the Deputy is making for those classes is not relevant to the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. McGilligan

If one Deputy is entitled to say that the people are now 50 times better off, is another not entitled to say that they are worse off and to show why?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Chair must endeavour to keep the Deputy to the Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. McGilligan

"Fifty times better of" was the comment made.

Mr. Cosgrave

It is strange that the "50" coincides with the increase in the price of bread, which is 58 per cent. I have no desire to labour the point unduly, but what I have a duty to do, and what I believe the House has a responsibility to see, is to see that justice is evenly distributed. Another section who were in a position to make their case and to secure increases, were transport workers. They secured an increase and the company, in turn, unable to meet it from any other source, had to pass it on to the public and the public have had to pay more in bus fares and transport charges.

Included in that category are the local authorities, who have been obliged to pay more for food for local authority institutions and who, as a result, will have to raise more money from rates in order to meet that extra demand. What I want to ascertain is why it was considered desirable or necessary to reduce the food subsidies I have mentioned, and then in two days, according to this Supplementary Estimate and a sheaf of Supplementary Estimates which were introduced here to-day, to ask the House to raise a sum of over £3,000,000, to meet only a fraction of the commitments which will arise out of the withdrawal of the food subsidies. Indeed, it will cover a wide variety of interests far less needy than those who were so severely affected by the rise in the cost of living and, may I add, by the continued rise in the cost of living over the past two years.

Mr. Calleary

I came into this House as a result of the 1952 Budget and I think the people of North Mayo realised the necessity for the 1952 Budget. For some time, I looked across and saw the members in the Opposition Benches. They all belong to the legal profession and these are the Deputies who come in here and tell us that Fianna Fáil were responsible for putting this burden on the taxpayers. We had this question well aired in North Mayo in 1952 and the people in North Mayo were quite satisfied that there was no alternative left to the Fianna Fáil Government but to introduce that harsh Budget, or else they would have to put very heavy taxation on something else.

An Ceann Comhairle

Of course, taxation does not arise on this. The only matter that arises on this is whether the amounts set out in the White Paper should be voted for the services mentioned.

Mr. McGilligan

It is a pity to spoil it.

An Ceann Comhairle

Government policy does not fall for consideration here now.

Mr. Calleary

I discussed a few times the references made to our sitting down in Belmullet alongside the Taoiseach and I thought that at least I might take this opportunity to deal with that. However, this Estimate was essential because of the financial chaos left us by the two Coalition Governments.

Mr. McGilligan

This is a good time to talk about it.

Mr. Calleary

The people believe that. They returned me at the top of the poll. I was down in Belmullet last Sunday and the people there showed their liking for my being with Eamon de Valera.

Mr. Rooney

The people in North Mayo are very innocent.

An Ceann Comhairle

There is a White Paper issued and there are certain Estimates in respect of people employed in the public service. A certain amount is set out against the Civil Service, the Army, the teachers and the Garda in it. The only question before the House is whether it will vote these amounts for the services mentioned. Taxation does not arise.

Mr. Calleary

We have to vote this because this amount is necessary arising out of the moneys that had to be given to these people.

Mr. McGilligan

Subsidies.

Mr. Calleary

There was no money, and the cost of living had to go up, arising out of the financial chaos left by the last Coalition Government. Remember that one could not borrow £5 from the bank. I well remember it. I live in the country and I know what happens. The same point arises in this case. If Fianna Fáil had to bring in this Budget——

An Ceann Comhairle

If the Deputy will not come to the Estimate, I shall have to ask him to resume his seat.

Mr. McGilligan

That is a pity.

Mr. Calleary

The people realised the necessity for it and the people know it was necessary. We in the West are quite confident that the Fianna Fáil Government did the right thing when they slashed——

An Ceann Comhairle

I cannot allow the Deputy to proceed on that line.

Mr. Calleary

Fianna Fáil had to take steps in this Budget. It was necessary to do so.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would the Deputy please resume his seat?

Mr. McGilligan

I am sorry that the Deputy from Belmullet had to resume his seat, since it was down there that the Taoiseach made his promise that the subsidies would not be cut and it was on that promise that the Deputy headed the poll and got his seat in this House. They went back on that promise and we know what happened; as a result, we have this Supplementary Estimate for £1,250,000.

