Holidays (Employees) Bill, 1938—Second Stage.

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

Minister for Industry and Commerce (Mr. Lemass)

This Bill is designed to apply, in the case of workers not covered by previous enactments, the same principles in respect of holidays as have been applied to those other workers. In 1936 the Conditions of Employment Act was passed, and, amongst other provisions, it secured for industrial workers the right to holidays with pay. In the case of such workers it provided six public holidays during the course of the year and one week's consecutive holiday as annual leave. The Shops (Conditions of Employment) Act of last year secured similar privileges for those who work in shops and wholesale houses, although the circumstances of these businesses necessitated some alteration in the particular method of applying the same principles.

When I was introducing the 1936 Act I informed the Dáil that it was the intention of the Government to enact similar legislation covering all occupations, so that there would be brought into existence a code of legislation which would prescribe minimum conditions of employment in these occupations and protect the workers engaged in them. The 1936 Act was the first of these measures, and the Shops (Conditions of Employment) Act of last year was the second.

It became obvious, however, in the course of preparation of these Bills that the preparation of a complete code was going to take a long time, having regard to the many difficulties experienced in framing legislative provisions to cover the varying circumstances of all occupations, and the Government considered that it was desirable to forestall the completion of its programme by introducing forthwith this Bill for the purpose of applying to all workers, as soon as possible, the holiday provisions of the 1936 Act, leaving the question of the regulation of other conditions of employment to be dealt with subsequently. That is the reason this Bill is being presented now. Certain classes of workers are excluded from its scope for a variety of reasons, but, generally speaking, it seeks to ensure for all workers, other than agricultural workers, not covered by the 1936 and 1937 Acts, the same right to holidays as industrial and commercial workers now have. For the information of Senators, I should point out that it was considered expedient for a number of reasons to repeal the holiday provisions of the 1936 Act and to re-enact them in this Bill, firstly, because it was considered more convenient that all these provisions should be embodied in this Bill, and, secondly, because experience had shown that some modification of the provisions of the 1936 Act was necessary to remove anomalies.

The terms of this Bill had to be drawn fairly widely because it is designed to cover workers in a great variety of occupations not all of whom can be treated in the same way. If Senators will consider, for example, the position which arises on a public holiday, they will see at once what I mean. If a public holiday is to be a real holiday for a number of people, a number of other people must work on that day. To give everybody a holiday on a public holiday would mean that there would be very few facilities available for enjoying the holiday. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce provisions which will enable some people to work at times that other people are on holiday and vice versa.

The circumstances of domestic servants, who are covered by this Bill, had also to be taken into account. A number of domestic servants might find it inconvenient, if not impossible, to take a holiday at all if that holiday meant being put out of the place in which they usually work and in which board and lodging are provided. In order to deal with particular circumstances which might arise, special provisions in relation to domestic servants had to be introduced in this Bill and the whole framework of the Bill is based upon a classification of the workers affected as "domestic" or "non-domestic" workers. I do not anticipate that the principle of the Bill will be contested. The legislature having already provided statutory regulations to ensure holidays with pay for other classes of workers will, I am sure, not seek to deny similar rights to the workers affected by this measure. Consequently, this is a Bill the various sections of which can be more conveniently discussed in Committee because what arises for consideration is not so much the principle itself as the manner of applying that principle to the various classes of persons concerned.

In general, the principle has been applied, as closely as possible, on the lines of the provisions of the 1936 and 1937 Acts so as to ensure, as near as may be, uniformity of treatment for all workers. As I explained, uniformity was not fully possible but I think everybody will recognise the necessity for having somewhat different provisions in the case of the workers affected by this Bill. In fact, a great deal of the work of applying the principle of holidays with pay to these workers will have to be done by regulation rather than by direct provision embodied in the Statute itself.

I do not think that there is any other matter to which I need make specific reference now. I should imagine that members of the Seanad would be anxious to give close examination to the Bill in Committee. Each section of the Bill raises problems of its own—separate problems and not related one to another. The procedure of Committee Stage is, therefore, more suitable to the Bill than that of Second Stage. I recommend the Bill to the Seanad. There can be no question that we are morally bound to enact this measure to secure, in respect of workers not covered by the 1936 and 1937 Acts, that their treatment by the State may be no different from that of any of the others.

