Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 14 Nov 1967

Vol. 231 No. 1

Committee on Finance. - Vote 41—Transport And Power (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That the Vote be referred back for reconsideration.

—(Deputy Cosgrave).

Mr. James Tully

Before I reported progress on Thursday night I made the comment that I was not impressed by letters written to newspapers. I said they are usually written for reasons other than what the contents of the letter seemed to suggest. We have all sorts of cranks who write all sorts of queer things to newspapers, and those who become involved in trying to answer those letters are only sending the fool further. For that reason letters written commenting on hotel accommodation and things like that are usually treated as a joke.

From time to time, however, letters have appeared in newspapers making serious charges against hoteliers or certain hotels in this country. Occasionally there is a rebuttal from the hotel that has been accused directly or indirectly. I believe that when such a charge is made it is up to either the hotelier or the tourist organisation to ensure that the full facts are given. Some time during last summer a comment was made about a western hotel where a fantastic sum was alleged to have been collected from a family who stayed there for a week or so. Subsequent reports in the newspaper suggested the sum was not altogether as big as had been suggested and that the accommodation which had been given was value for the sum anyway, and the matter was left there. I think these matters should be cleared up fully, because in cases like that irreparable harm can be done.

That does not clear the air where the situation is that hotels and restaurants have got into the habit, particularly during rush periods in the tourist season, of charging excessive amounts for pretty bad fare. Apart entirely from the question of food, very often the accommodation in some of the so-called high-class hotels leaves very much to be desired. Where a matter is brought to the notice of the tourist board they should, in every case, have it investigated and ensure that there will be no recurrence of the incident which caused the complaint. One dissatisfied customer, particularly if he is a non-national, can prevent very many people from coming to this country on holidays in the years to come. I do know that the number of people who are doing this sort of thing is small, but no matter how small the number is they are doing harm and they should be prevented from continuing.

The tourist board have a regulation which lays it down that certain standards must be observed before the name "guesthouse" or "hotel" can be displayed on a sign. This has rather peculiar effects. I know of one small hotel which was in operation for over 25 years and where the accommodation was about nine bedrooms. The owner of the hotel decided to spend some money on it. He spent £2,500 decorating and making the place more presentable, and immediately the tourist board inspected it and said that as the number of bedrooms was too small, it could no longer be called a hotel. It had been calling itself a hotel and giving good fare for over 25 years. It does seem rather unfair that something like this should happen. The person concerned accepted the tourist board's decision and had to remove the sign "hotel". It is very hard luck on those who have been in business for many years without a complaint, and they should get some consideration when things like this happen.

Deputy Mullen referred to the question of further hotels that were going to be built in and around Dublin. I agree entirely with his comment that the hotel bed-nights which were available last year and the year before were not fully availed of and that additional hotels, particularly top-class hotels are not required at the present time. There is no demand for them in and around Dublin, and therefore the Minister should not encourage the building of those hotels until there is a clear demand for them.

However, there is demand throughout the country for the smaller type, middle-class hotel, and the building of these should get every encouragement possible. I must again refer to the fact that it does not seem to have penetrated to the people who run the tourist industry that the vast majority of people who come here on holidays fit into two classifications: the Irish people returning here on holiday and the working-class or middle-class British tourist who comes here and spends money freely. We have a myth here that our tourist industry depends on American dollars and that the Americans come here in tremendous numbers spreading their "greenbacks" all over the place. The people in the hotel business and who know it well are prepared to give any evidence that is necessary that, while we welcome any type of tourist who is prepared to pay his way, the suggestion that these people are the backbone of the tourist industry is all cod.

This has been proved by such an organisation as Butlins Holiday Camp in my constituency to which so many cross-Channel people come, and spend quite a lot of money not alone in the camp but in the neighbourhood and here in Dublin city. Butlins carry out their own type of tourist attraction and they are able to bring tourists here and look after them. They have proved that the middle-class type of accommodation is what is required, and this is evident from the fact that this year, and last year similarly, when other people were complaining of the shortage of tourists, Butlins had almost all their bed-nights occupied, and paid for.

There is a great deal of dissatisfaction in regard to some of the services operated by CIE. I want to repeat a complaint which I made here on a number of occasions. The failure to synchronise the CIE but services with the train services, where that is possible, continues to mystify me. Near where I live, there is a railway station. Some time ago a number of persons who were in the habit of travelling by train to that station and continuing their journey by bus, if they could catch the bus, or on foot, if they could not, complained to me that the bus left the station just as the train came in. They asked me to make representations to the people responsible. I did so, and it was pointed out to me that the train was due in at 8.25 and the bus was due out at 8.23fi but they indicated that they would endeavour to do something pretty quickly. They moved the departure time of the bus forward to 8.18 so that the people getting off the train would not see the bus leaving. The bus had gone before the peopl arrived and therefore the cause of complaint was removed. That type of action is extremely stupid. There is no reason why the train could not come on time and why the bus could not remain at the station for two or three minutes longer and thereby secure anything from two to ten fares which would help to reduce the deficit on CIE. I understand that this sort of thing happens throughout the country. I have seen evidence of it in my area. I made a complaint the result of which was as I have indicated.

In the city one hears complaints about CIE fares being too high. In the country they are absolutely ridiculous. I live six miles from Drogheda. For that six miles, the single fare is 2/10d. I can see no reason for such a high fare. If the fare were reduced, people would use the service who at the present time simply cannot afford to do so.

I had a question down the other day about the school bus service, of which CIE have a monopoly. Is there any special reason why a single deck bus carrying about 50 children, which is supposed to carry 40 or fewer, should travel on a route while at the same time a double-deck ordinary service bus travels behind it carrying about six people? Is there any reason why the children should not be allowed to use both buses? If there is not sufficient accommodation on one, accommodation is available on the other. The taxpayer is paying for the school bus service and I do not understand why CIE should issue instructions that the schoolchildren must use the school bus and that their ticket does not allow them to travel on the ordinary service bus unless they had been using the other bus before the introduction of the school bus service. This is the sort of stupid nonsense that gets the general public up in arms against CIE.

I should like the Minister to explain to me why certain railway stations have been closed down where there is a reasonable service. For instance, there is the Laytown-Bettystown station. On Sunday there is one train to Dublin and one train back very late at night. That is a seaside resort which is now built up to a population of about 1,250 people. There is no reason why the train facilities should be wthdrawn from them. Until this year, the trains stopped at that station, one going up in the afternoon and one coming back in the early evening. I cannot understand the decision of CIE to cancel that service. If nobody was using the service, their decision would be understandable but people were using it.

There is one matter in connection with which I blame the Minister more than anybody else. There are complaints at the present time about road traffic and the serious accidents caused by heavy vehicles on roads wrich are unable to carry them. As fas as the Minister and his Department close down railways, more heavy vehicles appear on the roads. They are a cause of loss and of death. It is unfortunate that this type of traffic should be allowed to build up. It is getting worse and will continue to get worse. An effort should be made to review the whole position of road versus rail services. Irreparable harm has already been done and will continue to be done.

The express buses are doing very well but would the Minister consider recommending to CIE to provide one or two extra stops on the journey? A stop of two or three minutes is of no great concern to persons travelling 100 or 150 miles. People who would be able to get a quick run to Navan or Kells are told that they cannot travel on the express bus as it is not scheduled to stop at these towns and these people then have to wait for a later bus while the express bus leaves with, perhaps, 12 passengers. A few extra stops might slightly discommode long-distance passengers but it would not be a very serious matter.

Perhaps the Minister will explain something? For some time past a programme has been televised by Telefís Éireann in which people are interviewed in and around O'Connell Street. Usually they are pedestrians or motorists. They are asked questions as to the traffic conditions. Many of them appear to know very little about the subject. The questions are framed in such a way as to suggest that there are too many cars in O'Connell Street and the persons interviewed usually finish by saying that they hope something will be done about it. Then a voice is heard to say: "And so do we" and the CIE sign appears on the screen.

Could the Minister tell me what is the object of that television advertisement and the cost of it? Is it the idea that viewers will get into the habit of accepting that private cars should not be allowed to run through O'Connell Street and that O'Connell Street should be reserved for CIE buses?

Over the last couple of weeks, the parking space in O'Connell Street has been reduced very considerably because of the fact that CIE buses are being parked down the city centre. I know no other city where public transport buses are parked in the city centre. Of course, we have to be different. Perhaps the Minister will comment on this intriguing matter?

There is one short comment that I should like to make with reference to the air services. I have figures here which I do not intend to go into because of the very great detail involved, which I have obtained in replies to questions over the past 12 months. Most of the money provided for replacement and repairs has been supplied by Vote of the House by way of loan or outright payment. I understand that with effect from this year the system is being changed, with the result that the air services are being allowed to find their own money, allowed to borrow from outside. The suggestion has been made to me that by the end of another two or three years, we may be in the peculiar position that our air services operating in and out of Irish airfields, carrying the Irish flag, will, in fact, be owned by somebody other than the State, and if the loans are made by non-nationals, that someone, some oil king or someone like that, may own our air services. I should like the Minister to comment on that because the information I have may not be correct.

Mr. S. Collins

It might be a bad investment.

Mr. James Tully

It might and it might not. The Jumbo Jets which we are to get in a year or so are also, I understand, likely to be financed by someone other than the Government, and most of the money may come from someone outside the country.

I should also like the Minister to reply to a question posed by Deputy Mullen. The Minister did not intervene at the time and when he is replying, I should like him to make a comment. Is it true that the operational profit shown by the air services is mainly made up of money received for the hire of two of the Irish planes to a company or companies in South America who take them in the off-peak season, use them for some months and return them at the end of that time, and then the Irish air service has to repaint them and put back the Aer Lingus sign on them before putting them back into service here? Is this true, and if it is, is it considered good business? It appears to be very like Irish Shipping which was intended to be responsible for the handling of goods through Irish ports and now in order to earn their keep, the ships have to be used as tramp steamers carrying whatever they can pick up from one port to another. These are not matters on which I am quarrelling with the Minister but I am anxious to get information so that I will know whether I am correct.

The Aer Lingus service is, in my opinion, the best air service we could get. That is generally admitted, no matter where one travels throughout Europe. I have one small complaint. Sometimes if you book through Aer Lingus to go abroad, you find that you may have to travel on some other airline and Aer Lingus do not take the responsibility for transferring you through the other airports. If you are in difficulties, you are referred to the air service on which you are travelling. After all, if you book through Aer Lingus, any complaint you have should be investigated by an Aer Lingus official. They should be responsible for seeing that your seat is available. That is something which might be brushed up. Admittedly it is a small point. Sometimes you find that the seats have got mixed up. When you are in a foreign airport, you may find that your seat is not there and when you try to check back with Aer Lingus, you are referred to BEA or to some other airline. It is a bit annoying and the only way it can be prevented is by Aer Lingus being responsible for their own passengers. If your seat is not available, an Aer Lingus official should make an investigation. Aer Lingus would be listened to far more quickly than an ordinary passenger.

I want to go back now to Bord na Móna. The other night I said that the peat consumed by the ESB was paid for at roughly half the production cost only. I should be glad if the Minister has had an opportunity of checking this figure. I am told that the generating stations are using peat and that the ESB pay half the production cost only. They are using half the total sales of Bord na Móna. At 31st March, 1967, they had used 48.1 per cent which was valued at £2,656,800. The total sales were £5,518,392. That is a big sum of money. Going back to a question I asked the Minister on 31st March, 1966, I find that the total repayable capital issued from State sources was £12,691,000. The interest paid on that amounted to £6,517,841. The amount of capital repaid over the same period was £2,165,422.

The extraordinary thing about this is that Bord na Móna appear to be the only firm which consistently attempted to repay capital and pay their interest up to date. In fact last year at 31st March, 1966, they repaid in interest £1,165,619. It was estimated that the interest payable in the following year on 31st March, 1967, would be £1,300,000. The last three half-yearly instalments of interest and capital repayments had to be met by borrowing because it was not possible to meet them out of earnings. As the Minister is aware, at a Bord na Móna meeting a few days ago, there was a request that the Department would allow the Board not to repay the interest until such time as they got out of their temporary difficulties. In view of the amazing effort which has been made by the Board to meet their commitments, I think the Minister should agree to that.

Bord na Móna employ a tremendous number of people in areas where there is practically no other employment. They produce home fuel and they export. I was wrong in my statement the other night that peat moss exports had dropped. My reason for suggesting that was that there was a small factory in my area which the Minister opened and from which peat moss was being exported. It closed down and I thought that the export of peat moss had dropped considerably. It appears that is not so. It appears they had a bumper year this year. I am very glad to hear it.

I would ask the Minister to give special consideration to the difficulties of Bord na Móna because it appears that of all the State companies and all the companies to which the State has lent money, Bord na Móna are the only company to date who have attempted to meet their responsibilities.

Mr. Childers

The ESB.

Mr. James Tully

But not on the same basis. If the Minister likes, I can give him some interesting figures about the ESB. The total amount paid to the ESB up to 22nd March, 1966, was £72,666,996 and the total repayment was £11,270,171. That appears to be very much less than the rate at which they might be expected to repay. There are some further figures, as I am sure the Minister is aware. Over a period the ESB have been attempting to repay but not on a comparable basis with what Bord na Móna has been repaying. I make the comment not because I decry the activities of the other State bodies but simply because I want to point out to the Minister that, if anybody has at the back of his mind any idea that Bord na Móna should be dealt with in a different way from that in which they have been dealt with up to now and that an effort should be made to cut down their activities, the Minister should not entertain that idea at all.

It is, I notice, proposed to introduce a new method of footing turf. From my own knowledge of this operation—I was born not very far from a bog—it would be necessary to have the turf in very wet condition before this proposed new system could be successfully operated. We are all, of course, hoping that the next season will be a fine one and it will not be necessary to cut any small sods.

Finally, I should like once more to say that I am grateful to the Minister for the effort he made this year to give the full facts to Deputies before the debate proper started. The notes have been a considerable help and I certainly appreciate his courtesy in making them available to me.

Mr. Briscoe

I should like to say at the outset how pleased I am to see the tremendous growth that has taken place in what might be described as "off season" tourism. There is without doubt a growing market here for the hunting and fishing type of holiday, which is becoming very popular, particularly on the Continent of Europe. Recently, when travelling through Tralee, I visited the type of hotel I hope to see springing up all over the country. I refer to the Mount Brandon hotel. It is an excellent hotel and it caters in particular for the off-season type of tourist.

