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Seanad Éireann debate -
Thursday, 12 Dec 1957

Vol. 48 No. 14

Agricultural Institute Bill, 1957—Second Stage.

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

The roots of this Bill lie in the generosity of the American people in making certain moneys available to this country under the Marshall Aid Plan. Senators will remember that these moneys fell into two categories. There were, first of all, the loan moneys equivalent to about £41,000,000, to which conditions were attached in relation to the repayment of the capital and the interest charges. The only conditions attached to the grant moneys were that the moneys should be applied for the general economic improvement of the country and the specific objects to which the moneys were to be applied had to be accepted and agreed upon by the American authorities.

About the middle of 1949 it was known that some grant moneys would be made available and the question as to how these moneys should be applied here came up for consideration. At an early stage, long before the total amount that would be available was known, it was suggested that the moneys could very well be applied here to the establishment of an agricultural institute. The E.C.A. had as their representative here at the time Mr. Joseph Carrigan. He was the Dean of the College of Agriculture in Vermont University, and he was also a Director of the Experiments Station attached to that College. It was not unnatural, therefore, that the idea of establishing an agricultural institute here should be discussed. The matter was taken up with a certain amount of enthusiasm and there were discussions which extended into 1950. In May, 1950, the Government adopted the idea in principle and consultations with various interested bodies here, such as university colleges and so on, took place.

In October, 1950, an outline scheme was sent to the American authorities, with a formal request for acceptance of the scheme. At that time, I think the Americans were not prepared to consider any scheme for the partial expenditure of the money. They wanted to have before them all the various ways in which it was to be expended and the items upon which it was to be expended. In 1951 certain investigations were made by the Irish Government in relation to the question as to what an agricultural institute would do. In June, 1951, there was a change of Government and, when the Government, of which I became the head, came into office, we set ourselves to considering the best way in which to utilise the moneys available. As far as I can recollect, it was about that time we knew fairly precisely the amount of money that would be available in the Grant Fund; it amounted to £6,142,000. We set out to consider then the best way in which that money could be expended here for the benefit of our economy and we decided, after very careful examination and consideration, on a number of purposes to which it might be devoted, one of them being the establishment of an agricultural institute.

We had our scheme practically completed by 1952 for submission but this time there was a change in the American system of administration and projects which could have been dealt with administratively, had there being no change, had to be submitted to various Committees of Congress of the United States House of Representatives and Senate. The result was that our full programme for the utilisation of these moneys, a programme which had to be very detailed, was submitted to the United States authorities some time in 1953. It was considered by the Committees of Congress and certain modifications to meet the views expressed by the committees were made.

The entire plan was brought to a head about June, 1954. Everything was ready, but there was another change of Government here. The new Government, however, were in the position that they were able to sign on behalf of Ireland, and America signed at the same time. Within a week after the change of Government we were able to get the agreement signed. That agreement provides in general for the allocation of these moneys. The allocations, of differing amounts, were for the benefit of agriculture and technical assistance, exchange scholarships and so on. Besides the main agreement, there were to be subsidiary agreements signed in respect of each particular project. That has been done in relation to all the other projects, with the exception of the agricultural institute item; the actual subsidiary agreement in relation to that has not yet been signed, but I understand it is practically ready for signature.

The amount assigned for the Agricultural Institute is £1,840,000. You will see in the Bill before you how it is proposed to deal with that sum. The Bill itself is straightforward. Anyone reading it carefully can learn what are the functions, powers and duties of the institute and the various methods by which it will be governed and so forth. I will come to deal with them in a few minutes. Now I am only giving the story of the slow progress made in the establishment of this institute. As I told you it began in 1949 and it is now the end of 1957. During that slow progress there were very many consultations with bodies which were interested here, and also with the American authorities. We had not merely to get agreement here at home but we also had to satisfy the American authorities. Therefore, to that extent the Government were not completely free to pursue the course which they might think desirable at any particular time.

However, when we came into office in 1951, we worked on the foundation that had already been laid, or at least on the idea which was there, and we pursued it as vigorously as we could. We continued the discussions which the previous Government had undertaken with various parties and had some successes and some failures. At any rate, we had brought it to such a point that we would have been able to put forward our proposals within a few months of our leaving office, once we had got the American agreement. These proposals were actually put forward by the Government that succeeded us, the Government that came into office in 1954. They were contained in a public statement in 1955. Sometimes it is referred to as a White Paper. I do not know how correct it is, from the parliamentary point of view, to speak of these proposals as a White Paper.

