I want to renew my opposition to this Bill on its Final Stage. Nothing that the Minister said in defence of the Bill on the earlier stages seems to me to meet the objections that were raised to the Bill. He himself asserted that so far as he was concerned he does not believe that, for instance, the earlier sections—2 and 3—make any difference in the law, as he understands it, but that he wants to make it clear. That is not my view of what is intended by the Bill, and it is not my view of what should influence the Seanad in its final judgment. Notwithstanding that I have heard the Minister's explanation in defence of the Bill, I am satisfied that the Bill is doing a thing that ought not to be done. In the first place, it is asking the Oireachtas to forego rights which are inherent in the Oireachtas, particularly in the Dáil, in regard to the checking and expenditure of public moneys. It purports to remove from the authority of the Comptroller and Auditor-General responsibilities which are imposed upon him by the Constitution and by the Comptroller and Auditor-General Act as well as by the general character of his office. I think that the Oireachtas has no right to disown its responsibility in this matter. It ought not to remove, as it purports to do, from the Comptroller and Auditor-General the powers of check upon public expenditure which it is his office to fulfil. On that ground I ask the House on this last opportunity to throw out the Bill.
Military Service Pensions Bill, 1929—Final Stage.
If I were a Demosthenes and were able to convince the Seanad that this Bill which has been introduced was bad for the country, I am afraid the only effect would be that some Senators who might be convinced of that would still act contrary to their convictions. One feels that it is almost futile to get up and try to convince them that this Bill is a bad one for the country because one feels that they will not act, even if convinced, according to their new convictions. This Bill, stripped of all its trimmings, camouflage and verbiage is simply and purely an effort to prove that the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Public Accounts Committee who agreed with him, were wrong when they declared that certain papers were essential for the proper audit of the accounts. The purpose of the Bill is not only to protect the Government in the future but to indemnify them against acts that they did in the past, whether these were accidental, intentional or unintentional.
This Bill is retrospective in its character. If the Government have done wrong things, the purpose of this Bill is to put them right legally. I want the Seanad to keep that in mind. This matter first arose when the Comptroller and Auditor-General said he wanted certain papers in order that he might be able to audit the accounts properly. The matter came before the Public Accounts Committee and was discussed by the members of it. The Government nominees on that Committee put forward the Government's objection to doing what the Comptroller and Auditor-General asked. The only argument that they put forward, and this is the only defence that has been made in support of the Bill, was this: that certain people might suffer if their names were exposed. The Public Accounts Committee at the time took that as a fairly reasonable argument. They agreed to the argument that was put forward because the sum involved at the time—something like £6,000—was relatively small. In the following year the sum under this head had mounted up to about £80,000. That put a different complexion on the matter. The Public Accounts Committee then veered round and thought it would be better and safer if the papers asked for were given to the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Last year the amount in question was about £253,000. This year the amount is about £208,000. It is probable that it will remain in or about that figure for some time. That is an enormous sum of money to have involved in this matter. We are not out merely to try and catch people. That is clear from the fact that the Fianna Fáil members on the Public Accounts Committee were quite willing to meet the Government when a small amount of money was involved. If a Bill were brought in to prevent, say, the Comptroller and Auditor-General from exposing these particular papers—to prevent him from allowing anybody to peruse them except himself—I think that would be fair enough. We must not forget that the people who went into this evidence were two Cumann na nGaedheal Deputies, two Ministers and a judge. The Comptroller and Auditor-General is an important public official. I think it should not frighten anybody if, as I have suggested, a Bill were brought in making it obligatory on him to keep these documents secret. It might be a very good manoeuvre for us Republicans to allow this Bill to go through quietly if we were to consider merely the political advantages to be derived in the future from its passing. I imagine it would secure great tactical advantages for us later on. It would be there as a precedent and later on we could drive wild horses through the Constitution along these lines. We have had other matters before us, but nothing quite so blatant as this one.
I am surprised that the Government did not introduce a Bill on the lines that I have suggested. The Comptroller and Auditor-General, in the ordinary course of his duty, is like the Party in Opposition, bound, when a matter is doubtful, always to suspect the worst. The Party in Opposition is perfectly justified in suspecting the worst, or, at least, in acting as if they suspected the worst. They are justified in doing that in order to make doubly sure, as it were, that things are put right. It is not through any mere feeling of pernicketiness that we are opposing the Bill, but because we believe—personally, I think it is not only possible but probable—that there is something that the Government really do not want to publish. If it was decided to give numbers in the cases of those receiving pensions, and whose names it is thought it would be dangerous to publish—to give the numbers for them and the total amount involved in their cases —with the publication of the names in all other cases, I do not think that we could disagree with that. As I have said, it might be a good manoeuvre on our part to allow this Bill to go through quietly, because by passing it we are establishing a precedent which will afford an opportunity of going through the Constitution later on.
