Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 15 Dec 1954

Vol. 44 No. 6

Wheat Prices—Motion.

Mr. Cogan

I move:—

That, having regard to the severe losses that wheat growers have suffered in the present year and in view of the importance of wheat-growing to our nation's economy, Seanad Éireann deeply deplores the Government's decision to reduce the price of wheat and strongly recommends that the matter be reconsidered and that the price for the 1955 wheat crop be not less than that paid for the 1954 crop.

Having regard to the rather complex matters with which we were dealing in the early part of the day, I may say that this is a very simple motion. Lest any non-agricultural Senators might be confused by any particular terms mentioned, I may say that the cut proposed by the Minister in regard to Irish-grown wheat amounts to £5 per ton, that is to say, the top price for wheat is being reduced from £33 to £28. It is no harm to mention in passing for the benefit also of non-agricultural Senators, that a barrel of wheat is one-eight of a ton, or 2½ cwt. or 20 stone. It is no harm to mention, as acres are frequently mentioned in the comparison of costings and so on, that as far as I am concerned in this discussion I will be dealing with statute acres. A great many farmers use the Irish acre in referring to such matters.

The drastic reduction in the price of wheat has come as a shock to the farming community. It is something for which they were entirely unprepared. It is true that over the past six months there has been poured into the daily provincial Press a stream of bilge calculated to misrepresent the wheat growers' position and prepare the way for a reduction in price. Nevertheless, I think most farmers assumed that the Minister and the Government would have sufficient consideration for the interests of agriculture and would not take this drastic step. Certainly it was felt that this step would not be taken by the Government without consultation, negotiation and agreement with responsible farmers' organisations. In every civilised agricultural country, drastic decisions on agricultural policy are not taken without first having consultation, negotiation and agreement with representative farmers' organisations. It is quite clear that no such agreements were reached here. The fact that the announcement of this severe reduction in the price of wheat was followed immediately by a storm of protest from all responsible farmers' organisations, is sufficient indication that those people were not consulted or, if consulted, their views were completely ignored.

I think there is another reason also why farmers felt that this step would not be taken. At the present time efforts are being made—and I think they will be successful—to establish a national farmers' union. It would have been a wise and prudent course for the Government to have awaited the establishment of that united agricultural organisation before taking this step. I think there is a general feeling throughout the country that agricultural policy should be kept out of Party politics.

Agricultural policy could be kept out of Party politics if there is a willingness on the part of whatever Government is in power to negotiate and consult with responsible non-political vocational farmers' organisations. I think the fact that we had a prospect of uniting agricultural organisations should have deterred the Minister from taking this step. I have referred to the campaign which has been waged in the daily and provincial Press to misrepresent the wheat growers' position. I think it is only necessary to say that that campaign in the main has been waged by people who have no interest in agriculture and very little knowledge of it. Few of them would know a buck rake from a puck goat, yet they take upon themselves to lecture not only to farmers but the community in regard to this particular matter.

Was any attempt made before this injustice was inflicted upon farmers to ascertain costings in regard to wheat growing? We know that fairly accurate costings are available in regard to sugar beet growing. They were arrived at mainly through the initiative of the managing director of the Irish Sugar Company, working in agreement with the representatives of the growers. As a result no one has dared so far to reduce the price paid over the last two years. The case that existed and was accepted in regard to beet, that costings have not fallen to any degree and therefore the price could not be reduced this year, must also be accepted in regard to wheat. The same factors operate—cost of labour, fertilisers and raw materials of that kind—so that in itself establishes the case for preserving the price of wheat at least for another year.

I have consulted not only with farmers but also with experts of the Department of Agriculture in regard to costs of producing wheat per acre. While I find a certain divergence of opinion in regard to the actual figures, I find that there is more or less agreement that the minimum cost of producing wheat would be somewhere in the region of £20 to £25 per acre—and that is a modest estimate. As we know, only in an exceptionally good year could we hope to secure more than one ton per acre, and as the top price for a ton for wheat under the Minister's new price is £28, it will be seen that the margin is very narrow. It certainly does not leave room for much speculation.

I have here some figures which were produced in the official organ of the Fine Gael Party, the Irish Independent. In an article entitled, “Down on the Farm”, written, I think, by a distinguished kinsman of the Minister's in the Irish Independent of 11th December, 1954, I quote:

"I have before me the accounts of a speculator in wheat growing. This man, who is not a farmer, had 40 statute acres of wheat on conacre last year, and this year at an average rent of £18 a statute acre. Here are the results:—

1953.

Costs—Total, £1,555.

Gross Return—£1,860.

Net Profit—£305.

1954

Costs (with extra labour, some drying, etc.)—£1,594.

Gross Return—£1,235.

Net Loss—£359."

This speculator is not an ordinary farmer, and you may take it his costs would be higher than those of an ordinary farmer.

Where that type of grower is concerned he is put out of business perhaps not by any action of the Minister but by weather conditions. Those are the type of people who came into wheat growing without prior knowledge which the ordinary farmer had and I think that their interest in it will be short-lived. There is no substantial profit in wheat growing either for the average farmer or the speculator. It is one of those operations which, like many other farming operations, if carried out with efficiency and industry, leave a narrow margin of profit to the producer. I think, therefore, it was very essential before taking any steps in regard to price fixing to make an investigation into costings. Such an investigation was not made and we have now an attack made upon the farmers, an attack which is deeply resented by every section of those engaged in agriculture. If this had been a normal year, if we had not experienced the bad weather conditions which we have experienced during the past week or two, but during the past six months, the Minister might have had a better hope of carrying out this attack on agriculture.

It is sometimes said by those who try to defend the Government's action that Fianna Fáil would have taken similar action if they had been in power. Fianna Fáil was in power in 1953 which, according to the records I have before me, was one of the best years for wheat growing. The yields, I think, in 1953 were on the whole somewhat higher than average. That year was reasonably favourable and if ever there was a good time for making a cut, it was in 1953. Nevertheless, Fianna Fáil in 1953 decided to continue the prices which had been in operation. It was only in the last week or two that those in authority—and by that I mean the Government and their advisers—became really aware of the abnormal weather conditions of this year, but farmers have been aware of them since last July. The hay making season was extremely bad, the harvesting operations were prolonged and expensive and to a great extent accompanied by considerable loss. There are very few farmers this year who have got away with less than 20 per cent. loss of their grain crops.

Some farmers and some good farmers have lost the greater portion of their grain. It is not only the very rich farmers who suffered losses; it is not only the people who used combines who suffered but many of the people who tried to operate by the old traditional method, the old fashioned way, if you like, of cutting with a reaper and binder and stooking and stacking, and going through all the operations have their corn in the fields and a very big portion may be written off as a complete loss.

It was in this particular year that the Minister and the Government decided in their wisdom to slash the price of wheat and to inflict a cut of at least 15 per cent. upon this most hard working section of the community. If a similar cut had been imposed upon those engaged in public employment and if a similar reduction had been introduced in regard to civil servants' salaries, agricultural wages and the remuneration of any other section of the community there would be a storm of protest that no Government could resist. Yet, these farmers have been called upon to make a sacrifice for no valid reason that can be put forward.

Can it be reasonably claimed that there is likely to be in the coming year any reduction in the cost of production of wheat growing? Can it be reasonably claimed that there is any likelihood that agricultural wages, for example, will be reduced in the coming year? I do not think so. Nobody expects that agricultural wages could be reduced in the coming year having regard to the fact that the cost of living has risen and is still steadily rising. Is it likely that the cost of fertilisers will be reduced in the coming year? All the indications are that the cost of fertilisers will increase.

The Minister, before he became Minister, was very eloquent in his denunciation of tariffs and taxes upon the raw materials of agriculture. Has he attempted since he came into office to remove all tariffs on fertilisers? Nothing in that respect has been done and nothing is likely to be done. The Minister's superior in the Government, the Tánaiste himself, has publicly announced that the fertiliser industry may expect that the protective tariffs on imported fertilisers will be rigidly maintained. I think that if the Minister came back with me on a fair day to Tinahely, where he spoke very eloquently on that subject, he would possibly be inclined to regret his words because he informed the farmers of Wicklow at that time that all duties on fertilisers would be abolished the moment he took office.

But there is another aspect of this question which cannot be forgotten or passed over, and it is that before taking office the Taoiseach gave the most solemn guarantee to the farmers of Ireland that the price of wheat which was then in operation would continue for five years. That guarantee was given over the radio. It was given far and wide on the public platforms throughout the country and was repeated with greater emphasis by the candidates standing for the Government Parties in the elections.

The farmers were told that under Fianna Fáil they had only a guarantee of the existing price for one year but that under Fine Gael and the inter-Party Government they would have a guarantee of the existing price for five years. I will read a public statement issued by the Fine Gael organisation in the constituency of Carlow-Kilkenny. It is only one of the hundreds that were issued:—

"Wheat: Fine Gael, in 1948, gave a five years' price guarantee for wheat. The price fixed for this season is in accord with that policy, and will be paid by Fine Gael. Fine Gael, as a Government, will give another five-year guarantee."

There you have a clear and emphatic promise to the farmers that that price——

Mr. Burke

That is a distortion of the facts.

Mr. Cogan

It is not.

Mr. Burke

Would the Senator read it again so that he might understand it?

Minister for Agriculture (Mr. Dillon)

Is fior duit.

Mr. Cogan

I am afraid that I am getting under the skins of some Senators. I should like if the Senators on the other side would keep a little cool and listen more attentively while I am reading this promise given by Fine Gael.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Would Senator Cogan state from what he is quoting and clear the air?

