When speaking last week, I referred to the hours of trading set out in the Bill and this morning I should like to mention that—I suppose, in common with quite a number of Deputies—I have received a number of letters from the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, all protesting against the Bill on the grounds that it extends the hours during which drink may be purchased in taverns. They claim that an extension of hours will lead to excessive drinking, that it will have a bad effect morally on the people, and that it will increase the danger or the risk of traffic casualties. Like many other Deputies, I have a great admiration for the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association. I agree they are doing very wonderful work and they deserve to be encouraged in every way possible. At the same time, I feel I must exercise my own judgment as to how I will vote when this section is being decided.
Intoxicating Liquor Bill, 1959—Committee Stage (Resumed).
The Deputy, of course, will vote the Party whip.
I have already indicated that I shall vote for the hours set out in the Bill.
Of course.
I do not believe that the extension of hours will lead to excessive drinking. I remember when drink was very cheap, when the pint of stout cost 2½d and a glass of whiskey could be bought for 4d. At that time, the ordinary people of the country were very depressed; they had to work terribly long hours in very poor conditions. They could not patronise bars and could not have bars in their own homes, so they went to the public house for rest, solace, or whatever one likes to call it, but at the present time I rather think that the price of these intoxicants has made it impossible for people to indulge in them to great excess. For the great majority, their incomes limit the amount they can consume.
In any case, listening to the speeches made here and to the suggestions in these letters from the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, one might conclude that we were a country of topers and that drunkenness was quite common and needed to be checked very severely. I do not at all believe that. At the time I speak of, when drink was cheap, it was quite an ordinary thing to find policemen hauling people to the barracks, something, I am glad to say, we never see now. The usual charge when they appeared in court was, "drunk and disorderly" but I do not recall reading a case of "drunk and disorderly" for very many months past. Indeed, the few cases which are presented are mainly in respect of itinerants. Consequently I think that, generally speaking, we in this country drink in moderation.
In that regard, I should like to refer to the terms of the pledge which members of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association take. They make what is known as the "Heroic Offering" in atonement for excess in the use of intoxicants by other people and that, I think, presupposes that the taking of drink is a boon, a providential boon rather than being sinful, if one cares to put it that way. Taken in moderation, it is a gift of Providence and my contention is that people drink in moderation at the present time. If the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, in pursuing their good work, feel there will be excesses when this Bill has been passed, I think they are somewhat exaggerating the position and shouldnot have any worries in that regard.
The other aspect is the moral aspect. They feel that the extension of hours will cause moral upset. Great Britian has already been mentioned, where the pubs close earlier than here and where the law is rigidly enforced. With laxity in enforcement of the law, or even as it stands at present, there seems to be no comparision between the moral behaviour of the people here and the people in England where there is such restriction.
Two or three of the letters also refer to bloodshed on the roads but I recently read in the papers that in Northern Ireland the number of casualties, killed and injured, on the roads, was something over 5,000 last year. Here in our own part of Ireland, the number was over 4,000. In other words, in Northern Ireland, there was a very much higher percentage of people killed and injured on the roads, notwithstanding the fact that their licensing laws are rigidly enforced and the hours are shorter. I think that, on these three counts, the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association need have no fears.
A number of the letters I received also stated that there was no demand for this new legislation and that, in fact, a plebiscite would show that the people were against it. They are entitled to publish what they think, but I think that I meet as many of the people who visit public houses as the members of that Association and I feel the Association are exaggerating their fears.
Last week, I listened to two or three members from the Fine Gael benches. Deputy Dockrell assured the House that restriction was necessary and quoted the fact that licences were necessary for the use of a gun or the purchase of ammunition. He felt that the restriction on the sale of drink to the hours of 10 p.m. and 10.30 p.m. was justified. A week or so before that, Deputy Esmonde, speaking on the Hire Purchase Bill, protested very vigorously against what he called Governmental control and interference with the rights of the people. I would fall more to the side of Deputy Esmonde than to that of Deputy Dockrell because I believe that what we should have is the minimum of restriction, not the maximum. I believe that the closing of the public houses at 10.30 p.m. in the summer, which is really 9.30 p.m., is restrictive and I am hoping that we will have one member on the Fine Gael benches who will vote for the hours mentioned in this Bill as they give a minimum of restriction.
I say these few words only to justify my action in voting for this Bill with the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, for the members of which I have the highest regard and whose organisation should be encouraged. I would say a last word in that regard—the terms of their pledge is that they make a "Heroic Offering" in atonement. That in itself justifies the pledge. I think the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association need have no fears that the hours in the Bill will lead to excessive drinking. The Bill will also have the effect of giving us a law that can be enforced because it is just and equitable to the people. Restrictions lead only to more drinking.
Mr. Ryan
One of the difficulties relating to this Bill is a difficulty we all appreciate, that the hours which are suitable in one district or parish may not be suitable in the next. The proximity of a football field or sportsground to a public house will influence the hours which the owner of that public house would like. I can understand why Deputies who represent rural districts support the hours proposed in this Bill. I believe that it is a genuine and well-intentioned attempt to meet the real needs of the rural community. However, I make no apology for making my protest against the Bill on behalf of over threequarters of a million people who do not want closing hours of 11.30 p.m. in the summer and 11 p.m. in the winter. I pray the Minister not to enforce on the people of Dublin and the environs of Dublin hours of drinking which are not wanted by the drinkers themselves, by the workers in the trade, by the owners of licensed houses, by the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, and are not wanted by the families of the people who drink. I would ask the Minister and the Government to think again before imposing, against the stated wish of the people of the city, those hours of drinking.
On Second Stage, the Minister said that these hours were purely permissive and that it was not mandatory on any publican to keep open to those hours. I seriously ask the Minister does he expect that public house owners will keep open at different hours from their rivals across the street who will keep open until 11.30? Would we not then have in the same street the undesirable bona fide traffic we have at the moment? The houses which would close early would be those operated by trade union labour and they would vomit out semi-inebriated people who would cross the street into a small family-owned public house at the other side where they would fight and struggle for drink in the last hour or half hour.
One of the troubles about the existing law is the last minute rush for drink. It would be so much worse if only one of every five public houses were to avail of the hours allowed by the Bill to be worked. If the trade unions refuse to work them, we shall have the situation of the last minute rush for drinks from the houses which close early to those which remain open. The social consequences of that must be obvious to all and I would ask the Minister not to impose upon an unwilling people the hours suggested in the Bill.
I can well appreciate the desire of the Minister, the Government and the Commission to achieve a degree of uniformity in order to wipe out the anachronism of the bona fide trade. I have put down some amendments suggesting hours of opening which, I believe, will meet the requirements of the people of the city. Because of the fact that the hours are not very much more than those which we have at present and that they keep a differential of only half an hour between the country and city public houses, I believe they would have the same effect of killing the undesirable bona fide traffic as the proposals the Minister has put into this Bill.
I would refer the Minister to any parish on the fringe of Dublin which is within the metropolitan area at present. If the people of Terenure, on the one hand, and of Drumcondra, on the other, leave their local public house at 10.30 p.m. and the nearest public house outside the metropolitan area— now a bona fide house—is a half a mile or a mile away, I respectfully suggest that it will not be worth the while of the people coming out of the city public house half an hour earlier to make a mad dash to a public house a mile or a half a mile up the road because by the time they get there, they will be shouting “Time” in the other house. If the law is to be enforced, they will be no sooner inside the door than they will be put out.
The hours I suggest have the advantage that you will not have the public houses in Dublin closing at the same time as public transport goes off the streets. I do not think the Government have paid sufficient attention to the social, physical and geographical problems that will arise night after night in Dublin if all the city public houses close at 11.30 p.m. Even at present, quite frequently, there is a rush for the last couple of buses on any route. You have the last-minute cinema crowds, the people who go for a cup of coffee or a cup of tea after a show, the people in the catering business and the show business—all rushing for the last buses. Are we to add to that the people coming out of the public houses slightly "under the weather"? I am not speaking of them in any derogatory way. But if a man has a few pints or a few "small ones" and is a little bit "under the weather", there is a danger he will be a little cantankerous. Add on to every bus queue 20 semi-inebriated people night after night, who will be fighting with other people for the last buses, and the morning after the police courts at Inn's Quay will be even more crowded than they are. Conductors and drivers probably will be assaulted and there will be all kinds of difficulties night after night.
Therefore, quite sincerely, I ask the Minister not to put into the Bill a provision whereby the public houses will close at the same time as public transport goes off the streets. That is why I have tabled the amendment suggesting that in the months of June, July, August and September, the closing hour in Dublin city and in the other county boroughs—although I do not profess to speak with any knowledge of the needs of the other county boroughs, I certainly do speak with some knowledge of the needs of Dublin—should be 11 p.m. For the rest of the year the city closing should be 10.30 p.m. My own opinion, which has been endorsed by everybody I have consulted about this Bill, with one exception, is that the most desirable closing hour for the county boroughs is 10.30 p.m. That is borne out by the Minority Report of the Intoxicating Liquor Commission, in which it is clearly stated:—
...a substantial number of the Commission find themselves in disagreement on the question of extending hours in the County Boroughs of Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Waterford.
The Minority Report goes on to say that:
...there was no general demand for longer hours in the county boroughs.
The same paragraph concludes with a suggestion that in the county boroughs, there should be 10.30 p.m. closing all the year round.
