Intoxicating Liquor Bill, 1962— Second Stage.

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

Minister for Justice (Mr. Haughey)

There has been circulated with the Bill an explanatory Memorandum, brought up to date to cover the amendments made in the course of the passage of the Bill through the Dáil.

As Senators will be aware, the Bill is in the nature of a tidying-up measure and has been drafted in the light of the experience gained since the 1960 Act was enacted and the enforcement of the law was at the same time tightened up. The main changes proposed in the Bill have been decided on only after the most thorough sounding of the opinions of all interested parties, and I can certainly say that the Bill has been given prolonged and careful consideration.

The provisions in the Bill that have aroused the most interest are, naturally, those relating to the hours of opening of licensed premises. The changes proposed in this regard are not very startling. They are intended to meet what I consider to be reasonable criticisms of the hours as they stand. As I said in the Dáil, it is better to do a little letting-out in time, when pressure becomes apparent, than to risk a major blow-out later on.

It is proposed to have 11.30 p.m. closing on week nights during the period of official Summer Time. At present there is 11.30 p.m. closing in the months June to September only.

It is proposed to abolish the compulsory closing hour 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m. in the County Boroughs of Limerick and Waterford but not in the County Boroughs of Dublin and Cork.

The only other change proposed in weekday hours is that, to facilitate premises that do a mixed business, the permitted hour for opening for unlicensed business in the mornings is being put back from 9.0 a.m. to 7.30 a.m.

I should, however, mention at this juncture that a very important provision was inserted in the Bill during the passage of the Bill through the Dáil, namely, that which will allow drink to be consumed for up to 10 minutes after the end of the permitted periods. This provision applies, of course, to Sundays as well as to weekdays and should, I hope, remove any grievances arising from the combination of the strict enforcement of the law and the provisions for compulsory endorsement of licences.

The Bill proposes that Sunday hours should be extended by substituting an opening period running from 4.0 p.m. to 10.0 p.m. all the year round for the present evening opening period of 5.0 p.m. to 9.0 p.m. in the months June to September, inclusive, and 5.0 p.m. to 8.0 p.m. in the remaining months of the year. In addition, it is proposed to permit the district court to authorise the opening of licensed premises for the sale of drink in any area not in a county or other borough at 12.0 noon instead of 12.30 p.m. and, also, to permit opening, for unlicensed business only, for a period of three-quarters of an hour in the morning.

I believe that the hours now proposed for Sunday evening opening will meet substantially the criticisms made that the hours provided in the 1960 Act did not cater for persons, in rural areas particularly, for whom the closing hour of 8.0 p.m. or 9.0 p.m. proved too early, or for persons attending matches or visiting holiday resorts in the afternoons, whose needs are not adequately met by the present opening hour of 5.0 p.m. I believe, also, that this solution is decidedly preferable to any alternative which would necessarily involve the re-introduction, in one form or another, of Area Exemption Orders.

It is proposed to extend the periods during which drink may be served with substantial meals in hotels and licensed restaurants to 12.30 a.m. on week nights, compared with midnight at present, and to 11.0 p.m. on Sundays, compared with 10.0 p.m. at present. Taken in conjunction with the proposal to define what is meant by a substantial meal, I feel that the extensions proposed are desirable and reasonable.

The 1960 Act provided that drink might be supplied in clubs during the hours of opening of public-houses and allowed the supply and consumption of drink with meals in clubs outside those hours on the same basis as in hotels and licensed restaurants. The Bill proposes to preserve this equality.

The Bill proposes to remedy what has become a source of dissatisfaction, namely, abuse of the provisions of the Licensing Acts that permit the consumption of drink outside the normal hours of opening where the drink is consumed with a substantial meal. The Bill, therefore, proposes that, to qualify as a substantial meal, the meal must be of a kind that might be expected to be served as a main midday or main evening meal or as a main course at such a meal and that a reasonable charge for the meal must be 5/-, or a higher figure if the Minister for Justice makes an order increasing that sum.

Provision is being made to check the tendency that has shown itself for Special Exemption Orders to be obtained for functions of a very run-of-the-mill nature in hotels and restaurants and for Occasional Licences to be obtained on a large scale for house-dances in certain dance halls. There is, I feel, general agreement that that tendency is socially undesirable. The provision in the Bill is, briefly, that save on six special festive days a year, the grant of a special exemption order for any function and the grant of an occasional licence for a dance will have to be conditional on the serving of a substantial meal to persons participating in the function or dance.

The Bill proposes to tighten up somewhat the law relating to General Exemption Orders. These are the orders that are granted for the accommodation of persons following a lawful trade or calling or attending a public fair or market. At present these orders may be granted for any period on weekdays save between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. The proposal is to confine them to the period between 5 a.m., in the case of fairs and markets, and 7 a.m., in the case of persons following a trade or calling other than that of fishing in tidal waters, and the normal time of opening in the morning. This change will not involve any change in existing practice as the orders at present in force are within the proposed new limits. In addition, it is proposed that, as regards Dublin, only those premises that have been getting these exemptions may get them in future. I do not say that there has been any great abuse of the present provisions so far, but from certain applications that have been made to the courts it is clear that the seeds of abuse are very definitely present in the very wide provisions now existing.

One or two special problems have presented themselves since the passing of the 1960 Act, and they are being dealt with in the Bill. The need has been felt to allow a departure from the normal closing hours in certain localities on the occasion of a very special event where an abnormally large crowd of visitors flock to a locality for a day or a week. Provision is, therefore, being made in the Bill authorising the district court to exempt licensees in any locality not in Dublin from the prohibited hours for a total of nine days in the year divided into not more than three separate periods.

It is also proposed to authorise the district court to permit the sale of drink under an occasional licence or special exemption order, whichever may be appropriate, at a function organised for bona fide members of what has come to be known as a festival club, that is to say, a club organised in conjunction with a festival of music, dancing, the theatre or the cinema, even though a substantial meal is not served in the course of the function.

Provision is being made authorising the court to permit drink to be sold in the premises or in the grounds of a sports club at times specified by the court during any one period of not more than five days in any year. This provision is to cater for such events as international golf tournaments which attract large numbers of persons to the grounds of a club. I might mention, at this point, that it is also proposed to authorise the court to grant 15 extensions in a year, instead of 12 as at present, for the supply of drink to members of a registered club outside the normal hours of opening.

Another exemption from the general closing hour provisions was introduced on Report Stage in the Dáil. It proposes to allow the sale of drink at any time at a railway station used by persons embarking on or disembarking from ships to persons who have completed a journey of at least 50 miles on board ship or who hold tickets entitling them to go on a journey of that distance at least. There is at present a similar exemption for persons who have travelled or who hold tickets entitling them to travel at least ten miles by train.

The Bill proposes to allow liquor licences to be obtained for greyhound tracks licensed under the Greyhound Industry Act, 1958. The sale of drink, however, will be permitted only during the period extending from 30 minutes before the beginning of a race, sale or trials and the beginning of the last race or the end of the sale or trials, as the case may be.

Provision is being made to outlaw the "locker lounge" system. The problem is not significant at the moment, and the provision is designed largely to close a loophole in the law.

The remaining provisions of the Bill are largely technical in nature and are unlikely to be of direct concern to the public in general. I feel that they can best be dealt with on Committee Stage. The Explanatory Memorandum will, I hope, be of assistance in the understanding of what is involved.

I have no hesitation in commending this Bill to the House. I believe that the provisions in relation to hours of opening and exemptions will remove those defects that have become apparent in the present law, and I feel certain that if those provisions go through we will have a licensing code that will meet the needs of our people for many years to come.

Professor Hayes

I am not highly skilled in this matter of licensing laws but I should like to make a few general observations. First, I think the Minister is to be congratulated on the fact that the Bill has been so altered in the Dáil that it needed an explanatory memorandum for us. We should be grateful to him for having supplied us with this explanatory memorandum so that the Bill can be followed in its details. It is largely a Bill of detail.

I used to know public houses fairly well in remote areas. Neither in the British days, before 1922, nor since 1922, was there any licensing law at all in these areas. An argument could be made to the effect that if you had no licensing hours prescribed by legislation, you might in fact have an arrangement which would give you less drinking. That is a matter which I think is possibly only a theoretical argument and has no bearing on the practical proposition that there must be licensing hours.

The present Bill could be described from one angle as a Bill to make further and better provision for drinking in urban and rural areas, night, noon and morning. It actually increases the number of hours during which people can drink. If it is to be rigidly enforced, in spite of that, it will cause considerable dissatisfaction. The truth is that the Minister or any Minister in his position is in the difficulty that he has to cater for people who live in entirely different conditions and who want entirely different things. I have been told by various people that what they require in the country is an opportunity to get a drink after last Mass. That is not something you can put into legislation. Indeed, the hours of last Mass are not the same everywhere.

I have been told, and I have seen it in some places, that that facility has always been available to them, in spite of the law. Whether it will be available to them in future, I do not know. The Minister has made it quite clear that he wants to have uniformity in this Bill and to have it enforced uniformly. But since conditions are different in different areas, the uniformity will of course cause difficulties in different places.

I know something about Dublin. I do not understand—it is the only specific point on the Bill that I should like to mention—why the Sunday hours in Dublin have been prolonged. I do not know who wants it. We have been assured that the publicans do not want it and we have been assured that the publicans' assistants do not want it. So far as I have been able to discover, nobody wants the afternoon hour at 4 o'clock. The opening hours from 12.30 p.m. until 2 p.m. seem to be quite satisfactory but nobody wants an evening opening hour as early as 4 p.m.

In this Bill, the Minister has increased the Sunday hours from 4½ to 7½ hours, an increase of three hours. He is anxious on account of bona fide traffic to have uniformity of hours. Would uniformity of closing hours not satisfy him? Would it not meet the point he wants to make and with which I think most of us are in agreement? Could the opening hour not be altered? The 4 o'clock opening hour on Sunday in Dublin seems to be quite difficult to work. It will certainly mean more expense and it will also mean that anybody who works in a public house will on certain Sundays have no time at all for himself. That is something which we can discuss in Committee.

The other point that strikes me about it is that the closing hour from 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m. was a very good idea. I remember well—few people, I suppose, now remember it—the discussion on that. It was achieved with great difficulty. I have always heard it praised by all kinds of people in Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Waterford. The Minister is now proposing to leave that closing hour in Dublin and Cork and to abolish it in Limerick and Waterford.

I have some connection with Waterford. I am informed and I believe that the great majority of the owners of public houses in Waterford city do not want the abolition of that hour. They still want to close from 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m. The Limerick position is different. It illustrates what I said at the beginning that different areas want different things. But if people in a particular place want a particular thing and if it is the law already, I do not see why the Minister would not leave it.

With those remarks, I leave the matter to discussion in Committee. In the condition in which we find ourselves, as I have already said, discussion in Committee, while it may be informative, will, I think, not be effective.

Miss Davidson

I rise to oppose this measure. I do so because I am convinced that the greater facilities for the consumption of intoxicating drink which this Bill gives can only result in a lowering of our national prestige.

The publicity given in our national press recently did not give me any feelings of pride, particularly when I read the banner headlines in the Sunday Independent of 15th July which proclaimed that drinking was the main pastime of the Irish. This statement was taken from a report of the Economist Intelligence Unit and referred to immigrants from Ireland in Britain. We know that there is a big section of foreign press which is only too glad to run down our country and our people, but, when we leave ourselves open to these charges, we can hardly blame anyone but ourselves when the failings of our people are highlighted in such a manner.

The Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, in a statement published on 22nd May of this year, said that the harm the proposed drinking extensions would do to the moral, social and family well-being of the nation would far outweigh any possible good. They say that last year saw a marked increase in the consumption of alcohol, especially of spirits. The statement quotes the Taoiseach as having referred to this trend as "a cause of concern to everybody interested in the health and welfare of our people."

The Act of 1960 extended the hours of drinking, hence the situation about which the Taoiseach is so perturbed. One would think on hearing the view of the holder of the highest post in the Government, that the Government would set about finding ways and means to rectify the evil. But Governments apparently have strange ways of doing things. This Government feels that the Taoiseach's anxiety will be allayed by giving even wider opportunities for drinking; by giving the habitués of the drinking establishments longer hours each night so that they can consume even more intoxicating liquor.

The Intoxicating Liquor Act now in force fixes the closing time on weekdays during the months June to September at 11 p.m. This Bill not only extends that time to 11.30 p.m. but gives a longer period for the 11.30 closing by tying the period of its operation to Summer Time, which this year extends from 25th March to 28th October, that is, the provision adds over three months during which the 11.30 p.m. closing will operate. As if that is not bad enough, it is further proposed to encourage the customer to purchase a final large supply by giving him an extra ten minutes in which to consume it.

Then we come to Sunday trading and trading on our National Feast-day. I had thought a young, progressive Minister for Justice would have firmly held out against greater facilities for drinking on these days but here, too, the drinking fraternity are being facilitated. The first period of drinking hours is 12.30 p.m. to 2 p.m. This is left unaltered except that Section 16 permits the district justice to authorise general opening in certain circumstances and areas on Sunday and on St. Patrick's Day between noon and 12.30 p.m., provided that no such order may be granted if during this half hour or part of it "a considerable number of people in the locality to which the Order would relate would be likely to be attending Divine Service". But in the second opening period, the Bill proposes that the licensed premises will open one hour earlier and close two hours later. They will open at 4 p.m. instead of 5 p.m. and close at 10 p.m., with the extra ten minutes added, of course, instead of 9 p.m.—three hours extra for the consumption of intoxicating liquor.

