I should say, initially, that I will resist the temptation of allowing my imagination to visualise the position if this morning the situation were reversed and Deputy G. Fitzgerald were sitting on the opposite benches as Minister for Labour and the present holder of that office were sitting here in Opposition. I am visualising what the attitude of the present Minister would be and basing that on my experience of him in Opposition and the ease with which he could solve every problem whether economic or social. I recollect his special presumed expertise in the matter of employment, matters connected with redundancy, and anything which had a kinship with what he would have described as his interest in and his knowledge of the workers.
I recollect, too, the swiftness with which he would dismiss the hand of Fianna Fáil as being incapable of governing and, because of that, he would assert there was no obligation on him to assist them in any predicament which might arise. He would establish as a political principle that there was no question of the Opposition complementing the Government and that the Government alone had the absolute responsibility to solve any problem which arose. I suppose I should admit that, up to that point, he had no experience of being in Government. In all charity one could excuse him and say that perhaps his faith in himself was such that he could solve all the problems of this nation and other nations. I am allowing that charity to him even though I criticise myself for so doing. Accordingly, as far as possible I will make positive comments on the motion we are discussing.
This Government and the Minister for Labour have brought the country into an economic quagmire, a situation which, in fairness to them, they all admit. How can the Minister say he is making any contribution towards solving the appalling unemployment problem by imposing additional taxes on the employers and the workers? That is what this motion represents. The position is bad enough without making it worse. Does the Minister not know that employers are put to the pin of their collar to survive? Daily we have business after business forced to retire from the scene. They are crying out for some form of incentive, or inducement, or encouragement, and here we have a measure from the Minister which he must accept worsens the position of the employer. I will not develop that point.
Let us look now at the case of the employee. This year the Minister for Finance based his budget on the premise that there would be a pay pause. The Minister for Labour should advise the Minister for Finance that you cannot aspire to a pay pause when day by day, and hour by hour, you are increasing the cost of living of employees. The Minister for Labour is asking ladies to pay an increase in the stamp of from 4p to 12p and male workers to pay an increase in the stamp of from 5p to 13p. In certain times that increase might seem rather small but, having regard to the narrow margins operating at the moment, the Minister should realise it will be an element in the case for increases that will be made by trade unions with which he is so familiar and to which he was attached for so long.
I have been presented with the difficulty of assessing where this Government are going, or where they think they are going. This is not a Government in the true fashion. There are no elements of the teamwork which ordinarily would be expected from a Government. Day after day we get ample proof of each one in his own right persuing elements of dictatorship, each one doing his own thing. There are verbal admissions of overall responsibility. They are, unfortunately for the country, articulate and eloquent men, who have the gift of the gab in making any case. When one looks at the totality there is evidence that in perfect disharmony the Left is not prepared to let the Right know what it is doing, and vice versa. Because of that, we have unparalleled unemployment at the moment, and it is developing. It is about the only thing that is developing under this Government.
I do not want to give a sermon on unemployment, but it is no harm to refer to the proverb and adage about what the devil will do with idle hands, or to what the Lord said about how a person should live during his lifetime —the quotation with which we are all familiar about—the sweat of one's brow. That philosophy reminds us of the need, apart from the desirability, for each person to be gainfully employed during his or her lifetime.
Each normal person is searching for that natural satisfaction which derives from being gainfully employed. Each person is searcihing for that sense of fulfilment that comes when he realises he has a contribution to make to society. This Government stand condemned for denying that right to so many people.
At any level unemployment is unwelcome and is socially undesirable but the greatest tragedy is in respect of the young men and women. Tens of thousands of young boys and girls are leaving second-and third-level education full of talent and idealism, having spent long arduous years applying themselves to education. This should normally guarantee them jobs but this does not happen.
What do this Government offer them? They offer idleness, disillusionment and shattered dreams. All of us must fear the reaction that, understandably, will ensue as a result of this frustration and as a result of the ineptitude of the Government to follow up what was prepared for them by their predecessors with regard to developing the economy to the point where it could absorb all of those people.
All of us know that in 1969 and in the early seventies Fianna Fáil had advanced the economic wellbeing of the country to the point where labourers, technicians and professional people were returning from other countries to fill a need that could not be satisfied at home. Having planned the economy, Fianna Fáil looked at the educational system. They saw that at primary level the curricula should be updated and that at secondary level there should be proper employment of the resources that existed to break the traditional competition that had occurred between secondary and vocational education. In pursuit of that aim they established community and comprehensive schools and regional colleges. All this was necessary to satisfy the economic programme which had been planned and which was being executed.
During those years the present Minister for Labour criticised the Government for the manner in which they were operating and for what he claimed was the lack of perfection in our economic structure. He told Fianna Fáil that if they could be removed from the scene he and his colleagues would come into office and lead us on to perfection. Let us consider what has happened.
It is not the first time that a Government like the present one have destroyed the dream of young Ireland. All of us know that the Coalition Governments have a record of double failure and we now have the hat-trick. In the past fate ensured that they were succeeded by Fianna Fáil who had a double success and, hopefully, we will have a hat-trick of successes. My fear is that the country will have reached a point where it will be impossible for any Government, whether party or national, to retrieve this situation and the longer this Government remain in office the greater will be the difficulty of retrieving the situation.
We hear much talk from the Minister for Industry and Commerce about our great wealth. I accept that a person could share what I regard as the "bingo" philosophy, of hoping that wealth will emerge from the ocean and from the land. We understand it is there but it will not be produced without a certain effort and at a price. I believe in looking at what is there. I believe in assessing what I can see and in utilising that resource. If there is any untapped resource in this country about which there is certainty it is labour. Our labour force is the greatest unemployed resource we have at the moment.
It is an extraordinary situation where ostensibly we seem to be concerned about applying ourselves to hidden wealth and hidden resources while at the same time we are neglecting and abusing the resource with the best potential we know of. In respect of that neglect, I accuse the Minister for Labour. I accuse him in particular in respect of the measure which he now introduces. I am sure he is conversant enough with the situation and fully aware of the sensitivity of industry at present to know that the measure he is introducing will not create one new job. On the contrary, he knows as well as I that it must add further to the accumulation of this untapped resource we have.
I am reminded of the days when the boot was on the other foot in this House—shortly there will be no boot on any foot and it will be difficult here, or anywhere else, to recognise any one thing from another. Certain elements in the Government have set about in their prodigal son philosophy to destroy the real wealth accumulated here over the years. That having been done, they are now endeavouring to pick-pocket the wealth of other nations, and, temporarily, they are getting that accommodation. They talk about the distribution of wealth without accepting the counter-balance, that to distribute anything one must first create it. They are not concerned about that; they are not concerned about the creation at all; there is too much hardship involved there and it has not the same ephemeral popularity as the other. They are succeeding very well in reaching a situation where the only true thing in respect of the distribution of wealth is that everyone will have so little that there will be equality. There will not be anything for anybody.
In similar circumstances, when the Minister was in Opposition, he was a great man for the emergency call. He wanted to declare an emergency in housing, an emergency in health and an emergency on the economic scene. He is now in the position of having made his own very substantial contribution to the appalling emergency in which we find ourselves today.
