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Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 22 Jul 1931

Vol. 14 No. 29

Electricity (Supply) (Amendment) Bill, 1931—Second Stage.

Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

In bringing this very disagreeable Bill before the House I feel it will be necessary to go somewhat into the past history of the whole Shannon scheme and of the Electricity Supply Board as it was set up, in order that Senators may get a proper perspective of what has happened, in so far as that can be accurately revealed at the moment, and an indication of what the future is likely to be. The Bill before the Seanad asks for three things. The first is that two million pounds should be handed over so as to be left at the disposal of the Electricity Supply Board under certain conditions. Here I must draw attention to the phrase which occurs in Section 3 of the Bill. In the first place the Minister for Finance "may" advance—not "shall" as before—and, secondly, he may advance "all such sums as the Minister for Industry and Commerce shall from time to time certify to be reasonably and properly required by the Board" for certain purposes. I draw attention to that because it is quite clear it makes a fundamental change in the old-time constitution of the Electricity Supply Board.

In Section 4 I am asking the House to impose upon the Board the necessity of paying £2,000 in the way that is mentioned there. These are the three things that are in the Bill: a requirement of £2,000,000 for the particular purposes of the Electricity Supply Board: ment of £2,000,000 for the general purposes of the Electricity Supply Board; and in connection with that second sum there is the stipulation that the money "may" be paid by the Minister for Finance, but only after another Minister has certified that the sums so required are reasonably and properly required by the Board.

I said previously, that if not in this Bill, at any rate in the penumbra of people's consciousness, there were certain other facts. The first fact is that certain resignations were presented to the Executive Council and that the Executive Council accepted these. The second fact deals with the constitution of the Board in so far as that constitution has relation to part-time members, or to put that in another way, the question of the association, in a part-time way, of people having a business point of view with the full-time members of the Board.

The Shannon scheme proper is not in this Bill. By that I mean the scheme which provided for generation of electricity through the waters of the Shannon running through the turbines at Ardnacrusha and the transmission of the electricity so generated over the long distance system bringing it to the outskirts of towns and villages with a population of 500 and upwards. That was the original Shannon' scheme. It was system No. 1. I had to carry out the constructional part of that scheme for a declared sum of money, first to be £5,200,000. I should divide that figure into two items, the figure of £4,600,000 to be spent actually on construction and the figure of £600,000 which was to be set aside to meet interest payments during the time that the construction works were being built and to meet deficiencies arising in the early years before the scheme had come to the point that it was earning sufficient revenue to repay the moneys expended on it. No part of that money is in this Bill. I allude to it here so that the whole thing may be put properly before the House.

There was a second system—the distribution system. That depended on the Bill that passed through the Oireachtas in 1927, and was amended later. The two principal Acts dealing with the complete Shannon development are the Shannon Electricity Act of 1925 and the Electricity Supply Act— on the distribution side—of 1927. Both Acts have been amended. The Shannon Electricity Act of 1925 was amended in 1929. The Electricity Supply Act was amended in 1929, and again in 1930. Under the first Act the sum which I was authorised to spend on certain matters then detailed was £4,600,000, with the addition of £600,000 to meet certain deficiencies. Under the 1929 Act that sum of money was raised to an effective sum, for the purposes of the Shannon, of £5,700,000. Under the old system the £600,000 was included in the sum of £5,200,000. In the second Act there appeared, as an addition to the sum of £5,700,000, the sum of £156,000. Out of the sum of £5,700,000 —I am giving a round figure—plus the £156,000, the Shannon first system was to have been built out. It was regarded that that sum of money would be sufficient to meet all the charges that were necessary under the Acts of 1925 and 1929. It was considered almost certain that it would do. There was certain provision made for contingencies, but the statement was made at the time that the total could not be regarded as absolutely clear, that there might have to be another application to the Oireachtas for more money. At the moment I am not making any application for more money so far as that side of the scheme is concerned.

The first part of the scheme entailed a commitment by way of capital expenditure of £4,600,000 and £600,000 to meet certain deficiencies. I pointed out that the difference between the first Bill and the amending Bill of 1929 if one viewed it from the point of view of the moneys necessary to remunerate the capital put in, could best be understood in this way. In the old Bill it was stated that if from 134,000,000 to 138,000,000 units were produced under the Shannon partial development scheme, and sold at .83 of a penny in bulk, that then everything would be paid for. That would provide revenue sufficient to meet the cost of management and operation of that part of the scheme, interest payments, sinking fund, renewals, depreciation. Everything could be met if 134,000,000 units could be sold at .83 of a penny. The difference made by the addition in the second Bill came to this, that if you sold the same number of units, not at .83 but at .9 of a penny, the Shannon No. 1 Scheme would pay its way and there would be sufficient money to remunerate all capital spent upon it. That is the situation with regard to the first stage of the Shannon scheme. I am not asking for any more money for that part of the development, and the situation is still the same, that if 134,000,000 units can be sold at an average price of .9 of a penny in bulk that part of the scheme is economic. I am speaking provisionally and on reports that are subject to scrutiny, but, as far as I can make out, that number of units will be sold in the year we are in, and the revenue obtained will not only pay for the outgoings on the generation and transmission system but will allow a certain carry forward to the distribution system.

The second section of the scheme deals with the distribution. The Act of 1927 was amended in the years 1929 and 1930. In the second Electricity Supply Act of 1927 two and a half millions were voted for the purposes set out in the 1927 Act, and for that there was to be done all distribution work, and all expenses in connection therewith had to be met. The Board had sums at its disposal for house-wiring, appliances, the setting up of showrooms, and even if they liked for their entry into the manufacturing side. With the money voted, and from the revenue that came in it was expected that the Board could pay its way, and both remunerate that sum of money as well as meet management and office expenses. The scheme of the Board was set out in considerable detail in the 1927 Act. Certain provisions were made with regard to the Board itself, the position it was to occupy, the number of people to be appointed, and the maximum period for which they might be appointed. There were also conditions laid down with regard to the capital put at their disposal, and how they were to remunerate that capital. There was a definite direction given to the Board with regard to their charges. It was imposed on the Board that their charges under Section 21, before the appointed day, had to be such as to conduce to a certain position being achieved after the appointed day. The appointed day was fixed as the last day of December, 1932, or such later date as might after consultation and after presentation to both Houses be agreed upon. As far as the 1927 Act was concerned, the appointed day was fixed for 1st January, 1933. After that certain things had to happen. The Board's charges to the public had to be such before the 1st January, 1933, that after the 1st January, 1933,

"the revenue derived in any year by the Board from such sales and services, together with its revenue (if any), in such year from other sources, will be sufficient and only sufficient (as nearly as may be) to pay all salaries, working expenses and other outgoings of the Board properly chargeable to income in that year (including the payments falling to be made in such year by the Board to the Minister for Finance in respect of interest and sinking fund payments on advances out of the Central Fund), and such sums as the Board may think proper to set aside in that year for reserve fund, extensions, renewals, depreciation, loans and other like purposes."

The Board was to be an independent Board. It was to be freed—and I explained this in the Parliament when legislation was going through—from Parliamentary inquisition; it was to be freed from Departmental inquisition; freed from the control either of Government Departments or of the Houses of Parliament, and in return for that—and it was stressed in every statement during the course of the legislation as the consideration for this tremendous independence— there was demanded the greatest publicity. There were to be account reports and statistics produced every year. The legislation for it that came first out of my hands was amended in both the Dáil and the Seanad, and in the end was quite precise upon what the Board had to produce. Certain accounts were stipulated that the Board must produce. The time for the production of these accounts was, as far as the Board was concerned, stated definitely and, as far as the Minister was concerned, some discretion was left to him. In addition to what the Board must produce as consideration for the independence given to them, the Minister has power under Section 32 to demand, if he thought fit, certain statistical information and certain other returns in addition to what the Oireachtas precisely required the Board to bring forward. The scheme, therefore, was a Board with considerable independence, a Board flung as far as it could be flung from Governmental control, and in return for all of that there was to be publicity on the finance side. That is a summing up of what the legislation insisted upon, great independence but great publicity with regard to the accounts. Certain responsibility was thrown upon the Minister when he got the accounts to see whether other material should not be demanded for the purpose of clarifying the accounts. The question of presenting these to the Houses would then arise.

The Board had considerable freedom as to how it was to spend the two and a half millions given to it, but no borrowing powers were given the Board. The Board was tied fast as far as legislation was concerned to the two and a half millions to carry out the multifarious duties thrown on it by legislation. A certain section in the Act deals with the acquired undertakings, of which, unfortunately, more has to be heard. The undertakings were divided for the purpose of the Bill into several classes. The authorised or statutory undertakings were put in a particular class and they were divided into two sections, the privately owned concerns and the municipally owned concerns. It was laid down with regard to privately-owned concerns that the purchase price had to be fixed by arbitration in default of agreement, and the Board had then to set aside a sum of money to meet that particular fair purchase price as either arbitrated or agreed upon. In regard to the municipal undertakings, the scheme was that, if and when they were taken over, there was to be no payment made, by way of purchase price, but the Board kept indemnifying the previous undertaker against the particular charges that were outstanding.

That was the scheme, therefore: an independent Board, consideration by way of publicity, publicity with regard to finance, publicity particularly with regard to certain specified accounts, and publicity in respect of certain reports, statistics and returns that the Minister might think fit to call for. The Board's duty with regard to charges was that the charges must be such before the appointed day that after the appointed day revenue was to meet outgoings, and only just to meet them. I think I can say, summing up all the implications of the legislation, that one thing stood out above everything else: that the electricity consumer was to pay for everything in the way of expenditure in bringing electricity to him, and the taxpayer was not to be called upon to meet any part of the charges. The taxpayer's credit was at the disposal of the Board for giving them certain money, but that the capital had to be remunerated, the interest had to be paid, and the sinking fund arrangement had to be such as to pay back the money in some period of years. The taxpayer under the first scheme was not to pay anything, was not to suffer any financial loss with regard to this scheme. As I said, he put his credit at the disposal of the Board for certain purposes, and for that he was to get the ordinary remuneration.

The Act, with these provisions, safely passed, the Board was eventually appointed. Right at the beginning I found myself in something of a dilemma. I had originated this scheme of an independent Board myself. I had always spoken of it as being a Board which could only carry on if it was freed from control of the type put upon a Government Department. But, while the legislation was going through, I had pointed out that there was a clause which gave the Executive Council power to demand certain dismissals, if they thought these dismissals were required, in order to ensure the economic and effective performance by the Board of their duties. I found myself right at the beginning faced with this problem. I had to give the Board as much independence as possible, but I had to discharge properly the responsibility laid upon me, as representing the Executive Council in this particular, of deciding whether a dismissal should be called for at a particular time.

The counter, by the way, to a dismissal was that on a dismissal being enforced by the Executive Council a statement of that fact and the reasons for it had to be put before the Oireachtas. I wanted to give the Board complete independence, and yet under the Act there was no doubt about my duty. If mistakes were made and came to my notice even accidentally, and if I did not take hold of the section which gave me the right to dismiss, and did not operate on it, I could certainly be held responsible for whatever the Board wrongly did. I argued to myself, and I argued to certain members of the Board, that the power to dismiss involved some supervision, such supervision, at any rate, as was necessary to enable me at the proper moment to say, "Now I must call for a dismissal." It did not at all involve any responsibility for the ordinary actions of the Board in technical matters or taking upon myself the burden of their decisions and operations in everything, but it certainly did entitle me, in fact it imposed upon me, the necessity to exercise such supervision of a limited type that would warrant me, if and when things were going astray, calling for a particular dismissal when the proper moment had arrived. That was under the Act which established the independent Board.

In addition to that, at the beginning of the Board's operations there was a peculiar and accidental circumstance. The Board was engaged upon certain operations through the country at the time when part of the Shannon works, which had been handed over to me to construct, had not been completely constructed. My contractors were on the spot at certain parts and their plant was there, and their ordinary officials for supervising purposes were there. The Board put it to me that there was a certain amount of work which was somewhat on the border line of transmission and distribution, and that as my contractors were there the best thing would be that, acting some way as the Board's agent, I would get my contractors to carry out certain work for them and charge it against their two and a half million pounds. I agreed to do this. But the money in the first place had to be put up by me, and I got recouped by the Board. That was the arrangement. I found myself, even in that piece of work, subject to the ordinary control I was under with regard to the whole contract. I had to make my case on everything to the Minister for Finance. I had to have a case made to me to my own satisfaction by my technical advisers, and that I then had to make to the Minister for Finance before the money would be granted to me. That accidental circumstance put me very closely in touch with the Board at certain parts of their operations, and I can put no better word on my feelings at the time than that the Board's operations, as I saw them, being in this close relationship, caused certain disturbance and anxiety in my mind. But if that accidental circumstance had not occurred, I, nevertheless, had some duty on me to exercise some sort of supervision, so as to enable me to say when the proper moment came for calling a dismissal, if that had to be done.

