Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 1 Jul 1926

Vol. 16 No. 18

COMMITTEE OF PROCEDURE AND PRIVILEGES. - ADJOURNMENT DEBATE—SHANNON SCHEME—ACCOMMODATION FOR SICK AND INJURED WORKERS.

Mr. P. HOGAN (Clare)

I want to view this matter of the want of accommodation for the sick and injured on the Shannon scheme from two points. I want to view it from the angle of the destitute sick and injured in that district, and I want to view it from the angle of the health authorities operating in that district. The workers on the Shannon scheme when sick or injured have to fall back upon the arrangements made by the local health authority to maintain them and to give them whatever relief they require. The contractors say that the stamping of the National Health Insurance cards is the end of their responsibility, that they have no further responsibility whatever in the matter of giving them care while they are ill or injured. One does not require a very vivid imagination to picture an incident such as this. A worker from County Mayo who has been unemployed, say, for a period of twelve or eighteen months, or, perhaps, two years, and he has, therefore, lapsed in National Health Insurance. He has nothing to his credit in the registers of the National Health Insurance Society. He gets work on the Shannon scheme and after two or three months work he becomes ill or injured. He has eight or twelve National Health Insurance stamps, probably, to his credit and he has no claim upon the funds of any National Health Insurance Society. He has to fall back upon the arrangements made by the local health authorities in the district, while the local health authorities have only made arrangements to meet normal conditions. The contractors deny that they have any responsibility in the matter and the sick and injured person has to fall upon the rates of the district. The local health authority will have to maintain him until he is well.

The Shannon scheme is not a normal manifestation of work, and the Minister when making a contract or signing a contract with Messrs. Siemens-Schuckert could easily have envisaged that the normal conditions would not have been maintained by the Shannon scheme. That is the normal conditions amongst the many employed, as to sickness and injury. The question naturally arises, what arrangements did the Minister make for the relief of the destitute sick and injured amongst those workers who may be employed on the Shannon scheme. The health authority in the Clare district and the health authority in the Limerick district believe that there has been an agreement come to between the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the contractors for the Shannon scheme and they have asked that they may be supplied with a copy of such arrangement. I myself asked the Minister if I could see such agreement, but the Minister declined to allow me to see it. Probably he will say that such an arrangement or agreement does not exist.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

What did the Minister say to you when you asked that question?

Mr. HOGAN

The Minister's recollection on the matter ought to be as good as mine.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I would like to have your version.

Mr. HOGAN

My version is that the Minister told me it was purely an arrangement between the Minister for Industry and Commerce and the contractors and had no reference whatsoever to the responsibility of the health authorities in the district where the Shannon scheme is operating. I hope that my impression of the Minister's statement is correct and that it coincides with his. What was the reason for withholding a view of it? Why does he withhold that agreement if that agreement had no reference whatever to the responsibilities of the health authorities in the district? Does he think he has treated the workers on the Shannon scheme fairly by throwing the responsibility for the abnormal conditions that prevail in that district upon the health authorities of the district? Does he think that the Public Health Acts, which impose certain duties on the local health authorities, cover these abnormal conditions and that the public health authorities could have budgetted sufficiently to meet these abnormal conditions? Does he think the local hospital accommodation is sufficiently big to meet the conditions created by the Shannon scheme? He could easily have seen that the conditions which the Public Health Acts imposed on the local health authorities were merely normal conditions. These are abnormal conditions, and did the Minister embody in the scheme or make an agreement afterwards with the contractors that they should make provision for hospital accommodation? The hospitals in Clare are strained because of the number of patients in them from the Shannon scheme. There is a large number of workers from the Shannon scheme in these hospitals. When I say a large number I want to emphasise the fact that it is comparatively large, considering what the hospitals were expected to look after and what the revenue budgetted for by the local bodies was intended to maintain. I do not want the Minister to take it from me that I deny the right of a Mayo worker or a Donegal worker who is sick and destitute in a district to be looked after in that district. I accept that right, but I deny the right of a Mayo worker or a Donegal worker who is sick and destitute in a district to be looked after in that district. I accept that right, but I deny the right of the Minister for Industry and Commerce to put upon the local authority the responsibility for providing for him. It is not a fair responsibility and the Minister should have foreseen that such a contingency would arise. If the Minister had been generous enough to give a wage sufficiently big to enable a worker to provide for the contingency of illness, probably we could agree with him.

