The motion under discussion has been rightly described as one which is really a waste of time of the House when there is so much important business to be done. Nevertheless, perhaps it is a good thing it should have arisen because the onslaught on this Governmnent, particularly the dictatorial and vicious attacks on their leader and the personal vendetta that has been carried on, aided and abetted by the media, whose darling Deputy Haughey once was for many years — what has happened between them I do not know, but certainly it is not doing our country any good — is not helping our Government to give the sort of stable leadership required in a time of economic crisis of which we are all only too well aware. What is even more reprehensible is that from within the Fianna Fáil Party we find the rumblings, grumblings and snide remarks about their leader and the deals he has done.
I want to talk about the deals allegedly done in so far as my support of this Government is concerned. I have nothing to hide, neither has the Taoiseach nor the Fianna Fáil Party. I discussed my requirements with the present Leader of the Opposition, Deputy FitzGerald and I discussed them with the leader of the present Government before the election of Taoiseach took place. I had two priorities. My small party in Donegal had long since indicated, in documentation as far back as 1977, what those priorities are. They had not anything to do with the oarish pump deals that have been alleged to have taken place and from which allegedly my constituency is now benefiting. My first priority, as it has been over the years, is that the Fianna Fáil Party and/or the Government of the day should recognise that we are a 32-county island. We should so say in every forum in which we have an opportunity and the end result of that statement should mean that the only ultimate solution is that the occupation of our country by a foreign power, namely, the British, should cease, and that there can be no real unity or peace unless and until it is clearly understood that Britain is prepared to go. I sought that assurance from both leaders. I did not get very far with the present Leader of the Opposition. I did get somewhat further with the present Taoiseach. Indeed, his performance in that regard since then — publicly and openly on the day of his election as Taoiseach and later in the more auspicious surroundings of Washington — has kept faith with what I believe to be our attitude and that of an Irish Government, particularly of a Fianna Fáil Party, to the whole national issue.
The second priority was a request on behalf of the entire nation that there should be, in order to reduce rising unemployment, a massive employment operation carried out by the Government specifically in this time of crisis and folding up industrial enterprises and, because we are a small island, there was one outlet, through which we could employ tens of thousands of those idle hands we are paying so much today for doing nothing. Those people could be employed in the construction industry providing the houses for an increasing population, the roads, sewers, water, harbours, piers, schools, extensions to our hospitals and our new hospitals. All this work needs to be done very urgently and we have the people to do it. We are spending practically as much to keep them in idleness as we would pay them to be actively engaged in doing the things that will eventually have to be done at two or three times today's costs. What an additional benefit there would be for our economy if we could take 50,000 of those who are unemployed today and put them into doing this work.
It was not a question of my particular constituency, as has been alleged by certain persons in the House and outside it. This was on a national basis. I have said, in reply to some of my critics in relation to the alleged deal I was engaging in for my own constituency, that it would not do much good to my county or my constituency if we had work for everybody and the other 25 counties were on their knees. This is a national issue, and a national crisis, which can be cured, in those times of declining employment, only in the manner in which my party have suggested and which we put before Deputy FitzGerald and Deputy Haughey before the election of the Taoiseach.
I found, in relation to the construction industry approach and the massive programme required, that the Taoiseach was convinced that this was the way forward. The only criticism I have since then is that, while a great effort has been made, it is not going nearly fast enough, it is not imaginative enough and is not really taking off as it should. It has not instilled the confidence that the thousands of sanctions that have gone out should have done because it has been done in a low key. We need more of the same but we need to have the public with us in the knowledge that in these present difficult times therein lies the major answer to our employment problems and our financial problems. There are very low import costs in the construction industry. There is no problem about selling the products abroad because there is a ready market standing, waiting in queues, for all of the things I have talked about.
We have the men and women capable of doing the job. There is a crying national need for all of the products of the construction industry. There is the wasteful spending of money in Social Welfare on those who are unfortunate to be unemployed today, who could be usefully employed on this great enterprise. This could be done now at a lesser cost that it could ever be done again. This is what I asked from the Taoiseach and it is on the basis of this priority and that attitude to the national issue that I supported Deputy Charles Haughey as Taoiseach and why, having supported the creation of a Government in a situation regarded as stalemate and at knife edge, I have continued to support that Government since then and will continue during the debate on the Finance Bill because I am realistic enough to know that there is no way any Government at this particular juncture, in a financial crisis as well as an economic crisis, can go on unless they provide the money from our people, difficult though that may be for them in times of soaring prices but it can be done. You either back the Government or you vote against them.