Mr. Baxter

I am not a "spoil sport" and I accept the aphorism that "all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." This Bill must be taken along with the Bills already passed. I profoundly disagree with the philosophy behind this measure and the other measures of a similar kind. They represent the conception of the Minister for Industry and Commerce. He tells us that we are morally bound to pass this Bill. It is strange, in a country where goods are scarce and dear, to have a Minister getting up in the legislature and enunciating a policy of less work, fewer days for work, and, by inference, less work being done on the days devoted to work. If there is one country in Europe in which the leaders of the people should get up and tell the people that they must work harder and must work longer hours, it is this country. Comparing our policy with the policy of other countries, one has to ask what are the possibilities of progress in the world in which we are living? There is no doubt that our people do not work as hard as the people across the Irish Sea. I doubt if it would be claimed that the people over there or, indeed, the people of France work as hard or as long hours as the people of certain other countries in Europe. We do not want to introduce these conditions here but we have the obligation upon us to examine the policy propagated here and see what the consequences will be.

Following the debacle in Czechoslovakia, the then leader there said to his people: "We must work harder and harder, so that we may forget our loss." I should not mind if the Minister's policy meant an equitable distribution of all the burdens of labour in this State. I should not mind if the Minister were propagating a policy in a country where you could number by the hundred thousand those who were going down the mines or standing the white heat of the blast furnaces. But these are not the conditions here. The Minister and I have very different conceptions as to what the structure of our future State ought to be. So far as one can judge, the Minister's view is one of glorification of industrialism. He thinks that that is the right foundation on which to build. It looks as if he wants to have his roots in the pavements of the streets, while I should like to have my roots, and the country's roots, in the soil of the country.

The great difficulty about all this legislation which the Minister is enacting is the situation that it has created and is creating in rural Ireland. I find it difficult to understand how the Minister, who, we must concede, works long hours and works very hard, believes that things are going to be bettered by fewer hours of labour and lower output during those hours, because that is the experience of those of us who have seen the fruits of some of the legislation already passed. Elsewhere in the world the cost of living is lower than it is here. People are working harder and producing more goods. Their output must be higher than ours. They are able to produce the necessaries of life and distribute them to the people at a lower price than that at which they can be procured here. Accordingly, the standard of life is higher for those people. The Minister's industrial policy, in pursuance of which he is coming forward with this legislation, was introduced at a time when the people living on the land were so harassed and depressed that it was easy to attract them to the towns. They were anxious to leave the land if there was anywhere else to go. The Minister, in proclaiming the value of his industrial policy, has been demoralising a great many people in the country. They have turned from the land and work on the land, and they have gone to the towns. There, there is a higher standard of living. There, there is more ease and more pleasure, and these things can be procured with the money which one can earn in the towns. The country districts, impoverished in many ways, with low purchasing capacity, and with an absence of many of the amenities to be found in the towns, are places where it has become increasingly difficult to keep our young people. There was no necessity whatever for the legislation the Minister has been enacting to make town life more attractive. If the Minister were taking the long view about his country's future, what he would be doing would be trying to make town life less attractive than it is. Unless that be done, there is no use in the Minister, at the opening of new factories in the country, trying to convince the people, as he has tried to do frequently with vigour and insight— of the value and importance of a progressive agricultural community to the industries of the State. When you have everything in favour of the people who live and work in the towns, to the disadvantage and detriment of those who are expected to stay in the country, life in rural Ireland will become more difficult and impossible, day after day, and the work of reconstruction will be something that no one in this State will be brave enough to face.

What are we getting out of this measure? I am not going to deal now with its effects on workers in industries in the towns or those other people to whom the Bill makes special reference. Take the position as I see it. Across from my home there is a dwelling where an official lives with his wife. There is a servant who will be styled under this Bill—it is in a rural district—a domestic servant, entitled to a fortnight's holidays with pay. Just adjoining there is a farmstead where the milk is procured for this family and where there are two servants. One does the work and can be rightly styled a domestic. The other will help with some of the domestic work in the house and milk a cow or perhaps two or three. As I see it, under this Bill, one will get 14 days' holidays with pay and the other cannot get any holidays at all. That is how the provisions of the Bill appear to me.

