Committee on Finance. - Vote 27 — Local Government (Resumed). – Dáil Éireann (18th Dáil) – Wednesday, 12 Oct 1966

Mr. Blaney

The matter of house purchase loans and supplementary grants has been raised here in many ways and many specific points have been raised. To reply in a general way, I should say that the original provision of £6,500,000 for house purchase loans and supplementary grants this year was greater than the amount provided in any year to date and compares quite favourably with the provision of £4.6 million in 1963-64, when there was no talk whatsoever of any shortage of money. This provision of £6,500,000 has been increased by £500,000, as a consequence of the Government's decision some few months ago to increase the overall capital for housing, sanitary services et cetera, which brings us to a figure of £7 million for the purposes of these loans and supplementary grants this year — a figure higher than any figure ever provided at any time in this country.

We have the talk, which I think is foolish and will do no good to any aspect of our development, the flamboyant, irresponsible and exaggerated statements made, for instance, by Deputy Dillon, taken up and chorused by a number of his colleagues, to the effect that the country is bust and that we have no money for anything. These statements, of course, are known by the people who make them to be untrue and talking in this way is doing damage — if it is possible to do damage — to the country and the prospects of its economy in the immediate future.

Mr. L'Estrange

What did you say in 1956?

Mr. Blaney

The situation in 1956 — as I thought I had made terribly clear, starkly clear, I might say, earlier in my reply — had very distinct similarities in regard to the difficulties confronting the Government today and the Government of that day. But what is happening today and what happened then have no similarity whatsoever. As against the deplorably bad conditions which were then truly existing, when the money was not there, we have money this particular year and we are providing more money this particular year than in any other year in the history of any Government in so far as my Department's operations are concerned. This money, as I have demonstrated, is not a figment of my imagination but has been proven to exist by the issues which have already taken place from the Local Loans Fund to various local authorities for all sorts of local government purposes.

Mr. Lyons

Is it a figment of the imagination that many people who have applied for grants over the past 18 months are still waiting?

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted, and 20 Members being present,

Mr. Blaney

What I was drawing attention to was the difference between the real situation today and the really deplorable situation in 1956 and 1957. It is true to say that not only are we providing more money but money is issuing, to disprove these Jonahs who are talking in these terms. It is also true that, while there may be some delays in the payment of supplementary grants and loans, the stage has now been reached, as it appears to me, that in most areas the allocations of money we have made for these purposes should be nearly equal in all cases, and equal in many cases, to the actual needs, as estimated by local authorities. Overall the position is one which has every appearance of improvement in regard to any criticism there might have been of it in the past six or nine months. By and large, we are going ahead, despite all the difficulties we have encountered. While the progress is not entirely satisfactory to me or to the Government — not enough is being done speedily enough—nevertheless, everything being taken into consideration, it must be admitted by the most prejudiced Deputy in Opposition that the situation is far better than they themselves would like it to be.

Mr. Lyons

But not as good as the Minister stated, or is continuing to state.

Mr. Blaney

A Deputy who makes that sort of interjection does not do so to elicit information but rather to hear the sound of his own voice because figures and facts have been given here until not only am I tired giving them but the House, indeed, must be tired listening to them, figures sufficient to convince even the most sceptical and prejudiced of Deputies, that the situation is much nearer to what I say it is than what Opposition Deputies say it is and what they would wish it to be.

Deputies Clinton, Cluskey, Seán Dunne and Larkin talked about the position in relation to house purchase loans in the Dublin area. Dublin Corporation propose to spend £622,000 on house purchase loans during the period 1st September, 1966, to 31st March next and this sum is in excess of the total amount involved in respect of applications on hands at 31st August, 1966. I should add that the corporation may now proceed on the assumption that their allocation for 1967-68 will be of the order of £1 million.

That being so, I fail to see how Dublin Corporation representatives who are Members of this House can find so much to cry about at the moment, and why they will not give any credit whatsoever for the fact that the allocation to Dublin Corporation for this purpose is in excess of £1 million this year. We have assured them that next year they can expect an amount of the order of £1 million again. Not only are we saying what we will do and what we are doing this year, but we have said that for next year — and this is important in the allocation of loans which are seldom drawn in the year in which they are allocated — it will be of the same order as it is this year. At the moment the moneys they have in hand are more than equal to the applications on hands at the end of August. That being so they are now in a position in which they never were before because they know what they can expect next year. This should have quite an effect on the activities of Dublin Corporation in regard to the allocation of loans for the future.

