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Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 3 May 1962

Vol. 195 No. 2

Committee on Finance. - Resolution No. 7—General (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:—
That it is expedient to amend the law relating to customs and inland revenue (including excise) and to make further provision in connection with finance.—(Minister for Finance.)

Before I moved to report progress, I was putting down for the record the facts in relation to certain matters to which advertence was made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce in the knowledge that the Minister undertook to come into the House and apologise if the information he had given to the House was inaccurate. However, he will have the opportunity of reading that information and I trust he will be as good as his word. It cannot be denied that up to the period of the war, the Fianna Fáil Party had done nothing in relation to non-contributory old age pensions, that during the war, in rural Ireland, a temporary allowance of 2/6d. was given, in addition to that old age pension.

Even giving Fianna Fáil the credit for that temporary allowance and making it permanent as was done not by Fianna Fáil but by the inter-Party Government, it is only now in this Budget that they have succeeded in bringing the figure of increases provided by Fianna Fáil to old age pensioners in rural Ireland up to the figure of increases provided by the inter-Party Government in the two periods in which they were in office. I said before I reported progress and I repeat now that these were the figures: up to the eve of the Budget, Fianna Fáil had brought in increases only to the extent of 7/6d. and with this increase now of 2/6d., they have reached equality with what was done by the two inter-Party Governments in that respect during their two periods of office.

In view of the statement made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce— I have no doubt himself misled by the figures he was given—it is well that the truth should be put on the record and the details are, of course, in the remarks I made earlier. Similarly, it is desirable to repeat particularly for the benefit of Deputy MacCarthy, who is now here, the figures in relation to housing expenditure for Cork Corporation, because again the Minister for Industry and Commerce was inaccurate in his recollection in that respect. The facts are that in each of the three years in which I was responsible, Cork Corporation received more money from the Government for housing expenditure than they have received in any single year since, that in the last year about which the Minister for Industry and Commerce spoke, the expenditure of Cork Corporation on housing of the working classes and under Small Dwellings Acts loans was £758,585. That was reduced in the next year of Fianna Fáil administration to £638,986 and again reduced in each of the two following years to just £500,000, a reduction of approximately £250,000.

Again, I have no doubt that when the Minister for Industry and Commerce goes to verify the figures, as I hope he will verify them, he will find that my figures are correct and that his recollection was incorrect. Perhaps Deputy MacCarthy will also take the opportunity of going back to see if these figures are right. If he can show me in any way they are wrong, I shall have great pleasure in withdrawing them, but I know they are the correct figures.

There has been since then a campaign of fraudulent misrepresentation, deliberately created in the first instance by the present Minister for Agriculture, then Minister for Local Government, and other Deputies on that side of the House who did not go into the accuracy of the figures. They took what he produced instead of getting figures correctly from the records. These are the correct figures and I may say for Deputy Sherwin's benefit that the figures in relation to Dublin Corporation show exactly the same ratio as the figures I have mentioned for Cork Corporation.

I shall explain the circumstances.

I shall tell the Deputy what the circumstances were. The circumstances were that Deputy Noel Lemass and Deputy Briscoe were clamouring all over the country that there was no money to be got. The facts were that in those years they were getting over £1,500,000 more money than they were given by Deputy Dr. Ryan. Deputy Noel Lemass and Deputy Briscoe deliberately went out on a campaign to prevent people erecting their own houses under the Small Dwellings Acts. They said the same amount of money was not being provided and in fact, as I said earlier, in 1955 and 1956 over £4,000,000 was provided and in 1957, £3,625,000. In the first year Fianna Fáil came back the amount was £2,165,000.

Let us deal with the remainder of the country because there may be Deputies in other areas who may equally have been misled. In 1956-1957, Local Loans Fund issues over the whole country were £10,998,000. In 1958-59 and again the following year, they had come down to £6,500,000. I admit freely in the case of the country Local Loans Fund issues were not needed to the same degree, because in many rural areas at that time the housing drive had provided the accommodation that was necessary for the moment. I make no comment whatever as to whether sufficient was being provided or not. I think in relation to outside areas perhaps there was a very definite case to make that the housing needs for the moment had been met. All I want to make clear is that the amounts provided bear no relation at all to the facts and figures indicated in good faith, but with wrong information, by one of the Ministers of the Government.

