This debate on the Office of Public Works will undoubtedly give the Parliamentary Secretary in charge an opportunity of explaining to the House, and indeed to the country, where his priorities lie in spending the money allocated to him in this Estimate and indeed in all his annual Estimates. The Office of Public Works covers a wide field and a great variety but the main responsibility of that Department must be implementing the legislation passed by this House. In my opinion the main legislation passed in relation to the Office of Public Works is the Arterial Drainage Act. I feel that the Office of Public Works are handling the whole question of arterial drainage in what can be described as a piece-meal way.
A very satisfactory drainage job was carried out on the Brosna river in County Offaly. Other major rivers followed, including the Corrib, and some time next year we are to commence a comprehensive drainage scheme on the river Boyne. This drainage scheme on the Boyne is long overdue. I am very glad that at least a start has been made. I presume that to drain the Boyne from outside Edenderry to Drogheda will take a long time but the drainage of the Boyne has been the subject of agitation for many years. I feel that the drainage of the Boyne will be a great asset to the landowners whose lands adjoin it.
I should like to hear from the Parliamentary Secretary what has happened to the river Nore. Repeated requests have been made over the years by the county councils concerned, all of whom have been asking that some steps be taken to carry out a comprehensive scheme from where the Nore rises in County Laois, down to the city of Kilkenny, through Thomastown and from there to the point where it joins the Suir and the Barrow. The river Nore, in my opinion, has been responsible for the flooding of thousands of acres of land and unless some practical steps are taken to relieve the landowners whose holdings are adjacent to the river Nore they will be in a very serious plight.
We all understand that it is not possible to have all those major drainage schemes in operation at the one time but surely it is not outside the bounds of possibility for the Office of Public Works to carry out in these areas some minor drainage works in preparation for the major drainage schemes. I have seen in parts of the river Nore huge trunks of trees resting in the bed of the river. I have seen the eyes of the bridges blocked, preventing the flow of water. Surely, pending the carrying out of a comprehensive scheme, it should be possible for the Office of Public Works to set up a new section for the purpose of seeing that at least there is a steady flow of water and that all obstructions are removed, such obstructions as trunks of trees and blocked eyes of bridges.
The local authorities have no power. The Local Authorities (Works) Act has been scrapped. There is no legal obligation on a local authority to carry out the works and when complaints are made regarding the carrying out of those important drainage schemes we are told that nothing can be done until the comprehensive drainage scheme is carried out. I would ask the Parliamentary Secretary to consider seriously the problems not alone in relation to the river Nore but also in relation to the Barrow where there are similar problems. By the time the Boyne and the Nore schemes have been concluded it will be time to carry out a comprehensive scheme again on the river Barrow because there are parts of the Barrow which were never attended to. Every winter there is very serious flooding of all lands in the Barrow valley. The Nore valley stretches from Mountrath in County Laois to Durrow and from that to Thomastown. Surely there must be an obligation on some State Department to take the necessary steps to see that farmers' lands are clear of water. I feel that a substantial sum of money should be provided each year for the carrying out of those works pending the main drainage scheme.
The Barrow Drainage Board which is responsible for the maintenance of the river is a board comprised of representatives of the county councils and others whose functions are very tied up and very limited under regulations. According to the law, the Barrow Drainage Board can only maintain the river in exactly the same condition as they found it when it was handed over to them by the Office of Public Works. No works can be carried out in any circumstances. The river banks can be swept away; the walls and the parapets of bridges can deteriorate with time and age and be knocked down. The county councils have no authority. The Board of Works will not permit certain works to be done and the Barrow Drainage Board cannot carry out improvements because these cannot be described in Office of Public Works language as maintenance work.
I feel the Parliamentary Secretary's Office should be in a position to bring about a greater measure of relief in relation to drainage because they are the only State Department responsible for drainage. Everybody knows that with the present very high rate of unemployment in rural Ireland the one scheme which will render a benefit to the landowners and provide local employment is drainage. I have never seen a drainage scheme yet, which could be described as a satisfactory scheme, which did not provide useful employment and leave the lands which were drained much better than they were before the scheme was executed. Therefore, I feel the time has come for a complete and entire reorganisation of the Office of Public Works in relation to drainage.
Deputy Donnellan referred to the drainage of the Shannon. When the drainage of the Shannon is likely to take place, I cannot tell or what proposals the Office of Public Works have in mind for the drainage of the Shannon, but there is one thing we do know, that is, that the drainage of the Shannon presents many unusual problems. Numerous promises have been made from time to time, promises of a very sincere character at the time, and, perhaps those who gave the undertakings and the promises were not without the knowledge that those works were not going to be hastily executed. What is the position in Roscommon and in the district of County Offaly from Shannonbridge right down to the district in the parish of Lusmagh known as the Angler's Rest, where we have continuous flooding every year? The lands were there are useless for eight to nine months every year. The landowners are obliged to pay heavy rates and in many instances they cannot put stock on the land because they are afraid of fluke. Fluke, as we know, comes from wet and waterlogged lands.