Probably I would not have raised this matter had the Minister given the worker a wage that would allow him to provide for the contingency of illness. But, as it is, the responsibility is thrown on the local authority to maintain him when he becomes destitute sick or destitute injured. It would appear that the ratepayers of Limerick and Clare must respond to the call of humanity from every part of Ireland and that the Minister and his model contractors can ignore it. I now come to the matter of general accommodation. I would like to say that I am not very much interested in the opinions expressed by the Minister as to the Press report—the opinions expressed this afternoon in reply to questions addressed to him by Deputy Lyons. I have personal information on the matter, and I propose to read short extracts from the reports made by the officers of the public health authorities concerned with that district. I have checked these statements with information that I obtained from public men in these districts, and I find that the statements and the information both coincide. The Minister stated this afternoon that there was accommodation for 140 more men than were there at present. That is perhaps putting the matter right so far as the Minister is concerned, but when you read this statement in conjunction with his other statement this afternoon that quite recently 280 men were disemployed on the scheme, that perhaps puts a different aspect on the matter. I take it these were put out before there was this accommodation available for the 140 men the Minister speaks of.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

That accommodation was available before the 280 men were dispensed with.

Mr. HOGAN

Perhaps that is so. I now propose to read the report made by the Home Assistance Officer for the district. The statement is an accurate one as I have checked it with information I received from public men in that district. I find that the two statements tally. This is the statement I propose to read: "Home Assistance Officer Mullane, whose district includes Ardnacrusha and other places covered by the Shannon scheme operations, stated that a lot of men had billeted themselves in stables, cow-houses, and barns. There was no hut accommodation for a lot of them. A man and his wife had taken possession of a pig-sty attached to a labourer's cottage and there were no less than twelve or fourteen in a stable at Blackwater in O'Grady's yard." Then we find the chairman of the county board of health —a body representative of the entire county—complimenting Mr. Mullane "on his report as to the conditions prevailing in his district and the extraordinary circumstances in which people were living —in out-houses, pig-sties and barns and lying on straw. If there were any outbreak of infectious disease it might be a menace to public health. Dr. Enright, medical officer of health should be asked to report fully on the conditions prevailing." We find public men from that district, one a member of the county council from that district and living there stating that "they have no better habitation. They want their wages and there are no huts for them. I know 15 people living in one stable and what can you do with them?"

Mr. McGILLIGAN

Were those 15 people on the scheme?

Mr. HOGAN

Home Assistance Officer Mullane, in his evidence, said that some of the 14 who were living in a stable were working on the scheme. As I stated already, I have checked the statements of Home Assistance Officer Mullane with the statements of others in the district, and I submit to the Minister that the health authority in the district within which is situate the Shannon scheme, is entitled to know what arrangements have been made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce with the contractors as to the provision for the destitute sick and destitute injured. When people are sent to work on this scheme from counties all over the country are the public health authorities in that district to be asked to maintain them? I put it to the Minister that there is sufficient evidence before him to prove—there is sufficient evidence available for me to prove—that there is not sufficient accommodation there. The Minister has stated that there was accommodation even before these 280 men were dispensed with, for 140 more men. I put it to him in this way: that there is sufficient evidence to give him reason to investigate the statements that have been made. I have no hesitation myself in believing what has been said, because I have checked the statements made. I suggest to him that this is a matter that ought to be investigated fully and at once. I say, too, that the local authority has a claim upon the Minister for Industry and Commerce to see what arrangements he has made or whether he has made any arrangements with regard to the care of the destitute sick and destitute injured on the scheme.

Mr. CLANCY

I desire to support the motion moved by Deputy Hogan. If something is not done very soon as regards the sanitary arrangements at Ardnacrusha, I greatly fear that an epidemic will break out that will be more serious than the 'flu epidemic we had in this county in 1918 and 1919. I was there in the month of April and May, and I must say that the air was anything at all but pleasant. On that account I say to the Minister that the sooner the sanitary arrangements there are seen to, the better. As Deputy Hogan has stated, people are huddled together in cow-houses, piggeries, and barns. If that condition of affairs is allowed to continue, I think that the people of Limerick and Clare will very soon have to turn their noses towards the Government and appeal to have something done. Goodness knows the rates in these two counties are high enough already. When we take into consideration the way the roads are in that area at the moment, and that the ratepayers have to keep them in a state of repair for the sake, I might say, of this firm that is going to take all this money out of the country, I think it is time that something should be done by the Government. It is true, of course, that Limerick will get its share of the light and that this scheme is for the benefit of the whole nation. If an epidemic breaks out as a result of the conditions that prevail, then I think the success of the Shannon scheme is going to be at a very great cost. I believe that if an epidemic were to break out it would be greater than anything that occurred in this country in "Black '47" or during the 'flu epidemic of 1918 and 1919.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

Deputy Hogan has stated that this is a matter that requires investigation. I think it does and I think also that the Deputy should investigate his facts a little more fully. He has not yet told me whether a certain number of individuals living under the conditions that have been described under big headlines in a certain newspaper recently are men who are actually employed on the scheme. We have the statement made by this home assistance officer who strangely enough put in some very hard work indeed for a fortnight before he issued his report trying to get a son or relative employed on the scheme under these filthy conditions that he has described. The bad sanitary arrangements and the other matters that he refers to would appear to have only been discovered when he could not procure a post for his relative under the scheme.

