Vol. 176 No. 11
I move:
That a sum not exceeding £116,280 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1960, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Finance, including the Paymaster-General's Office.
I want to raise a few points on the general Estimate. First, I should like to suggest to the Minister that changes in the order of Estimates cause unnecessary inconvenience and give unnecessary trouble when one is trying to trace where the various Estimates are. This year, for example, the Department of Agriculture moved from No. 27 to No. 49. It had been No. 27 for ages and I cannot see what the point of the change was or why it was introduced.
I think it is also time that rates of pay were set out on the proper, modern scales and not on the old basis. The rates, I know, are set out in the sub-heads to the various individual Estimates but the rates that are set out in the preface in Page IX in the beginning, are the old rates which have been varied down the years by each different award. The same pattern is followed on Page X and I think also the standardisation in the amendments is set out on page VII. Would it not be better that the actual amalgamations that there are of the various pay orders would be published not merely as they are shown to have been made through the years, but that they would be actually published at the rates which are applicable on pages IX and X?
I have always wondered why the sub-heads were set out as they are. I have the greatest difficulty in making sure that I am comparing like with like and I have always forgotten to ask why. If the Minister looks at any sub-head of any Estimate he will see that the number of civil servants in the Department or in the section of the Department is set out and, in the first column, it is the number that were there in the preceding year; in the second column it is the number that is there in the current year. But then, when we go over to the cost of those, on the right hand side of the particular page we find that the order is reversed and in consequence of that very frequently when people try to compare cost with cost, confusion arises. I cannot see what was the reason for switching the columns around. I suppose it has probably come down from some hallowed Treasury minute of many years ago.
It seems to me it would be much easier to have the same basis for both and I think it would be worth considering changing this in the future. The Volume of Estimates has become so complicated now that anything that can be done to simplify reference to it is worth doing.
I do not propose to make any general observations on the Minister's Department except in regard to the subject that was touched on the other day in the discussion on the Ministers and Secretaries Bill. The Minister for Finance is the Minister most concerned with State companies partly because, in relation to some of them, he has the specific statutory power of appointing directors and partly because he, by reason of his shareholding, elects the directors otherwise. I want to put it to the Minister that very different considerations should apply in regard to existing directors and new directors. Unless there is a most specific reason which the Minister is prepared to justify in this House I think it is not desirable that when a director's term, the term for which he was originally elected on appointment, comes to an end he should not be reappointed.
The method that has been adopted by the Minister during the current year of not reappointing certain directors of certain concerns, merely because they happen to have been originally appointed by another Government, does not add to his credit and certainly will not inure to the efficiency of the service of the boards of these companies.
It is quite clear that we shall not be able to get people of the calibre and standard that everybody would wish to act as directors of State companies if they are to be removed for no other reason whatever except that the Minister feels they were appointed by another Government and therefore he should remove them. We had considerable public discussion about that last year in relation to the Chairman of the Agricultural Credit Corporation. The Chairman, who was the first President of Macra na Feirme, was removed simply and solely because the Minister wanted to put in a political pal of his own. We had another case in relation to the Sugar Company where a place was found in that way for an ex-Fianna Fáil Deputy. I am making no comment about him personally at all. The first Chairman of the Young Farmers was removed and not reappointed to make way for that new appointee.
I had frankly hoped that that system was changed when two appointments to the Industrial Credit Company were made in the Spring of this year and in respect of which everybody would agree they were excellent appointments. But I was appalled to discover recently in relation to another State company that a man who, in the particular sector of the economy in which that State company operates, is justly recognised as being in the forefront, was not reappointed by the Minister. He is a man who has had not merely success in his own business in that line of country but who, by his achievements, has brought very great honour and profit to the country.
When his term of office came to an end in the ordinary way he did not even get from the Minister the ordinary civil letter of thanks for his service that anybody would be entitled to receive. He did not even receive from the Minister a notification that the Minister was sorry he could not reappoint him. The secretary of the company concerned received from an official in the Department of Finance merely a formal notification that at the meeting Mr. So-and-So was to be appointed a director; and the director who had acted for three years, and given of his time and trouble to a manner and a degree that would be many thousand times the director's fee in that concern, was not even told by the Minister for Finance or by anyone on his behalf that he was not to be reappointed in the ordinary manner. I think that was discourtesy to a shocking degree and I think—I have no complaint whatever about the person appointed subsequently—it is a practice that will mean we shall not get for our State-sponsored companies the type of man we want if they are to continue to operate in any sector of the economy.