Capital allocation to Dublin County Council for house purchase loans for 1966-67 was increased from £650,000 to £820,000. This allocation compares with actual issues last year — and mark this — of £480,000. That is what was issued last year under this heading by Dublin County Council, and we are giving them an allocation of £820,000 for their operations under this heading in the coming year. Lest anyone choose to say that last year they did not get all they wanted, that it was a bad year for various reasons, let us go back to the year before when there was no shortage of money and we find that what they got was £250,000, and that was what they spent. So, giving them full freedom of spending in 1964-65 they actually paid out £250,000. Last year they paid out £480,000 and this year — this terrible year we are told about — they are allocated no less than £820,000. If that does not give the lie to those who say we are "bust" and have no money, I do not know what could more clearly do so.

At the end of August, 1966, Dublin Corporation had approved of all loan applications on hands with the exception of loans totalling £156,000 which were being processed and which will be approved during the next few weeks if the individual applications are found to be in order. That is the normal situation when investigations have to take place as to the overall validity, and so forth, of the applications.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): Approximately how many houses would be involved?

Mr. Blaney

The Deputy is adept with figures and can more readily sort that out than I can. I cannot talk and make calculations at the same time. While I am on my feet here I am supposed to be talking. Allegations were made that there was no money for loans and grants in Monaghan, Louth, Meath, Galway. These assertions were made by Deputy Dillon, Deputy Coogan, Deputy O'Hara and others. Deputy Dillon said we had not got six pence, but Monaghan got £77,000 for housing loans. Approximately £10,000 was for payments on foot of 35 applications in hands. That is the latest information I have. I have already covered the position of Louth county in reply to a Parliamentary question. Louth County Council by and large are as near to being satisfied with regard to the loans situation as any of us is ever likely to be. Louth County Council are satisfied that the allocation for loans is reasonably adequate. In Drogheda, estimated demands for loans and grants is £114,000, and the allocation is £140,000, which may make some Deputies begin to wonder where they will use it. The Dundalk allocation is £29,000 and that is regarded as being reasonably adequate to meet the demands arising this year. I should add that no instalments on foot of these loans are held up so far as I am aware.

We come now to Galway Corporation about which we hear such a stream of accusations from Deputy Coogan. The backlog in Galway has largely been ment according to my information, but there is an over-rigid attitude to new applications. I have already mentioned that this was so in a number of cases, and I say that in the case of Galway city they are being over-rigid. I should add that unless they move soon in accepting applications they will not need any money for payments next year. I do not want this to happen in Galway city where housing is needed. They should be reasonable and accept new applications which they are not doing. If they do so they will require money to meet payments on foot of these new applications. Unless they accept these applications soon there will not be any payments falling due next year because there will not be any need for money. I deplore this in the case of Galway city rather than welcoming it as some Opposition Deputies might seem to think I would.

There was a suggestion that no money has been issued in Carlow. In fact, £10,000 has issued for supplementary grants and an undrawn balance of £5,000 is available. In relation to Carlow again, £195,000 has been allocated for loans and grants plus a substantial credit balance at 31st May, 1966. So far as we can judge from all our information the position in Carlow is reasonably satisfactory.

In Mayo we find that £50.000 issued from the Local Loans Fund for supplementary grants on 30th August, 1966. I believe the backlog is being cleared by the council and it may even be cleared by tonight.

I shall certainly check on that, as I will on any information given me by any other Deputy but, so far as I know, the £105,000 allocated to the county council is regarded as reasonably satisfactory — I shall not say 100 per cent—so far as it is directed to the operation of loans and grants for payment this year. I should add that £46,000 of this particular allocation has already been drawn this year.

Cork County Council has already had issued from the Local Loans Fund this year £265,000 out of their gross £640,000 for house purchase loans. All applicants have been informed that they will be paid this year if otherwise in order. The question of supplementary grants in respect of West Cork was raised and at 31st August last year there were unpaid grants to the total of £11,000. An instalment of £15,000 was issued in the previous month, on July 15th. There is £18,000 left to meet further payments and the position, again subject to any information anybody may have, is, by and large, all right. The North Cork area has had £7,000 issued by the council for supplementary grants in the past few weeks and there is an undrawn balance of £9,000 available. Again, the overall position seems to be adequate.