Deputy Tully referred to hotel building in Dublin and he gave it as his opinion that there were sufficient hotels in Dublin to cater for all needs. I believe he is wrong in that. I understand grants are not available to anyone wishing to build an hotel in Dublin but there are varying degrees of grants for hotels throughout the country. It is my belief that within the next few years our tourist traffic will be double what it is at the moment. I hope we will be ready for it. The rate of growth is not as rapid here as it is in other European countries, such as Spain and Portugal, but the traffic it growing.

With regard to airlines, I shall not go into this in detail except to say that I believe we should open the flood-gates. I shall say no more than that. The emphasis should be—I am glad to see it is—on the building of hotels in the western areas. I should like to see more hotels in, for instance, West Cork. Sometimes people here make an amusing reference to Ballydehob. I saw Ballydehob recently; it is one of the most beautiful parts of Ireland. It is really magnificent. I hope it will thrive as a tourist attraction. I should like to see more hotels going up in regions like Ballydehob. here is no doubt that a great many people have never seen their own country.

A great many people have not seen our ancient monuments. Bord Fáilte, as the House is aware, is one of the sponsors of the Rosc exhibition. The success of that exhibition is, in my opinion, assured. I understand that busloads of children are being organised to see thest ancient monuments. One of the difficulties confronting Bord Fáilte as one of the sponsors was the interference — I describe it very definitely as interference—of the RDS. I was never more conscious of the need for a national exhibition hall in which exhibitions could be held without either interference in or dictation as to what one should or should not show and, at a later stage, I hope to make a case for such a hall. I cannot do so on this Estimate.

I agree with other speakers who argue that there is need for the less profitable bus routes. There is too much of a tendency on the part of CIE to pay too much attention to the routes that will pay. I am one of those who believe firmly that there is need for a ring route around Dublin. There are such routes in most major cities.

At the moment if someone wants to travel from Ringsend to Crumlin, he or she must take two buses. It should be possible to have a service right around the perimeter, particularly on Sunday, to facilitate people visiting hospitals, relatives and so on. I trust the Minister will deal with this particular matter when he comes to reply.

The container traffic is growing very rapidly. A number of companies engage in this traffic. I should like the shipping lines given permission to have containers that could go straight to the factory door of the particular firm an the firm's own trucks. I know of an instance where one company who wish to operate their own trucks cannot do so because CIE have a monopoly of trucking containers from the particular area as it is more than 15 miles from the city centre. I think it applies to other parts of Ireland as well. This particular company could operate this service, packing the containers at the factory, moving them to the docks on their own trucks and shipping them for 40 per cent less transport cost than CIE are charging. I feel that companies like this should be encouraged because with ever-increasing competition from adroad transport costs are one of the most important factors in keeping costs down.

I should like to make one comment about Dublin Airport where at the self-service café, where you just stand up and get a cup of coffee—you are not served by any waitress—there is a service charge. I think this is wrong and I know that it causes annoyance to many travellers who feel that the last halfpenny is being dragged out of them before they leave the country. They have to queue up for a cup of coffee and when they get it are charged a service charge. If the Minister examines this, I think he will find that there is a genuine grievance over this. I think it is wrong. Nobody minds paying the service charge when he is getting a service, but when he is not he feels that he is being robbed.

The last point I should like to deal with is the case of certain members of our society, old IRA veterans, who are still employed in State and semi-State bodies. I have had to deal with the case of a man who was well known in 1916 and who fought for this country and was prepared to die for this country, as many of his comrades did. He has been eworking in the ESB for many years. I appreciate that the Minister does not like to interfere with the internal working of the semi-State bodies. He likes to let people feel free to use their initiative. However, this is a case of a man who is aged 65. He was about to be retired and got two extensions of six months. Although I wrote a letter to the Chairman of the ESB pleading the man's cause and saying that he had given service to his country and should be allowed to remain on, I was told that two extensions were all that could be given to him. It was explained to me that this man had a good pension. The point was that this man did not want to retire. Some people just die if they are retired from work. They want to keep on going. I should like to see a more humane approach to those old IRA people who work in semi-State bodies. There are not many of them left. We pay a lot of lip service to those men and what they did. There are not many of them left and in 15 years they will be as rare as hen's teeth. I think that we should bend over backwards to facilitate them somehow. I know, and every member here knows, that the very people who are the chairmen and directors of those companies would not be so if it had not been for those men who went out and won freedom for this country, but it would be some civil servants from England who would be in the jobs.

Mr. James Tully

And they do not have to retire at 65 either.

Mr. Briscoe

I should like the Minister to have a word with the chairmen of the various semi-State bodies under his control to see if they can stretch a point as far as these people are concerned. Nobody will object and I am quite sure this is one case— Deputy Tully will tell me if I am wrong —where the unions would not object to those men holding somebody else out of a job because of the fact that they had given service to their country.

I wish the Minister's many Departments the very best of luck in the coming year and I know he is riding on the crest of a wave of great prosperity as far as many of the Departments he controls are concerned, certainly tourism. I should like to congratulate him and to tell him that I support him completely in all the plans which he has for the future years.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

I want to state at the outset that I am very disappointed that the Minister, in his opening speech, made no reference whatsoever to the recent announcement by the Minister for Education that the Government were examining the possibilities of extending the facilities of the Shannon development area to include Limerick and Ennis. This is something that, as the Minister well knows, I have advocated from these benches on numerous occasions. I publicly welcomed the announcement of the Minister for Education but we have had in the past fortnight the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the Minister for Transport and Power introducing their respective Estimates, two Ministers vitally involved in this proposal and neither of them has given any information or even referred to this proposal announced by Deputy O'Malley.

I am asking the Minister for Transport and Power, when he is replying to this debate, to tell us and the people of Limerick and the people in the Shannon region what exactly is taking place. The Minister on previous occasions here, in replying to debates on Transport and Power, has referred to the suggestion that I put forward that the linking up of Limerick, Shannon and Ennis was a logic development and something desirable.

I recall last year when the Minister not merely mentioned this matter when replying to the debate but he subsequently very kindly sent me a lengthy letter pointing out why such a development was not feasible. To be quite blunt about it, we in Limerick want to know whether or not the Minister for Education was bluffing. We want to know what the intentions are regarding this proposal. Is tithe intention to bring in Limerick and Ennis under the administration of a Shannon development company for the purpose of industrial development? If it is, I would support this move but in view of the fact that the Minister for Education made this announcement at the outset of a by-election campaign in an adjoining constituency and in view of the fact that the two Ministers concerned have made no reference to it in introducing their Estimates here in the House, we are, quite frankly, a bit sceptical about what exactly is intended.

I want to restate my views on this proposal and I can assure the Minister for Transport and Power, the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the Minister for Education that I will press and we are going to see to it as far as we can that this announcement of the Minister for Education will be implemented and implemented without delay. The Shannon Industrial Estate is undoubtedly making considerable progress. In fact, the Minister, when introducing his annual Estimates, has been able to report new factories and new trading concerns being added on each year. We find from the Minister's speech on page 27 that:

At 31st March, 1967, there were 18 manufacturing and 15 commercial firms operating at Shannon employing 3,244 persons of whom 1,908 were men. Eight new firms were established during 1966-67 and two firms ceased operations. 1,015,150 sq. feet of factory, warehousing and office space were completed or under construction compared with 908,000 sq. feet at 31st March, 1966.

Undoubtedly the expansion of industry at Shannon has been very satisfactory but a situation has been arising which should have been apparent years ago, that the Industrial Estate was expanding but was expanding at the expense of Limerick and perhaps Ennis. I am not qualified to speak on Ennis here but I am speaking on behalf of Limerick. The plain fact of the matter is that the inducements held out to industrialists at Shannon Airport have been such that an industrialist would be foolish to set up in Limerick where the facilities, grants and other inducements could not be compared with those offered at Shannon Airport. As a result, we have had various industries set up at Shannon and no industry established in Limerick in recent years.

I believe that, with the establishment of the 18 manufacturing industries and the 15 trading concerns at Shannon Airport, it is high time now to review the whole position. It is time to examine the potential of the Industrial Estate at Shannon from the point of view of further industrial expansion. It is more important still that the potential of the entire region should be examined. We thought in Limerick, when Deputy O'Malley made his announcement, that this was the intention of the Government and that the Minister for Transport and Power was examining the situation to see if it would be practical and possible to extend the inducements and facilities available at Shannon to Limerick city and to Ennis.

I believe this is a logical development. I believe that from the point of view of the development of the region as a whole there would be considerable advantages if Limerick city and Ennis could be drawn in with Shannon as one development region, because, as I understand it, the number of industrialists who have explored the possibility of setting up plants at Shannon far exceeds the number who have in fact decided to set up plants there. I am also informed that a number of industrialists who examined the attractiveness of Shannon and who subsequently decided that the Industrial Estate there was not suitable would have been very glad to set up in Limerick city if the same grants, inducements and other facilities were available there.

I have it on reliable authority that in at least two cases industrialists who went to Shannon and examined the potential there decided for certain reasons that this did not meet their requirements. In one case, the plant was established in another part of the country and in another case, the firm concerned did not establish a plant in any part of the country. If Limerick and Ennis were added on to Shannon, this south-western region could offer very great attractions, facilities and advantages to industrialists to set up industries there and it would put us in the position, in Limerick and Shannon, of being able to compete with other areas, particularly on the east coast who seem to be able to attract far more industries than we can in the south-west.

We are interested in this development in Limerick, and as a Deputy from Limerick, I certainly will support this measure, if and when it is introduced. The sooner it is introduced, the better it will be, because we are in the situation in Limerick where we have had a considerable amount of unemployment and redundancy and the whole situation from the employment point of view is critical. If Limerick were linked with Shannon from the point of view of industrial development, it would improve the situation considerably. This is a matter of extreme urgency.

Another thing I notice from the statement issued by the Minister, and the notes which he circulated to Deputies, which I found very useful, is that in relation to the Shannon Industrial Estate, when it was established, the idea was that the factories there would utilise air transport and that a considerable amount of freight traffic would offset the then decline in passenger traffic. The figures given by the Minister conflicts slightly what he stated in his opening speech in introducing his Estimate when he said that air freight traffic generated by the Industrial Estate represented one-half of the total traffic, whereas in the notes circulated, he said it represented one-third. Those figures are not at all satisfactory, particularly when you take into account the fact that the Industrial Estate at Shannon was established primarily to generate air freight traffic. In fact, the extraordinary thing is that we now find over the past couple of years that passenger traffic has increased substantially while at the same time air freight traffic has increased but not to the extent one would expect. The Shannon Industrial Estate has not made that contribution to the increase in air freight traffic one would expect.

I see in the notes circulated by the Minister that the terminal freight increased by 21 per cent since 1965 and I see also that he states that the percentage of this generated by the Industrial Estate is only one-third so that what this simply means is that despite the fact that we now have 18 manufacturing industries in the Industrial Estate and that we have a number of other trading concerns, 15 in all, two-thirds of the terminal freight traffic at Shannon is coming from outside the Shannon Industrial Estate.

I referred to this before on previous Estimates and I remember two years ago I made a case for extending the industrial grants and facilities at Shannon to Ennis and Limerick. I pointed out that both places have provided more air freight business for Shannon than the Industrial Estate. It is vitally essential that in future, when consideration is being given to industrialists who wish to set up plants at Shannon, one condition should be that the products it is intended to produce should be products which lend themselves to air transport. We know a number of industries in the Shannon Industrial Estate which lend themselves to air transport. The diamond company is one example and those products lend themselves to transport by air.

The pharmaceutical industry is another type of industry which is suited to air freight. These are industries which can use air transport very economically and efficiently. We have other industries at the Shannon Industrial Estate which load their products on trucks to and from Northern Ireland and deliver them to the ferries and so pass them on to Great Britain. Likewise, the raw material is brought back. We can argue as to whether or not the establishment of the Industrial Estate has been responsible to any great extent for the fact that the airport as such is in the thriving condition in which it is today. It would be, I presume, an interesting study but one which I have not time to carry out.

From his previous statements in the House, I got the feeling that the Minister did not look too favourably on extending the facilities of the Shannon Industrial Estate to Limerick or Ennis. He mentioned that there were considerable difficulties in the way of effecting this, but from what I can gather and from inquiries I have made, there is no very great obstacle in the way. I have no doubt about that whatsoever. I have already said that the inclusion of Limerick and Ennis on the same basis as the Shannon Industrial Estate would add considerably to industrial expansion in the Limerick region where industrial development is badly needed; in fact, much more so now than in any other part of the country.

Looking at the returns for the airport itself, as distinct from the Estate, I find that the figures in relation to passenger traffic are quite satisfactory. Table XVI of the — Minister's notes under the heading "Passengers", shows that there has been an increase of 20 per cent in terminal passenger traffic since 1965 and an increase of 184 per cent in terminal passenger traffic since 1960. While there has been this distinct increase in terminal passengers, there has been a considerable reduction in the number of transit passengers. Since 1965, the number of transit passengers at Shannon has fallen by 11 per cent and since 1960, it has fallen by 58 per cent. This might not seem significant but the net result is that it gives a total increase of 13 uer cent for passenger traffic since 1960, and an increase of ten per cent since 1965.

These figures are much more significant than might perhaps seem from the table. This would indicate the growing importance of Shannon as a terminal airport and that more and more passengers coming into Ireland are terminating their flights at Shannon. In fact, as far as I am aware, although the Minister has not given any figures, the number of transatlantic passengers coming to Ireland from the United States by our national airline continue to increase and well over 50 per cent of those passengers leave the planes at Shannon and terminate their journey there. It would seem, then, that Shannon is being used more and more as the international air terminal by transatlantic passengers.

This leads me to the old argument and the old bogey. I am glad the Minister mentioned it and reiterated the Government's views on the matter. I refer to the continual pressure by the American airlines to get permission to land at Dublin Airport. It also leade me to another matter which is mentioned in the Minister's speech and which, I think, can be taken in the context of the utilisation of Shannon as an international air terminal. The Minister said that plans were being made for extending Dublin and Shannon Airports, to cater for the Jumbo Jets, and the Boeing 747s. These giant monsters of the air will be coming in here in 1971 and Aer Lingus have ordered two.

We will have to look at this whole question realistically. If the figures furnished by the Minister show that an increasing number, or proportion, of the people coming into this country from the United States land at Shannon Airport, I finfid it har to justify the vast expenditure at Shannon and the vast expenditure at Dublin to prepare both airports for the advent of the Jumbo Jets. It would be, and it certainly can be argued, much more rational to extend the facilities at Shannon if, as the Minister said in his speech, Shannon is our international airport. Commonsense then should dictate that we extend the facilities at Shannon and extend that airport to cater for the Jumbo Jets.