I wonder what was in the Minister's mind when he decided on these hours? In a country which prides itself on its family ties and family atmosphere, surely there is something strange in placing such added temptation in the way of those who perhaps are already too fond of drink? At present a man can go into a public-house at 12.30 on Sunday and stay there until 2 p.m. Under the new Bill, he will just have time to return home for his Sunday dinner and get back to the public-house again by 4 p.m. where he will most likely remain until he is ejected at 10.10 p.m. This will be the procedure and it is hardly calculated to foster the type of family life we are anxious to uphold.

Consider the family of such a man. He is at work all the week. He will be at the public-house each evening from tea time until 11.40 p.m. and now on Sunday, he will disappear from the scene altogether. How can he help his wife to supervise the goings and comings of a growing family when in most cases midnight will not see him in his home? The added opportunity for drinking will mean a smaller housekeeping allowance for the wives of these men. The President of the British Medical Association speaking in Belfast and quoted in the Irish Press of 24th July said that with the lack of home life, delinquency is appearing at an earlier age.

So far, I have referred to the drinking public. Let me now refer to those who serve the public. At the time of the passing of the 1960 Act, I referred to the hardship to workers in the liquor trade who were kept at work until long past the hour at which they can avail of public transport. The new Bill will leave the hour still later and for a longer period. The proposals in the 1962 Bill will very considerably worsen the conditions of these workers and so far as Sunday is concerned, they will end very effectively any possibility of family meals or family outings. The unions catering for these workers complain that the new Sunday hours will effectively prevent their members from taking part in or watching GAA games. I understand there are two GAA teams consisting wholly of barmen which will now have to disband.

Hotels and restaurants will also under the Bill be granted extended hours. The passport here is a "substantial" meal. On week nights, those frequenting hotels can drink until 12.30 a.m. and on Sundays until 11 p.m.—half an hour longer on week nights and one hour longer on Sunday nights. Those who frequent the hotels and restaurants in the general run are those with more money to waste. They will have no difficulty in producing the 5/- for the passport and I do not think they will worry overmuch about the menu. A person setting out for such late night drinking will not want a substantial meal as he will already have had his meal about 8 p.m. All he wants at that hour is intoxicating drink and he will pay the 5/- quite willingly to get it. He will then get into his car and, regardless of his condition, drive home. He may arrive without incident but the chances are he will not.

There are other matters in this Bill which must perturb thinking people. The increasing insobriety of our people is, as the Taoiseach has said, "a cause of concern to everybody interested in the health and welfare of our people." The results of the excessive consumption of alcohol are before our eyes every day. We know of drunken driving cases and of the innocent victims of such driving. We read of attacks on members of the public and the Garda, of robberies and of embezzlements and worse, and we have the defending solicitors pleading ad nauseam that their clients come of respectable families but when the crimes were committed, they did not know what they were doing, due to the excessive consumption of intoxicating liquor.

The Irish Press of 25th of this month carries a report of a case in the Dublin Children's Court concerning a stabbing affair. In that case, a police witness informed the district justice that the boy charged and convicted had drink taken at the time. He was 16 years. I would plead with the members of this House to take a stand against this Bill and, indeed, against any action that would lead to an extension of alcoholism among our people.

Professor Quinlan

I can only label this Bill as a confidence trick. Less than two years ago, we had the report of the Commission on Intoxicating Liquor and that Commission recommended quite a substantial modification of existing laws to get away from the evils of the bona fide trade. By a very narrow margin, by 12 votes to 9, that Commission recommended certain extensions of the hours, including an extension on Sunday from what prevailed then, four hours, 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 7 p.m., to two hours in the afternoon and 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., an extra two hours. When the Bill was brought in, the Minister concerned asked how any Senator or Deputy dared suggest that the hours recommended by the Commission were too long. After all, were there not two members of the Pioneers on it? This is the confidence trick that has been perpetrated on us. Today we have the Minister making no reference to that Commission. That has gone by the board. What was four hours' drinking is now to be made approximately eight and a half hours' drinking. Why? The Commission, if they had been asked their opinion on that, would have unanimously rejected such a preposterous recommendation.

Therefore, the Report of the Commission was made to make the first breach in the Sunday observance here, followed up by making the case that we must have full uniformity, that the tourists need more drinking hours on Sunday and all that sort of thing. I would ask Senators to go back to the Report of the Commission and to see that the change was recommended by only 12 votes to 9. The other nine recommended that the existing laws should be adhered to and enforced. I do not see why we are keeping a Garda Síochána Force and a Ministry of Justice if they are not capable of enforcing the law as set out. Of course, those laws could have been enforced at that time just the same as any other law. But that breach was made. We were effectively prevented from discussing it by holding up to us this Commission and the two Pioneer representatives who signed the Report. The reason they signed it was to try to get agreement on something. Even though they did not by any means approve of the longer hours, they felt that by cutting out the bona fide trade, and at the same time imposing very severe restrictions on the granting of area exemption orders and so on, there would be an overall improvement. For that reason they went along with the existing hours. I challenge the Minister to state in the House, however, that the two representatives of the Pioneer Association on that Commission would have agreed to the hours he proposed today. Senator Miss Davidson has read the report of the Pioneers on that. It shows quite clearly that such a recommendation would have been rejected overwhelmingly by the Commission. Consequently, I am understating the case when I label this the worst confidence trick I have seen perpetrated in the House in my six years here. I hope any Minister in future will not try to misuse the work of the Commission in this way.

We come now to the recommendations made. We see breaches made everywhere. We have the hours of 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Sundays. Then we have this wonderful provision for one and a half hours after Mass, and in certain cases the hours can be from 12 to 2.30. The condition is that the majority of the citizens should not be at Divine Worship at that time. Surely that condition is satisfied in any large town where there are three or four Masses on Sunday? You cannot then hold in law that the majority of the people are attending the last Mass. Consequently, that is a provision that will be applied more and more, and, in effect, we will be legislating for a Sunday morning opening of two and a half hours. What a wonderful start to the Sunday!

If that is not enough, we have this drinking-up time of ten minutes. Since the last Act was brought in, surely in the public houses at ten minutes or a quarter of an hour before time there is always the call: "Last drink now" and the hatch goes down after that? They are giving ten minutes for drinking-up time. This is just a means of providing an additional ten minutes and increasing the Sunday period by a further 20 minutes—ten minutes in the afternoon and ten minutes in the evening.

How this can be brought into a Christian country beats me. We look across at England and see the hours there on Sundays are 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. In Scotland there are no hours at all on a Sunday. Evidently, we are going to capture the tourist trade of the world by advertising Ireland as the place where you can drink, and drink more still. That is recreating in the public mind and in the mind of the tourist the picture of the drunken Irishman, with which we have been disgraced down the years and which I had hoped we were getting away from. That is the picture reinforced by the recent report which estimates there are 70,000 alcoholics in our population today. That is the equivalent of over 1,250,000 alcoholics in Britain, and I do not think any estimate for Britain would place the number as high as that.

What does democracy mean? Are we to legislate for the majority of the people or are we to be dictated to by what in this case, I presume, on a vote would not be more than a two per cent. or three per cent. minority? First, we can take the fact that all the women of the country without hesitation would be against it. That is 50 per cent. straight away. The Pioneer organisation is against it, and we know how strong that organisation is. The clergy of all denominations who have spoken since this was issued have been against it. Do their views count for anything in this country? All the fathers of families, who take seriously their obligations in respect of their families in trying to equip them for life, certainly do not want to rot in public houses on Sundays. We are legislating for a minority of two per cent. of the population.

We are told that this is not going to increase the consumption of alcohol. That, again, is just not correct. Nobody can say that the provision of hours from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. on a Sunday will not considerably increase the consumption of alcohol. Let us look into the Minister's contention that the consumption of alcohol is limited by the pocket of the individual concerned. Let us assume for a moment it is correct, even though I know full well it is not, then the publicans are expected to pay for an additional three and a half hours on Sunday at double time and to pay an increase due to the fact that the Summer opening to 11.30 p.m. now covers the Summer Time period, which has been extended by a further two months by recent legislation.

Consequently that extra time has to be paid for. Add all these together and the wage bill simply has to go up. If there is not increased consumption, then the only way that wage bill can be met is by an increase in the price of drink. From Seanad Éireann, I urge the publicans to take the Minister's statement at its face value, to assume that there is no increase, and to proceed forthwith, on the passage of this Bill, to increase all drink prices in order to remunerate themselves and their staffs adequately for the increased hours. I welcome the sign, but I should have preferred that that increased cost, instead of finding its way towards paying the legitimate wages for these increased hours now being foisted on the licensing trade——

Mr. L'Estrange

Is it in order, Sir, for the Minister and the Leader of the House to be jibing and jeering while a member of the Seanad is speaking? Since the Senator has started, they have been continually jibing, jeering and laughing. That is not orderly.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

I am grateful to the Senator for raising the matter because, for the last quarter of an hour, I have been exercising considerable restraint to prevent myself from interfering in the course of conduct on my left. I hope it will now be discontinued.

Tomás Ó Maoláin

I have a sense of humour, and I cannot help enjoying the Senator's speech so much that I must laugh.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

It is very difficult for the Chair to follow the arguments made when there is also semi-audible derisive commentary. I now rule it out of order, and I hope it will be discontinued.

Professor Quinlan

Thank you. Certainly the conduct you mentioned was most disturbing here, but I do not intend to be put off by such displays of bad manners in the Seanad, or elsewhere.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Perhaps Senator Quinlan now would cease to be provocative.

Professor Quinlan

To return to the point I was making, I urge the publicans to increase their prices forthwith, to take account of the increased wages that have been foisted on them. As a public representative, I would, of course, far prefer if those increased charges were actually excise charges which could be devoted to some desirable purpose in our community. These charges, which will be put on in the course of the next three weeks, could in fact have provided at least 5/- per week for the old age pensioner, not to mention many other deserving causes to which they could have been put.

As one coming from the country, as one who believes in rural Ireland, I wish to repudiate very strongly that rural Ireland is just the habitation of drunkards and that the people in rural Ireland cannot survive unless they get this extension on Sunday night from eight o'clock to ten o'clock. Thank God, rural Ireland is far more virile than that. I have been in touch with the young men in rural Ireland, the young men who man our rural organisations, such as Macra na Feirme and Muintir na Tíre, the various Gaelic athletic clubs and sports clubs. These young men will not be found in public houses between eight and ten o'clock on Sunday and they repudiate any suggestion that they are the cause of this confidence trick being played on the nation.

These young people have, thank God again, departed from the conditions of the past, when farmers had to work until eight and nine o'clock at night, when farmers had not adjusted themselves to the introduction of Summer Time. Now in practically all parts of the country Summer Time is accepted. The farmer's day starts that hour earlier and finishes that hour earlier at night. Consequently, there is no foundation whatsoever for the suggestion that rural Ireland is responsible for this. Some of the drunks in rural Ireland are responsible, but surely we should not be legislating here for those? If there is one provision we should make with regard to Sunday, it is a provision providing that light meals will be served. When families in rural Ireland go out for the day, they may wish to pull up in the evening for a cup of tea or coffee, or to eat some light meal. There is need to encourage that kind of activity and the Minister and his Government would be far better advised if they tried to assess the needs for such establishments and used their persuasions to popularise them.

Again, we have the fact that many things are being tightened up in this Bill, but there is no suggestion that drunkenness will be tightened up, or that the offence of drunkenness will be subjected to any heavier penalties. We still read in the papers of men being drunk and disorderly fined 5/- or, if it is very serious, the penalty may be 10/- or £1. Surely any liberalisation here, or any extension of hours, should follow upon a real drive first to ensure that drunkenness is eliminated. I have had representations from many young people. They say that, in the past year and a half, the conduct in our dance halls has deteriorated enormously because of the young men who do not feel sufficiently confident, perhaps, to go into the dance hall until they have had far too much to drink. That is not confined to any particular set, to the hunt balls, or anything else. It is much more serious at the ordinary eight to twelve dances in our cities and towns. The sooner steps are taken to curb that disgraceful type of conduct, the better it will be. It is only one in ten, or perhaps one in 20, of the young men attending these dances who drink to excess and subsequently make the dances a misery for everybody else. I speak from experience. Only last week I had representations on that matter.

As if this were not enough, we have here now a provision for liqueur chocolates. Now we are really going to become modernised; we are to have liqueur chocolates on full and open sale. There is, of course, a provision that it will be an offence to sell these chocolates to anybody under 16 years of age. But that does not prevent the purchaser giving them to children, or to anybody to whom he wishes to give them. As far as I can reckon the maximum figures given in the Bill, a manufacturer of chocolates can comply with the terms of the Bill and still succeed in getting one glass of liqueur into every ten chocolates. If the person buying the chocolates wants the liqueur and not the chocolates, there is nothing to prevent him throwing the chocolates into the wastepaper basket and drinking the liqueur. This could be very serious in our dance halls where it might become quite fashionable to pass the chocolates round, the chocolates with the "lift" in them. It could become almost as serious as the "reefer" trade in other countries, where "reefers" are taken for a "lift" or a "gee-up." I think this is one section we will have to have deleted from this Bill. There are far too many dangers in it to allow it to go through. Otherwise the percentage of alcohol should have been whittled down to the point at which it is of no significance but, as it stands, it is in my view the most dangerous provision in the Bill, even more dangerous than the Sunday openings.