Offaly has an undrawn balance of £17,000 available. They had no outstanding commitments on 31st August and only £20,000 of applications awaiting approval. This I should imagine is a very satisfactory situation. Laois had an undrawn balance of £14,000 and this allocation for that county we understand is again reasonably satisfactory. There is a capital allocation for South Tipperary of £14,000, together with a credit balance of £6,000, with which they came in at 31st March last, and there is need for a loan of only £4,000 which is being approved.

Leaving these matters of the inadequacy, as stated here, of various moneys for loans and grants and going on to some more general matters, having regard to the loans and the costs of houses——

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): Earlier the Minister promised to deal with the number of houses commenced or sanctioned for loans and grants this year as compared with last year.

Mr. Blaney

(Cavan): We all know where it is.

Another matter raised by Deputy Clinton is that local authorities were told in the circular of March, 1966, to sell sites. I am not quite sure what Deputy Clinton was implying, whether it was that they were told to sell the sites when things got so bad that they had to raise money to pay their debts. When it came from that side of the House that is the only interpretation I could put on it. However, let me say there was no such suggestion in the circular of March, 1966. If there ever was a circular that mentioned the selling of sites by local authorities it would have referred to the development of land into sites for houses. That is the only context in which it would have emanated from my Department.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): Would the Minister recognise the circular?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Would the Deputy cease interrupting and permit the Minister to proceed?

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): I want to put on record——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy is not in order in putting anything on record.

Mr. Blaney

In regard to the provision of recreational facilities on new housing estates, this is a very desirable thing to do and we should like the local authorities to do everything possible in this direction. According to Deputy Booth, Dún Laoghaire has had a population explosion, and this is borne out by the figures already available from the recent census. He suggested that, as a result of this sudden explosion, the housing needs of Dún Laoghaire have been under-estimated By the Minister and his officials. I cannot agree with this. In my Department we do not estimate the needs of any local housing authority. Since 1960 this is a matter which should be decided, and is being decided, by the housing authorities and not by the Minister and his officials. Therefore, if an under-estimation has taken place since 1960, I must suggest to Deputy Booth that he raise the matter with the officials in the Dún Laoghaire Corporation.

It has also been suggested by Deputy Coughlan from Limerick that the Department should devise a scheme to re-house the Army and gardaí. I scarcely need to remind the Deputy that the National Building Agency was set up and that the provision of houses for gardaí is one of its objectives, which objective it has been working on faithfully since its inception. To date the NBA have provided 383 houses; 48 are in progress, and some further houses are at tender stage. I should add that we do not provide these houses willy nilly. We provide them at the requisition of the Department of Justice where they want them, when they want them, and how they want them. We have no discretion whether we build more this year or less next year. It is entirely up to the Department who requisitions the NBA to do the job. There are 383 new Gárda houses provided by the NBA since its inception, 48 in progress and a further number at the tender stage.

The question of the provision of houses for the Army has been raised by the Minister for Defence with my Department and with the NBA. I am glad of that because this is another job which I believe the NBA can very usefully carry out and would be quite happy to carry out. Again, the ordering of these houses will rest with the appropriate Department, Defence, and the NBA, if and when requested to do the job, will no doubt do it equally as well for the Army as they have for the Garda. This will help the local authority housing situation in many towns. Naturally, a number of Garda and Army personnel are living in houses that might otherwise be available for civilian personnel. If houses can be provided through the Department of Justice and the Department of Defence by the NBA there will be an advantage gained in those towns where Army personnel and Gardaí are living in private or local authority houses.

I cannot help that. A plea was made by Deputy Dowling for more attention to be paid to the tenants' views in the design of houses. I can tell Deputy Dowling that An Foras Forbartha are already undertaking research on housing design standards and the standards are also under review by my Department. Special studies are on hand with UCD and the contractors' federation for a sociological survey, including the study of tenants' views of design. What comes out of this will be the really vital matter but, for Deputy Dowling's information, there is a great deal going on about it at the moment and we are hoping for some good results.