This is a very bad Bill. I felt rather glad that, when the Bill was reaching its last stages, the rules of the House had to be broken through in order to admit of its speedy passage. The Bill breaks through the Constitution. The Minister is rather unfortunate that, in reaching the Final Stage of this Bill, the rules of the House have had to be suspended. Has the Minister any regard for the rules of the House or for the Constitution? When this Bill came up for consideration on the last occasion I opposed it in a speech which, in my judgment, was a perfectly reasonable speech. I opposed it on constitutional grounds. As Senator Robinson has said, this Bill involves the expenditure of public money to the extent of about £270,000. If we seek for comparisons, that is about the sum which was required for old age pensions and in respect of which there was the fall of the Government. Of course it rose again like the Phoenix from its ashes, but still £270,000 in a small country like this is a considerable sum. In my judgment the breaking through of principles of constitutional government is of greater importance than that.
This Bill was intended to give pensions to men who had served in the Irish Republican Army and in kindred organisations before the Truce, and who continued to serve in the Free State Army after the Truce. If any member of the Army who fought for the independence of this country is in need of a pension, I would not raise my voice to oppose it, whatever his conduct may have been in after years. But not one of the men whom I knew in the course of the struggle ever fought for a pension or in the hope of getting one. I am greatly afraid that numbers of people who performed no service to their country before the Truce, or to anybody else, have succeeded in getting pensions. They have come out like flies in the sunshine. I greatly fear that a number of them have got pensions which they do not deserve and which they did not earn and which a poor country can ill afford to pay. The Minister, in his speech in the Dáil, said that he himself was entitled to a pension but that he did not demand one. What I say is that a great number of people have demanded pensions and have got them who were not entitled to them.
Will the Senator adduce a little evidence on that point?
Probably. I said on the last occasion that it was not my duty to inquire into individual cases. It is not my business to do that. I base my opposition to this Bill on the broad constitutional ground that the Comptroller and Auditor-General has been excluded from these documents. In the other House a great many examples were given of cases where pensions had at first been refused and were afterwards granted, and the coincidence was adverted to that a general election was in the offing and supervened. That is no part of my argument here to-day.
It is your whole argument.
The Constitution says that all expenditure of public money must be vouched for by the Comptroller-General and that when it has been spent it must be audited by the same man as Auditor-General. That is the practice which has been found necessary in every country for the purpose of preserving the purity of public life, because human nature being what it is, the ablest man sometime or other may go wrong. My friend, Senator Milroy, I am sure, in his wide reading of the history of this and other countries, must know that public men in former times have gone wrong, and that because they have gone wrong it became necessary to devise this machine—the Comptroller and Auditor-General. It was a great protection to Ministers, a great security, because while this officer is there and allowed to discharge his functions not alone can there be no misappropriation of public money, but there can be no suggestion against the integrity of Ministers. He is a great protection to Ministers, as I have said, and he is also a great protection to the public. While this State has been in existence for nearly eight years, there have been few occasions on which the Auditor-General has been prevented from doing his duty. I do not think there has been any occasion up to the present, and I will say this of an officer whom I do not know, that so far as I can see, reading from the reports of public accounts and the audits of public accounts, that officer has done his duty with great wisdom, great forbearance and great courage.
I may have misheard the Senator, but I gathered from what he was saying that the Auditor-General had on occasions been prevented from doing his duty.
I said I did not think he had on any occasion up to the present. I am glad Senator Johnson intervened to emphasise that point I have made. So far as I know, on no occasion up to the present has the Auditor-General been prevented from discharging his very responsible duties, and he has discharged them well, so far as I can see. Now comes this Pensions Bill. It was a highly controversial measure, because while it provided for pensions for one class of the I.R.A. it excluded pensions from another class. There was a double test for those entitled to pensions. They must have performed services to their country before the Truce, and they must have been in the National Army after the Truce. Soldiers of the Republic, no matter how valiant they may have been in the days before the Truce, are not entitled to pensions under this Act. Therefore, it was a highly controversial Party measure, and it was most desirable that in the carrying into effect of that measure the greatest candour should be observed. Now, what is done? A board is set up, and it was attempted to suggest that that board was a court of justice whose decisions could not be questioned. Well, I think that argument was abandoned. Of course, it was bound to be abandoned. It should never have been put forward, because the very men who said it was a court were the men who contended that similar institutions that were advising General Macready and others were not courts. We proved in the House of Lords that the military courts set up to advise General Macready were not courts.
