Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 11 Mar 1953

Vol. 41 No. 7

Restrictive Trade Practices Bill, 1952—Second Stage.

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

Minister for Industry and Commerce (Mr. Lemass)

The purpose of this Restrictive Trade Practices Bill is to provide machinery for the investigation of restrictive practices in trade and to provide the means for taking appropriate measures where trade practices are considered to be restricting competition unfairly or to be in any way contrary to the public interest.

There is at the present time no statutory machinery for the investigation of trade practices which are alleged to be restrictive of competition or detrimental to the public welfare. Neither has the Minister for Industry and Commerce nor any other Minister power to take action to prevent such practices or to remedy any situation resulting from them where he is of the opinion that the public interest has been contravened. I think that apart altogether from any question that may arise as to the best method of meeting the problems which these restrictive trade practices constitute it will be agreed that it is time that something should be done about them and that as a minimum there should be machinery for investigating them and machinery for doing something about them if the investigation shows it to be necessary.

The problem of restrictive trade practices action by trade associations or combinations of manufacturers or traders to reduce or eliminate competition in their own interests is of comparatively recent growth in this country. I think it would be true to say that it developed very largely as a result of the conditions which prevailed here during the war years. These conditions necessitated frequent consultation between Government Departments and trade associations on the distribution of scarce commodities. They necessitated the promotion of trade associations, to facilitate such discussions, when they did not exist and they accustomed traders to a situation in which trade in particular classes of goods was confined to those previously engaged in dealing in them and in which new entrants to particular trades were not encouraged. Furthermore, the frequent announcements in the Press that regulations regarding the distribution of goods had been discussed with and agreed with particular trade associations tended to enhance the prestige of these associations and give them an authority in the trades concerned which they had not previously enjoyed.

In many cases arrangements for the equitable distribution of scarce supplies or the utilisation of such supplies for necessary purposes were carried on voluntarily without statutory authority and through the co-operation of the trade associations. That was particularly the case in regard to commodities which offered special problems which could not be easily resolved by the machinery of regulation and control. While attributing the growth of what are now generally agreed to be undesirable practices to the circumstances of the emergency years, it would only be fair to say that many of these trade associations did extraordinarily useful work in that period and many of the difficulties of that time could not have been resolved without their co-operation. Whatever is the explanation of the recent growth in restrictive trade practices, it is obvious that they are fairly widespread and that a number of trade associations and organisations are now disposed to maintain the special conditions which developed during the difficult circumstances of the emergency and have adopted practices for the regulation of their trade which are designed to serve the interests of their members and are often in conflict with the public interest. It is perhaps also only fair to say that our experience in that regard has been not dissimilar to the experience of other countries in the same period.

The most obvious of these practices —that which evoked the largest measure of public criticism—has been the exclusion of new entrants from a particular branch of trade or commerce. It was the most likely extension of wartime arrangements into the present peacetime economy. That prevention of new entrants into a particular trade or a particular branch of commerce was effected either by overt act or by the imposition of conditions so onerous as to make it impossible for new entrants with limited capital resources to comply with them. A number of complaints have been made in recent years to the Department of Industry and Commerce alleging the extension of arrangements of that character, arrangements designed to exclude new people from entering into any branch of commerce. The purpose of these arrangements was to restrict competition in the trade for the benefit of those previously established in it. There have been, of course, many complaints about other restrictive practices, most of which Senators will have heard in or outside the House.

The allegations made to the Department of Industry and Commerce may not have covered them all but they covered an extraordinary number. They related to the imposition and the maintenance of unreasonable qualifications for trade discount, refusal of supply on trade terms to people who were not members of a trade association or approved by a particular association, exclusive dealing arrangements between suppliers and retailers— that is, agreements on the part of retailers to sell only the products of particular suppliers.

There were complaints of unreasonable limitations of wholesale channels for particular commodities and of resale price maintenance agreements affecting a number of commodities. There have been, as Senators probably know, allegations that boycotts have been arranged against traders who attempted to sell goods at a price lower than the minimum retail price fixed by manufacturers or importers and in other cases the threat of boycott has been used to force manufacturers to refuse to supply goods to traders. The indications that these practices are fairly widespread in trade necessitate a thorough examination of the position, directed to determining whether the public interest is adversely affected.

I am sure the Seanad will expect me, for the purpose of enabling Senators to assess the gravity and extent of the problem, to indicate the trades covered by these complaints but in doing so I should make it clear that I am not in any way anticipating the investigation of any practice under the machinery proposed to be established under the Bill and I am not in a position to discuss the merits or demerits of any case, either to sustain or assail the justification sometimes put forward for the operation of these trade practices. I am mentioning trades in respect of which I have received complaints merely to indicate the extent to which ground for complaint exists and the magnitude of the problem with which the Bill is designed to deal.

The greatest volume of complaint expressed in the form of communications addressed to the Department of Industry and Commerce or voiced in the Dáil or other public assemblies throughout the country related to the distribution of petrol and the principal ground for complaint in regard to petrol related to the withholding of supplies in certain cases from persons wishing to enter the petrol retailing business. But that practice was also alleged to apply to trade in a large number of other goods: radios, paper bags, wrapping paper, newspapers and periodicals, cinema films, bicycles and the component parts of bicycles, boots and shoes, rubber footwear, coal, motor cars and accessories, electrical goods, glass, pottery, sanitary ware, building materials and requisites of various kinds, certain tools like files and saws, agricultural machinery, certain pharmaceutical supplies, drapery goods and many classes of foodstuffs.

In respect of motor cars, wireless sets, agricultural machinery, boots and shoes, some drapery goods and foodstuffs, cigarettes and tobacco, it has been alleged that restrictive practices in operation included resale price maintenance agreements. Again I want to say that it is not to be assumed that in every case in which a complaint was made it was well founded or that the regulation of distribution by trade associations or by arrangements between manufacturers and retailers is necessarily injurious to the public interest. Whether those practices are or are not in the public interest can only be determined in my view by a special investigation process. There is, as I said, no statutory authority for such investigation at the present time and it is to provide the means of carrying through such an investigation that many of the provisions of this Bill have been designed.

In framing the proposals in the Bill, I was guided by two main principles. The first is that, as a general rule and within such protection as may be afforded to any industry by tariffs or other import regulations, free and fair competition in distribution is desirable in the public interest. The second principle is that even though circumstances may in exceptional cases warrant some degree of trade regulation, trade associations or combinations of traders cannot be allowed to arrogate to themselves the right to impose that regulation or to limit competition. The very fact that our industrial economy has been based of necessity to such a large extent upon tariff and quota protection makes it all the more necessary that the Government should be vigilant in ensuring that there is effective internal competition.

Where competition from external resources has been removed or has been lessened, conditions necessarily exist which facilitate the making of agreements between producers or between producers and distributors or even between distributors themselves of a restrictive character to regulate trade so as to limit competition and secondly so as to facilitate price maintenance, because the operation of these restrictive practices or price maintenance arrangements can only be adopted where the persons desiring to engage in trade have no alternative source of supply open to them. For that reason many of these agreements and arrangements and many of these combinations between traders are facilitated.

I think we should approach this issue with the view that, where combinations exist between traders who should in the natural order of things be in competition with one another, the combinations must be looked upon with deep suspicion, they must be regarded as a potential source of injury to the public and liable to be detrimental to the interest of consumers. I do not want it to be understood that the problem this Bill is designed to deal with is confined to goods manufactured by protected industry. Some of the complaints of unfair restrictions which have been received relate to traders trading in commodities which are imported. It is equally essential in the public interest that no arrangements or agreements between importers and distributors for the restriction of competition should be permitted, just as in respect of protected goods. Neither are these restrictive practices necessarily confined to internal arrangements. Agreements which are restrictive of competition and which can be detrimental to the interest of the consuming public can also be made between importers and external suppliers and these agreements may cover market sharing or profit fixing arrangements of a most objectionable kind.

Similarly, on the export side, individual exporters or intending exporters may be subject to unfair coercion or restraint by combination between other exporters in this country and importers in foreign markets. The effect of these arrangements would be to canalise trade through certain channels and so to make it difficult or impossible for the individual exporter here to survive outside the ring.

I have stated as a principle that associations of traders should not be allowed to arrogate to themselves the right to regulate trade restrictively. Where they may do so, it is to be feared that the stronger the trade organisation the more likely it is that, if no check is applied, the regulation of trade will eventually prove harmful to the public interest. In saying that I do not want it to be thought that I am opposed to trade associations. On the contrary, I think that trade associations are valuable and are in many respects indispensable for the efficient conduct of industry and commerce. There are many legitimate and useful fields in which these trade associations can be active, but it is natural and inevitable, perhaps, that their primary concern is with the interests of their members and there are obvious inducements to them to limit competition in the interest of their members. To the extent to which any particular group or association of traders have taken it upon themselves to exclude other citizens from particular trades or of otherwise regulating trade restrictively, they have—regardless of what justification they may advance for their actions—usurped functions which are properly exercisable only by the Oireachtas.

The experience of recent years in that regard has made it clear, I think, that the time has come when the Oireachtas must consider the provision of machinery for the review and the control of restrictive trade practices in the public interest. The problem is not an easy one nor is it possible to find a short cut to its solution. Agreements and combinations and conspiracies in which producers and distributors, or both, co-operate to secure a monopoly or to fix and maintain prices or price levels must, as I said, be suspect because they involve the power to control the market; but there are agreements and regulations in operation in many trades the effect of which is not monopolistic and which are genuinely designed and operate to prevent abuses of various kinds and which have the effect of assisting in the orderly distribution of goods.

While the aim of legislation must be the development of the fullest and most effective competition in every trade in the interest of consumers, care must also be taken to ensure that it is fair competition. Senators are aware that specious arguments are advanced in justification of restrictive trade practices and the commonest justification is that they improve efficiency in distribution. I am prepared to recognise that that possibility cannot be ruled out, that a degree of regulation in some trades may be desirable in the public interest; but I think we should proceed on the assumption that it should be done openly, if at all, and then only after justification to a competent authority established for that purpose.

Before deciding on the approach in this Bill, I considered various alternative methods of tackling this problem. It would be possible to propose here a Bill which would lay down a general prohibition upon unfair competition or restrictive practices or on resale price maintenance agreements which are contrary to the public interest and then leave it to the courts to decide in particular cases what particular actions were in conflict with that law. I think, however, it will be apparent to Senators who have given thought to this matter, and from what I have already said, that legislation upon these lines would achieve no real purpose, and probably would not provide any more satisfactory means of redress than are available at present. The duty of the courts generally is to interpret and apply the law as it is enacted here by the Houses of the Oireachtas. I feel that it would be undesirable, and indeed impracticable, to impose on the courts the duty of determining whether a wide range of commercial practices operating in varying circumstances and in different degrees in different trades are unfair and harmful to the public interest.

Another way of dealing with restrictive practices would be to schedule and declare unlawful in every trade specific practices considered to be contrary to the public interest. I decided that it would be objectionable to proceed on these lines, that to draw up a list of these practices on the basis of our experience and the experience of other countries would be very unsafe, partly because our experience is limited and partly because of differences in the conditions and in the commercial philosophies of one country and another. The list of practices which could be prohibited without risk of interference with legitimate customs in various trades could not easily be declared with finality. It would take an inordinately long time to make the investigations, if indeed it would be possible to make the investigations at all, which would be necessary to establish such a list, that is to say, a list of practices which could be banned in all trades, in all circumstances, but the most obvious objection to that course is that, even if a satisfactory list could be prepared and incorporated in an Act, the many forms which restraint of trade might assume in order to circumvent the law could not possibly be foreseen or guarded against in the list of specific prohibitions. Commercial ingenuity would always find a way around a law of that kind and get the same results by methods differing slightly, but differing nevertheless, from those banned by the legislation.

Another method of approach would be to prohibit all trade practices of a restrictive kind carried on by trade associations and, at the same time, provide that such practices as the Minister for Industry and Commerce or some statutory authority might approve after investigation could lawfully be carried on. That was the approach to the problem I favoured in 1947 and certain provisions were inserted in the Industrial Prices and Efficiency Bill introduced in that year designed to make that approach possible; but on reconsideration of the problem and having taken note of the increase in the dimensions of the problem since 1947 as well as having benefited by the advice secured from authorities in the United States responsible for the administration of similar enactments there and given to officers of my Department who visited them for the purpose of getting guidance in that connection, I have decided that it would not be desirable at all to proceed upon that course since not all restrictive practices are necessarily harmful nor is it definite that even resale price maintenance arrangements should not be tolerated in any set of circumstances.