This is wrongly described as the result of arbitration. I should like to mention that there are six groups covered in this. Three of the groups are an independent matter, as regards what is being given to them. As a result of arbitration, the chairman of the Arbitration Board made a particular finding under which civil servants would get a 6 per cent. increase. As far as the others are concerned, this was not a result of arbitration. If my memory is correct in the matter, at one time, when the civil servants had put forward their right to arbitration, the Minister denied them that right and said that if they did go to arbitration and if they got an award in their favour, he would come into the House and ask the House to refuse to honour the award. I think I am right in that.

Dr. Ryan

Just about as right as ever you were. It is not right.

Mr. McGilligan

Did the Minister not say to the civil servants that he did not want them to go to arbitration, that he would do his best to stop them from going there and that if they proceeded to arbitration and got an award, he would not pay it but would come into the House to ask the House to refuse the money? That is right.

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy is in order, so he can go on.

Mr. McGilligan

I challenge contradiction. That is right. In the end, then, what the Minister said was that he would get the civil servants together and get them to accept a particular sum.

An Ceann Comhairle

It does not seem to be relevant to this discussion.

Mr. McGilligan

I am asking about this figure which is appropriate to the top three classes. The civil servants did not get arbitration and the other two groups, the Army and the Gárdaí, are related to the Civil Service and had their moneys voted to them here, dependent upon what was offered to and accepted under duress by the Civil Service. I suggest that the argument Deputy Lindsay put forward shows the correct way in which this should be considered, that is, the Minister should think again about the difference between the 10/-offered and accepted under duress and the 6 per cent. which was undoubtedly the lowest that the civil servants, the Army and the Gárdaí would have achieved, if this matter had gone in the ordinary way to arbitration.

Arbitration was a wise solution for a lot of these difficulties and arbitration was established, first of all, in the days of the first inter-Party Government. It is now not being honoured correctly. An effort was made previously not to honour arbitration awards, in this House, and even when they were, certain arrears were cut off. I am glad to see, however, that we have decided to give this measure of imperfect justice, as far as three of the groups of the six covered here are concerned. The civil servants, the Guards and the members of the Army have not got what they were entitled to get and, if the Minister thinks the attitude which he has coerced them into taking is a sound one, he should let the matter go to arbitration.

It might be suggested by Deputy Calleary that that would be a bad thing because it would set in motion another series of demands by groups who are not covered by arbitration. It is good to have this brought home at this time. Deputy Calleary holds, and thinks that it was right, to have the subsidies slashed to the end, but I remember when it was first stated by Deputy Kyne and his colleagues that they would use their industrial strength to see wages were raised to meet the increased cost of living, caused by the cutting of the subsidies, a chorus came from the Government Benches saying it was a conspiracy, and that we were doing something deliberately to try to wreck what they termed the forward progress of the then new Government. It was stated that it was something of a sabotaging of the national effort. Apparently that view that any effort to readjust wages to meet the increased cost of living amounts to a conspiracy has now disappeared.

We are voting something short of £1,000,000 to cover these increases for a limited period of the year. So many calculations have to be made regarding the time that it is not easy to calculate what they would cost over a full year, but £1,250,000 is my calculation of the cost over a full year. In any event, that is the sum demanded and it is the consequences of the ill-advised step of cutting the subsidies in the way it was done in the 1957 Budget.

The other matter I want to refer to is this: to some degree these payments relate back—the Estimate is paying off arrears. I remember the time when the inter-Party Government decided that there was an arrears payment to be met of something like this sum here, around about £1,000,000, and the chorus that came from the then Opposition, now the present Government, was that it would trigger off new demands for wage increases and, eventually, we were told that was what caused inflation, with the consequences that ensued in 1955. I hope that those things are still remembered and that the Minister will be able to assure us that there is some change in the political and economic system which will not trigger off an inflation at the present time.