Speaking on the Second Stage of the Bill, I drew the Minister's attention to the fact that it was not correct to say that a majority of the Commission wanted a closing hour in the whole country of 10.30 p.m. Mr. Clear and Mr. O'Flynn of the Pioneer Association said they put their names most reluctantly to the Majority Report merely for the purpose of achieving uniformity in order that the abuse of bona fide traffic might be wiped out. They did that, I suggest, not because they wanted an extension to 11.30 p.m. everywhere but because they wanted a compromise solution for a general closing hour in all areas of 11 p.m.
The Minority Report suggested a closing hour of 10.30 p.m. in the county boroughs and 11.30 p.m. in the rural areas. They went on to say— with a little too much optimism, I think—that the differential in trading hours between the county boroughs and the other areas—at present two hours in winter and one-and-a-half hours in summer—if reduced to one hour, would have the advantage of removing the undesirable bona fide traffic. If you leave a differential of one hour between the city houses and the rural houses, there will be a last-minute dash out to the bona fide house. The hours I suggest leave a harmless differential of a half hour. Therefore, I ask the Minister and the Government to consider my amendment and to think again before imposing on an unwilling population in the city hours of drinking for which there has been no demand and to which there is a considerable amount of opposition.
In his speech on the Second Stage, the Minister gave utterance to what I regard as a very reactionary statement. He said, in relation to the opposition of the trade unions to the extended hours at night time:
Acceptance could never be given to the proposition that the working of late or unorthodox hours, which suit the convenience of the public, should be forbidden by law because the employers and employees would prefer not to work them.
Would the Deputy give the reference please?
Mr. Ryan
Column 196, volume 177, of the Dáil Debates. This House has on many occasions in the past, quite rightly, enacted legislation to protect workers against working awkward hours. The Shops Acts, the Factory Acts and other legislative proposals have provided that reasonable hours will be worked. It is well known that, by agreement sometimes and other times only by the force of argument on the part of trade unions, the working hours of work people have been regulated to proper periods. I would suggest to the Minister that the unions are not being unreasonable. They protested against being asked to work up to an hour which would coincide with the removal of public transport from the streets. The unions are not being unreasonable when they say that the family life of their members would be disrupted if they were asked to work night after night up to an hour before which their wives and families would have gone to bed.
I am earnestly asking the Minister to think once again before compelling the workers to work hours which are unfair to them, on the one hand, and which, on the other hand, are not wanted by the drinking public.
It has been suggested that the Commission were influenced by the weight of the evidence in connection with bona fide drinking, and that they arrived at the conclusion that there was need for extra drinking facilities in the city, because the rush to the bona fide houses proved there was a need for extra hours. On the fringe of Dublin city, there are only a small number of bona fide houses relative to the number of public houses in the city. I doubt if as much as one or two per cent. of the people who consume alcoholic liquor in public houses in the city, rush to the bona fide houses on the fringe of the city at night.
It is a well-known principle that it is very bad law to make a law to suit a bad case. That is what we are doing when we force, on an unwilling population, a law which will provide for the needs of a very small minority. I have taken the trouble—and I am sure very many other Deputies have done so—of consulting the boys who "do the bona fide.” I use the proper verb in the jargon of drinking when I refer to people who “do the bona fide.” They would not regret in the least if the temptation were taken out of their way. I believe 75 per cent. of those who go to a bona fide house regret it the following morning, because they have sick heads and stomachs which last throughout the day and which can be cured only by another trip to a bona fide house that night. If the temptation provided by bona fide houses were removed, I believe they would be quite content to leave the city public houses at the closing hour with the slight addition proposed in my amendments to the hours which the Government suggest in this Bill.
Longer hours are not wanted and there is no public demand for them. As an earnest of goodwill and an indication of our sincerity, I believe the city people are prepared to accept the closing hour in the four months of the summer as 11 o'clock in the evening. That would be half an hour before public transport ceases, and people coming out of the public houses in dribs and drabs would be able to get public transport in the last half-hour and be safely home before the last public transport had gone off the streets.
I have considerable sympathy with the unions in their opposition to the longer hours. By and large, particularly in the city, most of the staffs of public houses are members of unions. The men who man the public houses in Dublin are very fine types, many of whom come from the country——
Most of them. They are all from Cavan.
And they will be the publicans in a few years.
Mr. Ryan
They show tolerance, tact and patience of a very high degree.
There was an example of tolerance from a Cavan man in the front bench over there.
Mr. Ryan
I have suggested in another amendment that the opening hours in the morning should not be any earlier in the cities than 11 o'clock. The individual whose head is sore the following morning and who thinks he needs a cure before 11 o'clock can get some kind of concoction in a chemist's shop which will open at 9 a.m. so there is no need to ask the majority of those who work in public houses to be at their places of employment at an hour when no reasonable person needs a drink. I can never see why a man should want a drink at 10 a.m. in the winter or 10.30 a.m. in the summer. I always find it harder to get up in the winter than in the summer. One of the strange things which our fathers in this House enacted a generation ago, was later opening hours in the summer than in the winter.
If we do not allow the public houses to open until 11 a.m., the effect will be to reduce the working hours and not to create an addition to them. My desire is that there should be a slight reduction in the working hours which would compensate the workers for having to work the extra half-hour in the evening. I appreciate that an hour worked in the middle of the morning is much less arduous than the last half-hour before closing in the evening.
The effect of opening until 11 p.m. would be that, compared with existing legislation, from 1st January to 10th April and from 2nd October to 31st December, there would be one hour less in the morning, and if the House would be good enough to adopt my humble suggestion in connection with the hours for the cities during that time, the workers would be asked to work an extra half-hour in the evening and the result would be a net saving in working hours of three hours per week. For the rest of the year from 10th April to 1st June, compared with existing legislation, there would be, in that seven and a half weeks, half an hour less to be worked in the mornings and the same hours in the evening as we have at present. From 1st June to the end of September or the beginning of October, when summer time is abolished, the effect of my amendment would be that the workers would work the same length of hours as they work at the moment.
I am asking the Minister to consider these hours because my suggestion would lessen the burden we are throwing on to the employees and the employers alike by asking them to work hours which are more awkward for them than the hours we have at the moment. One of the reasons, quite honestly, why the cities are not in favour of the extended hours proposed in this Bill, is that they appreciate that the unions will, quite rightly —and they will have my complete support—look for additional wages, and no fairminded man can oppose them. The publican will then have to pass on the burden to the consumer and goodness knows, for the working man and the unemployed man in the city of Dublin, the price of drink is already prohibitive.
If a member of this House were to go to an average public house on an average weekday, an hour or two before closing time, he would sometimes find the number of staff greater than the number of customers. The last rush in the business inevitably takes place during the last hour or half-hour. The reason for that is not that people would not like to have a nice easy-going session from 7 or 8 o'clock until closing time, but they simply cannot afford it. If the price of drink in Dublin is to be increased still further, we shall be killing the goose that lays the golden egg.
I am therefore respectfully suggesting that we might to some extent meet the wishes of those in the trade were we to reduce at one end the hours they are asked to work. The hours, I respectfully suggest, are sufficient because I suppose there is less than .01 of public house customers, even in the centre of the city, who go looking for drink before 11 a.m. If a person were in such a bad way that he needs a cure in the morning, he can always get it from the doctor——
He can get it in other places. He will get it in any pub he wants it.
Some pubs open day and night.
If he feels so bad, a cure is no good to him.
Deputy Ryan.
Mr. Ryan
Deputy Dillon made a suggestion which is worth considering, that is, that instead of a publican closing his door when closing time comes, he should leave it open, that the onus should be on the customer to leave. If that happened and were our courts to impose heavier fines on the customer, with a prohibition against the publican paying the fine—which is just as important—there might not be the number of breaches of the licensing laws as there are at present.
It is sometimes very difficult for the publican and his staff to clear a pub at closing time. The invariable experience is that when a prosecution takes place, the customer is fined anything from 2/6d. to 10/—in many cases, the publican, in order to keep his trade, pays the fine—and the publican is fined anything from £2 to £5 and runs the risk of losing his licence. The offenders, of course, are the customers.
I am sure that many members of the House, including myself, would quite readily admit guilt in relation to this matter, but if the onus were passed on to the customer, there would not be the breaches of the licensing laws that we have experienced in the past. No matter what the Minister's intention may be, no matter what licensing laws this House may adopt, it will be exceedingly difficult to enforce the licensing laws, unless the onus is put on the customer and not on the publican. Of course, some responsibility would have to be put on the publican. Otherwise, there would be some publicans who would entice people against their own interests and advantage. Nevertheless, the time has come when greater onus should be put on the customer than has been the case in the past.
On this account, I sincerely ask the Minister to meet me to this extent: while appreciating the need for uniformity so far as it can be achieved, I ask him not to chase after that principle and thereby create in the cities vast social problems which can only be imagined. The Minister may say that I am exaggerating. I do not believe I am. I believe social problems will arise night after night if the hours which the publican does not want are provided. I would respectfully say also that if these longer hours are provided in the cities, the most undesirable elements will certainly avail of them night after night after night, whereas the quiet family man may not avail of them. It has been suggested that you can provide the longer hours and that the person can go home, if he wants to. That is quite right but the undesirable fellow, the fellow who does not know where to stop, the night owl who stays out all night, is the type who will avail of these hours night after night.
His pocket will stop him.