Finally, we come to the workers associated with this trade. They have been pushed aside contemptuously as though their only function was to stand around and administer drink to people who already have had sufficient time to drink. I suggest that is an outrage on the rights of those people, on their family rights and on their right to enjoy the Sunday as well as the other people who have got at present a five-day week. We go to a five-day week for most of our workers and we push many others into all forms of outrageous hours.

Most of the provisions in this Bill can be fought on the Committee Stage. Speaking for myself—and I know many other Senators feel exactly the same way—we intend to create the maximum possible difficulties in passing this Bill because we believe it is an outrage on rural Ireland and it is the lowest form of confidence trick that has been tried by any Government in misusing the report of a commission.

It is a pity we would not all approach this measure with the same objectivity as the Minister has shown. Senator Quinlan said that this was a confidence trick. It is no such thing. It is the very opposite, because we all know the Minister, when putting this Bill through the Dáil, left himself open to argument from all sides of the House and that his purpose was to ensure that a Bill would emerge from the Houses and that Oireachtas that would meet a complicated problem and that is the regularisation of the hours of drinking in the country. I am glad the Minister did not allow himself to be swayed by self-appointed moralists in the country, people who pretend they are ahead of all other people in the desire to see that young people would not be led into wrong paths or wrong places or do things they should not do.

Everybody knows that the arrangement of the hours during which intoxicating drink is to be sold has nothing at all to do with what Senator Quinlan has been referring to, the abuses that take place in dancehalls and places like that. If a person is inclined to indulge in excessive drinking, he can do it in one hour as well as in three and if the one hour would not be sufficient for him there would have been other ways and means of getting the drink he would want.

I am one person who holds that the hours of drinking have nothing at all to do with excessive drinking. This Bill is a measure to rearrange the hours of drinking in the country and in the cities and to provide for those people who want reasonable refreshments. It has nothing to do with the excessive drinker.

There are complaints that the hours are too long and that 11.30 during the official summer time is too late. I do not agree with that at all. Anybody who understands the position in rural Ireland knows very well that 11.30 is a comparatively early hour in the country and if people have to do their work up to a late hour in the summer time, if they want to, they are entitled to get refreshments after their work.

We have also to consider the seaside places, the holiday resorts. When the 1960 Bill was before us here some of us said we thought the provisions of that measure, excellent though they were, were not sufficient to meet the requirements of the holiday resorts. We spoke not merely from the point of view of tourists but from the point of view of the people living in those places who after their day's work would like to come in in the evening and participate in the life of the place with the tourists. We said they were entitled to some refreshment and I am glad to see that the Minister is giving extra time in the evening in this Bill.

As I have said, we should approach this matter, not from any narrow political angle but with a desire to do the best we can to tighten up the licensing laws. Senator Quinlan said the licensing laws as they existed before the passage of the 1960 Act could have been enforced but the point is that they were not being enforced and, above all, the position was that the people had no respect for the licensing laws as they existed at that time. We are glad to be able to say that, since the passing of that 1960 Act, the people of the country have developed a healthy respect for the licensing laws and now the licensing laws are being enforced and this Bill, when it is enacted, will ensure that the enforcement of the law will be continued because we all know that when laws are unsuitable for the people for whom they are intended, the people will not respect them. This is an attempt to ensure that the licensing laws will be suited to the requirements of the people and because of that the people will have respect for them.

A very lurid picture has been painted here to-day by Senator Miss Davidson and Senator Quinlan about what will take place in the country after the passage of this Bill. Homes will be wrecked and everything bad will happen. They know very well in their hearts and souls that this Bill has nothing at all to do with some of the things to which they refer. If there is excessive drinking in the country, that is a matter over which this Legislature has no control. It is the people's own character and their own self-control that must be brought to bear on such problems. We are not here to legislate for those who indulge in excessive drinking; we are here to legislate for the people who wish to indulge in refreshment in a reasonable manner and at suitable times.

Reference has been made to the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association. While we have great respect for that association, at the same time, we know very well it is their business to take a narrow view of this problem. We have to take a wider view. We have to cater for the people as a whole and ensure that if they want refreshments in a public house, they can get them within reasonable hours.

I wish to welcome particularly Section 8 by which it will be possible for a district court to grant an exemption for special occasions. It is right that that power should be in the Bill. The only difficulty I see about it is that district justices take different views. Some district justices are more lenient than others and it could happen that the administration of that section would vary in different parts of the country. I do not know whether I am right in saying that. Of course, I know very well it would be almost impossible to do anything about it, except perhaps to issue some sort of directive to the district courts as to the types of special occasion for which these exemptions should be granted.

The general effect of the Bill is to increase the hours of drinking all over the country. I doubt very much if there is any demand for such an increase in the hours of drinking. There was undoubtedly a demand for the rearrangement of hours, particularly on Sundays and in different parts of the country. Where the Minister and the Government have gone wrong is in insisting on uniform opening and uniform closing hours for the whole country. I think that is bad. Though this is a small country, its people differ drastically from one part to another. So do their habits, social and business.

The Bill proposes that the people of the cities who end their work at an early hour, and most of whom do not work on a Sunday, should observe the same licensing code as the people in rural Ireland and in the remote parts of the country who work late hours and who do considerable work on a Sunday. It proposes that the pubs in rural Ireland operated by a man and his wife shall observe the same long hours on a Sunday as the trade union pub in the city of Dublin. The Bill proposes that people should have the same drinking facilities during the ordinary working year when they are working as when they are enjoying themselves on holidays or when they have leisure hours during which they have no worries and no responsibilities.

The Bill seeks, as I have said, to enforce uniformity throughout the country when the habits of the people differ drastically and the lives of the people differ so much. The people do not observe the same time in all parts of the country. As usual, when uniformity prevails, the people of rural Ireland must accept what prevails in the large cities of Dublin and Cork except, of course, when it is a question of remunerating the people out of public funds. Then the differential is accepted.

I shall not deal at any great length with the Sunday hours as they apply to Dublin. Perhaps, 4 p.m. to 10 on a Sunday suits Dublin. I do not know, but I do say that those hours are far too long in rural Ireland in ordinary circumstances. It has been said that nobody wants those hours on a Sunday. I do not think the publicans want them. One publican summed it up nicely to me when he said: "There is very little for publicans in the Bill in respect of Sunday except more varicose veins." Since 1960, the rural publicans who ran family pubs led a more enjoyable life— a more civilised life. It was good to see a publican and his wife going out for a short walk or for a drive to the local lake on a Sunday afternoon between the hours of 2 and 5. It was short, but it was so much time off. If these new Sunday hours become law, it will mean that the publican and his wife will be tied to the public house from immediately after last Mass until they close at 10 p.m.

I do not think the drinking public want these drinking hours on a Sunday. The Minister feels they do, but I think if something like a gallup poll were taken of the ordinary drinkers in their normal senses they would not demand those hours. I think, and I do not say this with the object of being offensive or objectionable, that if the Minister obtained the views of the drinkers—those views are supposed to be represented in the drafting of the Bill—he must have got them at closing time or very shortly before. I feel that if the views of the drinkers had been obtained in the morning or during the day they would have been much different.

Tomás Ó Maoláin

Or the morning after.

Mr. Fitzpatrick

I expect that we are not supposed to go into the Bill section by section at this stage. I think the Minister in introducing it dealt with the major points section by section, and perhaps it would be no harm to make a few comments now. The point I want to mention now is proper because it outlines a very important principle. Since 1957, I understand that a number of publicans in Dublin availed of the law to apply for exemptions on premises adjacent to the markets and docks. Under the provisions of the licensing code, one could get an exemption for people attending fairs or markets or for people following a lawful trade or calling. The Minister said in the Dáil that it had become an ever-increasing circle and that it had extended from the market and the docks very nearly to O'Connell Street.

In first introducing the Bill, the Minister intended that there should be no further such exemptions except to cater for the markets. Under pressure he yielded. What I consider very foolish and undesirable is that he stipulated that only those who had up to this year obtained such exemptions may in future apply for and obtain one. That is undesirable because no notice has been given. If two years' notice had been given, and if every case were tried on its merits, and an exemption given in suitable cases, there might be something to be said for freezing the position then.

There are streets in the city in which there may be 14 or 15 public-houses, and if this Bill becomes law, one of them will be able to open at 7 a.m. and the rest will not be able to open until 10.30 a.m. The result will be that one licensed premises, by virtue of this Bill, will assume an artificial value of thousands of pounds more than the neighbouring public-houses. That is not fair; it is not just. I doubt very much whether it is constitutional. It is creating a vested interest in one public-house to the disadvantage of the neighbouring public-houses. I urge the Minister seriously to consider this section again. He should give all publicans two years' notice to apply for an exemption or insert a provision in the Bill to regulate the granting of exemptions, and then freeze them. It is unfair to freeze them now without notice in a Bill such as this.

I may be pardoned for mentioning one pet section of mine. I think it may cause some difficulty to the Minister. Section 23 presumes, until the conrary is proved, that certain premises are licensed. That is a pet section of mine because I put forward a defence in our district court which made it necessary for the Minister to insert this section. The Minister has not completely closed the door. I think it is still a little ajar. It is a section that made every lawyer in the country go through the Bill with a fine comb and have points like this raised.

God forbid.

Mr. McGlinchey

The suggestion that the restriction in hours would in turn reduce the consumption of drink is something that, in my opinion, is very wrong. In the Prohibition days in America, the Americans discovered that people could still get drunk. In rural Ireland, when poteen distilling was at its height, it was discovered that a considerable amount of drunkenness existed.

It is the tendency across Europe to extend drinking hours and to provide as many facilities as possible. It has been proved that the longer people have to drink, the less likelihood they are to get drunk. I am very much surprised by Senator Fitzpatrick's attitude to this Bill as, indeed, I am in the entire attitude of the Fine Gael Party.

Just two years ago this Sunday, the 1960 Act became law. I remember well that the very next day the Fine Gael Party on my county council had Standing Orders suspended in order to make political capital out of the Act. The cry then was that the drinking hours on Sunday were not long enough. Throughout this entire country, protest meetings were held, objecting to the short hours on a Sunday. We were told in 1960 that Fianna Fáil would fall as a result of the 1960 Act. To-day, we are told that nobody asked for a new Bill, that nobody asked for this measure. Those of us who can remember only too well the protests by Fine Gael members and publicans throughout the country cannot understand their sanctimonious attitude to-day.

It is quite true that this Bill will go a long way to prevent drunkenness in this country. Up to now, the British gutter Press hostile to this country, liked to look upon us as a nation of drunkards. I am perturbed to think that Senator Fitzpatrick appears to be joining that bandwagon. It is gross exaggeration to say that the Irish people are a nation of drunkards.

Mr. Fitzpatrick

I never said any such thing.

Mr. McGlinchey

It may be that there is a small section in this community who may be guilty of insobriety, due to the fact that they do not know how to drink properly. The shorter the hours that are given to people to drink, the more likely they are to drink more. I feel that the Minister has gone a long way in this Bill to alleviate this trouble.

The encouragement to people to eat while they are drinking is something that cannot do anything but good. The tendency has been for people who enter a public house to stay there for hours, on an empty stomach and accordingly they become drunk much easier. I feel that the Minister has recognised that the modern trend in Europe and elsewhere is that facilities should be provided for people to eat while they are drinking. As long as a person drinks with food in his stomach, there is less likelihood of his getting drunk.

I consider this Bill an excellent measure. I feel it will go a long way towards preventing drunkenness in this country. I think the Minister is to be congratulated on his initiative in introducing it. Of course, he has met with criticism—something that is not new to the Minister for Justice. For some months past, he has been the target of the Fine Gael Party. We in Fianna Fáil consider that the greatest tribute to the Minister is that he should be criticised by Fine Gael. He has introduced a measure that will meet with the approval of the drinking public.

It is unusual for publicans and the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association to be on the one line of thinking. However, to-day Senator Fitzpatrick mentioned, on the one hand, that a publican was opposed to the long hours on Sunday and, on the other hand, was annoyed at the loss of business. I am quite sure that some time ago that same publican would have remained in his public house until 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning in order to earn a few shillings illegally. Before the 1960 Act, 95 per cent. of the publicans in the country broke that law. If, on the one hand, that publican is now annoyed that the hours are being extended on Sunday and, on the other hand, Senator Fitzpatrick deplores the danger of abuse that might creep in as a result of this measure, then it would appear that while the new hours on Sunday may not altogether appeal to the publican, they will appeal to the drinking public. Analysing this Bill, I feel that the Minister has made excellent facilities available for the people who matter in this country, namely, the ordinary drinking people.

Mr. McGuire

The discussion on this Bill could go on for ever because it is on a subject on which everybody seems to have a different view and an honest view, too. I take some small exception to the last speaker's remarks about Fine Gael opposition to this Bill. I am a member of the Fine Gael Party and I know the views in the Party, and the views expressed in the Dáil, and I would say there are as many different views on this Bill as there are members of the Party. There is no set Party view. At least, I am not bound by any set Party view. The fact is that this subject seems to be so involved, between morality, health, civilisation and so on, that we all have different views but we should give credit to the critics in that they are trying to do their duty and iron out an involved subject.