Of course, the same rule would apply in this case. They are not courts, but the proceedings before them are to be kept private. The evidence taken at these courts is to be kept from the eye of the Comptroller-General. Why? Is it to be suggested that the Comptroller-General is not a man to be relied on? Is it to be suggested that this high officer would be false to the trust imposed upon him? No. The only other suggestion that can possibly be made is this, that there are a number of people in receipt of pensions and allowances under this Party measure who are not entitled to them, and that there must be great malversation of public money. Let my friend, Senator Milroy, answer that in any way he likes. I make no charge against anybody, because I have no information of any individual case, but I say that the concealing of these papers was the strongest circumstantial proof that there must be something very serious to conceal. We are told these papers are private documents and only to be seen by members of the Board. They are no such thing. President Cosgrave stated very frankly in the Dáil that the papers are in existence, that they are public documents, and that they are in a certain room. Of course the notes were taken by shorthand writers who were paid by the State. The papers were no more the property of the members of the Tribunal than this House is the property of the members of the Tribunal. The public documents are there which would show the Comptroller and Auditor-General whether these pensions had been fairly granted or not. There might be very extraordinary cases which would strike him at once, but he is not to see these papers.
What excuse is given? "Oh, if he were to see these papers grave injury might be done to some people in England, Scotland, the North of Ireland, or elsewhere." My answer is if a man was entitled to a pension, and if that appeared on the documents, the Comptroller and Auditor-General would have nothing to say to it. If from these documents it appears that the man was not entitled to the pension, and that he was committing a fraud on the State, I say then that the person committing that fraud should not be protected. It has also been said: "If you show these documents to the Comptroller and Auditor-General that will be showing them to every clerk in his office." I deny that. I deny that any person except the Comptroller and Auditor-General has the right to see these documents, just as I assert that he has the absolute right under the Constitution to see them. He is the man you exclude. Who is the man you will not trust? He is the man appointed by the Dáil, first to give warrant for every payment authorised by the Minister, and then to audit every payment made on the authority of the Minister.
He is selected by the Dáil to be the servant of the people of this State. He cannot be dismissed by the Dáil—the Dáil and Seanad must concur in his dismissal. He is a man who cannot be a member of either House of the Oireachtas, a man set apart and protected in every way which human ingenuity can invent for the purpose of securing that he shall be an honest, upright, and efficient public servant, a watchdog of the public funds. I have no reason to think that the present occupant of that office is unworthy of the trust which the people have put upon him, but apparently he is not worthy of the confidence of Ministers or of the Minister for Defence. My submission is that the Minister for Defence, in excluding this public officer from his duties is breaking the Constitution in a fundamental way, because when you come to the question of money, the appropriation of public funds, you come to the foundations of this Constitution, just as you do in every constitution.
It is a curious thing that this Comptroller and Auditor-General has met with the disapproval of the military men and the military Ministers for a considerable time. The most remarkable incident in connection with this office was where he disclosed the purchase of 10,000 or 20,000 periscopes. That was the first discovery he made—somebody, in the course of the Civil War, had purchased 10,000 or 20,000 periscopes in order to enable the Free Staters to look at the Republicans. Since he was guilty of that first offence he has not been a persona grata in that particular Department, and now they are preventing him from seeing these documents which it is his right under the Constitution to see, which it is his duty under the Constitution to examine, and which I think this Bill will not prevent him if he desires to have them examined, because, as I said on the last occasion, it is very hard to break through the fundamental principles and rights of the people, and even the Minister for Defence, if he desires to do so, with all his skill will find it very difficult. These documents will, I think, become famous. They will become rather historical. We understand they are locked up, that the Minister for Defence himself has not seen them, and, as he protests, cannot see them, but I think people hereafter will be very curious to see them, and let us hope they will not find too many things wrong. Very likely the evidence will then be forgotten or lost.
The Minister said in the Dáil that he would be very anxious to receive information as to pensions which were wrongly obtained. I have no means of giving him that information. It is not my duty or the duty of any member of this House to go around and procure that information for him, but it would be the duty of the Comptroller and Auditor-General to look through the documents and examine them, to bring his experience and knowledge to bear upon them, and then when he had done that to bring in any complaints or observations he had to make before the constitutional Committee appointed by the Dáil to look into the Public Accounts. What I submit to the House is that this Bill is wrong, that it is conceived in temper, and that it offends against constitutional principles in a vital way. No doubt it has passed through the Dáil. It has received a Second Reading in the Seanad, and perhaps it will be passed to-day, but certainly it will not be passed without the strongest protest I can make against it.