I cannot see, and I certainly find it hard to believe, that money is so plentiful that the Government can afford to expend such a vast amount in duplicating facilities at two airports. These aircraft will carry 300-400 people. The manufacturers and some of the American airlines—Pan-Am, TWA and others—want to have the number of passengers reduced in those aircraft, but it will mean that 300-400 people will arrive. To extend facilities, at any one of our airports, to cater for that number of passengers will cost a vast amount of money.

I was at Shannon Airport three months ago when a charter flight from New York touched down on a particular type of aircraft, a DC8 or a stretched version of the DC8, carrying 178 passengers. One hundered and seventy-eight passengers came off that plane at Shannon. I had an opportunity of studying the handling facilities there—customs clearance and all the other factors involved in clearing passengers from an aircraft. I noted the difficulties involved and realised that if this had been a plane carrying a far larger number of passengers, the difficulties would have been doubled or trebled. Therefore, when the Jumbo Jets come in in a few years, carrying many times that number of passengers, preparations involving vast outlay will have to be made.

The place to start with such preparations is Shannon Airport. While I am on this matter of preparing our airports for the Jumbo Jets, I wish to remind the House that the Minister has told us that a firm of consultants has been enganged to examine the improvements necessary to Dublin Airport. In reply to a question by me a couple of weeks ago, he said that plans were in course of preparation for improving facilities at Shannon. These is considerable doubt among the epople in the Shannon area about the intentions of the Government in this respect and perhaps the Minister will tell us why, if it was necessary to engage consultants to examinethe facilities at Dublin, it was not necessary to carry out the same examination in regard to Shannon.

I wish to say also that the people directly concerned at Shannon and those in the immediate neighbourhood have not much confidence in the Department of Transport and Power in the matter of dealing with problems connected with the airport. For instance, I raised last summer in the Dáil a situation which occurred at Shannon Airport at the peak period of traffic, the peak of the tourist season in July. At that time workmen were engaged on a reconstruction job in the duty-free shop Passengers landing there had to shop to the accompaniment of pneumatic drills, hammers and all sorts of other noises. Why it was not possible to have had this work done during the seven or eight months of the off season and why it had to be prolonged into the summer season, I cannot explain. The Minister did not explain it to me in reply to my question, beyond saying that such things happen. There the several months between October and May when necessary improvements should be carried out, and if the Minister's Department bungle a job like that, can he blame us if we have no confidence in the Department's ability to prepare the Airport for Jumbo Jets?

We require more information about the Minister's plans to prepare Shannon for larger aircraft. We need details. I emphasise again that the Minister will have a big job convincing the House and the people of the country that it is necessary to equip two airports to cater for larger aircraft. I do not know whk Shannon cannot be used as the transatlantic terminal, with feeder services to Dublin. This question reverts to the position at the beginning when Shannon should have been designated as the terminal for all transatlantic flights of Aerlínte. If that had happened originally, we should not now be subjected to the pressure we are having from Pan-American and other airlines to fly direct to Dublin.

I am not familiar with the technicalities of aviation but looking at it from the commonsence point of view and assuming that 60 per cent of the people coming to Shannon disembark there and that only 40 per cent go on to Dublin, one can see that when the monster aircraft begin to fly to Shannon and 250 out of their 400 passengers alight at Shannon, it is nonsensical to send these huge aircraft the extra 100 miles with the remainder of the passenger load.

As I have said. I am glad to see that the Minister and the Department are realistic in their attitude to the application of the American airlines to fly into Dublin Airport. However, we must be prepared for further efforts by the Americans. In recent weeks, during which I had not much time to read the newspapers, I remember seeing a heading to the effect that the President of TWA or Pan-Am, or some spokesman for one or the other stated emphatically in Dublin that this airline would be utilising Dublin Airport in the summer of 1968. He went further and said he was so confident of this that his company's timetables were now being prepared and that the times of landings and departures were being printed. This is the type of high-pressure salesmanship we associate with the States and I hope nothing will happen to make the Minister back peddle in his attitude because it would be disastrous from the point of view of the high investment in tourism and in other spheres in the Shannon region, if the American airlines were allowed into Dublin. I sincerely hope it will be possible to give the final answer to the Americans —to tell them that with the advent of larger aircraft, Shannon will be the international air terminal and that feeder services will be provided to Dublin, Cork or elsewhere.

There are numerous matters in relation to the Shannon Development Company and to the airport itself to which I wish to refer. Perhaps I am more familiar with the situation there than most other Deputies and this perhaps explains my devoting such a large part of my contribution to this debate to it.

I have referred now to the Industrial Estate at Shannon, to passenger traffic at the airport and to air freight traffic. There is another aspect of the work of the Shannon Development Company which I think does not get the credit it deserves. I am not in any way reflecting on the Minister. I know he appreciates it and has often commented on it. I refer to the work the Shannon Development Company are doing in the field of tourism in the south-west. As one who has had close contact with the tourist section of the Shannon Development Company, I want to express my appreciation of and to pay tribute to the staff in the tourist section of the Shannon Development Company for the tremendous work they have been doing over the past few years. Many people think the only contribution the Shannon Development Company have made to tourist development in the south-west is a medieval banquet at Bunratty Castle and very often slighting remarks are passed on this particular event. I believe Bunratty Castle and the medieval banquet have been a tremendous success. Some people call it a gimmick: it may be, but facts are facts and the results speak for themselves. Bunratty has proved an outstanding tourist attraction and the medieval banquet has gone from success to success, to such an extent that it is becoming a "must" particularly with American visitors and, more recently, I am glad to say, with English visitors.

The Folk Village at Bunratty is attracting an increasing number of people. I had occasion to spend a day there during the past summer examining the whole set-up. I was quite pleased with what I found. However, it is not merely in the matter of promoting Bunratty Castle that the Shannon Development Company have made their mark on tourism but in other fields as well. I refer now to the increasing numbers of anglers coming to the Shannon region in recent years. I have been closely associated with the Shannon Development Company in developing angling. I made two trips to Britain in recent years to promote, as best I could, the coming of people for an angling holiday to this country. We are fortunate that that region has angling facilities second to none. We have sea-fishing off the coast of Clare and, in the Shannon Estuary, there is game fishing and coarse fishing. The Shannonside Regional Tourist Organisation is, I am glad to say, over the past few months devoting more attention to the angling potential of the region.

The Shannon Development Company have done a good job in tourist development but there is much more that can be done. I sincerely hope that, if we reach the situation in which Limerick, Shannon and Ennis become one industrial development region, this region will also become one development region for the purposes of tourism. I know the Shannonside Regional Company and the Shannon Development Authority work in close co-operation but, of late, people in Limerick feel—I cannot say whether or not there is justification for their complaints—that the Shannon Development Company is forgetting Limerick to a certain extent. Castles have been opened along the west coast. A number of angling centres have been opened in Clare and elsewhere. There is a feeling in Limerick that much more might be done and that much more tourist business could be directed to Limerick from Shannon Airport, thus generating more business there.

I would remind the Minister that we have King John's Castle in Limerick. We have outstanding angling facilities, particularly coarse angling, within five minutes of Limerick city centre at a place known as "the Plassey". We have one of the best game fishing centres in the country at Castleconnell, a few miles out from Limerick. A certain amount of work has been done to develop these centres. I hope it will be possible to give more attention to the Limerick area in the coming season. I think there was a bit of a row, during the early part of last season, between some representative body in Limerick—possibly the Chamber of Commerce—and the Shannon Development Company. What was wrong was that CIE tours from Shannon Airport were not coming into Limerick to enable the tourists to spend money there and to have a meal.

I have always held the view that the future of Shannon Airport depends on the development of the Shannon region, that is, the development of the potential of Limerick city, Limerick county and Clare county. I believe this region forms a natural development area not merely for industry but also for tourism. I am convinced that if the main functions of the Shannon Development Company are extended to include Limerick and Ennis—and perhaps all of County Limerick—it will benefit the region industrially. It will bring a far greater number of tourists into the area and, in the final analysis, will generate much more traffic at Shannon Airport.

While I am on this question of Shannon, I would refer to some points made by the Minister in regard to Aer Lingus. Judging from reports supplied by the Minister, Aer Lingus seems to be making reasonably good progress. I would remind him of a matter I raised in this House on a number of occasions. The last time would be about July, when the Parliamentary Secretary replied. There is a demand for a scheduled service between Birmingham and Shannon. I was informed last July that the information Aer Lingus have leads them to believe that such a service would not be economic. The Parliamentary Secretary did undertake at the time to ask Aer Lingus to carry out a detailed examination of the potential. I am familiar with Birmingham and I have had close contacts with a number of Irish organisations over there and I have been informed, when over there in recent years, that Irish people from the south and south-west regions have been enquiring why they cannot fly direct to Shannon from Birmingham. Statistics which were supplied to me by the Federation of Irish Societies in the North of England indicated that 60 per cent of the Irish population in Birmingham come from the south and west. I would ask the Minister to contact Aer Lingus again and ask them to examine the possibilities of having a direct service from Birmingham to Shannon.

The Limerick Junior Chamber of Commerce have taken up this matter and at their request their counterpart in Birmingham, the Birmingham Junior Chamber of Commerce is carrying out an examination into the matter. All the information I have leads me to believe that there is a demand for this service. In addition to facilitating our exiles coming home on holidays, and making it easier for them, such a scheduled service would increase the number of tourists coming into the region. In the English midlands there is a colossal potential market of angling tourists and our south-western region offers outstanding facilities for them.

Mr. O'Hara

What about a service between Birmingham and Castlebar?

Mr. T. O'Donnell

We will have a feeder service to Castlebar. I apologise for not mentioning Castlebar before. I realise there is an airport there. The Minister referred to the fact that Aer Lingus was rationalising its fleet and I note that it is intended to sell Viscounts and BAC One-Elevens and that they were going over to Boeings. That is a very desirable development but I wonder why this could not have been foreseen when the BAC One-Elevens were purchased. I recall clearly that at the time I questioned the Minister and he put forward what I thought were convincing arguments in support of Aer Lingus purchasing the BAC One-Elevens. It has now been proved beyond all doubt that the corresponding Boeing aircraft are far superior and more suited to our requirements. Perhaps the Minister could give us some additional information in regard to the prospects for selling the BAC One-Elevens and the Viscounts. As far as I know, the Carvairs have not yet been sold.

Mr. S. Collins

Will they ever be sold?

Mr. T. O'Donnell

Perhaps he will tell us what efforts have been made to sell these aircraft and what they are likely to realise. The Minister referred to the Shannon Repair Service in his speech and he stated that with his approval Aer Lingus have taken over that company. The Shannon Repair Service has had an up and down history. On a number of occasions I have made representations to the Minister regarding this enterprise. While I would express my appreciation of the efforts he made on a number of occasions, unfortunately on the last occasion he was not able to do anything to solve difficulties which arose when a number of apprentices who had finished their training and had become fully qualified mechanics could not be retained by the company. I presume efforts have been made to secure business for the Shannon Repair Service. Frankly, I am not very happy about the fact that Aer Lingus have taken over the company. I made inquiries in certain quarters and I was told that business is available and could be obtained if they went about it in a proper way and that the company could be made a viable enterprise. However, I am also told that no serious effort was made to go after business.

I have also been informed, and the Minister can refute or confirm this, that when approaches were made some time ago to the Shannon Repair Service by a certain airline, the company did not show any interest in obtaining this type of business. Apparently the proposition was that this independent airline wanted a major overhaul carried out on a number of aircraft and the Shannon Repair Service were not interested. I should like the Minister to tell what efforts have been made by the company to obtain business so that the comparatively small number of workers can be kept in full employment.

In regard to CIE, we have the same old story again. In fact, when I took up my newspaper the other day I saw the same headlines appearing again. The Minister was ullagoning about the fact that all the CIE financial troubles were due to the workers and to strikes. He was also ullagoning about the fact that an increased subsidy would be necessary and that their losses were great. There is no Department of State, semi-State body or any other body about which there is so much confusion in the public mind than there is about CIE. They seem to be harping again and again on the fact that CIE is costing £2 million. Rarely is mention made of the economic and social returns to the country from that investment of £2 million. In the figures furnished by the Minister, we find there are 20,000 people on the payroll of CIE. If we take into account various factors, such as employment content, the amount paid by the workers in direct and indirect taxation and all the various returns to the Exchequer from the huge operation of CIE it could well be proved that this expenditure of £2 million is fully justifiable.

In CIE we are fortunate to have a national transport system as good as and better than most transport systems in Western Europe today. We are also fortunate that the 20,000 people working for CIE are as fine a body of workers as could be found in any industry in any country. I would ask the Minister to brush up on his public relations and his human relations, particularly in respect of his pronouncements in regard to CIE workers, the frequency of strikes ond so on. We forget the contribution CIE has made and is making to the tourist industry. I am fully satisfied that the £2 million subsidy to CIE is justified.

I noted in the returns furnished by the Minister that the number of rail passengers has dropped. I am wondering if it might be possible to use ways and means in addition to those already used to encourage more people to travel by rail. I am particularly keen on the idea of cheap weekend fares because they are very desirable. They used to operate on a monthly basis in former years and now I think they operate every fortnight. If these could be extended, they could be found to be a very good source of revenue to CIE. People from the country working in Dublin, particularly since the introduction of the five-day week, would have an opportunity of going home on Friday night and returning on Sunday night. I do not know on how many routes these cheap week-end excursions operate, but I feel they could operate not only once a fortnight but every week.

Deputy Cosgrave and Deputy Treacy referred to the horrible treatment meted out to a certain category of CIE pensioner. Every time this debate comes around, other Deputies and I have referred to these unfortunate people. In the period of six years I have been a Deputy, I have tabled a Private Member's Motion on two occasions in an endeavour to secure some measure of justice for these unfortunate people. There are approximately 1,000 CIE pensioners in receipt of a pension of £1 per week, some hundreds in receipt of 22/6d per week and others getting £2 11s. 3d. When those getting £2 11s. 3d reach the age of 70, their pension is reduced to £1 2s. 6. Time and again, when this question has cropped up, the Minister has sought to justify it because the person qualifies for a contributory old age pension at the age of 70.

I would appeal to the Minister, as I have done on many occasions previously, to make some effort before all these people are dead and gone to find a way of getting them the extra few shillings. It will not bankrupt the country or put CIE out of business. There is every argument in justice and fairplay for giving these unfortunate pensioners a reasonable pension at the end of their days. Many of them are over 70 years of age. I would go so far as to say that all the 1,049 pensioners receiving £1 per week are well over 70 years of age and many of them are 75. They have only a few years left. Surely the Minister could do something? He explained in reply to a Parliamentary Question recently that certain technical difficulties were involved. But, surely in the light of the injustice these people have suffered and the hardships they have had to endure on their miserable pittance of £1 per week, it would be possible to do something for them? In all sincerity I appeal to the Minister to take the initiative and give them something.