One of the things noticeable about this Budget when it was introduced by the Minister was the lack of all planning. In any Budget, it is clear that we want to do something more than a mere exercise in arithmetic. We want to do something more than merely provide the Minister with the money that comes in, on the one hand and goes out, on the other. Budgets should have a plan running through them to influence the trend of economic affairs in the right direction, but the peculiar thing about the Budget to which we listened just before Easter was that there seemed to be no plan at all in it. There was no overall instruction as to the manner in which the Minister wished to influence the trend of economic affairs. The Budget should be one of the main instruments by which that trend is influenced, but I cannot find any sign of purpose, or any sign of direction, or any real indication from the Minister that he has any ideas constructively to help in pointing the way in which our economic affairs should be directed.

All of us will accept that the main overriding consideration in our economic affairs at the moment must be the influence the Budget will have on the preparations we must make for our entry into the Common Market. In that connection, I think the record of this Government is lamentable. Before I go on to deal with the Common Market fully, I should like to know why no direction is given in the Budget with respect to the Common Market. The Minister did make a reference in the end of his speech to the possibility that there might be revenue difficulties ahead in relation to our conformity with conditions in the European Economic Community. That is in direct contradiction of one of the papers published by the Economic Research Institute. I think it was that by Mr. Nevin in which he said that one thing that was quite clear from the nature of our tariff and customs duty schedule was that we would not have very much difficulty in relation to the operations of the Common Market.

I find it hard to reconcile the two approaches. My understanding of the difficulties is that they arise more from the fact that we obtain an appallingly high percentage of our national tax revenue from one single commodity, tobacco, and that we are exceedingly vulnerable, far more so than any other country, to any change there may be in the smoking habits of the consuming public. The Minister correctly said in his Budget Statement that he had to advert to the possible changes in the smoking habits of the people because of the medical reports and that they might have a great effect on his revenue. I think it would be true to say that it is that difficulty of taking so very much, about 25 to 26 per cent, of our central Government revenue from one single item that causes the anxiety to which the Minister referred at the end of his Budget speech.

In relation to the Common Market, I do not see in this Budget any evidence at all of a plan or a scheme or even a genuine desire to mark the direction in which we should go. I know that £300,000 is set aside for industrial reorganisation, but is there anything in the Budget to assist agriculture this year more than any other year? Is there anything in the Budget that will help agricultural marketing? We know the fiasco there was in relation to £250,000, the windfall receipt of 1957, which was assigned to agricultural marketing improvements. That money was all spent without any new markets being obtained and without any improvement in marketing methods being achieved.

A very useful little booklet was published the other day called The Exporters Review which gives information in graph form. I find that the graphs implant the information much more firmly in my mind than the reading of statistical tables. I know that some other people do not like graphs but they always bring things home more clearly to me. It is quite clear from that booklet and the information in it that the real increase in our exports in 1961 over 1960 was in the agricultural field, that the increase in the manufacturing field was of virtually little consequence compared with that in the agricultural field.

The increase in the exports of live animals was from £44,000,000 to £55,000,000 and the increase in the exports of foodstuffs from £43,000,000 to £55,000,000, compared with an increase in the exports of drink and tobacco of a couple of hundred thousand pounds. The increase in manufactured goods, excluding drink and tobacco, was from £32,500,000 to £34,600,000. We have got to have exports to live and survive as an economically viable entity and yet agriculture and live animals, which did give us that additional increase in 1961, have not received any incentive, any job in the arm, to ensure that there will be an increase in production.

We hear very often from the Government benches about the great things promised and carried through in their Programme for Economic Expansion. In relation to live animals, we know that cattle must be the mainstay of that section. We know and are glad to see that there has been an increase in pig and sheep populations but it is not with the pig or the sheep that the real fundamental basis of the economy will lie. It will lie with cattle and that is quite right. The objective of policy was set out on page 50, “to increase cow numbers progressively to at least 1,500,000 by 1964”. Unfortunately, we know that there has been only a trifling increase, that we are miles and miles away and have no hope whatever in the two years to 1964 of reaching that target, no hope of acheiving the objective set out on the same page of adding 50,000 heifers per annum to our breeding stocks. In that really fundamental part of the effort to expand our economic future, the vital sector of it, the cattle sector, there has been an abysmal failure. Either the Government did not mean what they said when they published this in 1958 or else they must admit that they failed in that respect.