Every time I listen to Senator Comyn I am more and more amazed at his reading of the Constitution. I do not think his speech should be allowed to pass without a brief explanation as to why some of us have disagreed entirely with the views he has expressed. I will not follow him into the merits or demerits of this Bill, or the question as to whether or not some people have got pensions who should not have got them. I have no knowledge in the matter, and I do not believe in the infallibility of a Committee or of any set of persons, but on the main issue I totally disagree with him—that it was the duty of the Comptroller and Auditor-General to see whether the pensions had been fairly granted or not. I believe his only function is to see whether the payments made were in accordance with the service which had been decided upon by the Committee.
Is the Senator quoting the Comptroller and Auditor-General or Senator Comyn?
Senator Comyn. I believe that anything outside what I have stated would be going outside the functions of the Comptroller and Auditor-General. Further, I believe it would be disastrous if he were to have any functions other than those of auditor. I do not believe he has any of the functions suggested by Senator Comyn.
What is the meaning of "Comptroller" then?
I do not think that "Comptroller" means that he controls the Oireachtas, whether it acts wisely or not. I believe the Oireachtas has the right to do wrong, if I may use the phrase——
It was not the Oireachtas did wrong.
It is his function to see whether the Vote is in accordance with the decision of the Oireachtas or not. I believe that is the issue, and that is the reason I support the Bill.
I am glad Senator Comyn was so thoughtful as to keep the discussion going until the return of the Minister for Defence. I would not have intervened were it not to make one or two brief comments on Senator Comyn's observations, and which observations were not heard by the Minister for Defence. Senator Comyn adopted a line of argument which, I think, is both regrettable and reprehensible. He was willing to wound but afraid to strike. He made the suggestion time and again that there had been malversation of public moneys, and pensions had been granted to people who were not entitled to them. When I challenged him to produce some evidence on that point he said: "I know nothing about that. I have no knowledge of it." Is there anything more contemptible than to make a suggestion discrediting the probity of public men, of men of administrative and executive authority, to make this insidious suggestion of corrupt practice, and then when challenged to admit that he has nothing on which to base that suggestion?
On a point of explanation, I made no suggestion of corrupt practice against the Ministers. What I say is that fraudulent claims may have been made and allowed. That was perfectly clear, I think, in my statement.
It is within the recollection of those who were here what were the actual words the Senator did use. According to the plain meaning of the words, I think it would be impossible to draw any inference from the words used by the Senator than that he wished to convey that there had been practices of the nature I have indicated. I say it is not creditable to the person who uses that kind of argument. It certainly does no good to any cause, especially to the cause on behalf of which that kind of argument is brought forward. I was glad to hear Senator Douglas's speech, and I believe that it would be a curious position which the Oireachtas would find itself in if it placed outside of its powers the right to limit the functions of any of its servants.
The Comptroller and Auditor-General is the servant of this Oireachtas, not the dictator, and the Oireachtas, if it so wishes, has, in my opinion, the power to limit his operations where it deems that such a limitation is necessary. It is perfectly futile and misleading to argue on the assumption, as has been argued, not so much to-day as on previous occasions, as if normal circumstances were the order appertaining to the occasion when the grounds for these pensions came into operation. I think it was Senator Comyn who, on the Second Reading, referred to the operations of the Comptroller and Auditor-General in England and to the careful steps that had been taken to safeguard public moneys. But the circumstancees which warranted those steps did not exist in reference to the period with which these pensions are concerned. Let us not forget that the particular class of pensions with which this Bill deals are pensions of the past and that the necessity for this Bill is not likely to recur as far as pensions are concerned in the future. The Minister for Defence made it very clear, both in this House and to those who have read the Official Debates in the Dáil, that there were specific and definite reasons concerning the safety and the security of certain individuals why the information given in confidence to the Board of Assessors should be withheld from publication. That is flippantly passed over as of no account, and the criticism of this Bill is based on the entirely misleading assumption that conditions which govern the enquiry into pensions nowadays operated in regard to these pensions. We know that such is not the case, that the circumstances were abnormal and that unusual steps had to be taken.
Senator Comyn has asserted that the Board of Assessors was not a court, but the only particle of ground for that belief that he revealed was something that happened in the House of Lords. The writ of the House of Lords does not run in Saorstát Eireann, though Senator Comyn may not be aware of that, and what happened in the House of Lords on that occasion has nothing whatever to do with the decision of the Oireachtas, as to whether a body which it sets up shall function as a court or not. I believe—and the contention is held by those who stand for this Bill—that it was a court, and if the Oireachtas decides that it was a court, then I assume that is the final word in the matter, and no matter what the House of Lords may have decided about other matters, the decision of the Oireachtas will stand. I have made these points because there were arguments made in the absence of the Minister for Defence which I did not want to pass without at least some challenge. Senator Comyn challenged me to answer some of them. Without the aid of his 20,000 periscopes, I could not say what it was he wanted me to answer, and for that reason I have to let it go by default.
