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Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 5 Dec 1963

Vol. 206 No. 6

Telephone Capital Bill, 1963—Second Stage.

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time.

This Bill is the tenth Telephone Capital Bill to come before Dáil Éireann since the transfer of services in 1922, and the fifth since the War. Its purpose is, briefly, to authorise the Minister for Finance to advance further moneys, up to a limit of £30 million, for continued development of the telephone service. The advances will be made as required over the next five years approximately.

Expenditure on the telephone service falls under two heads. Ordinary day-to-day operation and maintenance are paid for out of moneys voted annually by the Oireachtas under the Vote for the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. Extension and development, on the other hand, are covered by funds provided under Telephone Capital Acts.

These Acts empower the Minister for Finance to issue out of the Central Fund sums, not exceeding a fixed total, for development of the telephone service. The issues are made on foot of annual Capital Works Estimates approved by the Minister for Finance. The Acts also authorise the Minister for Finance to borrow in order to meet or repay the issues from the Central Fund. The moneys required for repayment of the sums borrowed are provided annually under sub-head G of the Post Office Vote.

The Telephone Capital Act, 1960, authorised the Minister for Finance to issue a total of £10 million for telephone development. This amount, together with a balance on hands from previous legislation, made some £10,805,000 available for expenditure. It was intended that this would last about five years. Owing to the rapid rise in the public demand for telephone service, however, the planned rate of expansion proved inadequate, and it was necessary to approve increased capital allocations each year. Expenditure during the three financial years ended 31st March last amounted to £8,250,000 leaving a balance of £2,555,000. This balance is insufficient to cover the capital programme for the current financial year which is estimated to cost £4½ million.

The amount of £8¼ million approximately which was spent in the last three financial years included some £4½ million for subscribers' lines and installations, over £1 million for exchanges, £2 million for trunk routes and the balance for buildings and stockholdings. During this period, 45,000 new subscribers' lines were connected to the system, 44,000 miles of new trunk circuits were added and over 230 kiosks were erected. These additions represented increases of 45 per cent, 70 per cent and 60 per cent respectively over the additions made in the three preceding years. Subscriber trunk dialling was extended to most of the major automatic exchanges and this facility is now available to 73 per cent of all subscribers. Additional cross-channel circuits were provided— we now have over 260 as against 24 in 1946—and direct transatlantic telephone circuits were established between this country and North America. During this period also a very considerable amount of engineering work developed on the telephone side of my Department in connection with the setting-up of the Irish television service.

The provision of the direct transatlantic circuits possibly merits special mention. Up to 1962 all our overseas telephone traffic was routed through and controlled at London. On 1st July, 1962, a direct route from Dublin to New York was established to carry traffic to North and South America, Canada and parts of Asia. Not only has revenue been sufficient to cover the annual charges, but a handsome surplus was shown in the first year of operation and an excellent standard of service was given. The number of circuits was increased last month from two to four. The additional circuits will enable an even speedier service to be given to the public and it is expected that revenue will continue to be more than sufficient to meet the rental charge.

The expansion and development of the service generally which I have briefly described was, of course, far greater than that achieved in any previous three year period and in normal circumstances my Department could point to it with some satisfaction. The circumstances in the past few years, however, were anything but normal. There was an unprecedented increase in demand for telephone service, as will be illustrated by the following figures. Applications for new telephones, which numbered 6,700 in 1953 and 10,600 in 1958, are expected to reach 16,500 in the current year. Between 1953 and 1958 the traffic rose from 92 million calls to 120 million, and it will be of the order of 178 million in 1963. This spectacular growth and the inability of the developing service to keep pace with it, resulted in enlarging the waiting list for telephones. A more serious consequence was that our trunk and exchange equipment became inadequate to cater satisfactorily for traffic during peak working hours.

These deficiencies became most apparent during the Summer of 1963, when delays in effecting calls were common on many routes, and when even the automatic system suffered serious congestion at times. These deficiencies did not grow overnight, however, and their causes were many. The principal cause was the severe shortage of capital during the 1950's, when the telephone service was afforded a low priority in the allocation of the limited finance available. Development planning was therefore necessarily restricted to short term measures, sufficient to keep the service going rather than to cater adequately for growth and maintain necessary reserves of plant. The consequent depression of spare capacity of lines and equipment coincided with the steep rise in public demand which I have outlined.

Long-term planning, and expansion of plant in advance of actual need, are especially vital in the telephone service. The provision of a large auto manual exchange involves years of work in acquiring a suitable site, erecting a building and installing equipment and necessary outlets to other centres. Moreover, trunk and local cables have to be ordered many years ahead to ensure that necessary spare circuits will be available when required by people who, when this planning should be taking place, may be a long way even from thinking of setting up their homes. It is possible by short-term planning and by using up existing spare equipment without replacing it, to keep capital costs at a low level for a time, but unless public demand falls off—an unlikely contingency at the present stage in this country—a situation eventually develops in which there is a major hold-up on all fronts. This situation was encountered last summer when peak public demand high-lighted the shortage of trunk circuits and exchange equipment. As a result subscribers experienced irritating delays and difficulties in completing calls.

Another general cause of complaint during the summer months was delay in securing a reply from exchanges, and particularly from Dublin trunk exchanges. The equipment shortages to which I have referred and the difficulties which they created led to an immense spate of calls to the trunk exchanges from subscribes who experienced problems in dialling their own calls. Not merely did this enormously increase the load of calls reaching operators, but the operators themselves, to whom I wish to pay special tribute for their untiring and patient efforts, had the same difficulties as subscribers in completing calls through the overloaded network.

The explanations I have given for failure to give a sufficiently satisfactory service in 1963 would be misleading if I did not add that by no means all subscribers had trouble with calls and the best proof that the needs of the public were met in very large part is the fact that the record number of 175 million calls were effected during the past year. The vast majority of these calls were made without trouble or delay. It is estimated that in the case even of calls controlled by operators, which are obviously the most difficult section of the traffic handled, more than two out of every three were connected without any delay and more than four out of every five within 15 minutes. Naturally, my Department is not satisfied with the standard recorded in these figures, and will spare no effort to improve it, but the factual picture which they give is far more favourable than the general impression which many people may have formed of the state of the telephone service.

I have mentioned capital starvation over the years and the huge increase in public demand as the principal reasons for the defects that exist in the telephone service. There were other factors also that hampered the Department in its efforts to make timely provision for necessary expansion of the system. Delivery terms for telephone equipment became longer and more uncertain. At the same time, industrial expansion at home and abroad created a tremendous demand for skilled personnel, especially in the field of electrical engineering, and my Department was in consequence unable to recruit engineers in the numbers desired.

I have considered it necessary to cover the past in some detail but my real concern is, of course, with the future.

My Department is now faced with the task of bringing the telephone service up to a satisfactory standard in the shortest possible time, and of establishing adequate reserves of plant capacity to cater for future growth. In order to give the House a general picture of the amount of work involved in this, I should explain that up to 1963, apart from the main co-axial routes connecting Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Dundalk and Sligo two radio links and a few short runs of cable, the service was dependent on open wire circuiting. Plans were laid in 1959, 1960 and 1961, which are now maturing, for the bringing into service of high capacity underground cable and radio links to serve Dublin-Wicklow-Arklow, Waterford-Clonmel, Waterford-Wexford-Enniscorthy, Carlow-Athy-Portlaoise, Limerick-Rathkeale-Tralee-Killarney-Listowel and Limerick-Athlone-Galway. These schemes range in cost from about £100,000 to £250,000 each.

Further plans for which contracts are at the moment under consideration include co-axial routes from Dublin to Ceannanus Mór, from Cork to Bandon, Cork to Youghal and Limerick to Tipperary. Other trunk schemes approved and in hand amount to some £2 million and schemes approved in principle will come to about a similar sum. Examples of the increased circuiting provided in schemes recently completed or approaching completion are Dublin-Arklow, 100 per cent increase; Waterford-Clonmel, 100 per cent increase; and Limerick-Tralee, 200 per cent increase.