This Vote certainly covers a very wide field, and I have not yet said anything about Bord Fáilte. In his introductory speech, the Minister referred to the efforts being made to increase tourist accommodation and so forth. According to newspaper reports, Deputy Mullen referred to an appointment made by Bord Fáilte in recent months—the appointment of an individual as manager for North America. I am not going to say very much about this, but I want to go on record as saying that I disagree entirely and I object to any appointment of that nature to such a responsible post being made by a semi-State body without advertising the vacancy. This is undoubtedly one of the most important posts within the tourist industry in this country. It was deplorable and it leaves the Board or whoever is responsible wide open to suspicion that this post of £5,00 a year, I understand, was filled without being advertised. I sincerly hope it will not happen again. Beyond that I will not go. I object strongly to it. It certainly reflects no credit on whoever was responsible.

Minister for Transport and Power (Mr. Childers)

I should like to ask the Deputy is he repeating the allegation of Deputy Mullen or is he not? Which?

Mr. T. O'Donnell

I am stating it is entirely wrong——

Mr. Childers

I understand the Deputy, but I want to know is he repeating the allegation.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

——that a semi-State Body should make an appointment without giving everybody interested an opportunity of applying.

Mr. Childers

That is all the Deputy is saying? That is perfectly legitimate.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

That is the point I am making.

Mr. Childers

OK.

Mr. T. O'Donnell

I notice that considerable progress has been made in the development of the farmhouse type holiday. I am also pleased to note that the regional tourist company have, over the past few months, appointed field officers. When I was referring to this question of farmhouse holidays and the potential it had, I said that the people interested in providing this type of accommodation found it difficult to obtain the necessary information and advice. However, speaking for our own regional tourist company, the Shannonside, now that the additional field officers have been appointed, people who are interested in providing accommodation for tourists, whether it be by way of guesthouse or farmhouse, can more easily obtain the necessary advice and information. There is no doubt whatsoever that the farmhouse holiday idea is a good one. It has a tremendous potential, but it is vital to ensure that standards are maintained at a reasonable level.

With the provision of additional car ferries on the cross-Channel routes, the number of motoring tourists who will come into this country will increase considerably in the coming year. I am not at all happy about the recent announcement that CIE intend to erect motels in certain parts of the country. The provision of hotel, and guesthouse accommodation and tourist accommodation in general can be left to private enterprise, and private enterprise should be encouraged as far as possible to provide all these amenities and facilities.

Mr. Moore

Earlier tonight an Opposition speaker complimented the Minister on his Estimate speech, and I should like to be associated with those remarks. When we see a Minister coming here with an Estimate covering no fewer than 13 undertakings, any one of which would be worthy of a day's discussion, and when we see that such undertakings as CIE, Aer Lingus and Aer Línte are included, we can appreciate the tremendous task which faces the Minister over the year, particularly having regard to the fact that he is responsible, at least partly, for the failures or successes of these undertakings.

While I may offer criticism in regard to CIE, I am well aware that CIE is very often the target for uninformed criticism. It is a tremendous undertaking and it must be the biggest single employer of labour in the whole country, employing over 20,000 people. It serves the public and, therefore, it is bound to be criticised more than other organisations which are not in direct contact with the public all the time.

To start off with a bit of praise of CIE, in recent weeks many members of this House travelled south as far as Cork and had to come back from there in a rush to attend the House. Many availed of the train service from Cork and I think I can say with assurance that few railway companies in the world could equal this service. The condition of the train, the cleanliness, the approach of the staff, the cheap food, all these things would be hard to beat anywhere. The cheerfulness of the hostesses, the waiters, and the whole staff on the train made the journey well worth while, apart from anything else which came later in the week.

In Dublin city CIE face a tremendous traffic problem, but they cannot solve it themselves; they can only help by making suggestions. Recently, with the co-operation of the Garda Síochána, Dublin Corporation and CIE, new clearways were made through the city. They have helped traffic considerably and have speeded the bus services. Unfortunately, I am told that many business houses, particularly smaller shops, are losing trade for about two hours every day because of the clearways. The buses may stop but private cars may not park. While we welcome the clearways, perhaps the Minister, in his review of this, might be able to think of something which would ease the lot of the taxidrivers, who are complaining that they are being penalised by the new clearway bye-laws, and of the small shopkeepers who are also being hit.

Criticism is also levelled very much at Dublin Corporation. For instance, with the announcement recently that the Minister had decided to allow the corporation to close the Grand Canal for a temporary period, there has been not a great outcry but an outcry from certain sections against this act of vandalism, as they call it. These people must realise that Dublin is a living, booming city, that houses are necessary and in order to provide those houses we must buy the land; the land must be drained, and the Grand Canal is being used to lay the mains so that the land can be drained to build the houses. To my mind, the building of houses comes far before any aesthetic value of a canal. The City Council has given its word that this canal will be opened.

For those who criticise corporators at times, we would ask them to remember that we have no intention of turning this city into a museum. The city is made for people and it is our intention to make a good standard of living for those people. It is our intention in the City Council to give the people the highest standard of housing possible and if, in the meantime, we must hurt some sections, it is a case of the greater need being met. I have no intention of supporting any move that will hold up the housing drive. We have been told by our engineers in the corporation that it is absolutely necessary to lay these drains and that the canal is the most suitable place along which to lay them. The members voted for this closure happy in the knowledge that this canal will be reopened. A lot has been said about the canal as a tourist amenity. The part around the Shannon may well be but there is little tourist attraction in the city section. The Minister gave figures for employment on the canal; it has been halved in the last six years, so there cannot be great activity on the canal if employment has fallen so heavily.

I was referring to the city bus services and while I have praised CIE, I also criticise them for the condition of some of the vehicles on the road. I know that the vehicles are damaged a lot by schoolchildren who cut the seat fabrics and write remarks all over the bus. There could be supervision to stop this, and CIE should now take a lot of obsolete vehicles out of service. I received a letter this morning from an old lady in the city in relation to the No. 52 bus service, which is a single decker, driver-only service. Were it not for the help of the driver, the old people could not board the bus. This kind of thing gets CIE a bad name. Very little would put it right. I would ask the Minister to discuss this matter with CIE. Some of the buses are out of date, almost archaic. It is time that we had some new ones. Money spent in providing them will be money well spent.

The Port of Dublin is expanding rapidly, as is only natural in the case of the premier port but there are critics who claim that the port facilities should be decentralised. There are only two ports on the east coast capable of great development—Belfast and Dublin. For hundreds of years the Port of Dublin has been the principal port. It is being expanded by the erection of new docks and the provision of new facilities. It is only a few months since the B. & I. company asked the Dublin Port and Docks Board to provide a jetty for the new ferry service. The board acted so quickly that the jetty is nearing completion and will be completed in time for the operation of the new service.

Expansion of the port involved injury to the small body of men who earn a living or subsidise their earnings by salmon fishing in the Ringsend area. Dublin is probably the only capital in Europe with a fish bearing river running through its centre. The amount of salmon taken there is considerable but when the Port and Docks Board finish the new docks the fishing area will be restricted. Apart from the fact that it is illegal to fish in shipping lanes, it is a highly dangerous exercise. If the board cannot provide safe fishing grounds for these men, I hope the Minister will press the right of these men to compensation for the loss of their fishing grounds. The men concerned do not oppose the expansion of the port. Many of them belong to dockers' families and realise that there must be expansion if employment is to be maintained at the Port of Dublin.

The decasualisation of labour will take place at Dublin Port in a comparatively short time. The main trade union catering for the men is studying this problem realistically but there is all the more reason why Dublin must attract to itself suitable industries where redundant dockers can be gainfully employed in the port area. The Port and Docks Board have ruled that they will allow into the port area only large industries that are essentially port industries, that is to say, big manufacturing plants engaged in export or import for which dock facilities are required in order to keep transport costs low. I hope that in the near future there will be an announcement of considerable industrial development at the port so that dockers will know that in case of redundancy there will be employment there for them which will give them at least the same standard of living as they have had up to now.

The B. & I. Shipping Company and Irish Shipping now own 24 vessels. This is probably the greatest number of vessels Irish-owned since the State was founded. If, 20 or more years ago a native concern had attempted to start a shipping line, the venture would have been crushed immediately by foreign companies. This is the greatest argument for State enterprise. No private company could possibly have withstood the challenge of continental and cross-Channel interests. When Deputy Seán Lemass founded Irish Shipping he showed the way to build up the shipping of the country. The Minister in his day has seen the B. & I. Company become a semi-State concern.

Mr. S. Collins

In view of the very interesting statements being made by Deputy Moore, we should have a quorum to hear him.

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

Mr. Moore

I come now to the question of the maintenance of these 24 vessels. If all repairs to these vessels were carried out in yards in the 26 Counties most of these yards would be assured of a high level of employment. In the Dublin harbour area there is a dry dock which is as good as any in these islands but, unfortunately, so far it has attracted very little work. The facilities available there should be advertised abroad. Belfast is noted for its shipbuilding, as is Cork, but Dublin which has a tradition in this industry has not done so well in recent years. The Minister should impress on B. & I. and Irish Shipping the importance of having repairs carried out in Irish yards, particularly yards which are not as heavily subsidised as others. Dublin dockyard is not subsidised at all. That yard is not having a good period at the moment. It could do with a lot more work. The fear has been expressed that unless they get more work it will be taken over by some cross-Channel firm, in which case its ultimate fate would be obscure.

Bord Fáilte are doing excellent work but, while they should try to attract American tourists, right beside us there is a market of 50 million people who will come here in greater numbers if we can attract them. In Britain angling has the biggest active following of any sport. We can offer great attraction to anglers. We should press home the great attraction we have in the still unpolluted rivers of this country. It would be well if Bord Fáilte had a department dealing with this aspect alone. It would bring in here the ordinary English workman who does not want high standards but expects cleanliness and comfort in the hotels, and a river to fish in. Any amount of money we might expend on this would considerably boost our trade.

Anyone who travels around the country knows the terrible billboard alleys which exist. They are an appalar ling sight. In the small and the major towns we see the most frightful advertisements with bad design, and they are horrible in their total appearance. This is not a matter for the Minister, but Bord Fáilte should make representations to the appropriate Minister to have this kind of thing stopped. It is very galling to drive along the roads and see these frightful advertisements, mostly by oil companies, tobacco firms and local publichouses and hotels. Hotels must advertise but they should do so in the proper way. If every person passing along made a vow not to stop at the hotels advertised, or not to buy the drink advertised or the oil advertised, a stop would soon be put to this. Parts of the country are in a frightful state because of these bill-boards.

Acting Chairman (Mr. Cunningham)

That is a matter for another Minister.

Mr. Moore

Bord Fáilte should take an interest in this matter. There has been tremendous publicity in recent years about the inadequacies of public toilets. While they do not compare with the cross-Channel ones, they are ahead of the Continental ones.

(Interruptions.)

Acting Chairman

This also is a matter for another Minister, the Minister for Local Government.

Mr. Moore

I am speaking about hotels generally. This is a serious matter and should get a lot more publicity.

While Aer Lingus are doing a tremendous job, and while the Minister's attitude to the airlines operating here is the right one for the country, the years ahead will bring a great challenge when the bigger planes arrive. I am told by a competent person that we will have a great problem when the supersonic planes start flying. We will have a new health hazard when the supersonic boom becomes a reality here. We have great faith in Aer Lingus that they will do their best to extend the airways. The Minister is an authority on airways so I think the future is quite bright.

The Minister's estimate is a most illuminating document and it emphasises the great need for more State investment. Where private enterprise has failed or will not take on the job, it is the duty of the Government, and this Department in particular, to press forward with State-aided schemes such as Bord Fáilte, Bord na Móna, Aer Lingus and others. In that way lies the surest policy for the prosperity of this State.

Mr. S. Collins

This is undoubtedly a very substantial Estimate and the range of the Minister's authority is both diverse and complex. In the remarks I have to make I do not intend to go outside the limit of a number of concerns and I will try to deal adequately with them. I shall start off where Deputy O'Donnell left off, and not in any spirit of personal criticism or abuse. The public want an explanation as to why a very responsible post in Bord Fáilte was filed without the normal type of advertisement and competition. It may well be that the Minister has very good and sound reasons to advance as to why this should have been done. He would be doing a service by allaying the suspicions which were aroused if he can do so.

Bord Fáilte have become a very significant part of the tourist industry and they have substantial control over a certain type of development. They have very wide powers. The Minister should exercise spot checks on some of the weird decisions they are capable of making. I have personal experience of an establishment in this country known to the Minister and regarded as the supplier of some of the very best food in the world which has been nonchalantly graded by our friends in Bord Fáilte as a grade B guesthouse. This place which is the size of a substantial country hotel has earned international praise and the accolade of no less a person that Miss Nichols for the quality and presentation of the food. She regards it as the best she met in this country, and among the best in this end of the world.

I am suspicious that Bord Fáilte are harnessed to the wrong outlook on tourism. I am inclined to believe that the supply of luxury grade A type tourist accommodation is satisfactory and that we are not putting emphasis on the real potential of tourism which is reasonably priced accommodation with cleanliness, adequate hygienic facilities and good quality Irish food— not menus with hieroglyphics in an unintelligible language, be it pidgin French or anything else. There is no doubt that we learned a lesson this year which our hoteliers are assessing very minutely. One can price oneself out of the tourist market. One can go a little bit too far and drive the tourist back to trying to find a more reasonable price level and more reasonable accommodation elsewhere.

Outside of our returning emigrants the main strength of our tourism lies in the British middle-classes. I represent an extensive tourist area, a progressive, developing tourist area, in West Cork. It is an area which caters for every type of tourist and tourists have become an integral part of the summer life of the area. They do not demand superlative standards. They demand adequate comfort and cleanliness and reasonably good Irish food at prices within their capacity to pay.

Bord Fáilte have a glorious capacity for over-advertising what is already advertised and for avoiding advertising places of simplicity and beauty. It is possible that my speech on this Estimate may read like a conducted tour of West Cork from Glandore through Union Hall, on to Baltimore, into Roaring Water Bay, to Mizen and back to Bantry Bay, but that does not alter the fact that we have in that area not only the most likeable and hospitable people but some of the most beautiful, unspoilt scenery in the world. In my opinion it is unrivalled. I am, I suppose, slightly biased. Bord Fáilte would be better engaged in developing the type of accommodation that will attract the middle-class tourist, even if that accommodation is suitable for only two or three, or perhaps one family. The travel agents in England look upon such accommodation very highly. That is the kind of accommodation sought by those who save fairly substantial sums for a two or three weeks holiday in the summer.