They were published by the Government to show what their mind at the time was, to show what their proposals were, and to see what public criticism these proposals might evoke. Those who are interested know that they were met with rather severe criticism. I must say, in passing, that to me a great deal of that criticism seemed unjustified. However, the Government in charge continued to have conversations to try to meet the vigorous criticisms and finally, in 1956, the Agricultural Institute Bill was introduced in the Dáil and was published last February. Again there was a change of Government. It did not alter the general continuity of this process. Again, believing that the project was long enough on the stocks and that it was better to make progress with it, we decided that, though perhaps it contained some things with which we were not in complete agreement, we should continue on the same lines. We did so because we considered that it seemed to meet with no severe criticism, and that it seemed to indicate that a certain amount of agreement had been arrived at by the Government, acting through the Minister for Agriculture, and the interested parties. We considered the Bill very carefully when we came into office and we decided that, in the main, we would follow the lines indicated in the Bill.

They were of a different character from those set out in the proposals I have referred to as the White Paper. We examined the Bill carefully to see whether we were satisfied with it and we made some changes. I am not going to deal with this, however, by way of comparison, comparing this Bill and the previous Bill, because it might lead to certain confusions. Anybody interested in comparing the two Bills can, I am sure, get a copy of the Bill which was circulated in February of this year, and compare it with the present Bill. That is a matter of interest for those keen on noticing changes and so on. I think I should confine myself, however, to the provisions of the present Bill.

This question of an agricultural institute could have been approached from two different points of view. One point of view was that of establishing a teaching college, a college in which you would have research more or less centralised, with definite powers to enable proposals regarding agricultural education and agricultural research to be put into practice. The other point of view was to establish something like the British Agricultural Research Council, which by giving grants to various bodies, helps to get a certain amount of work done which it desires to have done. The first approach was, more or less, the idea in the White Paper proposals. The other is the line which is followed in this Bill.

You will see from Section 4, which is the section that indicates the powers, duties and functions of the institute, how it is proposed to act. I will come later to the governing body, the human instrument for getting certain things done, for coming to decisions and so on. It is a body which will try to co-ordinate. It has no powers of coercion and compulsion but it has powers of inducement by making grants to institutions and persons. I suppose when one uses the word "persons" it is meant in the broad sense, to include institutions engaged in agricultural research.

If you survey the ground at the moment you will see that the university colleges are engaged in certain fundamental teaching, which is necessary for agriculture and for other sciences as well. There are certain fundamental sciences that are being taught in these universities. It would be very foolish to attempt to duplicate that work and that was not intended in what I call the White Paper proposals. The idea incorporated in the present institute is to make use of the work done in those colleges as far as one can.

Not merely are these fundamental sciences being taught but also various branches of agriculture are taught. You have the faculties for this in some of the colleges and you have also certain research work being done by them. I would like, but I have not the time and I think it would not be appropriate, to point out that a great deal of very good work has already been done, and we have hidden our light very much under a bushel in regard to work being done by our existing agricultural research institutions. We have also the research units under the control of the Department of Agriculture and the idea is that this institution would be the means of coordinating the work done by all these bodies, reviewing the work done by them, and advising them in the sense of consulting and talking over their work with a view to suggesting certain things, and hearing what they have to say about some of the work that is being done. I think that can be done with goodwill but it cannot be done without it.

The whole hope of the institute is that it will secure the goodwill of the existing institutions so that they may be ready to co-operate, so that they will listen to any advice and so that they, in return, may make suggestions to the institute. The first duty of the institute is to try—I say "try" because they have no real powers of compulsion—to secure co-operation so that there will be as little overlapping as possible and so that the direction of research should be that which promises to be of most value to the country.

Of course, you always have the question of fundamental research, which very often turns out to be much more valuable than research directed towards a specific object; but research directed towards a specific object has the advantage that you know exactly where you are going and you have a much better chance of getting results fairly quickly.

The first thing, then, is the attempt to secure co-operation and to co-ordinate, as far as your powers will permit. In order that there should not be waste, it is obviously desirable that the institute should be in a position to give grants to existing institutions to do research for which they seem to be particularly fitted. If, for instance, a certain distance is gone in research work in an existing institution, it is desirable—indeed it might be the cheapest way of doing it—to add certain facilities, it may be a piece of special equipment or it may be increasing the staff somewhat to get the necessary team work.

In a great deal of modern research you need team work and you need to have the proper instruments. Otherwise there is a good deal of unnecessary time spent. I do not like to call it waste of time because very frequently in these cases, even though there may be delays if you have not got the most up-to-date apparatus, in the actual working and trying to improvise apparatus, you may do better than if you took the existing apparatus and worked with it. It would be for the institute to see, if they want particular things done, whether it was better to do it itself or to get some of the existing institutions to do it. If they think it is better to get the existing institutions to do it, they can add to their resources by way of grants. If you look at Section 4 you will see the institute has the power of making grants for specific purposes, imposing such conditions as may be required and as it thinks right.