A total prohibition of all these practices, subject to the possibility of subsequent approval of them in particular cases, would also, I think, disorganise trade very considerably and put an almost impossible burden upon the Minister or the authority responsible for administering an Act of that kind. Our approach to this problem must necessarily be experimental within limits and I believe that the measure I am proposing provides the quickest and most effective way of dealing with this problem, or at least of dealing with the problem as we see it at present. Whether the investigations of the Fair Trade Commission, as they proceed, will give us new experience of it and show directions in which the legislation can be improved or not, it is impossible to forecast, but this Bill is not presented to the Seanad as representing necessarily the last word in legislation for dealing with this problem. If experience over a period of time shows that improvement in the legislation is possible, that can be achieved. It can be said, however, of the Bill that the procedure it contemplates will enable conditions in individual trades to be examined independently and will enable particular practices to be prohibited only when it is first demonstrated to the Oireachtas that they are unfair and operate contrary to the public interest. The functions of the courts in cases of prosecution will then be simply to determine whether a particular practice which has been banned by the Oireachtas under the procedure set out in the Bill has been adopted and, if so, to determine the appropriate penalties.

The Bill provides for the establishment of a commission, a permanent commission, whose functions will be to investigate these practices. It provides for the making of reports by the commission to the Minister for Industry and Commerce, on the basis of which Orders may be made by the Minister prohibiting restrictive practices affecting the supply or distribution of goods or the rendering of services ancillary to the supply of goods, or prohibiting resale price maintenance arrangements which appear to be contrary to the public interest. The Orders made by the Minister under the appropriate section of the Bill will not have any force until they are confirmed by legislation passed by the Oireachtas. The intention is that the confirming Bills will be of a simple kind with which the Seanad will be familar in connection with the confirmation of Orders made by various Ministers under different statutes, such as Orders imposing customs duties, or harbour works Orders.

Mr. Douglas

Can they be amended when passing?

Mr. Lemass

Certainly.

Mr. Douglas

That is very important.

Mr. Lemass

The power of the Oireachtas to amend any Bill proposed to it is beyond question. There are two different methods of approach proposed in the Bill to the investigation of trade practices. The Fair Trade Commission, which will be established if the Bill is passed, may, on their own initiative, or on the request of a trade association, prepare and publish fair trading rules for any trade, having first given notice of its intention to prepare them and having afforded an opportunity to all interested parties to make representations. These rules will be prepared and published by the commission without reference to the Minister and will not have the force of law. It is intended that they will serve as a code of conduct for a trade, or the trades or industries concerned. My hope is that trade associations which consider it necessary to maintain rules for the efficient and orderly conduct of their trades will bring the rules they have in force to this Fair Trade Commission, and have them examined there and amended as the commission recommends, in order to eliminate any aspect of them which appears to prejudice the public interest.

If speedy action is to be achieved in the elimination of restrictive practices, it is more likely to come as a result of that section of the Bill than of the sections relating to the making of statutory Orders. I have been urging upon trade associations that they should voluntarily put their own houses in order, revise their rules to make them unobjectionable from the public point of view and get clearance of them on a voluntary basis as contemplated in the Bill. If, subsequently, fair trading rules are found not to be observed in the trade, then they can be converted into statutory rules enforceable through the courts by the procedure laid down in the Bill. I should hope, however, that there will be a general recognition in industry and trade that the time for restrictive practices is past, that there will be a general movement to get rid of these restrictive practices, that the help of the commission will be sought to that end and that the number of cases where the commission will have to act in a manner which will be designed ultimately to secure the imposition of rules upon trades, rules designed to prevent restrictive practices in these trades, will thereby be minimised.

If, however, restrictive practices are alleged to exist in any trade which that trade is unwilling to forego or where action is not taken voluntarily by the trade to secure elimination, then the commission can decide to hold a public inquiry into the circumstances of that trade. It can make that decision on its own initiative and must do so if so requested by the Minister for Industry and Commerce.

These public inquiries will be conducted in accordance with whatever procedure upon which the commission may determine. The Bill contains the usual safeguards against the disclosure of confidential information which might be detrimental to any legitimate business interests. There will be publication of notice of intention to hold these inquiries. Access to the commission will be open to any person who appears to be interested in the matter or who can bring to the notice of the commission any particular practice which is regarded as objectionable.

The commission will make its report to the Minister and the Minister must publish that report to the Oireachtas subject only to such deletions as he may think desirable after consultation with the commission to avoid doing unnecessary damage to legitimate trade interests and where he believes that the publication of that information is not necessary for the proper understanding of the report. Even in such a case, however, the report must contain an indication of the general character of any material deleted from it. On publication of the report, the Minister may make an Order which will subsequently be confirmed by legislation and become the law of the land. From that time on any person indulging in the restrictive practices banned under the Order will commit an offence for which he can be prosecuted in the courts.

It is my hope that the procedure set out in Section 7 of the Bill which relates to these inquiries will enable the maximum possible degree of cooperation to be secured from the public and that the procedure will facilitate the commission in forming a considered judgment on the effect of the restrictive practices in various trades.

The commission will have power to inquire into resale price maintenance arrangements. Resale price maintenance is a trade practice by which retailers are required to sell goods at prices prescribed by the manufacturer or by any other supplier of goods, a practice under which the retailer is not free to settle his own selling price in the light of his own circumstances. Manufacturers or importers of these goods prescribe the price which they think retailers should charge. The task of seeing that the retailer maintains the fixed retail price is sometimes performed solely by the individual manufacturer who may refuse to supply a trader who sells below the fixed price. More often it is done by a trade association representative of manufacturers and distributors.

If a trader fails to observe any of the rules of these associations in connection with resale price maintenance he may suffer severe penalties ranging from fines up to a total boycott. The boycott system is, of course, most objectionable since, under it, a trader may not be able to get supplies from any manufacturer even though he may have only cut the price of the goods sold by one of them. Section 10 of the Bill provides that the commission will keep under review the operation of Orders made under Section 9. They must also keep under review, in a general way, the effect on the public interest of restrictive practices.

It is perhaps important that I should explain in connection with the duties imposed on the commission by Section 10, duties of a general character, that no question of making Orders would arise from reports submitted to the Minister under that section. Where the public may think some action is required, the matter will be dealt with under Section 74 which deals with fair trading rules, or Section 7, the section which deals with public inquiries.

Some comment was made in the Dáil on the severity of the penalties proposed in the Bill for breach of Orders made under it. I think it is necessary to have a prospect of severe penalties in the legislation. People who restrain trade by any of these arrangements do so because it is profitable for them, and it is only fair that the penalties for restrictive practices should be heavy. Even though the penalties involved in the Bill are severe, and include penalties for continuing offences, they may not be sufficient to deter wealthy combines from continuing the practice. The provisions of Section 11 of the Bill. however, enable injunctions to be sought in the courts to compel the abandonment of restrictive practices and, of course, any subsequent noncompliance with an injunction of that character would expose the offenders to all the penalties attendant on contempt of court, but by giving the right to seek an injunction, aggrieved traders are afforded the opportunity of taking effective action on their own initiative.

There are just one or two other matters I want to refer to. The Bill does not apply to any regulation of trade or of prices made in pursuance of specific statutory authorisation. For the information of Senators, I may give as examples of the matters I have in mind in providing for that exemption the charging for electricity supplies and various provisions in Acts administered by the Minister for Agriculture in connection with agricultural produce generally. Where the Oireachtas has specifically legislated and given a statutory authority like the E.S.B. or some Minister such as the Minister for Agriculture the power to fix minimum prices and impose other limitations upon trade and goods, there is no sense in having these powers investigated by this commission. The Oireachtas took the step of giving powers to the Minister or the statutory body in the belief that it was in the public interest that they should have these powers.

That exemption applies only to powers exercised in pursuance of statutory authority and it would not apply to the actions of companies established by statute to conduct various types of business activity, even though the State may own the principal interest of that company: it would not apply for example to the Irish Sugar Company, Irish Steel Limited or other organisations of that kind where, if they have a restrictive trade practice of an objectionable kind, it could be investigated by this commission, the same as any privately owned concern. Neither does the Bill make provision for dealing with monopolies in connection with the manufacture of goods. This Bill deals only with trading or supplying goods for the purposes of trade. I do not think that conditions exist at present in relation to the manufacture of goods which make it necessary for us to go into anti-monopoly legislation on the American model.

One other matter I would like to bring forward. The Bill does not apply to restrictive practices in connection with human labour relations. I know that there are many people who say that the most objectionable kind of restrictive practices in many trades are operated by trade unions; that may or may not be true. The fact is that trade unions operate under a law which gives them legal status and certain privileges, recognising that their function is to apply restrictions in the utilisation of human labour. I have said elsewhere that the need for reconsidering and revising the law relating to trade unions is recognised, and its revision is indeed at present under consideration. The views of appropriate organisations have been invited as to the form the amendment of that law should take but I do not think it would be advisable to attempt to deal with restrictive practices of trade unions in regard to the utilisation of labour or human labour relations generally in this Bill. It would not be appropriate to provide for the control of matters of that kind, by a commission established and chosen because of its suitability to deal with restrictive practices in trading and not restrictive practices of any other kind. It would be undesirable to extend its scope and function to cover such matters. These if they are to be dealt with will have to be dealt with in a separate measure. This Bill deals only with trade and commerce and the distribution of goods and ancillary services of that kind.

Business suspended at 6.10 p.m. and resumed at 7.15 p.m.

Mr. Douglas

The Minister, in his introductory speech, was very guarded. He was very interesting from my point of view. He expressed less definite opinions than is usual—and that is not meant in any uncomplimentary sense. He adopted the line that there were an enormous number of complaints which had reached him or his Department from time to time and that he was not prepared to voice any specific opinion about them. In so far as he did express opinions, I found myself to a large extent in agreement.

But I have rather a different angle in my approach to the problem and to the Bill. I am speaking for myself and not necessarily for any Party. It is not, I think, a measure which ought to be debated on strict Party lines, and I think that some of the views I hope to express are shared by quite a number of persons. It seems to me that the title is somewhat misleading and it would have been better if it had been called the Unfair Trade Practices Bill. The sub-title is an Act concerning restrictive trade practices in regard to the supply and distribution of goods but from reading the Bill and listening to the Minister it is quite obvious that it is not intended to deal with restrictive practices as such, but with unfair practices, whether these can be described as restrictive or not.

As the Minister admits, there are many trade practices which can be described as restrictive although they are fair and in the interests of the public generally. Many of them are designed mainly if not solely to reduce the cost of production or distribution and, in so far as they do that, it will not, I think, be disputed that they can be regarded as in the public interest. Whether they are fair or reasonable is a matter on which the widest possible difference of opinion may exist.

When the Minister introduced the Bill in the Dáil he emphasised particularly his objection to rings. He was not quite as emphatic to-day, but I think it would be a fair interpretation of his remarks to say that he thinks the greatest danger is from rings or collective agreements. I am as much opposed to rings as the Minister and it is my conviction that the Minister would have been wiser if he had confined his attention to the prevention of rings and collective agreements designed to impose unfair trade practices. This Bill goes very much further and I and many others fear it may develop into another form of permanent State interference with trade and industry.

As the Minister pointed out, the main object of the Bill is to set up or enable him or the Government to set up a new commission. It will be, as I think is more or less inevitable, to a large extent under the control of the Minister; he will choose the persons and they will be subject to removal by him. The functions of the commission may roughly be divided into two. One of these functions is to hold an inquiry where there is reason to suspect that unfair trading conditions exist in the distribution of any kind of goods. With this function I do not disagree. It is made pretty clear, I think, that recommendations of the commission cannot have the force of law unless confirmed by an Act of Parliament. The Minister has assured me that an Order so introduced can be amended.

Mr. Lemass

I say the Bill will be a Bill to confirm an Order and can be amended just as Orders relating to the imposition of customs are confirmed by legislation now.

Mr. Douglas

The point I want to make is that if the Bill simply confirms the Order you cannot amend the Order. That is completely useless. I think if the amendment is to be effective, a Bill confirming an Order should have the Order as a Schedule and it should be possible after debate to amend that Order. Otherwise the confirming of it simply means it is passed by the majority and there can be no effective change made in it. Those who know the Minister and sit opposite to him know that he is very willing to listen to argument, possibly more willing than any other Minister, but the value of confirmation by the Oireachtas, if an error cannot be corrected, seems nothing like as great as I thought it was and I would be much happier if I thought that every Order would be in a Schedule to a Bill or in some form that can be amended. In a simple confirmation Bill an Order could not be amended. The amending of the Bill has no value. You can amend by removing the Order, but that would be a defeat of the Bill. If Orders are made, I want them to be successful and I want them to be the result of general consent. I do not believe there is any serious danger that Orders of this kind will be Party measures. No matter what Government is in power they will require care and are extremely unlikely to be debated on strictly Party lines. I think there always should be members of both Houses who will be able to criticise and what is more important still, will be able to represent opinions from experienced persons outside the Oireachtas.