Alcohol is not an evil in itself. In fact, it is a blessing properly used. It is even used by doctors. It is very beneficial if properly used. It is the abuse of alcohol that is wrong and it is not only in this country that it is abused. Go to any country, go to France where M. Mendes-France showed that it is one of the most alcoholic countries in the world, if it is not the most alcoholic. Ireland is no different from any other country. It is only a question of the difference between the civilised and the uncivilised use of drink. There have been attacks on the greater freedom allowed in this Bill and these attacks are based on the idea of the uncivilised use of alcohol. It is only a question of whether we should liberalise the present situation in order to make people drink in a more civilised manner. The question is whether what we are doing in this Bill will make for more civilised drinking?

I rather agree with Senator Miss Davidson in connection with the hours for public-houses and lounge bars. I think the lounge bar and the public-house drinking is, largely speaking, rather uncivilised and I use that word in its very broadest sense. I think it goes back to the habit of standing drinks. If the people in bars and lounges would only have a drink there would not be very much over drinking or drunkenness but we all know there is something we cannot deal with and with which no legislation can deal and that is the old habit of standing a round. If we could make the law to ensure that you could only stand one round——

Mr. Haughey

A lot of fellows would like that.

Mr. McGuire

The furthest we can go is to join the anti-treating league. I do not know what success that has had. I used to hear a lot about it but I never met anybody who would be allowed obey its rules. On the point of longer hours, there are different opinions on the question of whether, if public-houses and bars are allowed remain open longer, people will drink more or less. Only last night I was in a lounge bar—I could not get a late meal in a restaurant at 8.45 p.m. and I had to go to a lounge bar to get one —and the barman was complaining about the later hours. He said that they do not get more people coming in even though they are open later and the people are only spending the same money. That would seem to bear out Senator Ó Ciosáin's contention that people are merely taking longer to drink the same number of drinks. I think that is better for them.

The reputation that Irish people have for drinking has been referred to but I think we are rather maligned on that point. I do not know why we have been singled out as drunkards or why the emphasis should be placed on uncivilised drinking on our own stages and screens and by our own writers. If we could stop them from typifying Irishmen as buffoons and drunkards every time they portray them it would be a good thing. It is very embarrassing to see Irishmen on UTV and the BBC television acting as buffoons and drunkards and acting the "funny-man" generally. If that could be stopped it would be some progress against this propaganda.

I agree with the parts of the Bill which encourage the civilised use of alcohol, those sections which provide for substantial meals. There is provision that drinks can be served with proper meals and not meals which are a mere subterfuge as used happen in Sweden some years ago when they gave you sandwiches which had been there for six months and nobody could eat them on that account.

There is also proper provision for the reasonable use of wines and spirits in hotels. In the past there has been a slight atmosphere almost of embarrassment, or a certain suggestion of sinfulness, in connection with drinking on even the most proper occasions of private and public meals. We had the whipping off of all wine bottles and glasses at a specified hour at even the most sedate and intimate functions even when the meal might be only three-quarters finished. That was uncivilised. You were asked: "Do you want any more to drink? The licence finishes at 10.30" but the dinner might only have begun at 9 o'clock. That surely is an uncivilised way to treat alcohol when wine is an essential and very desirable part of the art of eating and living. I very much welcome the way that this matter has been dealt with in this Bill.

I agree with the provisions relating to the special exemption orders and occasional licences for dances and other functions. They seem to be reasonable and, again, there seems to be a desire to deal with this matter in a civilised way so that the wrong kind of functions will not be held, in a loose or careless way, exemptions which would bring into disrepute the proper and reasonable exemption orders and occasional licences that should be given from time to time. I should like to congratulate the Minister on trying to make drinking more civilised.

Pádraig Ó Siochfhradha

Is ar éigin a tugadh aon Bhille isteach ós cóir na Dála nó an tSeanaid a fuair oiread sin cíoradh agus scagadh agus, ar an dtaobh eile, masladh agus atá fáite ag an mBille seo. Molaim an Bille. Molaim an iarracht seo atá dhá déanamh ag an Aire sa Bhille chun gnó so agus cleachtadh so ar óil a rialú i slí ná beidh oiread dochair ag gabháil leis na cleachtaithe sin a chuirtear ina leith.

Ach ní mór dom a rá go gcreidim pé nidh a dhéanfaidh an tAire, nó an Bille, nó an dlí ná beidh lucht óil sásta leis sa deireadh thiar. Ní féidir iad a shásamh agus is iad an dream is mó atá tughta do cháinseoireacht in Éirinn iad. Dream beag is ea iad. Dream beag sa phobal í gcoitinne is ea iad ach féach an glór is féidir leo a dhéanamh, an méid fothraim, an méid mí-shásaimh atá dhá tharraingt acu lenár ndaoine i dtaobh an cead atá uatha chun bheith ag slugaireacht pórtair i dtithe óil. Is uafásach an rud go bhfuil an méid sin de aire poiblí agus de chrá poiblí ar siúl i dtaobh an nidh chéanna—an t-ól so in ionad mí-rún a bheith againn leis.

Tá mí-shásamh ag gabháil le lucht an óil. Ní cuimhin liomsa—agus is duine aosta go leor mé anois—aon uair go rabhadar sásta leis an dlí agus ní h-aon díobhail go dtuigfeadh an t-Aire nach bhfuil siad sásta anois leis mar gheobhaidh siad cúis ghearáin eile. An iarracht atá déanta ag an Aire molaim go mór é chun caitheamh bidh a cheangail ar shlí éigin le nós an óil.

Tá aithne agam ar bhailte beaga in Éirinn—agus aithne agam le fada orthu —a bhfuil míle go leith nó dhá mhíle duine iontu agus ar m'eolas féin bhí leath-chéad agus a dó tithe óil i gceann acu agus leath-chéad sa cheann eile agus gan de phobal sna bailte sin ach míle go leith nó dhá mhíle duine an chuid is mó. San am gcéanna ní raibh thar dhá thigh nó dhá áit go bhfaighfí béile bidh sna bailte céanna. Anois sin scéal atá ar leatrom ar fad, ar chlaon-sheasamh agus má éiríonn leis an Aire nós an bhidh a bhunú i dteannta bheith ag óil agus ag múchadh tarta beidh rud mór déanta aige agus beidh nós tosnaithe aige in Éirinn gur mór an tábhacht é agus gur mór an riachtanas atá leis. Ach sé an nidh tubaisteach atá ann an nós atá ag beagán daoine i ngach baile acu féin bheith dhá shacadh féin le piúntanna pórtair, dul ar meisce agus beithígh a dhéanamh díobh féin i láthair an phobail. Ach níl i gceist ansin in aon bhaile ná in aon tuath ach beagán daoine. Dúirt duine éigin nach raibh ann ach a dó nó a trí faoin gcéad. Ach féach an méid clampair atá againn mar gheall orthu. Dá mbeadh mo thoil agamsa do chuirfinn isteach i bpriosún iad go dtagadh ciall dóibh.

Tá scéal agam ar fhear acu—fear breágh mór, láidir, macánta, óg. Comhaois dom féin a bhí sé agus níor thaithn meisce leis ach thaithn pórtair leis. Dúirt sé an méid seo agus tá sé ina nath ó shoin: "I would not mind a fellow drinking 15 or 16 pints but making a bloody beast of himself altogether." Sin é an saghas duine go gcaithfimid smacht éigin a chur air agus a mhalairt de chiall a thúirt dó. Ní le tart a ól sé é ach le cleachtadh nóis dul isteach i dtigh óil le cúigear nó seisear eile agus "rounds" agus "rounds" a ghlaoch. Nuair adúirt sé an chaint sin ní raibh ar an bpiúnt ach dhá phingin go leith. Tá sé beagán níos daoire anois agus bfhéidir nach n-ólann said an oiread. Ach tá daoine fós, pé slí a gheibheann siad an t-airgead chuige, a ragadh go dtí an 15 nó an 16 piúntanna dá bhféadfaidís dul ann. Ach le cúnam an dlí a chuirfí i bhfeidhm maille le pionóistí oiriúnacha, is dóigh liomsa gur féidir an rud sin fós a leigheas agus níl le leigheas ach beirt, triúr nó ceathrar faoin gcéad den phobal. Molaim an Bille agus tá súil agam go n-éireoidh leis.

Mr. Fitzgerald

When we assembled here this morning, somebody jocosely remarked that Pioneers should not be allowed speak on this Bill. Senator Ó Ciosáin subscribed to that view to some extent when he suggested that the view of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association would be a narrow view, but I think Senator McGlinchey blew that theory sky-high when he spoke on the Bill. I am opposed to the Bill. Because of the emblem I wear I do not want to be considered a kill-joy, a pussy-foot or objecting to anyone taking a drink.

Mr. Haughey

Which of the two?

Mr. Fitzgerald

I shall explain in a minute. If medals for long service in the Pioneer Association were given out, I would not qualify for one. Most of you will know what that means. I have experience of both sides of the fence. This Bill is like a certain Act— it is good in parts—but I am afraid the good parts are outweighted by those not so good. The 1960 Act was a very good Act in many ways. As the Minister said, speaking on the Second Stage in the Dáil, it brought law and order and respect into our licensing legislation. It is true there were certain flaws and deficiencies in it and in the 1962 Act. The Minister rightly tried to remedy these. But I am afraid he may have leaned over a bit too far in his efforts to put things right.

The 1960 Act did not cater for the seaside resorts. The hours there were insufficient for many reasons. In places with very good strands but little amenities, like Laytown, it did not appear right that when excursionists arrived on a wet Sunday they were put out of hotel lounges or public houses at 2 o'clock and had to wander around or sit in their buses until the public houses opened again at 5 o'clock. The Minister was quite justified in attempting to remedy that position. In spite of the Minister's attempt to bring about uniformity, so far as Dublin and the rural areas are concerned, the hours are altogether too long. I have no objection to public houses being open from, say, six o'clock to ten o'clock, but I do feel that the four o'clock opening in Dublin city is most uncalled for. I am not now expressing the view of the public; I am expressing the view of the publican and the barman. Their Sunday will be very much interfered with, both from the domestic and the social point of view. It will be completely disrupted.

I was sorry I was not able to be on the deputation that met the Minister in relation to two well-known GAA clubs here in this city which will go out of existence as a result of this Bill. I refer to the Banba and the Grocers', possibly two of the oldest teams in the Association. They are mainly composed of country boys and barmen who come up here and join the clubs. There may be many other barmen and apprentices members of other clubs. Because of the hours they will have to work on Sunday, not alone will they not be able to play in any games but they will not even be able to go to see the games. That is the position.

They will come in to work from 12.30 to 2 p.m. They will have a meal when they get out after two o'clock and they will have to get back to work at four o'clock. By the time they have had a meal, there will be very little time left for anything else. Consider the position of the older barmen who have gone beyond playing games. They may like to go to Croke Park on Sunday, or out to Parnell or O'Toole Park, to see the games there. They may be interested in the teams; they may be supporting particular teams. Under these revised hours, what opportunity will they have for doing that on Sunday? It may be said that they can get time off. Will anybody suggest that on a Sunday on which an All-Ireland Final or semi-Final, or some provincial match is being played, here in Croke Park, with an attendance of anything from 50,000 to 90,000 people, a publican could give his barmen time off to go to see the match? There would be a tremendous influx of people into the city and publicans would naturally be anxious to cash in on the crowd coming to town.

That is a position to which I think the Minister should give more consideration. It is not possible at this stage to do anything about it here, and it is with a certain feeling of frustration that we are speaking here because, even if the Minister were to accept an amendment to remedy that position, and that is not likely to happen, he would have to go back again to the Dáil, and we know the Dáil would not be called back for an amendment of that kind. Nevertheless, it is a matter of very vital importance. Consider the case of a boy coming up from Tipperary or Kilkenny, having left school, to serve his time in a city licensed premises. He is absolutely debarred from taking any part in our games as a result of this Bill. That is a rather undesirable position in which to put such a boy. I think it is unwarranted.

Consider, too, the barman who might be interested in taking his wife and family out on Sunday. What opportunity will he have to spend a Sunday either at the seaside or in the country with his family, if these hours come into operation? I respectfully suggest the Minister should have left the hours five o'clock to ten o'clock; that seemed to have general approval. I have no objection at the other end of the scale, but I have objection to the four o'clock opening. What will four o'clock opening achieve in the city of Dublin when games start at 3.30 p.m. and end at five o'clock approximately? It will not achieve anything. Everybody will be at the venue where the event is taking place. There will be very few in the public houses, except perhaps people whom it is not desirable to have there at all.

Coming now to the rural areas, I wonder how many Senators have met publicans who are enthusiastic about the extended hours on Sunday proposed in this measure? Someone may ask: what do I know about publicans? I can assure the Seanad I know quite a bit about them and there are many Senators here who know I know a little about them. I have not met one who wants these extended hours on Sunday —not one—because, in effect, what this will mean to the publican is that he will work longer hours on Sunday for the same income.

In spite of what anyone may say to the contrary, I do not believe longer hours will bring about any increase in drinking because I believe the average person, who looks after the needs of his family, has a certain amount of money with which he can go out and enjoy himself, and have a few drinks with a few friends. He will not change that pattern. He will still go out with the same amount of money. He will possibly spend more time having his drink and talking to his friends; the bored publican or the bored barman will have to listen to all that; the bored publican will have to keep his public house open longer for the same amount of money.

I sincerely hope they will not adopt Senator Quinlan's suggestion. I am sure if Senator Quinlan were like those Senators who have to face the public at election time, he would not have advocated that the publican should increase the price of drink to show his resentment or compensate himself for the longer hours he will have to work, because, if the publican increases the price of drink, he will kill the goose that lays the golden egg.