Think of the problem which is created by this Bill generally. You have all these hosts of young people coming from the country and entering service in the city. They will come from the 15, 20 or 30 acre farm. There may be one girl out of a family who will go off and marry a small farmer. You see her after some years, with three, four or five children, struggling against all the difficulties of bringing up these children. The other sister will go off to town, and she will come back each year on her 14 days' holidays with pay, very well dressed, very happy, and obviously enjoying a much higher standard of living than the sister who remained at home in the country. You have that repeated probably in every townland— in the west, in the south, and in the north—in counties like mine, ad infinitum. When you have conditions like those for the people who live on the land, when you have all these facilities given to the people who come into the towns and cities, while all the inequities are borne by the people who remain at home. I have no doubt whatever that the Minister for Agriculture in this country and those who want to work with him will have an impossible task.

I believe the Minister has begun at the wrong end altogether. I do not believe that this State has become so highly industrialised, that we have made so much progress industrially, that we should rush so much ahead of our time to procure for the people who are engaged in industry or in some service other than the work of agriculture, all these amenities through the legislature while those who are courageous enough to remain on the land, or who cannot get away have to suffer all the disadvantages. I am attacking the philosophy behind the Minister's measure. I think that this Bill is perhaps ahead of our time. If some action were taken to raise the standard of living of the people who still remain on the land, before the Minister marched so far, we would have a better distribution of the burden, the equities and the inequities, on the part of the Legislature. I greatly fear that we are reaching the point referred to by the Bishop of Galway the other day when, not without good reason, he said: "The real strength and well-being of the country, human beings, are disappearing at such a rapid rate that, if it be not changed, the next century will see the extinction of the Irish people on the land of Ireland." I greatly fear that by what you are doing here you are rocking the foundations below, without building anything constructive in your towns or cities. I am convinced that the time has arrived when stock should be taken of the position.

This Bill, I know, is only one of a series of measures through which the Minister has enunciated his policy. I greatly fear that the Minister is building on sand. I do not feel that one can consistently oppose this measure, certainly not on Second Reading, in view of what has gone before, but I should like the Minister to take stock of the position because success, even a very limited success, cannot come to the policy for which the Minister has been standing unless he realises the disabilities and the disadvantages which the propagation of that policy has meant for the people living on the land.

Mr. Douglas

I have, pretty consistently I think, supported the principle underlying this Bill and, in spite of what my friend Senator Baxter says, I am still in favour of it. I believe that, as far as the towns are concerned at any rate, there is everything to be said in favour of, and very little to be said against, the principle of an annual holiday. I do not at all accept the view of Senator Baxter, that a person who at one period goes away for a holiday of seven or 14 days will of necessity do less work than if no such holiday were given. If the holiday is a bona fide one, I think the reverse should be the case. While in this country we have not produced any figures in this regard, I know that years ago some leading industrialists in Great Britain did try the idea, which was then new, of a paid holiday for their workers and they found that it was definitely to their advantage. In the case of industrial work, in which the holidays principle has been established by law, there could be a case against it, in certain industries only, on the ground that it adds somewhat to the cost of production and makes it more difficult to compete, certainly as far as exports are concerned. In spite of that argument, which I admit, I am still glad that as far as industrial work is concerned the principle has been put into operation here.

I should like to see some greater effort than seems to be made in this Bill to ensure that holidays will be genuinely taken. The industrial worker cannot, if I understand the Bill aright, do industrial work during his holidays. He cannot undertake work for pay during his holidays but, as far as other workers are concerned, there is nothing in the Bill to prevent their doing so. If a considerable number of workers took advantage of their holidays with pay to go and work for pay at some other kind of work, it would defeat the object of the Bill. The Minister may say that it is almost impossible to provide against that. Perhaps he is right, but this is one of the cases where I would prefer to see such a law enacted even though it was difficult to enforce it. I do not propose to speak at length on the Bill because I am in favour of the principle of it. The Bill is a very complicated measure. I have had to read some of the clauses three or four times before I could arrive at an idea of what they contained. The object before the House should be to try to alter the Bill so as to make it as clear as possible, in order that people who will have to carry out the provisions will be able to understand them.