Mr. Ryan
It does not always, unfortunately, until it is too late. He will do it night after night, to his own ruin. I can appreciate the high sentiments of people who do not believe in State interference with the individual, but it was said on another occasion here and it needs to be said again, that this is not a milk Bill; it is not a mineral water Bill; it is not a water Bill. This is a Bill dealing with something the appetite for which increases as it is consumed. On that account, there are limits in relation to licensing laws. There is no need to discuss the principle. It is generally accepted. It is a question of what the need is. I suggest to the Minister that the need in the cities is not for the longer hours which he is asking the House to adopt but for a slight extension, perhaps. If the extension is limited to the hours which I am suggesting, one of the main purposes of this Bill will be achieved, namely, the abolition of the abuses of the bona fide trade because if the differential between city and country is kept to half an hour, it will not be worth while to go on an excursion for drink.
It is very difficult to discuss these amendments without appearing to moralise or to tell people how they should live. That is a difficulty in which many Deputies find themselves. The difficulty is reduced when it is realised from the discussions that have taken place, the amendments that have been put down and the Report of the Commission, that the entire country agrees that there should be some control of the hours of drinking. That has been unanimously accepted by the House because there has been no suggestion, by way of amendment or otherwise, that public houses and bars should be allowed to remain open for 24 hours per day.
We could waste a lot of time in discussing these amendments. The issues as far as these sections are concerned are narrowed down to the question whether the hour at night should be 10 p.m., 10.30 p.m. or 11 p.m. It should not take very long to make up our minds on that question. I want to say immediately, merely to be on record, that I have considered that 10 p.m. closing in winter is too early; but that 10.30 p.m. in summer is too early, but that 11.30 p.m. is too late and that 11 p.m. in the winter is too late. So, whether it is Solomon's judgment or not, I am in favour of the 11 p.m. closing in summer and the 10.30 p.m. closing in winter.
Some people have said that there seems to be nothing wrong with men being in public houses until 12 or 12.30 at night. Deputy Corry, who always speaks here for the rural community, has talked about the agricultural worker or the small farmer being finished work at 10 p.m. and suggested that that is the only time he can go to a public house to have a few drinks. We should try to change that pattern. I think the Minister can do it if he provides for the hours which have been suggested in the amendment or the hours which I suggested. I do not believe that we in Ireland make the proper use of our mornings. We always seem to concentrate our work and drinking into a certain part of the day. With all due respect to the rural community—this is not by way of criticism—I would ask: does anybody ever consider the time at which the majority of the people of this country start to work? I am not referring in particular to the rural community.
It is very seldom you get anybody up early in Dublin.
It should be said that there is 20 times more activity in the city of Dublin and the provincial towns at 7.30 a.m. than there is in the rural areas.
That is cod—undiluted cod.
Deputy Moher or Deputy Corry may contradict. I am putting a point of view. We do not utilise our mornings or daylight as much as we should. On the other hand, a statement was made here to the effect that people have to work until 10 p.m. in the summer. I do not think Deputy Moher would tell me the rural community start work at 4.30 in the morning.
5.30 a.m.
I do not believe it.
The Deputy never lived in a dairying area.
Some do. I do not say nobody in the rural area starts work at 4.30, 5.30 or 6.30 in the morning but the pattern is, I understand, to commence work very late in the morning with the result that only one and a half or two hours are left in which to drink. That pattern of life has existed for many years, and I do not think it desirable to change it. I do not refer only to the rural community. There are also civil servants who start work at 9.30, 10 or 10.30 in the morning. It means that four or five hours of daylight have gone and I do not think it is good enough for anybody here to ask the Minister to have the public houses open till 11.30 or 12 at night. There is a greater case for moving the work a bit further towards the beginning of the day.
Pleas have been made here for a general opening and a suggestion was made that the drinking public would make their own hours, that their pocket would regulate their drinking hours and the amount of liquor they would consume. Other countries have been quoted as examples of this. Many people have instanced France and other continental countries where one can get a drink at any time during the whole 24 hours. That is not a situation that should be encouraged here. I do not think we should imitate France or any other continental country in that respect because I would hate to see this country become a country of alcoholics. We have a reputation in this country for being good drinkers and hard drinkers but nobody could say we have a big percentage of alcoholics. The Irishman who drinks consumes a good deal in about two hours.
He has to get out of the public house.
But he is not an alcoholic. He does not sip all day as some of the people on the Continent do. I should like to support the view of Deputy Ryan when he talks about the attitude of the trade unions. The trade unions are violently opposed to the opening of the public houses until 11.30 p.m. and we should have a certain amount of sympathy for the point of view of the workers concerned. The 11.30 closing time for the public houses in Dublin means that the barmen in the majority of cases will not get to their homes till 12.30 a.m. and perhaps later. I am not as conversant as Deputy Ryan would be with the problem of travelling in Dublin but if the barman does not leave the public house until 12 or maybe later and has to travel to Drimnagh or Ballyfermot, it is nearly one o'clock when he gets home.
There is also the suggestion in this Bill that the public houses should open on Sunday thus imposing upon the barmen another five hours' work in the public house and another two hours for travelling, cleaning up, and so on. What sort of family life will such a barman have? I met representatives of the union concerned. I am sure the Minister did, too, as well as members of the other Parties and their point of view is that they do not want their family life disrupted. They do not want to be inconvenienced to the extent of spending only a few hours at home, whether for sleeping or enjoying the company of their family. They are genuine in making that protest. I do not think they would be so averse to the opening of public houses till 11 o'clock although they would prefer 10.30. However their point of view ought to be respected because they represent a fairly big section of the Dublin community.
I want to put on record that while I believe the existing hours are too early, the proposal in the Bill makes them too late. I would support the compromise that has been suggested in one or two of the amendments whereby the drinking hours in the winter would be up to 10.30 and in the summer up to 11 o'clock. There is no convincing argument I could put to the Minister but I would draw attention to the attitude of the trade union and the general public. In the light of that attitude I believe the closing hours suggested in the amendment, namely, 11 o'clock would be acceptable to the workers, the trade and the drinking public.
I am one of those who gave evidence before the Intoxicating Liquor Commission on behalf of the Bray and District Licensed Grocers and Vintners Protection Association. The hours we sought for Bray and district, including North Wicklow, are practically the same as those recommended in the Commission's findings. Since the findings of the Commission were published I have not heard anyone dissenting from the hours proposed in the Bill. The hour of closing, 11.30 in the summertime, from June to September, seems to be the ideal for seaside places like Bray, Arklow, Greystones or any of the other places which cater for tourists such as Glendalough, Roundwood and all around my constituency.
I welcome the Bill on behalf of the trade and the general public. I always considered that in an urban area like Bray it was wrong that people had to travel three miles on Sunday to get a drink. This caused family disruption because they left home to get a drink and instead of going back to their lunch they stayed on consuming a substantial quantity of liquor and did not return home until closing time on Sunday night.
Are we discussing Sunday night?
We are discussing week-day openings only. Sunday openings will be discussed at a later stage.
I am sorry. There are a few other matters which I should like to mention, one of which is late drinking by young people at dances.
It does not arise on this section.
On behalf of the Bray traders and the public in my constituency, I welcome the Bill in its general terms. I am sure it will suit everybody. The workers in my area work a 46-hour week under the Shops (Hours of Trading) Act, 1947. I think they have no great grievance.
We know why we have the section, the amendment and the Bill. They are before us as a result of the findings of a Commission set up by the previous Government, the inter-Party Government. The Minister adopted the recommendations of the greater number of the members of that Commission and introduced his Bill. I have not the slightest doubt that that Bill, were it put to this House a week after it was introduced, would have passed as it stood. Pressure groups have since become active in relation to members of this House.
My fear, speaking as a rural Deputy, is that the purpose of the section and the amendment and the Bill itself will be defeated. I welcomed the extension of the hours for drinking for the rural population on weekdays and on Sundays as I thought it was the emancipation of the rural dweller. To my amazement, I met a countryman the other day and when I asked him what he thought of the Bill and of the amendment, he said: "You are making a mess of the whole thing up there. Why do you want it at all? Sure we can drink at any hour of the day we like, Sunday or Monday, all over the country. Now you are focussing attention on it. You will have the Gardaí raiding and we shall not be able to get a drink at all."
After 12.
After 12 or at any hour. That was the respect in which the licensing laws were held. If we want to continue in that way, if we want to act like the ostrich and stick our heads in the sand, let us do so. I want to see the laws enacted by this Oireachtas respected by the public and enforced by the Gárda. While the populace and the authorities are not behind the laws, they will not be enforced. I am satisfied we shall get the co-operation of the public, the Gárda and the judiciary, as well as the respect of the Irish nation and of our visitors, if we enact this Bill and extend the drinking hours.
Let me give a small example. We have an island off our coast in Donegal where there are five public houses. Prior to the Treaty, we had a police barracks with a sergeant and four policemen on the island. I am assured that at the old petty sessions court, there was at least one licensing prosecution per month and at least ten summonses for drunkenness. After the Treaty, the State, in its wisdom, abolished the police barracks on the island. Now the Gárda have no means of access to the island by surprise. The public houses there are open almost at any time a person wants a drink. I spent many nights on the island and I speak from experience. You can have a drink there at any hour of the night you want it.
I have never yet, in my 29 years' experience of the district court, come across one charge of drunkenness on the island. I have never yet come across an assault case arising out of drunkenness. There are 14 motor vehicles on the island and I have never yet heard of an accident arising out of which a driver has been charged, under Section 30, with driving while drunk. I have never heard of one prosecution under Section 30 because if a man wants to drink there, he can have it at any hour he wants it.