All the additional circuiting to which I have referred as recently provided or due to be provided shortly, was planned and ordered a considerable time ago, and major projects now in the planning and design stages will not mature in the form of working circuits for several years. This is something which my Department cannot control. As I have said on several occasions the design, procurement and installation of this sort of equipment is an extremely slow business. Of the orders for stores and works which are at present with contractors for execution more than 2¾ million pounds worth are outstanding for more than a year, 1½ million pounds worth over two years and £185,000 worth over three years.

The £30 million capital expenditure provided for under the Bill now before the House represents our estimate of the cost of the works programme which it is hoped to carry out in the next five years or so. It is an ambitious programme, which will cost almost as much as has been spent on telephone development since the foundation of the State.

It envisages the following main tasks: the connection of 115,000 new subscribers' lines, the conversion of some hundreds of manually-operated exchanges to automatic working, the opening of an auxiliary trunk exchange in Dublin, the erection of 600 street kiosks, and the expansion of trunk circuiting in order to overtake arrears, to establish a no-delay service and to cater for expansion. It also includes the provision of a new cross channel link.

In round figures the principal expenditure heads will be: £16¼ million on subscribers' exchange lines and apparatus, £7½ million on trunk circuits, £4¾ million on equipment of new exchanges and extension of existing exchanges, £1 million on buildings and £½ a million on increased stock-holdings.

This brief listing of the objectives of the programme naturally gives no picture of the magnitude of the problems to be overcome in order to achieve them. The hundreds of new exchanges required involve the acquisition of sites, each of which must for technical reasons be selected within a restricted area, and the design and erection of buildings. Cables for subscribers' circuits must be laid throughout the length and breadth of the country and each cable must be designed throughout its whole course to give the number of circuits estimated to be needed by future subscribers. The most skilled engineering planning is involved in provision of trunk needs. Technical possibilities are constantly changing in this field and in order to get satisfactory results our engineers must keep abreast of all modern developments that might suit our requirements and conditions.

Many Deputies will be aware that while some years ago all telephone circuits consisted of pairs of wires erected on poles, later developments enabled equipment to be fitted to these wires which multiplied the speech channels. Later still, our main backbone trunk network was laid in underground cables equipped to give hundreds of speech channels. In recent years the circuits on shorter distance routes have been provided in cables, both aerial and underground. In the cross-channel service the number of circuits was multiplied many times over by fitting newly-designed submarine repeaters, of which those Deputies who visited the recent Scientific Exhibition at the RDS will have seen an example. More recently still, the development of micro-wave links which have been used on the Athlone-Galway and other routes has opened up new possibilities and they are likely to be used extensively in future on many routes which hitherto would have had to be served by underground cable. The types of automatic exchanges becoming available have also shown radical developments and more can be expected.

From the outline I have given of the works programme ahead, it will be clear that substantial increases in engineering staff will be needed. To ensure that the necessary quotas of trained personnel will be available in the different grades is one of the major problems confronting the Department. There is a general international shortage of electrical engineers and we have been unable in the past to get all those we need, although I may say that in our efforts to recruit them we have cut formalities to the absolute minimum. It is, of course, possible that the recruitment situation may improve but we cannot count on this or defer other action in hopes of it.

We have examined, therefore, what can be done to ensure that development will not be impeded by shortage of engineers.

As a first step it was decided recently to set up a new sub-professional grade in the Department to take over some of the routine work at present done by professional engineers and release them for the higher technical work which is more properly their task and for which they are qualified. The relief that can be provided in this way is, of course, limited. In addition, therefore, it has been decided in principle to introduce a scheme of scholarships whereby a number of young men will be selected annually to attend full-time day courses of study to enable them to acquire professional engineering qualifications. Some of the scholarships will be offered for competition among serving sub-professional staff while the remainder will be offered for competition among Secondary School Leaving Certificate holders.

This scheme will not, of course, bear fruit for some years and in the meantime the Department will adopt whatever practical short-term expedients are open to it to meet the situation. In particular, it is hoped by giving out as much work as possible to contractors to reduce in some degree the pressure on the Department's own staff resources and the possibility is not excluded of giving part of the work of planning as well as execution of major jobs to contractors. Despite these various measures we must face the possibility that shortage of professional engineers may in some degree hamper progress. At the workman level we have been building up the force steadily and the Estimate provision of 2,860 for the current year is 50 per cent greater than that of five years ago. Much still remains to be done, however, and special action has been taken to step up the rate of intake especially of youths to be trained for the skilled grades, and to intensify training. I am happy to say that we have received very full co-operation from vocational education committees in providing the additional courses which the increased intake necessitates and we are deeply grateful for this.

As a five year period is needed to bring the service to the desired state of efficiency and to cater fully for traffic and for persons requiring telephones, Deputies will appreciate that in the earlier years of that period all demands on the service cannot be met in full. The most urgent item in the development programme is to expand the trunk network which suffered more than any other part of the system from the capital restrictions of the past. I have directed my Department to give special priority to this work, even though the connection of new telephones for a large number of applicants will have to be deferred in consequence. I am fully satisfied that this is the proper course to follow in present circumstances. It will be an unpopular course, but it is the only one that offers a reasonable prospect of eliminating quickly the possibility of conditions of congestion such as occurred in many sections of the network during the summer months of 1963.

I feel that Deputies generally will acknowledge the prudence of this decision, but I would like them also to accept the implications of it, which are that the waiting list in many areas will continue to grow for some time ahead. I cannot usefully say how long this will go on but according as essential works are completed from district to district, it will be possible to resume the connection of individual subscribers.

On the same subject, I should like to emphasise that my direction to concentrate intensively on trunk work will affect some applications for telephone service which, on the basis of earlier policy, would have been met within the next few months. Many of these applicants were advised of their prospects at the time and will now be disappointed to learn that they will have to wait somewhat longer. It is with great regret that I find that the general situation which has developed has made it impossible to fulfil the hopes held out to these people originally. I hope they will be induced to be as patient as possible by the assurance which I now give that there will be no avoidable delay in giving them service. The planned programme I have been describing will, when under way, enable the waiting list to be rapidly reduced.

Completion of the programme is going to tax the capacity of the Department to the limit. I do not wish to leave anyone in any doubt about this. On the other hand, as I have explained, much work has already been done in advance of this Bill in the way of planning and ordering the equipment needed for the programme. The work to be done in the remainder of this year, and next year, and indeed even further ahead depends in large degree on decisions already taken and orders already placed. Delivery dates of some specially engineered equipment may be as long as three years. For new exchanges to be provided in future years we have already acquired 37 sites, we are in active negotiation for acquisition of another 27 sites and a further 34 sites have been selected for acquisition.

Moreover, 41 buildings for major exchanges are already completed or in course of erection or are at the planning stage. In Dublin, a new main stores headquarters building is at the tender stage which will enable the most efficient stores handling methods to be introduced and plans are advanced for centralisation of engineering staffs at present scattered in buildings throughout the city.

I would like to say a word about the financial position of the telephone service. In the commercial accounts prepared in respect of each financial year, the revenue earned by the telephone service is shown as income. Against this is charged expenditure incurred on the operation and maintenance of the service, interest on the total capital employed, and the provision in respect of depreciation and superannuation. Having provided for these charges the telephone service heretofore has shown a surplus of income over expenditure and has never involved any levy on the taxpayer. If the existing rate of return on capital is maintained over the period covered by the Telephone Capital Bill, the telephone service will, over the same period, have contributed over £11 million from its own resources by way of depreciation provision and surplus revenue, and will in addition have contributed £9.25 million approximately to the Exchequer by way of interest on capital, thus substantially reducing the net draw on the Exchequer towards meeting the capital outlay provided for in this Bill.