The next thing is that the institute can establish research units itself. It will do that, of course, if the governing body of the institute is of the opinion that that is the best way in which the particular investigation it thinks should be entered upon can be carried out. Co-ordination, facilitating and helping by grants existing institutions is one way; the other way is entering itself upon scientific research and investigation by establishing research units with its own staff and under its own immediate control.

Grants and moneys will be available for the institute itself as well. Teaching, as such, at least in its elementary stages, is not contemplated; but such teaching and study as would go with advanced research is, of course, essential and they can provide for that by courses for advanced students, seminars and the usual methods of encouragement for study and the giving of information which is availed of in institutes for research. It can give scholarships for advanced students to enable them to come to the institute and prosecute certain lines of investigation. It can give fellowships, under such conditions as it may determine, for outstanding work done in the field of agriculture or of the sciences that may be ancillary or helpful to agriculture.

I think that I have indicated the main purposes and main functions of the institute as set out in Section 4. They are, first of all, given in general terms in sub-section (1); and in sub-section (2) you have a variety of specific examples. They are lettered (a), (b), (c) and so on.

In sub-section (3) you have a very important additional provision. From time to time the Minister for Agriculture may wish to have certain investigations pursued and to have certain information. It is put as a duty on the institute to give him that advice. It is the intention, and I hope the sub-section so provides, that there is a duty on the institute to pursue an investigation and to give him the advice and the information which he would request in a particular case.

In the other House an example was given of what might be required. There might be some sudden disease in plants and you might want it investigated with a view to finding its origin and getting means of combating it. In the past it was complained by the Department of Agriculture that when they asked some of the existing institutions for information, they could not get it as of right. It was given to them as a matter of courtesy. If, for instance, a professor in one of the colleges was engaged in a piece of research to which he had completely devoted himself, he might not wish to allow himself to be diverted to another line of research simply as an act of courtesy.

It was considered desirable that there should be a duty on the institute to advise the Minister for Agriculture in regard to specific matters that might be referred to them. I know that power could be abused and I can understand that you might have a certain amount of criticism of that power but, on the other hand, if considerable sums are put at the disposal of the institute, it is not unreasonable to expect that institute to come in and help in an emergency situation.

We now pass from the functions and powers of the institute to its governing body. Again, I will not make comparisons, because it is better for us to keep to the framework of the Bill as it stands. As the Bill stands, the governing power is in a council. That council has complete authority. That is the intention. I hope it is carried out in detail in the Bill and I would ask for any criticism where it would seem not to be so. The intention of the Bill is that the governing body, the council, should have supreme authority and have the last word in regard to any matter that may arise, that is as far as what should be done is concerned, what grants should be made, and so on.

That being the governing body's power, the question is what will its personnel be? The personnel that is provided is a chairman and 12 ordinary members. The chairman, to indicate the importance of the office, is to be appointed by the President. The first chairman, in fact, and subsesequent chairmen will be appointed by the President. Of course, as every Senator knows, the President will act in all such cases on the advice of the Government.

The 12 ordinary members are divided into three classes. We have, first of all, those who are to be representative of agricultural and rural organisations. There are five such members. The next class are those who are representative of the universities and there will be one representative from each of the four universiy colleges, the three colleges of the National University and Trinity College, Dublin. We have the third class in those nominated and appointed by the Government. Obviously, the Government will have the choosing of these at their own discretion.

In regard to the other two classes, however, the Government have to act on the nomination of the University Colleges in the case of the four ordinary university members, and in the case of the rural organisation, will have to act on the nomination of the various agricultural rural bodies. If you had four or five of these bodies and said: "We will have nominations from this body, this body and so on", then the task would be easy and that would be put in the Bill, but, unfortunately, the organisation of the farming community has not reached the stage at which you can do that, so that the Government will have to try to work out a scheme in which you will have five nominations coming from the most representative of these farming and rural groups.

That will be done by Government Order which, of course, will be published in the usual way, setting forth what organisations are to nominate and, I expect, what are the conditions under which these nominations are to be made. Once the five nominations are made, then the Government must appoint these persons.

There is a Schedule dealing with meetings and various matters of detail. If you look at the Schedule—it is connected with Section 5 which deals with the council—you will see that it deals with various things which affect the conduct of the council and so on. I do not think that at this stage it is necessary for me to go into the detail set out in that Schedule.

The chairman will always be appointed by the President for a definite term of years, not exceeding three years. In regard to the chairman who will be part-time—the other members, I take it, will be part-time— certain remuneration will be attached to the office. As far as the other members are concerned, I do not think there is anything intended for these people except that out-of-pocket expenses with regard to meetings will be met.