Mr. Cogan

This is a public election notice published in the Munster Express of the 14-5-1954. It is as follows:—

"Carlow-Kilkenny Constituency. The tillage farmer and his man and Fine Gael. Wheat: Fine Gael, in 1948, gave a five years' price guarantee for wheat. The price fixed for this season is in accord with that policy and will be paid by Fine Gael. Fine Gael, as a Government, will give another five-year guarantee. If this market was guaranteed to you, what would it be worth? Make sure it is. Vote Fine Gael. Crotty, Fielding, Hughes, 1, 2, 3.

Mr. Burke

What price?

Mr. Cogan

Now I can see all the people on the Fine Gael side trying to quibble out of that public announcement.

Mr. Dillon

Every word of it is correct.

Mr. Cogan

They guaranteed that the price of wheat would remain for five years. We had a repetition of the assertion that the wheat price was guaranteed for five years in 1948. What happened in 1948? The price of wheat, when the present Minister came into office in 1948, was £3 2s. 6d. and the Minister guaranteed to continue that price. That example of a five-year guarantee, having been quoted, this public announcement goes on to remind the farmers of that five-year guarantee and to use these words: "Fine Gael as a Government will give another five-year guarantee." Could anyone read any meaning into that promise except that the price of wheat would not be reduced for five years? That was the meaning that was intended to be read into the announcement, and that was the meaning that Fine Gael tried to induce farmers to take out of it.

I know myself that a number of farmers took that meaning out of it and went to the polls happily reassured that the price of wheat would not be reduced for five years. It is easy for legal gentlemen to make those kind of promises and then by a legal quibble get out of them, but the reasonable meaning to be drawn from those words is that the price would remain unchanged for five years. No amount of quibbling will convince the farmers that a swindle was not put over on them, that they were not deliberately misled by that promise, and that they were deliberately misled solely for opportunist Party purposes.

I have dealt with the failure of the Fine Gael Party. I am not including any other Party in this because I do not think they took any part in giving that guarantee. I am not so sure about other Parties, but certainly I am charging Fine Gael with breaking faith with the farmers. However, leaving all that aside—leaving aside the question of what Government or what Minister may be in power—viewing the matter purely from a national and economic standpoint, let us ask ourselves whether or not it is desirable to cut the price of wheat. I have pointed out that it is undesirable to do so this year on account of the weather conditions which we have experienced, but even if we had had better weather conditions, would it be desirable, in the national interest, to cut the price of wheat? What is the value of wheat to the nation? That is the important consideration. First of all, by growing at least two-thirds of our requirements here in Ireland, we safeguard the position of our people in times of emergency. We cannot be compelled to crawl upon our hands and knees to any outside power to beg for bread so long as our people are prepared and enabled to use the land of Ireland to grow wheat. There are individuals who will say that a sound insurance against an emergency would be to lay in a store of imported seed wheat and, if an emergency should strike this country, to set the farmers to work to grow the wheat. Does anybody think that that would be a practical proposition? No farmer would, for a moment, countenance it. It might appeal to the armchair economist—it might appeal to the man who does all his agricultural and economic calculations on sheets of clean paper—but it is not in accordance with realities.

In order to get two-thirds of our wheat requirements grown here, it is necessary to build up the wheat-growing organisation. You have got to have farmers with a knowledge of the technique of wheat-growing. You have to have the varieties of wheat suitable for this climate. You have to have the machinery for the sowing and harvesting of the crop. You cannot turn the vast grass ranches, overnight, into efficient wheat-growing areas. It is necessary that the organisation be built up and perfected. At the same time, you must have your mills prepared to accept Irish wheat and you must have the facilities for drying wheat. These things have all to be built up and perfected. That cannot be done unless we have a very substantial acreage all the time under wheat.

The Minister, I think, and his friends claim a good deal of credit for the manner in which our farmers have faced up to the problem of overcoming the appalling weather conditions we have experienced this year. However, he omitted to give full credit to his predecessor in office who had pushed forward the wheat-growing policy, enlarged the acreage and expanded the drying facilities out of all recognition. In the past three years, the facilities for drying wheat were increased by at least 50 per cent. That was done mainly at the insistence of the Minister's predecessor in office, and it was possible only because we had a definite, clear-cut and resolute wheat-growing policy. If we were to abandon wheat, and cutting the price is a step towards the abandonment of wheat, the whole machinery in the growing of wheat would fall into disuse—the mechanical assistance which farmers have for their tillage operations and the drying facilities in our mills. Then, in the event of an emergency we should find ourselves completely unprepared.

Remember that, from a national viewpoint, our agricultural industry is passing through a transition period. We are changing over from the old-fashioned methods of horse-drawn implements to mechanisation. Most farmers have modernised and reequipped their farms and they have done that at considerable expense to themselves. It would not have been possible for them to do so were it not for the fact that they had at least one crop for which there was a guaranteed price. Even at the present time, there are farmers who owe money in respect of the purchase of modern farm implements—tractors, combine harvesters, farm implements and the other equipment which is so essential in modern farming. The farmers are depending on a guaranteed price for at least one of their tillage crops—for a few years, anyhow—to enable them to clear off those debts and to recoup themselves, to some extent, for the expenditure involved in changing over to modern methods. Remember, modern methods are the best methods in agriculture, as they are in every other industry.

Wheat-growing contributes and has contributed more than anything else to improving the quality of our land. Land does not improve if it is left to nature. Land does not improve if it is left in permanent pasture. Very soon, the greater portion of the soil deteriorates. Every type of weed and of unprofitable grass develops in land that is left uncultivated. In order to get the maximum production from the land, cultivation is essential. A guaranteed price for at least one tillage crop is essential in order to carry out cultivation. Therefore, it will be seen that wheat-growing is linked up with progressive farming. That is why progressive farmers' organisations such as the Beet Growers' Association and Macra na Feirme and all those other organisations which cater for the young, progressive element in agriculture are so determined in demanding that the wheat-growing policy be continued and preserved.

The growing of wheat has advantages not only for the farmer but for all sections of the community. It brings about a considerable expenditure of money in rural areas. Money is expended in the local towns on the purchase of fertilisers, machinery, and so forth. Money is put into circulation in the local towns when the wheat is delivered to the mill. Additional men are employed on the farms in the growing of wheat. Additional men are employed on the transport of that wheat to the mill. Furthermore, as a result of the wheat-growing policy, we have the security which is enjoyed by the smaller mills throughout the length and breadth of the State. These small mills would be wiped out completely in three years if native wheat growing were abolished. If we depended entirely on imported wheat, we should have mills only at the big ports, and the small mills throughout the country which are giving much-needed employment would disappear. All these important factors hinge on wheat growing.

To-day, we are witnessing a deliberate attempt to bring wheat growing in this country to an end. We, in this Seanad, do not want to dictate to the Government but, for the very important reasons which I have mentioned, we should at least recommend that the Government reconsider their decision in this grave matter.

There is, of course, the other aspect of the question. Apart from the farmers' interest and apart from the workers' interest, there is the national interest in regard to the balance of payments. If we are to send out of this country £15,000,000 or £16,000,000 for imported wheat, if we are to depend upon other nations for our entire supply of wheat, from what source is that money to be found? Nobody can dispute the fact that we have to export the produce of two acres of Irish land under pasture in order to bring in the amount of wheat that we could grow here upon one acre. That fact will not be disputed and therefore is it sound economic policy to export the produce of two acres in order to get back into this country what we could grow on one acre?

There is no clash whatever between the growing of wheat and the growing of other crops. There is no conflict whatever between the growing of wheat and the live-stock industry. All can work in unity and harmony. Most of the alleged clashes in agriculture, in our economic system, are discovered, if you like, by those who have really no knowledge of the economic conditions in their practical effect. We can grow the total amount of wheat that it is necessary for us to grow and that is not 100 per cent. of our requirements. If we could grow at least two-thirds of our requirements, we would be doing quite well, and, by growing two-thirds of our requirements, we do not need to put more than 5 per cent., one-twentieth part, of our arable land under wheat. Does anyone seriously contend that the putting of one-twentieth of our arable land under wheat would in any way interfere with the cattle-raising industry, with the dairying industry, with the other branches of tillage farming which are so essential in their own way? Viewed from every conceivable angle, no case can be made for reducing the price of wheat and thereby seeking to bring to an end wheat growing in this State.

I hoped that, when the Minister came to make the case for the slashing of the price of wheat in the Dáil, he would make a reasonable case. He did nothing of the kind. Stripped of the patronising patter in which he usually indulges and the empty blather, there were two strong points.

Mr. Dillon

I miss the Senator's customary courtesy.

Mr. Cogan

I missed it, too, from the Minister, but there were two points which I thought he tried to make. I am going to deal with these and to deal with them seriously, and I am going to deal with them without any discourtesy to the Minister, I hope, and without any offence. I hope I will not hurt his feelings in any way.

The Minister made two points, the first of which was that there was a possibility of a surplus. This scare of a surplus has been held up to the public as something to put us off wheat growing. He also referred to speculators. I will deal with the more serious of these two points first, that is, the question of a surplus. We all acknowledge that a surplus would be a serious matter, if it were something that could reasonably be expected. No one in this State would like to have the nation in the position in which it would have to export a quantity of wheat. Nobody wants to do that and nobody, I think, intended that that should happen, but does anyone in this House at this time—whatever may have been the position when the Minister first made his decision—seriously think that there is likely to be anything like as much wheat grown next year as was grown this year, even at last year's price?

Does everyone not realise that the experience of weather conditions over the last year will result in at least a 20 per cent. cut in the acreage of wheat? Even if the price remained unchanged, that is absolutely certain. Men were encouraged by three fairly good wheat-growing years to expand acreage this year to an extent which they would not have attempted, if they had had the experience of the present year, and we may take it that at least a 20 per cent. cut in the acreage will occur in the coming year, even if the price were to remain at its present figure. One has only to travel through the country, leaving aside the terribly devastated areas under floods—to cross any tillage field at present, to realise that no agricultural operations can be carried out for a very long time, and in any case the depressing effect of last year will certainly cut the total acreage under tillage in the coming year, so that we may take it as a foregone conclusion that the acreage will be down in the coming year, even if there were no reduction whatever.