In conclusion, I may sum up by saying that the task we are setting ourselves is a difficult one but difficulties are there to be overcome and we shall overcome them in one way or another. Our ultimate aim is to have a fully automatic service and a reserve of plant and equipment that will enable new subscribers to be given telephones on demand and all calls to be connected without delay. The present programme will not carry us as far as this but it aims at eliminating the waiting list and providing a thoroughly satisfactory call service. If we succeed in this programme, and I have no doubt we shall, this capital sum will have been well spent. The day is gone when the telephone was a luxury service. An adequate communications system is now an essential requirement for the expansion of all business activities and my Department is aware of the contribution it must make towards facilitating the many forms of public development on which the country depends, not to mention social activity and the convenience of individuals. The moneys to be provided under this Bill will enable these responsibilities to be met and I recommend the Bill to the House for approval.

We welcome this Bill and we are pleased the Minister has brought it in for the development of the telephone service. When the Minister's Estimate was being considered here, we put down a motion to refer it back on the ground that the telephone service was not being developed adequately. We felt that was necessary because there was nothing like what could be regarded as an efficient telephone service. It is one service, as the Minister has just pointed out, that is paying its way. There are many projects which the Government have undertaken and in which the capital is not being serviced but this is one in which the capital is being serviced. From that point of view, we felt the Government should have extended the service earlier and put much more money into its development. It gives good employment which is spread over the work involved in laying underground cables and the other types of work within the service. It is employment which is badly needed.

As the Minister also pointed out, the telephone is no longer a luxury service. It is a necessity and has been such for many years. The Minister sought the co-operation of the House but I thought it was in bad taste to suggest that a lot of the trouble was due to the scarcity of capital in the 1950s. At that period the capital provided was ample to meet the demand and there is no use referring to it. The Minister is getting co-operation and he should be very grateful for that without referring back to that matter.

We would like to see the position in which telephones would be available practically on demand. Week after week when the Dáil is sitting, questions are addressed to the Minister by different Deputies asking how many applications there are for telephones, when it is hoped they will be supplied and how many have been supplied over the past 12 months. Deputies do not put down these questions merely for the purpose of annoying the Minister or creating friction. They put them down because they are being pressed by their constituents. I am pressed in the same manner. Recently I wrote to the Minister about a man who has been appointed a purchaser of livestock. I thought it would be considered very important that this man would have a telephone—engaging, as he is, in the major industry of the country, attending markets, and so on. The Minister wrote and said he regretted he could not provide a telephone within a reasonable time. I wrote again to the Minister about it as I felt it was a very serious case but again I got the same reply, that only clergymen and doctors got priority. The Minister should give priority when important business is concerned—important not alone to this man but from the point of view of the agricultural industry in general in the country.

I thought that, with the money being provided now, we would be much nearer satisfying the demand for telephones. I understand there are 10,000 applications. According to the Minister, even applications already promised will now go back further in the list. That is disappointing. I thought that not alone would they not be put back but that we would get an earlier service due to this extra money. I appreciate that it may take a long time to order heavy equipment but we feel the people will be disappointed that they are not getting the service sooner.

This Bill, I might mention, was announced at the height of the Subpostmasters strike when there were protests all over the country from newspapers and from every public body about the mishandling of the telephone service and of the Post Office in general.

It was introduced long before that.

The Deputy was talking about the speech.

We were told we would be surprised at the amount of money the Minister would look for in the future. If the subpostmasters strike had that effect—

It had nothing to do with it at all.

It is a good thing that that business has been settled. We welcome very much the scholarships. We appreciate that there is a shortage of trained engineering personnel in the Post Office and other services at present, especially with the very large expansion which is going on, and we welcome the scholarships which have been set up.

The telephone service, as I mentioned in my speech on the Estimates, should be put on the same basis as the ESB. They should plan ahead and any subscribers who want to be connected should be able to get connection without delay. Again, I would ask the Minister to make special provision for people in business who require to get into touch with people in different parts of the country and to give them the service which they so badly require.

On behalf of the Labour Party, we welcome anything which the Minister and the Government can do to try to improve the telephone system in this country. Realising that we cannot have developments or improvements without the necessary money, we are prepared to support the provision for the money. It is only fair to say, as the last speaker commented, that while the timing of the speech announcing this measure appeared to be for a political reason—I said "appeared to be"—we are prepared to give credit to the Minister for at least having the courage to look for what he thought was the necessary amount of money to do the job.

Over the years all of us here in this House have condemned Ministers for not doing what we thought they should do and for not giving the service which we thought the public were entitled to. It is only fair that, when a Minister decides he will try to get the necessary money to do a job, all of us should give him whatever support he needs to have that carried out. For that reason, we welcome this measure.

While admitting that over the past few months there has been a decided improvement, particularly in trunk dialling, nevertheless during the Summer recess this year everything went haywire. I am sure the Minister was sick and tired of people asking questions and making personal complaints even to him. I have done so myself, in an attempt to get a number which I could not otherwise get. But there is one thing which was carried out and I want to record my strongest personal objection to it. I refer to the system whereby you can have what they call double-charge priority. If somebody wants to call from one number to a number somewhere else in the country and he dials it or it cannot be got he asks the Exchange to get it and is told, in effect: "We are sorry. There is a delay of one hour, two hours or three hours". If people are prepared to pay double-charge, they can have the number at a snap of the fingers. I do not think that system should be in existence. Everybody who has a telephone or who is using a telephone and pays the charge is entitled to the same priority as somebody who has money enough to pay the double charge. That practice should be discontinued.

With regard to the training of staff to deal with the engineering problem, I think that is a good idea. Unfortunately, at the present time in this country there is a great shortage of engineers in practically every field of industry. Possibly it may be something which will right itself in a year or so. Possibly it is something which will never right itself.

I am told that one of the biggest troubles is the amount of remuneration the engineer gets in this country compared with what he can get elsewhere. If that is so, the Minister can suggest to the Government that engineers be paid a decent rate. There is no point in voting £30 million to the Minister to do a job if he says he has not the necessary technical staff, that they will not work for the money they are being offered and that, therefore, he cannot go ahead with the job. If that is part of the problem, the Minister should ask to have made available the money necessary to pay those people. Furthermore, he should continue to train not alone school-leavers, as he suggests, but also those who are working in the job. I am aware that promotion has been given to certain people who have worked on this type of job over the past number of years but I suggest the Minister should go even further. Possibly my approach to this may be entirely different from his approach or from that of a number of other Deputies here. However, I find that the man who has practical experience of a job is very often a much better man to do it than a man with a very high degree of technical skill, according to the training he got in some of the universities, but who, in fact, does not know as much about the day-to-day work of the job as the man who is at it every day.

If the Minister gets his officials to check down through the list of men who are doing even menial tasks in the Post Office engineering section he will find quite a number of people who would be able to assist very much in this problem if they were given a chance. I do not want to decry the efforts which the Minister has already made but I suggest he could go a lot further—even if it should be necessary to give a short-term course to those people before they are advanced to do that type of work.

When the Minister talks about giving training to school leavers to bring them up to engineering grade for Post Office work, he should not lose sight of the fact that this is a relatively short-term job and he should ensure that those who are trained for this work will not, when the job is completed, as completed it must be in the course of time, find themselves at a dead-end, with no outlet of any kind, and with no chance of being offered employment elsewhere because they will not have certain degrees to commend them. I appeal to the Minister to bear that fact in mind when making the arrangements he adumbrated here this morning.

I am not happy about passing over some of the work to contractors. The Department of Posts and Telegraphs has been giving a uniformly high standard of work and it would be a pity if that standard were allowed to drop because of the work being given out to someone anxious to make a fast buck; there is always the danger of that if work is farmed out. If at all possible, the Minister should continue to do the work by direct labour.

It is rather perturbing to hear that not alone may the Minister not be able to give immediate connection to subscribers who have already applied but that those who were notified they would get connection in a reasonable time must wait a little longer and possess their souls in patience so that a better service may be given to those who already have connections. Human nature being what it is, we find it a little difficult to accept that particular piece of philosophy. The Minister may be doing himself an injustice, but surely it should be possible to continue giving connections in many areas.