Why have we all this talk about drunkenness? I shall tell you. A man has only a certain amount to spend on drink, be it 5/-, 10/-, 15/- or £1, in the week. That is all he has to spend. Saturday night may be his night of choice to spend it. He may not, for domestic and other reasons, be able to get to a public house, say, until 9 o'clock on a Saturday night. If it is winter time and if he has to get out at 10 p.m. he will spend his 10/- or 15/- no matter what happens and, if he has not spent it when closing hour comes, what does he do? He buys what, in my opinion, is the most dangerous feature of the whole matter, namely, the bottle for the hip pocket.
The same thing happens after 12 o'clock at night dances. If a man could go in and sip his drink and dance, come back and finish his drink, you would never see drunkenness, but we cannot do that. The result is that people who want spirits at a dance have it in their hip pocket. They are drinking it undiluted out of the bottle and one knows the effect spirits, on such an occasion, has on an individual.
I appeal to the Minister, speaking as a rural Deputy, not to be persuaded by any person but to stick to the hours suggested in this Bill, namely, 11.30 at night during certain months of the summer season and 11 o'clock at night during the winter. I also appeal to him to insist that the hours he has set out for Sunday opening—I think they are 12.30 p.m. to 2 p.m.—be accepted. It does not arise on this but the amendment is sensible and will suit rural Ireland.
It is not fair for a rural Deputy to give his views on what should take place in the city of Dublin. However I might mention that, in the case of Deputies from rural Ireland who have to spend part of the year in Dublin, there are certain occasions such as an All-Ireland Final or a Fianna Fáil or a Fine Gael Árd Fheis, when rural constituents come up and want a drink. I know of no Deputy who cannot find ways and means of getting them a drink. I should much prefer to see them enabled to have a drink, respecting our laws and taking it legitimately.
I have much sympathy with Deputy Ryan and Deputy Corish with regard to the trade unions. We should bear in mind that, according to the law of this State at the moment, one is entitled to go into a restaurant and demand a hot meal up to midnight. In how many hotels will you get a hot meal after 10 p.m.? Although they are bound to serve it, they do not remain open.
If public houses in the city were permitted to remain open late at night, possibly some of them might decide to close early while others might decide to remain open, depending entirely on the clientele they had built up. While it is very unfair, as I say, for country Deputies to suggest what the law in the city should be, if Deputies on all sides of the House representing Dublin city feel that the public houses should close at 10.30 p.m., then certainly I would bow to their suggestion; but so far as rural Ireland is concerned, I appeal to the Minister to stick to the decision he has made and to the hours suggested in the Bill and not let any pressure groups persuade him to change them.
I know certain pressure groups for whom I have a great respect. I know that they are now endeavouring to persuade Deputies to vote against the late closing of public houses. If those gentlemen had done their duty over the past 20 years and assisted the Guards by reporting breaches of the licensing laws, there would be no necessity now for them to exercise pressure on people who wish to exercise their right to vote as they feel their consciences justify them in voting.
It is all very fine for these gentlemen to hold up their hands and say: "You will ruin Ireland by permitting the people to drink after hours". We are drinking after hours but I never heard of one of them reporting the drinking after hours to the Guards. Their opinion should not weigh too heavily with the Minister. The Minister will agree with me that people in rural Ireland who work late at night are entitled to go into a public house. As Deputy Corry said, the public house is the clubhouse of the labouring man and he should be permitted to stay there at night.
Listening to and reading this debate one would imagine that once the Bill becomes an Act and the public houses open at 10.30 in the morning and close at 11.30 at night, every man will run in at 10.30 a.m. when they open and remain there until 11.30 p.m., or go in every night at 8 p.m. and stay there until 11.30 p.m. A man can only afford to go in one or two nights a week, if he lives down the country and we should give him a reasonable hour. In some parishes in Ireland, we still have old time and 11.30 p.m. is not a late hour and has never been a late hour. I heard some Deputy interrupt and say that in Dublin the people are up and about their business at 7.30 a.m. In rural Ireland, there is not much use shaking hay at 7.30 a.m. when it is still covered with dew, but you have to stick it out sometimes until 10.30 at night. Nature prescribes the hours which you have to work in rural Ireland; the trade unions usually do it in Dublin. We have no control over the working hours in rural Ireland so that is a very important point to bear in mind.
I speak from my own experience. I speak as a Deputy, as a dweller in rural Ireland who is not ashamed to say that he takes a drink and takes it in a public house, and I feel I should be entitled to have a drink without breaking the law up to 11 o'clock at night. I speak also as a solicitor who has defended many publicans. We have reached the stage now where automatically the fine is ten shillings. Men found on the premises, if they are represented by a solicitor, are given D.P.O.A.—dismissed under the Probation of Offenders Act. If they are not defended by a solicitor, they are fined 2/6. Is that not a disgrace?
Cheap enough.
That is exactly what is happening. We are drinking until 1 and 2 o'clock in the morning and we say "Cheap enough." That is not the way in which we want the laws to be respected. I do believe that we shall get the co-operation of the publicans and the public if we have these hours. I have discussed it with many publicans and they say they are in agreement with the penalty which the Minister suggests under the Bill, namely, endorsement after the first prosecution. As a matter of fact, there is one thing with which they do not agree, that is, the penalty of £1 to be imposed on persons found on licensed premises. They think it should be slightly higher and I am inclined to agree with them. There is the old point that if you have no receiver, you will have no thief. If you have no drinker after hours, you will have no breach of the licensing laws. If you could deter him by a stiff penalty, you would get somewhere. The penalty proposed is a minimum of £1 and a maximum of £5. If this Bill goes through, I shall have the greatest respect for our licensing laws and I think they will be respected by the people.
There is another point which arises on the section. It is the amendment of the Schedule where it is left to the district justices and to their discretion to grant general area exemption orders. I think it is in Section 16 of the 1927 Act——
That matter is hardly relevant to the amendment.
I think the matter is appropriate to the amendment in this way, that at the moment hours may be extended on certain occasions. For instance, if there is a Pattern down in some part of Cork, or a feis in Roscommon or Donegal, or an influx of visitors to a seaside resort on a Sunday, the district justice, on an application from a number of publicans or the Garda superintendent, may grant certain hours of opening.
Perhaps the Deputy would come back now to the amendment.
This amendment was put down by Deputy Cosgrave and deals with the city of Dublin and, I think, Cork and Galway. If I have not spoken in favour of the amendment, I am giving reasons why it should apply only to the county borough, but I am appealing to the Minister on the section not to be intimidated, to stand fast and give us the hours he suggests, namely 11.30 p.m. in the summer time and 11 p.m. in the winter, in rural Ireland. As I said, the Minister is a Deputy representing the city of Dublin. He knows more about conditions here, as I am sure do Deputy Cosgrave, Deputy Ryan and others, than I, but as a rural Deputy my mind is open on the amendment. On the section, however, I ask the Minister to stand fast.
I supported this Bill and welcomed it when it was introduced. Like many other Deputies, since then, I have been assailed by many interests. I do not feel justified in using this House for furthering my own opinions and I realise that the people who sent me here expect me to take into consideration the submissions they put to me. My only consideration when speaking originally was the workers concerned in the trade.
Since the Taoiseach, in his wisdom, has decided that this is a Government decision, arising out of the findings of the Commission, that therefore there will not be a free vote of the House and that the Bill will be passed, I find myself in a dilemma. Apart from the Commission and the findings of the Commission, I wonder would the Minister, with the advent of the municipal elections, ensure that the same ballot paper be used to get an expression from the people. With regard to Dublin, I believe it is essential to have some extension of the licensing laws as they exist at the moment. Irrespective of any pressure that may be brought to bear upon me, I hope there will be uniformity of hours. Having regard to the facilities available in Dublin, one has only to ring a taxi and within four or five minutes, one can be outside the city for a drink. I have nothing against those people who have very wellconducted inns and houses in the county. I believe they will lose nothing.
Instead of taking a taxi and leaving their "locals" at closing time, people will decide to go out at 8 o'clock and they may make a night of it, if they feel like it. I know the city and I know the licensing laws and, like Deputy Corry, I may have found myself on premises later than I should have been. I believe that the hours will not make any difference in so far as the city or the city limits are concerned. I sincerely believe that there will be no loss to those who are affected, say, in the bona fide trade. Eventually, the conditions will regularise themselves and they may find that instead of losing trade, they will gain trade, because people, instead of rushing out for an hour, will go out for a couple of hours not only to enjoy the liquor but also to enjoy the other amenities which these people provide in their houses.
While my suggestion as to getting the feeling of the people concerned may not be feasible, I am sure the Minister and the Government do not want to force legislation on the country if they feel that the country as a whole, or the majority of the people, would not welcome it. I was in the United States when they brought in a law to prohibit drinking. Even the youngest person to-day knows the tragedy and the dangers that ensued from that. I am not suggesting that the same thing would happen here. Nevertheless, taking into consideration our temperament, it is a well-known fact that if we are told we cannot do this or do that, there are many people who will risk doing it.
I hope that when the new law becomes operative, every precaution will be taken to see that it is enforced. The good example should be shown and no breaches should be tolerated.