The Minister in connection with this in the Dáil tried to make the point that the Fianna Fáil Party were committed to some form of drastic restriction in wheat acreage. He quoted a governmental decision made last February that the target in this State would be 300,000 tons of dried wheat. He tried to make it appear to those who were not acquainted with the facts that 300,000 tons of wheat was a very small amount and that it would entail a very drastic cut in wheat acreage. In actual fact, it is probably the amount which we will secure from the very large acreage this year, and let us remember that the conditions this year were exceptional to such a degree that they are never likely to occur again.

It is true that in this year, 1954, farmers put under wheat an estimated acreage of 490,000 acres. That acreage, that large expansion, if you like, in acreage, was due to certain factors which are never likely to recur in this State. First of all, we had the decontrol of cattle in Britain, which had the effect of creating uncertainty among farmers as to the future of the cattle trade. Many farmers felt it would be a safer investment to go into wheat rather than speculate with cattle, because, as we know, anything could happen, or a number of farmers felt that anything could happen, if control of the meat trade was removed in Great Britain. Not only that, but at the time we had politicians who were then in opposition going through the country from fair to fair telling the farmers that the price of cattle was going to fall if Fianna Fáil remained in office, that the then Minister was so incompetent that he would not be able to negotiate a favourable trade agreement and that cattle prices would fall.

We had, in addition to that, the uncertainty in regard to barley prices. We know that in the previous year our then Minister for Agriculture secured a fair price for barley by placing certain restrictions on imported maize. There was a vile and a vicious attack on him for so doing, both in the Oireachtas and throughout the country and there was a feeling that much as he wished to maintain a price for the barley grower he would be unable to do it in 1954. That was another incentive to farmers to go over to wheat. In addition to that, we had a widespread whispering campaign, if you like, telling the farmers that 1954 would be the last year for wheat. Farmers were told that the wheat price would not be maintained after 1954. I suppose a number of farmers also had a certain fear in their minds that the present anti-wheat Minister would succeed in getting back into office and that the price would not continue.

All those factors operated to increase the acreage under wheat. If the price had remained unchanged, those factors would not operate again. We see, therefore, that if the Minister had negotiated and consulted with the farmers' organisations, if he had adopted their advice and had kept the price at the level of last year, there would have been a substantial reduction in the acreage, and there would be no possibility of a surplus. I think that the Estimate made by the former Minister for Agriculture, Deputy Thomas Walsh, that the target to be aimed at should be somewhere between 400,000 and 450,000 acres, was a reasonable one. It was one that was never likely to be exceeded, but even to go to the extreme and admit that after a couple of good years there would be the possibility of that acreage being exceeded, that there would be the possibility of more than 450,000 acres being grown, and in that way creating a difficulty for the Government, would it not have been better to have had the wheat grown under contract the same as beet and malting barley rather than to impose a cut?

A reasonable way of delimiting the acreage would be to let farmers sign a contract for whatever amount of wheat they thought they could grow. If the total acreage contracted for exceeded the requirements of 450,000 acres then limit the acreage. That could have been done without any difficulty. It is being done in regard to malting barley and beet and it creates no administrative problem of any kind. While it might not be necessary next year or the year after, if any circumstance arose in which it would be necessary, it would be a solution of the problem rather than a cutting of the price.

The Minister, in making a case against the wheat grower in the Dáil, fell back on another line of argument. He launched a fierce attack on what he called the speculator. Now as we all know the word "speculator" is what the yanks call "a hate word". It is a word used by unscrupulous politicians to whip up public opinion against particular individuals. We have the same use made of the words "Jew", "Freemason", "banker", and even of "politicians" and in regard to their collaborators; but having no case and being unable to make any case against the growing of wheat the Minister thought it would be a good thing to start a campaign against a small number of individuals. We know that Herr Hitler in Germany thought it a very good thing to attack the Jewish minority. Politicians in every country try that when they have no reasonable, moral or logical grounds for attacks and it very often works fairly well and even successfully.

As far as speculator in the ordinary sense of the word is concerned, the farmer who grows wheat and carries on farming is a speculator in the broad sense of the word. If you narrow it down, there are the men who take land by conacre. There are tens of thousands of farmers taking land for tillage by conacre every year, and I do not think it would be fair to describe any of them as speculators. Most of them are small farmers who have not sufficient land of their own; many of them are farmers' sons, with agricultural experience, who have not land and who take conacre in order to try and make a little profit for themselves. But even if you were to take the particular type of speculators mentioned by the Minister, non-farmers in the city, for instance, who took land by conacre, in the same way as the men to whom I have referred, for wheat growing, is there not some better way of dealing with such people, if such a thing is recognised as an abuse, than by cutting the price? Is it right or just to punish the small farmers throughout the length and breadth of the country because 2 or 3 per cent. of the wheat grown last year was grown under what might be known as an undesirable, or ranching system?

What is the real evil, if you like, in regard to large-scale wheat growing? The evil, of course, is the growing of wheat in the same land year after year. That is the only real evil. It is an evil and it is something that should not be encouraged by the Government. It is something which should be prevented. By the growing of wheat year after year in the same land you exhaust the fertility of that land and you introduce disease into it which will make it impossible for that soil to grow any cereal crop.

Mr. Hickey

Is there to be any limit to this discussion?

Mr. Hawkins

No.

Mr. Hickey

I have already read 76 pages, in the Dáil Debates, of the discussion that took place there on this question.

Mr. Quirke

It might be a good thing if the Senator had to read another 76 pages on the subject now. It might provide some education for a lot of the Senators.

Mr. Cogan

I sometimes feel sorry for people in the towns and cities who have no patience——

Mr. Burke

It is hard to be patient with gloom.

Mr. Cogan

——and do not want to hear the views of those who have knowledge of agricultural conditions.

Mr. Burke

It is abuse and not views.

Mr. Cogan

I do not know what is biting Senator Burke, but apparently he thinks that the farmers of the country ought to be penalised. He thinks that their incomes ought to be cut by 15 per cent. while those of every other section of the community are being greatly increased. That may appear to him to be a sound proposition.

Mr. Burke

I grow more wheat than the Senator does, and I have made a success of it.

An Cathaoirleach

I think it would be better if Senator Cogan were allowed to finish his speech.

Mr. Burke

I can make my wheat pay even with the rain coming down on it.

An Cathaoirleach

I have said that it would be better if Senator Cogan were allowed to continue his speech.

Mr. Cogan

I know that what I am saying may offend some people who have no interest in agriculture, no interest in the farmer or the farm worker, but it is essential that the case should be clearly stated for the wheat growers who are so essential to the nation. The Minister was trying to ride off on the plea that there was an objectionable practice which he called speculation. I am prepared to acknowledge that the growing of wheat successfully year after year on the same land——

An Cathaoirleach

The Senator has already said that on two occasions. He must not repeat himself.

Mr. Cogan

I was trying to say it when I was interrupted. Therefore, some measure should be taken to avoid that, but does anyone think that the cutting of the price is the best way to deal with it? Remember this, if you take the moneyed man, the non-farmer who takes land by conacre to grow wheat, who has plenty of money to put into it, it is not a cut in the price that is the most serious deterrent to that person. I think the weather conditions of the present year would probably deter that kind of operation much more effectively than any reduction in price, because anyone who introduces mass production into agriculture can manage perhaps to operate with a very much narrower margin of profit than the ordinary farmer and, therefore, the cutting of the price is not going to put an end to that undesirable practice. The most effective way, I would say, if that practice is to continue—and I hope it will not—would be to deal with it in the same way as beet, that is, on the contract system, under which every man is allotted a contract in proportion to the area of his holding. That is done in regard to beet and malting barley and it has been found effective and satisfactory. Therefore, neither on the grounds of a surplus nor on the ground that an undesirable farming practice has grown up on the guaranteed price, can this cut be justified. Since the reasons the Minister gave in the Dáil were fallacious, were fraudulent if you like, we are entitled to ask——

Professor Hayes

Did he say fraudulent? Sir, is not that a curious word to apply to proceedings in the other House. Perhaps the Senator does not understand it. Surely fraudulent is not an orderly word?

Mr. Cogan

I am not going to school to the Senator on the other side. Certainly, the reasons given could have no support in logic. There is no possibility or likelihood of a surplus within the coming year and as far as speculation is concerned it can be dealt with much more effectively than by a price cut. We are entitled to ask what were the real reasons for this slashing of the farmers' income. I would suggest that the real reason, the true reason why the Government decided that this £1,000,000 or £1,500,000 or £2,000,000 would have to be taken from the farmers of Ireland, was that they wanted the money, they wanted it desperately, they wanted it badly and they had to get it. That was the real reason and I do not think anyone can deny that. Money was required to meet commitments which were not provided for in the Budget, which the present Government decided upon—increased bonuses and salaries to civil servants and increased subsidies and, perhaps, also to meet the demand which is being made for increased allowances for members of the Oireachtas. All these demands have been put up to the Government. Some of them are being met and money must be found from some source. There was no source available but the poor unfortunate farmer and he has to pay this levy when he grows his wheat

That, I think, is the main reason, but of course, there is another reason which is perhaps an historic reason for the cut in the price of wheat. The Minister for Agriculture and the whole Fine Gael Party have campaigned against wheat growing down through the last 20 years, campaigned vigorously, viciously and ruthlessly. We are told that again and again, and I have listened to speeches made against the growing of wheat. Wheat, we were told, was a "cod," wheat was entirely undesirable and wheat and beet, we were told, even by the present Minister, would eventually go "up the spout." I think on one occasion the present Minister said: "God speed the day," calling upon the Almighty to assist him in such a nefarious policy. This old hate of wheat and the wheat grower has asserted itself as every reasonable person knew it would assert itself eventually. I am reminded of the words of the poet in this respect:

"I dread the drugged cup, not the open blow,

I dread the old hate in a new disguise."