I am glad to see further development of car ferry facilities. The existing ferries have brought about a valuable increase in the numbers of tourists. I have heard complaints about overcharging but I am proud to be able to say that I have yet to hear any complaint of any consequence in relation to the accommodation provided in my area, be it the luxury accommodation at Glengarriff or the simpler type of accommodation for the sailor and the fisherman.

Bord Fáilte will have to be slanted in the right direction. Any industry depends in the main on the middle-classes and the working-classes. Tourism is no different. These are the people who are the good spenders. We should recognise that sector in our tourist industry if we intend to maintain tourism at its present level or develop it still further so that it will become an essentially enduring part of our economy. Tourism is significant from the point of view of balancing our economy.

The notions of Bord Fáilte are highfalutin and chaotic. I suppose they are entitled to an odd holiday to see what the rest of the world is doing, but I would prefer to see them getting down to the reality of our immediate problem, namely, the improvement of the accommodation in farmhouses and so on. It would be much better to give small grants to these people rather than advance large sums for the construction of expensive hotels or motels. The reason why State enterprise is now entering into this field of activity is that private enterprise appreciates that saturation point has been reached where the luxury accommodation is concerned. When the figures for this year are broken down it will be interesting to see how much of our tourist income will have come from the elements I have described. I believe Bord Fáilte could by a change of emphasis make grants available to give those interested an opportunity of developing farmhouse accommodation. If that is done with the necessary impetus that type of holiday will become a very effective part of our economy.

The ESB is a very complex network. In the initial stages of rural electrification certain people refused connection. I know the Minister has a very personal interest in the Beara Peninsula.

I want to direct his attention to the fact that there are several pockets of 12, 14, and 15 homes in Garnish, Allihies and other areas now urgently seeking connection. When one considers the nature of the terrain out there, the hardships and the difficulties of people in that isolated peninsula, I think the Minister will readily appreciate that they have a very special case for early and special consideration. I am being harried and pressed over the last 15 or 16 months by groups of people in the Faha, the Garnish and the Allihies area for a speeding up. Many of them have already been assessed and the fixed charges which will be very substantial have been made known to them but even with all these difficulties they are still prepared to carry on and they are now pressing for the connection. I would ask the Minister without undue favouritism to anybody to have a review of what can be done in what I describe as these áiteanna iargúlta. They are far away in very difficult circumstances. It is impossible for people in the Dáil who are not aware of the West Cork situation to realise that these places I am talking about are actually over 100 miles away from Cork City. They are out in the next parish to America, out in lonely, wave-battered, windswept areas and the comfort that will be ensured for these people with this connection and the aid it will be to them in their pig production, in their calf rearing and in their small mixed farming is readily appreciable by anybody who knows the situation in the West or in parts of Kerry or West Cork.

I would ask the Minister to also take into consideration the possibility of speeding up certain areas around Ballyvourney, Coolea and Reenasagart which is Fíor-Ghaeltacht and in which the teanga dhútchais is the teanga dhútchais. I would make an urgent personal plea on behalf of those people that they might get at the earliest possible date the convenience of this connection because in this kind of isolated place where the ESB have difficulties because, as I said before, in the initial stage in the unenlightened state of many people connections were refused they have now become a matter of urgency to try to keep people within the confines of those areas and we know perfectly well that any luxury or any help that can be given to them is well worthwhile not only from the national or the linguistical point of view but also from the point of view of the social benefit to keep those people in rural Ireland.

One could be very critical of Bord na Móna and its association with the ESB. The Minister should be very frank with the House as to whether or not, in fact, the ESB is being used as the consumer of uneconomic fuel produced by Bord na Móna. If he can justify it on the basis of the social benefit of the employment that Bord na Móna is giving or the potential of the development that Bord na Móna is trying I think the criticism of this House will be helpful and realistic. However, to try to cover up concealed subsidies to bolster up uneconomic expansion is not the way to get around the problem. I would say perfectly honestly that there is nobody who would like to see Bord na Móna going from strength to strength more than I would. I would love to feel that we would be able to exploit our native fuel, develop all kinds of good grass-growing lands or seed-carrying lands from cutaway bog. Nobody would be more anxious than I to see that this enterprise got full scope if I could get some realistic assurance that we were not, willy-nilly, on a path of extravagant expenditure for no result.

I think we need to review in a very deliberate kind of way our thinking. There must be some exploitable way of getting economic production of turf. We all know that fuel for consumption in the domestic area is very expensive whether it be coal, turf, timber or briquettes. If efficiency of production led to any practical reduction in cost to the consumer Bord na Móna would find themselves getting a bigger and greater share of the market. However, when you have the laissez faire type of arrangement that has been revealed by the examination and counter-examination of the accounts of Bord na Móna and the accounts of the ESB, we know that a certain amount of the impetus that is necessary for this keen production is gone. We also know that where bolstering up on the national funds is readily available the impetus of sustained hard work quickly disappears. I shall not go beyond that in criticism. The time has come for us to stand back and for somebody to analyse and review and give a proper assessment of where Bord na Móna is going and what its real potential is so that we can in this House in a responsible way decide what its future will be.

I agree with Deputy Moore, who was here a few moments ago, that CIE can too readily become the target of uninformed criticism perhaps but there is no doubt that there are many complex problems in relation to it that we must constantly stress. Like Deputy O'Donnell, I shall also make an appeal for the ever-diminishing band of pensioners who have pittances after their service in CIE. I know it can be argued with great vehemence that times have changed and that these people when they went in to work in the various branches of the old railways before they became CIE had not anything like the conditions that are there nowadays but when the numbers are comparatively small as they are and getting smaller I do not think it would strain the conscience of the nation or burst the purse to give them some reasonable consideration, even if it is only by way of a grant for their lifetime to enhance the pittance they are getting. Mind you, to my mind there is something esoteric about this concept, when they reach pensionable age, of taking back something of their pension from them because they are getting a contributory pension which has been earned by them by virtue of the fact that they were insured people for the requisite period during their lifetime. It is very hard to justify that to a man who is living at subsistence level because the old age pensioners in this country, no matter how much we laud our social services, are very much on the subsistence level. We all shout at Budget time to ameliorate their lot but when we view without passion the kind of service and the effective usefulness CIE has been to the nation those people merit special consideration.

I seldom say much in favour of the Government but it was a great source of pleasure to me in the summertime to see the old age pensioners were reaping to the full the benefit of free travel in certain circumstances during the week. It was good to see them in Ballycotton, Schull and other places enjoying themselves throughout the day. I wonder if we could ever consider the person who has to retire at 65 years of age and whether we would consider the possibility, or whether the Minister for Transport and Power in discussion with the Minister for Finance, would consider the possibility of extending those benefits to this type of person. Many of them are on small pensions and they are in the same category as old age pensioners. They have retired from full active work; they have time on their hands and would be very anxious to avail of the facilities given to old age pensioners either in connection with the ESB or in regard to travel facilities.

I mention those as they come within the ambit of the Minister and I ask that before Budget time comes along, we would consider something that was just an oversight. The old age pensioners were a readily ascertainable class because they had pension books but we overlooked the fact that there was a large number of other people who should enjoy those facilities. I am thinking in particular of gas employees and retired employees of the ESB who would readily appreciate the extension of those facilities to them.

A lot has been said about Irish Shipping. I have always had tremendous reservations about Irish Shipping and they are becoming more and more deep-seated when it is realised that Irish Shipping are now only a misnomer, that they are really an international commercial charter line. Some of our new ships are delivered directly to charter services and the goods now carried by Irish Shipping in the form of Irish exports or imports are negligible compared with what they should be. I have always wondered and I still wonder how it is that we can hire those big freighters for carrying grain, slag or bulk cargo all over the world and that we were never able to enter into the type of trade that was necessary for us in the form of decent cattle vessels and vessels designed to effectively and reasonably transport our goods, a very large bulk of which are only for cross-Channel.

I may have been raising a hornet's nest when I felt many years ago that Irish Shipping should have replaced British Railways. Maybe I am expecting too much if I ask that our ships and our State shipping line be given priority and preference and that we buy the type of vessels that will deal with our trade and our business because, blow hot or cold all you like about the B & I and the other shipping lines, they are all running into a hell of a tough time. Expertise and very careful planning will have to go into routing their services and the type of ships if we are to survive in the market with Irish Shipping at all.

Remember, Irish Shipping now virtually embraces the B & I, which is Irish shipping, and a substantial part of Palgrave Murphy, which is held by them. One talks about it but one has to realise that they are not paying back the enormous sums of interest that are due. They are not able to earn it to pay it back. We have got to face the problem of writing it off and making this company a practical reality as a commercial entity or continue more subsidies to a charter service for the rest of the world which, of course, is all cod.

I sympathise with the Minister in this because the range, extent and scope of his management is immense. Of course, there is the endemic disease in relation to all State companies under his control. The real incentive for money making is not there and they tend to become concerns overloaded with expertise, time and motion personnel and all kinds of upper echelon bracket administrative staff that have very little reality or justification in relation to a normal commercial business.

Now that the Minister has come back and I am very nearly ready to conclude, I want to reiterate something I said when he was out because I know he has a very deep seated personal interest in the Beara peninsula. I was explaining that there are a number of isolated pockets back towards Faha, Garnish and Allihies where there are quite a number of people who were refused connection, and where there is now a very big upsurge of desire for supply. I was about to ask him to make a special case to the ESB that remote areas would be connected as quickly as possible. Every comfort we would give in those areas would be readily appreciated and the quicker the better.

Let me conclude on that note. Most of the State companies have now had their growing pains. The ESB in a very special way has justified all our confidence, despite the fact that it was at one time the bitter plaything of controversy. I think the time has come to take an objective view of Bord na Móna and see where it is going and how it can get there.

I think the re-equipment programme has improved the CIE earning capacity and ultimately I hope it will stabilise itself on its now limited subsidy.

Irish Shipping, the charter pool and the charter market, warrant very deep scrutiny. The time has come to appraise in a realistic way what the future of the bigger type of ships we now have out on charter will be, with a regrouping of our ships in a different way and getting rid of the ships that will not fit into the type of development into which the experts think Irish Shipping should go.

As I said earlier, there is now an integration between Irish Shipping, the B & I and Palgrave Murphy, because there is a deep-seated State interest in all of them. Let us have a look at what their combined potential is, gear ourselves to meet effectively that potential and deal with the problem of our own imports and exports and to what extent we can carry them on our ships before we start, as we have started in a very big way, to become charter ships of an international character carrying all types of goods from Timbuctoo to God knows where and from Hong Kong to God knows where—everything to anywhere but home.

Finally, let the final and biggest effort of the Minister be to call in the head buck cats of Bord Fáilte and tell them that the emphasis as to the future of this country will not be on luxury hotels but on worth while accommodation that is clean and presentable, on houses that are well-kept and have adequate, hygienic accommodation for visitors. We should be prepared to give them good, decent, wholesome Irish cooked food in an Irish way. We should be prepared to look after the comforts of our middle-class visitor whether he comes in his car on a tour or whether he is a fisherman, coarse fishing or fishing for trout or salmon. He is the type of person who is worthwhile because he spends his money in the more remote areas, in the local farmhouse or in the seaside guesthouse which will give him the type of accommodation he desires. He will integrate with the people and enjoy himself among them. Above all, tell him that we will take all the additional tourists who would like to come because here we have the most hospitable, decent and likeable people in the whole world.

Mr. Gallagher

Coming back from West Cork and Limerick, as I have done, and having listened to Fine Gael speeches on what is desired as the just society, it has been quite enthralling to listen to Deputy S. Collins from West Cork. He has become socially somewhat of a capitalist.

On this important Estimate of the Department of Transport and Power and on the State bodies it controls, I have been enlightened by Deputy S. Collins praising what has been done and asking for a greater effort. This type of support from the Opposition is always acceptable and something we always wish for.

Dealing briefly with CIE, I am never satisfied that CIE is being adequately run but then I happen to fall into the category of persons who are capitalist rather than socialist, so my thought on this subject would probably be unacceptable to this House and probably unacceptable to many people. However, I want to say this about CIE. They are giving a worthwhile service to the nation and to our people. To the critics who say that CIE fall short in meeting their ideas of good service, I should like to say that if they want that excellent service they must be prepared for some chopping off of inefficient services and a development of those services that can be made more efficient and serviceable. However, that is not a nice thing to say in this House this evening or any evening. Any arguments that would call for efficiency at the cost of disemployment and redundancy would be unacceptable, but it was nice to listen to Deputy Seán Collins saying, not in so many words, that this was the idea he had in mind.

CIE has given excellent service. Yes, it can be improved immeasurably and to a large extent at the cost of road transport. As our car-owning population increases more and more people are, in fact, turning to CIE to travel the 50 or 60 miles in between. The staff and the management of CIE are well integrated and, indeed, efficiency minded. They are doing their best but being what it is, a State monopoly, a State service, they are constrained to have regard to all the obligations society imposes upon them. Within those confines and limits, I am quite satisfied that CIE are doing an excellent job. I would wish that this House and all of our people would have regard to simple facts. We cannot dispute facts and set them aside, and if we wish to have a social service we must be prepared to pay for it. We cannot have a cheap service and an efficient service at the same time. It must be one or the other.

CIE have done a good job. I do not use their services too frequently because I do not find them economic, but they serve a certain section of our society and they serve them well. I have no brief for inefficiency but I am concerned about the public, and CIE, in this context, are doing the best they can. If the preoccupation of CIE is to provide a social service, then hopes of having an efficient but cheap service are without foundation without State subsidisation.

On Bord Fáilte. I did not hear any criticism from Deputy Seán Collins. He was mainly concerned that they would remember to develop West Cork and he read out a litany of place names in his constituency towards which they should devote money by way of grants. Bord Fáilte are doing a magnificent job of selling Ireland abroad—our hospitality, our quiet, peaceful roads and the capacity of our people to make visitors welcome and happy in Ireland. Bord Fáilte are now running up against trends which are developing everywhere. One of the trends in our hotel development is towards more expensive establishments. This, after all, is probably the most rewarding because it calls for an excellent service but at a higher charge. Below that we find the middle class hotel, the bed and breakfast hotel, and the ideal charge here would be between 25s and 50s. It is difficult to achieve this in the ordinary commercially-managed hotel, though it is possible to do so in the family business. Such levels are desirable and acceptable but it will take a colossal amount of selling on the part of the Department and Bord Fáilte to put this across because it depends entirely on the business acumen of individuals throughout the country.

It is significant that probably the best Bord Fáilte development in recent years has been in the farm holiday scheme. Hundreds of our farmers are adopting this method of new income and are providing excellent holiday occasions for visitors from abroad. It is ideal because the entire family—the farmer, his wife and the children— participate in the provision of this excellent service. The problem of paying what one might describe as economic wages does not arise. Therefore, I ask the Minister to extend this with all the personal effort and financial support he can. In this field lies our greatest hope of success in the tourist business.