It seems to me that an effort is being made to give a new definition to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I think it would be a very good thing if members of the Seanad would refer to the Constitution and see who this particular individual is, and what are the functions attaching to the office. Here is what Article 62 says:—
Dáil Eireann shall appoint a Comptroller and Auditor-General to act on behalf of the Irish Free State (Saorstát Eireann). He shall control all disbursements and shall audit all accounts of moneys administered by or under the authority of the Oireachtas and shall report to Dáil Eireann at stated periods to be determined by law.
What I want to know as an ordinary layman is this, without any assumption at all of being versed in legal matters: if a controller is to control how is he to control? If he is to report, how is he to report on that control, if records are withheld from him? The title of the Bill states that all findings shall be final, conclusive and binding on all persons and tribunals whatsoever. Without any reference to the possibility or the probability of corruption there is always the likelihood of error. How is he to report on that likelihood of error if he cannot get documents? If this Bill passes I cannot see any reason at all for the maintenance of the office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I propose to support the Bill. I do so, not because I am enamoured of anything that would limit the general right of the Comptroller and Auditor-General to examine any documents relating to any Department. It would be very deplorable if that right were to be limited, and in deciding my course of action on this Bill I have put the question to myself whether that right is limited on this occasion. The answer to my mind is that it is not. It limits and it actually destroys the Comptroller and Auditor-General's right of inspection in respect of a particular class of case, and only of a particular class of case. That is the case of persons who served in the National Forces before a particular date—I forget exactly what date— but it only applies to these people who served before that date; it does not apply to any people who served since then, nor will it apply in the future. The question is whether it is justifiable that that right of inspection should be withdrawn from the Comptroller and Auditor-General in respect of those cases. On the whole I think the Oireachtas might allow that to be done. To my mind this Bill is in effect an Indemnity Bill, such as is passed in all Parliaments after periods of military conflict. In these conflicts things happen which it is not always in the interests of the State should be brought under public gaze, not merely things that are ugly and criminal but things that, if brought into the public light might have damaging effects upon the careers of people who were involved. That I understand is the principal reason put forward why this course should be taken now. If these Indemnity Bills are given to Governments in other countries I cannot see why our Government should be refused this one. I can, of course, understand the strong objection taken by Fianna Fáil to seeing men who fought and defeated them in the field recompensed in this way, but for those who supported the State at that time, and who are grateful for the services of the men who are now being recompensed, to oppose this Bill seems to me to be illogical and ungenerous. As one who supported the State at that time I have come to the conclusion that the Bill should be supported now.
On a point of personal explanation. Speaking for myself and my Party in this matter there has never been any suggestion from these benches or from our Party in the Dáil that we are opposed to this measure because pensions are being received by people who fought against us. We oppose the measure for the reasons we stated clearly to-day, because we think if we were in power others would be perfectly entitled to ask that the Comptroller and Auditor-General should see that he had control of all disbursements and that they would insist on facilitating him in that way. I think it was grossly unfair of the Senator to make such a suggestion.
I am very glad, of course, to hear that statement from the Senator, but what I said was that I was not surprised at the objection to this Bill which did recompense these men. If I did him wrong by suggesting that that was his reason for the opposition I express my regret.
I listened with a certain amount of amazement to Senator Milroy's statement, because it seems to me, if his argument is logically pursued, we do not want a Comptroller and Auditor-General at all. He spoke of the probity of public men, and while we are all reasonably satisfied that there is no undue lack of probity in our public men, we still feel it is essential that the Comptroller and Auditor-General should act, control, check and pass all accounts when they are paid, and that the Public Accounts Committee should take up with any Department which either pays in the wrong, overpays, or does something which is contrary to the public interest. It must be remembered that the public men referred to are the servants of the Oireachtas, and it should have control over these public men. That is the sole reason why we have a Comptroller and Auditor-General, to safeguard the funds belonging to the public. Let us be quite honest about this matter. There is a very considerable feeling of uneasiness with regard to some of these pensions. It may not be justified; the pensions may all have been granted in perfect good faith, and all the money may have been earned, even, as Senator Hooper suggested, in suppressing Fianna Fáil. I did not know that Army pensions had yet been voted for the suppression of Fianna Fáil, or whether these pensions are being voted in anticipation of the suppression that is going to come. We do not want to expose any pension. We realise, as sane, sensible individuals, that pensions have been granted to certain people, and that to make the matter public property would undoubtedly inflict hardship on such individuals. But surely there is no reason why the Comptroller and Auditor-General should not be in a position to examine and to satisfy himself that these pensions have been legitimately granted and legitimately paid; that does not necessarily mean that the names of the men to whom pensions are paid are going to be broadcast; it does not mean that the "Independent" or the "Irish Times" is going to carry the full list. Granted that this is an Indemnity Bill, we realise that a certain amount of ordinary discretion should be exercised, but we do not think it would be running any risk of undue publicity if the Comptroller and Auditor-General saw all the papers and the evidence on which pensions were granted.
