There is one remark that one might make in opening this discussion, and that is that in drawing up the Address the Ministry apparently did not desire that this session should be behind the last in legislative output, and that the record of about one Act per week ought to be reached in this coming session. The Dáil will have no fear of unemployment if the proceedings suggested, and the Bills suggested in the Address are to be carried through and fully considered.
There are so many points that might be raised, and which I have no doubt will be dealt with by various Deputies, that I propose to confine myself mainly to one paragraph, prefacing that by expressing my regret that the reference to the possibility of the release of the prisoners shows so little confidence in the ability of the Government to bring about a state of peace as is suggested. "It is hoped that it may be found compatible with public security, gradually to release the majority of those persons at present detained for the public safety.""Gradually to release the majority," and there is still only three or four months to run before the extension of the present powers of detaining prisoners without trial will have expired. The suggestion that you may gradually release the majority carries with it the complementary suggestion that the minority have no right to expect or hope for release within the period dealt with in this Address. That, I think, is very unsatisfactory, indeed. I propose to leave Deputy Alfred Byrne to follow the discussion upon this matter, inasmuch as he has interested himself very heartily with the case of these interness. I intend to deal with the succeeding paragraph, or the paragraph dealing with unemployment, and the general industrial economic condition of the country, and while one may express one's pleasure at the announcement that the Government is paying very, very close attention to this problem; that they are confident that stable conditions and enterprise will find many opportunities, one cannot but feel regretful that the Government is not taking the problem in hands as seriously as I think the problem warrants. We are told that developments are at present hampered by disagreements between employers and employees. Undoubtedly that is so, but it is to be regretted, and it is a great pity, indeed, that at the time when peace had more or less come upon the country, that employers should have insisted upon destroying the peace of the country by promoting these disagreements which have occurred and which have hampered developments, and that they should have insisted upon certain changes in the industrial arrangements as to impose these impediments in the development of the peaceful character and prosperity of the country. We know that it is commonly spoken and written that the men who are in disagreement with their employers or with the terms of their employment are to blame for not accepting the prices which the employers have offered. That runs through every speech, every advertisement, every leading article in all the newspapers, forgetful, as it seems to me, that the active agent in promoting these disagreements has been, not the men, but the employers. We do not blame the merchant or the manufacturer when he offers an article to a customer at a price, and the customer refuses to take it at that price, we do not blame the seller for the discomfort that is entailed by his refusal to sell at that price, but that is what is done in the case of the men and the employers. We are told it must be recognised that the condition of the times prohibits the maintenance of the inflation caused by the European war artificially prolonged by our domestic strife, and that high profits and high wages can no longer be sustained by a country whose economic life has agriculture as its basis and foundation.
I am glad to recognise in this sentence that the Government is impressed with the fact that the economic life of the country has agriculture as its basis and foundation. I am sorry to know that the assertion of high prices, high profits, and high wages does not include in this Address high interest charges, which were included in the items referred to by the President in the speech he made in the Dáil a week or two ago.
I hope there is no significance in the omission of that. We are told that a recognition of facts is of the first necessity if industrial friction is to be allayed. I am very anxious that the facts should be laid before the Dáil and before the country, so that they may be recognised as facts. It is not enough to produce a few figures, publish advertisements in newspapers, and treat them as facts, and the only facts. It is not enough only to take the immediately obvious facts and treat them as though they were the only facts. There are mountain ranges behind the hills that are immediately within our vision. There are things that we have experience of that are not the things that are only now coming into notice. You cannot form a right judgement on a question if you are only to consider those facts which are of immediate moment and which appear to be the only ones that are causing action to be taken. There are other facts. I submit that it is not only the facts of to-day that have to be taken into account; you must take into account the facts and the conditions of five years ago, ten years ago, fifteen years ago, twenty years ago. I want to ask the Dáil to bear with me when I put some of the facts that are not frequently dealt with for their consideration. If we are to be persuaded that high prices, high profits, and high wages cannot be sustained then I suggest that as many facts as can be gathered together ought to be made public and placed before the country and the Dáil. The case is made—it is even made in the statement made by the President a little while ago—that there must be reductions in wages. He is proposing to submit suggestions about a reduction in wages of 1/- per day, and consequent reductions to pieceworkers and the like. I am not going to prejudice that proposal in any way, but it seems to me unfortunate that the proposal should be to reduce wages by 1/- a day and then to set up this Court of Inquiry to deal with one particular class of employment.
We are told very clearly by those speaking on behalf of one of the Parties to these disagreements that costs of living have no relation to the prices in the market and ought not to be considered in fixing the rates of wages. I hope I am not overstating the proposition that was made a few days ago and assented to by Deputy Hewat with enthusiasm. But the point was made, to which he assented, that the price in the market, the price to be got for products, was a factor that ought to be taken into account in fixing wages, not the cost of living to the workman. I wonder will it be conceded to the workman that in that which he has to sell he has to take into account the cost of living. This whole question seems to me to require some kind of an assent to a proposition that human labour must not be treated in the same way, and by the same logic, the same arguments, as an ordinary marketable commodity. We have the very highest authority for disclaiming any such way of looking upon human labour. It must not be treated as a commodity in the market, to be bought and sold as ordinary marketable goods. If we are to proceed, as one would gather from the speeches, leading articles, advertisements and letters that we read, on the assumption that what are called "inexorable economic laws" are to prevail in dealing with the price of human labour, the wages paid to the men for their work, so-called laws which are only valid if we accept the proposition that the dominating factor in economic life is human greed and acquisitiveness—if we are to accept any other assumption than that then we have no right to consider the price of labour in the same category with any other commodities that are bought and sold in the market. I believe that we ought to have an understanding of our respective positions on that question. If we are to deal with these problems in that light as though human labour is to be considered as boots or pig-iron, supply and demand determining the price to be paid for it, then we know where we are, and I suppose we have to fall back upon the usual methods of getting the most you can at the opportune time, taking advantage of any opportunity, whether buying or selling.
If that is to be the position, then, of course, the moral factor does not enter into it, and we are forced back upon the "dog fight," as somebody called it—the scramble in the attempt to hold what one has in any circumstances, except fear or hunger, no other considerations being taken into account. I wondered, when I read the reference to the necessity for deflation—presumably not referring to currency, but to high prices, high profits and high wages—I wondered whether the agriculturist would accept the proposition that high prices could not be sustained, and ought not to be. Is it to be accepted generally that the price of wheat or beef, or bacon or butter, ought to be brought down still further, and that the high prices of those products are bad for the country, because that is the proposition in this address? I have had my attention called to one firm's interest in the question of high profits, and I am going to ask the Dáil to listen to a few figures.