Mr. HOGAN

Does the Minister suggest that it was Home Assistance Officer Mullane who raised this matter? Is not the Minister aware that there were several conferences between the public health authorities for Clare and Limerick and his Department as well as the Department for Local Government with a view to fixing responsibility as to the conditions in these districts?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I am saying that the headline publicity in this was given by this Home Assistance Officer and that it was given under the conditions I have referred to. Home Assistance Officer Mullane or the Deputy has not yet told me of five men working on the scheme and living under certain conditions in pig-sties or barns or whatever the allegations may amount to. The Deputy stated that people told him about the statements in the Press of odd men passing backwards and forwards. The figure of 400, I think, was mentioned at one time: some on the scheme and some not—some on for a day or two.

Mr. HOGAN

Are you answering the newspaper?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I am answering that amount of the newspaper report which has been attempted to be corroborated by the Deputy here this evening.

Mr. HOGAN

I have not attempted to corroborate any newspaper report because I have not taken cognisance of these reports.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

The Deputy made the statement that there was a newspaper report and to a certain extent that he had made an attempt to corroborate it. He stated that the newspaper report appeared to coincide with other statements made to him, and these are the particulars that I am getting at. We have heard a lot about the trouble that is going to be put on the ratepayers of the district under certain terrible conditions pictured particularly by Deputy Clancy. These conditions have not yet arisen. I put in direct negation to what Deputy Clancy has said that there is a medical officer in the camp, and that the sanitary arrangements at Ardnacrusha are as sound as they could be on any works. As far as these arrangements are concerned, there is not the slightest fear of any attack or of any epidemic such as the Deputy has outlined here to-night.

Mr. MORRISSEY

Would the Minister allow me to put to him as politely and as courteously as I can one question? I am not interrupting now merely for the sake of doing so. I want to know from the Minister whether the information that he is now giving to the House with regard to the conditions in Ardnacrusha has been supplied to him by an official of his own Department or by an official of the contractors?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

The information that I am relying on has come from different sources: it has come from the contractors and from officials in my own Department who have actually been on the works.

Mr. MORRISSEY

When?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I think the latest visit paid by any of them was last week. I simply pass over that question of the sanitary arrangements without any further comment than this, there is a medical officer there who has the right to inspect and go into every matter with regard to sanitary arrangements. He has to make his reports and these reports have to be attended to. Even in the interests of getting work done, to put it on no other basis, the camp has to be kept in a healthy condition. As to the question of accommodation on the spot, I can but repeat my statement of this morning that prior to these 280 men of whom I spoke earlier in the day having ceased work, there was hut accommodation for 140 people if they wished to avail of it. How it can be said under those circumstances that there is any lack of accommodation I cannot make out. As to accommodation on the spot for injured and sick, I consider it unreasonable to ask the contractors to keep a hospital at Ardnacrusha centre sufficient, for instance, to provide for all the men engaged at Ardnacrusha falling ill, you would want a hospital really bigger than the works for that purpose. There is a hospital there with sufficient accommodation for accident cases, and in addition to that there is room for first-aid treatment, and arrangements have been made whereby there is telephonic communication as between the doctor and every part where the Shannon works are being carried on. There is that, which is the only accommodation I would consider to put on the contractors.

With regard to this matter of people falling sick and having to be looked to in some other way, I have been for a long time endeavouring to get the Limerick and Clare authorities to come to some arrangement with regard to these people, and I saw resolutions recently passed as to what Limerick and Clare consider they are bound to do. They are bound not by their resolutions but the law, and they will continue to be bound by the law, and where men are considered by the medical officer in individual cases to be suitable cases to be taken in and to be cared for by the public health authorities in these two counties, then they will have to be taken in. If I have to meet the argument that that will put an unduly severe strain on the resources of the local authorities to meet by having a tremendous number of injured or sick cases, I point on the other hand to the immense benefit Limerick is getting at this moment from the money that is in circulation with regard to the scheme, and even in Clare, but not to the same extent.