Roads and road traffic are matters of growing importance. Many Deputies referred to these matters and gave various details and various views. The only overall statement that I should like to make at the outset in this regard is that I assure all the Deputies who made suggestions that they will be most carefully considered and, if there is anything in them, that we will try to utilise them. We are grateful for them even if we find many of them not to be acceptable.

There were Deputies who spoke for and against main and arterial road improvement schemes. I do not think you could draw a line down the middle of the House and say that all on one side were for and all on the other side were against. Various Deputies have various views on the matter. We should look at the facts in regard to arterial and main road improvement schemes. The standards that are being applied in improvements on these categories of roads are based on accepted engineering standards. While we may disagree in regard to some aspects of the standards, on the whole, it is difficult to find a case that will effectively jettison the case that can be made and has been made by road engineering experts and traffic experts who have made a study of these matters and have great experience of them, not only in Ireland but abroad. Some, of them have widened their experience by visits abroad and have returned to help us with our problems.

Although I have often heard the reverse being stated, it is a fact that improved roads have a lower accident rate in relation to traffic. It is the latter part of that statement that needs to be driven home. We must keep in mind the qualification, "in relation to the traffic on them". All too often I have heard people say that there are more accidents on a road since it was widened and straightened than there ever were before. Unfortunately, as a result of the growth of traffic and the increase in the number of vehicles, it can be said of any road that there are more accidents on it now than there ever were before. There are more vehicles on it. Unfortunately, where there are vehicles, whether moving or stationary, there are accidents. This is all too true. I admit that if none of them was moving, there would not be any collisions but there still would be accidents. It is true that improved roads do show a lower accident rate in relation to the traffic using them and this is a very important matter that must be weighed very carefully when talking about money being wasted by the raising of the standard of certain heavily trafficked roads. My regret is that there are not more funds at my disposal to do more about a greater number of heavily trafficked roads more quickly than is possible at the moment.

Some Deputies tried to pit roads against houses. Although it may not be intended as such, this is a gimmick I do not like. We could also say that road expenditure should be considered in the light of what we expend on health services. We could make a case that if we spent £x more on our hospitals and health services, we could save more lives than by improving our roads. These arguments are easy to make but difficult to answer; indeed, it is almost impossible to answer them conclusively one way or the other. The pitting of one service against another does not serve either of the services. Deputies who have done this even while making such arguments have unwittingly made good cases for greater expenditure on the roads than at present. We might ask ourselves — Deputies quoted the OECD figures in regard to housing standards — how does our expenditure on roads compare with that of other countries? Indeed, the question has been asked by Deputy Hogan of Tipperary. Per head of the population it is very low. Our investment in motor vehicles is high, but in roads it is low. That is per head of the population in both cases.

According to Deputy O.J. Flanagan, road-widening schemes are being held up for lack of money. There is a way of proving this but, so far as I am concerned, I must deny this allegation. Approximately the same allocations as last year have been made overall. Perhaps Deputy Flanagan would give me details of jobs that have been held up? If they are exceptional cases, I shall try to have them investigated.

Deputy Donegan alleged that the expenditure on arterial roads has been deliberately curtailed by the Minister. This year the overall grants for arterial roads are the same as last year, and in particular the Louth grant is on that basis. Work on the T.1, to which I am sure the Deputy was referring, has been impeded by difficulties other than the allocation to that particular county.

It has been suggested I should consider new arrangements for the administration of arterial roads. This suggestion was made by both Deputy Andrews and Deputy Booth. Deputy Clinton went further and advocated that we should nationalise them. Before any of these suggestions was made, I had in fact set in train the various investigations necessary for a proper appraisal of this whole matter. I have in particular asked my officials to find out whether or not the present system of administration of road moneys is equal to the task before us at the moment, with particular reference to our arterial road system. It may well be that a new organisation may be set up in the not too distant future — it is still too early to know — to handle the improvement, repair and maintenance of at least arterial roads, and perhaps more. All I can say is that I am fully alive to the problem. The Department are working on it and we have had fact-finding investigations for a considerable time to get all the necessary information to enable us to make a final assessment. If we find — as I believe we probably will find — that changes are needed and a new type of organisation will have to be brought into being, I will bring it into being if it is shown to be justified.