I suggest the matters referred to here with regard to the cost of living, particularly the impact of the reduction of the subsidies on the prices of bread and butter, are quite germane and appropriate to the discussion. The Tánaiste told us, when there was a discussion on the consumption of bread——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy is proceeding to discuss Government policy.

Mr. McGilligan

I am making a passing reference in answer to Deputy Haughey who said——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy is making a speech of passing references——

Mr. McGilligan

I am, Sir. I believe all passing references are relevant, in so far as they have relevancy to the matter under discussion.

An Ceann Comhairle

——passing references which in themselves are disorderly. The Deputy's speech is entirely disorderly.

Mr. McGilligan

I have not been speaking very long and I have spoken mainly on these figures. I am making reference to the absurd comment that was made that people are 50 per cent. better off now than they were a year ago.

An Ceann Comhairle

That does not arise on the Estimate.

Mr. McGilligan

I do not know why the comment was let pass, but it was made, and I suggest I am entitled to the same leniency from the Chair simply to counter it, and to point out the matter that Deputy Costello has already referred to. We are told that less money spent on bread, flour and butter was a sign of a rising standard of living. Ranks know better. Ranks have claimed a loss of £2,000 compared with a profit of £55,000 the year previously. They attribute this to the demand for flour and bread falling steeply after the subsidies were removed in 1957, and the sale of flour never recovered, and secondly, the decline in consumption is due to the decrease in population in certain areas. I wonder if people are aware that out of every three persons born in the country now, one will die abroad?

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy knows perfectly well that this is not germane to the Estimate before the House.

Mr. McGilligan

I am discussing an Estimate for £1,000,000 which I suggest, and it is accepted by my opponents, is based on the cutting of food subsidies. There is no other foundation for it. The food subsidies were cut and this is an effort to give justice to one group of the community.

An Ceann Comhairle

What the Deputy is discussing is purely irrelevant.

Mr. McGilligan

If it is possible for a Deputy to say that people are 50 per cent. better off than they were, I am entitled to say that is not shown by emigration, and the distress shown in many parts of the country.

Mr. Rooney

This Supplementary Estimate is introduced as a result of the 1957 Budget. It has been, if you like to describe it so, the delayed action of that Budget. It was pointed out in 1957, when the Budget was being debated, that it would be necessary for the civil servants and every class in the country to seek compensation for the rise in the cost of living. The ordinary conditions of employment which apply to civil servants assure them that they are entitled to an increase as a result of that rise in the cost of living, but we have a situation where, in fact, they are not getting in full the compensation to which they are entitled, having regard to their conditions of employment. However, I assume that arrangement has been made between the Minister for Finance and their own representatives.

It is well known that a large number of civil servants are not satisfied with the manner in which their just claim to an increase has been met. This is the second time that the public servants have had to request a Fianna Fáil Government for an increase in their remuneration, directly resulting from the Budgets introduced by Fianna Fáil. On the last occasion, the 1952 Budget put a similar load on the civil servants and the Government refused to honour their claim. We remember that Fianna Fáil refused to pay the amount which the civil servants were entitled to.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy has heard that matter ruled out of order before.

Mr. Rooney

No, Sir; I did not hear that being ruled out of order.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy knows it is not relevant to the matter before the House.

Mr. Rooney

Very well, Sir, except that I wanted to mention that we are discussing the consequences of the 1957 Budget.

An Ceann Comhairle

We are discussing an Estimate for a certain amount of money to meet increases for certain people in the public service. Whether that should be voted or not is the matter before the House.

Mr. Rooney

Very well, Sir; we are being asked to approve of this Estimate. It is the logical outcome of Government budgetary policy which affected the cost of living of the people and the classes who are concerned in this Estimate. We have a situation here where a number of civil servants, earning around £1,000 a year, will be entitled to an increase of about £1 a week to meet an increase in the cost of living resulting from the Budget of 1957. We remember that 1/6 a week was given to old age pensioners and destitute classes to meet the same rise in the cost of living. This Estimate is to offset increases in the price of bread, increases in the price of butter and increases in the price of flour and other essentials. Surely the case is not made that the essentials normally consumed by civil servants cannot be consumed by the various distressed classes who get a total increase of only 1/6 a week to meet the same rise in prices?

