Before we adjourned last night I was trying to let light into the dark minds of the Coalition supporters and I was referring——
Central Fund Bill, 1961 (Certified Money Bill) — Second Stage (Resumed) and Subsequent Stages.
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
I wish the Senator would not start off on that note.
——to the success stories of the Fianna Fáil administration about which Senator Murphy appears to have some doubts. He referred to the expenditure on Haulbowline and, as far as I could gather from his remarks, suggested there was some laxity either on the part of the Government or on the part of Irish Steel in the rapid development of that concern.
I should like to recall to Senator Murphy's mind that in 1959/60 the total sales of their products exceeded £2 million and they were ten per cent. above the highest figure previously recorded. It is interesting and satisfactory to note that over £500,000 worth of that total was export products. At present there is a big programme of reconstruction and expansion under way and when it is completed this firm will be in a position to make a greatly increased contribution to the national economy. I do not think Senator Murphy need have any worries that Irish Steel will go ahead and will play the same vital part in our economy as all the other great industrial undertakings which have had their beginnings as a consequence of the policy of Fianna Fáil.
Senator Murphy made some reference to unemployment but, no matter how he juggles the figures, the fact remains that there are some 31,000 fewer people out of work now than when the Coalition were thrown out in 1957. Therefore, we have, in fact, "got cracking". I notice he did not take too much time on the cost of living. I do not deny that it has increased but it should be recorded that the increase was smaller proportionately than that which took place in the last three years of the Coalition Government. Furthermore, as Senator Murphy is well aware, wages have gone up steadily since 1957 and over 700,000 workers have been cushioned against price rises by an increase in real wages of some 11.5 per cent.
Senator Murphy waxes eloquent on the fact that Fianna Fáil now welcomes foreign capital. He forgets the position that obtained here in 1932 when the first Fianna Fáil Government took over the administration of this part of Ireland. He forgets the measures that were necessary at that time to get an industrial drive going and to re-create in the minds of our people the belief that Irish brains and Irish skill could do what people in other countries had been able to do in regard to manufactured goods.
It took some time to get that going and it needed measure on the Statute Book to ensure that industrial undertakings started here would not go to the wall as a consequence of unfair competition from outside. That process, as I say, took some years and the point was reached where Irish industry was on its feet and was able under its own steam to go into the export market where we need no longer, because of the development of skill and techniques, fear the incursion of foreign competition. Therefore foreign capital may now come to this country without doing damage to our home industries. It should be remembered, however, that foreign capital would not come to this country were it not for the stability of this Government, were it not for the progressive development of the national economy under the present Government and the satisfactory outcome of the measures adopted by the Government to ensure the stability of the economy.
Senator Murphy got some fun out of the use of the phrase "Let us get cracking." He reminded me of the fact that the Party of which he is such a distinguished member made a certain series of promises to the electorate in 1954. It would be very interesting, in view of the very serious promises they made to the electorate, to see how that Party "got cracking" when they were in a position to do so.
They got into bad company.
In case anyone doubts it, I have here a copy of the official Labour promise which was made in Dublin a few days before the poll in 1954. It is a very well-produced job, and states what the Labour Party solemnly committed itself to. Under a cross-heading in leaded type, "Labour's Pledge", here is what it says:
Labour has made its position on prices quite clear.
This is in capital letters.
It is pledged to reduce food prices and will insist on increasing the subsidies if this is necessary to bring about a reduction.
That was done, was it not?
I continue the quotation:
Labour is the only Party which has given this pledge to the electorate. No matter what the position is after the election Labour will stand firm by this pledge.
They did.
Then, to ensure that this colossal political swindle would get across——
What about the price of butter? It was reduced.
—— they added this:
Labour cannot be in a position after the elections to form a Government on its own but it can control any Government that is formed.
They were three years in office as members of the Coalition Government. The statement is in black and white—it was issued officially by the Labour Party—that they could control any Government that was formed. They were pledged to reduce prices. Let us see how they "got cracking".
It is interesting and educative to the people, in view of all the play that has been made here from time to time with the words "cost of living" and "rise in prices", to see how that particular group in the Coalition "got cracking" on their promise to reduce prices.
On 24th October, 1956, nearing the end of the Coalition's second term of disastrous office, a Question was asked in the Dáil of the then Taoiseach. At column 7 of Volume 160 of the Official Report, the Taoiseach replied to the Question. The Question was if he would state the items which had risen in price under the Coalition. The Taoiseach gave a list of 112 items. It is most interesting to see what those items were: Beef, mutton, ham, pork, sausages, boiling fowl, herring, whiting, cod steak, tinned salmon, eggs, cheese, lard, fresh milk, condensed milk, cake, oatmeal, rice, semolina, potatoes, cabbage, onions, carrots, cooking apples, oranges, tomatoes, sultanas, tinned pears, tea, coffee, cocoa, jam, sauce, sweets, chocolate, biscuits, minerals, coal, gas, turf, electricity, firewood, candles, paraffin oil, rent, rates, repairs, suits, overcoats, raincoats, flannel trousers, overalls, sportscoats, shirts, pyjamas, blouses, skirts, woollen dresses, cotton dresses, hats, knitting wool, boots and shoes, children's sandals, beer and ale, stout, whiskey, cigarettes, tobacco, mattresses, chairs, three-piece suites, bedroom suites, radios, linoleum, blankets, sheets, curtain materials, cutlery, crockery, galvanised buckets, scrubbing brushes, soap, soap powder, scouring powder, education, hotel expenses, boot polish, toothpaste, razor blades and face powder.
I am afraid the Senator is going into too much detail.
He forgot bread, butter and flour.
There are only a few more and it is important that they should be recorded: Medicines, matches, writing pads, envelopes, bicycles, cycle tyres, admission to cinemas, admission to football matches, admission to dances, shoe repairs, hairdressing, dry cleaning, motor cars, motor cycles, petrol, train fares, bus fares, papers, magazines, postage, telephone.
Bread and butter are missing.
That was the way in which the Coalition Government in three years "got cracking" on the reduction of the cost of living and the reduction of prices.
But bread and butter are missing.
That was the way in which the Labour Party kept the solemn pledge which they had made to the people on the occasion of the general election that they would control any Government that was formed. They were in a position to control the Government of which they were members and apparently they either forgot their election promises or deliberately ignored them, or just did not give a damn what happened once they were members of the Government.
In case the Fine Gael Party should feel aggrieved at all the blame being put on Labour for this colossal swindle, I should like to display here the famous little leaflet by which they perpetrated the most colossal fraud ever perpetrated on the people. That leaflet was issued in 1954 by Fine Gael, on the same lines as the Labour Party. A few of the points in it are of interest. They say that all the increases which took place in the price of certain items quoted were deliberately imposed on the people by the present Government, by Fianna Fáil. They say that they have taken unnecessary sums of money and they ask: "So you want relief from high taxation and the high cost of living? If so, change the Government. Fine Gael for better times." That was 1954.
There must be an election in the offing.
The "better times" operated to the brink of disaster. The Labour Party in some constituencies were not quite satisfied that the facts given in this leaflet were convincing enough. So, in one constituency, one of the Labour candidates proceeded to invent figures not at all in accord with the figures in the leaflet issued by the Fine Gael Party or, indeed, by the Labour Party. The swindle took place and was successful. That is not bad enough.
Senator O'Quigley referred here last night to the well-known maxim quoted by the distinguished and beloved Leader of Fianna Fáil at that time—"Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me." The Coalition succeeded in fooling the people twice, once in 1948 and again in 1954. They got away with it and did nothing. They will never again succeed, and neither will any other Party or combination of Parties, in perpetrating that fraudulent swindle on the people by way of leaflets of this type or in any other way since the people have had such bitter experience of what that type of electioneering meant to them and of what these unfilled promises meant.
Senator Donegan referred to the credit facilities to farmers and to the fact that farmers could now get a bank overdraft. What a change from the days of the Government which Senator Donegan supported. What a change from County Louth in 1954. For the benefit of Senator Donegan and other people over there who seem to think that all these things have been forgotten, I should like to recall the devastating analysis of the position of the agricultural community which was made by a member of this Houses, one of the most highly-respected business men of this country and one of the strongest supporters of Fine Gael. I refer to the late Senator McGee of Ardee.
As reported in the Drogheda Independent of 26th February, 1955, he had this to say with regard to the Coalition Government:
I am afraid there is an anti-agricultural bias being taken up by the Government. Within the last eight days I arranged mortgages for two respectable farmers. The worst of it was that these men told me that had they not voted as they did the present situation would not have arisen.
Obviously they voted for Fine Gael and the Coalition. The quotation continues:
I do not want to be unfair but I want to keep the Government from making fools of themselves. There is not a farmer in Louth who after the difficulties he had to contend with last year, did not wonder if there was any Christian charity left in them at all.
He meant left in the Fine Gael Coalition Government. He wound up with this remark:
In my opinion they are gone mad. When Mr. de Valera said a few years ago that if the other side ever got into power Ireland was finished I did not realise it would come so soon.
It took two years after that before the people got the opportunity of correcting the blunder they made in 1954.
This widens the debate.
The Senator does not like the truth but he will get it. Senator Donegan is a great man when he comes in here where he thinks the national newspapers may report the gems of wisdom that fall from his mouth. He is a great man for giving praise occasionally to Irish industry and to its development. However, when he goes down the country and gets into a cosy little corner amongst the Fine Gael supporters he plays a different tune.
I was interested to read the report of a Fine Gael dinner in County Louth in the Drogheda Independent of 14th January, 1961, at which Senator Donegan is quoted as having addressed some admonitory remarks to his hearers about the claims for industrial development which were being made by the Fianna Fáil Government. He is reported as saying:
The Government prefer to play the tariff wall and set up sheds where "do-it-yourself" kits could be assembled.
That was Senator Donegan's reference to industrial development and to the magnificent productive units which have been established in this country during the past four years.
Quote. Let us in on it.
I should like every worker in the great Cement Works in Drogheda, which were started in spite of the opposition of Fine Gael, to read Senator Donegan's reference and to ask himself if the Drogheda Cement Works are an example of the "do-it-yourself kits" which Senator Donegan thinks is the only type of industry which Fianna Fáil set up in this country. I should like also the workers in the many splendid boot factories in County Louth and in the industrial area of Dunleer to take heed of Senator Donegan's insulting references and to make up their minds, when they have the opportunity, to deal with Senator Donegan in the right and proper manner.
They were there before Fianna Fáil came into office.
If the Senator does not keep quiet, I shall have to turn to him. Senator Burke had a few words to say last night that call for comment also. He was worried that the cost of running the country was getting out of hand. As is the usual practice with his colleagues in Fine Gael, he failed to give any indication as to where he would make cuts, what services he would reduce or in what way he would deal with the problem. It is the same old streanncán we have heard for years. It is the same old streanncán the late Dr. T.F.O'Higgins indulged in in a Press controversy with me about 15 years ago. We wrote letters to the newspapers for about a month. I continued to challenge him to indicate how Fine Gael would deal with matters, how they would cut expenditure, on what services they would save and how much they would save. After a month's controversy, I failed to get an answer from him. We cannot get an answer from Fine Gael or from the Labour Party here.
I should like to know from some Fine Gael speaker what services they would like cut to curb rising expenditure and to save money as they are so anxious to do. I should like to draw attention to the Book of Estimates on which this debate is based and which Senators no doubt have studied. If Senator O'Donovan will refer to the audited expenditure for 1953-54—the last year Fianna Fáil were in office before the Coalition took over—he will find it was £104,931,089. In the year in which the Fine Gael Coalition were thrown out by the people, 1956-57, he will find that the audited expenditure had risen to £109,456,420. There was an increase in expenditure every year the Coalition were in office to a total of £4,525,331.
Three millions of it being food subsidies and of direct benefit to the people.
I would recall also for the benefit of the financial wizards on the other side that the Coalition which lasted from 1948 to 1951 left deficits totalling £61 million behind them. By 1954, the Fianna Fáil Government had reduced that deficit to £8 million, but, unfortunately, the second Coalition came into office and again they left a deficit of £14 million. Not alone that, but the debt they left to be paid out of taxation for the payment of principal and interest on loans increased from £4½ million, when the first Coalition took over, to £10 million when they left in 1951. When they were thrown out in 1957, it was up to £17 million.
What is it today? Is it £25 million yet? I think it is £25 million this year.
We have been told that current expenditure on State services rose by 10.9 per cent. in the last year but the gross national product also went up by 16.3 per cent.
Last year? Go on.
If Senator O'Donovan does not conduct himself——
These are ridiculous figures.
——I must ask the Chair to intervene.
The whole thing is a myth.
We are entitled to the free speech which Senator O'Donovan and his Blueshirts tried to deny the people in 1934.
In my opinion, this is out of order.
Go down to O'Connell Street to the hustings.
Senator Ó Maoláin should be allowed to proceed in an orderly fashion.
In an otherwise sensible speech, Senator McGuire claimed that the expansion in industry and exports was due to some action taken by the Coalition Government. Senator McGuire should have regard to what I said in reply to Senator Murphy. There would be no industries, no exports and no possibility of giving employment, were it not for the fact that in 1932 the rot of the first ten years of Cumann na nGaelheal was stopped. A Government with drive, initiative and belief in themselves and in the people took over, and an industrial drive was got going which established industries here which are a credit to the country. Were it not for the fact that these industries were in existence—brought into existence under Fianna Fáil policy—no steps taken by any Government would have resulted in any exports, much less an increase in exports.