That is not clear from the Minister's speech. Where it is possible he should go ahead with giving connections. The suggestion made by the Minister was that these people might have to wait a very long time.

Now I understand that if a connection is being given to someone over three miles from an exchange, there is a charge of 8/- per furlong added on to their rent.

I think it is much more.

That makes the matter worse. I have no actual experience of this, but I have been told that 8/- is the figure.

It is 8/- a quarter.

Per furlong?

That is what I said.

There are eight furlongs in a mile.

It is every three months.

It is £3 4/- per three months.

Wrong number.

I was calculating the cost for the year. The Deputy was dealing with a quarter of a year.

It is difficult, I admit, to make comparisons between furlongs and £.s.d. At least we have straightened it out. They pay 8/- per furlong per quarter. Now the location of exchanges is purely incidental and accidential. If there were, for example, an exchange in Dunshaughlin the people in the area would be able to have their telephone calls at the normal charge. In fact, the exchange for that area is in Dunboyne and there is quite a large area around Kilbricken where people have to pay extra just because the Post Office people decided to locate the exchange somewhere else. That is unfair. On reflection, I am sure the Minister will agree that something can be done to improve that situation.

I come now to poles. The Minister stated that now most of the lines are going underground. That is a good thing.

Deputy Everett laid the first underground cable between Dublin and Sligo in 1956.

Many cables have been laid since then. Is it necessary now to have a pole before connection can be made to a house? You find a single 35-foot pole outside a private house or business premises. It is unsightly. It looks stupid. Surely it should be possible now to effect connection with an underground cable. These single poles are like sore thumbs defacing the countryside. Will the Minister take steps to have something done to remedy that situation?

With regard to the provision of kiosks, I am aware these have to be scheduled the previous year in order to ensure the programme is properly planned. It is not, however, properly appreciated that because there are half a dozen private telephones in an area that does not answer the problem of those who have no telephones and who may require a priest, a doctor, or someone else, during the night. People are very kind, but even the kindest people resent being disturbed night after night so that a neighbour can use the telephone. Kiosks should be erected. The fact that the telephone in the local post office is not used as it should be is not the answer to this problem. In heavily built-up areas and in the more backward parts of the country kiosks should be provided in central positions.

Reverting again for a moment to the recruitment of technical staff, I suggest that staff should be recruited as far as possible from the people who have been trained in the work. The Minister might usefully approach the Department of Defence; he would find he could get quite a number of trained personnel from the Signal Corps. They might be glad of civilian employment and they would help considerably in implementing the programme planned. At the end of the Emergency the Department of Posts and Telegraphs— they are to be commended for it— absorbed numbers of ex-servicemen. They are still doing that. They were foremost in all the Departments of State in providing employment for these men.

We support the Bill. If money is needed, then this House will have to provide it. We appreciate that every effort is being made. I agree completely with the Minister's statement that those who operate the telephone services, particularly over the bad winter this year, deserve the gratitude of the general public. While all of us have been very annoyed from time to time by long delays, on reflection we must agree we had a group of people who must have had the patience of Job to listen to all the complaints and still remain civil.

We will give the Minister the money he seeks without objection. At the same time, I take a little amiss the statement of the Minister regarding the shortage of capital:

The principal cause was the severe shortage of capital during the 1950s when the telephone service was afforded a low priority in the allocation of the limited finance available.

At that time the telephone service was adequate for the then demand. In those years also, a good deal of money was spent on the pioneering work of laying underground cables. We shall leave the matter at that.

I could make a good deal of complaint about the delay in getting an answer from exchanges. I do not blame the people in the exchanges because, whenever I ask them, I discover it is due to their being understaffed. Now that the Department are about to change over to automatic working, it appears to be their policy not to recruit staff for the manually operated exchanges.

The telephone service from this House itself could be improved, especially at night. Last year I said that you could dial for 15 minutes, hear the double-beat, indicating that the bell in the exchange was ringing, but not get a reply. That position has improved very much, but there could be further improvement.

The Department appear to be loth to recruit outdoor staff—the people who put up lines and instal telephones. There is practically no increase in the number of those men compared with the number of people looking for telephones. A social revolution has taken place within the past eight or nine years. This is illustrated by the case of a young woman, coming from a farm near a village, who married a man with a fine farm in a rather isolated area. There was a day when such a woman would have had a servant girl as help, but to-day she cannot get anybody. These people have to live in isolated areas, but they cannot get a telephone. Applications from such people have been in the Minister's Department for more than a year. Some applications have been there for years.

The Minister is being generously given this money; yet he tells us that the overhaul of existing lines will take some years and that an awful lot of work remains to be done. I take it that will cause a delay in the installation of telephones. If this work is necessary, the Minister should allocate staff to it. But if that allocation of staff means that the staff responsible for the installation of telephones is depleted, he should recruit—perhaps on a temporary basis—field staff for installation work alone.

I know of a man who set up in business in an office in a fine market town. He has been a year and a half waiting for a telephone. Yet another man who took an office in the same building got the telephone in two months. It was said he knew somebody. If the Minister is serious, he must give attention to these many urgent applications for telephones. With respect, I think the Department have neglected that end, judging from what is happening in my constituency. I was getting so many letters from my constituents about telephones that I asked some of my colleagues if they were getting the same. I discovered that some of them were getting even more than I was. There should be no excuse when this money is voted. Staff should be recruited immediately for the installation of telephones.

The Minister's Department recruits men on a temporary basis, and these men are glad to get the work. However, the Department should, I feel, lend them protective clothing. I have seen some of these men being drenched while doing urgent work. I know the Minister will agree with this, and I ask him to make inquiries in the Department and point out that this would be an easy thing to do.

Is that not purely a matter of administration?

It would be a great thing.

I do not doubt it, but I think the Deputy could raise it more effectively on the Estimate.

They would be drenched between now and the Estimate. In another branch the Minister's officers recruit many men during Christmas as temporary postmen. I am sure the Minister has noted my remarks.

In conclusion, I hope the Minister will get on with the work and not have the unfortunate public waiting for telephones on the Kathleen Mavourneen system.

I welcome this measure, particularly in view of the big increase in the demand for telephones during the past number of years. I appreciate it is difficult to meet all these demands within a reasonable time. One of my main reasons for intervening, however, is to deal with the system applied by the Department in dealing with applications for the installing of telephones. I find that people who applied a number of years ago have not yet been catered for, although they live closer to the trunk routes than others who have received the service within a reasonably short period. There is something wrong. As far as possible, applications should be dealt with in strict rotation. I know it is difficult to carry that out strictly. Naturally, when the Post Office are linking up a district, they will cover all the applications from that district but there is the consideration that some people have had to wait much longer for a telephone service than is right. Therefore, I would ask the Minister to ensure that long outstanding applications will be dealt with as quickly as possible, unless there are some valid reasons for further delay.

Deputy Tully referred to the question of the erection of kiosks in various centres. It is of great advantage to have public phone booths in as many places as possible, particularly, where feasible, at crossroads in isolated and remote places.

I was surprised that the Minister did not approve of the recent request made to have a telephone booth erected in Clonakilty town. The town has a population of about 2,500 and the only public telephone kiosk there is located within 100 yards of the post office. Naturally, the local people were anxious that a second phone booth be erected at the other end of the town to facilitate the residents there. Despite various representations made to him, the Minister saw fit to turn down the application, even though every town and village with a population of more than 250 has a public telephone booth, in addition to the telephone that is available in the post office.

I agree that it is a good idea to have a public phone booth in all towns of more than 250 population. The Minister should reconsider the application from Clonakilty, having regard to the fact that the population of that town is ten times the number required in order to have a kiosk erected and the necessity for a telephone kiosk at the other end of the town of Clonakilty.