With regard to the particular issue of confidence in the Government my confidence in them is greater than it would be for any combination that might offer themselves from the rest of the House. This is not because I am a product of the civil war politics. It is because our present dilemma started during the years prior to 1977 under a Coalition Government. The writing was on the wall for that Coalition Government for a year before the election. As soon as an election came they would be put out of Government. They were, to a degree which was not witnessed in the country before. At the same time, perhaps the huge majority might have been somewhat less if it was not because the then Leader and the ultimate Minister for Finance, Deputy George Colley, came along and topped up a situation that did not need topping up by wiping out rates on houses when we could not afford to do that, by taking taxes off cars, when we needed the money to fix the roads that cars use. They were so blind at the time they could not see they would have won the election if they never went out at all. They added to the dilemma, which was already created and fuelled by the ineptness of the then Coalition Government.
We have been on a steady graph downwards from then onwards, economically and financially. We got a chance in a change of Government from Fianna Fáil to Coalition again this time last year. We know what happened. When it came to handling the finances of the country they displayed they were as inept in that regard as they proved themselves to be in a previous administration on the economics of running the country. This was so bad that it was probably parallel to the stupidity of the people in the Fianna Fáil Party prior to the 1977 election in bribing the people to vote for them at a time when the people were crying out to vote for Fianna Fáil because they were so fed up with the Coalition Government.
The Coalition Government came in with financial proposals to put 18 per cent VAT on clothing and footwear at a time when the section of our community whose backs were breaking under the burden of costs and taxes, the people with large families, would bear the brunt of all this. In doing that at that time an ineptness of leadership was shown, which I believe is unparalleled in the history of the country in relation to any Government since the State was founded in the twenties.
That is the background to my continuing support for the Fianna Fáil Government. It goes far beyond that. If you do not have a Fianna Fáil Government what will you get? You get back what we had for eight months. They hardly knew when to come in out of the rain as they displayed in the budget proposals that were defeated here on 27 January.
Of all things, the people do not want to see us back this year, or next year, looking for votes because they know they have had the Coalition up to 1977, Fianna Fáil from 1977 to 1981, the Coalition for the remainder of 1981 and early 1982 and Fianna Fáil back again, the same mix as before. Is there any point, any sanity in going back to the people after seven months and asking them to choose one or other lot of us again? To do what? To really slow things up while an election takes place, to add to our difficulties and our problems, to create further financial crises in the country and create doubt in the minds of those who are stuggling to try to continue in business and provide employment. That is what an election would do at this time and I said that at the time of the election of the Government. On that occasion I said that whoever unnecessarily brought about an early election would probably never be seen in the House again, and deservedly so. I repeat today that whoever unnecessarily brings about an election — an election at this time on the issues before us is unnecessary, cannot produce anything better than we have got and, probably may produce worse and do harm in the meantime — may not be returned. It will be reflected in the vote of all associated with them, and rightly so.
I should like now to return again to this matter of deals. What is wrong with deals? What is the difference? What is wrong with a politician, after he has been elected like the rest of us, seeking within his own party to get the support to become leader of it? What is wrong, when he becomes leader of that party, seeking the support of Members of this House, sufficient to give him a majority to become Taoiseach and select a Government? What can those in the various Coalitions say, from Labour and Fine Gael who went out and stood on seperate platforms, just as we did on this occasion, and returned to do deals? Nobody has written that up as something corrupt. It may be that we have alleged it was done after the event rather than before but it has never been said that it was corrupt.
However, there is this aura being created around what has taken place in the formation of the Government as if it was corrupt in a way we have never experienced in any circumstances before. That is totally wrong. The Fine Gael Party in particular, aided and abetted by some within Fianna Fáil, given ample coverage by the media, are trying to erode without any good purpose or alternative, the Government through attacking viciously the man who occupies, by our choice in this House, the position of Taoiseach. That man was chosen by the unanimous choice of his own party only a few months ago. Those who were doing that, whether they are in Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil or the media are doing little service for the country at a time when it needs the help of all rather than the hinderance of the many who are now rising up and would like to join the band of criticism. They are implying that if only they could get something together they could do it.
Those people have had their opportunity but they messed it up. They cannot show that there is any likelihood that if they are given another opportunity in the morning they would do anything different. In fact, everything shows, right up to their departure on 27 January, that they are likely to make a bigger mess in the future than they did in the past because of the ineptness of the leadership. There is another matter that has been bandied about for too long and, perhaps, it has been misunderstood. That relates to the alleged strokes of the Taoiseach in the Dublin West by-election. We should not forget that the figures for that by-election were on a knife-edge, 1 or 2 per cent between them at the previous election. The Government in a by-election at any time carries a bit of a handicap, a bit of extra lead and that lead proved too much on this occasion. I am one of the few people who can say that the appointment of Mr. Burke to become our Commisioner in Brussels was on merit, the man being the best and most suitable we could choose to do a job in an institution which is becoming more important to the well-being of the country. I do not say that in retrospect because I am on record as saying, when the term of office of Mr. Burke as Commissioner was coming to an end, that he should be retained. No fault to Deputy O'Kennedy, I wanted Mr. Burke to continue. I wanted the party political business done away with as far as Europe was concerned because it does not exist there anyway. We had a need for Mr. Burke, a man of integrity and I say that, although he has been on the opposite benches to me while he was a Member of this House and a Minister, I found him to be upright and honest in all things he did.