I regret the Minister did not adopt the suggestion made by Deputy Corish and leave this issue to a free vote. It is a purely domestic matter; it has no national or political significance. It is merely a case of one man's opinion against another's. I am sure that in the Minister's Party there are people who would express the very same views as I have expressed and who are just as much opposed to this as anybody in any other Party. In the Labour Party, it was very difficult to get agreement on it and it was decided to leave it to an open vote. There is no national significance in the issue.

This Bill is not wanted in the rural areas. The publicans did not ask for it. The publicans resent it and cognisance should be taken of that fact. The Minister would have been better advised to have left it to a free vote. It should not have been made a Party issue. I feel certain people voted for this, even though they knew it was not the right thing to do.

Business suspended at 1 p.m. and resumed at 2 p.m.

Tomás Ó Maoláin

This, as the Minister said, when introducing it, is a tidying-up measure in the light of the experience gained since the enactment of the 1960 Act. For a beginning, I should like to extend my hearty congratulations to the Minister on the expeditious manner in which he produced this Bill. He put a lot of work and thought into it. It is a very good Bill which will go some part of the way to meet the requirements which I suggested should be made in my speech on the 1960 Bill.

There is nothing revolutionary in this Bill but it is a step in the right direction. By a step in the right direction, I mean the direction to which I referred on the Second Stage of the 1960 Bill. I believe personally the day will come, and I hope it may come in the not too distant future, when a Bill will be introduced into the Dáil and this House to repeal all legislation controlling the sale and consumption of liquor. I am convinced that the abolition of all these restrictive laws which prevent people having a drink when they feel like it and prevent people selling it when they want to sell it are a restriction of the liberty of the subject. I look forward, as I say, to the day—and this Bill is a step in that direction—when a Bill will be introduced to deal with the problem and meet it in the way I have suggested.

Senators who were here in 1960 will remember that on the Second Stage of that Bill, I took them on a tour into practically every country in Europe and dealt with the licensing laws operating in each. Anyone who takes the trouble to read that speech in the Seanad debates will find that even with the introduction of this measure, which liberalises to a further extent our own laws, we are still far behind most of the countries of Europe in the facilities which we offer for drink and refreshment.

I give a particular welcome to Sections 2, 3, 4, 7 and 9 of this Bill. The Sunday hours which are now to be put into operation will meet the needs of the rural community. The provision in the Bill for a drink with meals up to 12.30 a.m. instead of 12 o'clock up to now on weeknights and 11 p.m. instead of 10 p.m. on Sundays is also a step in the right direction and will not be abused.

I am satisfied that the substantial meal provision which the Minister has incorporated in the Bill will end any possibility of an abuse of the facilities now provided. I am glad a figure is mentioned in that respect because, having patronised public houses in the days before the 1960 Bill was enacted, I recall a system which obtained in some parts whereby one could qualify for a drink by buying a sandwich and that plate was passed around all afternoon as each person finished his drink. This provision of having to pay at least 5/- for a meal will do away with that possibility of fraudulent intent.

There is another point in the Bill to which I give a very special welcome. That is Section 7 under which a period of 10 minutes is allowed for finishing a drink. Senator Fitzpatrick poked some fun at it in the real Deputy Dillon style by saying it was all cod. Apparently Senator Fitzpatrick does not have his drink in Dublin or he would realise it was anything but all cod. Something has been happening here since the enactment of the 1960 Bill which, in my opinion, was an infringement of the rights of the citizen to enjoy a drink under the law.

I refer to the fact that in many public houses in this city, when it came to quarter to 11, the publicans and their assistants announced that was the last drink, and at quarter to 11 the bar closed down. So strictly has the Act of 1960 been enforced that every public house was cleared by 11 p.m. and there was no possibility of getting a drink between quarter to 11 and 11 o'clock. That, as I have said, was a denial of the rights conferred on the citizens by law and this provision will give an opportunity to patrons to order their last drinks at a couple of minutes to eleven and give them ten full minutes to finish them.

Senator Fitzpatrick's doleful picture of this Bill encouraging the buying of round after round of drinks was laughable. I do not think he himself believes it. Round after round of drinks are determined in the same way as the other provisions of this Bill—by the economic circumstances of the people. Most people who go into a public house do not do so for round after round of drinks. They go in to have a few drinks and then go home.

I was particularly amused by the doleful picture painted by Senators on the other side of the House of the awful consequences which will follow the enactment of this Bill. We heard the same story in 1960—the same prophecies of the drunkenness that would result from the longer hours of opening. We heard of the misery that would be brought on the wives and families of those who would be encouraged to drink a little longer on Sundays. Nothing of the sort has transpired. As Senators are aware, the 1960 Act resulted in a more liberal interpretation of the needs of the people in respect of refreshment and it has not been abused. There has been no violent increase in drunkenness, no disgraceful scenes outside public houses since the coming into effect of the 1960 Bill. There have been no sad stories in the courts of people staying in public houses all day and all night.

Neither will it happen through the enactment of this Bill. A person's drinking capacity will be determined by his economic circumstances: the price of drink will regulate the quantity any person will be able to consume. Nowadays nobody is able to afford the amount of drink which would result in the doleful effects the Jeremiahs prophesy in relation to this Bill. Senator McGuire threw the only refreshing note from the other side of the House into this debate and Senator Fitzgerald also was reasonable. Senator Quinlan, as usual, being a wage cutter, today wants to put up prices and to jump anybody who wants to enjoy the satisfaction of a drink. He and those who think like him regard persons who like refreshment as criminals, as social outcasts and are prepared to do anything to prevent them enjoying the good things the Lord has given us.

As my colleague, Senator Boland, said, you cannot legislate people into sainthood and if Senator Quinlan and those who think like him believe you can regulate a person's saintliness by passing a Bill here they are making a very grievous mistake. That is a Bill which will not result in widespread waves of drunkenness. The people who spoke against it as did Senator Quinlan seem to regard the Irish people as a pack of morons, of uncontrolled savages, who should not be allowed the opportunity of having a drink when they want it in case they abuse it. The Irish people are no worse or no better than any race in the world. They have not misconducted themselves any more than others in the past and are not likely to do so because of the passage of this Bill.

This Bill is an effort to bring us more into line with continental Europe and, apart from the satisfaction it will give to our own people, it will be a further asset to us in the development of the tourist trade from the Continent of Europe. I hope the Seanad will see the value of the Bill and will help us to expedite its passage into law.

Mr. Quigley

I appreciate the fact that the Minister introduced this Bill with the object of bringing about uniformity in the trade, but I am afraid it is very hard to have uniformity as a working proposition in the different parts of the country. I speak here as a licensed trader from rural Ireland and I have yet to meet a colleague in the trade who is in favour of this Bill. The second opening period on Sunday takes away the traditional way of life of the publican, his family and his assistants in rural areas. It means that, having opened at 12.30 and closed down at 2 p.m., he has to open again from four until 10 p.m.

It was said there was an uproar against the 1960 Act because of the absence from it of suitable hours of opening for all the people. It was suggested that from 7 p.m. to 10 would be acceptable. I am not speaking now as a politician but as a member of the trade and as a representative of a rural community with long experience and I have yet to meet a publican in favour of working for 86 hours a week when other people can enjoy a five-day or a six-day week. It was most unfair to suggest that publicans need not open their premises unless they wish to do so. A publican must open his bar if his neighbours do. It is a very hard existence and publicans have to keep open.

There are other matters which I could talk about but I do not believe in delaying the House unduly. I congratulate the Minister on taking out Section 15. That has been brought about by pressure of public opinion. I approve the provision that where Church services permit, licensed premises may open at 12 noon. I visualise farmers and their workmen returning home from Mass and having to wait half an hour outside the publican's door. That is not right. It is a good thing that it should be left to the discretion of the district justice to grant an occasional licence. I welcome that part of the Bill but I do not approve of the provision that an offence must be recorded on the licence, that discretion does not lie with the district justice, that endorsement is compulsory. Having regard to all the praise we have heard of district justices for the past month, one would imagine that they are men to whom discretion could be left to endorse a licence or not. I intend putting down an amendment in relation to that matter.

Mr. Mooney

There are a few points in this Bill which have particular appeal for me. One is the provision whereby licensed premises may remain open until 10 p.m. on Sunday. I had the unhappy experience recently of travelling a distance of 50 miles accompanied by my wife and family and some other people. We called at a restaurant and were refused admission, due to the fact that the licensing hours had come into effect, and we could not be served with a meal. I thought it a terrible state of affairs in a country that is developing tourism that during that journey, due to the licensing law then obtaining, we could not be provided with a meal. May I add, this restaurant had a licence.

I am glad the Minister has put clubs in the same category as licensed premises because I personally have felt that clubs should have been amenable to the law the same as anybody else. I could not understand why exemption was given to club members to drink until all hours in the morning, while other people, the ordinary working man, had to leave licensed premises at a certain hour.

I am also glad that the Minister has cut out this question of area exemption orders.

Mr. Fitzpatrick

He has extended that, I think—he has extended the right to get 12 to 15.

Mr. Mooney

Yes, but he has put them on the same basis as licensed premises. Another section deals with the curtailment of exemption orders. The position has been that if there was a dog fight an application was made for an area exemption order. The impression seemed to be created that we were a nation of drinkers, that we could not go out for a day unless we could get a drink. If there was to be an occasion in the town, a fleadh ceóil or feis, the local publicans rushed into the courts looking for an exemption order to enable them to provide the necessary facilities, as they said, for the large crowd expected to come in.

I should like the Minister to insert a provision in the Bill, if that is still possible, placing an onus on publicans in regard to excessive drinking. If there were some such provision whereby a man who had had sufficient drink would not be served with more, we might have fewer tragic accidents on the roads. That onus should be placed on the publican and should have the force of law.

The question of serving drink to people under age should also be considered. Unfortunately, we have seen reports of cases where young fellows have been before the courts as a result of drink and there has been comment on this matter by justices and others. Some onus should be placed on the publicans in regard to this matter and the provision should have the force of law.

I am a Pioneer and like my colleague on the other side, Senator Fitzgerald, I am not a killjoy. People are entitled to whatever refreshment they wish to have. I am convinced that no matter what legislation is passed, the man who wants a drink will get it. I am not casting any reflection on the powers that be or on the administration of the law when I say that the fellow who is fond of drink will still get his drink as he got it heretofore. We can congratulate ourselves that these people are a minority of our population.

Senator McGuire referred to the question of our being falsely represented on UTV. While I agree with him to a point about playwrights representing us as we are not, I have had the sad experience of seeing people leaving themselves open to that representation. One has not to go back to far-off days to find such cases. I have been at various functions and have seen a man being held up by two others and photographed and cine-filmed by visitors, the film to be brought back to their country of origin and shown as depicting an Irish festival, or whatever the function was. We are rather prone to criticise people who we claim misrepresent us but we must take some of the blame because we leave ourselves open to such misrepresentation.

I am very happy to know that the strength of the Pioneer Association is as great as, if not greater than, ever it was and that our young people are finding other outlets for their amusement than the public house. I feel the Bill will not encourage drinking to the extent that has been suggested here.

Senator Quigley referred to uniformity of hours. It must be appreciated that the Minister had a difficult task there. While the Senator suggested 4 p.m. opening does not suit his part of the country, in my area the reverse is the case. We happen to be in a diocese where funerals take place in the afternoon, especially in the summer, usually around 4 p.m. and in the winter at 3 p.m. Heretofore, people had to wait until 5 p.m. to get a drink. Now they will have facilities under this Bill to get a drink earlier.

In regard to Sunday opening, I have certain misgivings about the 10 p.m. closing time. It is my personal view that people may be inclined, after leaving the public house, to go to the local dance hall as a last resort. People who might not have intended in the first instance to go to the dance may decide to do so when the public house closes. We should strengthen the legislation in that regard and also to cover the question of bringing drink out of public houses. When this Bill is in force, there should be no excuse for bringing drink out into a car or into a dance hall. I hope the Minister will take the necessary steps to see that the law is invoked and enforced to the full in that respect because the Bill is a liberal Bill in which the Minister has endeavoured to meet the wishes of the many sections that have made representations in respect of the licensing laws. A minority will continue to drink irrespective of what law may be passed and the Dáil or the Seanad cannot hope to legislate those people on to the straight and narrow path or into the Pioneer Association. There are a few points that I want to raise on the different sections later.

Mr. Lindsay

Only one aspect of the Bill obtrudes itself fully on the public mind, that is, its coming so soon after the 1960 Act means that not alone was there considerable pressure of public opinion in relation to the unsatisfactory nature of the 1960 Act but that pressure made itself felt on the Government. They now come before the Dáil and Seanad with a new Bill, hoping, as I suppose is the case with all Bills, that it will be the last that will be necessary. In this country, both under alien administration and our own, we have been legislating for the sale and consumption of intoxicating liquor since the early decades of the last century.

Tomás Ó Maoláin

They do that in every country.

Mr. Lindsay

That is only added proof of what I propose to say. The hope that legislation will make saints of all of us or turn us into what Senator McGuire would like to call civilised drinkers is a pious hope, utterly incapable, in my view, of full implementation. It may effect some improvements in some cases with some people; the effect can only be partial.