One provision in the Bill which I view with a certain amount of uneasiness is the provision that an inquiry can be held by one person alone. I think that is a mistake. As the Bill stands it could be one of the temporary members. That I think would possibly be a worse mistake. I do not say that is intended but if the Minister looks into it he will find that as the Bill stands it could be one temporary member or it could be one permanent member. There are many trade practices about which the widest possible difference of opinion exists between equally honest and equally fair-minded persons. Some people consider certain practices to be objectionable which other people believe to be in the public interest. Before I sit down I hope to refer in more detail to some of the matters in which there is a wide difference of opinion. The point I want to make now is that there is no general agreement as to what is fair or what is unfair and in these circumstances I think it is dangerous to entrust an inquiry to one person. Remember that the commission, after receiving the report of that one person, is to supply not facts solely but opinions.

It is specifically set out in the Bill that the Minister or the Government want to know their opinions as to the effects of certain practices. I am assuming that the persons appointed in the commission must be persons of experience and proved ability, and, if so, they are bound to have certain preconceived opinions. It does not mean they are not competent to hold an inquiry, but we are all human and everyone is to a certain extent affected by preconceived ideas. I would suggest to the Minister that if he is not prepared—and I gather from the report of the Dáil that he was not prepared—always to have two, that he would put into the Bill something to make it clear that there would be an inquiry by one member only in cases where the whole commission regarded the matter as minor or relatively unimportant. I am voicing a view I have heard expressed by many people and I think I am right in telling the Minister that there is uneasiness with regard to the provision that the inquiry should be by one person.

Another matter which I view with a certain amount of uneasiness is this. I am not convinced that inquiries should always be in public except as provided in the Bill where it is necessary to avoid disclosure of confidential information. There is one point there that I wanted to ask the Minister and possibly his assistants will make a note of it. When replying, he might give us a little more information as to what he regards as meant by the words "necessary to avoid any disclosure of confidential information which might materially injure the legitimate business interests of any person." Supposing for the sake of argument that a small trader is asked to give evidence and supposing he is asked to give evidence of what he thinks is an unfair practice on the part of a large firm or possibly a firm which has a monopoly. Even with the quickest possible report it would be three to six months before any action could be taken as a result of that inquiry. He is liable to be asked in public to produce evidence against the only people from whom he can get his supplies. I suggest that the Bill may defeat its own purpose by the insistence on publicity and that it would be better if evidence were taken in private except where the commission is of opinion that a matter of general public interest was concerned and that it could be wisely discussed in public.

I know I may be misunderstood. There is a general idea that everything should be public and open to everybody. There is a danger that you will not get the evidence you want because of the fact that it would not be fair to press persons to give it in public. I would like to see an amendment introduced if the Minister is not prepared— and I imagine from what happened in the Dáil he is not—to amend the provision that sittings must be in public. I would like to see an amendment introduced which would provide that where a witness asks to have his evidence taken in private the request shall be agreed to, unless the commission are satisfied that the request is unreasonable. I would like them to have power to hear any witness in private if he asks for it and if they think it is reasonable.

The second main function of the commission is to prepare and publish fair trading rules for any trade or business. These rules may be at the request of an association or may be on the initiative of the commission. They will not be binding in law, as the Minister has pointed out; but if anybody is found not keeping the rules the commission may report to the Minister. What the Minister can then do about it is by no means clear to me unless he is going to introduce new legislation. In my opinion, it is a mistake to ask a commission to prepare rules for an association of traders. I think it is possible that it may defeat the main object of the Bill which is to ensure free and fair competition. I am not satisfied that it is wise or necessary to increase the number of trading rules. It seems to me that in almost every case where the State provides trading rules it will be impossible to avoid some restrictions and that where existing trade associations exist without rules and everything is open and above board it would be better to leave them alone.

I am president of an association of manufacturers. The members consult together on various matters and provide collective information for Government Departments but there is absolutely free competition amongst them and they compete not only in price but also in value and in methods of distribution. Each member can decide what he considers the best and cheapest way of selling his goods. Each manufacturer can decide for himself as to whether he will sell through the wholesaler or whether he will sell direct to the retailer. He can have special branded goods with a fixed selling price or not. It is all a matter for individual judgment and each member decides his own policy. I believe that in the case of an association of that kind, where there is, as can quite easily be proved, complete freedom and where there is fair competition, it would be no advantage whatever to have the State coming in and providing so-called fair trading rules. That, however, may be a matter of opinion.

I was rather hoping that the Minister when dealing with the Bill—I do not think he did it in the Dáil, but I did not read all the debate—might have given us a little more idea of what kind of fair trading rules he has in mind. I do not see any need for any such rules, unless and until there is evidence of a ring or of some type of collective agreement for the purpose of restricting competition. I am, and have always been, opposed to rings for the purpose of fixing prices or conditions of trade; but I am in favour of the maximum amount of freedom for the individual manufacturer to stand up against a ring or to fix his own conditions. If he makes a mistake, he will pay for it himself. It is only when you find collective agreements that I believe there is danger. I do not think it is very great in this country yet, but it is a potential danger. If there is a trade ring, which is thought to be exploiting the public I doubt if you are going to cure it by fair trading rules. If the Government are going to deal with it, it would be far better to have an inquiry and have it dealt with by an Order under Section 9 of the Bill.

When the Bill was introduced, it contained nothing to indicate what the Legislature regarded as a restrictive or unfair practice. Now it has a second Schedule which contains a list of what are described as unfair practices. I agree that this is an improvement, but, as it is not binding on the commission, its value is somewhat limited. One of the difficulties arising out of this list, is that almost every paragraph contains one or other of these words: "unreasonable", "unjustly", "unfairly", "without just cause", or similar words in regard to which there could be almost as many honest differences of opinion as there are qualifying words. I agree that it would be dangerous to have the Second Schedule without some such words. They may be to a certain extent a guide and I am drawing attention to them because I think they show that there could be the widest possible difference of opinion between people of experience and people who are equally honest and opposed to unfair practices. I suggest that what could be unfair and contrary to the public interest in one set of circumstances might be perfectly proper and desirable in a completely different set of circumstances. I rather gathered from the Minister's speech that he has come to the same conclusion.

Although the Bill has been amended, as I think, wisely, in order to include certain services connected with supply, it is mainly designed to deal with unfair practices in the distribution of goods. My contention, to put it briefly, is that, except where there is a monopoly, the individual manufacturer should be left quite free to decide how he will distribute his goods, and, subject to any State profits control, fix the price at which his goods will be sold, if he thinks it good policy to do so. It should be illegal to form rings or restrictive agreements without specific State sanction or approval.

In order to explain what is in my mind and to emphasise the difficulties which I see in any attempt to make fair trading rules, I propose to refer to some of the problems which have to be faced by a manufacturer in relation to the supply or distribution of his goods. One of the earliest questions for decision is whether to sell to wholesalers only or to sell direct to retailers. He may even decide in certain cases to sell direct to the consumer. In considering this question, he will have to have regard to the effect it may have on the price of his product to the consumer and the cost of distribution. If he sells through wholesalers only, he will save considerable distribution costs, but his price must be sufficient to allow the wholesaler a fair profit. He has to decide whether he will sell indiscriminately to anyone who claims to be a wholesaler, or whether he will set up certain conditions of sale.

There are many kinds of condition of sale which might be decided upon and I mention a few for the purpose of illustration. He might decide to insist on a minimum quantity for each order. He might demand that goods must be bought for cash or must be paid for within a specified time. He might possibly decide to limit the total number of wholesalers in order to avoid the expense of too many small orders. I am not arguing for or against any of these; I am merely pointing out the various problems that have to be faced. If the goods are branded and sold under special trade mark and if there is a price maintenance policy, it would probably be a condition that the wholesaler would sell only to retailers who would agree to sell at the fixed price.

All of these conditions might come under one or other of the paragraphs in the Second Schedule, but, if they came before the proposed commission, the main function of the commission would not be the ascertaining of the facts, which probably would not be in dispute, but how they would look on them in the light of the words "unfair,""unreasonable,""unjust" or "in the public interest." Therefore, it seems to me that the most important function of the commission will be that of giving an opinion. I do not think the facts will be difficult of ascertainment. If a manufacturer is to have no restrictions on sales he could easily have so many so-called wholesalers that the price would be inflated by too heavy distribution expenses on too small orders.

To have a limited number of wholesalers could, I suppose, be called a restrictive practice, but it would not be necessarily against the public interest. The circumstances which would vary in almost every case, would govern the decision. If that decision were the result of a combine of manufacturers, it could, I think, be very dangerous, and strong exception could be taken to it. If the decision is made by the individual manufacturer, the position is that if he makes a mistake he will pay for it and the danger to the public is practically nil.

If the manufacturer decides to go direct to the retailer, he will have a different set of problems. He will cut out the wholesalers' profit but will probably have much higher distribution charges to meet. In deciding to cut out wholesalers, he is clearly guilty of a restrictive practice.

Mr. Hearne

Why?

Mr. Douglas

It is a restrictive practice because he is restricting the number of traders by going direct to the retailer. My point is that nobody would claim that to be an objectionable practice, but, on the strict meaning of the word "restrictive," it is a restrictive practice.

Mr. Hearne

Restricted to wholesalers only.

Mr. Douglas

I am not objecting to the practice. I am talking about where a manufacturer cuts out the wholesaler and decides to go direct to the retailer. It is a practice to which nobody will object except, perhaps, the wholesaler. My case is that these are problems and in a group of manufacturers one should be free to do one thing and another. Each should be able to decide for himself without interference, and there is no danger so long as he is able to do so. I do not know whether the Minister considers that fair trading rules should deal with such matters as I have referred to, but I imagine it would be difficult to avoid dealing with them if you have fair trading rules.

The obvious object of each manufacturer will be to sell the largest quantity of goods at a price that will give him a fair profit. He will not restrict sales to anybody unless he thinks he has good reason. Paragraph (b) of subsection (1) of Section 9 appears to visualise the possibility of forcing a manufacturer or trader to sell goods to a person against his judgment. I rather hope that the Minister will deal with this aspect of the position when he is replying, because I think this is a matter that could be open to serious abuse. We all know that it is the practice of many firms to supply goods only to traders whom they have found to be good payers. I think it is essential to good business to maintain private judgment in the choice of customers where credit has to be given and whereas there might be exceptional circumstances in which a sale for cash might be insisted on, it would be wrong to force a sale for credit by the action of any commission set up by the State unless the State guaranteed payment.

Everyone with business experience knows that credit inquiries have to be secret and confidential. Goods are often refused for no other reason than that the result of inquiries is not regarded as satisfactory, but no trader could possibly give that as a reason because he might be subject to a libel action if he were to do anything of the kind. I think there should be something in the Bill to make it clear that in dealing with unfair practices there could be no forcing of sales.

If a manufacturer makes goods and finds he cannot sell them profitably, he should be perfectly free to cease making them. A strict reading of the provisions in the Bill will show that some of them are capable of the interpretation that he could be ordered to continue to supply. There is another reason, in addition to the question of credit, why a manufacturer sometimes refuses to accept an order, and that is because the manufacturer has reason to believe that the buyer intends to offer the goods to the public at a price below cost or at a price which does not allow a fair or a reasonable profit. There are certain traders who make a practice of selling certain goods at extremely low prices and making up for this by an extra profit on other goods. They are, of course, entitled to do so. Sometimes the price is at cost. Sometimes it is below cost, and sometimes it is at a small margin above cost. This is, I think, legitimate.

Mr. Hearne

Legitimate?

Mr. Douglas

Legal.

Mr. Hearne

It is legal.

Mr. Douglas

It is within the law and difficult to deal with, and may superficially appear to be to the benefit of the public. My opinion is that it may be completely misleading to say that it is to the benefit of the public. It may only be to the advantage of a very small percentage of the public who are fortunate enough to get a small number of goods at uneconomic prices at the expense of others less fortunate. Goods cannot be distributed without a profit. If goods are sold at a loss, the loss must be made up by profits on other goods. That is obvious.

At the present time the manufacturer can to some extent protect himself against the injury to his business which must occur if his goods are retailed at or below cost price. He can refuse to supply any more goods if he desires. If you remove from the manufacturer this right to refuse to sell his goods I suggest that you may leave the small manufacturer at the mercy of a large and powerful distributor. If the recognisable goods of a manufacturer are advertised and sold by a big retail distributor at or below cost no other firm will buy these goods as they cannot be sold at a profit.