I hope the Minister will turn back the files and see that, when I was there, I reappointed many people who, I knew when doing so, were Fianna Fáil. They had been appointed by previous Governments but I thought they were competent for their jobs and reappointed them as a matter of principle. There can be no question whatever—none—of the competency of the man I had in mind. He is outstandingly competent but merely because he was appointed by the then Minister for Agriculture, Deputy Dillon, and myself, he has been thrown overboard by the present Minister for Finance. That will not make for continuity in policy; it will not make for the prestige of the company concerned and it certainly will not make for the prestige of the Government or of the House.
When we passed the Vote for the President's Establishment I stood up and I was told I was late but that I could say what I wanted to say on this Vote. I should like to protest formally against the amount of money spent on the President's Establishment. It is over £50,000 and is equal to what half the members of this House receive in allowances. That is a vast amount of money for a poor country to spend on what is a ceremonial office, the work of which could be done, I am sure, by the Chief Justice or some other person. I object to it on other grounds. This large sum is to support a person who is merely the nominee of one or two groups. If the money has to be spent, it should be spent in some way from which the country would benefit.
I cannot see how the Deputy can raise this matter on the vote for the Office of the Minister for Finance. There is nothing in the Estimate relating to the matter raised by the Deputy.
I was told I could raise it. I did not hear what was going on. I have referred previously to the need for amplification. The President's Vote passed in a flash and I was told I could raise it on this Vote. I have just a few more words to say.
The fact that the Deputy was absent——
I was not absent.
What happened was there was some little confusion about the Order of Business. The Minister got up and moved Vote No. 1 quite in the normal way but there was so much confusion that I think certain Deputies did not realise that the Minister had moved it. It was then suggested that rather than go back on Vote 1, Deputy Sherwin might be able to raise it on this Vote.
And the Ceann Comhairle seemed to accept that suggestion.
That is misleading. The Ceann Comhairle did not say anything.
It was let go. Otherwise the Deputy could have gone back.
If the Ceann Comhairle had said it could not have been raised, there would obviously have been an application to have that Estimate again.
I cannot allow the Deputy to establish a precedent of this nature.
The Ceann Comhairle should have informed me of that, and he did not so inform me. He led me to believe I could mention the matter on this Vote.
Undoubtedly he did.
If we have to spend this money on this establishment——
There is no mention of any money for the Establishment to which the Deputy refers and I cannot, therefore, allow the Deputy to proceed.
Very well. Let vote for somebody——
The Deputy will have a chance of raising the matter o the Appropriation Bill.
I would be more relevant then.
The holder of this office once said that no man in this country was worth more than £1,000 per year. If the holder of the office finds he can run the establishment now on £1,000, and save £49,000, will the Minister for Finance accept the £49,000 back?
The matter does not arise on this Vote.
It is a question of saving money.
In reply to Deputy Sweetman, I am informed that the change in the order of the Estimates has been made by the Committee of Public Accounts. It has not been done by my Department. My Department agreed to it. Certain suggestions are made every year, and are agreed to.
Did they offer the Minister any reasons for changing the order?
That I do not really know.
But the Minister accepted the change.
I do not think it makes much difference. The Deputy pointed out that the number of officers is given on one side for 1958-59 and then 1959-60, and the cost is reversed on the other side. That is done for comparison purposes. It is the same system as that adopted in balance sheets. The comparison is on the outside in each case.
With regard to consolidated pay, the staff asked recently for an up-to-date version of the scales. That is being considered at the moment.
Deputy Sweetman raised a point with regard to the appointment of directors. As far as changing directors goes, it is done by both sides. It appears to be the prerogative of the Minister to appoint the best director, from his point of view. Sometimes he leaves the man who is in the post, irrespective of politics; sometimes he does not. I am sure any Minister could make a defence if he were challenged about any change. I do not think we need discuss the matter any further.