For that reason I hope there will be a considerable delay between the Second Stage and the Committee Stage. My own experience, particularly with regard to Bills which affect business people and industrialists, is that the only time they have for reading the Bill and trying to understand it is the interval between the time it officially passes the Dáil and the time it is dealt with in the Seanad. A reasonable period of time would give such people an opportunity of making suggestions or of writing letters to Senators putting forward these suggestions. I support the principle of the Bill, and I hope that it will be carefully examined, not because I am against anything in it, but because I am not at all sure that some of the sections are as clear as they could be or should be.

Mr. McEllin

I must say, at the outset, that I am in agreement with Senator Douglas in supporting the general principle of the Bill. I do feel that of all Bills that have been brought before this House for a considerable time past this Bill is perfectly justified. It caters for a section of the community which is the most abused section that I know of—the domestic servant class. I believe that this Bill will go a long way to stop the worst form of emigration we have had, namely, the emigration of poor girls from the west of Ireland to England, tempted, as they have been, by long hours off and high wages. I believe that if the Bill succeeds in achieving the objects which the Minister has in mind, it will bring about a new standard of living and a new outlook for domestics in this country. I think that anything we can do, or which employers generally can do, to raise the level of wages and provide better conditions of employment for these servants, represents good national work. Senator Baxter painted a very morbid picture in comparing the standard of living of the small farmer's daughter who marries and lives on the land with the standard of living of the girl who gets employment in the city. I can speak from my own experience of the West of Ireland, from which, in the past, we had very extensive emigration to America. In no case did I ever see a servant girl, who, after some years in America, had saved enough to enable her to come home, anxious to return to that higher standard of living which she was supposed to have in America. In no case would she return to that higher standard of living if she could get an opportunity of marrying a small farmer at home. As a matter of fact, it is the ambition of girls who have worked in that type of employment to get out of it as quickly as possible, even though they have to marry the poorest and the smallest amongst farmers in this country.

I want to ask why it is not seen fit to extend the provisions of the Bill to agricultural workers. I think the principle of paid holidays, whether one agrees with it or not—and it cuts both ways—is accepted. Employers do, to a certain extent, safeguard themselves against the full effects of a measure of this kind, but I should like to know why agricultural workers should be excluded.

Mr. McGee

Living as I do in close proximity to, and perhaps dividing, Senators Baxter and Counihan, I might say a few words to bring them a little more closely together. I think the view which Senator Counihan enunciated is one which will find a great deal of favour with all farmers who, unfortunately, due to certain effects of the present time, are inclined to look with prejudice, as if their own position was being lowered, on any effort by the Minister to uplift the standard of living in the towns. It appears to many rural residents and thinkers as being the predominance of the urban mind. I do not think there is any reason why the House, for one instant, should have any cause to delay in reaching the decision that life in Ireland is not attractive just now. I think that if Senator Baxter did seem a little strong to the more cultured minds which we rural citizens always admit to be almost the sole property of town residents, it is due, in my opinion, to the fact that sufficient legislation to uplift rural life is not available. Recently, a measure has been introduced setting up a wages board and if I mistake not, the maximum wage fixed is something in the neighbourhood of 24/-. If the Minister's inspectors throughout the country examine the position, I think they will find that in many instances labourers are offering their services at perhaps half that figure and expressing their willingness to inform the inspectors that they are getting the full rate.

I should be the last to depart from the theory of Senator Foran, because I believe that without sufficient pay you cannot expect loyalty in the State. In my conception of a national outlook and loyalty in the State, the man at the foot of the ladder—the agricultural labourer, the small farmer and, perhaps, the big farmer—has first to be considered. Hence it is that I should deprecate a too serious division between Senator Baxter and Senator Counihan. I do not think it exists. I think the views expressed by Senator Baxter apply, more or less, to the case of many farmers who find the ground is slipping from them rapidly. All of us here are agreed that the standard of life in the country should be raised. I hope and trust that the Minister, in the pursuit of his task, will give some thought to this: that there is a rural Ireland behind those in receipt of a wage of 24/- and 25/- a week, and that that is not an attractive wage compared with what may be offered in the towns. While I support the principle of the Bill, I do not like to see Senator Baxter scarified too much. I think that between himself and Senator Counihan there is a bridge, and that it is up to the Minister to try to see that his views coincide with theirs, and that something is done for our agricultural life.

