This Land Bill is designed purely and simply to get the goodwill and support of the farming community in the west of Ireland. Any benefits contained in it are applicable to the congested areas and any difficulties contained in it are designed and aimed at the people who are not residing in those areas. This Bill goes so far as to define the meaning of congested areas in relation to its application and I find that the only areas so defined all have a coast line along the Atlantic. Not one other county is mentioned in that list. Many of us who are familiar with conditions in this country recognise that there is congestion, land hunger and the need for resettlement in many other places.
Here we have a Bill which does very little for landless men who have good farming knowledge. It does nothing more for them than any previous Bill and it does nothing to increase the size of existing Land Commission holdings which are considered uneconomic according to the terms of the Bill itself. There is nothing in it to deal with the problem created by the purchase of land by aliens and there is nothing in it to regulate that development.
One section which will meet with a favourable reception in this House and outside it relates to elderly people but, on examination of that section, we see that it applies only to a husband and wife or to a blind person. What about the father and son, the brother and sister, the mother and son, and the widow? There are many types of land holders who should be included in this section in order that the intentions of the Bill may be achieved and that they may qualify for the benefits offered here under the social welfare section.
There is nothing in the Bill to deal with the bad housing situation on the land, even if we restrict that comment to housing conditions on lands with which the Land Commission have been concerned. This Bill, obviously designed for the west of Ireland and the congested areas along the western seaboard, will not benefit the 10,000 landless men and small farmers in County Dublin, men who have a good knowledge of farming and who need land.
There is congestion in county Dublin. It is now the smallest county in Ireland because of the large area of land taken over by Dublin city and suburbs; the amount of land remaining is less than that in any other county. A number of smallholders in the county are agitating for portions of land. There are also landless men with a good knowledge of land management. There are dispossessed farm managers and farm labourers who worked on lands taken over by the Land Commission and who now want to be settled on land themselves.
Not alone is this Bill a nuisance so far as Dublin county is concerned, but it is also a nuisance for Leinster, Munster and the midlands because the provisions are designed with the accent all the time on the relief of congestion in the congested areas. Take the smallholder from the west who gives up a 20-acre holding in order that local congestion may be relieved. He is transferred to a farm of 45 acres in the midlands. At the same time, a smallholder in the midlands, who gives up 20 acres of land, also gets 45 acres but the gentleman from the congested area gets his land on a half annuity whereas the other, who was resident in the midlands, must pay the full annuity.
Right through the Bill preference is given to persons from the west of Ireland. It is a onesided Bill and, because it is, it is most unfair. Whatever the policy may be, it is the taxpayers in general who will contribute towards the cost of implementing it. The taxpayers of Dublin, Cork, Limerick, and elsewhere, will contribute to this. Yet the Bill is designed mainly to give advantages and benefits to people from the west of Ireland. I think it should be called "The Migration Bill for the West of Ireland" rather than the Land Bill, 1963.
With regard to the payment of the full annuity, I cannot see anywhere in the Bill the period during which the full annuity is payable. The half annuity is perpetual. Surely the period during which the full annuity will be payable should be indicated.
I notice it is by ministerial order that a congested district will be recognised and brought within the scope of this measure in order to give the benefits offered to residents of congested areas. Similarly, loan facilities are offered only to persons resident in congested areas. A man with 100 acres in a congested area can avail of loan facilities from the Land Commission whereas a man with 50 acres or 20 acres outside these areas cannot avail of any loan facilities or benefits under this Bill.
In connection with the cash loans set out, is the Land Commission prepared to give a cash loan for the purchase of a viable holding by a person from a congested area or will the cash be made available on the Land Commission guarantee to a bank? I ask that question because many from whom land has been taken by the Land Commission wanted cash and all they got was a slip of paper. They got land bonds. Most of these were interested in cash. That is why I ask this question now. This benefit is, of course, also available only to congests.
I notice that when a congest gets these benefits he is bound to sell the land only to the Land Commission. He is not free to dispose of it as he wishes. Now many people would prefer to get a very limited income from the land rather than sell it to the Irish Land Commission with the prospect of a life annuity in cash because the purchasing power of money is falling rapidly. A fairly young person receiving such annuity might find himself in very straitened circumstances after some years. The purchasing power of the £ today is 6/10 as compared with prewar values. People in receipt of these annuities might find themselves very poor indeed at the end of 20 or 30 years; should the value of money continue to fall, these annuities would be almost useless. That is one of the reasons why people place such value on land. Land remains an asset and the sale price moves up as the purchasing power of money falls. The Bill does not incidentally set out what the minimum or maximum price per acre will be for land voluntarily sold to the Land Commission or whether the price will be related to existing market conditions in the particular area.