There are long delays in getting calls in some districts. That applies particularly to Schull and the Beara Peninsula and other districts. Occasionally people have to wait for well over a quarter of an hour to get a call and in some isolated cases as much as half an hour. I am surprised at the statement by the Minister that more than two out of every three were connected without any delay and not more than one out of five people have to wait for more than 15 minutes. That is an extract from the Minister's statement. It would seem that the Minister is satisfied if not more than one out of five people have to wait for more than 15 minutes.

Read a little more and you will see that I am not satisfied.

The Minister has given the position as it is today and I consider it out of place for the Minister to suggest that one out of five should wait for 15 minutes.

The Minister is now getting a good deal of money to develop the telephone services. One important matter is the need to provide phone boxes in small post offices which will provide privacy for persons using the services. The fact that such provision is not made at present results in a big loss to the Post Office. The Minister should address himself to that question. If he does, the revenue from the telephone service will increase substantially.

I do not know whether it is wellfounded or not but there is a belief that in some places business transacted over the phone is not in any way secret. Whether that is so or not, I am not in a position to say but I am well aware that the existence of that belief results in loss of revenue to the telephone service. I was surprised on phoning the Minister's Department some time ago to be told that the business I wanted to discuss could not be transacted over the telephone. That implied that a telephone conversation is not secret, even in the Minister's Department. The Minister should address himself to this question also because it is a serious disadvantage that the belief should be held by so many citizens that business transacted on the telephone is in no way secret and that there are people who make it their business to listen in to conversations on the telephone.

I have no technical knowledge of the phone system but I do know that a number of people will not use the telephone service for the purpose of transacting business as they would do if they were satisfied that the system was secret. It is imperative that the Minister should make a statement with reference to it. There is considerable loss of revenue involved and, also, a good deal of inconvenience to citizens who occasionally have to make long journeys to carry out business that could be transacted over the phone, if the people had confidence in the secrecy of the system.

I will conclude by asking the Minister to try to do something for applicants who have been waiting for more than two years for a telephone service. It is not asking too much to ask that applicants who have been waiting for more than two years should get immediate consideration. I would also ask the Minister to provide privacy for people making calls in small post offices in country areas. I would reiterate my request to the Minister to address himself to the question of the secrecy of the telephone system.

Posts and Telegraphs in the problem

The House has been very patient with the Minister for that he seems to have found virtually insuperable of getting a rational telephone service in the country. My patience, certainly, is exhausted when I see in the Minister's official statement a falsehood which he ought to be ashamed of seeking to foist on this House. On page 4 of his manuscript, he says that the principal cause for his own shortcomings—this is his principal defence for his own failure to discharge the elementary duties of a competent Minister for Posts and Telegraphs—the principal cause, he says, of his failure was the severe shortage of capital into the 1950s when the telephone service was given a low priority in the allocation of the limited finance available. That is a malignant falsehood. The Minister ought to know that and it is a scandal that he would insert a paragraph of that kind in his statement. Of course, the statement was circulated to the Press before the Minister stood up to speak here and the hope is that its contents will go unchallenged because people are concerned now to get the service and not to controvert that kind of statement. However, I intend to controvert it and I hope, having controverted it, not for the first time, by figures from the Statistical Abstract, that falsehood will not be further repeated in this House.

In 1953, according to the Minister, there were 6,700 applications outstanding for telephones; in 1951, two years before that situation rose, £1,800,000 had been made available under the Telephone Capital Acts, and in 1952 £2,600,000 was made available. Let us read the record, and it is all available to anybody who wants to look at it in the Statistical Abstract which is published annually.

During the war years, issues under the Telephone Capital Acts naturally fell to a low figure because supplies were not available. In 1946, there was only £100,000 made available; in 1947, it was £353,000; and in 1948, the first year of the inter-Party Government when the late Deputy Keyes was Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, the appropriation was only £335,000. In 1949, £1,225,000 was supplied under the Telephone Capital Acts; in 1950, £1,250,000; in 1951, £1,800,000 and in 1952, £2,600,000. It is true that Fianna Fáil came back into office in that year, and the appropriation of the following year fell to £1,950,000 and was further cut by that Fianna Fáil Administration to £1,050,000. We returned to office in 1955 and the telephone capital issues in our first Budget amounted to £1,400,000. The following year, 1956, they were £1,750,000, and the following year, they were £1,650,000. Then Fianna Fáil came back to office again and in their first Budget, the appropriation under the Telephone Capital Acts was reduced from £1,650,000 to £1,150,000, by £500,000, in 1958. In 1959, they gave £1,450,000 but they cut it again in 1960 to £1,350,000, and this at a time when demand for telephones was steeply rising.

I compare that performance with the performance of Deputy Everett who was Minister for Posts and Telegraphs and who, in anticipation of the demand, laid a cable from Dublin to Sligo which I believe is still providing excess capacity, and that cable was laid nearly ten years ago. As I say, I think the House has been very patient with the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. Deputies from all parts of the House have had a steady stream of correspondence from constituents bitterly complaining about their inability to get telephone installations and the unsatisfactory service after the telephones have been installed. The Minister has excused himself on the grounds that he had not the equipment, that the demand was very heavy——

I am stating facts.

Those are the facts: those are the Telephone Capital Acts facts which I have read.

The allocations have been going up steadily year after year since I came into office.

There is such a thing as shutting the stable door after the horse is gone.

The Deputy should read what the then Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, his own Minister, said in reply to the debate on the Capital Bill of 1956.

I am reading the figures of money actually supplied.

He will find there a bitter complaint from the then Minister about the curtailments of capital.

Here are the figures from the Statistical Abstract showing that year after year the appropriations under the Telephone Capital Acts were steadily rising and at a time when the total outstanding demands for telephones was 6,700 as compared with a figure of 10,000 now.

The Deputy should read what his own Minister said.

I am reading the facts about the telephone capital issues.

His own Minister complained bitterly that what he wanted was not made available. That is on the records of the House. The allocations have been going up steadily since I came in.

The Minister will get plenty of time to make whatever case he likes when I am finished but, until I am finished, I do not think he ought to interrupt. I have read out the telephone capital appropriation for each year of the 1950s. This is 1963.

Read them out from 1960 to date.

This is 1963 and since I came into Dáil Éireann I never saw a more chaotic state obtaining in the telephone service than obtains at the present time. That is the plain truth and everybody knows it.

The country never was as prosperous as it is at the moment. There never was such a demand for telephone services. The calls have gone up by 167 million last year because of the economic expansion of the country.

Deputy Dillon on the Bill, without interruption.

The same thing applies in England.

I am not surprised that the Minister finds it hard to face the truth because he has been extended such indulgence by the House in the past and indeed I was prepared to continue that today but for the flagrant falsehood, the considered falsehood, contained in his statement which he advances as an alibi for his own deplorable performance. It is because he has sought to shelter under slander of his predecessors that I have felt it right to expose him to the real rebuke which his deplorable administration of the Department deserves.

There is no use in our pretending any longer that forbearance must be the order of the day. I am only saying to the Minister's face what everybody else is saying behind his back, and my only regret is that the forbearance shown him so far has emboldened him to insert that falsehood in his speech, the insertion of which has called from me the correction which I now administer to him and which ought to serve as a warning that there is a limit to the patience of this House.

The Minister speaks of the inadequacy of the equipment available to him for the provision of services and he assures the House that he intends to exert himself to remedy these deficiencies as fast as he can. The general authorisation for the Minister for Finance to make advances under the Telephone Capital Acts has been extended. That is a necessary thing to do, of course, because the expense of the apparatus and equipment to be purchased is continually rising and, as the value of money declines, the expense of these installations will go on rising, involving a heavier and heavier capital commitment.

There is no guarantee that the larger authorisation under the Telephone Capital Bill will produce any result if the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs continue the bumbling administration that has characterised their activities during the past five years, but if they put their minds resolutely to the task, there is now authorisation under the Bill to finance all efforts to bring the matter to a successful conclusion. It all depends on whether they avail of that authorisation or not.