Mr. Crosbie

A lot has been said about the philosophy behind this Bill and the philosophy against it, but those whom this Bill is intended to assist most—domestic servants—are also philosophers. I think that their philosophy was best expressed by the story of the little servant girl in New York who, at the end of a 16-hour day, sat down for the first time, and said: "It is the will of God to be flat-footed and the fun of the world to be Irish." I think that, if this Bill can be regarded as a charter of freedom for that class of our people, it is to be welcomed in every possible way.

Cathaoirleach

The Minister to conclude.

Mr. Lemass

Senator Baxter, who spoke first upon this measure, made mention of a number of matters of great importance. He touched lightly on questions of such very great importance that no discussion which we could undertake here this afternoon could adequately dispose of them. He touched upon these questions, however, in a manner which I think indicated that he had not properly related them to the Bill before the House, because in doing so he said he was attacking what he described as the philosophy or the policy behind this Bill. I do not think that he understands what the policy, or the philosophy, behind the Bill is. It certainly is not a philosophy of less work, or a policy of attracting people from the rural areas into the towns, or of dealing more advantageously or more leniently with the problems of the towns than with the problems of the rural areas. There is no such intention behind this Bill, and I think it is necessary that that should be made very clear indeed.

I do not think that the enactment of statutory provisions requiring that workers should get annual leave with pay, or six public holidays in the year with pay, can, in any circumstances, be interpreted as going to lead the workers to do less work, or as indicating the general idea that less work should be done. I agree with Senator Baxter, and I agree with other Senators who have spoken here, that in the particular circumstances of this country more work per individual, and more work done per hour, is very necessary indeed. I do not agree with Senator Baxter that our people work less than the workers in other countries. I challenge him, and I challenge anyone else, to produce evidence that that is so. I think that, before a statement of that kind is made, there should be available some evidence to support it. I submit that all the evidence is to the contrary. I have read in English newspapers letters written by indignant British citizens, and I have read in the reports of the debates in the British House of Commons speeches made by British Ministers and Members of Parliament, all complaining that English employers in England will employ Irish workers in preference to Englishmen because, they say, they work harder. Possibly they work harder in England than they do here. I am quite certain that I can say this without fear of contradiction— that there is not an English farmer who would not employ an Irish agricultural worker in preference to an English agricultural worker any time. If that is so, then, obviously there is no justification for this general accusation against our people that they are not inclined to work hard.

Further, I invite Senators to interview people associated with industrial concerns in this country who have had experience of factory management elsewhere, and ask them if it is their experience that Irish workers in those factories work less hard, less enthusiastically and less willingly than workers in other countries in similar occupations. I say that there is a whole volume of evidence to the contrary. I am not saying that we cannot work harder here. Of course we can, but I will join issue with Senator Campbell any day on the question whether we can solve unemployment by reducing the hours of work. I have never advocated a reduction in the hours of work on the ground that it would solve unemployment. I do not think it could solve unemployment.

Mr. Baxter

Not at all.

Mr. Lemass

I think that is almost capable of mathematical proof. Mind you, if we could take the whole economic life of this country and organise it in every aspect and in every detail, as the Germans and the Russians have done, we might, and probably could, eliminate unemployment, and even do so in a manner which would appear to involve the performance of a lesser quantity of work per each individual, but it would also be at the price of a much lower standard of living. Clearly, a reduction of hours of work, accompanied by a reduction of earnings, could be operated to reduce unemployment. That is theoretically possible. If you take 100 men to do a certain job in 100 days, then 200 men can do that same job in 50 days—that is assuming that there are no external circumstances to upset the calculation; but, taking the simplest case, you can employ 200 men for 50 days or 200 men for 100 half-days to get the same amount of work done, but, in fact, they will not be employed if, by increasing the number, you are going to increase the cost of the job. If the theory is, and I think it is a fairly good theory, that a reduction of hours of work must not be accompanied by a reduction of earnings, then there is no solution of unemployment along that road.

We can, and I think we should, reduce the hours of work for other reasons, —for instance, by trying to secure for our workers some share of the benefits of improved industrial methods and of new inventions. There is always the question, when some new industrial process or device revolutionises the methods of production in some industry, whether the benefit of that new process is to go entirely to the employer or to the owner of the process in higher profits, or entirely to the public in a lowering of prices, or whether it should be distributed between the employer, the public, and the workers.

