I do not intend to be long. I had hoped to confine my remarks the other evening to five minutes. I will do my best to do that, but I would remind the House that my offer was not then taken up.
The Leader of the House acted very well in introducing this motion. It gives an opportunity for discussion in another way on matters that had been ruled out of order technically. We must all appreciate that this has distinctly facilitated any of us who wanted to refer to matters related to C.I.E. It is a step which, as other Senators have said, is to be welcomed.
Now, in general, we tend to say C.I.E. is very efficient. We appreciate that, and so on. In some ways it is very efficient, but in other ways it seems to be not as efficient as one would require.
I want to say something in a moment about the closing of branch lines. Some of the main lines, however, are not as efficient as they ought to be. I had occasion to travel to Cork a little earlier than this time last year. I travelled down on the morning train and came up on the evening train about 10 days later. On both occasions, I sat with friends travelling with me, in an unheated carriage. The weather was considerably different from the weather we have had today. When I made some enquiries of the inspector I was told we were entitled to move into a heated carriage, which we then did. That happened twice— once on the morning train going down and once on the evening coming back 10 days later. I do not think that on a main line that should be possible.
With all the talk about efficiency, we begin by closing the small branch lines, but the efficiency demanded by the management on the main lines is far from enough.
A great deal has been said about the closing of the branch lines and the west Cork railway branch line in particular. It seems to be thought sufficient to say that a line is losing money, and it must therefore be closed. We all know this line. It was a line I later travelled on, on the occasion I have just mentioned. It is a magnificient line from the point of view of tourism. It goes through wonderful country. Merely to judge it on the question as to whether this particular branch pays its way seems an illustration of an entirely wrong approach, by those who should have the community's as well as the Company's interests at heart.
I was staggered, if I may say it in parenthesis, by the attitude of Senator Seán Ó Donnabháin who got all worked up with indignation because, he said, a petition was being got up locally! He seemed to think that it was a monstrous thing that people should have asked for signatures. Why should they not? What is wrong with it?
On the whole question as to whether you should necessarily close down a line which is "uneconomic", I should like to make some comment. On page 9 of the report it says: "During the year, the Board decided that the undermentioned lines could not be made economic," and, therefore, it decided to close them. I made the point then, and several times since, when we were asked to pass the Transport Bill in 1958 that, in fact, there are other major considerations in relation to transport. They are considerations which relate to transport as much as they relate to the necessity for keeping open lines of communication through the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. It is essential for business and civilised life that certain methods of communication, of carrying postal packets, letters, freight and people, should be kept open, whether or not, in a particular local area, they lose money. It is quite obvious that if you were to run the Post Office on this kind of economic concept, parts of this country would be entirely without postal and telegraph services. The balance sheet attitude, which says that if there is a local deficit we must close down the local line is deplorably shortsighted. In other words, there may well be certain uneconomic sectors of railway lines which must be carried by the economic sectors.
Senator McGuire made that very point in relation to the business he understands so well himself—the field of retail trade—where it is absolutely essential to carry some uneconomic lines. I think that is as essential in relation to transport as it is in relation to trade. It would be absurd to set up toll gates on every road and close the roads which did not pay for themselves after a year, by the amount of the toll collected. I feel, therefore, that this "balance sheet attitude" has been an extremely narrow one.
It is also unreal because it is claimed that they are saving money in this way. There is no longer an obligation upon the company to maintain the permanent way of the abandoned line. If there is overcrowding on the roads, however, as there certainly will be, the time will come when increased expenditure on them will have to be paid for. It is taking money out of one of the pockets of the community and putting it into another pocket. We are producing a situation which demands that more and more money be spent on the roads, and pretending that we are saving money, simply because we do not have to spend it on the permanent way. That is a situation which seems to be indefensible. I am afraid we rather brought it upon ourselves because we allowed, in the Transport Act, this concept to be accepted.
I should like to quote something I said myself upon that Act when it was before us, at col. 732, Vol. 49, of the Official Report. I said:
"We should recognise that the power we are now giving would enable C.I.E. to do that"—to close the lines that were not actually paying—"if they considered that the running of these stations and lines was uneconomic."
We made the point that the Minister who was then before us had seemed very indignant, previously, in the 1949 debate, for the then Deputy Seán Lemass asked—and this is a quotation from the Dáil: "Will the Minister tell us if he accepted that recommendation?" which was a recommendation of the Milne Report which said: "In all the circumstances it is considered that any proposal to close branch lines solely on the grounds that they are at present unprofitable should be rejected." Deputy Lemass was then most indignantly urging the then Minister to accept that suggestion. Yet, when as Minister for Industry and Commerce, Deputy Seán Lemass came before us and asked us to pass that 1958 Bill, he seemed to have become quite unconcerned that it contained that narrow attitude so wisely condemand by the Milne Report.
I should like to mention another point. It is my last point. It is a question which is mentioned on page 9 of the C.I.E. Report for 1960, which we are now considering. I read in the report that "work study teams of the Board's employees were set up and extensive work study was undertaken particularly at the Inchicore Works and Traffic Department." I should like to ask, arising out of that, whether there was any work study on the management side? I should like to know whether the managers have been found to be conducting their business well from the point of view of personnel management and labour relations, in view also of what is said on page 11: "Joint consultation was established with the trade unions and the staff at all levels." I should like to know whether this, in fact, can be said to be working satisfactorily, when in point of fact for five days out of the working week, the workers are locked out and prevented from working. I should like to know whether, if the workers took the buses and proceeded to work them, the police could legally be called in at the behest of the management which is studying work?
I am gravely perturbed at the whole question of labour relations in this company. We, as a community, are suffering from a breakdown on the part of the management in relation to their workers' dissatisfaction. The workers say they will not work for two days of the week because of wage conditions on those two days but for the other five days they are prepared to work. Yet the management is allowed by the Minister to stop them.