I say again that there is uneasiness about the granting of these pensions, about the amount of them, and that the uneasiness will always exist until all the data is at least certified by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The arguments that have been repeated here to-day by Senator Milroy and others do not convince us, and I submit do not convince any fair-minded people that the amounts are right, and that only these amounts have been paid. I am rather sorry that Senator Hooper dragged a red herring across the track as regards Fianna Fáil. I did not know that they were yet suppressed, or that pensions were awarded for their suppression. It is symptomatic, but we hope for better times.
Did not the supporters of Fianna Fáil fight against this State?
And some of the supporters of Cumann na nGaedheal, perhaps.
We made no secret of it.
On the question of the operations of the Army against Fianna Fáil, the last information we have is dated December, 1926, some nine months after the establishment of Fianna Fáil. At that time Fianna Fáil was one Party in a body set up in defiance of this State and for the purpose of subverting this State. Fianna Fáil and the people who are associated with that body naturally have a grievance against the Army, which made the operations of that outside body impossible. Nothing new has been said in this debate. The argument has mostly centred round a mistaken conception of the position of the Comptroller and Auditor-General. One Senator said that if the Comptroller and Auditor-General were not to function as he wished him to function there would be no need for the Comptroller and Auditor-General. As a matter of fact, the functions that have been attributed to the Comptroller and Auditor-General by the Senators objecting to this Bill would do away with the need for government. The Comptroller and Auditor-General controls disbursements. We who govern administer this country according to the law. The Comptroller and Auditor-General can see that I am not paying a sum to a soldier or to an officer greater than the sum sanctioned; he cannot come along to me and say: "I do not think that you should really pay a major at such a rate," or, "I think that you could really get soldiers cheaper." He has not the right to do that. It is set down, either by legislation or by regulation, what should be paid under certain circumstances, and the Comptroller and Auditor-General merely sees the vouchers, and so on. He sees that so many men are serving in the Army in such a rank, that the pay for such a rank is so much, and he cannot say that it should be otherwise; he merely sees that that number is paid.
As far as the payment of a pensioner is concerned, Fianna Fáil may object to the original Act, but we are not discussing that. I have no doubt but that they do object to anybody other than their own followers getting any advantage out of the strife that took place, but the original Act lays down perfectly clearly that military pensions, that is to say, the sum that the law says should be paid, is decided by the certificate of the Board. That is what the original Act says: "For the purpose of calculating the amount of military service pension which any holder of a certificate of military service under this Act shall receive the military service of such person as found by the Board of Assessors and set out in his certificate of military service shall be calculated in each case according to the rules set out in the Second Schedule of this Act." It shall be founded on what they find. If the man only gave one month and the Board found that he gave twenty years, for the purpose of the Act the service for which he is to receive a pension is twenty years, not one month, because the Act says that the actual period for which he is to be paid is as set down in the certificate, and that certificate is available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Comptroller and Auditor-General exercises the same function here as he does in any normal case. The Act says that men shall receive pensions under certain conditions, their cases having been examined by the Board. The certificates are available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and he can see whether they are being paid according to these certificates, or more or less.
There has been a general misconception of the whole position. It has been suggested that we might let the Comptroller and Auditor-General see things confidentially. I think it was Senator Comyn who said that he would necessarily only report cases where more was being given than should have been given, or where a pension should not have been given at all. That is not the case.
In the Dáil I pointed out to a Deputy belonging to the Fianna Fáil Party, who had tried to mislead people by quoting certain things that has been referred by the Comptroller and Auditor-General to the Public Accounts Committee, but who had carefully suppressed certain things, that in each one of these cases that had been reported and made public it was demonstrated that the men had received these pensions quite rightly and correctly, and that the report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General had been made on a misconception and a misapprehension of the whole position.
On a point of order. I do not want to raise this matter merely to delay the proceedings, but the Minister made a statement—and I shall ask you, sir, to rule whether it is in order to say—that a member of the other House carefully tried to mislead people.
Cathaoirleach
I think that is hardly justifiable.