A correspondence originated between myself and the Board on all this matter, and right at the beginning I decided that the best line I could take with the Board was to concentrate entirely upon two things, which were really the same thing viewed from two angles. I wanted to concentrate upon this: Would they be able to carry out all their duties under the distribution system within the sum of money given by the Oireachtas? Sometimes I approached this from the angle of the money they had to expend, and sometimes I approached it from the angle of, "What return are you going to get, what number of units do you think you are going to sell, and what revenue are you going to derive?" Both things converged on the same point: could I get an assurance that they would carry out their duties within the sum of two-and-a-half millions; could they carry them out in such a way that they would sell at the experts' prices a sufficient number of units to remunerate the State for all the money that had been expended on the plan, both Number 1 and Number 2 system.

The first letter I wrote in which that statement was put up in a definite way was in August, 1928, where I used a phrase more or less of this type: that I would be glad to hear that the Board is optimistic that distribution will be achieved within the limits of the money voted for the purpose, and to be supplied with the figures upon which that optimism is based. I take that as the first letter in a long drawn-out correspondence which ran on until March or April of this year. I got from the Board in answer to that request a statement that really they could not give me any estimate; it was too soon to expect any estimate; that anything they could give me would be so vague and unreliable as to be of no use for all practical purposes. Later on I got a letter which they said was sent to me for the purpose of assuring me that the work could be carried out within the limits of the two-and-a-half millions. When I examined that I found that the undischarged liabilities of the municipal undertakings acquired by the Board were in question. The Board said, "That clearly is not within the sum of two-and-a-half millions." I said, "It is." I said, further and distinctly, "Whether it is or not, it was intended to be." I said: "We always wanted to have the picture of the £5,200,000, whatever it may rise to, plus the two-and-a-half millions as the entire capital sum which you will have to remunerate in some way or other. You may divide it and say of part of it that you will pay it year by year out of revenue, and of another part that you will merely pay interest on it with a sinking fund arrangement to amortise it; but while you may approach your problem of repayment either from the point of view of the revenue required to remunerate the capital entrusted to you, or from the angle of the capital sums requiring to be remunerated, we intended that the full capital for which you shall be liable would be the money spent on the Shannon works as by the Act defined, plus a sum of £2,500,000, which includes the capital liabilities undischarged of the municipal undertakings acquired by you.

I soon found that they were proceeding on the basis that the two-and-a-half millions did not include this sum. That was my first difficulty. I knew how the two-and-a-half millions had been drawn up. I felt I left the Oireachtas under the impression that it was intended to cover all these charges, and I warned the Board in April, 1929, that if that was not quite clear there was a Bill coming on in 1929, and that in that Bill I would make it clear. I told them I was going to ask the Dáil to put in a very definite statement, declaring that the two-and-a-half million pounds must be looked upon as including the undischarged liabilities of the municipal undertaking which the Board had acquired or which they would acquire. I also wanted another amendment put in. At that time I was not satisfied that we were getting sufficient information even about the finances of the Board, and I intended to come to the House and to ask them in the phrase which imposed upon the Minister for Finance the necessity of paying sums of money to the Board, as and when they demanded it, to change the word "shall" which imposed the necessity, into the word "may," which would give a certain amount of financial control. I said I would make the case that until that money was expended, until, in other words, the accounts began to appear in the ordinary way, and the finances of the Board were shown to be what they should be, there should be some sort of financial control. I told them I was coming to the Dáil to ask them to agree to that.

At the time when the Bill was introduced I formally intimated to the Board that it was my intention to introduce two amendments to achieve that position. The Board asked me not to put up these amendments, and they said if I agreed not to put in these two amendments they would agree to regard the sum which was at their disposal as two-and-a-half millions, less the amount of undischarged liabilities of the undertakings of a municipal type acquired or to be acquired by them. They said that they would base their expenditure on the assumption that two-and-a-half millions was the figure, less the sum of the undischarged liabilities. And upon that undertaking, which I got reduced to writing, I did not ask the Dáil to insert either of these amendments.

Now, that undertaking is a very important item in this whole business, but is not by any means the most important item. I had got something which amounted to a limited control over a certain part of the Board's money by that undertaking, but before that undertaking was made, and after it was made right down to the months of February or March this year, my attitude to the Board was this: "The Oireachtas, to my mind, was given a definitely limited figure for the amount of money you are to expend. If you want more I shall get it for you provided I get from you the data on which I think I can make a good case to the Dáil to grant more money." The allegation has been made that I tried to put the Board into the strait-waistcoat of this two-and-a-half millions of money. Nothing of the sort. Over and over again I held out the prospect of further advances on a suitable case being made. I said to them, "This is a large sum of money; it has grown to enormous proportions. Give me the data on which I can form an opinion that at some time this vast sum of money will be remunerated." Even in the last days of the correspondence, I said to them: "Regard yourselves as people who have exhausted all the capital at their disposal and give me such information as a borrower would afford to a man from whom he was seeking a loan, because that information the Oireachtas will want from me if I come before them for further money for you."

The meeting about the agreement took place in July, 1929. The undertaking was reduced to writing some time in the early days of August of the same year. I got certain statements from the Board at the same time that any information I required would be given in the fullest and freest way. They proceeded to make demands for money, and at a much later time we again got apprehensive. A calculation was made, and on it we wrote back to say that it looked as if they were now committing themselves beyond the sum of money at their disposal, and directed their attention to that agreement. And that correspondence on that particular side of it went on for many months. In the end, in February or March of this year, I got a statement from the Board to this effect—a statement, remember, either in February or March, 1931—that the agreement entered into in August, 1929, was broken in December of that year, or at the latest in January, 1930. As an explanation of the breach I was told that the Board did not know with any degree of accuracy at any time what their capital commitments were, and they stressed that whatever they had spent in excess of the sum of money allowed was spent up to June, 1930, in ignorance of what exactly they were spending. My retort to that was: "I do not regard it as any mitigation when you say you were in such a position in regard to your accounts that you did not know what you were spending up to June, but the clear implication of your letter is that from June, 1930, you continued to spend with knowledge and in breach of that agreement." Their answer was that since June they had overspent with knowledge—they admitted that; they agreed that the sum of money in question was about £225,000, and their plea on this amount was that they had spent it because it was consequential on the earlier quarter of a million that they spent in the early part of 1930 without knowing that what they were spending was beyond the limits imposed upon them. That directed my attention more acutely upon another side of the Board's operations.

I had it previously revealed in letters to me that their accounts were in a bad way. I want this phrase to be understood properly; when I say in a bad way I mean that they had not material upon which to base proper accounts. As I say, I had some disquiet and anxiety about it beforehand. But I got that information in a definite way at the same time as I got a rather reassuring statement from the man who had been appointed the new Chairman in 1930. In June or July of 1930 he told me that, recognising that the accounts for the year before had not been of the proper type, and that there were certain defects revealed in their organisation, he decided upon what I thought a good step, and one that certainly relieved me of a considerable amount of anxiety at that time. He said that with the approval of the Board he had decided to call in the outside firm of auditors, who had been in to supervise the accounts of the year before. That firm was the firm of Kennedy, Crowley and Company, who were appointed by me the previous year on behalf of the State to supervise the accounts of the Board according to the Act, and the Chairman in July, 1930, said that in June he had got the approval of his colleagues on the Board to call in the staff of that auditor's firm in order to get together the material for the accounts. In the early part of this year, when the worst was being broken upon me almost at one blow, I found this out about the accounts. I was told that in the early part of the year—I think again it would be February or March of this year—that from July, 1930, five of that auditor's staff, and from September seven of that auditor's staff, had been on the Board's premises, engaged continuously in the remaking of the records that should have been there, and were not there, and that were required for the proper building up of the Board's accounts. I know now that not merely were there five or seven men there continuously, but that the number jumped to seventeen at a later point. Remember that their work was not the preparation of accounts simply. This point should be stressed: the material necessary for anyone to build up accounts was not there. Invoices were in arrear—thousands in arrear—order forms, and everything which goes to the making up of accounts, had either been mislaid or destroyed. There was no material from which proper accounts could be produced. Add that to the other situation. The Board tell me at a point that they have expended nearly half a million in breach of agreement; that for the first six months of 1930 that money was spent in breach of agreement, because they did not know at any time with reasonable accuracy what their capital commitments were. And they tell me that for the remaining part of that year they spent £225,000, because it was consequential upon the amount they had previously spent in ignorance—an amazing statement, which could not be believed but for the further information which I got about the accounts.

The last point and the worst of the situation was revealed to me in the early part of this year—that the Board had, in fact, gone very far beyond the expenditure they were allowed. They had gone beyond it in two ways—in actual spending and in commitments from which they could not extricate themselves. What they had done put me in the difficulty that I had to face up, unprepared and without material for a decision, to a new development of, say, the Shannon or some other river. They had got to the point at which consumption was such that it could not be supplied from the full output at Ardnacrusha in the first stage of development. In other words, they had put me in the position that I would have to come to the two Houses of the Oireachtas and say, "I want money for a new development of the Shannon, though I can give no satisfactory information about the development which has been exhausted." The Board found themselves in the position that they required more power than the Shannon scheme, on partial development, could produce, and they left it to me to come post factum and make that explanation to the House and say, "I want the money for this further development." It was a disagreeable situation in which to be placed. I asked them to show me how the money already granted and spent on any stage of the Shannon scheme has remunerated itself, how the scheme is remunerating the capital moneys spent on the old stage or will repay those required for the new stage, and I will try and get the money for you. But I want certain data. I want the sort of data that a borrower who had exhausted the moneys previously placed at his disposal ought to give a lender from whom he is seeking a new loan." That information I did not get from them. I have not got it accurately up to this moment. I have, however, got certain figures—much better figures than I ever got from the old Board. But I did not get the information which I ought to have got to enable me to come before this House and ask for an additional sum of £2,000,000. And I have not got the information which would warrant this House giving me that sum in ordinary circumstances.

The situation in regard to the Board was that an undertaking had been made with me and broken. The explanation was that it was broken in ignorance, because the people concerned had not taken the elementary financial precaution of getting together the material for accounts, keeping the accounts in order, and getting them properly produced. Even when I realised that this was the situation I temporarily put the agreement on one side. I urged the Board to demonstrate to me that at any stage the Shannon development is properly remunerating the capital expenditure on it, and I held out hopes of getting extra money for development. I could not get that demonstration. I found myself in a position in which I had to come to the Oireachtas for more money to be placed at the disposal of people who had made an agreement and broken it; who had their accounts in the condition which I have described, and who had rushed me, the Government and the whole country into new development without giving us an opportunity of deciding before the event whether that new development should be undertaken or not. In those circumstances, two resignations came to my hands and I accepted them. And in that medley of circumstances I have to make my appearance in this House and ask for a sum of £2,000,000. I shall give details of the £2,000,000 on Committee Stage. I think that will be the proper occasion on which to give the details. But I want some money to carry the Board forward, and until I get a better appreciation of what the Board's circumstances are, I want to have that money under the control of the Minister for Finance, who may issue the money on a certificate from the Minister for Industry and Commerce that it is reasonably and properly required.

I have a bundle of correspondence with regard to this whole business. The public has a right to get that correspondence, and it will get it some time. Public policy, however, dictates that it should not be produced at the moment. That correspondence makes clear that there was an agreement made with me. There is an admission that the agreement was made, and there is no quibbling about it so far as the correspondence is concerned. There is also a clear-cut and definite admission that the agreement was broken. I put it to the Seanad that where you have an independent Board, a Board entrusted with a big amount of public property—£5,000,000 worth at least— a Board which is in addition given big sums of public money to dispose of, and which is not subjected to the ordinary inquisition to which a Government would be subjected as to how they are spending their time and money, you must demand the greatest care, the utmost punctilio, with regard to agreements into which they enter. Otherwise, no Minister will trust himself in the hands of such a body, but will insist on having control right down to the bottom. There is at any rate the definite admission by these people that this agreement was broken, that their accounts were in such a condition that no true picture of their commitments and of their finances could be got, and the position later on revealed that every department required reorganisation, and that there was no co-operation as between the different departments. I have all sorts of phrases from themselves with regard to their operations, and I think the implication from those phrases, as well as from their explicit statements that they did not know from time to time with reasonable accuracy what their capital commitments were—the implication from all that is that they could not have based their system of charging upon an appreciation of what it was costing them to supply electricity to consumers. How they arrived at their charges I do not exactly know. I have certain explanations from them as to how it was done, but it certainly was not done in the way the Act laid down—that the charges shall be such and only such as to meet a certain number of things laid down. If they got to that point—I do not think they ever did—they would have got to it by accident, because they had not before them at any time a statement of what their capital commitments were. In those circumstances, how could they have decided upon the revenue required to remunerate their capital commitments? They have further done this—I do not know that any independent board ever conceived by a government was expected to be in this position—they have brought themselves, whether deliberately or not I do not know, but, on their own admission, they are brought to the point where new development of some type must take place. They do that, and they ask us to bless the affair after the event. They do not give us the data or figures upon which, if they were coming to us before the event, we could properly decide whether we should authorise them to undertake it or not. They simply say, "There is the position, and so much money must be spent on new development."