An Ceann Comhairle

A Supplementary Estimate does not give the same wide discussion as an ordinary Estimate. The Deputy is advocating an increase in old age pensions. That could not be advocated on an Estimate because it means the introduction of legislation.

Mr. Rooney

I am sorry.

An Ceann Comhairle

I do not want to interfere with the Deputy, but the Deputy is introducing a matter which from his experience he should know is totally irrelevant to the matter before the House.

Mr. Rooney

I think I mentioned that I was not advocating on this Estimate what you suggest. I feel that an Estimate dealing with that matter should have come before the House before this one, which includes the higher paid civil servants. They are justly entitled to what they are getting and to more if it were given to them.

We read in the newspapers a statement by a representative of the civil servants in the last day or two showing that the Government had not honoured in full the conditions of employment which existed between the Government and the civil servants, so far as the adjustment of salaries is concerned.

This Estimate comes before us at a time when there are 7,000 young people in Dublin City unable to get a day's work and 20,000 others unemployed. That is the situation outside this House when we are confronted with an Estimate to compensate for the rise in the cost of living resulting from the 1957 Budget.

Before the Christmas Recess, the income ceiling in respect of certain social welfare benefits and health services was raised from £600 to £800 a year, but there again——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy is travelling very wide of what is in this Estimate. If he does not come to the Estimate, I must ask him to resume his seat and discontinue his statement.

Mr. Rooney

I shall not proceed on that line, except to say that they are the points which immediately come to mind on studying this Estimate this evening. The Minister for Finance and the Government should honour their contract with the civil servants and give them no more and no less than they are entitled to in this Estimate. They are giving them less than they are, in fact, entitled to. So far as I am concerned, I am agreeable to the Estimate going through but, even at this stage, I would ask the Government not to ignore the fact that the persons who are to benefit as a result of this Supplementary Estimate are not, in fact, getting what they are entitled to get.

Dr. Ryan

One or two Deputies in talking to this Estimate gave the impression that there was no trouble in getting money for this purpose, while it is very hard to get money for something else. I can assure the Deputies that it is just as troublesome to get money for this purpose as to get it for any other purpose and the provision of £1,000,000 or £1,250,000 is sure to cause us trouble in any case.

Deputy O'Sullivan, in talking about this Estimate, made some mistakes. I am not surprised at that, of course, because I do not expect complete accuracy from Deputy O'Sullivan. The item concerning the higher Civil Service, as it is called, has nothing to do with this award at all. It is a hangover from the 1955 agreement, the agreement made by our predecessors in office, and it is giving the 5 per cent. which they all the time claimed they should have got at that time. That case, of course, was made very much stronger when the arbitrable groups, as it were, got the last award because it meant that the arbitrable groups had got two awards, while those in the higher groups got nothing. It was for that reason that the 1955 agreement was extended, as it were, to those in the higher groups.

Fine Gael, of course, naturally, having the Fine Gael mentality will always agree to give something to a big group like the civil servants. Naturally, they will not object to their getting it. Every Opposition speaker started off by saying that he agreed with the Estimate and that the money should be given, but proceeded to make some objection or another in another way. It is grand to be all things to all men. It is like the man trying to cross the water with the ass. When you try to please everybody, you please nobody, and Fine Gael should realise that when they count up their successes at the polls.

These classes are entitled to the award, of course. Fine Gael are right in that. But why should certain Fine Gael speakers, like Deputy McGilligan and Deputy Rooney, try to create trouble? Why should they, as it were, encourage the civil servants by suggesting to them that they have not got enough and should go for more? They are quoting from a statement made at some meeting or other. I do not know whether it was right or wrong, whether there is any substance in it at all or not, but, if Deputies are to take their position in this House seriously and are to be responsible for the raising of taxation—and taxation is hard enough to raise—and for the expenditure of that taxation, they should not try to create trouble by pretending that they have read a statement, that it is right on the civil servants' side and wrong on the Government side and that the Government have not done enough. At least, let us wait until we see what the position is before making statements of that kind.