There has been no real upsurge in that line which could bring us any hope for the future in relation to the volume of output from the number of cattle. Why then did not the Minister in this Budget, when dealing with and considering certain aspects of agriculture, do something to get that desirable objective? Why was he satisfied merely to have the objective laid down in 1958 and forget all about it in 1962 when it appeared clear that the hope that by drifting along we could get to that target was utterly futile? In agricultural production, that is the main sector in which we are likely to find in the EEC that there is a real opening for us. In regard to that opening there has been complete failure both in Government policies up to this and in this Budget to provide any incentive towards arriving at the 1,500,000 cows which we need in order to be able to build up our stocks adequately to take advantage, in the first place, of the fact that so many more acres of land have been brought into production and, in the second, adequately to take advantage of the modern knowledge that the land can carry more than was formerly the case.

It is an unhappy fact that the basic number of cows has stayed static or virtually static all through the years. The only reason we have more cattle in recent years is because of the success in reducing the death rate of young cattle through modern medicine and through the new look given in that respect to veterinary approaches by the Department of Agriculture by Deputy Dillon in 1948. We know the position as it was then and the change that has been brought about in reducing the mortality in livestock since then with the aid of modern methods and the intensive approach by the veterinary profession to the problem. But there is nothing in this Budget to get over the hump; nothing to get us to the position of being able more adequately to meet the challenge of the Common Market.

Deputy J.A. Costello referred this morning to the first report of the Capital Investment Advisory Committee in that regard. Without going into any arguments about the amounts available or anything else, it is perfectly clear that the provision of the amount provided by the Minister for Finance in the form of a calf subsidy would have had a far better effect on national productivity and would have had it in a manner that could not be challenged by any other country as subsidisation of exports and unfair dumping. The Minister failed to do that.

In regard to agricultural exports we must, for the remainder of this year, face considerable difficulties. I think everybody agrees, and, in fact, the sample census published from January makes it clear, that there were fewer cattle in the country at that time. More cattle were probably exported in the first quarter of this year than would normally be exported because of the effect of the subsidy ending on 31st March. Yet, in spite of that acceleration and, perhaps, anticipation of exports in the first quarter of this year we find domestic exports were virtually the same as in the corresponding period last year. I do not know if the Minister has reason to believe that they will hold up to the same figure but it seems quite certain they will not provide that buoyancy necessary to offset the impact of additional imports.

Additional imports were slight in the first quarter but if the change in the terms of trade, which was so apparent up to the end of November, were to continue I am afraid the Minister would find himself in considerable difficulty and would very much regret that he had not done something more positive to assist agriculture in the Budget by means of the incentive rather than by taking what has been described as the easy way out.

In the years that lie ahead I think we shall find that the greatest tragedy is the manner in which the Government have failed to take adequate steps in time—let me stress that—to equip ourselves for Common Market competition. This morning the Minister for Industry and Commerce said that my criticism of the Budget was that the steps taken in the Budget were too little and too late. I corrected him then and I correct him now. I think they were too late and too little. The "too late" is far more important than even the "too little". I think the Treaty of Rome was signed on the 25th March, 1957, as far as my recollection goes. As far as we can see, no step whatever was taken by the Government in relation to preparation for our possible adhesion to the EEC until June or July of last year.

I should like the Minister to answer this one simple question: Will he put on the Table of the House any directive that he or the Government gave to any State company to prepare the way for a possible adherence to the EEC by this country between the time his Government came into office in March, 1957, just before the Treaty of Rome was signed, and the Budget date this time last year? Will they make available the terms, the directives they gave to any State company in that period, showing they were alive to the possibilities? Then the public will be able to judge.

I venture to say from all the inquiries I have been able to make that not until this time last year did the Government even give a thought to the possibility that Britain and, therefore we, might join the European Community. I believe what happened was that the Government thought it was not only unlikely but impossible to contemplate that Britain would join the EEC and accordingly no steps were taken. I believe that the rush at the very end, in June of last year was because they suddenly found all their concepts were shattered and they then had to do in a very short space of time what should have been done over the years.

I know there is at least one Statesponsored body—the reason I mention State-sponsored bodies is that I am judging the attitude of the Government in relation to these bodies as their general attitude in relation to the problem as a whole—which was told before we left office in 1957 to start thinking in terms of looking for European markets in the belief that there would be a wider concept of Europe in the years ahead. So I ask what directives were given by the Government to think ahead, once the Treaty of Rome had been signed after Fianna Fáil came back to office.