The question of Cork has been introduced as a special item into this controversy. I have two statements, and two statements only, with regard to Cork. On 26th February, of this year, the Board told me that the acquisition of Cork rendered impossible, without breaking the agreement, what could be considered as the minimum measure of development. On 2nd April of this year they wrote me more or less to the effect that the keeping of the agreement was rendered impossible by the acquisition of Cork. Remember that, between February and April of this year, they discovered for themselves that the acquisition of Cork in April, 1930, rendered the keeping of the agreement impossible. They continue with this phrase in the letter of April of this year: "The purchase of Cork was entered upon in the belief that it could be done within the agreement; otherwise we would have approached the Executive Council to secure release from it." Cork cost a sum of £500,000. With extensions, I think, the figure was about £600,000. At all events, it was something in the neighbourhood of half a million pounds. They entered upon that purchase in April, 1930; the earliest date on which they can tell me anything about it is February, 1931; in April, 1931, they make the definite statement that the keeping of the agreement was rendered impossible by the acquisition of Cork, and that that undertaking was entered upon in the belief that it could be carried out within the terms of the agreement, as otherwise they would have approached the Executive Council to secure release from the agreement.

A further point has been introduced into the discussion, that the Electricity Supply Board found itself hampered by departmental control exercised over them by supermen in the Civil Service who regarded their position with jealousy and who determined to get their hands fastened upon the whole business. In proof of that one thing is alleged—that on the first demand the Board put up for money in September, 1927, they were met with a refusal by the Department of Finance. I want that position made absolutely clear. Early in the month of September, 1927, the Board applied for the first advance of a sum of about £1,000. They got an intimation, verbally, from the Department of Finance that there were two sub-sections of a section under which they could demand money and that it would be necessary for Government purposes to keep separate accounts of the moneys withdrawn by the Board under the two sub-sections. They were asked to put their requisition in such a form as would indicate under which sub-section they wished to put their demand. As a matter of fact, they subsequently made their demand under the wrong sub-section, but they got the money and got it by the date that they said they needed it. That was the only time until October of last year that the Department of Finance raised any point about the money to be advanced, and from the time that first £1,000 was advanced until October of last year a sum of £1,900,000 was advanced. The Department of Finance never said anything with regard to advances since September, 1927, until last October.

In October of last year, acting for me, the Department of Finance stated to the Board "We have now definitely come to the conclusion that you are beyond the sum of money which you are allowed. Until you prove that there is still some money to come to you we cannot advance you any further money." They have not been able to prove to me that there is any money to come to them. In fact they have admitted that they have over-spent. In October the Department of Finance did close down on them at my request. Previous to that in the first month of the life of the Board there was a demand for £1,000 and the Department of Finance returned the demand with the request "Tell us under what sub-section of Section 12 this is being demanded," and the moment they stated that, even though they mentioned the wrong sub-section, they got the money on the date they required it. That is the whole story with regard to control by the Department of Finance.

The sum of two and a half million pounds is to some extent pivotal in all this discussion. I have been asked how was that sum arrived at. I may frankly admit that it was a rather rough-and-ready calculation, but there were data upon which it was built. On the Second Reading of the Electricity Supply Bill in 1927 I stated that there were certain groups outside this country who were interested in electricity in this country, who were keen, in fact, in getting control of the electricity development of the country, and these groups, one in particular, had advanced to the point of making a detailed calculation as to the money required to be put into the distribution side. There was one person here acting as agent for that group, and the calculation made through and by that agent was brought to me. I took it as a basis upon which to go. I made certain deductions from it. It was the first sum put up to me here; it clearly was a sum which had bargaining points.

I made certain deductions, small in amount relative to the total sum in question, and I found myself arriving, on the basis of that calculation, at two and a half millions as being the necessary sum to cover everything required on the distribution side. I remember raising another point that an outside firm coming in was not going to take over the municipal undertakings without buying them. Some group in this country might do that. The cry of confiscation was, in fact, raised even in regard to the change of trusteeship from municipal government to the National Board, and when then raised I could not help thinking how appropriate the cry would have been if an outside body was getting control of electricity charges in this country in order to remunerate themselves for the capital put into the undertaking? But, at any rate, the sum of money suggested by them was supposed to include everything I had before me. I am now told that this is not so, but if it is not, and if money was spent on other things, why was not that answer put up to me when I said the two and a half millions had been overspent? Then I could have come to the Oireachtas and said that the two and a half millions was only supposed to cover certain items, and extra money is required for what is clearly extra work.

I had another way of judging the matter. A rough calculation for electricity undertakings shows that as between generation, long-distance transmission and distribution, you can divide your capital expenditure into equal thirds. We had before us particulars of the Shannon first scheme development in respect of generation and long-distance transmission at a capital cost of £4,600,000. The extra £600,000 in the first sum of £5,200,000 was not capital money as we ordinarily know it; it was intended to meet certain deficiencies during the non-paying period. The actual money to be spent was £4,600,000. That calculation of thirds, again on a rough-and-ready basis, gives us two and a half million pounds as the sum essential for distribution. In addition I had an entirely different memorandum produced for me by the man who afterwards became managing director, in which he proved to me, on the basis of calculations made on the spot by experts, that omitting the cities of Limerick, Waterford, Dublin and Cork, and setting out to build a completely new network in every town and village of 500 population and upwards, to bring leads into the houses, to instal meters, and to provide public lighting in all these places, a sum of £600,000 would suffice. If we brought in Waterford and Limerick £75,000 extra would cover them.

We had £675,000 as the sum required to put in a completely new network in all towns and villages of 500 population and upwards, to put leads into the houses, and to provide for street lighting in all these places, etc. Cork cost half a million, as the actual event showed. The undischarged liabilities in Dublin were about £600,000. The undischarged liabilities of the whole undertakings at date of vesting amounted to £800,000. Add £675,000, £800,000 and £500,000 together, and on this basis you will certainly find two and a half million pounds would be sufficient for all purposes. Those, at any rate, were the calculations I had before me when I came to the two Houses of the Oireachtas for a sum of two and a half millions. Although everything was supposed to be within our consideration when we allocated that sum, nobody ever thought that that was the last sum which would be asked for for distribution. The only point was that it was sufficient to start with, and that a case would have to be made for any further sum. That was the line I took in my letters to the Board: "If the two and a half million pounds has been expended, show me that it has been usefully expended, and, if you want any extra money, show me how you are going to remunerate that."

We have got now to the point, this being the medley of circumstances, that the Board must be allowed to carry on. The Board, to my mind, has overspent under the terms of the agreement a minimum figure of £600,000. If I were to take into consideration what I might call its overspending and its inextricable commitments, the sum of £850,000 would certainly be required. If that money was in the Board's hands to-morrow I do not think they would have a shilling of it within a week. Something else in the way of financial provision is required to carry them on for a reasonable period, and I ask for £2,000,000. I will detail the sub-heads under which it is proposed to spend that money in Committee, as I think it is a point more for Committee than for this stage. I want that money under control. For some of it I take no responsibility; that is in regard to the debts that have been incurred. We had better pay them. There will be certain inquiries as to the people who are getting the money, but you may take it that there is a sum of about three-quarters of a million that will have to be expended almost at once. In addition, the Board requires other moneys. One could limit the sum of money according to the period one thinks the new situation should last. Again, I would like to talk of the period in the Committee Stage. That sum of £2,000,000, if expended, has to be remunerated by the sale of such current as will be produced from the partial development of the Shannon scheme, but it is not intended to be remunerated only by that, because some of that money will be spent for the purpose of a greater generation system. There has to be some extra unit supply generated and sold to consumers. There is certain development money in this. We have got to arrange for a stand-by, for such arrangements at the Pigeon House that we have the effect of three turbines working at Ardnacrusha instead of the ordinary two. There are various ways in which extra power can be squeezed out. This money involves the provision of more than was ordinarily expected from the Shannon system alone on partial development. Of course I hope to get remuneration of any money that will be spent. For the debts I take no responsibility. Even for the new money, other than that portion used to pay accumulated debts, I shall come to the House to get myself relieved of responsibility at the first moment I feel that the responsibility can properly be taken from me. The Board must be allowed, when it comes into smooth water again, to function once more in an independent way.

We have not got the accounts yet for the year 1929-30. As I say, the material upon which to base these accounts was not there. It has been mainly re-made by these outside people who have been brought in. If it is re-made in its entirety it means that the material upon which the 1929-30 accounts and the 1930-31 accounts will be founded is there, so that the 1930-31 accounts ought to come out much more speedily than the old accounts. I believe the 1929-30 accounts have only gone to the auditor. He will have to audit them. Then they will come to me and I will have the right to demand extra clarifying information if I want it. The requesting of certain information from the Board and the getting of it may take several weeks. These accounts may be published about October of this year. I am not in a position to guarantee anything earlier than that. But the 1929-30 accounts mean very little. The accounts that are important are the accounts for the year ending 31st March last. When those will be in my hands I cannot say. Again, I would not guarantee them earlier than the beginning of next year. I doubt if I will have them at that time. Certainly at that time special reports will have to be called for. One special report must be called for, as to the circumstances that led to the delay in regard to the accounts in general; secondly, as to what the auditor's view is of the then position of the Board with regard to its capital commitments, its expenditure and its revenue. I certainly will have a great deal of statistical returns to look for at that time. It will take some time to get those and I cannot promise them for presentation to the House until about St. Patrick's Day or Easter of next year. Then there may be legislation required on foot of all that.

Two question are likely to arise when that information comes before the House. I think it is almost certain they will arise, and I say this relying on information in my possession. I have not this information in final form. Even such as it is, I have not had time to have it examined for myself and there is a good amount that I cannot examine on my own. Anything I have is provisional, but even though of a provisional nature it makes it clear to me that the old rigid and conservative system upon which the whole Shannon finances were laid has to be changed. Some easement must be made as a result of what has happened so that electricity consumers will not be burdened with excessive charges and the taxpayer will not have to pay a single shilling for this, as we intended he never should pay.

I hope to come forward when I get these accounts with the best analysis that I can make of the accounts and with what the auditor says, and I will submit these to the two Houses. At that time two types of outsiders may have to be called in. We may have to get somebody to say whether a proper system of electrical accounts has yet been arrived at. Secondly, if I have to make suggestions, and I think it is the Government's duty to make suggestions, first as regards the readjustment in the finances and the layout of this scheme and in regard to anything else that may have to happen, then I think it is most likely that experts of a different type—not accountants—may have to be brought in to say whether our suggestions are right or wrong, and what amendments of our suggestions they will make. But no date can be assigned for that before the Easter of next year, to my mind.

That, as I said, is the disagreeable situation in which I find myself. My responsibility will naturally come up for criticism at this point. There was an independent Board, a Board at any rate so far as legislation was concerned that had given to it an independent position. In my statements to this House indicating my own point of view, and I take responsibility for the scheme of the Board, I certainly made it clear that it was the intention to fling the Board at arm's length from the Government, but I always balanced this freedom by publicity with regard to accounts and finances and the power to dismiss.

It can be said that I have interfered. I have. I interfered with different attitudes of mind at different times and in different ways—what I call suspicion at first, deepening to anxiety, getting to a point of moral certainty, and at the end to absolute certainty, in regard to what was happening. At the beginning I operated on my own. I tried to get reports from the Board. I wrote them letters and concentrated on one or two items: "Will you be able, within the limits of the money, to get a distribution system going so that you can sell electricity at a cheap rate and remunerate all the capital expenditure?" Then I got an agreement made in August, 1929. In September of 1929 I associated with the Board in a part-time capacity two people. In the early part of 1930 I decided upon a reorganisation of the Board. That reorganisation led to what I still call the resignation of the then Chairman, and his reappointment as a part-time member at a decreased salary, with bonus by way of remuneration.

It has been said elsewhere and I accept it as a correct statement that I took responsibility for, first of all, taking the resignation, if that is the word we are going to use, of the Chairman and thereafter associating him as a part-time member with the Board. The date is important in this matter— February of 1930. Not very many months after the gentleman's agreement had been made and very many months ahead of my having any information that things were definitely wrong I had two part-time people appointed on the Board. When their period of office was over I had certain talks with them. The main thing I got from them was that it was almost an impossibility to get correct information even as a member of the Board. That was the situation I faced up to in February, 1930. I had no information that anything was wrong, nothing much to go on to warrant dismissals, but sufficient disturbing circumstances to make me take certain action regardless of feelings of certain persons. I put it to the then Chairman that I wanted a reorganisation, that I wanted in somebody who would pay more attention to the general finances of the Board than what had been paid up-to-date, and I achieved my reorganisation in February, 1930. I appointed a new Chairman and a new full-time member, and it took those two people some time to get in touch with the details. It was not until June that I got a statement from the then Chairman that he had secured the approval of his colleagues—I think the phrase was— to call in these outside people, so as to get the accounts in a proper form. That was a satisfactory thing and the first satisfactory thing in connection with the Board almost since I began to get suspicious. Since then, with Mr. Browne as Chairman and Mr. Fay as full-time member, matters developed, and clarification and enlightenment of the real facts of the situation increased until the early part of this year, when in certain circumstances I got two resignations tendered to me. I accepted these resignations.

