I am sorry the Taoiseach is leaving the House as he is the architect of this iniquitous system by which the Industrial Credit Company is allowed to be in the position of setting at nought the terms of this Bill. Let me draw the attention of the House to the limitation provided in Section 3 (1) (d) (i) of the Bill. As the Minister indicated a few minutes ago, that provides that the limit of the share capital and the amounts raised by the Industrial Credit Company is to be £15,000,000. However, it does not, in any way, according to the procedure that has been adopted, limit the contingent liability which the Industrial Credit Company may take upon themselves, that whatever money may be advanced from time to time, or whatever money may be raised from time to time by the Industrial Credit Company by share capital or by loan stock, will be utilised by them and properly utilised by them for the purpose of the direct financing of industrial undertakings. But in addition to that the company has adopted the practice of making guarantees which, if the guarantees came home to roost, would far exceed the limitation that is included in this Bill and in the existing statutes. That is entirely wrong and in fact it is almost a breach of faith with the House.
Every one of us agrees that the appropriate finance should be made available for any worthwhile project but it should be made available in the right way. I am clear myself that there has been no project that was worthwhile that has failed to materialise because of lack of finance. Finance may have been provided in different ways that were not so desirable as this way, I agree, but finance has always been provided. However, where a State-sponsored body is committing itself to more than the limit of its commitments as provided by the Oireachtas, even though that commitment is only contingent, it is, in my view, a breach of the spirit and of the letter of the Act which sets it up.
There must be a much more frank approach to this situation. I appreciate there must be the confidential inquiries and negotiations that go on from time to time until a project becomes a reality and until the provision of finance or the provision of a guarantee becomes a reality. Once the provision of finance has become an actual fact then there must be the acknowledgement of the provision that it is the State and the taxpayer who are providing that finance, be it actual or be it contingent under guarantee. Once public money has been committed to an expenditure — and public rumour has it it has been committed in the Cork case — there is an obligation on the Minister and on the Industrial Credit Company to tell the House and the country of the commitments that have been entered into.
It is not right that commitments of the sort and size that have been made in that respect should be made without this House being told that they have been entered into. It is not right that commitments of that size, totalled up with the other umbrella or contingent guarantee commitments that have been made, should exceed, with the capital already advanced, the limitations provided in an Act. It would be far better for the future sound basing of Irish industrial finance that there would be frankness in this respect and that there would not be the effort that is being made up to this to hide the facts in relation to it. It would be far better for the industry concerned and for future industries as well.
The Taoiseach, when he was Minister for Industry and Commerce, said that, in his view, that could not be done because it would mean the Government would be taking political responsibility for something in regard to which they had not the political choice in the determination of the grant or of the provision of finance. I do not agree. I do not agree that there is any question of political responsibility if the Board of the Industrial Credit Company are going on their own initiative. If they are not going on their own responsibility, they can only be going on the responsibility of the Government in which circumstances it is only right that the situation should be publicised.
When the trade loan arrangements were being abolished we were specifically told here that the reason for the abolition of the trade loan procedure was not the publicity when the loan had been given but the cumbersome method of arriving at a decision as to whether a trade loan was warranted or not. I agree with the Minister for Industry and Commerce that the procedure coming up to the point of decision in relation to a loan under the Trade Loans (Guarantee) Acts was cumbersome but there were the further tabling provisions in these Acts and it was not suggested at that time that one of the things that the new practice was going to do was to avoid that publicity. I think it would be bad that it should be avoided.
I also wish to draw the attention of the Minister to the provisions in paragraph 9 of the Chapter on industry in Economic Development. Up to this a great deal of our industrial finance has been provided by bank loan overdrafts rather than by the provision of finance through public issues. The chapter to which I have referred draws attention to the possibility of operating unit trusts in Ireland to be sponsored by the Industrial Credit Company. It also draws attention to the fact that in other countries unit trusts of that sort, and savings movements within the factories concerned, give those employed an opportunity of taking an interest in their own concern and therefore in their own job.
There has been far too much holding of Irish industrial shares as a permanency rather than the free byplay of purchase and sale that would have the effect of procuring here an industrial share market. If one wants to buy the Irish industrial shares of the great majority of Irish concerns, for a considerable time there may not be any shares on offer for sale. Similarly if one wants to sell them, for a considerable time there may not be anyone on hand to purchase. It is that lack of fluidity that has contributed in no little degree to there being a lack of entrepreneur capital for industrial concerns which was met therefore by bank overdraft accommodation.
It was also contributed to by the desire of many people who bought such shares to continue to hold them and to the fact that they did not ever change out of them; therefore shares did not come on the market. But it was somewhat of a circle. The reason they did hold them was because there were not buyers and the reason there were not buyers was that the shares did not come into the market. The formation of a unit trust here for Irish industrial shares would materially improve that position. It would probably do more than anything else to create an industrial share market of real dimensions. If such is to be formed in this country, then it seems to me that it can only be done through a lead being given by the Industrial Credit Company such as is suggested in the paragraph of Economic Development to which I have referred.
I should like the Minister, when introducing this Bill, not only to do so in terms of monetary limits but also in terms of the class of production involved, what employment was hoped for and what amount of capital per employee was likely to be necessary, in modern parlance. In relation to the discussion we had this morning on the Undeveloped Areas Bill for Foras Tionscal and the Industrial Development Authority, it appeared that somewhere between £1,150 and £1,200 has to be sunk in any undertaking for the employment of one man or, to be more strictly accurate, one person, because the figures we got did not indicate whether it was male, female or juvenile employment.
Whether it is male, female or juvenile, it does make it clear that the amount that has to be found from industrial enterprise in order to provide employment is a very substantial amount indeed. It also makes it certain that when we are getting into a project of any substantial size, the amount by way of guarantee may be very substantial indeed. When it is as substantial as that, this House and the country as a whole have a right to be told the amount of the taxpayers' money that is being pledged in excess of the amounts permitted by statute for direct financing operations.