In most cases, I think the workers can get the advantage of that improved process in the form of greater leisure more easily than in the form of higher wages, nor is it wise that they should always get the advantage in higher wages as against more leisure. But, if we are legislating to ensure that workers shall have certain rights, particularly that they shall have the right to certain public holidays with pay and to annual holidays with pay, it is not for the purpose of encouraging them to do less work when they are working, but, on the contrary, in the expectation and hope that when working they will realise, in so far as they can be made realise, that they are going to be treated not merely as parts of a machine but that their rights as human beings are going to be protected. If we can get that idea into their heads, then I think we will get a return in better output rather than in lower output.

As Senator Douglas has pointed out, it has been the experience of a large number of big firms who have investigated the facts that shorter working hours and improved working conditions have led, according to the reports of their experts, to this conclusion: that the output per hour per individual was always increased with improved working conditions.

It is, I think, a very undesirable trend, when measures of this kind are being considered, to suggest that there is some conflict of interest between the cities and the rural areas. I do not think there is that conflict. Mind you, I am not prepared to contest the view that there are anomalies, and that sometimes the intervention of the State in economic matters operates, or appears to operate, unduly to the advantage of the urban area as against the rural area. I think that the attractiveness of life in the cities, as compared with the rural areas, has been greatly exaggerated even if you take it on the basis of shillings and pence.

The average wage payable in the city is undoubtedly higher. It appears to be higher than the average paid in the rural areas, but whether it represents a better standard of living is, I submit, open to question. Take the case of the average agricultural worker paid the minimum wage fixed by the Agricultural Wages Act, and compare him with the industrial worker living in some tenement dwelling in Dublin who is paid a much higher rate per week when working. I am certain that the agricultural worker in the rural area would not change places with him if he knew all the circumstances. Undoubtedly, when he reads that some strike is being settled in the city on the basis of an increase of a few pence per hour—it may bring the city worker's wage up to £3 or £3 10s. a week—he applies that sum to his own experience in the rural area, and gets, I submit, a very false conception of what, in fact, it actually represents in purchasing power. On that account, you get a certain sense of grievance and of unfairness which is not altogether closely related to the facts. The experts in the Department of Agriculture have expressed the view that a wage of 30/- a week in a rural area is equivalent to 50/- a week in a city area. That is a matter upon which the opinions of experts and of in-experts will differ, but that there is a substantial difference between the amount of money required in a city to purchase the same standard of living as can be secured in the country is, I think, unquestionable.

It is altogether wrong to suggest, and entirely contrary to the facts, that the trend of Government policy has been in favour of the cities, or that the trend of legislation enacted here in recent years has been designed to benefit the urban dweller as against the rural dweller. I had the same statements made in the Dáil. I was told there by, presumably, a responsible Deputy that all the social services were designed to benefit the city dwellers as against the rural dwellers. The opposite is the fact. In many cases the application of these social services to rural areas was undertaken with great difficulty and at an expense altogether out of proportion to the expense involved in their application in city areas in order that disparity or unfairness would not arise. This legislation has been described as legislation in favour of city dwellers. It is nothing of the kind. It applies to every person who comes within the category of workers described in it, whether these persons reside and work in cities or rural areas. We have excluded agricultural workers from the Bill. That is true, but they were excluded for reasons which, on examination, will, I think, be pretty obvious. Agriculture is a seasonal occupation and it is difficult to apply the same principles to workers employed in an occupation of that kind as can be applied to those who work in factories—on railways or other industrial occupations. In any event, we decided that legislation bearing on the conditions of employment for agricultural workers should be enacted separately from legislation applying to other workers. That is why the Agricultural Wages Act was adopted as a separate measure, and any extension of the protection given by the State to agricultural workers and their conditions of employment should, I think, be done by an extension of that Act, rather than by the inclusion of agricultural workers in a Bill of this kind which, obviously, is designed to deal with conditions different from those under which they work.

I have no doubt that, in due course, the improvement of the conditions of agricultural workers will become of live interest. I do not know if Senators have noticed that a committee in Northern Ireland have published a report which proposes quite revolutionary changes for that part of Ireland in the law relating to agricultural workers, including paid holidays, overtime payments and other proposals of that kind. The conditions of agricultural workers in that area may not be as good at present as they are here, but it is clear that the trend everywhere is in the same direction.