The scheme of the Board will have to be discussed. I do not think it can be discussed here because we are not in a position to consider it clearly, but I am very reluctant to abandon the idea of an independent Board working a big scheme like this. When we come to discuss the independent Board and what degree of independence it is going to have we must also have a discussion on what the power to dismiss entails. Is it to be regarded as involving the duty of looking into the affairs of the Board? If so it may soon become a full time post. If we are going to take up that attitude, it is better to associate the Minister actually and definitely with the whole working of the Board. I do not think we ought to get to that, but there ought to be a certain responsibility arising out of this power to dismiss. It ought not to drive him into looking into all the details of the Board. However, I did interfere in certain ways. I interfered by letter when I tried to get certain information. It was as little interference as I could have, but I do admit that it was almost as much as I could have in the early stages of the Board. But when I found that to my mind they were going beyond the amount of the money put by the Oireachtas under their control, I asked them to submit to the arbitration of the Legislature that created them. They said that they would accept that point of view. I took it that, having accepted, they would carry out their undertaking. I did not insist on coming to the two Houses, and I regret that I did not so insist.

Later I associated two men with that Board to see what was happening there. I wanted to get certain particulars of the working. I asked generally what was the situation. I had nothing concrete; but a certain number of vague, disturbing things came to my notice, and they drove me to reorganise the Board. I reorganised the Board. To some extent that might be called interfering, putting in two new members. To the extent that there was interference there may be blame or credit attached to me. Now we come to a complete disruption of the scheme of the old independent Board. I ask for it over a limited period. I am not abandoning the idea of an independent Board, but in the particular circumstances I have again to face up to my responsibilities. The two millions is to be given on the authority of the Minister, instead of paying as and when the Board demand. For the time being I am interfering completely with the Board, but my responsibility is going to be exercised in this way. I am not technical. I doubt even if I have advisers about me who are technical. The interference that I will exercise on the Board will be on the money side. I shall ask: How much do you want? What is it for? To what extent will it be remunerated? I intend generally to have my control confined to that.

The last item is the position of the part-timers. I forget the exact month upon which their period of office terminated, but as from that date they were appointed for a six months' period. It is limited to six months deliberately, because I wanted to have discussion with these part-time men as to whether there can be struck a proper balance between the authority which they can exercise by their votes upon that Board and the responsibility which they will take as and when things go wrong with the Board. It is a very difficult balance to get. They are three members of the Board out of five. The three part-timers might often outvote the full-time men. If anything goes wrong when they have the controlling authority, it is clear that they must take the greatest share of responsibility. I regard the business element on that Board as very valuable from two points of view. One that they stand in a sort of representative capacity; they represent the consumers, and stand between the Board and the consumers in the country. Secondly, they bring to bear upon the Board a business outlook. I hope that they are not for the future going to deal with the technical side very much. Their position on that Board should be such that they would confine themselves to the bigger questions, the finances of the Board, how far the money is being spent wisely, and in seeing whether the money being spent will show the certainty of remuneration early, or not too late. Although they are in a very indefinite position at the moment it is my intention to keep the business element there. I say that though I recognise there is still considerable room for doubt, arising out of all the circumstances of the past, as to what position they ought to occupy in the affairs of a Board of a technical type such as this.

People will ask at this time, as a sort of summary of the whole affair, what is the situation with regard to the economics of the Board. To that I must simply say I am not in a position to state anything accurately or usefully. I have reports which will have to be examined thoroughly, reports which will probably suffer a great deal of adjustments before they can be made to fit into the circumstances of the Board, but it is quite impossible for me at this moment to give any indication with regard to the economics of the whole system. If I said anything, I am as liable to mislead people on the optimistic side as on the other side. I do not think it is possible for anybody to make a definite statement on that point at the moment. I hope that I will not be pressed on that matter, because it would be asking me, with certain information in my hands, to pass a judgment on that information without knowing whether that is all that has to be said upon the subject. People may ask: "Are we not to know soon about this matter?" They will know about it as soon as I can get the information. As soon as the two years' accounts that are now outstanding are in our hands, and as soon as reports are made, so soon will I come to the House to make a statement. People may rely upon that being done as speedily as possible. It will be done for this reason: no Minister ever wants to be charged with responsibility for a concern like this, which is fundamentally a business concern. If any Minister takes it on, he loads himself with a terrific responsibility. I, in particular, am loading myself with a responsibility that I am very unwilling to take, because it is purely a business concern, and my commitments are such that I cannot give the time to the work that it really demands. There is a stimulus to me to get rid of that responsibility and hand it over to the Board as early as possible. That alone, if nothing else, would bring me back to the House.

With regard to dates, I may say the first year's accounts will not be in hands until some time in the autumn. The vital accounts, the 1930-31 accounts, will not be in hands until early next year. After that, some examinations and certain adjustments have to be made; but between St. Patrick's Day and Easter time there ought to be a presentation to the House of all the facts and figures. I hope that then the Minister will be completely relieved of all responsibility or have it precisely fixed how far he is to have any responsibility for this scheme.

I suppose this is one of the most important debates that we have had to deal with in this House for a considerable time. I would like to approach this matter quite dispassionately and, if we have any criticism to offer, we will keep in mind that this is our biggest State enterprise. The State is involved very heavily indeed in the Shannon scheme, and we must realise that anything we may offer by way of criticism in this House may not only affect the Shannon scheme and the Electricity Supply Board, but really the whole national credit. I think if we have that spirit in approaching the problems that are being put to us here, the necessity for dealing with all the peculiar circumstances that surround the debates, the controversies and so on, we will have a chance of emerging with the minimum of discredit either to the scheme or to the national credit.

Perhaps nothing has excited quite so much interest as the controversy that has been raging for the last few weeks with regard to the opinions of the legislature, the Minister and the former managing director of the Electricity Supply Board. There is a general feeling, and I think there is justification for it, that all that has transpired so far has been undesirable from this point of view: that one side, the Ministerial side, has been heard at great length and the other side has not had any hearing whatsoever. Of course we have to admit, because of the peculiar position and the fact that the matter was only discussed within the Oireachtas, that had to be so. I am not discussing the rights or wrongs of the Electricity Supply Board as such. I am not questioning the charges made by the Minister. I say it is undesirable that a one-sided debate should be concentrated on either an individual or a Board without an opportunity being offered to hear the other side of the story.

Let us be quite clear that all in good time the country will apportion the blame where it belongs. I think, particularly from the point of view of the Minister, from the point of view of the Board, the Oireachtas and the national credit involved, it would have been desirable if the Minister appointed a commission or a committee, representative of both Houses, made up of all Parties, which could investigate everything, and it would give the other side an opportunity to make their case against the Minister or to deal with the difficulties that they were confronted with in their attempts to carry on the work of the Electricity Supply Board.

There is a more important thing to be considered, and that is that such an advisory committee could apply ordinary laymen's intelligence in order to see that the work of the Electricity Supply Board, and all the activities connected with the Shannon scheme, could be secured on a stable basis for the future. That, to my mind, is far more important than the controversies, the attacks, the counter-attacks and counter-offensives that have taken place. It is far more essential that we should get to a point when the House can be satisfied, not with the individual statement of one man, such as the Minister, that things are going to be all right, but we should have the opinion of a body representative of the different parties in both Houses. We would like to have from such a body an assurance that the issues were being cleaned up, that all questions were being ironed out and that there was a reasonable hope of getting the Shannon scheme and everything connected with national electrification on a clean and economic basis.

I want to be quite fair to the Minister and I must say that to-day he was very much more informing than he was during the debates in the other House; at least it seemed so to me. I think the Minister was ill-advised in his method of handling the issue in the other House. He did not take the Dáil fully into his confidence. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that the Minister took us much more into his confidence to-day than he did the other House. When I speak of the Minister being ill-advised in not taking the Dáil fully into his confidence, I mean that, through the Dáil, he did not take the whole country into his confidence. In consequence, a very undesirable situation has arisen. All sorts of suspicions, loose talk, hasty judgments, rash judgments, are prevalent amongst people not competent to judge any of the issues involved.

That is the position in the country. That is not desirable from the Ministerial point of view, from the point of view of national credit, or from the point of view of the Electricity Supply Board. We know there are people in this country, just as there are in all countries, who rush to hasty conclusions, and they are sometimes prompted by all sorts of motives. I suggest, even at this hour, the Minister would be doing himself a great service, and he would be doing the Executive Council and the country a great service, if he established such a committee as I have suggested. If I were looking at this matter purely from a Party point of view, I would be inclined to let the Minister go headlong, as he is going, so that he would discredit himself and his Party. Let us hope that there is something finer than and far above all Parties in this matter.

We must approach this huge scheme in order to see, first of all, that the money involved is safeguarded, that it will recoup to some extent the capital charges and sinking fund, and that adequate service will be given. There is here a big national issue. This is the biggest scheme the State has ever entered upon, and we must have that scheme working properly, irrespective of Party interests.

The Minister will admit that, no matter what has happened up to the present in this conflict between himself and the Board, it would be well if we could face the position when that conflict would be removed out of both their hands, and that the matter should be dealt with by an impartial body such as I suggest. In this Bill that we have before us the Minister is asking for two million pounds. In discussing this question of two million pounds we might perhaps dissipate some of the misunderstandings and loose talk that have been going about. I think we would all admit that the general impression to the uninitiated and to the people who do not think accurately throughout the country is that there is a question of two millions being voted for the Electricity Supply Board to be in charge of the Minister, subject to the Minister for Finance. Rightly or wrongly, it is being interpreted that these two millions are to take the place of money that had been lost by the Electricity Supply Board. Of course, on the figures and facts, that is wrong. The total amount, according to the Minister, is an amount of £850,000, a very big amount and very serious proposition to be up against, but still very different from the impression that has been created about this two million pounds.

I hold that the Minister has been largely responsible for creating that impression. It may be that he was unconsciously doing so, but, rightly or wrongly, that impression has been created, and it is misleading. The Minister may think that people who talk loosely in that way do not matter, but public opinion does matter and does affect public credit. As to this £850,000, there is a very definite difference of opinion between the Minister and the Electricity Supply Board as regards what were their commitments. I do not think yet that I am perfectly satisfied that the Minister made his position clear in trying to insist on the Electricity Supply Board being definitely committed to discharge the liabilities out of the £2,500,000 that was voted to them.

The Minister has very definitely stated that he has an agreement about that, and I have no doubt that that is so. But I want to point out that the Minister must have had very serious doubts about that when he proposed to bring in two amendments into his 1929 measure, which he did not do at the request of the Electricity Supply Board. That, I think, was a serious mistake. He has admitted it was a serious mistake. It weakens his position in trying to make it clear to us— and it is not clear—that the Electricity Supply Board was definitely involved in the settlement of these liabilities. They made their plea that they were not really entitled to be committed to this out of the £2,500,000, and their word stands against the Minister's. Here again is one of the points that might be cleared up if we had an impartial committee to review the situation. Before we leave this question as to the amount of money, I would like to ask the Minister why we are asked to vote £1,150,000 in addition to the £850,000, and place this in charge of the Minister, without being given some idea as to what he is going to use it for? How has the Minister arrived at that figure? Is it simply a round figure of £2,000,000, which leaves £1,150,000 at his disposal out of the £2,000,000?

When the Minister is replying I want one point made clear. Is there any portion of that money going to cover the Bill for extras on the construction side? It has been suggested, and it has been generally discussed, that Siemens-Schuckert——

May I answer that now?

Cathaoirleach

Yes.

It could not be done legally.

Well I may tell the Minister that it is generally believed that portion of this vote is going to settle that account, and on that point we are entitled to ask at the same time if there is a bill of that sort from Siemens-Schuckert, if that bill of extras has been submitted, analysed, the invoices passed and the amounts agreed upon, or if there is any difference of opinion between the Minister on the one hand and Siemens-Schuckert on the other hand, as to what that bill of extras is to be? I think there is something, in view of the disturbance about the accounts, that we should be told about at any time.