Besides the governing body, the council, you have the chief officer of the institute who is called the director. The director has to act subject to the direction of the council but he is in charge of the staff and the general direction of research and so on. When you have an authority like that there is always a possibility of a clash. It is not easy to make up your mind as to how you should allocate between the council and the director the respective powers and duties. Personally, I very strongly hold the view that it is better to let the council have the last word, if there is to be a last word, hoping that the council will be composed of men of common sense who will know best how to run the affairs of the institute. If the council have a good director, who technically should be a research man or a man who is acquainted with the general character and nature of research, they will listen to his proposals. He is not a member of the council but he would naturally put his proposals before the council. If they are wise they will listen to them carefully and they will not object unless they see something obviously wrong. Therefore, the hope is that the director will get the liberty to do the work in the way in which he, as a technical expert in this work, will think best.

There is, of course, a human problem there, as you have in all these cases—the human problem of getting proper team work and proper co-operation. The best chance of securing it is in the way I have indicated. There is less likelihood that 12 or 13 people—sensible people, as I hope they will be—will run off on some foolish line, than there may be in the case of an individual. I believe there is safety, so to speak, in numbers, in that matter. Consequently, we can with safety leave the last word in these matters to them, whilst wishing to give the director the freedom which would be necessary for him to do his work in the best way. In giving him that freedom, he will not be unduly hampered by any directions he may get from the council as a whole.

The next thing I should deal with is the funds. I have dealt with Section 4, the functions; with Section 5, the council, and with Section 7, the director. Now I wish to draw attention to Sections 10 and 11. At an earlier stage I pointed out that the total sum available is £1,840,000. That is divided into two parts and the first part, £840,000, is intended to be a capital sum which would be available for capital purposes. Every Senator knows what is intended by that—such things as buildings and certain permanent types of equipment. It is not intended that that money should be available for ordinary day-to-day use. The interest on it will be so available, but the principal itself will not be available for the current work of the institute. It is available for all the types of capital grants or for any units which the institute itself may decide to put up. It is available for grants for the extension of facilities in existing units in other institutions and so on. In other words, it is available for capital purposes. It is to be given to the institute whenever the institute requests it. The income from it—at least from such portion of it as is not expended, the portion that remains at any stage, the dividends and interest and so on that may derive from that sum of money— will be available as an addition to the current income of the institute.

I come now to Section 11. Senators will notice in Section 11 that there is an endowment fund of £1,000,000. That £1,000,000 is to be invested for the endowment of the institute, bringing in an annual income depending on the rates of dividend on its investments, and so on. Assuming it was able to have investments to bring in an average of 5 per cent., the income would be £50,000 a year from that.

Another source of current income which it will have is the annual grant from the Oireachtas, provided for in Section 12. The amount of that grant is to be determined by the Minister for Finance, as is right and proper, having listened to the applications and the needs and the work that was being done by the institute, and having consulted the Minister for Agriculture, who will generally side very strongly with the institute, I feel certain, in getting work done. The Minister for Finance has the obligation to see that it is remembered that the money that is got, has to be got by taxation, and that if we are not careful about taxation we may impose burdens which may have serious consequences in regard to what we are aiming to do by this institute, that is, to advance our economic position in the country as a whole.

I think Senators will agree that it is only right that the Minister for Finance—of course, with the approval of his colleagues—should have the last word to say on that. Some people will say, "You are making the institute dependent upon the Government." Well, the Government has to find the means by imposing taxation on the people, and it has to find a balance between the various things that have to be done and the money so taken out of the people's pockets. However, there is provision made for such an annual grant and any Government would naturally be interested in trying to make the most of this institute and give it the means to work as efficiently as possible.

In addition, the institute can get a certain income from fees—I do not know how much. Trying to look ahead, I do not think that these fees are likely to be of a very substantial amount. I hope I am wrong but at the moment I would not care to make the fate of the institute dependent upon that particular item of its income. Also, of course, the institute can receive donations, from such good people as we may find in the community who would be willing to donate gifts to the institute, as is done in other countries. If we have any big industries associated in any way with agriculture, they may make sums available by donation for the institute.

I have covered now the functions of the institute, the council and the director. I have spoken of the sources from which the institute is to obtain its capital moneys and its annual income.

For the rest, the Bill is largely a question of details about staff and so on. In Section 17 there is a provision that the staff is to be appointed either by the council or under the authority of the council and there is a provision that, in the case of the research staff, before making appointments to the research staff, a board of people who would be regarded as competent to judge of the qualifications of the applicants and to study the applications would be set up and that the council would consider the report of that board when the appointment is being made. Making appointments of technical people is always a matter of difficulty, as those Senators who have anything to do with universities and the appointment of professors, and so on, know full well. It is an extremely difficult thing to arrange that the person who is best qualified and best fit to do the job will be appointed. Very often, the man with the highest academic qualifications may not necessarily be the best person for the task and the best thing is to set up a board who will go into what the man has done and thereby judge what he is capable of doing, go into his qualifications and so on, examine them carefully and send their report to the council.