We had a number of references to the fact that young people are leaving the land and coming into the cities. I should like to question whether they are doing it any more now than they were 10 or 20 years ago. It is true that the influence of the cinema, the daily newspaper, and other factors of that kind are operating to make city life appear to be more attractive than rural life. But whether, in fact, people have found it to be so on trial is another question. Senator MacEllin referred to the fact that a very large number of those who leave the West of Ireland to take up domestic service in America and England come back and are anxious to get back and marry locally and devote the rest of their lives to being the wife of some small farmer in that area. I am certain that they all do not come back. Human nature is as variable now as ever it was, and some people will be attracted by one form of life which would be torture to others. But not all the factors that are tending to make young people leave rural areas and seek a different environment in cities are subject to the control of the Government. Some of these factors are subject to the control of Deputies and Senators and they might exercise their influence more directly in their own constituencies than by making speeches here.

There is always a movement of population from the rural areas into the cities; there must always be a movement of population from the rural areas into the cities. At times, due to temporary causes, that movement will be accelerated or the reverse. But to speak of it as something which began this year or last year or the year before, is sheer nonsense. It has always been there. While, undoubtedly we must ensure that there are no causes operating to accelerate it which are within our power to remove, the mere fact of its existence is not necessarily a bad thing if there is sufficient population left to ensure that the land is properly employed. I do not want to quote statistics. I invite Senators to study them themselves, and they will find that available statistics do not show any substantial diminution or, in fact, any diminution, in the number employed in agriculture.

It has been the Government policy to provide by whatever means we can other forms of employment than employment in agriculture. We have often had considerable difficulty in that matter, and sometimes, by exercising very direct pressure, tried to ensure that the new industrial employment resulting from the Government policy would not be concentrated in the cities, but would be distributed around the smaller towns. Industrial occupations must necessarily take place in towns, because facilities which are only available in towns are required. Water supply, sewerage, sometimes gas, electricity and other facilities of that kind cannot be cheaply provided in rural areas. Therefore, industrial employment must necessarily be concentrated in towns. But it has been the Government policy, as everybody knows, to ensure that, as far as possible, new industrial employment would be secured in these rural towns.

In implementing that policy we had to face the fact that it might involve, and possibly does involve, for a time at least, higher prices for the goods produced than would have been possible if purely economic considerations applied. I do not think that purely economic considerations should apply, but that social considerations should also be taken into account. In due course the initial difficulties which industrial concerns have to contend with may be removed. In some cases, perhaps, they will never be removed, because they are inherent in the site selected. But I think it is well worth while paying a slightly increased price for some industrial products if, in return, we get a distribution of employment throughout the whole country, rather than a concentration of population in one or two centres.

Senator Baxter referred to this Bill and similar measures as indicating that we were rushing ahead of our time. On the other hand, Senator Counihan said that we were, in fact, securing for the workers covered by the Bill no advantages which they had not already got. I do not think either statement is altogether correct. I think the purpose of legislation of this kind should be to establish as the general rule what is, in fact, the general practice; that we should not attempt to go further than level up from the bottom; to make uniform and legally enforceable everywhere the conditions which public opinion and good employers have generally succeeded in making effective in various occupations. I do not think we should try to go further than that—that our legislation should be to fix minimum conditions and not to try to force the pace.

In so far as Senator Baxter appeared to object to the State doing that work at all, I think the answer must be that it is much better to have these improved conditions secured by legislative enactments than by agitation and upheaval. I think that in due course we will have the idea very generally accepted that there is a duty on the State to ensure that abuses of one kind or another are not associated with any form of employment, and that the job of removing these abuses is one for the Government rather than for a combination of workers or some public agitation to deal with.

Senator Douglas referred to the possibility of some sections of the Bill not being sufficiently clear. I would much prefer if we could have framed this measure in simpler language, because I see difficulties in the future arising from the technical phraseology used in certain sections. But these difficulties would be very small in relation to the difficulties which might arise, and which, in fact, have arisen under earlier Bills, due to the inadequacy of the provisions to cope with all circumstances. We have had difficulties already under the 1936 Act, due entirely to the phraseology used, and the phraseology used was dictated by a desire for simplicity. We will get simplicity if we can, but I think we must get clarity and absence of ambiguity at all costs, particularly in a measure of this kind.