Senator Ó Maoláin, in telling the story of what has happened since 1960, was, I think, really out of touch with reality. He said that there were no drunken scenes in public houses since 1960. I should hate to start counting heads. We all know the situation and there is not much point in approaching legislation of this kind with our heads in the sand and not recognising fully our faults and limitations and, as a people, the particular difficulties that attach to us in the implementation of the social conscience of its own momentum rather than through the exhortations made here or elsewhere and through the strictures in the various sections of the Bill when it becomes law.

It has been suggested that the people who are bewailing the fact that greater facilities will be given for drinking are giving the wrong impression—that we are a nation of drinkers and that there is something wrong with us in that respect. Perhaps there is something wrong with us. It cannot be denied, I think, that we are a race of drinkers. The sooner we get that idea into our heads, the better. Not alone is it known to ourselves in the course of our daily lives in relation to the habits of ourselves and those of our neighbours but it is proved also in a very recent book which, although I have not read it, was the work of Father O'Doherty of UCD and Dr. McGrath of the Hospital of St. John of God. Dr. McGrath is in very close touch with the effects of over-indulgence in alcohol, and I am sure that Father O'Doherty as a professor in UCD would also be in a position to speak with authority. There is a third person involved whose name escapes me but in their book, they give a figure of 70 per cent. alcoholics in this country. Whatever will be done for the alcoholic will be done through the medium of treatment, psychological and pathological, so far as it can go, but certainly very little can be done in the enactments of Parliament because he will be able to drive a coach and four through them in a perfectly legitimate way. He can always lay in stocks and have them at home.

I am not thinking of the alcoholics, people who are in fact diseased. Let us talk of the ordinary social drinking which I think is what is envisaged in this Bill. Some very pleasant things have been written about drink and I do not see why it should be regarded as evil in itself. There is a puritanical approach certainly in one line in a ditty which comes, I think, from Northern Ireland which seems to make it the subject matter of a boast that "there are no public houses in the Lambeg road", as if every other house was a sort of saintly enclosure. You have the opposite view expressed by poets and prose writers alike who have written beautiful things about drink— I do not know whether it was as a result of its inspiration. Keats spoke of it——

Mr. Haughey

"O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been Cool'd for a long age in the deep delved earth"

Mr. Lindsay

"And in a white sheet of vineleaf wrapped

So bury me in some sweet garden"

and

"I wonder what the vintners buy

One half so precious as the goods they sell."

That comes from Persia, through the late Mr. Fitzgerald, from Omar Khayyám. We come nearer home where we had Riocard Bairéad of the Barony of Erris in my own county of Mayo and his "Preab San Ól".

Mar sin agus do bhrí sin

Níl beart níos críonna

Na bheith go síoraí

Ag cur preab san ól."

"Go síoraí"—they probably lived in an area where distillations both legal and otherwise were so easily come by that it was possible to have everlasting sipping.

The Minister and the Government are seeking uniformity in this. Uniformity is a queer thing. It may be related to many facets of our life. Uniformity of time seems to be the main objective here. That is something that would interfere considerably with what I call, for want of a better name, regional requirements. The term simply means that the city of Dublin is different from country areas and some country areas are different from others. Let me cite an example here of what can happen in a rural area on a Sunday morning.

I am sure every Senator knows of remote churches in country areas where there is one Mass at 9 or 10 o'clock and the people gather there from the hills and valleys. There might be a public house near it, a school and post office. I am thinking of old people particularly who meet but once a week when they come to Mass and congregate outside the gates afterwards. They go into the public house and they might have a couple of bottles of stout and a "half-one" and a chat and then go home to lunch. That is the weekly club meeting of those people in rural areas. There is no drunkenness associated with it. These old warriors, having discussed and criticised us, all very happily and without any acrimony, take up their sticks, put on their hats and wander off to their respective homes to have their lunch and there is no more drinking until the following Sunday morning.

I do not think this Bill meets this kind of situation. Public houses may open in certain places, if they apply, for a half an hour, I think, before the permitted hour of 12.30. That is no good in the areas I am talking about but I think if I know the people of this country and if the Garda station is suitably situated that in spite of the best intentions in this or in any other enactment, these old warriors of whom I am speaking will still have their "half-one" and bottle of stout. It would be a pity if they could not. I do not want that to be taken as an outright invitation to break the law, but it is a characteristic of ours that the more laws there are, the happier we are to break them.

Enforcement as well as uniformity is the objective of which the Minister speaks. He will get enforcement to some extent, but he will not get it to the full extent. I do not think that can be attributed to original sin either. Legislation is man-made and probably some people seek inspiration in devising it. All of us are fallible, as are all man-made institutions. The Ten Commandments were great precepts, and still are. They are 2,000 years old and the people responsible for their enforcement consider it necessary Sunday after Sunday and at retreats and missions to exhort people to keep the Commandments. What hope has the Minister who is, I take it, as fallible as the rest of us——

Mr. Haughey

Even human.

Mr. Lindsay

So I am told. What hope has he of implementing a measure such as this when it is so difficult to enforce matters which should claim our greater attention? What will be the situation in the country when people are making funeral arrangements? There is a technical term which is used in the country for it but it escapes me. That is something of which the Minister should take cognisance. There are occasions of that kind where the immediate relatives engaged in that sorrowful performance should be able to go into a public house without let or hindrance.

The question of drinking in dance halls has been brought up. I do not know that it would not be better in the long run, where there are facilities, to allow people to sell drink at dance halls. As I understand it, the whole problem will emanate from the fact that the dance goer in the unlicensed dance hall goes to the nearest public house and fights against time while drinking. He brings something with him when he goes back. That is a well-known fact and will not be stopped by Senator Mooney's exhortations. Having fought against time, and probably having drunk too much, he takes something back with him, and he drinks it in the most dangerous form of all, unmeasured, in the dark. If a person were free to go to a bar or sit at a table and drink a bottle of stout, a bottle of beer or even whiskey, and buy a mineral for his partner if there is that type of partner left in the country now, it would not be so dangerous because it then assumes a social aspect.

I am not very conversant with the city of Dublin now, and I shall have to look at the matter of early opening more carefully before Committee Stage. Senator Fitzpatrick dealt with that matter already and probably due to the fact that there are more Cavan men than Mayo men in public houses in Dublin these days, he probably knows more about it. There is a suggestion that if this Bill became law in its present form it would give a certain monopoly to those people who have early opening already, place an unreal value on one public house and depreciate the value of others. People should have an opportunity to apply for such early opening or such orders as may be allowed, and it should be left to the discretion of the district justice as to whether or not they get them. I believe many of those people would not apply at all. Their real grievance is when they find they have not an opportunity of so doing, like a person in an ordinary court case who, on being beaten in the district court, says: "We will go the rest of the way," and is not happy until he does so even though he is beaten again. He pays up gladly because he is satisfied that he has gone the whole distance and put up a reasonably good fight.

The matters I wanted to deal with were the remote areas and the early Masses, the dance halls—and, as I said, facilities for drinking where the Garda do not make any objection might cure a lot of the business of overdrinking in public houses and the bringing back to the dance hall of large quantities and subsequently drinking it unmeasured—the funeral arrangements and the early opening in Dublin.

I have not any great personal interest in Waterford or Limerick, but I should like to know why it has been decided to leave the public houses shut from 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m. in Dublin and Cork on ordinary opening days, and that the public houses in Limerick and Waterford should remain open, particularly if, as Senator Fitzpatrick said, such a large majority of the publicans of Waterford have expressed their desire to have their public houses closed from 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m. in an ordinary drinking day.

The Bill undoubtedly gives more hours for drinking. I do not accept anyone's pronouncement that our drinking is governed by our economic circumstances. Our drinking is governed by the economic circumstances in which we would like to believe we live. In other words, that translated means that most of us drink beyond our means and someone will have to pay the piper sooner or later. Now we are getting a greater opportunity to drink on Sunday afternoons. In the country there is a mixed feeling about it but, by and large, publicans have told me that people who live a number of miles from the local town or village and have to milk the cows or do the general farmyard chores in the late afternoon or early evening, will not reach the towns until well after tea time.

I would have thought that it would have been better to open from 3 o'clock or 3.30 p.m. to 10 o'clock or 10.30 p.m. and leave the afternoons free for the publicans and those who work for them. That, of course, immediately presents the difficulty of granting area exemptions. I do not know that they were such a bad thing. Anyone who ever visited a country village or town on a Church holiday, when the people do not work, and when the pubs are not open, will know that there is not a sinner in them in the afternoons. They just do not come in at that time. Sundays are the same.

We will be legislating again on this matter in a few years and I hope that some, at any rate, of the views I have expressed will be considered by the Minister. I do not know if there is urgency about this Bill. If there is, and if the Minister wants to get it, say, from the Seanad in this present session, then amendment would seem impossible because the Dáil will very likely not be recalled in order to give effect to it.

We are so far into the season now that, from the tourist point of view, it would be just as well to leave things as they are and to let this Bill roll on until the October sittings. Possibly a fresh look could be taken at it by the Seanad and the Dáil later in the winter. It would be as well to take our time at it. If we are going to do something at all, we should do it well so that it will not be necessary for this Government or a later Government to change it later on.

There are some other matters also. There are different points such as Section 19vis-á-vis Section 23 of the Act of 1874 which will require very careful consideration. I do not know if the Minister and his advisers would not be wiser to take a second look at that.

I do not think ten minutes is enough. Then, again, I do not think an hour would be enough. It is very hard to know. I take it that it means that no drink can be sold after 11.30 at night though you have until 11.40 to finish a drink. Ten minutes might be enough for some and not for others at that particular juncture, particularly having regard to the fact that at that time of the night, there might be a tendency, around 11.25, to order a little extra for the ten minutes. The whole thing is fraught with difficulty.

I can still see the Government's difficulty in this, too. Let us not put our heads in the sand. We are a nation of drinkers. Let us deal with the situation as such. My personal view is no hours at all, 24 hours full, and let the trade regulate it themselves, and they would not be long regulating it.

Another aspect of the licensing laws in rural Ireland is that, while up to 1960, there was a general sort of non-observance, from 1960 on, there has been partial non-observance but the partial non-observance has taken on a very undesirable aspect. Some public houses in some towns and villages apparently can stay open, while others cannot. I think that is a state of affairs that could well be remedied by uniformity of closing, whatever about uniformity of opening. That is the kind of thing one should guard against.

I am not saying this in relation to the present Government; it is in relation to any Government in power. There is a general feeling that if publicans, say under the present administration, belong to the local hierarchy of the Fianna Fáil Party or, under another administration, belong to the local hierarchy of the Fine Gael Party, they think they can order Gardaí about and tell them that if they do not shut the eye, they can go to worse stations. That was so rampant that I think it recently became the subject matter of a music hall joke in the Theatre Royal some time before it closed.

One of our best known comedians —I forget his name—put the whole thing in a nutshell. He described a publican opening the door at 3 a.m. to an inquirer who kept on knocking. When the publican opened the door, he was in his shirt sleeves, the lights were on and business was as usual. He said: "Good morning sergeant, do you want a pint or a transfer?" That may well be. I do not think it exists but it exists in the minds of the people. That is the kind of thing we want to get rid of.

On Committee Stage, we should be able to get rid of a good many of these things. The principal objection from this side of the House is to the Sunday afternoon hour. More far-reaching parts, such as Section 15, and so on, were already gone before the Bill reached us.

Mr. Nash

I must say that I listened with very considerable interest to the debate to-day. I think we can say that everyone who has spoken has done so with complete sincerity and a complete belief in the views expressed. Senator Quinlan came in for a considerable amount of criticism. I must say he does represent a very considerable volume of opinion regarding drinking. He expressed his views with clarity and sincerity and as he saw it his duty to do so. I think we owe a tribute to him for that and to anybody else also who may express views with which, perhaps, we ourselves may not completely agree.

Having listened to the debate, I find myself more or less of the same view as Senator McGuire. I must say I sympathise very considerably with the Minister in the position in which he finds himself. He must legislate for the common good. He must examine and try to find out to the best of his ability what is the common good and what will meet the circumstances of this particular situation. There is no doubt that while human nature is human nature, certain people will abuse the law. They will drink too much. You will always have alcoholics. It is not the Minister's duty to legislate for alcoholics. In actual fact, if there were to be legislation for them, that legislation would have to controlled by the Minister for Health and not the Minister for Justice.

The first question one has to consider in legislation of this nature and in considering the common good is whether the bringing about of this uniformity and the extension of these hours are for the common good. There is no doubt that prior to the passage of the 1960 Act, there was wholesale abuse. For all practical purposes, in certain parts of the country—and I have no doubt also in certain parts of the city—you had what has been advocated here to-day, 24 hours drinking. But it was drinking without the law. It was drinking in rooms with the blinds drawn and a hush-hush atmosphere about the whole thing. It was bringing the observance of the law into complete disrepute.

There is no doubt also that there were publicans who would not deliberately do an injustice to anybody and who, in their normal lives outside of the licensing laws, were completely law-abiding but who had no regard whatever for the licensing laws. There was no moral obloquy attached to a breach of those laws. When there were prosecutions, the fines imposed were purely nominal. That tended to bring the whole code of licensing law into disrepute. If you bring one section of legislation into disrepute, you are just a small step from bringing another section of legislation into disrepute also, and so on, extending the matter further and further.

It has been suggested that the Minister has gone too far as regards hours and that these hours should attach only to the seaside resorts. If you do that, you are back again to the bona fide traffic. Anybody living within 15 or 20 miles of a seaside resort will drive there, be it to Dún Laoghaire, Ballybunion, Skerries, and so on. He will drink there until all hours because he is a bona fide traveller at the seaside resort and will drive home when he is no longer fitted to do so.