One can get quite an amount of amusement listening to the various views given by different Deputies. One thing sticks out, however, that is, the two different worlds which exist today between what one might call the official class and the ordinary worker, particularly in the rural areas. Deputy Corish took us to task. In the earlier days, I was foolish enough to come to this House fairly early in the morning, thinking that I could get work done before the Dáil assembled at half-past ten. I never yet saw any fellow from the city there. He was in bed. If you get up in Dublin at the hour at which we have to get up in the rural areas, the landlady will say that you are waking the house in the middle of the night.
Nothing amuses me more than Deputy Ryan's and Deputy Dillon's proposal to open the pub doors at closing time. The publican has the clock on the wall and he will see what the closing time is. If he opens the door and the fellow sees the door open, he will think it is not closing time and walk in. Deputy Ryan wants that man fined and the publican not fined at all.
For having no watch.
We must remember that up to the present the law with regard to intoxicating liquor was a law made for Dublin and enforced on the rest of the community, whether they liked it or not.
There are half a million people in Dublin.
It is a pity Hitler did not deal with them. There are half a million people in Dublin and the rest of the country is working for them.
There are a lot of Corkmen in Dublin.
I had experience of the pressure groups to which Deputy Carroll referred. It is over 12 years since I got relief in the House for the ordinary rural publican. I saw the pressure groups go to work and I saw a flood of complaints from every crank in the country about it. Six weeks afterwards, I brought in a Bill which closed the city public houses in Dublin and the pressure groups were howling and shouting about the moral law and all the rest of it. The whole world would be wrong if the country boys got a drink in a pub on a Sunday. They did not use their pressure then to close the city as well as the country houses. They kept their mouths shut but now the same pressure groups are coming in here, approaching Deputies to see that the city pubs are kept open. That is why I say that up to the present Dublin has been running the rest of the country.
Some of us found ourselves in a rather funny position when this matter was being discussed at the Commission. I hate injuring any man, particularly in his business, but evidence was given at the Commission that publicans within a circle of four or five miles from the city would suffer if the bona fide trade was abolished. Some of us did feel it, but there has to be some change in it now, and in that change there will be no drink for the fellow who can travel a distance of three miles in a motor car. I am convinced that if we are to have respect for enforcement of the law, we must have a unified closing time and there is no use in approaching the problem in any other way. Let that unified hour be 11 or 12 o'clock, but for my part I would like to have it as close as possible to the hour at present enjoyed by the upper class, the gentlemen with the motor cars who can drink up until 12 o'clock at night. That is why I am in favour of the 11.30 p.m. closing and, if I had my way, I would make it 11.30 the whole year around because there is no difference between summer and winter in that respect.
Deputy Corish is very anxious about the hours that a city person would work, very anxious that such a person would not be upset in any way. I know people earning their livelihood in my own district who have to go in to work at 12 o'clock at night and they are glad to have that work and thank God for it. They work in different shifts. There is nothing to stop the Dublin people concerned holding a general meeting and making the city a closed borough, as far as organisation is concerned, and making a uniform closing hour of 10 p.m. or 10.30 p.m. We shall not cry after them if they do that, and again I repeat that to have different closing hours is wrong. I myself made a mistake about it but I am man enough to admit it.
We all know that during the summer months men are working in the rural areas until 9 o'clock at night. They are paid overtime for it now, thank God, but there was a time when they were not. The ordinary small farmer saving hay with his family is entitled to get into a public house when he finishes his work and I would appeal to the Minister, if for nothing else except what Deputy O'Donnell told us about the islands in his area, to have consideration for that problem. He told us he would not go to the islands any more if the hours were changed and I think on that account alone the Minister ought to stick to the hours they have there, and endeavour to have a uniform closing hour.
As I said before, these groups had representatives on the Commission and they signed the report. Despite anything the Minister said the other day, there was nothing to stop these people proposing an amendment at the Commission and seeing what support they would get for it, but instead the representatives of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association did sign the majority report.
That Commission was set up by the inter-Party Government and various Deputies, including myself, served on it. In addition, various members of the public representing different interests were called in on it, and I am sure the people I mention were representing the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association.
I think we should get this clear. Were they there as individuals or were they representing the Association?
They were representing the Association, as far as I could see.
Could the Minister not clear that point?
One of the two was a representative of the Pioneer Association.
Well, that is clear. I did not know that.
I do not know which of the two it was.
The Deputy was right and he was wrong. One was there as an individual.
One was certainly in the higher circle of the Pioneer Association and the other was a representative of the Association. That is how they stood, just as individuals were selected to represent the licensing trade in different capacities.
But there is a difference between representing and being representative of. The Deputy was not representing the farmers even though he is a farmer.
I was selected by this House and I went there in that capacity.
That point does not really arise.
When I hear this talk about the interference of pressure groups I want to point out that they had time then to put up their arguments and put down amendments. If I were in their position I certainly would have moved amendments, even if I had only one seconder, as I often did in this House. A man is entitled to put his views forward.
Not always.
There was also the point made by Deputy Dillon, and supported by Deputy Ryan, on the ridiculous condition that would exist if the publicans all opened their doors at closing time for the one individual who would be passing and would not know the hour——
The innocent fellow.
——and that he would be fined and not the publican. To my mind, those things are foolish. I am glad that the Minister has taken the stand that he has taken on this matter and that the Bill will go through the House with the recommendations of the Commission. We all know what people down the country think. For the past 12 years, since this House refused to do justice to the rural community, the rural community and the Garda have decided that they will not enforce an unjust law. That has been going on for 12 years and I think it would be very hard, even now, to get respect for a law that has been held in contempt for 10 or 12 years. It cannot be denied by any Deputy here that the law has been held in contempt.
I am not a drinking man. I seldom take anything and when I do it is generally a mineral. I was drunk once and I was drunk that time for three days. It was poteen we made in an internment camp and it was good strong stuff.
The Deputy is now sober and it is time he discussed the amendment.
I do not wish to delay the House but there is one other thing I would like to say. Some people from the ecountry go into publichouses in Dublin and they have noticed that about 20 minutes before closing time, the gentleman behind the bar says: "Time gentlemen, please" as a reminder that they should call again. That is repeated every three or four minutes until closing time. That is my experience of the Dublin publican and his anxiety to close up.
Consideration of what is involved in this section and the amendments to it demands certain specific inquiry at the outset. As far as I can see, they deal with two matters— the first being the change in the existing closing hours from 10.30 p.m. to 11.30 p.m. The other is implied in the first one, namely, that when the hours are changed, the bona fide trade will have been disposed of? Before any change is brought about, or should be brought about, the necessity for it should be clear and the demand for it should be generally noticeable throughout the country.
The fact that one Government or another set up a Commission to inquire into certain matters and that that Commission brought in certain recommendations does not mean that the recommendations ought to be adopted either in whole or in part. I am not in the slightest influenced by the fact that the Commission which brought in this report was a Commission set up under the Government in which my Party played a big part. One has to have regard to the evidence put before that Commission, to how it was treated and how it was compared with conflicting evidence given and the results brought about.
As far as I can gather from the explanatory memorandum or from the Minister's Second Reading speech, there is no serious demand and no serious necessity for this change from 10.30 p.m. to 11.30 p.m. If it is a proposal designed to achieve uniformity, that uniformity could be achieved by completely abolishing the bona fide trade and leaving the hours as they stand, 10 p.m. in winter and 10.30 p.m. in the summer. Why is it necessary, in order to achieve the abolition of what is a relatively small trade, to impose something on the whole of the country?
I am of the view that the Government, in this regard, are engaging in what almost inevitably leads to faulty results—compromise. I have no time for compromise in matters of public concern. As I have already said, I am not disposed to be influenced by what the findings of any Commission may be. I am not disposed to be influenced by the smug references to disregard for the law and the bringing of the law into disrepute. Can any Deputy here or can the Minister say how it will be possible to enforce a closing hour of 11.30 p.m. rather than a closing hour of 10.30 p.m.? If the law is there, why can it not be enforced in relation to any particular hour, even 9.30 p.m.? All this talk of lack of ability to enforce the law is utter codology. It can be enforced at 10.30 p.m. or 10 p.m. just as well as at 11 p.m. or 11.30 p.m.
I do not for a moment accept the suggestion that the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, which from its various branches and from its general headquarters has made representations to us, can be regarded as a pressure group. The motives of such an organisation cannot and should not be questioned and should not be made the subject matter of derision here. I think it was Deputy Loughman who said that the proposed hours in the Bill were acceptable to the people and were just and, therefore, can be enforced. How were the previous hours unacceptable to the people? How were they unjust and how could they, in consequence, fail to be enforced?
I do not see any merit in the argument that the hours should be extended in order to assist our tourist trade. The licensing laws of any other country—even of those which engage in the tourist trade to a greater extent than we do—are not altered to suit our coming. I should hate to think that this country would come to be described in the tourist brochures of the countries of Europe and the world as a country in which it is possible to drink to a later hour than in any other country.
It has been argued here by Deputy Corry and suggested by Deputy Moher—and indeed by Deputy O'Donnell of my own Party—that the rural deweller should be entitled to get a drink up to 11.30 p.m. and that it would be easier for him to keep the law. Deputy Moher, in a bitter aside in defence of the rural dweller, when Deputy Corish suggested that Dublin people got up earlier than people in the country, said that Deputy Corish must never have lived in a dairying area where people begin work at 5.30 a.m. Very good. I accept that statement unreservedly from Deputy Moher. But why, in the name of goodness, does Deputy Moher want a closing hour as late as 11.30 p.m. for a person who has to rise at 5 a.m.? I should have thought, having regard to the natural need for sleep, that the person who has to get up at 5.30 a.m. will not be able to give a reasonable return the next day if he stays drinking until 11.30 the night before.