It was encouraging to read recently in the newspapers an advertisement to the effect that Aer Lingus are offering a site at Dublin Airport for the development of an hotel at reasonable prices. I wish them luck in this enterprise but frankly I do not hold out much hope that they will achieve what they seek in their advertisement. In my experience, well-managed hotels cannot now be run at such a level unless they can dress all their holiday-makers in blue suits and march them in queues.

Irish Shipping have made tremendous progress during the years. The Deputy who spoke immediately before me criticised them because they were acting in a mercantile way, selling their services throughout the world. He argued that the entire effort should be devoted to the transport of goods between this country and the countries with which we trade. The history of the mercantile nations of the world indicates, however, that a good shipping service becomes efficient by carrying cargo to all parts of the world, and that to depend entirely on a domestic cargo service would be a limiting factor leaving the company unchartered and unearning. Since Irish Shipping were founded during the war they have worked up a wonderful record. If there have been losses—I know there have been—they have been minimal. At the same time, they have provided a service of which they can be justifiably proud in the eyes of the mercantile services of the world.

In the matter of docks and dockyards, however, we have not such a glowing picture to paint. It is no harm to mention this evening that while Deputy Moore appealed on behalf of the Liffey Dockyard, Deputy Collins from West Cork did not ask for any help for the Cork yard. It is interesting to note that, by and large, the Cork dockyard is doing quite a good job. It is providing and maintaining employment in Cork. I should hate to remind Deputy Collins that his Party took a dim view of a Vote of £900,000 here some years ago to support and maintain that yard. Deputy Collins set out for a just society in West Limerick and Cork. He is now very much a capitalist and has come to realise that investment means a return rather than a social service.

Mr. S. Collins

I shall make my own speeches.

Mr. Gallagher

The Deputy has helped me considerably. Verolme Dockyard in Cork is doing a very considerable job. In the matter of the ESB, there is this appeal which, through the Chair, I must make to the House and to the Minister. I want to see abolished as quickly as possible the service charge which is imposed on the less wealthy of our people. I want them to enjoy in any part of Ireland a supply of electricity at the same rates as we do in cities and in our more developed areas. I say, with all the conviction I can bring, that I do not think we are a specialised or a selective society and that the quicker the Minister abolishes this special service charge the better. I deal with this problem every day. Quite frankly, I cannot find an argument to justify it or defend that these poorer people are not regarded as a secondor third- or fourth-rate class of our society.

The ESB have rendered to this country a wonderful service. From the early days of Ardnacrusha, which I remember as a young boy, and subsequent development down the years, the ESB have given this country a magnificent service. Their planning, their anticipation of future demands, must get from me a special word of praise. The consumption of electricity is growing so much that one's admiration must be excited by the capacity of the board to anticipate the demand.

My erstwhile colleague across the floor of the House spoke of the use of Bord na Móna peat for the generation of electricity. I am surprised that he should use this argument in view of the Fine Gael argument of a Just Society. However, one expects this type of superfluous argument which is made from time to time in the hope that it will cod somebody along the way. The development of our bogs and the use of our peat resources for the generation of electricity is laudable although I accept fully that it is not the most economic procedure. It is a method by which our resources are being developed and can be developed and provide a source of employment which we badly need in our backward areas.

The responsibilities of the Minister for Transport and Power are many. They cover a very wide field. For the past few years, since I have been in Dáil Éireann, I have had to listen to him being attacked in many ways. I have heard him give the stock answer that he has no function in the matter. The remarkable thing about it is that it is true.

In the final part of my short speech here this evening, I want to come to the subject of Aer Lingus which can be described as one of our proudest achievements. It has grown from a small business into a huge concern. I cannot but remember some 20 years ago—yes, it is 20 years ago—when we were coming out of the war years and making plans for the future, as we did in this Party. I cannot but remember that when Aer Lingus planned Aerlínte and the transatlantic air service, three Constellation liners were purchased and staffs were trained to run those services. Then a shocking disaster occurred. There was a general election in 1948 and, during that year, there was a change of Government. The then economists of the Fine Gael Party and of the Labour Party and of the other Parties constituting the Coalition at that time—Clann na Poblachta and Clann na Talmhan—decided that this was a shocking, wasteful extravagance, a waste they could not tolerate.

It is sad to think that, today, Fine Gael talk about a Just Society. In those years of Coalition Government, the then Minister for Industry and Commerce, a good old friend of mine, the late Deputy William Norton, and this conglomeration, this Coalition, decided that this was something that this little island of ours could not afford, that it was far beyond our means, that we were too extravagant and too ambitious, that this fellow Lemass—Deputy Seán Lemass the then Minister for Industry and Commerce— was some kind of a mad gambler, that this argument could not be founded on solid economic facts. They decided that the transatlantic air service, whose inaugural flight was arranged for the Saint Patrick's Day of the following year, would be abolished and they did so. They held an auction of the Constellations and, lest we might forget, they told us they made a profit on the sales of the three Constellations. When they made that statement, they did not tell us that there was a devaluation of the £ sterling. But that was not all. There were other aspects of that period of negative Government. There was the development of Haulbowline in Cork and this, too, was abolished as something we could never achieve in this country.

We have established the most successful transatlantic airline in the world today. When you read the statistics daily, it is clear enough. I know that there are people in the Opposition who will argue that the reason we are successful is because we are bringing home our own emigrants. Those same people will readily admit that the Israeli lines are successful because they are bringing home Jews to Israel. The fact is that it was, is and continues to be a source of revenue and development that could have been developed but which was denied to us for ten years. What could have been achieved in 1949 had to wait to be achieved ten years later. I make my contribution to this debate with a certain sense of frustration. When I think that we are sitting in this Parliament for which in other days other men did so much in order that we might have the right to sit here, and when I see Members utilising the House for their own motives and political desires, it does not fill me with any great sense of delight. In an endeavour to understand human beings I bear with them.

How long I shall be a Member of this House is a matter for my electorate but I hope that our deliberations in the years ahead, from all sides, will be directed towards the development of our resources and to the encouragement of our people, rather than to doctrinaire argument that the less you do the more you will get. I would appeal to the Minister not to forget the west in future planning, in particular not to forget the home of Yeats, Sligo. Do not forget that lovely panoramic drive from Boyle to Bundoran. That drive from Boyle to Lough Key, right into Bundoran, equals anything in the world and I do not think we could find a more sublime or desirable setting for a holiday centre. Give us all the help you can to develop our tourist resorts.

Mr. S. Collins

I will take the Deputy down to Bantry Bay next year.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The annual Estimate of the Minister for Transport and Power gives us our only opportunity of having what we can describe as a general overall discussion relating to all the semi-State boards under the Minister's care. Too often Deputies have endeavoured to obtain information from the Minister, by way of Parliamentary Question, about Bord Fáilte, Aer Lingus, CIE, and Bord na Móna and the Minister's stock reply is that he does not interfere in the everyday administration of these boards. Therefore, the only opportunity that the House has of making comment, favourable or unfavourable, in relation to these boards is during this debate. The air would be cleared greatly if the Minister, for the convenience of Deputies and the general public, altered his stock reply to Parliamentary Questions relating to these boards and to how public money voted by this House was spent by them. It would be very easy for the Minister to say that he has no responsibility but that for the information of the House he would like to give the following report which he has received from the board, whichever board it might be under his Department. It leaves a great amount of suspicion in the minds of the taxpayers when the Minister refuses to give information and when he is inclined to shroud the activities of these boards in a cloak of secrecy. One would imagine that any Deputy who requires information about any aspect of these boards would, as one who has voted the money for that board in this House, be entitled to such information. We give the Minister for Transport and Power a blank cheque which he passes on to the boards under his administration and we have no further say in the matter.

The time has come when Parliament will have to devise some means of extracting information concerning the management of semi-State bodies. If there is any suspicion or general dissatisfaction about the manner in which public moneys voted to these bodies are administered a clear duty devolves on someone to clear the air and to give whatever information is required by Members of this House without hesitation. I am not for a moment insinuating that there is any question of misappropriation of funds by any of these State organisations, but I am stating for a fact that if the Minister continues to refuse to give information, then the position is being left wide open for public unrest and unfavourable comment. This arouses suspicion in the minds of the public.

I am afraid, in relation to many of our State bodies which are under the charge of the Minister, that there has been a great deal of suspicion in regard to how public money is being spent, on what it has been spent, in relation to certain promotions, to the giving of jobs and the filling of vacancies by all the boards mentioned by the Minister. This House should insist—and it is the duty of the Minister to see it is done— that in respect of all vacancies for responsible positions in Irish Shipping. Aer Lingus, Aerlínte, Bord Fáilte, Bord na Móna or CIE, the boards concerned should give an undertaking that these vacancies will be advertised. The filling of vacancies without their being advertised, the making of new appointments without giving members of the public qualified for these appointments an opportunity of applying for them, and the making of new jobs and big jobs for certain people on these boards has undoubtedly aroused the curiosity of the people.

Members of all Parties feel rather stupid when they cannot solicit or get information concerning these appointments and promotions, despite the fact that the House votes public money for the posts concerned. It is high time for the Minister to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding the spending of money by all these boards. If there are important new appointments to be made in any of these semi-State bodies, when the terms of appointment are satisfactory to him, the Minister should insist that qualified members of the general public be given an opportunity of applying for these posts. Whether we like it or not, there are certain grounds for the charges and accusations that have been made that certain preferences are given in the appointment of well-known Government supporters. In the case of State companies under the Minister's administration it has been well known, and is well known, that one of the best qualifications for promotion is to be an active worker for or supporter of the Government.

Mr. Childers

Absolute nonsense.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The Minister may say he has no responsibility, but we cannot close our eyes to facts. The fact remains that, if one wants to advance in any of these semi-State bodies today, one must support Fianna Fáil.

Mr. Childers

Absolute nonsense. I make no interference whatever of that kind, and the Deputy knows it well. He should take my word for it.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I should like to give instances, but I do not think it would be right or fair. That is why I refrain most reluctantly from mentioning names. I am sure the Chair will agree that the names of persons who are not here to defend themselves should not be mentioned in the House, and I do not intend to mention them. There is nothing easier than for the Minister to say he has no responsibility. He is right. He has no responsibility. But he has people on these boards, placed there by him, who will look after his interests, his Party's interests and his Government's interests. Then, of course, like Pontius Pilate, he can wash his hands completely, and rightly say he has no responsibility.

An Ceann Comhairle

I do not think the Minister should be likened to Pontius Pilate.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I have not made a comparison that the Minister was like Pontius Pilate. I should have to apologise to Pontius Pilate for that. I was just making the comparison that, as the said gentleman washed his hands on one occasion, so can the Minister in similar circumstances wash his hands completely of the activities of CIE and Bord na Móna in relation to staff matters.

Mr. Childers

I do not wash my hands of responsibility for the actions of the boards in so far as I always demand that they promote people on merit and without regard to Party.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

That is the first time I heard it mentioned that the Minister had any responsibility at all and that he intervened in relation to appointments.

Mr. Childers

I did not say I intervened. I said that the boards, if they are going to continue to have my confidence, should arrange for the promotion of people on the basis of merit, loyalty to the company and zeal.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

No doubt, the Minister sees that is done. Sooner or later there will have to be a clearing of the air in relation to staff promotions in all these companies.

May I make reference to one or two of these semi-State concerns, commencing with CIE? CIE, born in 1944, is a very big organisation. I remember distinctly when the Transport Bill of 1944 was going through this House. I had the pleasure of voting against the Transport Bill in the Dáil elected in 1943. On that occasion it was beaten by one vote. We were guaranteed by the then Minister for Industry and Commerce, who was responsible for the birth of CIE, that as a result of the setting up of this company and the dissolution of the old GS and WR we were going to have cheaper fares, more employment and efficient transport. I have here a press cutting which refers to a statement made by the then Minister for Industry and Commerce in the month of May, 1944, speaking in Carlow and referring to CIE. He said:

The economies resulting from the scheme will mean cheaper rates for transport, better services and will give transport workers better security of employment and remuneration which they can never have unless such a reorganisation is effected.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would the Deputy give the reference?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

A quotation from a speech made by Deputy Seán Lemass in Carlow in May, 1944, and published in an article by the Sunday Independent. Everybody knows we have not got cheap rates of transport from CIE. The workers employed by CIE did not get the security of employment which CIE promised them. Even to this day CIE have been pruning staff continually.

On the question of the undertaking that was given on the establishment of CIE, the board of CIE have since disowned several hundred miles of railways, cut off transport services, closed railway stations, dismantled and sold the steel railway tracks, and later, when they took over the Grand Canal Company, they proceeded to close down lock houses and certain sections of canals. The activity on our canals, which was very energetic at the time in many areas, was brought to an end. How long can Parliament continue subsidising CIE? What a great change it is to see subsidies going to CIE, more particularly when we see that the then Minister for Industry and Commerce, Deputy Lemass, told the Dáil that the Government did not believe in subsidised transport facilities. Subsidised transport facilities—is that not exactly what we have? Those who are employed by CIE cannot say with any degree of certainty that their positions for the future are firmly established.

One found it very difficult to understand how CIE could pay its way when the rail services were in competition with bus services on exactly the same routes. CIE succeeded in making a case for the dismantling of railways and the closing down of certain branch lines, and the case they made for closing them down was that they had not got public support. In order to attract public support from the railways the same firm was operating bus services, and it was, therefore, very easy to produce statistics to show that the people were not travelling by train. Are there many countries that are continuing with State-subsidised transport? I have often wondered why some consideration was not given to permitting, if they wished, city corporations to provide their own transport. I am a believer in private enterprise. Private enterprise could be more efficient and probably cheaper on the users in the long run.

Mr. Childers

It is only the railway company that is losing, like every other railway company in Europe.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The railway company is losing?

Mr. Childers

Like every other railway company in Europe, not the buses.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

On the establishment of CIE, we were told that the railway company would not be losing, that we would have efficient transport, and not alone efficient but cheaper transport. The board of CIE is being protected too much. I have often wondered why the Minister for Transport and Power did not consider the allocasion of a greater number of merchandise licences to private enterprise for the haulage of goods. On many occasions genuine cases have been presented to his Department, but the only circumstances in which a merchandise licence can be granted are where CIE cannot cope with the demands for transport in an area. The time has come when the Minister should review this position and when the question of transport charges should be more fully investigated than it has been.