Reference was made here, in another regard, to conditions in agricultural areas. Senator McGee referred to the fact that it was not unusual for labourers to offer their services at lower than the minimum wage fixed by the Agricultural Wages Act and pretend to inspectors that they were in fact getting such wage. That may be so. I am not prepared to contend that that has never happened. The last occasion upon which I discussed in this House the question of agricultural employment was some 18 months ago or so, and the burden of the complaint on that occasion from Senator Counihan and a number of other Senators who are still here, was that, owing to the operation of the Unemployment Assistance Act farmers could not get workers at all. Senator Counihan and other Senators will remember the complaint being voiced not merely here but in the Dáil— it was voiced also outside these Houses—that, due to the extension of the unemployment assistance scheme to rural areas, there were, in fact, considerable difficulties being experienced by farmers at seasons of the year, or at all times, in getting workers and I know from investigation of a number of complaints that that was so on occasion.

Different circumstances apply in different parts of the country and the experience of one part of the country should not be deemed to be the experience of the whole, but if we are going to improve conditions in rural areas, to make it possible for agriculturists to get a better profit from agriculture and, consequently, give better conditions of employment to agricultural workers and make life in rural areas more attractive, there is nothing in this Bill to stop it. That is the point I want to get into the minds of Senators —there is nothing in this Bill in conflict with that idea. Everybody has the same motive and the same idea in mind in relation to rural areas. There is nothing whatever in this Bill, or any similar measure enacted, to benefit industrial workers or non-agricultural workers, that will prevent the adoption of any proposal that may be considered practicable to improve conditions in rural areas. I should like to emphasise again that there is no necessary conflict between a sound policy for the improvement of urban conditions or the promotion of urban industries and an equally sound policy for the improvement of conditions in rural areas or the promotion of the prosperity of agriculture.

Mr. Baxter

Why did you not deal with that first? That is my point.

Mr. Lemass

I contend that we are in fact doing so. This idea that we are rushing ahead with legislation to benefit urban dwellers and city workers and postpone action in relation to agriculture or rural areas is wrong. I say that if any examination is made of the various measures of one kind or another involving action by the Dáil or Seanad in the past five or six years it will be found that by far the greater number had very direct relation to rural and agricultural conditions. It may be that factors were greater than our strength, that the factors which were operating to depress conditions in agriculture were beyond our power to remove. I would not contend that myself, but it has to be recognised that the factors that have depressed agriculture are very powerful indeed, and that it is going to take, not merely a very great effort, but also a considerable period of time before they can be fully dealt with.

There is a proposal to set up a commission of inquiry into agriculture, a commission with wide terms of reference and which will be representative of various interests, to deal with the problem of agriculture as a whole, and in so far as that separate examination, which will have no direct relation to the day-to-day problems, can be made by a body of this kind much more thoroughly than by a Minister of State or officers of a State Department, if that inquiry produces proposals which, on the face of them, are worth trying, there will be no hesitation in trying them, because I think everybody recognises—I certainly never in my life have heard anybody contend to the contrary —that the whole prosperity of this country depends upon the prosperity of agriculture and that everything else, industries, urban conditions of employment and all will go unless the problem of agriculture can be safeguarded. That fact being so clearly recognised, Senator Baxter, Senator McGee and others need have no fear that anything will be done which would be in conflict with the realisation of that aim.

Question put and agreed to.

Cathaoirleach

When will the next stage be taken?

Mr. Lemass

That is a matter for the Seanad.

Mr. Douglas

I suggest that we take it on the first day on which we meet after Christmas. I presume we will meet about the middle of January. I do not know what date the Dáil is adjourning to, but I understand it is some time in February. If we were to meet about the 18th January, it would give ample time to get the Bill through without undue haste.

Mr. Lemass

It is not a Bill which it is necessary to rush. The result will be the same whether it is enacted at the end of January or in February. There are reasons which make it desirable that the Bill should come into operation in April or May—neither before nor after that. There is no need to rush. If I could be assured that the Bill, in its present form or as amended after discussion, would be enacted in the middle of February, it would suit all right.

Mr. M. Hayes

Fix the next stage for the 18th of January and we can take it the first day we meet.

Committee Stage fixed for 18th January.

Seanad Éireann debate - Wednesday, 7 Dec 1938

Holidays (Employees) Bill, 1938—Second Stage.

Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 7 Dec 1938