As far as I can see, little or nothing was done until this time last year and then a hurried patchwork quilt had to be prepared. Certain high officials of the various Departments, for whose competence I have the highest admiration, were locked up for a week-end to try and make good for the Government their failure to anticipate a political decision, as it was.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce and I referred this morning to the Committee on Industrial Organisation, the Report from which is published at Paper 6,510 of February last. Every lead, every word of that report, accentuates the tragedy that this or some similar Committee were not established long before they were. In the first page alone I note this sentence: "New arrangements like development councils or industrial research associations might be worth examination." Of course, they might it the Government had done their duty in preparing the country for the Common Market. Not only would it be worth examination in February, 1962, but the examination would have been concluded and we would have known where we stood.

The report states that action was urgent for three reasons and this again bears out the tragedy it was that some body like this Committee had not been put in charge of considering the problem long before. Paragraph 13 of the report says: "Any additional State aid should, therefore, be introduced as soon as possible and we recommend accordingly." Why? Because of the delay in the starting of the consideration of this problem. Again on Page 13, the Committee refer to the urgency of what they call a crash programme of re-equipment. Why? Because the Government slept while all their neighbours were re-equipping and re-tooling at a rate that may, unfortunately, have repercussions here for many years ahead.

Again, in the last paragraph of the report, the Committee say that the Revenue Commissioners should examine the practicability of a scheme. It is highly desirable that the Revenue Commissioners should examine the practicability of a scheme but it is not on the eve of our entry that this should have been examined. It should have been examined when the Treaty of Rome was signed. In such an event the examination would not be merely continuing now but would have been concluded and the necessary action would have been taken.

The whole of this Committee's report—and they do make certain worthwhile suggestions—is underlined by their acknowledgment and acceptance of the fact that they themselves realise they have been put into the position of being too late on the scene and they have had, on that account, to indicate a crash programme. To do what? It is a crash programme to rescue industry from the failure and the ruins of the Lemass policy which is written into the first sentence of this Committee's report: "In their present state, many Irish firms and industries could not survive freer competition from imports".

The Lemass policy was one of ensuring, whether by assistance of high protective tariffs or limited quotas, that there would not be that competition which alone, perhaps, in any industry or in any sphere of life, provides the urge to improvement, the urge towards ensuring that industry moves ahead all the time rather than that it should stand still. There must be attempts to improve technical training at all levels. Are we not leaving it very late to improve our technical training at this stage, on the eve of our access, six months after the Government applied, and rightly applied, to join the European Economic Community?

I have referred already to the phrase about things that were worth examination. The same applies in that respect but when one reads this report, there is one thing that stands out in it in every page, that is, the sense of urgency the members of that Committee felt about getting things rectified and made ready. This was not intended to be a political report; it was intended to be a realistic report about the necessity for industrial action to fit in with new conditions in Europe. I am afraid that even since that report was published, there has not been enough determination, or a lead given by the Government, to ensure that the country as a whole, and industry in particular, will be able to prepare for the very considerable strain there will be in ensuring that tariffs are cut down to the common level by December, 1969.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce, and indeed I think the Minister for Finance also, in his speech or perhaps on the radio—I think, in his speech—said that if industry took up more of the benefits from the Budget than would cost the Central Fund more than £100,000, the Government would be very glad. I say that the incentives are too small and the Government's own estimate of those incentives is that they will cost only £100,000. That is the Government's estimate, and the only incentive they have provided in the Budget for industry to meet the challenge of the Common Market is something that will cost £100,000. I did not put it at that and we on this side of the House did not put it at that. The Minister and the Government did, and that small estimate is the only thing they are doing.

That is their estimate of what it is necessary to do. That is their estimate of the urgency of the crash programme of re-equipping and remodernisation even in the Budget. A fortnight after the Budget, certain of the incentives announced to enable industry to meet the Common Market challenge still are not known and cannot be obtained. The bodies through which they are to be distributed and administered have not yet got all the information necessary from the Government to disseminate to the public. At least I am assuming that. If they had got the information, they would disseminate it, but they are certainly not disseminating it, and the only assumption I can make is that they have not got it from the Government. The urgency of the matter is such that I am sure that those who are to administer it would announce immediately that the information had been made available to them.

