I was unavoidably absent when the Second Reading of this Bill came before the House. I would like to say a few words about it now. I agree with Senator Jameson that it is a wrong departure to put the extra charge on the consumers of bread instead of having it paid out of the Central Fund. However, the Central Fund, as we all know, is in a very bad way, and as the money is not there this expedient had to be resorted to, and also because it is the policy of the Government to hide their deeds and to keep the people from knowing how they are being taxed and fleeced. Abraham Lincoln said that the man who could not make a mistake could not make anything, but the man who made the same mistake twice was a fool. I do not know what we are to call anyone who goes on perpetuating a mistake. I believe the policy of growing wheat is a wrong one, for the reason that there is very little land in highly-valued counties suitable for growing that crop. Good land will be turned into bad land by the growing of wheat. That is an established fact and cannot be denied. No crop will take the heart out of land like wheat. I do not object to people growing wheat if they want to do so. Wheat has been grown in this country for centuries, but in small quantities. People grow a little for their own use, as small crops can be easily saved. The crop was not always saved, but was lost owing to bad seasons and an unsuitable climate.
I object to this policy being forced on the country, instead of keeping to a system that was established by our forefathers with all their experience. This country is essentially a live stock country. Live stock are the sheet anchor of the agricultural industry. Without live stock there will never be prosperity. I stated in this House several times that bread made from home-grown wheat is inferior to other bread because of the quality of the wheat. By chance a good sample might be got after a very fine summer from good land and from good management. I do not deny that. That would be the exception and not the rule. I know people who have grown wheat all their lives, but some members of such families cannot eat bread made from home-grown wheat. They have to get loaf bread from the shops. People who use flour made from home-grown wheat have been accustomed to mix it with light flour in order to make it digestible and palatable. Let nobody get away with the idea that this wheat policy is going to create employment. It is not. Wheat is taking the place of other corn crops, notably oats. I am acquainted with people who grow wheat, but they do so in order to snatch at the few pennies that they must get somehow. That is the only reason they dropped the growing of other cereals, just as those who grow beet dropped the growing of mangels and turnips. Large beet-growers in Wexford grow no mangels now, and are not growing other corn crops. In any case corn crops do not give much employment. A man and a pair of horses would only take a few weeks in the year to deal with the corn crops on a farm. Senator Wilson mentioned a short time ago that wheat was selling at 38/- a barrel. Nobody wanted to grow wheat then.
Is the Minister aware that a large quantity of the spring wheat that was sown in County Wexford this year was a complete failure? In the case of a neighbour of mine who has 24 acres it came up a few inches and then ran along the ground. It may grow a little more but it will not ripen. What is the Minister going to do to see that such people get compensation for the failure of their wheat? What is going to happen generally if 100,000 acres of wheat or whatever quantity the Minister requires are grown to supply the whole country with home-grown wheat? However, I do not believe that time will ever come. I believe the wheat-growing policy will be forgotten in a few years. The present situation cannot go on. It is a highly uneconomic crop and that is my objection to this policy of substituting wheat for other crops. I voted for Senator Counihan's amendment because the farmers are in such a position now that I could not conscientiously vote to keep a penny out of their pockets, that they might get by any means.