In order to make my case clear I will quote one case of which I have some personal knowledge. A manufacturer brought out a new article and offered it to the wholesale trade. The manufacturer's price was 2/2. It was an article subject to marginal price control which meant that the wholesale maximum price was 2/6. The maximum retail price was 3/2. The manufacturer concerned received quite a good number of orders and one of the orders he received was for quite a good quantity from a very big firm. When the goods were supplied to this very big firm that firm advertised the article at 1/11 which was 10 per cent. below cost. The manufacturer then got protests from all over the place and many of the traders said: "Will you please cancel my order?" The manufacturer had to do so because whatever benefit there might be to one person selling below cost there could certainly be no benefit for a lot of people doing so. That was a case of which I had some personal knowledge. The result, of course, was a loss to the manufacturer but as the law stands he was able to protect himself for the future by simply not selling that type of goods again to the same big firm. I contend that that is a right which ought to be continued. It is a fair and reasonable restrictive practice, one which is essential for the smaller manufacturer.

That is not an isolated case. I have heard of many similar cases in England, of a much more serious nature. A good many years ago there was a case that I knew of. The information came to me from an Irish firm who were then buying from England goods which were not made here. This firm received a notice from a very large English firm to the effect that their prices had been suddenly reduced by I think 30 per cent. and that if they would give them a note of the stock they had they would get a credit note. A new manufacturer was offering goods at lower prices. The big firm in England considered they were justified in reducing prices drastically so as to kill competition by the new English manufacturer.

That was a case which occurred many years ago. In my opinion price cutting of itself is neither an evil nor a virtue. It depends almost entirely on the circumstances in which it occurs. It can be used to prevent fair competition. If a wealthy company can sell at a loss long enough it may very soon put its competitors out of business.

One of the matters upon which the commission is to report to the Minister, as provided in Section 8 of the Bill, is that of resale price maintenance. In my opinion resale price maintenance when carried out by a monopoly or operated by a ring so as to avoid competition is as a general rule undesirable and should be prohibited or at any rate prohibited only after it has been specifically approved by the Prices Commission or some other similar body. I am equally of the opinion that resale price maintenance by which the individual manufacturer of branded goods prescribes the price at which those goods are to be resold to the public is a good thing and not detrimental to the public interest provided there is no price agreement between manufacturers.

The maintenance of the resale price of a branded article produced by a manufacturer does not in any way interfere with the right of another manufacturer to produce a similar article at a different price. A retailer can sell competing goods under another brand at any price. There is a great deal to be said for the protection of quality and standard which the manufacturer must maintain in resale price maintenance. In other words if it is free I think it should be encouraged. It generally involves advertising a trade mark or brand at considerable expenditure. I think we should certainly help the manufacturer to defend himself against injury by unfair price-cutting. This is by no means unusual. It could easily happen that where a manufacturer has spent a great deal of money on a good product in advertising it and getting it established on the market he would find that an enterprising and wealthy distributor would then take unfair advantage of his advertising and destroy its effect by selling that branded article below cost. It might suit that distributor to cut the price below cost because it is so well known that he will get the benefit of the advertising. This could lead to greater reduced sales or the product might even go off the market. When an independent manufacturer decides on a resale price maintenance policy for branded goods he does so in order to establish a permanent trade by obtaining the confidence not only of the public but also of the wholesaler and the retailer.

Mr. Hearne

And is prepared to spend money to prove it.

Mr. Douglas

And if he does not spend money he is not likely to succeed.

Mr. Colgan

What about the people who have to buy the article?

Mr. Douglas

The people who are buying the article where there is a proper system of resale price maintenance should be buying it at a lower price than if they were getting it under indiscriminate distribution. If the price is not right, the article will soon go off the retail market. Where an individual manufacturer adopts a resale price maintenance policy, he does not give a high profit to the wholesalers or retailers. He cannot afford to do it because he is paying for heavy expenditure of money on advertising. In time, if he gets a big enough turnover, everybody is satisfied but if he fails to secure a large sale he will probably admit failure. If in the case of established articles which are of such good quality that they are being bought freely by the public an Order were to be made—of course, the Minister is not proposing anything of the kind and I am only dealing with the general problem in the Bill—making resale price maintenance illegal, then in many cases there would be such a drop in the sale of articles that the price would inevitably have to increase to enable the continuation of manufacture in greatly reduced quantities.

It is important for the independent manufacturer that the fixed wholesale and retail prices should not be set too high, because, if he sets these prices too high, he may fail to get bulk sale, and if he sells at too high a price and reaps a large profit, some other manufacturer will begin competing with him and produce a similar article at a lower price. No matter what Orders may be made I suggest that the Minister will have to exercise a considerable amount of care if he is not going to interfere with production.

My opinion is that, if this Bill is to be operated without injury to trade, it should be so operated that its main object should be to provide for healthy, adequate and fair competition, and not to assist unfair price-cutting or persons who wish to prevent ordered conditions in trade. The Minister could create easily in this country a condition in which manufacturers generally were forced to compete to produce the cheapest and the lowest quality article at the lowest possible price. That would not be in the public interest and, if you do not allow the reasonable amount of restriction necessary to maintain fair trading conditions, I think it will happen.

There is another matter to which I would like to draw the Minister's attention. It does not seem to me that it is in the Bill, though it may be implied. I think that the question of resale price maintenance should not be mixed up with unfair practices. There should be no implication that resale price maintenance is of itself an objectionable practice. When the commission reports that it is in operation it should specifically report to the Minister, and through him to the public, whether it is operated by individual manufacturers or whether the prices are fixed or enforced by collective agreements or by rings.

I would like to touch upon just another matter and it is one type of unfair practice which has grown up in certain distributive trades which is rather difficult to deal with. I am referring to advertisements which are calculated to mislead the readers. It would be very difficult to arrange, but it would not be any harm if every advertiser was liable to have to prove the truth of his advertisements before the fair trade commission.

Mr. Hearne

That is a revolution.

Mr. Douglas

I imagine that the Minister may say he would prefer somebody else to have charge of that Department. I have seen recently advertisements of rayon cloth described as linen and it is quite common to see cloth described as linen finished when it is nothing of the kind. That is probably illegal but it is not anybody's business to do anything about it. Speaking generally, I think the standard of advertising is very high. The vast majority of our Irish advertisers have a considerable regard for truth and accuracy and I would not like to give the impression that there is a lower standard than in other countries

There is one type of advertisement which appears to me to be undesirable. It is the type which advertises goods on which the margin of profit is controlled and reads something like this—"Usual price £5 19s. 6d., our price £3 9s. 6d." Everybody in the trade knows that a profit of £2 10s would not be permitted.

Mr. Colgan

What about the drapery trade?

Mr. Douglas

I am dealing with certain types of advertisements: you can apply my remarks as you will.

Mr. Hearne

The advertisements for pure wool are ones which get me always.

Mr. Douglas

I am not in the woollen trade: I had a note of wool but I passed it over and thought that I should deal with linen. It is quite common to have things described as pure wool and which the public think are all-wool, but, in fact, these articles are not all-wool. I could go on for a considerable length on that topic. However, I am suggesting that if we are going to have a fair trading commission a little attention might be paid to advertising which is an important factor in distribution and which certainly adds to the many difficulties relating to it.

Mr. Hearne

May I intervene to say this? The Senator said he did not want to be long-winded, but, with the possible exception of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who is here with us, I think that every member would like to have this debate carried on for as long as necessary.

Mr. Douglas

Thank you very much. It is a subject on which I am personally very much interested and have had a fair amount of experience. I was just referring to the type of advertisement which we see in newspapers and which suggests that the goods advertised were usually priced at almost twice the price quoted. We know perfectly well that marginal profit control is in force for most articles of clothing. There is something wrong if the difference between the usual price and the price at which the goods are offered is greater than the profit margin. Either the usual price is not correct or the goods are being sold below cost. If the goods are seconds or faulty the advertisement should say so. The result is that a wrong impression is given to the general public who obtain an entirely false idea of the profits permitted by the Government or taken in the trade by the normal distributors. The public know, of course, that from time to time goods which could not be sold at the usual prices may be sold subsequently at below cost price, but they also know that you cannot run a business by selling below cost for any length of time.

A short time ago I went through two advertisements containing a large number of goods the profits on which are controlled. I found that most of the articles contained in these advertisements were described as "usual price, so much; our price, so much". In the majority of cases the difference between the two prices exceeded the maximum permitted profit margin. On that I think comment is unnecessary. I mention the particular type of advertisement because I believe that it will be found that certain practices have grown up on the part of manufacturers and their distributors to protect themselves as far as they can against a certain type of unfair trading. I think, therefore, that advertising is something that might be taken into consideration if fair trading rules are being prepared.

Although I am criticising the Bill, in certain respects I am not opposing it. It has passed the Dáil and I agree that there is a demand for some measure to deal with unfair trade practices. I am not convinced, however, that this Bill provides the best method of dealing with the problem and I have not, as I have already stated, much faith in fair trading rules that will not have the force of law. I hope when the Bill becomes law that the trade generally will co-operate with the Department and the commission and give them the information which they require with the minimum amount of trouble. They should endeavour to work together. I would like to make it clear at the same time that I do not think it should be considered as unco-operative if a trade association whose members are perfectly free and which has no rules does not come and ask for a set of rules. Where there is free competition it is better that trade associations should be without rigid rules.

It is perfectly obvious to everyone that the success of this measure will depend on the personnel of the commission. I am, perhaps, biassed, but I doubt very much if anybody is fit to form a fair opinion of the various practices that have grown up in trade unless he has practical experience of business himself. It would be unwise for me to offer to throw the slightest doubt on lawyers as the most suitable persons for a commission of this kind. I think if the Minister does not get some member of the commission with experience, who has a knowledge of business, he will find it hard to get a reliable and unbiassed opinion. He is going to find it difficult to get the right persons, but I hope he will succeed.

One matter which causes me uneasiness is that the system set up in this Bill will leave a long period of uncertainty. The Minister has given very clearly the reasons for adopting this type of Bill. I have, not so clearly perhaps, indicated the reasons why I would much prefer the setting up of a commission to deal with rings or trading combinations. It would be better to have a commission to deal with that first and leave private trade alone and then endeavour to bring in a Bill based on the report. I believe it would be possible to have a commission to deal with rings and combinations and at the same time to have a report on the effect of what are commonly called trade union restrictive practices. The two things could be taken together and I would expect considerable agreement on what are unfair practices and what are not.

In the meantime, the system set up by the Minister leads to uncertainty. It would be difficult for any manufacturer to decide to adopt a new policy relating to the goods he is producing without knowing how far retail price maintenance will be permitted. In other words, it is going to be difficult for him to know what are and what are not going to be held to be unfair restrictive practices. In the meantime, we are going to have a period of uncertainty and it is a pity that it does not seem possible to find any way out of it. It has been said no decent trader would possibly be afraid unless he is adopting unfair practices. I regard that as nonsense. No decent trader operates what he believes to be unfair practices, but many people carry on practices which they believe fair but which the commission might consider to be unfair, and in the meantime there will be a period of uncertainty.

I hope when the Bill comes into operation that it will be accepted in a spirit of co-operation. I hope that the commission will not attempt to enforce the rules in regard to the production of documents, etc., too quickly or too readily. Every effort should be made to see that these things are done in the same spirit of understanding with which the Bill was introduced by the Minister here.

Mr. Summerfield

This is one of the most important Bills introduced into this House for many a day. At the outset, I want to make it clear, as Senator Douglas did, that important and responsible trade interests, in their criticism of this Bill, were not animated by hostility to it, but I would be failing in my duty if I did not criticise the Bill and deal with its possibilities rather than its probabilities.

The Bill proposes to confer certain powers on certain people. I want to make it clear to the Minister and to the House that in discussions on this Bill we must recognise the common interest of the State and in no case has there been any quarrel with the Minister in his decision to exterminate trade practices adversely affecting our economic system, practices which are unjust and unfair. Senator Douglas dealt with various aspects of the Bill and the setting up of a commission to consider what are unreasonable and unjust trade practices. Therefore, while that wide latitude exists and is going to be given into the hands of the commission we have to criticise the Bill here in this House and show some of the possible dangers in it and it is in that spirit that I am going to make my remarks now.

I hope no one will assume for a minute that I am quarrelling with the spirit animating the Minister in introducing the Bill. Indeed, I must pay this tribute to him, that he did invite and receive deputations from commercial interests—I was on some of them myself—and subsequently received amendments, some of which he accepted and, in fact, the Bill now is a considerable improvement on the original draft. But now I come to the criticism I have to make. It is sincere and echoes the fears of people whom I have some claims to represent. It is widely felt that this Bill will be a very costly experiment and will add even further dead-weight to the cost of Government at a time when we are told that taxation has reached its limit.