In regard to the allowance of £156 per year mentioned here, it is not clear to me, at any rate, whether this figure will be a joint means test allowance or whether the allowance will be separate for husband and wife when applied for the purpose of calculating any old age pension that might be payable from the Department of Social Welfare. If it means they are getting a means test allowance of only £78 per year each, it is not much use to tell them they will get social welfare in addition because at present £104 is apparently the limit when a means test is being applied.
The Bill makes provision for further powers of acquisition, but it is to be hoped the policy pursued in the early Thirties, when a number of farmers received the princely sum of £5 per acre for land taken from them, will not be continued. We must be careful to ensure that a fair price will be paid and that we will not go into the sphere of confiscation when it comes to taking land from people. I have an example of a young farmer who was given 100 acres of land by his grandfather. The Land Commission moved in immediately. They said he was able to earn his living otherwise than on the land, and they would not allow that land to be given to him. They took the farm and divided it up. That was a very serious interference with the rights of a private individual. This man's father subsequently gave him a portion of land, and he has proved to be a very successful farmer. He retired from his business in Dublin and he engages now only in farming. He was a farmer's son and he knew farming very well. Yet he was prevented from having the land which his grandfather had given to him. This is an example of where the Land Commission interfered unfairly with the rights of a private individual.
I welcome the section which provides that land will be available for all appropriate purposes instead of being reserved for migrants only. That is a very welcome step. There can be land hunger. There is congestion in many areas outside the areas specified by the Minister in this Bill. Now it appears there will be a more liberal attitude so far as the purposes for which land is reserved are concerned.
I have raised previously a question concerning the period for which full annuities would be payable. It would be most unfair for payment to be stretched over an unlimited period. So far as the provisions of this Bill interfere with existing conditions, they will result in reducing the sale value of land. The Bill is a threat to fixity of tenure, one of the principles the Irish people are determined to maintain. It looks as if the Land Commission are moving in more and more as the landlords of this country. They tend to interfere with the ownership and management of land. Nobody will object to the Land Commission moving in on derelict holdings. However, the first place they should move in is on their own holdings—the holdings they have already allocated to different types of people, mainly congests and other smallholders. A number of these holdings are derelict.
The houses are locked up and the owners, perhaps, are working in England. Something should be done about taking over those holdings instead of interfering with the rights of private individuals not directly asociated with the Land Commission. The Commission have a great responsibility to the State to ensure that this land, very often taken by compulsion at very unsatisfactory prices, will be properly worked and managed and not allowed to become a wilderness. There are plenty of wildernesses all over the country, and they are no credit to the Land Commission.
We witnessed with disgust in the past the allocation of land to wasters and good-for-nothings, who never stopped until they succeeded in getting that land vested. Then they went to the auctioneer, sold the land given to them at the expense of the State, put the money in their pockets and made off to the nearest pub or elsewhere. It is only right to say, however, that most of the allocations proved to be a success and the persons who received the land turned out to be very deserving cases. But the Land Commission should lose no time in seeing what is happening to the land they have allocated and making reports on it.
I believe they are supposed to have annual reports of the management of each farm. I cannot imagine the kind of report that must be going in about some of those derelict sites and abandoned wildernesses. But for agricultural development in recent years, there would be more of them. There are now plenty of enterprising agricultural contractors only too anxious to go in and work and develop these lands. Even if they do, the persons who got that land should be dispossessed because they are a burden on the taxpayers and have proved that they did not deserve the free gift which they received from the State in the form of a farm of land.
There is an aspect of this Bill which will affect the rights of the individual so far as landowners are concerned, that is, where a notice from the Land Commission inspector is served. The moment the person gets service of the notice he is not allowed to let, sublet, subdivide or transfer any part of that land. A period of 12 months appears to be too long for that purpose. It means that the farm is frozen, is worthless and valueless to the unfortunate man who has received the notice. He will not get anything by way of compensation from the Land Commission who have served the notice if in the long run they decide not to purchase the holding. Certainly, the value of the land would be almost nil for the 12 months while that notice is effective. That is a long time in which to leave people in a state of suspense. It should be possible for the Land Commission to make a decision in a period much less than 12 months.