The council is not compelled to act on the recommendations of the board but, of course, like any sensible body of people—and I hope many of them will be expert in the matters under determination, that is the question of agriculture—they will have sufficiently intimate knowledge of the work that is to be done that they will be able to satisfy themselves as to whether the recommendation of the board is, in fact, the best. I imagine that in nine out of ten, or 99 out of 100, cases the recommendation of the board would be accepted.

I think I should not detain the Seanad any further in explaining the Bill. It is a straightforward Bill. I have, I think, dealt with the main provisions which it is proper to deal with at the Second Reading Stage, and the rest of the Bill will be subject, in the Committee Stage, to close scrutiny, I am sure, by all Senators, and any matters that I have not touched on can be brought up in Committee. I hope I have covered the main ground that Senators want to have covered at this stage and, if there are any questions asked, I hope I shall be able to answer them in concluding.

Naturally, the first thing that falls to be said upon this Bill is to agree with the Taoiseach that we should thank the American people and the American Government for making this money available for education in agriculture and, therefore, for a contribution towards the economic prosperity of Ireland. The best possible thanks that we can give to the Americans would surely be to make this measure as effective as possible and to see that it works in the spirit in which it is offered and that it does bring the results which we all hope will come from it.

It is, as the Taoiseach has pointed out, a Bill which has taken a long time to get to the Oireachtas because it involved negotiations between the Irish and the United States Governments. The Bill embodies an agreement between these. It should be added, as was clear from the Taoiseach's speech, that the Bill also, in the main, is the same as the Bill proposed by the previous Government, Mr. Costello's Government. There is one main difference but we can come to that in Committee.

The Taoiseach's presence, I take it, to-night is a tribute to the critical capacities of this House and we appreciate that he has thought fit to give us what I regard, at any rate, as an excellent summary of the provisions of this Bill. I found myself in agreement with most of what he said in the beginning, with the way in which he hoped the Bill would work.

He called the Bill a straightforward Bill. Perhaps the way to say that is that it is a straightforward Bill in its leanness. It is a Bill which gives immense powers to the council of an institute but it nowhere says what precisely the institute should do. The Taoiseach has given some indication this evening of his mind on the matter. For my part, I found what he had to say more agreeable to me and clearer than anything which I had read in the Dáil Debates.

The scheme in the Bill is not the same as that in the White Paper originally published by the Minister for Agriculture in the previous Government, Deputy Dillon. That White Paper—with which it appears the Taoiseach agrees—came in for a great deal of criticism. I do not know how far this Bill meets the criticism, which was very vocal at that time. There are many people—I am afraid I am one of them—who, if they had their way, would arrange rather a different scheme for spending this money. There is no advantage whatever to be gained by discussing that kind of thing now. The main thing is to bring to the working of this particular plan all the goodwill, energy and co-operation possible.

As far as I am concerned, both as a politician and as a Professor of the National University at University College, Dublin, I can say that everything that can possibly be done to make this scheme work in a reasonable way will be done. The amount of money available is not very large. It amounts to £840,000 for capital expenditure and income from the interest on £1,000,000. Even if the whole £840,000 is not spent on capital and is invested and the interest accrues for annual income to the institute, the sum will be comparatively small when one recalls the immense task that has to be accomplished. In Britain, for example, as far as I remember, the Government itself is expending £6,000,000 on agricultural research apart altogether from the immenses sums of money put into agricultural research by bodies such as Imperial Chemicals and other big industrial or other corporations.

Although our population is much smaller than that of Britain, our interest in agriculture is immense. We are entirely dependent on it. Therefore, the amount of money which we are prepared to spend will, I think, have to become much larger. However, as the money is not so great, one would have to exercise great care in the spending of it. The Bill creates a council of a completely new type, the operations of which, I think, hopeful as one may be, nobody can quite predict. In Section 4, that council is given, in the usual way in these Bills, very wide powers. It is not compelled to exercise all of these powers or, indeed, any of them but it has a very considerable variety of powers.

It would appear—until we heard the Taoiseach to-night—that there was no very clear idea as to how these powers would be exercised. I agree with him entirely that the first thing this council will have to do, when appointed, is to survey the existing facilities for higher agricultural education including research—existing facilities in men and women, personnel, laboratories, physical facilities such as farms, and so on. We must see what use can be made of what is there or what extensions to these might be profitable.

The institute clearly has power, under Section 4, to use this money to expand existing facilities or to recommend to the Government, under Section 12, that the Government itself should contribute moneys for the expansion or improvement of existing facilities. These existing facilities are not very great. There is, in fact, only one teaching Faculty of Agriculture in the country—that is in University College, Dublin. There is a Faculty of Dairy Science in Cork and, as well, certain work is carried out by the Department of Agriculture in places belonging to it.