The Minister has told us that he is satisfied that he must have the Bill. I will accept that from him but again, dealing with possibilities rather than probabilities, I say that any study of the Bill will indicate that it could—I hope it will not—but it could undermine the whole commercial activities of the State. It is obviously discriminating in that it deals with alleged trade malpractices and does not deal with workers' trade unions and restrictive practices among the professional interests which, in my opinion, could be proved more obnoxious to the community than anything else that would be revealed by the investigations that could be carried out under the Bill.

The Bill is a leap in the dark because of the enormous and elastic powers it gives to a small body of men at present unknown and unidentified. Again, I am probably being provocative. I know that the Minister will endeavour to find the men best suited to the position, but they will have to be endowed with the wisdom of a dozen Solomons to carry out adequately the responsibility imposed on them by the Bill. The Bill is to give this commission power to suggest the imposition on the supply and distribution of goods in this country an entirely new set of trading conditions, out of line, I suggest, with those operating in the rest of the world.

Throughout the debate in the Dáil emphasis was placed on restrictive trade practices, limitations on discounts and supplies and so on. Every feature of commercial trading as dealt with by the Minister refers to established practices obtaining not alone here but throughout the civilised world. This Bill is going to give the commission power to suggest something entirely new and I have to express these fears and doubts about, in the first place, their ability and, in the second, their wisdom to do it. One of the many significant features of the Bill is that it is not to examine State controlled industrial activity in any way. It is well to remember that these State activities are in the main monopolies which since their inception have been permitted from time to time to increase their charges without any investigation into the reasons by the price commission or by anyone else. Look how that differs from the practice in ordinary competitive business in the State where a heavy scrutiny is carried out of the applicant for a price increase.

In his speech in the Dáil on the Second Stage the Minister stated, in Dáil Debates, Volume 134, No. 6, column 813:—

"The purpose of this Bill is to provide administrative machinery for the investigation of those trade practices and to do something about them if they are found to be inimical to the public welfare. When I use the term ‘public welfare' in that connection I mean practices which are designed to eliminate or restrict competition into the supply or distribution of any class of goods or which operate to deprive an individual citizen of the opportunity of engaging in legitimate trade in a particular class of goods."

Those are the words of the Minister. But we are entitled to ask are we to gather from this that when this Bill becomes law people, without qualifications of any kind, are to be permitted to enter any trade that they wish? I hope to prove that it is in the public interest that responsible trade associations shall be permitted to operate trading rules to ensure that where a particular trade has to give service to the public the people engaged in it must be properly qualified to do so. That is a reasonable statement, I think, but there is the possibility that the commission may not agree with my interpretation of the word "reasonable". "Free for all" trading without restrictions or qualifications would attract undesirable "spivs" and dabblers, without roots or responsibilities, whose earnings would never be known, or properly assessed, and whose operations would cripple properly established businesses, bring about bankruptcies galore and create havoc in the revenues of the State.

You have only to cast your minds back a few years to recall the operations of that type of trader during the black-market era. Native "spivs" were augmented by hordes of "gangway-jumpers" who crossed from the other side of the Channel. They operated from the slums of Dublin, and, dealing in scarce commodities, got prices three and four times higher than the legitimate established traders in the country charged, and that type took their ill-gotten gains out of the country when the opportunity to fleece the public no longer existed. It is to prevent competition from that type of trader that we have the various practices existing to-day. We say seriously that the stability of the State itself depends on the maintenance and strengthening of the established businesses in this country, which not only create employment, but contribute heavily to the revenue of the State. They have to have this degree of price maintenance, and certain other conditions of trade, in order to maintain them in their businesses and to protect them from the operations of the type of trader I have referred to.

In column 816 of the same Volume of Dáil Debates, No. 134, the Minister goes on to refer to: "... onerous conditions either as to dimensions of the trader's premises, the technical qualifications which he should possess or the staff that he should employ or simply by the imposition of unreasonable conditions or qualifications for trade discounts." Now, I am coming on the aggressive, not on the defensive. The motor trade is one of those trades in which it is necessary at present for entrants to have certain floor space, certain tool equipment and mechanical skill, before approval for trading discounts is granted by the Irish Motor Traders' Association, of which I am a past president, and I make no apology for those restrictions, and think they will commend themselves to any reasonable man.

I feel that they must commend themselves to any reasonable man. The only argument I have heard so far about them is that there is not free competition and that they arrogate to themselves power that rightly belongs to the State.

Before we laid down these conditions that a motor trader must have adequate space, adequate tools and adequate skill to cater for the maintenance of motor vehicles, a condition existed which was no credit to the country and which left a bad impression on the foreign tourists who brought their cars here. I refer to the past, when many motor traders had decrepit lean-to shacks, a few hammers and chisels, a few worn out spanners, and when they had mechanical skill only to the degree found necessary to drive the most popular type of car in use at that time. If the Irish Motor Traders' Association is to be put in the dock now because it has brought about a complete change in the position, and the country is now dotted with motor traders' premises that will compare favourably with those in other countries, then we gladly accept the responsibility for our actions.

This gives me an occasion to put the guilt for certain actions and alleged malpractices where it rightly belongs. It may come as news to this House and to the public generally that the Motor Traders' Association never controlled the erection of petrol pumps in this country nor the supply of petrol to them. I want that put down and I accept full responsibility for it. For a period the petrol companies consulted the Motor Traders' Association but when it suited them to go against our wishes as to who should get pumps and who should not they invariably did as they wished. We got rid of that position years ago and we notified the Government of the time and since that day they have not consulted us. All of these complaints hurled at the Minister, his staff, and various T.D.s and Senators about the motor traders denying Paddy Murphy or Mick Reilly a petrol pump were rightly chargeable to the petrol companies concerned. I hope we will never again have to defend ourselves about petrol pumps or petrol supplies, when we ourselves have nothing to do with it.

The Minister said, as given in Volume 134, column 816 of the Dáil Reports:—

"There is, however, the very important matter of resale price maintenance arrangements."

Now, I could devote a long time to this, but I will content myself with quoting the following extract from the Ironmongery Journal of October 1952:—

"Price maintenance has now been reinstated in 45 of the United States of America. This largely restores the position altered by the ruling of the United States Supreme Court, in 1951, that certain fair trade laws in some states were contrary to the Federal Anti-Trust Laws. The reinstatement came into effect during July when the President, Mr. Truman, signed the McGuire Fair Trade Bill, which permits manufacturers to establish retail selling prices by which retailers must abide even though they have not signed resale price agreements.

In signing the Bill, the President said it had value in eliminating certain unfair competitive practices and thereby would help small businessmen to stay in business. ‘Which I believe is a healthy thing for our economy and society,' he added. President Truman also urged Congress to make a thorough investigation of the field of price legislation including not only the fair trade laws, but the related problems of price discrimination and anti-trust policy.

Manufacturers and distributors as a whole welcome the Bill; but some of them point out that its success will largely depend on the thoroughness with which manufacturers enforce their price policy; and they feel that it should cover mail-order price cutters."

That is a policy that 45 of the United States of America enacted only a few months ago. Since that statement was published we have on the front page of the Irish Times of Friday, November 21st, 1952, the following quotation from the United States Experts' “Ibex” Report in so far as it refers to price control:—

"The heavy hand of Government controls has extended widely over all business operations in a manner that has tended to stifle private initiative. Price controls, exercised not as an emergency measure, but as a continuing instrument, have tended to become profit controls, justified not as a means of controlling inflation but on the ground that profits beyond a certain minimum are an evil that should be penalised regardless of whether they result from monopoly or from superior efficiency of operation in a fully competitive situation.

If Ireland elects to place major dependence upon socialist procedures, that is certainly within its own prerogative. But if it intends to depend importantly upon individual initiative, it cannot hope to be successful unless it is willing to allow sufficient differential returns to elicit extra profit, imagination and operating effectiveness."

That statement is definite and to the point, and I suggest the advice it contains is something we cannot ignore with impunity.

As long as we place our faith in private enterprise, what encouragement is there for any Irishman to invest his money and his talents in speculative industry here, while he is haunted by the fear of present and future Government interferences to a degree not known in other free democracies? I know no other free democracy where they put in such controls to muzzle the business of the State.

I have no doubt that some practices exist in the sale and distribution of goods here which no reasonable man would attempt to defend, and I am not going to do so. I feel that this Bill now before us can, perhaps, not unfairly, be described as "blanket" legislation and full of dangers.

I was a member of the special committee of the Associated Chambers of Commerce which, after an interview with the Minister, submitted a long list of suggested amendments to this Bill. In some small, but rather important details, the Minister accepted those suggestions, and again I want to thank him for that. In conclusion, I want to assure him that there is no hostility to his motives—Senator Douglas mentioned this also—but there is rather an anxiety, a fear of the unknown. If I could be satisfied about the fears we have of what is contained in this, the way the unknown personnel are going to interpret these qualifying adjectives that run through the Bill, then perhaps I could approve the Bill and give it full support as vehemently as I am criticising it now. I feel that we have a duty to fulfil when a Bill of the importance and scope of this one comes before us, and that we would be failing in our duty if we did not speak frankly and fairly and in no Party spirit, pointing out the dangers and the consequences of a Bill that we ourselves are going to help to become the law.

Mr. Colgan

It is about time someone got up to bid a word of welcome to the Bill. Senator Douglas and Senator Summerfield were much concerned about the effect it would have on the class they represent, but they seem to ignore the fact that the purpose of the Bill is to protect the general community or to help the general community to get what they want at a reasonable price.

The Minister used an expression which brought recollections to my mind, when he mentioned "in restraint of trade." Up to comparatively recent times that phrase was used only against the trade union movement. One of the reasons given for bludgeoning the trade union movement for almost a century was that they were "in restraint of trade." No one did anything "in restraint of trade" except the trade unions, until comparatively recently. A typical case of that kind was that of a branch official of one of the engineering unions in the sixties— that is not so long ago—who robbed the funds of the branch and was prosecuted. The decision of both the lower and the higher court was that he did a praiseworthy action in robbing the funds because, unions being illegal bodies and "in restraint of trade", everything one did against them was praiseworthy. That is a fact.

Senator Summerfield tried to make the point that the Minister should be more concerned about the alleged—and I use the word advisedly—restrictive practices of the trade unions than the obvious restrictive practices of the employing and distributing classes. The Minister mentioned various concerns in regard to which he was satisfied that certain restrictive practices operated, but every one of us knows that this thing is widespread, that it is nationwide and that, in every direction, there is a conspiracy—I use that word advisedly—to keep up the price of articles to the man in the street, the consuming public.

The Minister said there was no legitimate power to compel these people to do the right thing. I suggest that they should have been prosecuted under the conspiracy laws, because when an association goes to a manufacturer and tells him not to supply goods to a particular man because he was selling at a lower price than the price they had fixed, it is a conspiracy and these people should have been prosecuted.

I understand, but I am not too sure about it, that a very vital commodity, so far as the farmers are concerned, fertilisers, is imported by a ring, a cartel or a combination. They import it and fix the price, and they also fix the people throughout the country who are allowed to sell these fertilisers. If that is not a restrictive practice, I do not know what is. There is a world-famous brewery in this city. I do not know anything about its products, thank God.

Mr. Hearne

Why "thank God"?

Mr. Colgan

The position is that, when that brewery was established, there were 28 other breweries in the city. Whether it was because of the good quality of their product or for other reasons, one by one they squeezed these competitors out, until now there is only one brewery left with them. They insist, and probably the quality of their product allows them to do so, that traders will sell no other product but theirs. They have insisted on that over the years and if that is not a restrictive practice, I do not know what is.

We had a case recently of a man in County Dublin who decided to sell goods at a certain price. A conspiracy was entered into between a certain association and all the people who were in a position to supply him with goods not to supply him with these goods. Small man as he was, this man brought the case to court, where he lost his case. The general public, however, are satisfied that that man was unfairly treated. That was an instance of a restrictive practice, deliberately keeping up the price of commodities to the poor people of County Dublin.

I was rather amused when I heard Senator Douglas talking about retail price maintenance. I could never understand—possibly Senator Douglas who, I believe, is in the drapery trade, can explain it to me—why, before Christmas, I will pay 6/6 for a pair of socks and on the 1st January get the same pair of socks for 3/6.

Mr. Douglas

I do not think the Senator comes to my shop.

Mr. Colgan

It is too far away from me. Then, there will be a sale in the middle of the summer and the same pair of socks will be down, possibly, to 2/6. I am not talking entirely about the 2/6 or 3/6 price, but if that article is sold at 6/6 before Christmas, obviously there is something crooked, something wrong, going on. I could never understand the ramifications of the drapery trade—how they could have so many articles in the windows which never seem to be sold.