The Minister approached wheat growing in a new disguise since he came into office. He pretended to be favourable, but when the opportunity arose he took advantage of it to slash the price, hoping that by so doing he would cut down the acreage and would send wheat growing into oblivion as he often promised he would do in the past. Here are his words on the 18th June, 1947.

A Senator

Quote some of your own words about Deputy Dr. Ryan when he was Minister for Agriculture.

Mr. Cogan

I am prepared to give the Senator in question all the time he likes to quote anything I have ever said on agricultural policy and I stand over every word of it. I am quoting from the Dáil Report of the 18th June, 1947:—

"I want to say again with emphasis that once wheat from abroad is available to this country I would not be found dead in a field of wheat on my land in this country because I know that that whole rotten fraud——

I notice the word "fraud" being used here—

"——in fact was invoked to permit the Rank interests and the other milling interests in this country to charge our people 30/- a cwt. for flour when they were selling it in Liverpool for 19/-. I will not have to worry because the wheat scheme is as dead as a door nail. Take off your compulsion to-morrow and see how much wheat will be grown."

The compulsion was taken off.

Mr. Dillon

Would the Senator oblige me with the reference?

Mr. Cogan

It is the Dáil Report of the 18th June, 1947 on the Vote for Agriculture. On the 9th July 1948, when the Minister was Minister for Agriculture, with all the responsibility of ministerial office on his shoulders, he said:

"I hold precisely the same views now as I have always held about growing wheat on Irish land in times of peace when supplies are available from other sources—in my judgment it is a ‘cod' and a waste of land."

Though the Minister has been absolutely consistent in this vendetta against wheat growing down through the years to the present day, I would ask the House not to be influenced by the fad or whim of a Minister who hates a particular crop. The average farmer, regardless of political views, is not prejudiced against any particular crop. He will grow any crop provided it gives him a reasonable profit. He is a practical man, and I ask the House to be practical in dealing with this matter. Judge the matter on these issues, regardless of what the Minister's personal feelings may be in regard to wheat; judge the matter in a logical way. If you do, I think you will be satisfied that it is desirable, at least for one year, that the price be continued. This motion only asks for the price to be effective for one year. It is desirable that this should be done, and in the course of the next year, perhaps, if the price remains unchanged, as I hope it will, that this House will recommend that it remain unchanged, and that the Minister will accept that recommendation. I hope that during the course of the next 12 months a national farmers' union will be established, and that that organisation will meet the Minister, and, by peaceful negotiation, arrive at an agreement in regard to wheat and other crops. There is no need to be deceived by the suggestions the Minister makes in regard to substitutes for wheat. There is no need to substitute any crop for wheat. Wheat growing can be continued at an acreage of between 400,000 acres and 450,000 acres. That crop is only one-twentieth of our total agricultural acreage, and we can grow in addition to wheat, oats, barley and potatoes. I hope there will be an increase in the acreage of these crops, and that we steadily push our tillage area up to approximately 3,000,000 acres, and that we will have a well-balanced agricultural economy based on fair play for the farmers, and for every particular commodity produced on the farm. Therefore, I ask the House to accept this motion.

Mr. Hartney

I formally second this motion. I will intervene in the debate at a later stage.

Professor O'Brien

I am included in the vocabulary of "hate" words in the mind of the mover of the motion because he talked about my being an armchair economist. Whether I am a very good economist or not I am obliged I think to plead guilty to that description. I hope to deal with this question in a very detached way. I am not going to discuss the particular terms of the motion because the actual price is one upon which I am unfit to express an opinion. When the motion was moved the whole question of the propriety of subsidising wheat growing was raised. I realise that the price this year will disappoint the farmers who naturally want to get as much as they can. Similarly perhaps it will disappoint the Minister for Finance who wants to give as little as he can. It is a matter for the Minister to disentangle himself as well as he can from the embarrassing legacy that has been left to him by his predecessors and by the election promises of his own Party, and to try to get back some sort of sanity in agriculture with the least cost to the taxpayer and to the land of the country.

The views which I am about to express I want to say are not a new point of view. I have had the misfortune of having to study this question in a professional capacity for over 30 years. The first time I had to tackle this question was at the Agricultural Commission which was reported in 1924. The whole question was then debated and the majority came down on the side of not subsidising any particular cereal crop. The matter was discussed in detail in the first committee on which members of the Fianna Fáil Party cooperated with the then Government in 1928, and again the majority of that committee recommended against subsidising wheat.

In the Dáil debate on wheat prices on 2nd December—I refer you to column 1557 in which Deputy Allen makes a reference to this. He said:—

"Down in the Library there is a document which should bring a blush of shame to the cheeks of anyone who reads it. There is a document down there published by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government at the expense of the taxpayers proving why wheat should not be grown here. Young Deputies in this House should go down to the Library and read that document."

I take it that the document he referred to was the report of the Economic Committee on wheat growing which sat in 1928. I would point out that that committee did not say that wheat should not be grown here. What the committee did say was that wheat should not be subsidised, which is a very different thing. The matter came up again in the Banking Commission of 1934-38. This commission which devoted considerable attention to Irish agriculture, expressed the view against artificial encouragement of cereal crops at the possible expense of other types of production. The circumstances in the '30s when the Banking Commission was sitting did to some extent, I think, justify the policy at that time. When the economic war was raging certain artificial support for agriculture may have been necessary. I would draw attention to the fact that the cereal policy of the Government in the '30s was one of raising the production of all cereal crops and not of one at the expense of the others.

On these separate occasions, I had the misfortune to devote a great deal of time to studying this question. I had no personal interest of any kind whatsoever, and studied it with detachment and objectivity. I came to the conclusion on those three occasions that wheat subsidies in peace-time in this country are not justified. The case for subsidising wheat in the '20s and '30s was based on slogans and false history. People seemed to believe that there was something mystical about wheat which was not present in other crops. For instance, such slogans as "The staff of life", "The food of the poor" were freely bandied about in those discussions and reference was made to self-sufficiency and remarks of that kind. A good deal of false history was invoked. It is true that since the time of the Famine there has been a fall in the area under wheat. The change is one which took place in other European countries as well. Actually I think that was a condition of the progress of the 19th century that Europe was getting some of its food cheaper from abroad and was turning over its own agriculture to the production of more profitable foodstuffs. As I said, that all belongs to the past.

The circumstances of the war, of course, brought about undoubtedly a different situation. From 1949 to 1955 any Government that was in power had the duty to try and grow as much wheat as possible at home. My objecttion to this motion and to the general thought behind it is that it is an attempt to continue a war-time policy in peace-time. The war has been over for nine years. We have disarmed in every direction. All our other war-time policies have been rejected and scrapped except the wheat policy. This security measure taken in war-time is still continued to-day.

Senator Cogan dealt with the question of wheat growing. I know it is a matter on which there is a difference of opinion, but I would like to give my reply to it at any rate. I quite admit that in case of war it is necessary to try to grow as much wheat as possible, but it is possible to expand wheat production in war-time without keeping up the wheat area in peace-time. It seems to me that the best way to ensure that wheat would be produced in war-time would be by keeping land in good heart and fertility during peace-time in order that it could be rapidly turned over to wheat. Secondly, it would be desirable to maintain a large supply of first-class seed wheat. Finally, we should encourage mechanisation, production and milling of other cereal crops. In that way all the land, the skill and the machinery would be available for a rapid turnover to wheat production if circumstances required it again.

For any country to continue its war-time policy in peace-time is an unhealthy policy to pursue. I always think that it is like a healthy man with an invalid's diet. When a man is sick, he has to keep to a certain diet. He has to limit himself and he has to avoid certain types of food, but for a strong healthy man to confine himself to an invalid's diet is the surest sign of a hypochondriac. If he does that long enough his natural health will be impaired. I suggest that turning over agriculture to one particular crop in this country prevents that country's natural healthy growth just as the healthy man who sticks to an invalid's diet does himself more harm than good. He undermines his constitution. A diet which is good for him in illness may be bad for him in health. That, generally speaking, is to my mind the case against wheat growing. The Minister in the Dáil debate on this subject put the matter so well that I would like to quote a few sentences from his speech because it seems to me to be the pith of the whole discussion. I quote from Volume 1523 of the Dáil Debates, dated 2nd December, 1954:—

"Do not let us forget that Ireland has 12,000,000 acres of arable land and the people who live on it and nothing else. It is that which is setting the standard of living for every individual in this country whether they live in town, city or countryside.... I must try, as my predecessor and his predecessor before him have done, to help the people who are living on the land of Ireland to get, not for themselves alone but for us all, the standard of living we enjoy and, more than that, the raw materials and the means to provide industrial employment for between 100,000 and 200,000 of our people who if they are thus employed must go elsewhere to seek a living. Bear this in mind, that if we fail to export agricultural produce profitably, it is not the farmer who will feel the first blast. When we have not the means to pay for the raw materials of industrial employment, the man who was thrown out of work in the cities and towns has no cottage to go home to where he would at least find milk, eggs and oatmeal to assist him over the lean period; he has nothing to go home to but his unemployment pay."

May I say with respect that that passage to my mind summarised the whole situation? The 12,000,000 acres of land must be employed with the maximum of intelligence and the minimum of waste. We must apply our minds to that 12,000,000 acres of land with the same ingenuity that an engineer approaches an engineering problem. We must use the land with the utmost efficiency in the sense that we get the maximum return with the minimum of effort.