I consider this a very one-sided Bill. Some recognition should have been given to the smallholders and landless men in other congested districts, not only in the areas which have an Atlantic coastline. We must be very careful that the effect of this Bill will not be to interfere in any way with free sale and the letting of land.
Very often land which is let on the 11 months system is put to very good use. There are many progressive farmers who do not own land but who rent land for milk, grain and beef production and there is coming off that land far more than the owner could ever hope to produce by his own enterprise and initiative because he has not got what it takes. Therefore, where land is being properly used by a person other than the owner great care should be taken to ensure that the good use of that land is not interfered with and that the volume of production on the holding is not reduced but is increased, if possible. It is not likely to be increased if the owner is prevented from letting it to a progressive, enterprising man but is left to work it himself. He may not be an enterprising, progressive person or he may require a considerable amount of capital.
There are many farmers who were reduced to poverty during the war and who have never recovered, who have large farms but have no capital. There may be enterprising, progressive farmers in the area who are making very good use of that land. In doing so they are giving a living to two families. They are supporting their own family and the family of the landowner who may have been reduced to a state of poverty before the war and has not since succeeded in securing sufficient capital to allow him to manage the farm himself.
The same considerations apply in the case of aged landowners who are not physically fit to work and manage their farms. If they are making that land available for worthwhile production by enterprising local farmers who are supporting their own families, there should be no interference with that land. It would be a gamble so far as the Land Commission are concerned. They might take the farm, divide the land and the land might produce far less and give a far smaller return than it is giving at the present time.
We will not get one extra acre of land as a result of this Land Bill. We must deal with the land that is there. I mention that because this Bill, like every other Land Bill, may encourage thousands of landless men and small farmers to believe that now there is a chance of their getting land. There will be hundreds of small farmers who will believe that there will be land available to enlarge their existing holdings when, in fact, it must be pointed out that the fraction of the population who may get an extra acre is very small indeed. We should not build up hopes in the minds of all and sundry that there will be lots of land available for division now by the Land Commission.
Every Deputy has had the experience of shopkeepers and various classes of wage earners asking to be recommended for a holding because they are farmers' sons and worked in their early years on the land and know how to manage land. Admittedly, there are many amongst them who could manage land and work it better than some people who are on the land, but it is difficult to see how the needs of all these people can be satisfied in addition to the needs of those who are already on the land.
I have mixed feelings regarding the vesting of Land Commission farms when I see what happened to many of the farms in my own constituency which were vested. It would be better for the Land Commission to resume a number of those farms rather than vest them in the existing tenants. Unfortunately, most of the vesting is now completed and most of those farms have gone under the auctioneer's hammer and have gone into the possession of new owners. Now that we have a new Land Bill and this question of vesting arises, those of us who have the experience of what occurred in the past in relation to farms allocated by the Land Commission should try to make provision in this Bill to ensure that there will not be a repetition of the conduct that we have witnessed in the past, and that people who are given a free holding of land will prove worthy of it, will prove they deserve it, will prove they are able to work and manage it and to get a high output from that land.
I feel a minimum output target should be specified by the Land Commission. They ought to be able to say to these new tenants that they require a certain output from the farm— poultry, livestock, vegetable crops, grain crops, or whatever it may be. A certain acreage of a certain quality should be capable of a minimum output. That minimum output should be specified by the Land Commission. It would be a test of the person who got a farm. It would prove very soon whether he was deserving of it, whether he was fit to be an owner and a manager of land.
We must face the fact that nearly 20,000 people left the land last year. Many of them did so because there is no living on the land for them. Many of those who left the land were owners of holdings of up to 20 acres. Those 20 acres are lying there still—let, possibly, to neighbours or to agricultural contractors—while the owners are working in Britain or even in Dublin. Therefore, we must face up to the fact that people are leaving the land and that this Bill may only in a small way succeed in arresting the flight from the land.
A Bill to ensure the satisfactory marketing of produce from the land would be a better step than a Bill at this stage for the division of land. When all these people—if there will be many—are moved out of the congested areas into Leinster and into the midlands, we ought to have increased output, increased production, more surpluses of various crops. The question then arises where all these will be sold.