That is an aspect of this proposed closing at 11.30 p.m. which should have some weight with the Minister and the Government—indeed, it is something to which the general public should direct their minds—the capacity of a person to give a fair return for the salary or wages he receives on the day after spending an evening drinking until 11.30 p.m., not to mention the possibility of 12 o'clock with this meal business. It is all very fine for people whose work is not easily subject to supervision or to examination for the first half of the next day.
Again, it must have a domestic effect, either through keeping people out later, on the one hand, or the spending of money necessary for the upkeep of the household, on the other. At present, I should say, that the general practice of the average drinker who has a few drinks is to go to his public house about 9 p.m. or 9.30 p.m. in the summer time and finish at 10.30 p.m. He spends about an hour or an hour and a half there, not necessarily drinking all the time but engaging in conversation and, in other words, using it as a club. What will he do now? Will he go again at 9.30 p.m. and stay until 11.30 p.m., which must necessarily cost him more? Or will he take the other line and say: "Now that the pubs are open until 11.30 p.m. I shall be able to go to a picture which I can leave about 10 o'clock and I shall still have about one and a half hours for the few drinks"? In that case, he would have the double expenditure of the picture, or whatever entertainment he chooses, and of the drink afterwards. It must take such people some time to go home. I think there is a good deal to be said for the point made by Deputy Ryan about what could happen, and probably will happen, in regard to public transport around that time.
I do not think that a heavier fine on the customer for a breach of the licensing laws meets the case, because a person who stays on for some reason or other with a drink in his hand may not be the person entirely responsible for the breach. I would leave the fines as they are in relation to ordinary breaches, but where it could be shown that a person in absolutely closed hours had persuaded the publican to let him in. I would have a substantial fine.
We must consider the situation when an all-the-year-round customer arrives at a public house during closed hours and knocks at the door. The knock is answered, because it might be any kind of important message. There are two people standing at the hall door—the publican inside facing his customer on the outside—and the customer is pleading with the publican. The customer might even be a person in a privileged position. We are not unaccustomed to such happenings, where patronage plays a part in the influencing of mankind. In those circumstances, the customer is using his position of patronage and his position as a customer to put the publican into the awkward position of letting him in. Then he is caught. In that case, the fine on the customer should be substantially higher than that on the publican.
Having listened to the speeches on the Second Reading and, so far, on Committee, one would imagine that every public house in this country was full of customers after the regular closing hours. Such is not the case. I come from a constituency where public houses are situated remotely enough from Garda supervision to make it possible for them to be open. I think it will be accepted generally that if a fact-finding body were to go over a certain selected part of rural Ireland to examine this position for themselves, they would find that the majority of public houses here close at the proper hour and that those that remain open are frequented by the same people all the year round. Moreover, they would find in the majority of cases that those public houses which remained open were owned by publicans who felt they could remain open with impunity, by reason of the patronage they enjoyed from some source or other.
I should not like it to go out that we are a nation of alcoholics or hard drinkers. We certainly can take our drinks and in the vast majority of cases, hold them. For that reason. let us keep to the time we have and not make this horrible admission of failure, this admission of complete inability to see that the laws were enforced right up to the present time.
I assert that if we cannot keep the pubs uniformly closed at 10 p.m. or 10.30 p.m. under the existing law, we shall not be able to do it at 11 p.m. or 11.30 p.m. More particularly, if that is the reason underlying this change, if tourism is the reason, or even partially the reason, then it is disgraceful that this Government should lend themselves to the proposition that this country should be regarded by visitors as one in which they can drink for a longer time than they can drink in their own countries.
When one stands up to speak on this amendment, having listened to the debate from 10.30 this morning, one feels that it is nonsensical to throw out a suggestion, or to make a speech, because we have been told by the Taoiseach that this is the Report of the Commission, and so far as the Government are concerned, they are carrying it out. What then is the use in anyone on this side of the House, or on any side of the House, standing up and saying: "This change or that change or the other change, should be made," when the Minister, on behalf of the Government, and the Taoiseach say: "This is the Report of the Commission; this is the Bill; we have a majority and this will be the law?"
May I say that many commissions were set up from time to time in this country? Were the recommendations of each of those commissions carried out? Not at all. Why then should not helpful amendments be put forward to this Bill? In the House at the moment we have people representing the business end of the matter; the legal profession is well represented; we have Deputies for Dublin city and Deputies from rural Ireland; Deputies who are members of the Pioneer Association; and Deputies, like myself, who take an odd drink.
Shame on the Deputy.
Not a bit of shame. Surely the Minister and the Government should not have closed minds on this matter. To give an example, Deputy Corry spoke for less than half an hour and he said that the legislation enacted here in 1942 was legislation for Dublin alone, and that it was the damnation of rural Ireland. On that occasion, the very same Deputy Corry had to vote for that legislation which he has been crying about ever since. The same thing is happening today as happened in 1942. The Commission have decided and the Fianna Fáil Government, with their majority in the House, say: "This will be the law, whether it is right or wrong."
I put it to the Minister that all this talk, and all this speech-making, is a vote of censure on the Garda authorities. That should not be the case because the 1942 legislation was such that it was impossible for the Garda authorities to enforce it throughout Ireland, for the simple reason that it was not uniform. No matter what hours are decided—and I shall give my views on what they should be—may I appeal to the Minister to let them be the same throughout the 26 counties over which we have jurisdiction? If there is the slightest difference between one area and another, it will be impossible for the Garda authorities to enforce the law. It is our job to make the laws, and it is their job to enforce them. Do not think that I am defending the Garda authorities.
I put it to the Minister and to his predecessor and all the Ministers for Justice before him, that there is not a Deputy who during his time did not approach the Department of Justice and the Minister in cases where a member of the Garda did his duty. If the Garda or the sergeant did his duty, he might be shifted far away, with the result that they said to themselves: "If I am wise, I shall not bother at all because I previously tried to uphold the law and was badly thanked for it, I was shifted away because I tried to do so." Therefore, we in this House are far more responsible than any other section of the people for the fact that the law was not carried out.
Again, I want to emphasise to the Minister that no matter what hours are decided upon and no matter what decision is reached, they should be uniform for every public house throughout Ireland. If that is not the case, we shall drift back to where we were previously. Listening to speeches and reading reports in the daily papers of the speeches made here, one would imagine we were a country of drunken "bowsies", that every one of us was watching to get into a public house at midnight or 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. That is not the case at all and we are belittling our people by suggesting it is so. I am not, never was, and, I am afraid, never shall be, a member of the Pioneer Association, but I protest against that Association being referred to as a pressure group. They are not a pressure group and I believe people who refer to them as such are beneath contempt. They are far from being a pressure group. They have nothing to gain. They are people who have a belief, who are sincere and honest about it and who have proved it. To refer to them as a pressure group is disgusting. I despise such statements. They are beneath contempt and should not be made in this House.
We have heard different suggestions about what the hours should be. In my honest view, 10.30 p.m. in either city or rural area is late enough for anybody. I believe that not a drink should be sold across the counter after 10.30 p.m. In other countries the moment closing time comes the law is enforced, no further drink is served and the customers must leave the premises. The closing hour is late enough for city people and it is just suitable for the people in rural Ireland. Deputy O'Donnell suggested that men work in the fields in rural areas in summer time, shaking out hay, at 10.30 p.m. Did anybody ever hear such a suggestion?
A Deputy
They seem to be shaking hay all the year round.
Hay must be gathered in before 9.30 p.m. or the dew will catch it.. I honestly believe that 10.30 p.m. is late enough. Public houses should not be open any later. They should be compelled to close at that time. That closing hour should be uniformly observed throughout the country. It will be to the advantage of the people. Any man who has finished work at 9 or 9.30 has plenty of time to go to the pub and have a drink or two until 10.30 p.m. Let the law be that they close at that hour and not a minute later.
Of course, up to now it was very difficult to know what the laws were. At a certain seaside resort in the South of Ireland, in the month of June, an American visitor noticed that the public houses kept going all night. He asked a Garda: "Will you tell me at what time the saloons close here?" The answer he got was: "About the end of October, Sir." That was the position but let it not be the position any longer. Let the Minister not say to me—because I shall not believe him —that it would be impossible to make them close at 10.30 p.m. If the law is respected as it should be, and is uniform throughout the country on that matter, even if you state 3 p.m. in the Bill, that should be enforced.
It is no use to suggest, as Deputy O'Donnell did, that the fines should be heavier. In his profession, the legal profession, he is a good man and if he had a case in six months' time he would ask the justice to reduce a fine on the ground that it was too heavy. That kind of thing is done and will continue to be done; the sympathy of the justices would be in that direction.
The Taoiseach has said that the report of the Commission is embodied in the Bill and that there will be no change. My appeal is to have the closing hour 10.30 p.m. I believe 11.30 p.m. is too late. A man who has to work next day, who leaves the public house at 10.30 will retire at 11.30 or 12, allowing time to go home and have supper. If he has to get up at 7.30 or 8 a.m. he would need to be in bed at 12 o'clock. It is as easy to enforce the law at 10.30 as it is at 11 p.m.
