asked the Minister for Transport and Power whether his attention has been drawn to a statement that CIE have placed in Britain or are about to place an order for new railway carriages; if so, if he will state why this order has not been placed in Ireland; and if he will make a statement clarifying the situation.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - CIE Railway Carriages.
3.
I am informed by CIE that having sought tenders they placed an order for 62 railway carriages with a British firm on 31st October, 1970. No tender for the carriages was received from any Irish firm. Because of shortage of skilled craft workers CIE cannot, at present, undertake carriage building but if the position in that respect eases they will endeavour to negotiate with the supplier to have a proportion of the work carried out at Inchicore. CIE inform me that discussions are still taking place with the trade unions to see how staff shortages might be overcome.
Is the Minister aware that CIE made many skilled workers redundant and that, if there were a shortage, it would be the fault of CIE rather than that of the workers? Is he aware that in August as many as 20 fitters who applied for employment were turned down and that at a seminar on 8th October, when the question of overtime was raised, the workers were told there could be no question of overtime as CIE had never been better off for skilled workers? How does he reconcile these facts with his statement?
The Deputy has only one side of the story in regard to this matter. It is a matter which dates back for a very considerable time. I do not want to prejudice the discussions that are still taking place with the trade unions to see how staff shortages might be overcome and it would serve no purpose for me to give the House the very long history relating to the whole problem. All I can say is that a number of the trade union officials in the CIE group are still anxious to have negotiations in order that a proportion of the work can be carried out. I do not propose to comment further. There has been a great deal of press comment but, as the Deputy knows, there are at least two sides to this question. For me to comment, particularly in the absence of the Minister, would be entirely wrong. If the Deputy chooses to press this matter I would ask him to question the Minister next week and then perhaps, if the Minister thinks that because of the Deputy's allegations he must give the full history of the case, he can in his own right do so. I should prefer to see these negotiations continuing in order to ensure that as much as possible of this type of work can be done through the contractor in the Inchicore engineering works. The whole question goes back a very long distance; it relates not to what the Deputy suggests but to the facilities for building all-steel carriages. It is a complex matter. I do not propose to make the position worse than it is.
Can the Minister say if a firm in Dundalk built some of these carriages a short time ago, if they put in a tender in this particular instance and if their tender got the consideration it deserved? They did put in a tender and as far as I know they were not told whether their tender was accepted or not accepted and there were no further negotiations, which seems a pity.
I could not tell the Deputy whether they were informed or not but I imagine they were. A firm in Dundalk did get a contract for heating vans some years ago. They tendered for a new contract and their tender, I understand, was so high as compared with the others that even allowing for the normal percentage preference given to Irish firms it was not possible for CIE to award the contract to them.
I appreciate that it could do more harm than good to go into great detail while negotiations are still in progress but there is one aspect I should like to press on the Minister. Is he aware that there is in fact no shortage of coach builders of whom there are 100 there, only 20 less than the maximum there have ever been, and could he say, therefore, whether, while the negotiations proceed with regard to the other matters, at least the coach building work on the under-frames could be immediately allocated to the Inchicore works as there is no problem in that respect?
As far as I know this relates to the building of all-steel railway carriages. Whatever staffs there are whose particular duties relate to certain skills the difficulty is in finding the skill to build all-steel carriages.
When CIE made it known that there was a shortage of skilled workers, surely at that stage the Minister for Labour should have come in and negotiated between the unions and CIE and not have waited until the order was given out? Surely something should have been done three or four years ago?
I do not want to prejudice this matter. I would prefer not to say anything more about it. It does go back a considerable distance and I think if the Deputy were in the place of the Minister for Labour he would find that whatever negotiations took place would have to take place between the company and the Group Union Committee representing all the unions and, in consequence, further down with the various craft unions. I do not think the Minister for Labour could have expedited the negotiations any more——
Why not?
——in a most complex situation.
Question No. 4.
Is it a fact that the unions were never even told how many additional workers were required to be upgraded? Does it not appear that CIE did not negotiate seriously in this matter? Is there not, therefore, a case for intervening now to make sure that any negotiations entered into are serious negotiations?
The Deputy can be assured that the negotiations are very serious.
Is it the case that the position has been prejudiced? Has an order been given or is it still possible to retrieve the position if negotiations are successful?
The order had to be given because there were certain financial conditions attached to the order which were extremely favourable to the company.
Does that mean that negotiations cannot solve the problem then?
Deputy Dowling.
Would the Minister, even at this late stage, try to convene a meeting of the interested parties to ensure that this type of nonsense does not occur in the future——
Hear, hear.
——because the workers of CIE are quite competent to build these carriages? The Minister should at this stage get the parties together so that this problem can be ironed out once and for all and so ensure that Irishmen will be employed at home rather than abroad.
As the Deputy knows, there is the establishment of the training board, AnCO, and there is also the proposal by CIE for an apprentice training scheme. I will convey the feelings of the House to the Minister for Transport and Power. If there is anything he can do which would bring these parties closer together in order to resolve this problem I am quite certain he will do it.
When the order is gone.