I move:—
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Go ndeontar suim ná raghaidh thar £5,427 chun slánuithe na suime is gá chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá de Mhárta, 1926, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí na Satharlainne Stáit. |
That a sum not exceeding £5,427 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1926, for the Salaries and Expenses of the State Laboratory. |
The duties of the staff of the State Laboratory include analysis of samples in connection with the work of the Revenue Commissioners. That is the greatest part of their work. They also do work for the Department of Agriculture and other Government Departments, and they do certain analysis of samples under the Food and Drugs Act. Prior to last year, the Revenue Commissioners and the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction employed separate staffs for analytical work done by them. To give some idea of the amount of work done by this laboratory, I may say that during the past financial year about 30,000 samples have been examined. Of these about 24,000 were for the Revenue Commissíoners. They included samples of beer to be examined in connection with the drawback on the payment of export duty, imported wines, and miscellaneous imports were examined for sugar contents. There are a great number of articles imported which contain a quantity of sugar, and these have to be examined. I think that there are 1,700 separate sugar items for which a rate has been fixed. There were examinations of pure sugar for the degree of polarisation, and examinations of all sorts of preparations which contain, or might contain, spirits. For the Department of Agriculture some 5,000 examinations were done, and for other Departments and under the Food and Drugs Act about 1,000 examinations were carried out. The Food and Drugs Act work is confined to reference samples. When a person is about to be prosecuted, one sample is sent to the State chemist for reference, and if a person decides to appeal on the ground that he is dissatisfied with the decision of the court, he can have the sample examined by the State chemist.
The increase shown in the amount in connection with the staff for the present year of £1,394 as compared with last year is due to the increased employment which will be given in connection with bacteriological and analytical work under the Dairy Produce Act. It is expected that during the year at least 12,000 samples of butter will be examined. Experience has shown that the amount provided last year for travelling and incidental expenses was too large. The travelling expenses arise when a witness has to travel to give evidence in support of his certificate before a court. It is thought that £50 will now be sufficient for that purpose. The amount for equipment is less because the laboratory has been set up and we are getting over the initial stages of this work.