I have tried to ascertain, from a practical point of view, whether the extension of hours will increase the amount of drunkenness. The 1921 Licensing Act in England considerably extended the hours of drinking in certain parts of the country and in other parts considerably reduced the hours of drinking. A list of the prosecutions for drunkenness for both parts was taken for four months before the bringing in of the Act and again for four months after the Act was brought in. The result of that was—whether it can be followed here, I do not know— that where the hours were extended the number of prosecutions for drunkenness increased by approximately 33? per cent. and where the hours were reduced, decreased by about 33? per cent. As I say, I do not know whether those figures could be taken to apply to this country. It is the duty of the Minister to see that the law is administered and respected and I feel he has applied his mind very conscientiously and to the best of his ability and soundness of judgment to this matter. His views coincide with the views of many of us, and despite the fact that excessive drinking does occur, he has done as much as possible to bring the thing into some kind of order.

Our licensing code goes back to 1833 and that Act is one of a series of Acts stretching over nearly 140 years. Of some of these Acts only one or two sections still remain and of others, only several subsections remain. Really at the moment the code is a jungle and it is a pity that when introducing this Bill, the Minister did not make it a comprehensive Bill to codify all these various bits and pieces and untidy soraps extending back to 1833. It is a pity from everybody's point of view, from the point of view of the publicans and from the point of view of the public or anyone who is expected to know the law. I may say that in the legal profession, it is common knowledge that if a person wants a new licence because of all the bits and pieces and the work required, the client is charged approximately two and a half times the amount that would normally be charged for going into the matter. There is at least two and a half times to three times the amount of work required.

I would be irrelevant in referring to any section of the Bill, but with your permission, Sir, I shall make a passing reference to the section which extends the time for ten minutes. As Senator Fitzpatrick said, those ten minutes will again bring the law into disrepute because if there is a prosecution, the onus is on the prosecution to show that the drink was sold in the ten minutes and it is not on the publican to show that it was not. That of course could readily be amended by shifting the onus the other way. There is plenty of precedent for that in road transport and other legislation.

Mr. McAuliffe

Having listened to the debate, I feel the Minister's predecessor must have done a good job in the 1960 Act because we got very little criticism of that Act. I do not know why the Minister introduced such drastic changes so soon after the 1960 Act, in view of the fact that the 1960 Act was 40 years behind the times. Perhaps it was that the Minister for Finance asked him to do something about extending the hours in order to increase the revenue. If that is not the reason, we can say the Minister has great courage and has not been afraid to bring in controversial Acts and steer them through Parliament successfully.

If I were asked what I thought of this Bill, I would say it was a wonderful bit of business, with the exception of the provisions regarding Sunday opening hours. We could all congratulate the Minister on this Bill, if he had not made such drastic changes in the Sunday opening hours. Let us not forget the history of Ireland, that we had a Father Mathew and that we once had a slogan "Ireland sober, Ireland free." We should not forget that we always had great respect for the Sunday and that we try to instil that respect into our children and we are proud of that. If we allow too long drinking hours on Sundays, a certain amount of disrespect for the Sunday will creep in.

The hours as they stand suited everybody. Senator Nash said that if there were extended hours at seaside resorts, the natural trend would be for the people to come in from rural areas to drink. That could never happen. You had the bona fide trade in Dublin which was a disgrace and which was finished by the 1960 Act. If the 1960 Act did nothing more than get rid of that undesirable trade which had been taking place for years around Dublin, it would have justified itself.

Senator Ó Maoláin said that he would prefer that there should be no hours and then this question would not arise, that whenever a person felt like a drink, he could go in and have it, but something would have to happen before we could see that day. That day cannot come because we have too many public houses in Ireland. Take the town of Mullingar. It has 70 public houses, about ten of which provide a good living for their proprietors. The others just drag along from day to day with an old man or an old woman running them and scarcely getting a living from them. The town of Kilbeggan has 14 public houses. It could do with four, which would do reasonably well. At present there are about ten which are not doing well but fortunately the people have some other sideline. Otherwise, they could not exist.

In Kerry, there is the town of Caherciveen. Very often, we find that Caherciveen is not even mentioned in the ordinary geography but there are 52 public houses there. I would say the population of Caherciveen is about 1,400 or 1,500. In any town in Ireland of that size, we must naturally be on the look-out for abuses in regard to people drinking after hours. The publicans in such towns will stand at the door to slip you in for a drink. It is vital for them to sell drink where there is such competition.

Great damage was done by the provision in the 1960 Act which allowed so many lapsed licences to be revived. It was a bad day's work that there was ever any concession in that regard. It is all right to compensate people for getting rid of licences in places where there are too many of them. The licence should be transferred to a district where there is an industry starting or an increase in population. That would do much more good than reviving lapsed licences. Every solicitor in the country was breaking his neck to find out where there was a lapsed licence and to put it on the market for sale.

I have spoken to many people— publicans, housewives, mothers and so on—and they all think that the extension of drinking hours on a Sunday is a disgrace. It certainly will lead to more drinking, whether the people can afford it or not, even though Senator Ó Ciosáin says it will not. In today's paper, we see an all-time record price of £47,000 paid for a public house in Dublin. The people who invested so much money in a public house in Dublin know they have a good prospect of getting it back. None of the publicans I have spoken to in Kildare, Meath and Westmeath wants these extra hours. The publicans and the barmen in Dublin do not want them. The only place in which there was a demand for it was the seaside resorts. The Minister could easily have given that concession to them and there would have been no danger of people running in from the country to get a few drinks in the seaside resorts.

The publicans do not want the extension of hours in the country because of the drinking habits there. No matter what time a public-house closes, a man there comes in only for the last hour. He has only so much money to spend and he is afraid that, if he arrived earlier, he might run short of money and have to leave before everyone else. The publican is also worried about extra overheads. You can imagine the extra cost of lighting and heating opening at 4 o'clock in winter will involve. Yet the publican would have to stand around until a few people came in for a drink at 9 o'clock, an hour before closing time.

Section 7, which makes provision for the ten minutes drinking-up time, is a good provision. I would disagree entirely with Senator Fitzpatrick when he says it is not a good idea. I have seen many disputes over publicans refusing to give a drink after 11.25. A man might come in at that time, demand a drink and tell the publican that he is entitled to have a drink up to 11.30, according to the law. This section allows him to order his drink up to 11.30. He cannot order another one after that, but he can spend 10 minutes drinking up his last drink, instead of having it snapped from the counter, as happens sometimes at present, and going out in bad humour because the drink he had paid for was taken from him.

Section 26 deals with the problem of locker lounges, and the Minister had no option but to introduce such legislation.

There is one matter I was asked to raise with the Minister. It concerns holiday camps. I am told that the residents of holiday camps are not treated in the same way as the residents of hotels, and I would ask the Minister to give them the concession of having a few drinks after hours, the same as the residents of hotels. People staying in holiday camps should be looked on in the same way as if they were staying in hotels.

I agree with everything in the Bill except the provision for extra hours on Sunday. I think that all that has been said here today about this Bill can be summed up in one phrase: We are not satisfied about the new hours on Sunday.

Mr. Boland

There is one aspect of this legislation to which no Senator has yet adverted, that is, that the licensed trade is a catering trade. Like all caterers, the workers in that trade are engaged working when others are enjoying themselves. They are compensated by getting extra pay. I have heard many Senators refer to the hardships on the publican. This is not legislation for the publicans. It is supposed to be in the interest of the people generally. Busmen, caterers and all the rest are busier at holiday periods, when all the rest of the people are enjoying themselves, than at any other period, but that is inseparable from the catering business.

Personally, I do not like one trend evident in the 1960 Act and also in this Act. We have courts and we have judges and district justices whom we should trust to administer the law in the courts. If I were Minister for Justice, I would not stand for having this business of a minimum penalty. The penalty should be left to the discretion of the courts. If any judge or district justice is worth his salt, he should be allowed to decide. No two cases are the same, and this idea of a man having to be fined £1 is ridiculous.

I read of a case in Clonmel recently. I know the district justice myself and I had to laugh at what he said. Six people were found in this public-house and they were all teetotallers. None of them ever took a drink in his life. They were drinking lemonade. They were caught and fined £1 each and the district justice commented: "£1 for drinking lemonade!" I know the district justice well. He could not say "5/-" or "6/-" but had to impose a fine of £1. It is all right to fix a maximum fine, but a minimum penalty is all wrong. It is a bad law. If we have courts, we should let them act as they see fit. Otherwise, what is the use of having them at all?

An Cathaoirleach

I take it the Minister will get in to conclude after Senator L'Estrange.

Mr. L'Estrange

In dealing with the sale of alcoholic liquor, I realise that it would be impossible for this Minister, or any other Minister, to introduce a Bill into the Oireachtas which would satisfy everybody. The Minister, as a member of the Government, must legislate for the common good. Now, in my opinion, this Bill extends drinking hours unnecessarily on Sunday evening. I believe there is a demand for an amendment of the 1960 Act in certain respects. Senator McGlinchey stated here today that Fine Gael wanted extended drinking hours for holiday resorts; he based his contention on the Fine Gael manifesto at the last general election. That statement is not true. I quote from the manifesto:

Fine Gael will, as a matter of urgency, review the licensing laws with a view, in particular, to rearranging the opening hours on Sunday and with special reference to the requirements of holiday resorts.

We were in favour then, and are still in favour, of rearranging the hours on Sunday, but I, for one, am not in favour of any extension of the hours. As I said, it had become apparent to everybody that the Sunday hours as fixed by the 1960 Act were not entirely satisfactory. Certain alterations or rearrangements are necessary. I believe alterations or rearrangements are necessary, but I do not believe in any extension of the hours. The Oireachtas gave long and thoughtful consideration to the 1960 Act. It does seem somewhat unnecessary that in the short space of two years, we should now be presented with yet another Bill dealing with the sale of intoxicating liquor and that we should be back here discussing this Bill, the purpose of which is to amend what we legislated under the 1960 Act.

In considering this Bill, we must consider the views of certain people. We must consider the views of the public. We must consider the views of the drinkers. We must consider the views of the publicans. We must consider the views of the Pioneers and the total abstainers. We must consider the views of the housewives, and we must consider this matter also from the point of view of the children. I have discussed this Bill. I have heard it discussed freely in different places. I found only one man in favour of extended hours on Sunday. He was a publican. I think the reason why he was in favour was that he is a supporter of the Government. He was one of eight or nine publicans and, in the end, he came out in favour of this provision. He was the only one. I have discussed it with total abstainers, with men, with women, with publicans and their employees. Nobody, except for that one man, was in favour of extended hours on Sunday.

Up to a few years ago, we had no legislation permitting the sale of intoxicating liquor on Sunday. I admit there was some drinking. In the 1960 Bill, we provided five and a half hours for drinking on Sunday. It is now proposed to extend that to seven and a half and, in certain cases, I think it can be even further extended. I believe that period is too long. We can rearrange the existing hours without extending them.

Suggestions were made in the Dáil, and made here again today, that we should not attempt to control drinking at all, that there should be what might be described as "open house", as there is on the Continent and in other countries. I do not think we should take a lead from other countries. I do not think we should copy what happens on the Continent or in other countries. If one examines the statistics for these countries, one will find there is a very high percentage of alcoholism, a very high percentage of murder, suicide, and other catastrophes attributable to drink, and to over-indulgence in drink. That is a fairly well-known fact.

The principle of fixed times for drinking has been accepted here. We all seem to be agreed on it. I take it we must approach this Bill now on that basis. I do not agree with the Minister or Senator Ó Ciosáin that extended hours will not mean an increase in the consumption of liquor. Of course it will mean an increase in the consumption of drink. Ask any publican; ask the wives and children of those who are fond of drink. As Senator Fitzpatrick said, ask the drinkers themselves on a Monday morning, or in the middle of the day, or any time when they are not in a public house. I know certain people in very responsible positions. I know that if their wives did not get their cheques the moment they arrive, there would be very little for the house.

I know that if their husbands got there first, the wives would get very little on which to run the house. These are people in highly responsible positions, but they have a failing. They are human and, as long as the temptation is there, they will spend the money on it. We all have our failings. None of us is perfect.

Mr. Browne

They are most irresponsible people, I think, rather than responsible.

Mr. L'Estrange

There are responsible people on that side of the House, responsible people on this side of the House, and there are responsible people who drink. We must legislate for the greatest good of the greatest number. If extended hours are provided, there is no denying these people will drink more on Sunday. I think everybody will admit that. When speaking on the Budget, the Taoiseach was of the opinion that there was too much drinking in this country at present. Yet the Minister comes along now, supported by Senator Ó Ciosáin, and tells us that longer hours will not have any effect on the amount people drink. I believe it will, especially on Sunday.

I am no pussyfoot. I do not object to people taking a drink on Sunday, or any other day. Drink is not an evil. It is the over-indulgence in it that does the harm. Drink in itself is not an evil, but I object to Parliament giving longer hours and greater facilities for drinking, especially on the Lord's Day. We know that Sunday is being abused in other countries, and even here to a certain extent by people working on Sunday. It is agreed that the majority of our people, if it can be avoided, should not adopt the practice of compelling people to work on Sunday. Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, a day of observance. We should set an example here by treating it in a special way. Instead of that, we are proposing to increase the hours for the consumption of liquor. The publicans and their workers will now have to work at least eight or nine hours on Sunday. They must clean up after closing time on the Sunday evening.