Over and above the provision of actual equipment, it is a howling scandal in this city at the present time that one can ring 10 at any time of the day, but particularly after six o'clock in the evening, and get no reply of any kind. I have held the instrument in my hand while the bell rang 42 times before anyone answered it. There is some absolute failure on somebody's part if that kind of thing can happen. I would not complain if somebody answered 10 calls after a reasonable time and said: "I am sorry; the lines are overloaded. Will you call again?" I would not mind if somebody answered and said there would be a delay because of overloading, but what is absolutely exasperating is to find nobody answers at all. What is even more exasperating is that if you turn to 31 to invoke the assistance of the supervisor, there again you may have to hold the instrument until it has rung between 25 and 30 times. That abuse is peculiarly exasperating after 6 o'clock in the evening.

I believe the situation could be materially relieved if more staff were attached to the switchboards at that hour. There appears to be a chronic conviction in the telephone organisation that, after the peak hours of business, there is a decline in demand. The fact is that the whole pattern of telephone user has changed in the past 20 years. In the past, the peak user of the telephone was related to trade and commerce but, in the changing world in which we live, the telephone has become very much more an instrument on which the ordinary person transacts his social business, so that the peak hours now may extend well into what used to be regarded as the slack period. Maybe it is that the telephone authorities do not think it is a matter of such urgency that that type of telephone user should have such prompt service, but I think they are wrong. They should realise that, if they want to get business, they must cater for it. Apparently at the present time they do not want business. Perhaps it is that they have too much business already for the amount of equipment they have, but that should not reduce the service to the absurd situation where the bell is allowed to ring 40 times.

This seems particularly fantastic when you pick up any American magazine or advertising medium and read there the millions of dollars spent every year by the telephone companies in order to persuade people to put in the telephone or, where they have one already, to put in two. I believe that in the modern world the telephone service should be operated by the community for the community. It is an interesting commentary that where the telephone is operated by private enterprise in the United States of America, the company operating it has become one of the biggest companies in the United States and has a service of such a character that it is advertising for additional subscribers, whereas we are talking about 310,000 applications outstanding and that it may take two years to clear off the arrears.

A lot of people may not understand the real financial implications of this whole telephone problem. They may not realise that, as far as I am aware, the only branch of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs which is paying a profit today is the telephone service. As far as I know, there is not £1 of money employed in the capital expansion of the telephone service that is not fully remunerated by the receipts from the service, and it seems to me to be some kind of insanity which persuades the Minister to allow the service which is profitable to break down when it could be turned into a moneyspinner and made materially to relieve the burden on the Exchequer of the other services which the Minister has a statutory obligation to maintain.

The Minister has adverted to this at page 13 of his introductory statement when he states:

If the existing rate of return on capital is maintained over the period covered by the Telephone Capital Bill, the telephone service will, over the same period, have contributed over £11 million from its own resources by way of depreciation, provision and surplus revenue, and will in addition have contributed £9.25 million approximately to the Exchequer by way of interest on capital, thus substantially reducing the net draw on the Exchequer towards meeting the capital outlet provided for in this Bill.

Bearing that in mind, I want to ask the House to remember that in addition to the capital figures I have read out and which were provided under Telephone Capital Acts from 1948 to 1959, I have no doubt the Department were themselves providing additional moneys from their own resources by way of depreciation provision and surplus revenue. I should like the Minister to tell us when he comes to reply what additional provision was made in those years from those two sources, apart from the actual money provided under the Telephone Capital Acts from 1948 down to 1959. These are figures which are not available to the rest of us. They are available only to the Minister.

I well remember—and this brings me to the last aspect of the Bill with which I wish to deal—that when Deputy Everett was Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, the question of providing a subterranean cable from Dublin to Sligo, with appropriate branch lines, was under consideration. If my memory serves me, there was considerable discussion and argument at Government level as to whether the cable it was first proposed to lay had a sufficient capacity, and the general principle was laid down that the practice of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs was generally covered by a Treasury decision going back to the period when the telephone company was first taken over by the State in 1908. That principle was that the State consented to the acquisition of the service from the private company on the condition that the Treasury were not required to provide money for capital development unless and until the demand existed.

That was the general practice. Any more insane basis for procedure in installing a telephone system in the country could not be imagined but one can easily understand that in Edwardian and Victorian times, that would be the Treasury's approach to a new undertaking of which the Treasury had yet no experience. It resulted in this dilemma presenting itself. We proposed to open a trench in the ground from Dublin to Sligo. The question was: should we put in the trench a cable adequate for all existing demands or should we say to ourselves that a great part of the cost of the installation was due to the digging of the trench and therefore we should put in a cable that would provide for all anticipated demands for years ahead? There was a revolutionary decision taken then that although the demands were then x, a cable should be put in that would carry two or three times x. Although the Treasury would have expressed horror at that decision, it seemed right to us to put in a cable that would carry all the anticipated demands.

Here again the Minister suggests that in the 'fifties nothing was done.

I did not suggest that.

The Minister did not say it but he said that the principal justification for his deplorable failure was the severe shortage of capital in the 'fifties when the telephone service was low in the list of priorities for the limited capital available.

And was it not? It was down at the bottom of the list.

At that time we were building more houses, investing more capital in necessary development and getting on with more essential work by way of capital investment than Fianna Fáil undertook in the previous 20 years or since. You have evidence of that in two fields. Arrears of telephone installations in 1953 amounted only to 6,700 and there were no houses falling down on the people in the streets of Dublin. There were cables put in the ground in anticipation of the demands for an extended telephone service.

The Deputy has mentioned only one so far.

It is the only one I can recall.

We had to put another one to Sligo since.

Where was that to?

Into the national networks and outlets. It cost £200,000.

Where did that go to?

Circuits were provided to Carrick-on-Shannon.

I am glad to hear that the Minister did that much. It was badly wanted. The trouble is that all this cheap, fraudulent Fianna Fáil propaganda weakens and distorts intelligent discussion of important matters in this house. The Department of Posts and Telegraphs may have foreseen the necessity for capital and asked for the necessary capital and it may be that the Department of Finance withheld it. This Government have now been in office for seven years and the situation with regard to the telephone service is worse now than it was seven years ago.

I have been here since 1959.

The Minister is a corporation sole and must accept responsibility for himself and his predecessors in office in his own Government.

The facts are that after seven years in office, the Minister's only alibi is that his predecessors did not do enough. The figures do not confirm that alibi and the attempt to establish that fraudulent alibi has drawn from me the censure which probably was overdue. What I am saying to his face in public is what 90 per cent of his own supporters are saying behind his back.

I urge the Minister to see that energetic measures are put in hand to provide the telephone where it is needed and to provide the circuits to carry the increase in traffic.

I want to direct his attention to this problem. In this matter of shortage of circuits, I understand the Minister's dilemma is that if he adds more telephones in a place where such a shortage exists, the only result will be the problem to which Deputy M. P. Murphy referred, of lines becoming crossed and people listening to one another's conversations. I assume that the overloading of circuits in Dublin explains the exasperating situation which arises when you start dialling a number and half way through, you get the engaged signal. You find in the case of a number with six digits that after you dial the first two, you get the engaged tone. Therefore I sympathise with the Minister if he says that he is being pressed to put in further circuits in Drumcondra, Ballsbridge, Glasnevin or Stillorgan. He wants these additional circuits because the existing circuits will not carry the traffic.

However, if you are living in Dublin and an emergency arises in which you cannot use your own telephone, you can go to a neighbour's house, to a kiosk or to a local shop and make contact of an emergency nature without intolerable inconvenience. But the Minister's rigorous test in respect of the necessity for circuits should not apply in rural Ireland. If from time to time emergencies do arise in the rural areas, the corresponding inconvenience of an isolated home not having a telephone at all is a grave matter. In the city you may have some inconvenience in the casual use of your telephone, but if there is an emergency on hand, the existence of a phone in the house is of incalculable value to people in rural places.