I withdraw that. I will merely say that he quoted a certain portion and omitted a certain portion, and, to my mind, that must necessarily have had the effect of not giving people the whole truth. In the case referred to, a man who was following his ordinary occupation offered his services in Easter Week and they were refused, but he was empowered to act in the intelligence service, and in that service was wounded. The Comptroller and Auditor-General put that forward. The circumstances were made public. In any case that we have, if all the information were given to the Comptroller and Auditor-General he might misunderstand the circumstances, and in a case where he had a doubt he would naturally refer it to the Public Accounts Committee and it would naturally become public. As far as I understand, in the original Act the certificate decided the period for which a man was to receive a pension. That certificate is made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. He also has the vouchers of the pensions that are paid to the various individuals, so that as far as the law is concerned he is exercising the functions in this case that he exercises in any other. In this I would respectfully differ from Senator Johnson. Senator Johnson purported to indicate what was the intention of the Bill. I think that anybody who peruses the Bill and knows the circumstances will agree that the intention is not as suggested by Senator Johnson. Anybody who lived through that period, and particularly anybody who was intimately associated with it, knows perfectly well that it is not in the interests of the individual, but it is also not in the interests of the State, that all the details of that period should be brought out in their brutal clarity.
The Board was set up. The Act said that the pensions should be based on the service established by the Board. It was specifically laid down that the Board should contain a judge or a barrister of not less than ten years' legal experience. For what purpose? So that we would be assured that the Board would contain in its personnel somebody who was trained for the purpose of judging evidence. The proposition now is that the one great man in the country who, above everybody else, is capable of judging evidence, is the man whose function it is to audit accounts. As far as the accounts are concerned, they are there, ready for him to audit. This is a question of evidence. I have admitted on many occasions that I quite conceived the possibility that all the evidence that was given was not true. As I said on another occasion, as we know there is not in this country that horror of perjury which we would like to see. But it is suggested that the Comptroller and Auditor-General, a man whose business is auditing, should go through all that evidence, and with all that perspicacity that is not given to other people, that he would be able to read a man's statement and say: "That is not true," and he would duly report it to the Public Accounts Committee, and say that that man should not have a pension. It is not his function to judge that. His function is to see that the funds expended are expended according to law. The law says that a man's pension shall be based upon the period set down in the certificate issued by this Board. If we have in any way departed from that he has all the material available to allow him to call attention to that fact. But here are the circumstances. Anybody who was intimately associated with the conditions beforehand knows perfectly well that it is not desirable, not merely from the internal but also from the external point of view, that all the details of that period should be brought out. In this case evidence had to be put forward, a man had to make it clear that he gave pre-truce military service within the meaning of the Act. How was he to do that? By setting out some definite warlike act. Remember that those acts were not what in normal warfare would be called warlike acts.
Will the Minister show what part of the Act says that he must give evidence of warlike acts?
What I meant was that he had to prove that he gave military service within the meaning of the Act. The Board are the only people to judge what was military service. Any Senator can conceive himself or any other individual going before that Board and saying: "I gave military service from such a date to such a date." They say: "Prove it." He says: "I give you the names of Colonel So-and-So, Brigadier General So-and-So and Private So-and-So," who participated in the same operation, and somebody writes in and says: "Yes, I was in command of his company and I am in a position to say that his was the hand that brought death to a certain individual who was an enemy of ours." That has happened in hundreds of cases. It is clearly not in the public interest that this information should be broadcasted, and it is not in the interests of many individuals of my own personal knowledge that the exact acts that they have performed should be made public. Remember also that the original Act did not lay down that the members of the Board should keep notes of the evidence. Senator Comyn is wrong when he says that shorthand writers, paid by the State. actually made these notes.
The President must then be wrong, because he stated it.
As far as I know the arrangements of the Board they did not include verbatim reporters. The members of the Board themselves made notes for their own guidance. They were not ordered by the original Act to make any such notes, but for their own convenience they made their own arrangements. Their own arrangements certainly did to the best of my knowledge include the making of certain notes. It is now proposed that these notes made by the Board should be made available for the Comptroller and Auditor-General, that the man who controls disbursements, and who audits, should obtain them.
Where is that proposed? Who proposed that the Board's notes should be made public? That has never been asked for yet.
I maintain that what is suggested by the opponents of this Bill makes that inevitable. The Comptroller and Auditor-General was offered the original application forms, upon which very many of the applicants have set out details of their activities, on condition that only he himself would see them.
That meant that he could not report on them.
