As the Chathaoirleach announced to-day, he has received notice from Senator Sweetman that on the motion for the Adjournment to-night Senator Sweetman proposes to direct the attention of the House to the operation of the Tomatoes (Regulation of Import) Order, 1946, Statutory Rules and Orders, 1946, No. 165, relating to the importation of tomatoes and to request the Minister for Agriculture to make a statement in reference to the matter.
Adjournment Debate—Importation of Tomatoes.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I shall be brief in regard to this matter for a variety of reasons not the least of which is that we have passed from the somewhat turbulent waters of local government into the placid calm of agriculture.
Does that make reference to the Minister?
Or to the condition of the fruit?
No. This motion is in relation to the importation of tomatoes which are not for the use which Senator O'Donovan has in mind. The importation of tomatoes was prohibited except under licence under the Regulation of Imports Act. That Order, No. 165, was published and was taken by the trade to mean that there would be a complete ban on the importation of tomatoes until the end of October. The Order was to apply from the period 12th June, 1946, until October 31st, 1946. This is not the first time this Order has been made, and I understand there was a reference to it in the other House to-day.
At the time I gave notice I was not aware that there would be any such reference. I understand that the Minister indicated that any person who asked for a licence would be given a licence. If that is so, I would like the Minister to explain why the Order is necessary at all. I would like to know, if there is to be completely free importation, what is the reason for bringing in the Order? If there is to be completely free importation, why was some effort not made by the Minister's Department to acquaint the trade that that was going to be his intention in the operation of the Order?
Let us consider the situation as it arose. Tomatoes have become, particularly in the last few months, part of the diet of almost every house in the country. They were available at the controlled price of 1/4 per lb. At that price it was possible for people of modest means to acquire them. I understand that there is at the present time a commission engaged on the ascertaining of certain nutritional values and I wonder if the inspectors engaged on that inquiry have reported in any way on the nutritional value of tomatoes. But suddenly this Order came in and the result of it was that supplies of tomatoes, which had been available for houses of moderate means, were shut down completely and in consequence of the Order tomatoes were only available at luxury prices.
If, perhaps, I had been aware of the full facts of this last week, I might have suggested to the Minister for Industry and Commerce that a benefit of this Order was that tomatoes could go into the luxury hotels which we are building, because at the price at which they have been available for the last week they certainly will not go into any of the ordinary houses of the country. The Minister was the person who caused the position where by virtue of this Order it was not possible for the ordinary person to obtain any quantity of the fruit because of the prohibitive price, a price which means in fact that they cannot obtain tomatoes at all.
I want to be crystal clear on one point. I am clearly and absolutely in favour of this fruit being grown here, of employment being given in the growing of it and of it being made a useful adjunct to our agriculture, but I want done in such a way that the people can get their requirements of a food that is of great nutritional value at a price within their means. There are, roughly, three seasons in regard to the cultivation of tomatoes. First of all, there is the season which is operating at present where the seedlings are nurtured in the hot-house and where the fruit is brought to maturity in the hot-house. Secondly, there is the season where the seedlings are nurtured in the hot-house and brought to maturity in cold glass frames, and finally there is the season where they are set out and brought to maturity without any heat at all. So far as the last season is concerned, it is that type of production which it is possible to encourage and possible for our farmers to go in for at prices which will not be prohibitive, but so far as the first class of season is concerned, by going in for that type of cultivation we are going to have merely a luxury trade because of the costs involved.
I want to say to the Minister that there is, of course, a tremendous advantage in this better fruit, this home-grown tomato, and no one will question that it is better than the imported article, but I want to know what is the great advantage which enables certain people, a few people, to get these high prices to the exclusion of the ordinary person of ordinary means. As a result of the Minister's Order—whether it was the Minister's intention or not I will not say—but as a result of that Order a person who could get the fruit within the last ten days or so will not be able to get it in the future until the licences have begun to operate, the licences which the Minister now tells us are going to be given. Would I be wrong in saying that perhaps what has happened is that the Minister has decided to mend his hand in regard to this importation? If he has done so, I may congratulate him on having reformed, but I would like to hear what he has to say.