The unfortunate thing, however, about it was that, in 1956-57, the old pattern of 1931 was repeating itself in the 26 Counties. Workers were going on short time; industries were beginning to close down; and the same situation as that which existed in 1931 was fast becoming a reality. On that point, it occurs to me that it would repay the economists and the financial wizards on the other side, and would repay Senator Murphy also, to go to the National Library one day and do one simple thing: get the files for the last months of 1931 or February, 1957 and compare them with the files of any newspaper for 1961 and see the difference in regard to employment, and in regard to the opportunities for work now open to the people of this country, and see the number of columns of advertisements for jobs vacant.
They have all gone away—the young people have all gone.
The comparison would have a salutary effect on the minds of those who made it. On the subject of the amazing recovery which has taken place since 1957, I quoted tributes from Fine Gael sources in this House last night and I should like to quote a few more for the edification of the gentlemen on the other side. We have heard quite a lot about the doleful position of West Cork and its railways. I should like to quote now from a speech made by a very estimable gentleman, Alderman Stephen D. Barrett, Fine Gael Deputy for Cork and Lord Mayor of the city.
We are a long way from West Cork now.
Here is what he said, as reported in the Irish Independent on 3rd November, 1960:
In the hitherto depressed area of West Cork new forces were at work giving promise of absorption of local labour and a call to those in exile to return home for employment.
In the country generally there was a new spirit.
Economically, great efforts were being made to capture the export market and attract tourist trade, and, politically and socially, to wipe out the bitterness and rancour of the past.
The Irish Independent cannot be claimed in any way to have any affiliations with Fianna Fáil or the Fianna Fáil Government.
Or with Fine Gael, either.
On 5th November, 1960, the Irish Independent said:
In the course of the past year there has been an encouraging upsurge in the hitherto slowly expanding Irish economy. Most of the main economic indicators have moved upwards, some by quite substantial margins, and it is generally agreed that a new dynamic of progress has been released.
In substantiation of our claim, I should like to refer also to another very estimable gentleman who represents the county of Meath in the Fine Gael interest. Captain Giles, who was discouraged by the weeping and wailing and banshee talk of some Fine Gael speakers, said, as reported in the Official Report of the Dáil on March 14th:
I do not want to complain about the country's desperate plight—it is not in a desperate plight at all.
Since I referred to industry and the situation which exists in regard to advertisements for jobs in the employment columns, let me also refer to the advertising business. There is in this country a very valuable journal which I hope every member of the Seanad gets, reads and studies. I refer to Development. The current issue of Development was so packed and cluttered with advertisements that it had to defer publication of quite an amount of editorial material. Here is what Development had to say in explanation of that fact:
This advertising boom, by the way, certainly reflects the change which is coming over the country. Business is looking up in scores of unexpected sectors. And naturally people react more agreeably; they get more cheerful, more optimistic, more confident—and are emboldened to become more enterprising.
Development cannot be accused of being a Fianna Fáil publication, either.
All these matters are worthy of comment, and, when one takes them in conjunction with the doleful prophecies made on the Central Fund Bill in 1957 and subsequent years and in conjunction with the doleful prophecies, reported in the Irish Independent of March 21st, last year, by the Leader of the Fine Gael Party, Deputy Dillon, one can evaluate in a proper way the statements made in criticism of the Government and the developments which have taken place. Deputy Dillon said that if the Government policy continued on the present lines, there would be a major economic crisis. There is no economic crisis. That theme song was sung by Fine Gael year after year since 1932. When we had our backs to the wall, they sang it and they continued to sing it when things were going well. They are the banshees and the Jeremiahs. They cannot get out of the habit. They have grown so accustomed to it that it has become second nature to them. But the people, the businessmen and the workers are witnesses to what is happening.
This country is going ahead in spite of Fine Gael and every effort made to impede its progress. Thanks to the fact that a Fianna Fáil Government are in control of the administration of these Twenty-Six Counties and to the knowledge the people have of the good work Fianna Fáil have done in the past and will continue to do in the future, there can be no doubt that when this general election has taken place, we shall find Fianna Fáil credited with an even greater number of seats than in the catastrophic defeat of Fine Gael in 1957.
In view of the present high cost of living and of the fact that the boundaries of Dublin have now been extended as far as Upper Ballyfermot, Walkinstown, Bluebell, Crumlin, Churchtown, Rathfarnham and Harmonstown and Finglas on the North side, I feel the Government ought to give careful consideration to the conditions of the working-class people living in those areas. It is obvious that in the very near future we shall have a further increase in bus fares. It is time for the Government, through C.I.E., to initiate some scheme whereby employers in the city will be able to supply their employees living in those outlying areas with tickets, weekly or otherwise, at a reduced rate. Such a scheme would not be abused. It would be workable only between the employers and the employees living in those areas. At present there is great hardship on the unemployed living in those areas. They have to attend employment exchanges twice or three times a week. The Government should consider, again through C.I.E., some means of providing them with travelling tickets.
That matter must be discussed on another occasion. It is not in order on this Bill. It is a matter of detail. We can discuss only general principles on the Bill.
I shall leave it at that, then. I merely wanted the Government to consider some scheme for the benefit of the particular classes to whom I have referred.
I had not intended to speak this morning but, having heard the recent spate of tirade, I feel bound to comment. What good does it do to this House, or to the country in general, that we should have a recital of broken promises and failures? Whom is it persuading? Whom is it impressing? It is not persuading or impressing anyone in this House. It is not persuading or impressing any newspaper reader throughout the country. What is it doing, this kind of dialogue in this House and in the other House? The kind of dialogue I mean is this: "You broke your promises in 1922": "That is all right, because you broke your promises in 1923." And so it goes on. The answer to accusations of broken promises and failure is simply to accuse the other Party of broken promises and failures.
What is the ultimate effect on the country? The demoralisation of the country and the devaluing of our political standards. What the country is hearing is the negative side—a catalogue of broken promises and failures—everywhere in this kind of debate. I say to the leaders of the Parties on both sides that it is impressing no one; it is getting no votes; it is giving fodder to the people in this country who say that politics is in a bad way and that Party politics is a bad system.
I really believe it is beyond the reasonable comprehension of an intelligent person why Senator Mullins, Senator O'Donovan, or any others who have gone in for this broken-promise technique, should believe it is doing any good to anyone. I do not want to produce a tirade of my own in reply to this, although it sounds like it. I am simply considering the effect on the country. I am going to try to do something positive. I should like to put it to the leaders of the Parties, as an Independent myself, that this negative criticism of politics in the past in this country is getting them nowhere and getting no votes.
Obviously, it is the imminence of the general election that is stirring up this kind of recrimination. But surely they should realise that it is not getting any votes and that, at the lowest level, it is futile. I appeal to our leaders, one and all, in this House and elsewhere, in the future to let the dialogue be: "We did this" and the answer be: "We did something better." That is an argument that appeals to reasonable and practicable people, not: "You did something bad" with the answer: "You did something worse." That is pulling politics down, down and down, in the eyes of the people of this country.
Let us have the positive approach. Let us have the statement of what was done and the counter statement of what was done better. Or, if we like statements of policies, let us have a statement such as: "Our intention is to do this" and, instead of the reply being: "You broke your promises before; therefore, you are bound to break them again", let it be positive: "Our intention is to do this better thing." Then politics will be steadily rising in the country, then politics will be constructive. But I greatly deplore the kind of denunciatory and recriminatory speech Senator Mullins has just made; and when anyone else makes it, I greatly deplore it. I am certain I am speaking for 90 per cent. of the voters. That is the point.
Including Senator Sheehy Skeffington.
Including Senator Sheehy Skeffington, perhaps. But it is not even getting votes.
The future looks bright for this country. As soon as Fianna Fáil have made up their minds about the new constituencies, have quit wrangling and fighting amongst themselves, have presented the new Electoral Bill to the Dáil and held a general election, a new Government will be elected. And we have no doubt in our minds after the Sligo-Leitrim by-election that that Government will be a Fine Gael Government, a Government prepared to work in the interests of all our people, irrespective of class, creed or politics.
At the conclusion of his speech Senator Mullins said this country was going ahead in spite of Fine Gael. I want to say this country is going ahead in spite of Fianna Fáil, in spite of the fact that they plunged the country into a civil war in the past and tried to burn it out. It took the leaders of Fine Gael, many of whom are still with us, to build it up again. The Fianna Fáil Party have now been in office for four years and this Bill gives us an opportunity of reviewing their work and of contrasting the state of affairs that exists today with the promises they made in 1957. When Senator Ó Maoláin speaks about swindles and broken promises, he reminds me of the Russian delegates at the United Nations talking about peace and the rights of minorities. As far as Senator Ó Maoláin is concerned, I look upon him as the father of the bandy-legged boy who, when he was sending the boy to school, said: "Johnnie, you are very bandy and if you happen to get into a row with any other boy call him `bandy legs, bandy legs' before he gets the opportunity of saying it to you." I agree with Senator Stanford that it would be much better to avoid accusations.
Senators
Hear, hear.
I want to say that when others do it I shall do it. When Senator Ó Maoláin makes speeches like that which he has just made it is only right that we should reply to them and we are entitled to do so on this Bill.
Give good example.
Let those who are older than I am give the example. It is up to the leaders of Parties to give the good example and, if they do not give it, do not blame the back benchers in a Party. If we were to consider all the Fianna Fáil promises, all that they hoped to do and were to do but forgot to do, we should be here for months. According to the Taoiseach, since 1932 we have been breasting the hill, we have been rounding the corner, but he has never been able to bring us to the land of promise and the land of sunshine which was held before the people.
In spite of the fact that Fianna Fáil have been in power for 23 out of the last 31 years, the greatest admission of failure appeared on their own posters at the recent Sligo-Leitrim by-election when on every boarding they told us that "Ireland's progress has now begun; keep it going." After 31 years that in itself is an admission of failure.
There were seven years of Coalition Government in between.
It is an admission of their own failure that they say, after 31 years, that Ireland's progress has now begun, despite the fact that they were in office for 23 of those 31 years.
Could we talk, Sir, about 1961 and 1962 on, instead of looking back?
If the matter is in relation to general financial policy, it is in order.
I want to make my own speech, and I do not want lectures from anybody. Some people may be accustomed to giving lectures at other times but I shall make my own type of speech. In any case, the people of Sligo-Leitrim did not believe the Government and their propaganda. They did not believe that Ireland's progress has even yet begun, and they served them with notice to quit. No one would welcome a counter-irritant as a substitute for a cure and there is no doubt that that precisely is what is in this Bill. It will be admitted by all that the country today needs a dynamic Government, a Government prepared to work hard and to lead the people to better times by a progressive policy, by example and hard work, and not by making flowery speeches as is happening at present.
Ministers should devote more time to the work of their Departments and less time to running around the country attending dinners and making after-dinner speeches. Everything in the garden may appear rosy when a man gets up to make an after-dinner speech, following a good dinner and whatever else goes along with it, but the majority of the people do not seem to share the optimism of our Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries when they are travelling the length and breadth of the country using flowery language and speaking in half truths. Indeed, if the flowery language of those speeches could do anything to make us wealthy or prosperous, no doubt we would be one of the most prosperous countries in Europe today.
We all agree that the Minister is seeking to extract from a dwindling population the largest sum ever asked for by any Minister, the sum of £132 million. There is no denying that people generally suffered a profound shock when they heard the figure because the people at present are overtaxed and unable to bear any further burdens. Money is not found growing on trees or under gooseberry bushes. Taxation is crippling production, it is crippling the farmers and it is crippling our industrialists. The sum sought by the Minister shows an increase of £8 million over that of last year and, if we take into account the £9 million saved by the abolition of the subsidies, the amount demanded now is £36 million over the 1957 figure. There has been a further increase in the amount taken out of people's pockets in rates of £3½ million. That is an increase of £40 million over the last four years, an increase of over 40 per cent.
There are many people who want to know when there will be an end to increased taxation. It would be no harm to remind the Government, because they often reminded the inter-Party Government when they were in office, that it is often the last straw that breaks the camel's back. We have £132 million being taken from the people's pockets in 1961 despite what appears in the Official Report for May, 1956, almost five years ago. The present Taoiseach, then Deputy Lemass in Opposition, was trying to win the people's votes by making false promises, promises he had no intention of fulfilling. In 1956, he said:
Taxation in this country has reached the danger limit. So far as we are concerned there will be no increase above the 1953 level.
Despite that specific promise, we are now paying £40 million above the 1957 level.
The Taoiseach, the Minister for Finance, and the Fianna Fáil Party want conveniently to forget their promises. That is nothing new. In 1932, when it was costing £22 million to run the country, they secured many votes by making a specific promise—it was made by Éamon de Valera, now An tUachtarán. He said that when Fianna Fáil were in power, they would reduce that figure by £2 million to £20 million. That gained many votes and the Party became the Government and, since then, I think taxation has increased every year. Instead of reducing taxation, as they said, by £2 million, it has since increased by £110 million.
No matter what Senator Ó Maoláin has said, if we contrast the present situation with the promises made in 1957, it can be truthfully said that never was so much promised as was promised by Fianna Fáil in 1957; never was so much expected by the people as a result and never has so little been done by any Government as has been done by Fianna Fáil in the past four years to honour the promises they made. It was a campaign of fraud. They went out determined to cheat the Irish voters and their promises were but stepping stones to office. They got back into power and very quickly forgot their promises. Many politicians blame the people for their apathy at elections, but what can one expect from the people when the Leaders of the Party and Ministers deny their own words after getting into office, deny they ever made such promises?
In 1957, the people were led to expect that subsidies would be maintained. These are Fianna Fáil words, that there would be no increase in prices. This was said both by the present Taoiseach and the former Taoiseach, Mr. de Valera. They said there would be no increase in taxation and that we would have vigorous measures to solve our economic problems and that immediate action would be taken to provide employment. The Government would "get cracking." There was a £100 million plan to problem vide 100,000 new jobs. The farmers were promised better times and better prices. How did the Government keep these promises? By withdrawing food subsidies, increasing the cost of foodstuffs and increasing taxation by £40 million. The farmers are getting less for their produce and emigration is increasing. There are fewer people at work. In 1957, we were told by the former Taoiseach and by Deputy Lemass, in the one night, that the subsidies "will be maintained". Fianna Fáil speakers and the Irish Press especially claim that Fianna Fáil have been consistent.