Again, we see that in the Shannon Valley there have been widespread losses from time to time. I have often thought on every occasion on which we have serious flooding in the Shannon that we have the Government reaching a state of panic to see what temporary measures of relief can be provided. I suggested many years ago, and I think the suggestion is on the records of the Office of Public Works, that a permanent committee be set up to deal with emergencies relating to the Shannon, comprising the counties of Offaly, Westmeath, Roscommon, Leitrim and Longford—all the counties which are flooded.
I do not know how long it will be before a comprehensive drainage scheme is carried out on the Shannon. I hope I am not foolish enough to presume it will be in the lifetime of the youngest member of this House, on the progress that has been made over the years. I would like to suggest to the Parliamentary Secretary that, when the survey of the Shannon is in progress in his Department, he consider at the same time as the drainage is actually undertaken, either by the Office of Public Works or by the Forestry Department, some extensive plantation along the Shannon Valley. There is quite an amount of land in the Shannon Valley which is suitable only for plantation. If there were co-operations between the Office of Public Works and the Forestry Department, a good deal of the unpleasantness which is experienced in the Shannon Valley from flooding could be eliminated. This unpleasantness would be avoided for future generations if good planting were undertaken. I am sure that before the Parliamentary Secretary delivers the last word on this Estimate, he will make some reference to the drainage of the Shannon. It will not be sufficient for him to repeat the promises that have been made over the years in regard to it. We would like to know exactly where we stand, whether it will be done or not.
I sincerely recommend that a section of the Parliamentary Secretary's Office be established to deal with minor drainage works that do not come within the scope of the arterial drainage programme but which are qualified for inclusion in catchments under the arterial drainage works as soon as steps are undertaken to do this work. Steps must be taken to drain the land of this country. The Parliamentary Secretary knows, and again it is on the record, that one of the priorities of the inter-Party Government, so long decried by the present Government, was drainage, because we believed in drainage. We believed that the money spent on drainage was money well spent, that the more you employed on drainage, the more work you were providing and the more you improved the land of Ireland, the better the yield. We believed that any money spent on drainage was a sound national investment.
The Office of Public Works is handling the whole problem of drainage in a very piecemeal, childlike fashion. That is why I seriously ask the Parliamentary Secretary to sit down with the officers of the Board and to enter into consultation with his colleagues in the Government so that they may have a whole new approach to this question of drainage. I have the honour to be a Member of this House for 25 years and I venture to say that in the past 25 years, if the records are gone back over, on every second Vote for the Office of Public Works reference has been made to the Nore, the Boyne and the Shannon. That is a quarter of a century gone in talk. Are we going to sit and talk for another quarter of a century? An ounce of action is worth a ton of talk and the time has come for us to provide courageously for drainage in an effort to increase production from our land and even to give the ratepayers value for their money. Proper drainage schemes would provide a great deal of employment in rural Ireland.
The second priority of the Office of Public Works, if not ranking with the first, should be the provision of new schools. It is right and proper to put on the records, a tribute to the architects in the Office of Public Works for their designing of new schools. We have here portrayed a very fine example of airy, clean, well-designed and apparently well-constructed national schools. It is only right and proper that a word of thanks should be put on the record to the engineering section and the architectural section of the Office of Public Works for what I consider to be an excellent plan of a good, modern school.
The Parliamentary Secretary should be aware that one of the most urgent problems we are facing in rural Ireland today is the complete elimination of our hovel-like, insanitary and badly-aired schools. We are embarking on a general scheme of educational re-organisation but, in many parts of rural Ireland, we still have damp hovels called national schools. In many areas you have in overcrowded national schools the old dry toilets, and some of the most appalling sanitary conditions, conditions which are beyond description. The Board of Works should carry out for the Department of Education, with the least possible delay, schemes for the provision of schools that can be described as healthy and modern. If the Office of Public Works are about to carry out improvement and maintenance schemes of national schools, top priority shourd be given to the provision of proper sanitary facilities.
Perhaps, Sir, the Estimate for the Department of Education might be a more suitable occasion on which to comment on the condition of our national schools. It perhaps is the most appropriate Department to deal with the matter, but I am aware that neither the Department of Education nor the Office of Public Works have the co-operation they could and should have from many school managers. That is why I would have hoped that when we have good and progressive school managers, we would not have the odd one lagging behind.
I may be on the very edge, or outside the bounds, of the debate on the Estimate for the Office of Public Works. However, they have sent their engineers to these schools and usually there is consultation with the school manager in regard to the cost of repairs and the proposed works to be carried out. The Office of Public Works, as the agents of the Department of Education, must submit plans, specifications and proposed improvement schemes to the schools manager. Very often we have the school manager complaining that the Office of Public Works are unreasonable in drafting too elaborate a proposal for him to undertake. If the school manager does not proceed with such work, the Office of Public Works or the Department of Education cannot compel him to do so. I doubt that there is any regulation to compel him to do so.
I hope to take up at another time and in another place the suggestion that every bishop in Ireland should appoint one of his clergy as an inspector of school managers for the purpose of seeing whether there are school managers with schools not up to the required standard, so that the necessary action can be taken. We cannot allow our children to attend schools in insanitary and unhealthy conditions where the Office of Public Works have proposals for carrying out improvements and where they are not done. I shall leave it at that because I am sure I have trespassed on the very edge of the debate.