I only want to say a word or two in support of Senator Sweetman. It is quite true that when this fruit became available recently, it became a necessity for a great many people. The Minister knows there are all sorts of scarcities and the presence of these tomatoes in the market made up for scarcities in many a home where there was no other alternative or substitute. The essential effect of the Minister's Order has been to deny this commodity to many people who had accustomed themselves to it in the last few weeks and there is this other circumstance attendant on it, that no matter what people pay for the Irish product it is not available, so far as one can judge. Irish tomatoes are not available in anything like sufficient quantities to meet the requirements of the people, even though all the people were prepared to pay the price fixed for them. That is only tantamount to denying the people a food which they require, for which there is no substitute, which was available to them before the Minister made the Order.
Senator Sweetman, myself and everybody else recognise there are certain difficulties in this in so far as a certain limited number of people have invested what is for them a relatively large amount of capital, but if the Minister attitude is that because a few people put in a certain amount of capital in an industry like this the consumers of the country must be denied an opportunity of purchasing this commodity anywhere else, then that is a misuse of capital and something that we cannot stand for. The Minister will have to face that fact. Whatever we may think about the necessity for protecting the home producer, I think some other method will have to be employed.
I do not know what the Minister proposes now. I do not know if he proposes to give licences to people and at the same time to oblige these people who take in the foreign tomatoes to take over the home-grown tomatoes at a certain price. Of course, he must have some scheme because it would be an unhappy circumstance if the small quantity of home-grown tomatoes available in the market would have to be sold at a price that would not meet the cost of production. I think that however the Minister extracts himself and these other people from this situation, it would be better for him and for all of us that the situation should not be permitted to develop in the future. In so far as the Minister is prepared to have the courage to alter his decision, he is to be congratulated. That is sound commonsense on his part, and it is a decision that will be appreciated. It is good to do a thing like that in time and not to wait until the position becomes so far gone that it will have to be done.
The essential point is that certain people who have invested capital in this luxury product are doing something which is going to be such a hardship on the rest of the community that they cannot expect to get security for that kind of luxury product in the future.
Senator Sweetman said that he understood this was not the first time this thing has been done. As a matter of fact it has been done for the last 11 years and as far as I can remember there was no complaint from either the Dáil or Seanad about it over the last 11 years. Evidently, however, some letters written by irresponsible people to the newspapers have had an effect on members of the Seanad and of the Dáil.
We were buying the tomatoes. That is why we were affected.
I wish the members of the Oireachtas would look up the Order because then they would see that there is no necessity for me to mend my hand at all. They can see a copy of this Order in the Library. They will see that it provides that it shall not be lawful during the period commencing on the 12th of June, 1946, and ending on the 31st October, 1946, to import any tomatoes unless—and then it goes on for over a page and a half to talk about licences.
There is only one page in my copy of the Order.
Turn it over.
Perhaps in the case of my copy, the typewriter got it all in on the one page?
Turn it over and you will see the reference to the licences. There are two lines in the Order stating that the importation of tomatoes will be prohibited unless licences are issued and then a page and a half on how the licences will be issued and the conditions that will be attached to them.
Anybody looking at that Order would be struck by the licensing provisions rather than by what is described as this "embargo" on tomatoes. This has been done for 11 years and it has been done in relation to a number of other things. For instance, onions were kept out except under licence for six or eight months before our own crop came in, so that we could gauge the amount of imported onions on the market until our own crop would come in. Then, our own crop would fill the bill. The same thing is done in respect of apples and tomatoes. Senators must know that, if we did not make this Order until about the 20th or 25th July, when our main crop would come in, there might be a carry-over of three weeks' imported tomatoes. That would have a very bad effect on our own suppliers— those who put on the market not a luxury article, as Senator Sweetman said, but an article at a fair price. The practice has been to bring in this Order about the middle of June and to issue licences. That answers one of the questions put by Senator Sweetman.