Any man who is a member of a public body will appreciate what is going on in certain other directions. When we send out for tenders for coal, only one price comes back. No matter how many coal merchants we send out to, they are all the same. I am not saying a word against these men. I like to see men getting on in life, but it is not so very long since some of these men were going around with a horse and cart and bell. Many of them are now fairly wealthy men—and more power to them—but the point is that if they are getting their wealth by making profits out of the people who cannot afford to pay, there is something wrong.

The same thing applies to builders. The Dublin Corporation were about to build 200 houses some 18 months ago and tenders were sought. We got six tenders which were all fairly close together and three which were fairly low. There were hundreds of pounds in the difference—and only a pound or so in the difference between the top six— between the highest and the lowest. When we gave the contract to the lowest price man, he wrote in to say he was sorry but he had made a mistake. We then gave it to the next man but he could not carry out the contract and it was the same in the case of the third, so that we were driven back to the other six. To say the least of it, there was something shady there.

I welcome this Bill because I believe it is an honest effort, not to help the distributors, the manufacturers or the salesmen, or to injure them, but to ensure that the general public will get a fair crack of the whip, and that, when they have money to spend, they will be able to spend it where they will get the best and the cheapest article. That state of affairs has died out of commercial life in this city. In our young days, we knew half a dozen shops selling the same article at a different price. Now, no matter where you go, prices are maintained. The Minister has explained that, in the period of scarcity during the emergency, there was a necessity to fix prices and to see that they were maintained, but the distributors realised shortly afterwards, if not then, that they were on to a very good thing and they immediately set about restricting competition and ensuring retail price maintenance.

None of us is opposed to traders getting a legitimate profit. It is only natural that they should, but what we maintain is that the profits they are making at present are not legitimate. Senator Douglas said that no decent trader could be accused of carrying on a restrictive practice. I would not say that such a trader was an indecent trader but I would say that he was not an honest trader. There are plenty of people who are not decent or honest carrying on restrictive practices, and, as a matter of fact, the general policy, so far as I can see, is to get what they can if they can get away with it. That is the position the man in the street finds himself up against to-day. Ask the woman who goes in with her basket to buy things. She will tell you what the position is and she will complain that there is no variation of price anywhere.

With regard to the point Senator Douglas raised in respect of advertising, I have often wondered why people should be allowed to advertise something which is untrue, which is false and a fraud. People have inserted advertisements of articles for sale and obviously the articles as described could not possibly be the articles they described them to be. Why should not these people be proceeded against for dishonesty, for fraud, when they are selling articles under false pretences—and the drapery trade are the worst? The drapery trade has always been an enigma to me. I could never understand it.

Mr. Baxter

Go into it.

Mr. Hearne

The best thing the Senator could do is to go into it.

Mr. Colgan

They have goods they never sell seemingly, and prices on Christmas Eve which fall by half on 1st January, and at summer sales, autumn sales and spring sales, go to nothing, which, I admit, is a good thing.

Why should I go and buy a thing on a Christmas Eve for 6/6 if I can get the same article on New Year's Day for 3/6?

Mr. McGuire

Does the Senator suggest they should have a restrictive practice, keep the price high and not have sales?

Professor Hayes

Would the Senator tell me—I am very interested—something about the price of books in respect of which there is never a sale at all?

Mr. Colgan

I only happen to be a bookbinder who makes the books. I am the one who insists on a week's wages being given for a good job of work well done and decent conditions of labour. I sympathise with everybody in regard to the price they have to pay for books. The price does not go into the pockets of the printers or the bookbinders. I think I have been rather irrelevant.

Mr. Hearne

But very entertaining.

Mr. Colgan

I welcome the Bill. I think it is one of the most important Bills that ever came before the Seanad. From the point of view of the general public it is the finest Bill that has come here for many a long day.

Mr. McMullen

I would like to endorse most of the remarks that have been made by Senator Colgan. My approach to this Bill would be the approach of the ordinary person, as to whether there was a necessity for the Bill or not. If I were to be influenced by the talk of Senator Douglas or Senator Summerfield, I would come to the conclusion that there was no necessity for the Bill at all, but I recall that the Minister, in his opening speech, said that many strong representations were made to the Department about the problems with which the Bill proposes to deal.

I have got to make up my mind, as an ordinary and simple person, where the truth of this problem lies and I am constrained to side with the Minister and come down on the side of the Department that there have been many complaints on this score. I am satisfied that the Minister is not coming to the Seanad or the Dáil to introduce a measure for which there is no necessity. This is an extremely difficult problem. Certain aspects of the problem confront us as trade union administrators every day of the week and particularly did they confront us during the years of the emergency.

My concern about the matter is to ensure that the working class of the country and the general public are going to be charged reasonable prices. The trade union movement has grown in stature and I want to suggest that they have adopted an enlightened attitude towards economics and the country generally. Quite frequently in the interests of the economic state of the country they have been induced to accept wage increases less than if they stood on the strict increase they were entitled to as revealed by the cost of living.

To have any chance of getting the trade unionists of the country to adopt a reasonable attitude of that kind, we have got to be certain that every other section of the community is playing its part. It is not the desire of anyone I represent or of any fair minded person, I am sure, to adopt an unfair attitude towards traders or manufacturers. I have frequently been outspoken on this problem on the side of the manufacturers when I thought, in fact, that they were not being fairly treated but I am satisfied that there is a good deal of price fixing and it is price fixing that the people of this country are mainly concerned about and that those prices are fixed above what is a fair price on a justifiable economic level for the commodity.

It is the Minister's duty to ensure that the consuming public get fair play and fair treatment. We might ask ourselves the question: "What has a fair trader to fear from this measure?" I do not think he has anything to apprehend whatever. Senator Douglas, in particular, made great play with the fair trade commission, and one would almost have concluded, listening to Senator Douglas, that a number of people were going to be appointed to the fair trade commission who would not know anything about the problem, and whose treatment of manufacturers and suppliers would be unfair. I want to suggest that the Minister, being the reasonable man that he is, will appoint people to the fair trade commission who are competent to do this work and that the fair trader, therefore, has nothing to fear from the fair trade commission. The people who are indulging in unfair trade practices are the people who have got something to fear from it, and, in consequence, the fair trade commission would be entitled to deal with them.

It is an extremely difficult problem. Senator Douglas made some reference which was tantamount to saying that the State would interfere with industry.

Mr. Douglas

I never said anything of the kind.

Mr. McMullen

If I have misrepresented the Senator I apologise. Perhaps my hearing is not as good as it used to be. I made a note following on what I understood to be the Senator's observation, if it was made. I accept the statement of Senator Douglas that it was not made. That would be entirely wrong and false, because it is quite a simple, straightforward, bona fide arrangement which no one who engages in fair trade practice has got anything whatever to fear from. That being the position, it is the duty of the fair trade commission to ensure that the people will not be asked to pay anything more than fair prices for the commodities they buy. If the fair trade commission can do that, and if the Bill can bring about a state of affairs like that in the country, I think the Bill is entirely justified.

The Minister has been criticised because he did not attempt to define what these offences were. It is not so easy to define them. I notice that when the Bill was first introduced there was no attempt to define them. An amendment was accepted the effect of which was to attempt to define them without being in any way exhaustive at all. As a matter of fact, I would have preferred had there been no attempt whatever to define what restrictive trade practices were. I would have preferred to have left it to the fair trade commission to deal with this problem because, as the Minister pointed out, if you attempt categorically to define these problems anyone who wants to do it can always circumvent anything you may impose in the Bill for the purpose of preventing the operation of unfair trade practices. I think it would have been better if the entire problem had been left to the commission.

I welcome the Bill that has been introduced. I believe that under its terms the people will get fair treatment and that it is a real and honest attempt to ensure that there will be no excessive charges for the commodities produced in the country. If it ensures that, I think the Minister will have done a good day's work in introducing this measure.

Mr. Baxter

The Senator is quite an optimist.

Professor O'Brien

I intend to confine my criticism of this measure to one or two details. In common with other members of the Seanad, with the exception of Senator Summerfield, I welcome the Bill in its general scope.

I think it is an attempt to deal with a grievance and with something which is perhaps thought to be an even greater grievance than it is. As the Minister said, a great many restrictions grew up during the war and have not been removed. Since then there has been a growing feeling of exploitation amongst the consuming public and that is why I think the Bill is good as far as it goes.

The Minister was somewhat disarming in his introductory speech because he admitted the narrow scope of the Bill. It is no harm repeating very shortly the wide field of restrictionism that is outside the scope of the Bill. We hope these may be the subject of other Bills in the future. The Minister himself drew attention to the fact that the greatest cause of restrictionism is unwise protection. Furthermore, many public services and monopolies and public utilities in this State in their operation have, of course, restrictive practices which cannot be dealt with in this Bill.

I do not want to make more than passing mention of trade unions. The Minister has said that he intends to introduce legislation to deal with trade unions and I admit, at any rate, that these are a separate problem. Finally, there is the wide range of services, banking, insurance and the professions, where there may be possibilities and scope for a similar investigation.

Inside its somewhat narrow and restricted field, the Bill is quite a good one and no doubt will do good. I agree with the Minister that his approach is the correct one. I read the debate in the Dáil with considerable interest and have thought a good deal about the various ways in which this problem could be attacked.

It would have been possible to define in the Bill illegal restrictive practices but the difficulty here is one of getting water-tight definitions. Furthermore, it would be extremely easy for people with good legal advice to drive a coach-and-four through Acts of Parliament of that kind. I think the real objection in that method as compared with the one the Minister has used is that all restrictive practices are not necessarily injurious to the public. A great many restrictive practices, as the Minister, Senator Summerfield and Senator Douglas have emphasised, may actually benefit the public and a certain amount of discretion must be allowed in interpreting the nature of any particular trade practice. If there had been an attempt to define certain practices as being themselves illegal, it might get out of touch with public opinion and with the course of events. Therefore, I think that, in modern times, simply to condemn all large-scale operations or restrictions on competition or combination by traders as indiscriminately wrong would be a retrograde step and would deprive the public of many advantages which can only be derived from restrictive practices of organisations and combinations of one kind or another. The method used in the Bill, that is to set up a tribunal to decide what is fair and not fair, is realistic and a sound method of approach.

Having said that, I think it is necessary to say that the powers entrusted to the commission are, of course, very wide and very great and the commission has got a very responsible task before it. I think that two things should be defined in relation to the commission. One of these has been defined in the course of the passage of the Bill through the Dáil and the other still requires, in my opinion, to be defined. The terms of reference of the commission have been defined. The Bill originally introduced in the Dáil left the terms of reference vague— Senator McMullen is in favour of retaining that vagueness. I think there is a great deal to be said for giving the commission certain lines to guide it which it should follow, and for that reason I think the Bill was considerably improved in passing through the Committee Stage in the Dáil.

I know that the definition used in the Second Schedule is not meant to be exhaustive, but at the same time it does give to the commission some guidance regarding what they ought to and ought not to do. What is more important, it gives to the trading public some rough idea of the sort of practices which will be tolerated and the sort of practices which will not. In so far as the Bill has defined unfair practices or described them it has been improved. I think the Bill can be still further amended and improved by an ampler definition of the nature of the commission itself. The fair and unfair trade practices were left extremely vague under the original draft and the Bill has since improved in that regard. However, the nature, composition and qualification of the tribunal which is going to operate these great powers is still left extremely vague. My principal criticism of the Bill is that the tribunal has not been sufficiently defined. I would like to offer one or two observations regarding the type of tribunal that I think should operate the Bill.

In the first place, I suggest there should be at least one judicial member on the commission. At least one member of this commission, following the analogy of other commissions, should be a person of judicial status, tenure and qualification. There is a certain amount of analogy between the Land Commission and this fair trading commission. The Land Commission was set up in 1881 with the principal function of fixing fair rents on land: it started without any definition of fair rent, so that a few years later it was necessary for Parliament to give some sort of lead to the commission on what were the standards to be observed in fixing fair rents. The Land Commission, however, did enjoy the services of a judge, the judicial commissioner. The result of having the judicial commissioner was to bring about in the Land Commission a certain continuity of policy in the interpretation of Acts which was in many cases an advantage.

The First Schedule of this Bill gives a great deal of information regarding the fair trading commission and tells us almost everything about it except one thing about which I would like to know. Who are the people on the commission to be? I do not expect that the Bill should actually name them, but I would like some sort of idea in the Bill as to what sort of people are going to comprise the commission. There is nothing whatsoever to define the type of person that should be appointed on this commission.

It is clear from the Schedule that the commission is in many ways to function as a court of law. It has a great many powers of a court of law, but there is one power which the court of law has which is not specifically mentioned in the Schedule. I suggest to the Minister that it might be well worth while to consider including it in the Bill before it is enacted. This is the power to award costs to organisations that are brought before this commission in a frivolous way. Section 7 of the Bill seems to me to contain something requiring explanation because it is not very clear. It seems to me that there is some contradiction between sub-section (1) and sub-section (5) of Section 7 of the Bill.