I suggest that, pending his ability to instal an adequate service in the rural areas, the Minister should allow overloading of the lines rather than refuse the telephone to people in country places who may have to send for the priest or doctor in an emergency or where old people are living alone. I know cases of old people living alone whose children have scattered. One child may be in Cork, another in Limerick, Dublin or Dundalk, and their great desire is to mitigate the loneliness of the elderly parent with whom only some female relative or girl is living. The children would like to have the facility of being able to ring up from time to time and have a chat with the parent.

I suppose it is hard for the busy and anxious administrators of the national telephone network to have regard to these considerations but in rural Ireland these are very important considerations. They do not fit into the ordinary hierarchy which the Department of Posts and Telegraphs have established of doctors, priests, veterinary surgeons and professional men who are entitled to some priority by virtue of their professional duties. Therefore, I suggest to the Minister that instead of adhering rigidly to these priorities, he would be justified in risking overloading the service in rural Ireland and I believe the vast majority of people there would cheerfully suffer any consequent inconvenience if they felt, by suffering it, they were helping the category of persons who had no telephones to get one substantially earlier than they might otherwise hope to do.

I hope we have heard the last of the Minister's false and dishonest argument——

It is not dishonest.

——that these misfortunes in recent years were due to something that happened ten or 15 years ago. That is not true. The provision of capital under the Telephone Capital Acts and other sources was reasonably adequate during the 'fifties, bearing in mind the then-existing demand and the prospective demand at that time. It is in the past five or six years that the whole programme has collapsed about the Minister's ears. Probably he has learned his lesson and, but for that unfortunate paragraph in his speech, I think he would have received from the House sympathetic understanding of his problems and enthusiastic readiness to help him to overcome them. That paragraph has imposed on me the disagreeable duty of recording the truth and I hope the figure to which I have directed attention, having once been put on the record, will never be challenged again.

I think it is about time we did something about eliminating some of the poles and wiring in the city and countryside. The multiplicity of traffic signs, aerials, telephone poles and ESB poles is objectionable. I mention that because it is a case that has been put to me. Every ten yards in the street, there is a pole of some type.

There is another matter I am more concerned about, and which I raised before. I asked the Minister if it was possible to discover people who use the telephone for purposes other than normal, such as using profane and obscene language, things that only perverts would do. The Minister said it is very difficult to track down such persons. During the past few months, because of all this Party-game talk about taxes—that is all it was—I was subjected to all sorts of abuse and threats. It is bad enough to have cowardly people writing letters to the newspapers but it is worse to have them ringing you up, using vile language and insulting your wife. One gentleman made it a practice to ring every morning at about ten past nine for three weeks. It was the same voice; every sort of filthy language was used to my wife who was up earlier than I was, getting the children out to school.

One may ask: Why answer the phone? Living in a busy constituency, my telephone rings about every quarter-hour during the day. I must answer it. When you read of certain types of crime in the papers, we see that the gardaí are able to rush to a telephone booth and find out from whom the calls came. The Minister should protect the citizens from this abuse and members of the House should also have protection. We have responsibilities and we are expected to do certain things. At least our phones, our wives and children, should be protected from these perverts. If the call came from a street here, it might be difficult to trace but if it came through an office, it should not be too hard to discover where that office is. Then an example could be made of some of these people. Occasionally, we read of perverts using the phone to insult females. Surely the Minister should do something to ensure that these persons can be located and brought to account for their conduct. We need only a few examples.

I have here a telephone bill for the quarter which was sent to a lady who does not use the phone very much. She rings her husband now and again, her doctor and a few others. She is asked to pay £2-5-0 rental and her calls cost £1. That means she must pay at least 4½d. a call which is rather unfair on a small subscriber. We hope that more people will install telephones but it is wrong to ask people to pay between 4d. and 6d. for a call. It is all right for business people who are making money out of it; they should be made to pay because a telephone call could earn them £5, as it often does. There should be a differential rent in favour of the small person and let the business rental jump. We heard a lot of criticism regarding the ESB rental and we were told of an old age pensioner asked to pay 11/- for a meter when he spent only 2/- on electricity. There is proof of that. It is unfair. When thinking of rentals in future, the Minister should consider a differential in favour of small subscribers.

There is a sizeable figure before us and this shows there has been neglect by the Fianna Fáil Government over the past seven years in facing up to a problem that has snowballed to this extent.

The telephone is a "must" and has been for quite a while. A few years ago, the Minister told us television was a "must". It was at that time he should have decided which should get precedence, television or the telephone. The telephone service is not a luxury; the television service is.

Another aspect of this matter is the danger of building up a labour force. I have no objection to a labour force being built up but the trouble is that when you do so and when the job has been completed, the force is dumped on the scrap heap. One speaker pointed out that the members of the force become "dead-end kids" and I agree with him. There should be some sense of security for those who are giving their best and the Minister should bear that in mind. It is important that the work should go ahead because every other day questions are asked by Deputies about this problem. I do not have to remind the Minister of that; I have kept the pressure on him to try to expedite the installation of telephones in my own area. The backlog is increasing every day and something will have to be done about it.

Agan in relation to a labour force, there is a policy in the Department that a man over 40 will not be employed for labouring work. That is wrong. Fathers of families will have to contribute in taxation towards this demand and they are entitled to get a chance to work. They have family responsibilities, just as other sections of the community have and, with such a sizeable sum of money involved, they should not be deprived of work. It may be said that this is not general policy but it is the policy, as I see it, in my area. I say it is unjust and probably unconstitutional.

A previous speaker mentioned blackguardism on the telephone. The public kiosks are a target for blackguardism. The Post Office staff are subjected to abuse and this hardworking staff could be better employed than having to listen to this type of gentleman, and indeed, on occasion, this type of lady. I would ask the Minister to see if some type of alarm could be introduced which would pinpoint the culprit on the spot and thus lead to his being brought to justice. As I said, this is a sizeable sum of money but we are all agreed that it is a sizeable investment and all I would add is, God speed, get on with the work and let us have results.

We recognise that because of the era of prosperity which the country has enjoyed for the past five or six years the demand for telephones has increased. It must be recognised that only those who are prospering can afford a telephone. There is one matter which I should like the Minister to consider. In recent times, some applicants for telephones have been requested to deposit £10. Everyone is not so requested but I do not know where the line of demarcation is drawn because I know of two architects, one of whom was requested to pay this £10 deposit and the other was not. I suggest that it should be sufficient to have a guarantor. I cannot see why a person should be requested to deposit £10 which will not be returned until he has ceased to be a subscriber. The £10 could be gaining interest for him. All these deposits of £10 must be gaining interest for the Department. If every applicant had to subscribe a deposit of £10, I would not be against it but why should only certain people be requested to do so? It seems wrong to me. It might be a wise thing if applicants were asked to make a deposit for a period of three or five years but I still think that a guarantor would make it easier for the applicants.

In regard to abuse, I must say that I have not suffered from it. The installation of post boxes, particularly in South-West Dublin is something that has been neglected, even though I have made application and shown the distances between the nearest two boxes——

The Deputy is referring to post boxes——

Under the Department of Posts and Telegraphs.

The question does not arise on the Bill which deals with telephones.

While I accept your ruling, Sir, I take it that this is a matter which comes under the Department of Posts and Telegraphs?

This is a Telephone Capital Bill, dealing solely with the extension of the telephone services.

Very well. I have no objection to the Bill. I thought I would take this opportunity of drawing attention to this matter of some people having to deposit £10 which is not recoverable until they are no longer subscribers.

In dealing with the points raised by Deputies on this Bill, I want to make it perfectly clear that when introducing the Bill I went to particular pains to make my statement as factual as possible and to set out, in so far as I could, the exact position at the moment in which the country stands in relation to telephone services and to telephone equipment and installations.