Before I vote for this measure I would like to know how the Minister arrives at this £1,150,000 and what he proposes to do with it. Now this brings us right down to the finance of the whole scheme. The Minister has talked about interest and sinking fund and I am not sure if I have been able to make a proper analysis of the capital charges involved in the Shannon Scheme and in the Electricity Supply Board. Let us be clear about these before we go any further. The Minister has mentioned and has differentiated distinctly between two things —that is the Shannon Scheme, the construction side, and the Electricity Supply Board, which I take to be the distribution side. Let us realise that these two for all practical purposes are the same thing and that it is the current of electricity that is going to be used throughout the country that has got to pay the commitments of both the Shannon construction scheme and the Electricity Supply Board together with any other commitments that may be involved in the distribution of current throughout the country. As I make out the amounts now they would be (1) under 1925 Act £5,200,000; under the Amending Bill passed later, £500,000; a vote of £156,000 passed in 1929 to meet the deficiencies of interest in the non-productive years and under the Electricity Supply Act, 1927, a sum of £2,500,000, making the total up to date under these various Acts a sum of £8,356,000.

If the sum asked for in this Bill is granted it will mean that the capital against the entire undertaking will amount to £10,356,000. I may have missed something because of the limited opportunities at my disposal, but I have checked that figure up with all the information that I could get. At the moment I do not know on what basis the Minister is going as regards interest and sinking fund. If we take it that it is a five per cent. basis, and I do not think the State is borrowing money at a less price than that, then according to my calculation the interest charges on £10,356,000 will, at five per cent., amount to £517,800. I would like Senators to bear that figure in mind because of certain things that I will have to refer to later.

That is one side of the story. I do not know on what basis the Minister is making his estimate, but if the national commitments in connection with the Shannon scheme and the Electricity Supply Board work out at approximately ten and a half million pounds, then we are committed to a charge of over half a million pounds— that is on a 5 per cent. basis—to meet that. The other side of the proposition is: what units are being distributed, what are we being paid, and what is the potential revenue? The Minister may say, of course, that in view of the chaotic state of affairs in the Electricity Supply Board it is impossible to arrive at any figures. I will come to that later. I want now to refer to certain statements that were made in this House by the Minister in July, 1929. I propose quoting some statements made by the Minister then. In reply to Senator Johnson on the question of capital charges, the Minister said:

A suggestion of that sort must be considered in the light of the new facts. What are the new facts? The facts are that if there is anything ahead of us it is not a deficit in the Shannon revenues, but rather the opposite. Not merely have the prophecies of a few years been upheld, but it would seem that the most sanguine hopes then entertained will be improved upon. The Electricity Supply Board are in a position to know what the position is. They have been making arrangements for the supply of electricity, and they estimate that in 1932, instead of the 110 million units originally estimated as the demand on the scheme, the Shannon will have to deliver fully 144 million units. That will be the demand in 1932, without any activity on the part of the Board.

Further in his analysis the Minister said, and this part of his statement is not clear to me.

The £486,000 per annum required in order to make the scheme pay, includes two items, and many people think it wrong that both these items should be included in the annual Bill. It includes payment for interest charges, and also a sinking fund which will have repaid the entire sum of money in a period of forty years, and will have paid interest on this money all the time.

Later on the same occasion the Minister said:

Interest on sinking fund charges amount to 70 per cent. of the £486,000 that has to be met each year.

I hope that the Minister will now indicate to us what the interest and sinking fund charges will amount to on this sum of nearly ten and a half million pounds. I would like to get that figure, because I am not clear as to the basis on which the Minister is proceeding. If we had that figure, as well as figures indicating the present output, we would be approaching the point where we could analyse the cost per unit on interest and sinking fund.

I have every sympathy with the Minister in the extraordinary difficulties that he is faced with, but I think he is following the wrong course in not taking the House fully into his confidence. I suggest that he would have not alone the sympathy of the two Houses but of the country if he had put his cards on the table and asked for the co-operation of both Houses instead of simply devoting himself to the attacks that he has made. In spite of the difficulties which the Minister had with the Board, in spite of the chaos that exists and the long delay that is going to take place before we can get the accounts, I submit that the Minister could give us three key figures which would guide us in our analysis of the position: what we would need to charge for electrical current, the present output and the consumption of current. He ought also to be able to give us the production and distribution costs as well as the overheads, including interest on capital and the allowance made for sinking fund. Without waiting for any analysis of the accounts or for the auditors' report I think we ought to be able to get those figures. If the Minister were agreeable to have the committee that I suggest they would be the people to handle this. If we are not to get that committee then I think the country ought to have the information that I asked for.

I want to refer again to the extracts from the Minister's speeches made in this House that I have already given. They are rather interesting in view of the admissions that the Minister made in the Dáil. He repeated them here. I would call the special attention of the House to the fact that these statements were made in this House on the 18th July, 1929. Now, we find that at that time the Minister was having trouble with the Board. It was in July, 1929, that the Minister threatened to bring in his amendment if the Board did not agree to do what he wanted them to do. The fact that the Minister had definitely before him the controversy, amounting to a threat, to bring in an amendment to clarify the issue as to whether the Electricity Supply Board were or were not entitled to pay the undischarged liabilities shows clearly that in July, 1929, he knew of these difficulties and was prepared to bring them forward in the Dáil. In view of that it seems to me extraordinary that the Minister should have come to the Seanad at the same time and discussed the new facts and, in particular, stressed the fact that the Electricity Supply Board were in a position to know what the position was. That, to my mind, is the most damaging letdown of the whole position by the Minister.

I remember distinctly after his speech here the feeling of great confidence that was instilled in the House, that everything was going splendidly with the Shannon scheme, when, at the same time, the Minister was having this conflict and was threatening to go to the Dáil with an amendment to clarify the issue between himself and the Electricity Supply Board. I have tried to be as concise and as much to the point as possible. I have tried to approach this thing in a spirit of fair play, and I suggest to the Minister that, even at the eleventh hour, the proper course is to take a representative body from both Houses and to try to get the matter straightened out, because, rightly or wrongly, the Minister has created a one-sided impression in the country. The feeling in such cases is with the man who is not heard, and whether he is entitled to sympathy or not he will get that sympathy. I think, from the point of view of the Minister, and from every point of view, the proper course is to have a committee of both Houses brought in.

I want again to ask the Minister to enlighten us about the £1,150,000 that he wants in addition to the amount necessary to straighten out the shortcomings of the Electricity Supply Board. Before we vote on that I think the House should know exactly what the Minister is going to do with it. I stress the fact that we ought to know the capital charges and the interest and sinking fund on the capital involved, so that we could visualise, or try to reason out what, with all the overhead expenses, the units of electricity will cost. I have no fear about the future of the electricity supply. I do not think it is going to be straightened out, but I have every confidence that the people will face up to the position if they are told the real facts. I am not suggesting that the Minister has held anything back, but I am suggesting that the people are not satisfied with the partial statements that have been made, and they want somebody that will guarantee to them that everything is as it should be. Even with the big capital and with the increased demand on the country the thing can be faced. It can only be faced by matters being disclosed on all sides, including those of the late Electricity Supply Board.

[The Leas-Chathaoirleach took the Chair.]

I think one might be excused for being reminded during this controversy of the optimistic reports that came from France and Mesopotamia during the war, and the revelations that have since been made by soldiers and statesmen who were interested and implicated during the time that these optimistic reports were being promulgated and circulated. In comparing the statements now being made with the statements made at that time, it is undoubtedly true, as Senator Connolly has pointed out, that the public was led to believe that the scheme was an immense success up to a recent date. The Minister has indicated to-day again that it is an immense success from the point of view of his Department, which had control of the generation side, but there seems to be some doubt as to whether it is a success from the point of view of the Board, to which was handed over powers and responsibilities by the Oireachtas, at the instigation of the Minister. An indictment is made of the Board by the Minister, and it seems to me to be a very severe and serious indictment of incompetency in some respects. We have not had a real opportunity—and I do not see any sign of having a real opportunity—of hearing the case for the defence. I agree in that with Senator Connolly, that it would only be right in the public interest and only fair that the Board which this House, along with the Dáil, was responsible for setting up, with a charter of independence and with tremendous powers, should have that opportunity.

The Minister's explanation was that he was in somewhat of a dilemma at an early stage in the history of the Board, and I can well understand it. I would be surprised if he had not found himself in a dilemma. When the 1927 Act was passed by the Oireachtas it gave extraordinary powers to the Electricity Supply Board, a complete monopoly of the sale of electricity, as well as powers of a very general character, which apparently they have not found it necessary to use, but, nevertheless, which they had. They were to be untrammelled in regard to charges, untrammelled with regard to policy, and, in fact, judging by the promises the Minister made and the assurances given, almost entirely untrammelled. This House and the Dáil were responsible for giving the Board those untrammelled powers, and, in my view, the Board was naturally inclined to interpret the powers given in their charter, the Electricity Supply Act of 1927, in the light of the assurance the Minister gave.

The Minister tells us to-day that he clearly wanted to divest the Board of day-to-day questioning, day-to-day interference by departments, and day-to-day questionings in Parliament. But that was not quite an accurate description of the Minister's assurances. It was not merely day-to-day questioning that was repudiated, and day-to-day interference by departments —the kind of control that spending departments feel resentful of and which the Minister for Finance imposes. The Minister's statements, both in the Dáil and Seanad, were very much more generous than that. I can quote from the Official Debates in the Dáil, Vol. 18, col. 1919: "It will be noticed that the Board is to be removed as far as possible from political pressure. It is intended to remove it as far as possible from incessant Government watchfulness and from incessant Parliamentary interference." Again: "I hope it will be remembered that—once the Board has been appointed—control or touch by my Department or myself with the Shannon Electricity Scheme ceases. This authority is entirely on its own, and operates on its own, free from Departmental control," vol. 18, col. 1921. When asked by Deputy Davin in the Dáil: "Would there be any interference with that Board by the Minister or his Department?" the Minister replied: "None whatever. A question to that effect might be answered, but that will be the only type of Parliamentary question that will be answered." That is to say, that there will be no interference or control by the Department, and one could go on quoting in a similar way speech after speech, assurance after assurance, to make it quite clear that the Board were to be an independent Board. They were given certain powers and certain duties, and to fulfil those duties they were assured of two and a half million pounds with which to carry out their job. With these powers and with these promises and assurances one can well understand the Board resenting at a very early stage, at so early a stage as 1928, when, as the Minister told us to-day, and as he told the Dáil, he had been asking questions, that he had been brought into certain touch with the Board because of a certain contractual arrangement between himself, as representing the generation construction scheme, and the Electricity Supply Board. Because of that accidental circumstance he found it necessary to intervene, and he says that, having retained the power to dismiss, he began to look upon his responsibility in that respect, and he found that if he was at any time to exercise the power to dismiss he had the right to inquire, to satisfy himself that he was justified in not exercising his power. Hence the dilemma.

I think it would be a miracle almost if there had been no such dilemma. I feel that it would be impossible to give a Board of this kind their independence and the power that they had with the authority to spend £2,500,000 to do a certain job, and then to divest oneself of responsibility for how the job will be done, while retaining the power to dismiss and while retaining the power to call for accounts and to call for reports. The two ideas are fundamentally opposed and in my view the dilemma that the Minister found himself in was inevitable. The Board were given the assurance that they could draw up to £2,500,000 to carry on their work. The Board were assured of the fullest support from the Minister, and I think it is probably true, although we have no detailed knowledge, that they got the fullest support apart from these interferences. To what extent there was interference I do not know. It is apparent that there was a continuous inquiry from 1928, and it suggests itself to me that the continuous inquiry was resented by the Board, and, if my reading of the Act and the debates would be any guide, they were justified in resenting that kind of interference. The responsibility lies on the Oireachtas. I do not think that the Oireachtas can dispense with that responsibility for having put the Board, on the one hand, and the Minister, on the other, in such a position that conflict of the kind that has occurred was almost inevitable.

The question of the £2,500,000 and what it was intended to include has loomed very large in this discussion. We had in the early stages of the Shannon Scheme some very detailed estimates of what was intended to be done with the 5 million odd pounds. It was not a binding estimate, but it was an indication to the Oireachtas of what the money would be spent upon, what work would be done with that money. No such estimate was presented in regard to the £2,500,000. The Minister told us that he had, at any rate, a certain guidance. He had certain views as to how the money ought to be spent and how it might be divided into various works. They were very rough, he said, but at least he had something in his mind when he fixed upon £2,500,000. We have not been told that when he appointed the Board and handed them their charter he indicated to that Board what was the intention of the Oireachtas or himself as to how that £2,500,000 was to be expended, how it would be divided, or any indication of how much should be spent on this or how much should be spent on that, or of the policy that was intended to be followed by the Board. The whole job was left in the hands of the Board, subject to the limit of £2,500,000.

But we did have assurances from the Minister as to what he hoped for. The Shannon scheme was based upon the production of 153,000,000 units and, I think, a sale of about 110,000,000 units at a certain price after a period of five years. It was indicated in some section, I think, in the Electricity Supply Bill, that the end of 1932 was to be the date when at least it would be expected or hoped that the scheme would be placed upon a paying basis, and, if not, a certain rearrangement of charges and so on had to be made.