I think it was Deputy O'Sullivan who talked about the big round of wage increases in 1957-58 when this Government came in. I do not think there was ever a quieter two years than the past two years. I do not know whether the Deputy was complaining that there were not more wages given or complaining that there were too much. I am dealing only with the fact. The fact is that when the Coalition Government came into office in 1955-56 there were many more rounds of wage increases during that time than there were in 1957-58 and if a demand for more wages means discontent and, as Fine Gael speakers tried to point out here to-day, if it means that the Government have made a muddle of things, causing a demand for increased wages, on that argument, the Coalition Government in 1955-56 certainly made a very much bigger muddle of things than we made in 1957-58. Of course, it was possibly due to the fact that the Fine Gael Party in the 1954 election promised better times for everybody and when they came into office, the people generally demanded those better times and looked for increased remuneration, and so on.

I think it was Deputy Kyne who made some complaint about women in the Civil Service being treated worse than men. Of course, although it works out that way, it is not a case of men and women; it is a case of married men and unmarried men and women. Women are in the unmarried group. An unmarried man is treated the same as a woman and gets only 7/6, whereas a married man gets 10/-.

When introducing the Estimate, I said that it was about £1,250,000, but, on account of savings in various Departments, the amount I was asking for was something under £1,000,000. I was asked where the savings came from. Every Department has a saving or over-spends. Where it over-spends, we ask for a Supplementary Estimate in order to give them more money. Where the Department has a saving, the saving is taken into account within the year and goes as a saving against the Budget. I would not be able to say in any particular case what the items are, but there are items of savings in various Departments.

As Deputy McGilligan has said, I did, as a matter of fact, say in the Financial Statement of 1957 that I was very anxious that there should be no demands for increased wages. The reason I said that at the time was that I felt it was necessary to try to put the country on its feet. It is a very different question now because the country is on its feet and the Government are able to pay their way, able to pay their liabilities, and so on —a very different position from that which obtained in 1957. For that reason, we are able to face those items of increased wages or increased salaries, as the case may be.

It was assumed by every Fine Gael speaker that this demand was entirely due to the abolition of the food subsidies. In fact, every one of the staff organisations, whether it was the teachers, the civil servants or anybody else, made the claim on the increased cost of living between autumn, 1955, and autumn, 1958. Remember these dates because in every one of their claims they were stated. As a matter of fact, the cost of living in mid-August, 1955, was 128. In mid-August, 1958, it was 143. But when Fianna Fáil came in—that is, in early 1957—the cost of living was actually at 135. Therefore, whatever demand the Civil Service may have made over these three years, half the increased cost of living had arisen under the Coalition Government and the other half under Fianna Fáil.

I would advise Fine Gael Deputies who took such delight in their speeches here to-day in pointing out that it was due entirely to the Fianna Fáil Government that these increases occurred, to read these speeches and say to themselves: "We will be half responsible and Fianna Fáil were responsible for the other half," because that is the position according to the figures. I am sure it would serve this country very much better if the speakers on the Opposition Benches would say: "We are half responsible and you are half responsible. We cannot help it. Let us do something, the best we can, to meet our liabilities in other ways.." It would be very nice if one could get a Fine Gael Opposition to talk like that, but I have no great hope that we ever will.

It was suggested by Opposition Deputies, including Deputy Dillon, that the Coalition Government had agreed not to abolish the food subsidies. I do not want to go into that question now: I am not sure if it is strictly in order. I would advise Deputies to read my winding-up speech on the 1957 Budget and weigh the evidence there and then make up their minds on whether or not the Coalition Government, if they had come back again in 1957, would have abolished the food subsidies. There is no doubt that they would have done it.

All this talk about Fianna Fáil abolishing the food subsidies and that the Coalition Government would not have done so, all this talk about Fianna Fáil being responsible for the increased cost of living, is simply not true. We have wasted three hours to-day on such talk and, at the end, we find that Fine Gael were just as responsible for the situation as Fianna Fáil. If they had said at the beginning: "We are both equally responsible and we must pass this Estimate," we could have saved those three hours and devoted them to discussing something else.

Vote put and agreed to.

Vote reported and agreed to.