I set out to give a history of telephone development in this country over a number of years past. On a previous Capital Telephone Bill and on the Estimate for my Department, I fully accounted for the amount of capital advances under the various Acts since the take-over in 1922. It is no harm to repeat here the amounts authorised to be raised and spent on telephones since the early days of this administration.

Under the Telephone Capital Act, 1924, a sum of £500,000 was provided; under the Capital Act, 1927, a sum of £500,000 was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1931, a sum of £250,000 was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1936, a sum of £500,000 was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1938, a sum of £1 million was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1946, a sum of £6 million was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1951, a sum of £8 million was authorised; under the Capital Act, 1956, a sum of £6 million was authorised; and under the Capital Act, 1960, a sum of £10 million was authorised. That comes to a total of £33,521,858 authorised under these Capital Acts.

Deputy Dillon apparently took grave exception to the inclusion of this sentence in my statement introducing this Bill, on page 4:

The principal cause was the severe shortage of capital during the 1950s when the telephone service was afforded a low priority in the allocation of the limited finance available.

Each year, of course, the Government allocate the capital to provide for the investment in that particular year in the various sectors of the economy where State capital is required. Telephone capital is provided for, in common with the other demands made from the other sectors—agriculture, industry and so on.

It has been the practice all down the years to show the telephone capital amounts that are available each year very low down in the queue. It is low down in the priority and the practice has been, all down the years, that the telephone capital allocations are down near the bottom of the line. There is no point in Deputy Dillon's trying to pretend that the situation was ever otherwise. Facts have to be faced in this matter. The whole picture and situation has to be fully appraised. The matter has to be looked upon in all its broadest aspects so that we can get down to the problem that confronts the Department of Posts and Telegraphs in meeting the unprecedented demand that has arisen in this country over the past four years for telephone service.

But the money was allotted to meet the demands at that time.

I have been pressed to meet anticipated demand as well as current demand. Deputy Dillon spoke of a Treasury regulation, I think, that prohibited the Post Office from meeting anticipated demand. He spoke vaguely of some decision being taken many years ago to change that situation.

He said it was changed in 1956.

My policy since I became Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, and the policy of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs over the years, has been to make provision for anticipated demand. The Minister for Posts and Telegraphs in 1956 sought authority for the allocation to his Department of the necessary capital to meet anticipated and current demand but he did not get what he was looking for from the then Government. He had to come to this House with a Bill that was drastically cut in the demand he was making for the provision of the necessary capital moneys for the telephone service. He complained bitterly in this House, when introducing that Bill, of the small amount of capital allocated to him for the execution of work which he saw it was necessary for the Post Office to engage in, in the years ahead, to meet the anticipated and current demand for telephone service. In replying to the debate, he again referred to the same matter. I have not said and I do not say that the telephone capital moneys were short since 1956: I said that over the whole period of the 1950s the allocation of capital to the telephone service was not sufficient to meet the unprecedented demand for telephone service within the country.

On the first available opportunity that presented itself to me after I became Minister for Posts and Telegraphs in 1959, I brought in a Telephone Capital Bill, in 1960. I asked that £10 million be made available to the Department of Posts and Telegraphs for the ensuing five-year period, as Capital Bills usually run for that period. I got the authorisation to bring in a Bill to have £10 million allocated from the Department of Finance to the Department of Posts and Telegraphs to be used at the rate of £2 million per year. That was the understanding the Department of Posts and Telegraphs had with the Department of Finance.

Towards the end of 1960-61, I came to the conclusion that investment at the rate of £2 million per year over the five-year period would not be sufficient. The following year, we raised the capital allocation to £2½ million, in agreement, of course, with the Department of Finance. At the same time, I want to point out that it fell to me to commence then the augmentation of the staff working in the Engineering Branch of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs so that we could usefully use the additional capital allocations made year by year to the service.

I have already pointed out the long delay that occurs in the delivery of orders. I want to point out now that we cannot place orders in advance of the money being authorised here to pay for the orders on delivery. To use usefully large amounts of capital in the development of a telephone service we need to have a labour force competent and capable usefully to use the cash, or the money, when it is allocated. At the same time, we have got to have a certain knowledge that the equipment ordered will be delivered into the country. Most of the equipment is manufactured outside the country and we have not got any effective control on delivery dates. Manufacturers are, too, finding it difficult to maintain delivery dates because of the fact that other countries are finding themselves in exactly the same position as we are. There is in other countries an increased demand for telephones. The Administrations in these countries are placing their orders for equipment also and expecting, like us, to get delivery of exactly the same kind of equipment. We are all in the market together and the manufacturers are finding it increasingly difficult to cater for the unprecedented demand that now obtains for telephone equipment.

The staff, then, has to be increased. Increasing the technical staff is not a simple matter. It is a matter that must be planned progressively in an ordered fashion. One cannot just find technical staff available in employment exchanges. One has to train them. One has to take many of them in young. I have explained the position in relation to the professional engineers. Since 1960 we have been building up our staff and this year it is 50 per cent greater than it was four or five years ago. Since I became Minister I have obtained the sanction of the Department of Finance for increased allocations from the sum authorised under the 1960 Act. As I said earlier, we started off with £2 million in 1960-61. In the next year it was raised to £2½ million. The year after it was £3½ million and the expenditure proposed in the current year is £4½ million. Anyone who looks at this in an objective way can see the development and the plan operating in the Department to meet the situation in relation to telephones since 1960.

Year by year the allocation of capital moneys has been increased. Year by year the staff to handle that cash usefully has been increased. In the current year we are spending £4½ million. Next year we hope the sum will be £6 million. Building up a staff is a progressive operation. So is increasing the allocations, and the purchase of equipment. We are proceeding in a progressive manner to deal with outstanding arrears. It is a formidable undertaking. When I was appointed Minister I took on an apparently formidable undertaking from the point of view of the telephone service I inherited. Even at the end of five years, with the utilisation of the capital now being authorised, the operation will not, in my opinion, be completed. The telephone service will need still further capital and still more work before we will have an absolutely efficient service suitable to the needs of the country, particularly from the point of view of the further development of the national economy.

Some of the matters raised here were matters of administration. I shall study the statements made by the Deputies and have these matters examined. These do not really fall to be dealt with under this Bill but, since they were raised, I should like to reply to them.

The Post Office (Amendment) Act, 1951, provides for the prosecution of persons who use the telephone to make calls of an offensive nature or to make nuisance calls. The regulations made in 1959 provide for the suspension of the telephone service to subscribers who use their phones, or allow their phones to be used, for calls of this kind. Whilst it is not practicable to pursue every case reported, the more serious and persistent cases are investigated and proceedings are instituted in every case in which there is sufficient evidence available and the circumstances warrant prosecution. Less serious cases, and cases involving juveniles, may sometimes be met by a warning, usually by a member of the Garda Síochána, as an alternative to prosecution. Most nuisance calls are made on the automatic system and this increases the difficulty of tracing them. We have our methods, but Deputies will appreciate that to publish details of them would reduce their effectiveness. Observations of a subscriber's line to trace nuisance calls is undertaken only with the knowledge and consent of the subscriber.

Deputy Tully raised the question of urgent trunk calls. He referred to the special charge made for jumping the queue; I use that expression for want of a better one at the moment.

Priority calls.

The aim where the special charge is concerned is to ensure that, when a particular trunk route is congested, urgent and important calls will be given precedence. The only practicable way of confirming that a particular call is genuinely urgent and important is to apply the special rate, which is double the normal fee. My Department is not interested in the special rate from the revenue aspect and would gladly drop it in favour of any other suitable and effective means of affording priority on a fair basis. Approximately one trunk call in every 1,000 is made at the special rate. It will be seen from that that we do not make anything out of it.

Deputy Lynch advised me to increase the staffs in telephone exchanges. It is expected that the total number recruited before the end of this year will be 215. I do not know if Deputy Lynch has any particular cases in mind in which he thinks there is a shortage of telephonists. If he brings them to my notice I shall have them examined.

Debate adjourned.
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