They have been— in breaking promises.
They have been consistent in two things: they have broken every major promise they made to the Irish people and they have been consistent in their inconsistency. Although the Taoiseach promised that there would be no increase in the costs of essential foodstuffs, they are now skyhigh. Fianna Fáil have achieved one record: the cost of living stands at the all-time high level of 149 points. Subsidies were removed to the tune of £9 million. Instead of keeping down the cost of living, as the poor were led to believe, the essential foodstuffs that the poor and the workers must use three or four times a day were increased in cost through deliberate Government action. Deliberate Government action sent up the cost of living immediately after the change of Government. The loaf for which the worker's wife had to pay 9d. went to ?d., despite the fact that we were told there would be no increase in essential foodstuffs. That was an increase of 6d. per loaf. Butter costing 3/9. was increased to 4/7., an increase of 10d. per lb. by the Party who said there would be no increase in the price of essential foodstuffs, the Party who always keep their word. The Party who claim to have been always consistent and who said that if every ship on the sea was sent to the bottom, we could do without John Bull and the rest of the world, sold our butter to John Bull at 2/6 and 2/8per lb., while charging the Irish housewife 4/7d. per lb. If that is the hallmark of consistency, I do not know the meaning of the word.
Flour was increased in price from 4/- to 8/- per stone. These are the essential foodstuffs of the poor. The wealthy man can go to the hotel and have a mixed grill or beef steak and onions, or whatever he wishes, but the poor must have bread, butter and sugar at least four times a day. To say the least of it, it was very unfair of the Government to break their word as Fianna Fáil did when they increased the price of essential foodstuffs in the past four years. No matter what may be said by Senator Ó Maoláin, it was no easy task for the inter-Party Government to find the money to maintain subsidies. It can truthfully be said of them that, during their seven years in office, they did not increase the price of essential foodstuffs. That increase was brought about subsequently by the deliberate action of Fianna Fáil.
Let us take for a moment the promises made about emigration. We remember the promise of Fianna Fáil that vigorous measures would be taken immediately Fianna Fáil were returned to office to stem the tide of emigration. They cried out at the chapel gates lamenting the canker of emigration and the harm it was doing to the people and to our economy. What have they done about emigration in the past four years? The official figures show that 185,000 Irish men and women applied for work permits in Britain in that period. The Minister for Finance said in the Dáil that Fine Gael had mentioned a figure of 200,000. They certainly did, and the only mistake they made was that their figure of 200,000 was too low.
Hear, hear!
Their estimate was too conservative. The pattern in the distant past was that a man, his son, or his daughter, emigrated and sent home money to help to keep the homestead going, be it a cottage in Mullingar, a small farm in Leitrim, Sligo, or anywhere else. What is the pattern to-day? Those of us who were down in Sligo recently will carry abiding memories of what we saw there. The little homesteads are closed. When we inquired why they were closed, we were told that the occupants had emigrated to England. One man applied for a permit in England but that man had with him his wife and five, six, seven or eight children. All these were driven from the land by Fianna Fáil policy.
The Government who have driven those people from the land can afford to spend £10,000,000 on jets. If we had the money and could afford it, it would be quite right and proper to spend the money on jets for our national prestige, and the emphasis has been on prestige. We have not, however, work to maintain our own people at home. I believe it would be much better to have the smoke swirling out of the chimneys on the little homesteads in the rural areas than to have it pouring from the jets in the sky. That £10,000,000 could be spent to much better advantage, if it were spent in keeping our own people at home. In our circumstances, it would be better to spend that £10,000,000 on providing work for our people than to compel them to seek a livelihood in another country.
We remember the promises made in regard to employment and unemployment. We remember the posters: "Get cracking. Wives, put your husbands to work". Unfortunately the wives who went into the polling booths and put their 1, 2 and 3 before the Fianna Fáil candidates did not think that the promises made would be broken so quickly. Instead of the Government putting their husbands to work, they compelled them to emigrate to England to earn a livelihood. It is perfectly obvious that people cannot be employed in Birmingham and Coventry and London and, at the same time, appear on the unemployment register here.
We remember the £100,000,000 plan. We remember the special four-page supplement in the Irish Press. We remember the promise made by Deputy Lemass to spend £100,000,000 and to provide 100,000 new jobs. Where is that £100,000,000 plan today? Where are the 100,000 new jobs? Of course, there are now only 99,998 new jobs because the Fianna Fáil Government, on returning to office, created an additional ministerial post. Practically their first act was to appoint a Minister for Transport and Power, despite the fact that, in 1956, Fianna Fáil Deputies stated in the Dáil that we should have fewer Ministers and that Justice and Defence should be amalgamated.
They created, too, a new post for the Taoiseach's son-in-law, the post of Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Justice. There were times when the Minister for Justice had a hard and difficult task. For the past 10 or 12 years, that Ministry has come to be regarded as one of the easiest Ministries. Yet, the Fianna Fáil Government saw fit to create the post of Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Justice. These two new appointments cost the taxpayers £10,000 to £12,000 per year. That is the blister that has been put upon the people.
Statistics prove conclusively that there are practically 50,000 fewer people employed today as against 1956. Fianna Fáil, of course, indulge in half-truths. They pick out the few industries in which there are increases in employment and they paint a rosy and a glowing picture. They never paint the full picture. The full picture would show that today there are 25,000 fewer people employed on the land as compared with 1956.
I mentioned here on an earlier occasion that Fianna Fáil had clamped down on housebuilding, despite all the promises they made in the past. In my own county, in one year, we built 200 labourers' cottages. For the past four years—I defy contradiction on this; I am speaking as chairman of the Westmeath County Council and the Minister can get the facts—we have had a housing scheme on hands. Away back in 1955, that scheme was drafted. For four and a half years, we have been trying to get sanction for that scheme. The plans have been sent back time after time, with the request that we should dot the "i's" and cross the "t's". We were advised at one time not to plaster the walls either inside or out. Remember, the Government were spending £10,000,000 on jets, but they wanted the labourer to live in a cottage without any plaster on the walls. That was the suggestion that emanated from the Department of Local Government. We intended to put wooden floors; we were advised that cement floors would be good enough. The plans were sent back. We refused to implement the instructions we got from the Department. Only in the past four or five months, with a general election in the offing, have they agreed to sanction our plans. Fortunately, we had our way; we will build a decent house, plastered inside and out, and with wooden floors. There will be two fireplaces; the Department recommended that there should be only one. That is the Party who talk about progress.
What about central heating and piped water?
We are going ahead with that scheme. We are putting money on our rates and borrowing £40,000 to go ahead with that scheme. We hear a lot about State grants provided for houses year after year. I can give the figures in respect of each year from 1948. There was only £341,000 paid out up to 1954-1955. There was a change of Government when £2,022,000 was paid out. In 1955-56, £2,248,000 was paid out. And that is the year in which we are told there was a financial crisis.
We hear the Fianna Fáil Party blaming the inter-Party Government for everything that went wrong at that time. Senator Ó Maoláin spoke about the moaners and groaners. I remember where the moaners and groaners were during those years in spite of the fact that £2,248,000— the largest sum ever—was paid out. Nothing like that sum was paid out in the past four years. In spite of the fact that the Fianna Fáil Party speak of the great upsurge we have in this country, there are over 5,000 fewer people employed today by the county councils than in 1956. I admit that most of that employment was due to the introduction by the inter-Party Government of the Local Authorities (Works) Act.
My own county got from £32,000 to as high as £62,000 in one particular year. No matter what may be said about that, I contend it was money well spent. It helped to give employment. I have often said this— and I do not mind saying it again— that in an undeveloped country like Ireland, where there is drainage work, afforestation work, land work and other work to be done, no able bodied man should be unemployed. Instead of expecting a man to live on 31/- or £3 a week dole, the Government should have schemes like the Local Authorities (Works) Act schemes, to put that man into employment, so that, instead of being a burden on the State and a burden on himself, he will be an asset to himself and an asset to the State. We should pay him a wage of £6 or £7 or whatever the wage paid by the local authority is. It should be a wage upon which he can at least live an ordinary decent life.
We believe in that. We think it is wrong for Fianna Fáil to do away with that scheme. The reason for doing that was that it was introduced by the inter-Party Government. The Fianna Fáil Party at their Ard Fheis last year passed a resolution demanding that the Fianna Fáil Government should reintroduce that scheme. At the General Council of County Councils, upon which members of Fianna Fáil are in the majority, a similar resolution was passed unanimously, but in spite of that, the Government still refuse to implement that scheme. It is no wonder that the Most Reverend Dr. Lucey, Bishop of Cork, said recently that never since the days of the Famine had there been so few people at work in relation to the total population. That is the truth in this country.
In spite of the vigorous measures that were to be taken by Fianna Fáil to end unemployment and emigration, Fianna Fáil claim credit because of a reduction of something like 20,000 or 25,000 in the number of unemployed. It is an empty kind of boast to declare that you have purchased a reduction of 20,000 in the number of unemployed by exporting well over 200,000 men, women and children in the past four years. Let us now come to the promises made by Fianna Fáil to the farmers. There were to be better times for all.
That is the phrase in the Senator's own leaflet.
Yes, but better prices and better times were promised to the farmers by Fianna Fáil. We know that is not the case today. We know that in 1953 the farmer got 29.4 per cent. of the national income. In 1958, he got 25 per cent. of the national income and in 1959 he got 24 per cent. of the national income, in spite of the fact that his overhead expenses are increasing. We know that the agricultural sales index figure in 1953 was 100. It went up to 107 in 1955 and it is now back to 96 in spite of the promises made by the Fianna Fáil Party.
While the farmers' rates, wages and overhead expenses have gone up anything from 30 to 40 per cent. in the past seven or eight years, their income has declined by almost 100 per cent. Those are the better times which the farmers have got from the present Government. I remember the promises made to the milk farmers. I remember being at a by-election in County Kerry and coming across a Fianna Fáil T.D. putting up posters for the march which was to take place in Dublin regarding the milk prices. We remember the rosy promises held out to the milk men of this country by Fianna Fáil but when they got back into office, instead of giving the farmers the increase they promised them, the price of milk was cut by 1d. per gallon.
That is to be measured with Deputy Dillon's 1/- a gallon.
It is not. Even if the Minister whispered to the Senator to say that, both the Senator and the Minister are completely wrong. They were demanding a fair price for milk. When the Senator tries to make little of Deputy Dillon's 1/- a gallon, as the Senator says, that is only a half truth. He promised a minimum to put a floor under the price of milk. He promised that for five years he would give 1/-, and 1/- was much better in 1948 than the Government's price is now because the cost of living and the overheads of the farmers have increased by 100 per cent. Having regard to those facts, the present Government would want to pay the milk producers 2/- a gallon in order that it would be as good as the 1/-promised at that time.
It was a reduction on the Fianna Fáil price at that time.
It was not.
He wanted to bring down the price at that time. He wanted to bring down the price to 1/-.
He made a promise to the people that he was prepared to give them a minimum.
By bringing it down.
They could get all they could possibly get at ½., ?d. or ¼d., but the State was prepared to say that they would get a guaranteed price of 1/-.
And bring it down 3d.
He was not bringing it down 3d. It was not at ?d. at the time.
It was.
I beg to differ with the Minister. The Minister can look up the figures and see that it was not.
Let us come to wheat and examine the position now compared with the position when Fianna Fáil took over and the dishonest promises they made to the people. The Minister for Finance took a hand in that because he stated over Radio Eireann that the cut in wheat prices was unnecessary. I was listening to the Minister speaking in County Carlow when the farmers were led to believe that if the Fianna Fáil Party were returned to office, they would give a price of £4 2s. 6d. per barrel for wheat. Despite that promise made by Fianna Fáil in 1957, despite the fact that farmers' rates have increased by 20 per cent., that wages, machinery and machinery parts, oil and all their other overhead expenses have increased by anything from 25 per cent. to 30 per cent., instead of getting what they should be getting now, nearly £5 per barrel, they are getting and will get this year 20 per cent. less than they were getting in 1956. Therefore, instead of Fianna Fáil paying £4 2s. 6d. for wheat under the last wheat order that was issued, farmers will be very lucky if they get anything from £3 5s. to £3 10s. per barrel.
When we are speaking about wheat, is is no harm to say that, in 1956, under an inter-Party Government with Deputy Dillon as Minister for Agriculture, enough wheat was grown to supply our full needs. There was even a surplus and it was grown not through filling ten fields with inspectors but by paying a fair and reasonable price to the farmer for his products.
And Deputy Dillon said all they could make was boot polish.
Deputy Dillon said no such thing. He said he would not be got dead in a field of Fianna Fáil wheat and who would blame him? You were producing three to three and a half barrels to the acre and if you look up the statistics, you will see they are getting 20 to 25 barrels——
He did not say "a Fianna Fáil field of wheat"; he said "a field of wheat".
He said "a field of wheat" at the time Fianna Fáil were in power.
That is different.
From the official statistics, you will see they were getting three and a half to four barrels an acre.
What was the yield of wheat after ten years of the first Fine Gael Government?
They had a difficult period trying to build up this country and they did a good job in building it up after the robbery that was done to the economy.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
That is remote from the Bill before the House.