Why has the Minister failed to use his high office to influence the board of CIE in relation to the very meagre pensions that are being paid to former CIE workers, all the older workers who are now probably in the evening of their lives? Those men who helped to build up the company from the days of the Great Southern Railways are entitled to much better recognition than they have received. CIE pensioners are men who were very dedicated to their work and many of them could be described as the pioneers of transport in this country. Many of them were employed on the permanent way and other sections of the Dublin Tramway Company which was acquired by CIE. There are not very many of these old-timers still living and the Minister should very seriously consider the question of a substantial increase in CIE pensions. If the opportunity presented itself, the Minister would have the goodwill of all Parties in this House in providing pensions for the old-timers associated with the Great Southern Railway and CIE which would allow them to live in a state of independence.

The Minister for Transport and Power has full responsibility for the provision of the money necessary for Aer Lingus. This company has been the subject of tributes from most of the Deputies who have spoken in this debate and I should like to add my tribute to the very high standard of efficiency displayed by Aer Lingus. Aer Lingus is our greatest advertisement abroad. It provides an excellent service. Our planes are piloted by men of great skill with very high qualifications. The debate should not be allowed to conclude without comment on the accident-free record of Aer Lingus which is probably the best record of any airline in the world. If there is any service of which we can be proud it is that provided by Aer Lingus which has conducted its affairs with a high standard of efficiency. One must refer to the courtesy extended to the travelling public and the manner in which rush periods such as holiday weekends, Christmas and summer holiday periods are dealt with. Aer Lingus is an extremely well-organised semi-State concern and every penny provided by this House for that organisation is well spent. The growth of Dublin Airport is clear and abundant evidence as to the investment in Aer Lingus.

I had never seen Cork Airport until last week. Those concerned with Aer Lingus read the debate on this Estimate and I say for the record that I was astonished at the magnificent building at Cork Airport, which is well-equipped and well-staffed.

Mr. Childers

In fairness to the officers of my Department I must say that Cork Airport is the direct responsibility of the Department and the overall design was prepared by the chief architect of my Department. Aer Lingus is already praised and now I want to tell the Deputy that Cork Airport was done by the Department.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I was not aware of that. As long as one is in this House one can learn something.

Mr. Childers

I have given the Deputy 109 pages of information. He might have found that out if he had read it.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I never read the Minister's speeches.

Mr. Childers

Some of his colleagues did read it from one end to the other.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

If Cork Airport is the responsibility of the Minister's Department and was designed by the chief architect of his Department, whatever praises I have directed towards Aer Lingus in this regard can be redirected towards the Department, to the chief architect and to the Minister himself. I believe in giving praise where praise is due. If a man deserves to be criticised let him be criticised. If he deserves praise, he should be praised. Cork Airport, whether it is the chief architect or the Minister who is responsible for it, is something to be proud of. It is an excellent airport. Few of us from the midlands have an opportunity to see Cork Airport because usually we use the facilities at Shannon or at Dublin Airport. Therefore, would the Minister be good enough this year or later to arrange for a trip to Cork Airport for those Deputies who have not seen it? Cork Airport is a credit to the country and there must be many Deputies who have not seen it. We are all familiar with Shannon and Dublin Airports. May I say that I spent a considerable time at Cork Airport—not canvassing but seeing off a Canadian Member of Parliament?

Mr. Lalor

He was in opposition, too.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

He was in opposition, too. I got the impression that Cork Airport was worth the expenditure voted for it by this House.

Reference is made in the Minister's speech to investment in the Shannon Free Airport Development Company Limited. It is hardly necessary for me to repeat what I said on the Vote for the Department of Industry and Commerce last week. I have great confidence in the work undertaken by the Development Company. I have seen numerous workers employed on the Industrial Estate there. I have seen the housing facilities, the shopping facilities and the growth of the Industrial Estate at Shannon. While from time to time members of the general public may offer some degree of criticism, I certainly should not like to be held as offering criticism because when I see men at work, whatever other people may call it, I call that progress. If I see men and women leaving factories with their pay packets at the end of the week I call that progress. Progress of that kind deserves a clap on the back.

I am convinced that the results which have been shown to the general public by the company responsible for the Industrial Estate at Shannon are worth every penny of public money that has been invested in that company. I go further than that. Every effort should be made to encourage foreign development and foreign investment at Shannon. This estate can be described as one of the pioneer industrial estates of this country. I hope that the rate of expansion we have seen at Shannon will continue. If from any section of the general public there comes any criticism in connection with the development of the Industrial Estate there, I trust that the Minister will proceed, with the full authority of the Department behind him, with further advancements and further developments at that Estate.

I cannot sav whether the development body at Shannon seeks financial aid from the Minister more often than annually. It seems to me that the board administer it in a businesslike and commonsense fashion. From what I have seen—and I speak only from what I have seen—every penny invested in Shannon has been well spent. The results are there for everyone to see It would be better to see those boys and girls who work at Shannon working there for foreign employers than to see them outside the shores of the country working for foreign employers elsewhere.

I hope more people come to Shannon to set up industries there. I hope the Government will hold out the welcoming hand with every possible aid and assistance, and with expert advice. The Board of the Shannon Development Company appear to have had expert advice because the manner in which the factories are laid out, the facilities available and the present atmosphere that seems to surround the whole industrial estate are an outstanding credit to the responsible board.

Mr. Corry

They must be all Fine Gael, are they?

Mr. Coogan

Some of them.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I cannot say because I have never examined the political qualification of any man, and most certainly I have never examined the political affiliations of the development board at Shannon. No matter what their politics are they are men of sound judgment, commonsense and intelligence, who spent money well and wisely. That is a good recommendation for them. Deputy Corry is rather disappointed that I am not criticising them.

Mr. Lalor

It would be a recommendation if it came from anyone else.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

If the Parliamentary Secretary remains quiet while I am speaking, I will guarantee that his seat in this House is safe. I will look after him. I will have a little surplus that will bring him back here.

Mr. Lalor

Is the Deputy going Labour?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I do not see anything wrong with the Labour Party. I have some very good friends in it.

An Ceann Comhairle

We cannot discuss it on this Estimate.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Deputy Corry is rather disappointed that I am not attacking the Shannon industrial development body. I can see a smile on the Minister's face as if he is wondering whether this is a display of hyprocrisy on my part.

Major de Valera

No one else used the word.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I can see it written across faces.

Mr. Childers

I would welcome the Deputy's constructive criticism of any company.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Does the Minister not agree that it is constructive?

Mr. Childers

I welcome criticism and I also welcome the Deputy's constructive criticism.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I always felt I carried influence with the Minister. I am glad that it is on public record that he welcomes any criticism I might make, constructive or otherwise. At least if a Deputy makes a constructive criticism or criticism other than constructive criticism it is considered by the Minister. Deputy Corry in his intervention was anxious to know the politics of the members of the Shannon development board. I am not concerned with their politics. I am concerned with men who do a good job. The job which the Shannon development board undertook to do has been well done and deserves praise. I trust that in the future their further efforts will be crowned with the same measure of success as in the past.

I wish the Shannon Development Company all the very best. I assure the Minister that if there was any degree of criticism which was visible to me on my visits to the Shannon area, I would be only too pleased to make it known for the record, for the information of the general public, and particularly for the information of the Minister, but I want to say that, from my experience, that body has done a good job, and done it well, and I trust that the Minister will be generous in his consideration of any demands which that body may make in relation to future development and the provision of employment for those needing it in the area.

Mr. Childers

It is nearly £10 million so far.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

That was money well spent. This House never objects to voting money provided there is a good return for that money. There has been an excellent return on the investment in Shannon.

The Minister has responsibility for the activities of Bord na Móna. I remember clearly the day of the old Turf Development Board. I shall not weary the House with my recollections, but they were the pioneers of turf development. The seeds of development were sown by that body. It was dissolved somewhere round June, 1944, or June, 1945, and Bord na Móna has since been charged with the development of our bogs.

Bord na Móna has helped to change the face of many parts of our countryside. For instance, in my constituency of Offaly one can travel any of the main roads and see the changes that have taken place. A vast acreage of bog has been developed. Side by side with that development the power stations have been erected. The first bog developed in Offaly was at Turraun. Then came Clonsast. Vast employment has been given over the years by Bord na Móna, but in latter years they seem to be cutting down on employment and curtailing their activities generally. That is most regrettable. There are vast acreages still awaiting development.

Permanent employees of Bord na Móna in the past are now being employed on a seasonal basis. I have made repeated requests to the Minister to use his influence to ensure that as many as possible will be employed by Bord na Móna. Side by side with that employment there should be a scheme in operation for the purpose of making cut-away bog available for afforestation.

An all-out drive should be made to popularise peat. The development of the peat briquette has been very successful but the supply does not always meet the demand. It is heartening to see that turf is consumed in the few fireplaces that remain in Government offices. The trend now is towards central heating. There is no fire like the fire one can see and feel simultaneously.

Mr. J. Gibbons

Níl aon tinteán mar do thinteán féin.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

There is no fire to equal the good turf fire.

Mr. Corry

Hear, hear.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Efforts should be made to encourage the greater use of peat, but there is little use in encouraging the use of peat unless the supply is equal to the demand. I understand it is difficult to guarantee the supply of briquettes. I believe there could be a considerable cutting down on coal imports if we used more of our own native fuel. The Department of Transport and Power is a Department with many and varied responsibilities and interests, but I trust the Minister and his Department will not lose sight of the fact that a case can be made for popularising the good old familiar Irish turf fire. There is a vast amount of wealth in our bogs still undeveloped. We never knew what wealth was in our bogs until the second World War. Until that time, people were ashamed to have to say that they came from the districts convenient to the bogs but overnight it was the real gentry who came from the boglands because it was from the bogs that the people of this country were kept warm when we could not possibly get supplies of coal. A very genuine effort should be made to get on with the further development of our peat resources which are still very great. There are hundreds of acres of undeveloped virgin bog which could give considerable employment in its development, but on inquiry, we are told that there is no hope of proceeding with that development because of the limited funds available to Bord na Móna for such work. Let us be courageous and let Bord na Móna make a survey for ten years to come and plan out a programme for large-scale development of the resources of virgin bog in the country. It will be a source of employment in rural Ireland, a source of employment for the many who like that type of work. With our rising unemployment figures, where in rural Ireland are they going to get work? It is not available on the roads; it is not available on the land. It must be made available, and the only source of rural employment we have must be on our bogs or in the development of a long-term forestry programme. A long-term forestry programme with planting on cutaway bog or making suitable use of cutaway bog is certainly not outside the reach of the engineering staff of Bord na Móna. They may be able to prepare some proposals for long-term planning for the years to come of the vast amount of our peat resources that have not as yet been developed by Bord na Móna.

I should like to ask the Minister what ever happened to the proposal once under consideration for the establishment of a briquette factory near Shannonbridge in County Offaly. I understand that it reached the stage where a site was decided on. For some reason or another, the development of this project appears to have come to a halt. In the area of the Blackwater bog, near Shannonbridge, which provides employment for the Clonfert parish of Galway, the parish of Moore in South Roscommon and the areas of Shannonbridge, Belmont and Blackwater, the establishment of a briquette factory would certainly supplement the production of briquettes by the briquette factory at Derrinlough and Croghan. If the peat is plentiful, and we are reliably informed it is, this would be a project well worthy of national investment. I advocate very strongly the setting up of this factory.

The vast amount of work which has been undertaken by the ESB should not be allowed to go without favourable comment. The ESB have done a good job in their rural electrification scheme. There are many pockets not yet connected in areas outside the catchment areas already connected with our schemes of rural electrification. I would ask the Minister to consider seriously some scheme for the subsidisation of costs in having supplies made available to people in these pockets, which are many throughout the country, and to many other people who are anxious to avail of rural electrification, but who because of the special service charges being a little high having regard to their very limited incomes are unable to do so. The ESB have most certainly performed an excellent job in rural Ireland. The only complaint that one ever hears concerning the ESB are the special overhead charges. I feel that in many instances those charges are most certainly excessive and I think the Board of the ESB should formulate some scheme for the purpose of providing some relief for those who can put forward a genuine case and who would avail of the facilities offered but for the fact that their financial condition will not permit them to do so. There are many such prospective customers. Practically every Deputy has had the experience at one time or another of having a very genuine case made.

The staff of the ESB throughout the country are deserving of public recognition. We have had experience of the manner in which these staffs maintain supplies of electricity. After heavy thunderstorms and bad weather, breakdowns are frequently reported in the supply of electricity, and it is only right that tribute should be paid to the skill and efficiency of the electricians and of all those who are employed by the ESB because of their efficiency and the manner in which they so successfully discharge their duties. I have no criticism whatever to offer in relation to the ESB. On the contrary, I praise very sincerely the undertakings of that Board. I think they deserve the best thanks for the excellent job of work they have undertaken in rural Ireland.

My only problem and the only problem to which I direct the serious attention of the Minister is the many people who want electricity and are convinced that they are entitled to it, but are unable to have it provided because of the excessive overhead charges. I feel that a fund should be set aside by the ESB to meet emergencies of that kind. In certain areas where it is well known that because of unemployment or because of special conditions prospective applicants are unable to meet these high charges, a good case can be made for subsidisation.

One other Board which comes under review tonight is Bord Fáilte. I cannot say the same about Bord Fáilte as I have said about some of the other semi-State bodies.

Mr. Corish

They will not get any fáilte from you.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Where do Bord Fáilte carry out their publicity drive to invite tourists to this country? At Euston Station, there is a small little poster. I do not know who put it there but it announces a welcome to Ireland and it is suggested that Ireland is the place for good holidays. Very convenient to the poster, there is an extensive hoarding advertising skiing on the Swiss Alps. There is an advertisement for the Scottish lakes. There is an advertisement directing attention to holidays along the Riviera, along the Italian coast at San Remo and in the vicinity of Northern Italy and Southern France. If one looks at the Bord Fáilte advertisement in contrast to the amount of publicity given to European and British holidays resorts, one feels extremely small. If we are going to advertise, let us advertise well and honestly, or not at all.

Mr. Childers

The Deputy evidently did not read the Bord Fáilte report which gives a full account of their advertising services.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I did not see it.