I do not object to people getting a drink after Mass or after Church on Sunday from 12.30 to 2 p.m. That is an excellent idea. They are entitled to it. They can go home at 2 p.m. and join their wives and families for dinner. It is going too far altogether to open a public house from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Sunday. As I have said there should be a rearrangement of the hours of opening. They should be from 6.30 to 9.30 or from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. The district justice should have authority to give area exemption orders for sporting or other functions to permit public houses to open at 5 p.m., 4 p.m. or whatever hour was considered most convenient on the Sunday in question. Only three or four exemption orders might be required in the year.

Senator Fitzgerald spoke about the young barmen from the country who are working in the city and who cannot play their national game on a Sunday. It is suggested that the public-houses need not open. Everybody knows that if A opens and B keeps closed, the customers will move over to A and B will lose his business. It is admitted that there are only certain Sundays on which there are sporting events or a fleadh ceoil or other function when early opening would be of any advantage to the publican. On the remaining Sundays, the publican would be standing behind the counter from 4 p.m. until 7.30 or 8 p.m. twiddling his thumbs or looking at the clock or looking out the door to see if there was a customer in the offing. Why keep these young barmen away from God's sunshine? Why not allow them out for a few hours on a Sunday? They could return to the public-house at, say, 6.30 p.m. and remain until 9.30 or at 7 p.m. and remain until 10 p.m., according as the Minister or Parliament thought necessary. The publican could go out on Sunday for a walk and would be back in time. There might be three or four Sundays in respect of which they could apply for area exemption orders and get them. I cannot see any necessity for the present hours.

There is a proposal in the Bill to extend the opening hours to 11.30 p.m. during official Summer Time. At present, the 11.30 closing time operates from June to September. The Minister's proposal is to extend that to the period from 25th March to 28th October. I do not see any objection to that. It is a good idea. In the Spring months of March and April, farmers and labourers are engaged until late evening at tillage, in the summer, at haymaking and in the autumn, at harvesting. Often, in the past, when they got to the public-house at 11 p.m., it was closed. The Minister is to be congratulated on the provision he is making and I am in full agreement with it.

I would agree with almost all sections of the Bill, except that providing for additional opening hours on Sunday.

Mr. Haughey

First of all, I want to say a word to the Seanad about the timing of the Bill and to refer to the complaint made by Senator Hayes this morning. It certainly was not my idea, nor did I wish, that this Bill should come to the Seanad only at this time. Indeed, I hoped the Bill might be law before this year's tourist season had got under way. I do not think we can blame anybody for the fact that the present situation has arisen. The Second Reading of the Bill commenced in the Dáil in the month of May and the Parliamentary programme was such that it is only now coming to the Seanad. I am not saying, and do not want to infer, that the Dáil was not fully entitled to give the Bill the very careful and detailed examination which it did give it or to discuss it as fully as it did. However, the Bill did take longer getting through the Dáil than I anticipated and I am quite sorry about the fact that the Bill is now here in the Seanad in such a position that if it is to be amended, it cannot become law until next October.

I am quite prepared to face up to the situation that if the Seanad really feels the Bill should be amended and it is absolutely essential that it should be amended in any respect, to accept that amendment and to hold the Bill until October but I will have to be persuaded that the amendment is so valuable that it is more important that it should be accepted than that the Bill should become law fairly soon because I do not agree with what Deputy Lindsay said about the urgency of the measure. Deputy Lindsay suggested that this present tourist season is fairly well advanced now and there would not be a great deal to be lost if we were to postpone the Bill until the Dáil reassembles. I feel there is still a considerable advantage to be gained in the tourist industry if the Bill becomes law fairly soon.

There are many parts of the country where the people are anxiously and eagerly awaiting the passing of the Bill into law. I want to assure Senators of that because I have constant and urgent representations from those affected and those interested about the situation. I am urged and pressed from a number of directions to have the Bill brought into operation as soon as possible. So that we are faced with the dilemma that we must decide, in the general interest, which is the more advantageous with regard to any amendment, whether the advantages and improvement that would flow from an amendment would outweigh the advantages which would accrue to the country as a whole and the tourist industry in particular if the Bill becomes law almost immediately.

As I say, I can do no more than apologise to the Seanad for bringing this Bill to it in this way and assure the Seanad again that it was not my fault and that I never intended that it should work out in that way.

It seems to me two main points of criticism have been raised on the Bill. On the one hand, the question is asked why is this Bill brought along now so soon after the passing of the 1960 Act, what is the necessity for it? The second criticism seems to be that the Bill unnecessarily extends general hours of opening, thereby resulting in two things: hardship to the publicans and their staffs and the danger of excessive drinking. It seems to me these are the two main lines along which criticism of the Bill has been directed.

There is nothing at all unreasonable or illogical in this Bill being produced at this stage. Senators will recall that my predecessor in office and the Taoiseach at the time said they did not anticipate that the 1960 Act was the last piece of legislation that would ever be passed on this subject, that they were prepared to give it a trial and if experience showed that improvements or alterations were necessary, those improvements or alterations would be made. The Government clearly promised both Houses of the Oireachtas at the time of the 1960 Act that, after an experimental period had elapsed, the situation would be reviewed and whatever amendments were shown to be necessary would be made.

It was in pursuance of that promise that I undertook to examine the situation which resulted from the operation of the 1960 Act and that I now come here with these proposals. It is utterly fallacious to suggest that this Bill was not wanted by anybody and that there was no public demand for it. Since I became Minister for Justice, there was no single aspect of my Department about which I was under greater pressure or more constant pressure than this matter of the licensing laws. Senators themselves should be aware that a number of Parliamentary Questions were addressed to me from time to time inquiring when I was going to complete my review of the operation of the 1960 Act and introduce the amending legislation. Apart from Parliament, there was in the normal democratic processes a very great and insistent pressure from all sorts of legitimate interests to do something about alleviating the hardship or removing the anomalies which had arisen from the working of the 1960 Act.

As I said in the Dáil, I think the 1960 Act was a wonderful piece of legislation and that, by and large, it achieved its purpose. I am standing by it and maintaining it. The broad structure of our licensing laws laid down in the 1960 Act is still there unimpaired and all I am doing, in effect, is tidying up and making alterations here and there where experience has shown that they are necessary. However, I think Senators could agree with me that the 1960 Act did bring order out of chaos, did bring, as one Senator said, respect for the law and that we now have a licensing code which is uniformly and impartially enforced and observed.

The suggestion has been made that this Bill unnecessarily extends the hours of opening, particularly on Sunday. Senator L'Estrange pointed out there was practically no change with regard to weekdays and the only change of any substance is that the longer hours of opening which prevail at present for the summer months are now extended to the full period of summer-time. I think that is fairly widely welcomed, particularly in the rural areas. The only really significant change being made in the general hours of opening is in regard to Sunday.

I want to explain why the present hours were decided upon. Senators are wrong in saying these hours are not necessary and leaving it at that. So far as I can assess public demand and requirements in this situation, there was a very widespread and general demand for the ten o'clock opening on Sunday nights. That was confirmed very strongly in the Dáil when Deputies on all sides of the House gave expression to that view and indeed voted accordingly. I want to remind Senators that when there was a division in the Dáil on the Final Stage of the Bill, there was an all-Party vote in favour of the Bill. Deputies from all Parties came into the Division Lobby to vote for the Bill. Therefore, in so far as the Dáil, at any rate, reflects public opinion, it is absolutely clear and evident that the ten o'clock closing on Sunday night was what was universally sought.

Mr. Fitzpatrick

I think that is generally accepted here, too.

Mr. Haughey

So that all we are really arguing about is the opening time in the evening on Sundays. I have already said quite clearly in the Dáil, and I want to admit it here again to the Seanad, that I am quite satisfied in my own mind that the opening at four o'clock is not really necessary in Dublin city or in Cork city, for that matter.

Mr. L'Estrange

Where is it necessary?

Mr. Haughey

I shall come to that. It is wrong to suggest at the outset that we can have seven to ten p.m. or six to ten p.m. or something like that. It is unreal to suggest to me that particularly in rural areas because of attendance at football matches and hurling matches we should go back to seven o'clock in the evening. Therefore, we are really only arguing about the period four to five p.m. on Sunday.

The difficulty here arises with regard to seaside resorts and holiday resorts generally. When we speak of holiday resorts, Senators will bear in mind that nowadays there is a very welcome and desirable trend of more and more inland places becoming holiday resorts and developing a very satisfactory tourist trade. The need to do something about these areas was self-evident. The principal complaint was that in many resorts the hoteliers and the licensed trade were prevented from catering for the day tripper and consequently were losing a great deal of business and, as it was put, in the few months of the year when they should be making some money, the licensing laws were preventing them from doing so.

There is also the type of situation which Senator Mooney mentioned, in which because of social, religious or sporting functions of one sort or another, particularly in the winter months, there is a demand in inland areas for the opening of public houses sometime in the afternoon, three o'clock, 3.30, four o'clock or thereabouts. That demand is there and there was the demand from the seaside resorts to open.

If those demands were legitimate, there was only one or other of two things to do: either give in to them by reintroducing an area exemption or a differential of some sort or, alternatively, make the general hours of opening such that they would cater for all the different areas. Whereas that arrangement might be what was necessary in one area but a little more than was really necessary in another, that is the solution I evolved and the Government agreed with me. The solution was that rather than introduce differentials in different areas to try to meet local needs, we decided upon general hours of opening which would be suitable to everyone.

The advantages are on the side of what the Government decided. We know the difficulties inherent in any differential system. First of all, there is the difficulty of deciding what is a tourist resort. Even then, different sections would require different hours and the whole thing would undoubtedly slip into chaos if we attempted to devise a system of differentials, apart altogether from the fact that we would reintroduce the whole business of having persons travel to get drinks.

What are the disadvantages in what is proposed? All anybody can say about it is that in some parts of the country, particularly in Dublin and Cork, the hours are unnecessary, but granting that argument, is that a terribly serious difficulty? I do not think it is. It is certainly not as serious as the reintroduction of differentials would be. No great evils can flow from the fact that premises may be open for a short period in some areas where there is no real demand. If there is no real demand, the public will not go into the licensed premises and that is that.

There is some element of hardship for publicans and their staffs, but, as I have said to the publicans and to the trade unions concerned, and to Deputies who dealt with this matter in extenso in the Dáil, these people are in the catering trade and though there are disadvantages, there are also rewards, as Senator Boland very rightly pointed out here today. The Dublin and Cork publicans are the better off sections of the trade. They have more resources, more skill and more experience in management than any other sections of the trade and if there have to be disadvantages in respect of some sections, I think the Dublin and Cork publicans are in a better position to take them and to carry them than are their weaker country colleagues. I think they will be able to surmount any difficulties this may cause.

If they say they do no business between 4 p.m. and 6 on Sunday afternoons, then surely they can arrange something like skeleton staffs to take care of the situation. Everybody these days has staff problems. Every business has problems of that nature. As our standard of living improves and as people in different trades demand better conditions of service, problems for managements increase but, by now, I think in all businesses people are developing systems of handling these problems, so I think Dublin publicans will be able to surmount these difficulties, too. I do not for a moment accept that there will be hardships for Dublin barmen. They are a well organised section of the community; they have two excellent trade unions catering for their needs; and I am quite sure they will be able to look after their own interests and see that their conditions of service are adequate.

The question of compulsory endorsement was raised by some Senators and I want to explain that I was under pressure in the Dáil and that it was indicated to me that it led to very great hardship for individual publicans. The general cause of that complaint was that a publican could, without being really culpable, suffer very serious financial loss. The danger time was from five to ten minutes immediately after closing time. It was suggested it was almost impossible for publicans to avoid technical offences in relation to those periods and that it was unfair that a compulsory endorsement should result from an almost inadvertent breach of the licensing laws in the period immediately following closing time.

It was pointed out that the system whereby a publican was able to serve a drink one minute before closing time and be expected to have the bar cleared one minute after closing time led to all sorts of difficulties and unpleasantness. I accepted that and the provision allowing a ten minutes period after closing time for clearing up purposes is being put forward in answer to those arguments. I think that provision will take a lot of the sting out of the argument about compulsory endorsement. It is during those ten minutes that most of the difficulty arises and it is during that period that a publican is most likely to break the law through no fault of his own.

I do not think anybody will have any particular sympathy with a publican who incurs the penalty of compulsory endorsement for an offence committed one or two hours after closing time. Such a licensee is looking for trouble since he is obviously breaking the law with his eyes wide open, but there is legitimate sympathy for the publican who is doing his best to clear his premises immediately after closing time but who is guilty of a breach of the law as it now stands. That is the sole justification for the proposal for the ten-minute clearing up time. There is the subsidiary justification that it will wipe out a lot of unpleasantness and argument which goes on at closing time at present.

I do not think there is anything else which I could be justified in going into at this stage. Most of the other points raised will, as a number of Senators said, come up again for full discussion on Committee Stage. I think I have dealt with the three main principles raised in respect to the Bill. I still feel nothing has been said here which would cause me to change my mind with regard to the wholehearted way in which I commended the Bill to the Seanad when introducing it.

Question put and agreed to.

Mr. Quinlan

I wish to be recorded as dissenting in protest against the desecration of Sunday involved in the opening between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m. on Sunday.

Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 1st August, 1962.

Seanad Éireann debate - Friday, 27 Jul 1962