The report of the Banking Commission was mainly concerned with financial problems but in the course of dealing with those financial problems it had to have regard to the balance of payments. The Banking Commission were very strongly of the opinion that this country should concentrate on the production of crops which it could export. A large amount of industry now requires materials from outside this country and unless agriculture is in a position to export in large quantities at competitive prices the whole superstructure of industry, as the Minister stated, would topple down. Therefore, from a purely general point of view and merely regarding the matter as an engineering problem, it seems to me that to try to deflect agricultural production into any artificial direction requires very strong justification.

I do not say that such a justification could not exist. I think it exists in war-time but in peace-time I do not think the case has been made for deflecting Irish agricultural production into the growing of wheat. To deflect it into wheat seems to me to require particular justification. I am not animated, as the mover of the motion suggested, by hatred of the crop but by a certain calm and objective study of the matter in which I have no personal interest of any kind whatsoever.

In the first place, it seems to me that the guaranteed price of wheat benefits only a very small minority of the farmers themselves. As far as I can understand, only one tenth of the farmers in this country derive any benefit from the high price of wheat. It seems to benefit minorities of farmers in every section of the country. The farmers who have a particular type of soil and who are situated in a particular part of the country derive a greater benefit than the farmers situated in a different way. The price definitely assists the large rather than the small farmer. A policy which is designed to encourage wheat growing is definitely a policy which is designed to assist the large and not the small farmer.

It leads, as the mover of the motion admitted, to over-cropping. Although he would not agree with me in this, it also leads to speculation and to the abuse of the subsidy by the conacre system. Incidentally, it has the effect of putting up the price of conacre land for other farmers who want to use it for other purposes.

The real objection is something that I mentioned before in connection with the policy of the 1930's. To subsidise any other cereal crop at the expense of others leads to the extraordinary situation that we have a surplus of one crop and a deficit of others, and that, at a time when wheat is produced in very large quantities, this country has to go outside its own shores in order to obtain its necessary supplies of oats and barley. The policy in the 1930's of encouraging all cereal crops at least prevented that extraordinary paradoxical situation.

In the commission in 1928, the question of employment was very seriously considered because one of the arguments in favour of subsidies was the employment it gave. If Senators, in the light of what I said earlier, could bring themselves to read this discussion which Deputy Allen seemed to think would make any decent Irishman blush, they would find interesting figures showing that the labour content of wheat is lower than that of any other crop. Therefore, from the point of view of giving employment, if that is to be the end of economic policy which, of course, is extremely doubtful, it is a bad crop. If a crop has to be subsidised for that purpose, almost any other crop would give more employment than wheat. Wheat is essentially a crop which can successfully be produced nowadays by mechanisation — and mechanisation requires imported fuel. In order to make the country independent of the outside world, what you would gain on wheat you would lose on fuel for tractors and other machines for the crop. That is an aspect of this question that must be borne in mind—that if there is likely to be an interruption in our supplies of imported wheat there is likely to be an interruption in our supplies of imported fuel.

The mover of the motion stated, at the end of his speech, that one of the objects of the Government in reducing the wheat subsidy is to save the expenditure of some public money. That does not seem to me to be a bad thing in itself: for a Government to try to save some expenditure is a very good thing. However, I should like to point out again to Senators that, if they could bear to read this document which had such a very bad effect on Deputy Allen, they would find there calculations regarding the expenditure of the same amount of money on agriculture in other directions.

The objection to spending money on wheat subsidy is not that it goes into the farmers' pockets but that it goes into the farmers' pockets for a purpose which is not nationally beneficial. The argument of that committee—the Economic Committee of 1928—was that the same amount of money spent on agriculture in a different way would bring about productive and lasting results; that the same amount of money spent on drainage, research, education, subsidies for credits, lime and other similar things, would build up productive activity in the country and would pay for itself in the long run. They pointed out that, by subsidising one particular crop, the subsidy has to be repeated year after year, and that if the subsidy is withdrawn the acreage automatically goes down. They thought, and I still think, that that is an unsatisfactory situation. As somebody said at the time, in what I consider a good metaphor, the difference between spending a certain amount of public money on agricultural research and on wheat subsidy is the difference between spending money on a perambulator and on a bath chair.

There is some hope that, some day, the occupant of the perambulator will be able to walk around by himself whereas we know that the person in the bath chair will have to be wheeled around to the end of his life. I suggest that the wheat subsidy is rather like the bath chair. The same amount of money spent on agriculture itself-not spent on other sections of the community—could bring about a rapidly-growing child which would soon be able to dispense with the artificial assistance. I want to make that point in particular because I know what will be said later in the course of this debate, that is, that I am a spokesman for urban interests; that I object to money being spent on agriculture and that, as the mover of the motion said, we all object to money going into the pockets of the farmers whereas we do not object to its going into the pockets of the civil servants or the pockets of other sections of the community.

That is why I want to emphasise that the Economic Committee of 1928 did not advocate not spending money on agriculture but, instead, advocated spending money on agriculture in a reproductive fashion—not in a mere deflective fashion—spending money not merely as a crutch but as an investment. Therefore, I do not base my objection to wheat on the ground that money is being spent on agriculture, but that it is being spent in a fashion that I, for one, would certainly consider rather wasteful.

I shall end this speech as I began it. I consider that the Minister has inherited a legacy from his predecessors and, indeed, from the election speeches of his own Party. He has promised a guaranteed price for wheat for some years, although the amount of the guarantee was never stated at the time of the election. The Government cannot be convicted of any breach of promise in this matter because a promise of a guarantee is not the same thing as a promise to continue a guarantee at any particular level. All they did was to promise to continue the guarantee. I hope that the Minister—with his courage, his vision, his foresight, his knowledge of agriculture and his inheritance of the great agricultural policy of the first Cumann na nGaedheal Government— will proceed as rapidly as he can, subject to legitimate expectations, to let agriculture go back to its natural line of development with the minimum cost to the Exchequer and the minimum damage to the soil of the country.

Mr. Dillon

I think the Seanad is greatly indebted to Senator Cogan for elucidating from Senator O'Brien the speech which he has just made. Personally, I am deeply indebted to Senator Cogan for providing the occasion on which Senator O'Brien saw fit to quote me at some length with approbation—for to be so quoted is fame indeed.

Now, I am obliged to say that I feel constrained to offer the Seanad an apology for being forced to rehash a debate that took place at some length in Dáil Éireann on the 2nd of this month. It is with a guilty conscience that I must tender to the Seanad substantially what I said in the Dáil, for I have heard no new issue raised, no new point made. However, the fact that the Seanad have invited me here to speak to them imposes on me the obligation of addressing to them virtually what I think, with great respect, they could much more conveniently have read at their leisure in the columns of the Official Report of Dáil Éireann, Volume 147, No. 10. However, since it is the pleasure of the Seanad that I should reiterate this debate to them, we have one and a half hours and I shall consume my modest portion of that period.

Senator O'Brien has referred to the labour content of wheat as a crop which, as he rightly said, was often advanced as a justification for the promotion of this crop. Yet when Deputy Moher was speaking in Dáil Éireann, as reported at column 1508 of the Official Report of the 2nd December last, he wished to be put on record as saying: "What I did say was that the combine was the solution to a very acute labour problem—a very acute labour problem—in the grain-growing areas." To that I replied:—

"It is the old story of whether the hen comes before the egg or the egg comes before the hen. I think what Deputy Moher, in any case, says is that when there are very few labourers on the land the combine is a great blessing for the farmer who is without labourers on his land. Is not that so? I remember the time when I used to be told that the wheat policy was designed to multiply the number of agricultural workers employed on the land. You pays your money and you takes your choice. I hope I do Deputy Moher no injustice, but it seems that when it suits Deputy Moher to say at the cross-roads that he is urging the employment of more and more men on the land and that the policy he advocates of 82/6 a barrel for wheat is designed to employ men on the land, that is scarcely consistent with the proposition so resonantly put forward by him to-day, that the combine is the most valuable instrument available to a farmer who has the fewest labourers on the land."

The next point that was raised was how did the Fianna Fáil Government —who, it is now universally agreed, proposed to limit the acreage of wheat to an acreage that would produce approximately 300,000 tons of dried wheat on the mill floor—propose to do it.

How did they propose to do it? All are agreed that they were wrong in doing it. How did they propose to do it? I cannot get any supporter of the Fianna Fáil Government to answer that question to me. There are only two ways in which they could have done it. One was to ration the acreage. Now, I ask Fianna Fáil Senators here to tell the Seanad before the debate is over did they propose to recruit again what was so poetically described by their own Minister for Agriculture as five fields of inspectors and the Civic Guards to go out and inspect every farm in Ireland and to point out to each farmer: "You will be allowed to grow a rood of wheat; you will be allowed to grow an acre of wheat; and you will be allowed to grow 100 acres of wheat"? If it was not their intention to measure up the land of every farm in Ireland, how did they propose to keep the acreage down?

It is suggested that the adverse weather this season would have deterred a great many farmers from growing it next season, but surely the argument that is made here is that it is a cruel hardship not to give the men who suffered under the adverse harvest this year a chance to get their money back next year, and I can assure the Seanad that, when I have read to them a list of acreages set in wheat in a variety of farms not far from this city by optimists this year, they will realise that, if the present price of 82/6 was maintained for wheat, the number of persons engaged in that type of agriculture would have doubled, trebled and quadrupled next year.

I cannot dismiss from my mind the belief that the case being made by members of the Fianna Fáil Party in the Dáil and now in the Seanad is that the men who did not get away with the swag this year ought to be given a chance to get it back next year and that it is a most cruel thing to rob them of that chance after they have suffered from adverse weather conditions in 1954.

I should like to give the Seanad—it is my duty to give the Seanad—certain statistics relating to the speculation that went on in wheat this year, but I want to give them in this context: I want to suggest to the Seanad that the right test of a policy is its results and that is the only legitimate test of a policy. Now, what did the policy of paying 82/6 a barrel for wheat result in for all of us to see? We are now in the month of December and we have in store a very large quantity of very poor quality wheat. We have no oats and we have no barley, and I am obliged to license the import of oats from Scotland and I am obliged to license the import of barley from Iraq. Is that a desirable result of policy? Does that result commend the policy that evoked that result to the Seanad?