Now we can come to the question of speed limits. Listening to people both inside and outside this House in recent years, one would think that I personally, as Minister for Local Government, was the final barrier in the way of the prevention of further slaughter on the roads because of not allowing speed limits suggested by well-meaning Deputies and others, and that I was against the whole idea of trying to make the roads more safe. This charge is made in spite of the fact that it was I who had the opportunity and pleasure of introducing the legislation which empowered me by regulation to fix speed limits in this country for the first time. The achievement of my Department and local authorities in bringing in speed limits on so many roads as quickly as they did has not been paralleled by any other country in the Western Hemisphere in recent years. The result was that we got speed limits quicker than we might have.

As a result, we have since been reaping some of the disadvantages in that not all of them were placed to the satisfaction of the public as a whole. Many changes have been requested; many changes have been made; and many more will be made in the future as a result of the review now taking place over all our roads. I would again plead that it will take time to carry out this review if we are to do it properly. The team working on this are working for the past couple of years. It is not possible to send out a dozen different teams. Even if we had 12 teams doing these reviews, we should probably finish up in the same way as if the first installation of the speed limit signs were left entirely, practically, to the local technical committees set up by me in the fond belief that because the people on them would be the county engineers and the garda authorities they, with their knowledge of all these towns and villages, would be far better able to find the right places, the right towns and the right streets on which we would apply our speed limits.

I say I "fondly hoped" that this would be the result but, fondly though I hoped it would be the result, it was only, I think, the 1st April that they came into being. The cowls were taken off. We saw these signs for the first time legally in existence. That was on 1st April and on 28th of the following July, without any pressure or pushing from Deputies or anybody else, but from my own personal observations deliberately made over a fairly wide area of the country between 1st April and July, I immediately ordered a review to be carried out by these technical committees.

Subsequently, in order to get some sort of uniformity brought finally into this matter, I had a small committee set up in my Department consisting of an administrative man out of my Department, a technical man out of my Department and a representative of the Garda Síochána to go back and vet the amended proposals that I felt would come from the local committees. It was I and my Department who asked these technical committees, inside eight weeks of the coming into operation of our first speed limit signs, to review their own work because we, in our observations in that short time, were not satisfied it was properly done.

The role of that small committee since then is one of continuing work arising from the amendments being proposed as a result of this second look by these committees. I had Members of the House, members of county councils, members of the public, and so on, and this is going on and will continue to go on without break until we have speed limit signs on every road in every county reviewed. In order to bring about a more speedy introduction of the actual application of the reviews agreed on, we will bring in counties and blocks of counties at a time rather than doing the neater job of doing the whole big job at the one time.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): The Minister had better come to Donegal soon.

Mr. Blaney

I am surprised at Deputy Fitzpatrick. He is so near Donegal and he still does not seem to know it. The people of Donegal already know this very well. This is a matter which I, as Minister, and the Deputy, as a legal man, deeply deplore. What I more deeply deplore is the scant attention that the taking of the law into their hands by these people got from the courts. That scant attention is something that I should like to put on record and, if provoked, I should like to put more on record in regard to the dealing with that particular matter.

Mr. Briscoe

May I ask if the Minister is satisfied that these driving schools are qualified to instruct?

Mr. Blaney

I have already indicated that in the new legislation which we hope to introduce this session, that is, if we get this Estimate finished——

Mr. Harte

We are not holding the Minister back at this stage.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The Minister has been speaking for two days with no money; for how long would he talk for if he had money?

Mr. Blaney

Only the Deputy with his monetary reform policy could answer that. In this new legislation, we hope to have power to enable the Minister, by some licensing system, to have some control over those schools and those who hold themselves out as instructors and charge for the instruction.

Mr. Briscoe

In the meantime, could they not be invited to apply on a voluntary basis to the Department for approval?

Mr. Blaney

Mr. Blaney

I represent everybody, including the itinerants, and I hope that I have a few friends among them. We also have had it said here that the itinerants have responsibilities and that the problem must be handled firmly. This is true. There are some who feel that some of these — like any other category — are not behaving themselves in all cases. Again, might I point out to those who have not yet made any effort to provide those camping sites that if the itinerants have a camping site they belong to, it not only gives them the sense of belonging there and the little bit of security which, God knows, they have so little of, but it also has the effect that they can be more easily controlled than if they are not on camping sites. That matter should be taken into account when considering camping sites.