Because of the vagueness of the statement made by the last speaker in respect to the removal of Guards from their stations because of interference —by Deputies, I presume—in action they have taken against people who have committed breaches of the law, I want to say that, so far as my term of office as Minister for Justice is concerned, no Guard has been interfered with for doing his duty either in respect to the licensing laws of this country or in respect to any other law.
And the Minister was not approached?
If a Garda or Garda officer in the course of his duty finds it necessary to institute a prosecution against a publican who is found contravening the laws of the land, that is a matter which is settled between the Garda officer and the publican in the courts. So far as I am concerned, I want to disabuse the Deputy of any idea he may have in his mind that such a thing as he stated is happening now. It is not.
Of course, the Minister does not remember the late Deputy Fogarty and the incident with Sergeant McDaid who was shifted from Dublin to Banagher in Offaly because he tried to exercise the law?
Let the dead rest.
The Deputy is not entitled to name members of the Garda.
May I make a point of order? The Minister says he knows of no case in which a Garda officer was transferred or victimised because he enforced the laws. I respectfully submit that Superintendent Quinn is in Bray to this day and Sergeant McDaid is alive; Deputy Fogarty is dead. The late Deputy Fogarty succeeded in having Sergeant McDaid transferred because he tried to enforce the laws.
That is contrary to the facts.
It is not and the Deputy knows quite well it is not. Sergeant McDaid was victimised because he enforced the licensing laws.
He was transferred by his own officials.
Superintendent Quinn of Bray will tell you the whole story about it.
That is not according to the facts at all.
Superintendent Quinn helped to get him out of it.
When the private conversation has ended perhaps there will be some order. Charges must not be made in this House where the people concerned cannot answer.
On a point of order, the Minister mentioned "the time of his juridiction" and things outside that should not have been brought in.
The Minister.
May I reiterate my statement? There has been no interference whatsoever in my time of office; that is what I said. I should like to say in respect to the views which have been expressed during the course of this morning's debate that they only go to show the complexity of the question we are discussing. Varying views have been expressed from the benches opposite. I do not think I am doing any wrong when I say that each Deputy expressed views completely different from those expressed by the speaker who had preceded him.
Why not?
That may be all to the good.
Yes.
It may be all to the good but, as I say, it goes to show the complexity of the question we are now discussing. We are discussing 11 amendments, all pertaining to the question of the hours during which drinking may take place on weekdays and, so far, we have got nothing from the Opposition that we can regard as representative. We here are standing behind the recommendations which are contained in the Bill.
As I said early on, we are not accepting in their entirety the recommendations of the Commission. We have altered those in some slight respects. We did not accept the suggestion or recommendation that the hours should be the same all the year round. We made what could be regarded as a wise and reasonable compromise when we decided that we could accept the recommendations of the Commission for four months of the year and reduced them by a half-hour in respect to the remaining eight months of what might be regarded as the winter period.
Statements have been made by Deputy Ryan and others with respect to the long hours this will impose on the assistants. I can best quote Deputy Belton who is not only a Deputy but also a man who is interested in the licensed trade. Deputy Belton made this statement in relation to the publicans' assistants which I quote from Col. 124, Vol. 178 of the Official Report of the 18th November, 1959:
They are in a catering trade and must work and carry on their employment when the rest of the people have their leisure hours or are on holidays.
That is a fair statement of the situation in respect to those who are engaged in the licensed business. When we talk and try to jerk tears from the eyes of the people who are listening by suggesting that these poor assistants are deprived of their family life by reason of these long hours, we seem to forget that there are very many other occupations in which people work very much longer hours than the hours suggested in this Bill.
I was recently at a dinner given by a trade union organisation at which there were 700 people. I was struck by the fact that there were about 70 or 100 girls attending to the needs of the guests at the dinner. The dinner did not finish until some little time after 12 o'clock and those girls were still there. That was a trade union dinner and those girls were members of a trade union. They were working within the specified hours permitted by the trade union.
Deputy Ryan referred similarly to the excessive hours, as he called them, that the assistants had to work. Once again I find myself trying to correct these misstatements that are being made and I hope my remarks will not have to be repeated. This was mentioned last week—and strange to say it was mentioned by a Labour Deputy, Deputy Larkin. These hours are governed by the Shops (Conditions of Employment) Act of 1938 and the assistants do not have to work more than 48 hours per week, which are trade union hours, and they are entitled then to work eight hours' overtime. Therefore saying that this is enforced slavery for the assistants in licensed premises is a misstatement of the facts and I hope it will not be repeated.
Deputy Ryan also spoke about the extra half hour and said that if there were a differentiation—which I personally do not favour—between the county boroughs and the rural areas, there would be a mad rush from the city to the country during that half hour. Of course we know that is not what would happen. What would happen probably is that the people who would want late drinking would be there long before the half hour; they would get out there early because of the fact that they would have an extra half hour to drink. That is the way I would imagine that would be dealt with.
Deputy Ryan also suggested—in fact he has an amendment down in this connection—a later hour of opening in the morning. The opening hour contained in the Bill is 10.30. He suggested it should be 11. The Deputy, being a legal man, must know that if the publican so desires he can keep his premises closed in the morning until 11 o'clock. He need not open till 11 or 12 or he need not open at all if he does not like. To legislate for the later hour is quite unnecessary. Half-past ten is the hour which has been there over a considerable period of time.
Reference was also made by Deputy Ryan to the fact that customers who are found on the premises after hours get off with a half-crown fine or some minor type of penalty. I am bringing in an amendment to ensure that persons found on the premises in future will be liable to a minimum fine of £1——
The Minister should increase it.
——and a maximum fine of £5. We realise that very often the publican is the victim of circumstances over which he may not have a great deal of control and we are going to impose a penalty on the person who is responsible for causing the publican to break the law.
A case in point is that mentioned by Deputy O'Donnell. Deputy O'Donnell strongly favours the hours in the Bill and other Deputies have more or less supported him in that respect. When we come to consider this thing on its merits it will be found that the hours I am recommending, the hours in the Bill, will be those most suitable to meet the needs of the persons who like to take a drink after their day's work. Deputy O'Donnell also said that not only are the fines imposed ridiculously low in some cases but that very often the Probation of Offenders Act is applied. I do not think the Deputy is correct in that.
In respect of the person who is on the premises.
The position is that the Probation of Offenders Act cannot be applied in such cases.
That might not stop some district justices——
That is the point.
Deputy Carroll said he had supported the Second Reading but, now, as a result of pressure put on him, he is having qualms of conscience. I recommend the Deputy to look at the recommendations of the representatives of the Pioneer Association. I think his qualms of conscience will be eased. They, too, found themselves in that position. They had to accept an alternative which they did not strongly favour but they preferred to accept it rather than to have the bona fide trade carried on.
Deputy Lindsay talked about the Commission, and other matters. Why did the Government of that day set up the Commission, if they did not think there was a serious situation which needed remedial attention? It was set up, as he himself remarked, in the time of the Coalition Government. The terms of reference given to that Commission were to inquire into the operation of the law relating to the sale and supply of intoxicating liquor and to make recommendations. That is all they did.
The Commission sat for 12 months. They listened to evidence from a very large number of witnesses and, having heard these witnesses, they made recommendations. By and large, the recommendations are reasonable. We are not accepting them in their entirety but we are accepting them to a very large extent. We realise that, because of the long period during which the Commission sat to inquire into this whole subject and the very large number of witnesses from every possible walk of life who were heard, they made decisions after very full investigation. By and large, the recommendations in the Bill are recommendations over which we ought to stand.
Apart from the varying views expressed in the course of the discussion, I suggest Deputies should read the 11 amendments on the Order Paper in the names of Deputies on the Fine Gael side of the House, as well as Independent and Labour Deputies. If they read down these amendments, they will see that they, too, vary in the same respect as the views expressed in the course of the debate. No two amendments agree with each other. From that point of view alone, I strongly recommend the House to agree to the hours outlined in the Bill because I could not accept any of the amendments. There is only one there in the name of Deputy Russell which suggests the deletion of the words "half-past" towards which I would have a leaning, but I cannot on my own say I am prepared to accept it. All I can say is that I shall be prepared to have the views expressed by all Deputies in the course of the discussion examined.
Will there be any chance of getting a drink on St. Patrick's Day this year without having to go to the Dog Show?
The Minister has referred to the Commission's Report in connection with the recommendation of 11.30 p.m. all the year round. I presume, as a compromise, the Minister has brought in the hours of 11.30 p.m. in this Bill for four months. Is he prepared to consider extending that hour of 11.30 p.m. to the period during Summer Time which now runs from mid-April to the first week in October? I assure the Minister that, if he makes the four months final, it is more than likely that pressure will be brought to bear upon him later to extend that period. I think he should by some means or another bring in an amendment, if necessary, on Report Stage, to make the summer period opening to 11.30 p.m. coincide with new time. There is just as strong an argument to bring in the month of May under the 11.30 p.m. closing hour as there is for the month of June.
As far as rural Ireland is concerned, I understand that many people have very strong views on the matter and that even pressure groups have indicated their view that the Minister should go further than the four months and extend the hour to the period of what is known as Summer Time.
As I listened to the Minister in his recent contribution and particularly towards the close of his remarks, I felt he had come around to a more open frame of mind after having listened to the arguments advanced in support of various amendments to this section. He spoke earlier of the complexity of the measure and said that that fact was being brought home to him. It was quite obvious to us from the word "go" that it would be a complex measure. In our decision to allow freedom of expression on these benches in relation to this Bill, we were conscious that it was a complex measure and a measure on which there were many differing views.