As I say, one of the tragedies is that it has not been brought home by the Government—and it is their duty as the leaders of the country to bring home—to industry and industrialists the essential nature of the task we have to undertake to increase productivity, if we are to succeed in increasing our standard of living. Indeed, I saw an article the other day written by a certain industrialist in the kept paper of the Minister for Finance and his colleagues in which this gem appeared:

If it is the policy of the country to increase the standard of living without taking productivity into consideration, well and good.

I should have thought it would have been obvious—I see a certain Deputy has come into the House—to anyone with any intelligence that you cannot increase the standard of living without increasing productivity, unless we discover, suddenly, overnight, a whole lot of new national resources. As that person is one of those who were responsible in another sphere for losing some £2,000,000 of the taxpayers' money, perhaps I should not judge him by too high a standard of knowledge.

Again, the Budget provides nothing in the nature of new incentives towards savings. I said earlier today —the Minister was not here but I think he would not disagree with me— that the difficulties in 1956 were caused by three things: the change in the terms of trade, the decline in savings, and the fact that production did not equate to the increase in incomes in 1955. In relation to the latter point, the Taoiseach himself has said that he is worried about the same situation applying now, following last year. He put that on record. Since last November, only one month's terms of trade have been published, that is, the December figure. Probably the Minister has a later figure than I have, but the April Economic Series published only the December figure. Up to last November, the terms of trade were gradually worsening for us month by month.

There remains the third question, that is, savings. Savings have been excellent, but to ensure that there is not the same combination of all three again, it would have been highly desirable had the Minister in his Budget done something to accentuate and improve savings and the incentives towards savings. The Finance Act, 1956, I think, provided help for the small saver by ensuring that the first £25 of a certain income that was received would not be liable to tax. An extension in that respect in this Budget would not have cost very much and would have been a worth-while pointer along the right road. It would also have ensured that the volume of savings would not merely stay up, but would increase and offset any difficulties there might be in that respect.

While I am talking about that, may I refer particularly to the Third Report of the Capital Investment Advisory Committee. At page 18, paragraph 47 it states:

that the taxation Commission should be asked to report as a matter of urgency on the possibility of encouraging enterprise by changes in taxation and of increasing tax incentives for the investment of savings at home, for the investment at home of past savings now held overseas and for the attraction of foreign capital.

As far as I can remember—I stand to be corrected by the Minister if I am wrong—I have never seen any report of any action along that recommendation since that time. As I say, I stand to be corrected because it is very easy to check a document and see what a document says. It is not always so easy to make a negative search that there has not been anything since. But I cannot see any evidence that in relation to saving that recommendation of the Capital Investment Advisory Committee has been put into operation. If I am wrong I shall be glad if the Minister will correct me and indicate what it is and the effect it has had.

I had intended to make some reference to the urgent necessity there is to have an incomes policy here, an incomes policy, which, of course, means very much more than merely a salary or wages policy, but, perhaps, in view of the fact that at the moment it might be taken as referring to something else, I will defer comment in that respect to the Finance Bill when we all hope that the present difficulties in that respect will have been overcome. I do not know whether I should mention this in relation to the Minister or whether it would be more a matter for the Taoiseach but bearing in mind that our whole economic fabric must be coloured by and dependent on our approach to the European Economic Community, does the Minister for Finance not think it is desirable that there should be a revised issue of the White Paper put before the House on the 30th June last year? We have since then had the agreement in relation to agricultural policy in the Community and the lines laid down which the policy is going to follow. We have had the revision in respect of the initiation of the second period in January of tariff reductions and there have been some further considerable additions since then. I do not think it is right that the country should be left in the position of depending for its information entirely on newspapers and on publications by the Irish section of the European movement or similar bodies. There should be a factual revision of that White Paper and it should be published pretty soon.

I differ with certain of the analyses drawn there. Some of them are, in my opinion, not as clear as they might be because, for example, one can always take different approaches to the manner of estimating the price of products as to whether they are ex-farm or ex-factory. But leaving that to one side, I pay tribute to the manner in which that White Paper was produced through the incompetence of the Government at such dreadfully short notice but now that we have had a year in which there have been considerable further movements it is desirable that there should be a new publication and a revised up-to-date publication to show what has happened since then.