Mr. P. HOGAN

What is Clare getting?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I will ask to Deputy to go to that part of his constituency which is affected by the scheme—I do not know whether it is his local area or not—and ask his constituents if they would consider the removal of certain parts of the work altogether from Clare.

Mr. P. HOGAN

That is begging the question.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I would like to know what answer the Deputy would get from his supporters in the area. There has to be recognition of the money in circulation by means of this scheme in and around Limerick. I put it that there is a law with regard to how people have to be received into certain places, and no resolutions from Clare or Limerick will affect the law. I go further, and say to the Deputy, that for months past I have been trying to get some sort of reasonable accommodation made as between the contractors and the Clare and Limerick authorities of public health, and the unreasonable persons in the negotiations were not the contractors.

Mr. P. HOGAN

Does the Minister know that the health rate is a county-at-large charge, and does he suggest that a special rate should be struck in the districts receiving benefit in connection with this scheme?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I suggest that is a matter that can be dealt with when there is any big inflow of people to be charged on the local authorities. I suggest that opportunity has been given time and again to these people to make reasonable contracts with the contractor, but, to put it quite plainly, they thought they had the contractors in a difficult position, and they were out on a fleecing operation, but so far that has not succeeded. I am not going to lend myself to make that attempted fleecing operation a success. There has been talk about the large number of men who are already in county homes. I do not know if they are accident or sick cases in connection with the Shannon scheme. I am told there is a considerable number of people about Limerick who have gone down there in the hope of getting work, and who keep hanging about Limerick in the hope of getting it, and am I to regard these as accident or sick cases in connection with the Shannon scheme? I cannot regard that as an argument——

Mr. DAVIN

Were these sent down by the Labour Exchange?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

People are not sent to Limerick by the Labour Exchange except there are vacancies, and if people go to Limerick to wait on the chance of getting work when some vacancies occur from time to time that is their own lookout.

Mr. P. HOGAN

Would the Minister make inquiries as to the number of workers under the Shannon scheme who are in Scariff hospital?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I would like Deputy to come forward with his figures, and to say there are so many invalided workers under the Shannon scheme who have gone to a particular hospital.

Mr. P. HOGAN

It would be easy to say they only came looking for work.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

It is not a question of saying, but it is a question of evidence. If they were on the Shannon scheme and were invalided out of it that can be proved.

Mr. P. HOGAN

If the evidence of the home assistance officer is not believed by the Minister, what is the use of submitting evidence?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

Give me a definite statement as to how many men there are in hospital coming from the Shannon scheme. If you read the evidence of the home assistance officer you will see that he has been very careful to avoid any sort of accuracy or definition in his statement. The question of the roads has been dragged into the subject. I thought that by this the Clare Council would have learned some sense. There was a time when a section of their roads was in a bad way and the contractors were ready to make a bargain to keep it in repair, or they offered in the alternative to supply a certain sum of money provided that the money was spent on the repair of the roads where the damage was complained of. The Clare authorities were not anxious for that. They wanted money to apply for the relief of rates in the county generally.

That particular attempt did not succeed either. There is much the same thing afoot with regard to the hospitals—with regard to what is called the care of the injured and sick from the Shannon scheme. I am quite ready, and I repeat it again, to use my utmost endeavour if the Deputy can induce the Limerick and Clare authorities to come to some reasonable frame of mind to get accommodation provided. I have certain powers of compulsion, that I can put upon the contractors with regard to this matter, but I certainly am not going to use any compulsory powers I have to get them to agree to what I consider an outrageously unreasonable thing. So far, neither of those authorities have put up anything. The Limerick authorities, at one period, did approach to a rather reasonable proposition, and then, I think, being persuaded or prejudiced by the Clare authorities they went away from that. The whole proposition now put up is entirely unreasonable, and I am not going to insist upon the contractors accepting it. There is accommodation at the works that has not been availed of. There is a small hospital which is sufficient for the care of accident cases.

Mr. P. HOGAN

For how many?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I cannot say the number; it is a small number; certainly not above half-a-dozen. In addition to that, there are arrangements made with regard to first aid. There is this provision with regard to telephonic communication with the doctor, who has undoubted sway as far as medical matters go in the Shannon works.

Mr. HOGAN

Whom is he responsible to?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

He is employed by the contractors. The Deputy's insinuation is that the doctor is going to neglect his professional duties because he is an employee of the contractors.

Mr. HOGAN

I have not made any insinuation—I asked whom he is responsible to.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

The Deputy's question had a meaning or it had not. Can the Deputy give any other meaning than that the doctor was going to neglect his professional duties simply because he was an employee of the contractors?