Senator Ó Maoláin referred to a statement by the late Senator McGee in 1955 in relation to an anti-agricultural bias on the part of the Fine Gael Government. There is certainly an anti-agricultural bias in this Government. He was referring to wheat prices and he said: "If there is any Christian charity left...". If there is any Christian charity left in Fianna Fáil and if they believe Senator McGee was right in 1955, why do they not restore the price of wheat to £4 2s. 6d., now that the farmers' costs of production are 30 per cent. to 40 per cent. higher than they were then? If they are not hypocrites, why do they not do it? Why do they quote this statement at all? Instead of showing some Christian charity to the farmers and giving them over £5 per barrel for their wheat to which they would be entitled, Fianna Fáil are to give them 10/- to 12/- less than they received when the late Senator McGee made that statement.
There is definitely an anti-agricultural bias and you cannot expect anything else when there is a city man as Taoiseach who has never been interested in the small farmers. Unless there is something done for the small farmers of Ireland, and done shortly, they may all turn the key in the door and leave the land. In 1957, Fianna Fáil promised that if they were restored to office, they would give £4 2s. 6d. per barrel when the price of the loaf was 9d.; now the farmer or his wife must pay ?d. for a loaf and the people who professed to have some Christian charity in them are prepared to give the farmer only £3 5s. or £3 10s. per barrel for his wheat. The stone of flour that was 4/- then now costs 8/- while the farmer gets 10/- less for wheat. There is very little Christian charity in that and the Government who are doing that cannot claim they are favouring the farmers in any way.
Another breach of faith by this Government and this Minister is in regard to the promise made by the Minister for Finance to reduce the number of civil servants. We all recall clearly the popular reaction to the statement by the Minister for Finance when he indicated he would carry out a survey which would result in greater economy in the operation of the Civil Service and that it was the intention of the Government to weed out any surplus personnel and that in consequence of the examination there would be more efficient administration with fewer personnel.
How did he weed them out? He weeded them out by doing as they have done in my own county, taking good Fianna Fáil supporters out of their homes and planking them into the Civil Service without sitting for any examination. Instead of weeding out civil servants and having a reduced number, what do we find?
That is a serious charge and the Senator should be called upon to give details of it. He should be asked to give the names of those concerned.
The charge I have made is quite true. Fianna Fáil people from my constituency have been taken out of their homes, put into a State car and placed in the Civil Service without doing any examination.
That is not true.
It is quite true.
It is not true; it could not be true.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I do not think it correct to say they were put into State cars but we all know there is a method of making appointments to the Civil Service without examination.
If the Leas-Chathaoirleach is going to help the Senator, that is all right.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Minister will not make that kind of remark to me.
The Minister has denied it. Will the Senator accept that denial?
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Chair has said there is a method of making appointments to the Civil Service—it has always been there—without examination.
What is the method?
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Under the Schedule to the Civil Service Regulation Act. I do not have to answer the Minister on that.
There was no such appointment.
Is the Senator to be asked to withdraw that allegation? The Minister has denied it and I understand the procedure is——
May I intervene on a point of information? The Minister, apparently, is not aware of the legislation governing appointments under the Civil Service Regulation Act and the Civil Service Commissioners Act. There is, in fact, statutory authority for appointing persons to the Civil Service without requiring them to undergo an examination.
In the public interest.
On the making of every such appointment, the Government must bring the names of the appointee before Parliament and state that the appointment has been made.
That is right.
Secondly——
Qualify it now.
——people can be recruited as temporary civil servants without examination.
This does not relate to the statement of Senator L'Estrange.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Let me say this: Senator L'Estrange's original remark was perfectly in order. I do not think his remark that they were put into State cars and brought up to the city was in order.
He should be asked to withdraw that remark in the interest of good order.
I withdraw the remark that they were put into State cars.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Thank you, Senator.
But not that they were put into State jobs.
Is it not evident from what the Leas-Chathaoirleach and Senator O'Quigley have said that they must either come in following an examination or in the public interest, in which case the names are put before the Dáil and Seanad? Let the Senator produce the names.
They are only some of thousands who have been put into the Civil Service by the back door in the past few years which is doing untold harm to the Civil Service.
There is no such thing as a back door and the Senator should withdraw that remark.
I cannot withdraw what I know to be the truth.
It is not the truth; it is the other thing.
There has been an introduction of back-door methods of appointing people who are not fit to be in the Civil Service.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Quite apart from the instance I gave, it is well known that there are temporary appointments to the Civil Service which are very numerous and made by all Governments even without being scheduled. A whole list of appointments may be scheduled.
Very limited.
The statement was that they were put into the Civil Service by back-door methods and put into State cars——
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Senator has withdrawn that.
——and brought up, presumably at the request of some Minister or Parliamentary Secretary, and put into jobs to which they were not entitled.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Apparently, Senator O'Grady did not hear Senator L'Estrange withdrawing the allegation that they were put into State cars.
He was forced to withdraw it eventually but he should never have made it.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
He withdrew it.
He knows it was untrue.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
It is off the record. As I said, his original statement was in order.
It is not of much importance when he does not give us the names of those who he alleges were put into State cars and State jobs.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I have allowed a good deal of interchange about this matter.
It is very seldom that I interrupt and if I did not consider it necessary, I would not do so.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I am not thinking of the Senator particularly. Three other people have interrupted. The matter has been fully ventilated and I think the Senator might conclude his remarks on it.
There was popular Press reaction when the Minister made the statement that the number of civil servants would be reduced. There were articles in all the papers. There was even an article in the Irish Press pointing out the wonderful work that was about to be done, the efficiency we would have in future in the Civil Service, that Dr. Ryan would use the hatchet. We see how it has been used. We see an addition of 400 to the Civil Service.
It seems to be the Government's intention at present to create two types of people, the well-off and the poor. There is do denying that the majority of our people are much worse off now than they were, say, four years ago. I do not agree with Fianna Fáil policy which gives a cost of living increase of £10 per week to a High Court judge who already had £4,900 a year, or about £100 per week, and at the same time, decides that 5/- or 7/6 is enough to give a road worker and 4/- is enough to give an agricultural labourer, and gives 6d. to 9d. to an Army pensioner, 2/4 a week to the soldiers who fought recently in the Congo and who got such praise in our papers and form our politicians. When the Government got an opportunity to do something for them, they gave them the beautiful sum of 2/4 a week, while, as I said, they gave High Court judges £10 per week.
That is altogether wrong about the Congo soldiers, absolutely wrong.
They got 2/4d.— privates in the Army—and I know from privates in Mullingar.
There is no use in trying to keep this man right. One might as well give it up.
The creation of such a wide division between the fortunes of a small minority and the fortunes of the majority of our people in town and country will bring about very grave and difficult social, economic and political problems in our society and, if it continues, could lead to communism in our country.
It is no harm to point out to the Government that you cannot build a prosperous community on a poverty-stricken agricultural community and that is what the Fianna Fáil Government are trying to do at the present time. We on this side of the House have always agreed with the industrial campaign, with the setting up of industries.
Always? There is a qualification to that.
The Cumann na nGaedheal Government started the Shannon Scheme — a Government which had the wisdom to put first things first.
And there were no factories to use the electricity.
If we had not got the Shannon Scheme and the electricity, we could not have had the industrial revolution which we had afterwards. The only good thing about it was that certain people who tried to destroy our country at that time did not get to destroy the Shannon Scheme, despite the fact that they did destroy a good deal in this country.
I understood the Senator was not born at that time.
Senator L'Estrange is in deep water now and should try to swim out of it.
He is an old crab now.
It is a pity he does not know a little more.
Probably he was employed as a boy scout at that time, if he was a boy scout.
I was in the L.D.F. from the first week it was formed.
I do not know how they kept you disciplined.
When the first beet factories were started, they were referred to by the people on the far side of the House as white elephants. We remember the propaganda and publicity they indulged in at that time.
Who sent beet and wheat up the spout?
They referred to the Shannon scheme and the Electricity Supply Board at that time as white elephants.
Be a little consistent.
We all want to see industries flourishing in this country.
Pay lip service.
It would be much better if we could have industries based on raw materials from our own country. Everybody knows that if we export an extra £50 million of agricultural products, let it be cattle, sheep or pigs, over the next three or four months, there will be £48 million or perhaps £49 million net profit coming into this country to be distributed amongst farmers, shopkeepers, merchants and every stratum in our society. It may be necessary to pay £1 million or £2 million for imported cotton seed cake or some other commodity we cannot produce.
The Senator is beginning to study the dismal subject.
If we export £15 million worth of industrial produce, the reverse is often the case. After importing the raw material, we shall be very lucky if we have £1 million or £2 million net profit coming back to this country to distribute among our people.
While our export figures may be high, we will not have real prosperity unless we can export more from the land or export more from factories where the raw material can be produced at home. There is a market at our door worth £200 million for small fruits and vegetables. Instead of having our jet planes travelling throughout the world, it would be better to have a shuttle plane service to London, Coventry, Birmingham and those other places in England where the markets are. If we had only 10 per cent. of that market, it would be worth £20 million to us. It would make a big difference to our economy and we could keep many more people in employment in their own country.
When we speak about industries, one would think all the new industries had been established under Fianna Fáil. If there is an increase in industrial exports at present, credit should be given where credit is due. Much of the credit for that is due to the fact that Deputy Sweetman when Minister for Finance and Deputy Norton when Minister for Industry and Commerce gave concessions to industrialists. Fianna Fáil introduced a Bill in 1932 which forbade any foreign capital to come into this country.
The Senator does not understand the position; it is quite clear. He has not got round to studying that subject.
In 1955 and 1956, the inter-Party Government brought the oil refinery to Cork.
That is a good one.
Laugh as much as you like. Facts are facts and cannot be denied. They brought in the money for the mines in Avoca. The people who were loudest in their denunciations were members of the Fianna Fáil Government.
Go back to 1936 and read who killed it then.
Who killed what?
The oil refinery.
What happened in 1936? The Fianna Fáil Party were in office and if anybody killed it, it must have been the Government at that time. We have always been in favour of bringing in people with "know-how" to start industries.
What did you do with the Marshall Aid moneys?
The landlords were put out of this country in the past. People are coming to-day with fat cheque books from Germany and other countries and are buying up our land. That is wrong. It is all right to bring in money——
It would be no harm if they developed some of the derelict land around Mullingar.
It is wrong that our land should be allowed to be sold to foreigners as is happening now under a Fianna Fáil Government. When we speak of the number of industries set up recently, I would direct the attention of the House to the reply given recently to a Parliamentary Question addressed by Deputy Sweetman to the Minister for Industry and Commerce. Here are the Minister's figures for the number of factories established in this country with the aid of foreign capital and technicians: For the years ending 31st March, 1955-56, 21; 31st March, 1956-57, 18; 31st March 1957-58, 21; 31st March, 1958-59, 13; 31st March, 1959-60, 7. They are going down each year, remember. So, instead of the great progress we have and the buoyant economy, the figures were seven in 1959-60; 13 in 1958-59; and in the years before that they were 21, 18, 21. So, in the last two years of inter-Party Government, 39 factories were established, 21 plus 18. In the three years of Fianna Fáil, only 41 factories were established. It took Fianna Fáil three years to do what the inter-Party Government did in two years.
How many closed down in 1956?
If you look up the official statistics, despite all the bragging by Fianna Fáil, at present there are 25,000 fewer people in industrial employment than there were in 1956.
Deputy Sweetman will have to check on that again.
There is no necessity to check on this. Deputy Sweetman asked the Question; your own Minister for Industry and Commerce answered the question. These are the figures given by your own Minister for Industry and Commerce. If you cannot believe the figures of your own Minister, I cannot help you. All I can say is : God help you.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I do not think Senator Laurence Walsh has any Minister for Industry and Commerce.
Senator L'Estrange is getting large encouragement from the number of his colleagues over there.
That has got nothing to do with you, Sir.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
These interjections must cease.
For any degree of prosperity we have in Ireland to-day, if we give credit where credit is due, we shall have to give it to the inter-Party Government, and especially to Deputy Dillon who put the farmers of Ireland on their feet.
That all depends on what you mean, as Professor Joad used to say.
Under the land reclamation scheme, 1,000,000 acres of land were reclaimed and are in full production to-day. Deputy Dillon encouraged the farmers to improve their land and to improve their grass. He said they should try to make two blades of grass grow where one formerly grew. We remember what Fianna Fáil said at that time. They said we were pro-British; they said we were ranchers and they spoke about the man with the dog. Now they have adopted the same policy themselves.
On 9th May, 1960, speaking at Inchicore, the Taoiseach proclaimed: "The keystone of Fianna Fáil economic policy is the British market." He tells us that in 1960. What a change has come over Fianna Fáil in 30 years! We were once told that the British market was gone and gone for ever and thanks be to God. The man who is now An tUachtarán once told us that the production of cattle in this country was finished and he advised the farmers to keep bees. He said he had been informed on very good authority that the best type of bee to keep was the Egyptian bee. Definitely many farmers have been stung —and they are still being stung—by the drones of the Fianna Fáil Party in the past 30 years.
Still, they vote for them.
The people did not take his advice and did not keep bees.
If they had done what he suggested, he would not be where he is to-day with a salary of £52,000 a year.
That is gross misrepresentation.
The Senator has reached a new low level and I really think he should be stopped——
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Order !
——if we want to conduct business in a dignified manner.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
He has referred to An tUachtarán. He is going too far.
I am trying to follow the Leader of the House.
(Interruptions.)
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Senators should allow Senator Carter to make a point of order.
Senator L'Estrange has referred to An tUachtarán in an undignified manner and has misrepresented him.
Of course he has.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I feel that one cannot get away from reference to a very active politician. I think the Senator is about to conclude on that. The first part of the reference should not be made in the House normally, and the second part of the reference is not really relevant to this debate.