I should like also to have heard from the Minister what his anticipations are in relation to costs in the year ahead. After the war we had a type of inflation which arose from the pull of excess demand: shortages of goods for a considerable time afterwards and money chasing which resulted here in a pull on external assets to some degree. That is not the present position. The present inflation, if it is going to arise, and certainly it looked very definitely a couple of months ago that it was certain to arise, is more a cost push inflation, as it has been called, an inflation that is arising because of internal factors in cost and because those internal factors in cost have not been met by productivity. The desirability of some authentic forecasting in that respect is quite obvious to everybody. That is not a matter in which taxation can provide any offsetting remedy because, while taxation could provide an offsetting remedy in relation to the consumer purchasing power, it is the salary and wage before taxation that is the operative factor in a cost push inflation and where we are going to go in that respect will very vitally govern our efficiency and our competitiveness in the new Europe.

Some people have said from time to time that some form of inflation is the price of growth, that you cannot have stability without economic stagnation. The Minister for Finance in his Budget speech in one place expressed the hope that people would keep prices stable and take their benefits and their improvements otherwise. Virtually every government in Europe, and almost in the world, has expressed that hope and all have had to abandon it long, long ago and we are likely to be getting back to one of the earlier stages of Keynesian theories saying that we will not have some economic growth without some consumer spending and pushing demand in that way.

The Minister in reply to a question of mine on the 29th of March acknowledged that in 1962 in central taxation he had taken a greater proportion of gross national product than in any year since 1953. I accept what the Minister has said from time to time that it is not the amount that is actually collected in taxation that matters so much as the rate of the percentage of gross national product. As the Minister himself said on the 29th of March and the 5th of April, this last year he took more in central taxation, expressed as a percentage of gross national product, than had ever been taken in the past ten years. A higher slice of the gross national cake was taken by the Government. I do not think that is anything of which any Minister for Finance should be proud. The increase from 18.6 per cent. in 1961 to 19.6 per cent. in 1962, and particularly bearing in mind it was the first time in those ten years that the percentage taken by the Government of gross national product ever rose over 19 per cent., is something which, to put it mildly, is unfortunate.

Finally, I want to make this reference, because of certain matters, raised by the Minister for Industry and Commerce, in relation to employment. The booklet Economic Statistics made it clear, in Table 16, that the number of persons at work in the main branches of non-agricultural activity, even in 1961, is less than it was in 1955 and 1956. We have heard from time to time comments from Ministers that there was a decline in agriculture all over the world and that they should not therefore be blamed for the decline in the number of people employed in agriculture. But it is to non-agricultural activity I am referring, and the increase there has been in 1961 over 1962 is in sharp contradiction to the promise made by Deputy Lemass, as he then was, in 1955 and repeated by him in 1956 and on several occasions that if only Fianna Fáil were allowed into office, they had a plan, a scheme and a policy properly drawn up which would ensure they would provide 100,000 extra jobs within a period of five years.

That has been denied both by the Taoiseach himself and by the Minister for Transport and Power. It is suggested that they were only proposals, that it was not a policy, that it was never something on which the Taoiseach really relied. I do not know anything about the inner workings of the Fianna Fáil mind or of the workings of the mind of the Taoiseach, as he now is, when he was producing that document, but it is not what was in his mind when he was producing that document which matters. What matters is the representation he made to the country and the manner in which he got the country to believe. The manner in which he got the country to believe was perfectly clear when he spoke at Listowel and said that Fianna Fáil had published proposals to reduce emigration and to create the same conditions of full employment as obtained in Britain and other European countries. That was on 13th February, 1956. Again, in Cork—I cannot remember whether Deputy MacCarthy was in Cork city at that stage or in a rural constituency: no; I beg your pardon; it was a by-election, but no doubt Deputy MacCarthy was aware of what his colleagues were saying in that by-election in Cork city—they made it clear that the new Fianna Fáil plan proposed an increase over five years of 100,000 in the number of new jobs. I do not see anything about "tentative proposals" and "possible suggestions"—two expressions used by the Government since they got there. They told the country that they had a firm, categorical plan, and it was on that basis that they put these representations to the people.

We are told now that, apart from agriculture, there is an upsurge in employment. The Minister for Industry and Commerce on television used figures for manufacturing industry alone, as he told me here today; but he got his questioner to put it to him that it was employment in all aspects of national living. The questioner, we know, was at one time a Fianna Fáil candidate, so he must be in on the secret. But, in fact, it is not only in agricultural employment there has been this catastrophic reduction. There has been a slight increase this year, but in non-agricultural employment we are not back to anywhere near the 726,000. There were 710,000 in 1961. Yet, according to the calculations made by Deputy Lemass, as he then was, we should be, on that basis, at over 800,000 people so employed now. That is quite apart from the fact that at that time Fianna Fáil never made it clear that the numbers engaged in farm work were, in their opinion, likely to decline, as they have declined during the six years they have been there.