Pumps should be provided pending comprehensive regional water schemes. I had that notion, too, at one time, about seven years ago, but I gave it up. I do not intend to go back on it again. It might give impetus to the notion that pumps should spring up here and there. They have the unhappy knack, wherever they are provided, of being there for far too long. Indeed, the fact they are put in certain locations has often militated against the enthusiasm that might have been expected from local residents and local county councils in regard to going ahead with water schemes. I do not like to see pumps provided but where it is absolutely necessary I agree they should be provided but only as a stop-gap.

Swimming pools were mentioned and I am glad they were, because they are something in which I have a very great interest. I believe we have need of a great many of them in the future of this country. It was stated by Deputy Dockrell that there should be a swimming pool in every housing scheme. I take it that he was referring to the size of housing schemes we have in Dublin and not to the housing schemes as we from the country might understand them. He went so far as to say that some of the big blocks of flats should be provided with swimming pools. I would agree with this outlook but not in the same fine detail as the Deputy has mentioned. I believe that in large cities such as Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Galway, while there undoubtedly will be a pressing demand for the olympic standard pool, the first thing we have to provide are swimming facilities for our own people. I do not necessarily mean competent swimming facilities for the few competitors of high standards. We want to see in the city of Dublin ordinary sized pools with ordinary capacity — pools with dimensions which can be regarded as adequate to serve many thousands of people. We should then draw for the city of Dublin and other cities and towns throughout the country a blueprint based on this pool size related to the population. We should then have a long-term programme. This would depend on our financial resources. We should then have a blueprint on which we will work steadily and systematically, year by year, providing two or three pools per year. Those should be of a pre-determined type and they should take into account what the needs of Dublin and those other places are in regard to swimming facilities.

Those pools should not necessarily be of high competitive standard at all. They should be of adequate size and depth and with sufficient dressing room and other toilet accommodation and so forth to serve a given area within a short radius. Those pools would be sufficient for the children of this and other cities and towns to swim in. The children could learn to swim in those smaller pools without having to take special transport or to go very far from their homes or endanger themselves in any way. I should like to see district pools provided in our cities and our larger towns throughout the country.

Instead of spending £150,000 or £200,000 on the provision of an Olympic standard pool in this city, I would much rather see ten of the ordinary prototype pools I have been advocating in ten different housing estates around the city. The children of the estates would derive far greater benefit from those ten pools, with very little extra cost, than from one big pool. Competitive swimmers would monopolise such a large pool, between galas and training, and there would be no place in this pool for the ordinary kids of this city or any other town in this country.

We must keep in mind that the elementary thing we want is a pool that will allow our kids and our young people to be taught to swim and in which they can practise swimming. Such pools should be of dimensions related to the population of the locality they are intended to serve. It is not necessary that they should be filtrated, that the water should be heated, that they should be covered so that they could be used the year round or that the dressing accommodation should be appropriate to the capacity of the pool and the numbers they serve. I have seen many plans requiring all sorts of frills for those pools. They are not necessary as far as the basic requirements of this or any other city are concerned. Until the elementary needs are met in a manner somewhat similar to what I have described the idea of spending money on the big elaborate pools is one which, though it may have my sympathy, certainly cannot have my support.

I believe, over the next year or so, even before all the money we want becomes available again, we may find it possible to set out a relatively small programme of the smaller and cheaper pools and that we need not necessarily wait the coming of all the money we require for everything else. When we think that a pool of the nature I have described, meeting and fulfilling the needs I have described, has been built for under £16,000 in one of our provincial towns, then we begin to realise that £100,000 could, in fact, build up to six of those pools in any given year. This, taking it against our total expenditure through local authorities and the Department of Local Government, is so infinitesimal, that when the arguments of those who say you could build 45 houses for that sum of money, are weighed against the overall good and the help given by those pools, it will be seen that we would be doing very great good in providing them.

It may well be that a 25-metre pool is not the ideal pool. It may also well be — I am now having this investigated for some time — that the £16,000 25-metre pool, taken on a pro rata basis, should be increased to a 33?-metre pool, with all the ancillary dressing accommodation required in the greater size pool. If this is so, we may well be, in the near future, in a position to decide whether the 25-metre pool is, in fact, sufficient for any location or district or whether a 33?-metre pool meets the needs of a particular town or city, or whether a number of 33?-metre pools, intermingled with 25-metre pools, would be the answer to Dublin city problems.