It should be withdrawn.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
There is no question of its being withdrawn. In fact it is true, but I think it should not have been made. I cannot see that the Senator should be asked to withdraw it.
If references of this type are to be allowed, and if this type of procedure is to be continued, then Parliamentary Government, as we understand it in this Seanad, must go by the board.
(Interruptions.)
The Senator dragged in the mud——
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
If the Senator will allow me? Personally, I noticed references to many matters in this debate. There are other authorities in the community to whom it is equally objectionable to refer. I mean other parts of the Government and the Judiciary, equally with the President and the Oireachtas.
I agree.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
But I think that one cannot really avoid reference to a person who was the Leader of a particular Party for a long period, and during a period of time which has, in fact, been drawn into the debate to-day.
I think it is completely wrong.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I think the matter is now finished.
It drags down the tone of this debate, and reduces it to the status of a meeting of the Westmeath County Council where Senator L'Estrange is the star performer and gets away with this type of muck.
One thing is certain. I was elected to the Westmeath County Council when Senator Carter could not get elected to the Longford County Council.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
There is no question——
The Leader of the House set the tone for the debate.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
There is provision in the Book of Estimates for the President's Establishment. It is not an important part of the Estimates Volume, but, at the same time, I cannot stop the Senator from making the reference.
While you, Sir, as Leas-Chathaoirleach, were on your feet a moment ago, I noticed that the Senator who caused all the trouble, Senator L'Estrange, had not the courtesy to resume his seat in accordance with Standing Orders, thereby showing disrespect for the Chair as well as the President.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I agree with Senator O'Grady. When the Chair is ruling on a point of order, a Senator must resume his seat.
I should like to refer to the statement made by Senator L'Estrange that I set the tone for this debate. Perhaps I did, but I made no personal or insulting reference to any person or to the Leader of any Party.
None whatever.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I agree that the Leader of the House did not make any personal reference in relation to outsiders, but it seemed to me that he did widen the range of the debate very considerably.
Senator L'Estrange would not speak like that in a public street. He spoke under the privilege of the House.
Senators on the opposite side of the House are beginning to learn now that Ireland is an agricultural country. If the people on the land are wealthy, then the whole nation can be wealthy, and if the people on the land are poor, then the whole nation will be poor. It has often been said by the illustrious leader of our Party, Deputy Dillon, that the standard of living of every man, woman and child ultimately depends on what the farmers of Ireland and their workers can profitably export because we have no underground wealth, no coal, steel, ore, or anything like that.
No one can deny that the farmer must have that money coming from exports to pay his bills, to buy artificial manure and seeds and to pay his rates. In my county of Westmeath, 77 per cent. of the rates come from the land. The farmer must pay rates in order that our services—roads, mental hospitals and other services—can be maintained. That money must come in from abroad to help us to buy raw materials and to keep the wheels of industry turning.
We have 12,000,000 acres of fertile arable soil, and we have a population of 2,500,000 people. Therefore, there are five acres of land for every person in the country. In 1948, after six years of uninterrupted strong Fianna Fáil Government, we had the lowest number of cattle, sheep and pigs on record. Our total exports were only £39,000,000, and they had increased by only £3,000,000 from 1932—a period of 16 years—despite the fact that everything we had to export doubled. If they had not doubled, our exports would have gone down by nearly £20,000,000.
Does the Senator forget what was happening in those days and what his colleagues were doing?
We should give credit where credit is due. In 1957, our total exports were £131,000,000, an increase of 92 per cent, in ten years. The inter-Party Government were in office for seven of those years. Senator Lenihan claimed credit for the increased export figure in 1957. That is ridiculous, and he knows it as well as everybody else. Fianna Fáil came into power in March of that year. Does Senator Lenihan think that the three-year-old cattle, and the two-year-old sheep and pigs which contributed to the export trade in 1957, were born and grew up in a month or two when the Fianna Fáil Government came into power? They may have had a magic wand in the past when they tried to fool the people with their promises, but they certainly could not do that. Credit must be given where credit is due and that was due to the work done by the Government in the years preceding 1957.
They left 94,000 registered unemployed in 1957.
I should like to remind Senator Ó Maoláin that there were 156,000 unemployed when Fianna Fáil were in office in 1935. If he looks up the record, he will see that there were 60,000 more people unemployed at that time. The prosperity we have is due to the fact that when there was a change of Government in 1948, Deputy Dillon and Deputy Morrissey, who were both Ministers, went to England to negotiate the Trade Agreement of 1948, which tied the price of our cattle to the price of British cattle.
If the price of British cattle goes up by 10/- a cwt. on 1st April, our Irish farmers get that increase also, because Deputy Dillon had the wisdom and the foresight in 1948 to tie the price of Irish cattle to the price of British cattle, knowing that if he went out of office, no matter how incompetent a Minister for Agriculture we might then have, he could stay at home in his office in Merrion Street and let the National Farmers Organisation in England look for better prices for their cattle and they would have to be passed on to us. That is what has been happening since the Trade Agreement was negotiated in 1948.
Last year, the Minister for Finance told us they would have negotiated as good a trade agreement. From 1938 to 1948, no Minister went over there. Instead, they sent civil servants——
When they went in 1938, they brought back something good, and you could not.
That was when the farmers lost £2,000,000 or £3,000,000 and you gave the British an extra £10,000,000 to which they were not entitled.
As a result of the treachery of Fine Gael.
You had taken £200,000,000 out of the pockets of the people here in taxation and tariffs, more than the annuities ever amounted to.
We beat the British and the Blueshirts combined then.
The Blueshirts were necessary when there were rogues and blackguards in this country trying to put down free speech and when your Taoiseach at the time would not protect free speech here.
Free speech !
The Blueshirts ensured free speech here, despite you and the likes of you.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Order !
You thought you were going to repeat the 1922 stunt.
The people on your side started 1922 against the law-fully-elected Government of the day, and you know that. The Minister for Finance stated that Fianna Fáil would have got us as good a trade agreement——
Or perhaps better.
Is it not true that, from 1939 to 1945 England was in the midst of a World War, her ships were being sent to the bottom of the ocean and her people were rationed to two ounces of meat per week? The arch-patriots of Fianna Fáil have always told us that England's difficulty was Ireland's opportunity. Was this not Ireland's opportunity then? If you had any regard for our farmers and wanted to see them get just prices, why did not the Minister, when he was Minister for Agriculture, go over and get a better trade agreement for them? You failed to do so. All that is wrong now is that you are all jealous because Deputy Dillon did it in 1948.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Senator is continually referring to "you". It would help considerably if he would refer to the Party or the Minister; in other words, if he would address his remarks to the Chair.
There has been a lot of talk about the buoyancy in the revenue and the increased prosperity we are supposed to have here. Over the past seven years, cattle have been exported here at £70 or £80 per head. These were cattle, or the progeny of cattle, that would have been slaughtered, had Fianna Fáil not been put out of office in 1948. Even in 1947, 114,000 calves were slaughtered and the owners paid 10/- for the hides.
Would the Senator not leave the knife out of his hand?
Nobody can deny that. Had those cattle been kept instead of slaughtered, they could have been reared and exported for £50 or £70 per head, as they were afterwards when there was a change of Government and we had a Government who would not continue the daft policy of Fianna Fáil. It is agreed by everybody that the farmers are not getting a fair crack of the whip at present.
Why does the Senator not reduce the rate in Westmeath where he is in control?
We cannot reduce the rate because the Government which Senator Carter supports told us, when introducing the Health Bill, it would cost 2/- in the £, but now it is costing 11/- in the £. You tried to get on Longford County Council, but the people would not elect you to it.
I did not—I could be elected any time I wished.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Perhaps we might finish with this private dispute between the two Senators.
The Senator is driving up the rates in Westmeath because of lack of moral courage.
I have always had moral courage, whether here or in Westmeath County Council. One thing neither you nor anybody else can accuse me of is lack of the courage to say what I believe is right.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
This private county council row should be terminated.
There is no row in Westmeath County Council. We are a happy and united family. When we struck the rate, Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour were a happy, united family and we came to an agreement on the increased rate without a vote. Perhaps if we had members like Senator Carter, we would not be able to do that. But the Fianna Fáil members in our county are respectable citizens and we were able to come to a fair compromise.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
I think that is enough about the County Westmeath rate.
As I say, the farmers are not getting a fair crack of the whip. In the past four years, they have lost over £30,000,000 on cattle prices, wheat prices went down, and there were lower prices for barley and oats. The farmer's wife got bad prices for for her poultry. She got bad prices for her turkeys at Christmas. Despite the fact there was an outcry against inter-Party Government that they were not strong enough to deal with a union in Dublin in regard to container traffic, the "strong Government" we have now did not deal with it during the past four years, and that is causing untold harm.
The Irish farmers have been in the front line of every war in this country, national, social and economic. All they want is a fair price for their produce, and they are definitely not getting that at present. Since the Government have deliberately increased the cost of living, we, in Fine Gael, believe it is their duty to compensate people for it. While the farmers have to pay 25 per cent. more for foodstuffs and contribute to increased wages, they themselves are receiving 10 per cent. less for their produce than they were getting four years ago. That is altogether wrong. If it continues much longer, we shall have a much more serious flight from the land than at present.
About three years ago, the Minister for Finance allocated £250,000 for agricultural marketing. That was done with a great flourish of trumpets. I remember hearing Senator Lenihan speak at length about it. I should like to know how much of that has been spent and what it is intended to do about marketing. We all know our marketing system is completely antediluvian. On the eve of leaving office, Fianna Fáil have introduced a Bill to set up a Pigs and Bacon Marketing Board.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
That would be more appropriate to the Appropriation Bill.
I think I am entitled to mention that this sum of £250,000 was set aside and nothing has been done about it. Last year, a Trade Fair was held in London, at which almost every country in the world, even countries from the most backward parts of Africa, were represented; yet Ireland was absent.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
This matter is not in order, not because it relates to expenditure but because the Senator is going into too much detail. He should reserve these remarks for the Appropriation Bill.
I want to refer to certain figures in regard to the cost of living. I have mentioned figures in regard to the cost of living on numerous occasions in the past and every time I mentioned them the Minister for Finance told me that my figures were completely wrong.
So they are.
I have got the Statistical Abstract and I have taken figures for different periods of Government and the Minister can look up the statistics and see they are quite correct. I know that when he gets up to speak he will start by saying that every figure I gave was completely wrong and a complete misrepresentation of the Fianna Fáil Party.
Phony figures.
There was a change of Government in 1948. In February of that year when the inter-Party Government came into office the cost of living stood at 99 points. They were in office until June, 1951, and when they went out the cost of living was 109 points, that is an increase of 10 points during their three to four years of office. Fianna Fáil came in in June, 1951, with the cost of living at 109 points. They introduced their Budget of 1952, which sent up the cost of living and when they went out of office on 2nd June, 1954, the cost of living stood at 124 points, an increase of 15 points. The inter-Party Government again came into power on the 2nd June, 1954, with the cost of living standing at 124 points and they went out on the 20th March, 1957, with the cost of living at 135 points, an increase of 11 points. Fianna Fáil once more came into power on the 20th March, 1957, with the cost of living at 135 points and today, after four years of Fianna Fáil Government, the cost of living is 149 points, an increase of 15 points. Now, if you add together the two terms during which the inter-Party Government were in office, seven and a half years, the cost of living went up by 21 points, and if you add together the two periods that Fianna Fáil were in power, only seven years, it has gone up——
The Senator's figures are phony.
My figures are correct. The Senator can put on his glasses and read the official statistics if he does not believe them. The cost of living during the two periods of Fianna Fáil Government went up by 29 points and for the two inter-Party Government periods of office by 21 points.
The 21 points are for six years and the 29 points for seven years.
They were in for three and one-quarter years and three and a half years.
Less than three and one-quarter and less than three.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Minister might answer that in the course of his reply.
I cannot reply to everything.
The Minister will if it is important.
From 1st March, 1948 to May, 1951, according to my calculation, would be three years and three months. Would that not be right? And from May, 1954, to the 20th March, 1957——
Yes, less than three years.
Two years and ten months. If you add two years and ten months and three years and ten months together you get six years and one month. During the period of the first inter-Party Government we had the Korean war.
My goodness!
The Minister can look up the official statistics——
What about the Congo?
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Order.
The Balubas are out now.
The prices of all our exports increased very substantially. As a matter of fact they increased by 12 or 14 per cent. During the next three years we had the Suez crisis and the prices of our imports increased by 11 per cent. There has been only a four per cent. increase in our import prices in the last four years and, despite that fact, the cost of living went up by 15 points due to deliberate Government action, although import prices remained almost stationary or increased very little. Credit should be given where credit is due. Although import prices increased by 14 or 15 per cent during both terms of the inter-Party Government they were not responsible for that fact. Although import prices increased much more steeply than during the Fianna Fáil Government's term of office, the inter-Party Government were able to keep the cost of living much more stable.
Today we have in Ireland people who are able and willing to work, who are looking for a lead from the Government but unfortunately they are not getting it. The people proved in Sligo-Leitrim and Carlow-Kilkenny, where the Fianna Fáil poll dropped by 8,000——
There were eight by-elections and we won five of them.
We will drive the Senator around Sligo-Leitrim in the near future.
I want to say that no Government in this country can promise the same material wealth as is available in England and America, but there is no denying that if we had a proper Government, a dynamic Government, prepared to work in the interests of all the people, this country could be made a much better country for people to live and work in. That can only come when we have a change of Government and I believe it will come very, very shortly.
If the occasion were different I would very definitely be anxious to speak at greater length. It is a great pity that we have to come in here and listen to a Senator with the ability of Senator L'Estrange wasting his time and the time of the Seanad talking about the slaughter of calves, and referring to the Blueshirts, something which is past history.