When Fianna Fáil were in Opposition and talking about emigration, they always said that passenger movement indications were not of any value. I remember a certain elderly stateman, who has now travelled to other spheres, saying from that bench there that the passenger movement figures were not any real guide to emigration at all, that of course there was plenty of emigration and that the fact there was a decrease in passenger movement—not merely a decrease but an end of emigration in that year—was simply nonsense. Now the passenger figures are quoted as gospel—they are better than the Bible—to give an indication. I think they are some indication, but only an indication, but what I cannot understand is that equally an indication is the number of people who apply for new jobs in England.

Hear, hear! That is the test.

The suggestion of the Government now is that emigration was reduced to such a degree in 1961 that our people were not going and they quoted the passenger movement figures in support of that. I want to know why they say that as against 1959 when more Irish men and women in 1961 applied for new insurance cards in England than applied in 1959. I know people change their jobs—we all do. They changed them in 1959 as well as in 1961. All the Government's boasts and statistics are of no avail until they explain why more people applied for new insurance cards in 1961 than applied in 1959. The Government admitted there was heavy emigration to England in 1959. That was part of their case—that there was emigration in 1957, 1958 and 1959 and that they had now improved the position to such a degree that they alleged the natural increase in population had beaten emigration. If they admit that there was heavy emigration in 1959, why is it in 1961 that the number of people seeking new insurance cards in Britain was higher than in the year in which they admit there was heavy emigration? One has only got to travel the countyside, to see the number of homes shut up, to see the number of young people who have gone. You speak at chapel gate meettings to audiences preponderantly in the higher age group, higher age group children and very thin in between middle-aged.

That is not the way to build up a healthy, thriving community. Certainly, we shall not build it up by pretending that our problems have been I cured, by trying to hide our heads in the sand and by neglecting to do anything about our problems until it is much too late to do it efficiently and efficaciously, as the Government did in relation to the Common Market.

I consider this is a good Budget. I do not propose to dwell on all its facets and details. I listened to the arguments for and against the Budget. It reflects very clearly the financial position of the country. It indicates the confidence of the Minister for Finance in the buoyancy of our revenue. It indicates his desire to leave money to our producers and wage-earners to spend in their own way.

The Minister was light on taxation and that is as I should like to see it. It is easy for Deputies to ask for more benefits and, at the same time, for less taxation. I was appalled, on Budget Day, to see Fine Gael and Labour vote against the provisions to meet the benefits proposed to be given to the most deserving sections in our community. The increase of 2/6d. per week from August next is not tremendous but the very people who have moved motion after motion here to improve social benefits voted against the increase. Did they hope to precipitate a general election? One wonders what the reason was for their action. They would have defeated the Government if they had got the support of all of the Independents. However, in addition to the Government, there were three responsible Independents. They voted in support of the Government because of their confidence that the Government will legislate fairly for the advancement of the country.

I shall never be able to understand why the Labour Party, in particular, voted against the proposed increases. I cannot understand why the Fine Gael Party criticises rates relief to farmers. One can recall many elections which they fought on similar tickets and similar promises. One wonders whether they have any regard to comparisons with other countries and one wonders about their sincerity when they talk of the position of our farmers if we join the Common Market. The Opposition must be aware that there is total derating of land in other European countries and that this is a form of indirect benefit to the producers. Indeed, the Government may have to look more and more to this form of aid to provide an incentive to our farmers to produce more and to take advantage of whatever opportunities may be available in the event of our joining the Common Market.

Our farmers deserve well of this country and of every Government which will ever sit here. Our farmers have always played their part confidently and well. I am quite sure this Government would have liked to see the farmer get more but when all of the benefits given to agriculture are added together they come to quite a sizable bill. The total aid now given to farmers approximates £35,000,000 which is not an inconsiderable sum. I am sure it compares quite favourably with the aid given to agriculture in other countries.

There was much talk about the eighth round increase from the Labour benches. I heard the argument advanced that production has matched the increase. I would ask Deputies who hold that view to examine carefully what brings about equality in this regard. Do they consider that the added production is a fair comparison of equality so far as the eighth round increase is concerned?

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.
The Dáil adjourned at 5 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Tuesday, 8th May, 1962.
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