I want also to demonstrate the type of wheat culture that evolved as a result of the price fixed for wheat, and, remember, this emerged—what I am about to describe—in a year in which we have no oats and no barley in the month of December. In County Dublin, three individuals harvested 1,000 acres of wheat each and of that at least 60 per cent. was conacre land. Senators might remember that, with a fixed price of 82/6 per barrel for wheat, that represents a subsidy of approximately £8 per acre, so that these three gentlemen got away with £24,000 of subsidy on their 3,000 acres of wheat. In the same County of Dublin, three other individuals had each between 500 and 1,000 acres under wheat. In addition, there were 16 persons in the County Dublin with between 100 and 500 acres of wheat. In the County Kildare, we had one grower with between 500 and 1,000 acres; and we had 24 individuals in County Kildare with between 100 and 500 acres of wheat. In Meath, we had one combine who had between 500 and 1,000 acres and we had 11 with between 100 and 500 acres. In Kilkenny, we had 23 individuals with between 100 and 500 acres of wheat; in Tipperary, five; and in Carlow, eight. Does anyone consider that that kind of farming is a contribution to prosperity or to anything else that is desirable? I do not think it is.

Mr. S. Hayes

Would the Minister give us the townlands and the names of those people in Tipperary or in the other counties?

Mr. Dillon

I have them all here, Senator, but I question the propriety of reading out the names of persons who did what was perfectly legitimate and what they were, in fact, encouraged by the Government of the day to do. I am not indicting the individuals who did this; I am indicting the Government who urged them to do it; but if a Government urges people to do something which, in the judgment of the community is monstrous, you blame the Government and not the individual, and I do not think it would be a fair thing to hold up to public odium, for that is what would fall upon them, the names of individuals who sought guidance from the Fianna Fáil Government and who, having got that guidance and direction, acted upon it. Am I not right in saying that, if there be odium to bear, let the Government that persuaded these individuals to do this thing bear the odium and do not visit it on those who carried out the advice tendered to them by their own Government of the day? I do not think the Seanad will think me unfair in adopting that attitude, though, God knows, there are few in this category to whom I am indebted, in any sense of the word.

Mr. S. Hayes

Is it not surprising that the Minister for Lands would not indict them or try to get after them in respect of this land they are abusing?

Mr. Dillon

To-morrow is a new day, Senator.

Mr. Tunney

It is conacre land.

Mr. Burke

It is conacre, Senator.

Mr. Dillon

Sixty per cent. of it was conacre, but we do not like landlords in this country—we never have—and I have not any doubt that the Irish Land Commission will wish to know who is it sets his land perennially and will inquire into whether such land may not profitably be placed in the hands of those who are prepared to labour it themselves.

I put, in competition with the policy which has evoked these surprising results, the policy on which I hope to proceed. But, before doing that, I want to turn to a matter which was mentioned by Senator O'Brien. The plain fact is that I find myself in entire agreement with all that Senator O'Brien has said, and if anyone does not like that they can lump it. I think the Senator will sympathise with me in this: that while certain economic facts are inescapable, it is the duty of a democratic Government to have regard, in its administration of public affairs, to considerations other than those strictly economic. I have ventured the proposition before, that the true test of democratic Government is not the size of its majority but that its title deeds to the description "democratic" are its solicitude and honest care for the rights of the minority which it is called to govern.

Now, it is an inescapable fact, as Senator O'Brien has said, that there is an element amongst our people with a sort of mystic devotion to the wheat crop, who would feel it a grievous imposition upon them if a new Government, coming into office, suddenly created a situation in which it was economically impossible for them to continue the cultivation of that crop. It was for that reason that in 1948, when the inter-Party Government came in, that we not only guaranteed the price but we increased the price, then guaranteed for wheat, from 57/6 to 62/6, and we did that avowedly for the purpose——

Mr. Hawkins

The increase was made in the November before the inter-Party Government came into power, and the Minister knows that better than I do.

Mr. Dillon

I understood that this body was the very citadel of civility. I understand that Senator Hawkins will have abundant opportunities of speaking after me.

Eamon Ó Ciosáin

There is nothing uncivil about that remark.

Mr. Dillon

Well, an interruption is a liberty which should be rarely taken as the Senator and I well know from our long experience in another place. Suffice it for me to say now that it was for that very reason in 1948 when we came into office that we did guarantee the price of 57/6 and increased it to 62/6 so as to carry reassurance to those, then in the minority, that we would respect and protect their legitimate prejudices to wheat, to which, in a free community, they were entitled as free men. In the campaign which led to their recent defeat, again it was our duty and pleasure, in deference to their legitimate prejudices as free men in a free society, to ensure that they would receive from the inter-Party Government precisely the same forbearance and solicitude for their feelings as they had found in 1948. They might rest assured that for a period of five years there would be a guaranteed price for wheat, and that when it became prudent and necessary to fix a new price for wheat which represented a reduction on the price then ruling, it would go so far as to provide a new guarantee for a period of two years at a fixed rate.

The purpose of that was to carry conviction to the minority in this country that it was the desire of the Government to give them a larger measure of security in the enjoyment of their particular preference in this matter than they had ever enjoyed heretofore. Possibly on the strict ruling of economics, it would be hard to defend that position, but I have no doubt that by the criterion of sound democratic procedure it was the right course to adopt.

I want to come now to the price. We would not have done our part as democrats in an Irish Government if we had proposed to our people, who had this burning zeal to grow this particular crop, a price which would have made it economically impossible for them to grow it. I want to say to the Seanad with the fullest possible deliberation, that the price of 70/- per barrel for wheat bushelling over 63 lb. is a fair price. I want to point out to the Seanad that that price represents a bonus of from 12/6 to 20/- per barrel over the world price obtaining for wheat. The Government, with their eyes wide open, deliberately provided that bonus for Irish wheat in favour of those who desired to grow it. I see that to-day the old absurdity of pretending that the price offered for Irish wheat is the lowest price offered in Europe has been abandoned. There has been no reference, I take it, to Turkey, Portugal and elsewhere in the Seanad. There was the ardent argument made that the price offered for wheat in Ireland was lower than that offered by any other nation in Europe. If Senators wish to see that particular thesis torn to pieces and revealed to be the fallacious argument that it truly is, I would refer them to column 1522, Volume 147, No. 10 of the Dáil Debates.

I want now to put in competition with the policy as declared by Fianna Fáil of 82/6 per barrel for wheat, and no barley and no oats, the policy which it is the intention of our Government to place before the people, and I gladly invite any challenge on that at the people's tribunal. Our object is to bring the three cereal crops into some rational relationship with a view to securing that there will be adequate supplies of all, and, accordingly, we offer to farmers who want to grow wheat the assurance that for two years they will have a guaranteed price of 70/- a barrel for the wheat they grow.

We are in the process of arranging that the oatmeal millers of this country will make contracts with the farmers of this country to grow all the oats that they require in the coming season at prices which the farmers will be prepared to accept. We are in negotiation with the compound feeding manufacturers and shall shortly discuss the matter with the maize meal manufacturers, and we will reinforce such agreements as we may make with both these bodies with the full resources of the Government to ensure that those who grow feeding barley in the country will be guaranteed access to a minimum price of 40/- per barrel for green barley delivered at a suitable number of delivery points throughout the country. Now, it will be quite free to any farmer who wishes and who is in a position to sell his barley for more than 40/- a barrel to go and sell it for more if he can get it, but he has the certain knowledge that if he can find no buyer a buyer will be provided for good quality feeding barley without limit as to the quantity for 40/- a barrel next year.

By this method we hope to secure an adequate supply of barley and oats for our domestic needs and such proportion of our wheat needs as farmers may think fit to produce. And we have the comforting belief that, whereas it is absolutely or virtually impossible to find a foreign market for surplus wheat in questionable condition, there is relatively little difficulty in securing a ready market for any coarse grain, such as oats and barley, that we might have for sale surplus to our own domestic requirements. I should add that I should think it highly unlikely that in any early future we would grow in our circumstances quantities of coarse grain in excess of our domestic requirements, but I have the virtual certainty that if we do there would be relatively little difficulty in disposing of it in the markets of the world.

I put that policy of a balanced sane type of cereals from the agricultural land of this country, plus an adequate acreage of barley and potatoes, fodder beet and such other crops as the farmers think it prudent to produce as the raw material of our live-stock industry, against a policy which produces wheat which is extremely difficult to use, with a steadily diminishing acreage of oats, barley and potatoes; and I invite the Seanad to judge which policy is the better.

I do not think the Seanad can legitimately dismiss from its recollection that the present Government of this country stands bound by the International Wheat Agreement signed by our predecessors, to take delivery of 270,000 tons of wheat this year and next year if it is tendered to us by any member of the International Wheat Agreement at the minimum price of $1.55 cents, f.o.b. Port Arthur. I think it must be remembered that the present guaranteed price continues for the entire period in which that obligation devolves upon us in the agreement entered into by my predecessor.

It may be relevant for me to remind the Seanad that our policy can be crystallised into the aphorism: "One more cow, one more sow and one more acre under the plough." Our objective, then, is to secure not only a growing acreage of cereal crops, prudently diversified, but also to keep constantly pressing into the minds of our farmers the vital value of grass, grown as a crop and recognised by the farmers as such, to be used as the most valuable raw material of the live-stock industry that we can extract from the land of Ireland. I glory in the fact that part of my duty, in addition to promoting the extensive production of tillage crops, is to keep for ever before the minds of the farmers who live upon and work our 12,000,000 acres of arable land, that every acre of it should in its due rotation carry a crop of grass, as carefully sown, tended, fertilised and saved as any other crop that is sown upon that land. I think it is my duty to keep for ever before the eyes of our people the fact that one of the illusions, one of the delusions, that has cost us as a people dear, has been the delusion that grass was not a crop but simply an accident that happened to the land. The fact is that those who believe that some providential accident will sow their land in grass without thought or care are being deluded into believing that grass grown where in fact there was a luxurious crop of weeds, is wasting land.