These are matters which we are sifting and discussing not only with local authorities, but with development companies, swimming authorities and swimming clubs. I think the most worthwhile thing we have done for swimming is the building in Longford of a pool at £16,000. A follow-up from that need not end with this one particular type or size of pool. What I would like to say is that I hope any future swimming pools will keep near to the cost of that type of pool. If we do this and we follow it up in that way, I believe we are realistic for the first time in 50 years. We are facing up to something that we in the local authorities would be prepared to do rather than codding ourselves and codding the public that we are going to spend £150,000 on swimming pools.

When we have these pools scattered around Dublin and other places, when we have competitors, then will come the demand and the real need to build, in addition to the small pools, large competitive pools from which we will send first-class swimmers from this country. It is noted that from a few places, one a public school and another a public entertainment centre, notable swimmers have been emerging. They do not have to have Olympic-type pools to become great swimmers, and some of them very great indeed. I believe hundreds of thousands of swimmers will appear out of nowhere in this country if we give them the decent elementary need and fulfil that need by giving them an elementary sort of pool designed at a cost the country can afford, and add a few around the country over the years.

I do not think so; we are a fair bit apart. As the Deputy says, there are others who might be nearer.

What did the Deputy do? Did he get the fairies to find a spring?

That is spoiling it. We are talking about Donegal.

Mr. Harte

What about the young dynamos?

Mr. Blaney

We had young dynamos before and they did not get very far.

Now we come to water pollution. This is a matter that has been cngaging the attention of my Department for some considerable time and we hope to do everything possible about it and to ensure that the future will be a little more clear in the real sense—I am talking about the water— than it would be if we did not do anything at all. This is a problem in other countries and it could become one here. The unfortunate thing is that once it has been allowed to take place, the vested interests that cause it are very hard to shift. You will find all sorts of people defending them and making appeals on their behalf, and if it is an industry, as it almost always is, there will be the unanswerable case made that if you insist on those people preventing this effluent, the industry will close down and there will be 100 or 200 people out of work. The real chance we have in this country is to try to prevent this sort of pollution taking place. Then we will not have the sort of problems other countries have found it impossible to get over in regard to this particular matter.

The overall situation in regard to these sanitary services is not as satisfactory as the overall housing position, for the reason that we have not been able, and have not thought it wise, to devote as much money to new works on the sanitary services side as might be desired by the people who have submitted tenders to us. But if we have not, it is not for the reason that we have not felt it most desirable that these schemes be carried out, and we will finance them, but the pressing problem of more and more houses is the greater one. When a scheme has been held back for some months on the sanitary services side, it enables us to build some additional houses during those same months and we feel it is better to do this than to go on as if nothing whatever were required from us by way of additional money for housing.

Planning is a matter which was talked about here to some degree and it did suffer in the debate from the fact that many Deputies did not appreciate that figures I gave in my opening speech had some significance. I know there are problems about the application of the Planning Act, and its terms, and this has caused misunderstanding and frustrations. But the real facts emerging are that almost 20,000 applications for planning permission were decided by local planning authorities in the year ended 31st March last and, of those, 90 per cent were granted. This could not be regarded by anybody as other than a display of reasonable attitude by the local authorities. In the same period, 1,075 appeals were disposed of and of these 1,075, 738 were formally determined by me, 186 were withdrawn and 151 were late or invalid. Of the 738 formally determined, 171 were allowed, 219 allowed subject to conditions. In 348 cases, the decision of the local authority was upheld and those who had appealed against it were rejected.

Taking the number fully allowed to the appellants to be 23 per cent of the 171 and 30 per cent, representing the 219 allowed with conditions, gives us just over 50 per cent of the appeals actually determined in favour of the appellants, or applicants, in this particular case and this 50 per cent relates to ten per cent turned down by the local authority. In all, it would appear that 95 per cent of the applications, between the local authorities' granting of permission and the Minister's subsequent granting of appeals, are, in fact, granted. That leaves a residue of five per cent and, naturally, there will be amongst that five per cent people who feel quite aggrieved.