Sub-section (1) states clearly that the commission may, on their own initiative or at the request of the Minister, cause an inquiry to be held. It would appear from that that an inquiry can only be initiated by the commission on their own initiative or by the Minister, but sub-section (5) refers to the commission receiving requests from people to hold inquiries. So far as I can see, there is no inconsistency between these two subsections. The next part says that the commission can themselves decide not to hold an inquiry at the request of a member of the public, but if they do so decide they must inform the person who made the request the reasons for their decision not to hold the inquiry. That seems to me to give the right to the public to start the proceedings in motion. If a person requests the commission to hold an inquiry and if it refuses to do so, then it must give the reasons for its decision to the persons concerned.

It seems to me to be implicit in sub-section (5) that the machinery of the commission can be put into operation by a demand on the part of a member of the public. I do not think that that is the intention, but I suggest that it is possible so long as the section stands as it is. It seems to me that the machinery can be started in operation by any member of the public, and as long as that is the case there ought to be some way of penalising a person who makes a request for an inquiry frivolously or without sufficient grounds. The First Schedule to the Bill could give the commission power to award costs against a person who invokes the machinery of the commission frivolously or without sufficient cause.

I agree with a lot of what Senator Douglas has said about the desirability of having more than one member sitting on these inquiries and about private sittings but these are details which can be easily remedied. My principal difficulty is that the powers given to the commission are not only extremely wide but still extremely vague and when one comes to the Second Schedule to the Bill one is impressed by the number of reservations, adjectives and adverbs which really in some ways make the whole Schedule extremely vague almost to the point of being meaningless. I do not wish to waste the time of the House going through the whole Schedule but as Senator Douglas has stated we have such phrases as "unnecessarily limit", "unjustly", "unfairly", "contrary to public interest", "without just cause", etc.

It seems to me that anybody attempting to interpret that Schedule would have considerable difficulty in interpreting it. They are asked firstly to get the facts like a jury, they are then asked to pronounce on the law like a judge, and they are also asked to pronounce on matters like what is reasonable, what is just and what is contrary to public policy and above all what is not in accordance with the principles of social justice. A Solon or a Solomon or a combination of both might be able to carry out that Schedule with a certain amount of success. I think it would require a person with a practical knowledge of business and accountancy and of law and I think also of economic theory and even for him it would be extremely difficult. If you could get a man qualified in all sections to interpret that extremely difficult Second Schedule in an entirely satisfactory way it would be an achievement. These are not administrative decisions that have to be made; they are essentially judicial and for that reason I suggest that one member of the commission at least should be a person of judicial standing who would be irremovable from office.

There is just one other small matter to which I wish to refer. It is something to which I have referred in this House before. I do not apologise for referring to it again because I think that it is very important from the constitutional point of view. That is that there will be other members of the commission, even if my suggestion of the appointment of a permanent judge as chairman is adopted, who will be acting in a part time, half time or temporary capacity. It is important that every member of the commission should of course be properly qualified and there are no positive qualifications provided for in connection with the Bill. I have no doubt that the Minister will appoint excellent men but at the same time this Bill when it becomes law will be on the Statute Book and every future Minister will be able to decide on the persons who will act on the commission. While it is not likely, there is always a possibility of a Minister using the commission for his own purposes by appointing his own personnel. That is why I think the nature of the personnel should be defined in the same way as the nature of the restrictive trade practices is defined in the Second Schedule.

When I look at the First Schedule dealing with the personnel of the commission I find no limitations whatever. There are no qualifications set out and a person need not even be an Irish national, need not have any particular qualifications, need have no legal training nor accountancy training to be appointed. There are three classes of people and three only considered unfit to sit on the tribunal, namely, convicted criminals, adjudicated bankrupts and members of the Dáil and Seanad. This is a matter to which I have previously referred. I feel strongly that this exclusion of members of the Dáil and Seanad from quasi-State bodies and public bodies of this kind is a matter requiring justification. I can see arguments in favour of it, but I cannot see any justification for it.

I suggest that it is not self evidently right and in fact I suggest that a great deal could be said to show that it is wrong. I do not want to belaud the British Parliament but I suggest that every student of politics in almost every country agrees that the success of the English Parliamentary system depends on the fact that its Members of Parliament are drawn from the general community of businessmen, bankers, land holders and professional men and that they are not professional politicians. In modern times, with the growth of public bodies, I think from the public point of view that persons capable of taking part in these bodies are capable of taking part in public legislation. Parliamentary draftsmen almost automatically exclude from such bodies members of the Dáil and Seanad.

I can see arguments for it in certain cases. It seems to me in this country overdone. I think that some case should be made. I think it is only fair to the Dáil and the Seanad that the Minister should give some reason why members of these Houses are not qualified to act as part-time members of the fair trade commission when it is set up. I feel strongly about it and one of the reasons is this: if this principle is extended beyond a certain point it is only a matter of time before university professors are excluded with the rest.

Mr. Hearne

That would be too bad.

Professor O'Brien

It might be a good thing for the Legislature but not for professors. An attempt has been made already in Australia. A motion has been brought into the Australian Parliament excluding university professors on the ground that universities are in receipt of large sums out of public funds. I can see a similar measure being slipped in a Schedule to some Bill in this country, but as long as I am privileged to be a member of the House it will not slip through. I do quite seriously ask the Minister to reconsider that from the constitutional point of view. Is it a good thing for the country to breed a class of professional politicians, members of the Dáil and Seanad, who would not be considered fit to do anything but legislate? I do not think it will lead to a healthy Legislature. It is a dangerous development.

To criticise the Bill on a matter of detail, it is fair to say that in its very nature the machinery is slow. But that is, of course, rather a good thing. It is a lesser evil than to abrogate parliamentary sovereignty completely. I congratulate the Minister in that he has not given the commission too great a discretionary power. All it can do is to make recommendations, and then he is expected—that is quite clear from a reading of the Bill—to act on its recommendation. If he does not intend to act on the commission's recommendation he must publicly state his reasons, so I take it that the normal course will be that the Minister will implement the recommendation of the commission. That takes time. If he is not going to follow the recommendation, there is a time limit during which he must make his report. If he is going to follow it there is no time limit. The commission may take some months to come to a decision and the Minister may then take months to make up his mind whether he is going to follow the recommendation or not. Unless he is not going to act he has unlimited time. I think all those delays are useful in the sense that they maintain the sovereignty of the Oireachtas, but they do provide people with an opportunity of mending their hand, of evading regulations and of driving a coach-and-four through Acts of Parliament.

I wonder if the Minister, as a mere drafting operation, could not reach a compromise between the extreme arbitrariness which might be given to the commission and the rather dangerous dilatoriness of the procedure envisaged at the moment in the Bill. Something could possibly be done to speed up the procedure without sacrificing too much in the way of parliamentary control. The Bill is a move in the right direction. The extension of Section 4 that enables people to have fair trading rules defined does enable business people to put their house in order and to make plans, knowing that what they do will not be afterwards challenged. The knowledge of the very existence of this Act, when it is passed, and the knowledge that machinery of this kind can be evoked against them will be a deterrent against any group of traders entering into anti-social activities or arrangements. I criticise the Bill in detail but commend it in principle and congratulate the Minister on its introduction.

Mr. McGuire

When Senator Douglas spoke to-day and suggested that the Bill should be called the Unfair Trading Practices Bill he made a very wise point, and it is a pity that it was not used in the beginning. It would have avoided a lot of confusion in the debates both in the Dáil and in this House. Everybody is in favour of eliminating unfair trading practices, but because this is called the Restrictive Trade Practices Bill it has happened here and in the other House that supporters of the Bill have confined themselves almost exclusively to enumerating restrictive practices and thereby apparently thought that they had made an unanswerable case for supporting the Bill. Senator Colgan told us of a lot of restrictive trade practices that he does not like, but I— and Senator Douglas, too, I am sure— could enumerate a lot more unfair practices than he could—all sorts of unfair practices both in this country and in every other country. I deplore these, and I think they should be dealt with and should not exist.

I think the Minister will agree that the business community have given this Bill a very close examination and have tried in every way to put up constructive suggestions, because we honestly do see in this Bill—as in other Bills in the past—some very undesirable features, and that is what we are addressing ourselves to. It is obviously unjust to allege that restrictive practices exist and then to brand everybody in business—simply because they have fixed prices or some other arrangement—to brand them as criminals. Senator McMullen asked what has any honest trader to fear from the Bill. But evidently he has not read it. Anybody is liable to be made the subject of the experimentation of the commission—because that is what the commission will be engaged in. The Minister has stated that the Bill is an experiment. The sponsors of the Bill have actually declared that the practices complained of are almost undefinable. We have, then, a Bill brought in to deal with something we cannot define. In most cases where people are brought to a court they are charged with something definite, but anybody may be brought up before this tribunal and tried on something that is not even defined. That is a reason why honest traders have reason to fear this Bill. That is the reason we feel that the whole matter should be defined in the Bill.

From the very beginning, when this Restrictive Practices Bill came on the tapis, in the Press and from the platform, anybody who dared to say that this measure had grave flaws was immediately dubbed as a protagonist of unfair practices. The Chamber of Commerce and many other groups and people were branded as a lot of wily people who were anxious to defend unfair practices and who were combining to get money unjustly out of the public.

Senator Douglas has covered the ground very fully and shown the objections to the Bill. There are principles involved which may affect other elements in the country, including the trade unions.

Mr. Colgan

That will not be anything new to trade unions.

Mr. McGuire

But if you were included in this Bill it would make you stand up and say exactly what I am saying and very much more strongly, perhaps. Any remarks I make are meant to be constructive and are in the general interest. I do not regard this Bill as a Party measure and I believe that it should not be treated in a Party way. The first thing wrong with it is its discriminatory character, especially because we are a country which is always talking about its private enterprise economy. The Stacy-May American Report on our economic condition, talking about the development of our economy, mentioned the inconsistent policies and practices that must be eliminated from labour, management and Government. It will be noted that there are three groups mentioned, but here when we are setting out to eliminate undesirable practices, where do we start? With one section of the community and one section only, the business community. In spite of the explanations we have had for the others not being included, I venture to say that the real reason for their exclusion is that it would be difficult to include them. The business community is the only group that the State can sit upon with impunity. My first objection, therefore, is that this Bill is discriminatory, in that it picks out one section of the community. We have had excuses why Government-controlled bodies cannot be brought into this Bill, why labour cannot be brought in. If it is not for all, why is it for one group only?

The second thing felt against the Bill is its obscurity. It is definitely and specifically directed to the business community, but we at least ask that we be told what is being directed at us, what are we charged with. They tell us that it is even impossible to say. In fact, Senator McMullen said they should not even have started to try to define its objects. We have no idea what the commission is going to do. We do not know what kind of a commission it will be—whether they will be politically-minded people, socialistically-minded people or communistically-minded people. This commission will go on for ever. It is not the people that Deputy Lemass will appoint that we think of, but who will be there in a few years' time. This tribunal will have unlimited powers under Section 3. The Schedule is only a sort of guide. Section 3 says that the Schedule shall not be regarded as exhaustive and shall not limit the commission in the exercise of its functions. Could any power be wider than that, and in the hands of a body which later on may consist of people who want completely to eliminate private enterprise?

We have been told from Yugoslavia by Marshal Tito that they are not preventing the Catholic Church from functioning there. Anyone who reads the Catholic papers knows that in Yugoslavia, although the law appears perfectly fair, the State has the power to put all sorts of taxes and restrictions on priests and it can thus indirectly make the working of the parishes impossible. Although to all outward appearances the Churches are open and functioning and to delegations sent from England and other countries there is the outward appearance of freedom of religious practice, all the time underhand methods are employed by the State which make the practice of religion impossible. In the same way, under this Bill, business could be made absolutely impossible. One may think I am exaggerating, but I am not. This Bill leaves wide open doors for unjustifiable State intrusion into business life.

We object, therefore, to the obscurity of this Bill and it has been worrying us; the fact that the Minister has been aware of its obscurity is shown by the way the Bill changed its complexion when going through the Dáil. Deputies began to try to define what the Bill aimed to eliminate and what exactly were undesirable restrictive practices. The Second Schedule which we now have in the Bill was an effort to do this. Even the proposer of the amendment which gave us this Schedule, Deputy Costello, admitted it was almost impossible to find a satisfactory definition. Indeed, this definition or this guide is so longwinded and so full of "ifs" and "ands" and "buts" that even from the commission's point of view it will be difficult to interpret that alone, not to say the things undefined and still outside it and brought in under Section 3.