This Bill is intended to put a top on our agricultural education. Its function is to do research itself, if it thinks fit, to cause research to be done and assist in getting the result of research to the farmers. That, I think, is also included in Section 4 and it is highly desirable.

It must be remembered, when one speaks of research of this kind, that research and higher education in agriculture or in anything else must be based upon good undergraduate education. There can be no possibility of getting people to do research unless you have sound undergraduate teaching and certain post-graduate courses. These courses consist of two years' general science and two years' practical and theoretical agricultural science. From the people who do that particular course, whether they do it in Dublin or in another faculty established somewhere else, we are bound to get our research students. You do not normally get, even from the best undergraduate classes, a very large number of research students. If the undergraduate work done at present is not extended and improved, the foundations upon which this Bill is bound to rest will be insecure. For that reason, we must take account of the whole picture of agricultural education while we are discussing the Second Stage of this Bill.

It is entirely true that the research that has to be done by this body must be related to the type of agriculture in which this country is engaged and to the lines of agricultural development likely to be the most favourable to our economic progress. Nobody has suggested, although there have been accusations of that kind, that somebody should be put into a laboratory and asked to do research which can never possibly have any effect on the problems which affect us in this country. Therefore, it must also be remembered—I think the Taoiseach pointed this out, too—that, apart from applied research, fundamental research must always be done in the universities or provided for by this institute in whatever way it thinks fit. To judge from the Dáil debate, it would appear that there are people who think you can instruct a research worker to do a particular job in a particular space of time, directed towards a particular end. That is not so. While practical problems can be solved and investigations carried out, provision must always be made for fundamental research.

Research is not, so to speak, a purchasable commodity. If you get a certain amount done for £10,000 it is not, unfortunately, the case that if you invest £20,000 you will get twice the amount done and you will get it done in a fixed time. In order that our research should be kept on particular lines, it is desirable that farmers should be associated with the council of this institute. It is fair to say that they are not the only judges and not necessarily the best judges of what should be done in this particular line. If the expressions of opinion in the other House are indicative of the minds of certain people, it would appear that there is bound to be a clash between what has been called "the farmers" and "the professors", that is to say, the people whose boots are not necessarily dirty all the time but who may be highly skilled at research.

One must hope much more common sense will be shown in the institute than has been shown by certain types of criticism already. One could hope, I think, for harmony and goodwill. There are certain points which I do not want to go into now, because unfortunately we started on this Bill rather late, and I think we should try to conclude the Second Stage to-night, particularly as I gather it is proposed to postpone the Committee Stage until next month.

A great deal could be said on Section 4. There are just a few points I should like to make, for the consideration of the Taoiseach before Committee Stage. I am not quite clear as to how the chairman and the director are going to work together. The previous Bill provided that the chairman was the director. As a university professor, I am familiar with the president of a university college being the director of that college, but I do not understand quite well how the chairman and director will work in harmony. The director, we presume, must be, as indicated here to-night, a scientist and he must also be an administrator. He must have a broad knowledge rather than an expertness in a narrow line of work, if he is to direct agricultural research generally in this country. He must be acquainted with scientific literature and with the agricultural industry as well. It seems to me very difficult to get a person who fulfils all those qualifications. If the chairman were a scientist as well, there would be very great difficulty. On the other hand, if the chairman were a layman, simply directing the meetings and generally seeing to the taking of decisions and so on, it might be different.

There is also the difficulty—which we can go into later on—of the period of office of the director. The Taoiseach will recollect that, when the National University was founded, a university commission was set up by the British Government of the day and they appointed university professors and lecturers for a period, I think, of seven years. I do not know whether that would suit in this case, because naturally a director, the kind of person we want, may already be in employment and may not be willing to leave that employment for something which does not guarantee permanency. On the other hand, this is a completely new project and it may be difficult for a person, and particularly for a very good person, to settle down to do the work in the conditions prevailing. There might possibly be found some scheme of "seconding" a man, as they say in the Civil Service—that is, a man could be given leave for a couple of years from the post he had, to see whether he would like this particular post. Again, a man might be chosen from another country. I do not know what is contemplated, but that seems to me to be one of the difficulties.

I realise it is right to say that the council must be the final arbiter as between conflicting interests, but I do not quite see how a chairman—and particularly a chairman interested in the work and having views of his own-is going to harmonise with an extremely competent director.

I welcome this Bill, although it is not exactly what I would have devised myself. I bespeak for the Bill the co-operation and goodwill of everybody concerned. The best way we can reward the generosity of the American Government and people and the considerable efforts made by various Ministers since 1949 to bring this matter to fruition, is by seeing that this institute works and brings forth the best possible fruits for Irish agriculture, on which, after all, the prosperity of all of us depends.