After the election of the Fianna Fáil Government I continued my efforts to prevail on the Fianna Fáil leadership, and the Government, to appoint Mr. Burke for the same reasons I was advancing when they had a 20-seat majority. I did not do that because it was a good stroke, that he would vacate his seat in Dublin West and Fianna Fáil might win, consolidating their position. It was on the basis that this small country that carries little political clout has only one Commissioner in what has now developed into a very tightly-knit club. If one looks at the record one will see that those with the longest service in that club are the people at the top. They have the greatest clout. In our nine years in the EEC what has happened to us?
Our first Commissioner is now our President and, unfortunately, with him to the Park appointment went the benefit of the four years' service he had already given, the benefit of the club spirit that had been developing and the contacts he would have made. That Commissioner was followed, in different circumstances, by Mr. Burke who fought his corner. I know that since I went to Europe. He came to be a respected member of the Commission. He was respected for his integrity, his commonsense and his fighting qualities but at the end of his term the party political altar had to have its sacrifice and Mr. Burke was cast aside. A new member was appointed and he suffered from the disability of not being known there, not having contacts and not having put in the service. That is why I repeat that Mr. Burke's appointment, far from being a stroke that went wrong, or something reprehensible done in the interests of party political politics, was in the best interests of the country. He had the highest qualifications available to do the best job for us. That should go on record and I hope it gets at least some of the publicity we have been getting in an adverse way as to why Mr. Burke was appointed. That adverse publicity is hurting Mr. Burke in his job in Europe. It is making him less effective because of the tirade we hear about how he was appointed, as if it was a dirty party political deal to try to get a seat for Fianna Fáil or that he was used as a pawn. That is so far from the truth that it is about time the truth was told and I hope it will be published in that respect.
As far as agriculture, unemployment, imports and such matters are concerned I should like to refer to what Deputy Quinn said. I have great regard for that Deputy as a person but having heard his comments on agriculture today it would be better if he studied the situation before he makes similar assertions again, that the vested interests see to it that the cattle go out on hoof or that vested interests see to it that this or that is done. The fact is that agriculture over several generations has had a rough time. The people on the land have stuck to it, in many cases more by tradition and their fondness of the land than for the benefit or return they were getting for the labour they were putting into it. If they have in the last ten years or so appeared to be getting a lot more than they got in the past, it should be remembered that what they were getting in the past was so far below what they were entitled to that it is doubtful if at any time, even in the best years of the past ten, they got anything like a proper recompense for their labours and the essential part they have to play in the economy both now and in the future.
I would put fisheries next to the construction industry. We have the best fishing grounds in any part of the world. We are not reaping the reward our closeness to our fishing grounds gives us. I was responsible for fisheries myself and I say with all due deference to the people in the Department of Fisheries that we have been toying with what should be our second biggest industry. How true that is can be seen when we look at the EEC as a whole and find that for every one person employed full time catching fish there are ten people working on shore processing fish. Here for every one person employed full time in fishing we have 0.7 people engaged in processing on shore. There is potential for 40,000 jobs on shore if we caught sufficient fish. We are not doing this because we are only toying with the fishing industry. We are not taking it seriously enough. Had we done so over 25 years ago, we would match the average employment on shore for every person employed at sea.
There is lack of agreement on a fishery policy and we could find ourselves in a situation where our fish would be taken and processed elsewhere. If we cannot catch the fish ourselves we should make a deal which would ensure that any fish caught in the waters around our coasts would be landed here. Let us get the employment on shore. It could be ten times what it is on the trawlers. There are riches which we have not exploited. We have never taken this issue seriously enough and have looked at it more in the nature of something which helps the west where there is little other opportunity for employment rather than the massive industry it could and should be. It could match that in other EEC countries.
As regards imports I should like to see VAT on imports of anything we produce here. To those who say that would be against the laws of the EEC I say there are many countries stronger than we are who do these things first and justify them later. We neither tried to do it or justify it. A case should be made to Brussels on the basis that if we are to get out of the dilemma we are in, exceptional measures need to be taken. It would be for the good of the Community as well as ourselves if by restricting imports in a manner which does not conform with the general norm in the EEC we could get out of our difficulties. We would cost the EEC less and subscribe more to it. If the Government cannot be seen internationally to flout these laws, although other countries have repeatedly done it when it suited them, another way would be if workers who go on strike about how much per metre they should be paid for shifting from bad offices to good offices found their way way down to the docks and big stores and had wildcat strikes about the unnecessary importation of foreign goods which puts their members out of work year in and year out. They would be doing something useful then instead of what they are doing at present.
If the Opposition want to cod anyone that they want an election they are not codding me. I do not believe, unless there is a nut case somewhere, that anyone really wants an election.
