As I understand the Minister's statement when introducing this Supplementary Estimate, the farmers are not really receiving any extra benefit. The last speaker implied that the Minister is introducing the Estimate for the purpose of increasing the benefits payable to farmers. He is not. This is only a bookkeeping Estimate because the rates have gone up considerably more than was anticipated by the Government.
It is not that the Government had not been warned about that. It had been repeatedly pointed out to them from these benches that there was no alternative to a rise in rates as a result of the policy they were pursuing. It is quite evident that the increase in rates that has taken place is largely due to the fiscal policy of the Government and of the Minister who is introducing a Supplementary Estimate for £150,000 to offset these bookkeeping deficiencies.
There is no benefit, good, bad or indifferent, in this for big farmers, medium farmers or small farmers. If the Minister intended to make any change, to introduce any extra reliefs, it would have been announced in the answer to a question which I put down yesterday to the Minister for Local Government. I asked the Minister yesterday if he would increase the rate relief for employment on farms to ensure greater employment and to offset the heavy rate increases which farmers have to meet. Here is the answer:
This is one of many matters relating to rate relief on agricultural land which is at present under active consideration.
While we are on the subject of rates, perhaps the Minister who is directly responsible for looking for the extra money from this House to deal with rates will give some indication as to what extra reliefs the Government intend to give the farmers. It is extraordinary that the Minister for Finance in introducing this Supplementary Estimate had not a word to say on that. I should like the Minister to indicate whether he is considering increasing the amount of rate relief on farms, no matter what size they are.
It is important that farmers should be given rate relief in respect of employment. Are there any plans for increasing this relief which is £17 and which has been static over the past ten years? Are there any other schemes for increasing reliefs to farmers? All these increases have been static. Apart from the increase given in the Budget before last, there have been no increased reliefs for those who have to bear the burden of rates. All the speakers, with the exception of the last speaker, referred to the fact that charges are increasing all the time. In this country we depend for our fiscal return, for the equation of our Budget, and so on, on what the farmers can produce. The heavier the burden that lies on them, the less the production will be and the more often the Minister will have to come back to this House with Supplementary Estimates trying to clear up the mess.
There is no other reason why the Minister has introduced a Supplementary Estimate here this afternoon except that the Government and those who advise him have completely misjudged the situation. At the beginning of this year, the Government estimated, with all the facts available, with all the inside knowledge of expert advisers, that there would be a four per cent increase in the rates. Deputy Dillon has very aptly said it is now revealed that there is an increase of 33? per cent on what they estimated. Somebody had done some muddled thinking or else it goes to prove another thing which I have always maintained, that policy conducted in this country is thought out in a theoretical manner without any practical approach.
Deputy McQuillan said that it is policy in other countries to take people off the land. That is not the policy of the EEC. It is recognised in many countries, as it should be recognised here, that it will not be possible to retain as many people on small holdings as heretofore. Of course, they are striving for a better standard of living. For that reason, the EEC countries and every other country with an agricultural economy as its basis, which is practically every country in the world, have realised that in order to retain the people on the land and give them a better standard of living, they must give them some other form of assistance. For that reason, there have been in all these countries remissions of taxation, many reliefs to the agricultural community.
Along with that, far from siphoning people off the land, they have endeavoured to keep them on the land, if only in part-time employment. They have endeavoured to keep the small holdings as they are, contrary to this Government's policy which appears to be to wipe out the small holdings and compound them into other holdings. That is not the European policy or that of any other country in the world. Other countries have accepted the fact that they have to provide a better standard of living and they are going about it in a different way altogether from that of Fianna Fáil.
I regret to have to tell the Minister for Finance that the very fact that he has come here this afternoon as Minister responsible for the financial policy of this Government proves that they have no policy to deal with the changing situation on the land. They have no policy to deal with the rising overhead charges, to equate conditions of farmers with those of the rest of the community. That is what is fundamentally wrong with the policy of this Government. The sooner they accept the fact that what the man who lives on the land produces is the backbone of our economy, the better. He should be given a fair deal and brought into line with other sections of the community. There is no use in the Government's talking about a five-year plan or about expanding our economy when they will not go to the root of the problem which exists not only in the west of Ireland—it is more acute and more severe in the west of Ireland and in Kerry, West Cork and such areas — but also in other places as well.
We cannot expect the agricultural community to go on enjoying the same standard of living and having the same remuneration and return as they have had all along. Those engaged in industries are able to increase their charges, but the agricultural community are depressed all the time. There is no use in the Minister chucking them a bone, if he is chucking them a bone. I think he is chucking them nothing. As I said, this Estimate is to clean up the financial muddle that has been created by him as the fiscal controller of the Government's policy. So long as we go on with that muddled sort of policy, we will get nowhere, and we will never have a stable, sound, profitable agricultural economy.
Deputy Fanning referred to agricultural prices and said the agricultural community were thriving, prosperous and happy. I wonder would he care to say that on a public platform outside the House? What this country wants is stability. It is only a couple of months since cattle were £5 5s. and £5 10s. a cwt. At present there is a bigger demand for cattle because of difficulties in the Argentine, which could have been foreseen by the Government if there had been any forward thinking at all. The export of cattle from the Argentine is less than it was, due to a rising population pressure which is likely to continue. Therefore, there is a slightly better demand for cattle than there was heretofore. The price of cattle has rocketed to £7 a cwt., but there is no guarantee for the farmer, big or small, that that price will be maintained. There is nothing enshrined in the Government's policy to maintain it. The same is true of pigs.