Whatever we may learn ultimately about the revenue derived from the sale of electrical power, we have assurances from the Minister of the probable sale for this year— 134,000,000 to 138,000,000 units for 1931. That is a remarkable achievement, whoever is responsible for it. It is recorded that there had been sold by the Board in the year ending 31st March, 1931, 84,413,000 units of electricity, and presumably according to the Minister's figures, if I have taken them down correctly, it is expected that there will be an increase on that of 50 million units this year, making 134 million units.

What does that return of 84,000,000 units relate to?

It is the return printed in the Dáil reports of last week.

But does it say from the Shannon development.

The number of units sold by the Board in the year ending 31st March, 1929, was 1,355,000 units: in the year ending 31st March, 1930, 43,177,000 units; in the year ending 31st March, 1931, 84,413,000 units. That was a reply given to Mr. Briscoe in the Official Debates of 15th July, column 1995. Further than that there is a table giving the number of units generated in the next column which I need not go into in detail. It goes to indicate that, on the production side, the estimates and hopes of the promoters of the scheme were well ahead, and in fact almost fully accomplished a considerable time before the appointed day.

I take it it is not much use generating unless one is selling, and it is not much use generating unless one has the means of consuming; that is to say, unless the places are linked up and wired and the general system completed, so that the power which is generated will eventually be consumed. If the policy of the Board—the independent Board—has been directed towards ensuring that the maximum supply will find consumption, and if they have succeeded to such a great degree as they have done in achieving that object, the only question that arises is as to whether the price at which they sold that power is going to be remunerative. I really feel that the Minister is not giving the House as much information as he could on this matter. Without desiring to bind him to details or expecting him to say definitely what the financial position of the undertaking is, I would expect him to be in a position to say, in regard to the quantity that is being consumed and paid for, that a certain revenue is expected from those who are buying it in bulk for power purposes, for domestic purposes, for light and heating, or at a flat rate for both purposes. There is, I am confident, knowledge of the relative proportions of the total consumption which is being devoted to power purposes, bulk power sales, and domestic purposes, and for ordinary industrial uses. I think almost inevitably the Board is in a position to supply the Minister with at least a rough approximation of what those sales are likely to bring in. I think we ought to have this. I think it is not enough to say: "We cannot give you detailed information of the actual financial position of the Board until the final accounts are submitted a year hence." For this two and a half millions, therefore, the Board has brought the consumers into the position to demand and to consume very nearly the total production of the Shannon power scheme up to date. The Minister tells us that the Board has gone rather beyond the intention— that is to say, that they have impinged upon the "further development" and more or less necessitated still further capital expenditure to enable a further development scheme to be undertaken. I am not quite clear upon this point, because in the scheme as outlined by the experts they did inform us that within the scheme of the first development there was the possibility of utilising steam plant stand-bys to increase the amount of units generated, and they told us on page 117 of the Experts' Report:

"The first development stage which the experts suggest, and which corresponds to a requirement of about 150 million units measured at the line busbars of the power house, is far from the full exploitation of the Siemens-Schuckert partial development. Combined with existing steam stations, which could be called on to supply an average of ten million units per year of peak-load energy, and dry-year supplementary, the partial development is capable of delivering about 225 million units per year."

That strikes me as being an indication that, even within the partial development scheme, it was right and proper to budget for a consumption of more than would be produced at the Shannon power station, and that as production at the steam plant would be minus any charge for capital expenditure it should be very cheaply-produced power. And as every additional unit that is consumed is going to have a downward influence upon the price of the rest it seems to me, on the face of it, good policy to proceed in the direction of extending production to the very greatest possible extent.

The Minister will not have forgotten a certain criticism that I myself directed to certain clauses of the Bill on the ground that it was undesirable to limit the Board to making the scheme pay and setting aside a sinking fund by a certain year, and that it would be good policy from the electrical economy standpoint to give the Board a longer period—shall I call it a provisional period—so as to induce people to enter into long period contracts—ten year contracts—and to ensure that there would be a consumption at a low rate, and in that way to make possible a very wide consumption and to develop fully, and as widely as possible, the habit of using electricity. Of course that was not embodied in the Bill. The Minister may say that the Board were bound, as they undoubtedly were, by the limitations of the Bill; but even with the limitations of the Bill it seems to me that their Charter, and the interpretation of the Charter which the Minister gave to the Oireachtas and the country, was to encourage them to embark upon a very generous consumption of electric power, and to link up as many points of consumption as was possible. The Minister says, and I think the gravamen of his case is, that the Board has not kept its accounts properly, has not been in a position to present to him, when required, a statement of the revenue possibilities. But somehow or other, whether by deliberation or not, the criticism has been directed to the late managing director. I have no particular reason for standing up for the late managing director. Speaking as one associated with the Labour movement, one might say that we had a great grievance against the managing director. But when we are speaking of the failure of accounting it would seem to me that the chief responsible person would naturally be the Chairman of the Board. He has been silent, and has not been invited, so far as I can gather, to state his reasons for failing to see that the accounting system was kept in proper order. I dare say he has something to urge in extenuation of his offence.

I have to assume that the Minister's account of the position in regard to the book-keeping system is an accurate one. I do not think that it is sufficient justification for the Board to say that the work of development went ahead so fast that the accounting system could not keep up with it. But when one blames the Board for failure in that respect, one has to consider the position of this House and of the Dáil in relation to the Minister. It was the Minister who chose and appointed this Board. The Minister is responsible for choosing, in good faith, people who did not rise to his expectations in regard to the management of the affairs of the Board. I do not think that it would be possible to avoid that risk— even if the Minister chose the veriest superman in respect to accounting. These are risks which have to be taken when appointing boards or judges or any persons to particular offices. I think this House, and the country generally, should take into account that that risk has to be taken, and that if a failure eventuates we have simply to pay the price. The unfortunate feature of this position is—and the Minister is not reconciled to the evil consequences of his policy—that the Board is appointed with certain powers. The Board is given money to spend, and it is not responsible to this House or to the Dáil. It has a kind of responsibility to the Minister, inasmuch as he has the power of dismissal. But if that power is not exercised, then all the Board has to do under its charter is to make the scheme pay. The Minister says he wants to get back to the position that future Boards will be in exactly that state of freedom from responsibility to the Oireachtas— that there should be no Minister to answer to the Oireachtas for how it carries on its duties, that it may still control the power policy of this country without accounting to anybody for how it carries on that policy, that it will not have to justify its policy so long as it makes the scheme pay. I hope that before the introduction of the Bill which the Minister suggests will be necessary there will be a good deal of thinking upon this problem. I quite agree that this kind of organisation ought to have a considerable amount of freedom from the type of Treasury control to which an ordinary Government Department has to submit. But there is a great difference between that position and giving a Board of this kind complete power and absolute freedom.

[The Cathaoirleach resumed the Chair.]

As I have said frequently, within the powers given, the Board might determine the whole economic policy of this country. It might divert that policy from the direction which the Minister would desire it should take. It might decide to give away power to certain classes of industry and to make another class of consumer pay the cost. So long as the scheme pays, there is no control of policy. Future Ministers will find, as the present Minister has found, that they are bound to exercise some sort of authority or supervision over the Board. Future Ministers will find themselves in the same dilemma as the present Minister has found himself in if there is a freedom given to the Board from eventual control of expenditure by them.

I am at a loss to understand the position of the Minister regarding the allocation of the £2,500,000. That sum was embodied in the Act of 1927, the Minister having certain figures to guide him. The Minister says that the gentleman who became managing director of the Board, before becoming managing director, had certain figures in mind. But that surely cannot be taken as sufficient warranty that the Board will spend the money in that way or within those limitations. I cannot conceive this foreign corporation, to which the Minister referred, providing for the supply of current to all the towns which it is proposed to supply under the first development scheme for the sum of £2,500,000, which is to include the buying out of Dublin, Rathmines, Pembroke, Cork, and all the other supply stations.

They did not propose to buy them.

I thought the Minister said they did.

I hope I did not say that they proposed to take them over.

I misunderstood the Minister. I wonder did they anticipate the sale of the total production of the Shannon first development scheme. What, in fact, is the position? Suppose we assume for the moment that the Board were entitled to spend this £2,500,000 in such a way as they were empowered to spend it.

The Minister gave the Dáil certain figures. I am not very confident in my interpretation of them all, because there was a good deal of complexity introduced, but as far as I can disentangle them, they mean that the Board has spent £1,950,000, has committed itself to certain further expenditure, £720,000, and therefore has nominally overspent—I am taking their interpretation of their powers under the Act—two hundred thousand pounds. But it is going to cost the Minister under this scheme £270,000 to acquire certain systems in towns which have existing undertakings which have not yet been acquired. Certain other works which were obviously contemplated in the general scheme are to be paid for out of the present £2,000,000. On the whole, it seems to me that what has happened is that the Board has gone very much faster than anybody expected. They have made it possible for consumption almost to total the supply of power, and they exceeded the original estimate by perhaps a quarter of a million pounds. No doubt the accounting is greatly at fault, but the evil that has been done, if any, is not a very great one. I put this as a kind of reassurance to myself, having been somewhat disturbed and frightened by the statement made by the Minister. Examining the figures he has given, examining as closely as I can the circumstances, the facts, and the allegations that have been made, it seems to me there is not the slightest need to have any despair about this scheme, but rather to be proud that after all that has happened, even with the failure of the accounting, we may look with very great confidence to its being an outstanding success in a very short time, as large a success as the Minister indicated in 1929.

I feel that it would be very desirable if the Minister could give the House some figures, even as rough an estimate as the two and a half million pounds estimate, to make us confident that, notwithstanding all that has been said, the probabilities, almost the certainties are that the scheme is perfectly sound, and is going to be a complete success without the necessity of adding to the cost to the consumer. I do not know whether it is possible—I fear it is not, but it would seem to be desirable if it were possible —for the Minister to say what this extra £2,000,000 will mean in the cost of power to the consumer. I think that probably we have to look for a reaction against the domestic use of electricity, if there is to be an increase at all, even the most fractional, in the cost of current. Even at the present cost I discern a considerable feeling of regret that people have been induced to instal electricity, and discard other sources of heating.

I hope that it will be found possible for the Minister to give us some assurance that there is no risk of an increased charge for electricity to the domestic consumer. If there is any fear of that, if there is any policy that would be likely to lead to that, then I think we may count on a very great decline in the consumption of electrical power for heating purposes in the houses of the masses. I dare say there will be questions arising in the course of the Committee Stage which will elucidate some of the points I have raised. I feel on the whole, after all the discussion that has taken place, that the scheme has been successful on the production side, up to now it has been successful on the distribution side and I feel pretty confident that it is not going to fail on the revenue side.

The Minister in introducing this Bill said that it was probably the most disagreeable measure that he ever had to introduce into the Oireachtas. I am not surprised at that. because here he had in the Shannon Scheme a great sociological enterprise, as he himself stated. He had that part of the scheme which dealt with the generation of electrical power complete. He had that part of the scheme which dealt with long-distance transmission complete. He had in 1927 to deal with the distribution of electrical power. It is my submission to the House without wishing to be unduly critical that from 1927 very serious mistakes have been made.

Now I think the first serious mistake made in 1927 was this that the Act itself did not provide that the members of the Board should have a certain qualification. I understand that in the electrical legislation of other countries there is always the provision that men in the position of the Board in this case are men with high qualifications and great experience. That I think is the first mistake that has been made. It is not a mistake for which the Minister is solely responsible. It is a mistake for which Parliament is responsible. I also think that the Minister miscalculated when he said that the cost of an electrical scheme could be divided into three units, that the development of power accounted for one unit, long distance transmission accounted for another unit, and distribution accounted for a third unit. The Minister said he had statistics before him to show that such was the case but I am inclined to think that these statistics related only to electrical undertakings adjacent to large cities and did not apply to electrical undertakings in a country like this where he had to bring power to villages of 500 and upwards. In any case I do submit to the House that the Minister's calculation was wrong.

I do not at all value the tender or the offer that was made to him by electrical suppliers from another country who wanted to get control of our electrical power, and I think the Minister was wrong in making any calculation based upon that. I think that he was wrong in assigning only £2,500,000 for the part of his scheme that related to distribution. That might have been fair enough where large cities were supplied with electric power from sources that generated electric power in great quantities. It might also apply to places where electricity was introduced for the first time, but here in this country you had schemes in many towns. You had vested interests and you had goodwill to be taken into account, and I do think that the Minister's estimate of £2,500,000 was under the mark.

Since these debates began I have looked into the Act of 1927, and I am also of the opinion that the Board were probably right in their contention that in regard to the municipal undertaking they were to take the undertaking with its burdens, and that the burden on the municipal undertaking was not to be included in the £2,500,000. Now that is proved by another section in the Act of 1927, which says that the Board shall indemnify their predecessors—that is, the municipal councils—in respect of interest and sinking fund of those transferred debts. However that may be a matter for discussion and for argument, it came up in an acute form in 1929. The Minister became aware that the plans which this Board was adopting would lead them to an expenditure exceeding £2,500,000 if the liabilities that they took over from municipal authorities were included. He found that they were heading towards an expenditure which would amount to £2,500,000 plus the cost of those transferred charges.