All these fundamental truths of agriculture it is my duty to keep constantly before the minds of the farmers. But I must do more than that, if the duties of the office I hold are to be faced with a discharge. I must bring within their reach the means effectively to use each acre of land, and there, I should submit to the Seanad, my duty stops. It is true that an excess of zeal has persuaded some of my predecessors to believe that in certain circumstances they had a duty to line the ditches of the farmers with Civic Guards and to recruit five fields of inspectors to break down their gates and burst open their fences, in order to make them do what they considered it right for them to do. I do not accept from this Legislature or anyone else any such duty or obligation. My duty is to bring within the knowledge, within the reach of the farmer and to take my stand where, by the grace of God, the Land League put every man except the man who owns his land—standing on the farmer's threshold until he was invited in. It is to me a privilege that I am a servant of the farmers of this country; and should the Oireachtas ever thrust upon me the rôle of being their master, I would reject it contemptuously to the hands which sought to give it to me.

To return to more mundane affairs, I admit that the price of £1 a barrel for transferring green wheat dried to the mill floor is a charge that causes me some concern. It was a charge not absent from my mind when I spoke of the wheat racket being instituted to serve the profits of the Rank interests in this country. It is true that the Fianna Fáil Government prescribed that the miller who handled the wheat of the farmers of Ireland would be paid £1 a barrel for his trouble and his profit as a miller superimposed thereupon. Who fixed that margin? Come now, let as come down to tin tacks. There is £1 a barrel for transferring green wheat from the farmer's sack to the miller's floor. Who fixed that margin? I hear no angry denials from the Fianna Fáil Benches.

Mr. Cogan

Who is retaining it?

Mr. Dillon

You ask me who is retaining it. They do not deny the paternity of the baby. I do not deny I have their foundling in my house and I must deal with it. To legitimise it is quite beyond my capacity, but I will do my best to make it look respectable.

A Senator

Give it a good foster-father.

Mr. Hawkins

I would like to put a question to the Minister. Is it not true that in 1948, a particular inquiry was set up, presided over by no less a person than Senator, now Judge, Lavery? I must ask the Minister is his report available to him, and if these matters referred to had taken place, why did not the Government of which Senator Lavery was Minister, and which afterwards appointed him judge, take action to eliminate these irregularities?

Mr. Dillon

Because in 1951, our people asserted the sovereign right denied them by the Senator's leader to do wrong. We have always believed on this side of the House that the Irish people have the right to do wrong, and by heavens, they exercised that right in June, 1951.

Mr. Hawkins

And in 1918.

Mr. Dillon

And if they exercised it, at least they vindicated the freedom they enjoyed. More power to their elbow, and mind you there was a time when they wanted a good deal of power from their elbow to retain it.

Mr. Hawkins

And they exercised that power in the interests of the Irish nation. But the Minister is getting away from answering the question. Here is a report presented at the expense of the State, by Senator Lavery, making certain recommendations, why did not the then Government take action?

Mr. Dillon

Because in the month of June, 1951, the people of Ireland exercised their often challenged right to do wrong.

Mr. Hawkins

As they will on the next occasion.

Mr. Dillon

Time will tell. In the interim, they have exercised their sovereign right to do right, and we are here. If Senator Hawkins feels that my observations in relation to the 20/-bargain are fair and just, his Government had the findings of that commission in their hands for three years and they did not do anything about it. Am I to assume that that particular charge of £1 a barrel for transferring grain from the farmer's stack to the mill floor is a fair and legitimate charge? I gave way to the Senator to answer his question and now I want him to answer me.

Mr. Hawkins

When the Minister answers my question I will answer his.

Mr. Dillon

So we will leave it veiled in obscurity. I do not think that I have anything further to say on this particular issue. I think the case is so coercive, that it is hard to reinforce it much further than I have done. I would refer Senators, if they wish to read a more stringent statement in this case, to Volume 147, No. 10, of the Dáil Debates, particularly to columns 157 to 1525. Of course, if they wish to spend their time reading the rest of it, they are quite welcome to do so.

Perhaps, in conclusion I should say, so certain am I that the policy of the Government in this matter is the right policy, and so certain am I that this policy will secure the approval of the vast majority of the decent farmers of this country, that I have caused copies of that debate, including all the speeches made by the Opposition, my speech and every other speech, to be sent to every member of every county committee of agriculture in Ireland.

Mr. Cogan

Will the Minister do the same in regard to this debate?

Mr. Dillon

Oh, God forbid!

Mr. Cogan

On a point of order, might I suggest to the Minister that it is a grave discourtesy to this House, if he is to differentiate between this House and the other?

A Senator

That is not a point of order.

Mr. Dillon

I mentioned this matter in order to assure the Senators that, on the merits of the case, as stated by both sides, I am anxious on behalf of the Government to take the judgment of the representatives of the farmers in every county in Ireland. I wanted to bring together all the facts, as stated by the best protagonists of each side, for their consideration, so that we might abide by their judgment. I have not the slightest doubt what that judgment is going to be. I would urge upon the Seanad, whose opinion in these matters is highly valued by the Government, to speak as emphatically on behalf of the agricultural community in this matter, as the Dáil did ten days ago.

Professor Hayes

Might I observe that the debate cannot conclude to-night, and that, therefore, the House might adjourn at 10 o'clock to-night?

An Cathaoirleach

Perhaps there will be a consultation between both sides on this matter.

Dr. Sheehy Skeffington

I have listened with great interest to the debate, and I have read the Dáil debate to which the Minister has referred us. I notice that on both sides of the House and in the other House there was a hope expressed, fairly universally, that Party politics would be left out. I get the impression, nevertheless, as an Independent here to-day, that Party politics are very much to the fore. I think it would be a regrettable fact if it should appear to be implied that the Minister acted as he did simply in order to thwart Fianna Fáil policy, or alternatively, if it were to be said that it was simply because the Minister was "hostile to wheat" that he acted as he did.

I should like, therefore, at this juncture to try and express something like a middle view, an independent view I hope. I suffer from the disability, of course, of being a town-dweller, and urban speaker, and I am fully aware of the fact that the farmer has a tendency to be suspicious, not without cause, of those who live in cities and who tell him how to run his farm. Sometimes, however, I get the impression that the farmer's view of the town-dweller is carried to extremes. One sometimes gets the impression, in fact, that the farmers would be happier if there was nobody there at all to consume their products—if the consumer could be wiped out altogether. I think that the equivalent and opposite attitude is sometimes displayed by the miller in relation to the farmer. I get the impression that the miller sometimes tends to disregard the farmer as a human being, and treats the farmer—who is his customer—as a person of no importance at all.

One would feel happier, if in this farmers' union which, we are told, is to come about, there were to be some investigation of the possibility of having public relations officers to act as go-betweens between miller and farmer and farmer and consumer. This might lead to smoother relations.

As I see it, on this motion, the general principle of the Minister's price-reduction is right and justified. In my opinion, the price of 82/6, which obtained this year for the best quality wheat, is too high. It is quite clear, of course, that the fixed price of wheat in this country will necessarily be artificial, just as the prices of many things in this country are artificial. We have just passed through the Seanad at lightning speed some measures whose purpose was to maintain tariffs ranging up to 75 per cent. on industrial articles which might otherwise be cheaply imported, and in order to give the local producers of similar articles the right to place an artificial price upon them. Therefore, I am not quite so afraid as Senator O'Brien is of artificial subsidised prices because I think that in certain circumstances they can be justified. I believe that to some extent they can be justified with wheat, as they have been justified, I think, with beet, and with at least some of the industrial products to which I referred.

The "bath chair" to which Senator O'Brien referred is apparently considered necessary for large numbers also of the industrial community in this country. Apparently production is to continue indefinitely for that rather odd vehicle for the benefit of the Irish industrialist. These protective duties do not gradually disappear and the increasing health and strength of the industrial patient does not apparently allow us ultimately to abolish them. I think, therefore, that an artificial price is necessary, but that this artificial price of 82/6 is, as far as one can judge, too high. Therefore, a reduction in price was necessary, and the Minister was justified in reaching a decision to that effect. I would say, however, that both the timing of that decision and the amount of the reduction were ill-judged.

Why is such a reduction right in principle? Why do I say that the price was too high? I would suggest that the price of wheat, as fixed by any Irish Government, should be high enough to justify growing wheat efficiently in this country, but not so high as to ensure over-concentration on wheat. I will not repeat what the Minister and Senator O'Brien said on that point in relation to oats and barley, but it seemed to me eminently sound. How can we defend a position in which we have so much concentration upon wheat that we have to import quantities of oats and barley? I am a little disturbed, nevertheless, by the fact that in relation to these other crops, to which the Minister wants to give encouragement, so far all he can say is that he is in process of negotiation for the purpose of seeing to it that the farmers will get a decent price. I would prefer if, as in the case of wheat, the facts were recognised and the price decided and told to the public now, at the same time.

Mr. Dillon

Might I interrupt the Senator? Perhaps, I did not make myself clear. There will be a minimum price of 40/- per barrel guaranteed for green barley of suitable milling quality. The minimum price for oats will be negotiated between the millers and the actual farmers they contract with in the same way as the beet price is arranged.