Mr. Childers

The report is published and given to every Deputy.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I want to see attractive posters in London, Paris, Rome, New York, Montreal and all the other places which I have visited. I do not want a booklet sent to me and Members of this House. That is of no great value to us. We want to see posters attracting the eye of the well-to-do continental people who have money to spend and who give consideration and thought to where they go on their holidays, whether they want to go fishing on the lakes of Scotland, whether they want to warm themselves on the sands of the Mediterranean, whether they want to go skiing in the Swiss Alps or whether they want to come here to Ireland. A booklet addressed to Deputies indicating that so much is spent on advertising will not reach the ears or the eyes of those people. How are you going to get those people? You will not get them unless you advertise where they are, the places they frequent and to which they go. I am quite sure there will be an improvement in this next year but I suggest to the Minister——

Mr. Corish

After your speech.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

——that if he saw the advertisement by Bord Fáilte at Euston Station in London, he would find that in comparison with the other countries, it does not pay any tribute to the Board. If we are to invite people to this country, we must publicise our country well. I have often wondered what the officers and offices of our embassies abroad were doing in that regard. We are told on the one hand that they represent this country, as they do, and may I say, with a high degree of dignity, honour and credit to this country but we are told on the other hand, that they are engaged in marketing what we produce. Still there is room for a vast amount of increased exports. We are told also that those offices are used for the purpose of advertising Ireland as a great tourist country.

Does the Minister ask for frequent reports from our various embassies abroad as to what those offices are doing in regard to publicising Ireland as an attractive holiday resort for the citizens in the countries to which they are accredited? In every embassy we have abroad, we should have tourist officers charged with the responsibility of publicising Ireland as a place to come to for holidays. It may be said that we have a bad climate for tourists. God has blessed us in this country with a most beautiful climate in which it is never too cold, never too hot, never too wet or never too dry. You cannot have it anywhere else. Does the Minister not agree?

Mr. Childers

Yes.

Mr. Corish

That is a good everything.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I think I am making the Minister's speech for him.

Major de Valera

You have not changed a bit.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Thanks. I would not have liked to have changed.

Mr. Childers

The Deputy did not understand what I said. I was not referring to a booklet of publicity. I was referring to the official report by Bord Fáilte in which the Deputy will see a full account of how they advertise in all the different media and centres, including one million pieces of publicity given out in the last financial year, so that the poster at Euston Station is not indicative of the publicity campaign. The Deputy should read the report: he will find it very interesting.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I can only describe the Euston Station poster as one of the handbills which were given out in comparison with the vast amount of advertising for the other countries seeking to attract tourists. If we are to advertise our country as a tourist attraction, and as I said, we have more to offer than most other European countries, we should advertise properly. I have referred to our climate. Our climate should in itself be a means of attracting people to this country.

Mr. Corish

If only to experience it.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

It might not be any harm if they did come to experience it. There are many tourists who like to experience rain and we have it here for them galore. You will get tourists who come from what can be described as very warm and dry countries. They seldom see rain and it is they whom Bord Fáilte should be trying to attract here. They should attract them here by every means in their power. Tourists very often go away rather pleased with their holidays here, because unlike the countries that have splitting sunshine all through the year, they cannot enjoy their holidays the same way they could enjoy them if the climate were more moderate. Very seldom have we extremely wet weather during our tourist season here. For that reason, our climate on the whole is ideally suited to attract tourists. But what I do not like is that some big hotels are rooking our tourists and I think that does endless damage to the tourist industry.

If Bord Fáilte have the slighte shred of evidence of any of our big hotel concerns overcharging or rooking our tourists they should be dealt with in the severest possible way. Our hotel charges are moderate.

Mr. Corry

Are what?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Yes, if you compare the charges of hotel accommodation. I am speaking of the tourist who wants to come and I am not talking about the ordinary worker who cannot go outside his own district. I am speaking about the well-to-do who come to spend money and who want to get value for it. It is most unfair that advantage be taken of visitors who may not be familiar with our currency and may not be familiar with our charges. The Minister knows quite well, because he answered questions in this House, that there have been cases of excessive charging by certain hotel concerns. I trust that an effort will be made to keep up the name of this country as a good tourist attraction and that our visitors will not have to return home, having been rooked right, left and centre, by certain hotel combines that are concerned only with getting all they can out of people. They do not care whether they come back or not.

Mr. Corish

It is not so much a question of overcharging as of high charges.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I suppose there is a difference between high charges and overcharging.

Mr. Corish

The chairman of Aer Lingus said they were pricing themselves out of the market. They are doing it legitimately; that is the unfortunate part of it.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

It is most unfair and a source of great damage to our tourist industry which can be ranked as our major industry since agriculture has vanished. It is like the Tau stone in County Clare about which I shall speak in a few minutes. The agricultural industry is gone. Therefore, all we have to fall back on is our tourist trade. I really feel an effort should be made to see that visitors are not subjected to excessive and high charges. I do feel that Bord Fáilte should have some means of protecting these people. I hope and trust that will be done.

An effort should also be made to attract more people to this country to avail of our coarse fishing and other fishing facilities. The last Deputy who spoke referred to the fact that we can offer the tourist who is seeking a good holiday the very best fishing that can be offered by any country in the world. The Inland Fisheries Trust have carried out a most successful programme and general development and improvements by way of the stocking of all rivers and making them more attractive for our tourists, particularly by way of coarse fishing. I often think that neither our salmon fishing nor our coarse fishing, or the very fine facilities in our lakes which have been stocked by the Inland Fisheries Trust, have ever been properly publicised.

There is a leaflet which I saw perhaps at Euston Station. If we want to publicise the wonderful salmon and coarse fishing and the manner in which our lakes can be developed, it cannot be done without good publicity. You get a good return from publicity. You may have to wait but every penny we spend on publicising our tourist facilities is money well spent.

Mr. Childers

There is an accurate guide and extensive publicity in The Angling Times in England and in numerous such publications.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

When is the Minister going to get rid of the fairies and the leprechauns? How often do we see the impression given of Ireland as the land of the leprechauns and the land of the fairies. There is always some kind of queer mystery associated with Ireland that in many instances is taken, particularly by the Yanks, as a skit. It is time for us to grow up as a nation and shake off the idea of the shillelagh and the leprechauns and the fairies. We have all grown up, or let us hope we have. I do not know whether there are people in the United States and Canada still foolish enough to believe that we have leprechauns and fairies loose throughout the country. It is going a bit far to have post-cards and pictures and vases and ties depicting the Irish leprechaun and the Irish fairy and the Irish shillelagh. Is it not time we had something better to go on than the publicising of the leprechauns?

Such publicity is not an attractive way of publicising the country. There are now no leprechauns, to my knowledge, in Ireland. There are now no fairies or raths surrounded by little men playing music. To my knowledge, they are non-existent. If Ireland is to build up our tourist industry on the fairies and leprechauns, may the Lord help us. I am sure there are people who come here and who go away sorry that they did not witness the spectacle of fairies and leprechauns that is built up abroad about this country. It is about time we shook off completely this idea of the leprechaun associated with Ireland. It is bad publicity. It is wrong. Perhaps it attracts a certain element but I doubt if it does. It is about time we gave it up and directed our attention to some sort of sensible publicity for this country.

Mr. Childers

There might be a few leprechauns yet.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Unless they are in the Minister's Department, I do not know where they are. Perhaps Bord Fáilte have locked them all up in Baggot Street.

Mr. Lalor

We still have one stage Irishman.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Perhaps Bord Fáilte have in Baggot Street some leprechauns suitably accommodated so that the Minister can consult them about publicising Ireland abroad. I advise him to cut out that sort of nonsense and to concentrate on publicising our rivers and lakes, our salmon, trout and coarse fishing, our shooting and our mountains. Cut out the leprechauns. Deputy Gallagher could not finish his speech without what I consider to be rude comments on the inter-Party Government. He said that the inter-Party Government were responsible for outrageous conduct in relation to the cutting down of finances for development of Aerlínte.

Mr. Cunningham

That is no fairy-tale.

Major de Valera

What about the transatlantic services?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I am coming to that. At that time we had our priorities right. The people had no houses. The country had a TB problem which surpassed that of any country in Western Europe. There were no hospital beds available. The money had to go to provide hospital beds to accommodate the people who were dying in their homes of TB. In addition, lands had to be drained. The money was spent providing houses for our people. Of course, at that time we had more houses than people to go into them.

Mr. Lalor

Why spend money on them, then?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

When we left office——

Mr. Cunningham

When you ran out.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Deputy Lalor was only going to school at the time. He does not remember.

Major de Valera

I remember.

Mr. Childers

The Constellations would have earned money with which to build houses.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

There were no hospital beds.

Mr. Childers

The Constellations would have earned money for more hospital beds, if they were required.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The money was spent on priorities. We spent it on housing for our people, on hospitals and hospital care, on drainage of our land. We drained one million acres. That is what the money was spent on.

Mr. Corry

And ladies' curling pins.

Major de Valera

If the Deputy wants to bring the debate into that line, we can accommodate him.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Deputy Gallagher said that this Party sabotaged the work of Aerlínte simply because there was a cut-down on expenditure. My reply is that we spent the money on housing for our people, on ridding our people of TB. That is what was done. Deputy Lalor was only going to school then.

Mr. Cunningham

That was the crock of gold.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

At the present time we cannot get a loan to repair a labourer's cottage.

Mr. Lalor

There are houses being built in every town in the Deputy's county.

Mr. L'Estrange

They must be for the leprechauns—they cannot be seen.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

If I am not distracted again, I should like to refer to the investment of public funds in luxury hotel accommodation. We have reached a stage in this country at which the housing situation can be described as a national emergency and yet we have public money being spent on the provision of additional luxury hotels. Is the Minister satisfied that our present hotel accommodation is not sufficient to cope with the visitors who are coming in? Where is the demand for more luxury hotels?

Mr. Childers

The Deputy has not read the report I gave him. If he had, he would know about the enormous increase in hotels, guesthouses and bed and breakfast accommodation—up to 34 per cent in three or four years. He does not read reports he gets.

Mr. Lalor

Last week he was admiring the airport in Cork.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I was here doing my job last week. That is what I am being paid for, not for running around Cork or anywhere else, like Deputy Corry.

Mr. Corry

That is where the Deputy is wrong.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Were you here last week?

Mr. Corry

I did my job and that is why the Deputy is trying to gather his legs across the floor of the House —because Labour will be moving in where he is. There is no cuter politician in Ireland. I will give the Deputy more credit when I get the opportunity later.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Thanks very much. The housing of the people is much more important than the provision of additional luxury hotels. Will the Minister tell us what is being done about giving financial assistance to small country hotels?

Mr. Childers

We have just increased the grant.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

But not enough. It would be far better to improve and increase the existing hotel accommodation. The managements of many hotels would be glad of generous financial assistance from the Government to help them to improve existing hotel accommodation. I recommend very strongly that steps be taken to improve the standard of our country hotels and that where there is a demand for financial assistance from Bord Fáilte, that assistance will be given freely and readily. It would be a very good investment and I trust it will be considered.

I doubt if I have any more to say on this Estimate. I think I have covered the ground with whatever comments I have made. I hope that, from the observations I have made, the Minister will find at least some points of my speech of assistance and of some guidance in relation to his activity during the coming year. Naturally enough, we express the hope that the bodies and the boards under his responsibility will have success in the years to come. I feel it is right that an opportunity be given to us all in this House to have a full and frank debate, particularly in relation to the many spheres of activity for which the Department of Transport and Power has responsibility.

I shall conclude on the note on which I started, namely, by begging the Minister to make some change in relation to the amount of information which is given to this House concerning all these boards and bodies. The patience of this House is becoming very much exhausted. Because of the patience of the House, of Deputies, becoming exhausted, I trust an effort will be made to have more detailed replies provided to Parliamentary Questions so as to clear the air on the many points raised from time to time by Deputies. The fact that the Minister refuses to give the information leaves a very high degree of suspicion in the minds of the general public. The seeds of that suspicion are being sown by the Minister himself because of his failure to facilitate the House and the country with information sought in relation to the spending of money voted by this House.

Mr. Corry

In the first place, I should like to congratulate Deputy Flanagan on his speech. He opened fire, in the first instance, on corruption which, he alleged, the Minister was guilty of in appointing Fianna Fáil nominees to boards. The Deputy should remember that we all like to pretend we have some bit of power. Deputy Flanagan was himself an adept at that—the small boy who used to go along and ramble into the county council office in the morning and find out where the tar-sprayer and the steam-roller were going the following week. He would then hoist up on a bicycle and pedal out there and say, in effect: "Look at the wretched road you have. I am ashamed of it. I shall see that that road is repaired for you,"—and, lo and behold, when the steam-roller came along, two or three days afterwards, Deputy Flanagan went up two notches more in regard to the power he had that he was able to compel officials from the county council to go out with their steam-roller and steam-roll the road.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

And, unlike the Deputy's promises, it was done.

Mr. Corry

Deputy Flanagan was a dab hand at it. I take off my hat to him.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Thanks very much.

Mr. Corry

No man collected more votes in that line than did Deputy Flanagan.

(Interruptions.)

Mr. Corry

Stop interrupting. That was all very well for the Deputy. Then he came along and seeing what has happened in the recent past he decided he had better trim his sails a bit. He started with praising the Shannon Industrial Estate, Cork Airport—they were all praised up to the sky. He wound up by telling us that the Minister is decent in patches, like a tinker's apron. I could not give any other description of what Deputy Flanagan said.

Deputy Flanagan is a cute politician. Looking at what is happening and seeing the Labour Party gradually walking over there as the main Opposition Party, he has made up his mind, I think, to return to the allegiance of his childhood when he was a good Fianna Fáil cumann secretary. Therefore, Deputy O.J. Flanagan is going to have another "go" at climbing on the bandwagon. Keep a watch out. I will bid him welcome into the fold. I should like to see Deputy Flanagan over here: we could do worse, I think.

Mr. Lalor

He is nobody's baby.

Mr. Corry

I think Deputy Flanagan has made up his mind on that point. I do not blame him a bit. Seeing the company he has there beside him——

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I am very proud of my company.

Mr. Corry

——he is blooming well right.

Mr. Lalor

He is leaving the sinking ship.

Mr. Corry

Seeing that the boys over there have changed their tactics, I am afraid I shall have to fall back again and be the only Opposition.

Mr. L'Estrange

Yourself.

Mr. Corry

That is what I see happening here.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I am the great "I am".

Mr. Corry

I look over there and I see that the Opposition has gone.

Major de Valera

It is quite true.

Mr. Corry

There is no Opposition at present. They are useless, helpless, and have not an idea of their own to put forward. Somebody must take the role of an Opposition in this House. Somebody must criticise whatever Government is there in order to keep them on their tippy-toes doing the work the nation sent them here to do.

Mr. J. Gibbons

That is very public-spirited of the Deputy.

Mr. Corry

I am. Now, I should like, in the first instance, to support two appeals made here, one of them by Deputy Gallagher and the other by Deputy O.J. Flanagan, in regard to the ESB service charge. The people concerned have been contributing in taxation from the first day the ESB started. I have seen whole districts where they still have to milk the cows by hand. They have no milking machines, no electricity for the pumping of water, no light. If they look for something, the ESB charge is such that it would drive any farmer into bankruptcy in three years.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.