I did say in the Dáil to-day that every licence sought had been granted. Only one licence was asked for and no application is under consideration in my Department. We granted the only licence for which we were asked. If we had been asked for more, I am sure we would have granted them. Apart from this Order, we would not permit tomatoes from certain places to be imported. That is done under an Order known as the Colorado Beetle Order. Any country in which the Colorado beetle is rampant would be out of bounds so far as the admission of any vegetable is concerned. The tomatoes which have come in so far have come from the Canary Islands which, we were assured, were free from the Colorado beetle. We would not, of course, issue licences after the first or second week of July unless we found there were no tomatoes in the country. If we calculated that there would be enough imported tomatoes to supply the market up to nearly the end of July, then we would stop the issue of licences and depend on our own main crop.
Do you not expect to be a bit later than usual this year?
We may. That has been the policy followed for 11 years and that is the policy which has been followed this year. If we had not adopted that policy about 1935 and got a number of glass-houses erected, we would not have had such a supply of tomatoes during the war years. Apart from the benefit to the growers concerned, that kept a certain amount of money in the country and we were able to supply consumers during the war years with more tomatoes than they would otherwise have obtained. That is not having any influence on the present position. We are quite prepared to go back to the policy pursued from 1935 to 1939 if supplies of imported tomatoes are available. I am not so sure that they are but they may be. With regard to this reference to "luxury prices" for home-grown tomatoes, up to a few days ago tomatoes were available in all the shops at 1/4. People have told me that, going into those shops, they saw some tomatoes labelled 1/4 and others 5/6. Some people selected the 5/6 tomatoes. If people are prepared to pay 5/6 for a luxury article while a 1/4 article is available, I do not think we should have any pity for them.
That is quite fair.
When our main crop comes in, I expect they will be sold at reasonable prices. The Minister for Industry and Commerce has been asked by certain interests to fix prices for home-grown tomatoes. I do not know whether that is advisable or not but I would not oppose his doing so if he thinks it necessary in the interests of consumers.
It might be better for the producers, too.
I find it hard to understand why members of the Oireachtas have become so anxious about the situation this year since they have information at their disposal in the Library that these Orders are made from year to year and that no change has been made in the wording of this Order from that of Orders made for the past 11 years. I can excuse certain people who write letters to the papers but I cannot understand a county committee of agriculture which passed a resolution on this subject. That committee is in a county which gets the most out of what some Senators would call "subsidies". I do not know whether there is any County Limerick Senator here. Limerick is a very big butter-producing county. It produces more than half the butter of the country and it has done well on butter for the past 13 years. Yet the committee of agriculture there unanimously passes a resolution to let the tomato growers go to the devil. The tomato growers are to be left to compete against Holland and the Canary Islands. The tomato growers could ask if the butter producers of Limerick would be prepared, in three or four years, to compete against New Zealand and other countries. It is hard to understand why trouble should be raised about this matter this year. There has been no change of policy.
We have not refused any licence and we have not got any further applications. There may be a difficulty in getting tomatoes to import at the moment. If there is a difficulty, this Order is not necessary. There are certain places from which we cannot permit tomatoes to be imported—the Channel Islands, for instance—on account of the Colorado beetle and I do not think that tomatoes would be available from any other place than the Canary Islands at this period. The Canary Islands' supply is almost finished. That, probably, accounts for the lack of applications.
Did you get any applications last year?
Not many.
Did you give licences pre-war?
Yes.
One reason why this question is much more important this year than it was in pre-war years is that we are severely rationed as regards cooking by the E.S.B. and the Gas Company and that there is a shortage of turf and a shortage of cooking fuel. Householders have to turn much more to cold meals and, for cold meals, the tomato is more necessary than for hot meals.
The Seanad adjourned at 9.50 p.m. until 3 p.m., Wednesday, 26th June, 1946.