I did not start the talk about the Blueshirts.
Senator Tunney was not here last night to hear Senator Ó Maoláin.
There are many things it would pay the country to forget. It is a shame to waste time talking about what one side or the other promised. Many promises were made and were not fulfilled. I give credit where credit is due. The inter-Party Government did good work for the country and the present Government have done good work, and if all that was good in both sides came together, something really worthwhile might result. Talking about the slaughter of calves will not prevent emigration.
If we had the calves, it might.
I am not one to say very much or to take up the time of the House, but it is tragic that people who are elected as responsible people should devote all their time to criticising others, instead of supporting and helping them for the betterment of the country and cutting out the humbug that we have been hearing for the past 30 or 40 years. After listening, for the past two hours, to the statements made, I feel it is a bad day for the country when the domestic affairs of any man are brought up for discussion. Reference has been made to a Parliamentary Secretary recently appointed. Is it not sad that despite the man's ability and qualifications, it should be said that he should be debarred from a position because the partner in life whom he chose happens to be the Taoiseach's daughter? It is time to get rid of that humbug and I appeal to all concerned to do so. If he has the ability and has the qualifications, as I am satisfied he has, and as the majority of people feel he has—he has proved himself a worthy Parliamentary Secretary—why should he not get the position?
I heard that Senator Ó Maoláin was rather rough on the Labour Party and if I had heard him, I would deal with him also.
Are you not doing now precisely what you complained about Senator L'Estrange doing?
What?
Criticising other people.
No; what I am saying about Senator L'Estrange is not the same thing. I am talking about the humbug that has been going on for the past 30 years.
It will never stop.
I am speaking as one of those who fought for the freedom of the country. It is time to cut out the humbug and the great harm it is doing and give credit where it is due. I was in the Fianna Fáil Party and I had the courage to leave it on a particular point, a standstill order, but I want Senator L'Estrange to remember that many members of the Government risked their lives for the freedom of this country, something which many other people have not offered to do.
They were well paid for it.
Senator L'Estrange could not imagine anyone doing anything, unless he was paid for it.
I am not going to drag down the level of this House. Speaking as one of those who joined the movement, I can say that not one person went into it at that time for payment. It was done for the freedom and the honour of the country, for God and Ireland.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Senator has taken this debate back farther than it has yet gone this morning.
What I am saying could have a great effect on the country. If we could get the best in each Party to come together and plan something practical, we might then be able to stop emigration.
Senator L'Estrange made one point, with which I agree, in regard to the small farmers. I should like the Minister to realise that we will not get the small farmers in Connacht to remain on their mountainy holdings, so long as the price of a small bag of flour is £4 because they have not £4 to give for it. Let us be honest and admit that is the cause of the closed doors. I would earnestly appeal to the Minister on their behalf to reconsider the decision to withdraw the subsidies, particularly on flour, because while these people may have butter in some seasons, and may be able to use eggs as substitutes, they cannot buy flour. Where would the money come from? Prices for stock last year were bad.
I want to speak for another class of people whom I have not heard mentioned. These are the people in this city and county and in other towns who are trying to buy their own homes and, at the same time, pay everybody 20/-in the £. I am making a very earnest appeal to the Minister for them, because as a member of a local authority, I know what I am talking about. This authority has lent £11 million under the Small Dwellings Act. When the rates of interest go up, it is sad for me —I have always been opposed to evictions—to find at every meeting of the county council a list of from six to 18 people, of whose houses the council must take possession. These people feel so degraded in the eyes of their friends and relatives when they cannot keep their homes that they clear out of the country. Something should be done to reduce loan charges for these people who are making an honest effort to buy their own homes.
Immediate steps should be taken to abolish ground rents. Speaking as one of those who took part in the land war to drive the British landlord out of the country, I say it is a disgrace that we have a worse type of scoundrel as landlords in and around Dublin getting £100 per acre for land that did not cost them——
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
That is not in order.
It is not too much to say that such things should not happen. Surely it is in order to speak on the reduction of loan charges? With all respect, it is as much in order as the slaughter of calves.
Absolutely.
The Senator was going to get support from Senator Carter there.
Every right-minded man in the country should support the aims and ideals I stand for. I am not afraid to tell the truth. I want to impress on the Minister that these are the new poor but, because of their inherent decency and honesty, they try to hide their poverty. The result is that, in the end, they have to clear out. The majority are young people starting off in life, with a family coming along. The position is not so acute in the first few years, but, as the family grows and the impact of full rates falls on them, they begin to know real hardship. The Minister can get from the Dublin County Council statistics of the numbers who have had to be dispossessed because of their inability to meet a burden of £3 per week for ground rent, rates, and loan repayments.
The only other matter to which I wish to refer is the position of local authorities. There is no doubt that the members of local authorities, once elected, co-operate to the utmost and do their very best, but they have no real power.
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Senator is again advocating legislation, I think.
I am advocating righteousness. If the members of the Dublin County Council want to improve a road for seven people living along it, they cannot do so because the manager holds the improvement of such a road does not come under the heading of a public utility. I would regard a road used by only two families as coming under the heading of a public utility, not to mind seven. All the elected members can do is strike the rate and appoint a rate collector.
Again, we spend thousands annually on road leading to this city, roads used by people from every other county in Ireland; but we have no power to provide footpaths for school children and pedestrians to save them from the perils of traffic. That is one reason the slaughter on the roads is so heavy. I appeal to the Minister to look into these matters to see if something can be done to give more power to local authorities.
Business suspended at 1.15 p.m. and resumed at 2.45 p.m.
I was glad that Senator Stanford intervened in this debate and, indeed, I agree with many of the things he said. I do not see much use in going back on the promises on both sides but if ever a public platform could be provided to go over all the promises in the past 40 years it would provide an interesting experiment. There are only two promises by this Government to which I intend to refer.
I agree with Senator Stanford in particular that negative criticism is not much good. It may serve the purpose of either political Party but it does not seem to me to do the slightest good to the country generally. I would, therefore, as I said often here before and as I said in the Dáil on the occasion of the last debate, be glad, indeed, to welcome a positive approach to any of the problems we have at the moment. I stated at the end of the debate in the Dáil that I was disappointed there was no positive suggestion in respect of a solution of many matters at the present time. I am afraid that I cannot say I was any more fortunate in this House in getting a positive suggestion of that kind. I am afraid I have to say also that, although the Dáil is frankly a political assembly, I do not think it is as political at the moment as this House.
It is not all the one way.
As a matter of fact, I have never seen Fine Gael so political as they are at the moment. They talk about depression in the country but it appears to me that the depression is on the Fine Gael side. It looks to me that the more this country progresses, the more depressed Fine Gael become. They were holding on to the last straw of cattle prices but, since cattle prices went up, they seem to have fallen to the lowest depths of depression. They have tried to get away from the depression by making wild attacks on the Fianna Fáil policy at the present time. Even Senator O'Quigley said that cattle prices would not do any good to the farmers and to the small farmers in particular. If that were to be admitted, it is a great pity that we did not have that opinion expressed last year when cattle prices were going down.
The Minister is misquoting me deliberately.
If they had, we might have been able to settle down to discuss what could be done to improve matters. However, we have to take the debate as it was and try to deal with some of the points raised. Undoubtedly, there is increased expenditure. There is not much point in any Senator saying that it is the highest expenditure ever. I am quite sure that next year, the year after and the year after that again, the same thing will be said.
Expenditure is going up all the time and the value of money is going down somewhat all the time. As some speaker on this side of the House said, there has been no suggestion from any speaker on either side as to where economies could be made. As a matter of fact, I was looking through a comparison between the expenditure for 1957-1958 and the present time. I find that the biggest is, of course, in agriculture, which has gone up by £8 million. What Senator Donegan said is hardly right—that the position with regard to agricultural expenditure was static. It is exactly twice as much as it was in 1957-1958. The general aim of the Government, as far as agricultural expenditure goes, is to help the farmer to produce more and produce a better article at a lower cost. Take the expenditure on the eradication of bovine tuberculosis. That is aimed at enabling the farmer to produce a more marketable article from the point of view of home consumption and public health and also to produce an article that will get a better price on the foreign market.
Let us take another big increase on the subsidies for fertilisers. The object behind that is to help the farmer to get more out of his land. The same would apply to the reclamation and rehabilitation scheme. If the farmer could get more out of his land, even at present costs or even at slightly increased costs, he would be better off. Therefore these various schemes under the Agriculture Vote which are costing so much money in recent years are all directed towards helping the farmer to produce better and at a lower cost.
Another big increase occurs in the case of social welfare. Social welfare costs have gone up by £3,000,000 and the cost of living has gone up—Senator L'Estrange gave the figures—by 17 points in the corresponding period. Therefore the social welfare recipient has got more to compensate him for the increased cost of living. Senator L'Estrange said the cost of living went up by 11 points under the last Government and by 17 points under this Government.
To be correct, it went up by 14 points under the Minister's Government.
Under the Coalition Government the old age pension went up by 2/6. Some of the Senators on the other side are very quick at making calculations. Which is better, to give 2/6 against 11 points or 4/- against 14 points? That is the position in regard to the cost of living. The same would apply to unemployment assistance, unemployment insurance and sickness benefit recipients. They have got these increased benefits to compensate them for the increase in the cost of living.
Wage earners were also mentioned. Since the beginning of 1957 real wages have gone up by 11 per cent. to compensate wage earners for the increase in the cost of living. We have compensated these two big classes, social welfare recipients and wage earners for any increase in the cost of living. There is the other big class left, farmers. I cannot claim that in regard to the cost of living they have been compensated in running their own households, as it were.
The next big increase is £2.6 million for education. No Senator will object to that increase; in fact most Senators here would say we should do more and so we would, if we could afford it. The Posts and Telegraphs Vote went up by £2.5 million but that money is an investment. The more we spend on Posts and Telegraphs the more we get back. It is just about paying its way all the time and the fact that we are now paying £2,500,000 more into it every year means we are getting the same amount back. Therefore we can disregard that.
Another item is £1.5 million for Local Government. Generally speaking, there are in Local Government many activities covered by that, housing, sanitary schemes, and so on, but that £1.5 million is practically all in capital expenditure. Under Public Works, arterial drainage schemes and many other schemes of that kind amount to £1.7 million. When all those items are added together, the total is almost £20,000,000 which is the difference between the £111 million of the 1957-58 Estimates and the £131 million in the current Estimates. A point made by the Opposition, which is a fair point, is that we have not now to pay for food subsidies that were provided for in the Estimates of 1957-58. It is not fair, however, to take the figure of £9,000,000 because we had to give compensation to various sections of the community when these food subsidies were taken off. As far as I remember, the net gain to the Exchequer in taking off the food subsidies was about £6,000,000.
£6,500,000.
All right, £6,500,000. Senator Lenihan took emigration and unemployment together and Senator O'Donovan said that was not right.
It was the Minister himself who took it.
Yes, but Senator Lenihan did, too.
You were both wrong.
We are both right.
No.
The point made by Senator Lenihan is correct. Senator L'Estrange claimed that the very big increase in exports started in 1957 and was therefore due to the wise rule of the Coalition Government, but if emigration was very high in the early months of 1957 we can equally claim it was due to the unwise rule of the Coalition Government.
I want to explain, when Senator O'Donovan says that sometimes we cannot give emigration figures and sometimes we do, the Statistics Department say: "We cannot give you accurate figures of emigration. We can only give the figures at the end of each census period", which, of course, is correct. They do, however, give figures of the movements outwards and inwards by sea and air and the differences are taken as an indication of the emigration during the intervening years. As any Senator can see, there can be an error to the extent of people passing across the Border and back during those years but if we assume, as we generally do in those figures, that the movement across the Border is about equal one way and the other, then the figures of movement outwards and inwards by sea and air can be taken as at least a reliable guide to the emigration during the period.
On that, Senators will find by examining it that there was something over 60,000, in 1957. Leave that for a moment because we do not want to claim that. Take 1958, 1959 and 1960. The figure for those three years was slightly lower than for 1954, 1955 and 1956. So, there is nothing to boast about there. It is not as low as we would like it to be but it is slightly lower. If we just admit that fact, that we have not done much better than the Coalition Government in that respect, then we could talk perhaps more sensibly on the question of a remedy for this situation.
I do not think we should be saddled with the 1957 figures but, at any rate, we cannot be saddled with the January and February figures of 1957 and nearly one-half the emigration in 1957 took place during those two months. We can disregard 1957, if you like. That is a correct figure but if Senator L'Estrange knew much about statistics he could catch me out on another point there. That is the correct figure.
January and February go into the previous year.
They always do, of course. The Senator is quite right, but why should we be saddled with the figure if they went out in those two months?
The same would apply to every year.
If you do not take January and February of 1957, things are all right as far as we are concerned; they are not any worse than they were. In fact, the position is a bit better than it was under the Coalition Government. So, let us accept the fact that emigration is an evil that none of us has been able to solve and let us settle down to solving that great problem that we have without saying, first of all, it adds up to 180,000. Then Fine Gael in the Dáil rounded it off to 200,000 and Senator L'Estrange says the figure should be 250,000. What do we gain by that? Whether it is 180,000, 200,000 or 250,000, it does not matter in the slightest as far as the person who has to emigrate is concerned. It does not matter in the slightest whether Senator L'Estrange is right or Fine Gael in the Dáil is right or I am right, but what does matter is, are we going to make it possible for people who are growing up now to find work in this country? I shall come to that point again.