The Minister referred to the amendments and to the fact that they revealed a variety of views in relation to closing hours. If his Party had been permitted the same freedom of expression, there is no doubt that we would probably have an even greater variety of views.
In introducing a Bill such as this, with the vital effect it has on the whole social life of the community, it is only natural that, varied as are the habits of our people in different parts of the country, it should be impossible to arrive at unanimity in support of any particular programme.
I, too, resent very much reference to pressure groups in relation to this Bill. What is our function in this House? We are not sent here merely to speak our own minds. We are sent here as public representatives. The public are quite entitled to exercise any influence they desire in relation to any measure brought into this House. In fact, I am amazed more pressure was not brought to bear on public representatives in relation to this measure.
If bodies or individuals are concerned with the provisions of this Bill for whatever motives you may like— whether it be for particular reasons, because of the effect it will have on their employment, because of interest in the drinking habits of our people in the case of bodies such as the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association —they are entitled at this stage of the Bill, or any other stage, to approach their public representatives to give voice to their opinions. Is it not helpful to the members of the House to have organisations and sections of the people who will come to them and tender their advice before it becomes law? The time when it is possible for us to amend this Bill is the proper time for us to hearken to this advice and to see how much there is in it which could be of assistance in evolving ultimately a Bill which will meet the requirements of the time.
I am aghast at some of the statements made in support of the Bill. I am aghast at the deifying of the people who have been breaking the law down the years. Whether the law was right or wrong, it should not have been broken. We have heard Deputies say that they have been in public houses at the dead of night and have seen their neighbours there drinking to a late hour. One would think that every person engaged in the licensed trade has been breaking the law and that the Government in office had shut their eyes to the fact or, if not, had been incapable of administering the law.
We all know there are reputable people in the licensed trade who down through the years have complied with the law and shut their doors at the proper time. It is not fair to those engaged in the trade to assert that anybody who complied with the law was a "sissy". I live on licensed premises and I know what the life is like and I assert that in every town throughout the country, there are people who have complied with the law.
In discussing the hours of closing proposed in the Bill, I want to say emphatically that, in my opinion and in the opinion of the majority of the people I have discussed it with, 11.30 p.m. is too late. First of all, in recent years, there has been a complete change in the lives of our people. Today there are many demands on the pocket of the worker or the small farmer. There are many other demands on him for the expenditure of any money he may have to spare. He could well spend what money is available to him for the consumption of drink in shorter hours than those proposed in this measure. It would be inimical to the increased production which is demanded by all Parties and Governments as so necessary for the survival of our country to extend the hours.
We all know that there is an increase in delinquency and that many people who desire to get a quiet night's sleep are denied it by the hooliganism that goes on not alone in the cities but in the towns and now even in rural parts. Anything designed to give any benediction to later hours will not be helpful towards cleaning up that kind of hooliganism. The people who live and work in licensed premises are entitled to reasonable hours and in most of the instances brought to my notice, they favour closing at 11 o'clock.
I agree that doing away with the bona fide trade is a good thing and it was overdue, but the Government could do well to carry out, as the Minister has just informed us, a revision of their proposals in consequence of the views expressed here. I again assert that we are not influenced by pressure groups in our decision, but we are influenced to some extent by the views they express because they are quite entitled to express them. I think it would be good if the Government, as they have done in relation to Sunday hours, looked again at this and accepted a compromise closing hour of 11 p.m.
It is good to hear kind words being expressed about members of the licensed trade because there are people who try to hold them up as vultures who go out into the street and try to get people into their public houses and make them drunk, or allow them to get drunk so long as the money is in their pockets. People who speak in that strain know nothing whatever about the licensed trade. They forget that the people who hold licences to sell intoxicating liquor are hardworking, conscientious and charitable people. They are always the first to receive appeals for local or national charities. By virtue of the fact that there is such huge competition in the licensed trade, they find that much of their profits do not find their way into their banking account, if they are lucky enough to have one. Very often, they have to deal with a type of customer with whom a draper or a hardware merchant or others do not have to deal. They have to deal sometimes with people who decide that the publican or his assistants are fair game for abuses of one kind or another.
I should like to see in this Bill some provision to help the licensed traders to defend themselves, or to ensure that the laws of the country will defend them, against people who on certain occasions will even use force. The Commission which sat for many months recommended an 11.30 p.m. closing at night. With that, I am in wholehearted agreement and I speak as one who has taken drink at both sides of the counter and I offer no apologies for that. We hear too much about drunkenness and about the danger of being drunk. It is very hard to know when a man is drunk. There is the saying "He is not drunk who to the floor will fall and rise and ask for more, but drunk is he who prostrate lies without the strength to drink or rise."
Or the time "the pig got up and slowly walked away"!
What we desire in this House is by our contributions to give to the consuming public and to the people who hold licences a law which they can respect and a law outside of which there will be no necessity to go to do their legitimate business. We hear a lot of talk about extending the hours for drinking but these people are talking through their hats. They have not read the Bill and they have not read the Report of the Commission. The hours of drinking are being curtailed and curtailed at a time when television is coming and will play a very important part in the future of the licensed trade.
We know, those of us who are interested and who took the trouble to find out, that in many towns in England and in many streets, there are derelict public houses, public houses which did a reasonably good trade up to a few years ago. That goes to show quite clearly that the public house is not the den of iniquity it has been held up to be by some foolish people. In this country and every other place where people meet, it has become a place for social chats where people enjoy the sociable atmosphere and the amenities provided. In England, since the advent of television, many public houses have closed down and that is the greatest indication that the public house is a place where people meet to talk and have a drink on their night out.
My particular reason for asking for 11.30 p.m. is this. The people who travel up to now were entitled to 12 o'clock drinking. They are the people who spend most money on drink. The worker's spending powers are very much curtailed. He has to pay for many things on the H.P. system. He has higher rents and rates to pay than before the housing problem was more or less solved. All these demands on his pay packet are really a deterrent to his drinking so that he cannot drink as much as he would like, his spending powers not being as great as they were. The result is that any time at all will suit the worker of the town to go home because he has not nowadays the surplus money he used to have to enjoy a pint or two extra.
This question of drunkenness, too, is grossly exaggerated. I speak with fairly good knowledge. I say quite candidly that drunken men in this country are about as scarce as Red Indians on the shores of Manhattan. I defy contradiction on that. If people take a drink, it is not a crime. The Master Himself not alone allowed the guests to drink but when the wine ran short, He performed a miracle. I refer to the Marriage Feast of Cana.
The bone of contention between the different people on both sides of the House is the 11.30 closing. They all hold different views on the matter. That is why I think the members of the Commission ought to know. They weighed the pros and cons; they turned the question over and back for a long time. Among the signatories to the Report were the people who are responsible for the Total Abstinence Association in this country. I am, indeed, pleased to think that there are members of this House who, I know, never drank intoxicating liquor but who, nevertheless, have been on the whole very fair in their observations here. It is good to think that they have not been selfish. It is not because they themselves do not drink that they will not allow anybody else to do so.
Again, I am afraid there are a number of people who look down their noses at those who are in charge of the licensed premises of this country. They forget that these licensed traders contribute to the Revenue Commis sioners. Many critics accept such money in the form of wages, salaries and so forth. There is not, as far as I know, any taint on the money collected by the Revenue Commissioners from the licensed trade.
City traders and other people have been telling us here quite candidly that they want 10.30 p.m. That is their affair. If the Bill is passed, there is no section in it which forces licensed traders in the city of Dublin to continue trading until 11.30 p.m. If they have sufficient trade during the period of 10 p.m. and 10.30 p.m. they are very lucky. That is due to the huge volume of business transacted in the city where there is a population of 750,000. Naturally, the licensed traders get a fair amount of that trade. In small towns, where you have 30, 35 or 40 members of the licensed trade, one can readily appreciate the great hardships on certain traders even to keep body and soul together. There are more publicans, poets and politicians in the county homes than any other section of the community.
I am sorry the Minister is not here. He is a man who never drank intoxicating liquor. I must compliment him on the way he handled this Bill. He was not a dog in the manger but has been very open-minded on the matter and has listened to whatever anybody had to say. I would ask this House to be unanimous on the 11.30 p.m. closing all the year round. If it is right to open between June and September, there is not a greater thirst obtaining during that period than there is during the winter.
Most of the money collected by the licensed traders goes to the Revenue Commissioners. The profits are small; competition is keen; the hours are hard; and the hardships are numerous. If you give the licensed traders 11.30 p.m., you are taking from them any excuse for not obeying the law. I would ask the Minister to reconsider that point. We do not ask him to go outside the Report of the Commission. We ask him to act in accordance with that Report. It is only half an hour but I think it would represent a great saving in this matter of raids, inspections and prosecutions by the Garda and so forth.
No matter how we like it, a member of the Garda who insists on the strict enforcement of the licensing laws is not the most popular man in a town. That is quite true—he is not. Still, in the town of Clonmel in my constituency, there have been more prosecutions, more inspections and more raids than in any town in Ireland, I think. I can truthfully say that not one member of the licensed trade ever approached me to have the sergeant or any Guards removed. They did not. If they did, I would turn the deaf ear to them. I would not interfere in matters of that kind. If a sergeant or Guard thinks his purpose is to carry out rigidly the licensing laws, that is his affair, not mine.