I do think it is hard to say what a man ought to have done in certain circumstances, but, looking back, I think that was the time the Minister ought to have come to Parliament and, instead of making what he has described here as a gentleman's undertaking with the Board, he ought to have legislated the matter and made it perfectly clear, because I do think and submit to this House that that gentleman's undertaking—I think the Minister used the phrase—was an illegal undertaking. It has had bad effects, because the Board went along with their scheme of development, and the Minister found last October that they had exceeded the sum which they were authorised to spend upon his understanding of the Act of Parliament. That is, they had spent £1,900,000 in cash, and had incurred a liability of £700,000 or £800,000 in respect of transferred municipal undertakings, and had also incurred liabilities to the extent of £250,000 which must be met immediately.

Therefore some time last year the Minister definitely found that they had overspent the money they were entitled to spend. I do think they had not then overspent their money but had gone very near it, had gone within £200,000 or £300,000 of it, and where the Minister was wrong was, I think, in closing down their credits. He should not have closed down their credits and put them in the ridiculous position in which this Board has been for the last eight or ten months. It is easy to criticise after the event, but I do think that the Minister was wrong in not either coming to Parliament last October and putting the whole thing before Parliament or continuing these payments. That is the end of my criticism on one aspect of this Bill. I do not like to be thought too severe, because this is a great undertaking. I am very sorry that it has not gone on to success without this confusion and this unpleasantness and this uncertainty in the public mind which have resulted from the disclosures that have taken place.

Another matter in which I think the Minister was at fault was this: I believe, on the true construction of the Bill, the Minister had no right at all to interfere with the Board from day to day or from month to month, to exercise any sort of immediate supervision. His only right was to dismiss, and his right was to dismiss in case the accounts were wrong. He found there were no accounts. This is the very centre of this controversy. Under the Act of 1927, in case the Board produced no accounts, or in case the accounts were wrong or false or fraudulent, he could claim the power of dismissal. But what has happened? The last accounts were for 1928-29. He has got no accounts for 1929-30. He ought to have now coming in accounts for 1930-31. The two years' accounts are now outstanding. The Board has been two years in default, and in great default, and I think the Minister was altogether too lenient in respect to the accounts, and altogether too severe with them in respect to other matters. We have learned a good deal from the statement of the Minister. Attending closely to the statement of the Minister, I find that the Minister is extremely anxious to be rid of the Shannon scheme. He is like the little boy at the country fair that takes hold of the little electric battery which sticks to his hand. The Shannon scheme is sticking to the Minister's hand and he wants to throw it away now but he cannot.

The Minister has told us that the supervision of the Shannon scheme and of the Board is a full-time job for one man. I believe that for the last two or three years it has been a full-time job, and I believe the Minister has been doing too much other work, and that if he had devoted himself entirely to this expenditure of ten or fifteen millions of public money he would have got the Shannon scheme on the rails by this time.

Now there is another matter that was disclosed to any person who closely followed the speech of the Minister, and it was this: that the Board has been going wrong in their method of development of this distribution system. They have been going so far wrong that they have rendered it incumbent upon this State to give them more electric power. They have forced this State to provide further electric power in order to round off their scheme of distribution. I understood that from the Minister's speech, but I was very sorry also to understand from the Minister's speech that the way he is going to provide electric power is by means of coal. The Minister said he is going to develop the works at the Pigeon House. Of course I may have misunderstood what the Minister said, but let us understand it now; there is to be a further development. Is it to be at Ardnacrusha or at the Pigeon House? What is it to be? If the Minister wants this money for development purposes why does he not tell us what this development is? There was one hopeful note in the Minister's speech, and it was this: that he expects to bring in expert assistance from abroad to look after the management of this great undertaking. He wants expert assistance from abroad to deal with the accounting in respect of this electrical undertaking. I think he ought to have expert assistance not merely in regard to the accounting but in regard to the engineering, in regard to the distribution, and in regard to the organisation of this great scheme. I think that particularly if the Minister cannot undertake to give his whole time to the supervision of this work. Here is what we are having. Undoubtedly under the Act of 1927 there was a Board independent of the Minister, as it was possible to conceive, without the reservation of any shred at all of control of public money. That is what we had in 1927. We gave £2,500,000 of public money to four or five men, and we gave them a free hand. That has led to, well, let us say, I hope not disaster. I would not like to see a scheme of this kind fail through incompetence or confusion, but certainly that which was done in 1927 has led to confusion.

I am glad that under this new Bill the Minister has reserved to himself control. I do not think it would be possible in this country, in the immediate future, to run any great enterprise with public money unless you have the budgeting and the control which is absolutely necessary in respect to the expenditure of public money. The Minister seems to be of a different opinion. I am glad to hear that he is going to control this undertaking for the next six or twelve months. I am sorry to hear that he hopes to be able to discharge himself from any control thereafter, because I am quite certain that no enterprise can be carried on, in which public money is given to people to spend, without thorough supervision. I do think that the Board ought to be put in funds to carry on, to pay their immediate liabilities, to go on energetically with the work so far as it is not completed.

I do agree with the Minister that it would be probably incumbent upon him to provide power in order to round off some of the mistakes that have been made in distribution. I have followed the speeches of the Minister in the Dáil as closely as I could. Here in the Seanad I have listened to the criticism of him. I have come to the conclusion that he still has in his possession at least £600,000 of the money of the Board that they were entitled to get from the Minister for Finance. I also see that the Minister has no intention whatever of paying the £850,000 which was due by municipal authorities and, of course, is due by the Board as their successors. Therefore I do not see any real necessity for more than £300,000 or £400,000 at the present moment.

Apart altogether from the liabilities of the municipal undertakings, if the Board had £750,000 to-morrow they would have to pay it out at the end of the week.

If the Board had £750,000 to-morrow morning it would have to pay it out to discharge claims of creditors on the Board.

Outside the municipal undertakings altogether.

But am I not right in saying that the Board are entitled to be paid by the Minister for Finance £600,000?

Waiving the agreement, yes.

Waiving the agreement, they are entitled to that. I have already said what I thought of the agreement. I think it was wrong to have made it. I think it was illegal when made; in any case it was unfortunate. That is all I say, but here we are now, we have to make the best of this great sociological enterprise, as it has been described by the Minister and by others. We are to make the best of it in the future, and we have to see that the public money is properly audited and that the public money is properly controlled by the Minister who is responsible to the Oireachtas. I am making this submission, that the most that is required at the present moment to put the Board in funds and to pay working expenses is about £500,000 or £600,000. So far as I can see from the figures— and of course I am only speaking from what I can gather from the debates here and the debates in the Dáil and other accounts I have seen—that is all that is required. Where is the necessity for £1,150,000 in a bad year like this and with the bad winter approaching? If our Minister can show the necessity for it I am sure that the Seanad will not be too parsimonious, but I do think that it is a large draft both on our pockets and on our credulity to expect us to vote two millions of money in the month of July, 1931, for the Shannon scheme further development.

I rise with considerable diffidence in this debate because on account of the issues being so very obscure. However, the main structure has been laid down and we are committed to it. My views with regard to it are known to many here. I was never in favour of a scheme on national lines. I do not wish to hand over the economic resources of the State entirely to be exploited by private enterprise. I always much prefer to have some form of arrangement whereby, under a franchise, this would be granted to a concessionaire under agreement. The concessionaire would be allowed to make whatever profit he could and you cut away altogether any connection between the State and commercial enterprise. But that cannot be gone back on now. We have a certain position which cannot be retrieved, has not yet failed and may not fail. To that extent the issue is somewhat limited. If I can venture an opinion, I think the amount of excitement, and almost heat, that has been brought into this whole matter has been exaggerated. I do not think that the position is anything like so serious as has been indicated. The Minister himself said that after 1931 the estimated units were being, or would be, sold, and the price, as far as we can see, that is being charged is the price that the experts estimated should be received. Until we know that that is not so I do not think we have reason for any alarm. I think that this matter has boiled itself down to a squabble between the Government and the Electricity Supply Board, and we have only heard one side of the case. For that reason I do not think we need be very much alarmed, except to this extent, that this should be regarded as a commercial proposition. All along there is a strong objection to bringing this thing close to politics. Even a minute ago Senator Comyn, giving voice to the views of a great many, said "why should we use coal?" As a business proposition, I should say we should use whichever is the cheaper. I strongly resent the proposition that we should use water if coal is cheaper. I always resent the attitude that you must not say this or that because of political reactions. There, again, business and politics should not be mixed.

There are certain matters on which I should like information from the Minister. Is the Board responsible for the discharge of any outstanding liability on the construction side? A sum of about £5,700,000 was set apart for construction. Of course in the early stages that was under the Development Scheme, and not the Electricity Supply Board. That money was spent under an earlier body. Am I to understand that that body is now dissolved, and that the responsibility for discharging any of the extras that may be ultimately agreed upon with the contractor for the construction will be discharged by that Board? If not, by whom will they be discharged? Will there have to be a specific demand on the Oireachtas for the amount on those extras? The Minister said a while ago that it would be illegal for the Board to pay those extras out of the two million they are asking for. I cannot see why. He will tell us no doubt when he is replying.

A great deal has been made of this question of the liability for the debts of the local authorities. But surely this is the way to look at it. On whomever the liability rested, when the Electricity Supply Board got into difficulties, and was not able to pay those contractors and creditors, should not the Government then have waived this agreement, should they not have come to the Board and said, "We must remove the stigma off the Board; they are all talking about your not paying your bills; we cannot allow that at all, and we propose to pay off those accounts?" I do not support the Board in their repudiation of that agreement, but at the same time I think they were ill-advised to make it. I understand they had no legal authority for making it, but once they made it they should have stuck to it as an honourable undertaking. I think the Government should have got them out of their difficulty.

The Minister has dealt at some length with the responsibility imposed upon him by his power of dismissal. Senator Johnson dealt with that too. The Minister can use that as a pretext for perpetual inquiries and investigation, because it is the only thing to do when one feels apprehensive. He may be of a nervous disposition, and feel that his responsibility with regard to dismissal would force him continually to make inquiries, and thus disgruntle people who thought they were independent, and then found they were not. I am afraid that is what went on, and rightly or wrongly, knowing a good deal about the internecine strife that went on between Government Departments, I feel that in that way bad blood and antagonism got started, personalities were introduced, and so the thing grew. That is the atmosphere in which the thing was living, and it would be hard to get away from that. That is the position in any institution in which politics and business are brought together.

In the war period, that incessant interference on the part of Departments was very obvious. We all remember the old joke about the troops going into action. They were just about to move forward when a military official came rushing up to know how much raspberry or strawberry jam they had on hands, or that they might have had within the previous six months. Possibly they might not have had any jam; it might have been pinched. You had the Electricity Supply Board up against a problem something of that nature. When the scheme started, the Board were bothered almost out of their lives getting engineers and workmen and looking after various little details. They had to deal with quite a lot of matters when they were starting operations and then, on top of it all, they were being continually worried by the Finance people, who were anxious to know all about this or that. That is really the fundamental issue, and that is why any business of this sort will not succeed if it is brought too closely into contact with Government Departments. I do not like tying the Board any closer to the Government. If we do so, we will have the dead hand of Finance interfering all the time. I have no doubt there are many officials and others who will know what I mean by the dead hand of Finance.

With regard to the Board, I think the Minister should have told us why, if he had responsibility for dismissals, he did not dismiss the Chairman. After all, if the Chairman failed, why did he not dismiss him? The Chairman was practically forced to send in his resignation. Why should he have been kept on and why should we now be asked to approve of a Board where the majority is still composed of the old gang? The Minister made some reference about part-time people having the same power as whole-time people. The whole thing is absolutely in conflict with the practical methods that should be adopted in the running of any such scheme. We have now to deal with an emergency situation, and it is rendered all the more difficult because this particular undertaking was in the growing stage. I do not like this proposal to tie the Electricity Supply Board closer to the Government than it was before. I do not think the scheme will be anything the better for that.

With regard to the estimates, we must remember that it is not easy in an emergency job to be sure of all the estimates. I am not defending the estimates here at all. We all remember the history of the constructional side of the Shannon Scheme. Right from the beginning we were never told that there was any estimate; we were never told there was a contract. All along we were kept in the dark, just as the Minister is now being kept in the dark, according to himself, as regards the affairs of the Electricity Supply Board. The Houses of the Oireachtas were never told anything except that they were going to spend ultimately about £5,700,000. Now we realise that there are extras of an unknown volume. I do not know the exact figure, but I believe it is pretty big. I do not think that can be avoided, but the point is that if you had extras in connection with the constructional work you must naturally expect a certain element of discovery as you proceed with the scheme. Something of that nature must be expected in any pioneer scheme such as this. For that reason I think we should expect something more than a mere ex parte statement. Whether we should have that now or later is purely a matter of opinion. I do not agree with Senator Connolly that political or Parliamentary committees would be in any way satisfactory.