With regard to employment, anybody who has listened to this debate on both sides would be convinced, if he were a credulous person inclined to believe everything he hears, that there was no reduction in employment during the three years the Coalition Government were there and that there has been a big reduction since. There are two tables published. One is agricultural employment and the other is non-agricultural employment. By adding these together, you get the figures mentioned by some of the Senators here. Adding these two figures together, in April, 1954, when the change of Government took place, it was 1,185,000 and in 1957, when the change came again, 1,136,000. So it was down 49,000. All we can gather from that is that, whatever criticism may be levelled against us, the Coalition. Government certainly had not the remedy when they were there. Whether they have a remedy now or not, I do not know, but certainly they had not got the remedy when they were there because the figure went down by 49,000. There are only two years' figures given since then, the beginning of 1958 and the beginning of 1959— down 24,000. So, in three years under the Coalition Government it went down 49,000 and in the two years that we were there it went down 24,000.
Give us the four years.
I shall hand the Senator the green book and let him make it up for himself. I am not going to accept Senator L'Estrange's statistics.
You cannot compare what happened in two years with what happened in three years.
I am saying that I have not got the figures for the third year here. I guarantee that it is not any worse than either of those two. So, two years and 24,000 compared with three years and 49,000 is not an unfavourable comparison as far as we are concerned. Still, it is going down and the point is what are we going to do about that? We have been doing what we can. We have stopped the big reduction. It is getting smaller and smaller. If any Senator from the other side of the House can say that there is anything that we have done that is not right or can suggest something which might improve things, that will be all to the good.
There was one year in which there was no reduction. That was the year 1954. In April, 1954, as compared with April, 1953, the number employed was 1,185,000 compared with 1,182,000 the year before which meant that during that term of Fianna Fáil, when it came to the end, they had got the thing right. For the first time it was got right. The Coalition Government came in and added 49,000 to it. Now, it has taken us three years to get it right and I am quite sure it will be right this year but if by any chance the people go mad and put them back again it is sure to go wrong again. These are the figures out of the green book which any Senator can get himself.
Surely the Minister must have up-to-date figures and could give us the last four years or the last three years?
I have not got them. They are not published yet. I shall have them when I come to the Budget.
Apply to the Minister for Transport and Power. He has plenty of statistics.
Look at the point they are making now. These Fine Gael men who are looking for depression, searching for depression and searching for the figures, when I say their figures are wrong they say: "Give us three years" but you will not find depression in these figures no matter how much you search for it.
You will not find anything else.
Not if the Senator has his way. I shall pass on to a more levelheaded speaker, Senator George O'Brien. Senator O'Brien seemed to think there was a discrepancy between the balance of payments out-turn for this year and the external assets. I do not want to say that Senator O'Brien was wrong but I think he has not seen the final figure—that is all I can say about that—because in the final figure I think he will see that the balance of payments will close within £1,000,000 either way. I am not sure whether it will be up to £1,000,000 plus or £1,000,000 minus but it is within £1,000,000 either way and as far as the external assets of the Central Bank, commercial banks and Departmental funds are concerned, they are down by only £300,000, so that there is a fair balance there, fair enough, anyway, to say that the figures are fairly correct in this case.
Another point raised by Senator O'Brien and on which he spent a good part of his speech was the national debt and its growth. When speaking in the Dáil on this subject, I said we need not be too worried about the increase in the national debt so long as the charges bear a fair relationship to the gross national product. That applies to this part of current expenditure but it applies to current expenditure in general. If the gross national product is growing, as it is every year, and if we remain around that 18 per cent, for current expenditure, things should work out all right. Since 1956-57, when the service of the net interest and sinking fund took 2.4 per cent. of the gross national product, it has grown slightly until 1960-61. It is estimated at 2.9 for the current year. Apparently it is growing but it has not grown to any very alarming extent. It has grown from 2.4 to 2.9.
Senator O'Donovan took up a question raised by Deputy Dillon and my reply to the question with regard to the influence of borrowing on the gross national product. Both Deputy Dillon and Senator O'Donovan seemed to suggest that the recent growth in the national income has artificially been reduced by an expansion in bank and hire purchase credit. It is not a valid argument to say that that had a direct influence on increasing the national income. The recent increase in the national income has been a genuine increase, measured in real terms, after allowing for changes in money values. The increase in gross national production in 1959 over 1958 was 3 per cent. In 1960, it is expected the increase in real value will be of the order of ¾ per cent. over 1959.
Senator O'Donovan argued that the hire purchase debt entered directly into the computation of national income and said that, on the other hand, bank credit could be regarded as coming indirectly into the national income. I presume he had in mind that personal expenditure can be increased beyond current income by resort to hire purchase or any other credit and that total personal expenditure plus personal savings is by definition equal to personal income which is related to national income.
If personal expenditure is swollen by purchases based on credit, the personal savings figure will to a great extent be reduced, since personal savings are found by subtracting personal expenditure from the separately-estimated personal income figure. Hire purchase does not directly increase the national income but it has an indirect effect. All credit has. We must admit that it plays a useful part in helping to stimulate production and therefore to channel national income. There is nothing wrong about using credit in the proper way. It is the abuses that are to be feared. If there is an abuse, it is almost certain to be shown in the balance of payments. If credit is used for consumer goods, and so on, the balance of payments will reflect that and it would result in an adverse balance in the payments.
We have three years' experience of a balanced economy as far as the balance of payments is concerned. So long as that remains, we can feel fairly happy about our credit position. If due to excessive spending on consumer goods, the balance of payments should show an adverse figure, it would mean we were living beyond our means. That is exactly what was shown by the figures for 1955 and 1956.
Speaking on cattle prices, Deputy Donegan said the first ray of light in the past four years appeared recently. Undoubtedly, cattle prices were down in 1960 compared with 1959 and 1958. Although they were down in 1960 they were better than they were in 1956. The increases in price in 1958 and 1959 were not maintained. They went back in 1960. Fortunately, they are going up again. Whether or not that will be maintained is a difficult question to answer. To some extent, prices went down on the very big increases in 1958 and 1959.
In our agricultural spending, we have aimed at increasing production. We have made it possible for the farmer to get better crops by draining his land and fertilising it properly so as to carry more stock. We have had some successes. There are more cattle, more sheep and more pigs now than for many years. Senator L'Estrange talked about 1948. When some adverse event occurred in 1948 or 1950 he talked about the Korean War. He had no sympathy whatever for us in trying to carry on during a world war. We had come out of a world war and our stocks were naturally very depleted. Our crops were very poor. We had no artificial manures for some years. We found it difficult to produce enough food for the people, apart from anything that was exported.
We had grass.
The stocks were low at that time. If Senator L'Estrange thinks that a Minister for Agriculture, who built up the stocks of this country in three years from 1948, is a superman I would say that any man you might pick off the street could do the same. Artificial manures were beginning to come in. It was possible for farmers to go ahead again. It would have taken a very able Minister to stop them from going on with that production.
We had grass.
We had no artificial manures. Senator L'Estrange hates listening to the truth because it is foreign to him. He cannot bear the truth.
I do not mind.
To take a datum year like 1948 is going beyond the bounds of the ridiculous. It is the sort of thing that would suit Senator L'Estrange to build a case upon. In the last four years I have come into this House three or four times and I have heard the same thing trotted out on each occasion. I used to waste time explaining to Senator L'Estrange why we had to do such things as slaughter calves, but it is not worthwhile. He will not be educated. We had our difficulties with the Blueshirts——
Senator Ó Maoláin is wearing a blue shirt beside the Minister.
It is not your kind of blue.
Senator Donegan and Senator L'Estrange also referred to the price of wheat. I am not telling any Cabinet secret when I say that I was responsible, against the opinion of the Minister for Agriculture, for the recent reduction in the price of wheat. I was responsible for getting the price down, because I wanted to get it down in the interests of good farming. Senator L'Estrange and Senator Donegan are here to represent farmers who produce 55 per cent. bushelling wheat. I do not want those farmers represented here. I do not want farmers to produce wheat that is no good for anything, not even for feeding, and then want the full price for it. I want to see some inducement given to them to produce good wheat.
The weather was responsible for that.
The price is just as good as ever for the farmers who produce good wheat. In bad weather, good farmers produce good wheat, and bad farmers do not. If farmers grow wheat in a haphazard fashion and do not employ labour, if bad weather comes, the crop will be at the very low bushelling rate of 53, 54 or 55. It is not fair to expect the taxpayers and the consumers to pay for the trash that came in last year. I met several farmers in Wexford since the price for bad wheat was reduced, and every one of them said to me: "You did not go far enough."
The inter-Party Government did the same thing in 1954, for the same reason, and the Minister was not satisfied.
When Deputy Dillon reduced the price, the wheat was good. I reduced the price of bad wheat. Senators must remember that means that if we have a surplus, there will be a levy, but the levy will not be high, because disposing of bad wheat will not cost us much. I want to encourage the good grower. Let Senator L'Estrange and Senator Donegan look after the indifferent person who does not know how to grow wheat at all.
(Interruptions.)
An Leas-Chathaoirleach
Order !
Senator Donegan gave another Fine Gael figure—their statistics are always very interesting—and said that the Land Project was now costing half what it cost in 1956-57. When I came into office, I saw in a publication that a man got £160 an acre under the B. Scheme for reclaiming land. We think that was a scandal. It was a scandal that the taxpayers should provide money of that kind for the reclamation of land. There was wasteful expenditure and wasteful administration under the B. Scheme. The A. Scheme was much better. The inspector went to the farmer and said: "If you do that yourself, and if you do it right, we will inspect it, and if we are satisfied, you will get a grant," and the farmer was told what the grant was.
We turned completely to the A Scheme and what was the result? The total spent on that scheme in 1956-57 was £2.7 million and this year we are providing £2.3 million. I admit that is a bit down, but it is not half what Senator Donegan said. Senator Donegan would have no scruple about repeating that figure to the farmers in County Louth and Senator L'Estrange would have no scruple either, even after I have told him the correct figure now. He will go on saying it.
Senator Donegan also said that the farmers were not getting more for milk. and I think Senator L'Estrange said the same. They are getting more for milk. We gave them ?d. per gallon at the beginning of last year. More milk was produced last year—in fact, it was the second highest year on record— so that altogether the farmers got a big amount of money for milk last year compared with what they got in other years.
They got £12 to £15 as well for the calves.
I would be here until 8 o'clock to-night, if I were to deal with all Senator L'Estrange's interruptions. They are always wrong but it takes some time to deal with them. I wrote down some points while he was speaking, and when I give the correct figures in reply to those points, he has something else to say. I cannot catch up with his lies and figures. Before leaving the subject, I may say that 1/7d. is a better price than 1/-.
What about the cost of living and the overhead expenses?
No matter what you compare, the Fianna Fáil price of 1/7d. is better than the Fine Gael price of 1/-.
It would need to be 2/- now to be as good as 1/- in 1948.
Senator Barry asked me if I could ensure that all the industrial projects are sound. I cannot. That reminds me of the Cumann na nGaedheal Government from 1922 to 1932, which put on about three tariffs in ten years. I remember they put a tariff on rosary beads, which are not a big item, and the Tariff Commission consisting of three men, working full time, took over four months to investigate that tariff and they visited many of the cities of Europe——
They must have been praying most of the time.
Ten years, and only three tariffs altogether. We all know there are a number of tariffs at the present time and I certainly cannot guarantee that every proposal that comes along is sound. I should like to say that any complaints I got against the Industrial Authority or against Foras Talúntais were always to the effect that they were too restrictive and hard to get through. They give a fair amount of consideration to any project that comes before them, and they do not want to let anything through, unless it has a fair chance of success.
Senator Barry also asked about the credentials of people who start industries here. That reminds me of silly attacks about bringing in foreigners with capital. If Senators looked at this in a reasonable and sensible way, they would thank us for building up industry. We built up industries for the home market and those industries produced textiles, leather, boots, shoes and cement. They now export goods and they account for about £20 million of our export business. That is all Irish capital—I am not sure about cement but most of it is Irish capital. They operate under the Control of Manufactures Act. They use Irish capital, Irish raw materials to a great extent, and Irish labour, and there is a good labour content being built up all the time.
Senator Barry said that he would like to have Senator Lenihan talking from the other side of the House supposing a Fine Gael Government had been in office for the past three or four years. He asked would Senator Lenihan be able to answer some questions. First of all, would Senator Lenihan like to draw a graph of the cattle prices for the past four years? As a matter of fact, that graph would show that they were at their lowest when we took over, and they have been higher ever since. They have never been so low since. They were very high in 1957 and 1958; they were practically as high in 1959; then they went down a bit again. In the graph for pigs, you could cut out the two depressions for the two three-year periods when Deputy Dillon was Minister for Agriculture.
It was the other way about.
Every time he was there, pigs went down. Now they are at their highest. Senator Barry talked about those who promised the food subsidies would not be removed and did not keep that promise. Is it not a remarkable record of this Party that when Fine Gael put their big organisation to reading every newspaper, every speech and every leaflet produced by Fianna Fáil, the only thing they could turn up was this matter of the food subsidies?
Why should we have made promises at that time? The people were coming up to us and saying: "For God's sake, put your heart into it and win this election." Take this matter of the food subsidies. If I had been asked the question put to the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste at the time: "Is it true you intend to do away with the food subsidies?" or "Is it true you have decided to do away with them?", I would have said "No." There was no indication to us during the election that it would be necessary. We had no indication that it would be necessary to find something like £14,000,000 to balance the Budget. In fact, we did not balance it because that was not sufficient. We cut out the food subsidies because we had to, but we did not go far enough.
Several times in the Dáil, I have asked ex-members of that Government what would they have done at that time. I have never had a suggestion from one of them as to where we could get another £100,000. We put on £3,000,000 extra taxation. That was as much as we could raise at the time. Every one knows the more you try to get, the more it goes down. Every extra penny on tobacco or on the pint gives you less. We could get only £3,000,000; we cut out the food subsidies; and yet our Budget was unbalanced to the extent of £5,500,000. No member of that Government ever told me where I could get an extra £100,000, and I would be very grateful if Senator L'Estrange could tell me.