The Senator says that this evidence could be made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and still we can be assured that this undesirable publicity will not take place. I say that we can be assured of nothing of the sort. I have given instances under another Act of ordinary perfectly straight cases where men got pensions that they should get which were duly made public. In this case if we hand this evidence over to the Comptroller and Auditor-General, he in his own judgment will say: "I am dubious about this, and I will report it to the Public Accounts Committee. If that is to be done I must insist that I have this material available to me and to my staff." He reports that to the Committee, and as far as I remember the arrangements, a Deputy gets up in the Dáil and moves to have their report published; the thing is duly published and is immediately published in the newspapers. I have no guarantee that if this material is made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General it will not also be made available to the general public here and elsewhere.
I am saying now what I have said over and over again, because people have persisted on misunderstanding the whole position. Everything that is available to me is available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. In so far as he is controlling my disbursements he has everything available to him that is available to me. The thing that is withheld is the evidence. The Act provided that the Board should contain a man specially trained for the consideration of evidence. The Comptroller and Auditor-General is not specially trained for the consideration of evidence. My reading of his function is that he should not say: "Personally I do not think that the work that that man did in 1916 or 1920 really warranted such a pension": his business is to see that the disbursement of these funds coincided, and only coincided, with such disbursements as were provided for by law. In this case he is perfectly able to do that because the disbursements provided by law are pensions, based upon periods of time, and set out in the certificate of the Board, which is available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. We are not limiting his powers; we are only defining his powers to be what we are advised they are by our own legal adviser and what I think ordinary common sense indicates are really his powers.
I think any honest-minded person who is acquainted with the circumstances of the earlier period knows that it is against national interest, against the personal interests of many of the men involved in this matter, that this information should be made public. We have no security for assuming that if these things are made available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General they will not also be made available to his staff, and necessarily also be made available to my staff, almost certainly in many cases made available to the Public Accounts Committee and to the public generally. We have no security for assuming that that will not happen. It is not in the public interest and not in good faith to the applicants that that should be done. As far as getting after anybody who may be drawing a pension that he has not earned is concerned I have yet to hear how the arrangement that is urged—that the evidence should be made available— would assist the Comptroller and Auditor-General in any way whatsoever. The certificates issued by the Board are available to him, and through him are available to the Public Accounts Committee. They can, if they like, raise any individual case and question whether a man is drawing a pension that he could not possibly have earned. But as far as the Comptroller and Auditor-General seeing the evidence is concerned it would not, to my mind, assist in diminishing one pension by one sixpence; it would certainly lead necessarily to national injury and to personal injury, and therefore we have introduced this Bill to make the position perfectly clear, although, as I said before, I am satisfied it does not alter the law in any way at all in that respect. It would not be fair to people who come forward to give evidence in the interests of such applicants, not necessarily the applicants themselves, but people who come forward to give evidence. I know of many cases, and there may even be members of the Seanad who themselves came forward to give evidence for certain applicants, and in that evidence necessarily gave certain information about themselves, although they might not in any way be beneficiaries under the original Act. This Bill is largely unnecessary; it is merely to reassure people's minds. If such a Bill were necessary it certainly would be everybody's duty to support it, to my mind, and certainly anybody who knows anything about the circumstances could form an idea as to the details contained in the evidence.
After the very illuminating speeches that we have had from both sides I am in a quandary as to how I should vote. In fact, I was very nearly adopting the safe course and going home to tea. After the statement of the Minister my mind is perfectly clear as to how I should act. The Minister has told us that the pension list is available to the Comptroller and Auditor-General, as well as the names and the amounts, but that on no account will the evidence be submitted to him, as it would not be judicious in the public interest to do so, that a committee has already sifted the evidence and awarded the pensions, and after having done that, the only duty for the Comptroller and Auditor-General was to pass the list. That being the case, I have no hesitation whatever in voting for the Bill.
Tá
- William Barrington.
- Sir Edward Coey Bigger.
- Samuel L. Brown, K.C.
- Miss Kathleen Browne.
- R.A. Butler.
- Alfred Byrne.
- Mrs. Costello.
- John C. Counihan.
- The Countess of Desart.
- James G. Douglas.
- Michael Fanning.
- Henry S. Guinness.
- P.J. Hooper.
- Cornelius Kennedy.
- Seán Milroy.
- Joseph O'Connor.
- M.F. O'Hanlon.
- L. O'Neill.
- Bernard O'Rourke.
- James J. Parkinson.
- Thomas Toal.
- Richard Wilson.
Níl
- Caitlín Bean Uí Chléirigh.
- Michael Comyn, K.C.
- Joseph Connolly.
- William Cummins.
- J.C. Dowdall.
- Michael Duffy.
- Thomas Foran.
- Sir John Purser Griffith.
- Thomas Johnson.
- Thomas Linehan.
- Seán E. MacEllin.
- Joseph O'Doherty.
- John T. O'Farrell.
- Siobhán Bean an Phaoraigh.
- Séumas Robinson.