I do not think that Senator Connolly made that suggestion.

Senator Connolly definitely suggested that to-day.

That is my recollection. He suggested a committee representative of all Parties—Fianna Fáil, Labour and other Parties I know in the Dáil it was suggested by Deputy de Valera or some other Deputy that there should be a Parliamentary inquiry. To my mind that is the wrong way to approach this question. I feel that any body such as that would merely spend its time learning things about this whole matter and getting to know about amps, volts and kilowatts. To be candid, I do not know much about them myself, and I do not suppose many other Senators do either.

I do not at all agree with the suggestion that, on the one hand, we should call in experts and, on the other hand, we should call in accountants. In my opinion, a recognised firm of consulting engineers should have drawn up a scheme at the very beginning. Consulting engineers invariably do so in connection with schemes for large municipalities and for Governments of other nations. They do what we should have done; they draw up schemes and tenders are invited in connection with those schemes. I think in this instance such a body might well be consulted. The whole matter could be investigated thoroughly and we could be assured that everything was going on all right. I do not suggest that things are not going as they should go, but there are a lot of people in the country who view the present situation as an indication of the failure of the whole scheme. There is really no suggestion of failure, but it is important that we should be assured that everything is all right.

We started off on this scheme in a great spirit of enthusiasm. It was certainly a big venture. A certain position now confronts us. If the Minister will now assure us that he will persuade the Electricity Supply Board to submit all matters to a competent body of people I believe that in two or three months they will be able to report to us as to whether or not we are on the right lines. Such a procedure would tend to reassure the thinking section of our people. It is not sufficient to tell us that this matter will be considered when all the accounts are furnished. I think there is quite enough information already on which to work straightaway.

With regard to the actual future of the Board, I do not think we are doing the right thing by tying it up in any way. The Minister says he is tying it up for a short time only. If that is a Parliamentary pledge we are prepared to accept it as such. I do not see how you will do the Shannon scheme any good by tying it up and making it subject to the control of civil servants. I wonder would the Minister consider the advisability of appointing a commercial man to conduct affairs at £10,000 a year? I know that many £10,000 a year men are not worth that salary, but there are some who are worth it and you cannot get them for less.

I think you would require a £10,000 a year man to clear up the mess, if there is a mess. All this thing of certifying and bringing in the Minister for Finance to examine this, that, and the other, is merely a waste of time. Appoint a man just as I suggest and give him an absolutely free hand. That is the only way in which you will properly carry out the scheme. If you tie the Board any closer to the Government the business will only stagnate. I am not sure that under the present system you will get sound and healthy consolidation. The experience of the past does not give us any great reason for hoping that a further mixture of politicians or officials will lead to any improvement in the business.

The net result of recent events has been to create lack of public confidence in the Shannon scheme, to a great extent. The facts as disclosed certainly do not justify anything of the sort. All that has happened is that we have been told by the Minister that a certain estimate, obviously a very loose estimate, has been exceeded by the Electricity Supply Board. Also there is really no system of accounting in existence to show how the Board stands financially. There is no suggestion that this money has been wasted or that there has been any mismanagement from the engineering point of view, but merely that there has been expenditure over and above the estimate as well as a lack of system. Seeing that this difference of opinion existed between the Minister and the Board over the last three years, one cannot help feeling that it was a pity some real genuine effort was not made to arrive at an agreement whereby a proper accounting system would be brought into operation instead of having the matter thrashed out here, of having the Oireachtas to decide on the strength of ex parte statements. It is a pity, too, that the two men who are historically and honourably associated with our greatest national enterprise so far should have had such a sharp difference of opinion. One cannot help feeling that it was a sharp conflict of strong personalities that resulted in the deadlock which culminated in the resignations and rendered this Bill necessary.

The scheme has admittedly been a great engineering success. I think the only complaint is that it has gone too fast, just like an army advancing towards an objective without waiting to report daily to its Government as to the progress it was making, and the manner in which it was making that progress. There was great enthusiam for achievement. That enthusiasm ran madly ahead of the building up of an accountancy system which would give the necessary statistics to the Minister and the Oireachtas. Some allowance can be made, I think, for the fact that it was an entirely new enterprise which had to be built up from the foundation, that it had to be worked by a new personnel the great majority of whom had no experience at all of electrical undertakings, and that it was impossible to budget with any degree of accuracy as to what the commitments of the future might be.

It is a pity, too, that the Board, at the beginning of its operations, did not employ a sufficient staff of eminent accountants. I understand that the most they could be induced to pay an accountant was about £600 a year. Senator Sir John Keane mentioned the figure of £10,000 that might, with profit, be paid to the head of a concern of that kind. The Senator is probably right, but the Board inspired, I believe, by that famous business element that had to be introduced on it, was really too mean to pay anybody. The whole scheme was established by starting to pay 32/- a week on the Shannon constructional work. The Board, when it came into existence, immediately proceeded to cut down trade union conditions so far as electricians were concerned, and, indeed, in the case of every worker they had anything to do with. Therefore, if there has been any failure it certainly has not been from the point of view of the wages paid to the workers on the scheme.

With regard to this sum of £2,500,000 neither the Minister nor anybody else knew exactly what the Board was expected to do with that sum. For instance, could they have utilised that amount of money and yet not have taken over the Cork, Dublin or a lot of the other undertakings? I take it that they were free to spend this £2,500,000 in any way they liked—by distribution, in the wiring of towns, and so on; that they could leave out a number of the principal undertakings and simply give them a bulk supply of electricity. If they spent money in that way and yet kept within the estimate, I doubt whether they would be serving the purposes of the scheme. The grossly inaccurate nature of that estimate is shown by the fact that although already over £2,500,000 have been spent, and that there are commitments representing another quarter of a million, the Minister himself proposes to make available another £1,150,000 for further constructional work. Now, it must have been very difficult to make an estimate as to what work of that kind would cost. The famous firm of Siemens-Schuckert, a firm of international repute and of long experience of this work, very materially underestimated the cost of the original scheme.

Originally it was said to cost £5,200,000. Eventually there had to be added the sum of over £600,000.

Not under the Siemens-Schuckert scheme. The last figure the Senator gave had to do with administration costs and other things. The Siemens-Schuckert plan was based on an expenditure of £4,600,000, and to that had to be added £600,000 to meet deficiencies and so on. The expenditure of the £4,600,000 was to be on the basis set out in page 80 of the Experts' Report, that is, an estimate which might vary plus or minus 10 per cent. on the civil constructional works. Siemens-Schuckert's final bill was within the original estimate plus that 10 per cent.

There was an increase somewhere anyway as compared with the original estimate of £5,200,000.

For administration costs and other items which are not in Siemens-Schuckert's calculations at all.

There was an underestimate somewhere?

Not on Siemens-Schuckert's side.

At all events there must be under-estimates or over-estimates in matters of this kind, and we must not be altogether surprised if the Board did make these under-estimates. It would seem to me as if the Board had been rather intimidated into coming to the agreement referred to in its final form. There was the threat that, if the agreement was not come to, certain amendments to the legislation passed would be introduced. The Board evidently gave an undertaking in writing, although they must have had a fairly good idea that they could not possibly carry it out, particularly when the position with regard to the Cork station was taken into account. I think it is a pity that at that stage there was not some proper understanding and discussion, so as not to allow this rather undesirable development at present before us to take place, involving, as it does, the severance from the scheme of at least one man who will, I think, be missed in all future developments.

The Minister has not told us what the income of the Board is. I heard a certain figure mentioned. I would like to know from the Minister if he could tell us something definitely about that. I was informed that the income of the Board last year was about £750,000, and that the income this year is estimated to be between £900,000 and £950,000. I would like to know whether these figures are approximately correct. Even if the total expenditure in connection with the scheme is to be in or about £10,500,000 I think it will be possible to meet these commitments and responsibilities if there is no very substantial increase in the amount of current consumed. I presume the Minister is in a position to say what was the actual income last year, and surely there must be some reasonable estimate as to what the income during this year will be. I would like to know on what basis the sinking fund is to be calculated, at least in the matter of time. Is it to be on a 20, 40, or 60 years' basis? I think in the case of a public undertaking like this one should go on a 60-year basis, as is done in the case of most State undertakings. On a 5 per cent. basis that, I think, would mean that only about half per cent. would go for sinking fund each year.

Sixty years' sinking fund, irrespective of the life of the thing you bought?

To pay back the money you got at 5 per cent. I know that was the estimate arrived at in connection with the railways—half per cent. per annum to be invested towards sinking fund. There was money allowed for renewals, but the other was to clear off the loan. I would like to know the number of years over which the advances are to be made? The great disadvantage that a public undertaking has to put up with, as compared to a private undertaking, is that a private undertaking raises capital and is under no obligation whatever to pay it back. It merely pays dividends on it. In the case of the Shannon Board money had to be raised, and not only had interest to be paid on that money, but all the capital had to be paid back as well.

And no dividends.

The capital has to be paid back.

The other does not pay capital back, but pays dividends.

These dividends are not guaranteed except in certain circumstances. In regard to the accrued liabilities of the authorised undertakings taken over, does the Minister suggest, in respect of these liabilities, that the Board should have put aside a lump sum out of the 2½ millions to meet them? They were not to be paid off in one year. Take the Dublin station, for instance. It had certain stock which had to be paid off in a number of years. That was being paid out of revenue, and the understanding with the Board was that as the amount became due each year they gave a cheque to the Dublin Corporation to indemnify them against that amount. Surely it would have been legitimate to take that out of revenue each year, instead of putting aside a lump sum to meet it?

There has been a new chairman since February, 1930, and one is naturally tempted to ask what has he been doing from that time to see that the accounts were being brought up to date, and that a proper accounting system was put into operation. It seems to me exceedingly difficult to understand how the man responsible for the technical side should be held accountable for the absence of an accounting system. Surely his business was to look after the engineering side while the other people, including the Chairman of the Board, and the accountant, looked after finance? I do not know whether the managing director had dictatorial powers there, and whether he was at liberty to do what he liked and to give no account. If that was the case, was the Minister aware of it and did he take steps to see that that position was not allowed to develop too far? On the whole, I think it would have been better from every point of view if the correspondence which, presumably, passed in connection with the matter, was laid upon the Tables of both Houses, because it would probably remove a lot of the unjustifiable suspicion which now exists, and would prevent people, perhaps, from getting sympathy to which they might not be entitled. I think it would be in the public interests if that were done.

I would like to know if the Minister considers that certain work was done that was unnecessary, or which was inadvisable, or again, whether work was done which involved waste, and whether he has any information at his disposal to show that there has been waste and mismanagement in the expenditure of money, because in the long run that is really what it amounts to? If we are to give a supply of electricity to the country money must be spent, and it would be a calamity if the scheme failed from penuriousness in the spending of an additional half million or an additional million pounds. I wonder if the Minister can say whether he thinks there has been mismanagement in that respect or maladministration of any kind? In the last part of the Bill providing for compensation for the managing director who has retired, apart from the merits of the case I think it is an exceedingly meagre amount for a man who was so prominently associated with the scheme and whose career is very largely linked up with it. I think we might have been a little more generous than to give one year's salary in a case of the kind.

At all events, one result of this controversy is to show that so-called independent concerns, which are very largely equivalent to private enterprises, without many of the advantages attaching to private enterprises, do not become quite so successful as they are supposed theoretically to be. With all its drawbacks and its sins, the Dublin Corporation made a brilliant success of its electricity scheme and supplied the people at very cheap rates. There was tremendous anxiety that there would be no political or State interference of any kind with this Board. It was to be a purely business concern in order that it might be the success that it deserved to be. Immediately it was allowed away on its own, we find, according to the Minister, in any case, that it ran amok and he had to take it in hands. He has now to watch over it like a schoolmaster for goodness knows how long, until he is assured that it is on the right track. Even then his responsibility cannot terminate, because he will be still responsible for the appointment and removal, if necessary, of members of the Board.

As he has stated he cannot decide upon removal or re-appointment until he knows how the work is going on. He cannot detach himself from it at any time in the future under the existing legislation. If it goes right for a while, and then goes wrong again what is to be the position? Are we to have fresh legislation authorising his intervention in order to save the Board? I think, in a matter of this kind, however undesirable some people may think it, the close association of the Minister either internally or otherwise, with the working of the Board is inevitable, if he is to have any responsibility for the appointment and removal of the Board.

On the whole, I suggest that nothing has been said in the debate by any responsible person that would give any ground for believing that the scheme is not a success from the engineering point of view, and there is every prospect that it is going to be a success from the economic point of view. An inquiry has been suggested, and one wonders who would prepare the information for the Minister on which he intends eventually to act in the case of an inquiry. There are auditors coming in, but it is hard to know to whom they are responsible. Are they responsible to the Board or partly to the Board and partly to the Minister? What sort of responsibility do they really carry? After he has received the information can he say it is an absolutely independent report, or merely one prepared by auditors employed by the Board and paid by them?

Debate adjourned until to-morrow.
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