They will get it when they are back in power.
So they are keeping it to themselves. The next thing Senator Barry wanted to know was how the Government would be defended on the question of putting up E.S.B. charges and bus fares. In 1956, E.S.B. charges went up by more than they have gone up at present, but at that time Fine Gael did not go around organising meetings about it. The people took it as a necessary evil and had to put up with it. Now, when they are going up under Fianna Fáil, a Fine Gael meeting is held in every village, and innocent people come in to listen to them protesting against the E.S.B. charges.
That is the first time I heard that the N.F.A. is Fine Gael.
The Senator must not have been reading the newspapers. He should pay a little more attention to politics. Both Senator Barry and Senator Murphy referred to Senator Lenihan's "political speech". I have often heard about the kettle calling the pot black, but you really could call the pot black in this case. Was it the only political speech? As I said, I never heard such political speeches in my life as I heard from Fine Gael on this occasion.
From both sides.
All right. We will have it that way, so. Senator McGuire also criticised the type of speech made here.
No answer.
He said they were all either black or white. If Fine Gael were speaking, Fianna Fáil were black; and if Fianna Fáil were speaking, Fine Gael were black. But Senator McGuire managed to make a speech himself where it was all either black or off white. I agree with him that any advance that has been made here —and I shall not say under whom— has been made by the people, sometimes wisely led and sometimes unwisely led, according as the leadership was constructive or not.
Take this question of credit. As Minister for Finance, I met the Boards of the Industrial Credit Company and the Agricultural Credit Corporation and told them they should be as helpful as possible in the matter of credit. I said to them: "You are not going to give out much credit if you have to be absolutely sure in every case you deal with. The reason I am saying that is if you fail to get back your money, I am not going to blame you." That should be the policy to help industry and agriculture, but yet we were criticised for that by a number of Fine Gael speakers, both in the Dáil and Seanad. Whether they are still tied to the restrictive policy they had when they were in office, and which led to the restriction of credit, I do not know. That is where leadership comes in. The people will do the thing, but there must be wise leadership. The people must not be restricted in their efforts to go ahead.
Senator McGuire also said that the reason our national loans were successful was that the interest rates were higher. On the average, perhaps, about a half per cent, but that is not so much. It may be due to the fact that there is more money available now and that there is more confidence now, but, in any event, I do not think it is entirely due to more attractive interest rates. As Senator McGuire pointed out in another connection, it was the general rate of interest earned at the time that decided the rate. Whenever a Minister is going for a national loan, he tries to find out what will attract money, considering the general interest rates all round. Interest rates all round were a bit higher when we were there and that made a great difference.
Another point raised was that Deputy Lemass, as he then was, had declared that Fianna Fáil had decided taxation was high enough and should not be raised. There are two ways of looking at this matter. Do Senators think if we are taking £131,000,000 this year, we should take only £131,000,000 next year and cut our taxation accordingly, to expect from the same tax a higher yield? If Deputy Lemass meant what I would mean by making that statement, it was that if we do not raise taxation but get in more, that is all right. We are not raising taxation but we are getting in more today.
We have changed certain taxes since 1957. We have increased some and reduced others. I am quite sure if they were tabulated we would find that we were getting in the same amount as if there had been no change. We took off as much as we put on, so that even though we have not increased taxation, I admit we are getting in more money. That is because—to use a word I do not like—of greater buoyancy. There is more money there. For instance we are getting in more income tax now than last year because people are earning more and they are bound to pay more——
P.A.Y.E.
They are paying more. It is not all due to P.A.Y.E. and anyway, if they were not earning the money, P.A.Y.E. would not get it off them. I am not giving away any secrets when I say that I expect to get more income tax next year than last year. We shall have a good Budget this year.
And then go to the country immediately afterwards.
And we shall do that as much to "grig" Fine Gael as to please Fianna Fáil. Senator McGuire said that he did not approve of putting industries here and there under political pressure. That is the kind of statement I do not like to hear. I do not know where political pressure can be used. I have done my best to get industries in my own town and I did not succeed and I think I am as good at using political pressure as anyone else. Where can it be used? After all, what happens is that local people say: "We are going to start an industry." They know what they have in mind, they say they are going ahead and they know where they are going to start it. As far as people from outside are concerned, they show us their location and they have never been told: "You must go there." Of course there is an inducement to them now to go to the underdeveloped areas because of the bigger grants, but apart from that no pressure can be used on them.
I was complaining that no suggestions were made but I have to give credit to Senator McGuire for suggesting that the amenities in the country should be made more attractive by having farm villages, industrial centres, more tourism and so on. At any rate, it is a suggestion although I do not know how practical it is. It would be difficult to get the farmers to live in a village like that. They are accustomed to living on their own farms. In fact, on a few occasions I have seen cases of two farmers living side by side and when one of these farms comes to be sold, its purchase is not regarded as an attractive proposition. Nobody likes to go and live practically in the same yard as another man. People have these ideas and it will take a long time to get rid of them. Senator McGuire said he would like to see a Fine Gael Government trying it. Well, if it could be tried in vacuo it would be all right but we would not like to see it tried because we think it would finish the country altogether.
There is every hope now.
They will be growing sideburns before there is a Fine Gael Government.
There is not much chance for the Senator.
Senator O'Quigley in his speech tried to destroy any hope the farmers might have from the increase in cattle prices. He said that as far as the small farmer was concerned it was not going to do him any good. As a matter of fact, he said that when there was a bad harvest it did not do the small farmer any harm. I think a bad harvest can do the small farmer an awful lot of harm. After all it is not only wheat that can be injured. There may be a bad crop of potatoes, barley, oats or, worse still, you might have a bad crop of hay. Therefore the bad harvest is just as serious for the small farmer as the big farmer, and I am quite sure that that increase in the price of cattle will benefit the small farmer.
The Senator said that a few days' work on Bord na Móna would be more important to the small farmer. He did not say the Coalition Government were responsible for Bord na Móna. The establishment of Bord na Móna was the only thing they did not claim in this debate. In fact, we all remember that when the Coalition came into office in 1948 they closed it down. It was one of the Fianna Fáil schemes. They closed it down but after a few years when they found they could not get coal, they started it again and they organised committees to encourage the cutting of turf. Of course it became a Coalition scheme because they had to encourage the cutting of turf after closing it down. In the same year, 1948, in regard to the Avoca Mines, they took out of the Estimates the amount provided for the mineral exploration, I think it was £80,000. It was kept out until Fianna Fáil come back into office. Fianna Fáil put it back again and carried out exploratory work and they found certain minerals. As a result, the St. Patrick's Copper Mines were started.
Senator Burke said that the Coalition kept down the cost of living. I have noticed that some Fine Gael people believe that. Senator L'Estrange gave certain figures. I did not check on them; I accept they are in or about right. If the cost of living is up and if anything can be done about it, let us try to get down to doing it.
Another point made by a number of speakers was that the farmers are not holding their proportion of the national income. They are not, but that point alone, I would say, is not of any great consequence. One can imagine that if we discovered a huge quantity of oil, which we could just pump out and export, the national income would go up by 50 per cent. but the farmers would not benefit by more than two or three per cent. so that their proportion would be lessened. What happened during the last few years was that industries increased very much more rapidly than before and outstripped agriculture and therefore the farmers had a lesser proportion of the national income than others. It is regrettable that agriculture did not advance as rapidly as industry but that is no reason why we should put a brake on industry and hold it back——
You should change the method of taxation.
——until agriculture advanced. But I do not think there is much in that point, about the proportion that various people get. It is possible, with the great expansion in tourism, that perhaps hotels are getting more than before. That is possible but those things will vary up and down and the figures of proportion are just an indication of a trend.
There is a 20 per cent. reduction.
It was not as much as that. I do not think that figure is correct.
Look up the figures.
That is all I have to say.
Question put and agreed to.
Agreed to take remaining stages today.
Bill considered in Committee.
SECTION 1.
Question proposed: "That Section 1 stand part of the Bill."
If I understand it correctly, this section deals with the Excess Vote for the Department of External Affairs. That Excess Vote has been certified by the Department of External Affairs as being due to the movements of ambassadors. I have not seen the certificate but I have been so informed by a member of the Public Accounts Committee. This kind of Excess Vote, of course, is quite an extraordinary event. The reason it was allowed to occur in 1959-60 was what I might call, for want of a better word, the antics of the Minister for External Affairs in the United Nations.
I have never spoken about this matter, although I felt pretty strongly about it. I might say I know something about it because the previous Government were tempted—I shall not say who the tempters were—before they left office to be first out of the box at the United Nations in relation to this neutralism. That Government resisted the temptation, very properly, I think. There was reason for that. I think it is quite unsuitable for a country of our size to be the first to raise a matter of international importance——
Inferiority com plex again.
It is not an inferiority complex. This is a matter of function and of what, in my opinion, the proper behaviour of people should be. We could play a very important part in international affairs——
We have played such a part.
I must ask Senator Ó Maoláin not to interrupt.
——because we opposed what is known in the modern world as colonialism. We were one of the first countries successfully to oppose it. Therefore, we can play a very important part. But this was a very different matter. The Minister is our representative and I would not criticise him in the United States, but here at home, we are quite entitled to criticise him. One can put it in any language one likes but he took us into the Red lobby in U.N.O.
That is the greatest fraud I ever heard.
I am coming to the more important part of this in relation to this Bill. If the Minister, having done that, was prepared to face the consequences, that is to say, to come to Dáil Éireann for a Supplementary Estimate as he should have come at the beginning of 1960, no doubt he would have had a debate lasting a couple of days on his hands, but at least he could say that he had faced up to it and that he did not take the back door way out.
This amount of money is now, in effect, being charged 15 months after it was spent. Of course, there is a certificate that it was due to pushing Ambassadors around but you deal with moneys of this sort within the year. Any excess could be due to any item you like to pick in the case of a Vote with an expenditure of this size. What I want to convey is that in the accounts branch of the Department of External Affairs, there was not the slightest doubt that it was well known well in advance of 31st March, 1960, that this excess would be incurred.
An excess Vote is not a joke. I remember one excess Vote in Dáil Éireann many years ago for an amount of £1 or £2 on a Vote accounted for by the Department of Finance. Deputy Dillon said then: "They are very honest. They did not try to cook the figures. It would be quite easy to leave a bill unpaid over the year, particularly in the case of a small sum." This is a completely different matter. I believe it was done because the Minister for External Affairs was not prepared to face up to the consequences in the Dáil. It was hoped that it would be forgotten, that the circumstances arose a long time back and that nobody would say anything about it.
I believe, first of all, that particular performance at U.N.O. was no credit to this country and, secondly, that very unfortunately, in my opinion, it let down our missionaries abroad. I regard that as a very shameful matter. These are people who do not go out of this country except to give a service of a special kind. I want to register my protest here about this matter being held over in this fashion for a period of 12 or 15 months. It is an extremely bad business and I am sorry that the Government did not have the courage to face up to it at the time and instead took what I call a cowardly backstairs way out of it.
Is the Senator trying to convey that he has not read the Dáil Debates or that he has forgotten about them in order to make this attack which he knows is not warranted about the United Nations? Expenditure in relation to the United Nations does not come out of this Vote at all. The Senator has given the impression that this was due to extra expenditure at the United Nations. That does not come under this Vote. I do not think I need say any more.
Since the Minister has taken that way out now, I must say that the Minister for External Affairs should have come to Dáil Éireann for authority for a Supplementary Estimate and he would have had to account for the policy of his Department, and he did not do it. So much for the Minister's answer.
The Senator wanted to throw some mud as usual at the Minister for External Affairs about the United Nations, about his actions there. It does not arise under this Vote.
I have never spoken on the subject before so why does the Minister say throw mud "as usual"?
The Senator knows the facts very well. He always reads the Dáil Debates because he quotes them here but it seems he decided to put them away and forget about them because they did not suit.
And it was out of order altogether.
It is not out of order.
The United Nations is not in this at all.
This is a shameful attack by the Deputy Leader of this House. We all know that the Opposition had ample opportunity to put down a motion of no confidence last year and to take full advantage of such a motion to criticise the Minister for External Affairs.
He was not there.
It is a shame that the Committee Stage of the Central Fund Bill should be used for an attack on the Minister for External Affairs who, it is agreed in general, has made great strides at United Nations meetings. Not merely is that agreed at home but also in Europe and beyond. I can produce evidence here from various papers in support of that statement. I do not think Senator O'Donovan can support his criticism by a single scrap of evidence.
There is no use in calling this a shameful attack or anything of the kind. The Government or the Department of External Affairs could quite easily have prevented this happening. There has been no explanation yet as to how this happened. You do not get rid of £6,900 of departmental funds by dropping it out of the window. How did it happen? There is no use in pretending that you can drop a sum like that out of a £400,000 Vote. If it were £690, I should say, well and good—there might be quite a simple explanation; but there is no simple explanation for this. The purpose of the Supply Services discussion is well known.
The purpose is to ensure that the Government will come to Dáil Éireann if they want to spend money, particularly if they want to spend it in relation to a service, the expenditure on which can be criticised. Suppose it were an error, one would be quite entitled to ask: "How come an error of this magnitude?" If one felt it was a straightforward error, one might say: "Well and good." All the evidence here, however, certainly points to the fact that there was going to be no Supplementary Estimate taken for that Department that year because the Government did not want a discussion on the matter in Dáil Éireann.
Question put and agreed to.
Sections 2 to 5, inclusive, agreed to.
Title agreed to.
Bill reported without recommendation.
Agreed to take the remaining Stages today.
Bill received for final consideration and ordered to be returned to the Dáil.