Another thing the business community are against and against which there is a general feeling in the country is this growth of State bodies having control over the lives of the whole community and certain sections of the community. This is the third body we now have controlling the commercial community and the commercial community only. The I.D.A. was introduced a few years ago during the reign of the inter-Party Government; we have the Prices Advisory Body and now the fair trading commission—yet we are still told this is a free enterprise country. That is another one of the things we are afraid of.

We do not know the character of this commission, which will be worked by the State and will advise the Minister. Naturally, I will be told we can rely on the Minister, that he is a reliable man —he is—but this Minister is not going to live for ever, while the Bill will last for a long time. This is a thing we must never forget in this type of legislation. State control is now being introduced for a particularly good object, but it may be used for a different object by other people at a later time.

We should be careful that we do not consider this type of legislation on a purely temporary and expedient basis. We would do well to remember that we are doing things here that are going down to, and will affect, posterity, and that we have a duty to look forward as well as merely to get over the present situation. We must remember that legislation is of a permanent nature, something which goes beyond the present occasion and something which is projected into the future and may have disastrous consequences at a later date.

The business community is by nature inclined to look ahead and has been regarded as heavy-footed and non-progressive. The reason is that if you have business responsibility you cannot be taking jumps in the dark and doing things quickly just in order to be popular. Business people have to do unpopular things and be slow and conservative and they are often accused of defending a particular interest. One of the remarkable things in England at present—I have seen it myself—is that although no matter how much money a man earns he cannot have more than £5,000 a year. I have known people who were capable of earning hundreds of thousands of pounds, but who were confined by penal income taxation to the £5,000 income limit. However, they still continue to expand and extend their commercial interests, and when I asked them whether it would not be better for them to buy a yacht and play golf, they said: "We have been trained like this, to realise our duty to the community and build up business and to look to the future prosperity of our country." Business people here do not get the credit they deserve and there is not the high level of taxation that would make it obvious that we, too, have business people anxious to do their work well and with a sense of responsibility to the State.

There is a point which I might deal with on the Committee Stage but which it is no harm to mention now. Another thing we are frightened of is the extension of power. In the original Bill there was mention of the Civic Guards being entitled to examine books and the same provision was in another Bill some time ago. It has caused deep perturbation amongst the business community. I see that the words, "Civic Guard", have been withdrawn from the original draft of this Bill and we are now to have "an authorised person" appointed by the commission. This could still be a Civic Guard. There was a time when, in all of those Bills, we had "no one below the rank of superintendent". I suppose the reason why this wording has been eliminated is that if there were to be a superintendent to do all the things that have to be done nowadays there would be more superintendents than Guards. While that might be good for promotion in the Garda, it would not be very good for the taxpayer. This change is an indication of the growth of this practice of inspection by State officials of business operations. This work of inspection which has been put on the Gardaí is something which business people resent and it is something completely outside what the Gardaí were originally intended to do.

The Bill has been very well examined by Senator Douglas and I fully agree with everything he said. He has given very clear illustrations of the kind of difficulty the best commission in the world will run into. Some of these will have a very serious effect on business which is already suffering from a number of staggering blows. If this extra element of uncertainty is now to be introduced, it is not going to help. I have already had several people in with me—Englishmen and Irish representatives of firms—asking me for example about this question of fixed prices—which can be a very good thing in the maintenance of high standards of trading. I do not propose to explain this particular matter now because Senator Douglas has already done so, but there is already much perturbation about the effects of this Bill and I find people asking me about this Bill whom the Bill could not affect at all. The trouble, however, is that, if the measure is obscure to us here in the Seanad how much more obscure must it be to the man in the street. The ordinary people have some idea that it is going to bring down all prices and that there is a terrific conspiracy going on about which they knew nothing. That is all bad for business.

As I am on that point, let me say that it is also a bad thing to be continually feeding the idea that there is something wrong with business—with the people who have been successful in commercial life. This is another projection of the ideas of socialists and of pandering to the lowest and poorest elements in the community—the people who want to feel that anybody who succeeds does so only through chicanery and quick methods. That is wrong, because the vast majority of business people are decent people trying to do a decent job and to pay decent wages. I feel that this legislation would have been better left undone.

There has been a suggestion that the trade unions should be brought into it. My references to trade unions earlier on were on the question of discriminatory legislation, but I do not feel that the trade unions should have a Bill of this kind brought in against them. Any restrictive practices in the trade unions would be much better hammered out with the employers when both are looking for trade because the arbiter of whether people can operate an undesirable trade practice or not is the question of whether they can sell their goods. If you go too far with any restrictive practice business people will not be able to sell their goods. Unfair restrictive practices may succeed in time of war or in time of scarcity when there is plenty of demand, but if anybody goes into business to-day he will find it hard enough to sell goods at the cheapest prices rather than look for the dearest prices. That is the economic factor we are up against.

The Bill has gone too far now to hope that anything will happen to change or stop it, but I hope that everything will be done to make it work smoothly. If the approach is on the basis of the business community being given a fair crack of the whip, being given credit for goodwill and a desire to work well for the State and to do the right thing and not on the basis of the business community being put in the dock, and labelled "twisters" and "chancers"—the basis on which some of the Bill's supporters have argued— there is no hope of its working at all. It will become a dead letter and defeat itself. I plead that this should be worked in a spirit of friendly co-operation, that the business people should be approached in a friendly way. If that is done and if there is general goodwill, I feel that it can be made to work and I wish it every success.

Mr. P.F. O'Reilly

I cannot and do not receive this Bill with any great enthusiasm, and I must say that I remain unconvinced by the Minister that there is any case for it. We have heard outside the House and from the Minister in a general way that there are restrictive practices, in business, in trade generally and in the supply and distribution of goods. I know that there are such restrictive practices, but restrictive practices per se cannot be condemned as bad. Very frequently, restrictive practices inure to the benefit of the trader and the public generally, and in such cases restrictive practices should be permitted.

The Minister has told us in a very general way of complaints as to restrictive practices, but in order to receive support for the Bill he should have been more particular. If he had been, if he had the information on which to be more particular, he might perhaps have received a good deal more support. I am quite certain that if the Minister were to give to all the other letters of complaint which he receives from time to time the consideration he tells us he has given letters he has received on this subject, he would be a particularly busy man— infinitely more busy than he is to-day. If he were to give to all the other letters the consideration that apparently he has given to some, he would be doing nothing but introducing Bills.

I am not satisfied that he has made a case on these complaints of restrictive practices for this Bill. We hear in a very general way outside and inside the House complaints about restrictive practices, but I have not got any evidence to suggest that these restrictive practices are so bad or so extensive as to warrant the introduction of this Bill. I do not suggest that there are not in operation restrictive practices which do injure the public. I am certain there are, and I know of one or two, but possibly if we are to deal with them it is not by a measure of this kind that we should deal with them. We could have a more definite measure to deal with them.

Again, I object to the Bill because, once more, we are introducing legislation for the control of business generally. That will be the effect of the new legislation the Minister will have to bring in following his desire to have an Order confirmed. When a report is made by the commission, and the Minister makes an Order on it, the Minister will bring in a Bill to give legal effect to the Order to enable him to deal with people who offend against it. Because of that, we shall again be dealing with business generally by means of legislation and once more legislating as to how business should be run. The Bill to-day deals with the employers and their organisations in regard to restrictive practices. Tomorrow or the day after, the next body of people to be dealt with by a similar Bill will be the employees and their organisations. There can be no doubt about that, but I am against the measure really because, for one, the Minister, in my opinion, has not made any case for it and, secondly, the effect of this legislation will be to legislate once more to bring business generally under the control of statutes.

That is all wrong. It is going too far altogether, I think, in the intervention of business in this country. Business would be much better without this legislation. However, I must say that if we feel we should deal with restrictive trade practices and other matters of that kind the Minister is endeavouring to deal with them in an excellent way. I think that the legislation prepared by him, having regard to what he has in view, could not be better because the whole thing is in the nature of an experiment. He could not be expected to bring in a Bill to deal aptly with what he has in mind. The only way he can deal with the matter is by means of this commission.

This will be a most important commission. It must have the best available personnel and in this respect I share entirely the view of Senator O'Brien with this exception—under no circumstances should the Minister permit a member of the Oireachtas to be on any commission of this kind. We cannot be judges and litigants at the same time. Everything must not only be done right but must appear to be done right. On a commission of this kind the Minister should not have any member of the Oireachtas but he should, I think, have a person permanently appointed, with a particular status, to be completely independent of the Minister and of the Oireachtas except for stated reasons so that in the working of the commission we would have a chairman, at any rate, independent and free to act within the statute as he would think proper. I think that is most important.

In accordance with the Bill the Minister may appoint as a member of the commission any person he wishes. We know, Sir, that he will appoint, as far as he can, the best available men. I think there is a great deal to be said for what Senator O'Brien mentioned, a point which cannot be overstressed, that on the commission you should have a person of judicial status and independence. I will not say that such a person should be a High Court or a Circuit Court judge. Certainly, none of these gentlemen could be spared from the courts. Therefore, if a High Court or a Circuit Court judge would not be appointed specifically for the commission, a person with the independent status of a judicial commissioner should be appointed on the commission and other members of the commission might, perhaps, be defined as having certain qualifications.

I do not want to be too particular about this point, but I do think that the Bill should contain a provision that a member of the commission other than the chairman should be a civil servant holding a rank not lower than that of a principal officer. I dwell on this point because I think that, if we do not have a proper and very useful commission, the Bill will prove to be of very little assistance to us.

In regard to restrictive practices, I might mention that the Government is very particular to say in Section 16 that "This Act shall not apply to anything done in the exercise of statutory duty." I would like the Minister to tell us exactly what he has in mind by that. I think local authorities—county councils and such bodies—may not contract to purchase goods with any person or firm unless that firm is on a central purchasing list. Would the local authority not be acting in a restrictive way by saying: "No. We shall go to nobody, no trader or contractor, unless he is on this purchasing list"? Why should not the county councils go to a person outside that list?

Mr. Hartney

If they get it at the same price, they can.

Mr. P.F. O'Reilly

If that is so, that may be an answer to my point, but would the Minister tell us what he has in mind by the provision in Section 16, that the Act will not apply to anything done in the exercise of statutory duty?

Then there is the matter mentioned by Senator McGuire—the authorised officer. I quite appreciate that we must have such a person contemplated in the Bill as the authorised officer, but I would like if the Minister would provide in the Act that the authorised officer would be a person of a particular status, an official of the Department of Industry and Commerce of not less than a particular rank. I do not know what particular person the Minister has in mind for the post of authorised officer or officers. It may be that he would think a member of the Garda Síochána should be such an officer. I think it would be unwise to have such a person, but I would not see any objection to a person of a particular rank in the Department.

In regard to the fair trade commission, I think the position is quite clearly set out in the Bill. I think it is a reasonable effort to deal with what must be a difficult matter. The Minister must act in a certain way following the making of reports by the commission. In Section 9, sub-section (2) it is provided that the Minister may by Order revoke or amend an Order under sub-section (1). I do not know why that provision is in the Bill, because the Order will have no effect unless confirmed by the Oireachtas. The report will be made and the Minister may revoke or amend the Order, but if the Order cannot have any effect until it is given legislative status, I do not know why the Minister should consider that he might revoke or amend an Order.

There is one other small matter to which I might refer the Minister. It is contained in Section 8 of the First Schedule whereby the authorised officer may enter a premises. Further on it is provided that he may require the person who carries on a particular activity and any person employed in connection therewith to produce to the officer any information he may require. It might happen that a solicitor would be consulted in regard to a matter as to whether a firm was committing a breach of a fair trading regulation.

I would point out to the Minister that where a person such as a member of the firm consults a solicitor for advice, the solicitor is privileged by the common law to-day and may refuse to disclose any conversation or produce any books or documents which he has made in connection with the giving of advice. I would like an assurance from the Minister that it is not intended in any way to interfere with that privilege. Perhaps the Minister will tell me the section does not go far enough to interfere with that privilege. It is quite possible that, in thinking that it might, I am putting too wide an interpretation on it. I would like to have the Minister's view on the matter.

I feel—and I say this quite honestly and sincerely—that there is no necessity for this Bill. Whatever necessity there may have been for it two or three years ago has gone now. The old normal competition has been restored and normal trading conditions operate to ensure that we are not done any injustice.

However, the Bill, as prepared by the Minister, is the best way to deal with the problem which he thinks exists, particularly with regard to the safeguard we have, that in future legislation there will not be any fear whatever that serious injustice is done. I move the adjournment of the debate.

Debate adjourned.

The Seanad adjourned at 10 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, 12th March, 1953.