In the first place, this Bill is welcomed generally by all Parties and I wish to pay my tribute to the American generosity which makes it possible to set up this great new institute of agriculture. This is obviously an improvement on the earlier Bill, which antagonised certain important interests. As both the Taoiseach and Senator Hayes have said, this Bill has had the co-operation and goodwill of all concerned with agricultural improvement and education in Ireland.

The Bill, of course, forms part—and, I may say, a small part—of a general policy for the improvement of Irish agriculture. Everybody is agreed on the need for the expansion of our agricultural production, especially in view of the changes which are coming in relation to the European Free Trade Area. These new changes may incur new dangers for Ireland, in the sense that we will have to meet new competitors; but they may also provide us with new opportunities in the sense that they will give us entrance to new markets. The environment in which our agriculture has to work is changing and, therefore, there is a need for adaptability, flexibility and preparation. In that, the institute of agriculture could play a vital part.

I am particularly anxious not to delay the Seanad this evening, but I feel a duty to pay a tribute to the founders of the programme of Irish agricultural reconstruction, of which this institute forms the coping-stone. In the 19th century, Irish agriculture was backward. There were historical reasons for that. Land tenure troubles and the land question took the interest and attention of farmers at a time when their competitors abroad, particularly in Denmark, were building up new competition. The problem present in the 80's for this country engaged the attention of Sir Horace Plunkett. The services of that great man were not appreciated by his contemporaries and I am afraid they are mainly forgotten by the younger generation to-day. It surprises me, sometimes, when people come out with great discoveries in regard to agricultural co-operation, all of which had been proclaimed by Horace Plunkett 60 or 70 years ago. People to-day possibly do not realise what a great figure Horace Plunkett was. He was a world figure. If there were any question about that, it could be proved by the remarkable tributes which were paid to him in the world Press at the time of his death.

Horace Plunkett's work in founding the Recess Committee in 1895 laid the foundations for modern agricultural reconstruction in Ireland. He realised the need for agricultural education, at a time when other countriesd had not realised it to the same extent. The result of that committee was the founding of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction, which was a new experiment in Irish administration. This Department was modelled on the great American Department of Agriculture in Washington. It was in no sense a mere echo of Whitehall or Dublin Castle. It was an Irish Department, especially adapted to Irish needs.

As one who had the honour of knowing Horace Plunkett, I can say that he would have found great satisfaction in the thought that this new institute is being founded by American money. Horace Plunkett had spent his youth in the United States. His authorised biography describes him as an Anglo-American Irishman. He had a vision of the part to be played in world history by this country, the United States and Great Britain, at a time when the future course of history, as we have known it, had not emerged in the way that anybody else foresaw. As I said, Horace Plunkett was an ambassador between Europe and the United States, and in that way he did a great deal to improve relations between Ireland, England and America. He would have regarded it as a particularly favourable aspect of this institute that it should be endowed by the great generosity of the American people.

I think it is only fair to pay a tribute to the excellent work done by the Department of Agriculture of which Horace Plunkett was the executive head for the first seven years. I wonder if the younger generation have ever asked themselves what Irish agriculture would be like to-day if the Department of Agriculture had not been founded by Horace Plunkett in the year 1900. The late Patrick Hogan was a distinguished Minister for Agriculture, but one must remember that he stepped on the driving plate of a great locomotive which had been constructed, oiled and was in full running order when he took over. It does not in any way take away from the admirable work and the great efficiency of the late Patrick Hogan to say that the machine which he drove was in operation when he took it over. He drove it with great ability in the right direction.

As I have said, the machine had been constructed by Horace Plunkett who laid the foundation of the agricultural policy of this country at the beginning of the present century. The Department of Agriculture has always maintained the highest standards of administrative and scientific integrity both before the Treaty and since. It has preserved the highest standards. It has been subject to criticism by people who did not understand its functions; and it would have achieved even greater results if agriculture had not been, in certain circumstances, the plaything of politics, if political policies in regard to agriculture had not, on certain occasions, frustrated the work of the Department.

The work of the Department has always aimed at reducing the cost of production and making Irish agriculture competitive, but these efforts have, on occasion, been neutralised by misdirected policies which, as I have said, led to frustration.

Might I remind the Senator that the whole policy on agriculture may not be discussed on this Bill?

I bow to your ruling. I was just about to say that the Department of Agriculture, as the Taoiseach stated, has always engaged itself in and encouraged agricultural research. This research was mainly undertaken in associated institutions, in the faculties of agriculture in the universities and other bodies. But the time has come when research needs to be co-ordinated rationally. Research to-day is very expensive; it requires a, great deal of money. I take it, in view of what the Taoiseach has said, that the functions of the new institute will not be to replace the existing agencies of research but to implement their actions and to supplement them, to coordinate them in the interest of the highest possible national advantage.

