I move amendment No. 137:—
In sub-section (1), page 58, line 38, to delete the words " three months " and substitute the words " one month ".
We thought that a month would be a reasonable time to give the Board to act. The Minister can extend the time if necessary.
I move amendment 138:—
In lines 28 and 29 to delete the words " not later than one month " and substitute therefor the words " not sooner than six months ".
The producer should know six months at least in advance, or 12 months if possible, what the price of pigs will be. Pigs cannot be produced overnight. The producers require to know the price in advance if they are to fill up a certain quota. They should be given time to consider whether it is worth their while to produce them at all. Sows might get scarce, and it would take 12 months before the people would be able to produce the necessary number of pigs.
What the Deputy says would be the ideal thing to do, but I am afraid it would be absolutely impossible. It would be a good thing if we could tell the farmers now what they would get for pigs next winter, but it would be very difficult to do it.
The period would be too long.
We provide that the order must come into force within a month, but we hope that the order will remain in force for six months or more. We hope it will not be necessary to change the price more than twice a year.
It will be impossible to regulate production unless the price is fixed a certain length of time in advance. By fixing it a month beforehand, you are not going to affect production. If people have the pigs they are going to market them whether the price is high or low.
Fixing the price so far in advance has its dangers, too.
Is it not agreed that when fixing the price certain factors, such as the cost of the food, are considered ?
The things mentioned here include the capacity of the market, stock of bacon and cold storage, the supply of pigs, their feeding; all these things have to be taken into consideration.
I take it that the intention is to fix the price a month or so in advance. Will that be published, will it be known to the public ?
It will be known.
There is a danger in that. There will be a temptation to hold back pigs at a certain time and then, again, there will be a tendency to let them on the market in big numbers. There will not be regular supply.
The very thing that the Board may mean might be to keep bacon off the market at a certain time and to let it come on rapidly at other times. If they fix the price about January 1st, say, that price would probably rule practically up to August.
Would it not be better to fix it definitely four months in advance and then there would be regular supplies ?
The Board is going to have a terrible job fixing prices, and I think we ought to give them every latitude. Their tendency will be to fix the prices well in advance but we should not tie them down to that, as the Deputy suggests.
I think there is a danger in fixing those prices.
What would be the object of fixing the prices if they were not to be published in advance ?
I remember myself one time, and the Deputy will probably have experience of it, too, bringing in live pigs into the market in Dublin, and I got a paper on the way in and I saw that I would get 16/- per head less than I would have got the day before; and we are going to stop that sort of thing by fixing the prices. To give you an example, I saw in the Irish Press on one day where two factories were advertising and one was giving 23/- per head per pig more than the other.
The Minister has only himself to blame for that, because he had a section in the Bill which could have dealt with it, but it was withdrawn.
I suppose that after a time the Board will be able to fix the prices for four months.
I suppose so. At the moment I do not see any objection to it.
It might be bad to make the period too long. It cuts both ways if you make the period very long.
It is very hard to foresee in this matter and I think we ought to leave the Board as free as possible.
Suppose, Minister, that you inserted a clause that where the Board found it practicable, or some words like that, could you not insert that in the Bill ?
I suppose we may take it that the Board is going to be very interested in its work. It will be just as interested as we are here and we ought to leave them free to do these things as they think best.
Fixing it for a long period in advance would have disadvantages in some ways.
The Board could hardly fix it very long in advance.
I move amendment 140:
In sub-section (1), paragraph (e), line 34, after the words " per hundredweight " to insert the words " dead weight ".
Is it not necessary to say whether it applies to live weight or dead weight ?
They are live pigs. It is live weight.
If that is so it seems to be in direct contradiction to what I was informed. The pig dealers were informed that there was no question of pigs being bought or sold by live weight at the fairs, that the only question of buying pigs would be when the pigs were offered dead.
These will be factory-produced pigs. Oh, I find it is buying by weight, not necessarily by dead weight.
Has the Board power to compel the purchase by dead weight or live weight at their option ? It might be very disadvantageous to buy at live weight.
We are going as far as possible by dead weight, but at fairs or markets pigs could be sold by live weight, and the Board might compel buying by live weight except in cases where there are no scales available.
I believe that is a bad system, because people will not buy pigs by live weight at fairs. It will encourage jobbers to go to the markets where there are no scales.
At a market where there are no weighing-scales can the owners collect tolls ?
That is another matter altogether.
I think we should see that there is no unfair competition against the man who only sells a pig every three or six months. There is more room, in my opinion, for a misjudgment in the weight of pigs than any other animal you sell.
Under the Bill there must be dead weight at the factory and live weight at the fairs and markets, except in the places where there are no sales and in those cases there will have to be special regulations.
It will destroy local fairs.
I believe if you compel people to purchase pigs by live weight in towns where there are no scales, it will mean that the pig jobbers will boycott the place where no scales are available.
I would not sympathise with them in that.
It is not a question of sympathising, it is a question of practical experience, They will go where they can buy to the best advantage. If they can buy to the best advantage in Strokestown, for example, where there are no scales, the jobbers will go there rather than to Elphin, say, where there are scales.
In other words, the jobbers will not attend certain fairs, because the system there will not enable them to " do" he producers.
You cannot blame the jobbers, because if I wanted to fool a jobber I could put a stone on to a pig—I could feed him with a stone of food before beginning him into the market, and the jobber would pay for it as a stone of pig, if I sold him by live weight. A man could pack up his pigs with food before bringing them into market, and then lift them down out of his cart and let them fall in the gutter because they could not stand up.
Will people have pigs collected at their own homes ?
They have the choice of sending them to the factory or having them collected.
A lot of farmers would be prepared to sell to a dealer on valuation rather than weight.
In our part of the country they sell both on live and dead weight.
There is no difficulty in selling by dead weight. Both factory and producer can agree on the matter of dead weight, but neither factory nor producer agree on live weight, because they can be defrauded.
I want to get back to the point. What is Deputy Dillon's difficulty ?
That the Board should have power to fix the dead weight on pigs bought at fairs.
They call not fix the price at fairs except on live weight.
I think you are doing a disservice by fixing a live-weight price. The tendency will be for dealers to seek only such fairs where there are no weighing facilities.
The farmers will soon come to know all about it.
There are many fairs where business men would give facilities for weighing to the buyers.
Deputy Dillon's argument is that it defrauds the purchasers.
Fraud on the purchasers acts unfavourably on the producers because the pig dealers would withdraw to other fairs. People dealing in pigs find that in 99 cases out of 100 the pig dealer will go within a few pounds of the weight by handling.
It is seriously suggested that the producer is going to alter the weight of his pig by stuffing him with food.
Is there anything in the Bill to prevent a farmer if he wishes to sell live weight doing so, or selling according to the calculation of value ?
In all fairs where there are weighing facilities they must be used.
But if we relied entirely upon that the Act might break down because it would be easy to withdraw weighing facilities. Is there any test for animals being weighed after being specially fed ?
I do not think there is any test for that particular purpose.
Amendment put and negatived.
I move amendment No. 143:—
In sub-section (3), page 59, line 17, to delete the word " before " and substitute the words " at a meeting to be held on ".
I move amendment No. 145:—
In sub-section (4) after the words " price order " to insert the words " such amendment to have effect not sooner than seven days after its publication in Iris Oifigiúil as provided in sub-section (5)”.
Does the Minister think it expedient that a price order could be amended without any notice at all ?
I agree. I accept the amendment in substance and promise to bring up an amendment dealing with the point on Report Stage.