Mr. CORISH

Has the medical officer of health of the district access to the premises?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I would not like to say he has freedom to go around the camp, but I will certainly see, if that gentleman wants a permit to visit the camp, that he will get it.

Mr. CORISH

Why should he need a special permit?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

Because everybody has to have it.

Mr. CORISH

Not at all. It is a place of residence, and is not any medical officer of health employed by a local authority entitled to visit any place of residence?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

If he has he can get into the camp.

Mr. CORISH

I think an arrangement ought to be made so that he can.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I do not know anything with regard to medical officers of health having the right to visit any place. If this right is there it cannot be taken away. If there is that right and it is being denied that can be seen to.

Mr. CORISH

I do not know anything about that.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I cannot answer arguments put forward at random. I thought the Deputy had a point that he had been refused.

Mr. CORISH

There certainly is the point that he has the right and no one can take away that right. The Minister for Local Government, I am sure, will agree that he has the right.

MINISTER for LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC HEALTH (Mr. Burke)

He has the right.

Mr. MORRISSEY

He is responsible for the health of the district.

Mr. CORISH

It might be a way to get over the difficulty.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

That is a suggestion which is helpful, at any rate. I do not know what the medical officer's powers are, but there cannot be any special conditions made with regard to the Shannon area where work is going on.

Mr. CORISH

He has full powers.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

If he has he can exercise them and there will be no stop put upon him. On the other point as to the accommodation outside, under the control of the Limerick and Clare authorities, I would ask Deputy Hogan instead of seeking out these peculiar cases, which are not definitely connected with the works, to use his efforts with his own local authorities to get them to come to some reasonable frame of mind so that something can be done as between them and the contractors in order that if any serious epidemic breaks out or if there is any succession of accidents people will be provided for. As the matter is at the moment I simply could not see my way to impose upon the contractors conditions that would have to be put upon them if the Limerick and Clare proposals were to be accepted.

Mr. JOHNSON

The Minister has made certain statements which suggest the necessity for examining the position regarding employment on the Shannon scheme, the method of recruitment, and so on. It is not more than a fortnight ago since a letter was shown to me by Deputy O'Connell.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Does the Deputy propose to make a speech now on this matter after the Minister has replied?

Mr. JOHNSON

I am proposing to ask the Minister to look into certain matters. The letter was from a constituent, a man who had two or three children and who was receiving insurance benefit. He was explaining that he had been sent by the Labour Exchange to the Shannon scheme a fortnight ago as a labourer. If that is an indication of a general practice through the country, and such men are being drafted into Ardnacrusha district, while other people are being paid off, one can understand why men will be hanging about the job in the hope of being re-employed. We were given to understand that this was a three-year job, and I am at a loss to understand why there should be "pays-off" in this way. We are getting into the position, I am afraid, if people are going to be recruited for the job, and other people paid off, that you will necessarily have a large number of people hanging about the works in the hope of being re-employed and not permanently engaged on the job. That, undoubtedly, will cause the trouble that is complained of, and probably will accentuate it.

Mr. McGILLIGAN

That is not the case. The Deputy has implied two things that are totally inaccurate if instructions which I asked to be given have been given and are being carried out—and I believe they have been given and are being adhered to. There were very definite instructions sent to the Labour Exchanges that only when there were definite vacancies to be filled were men to be sent to Limerick or Ardnacrusha, or any place around where work was going on. As a matter of fact, there was a system of quotas from different districts arranged for. As to the other matter—that people are being frequently paid off and taken on again— there is no such practice. I spoke today of the staff being reduced by about 280 men on the recent completion of the temporary works. They were men who were required for a certain particular type of work that is being done, amongst them being 36 Germans, who have recently been dismissed. The work for which they were engaged has come to an end, and they have been dismissed. But there is no taking on of men, having them on the work for a fortnight or three weeks, paying them off and getting men to replace them— there is no such practice as that. Occasionally there are certain odd types of work that have to be done. There may be a fortnight's work ahead; that may come to an end, and there may be no further work of that type to be done for a couple of days. If there is a relaxation of conditions, so that men employed at one piece of work could go on to another when there is not any more of that particular type of work to be done—if the trade union regulations do not prevent men from being engaged on some other transition work, there will be no necessity to pay some of the men off. But there are certain conditions that operate and have to be observed.

Mr. T. MURPHY

Has the Minister any statement to make with regard to the report that appeared in the "Irish Independent," on the conditions, from a journalist who was sent specially to investigate matters?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

I saw the statement there of the Commandant of the camp which, I think, answered the journalist's statement perfectly.

Mr. MURPHY

Does the Minister think it was a satisfactory answer?

Mr. McGILLIGAN

Perfectly.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.25.