Dr. Sheehy Skeffington

Thank you, Sir. I should like to turn now to the question of efficiency. One of the most insulting things that townspeople can say about Irish farmers is to suggest in any way that they are lacking in efficiency. I would like just to say something about this word "efficiency" along these lines: I should like to suggest that it is quite possible for a small farmer to be, technically speaking, "inefficient" through no fault of his own, through lack of capital, lack of machinery, lack of land and lack of arable acreage. No amount of hard work—and all these farmers, almost without exception, work hard—they work considerably harder than we are obliged to do in the towns—no amount of hard work will make up for these lacks. Consequently, from the economic point of view, if it is said in relation to certain small farmers that they are inefficient, it is not because the farmers are not doing their job, but simply because the farmers are under-capitalised and have not got the machinery, the equipment, or sufficient arable acreage. The methods that are forced on such a farmer, by conditions beyond his control, are inefficient from the point of view of the economy of the country.

It would be departing too far, to go into the question of how in the future you might eliminate, or hope to eliminate such inefficiencies. Suffice it to say that the State, the community, could help to increase the availability of machines and equipment and facilitate capitalisation for the farmer, and that the State could actively help the farmers to farm co-operatively. Inevitably, I think, that will have to be done in the future, and I hope in the not too distant future.

I submit, consequently, that if the wheat price is to be kept sufficiently high to enable this type of small farmer to make a reasonable profit to-day, in spite of the technical inefficiency of method which is not their fault, then the more fortunate and the more highly capitalised farmers will make too much, and some of them will make a packet. That is one of the dilemmas with which any Minister for Agriculture in this country is faced. One meets with the same experience in many spheres. You get the example of a grocers' union trying to see to it that the prices of certain commodities are kept sufficiently high for the small and relatively "inefficient" grocers to be kept in business, when those same high prices would be bringing in too great a profit to grocers or shopkeepers working on a much bigger scale.

I would say that the same thing occurs in milling, that the smaller mills are in a sense kept ticking over and kept "efficient" by prices and profit margins—such as those referred to by the Minister—which give to the bigger millers far more profit than can be justified either in private or in public.

Mr. Hickey

The price of the bag of flour is based on the most uneconomic mill in the country.

Dr. Sheehy Skeffington

Exactly. In general, I agree with James Connolly when he wrote before the turn of the century, as far back as 1897, that "the days of the small farmers, as of the small capitalists are gone, and that wherever they are still found they find it impossible to compete with the mammoth farms of America and Australia." However, whatever may be the evolution in this country of the small farmer in the future, our concern now is to fix a price which will be something in the nature of a compromise—a price which will not be so high as to mean too fat a profit to the large-scale mechanised farmer and a price which will not be so low as to drive the small and medium farmer out of wheat, or, worse still, out of farming, for want of a vital cash crop. To make such a decision and to fix a price in that way, is not an easy task. It is further complicated by the fact that a price which would be theoretically right for this purpose could be made to seem far too high or far too low by freak weather conditions—and, as we all know, freak conditions appear to be the only kind of weather conditions we ever get in this country.

Now, I believe the Minister is right in thinking that the price of 82/6 per barrel has revealed itself to be too high, and I believe that, secretly, the main Opposition Party agree with him; because the Fianna Fáil aim, as has been stated several times, was that we should be able to produce roughly two-thirds of our requirements of wheat here, calculated at about 300,000 tons of wheat. For that, it was regarded as being necessary to have an acreage of something like 450,000 acres of wheat. In the Dáil, referring to Fianna Fáil policy, Deputy Aiken said: "Our policy and price were aimed at getting that acreage"—450,000 acres of wheat. But, in fact, they got far more. They got 490,000 acres in 1954.

Mr. Cogan

Under very exceptional circumstances.

Dr. Sheehy Skeffington

They overshot their mark by nearly 10 per cent. Why? Because the price was too high at 82/6 a barrel. Therefore, I feel that the Minister is justified in asking the proposers of this motion: "How else, except by a cut in the price, would you have reduced the wheat acreage by about 10 per cent. next year, and in future years?" I suggest, therefore, that the Minister is right in principle —the principle involved in the price cut.

However, with regard to the timing and the amount, I would have some reservations. I would say, in regard to timing: at any time, in relation to a crop or in relation to farming the farmers are entitled to a longer warning of any intention radically to alter the price. They have a right to that at any time, but just this year, when not only have harvesting conditions been appalling, but also, later, after the Minister's decision, there have been flood conditions on many farms, it seems to me that the decision in relation to the individual farmer has been too abrupt. Why was it so abrupt? Why did the Minister feel it had to be done in what appears to me so swift and hasty a manner? I suggest that it was, at least in part, due to the fact that the Minister was greatly exasperated by the people whom he calls "speculators." I would express my surprise here, because I am frequently told that when in industry there are to be found people who are prepared to risk their capital in the hope of getting a whacking big dividend, that dividend is justified by the measure of the risk they take—that these people are rugged individualists, taking advantage of the great system of free enterprise, and raking in a perfectly legitmate return for their money.

The Minister has said, quite rightly, that these "speculators" have, in fact, not broken the law. The whole idea of conacre may be bad: I think almost certainly it is; it may even be ruinous to the land. However, the law has not dealt with that problem. Why should we ask these people personally to stand back? Furthermore, these people produce as good wheat as anybody else, and we are committed to the proposition that we want a certain proportion of our wheat to be Irish-produced. These people produce it. They take us at our word. If they had not produced good wheat they would not have been paid. Moreover, I think the Minister, in suggesting that the entire subsidy went to them, is not quite accurate, because at least a proportion of that subsidy went to the owners of the land, in the form of rent for conacre, frequently an inflated rent. It went into the pocket, in other words, of the landowner who was prepared to let this land—to whom I think the Minister rightly referred in terms not altogether approving.

But what about this landowner and what exactly are we going to do with this type of person, who sits back and reaps this entirely unearned increment from high conacre prices? What action is intended against him? The Minister himself in the Dáil—away back in 1937—said rightly, and I am sure he will still take this view here: "Conacre is a most objectionable form of landlordism, and I should like to know if this is part of the Government's policy". I also should like to know now if it is part of this Government's policy to let conacre continue, or to tackle it, as I think was implied in the Minister's speech this evening. I think we should be wrong, however, to allow our sense of exasperation with these people, who have used our wheat policy to their own advantage, make us slash the price so quickly that the worst sufferers will be our own small and medium farmers. So much for the question of the timing of this cut. Now to the question of the amount.

I think the amount of the cut has been too big for the farmers to have to adapt themselves to all at once. I agree that the system of staggered pricing, introduced by the Minister, modifies that a bit, but, in fact, it will hit mainly the combine harvester, because his wheat will not be dry enough, unless he is able to get it dried to store in order to wait for a better price. I suggest that the attitude underlying the Minister's scheme is an attitude of wanting, to some extent, either to turn back the clock or to hold it back. I think, in relation to this country and to modern conditions both on the land and in industry, that that attitude is wrong. As I see it, the future of Irish farming lies with the highly-capitalised farm. Will that displace labour? I very much doubt it. I submit that the method of farming with the combine team, while it may not, in fact, give all the employment upon the farm, will give employment to the combine team themselves, to the lorry drivers, to the millers, and to the workers in the mills. Furthermore, for these men, I suggest it is a better type of work, and better paid, than the work of the farm labourer on the farm twenty or thirty years ago. Most of these men are young, independent-minded men, and they are serving the country well. These teams of combine workers, tractor drivers, lorry drivers, mill workers, and so forth, who represent highly-capitalised mechanised Irish agriculture, could be the making of Irish industry as well as of Irish agriculture. In a country like Denmark—which, inevitably, one mentions in relation to farming—I would mention only this: that in Denmark a smaller percentage of the working population is one the land than in Ireland. They have more mechanisation; and that has resulted in a big home market for agricultural implements and machines and, in turn, that home market has resulted in a big export trade for such things as agricultural implements, tools, machines, churns, and so forth.

I regard it as the duty of the State and, consequently, of the Department of Agriculture, to see to it that the advantage to be derived from mechanised agriculture will be spread to the benefit of the whole community —not just of the few people who work it for their own advantage now. Let us not, however, on that account be led to act against the combine, against mechanisation. Let us not be led to discourage, even inadvertently, the great capitalisation of Irish farms, most of which are so grossly under-capitalised to-day. For all these reasons, I would urge the Minister to reconsider the question of the wheat price for this coming year.

We have been told that Party politics are not entering into this, but that is clearly nonsense. Certainly, a great deal of Party political capital would be made out of the fact that the Minister had changed his mind or modified his view, if he did so. If the Minister changed his mind and modified somewhat the price cut now, inevitably those opposing him would claim very loudly throughout the country the entire credit for it.

Mr. Dillon

Might I ask the Senator does he advert to the fact that the price already fixed is for two years?

Dr. Sheehy Skeffington

Yes, I realise that, but I want now to recognise the fact that, if the Minister were to be led to reconsider his view, the credit for that change of mind would be claimed by his political opponents. However, I would further suggest that the Minister is not generally regarded as the most supine of men; he is not notorious for the alacrity with which he yields to appeals, to criticism, to abuse or pressure from political apponents and, consequently, were he to change his mind, to reconsider and to review the situation, in view of the very critical position in many farms to-day, the motives, I suggest, of the Minister could not be misinterpreted. In other words—and I say this in conclusion—I believe in all sincerity that he is a big enough man to reconsider the matter on its merits, and to announce, first of all, his intention for next year and subsequent years to make a substantial cut in the guaranteed price of wheat, and, secondly, to make a token cut this year as an earnest of that intention, but to make no more than such a token cut.

I might say, in conclusion, that I intend to abstain from voting on the motion, for the reason that the wording of the motion suggests that we want to stick quite slavishly to this year's price, whereas I regard it as necessary to make a certain cut.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

It is understood that there is agreement for the Seanad to meet to-morrow at 3 o'clock?

Eamon Ó Ciosáin

I move the adjournment of the debate.

Debate adjourned.

The Seanad adjourned at 10.5 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, 16th December.