But, on the other hand, these controls in planning, or indeed in anything else, are there — indeed if there was nobody being turned down, there would not be any need for them — and there is approximately five per cent in the ultimate analysis not getting through. Ninety-five per cent are succeeding and, while there may be aggrieved people amongst the five per cent, it can only be taken from these facts and figures that the Planning Act, whether at local or central level, is being administered in a reasonable manner. There is not the case for complaint that some Deputies have been making.

Time is running out, and I do not mean tonight. It is coming up to October, 1967, and very little preparations have been made by most local authorities.

Mr. Blaney

The Deputy put me off. I thought he meant time for the Estimate was running out and I was beginning to get worried.

Mr. Blaney

It is not worth while unless you are hard put to it. Presiding officers and poll clerks, it was said, could not vote at the recent Presidential election. Unfortunately, it is only too true in too many cases. The law which might have been amended in this regard has not yet been amended and poll clerks and presiding officers who were appointed to stations other than where they are registered, under the strict letter of the law, were not entitled to, and did not get, the transfer of vote they ordinarily enjoyed for general elections. I very much regret this and hope we shall not have a recurrence of it and that those people who are giving a service to the community will have the same facilities in future Presidential elections as they now enjoy in regard to general elections.

I have been asked whether any progress has been made as regards extension of postal voting. Proposals for the amendment of the electoral law are being formulated at present and it is intended that a Bill will be drafted which will facilitate voting by election staff at Presidential elections as I have already mentioned and will also provide for the extension to certain classes of postal voting. Do not press me to be more specific as regards these classes of persons; we shall have an opportunity of discussing it, when and if the measure comes to the House.

Mr. Clinton

Would it be through before next year?

Mr. Blaney

I could not promise that. Three weeks ago I would have made a bet that I would have been out of the House with this Estimate much earlier. If I were left to myself to talk, I should have been finished two days ago. There was a complaint that people living in a certain part of the Cork area are not represented on the City Council. To a great extent, that is true and that is a result of the extension of the city boundary. I can assure those people who are not represented in the council of the new area to which they belong that this will not long continue and that they will have an opportunity of having their own elected representatives on the appropriate councils by the end of next June.

Mr. Corry

It all depends on the carving.

Mr. Harte

That is the Cork way of saying gerrymandering.

Mr. Blaney

No matter how it happens they will have representatives on the council if they want to elect them and I am sure they will.

I want to refer to Ballymun but not in a general way. I heard Deputy Larkin say on one occasion—and I was not interested in interrupting to correct him nor was I absolutely sure that what he was saying was not true although I had very grave doubts— that the kitchens in the houses in Ballymun were so small that you could not swing a cat in them, that they were eight feet by five feet and that there was a door on both sides of them. Since then I have had a thorough search made in the Ballymun houses and my people cannot find a house with a kitchen of these dimensions.

This was not determined by the consortium building houses there and it does not mean they will get more money for doing less. The fact is that because of the system of contract and pricing of their scheme, the question of whether one, two or three types of house were to be continued in production was determined by negotiation between the builders and the National Building Agency and any saving that may have been made as a result of the cutting down of this house, which was more expensive than the other two, did not mean a saving for the contractors. Therefore, the Deputy can rest assured that in arriving at the conclusion not to use this type of house, there was no conferring of benefit on the builder. This happened because of the views of the NBA and their consultant advisers that this type of house was costing more than the others, that it was taking up more space, that it required a greater frontage and therefore that it cut down on the full utilisation of the site. It was not worth the addition and agreement was reached that of the three types this type would not be repeated in any sections of the scheme.

Deputy Cluskey spoke about Ballymun. He said the new flats were all right but the houses were not all he would like them to be. He said they were a bit off-beat, that they would cost a lot of money to maintain. The strange thing about this is that the corporation of which he is a member were consulted about a great number of things, not least being the type of house to be built. It was only natural that we in the Department should have the views of the corporation and be guided by their experience so that anything we proposed to do ultimately would be examined by them and, if possible, have their approval. This procedure went right through and let me say, in case I may be misunderstood, that the corporation had an opportunity to see the proposals and to comment on them. They did not disapprove of the structures we are now building.

Committee on Finance. - Vote 27 — Local Government (Resumed).

Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 12 Oct 1966