The Taoiseach made the point, with which we must all agree, that agricultural research must be related to the actual day to day needs of farmers. There is no point in setting up an agricultural institute that cannot influence day to day farming any more than there is in establishing a great fertiliser factory when there are no provisions for spreading the fertiliser on the land. Therefore, the object of the institute is to improve practical agriculture. In this respect the function which is specifically designated in Section 4, sub-section (2) (j), is of great importance—that is to say, the function to

disseminate, or procure the dissemination of, the results of agricultural research to interested persons, including, in particular, persons engaged in providing advisory services in relation to agriculture.

The persons mainly engaged in this function are the agricultural graduates of our universities. Therefore, the success of this new agricultural institute will depend, as Senator Hayes said, on the provision of more and more improved agricultural education, so that instead of this institute reducing the need for agricultural education in the universities, it will increase it.

I have heard agricultural instructors described as conduit pipes. They bring to the institute the knowledge of the practical problems of farmers and bring down to the farmers the knowledge of the results of research. The success of this programme of research will depend on an ample advisory service for farmers. That, in its turn, will depend on the fullest development of the educational facilities of the universities in the agricultural faculty.

I might refer in passing to the admirable report of the Commission on Agriculture in 1924 which was presided over with great distinction by Professor Drew. This report, which was partly acted on and partly neglected, laid down a programme for agricultural education at every level—the primary level, the secondary level, the vocational level and the universities. It is one of those reports which I had in my mind, when I said in an earlier debate this year, a great deal of expert advice is available to the Irish Government which it does not always adopt. I hope that, when the institute is set up, some of the proposals in the Drew Commission Report of 1924 will not be forgotten.

There is one very important question to which the Taoiseach did not refer which I should like him to answer in his reply. Does research include marketing? Section 2 of the Bill does not make this clear. In the Dáil, the Acting Minister for Agriculture was asked this very question but the reply which he gave was not to my satisfaction. I am not criticising the reply, but I say it was not satisfactory because, if it is correct, I am afraid the institute will, to some extent, misfire. As reported at column 926 of the Official Dáil Report for November 21st, the Minister said:—

"A question was asked as to what ‘research' covers. If Deputies look at Section 2, they will find that ‘research' and ‘agriculture' are both defined. From those two definitions, it will be seen that ‘agricultural research' in this Bill includes investigation, test, experiment, analysis and study of facilities, activities and sciences which relate to or tend to promote or improve agriculture. That would seem to me to decide the question as to whether the institute could study marketing abroad. I think it is beyond it; but it could study packaging, harvesting and packaging and that sort of work, in regard to either agricultural or horticultural products."

In regard to that, I should like to say that agriculture is a business, not merely a science. Farmers are not farming for the good of their health; they are farmers to make a profit. Horace Plunkett always insisted that agriculture depended for its success on better farming and better business. In the early years of this century the Department could not contribute financially to business research because of the opposition of vested trading interests and the marketing of farm produce had to be left to the co-operative movement. One of the criticisms of the Department of Agriculture—to my mind the Department was not at fault because it was part of the spirit of the times in which it was founded—was the lack of economic research.

I cannot refrain from telling the Seanad an anecdote in relation to a conversation which I had with Mr. Carrigan, the administrator of the Marshall Aid Fund. I told him one evening that there was not very much money spent on agricultural economics in the Irish universities. He asked me what the sum was. I told him that, as far as I knew, the only education in agricultural economics was given by a course of lectures in Albert College for which one of our staff was paid £100 a year. Mr. Carrigan said: "Do you mean to say the total amount spent on agricultural economics education in Ireland is 400 dollars a year?" I said: "No, it is 280 dollars. You have forgotten the devaluation."

May I ask the Taoiseach to assure us that that deficiency will be repaired? There is no use in the farmers producing unless they are able to sell their products at a profit. I know the line between production and marketing is very hard to draw. Successful marketing must begin on the farm and marketing nowadays depends upon standardisation, freedom from disease, grading, and so on. There is no use in a farmer doing his part properly, unless he can be assured of an adequate marketing organisation. In that connection, I should like to congratulate the Government on setting up the new Committee on Agricultural Marketing. I hope that committee is one of the bodies which will share in the beneficence of this institute.

This institute can play a great part in the agricultural advance of this country, but its success will depend on close association and co-operation with the Department of Agriculture, with the agricultural faculties of the universities, the co-operative societies and the farmers' organisations. The good effect of this institute will depend also on a wise agricultural policy in many other directions. By itself, it will contribute only a small part to our agricultural advance. There must be a sound policy in relation to education, to the provision of capital and credit, to the size of farms, to marketing organisations and suitablé trade agreements in relation to the Free Trade Area. However, inside that context and inside a wide policy of general agricultural reconstruction, this institute can play a useful part. It deserves the support of the Seanad and, as I said at the beginning, we should be very grateful to the American Government for its very benevolent action to assist our economic progress.

Debate adjourned.
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