I move the Second Reading of the Central Fund Bill, 1928. I do not think it would be useful to attempt to reply to the very many points which were raised in the course of the debate on the Vote on Account. Most of these matters will arise very soon on the different Estimates, and can be more fully discussed when we are dealing with the Estimates. On the general question of Government expenditure and economy, I would like to say, and I think it has been said already, that nothing will get less support, or will be less readily supported, in the House than any proposal for the reduction of expenditure, if we leave out one or two headings. The cost of the Governor-General's establishment raises a political question, and there will always be calls for reduction there, and also in respect of salaries of a comparatively small number of the higher officials. But, if we leave out these cases, the demand in the Dáil always has been for more expenditure Scarcely any proposal can be put before the Dáil by the Government without having demands arise that any expenditure that will take place under these proposals should be increased. A Drainage Bill was introduced the other day for a type of drainage scheme that really should require no State contribution. Nobody criticised the Bill because a State contribution was provided. We did provide that contribution in order to oil the wheels, although we think that in reality no State contribution should be necessary for these schemes. There was, however, no criticism about giving a State contribution; on the other hand, there were calls from all sides for an increased State contribution.
When a Vote for the relief of unemployment is before the Dáil, no matter how much that Vote is, the demand is that it should be increased. All along, except, as I say, in the case of one or two Votes where political points may be scored, the Government is faced generally with demands for increased expenditure. Instead of having the Supply Estimates totalling something like £23,000,000, if we really tried to meet the demands of the House and tried to take what was a popular course in the House, we would have a Budget running to perhaps double that sum. I would like to say, in this connection, that there are two sides to the question of economy, and that it is not a desirable thing merely to reduce expenditure. It is good to relieve the burden on the taxpayer and to relieve the burden on industry. On the other hand, it may be a disadvantage to the whole community to reduce or abandon some of the services for which taxation is necessary. It was Deputy Lemass, I think, who said that taxation should bear a direct relation to the national income. It must. But there is another factor to be taken into account, and that is the use that is made of the money that is taken out of the pockets of the ratepayers. We had recently before the Dáil a motion in connection with old age pensions. The Government proposal was stated to be inadequate. When the Bill, following a motion actually passed, came before the Dáil, we were faced with a fresh demand for increased expenditure, and it was stated that something more should be done for the blind. I have already referred to drainage. It is desired that more money should be spent on drainage, and the Land Commission is asked to speed up its work and to spend additional money on improvements, that it should in fact substantially increase its annual expenditure. We have proposals for increases of expenditure under the head of education. We have demands that certain classes of teachers, who are not at present entitled to pensions, should be given pensions. We have had demands frequently for all sorts of increased services through the Department of Agriculture. There is not a year in which demands do not come up for increased expenditure on cow-testing. That is very good expenditure, and very remunerative to the community. Increased money has been provided for it year after year, but we never provide sufficient money to meet the demand. We have demands every year in this House for increased expenditure on forestry. That is expenditure which, I think, at the best is only partly remunerative. I do not think we can get recoupment of the capital and payment of interest out of any forestry scheme. But whenever forestry is mentioned in this House the demand is that the amount appropriated to it should be increased.
The Agricultural Grant was doubled a year or two ago. We were told that to double it was better than nothing but that that was all that could be said for what we were doing. We have expended very considerable sums in the provision of housing. These are not sufficient to solve speedily the housing problem and naturally we have demands for largely increased expenditure on housing. We had demands for loosening the procedure in connection with the Land Improvement Loans, reducing the rates of interest and reducing all the other charges that fall on borrowers. We had demands here after the fluke epidemic for very big votes for compensation to be paid to individuals whose losses in many cases were in part, at least, and in some cases wholly, due to their own neglect. We provided credit facilities and we were pressed to provide these credit facilities on easier terms. Yesterday, when Deputy Flinn was making statements about industry and commerce my opinion was that the statement practically worked out as a demand for increased expenditure. He explained that certain things were not done and he asked that they should be done. He indicated in a general way that less money should be spent on the enforcement of statutory duties. He was much vaguer in that respect than where he was asking for additional services.
It seems to me that always everybody says there should be economy, there should be a reduction of expenditure, but when we come to any individual head of expenditure, we have demands for increased expenditure in the case of every head of expenditure except in cases where some political consideration is involved. I think that we really will have to get closer to the ground in this matter in future discussions in this House if we are to make any progress. It was difficult, perhaps, to carry on discussions in the past owing to the fact that we had not the main Opposition actually in the House. I think that in the new circumstances we ought really to make a bigger attempt to get down to realities. If we conduct the thing on a propagandist basis we will make no progress at all. We can take the various heads of expenditure and instead of talking about a reduction of £1,000,000 or £3,000,000 we can take individual Votes and we can see whether it is desirable to reduce an individual Vote by £1,000, £10,000, or £100,000, as the case may be. We can point out what will be the consequence of reducing expenditure and we will be able to make up our minds whether it is better to reduce taxation by a certain amount and give up certain services; or whether a particular service is worth what it costs and should be continued or even whether it should be increased.
I have been very anxious to reduce the burden of taxation, and to encourage enterprise, and to induce the individual undertaker of industry to go ahead. But I have never taken up the point of view that if we can reduce expenditure, irrespective of how the saving is accomplished, we are doing well. It seems to me that we do fail to bring the two sides of the problem together in the course of a great many discussions in this House. We discuss on one day the need for reducing expenditure, and we discuss on another day the need for increased services, and very often the attitude that a particular speaker takes on one day is quite inconsistent with the attitude he takes on another. It has been stated that we are carrying on expenditure on an Imperial scale. I do not know that it is perhaps appropriate to go into that now at any great length. But it is not true to say that we are carrying on expenditure on an Imperial scale. We have reduced scales in all Departments. We have reduced the salaries paid at the top more, proportionately, than salaries further down have been reduced. If you take our Judiciary you will find that the salaries are lower than in the Six County area, and very much lower than the salaries paid here before the setting up of the Free State. The salaries paid to the heads of Departments are even lower. We have pursued the policy of bringing down these particular charges. But there is a limit to which we can fruitfully go along that line. It is necessary to bring into your Civil Service a certain proportion of men of first-class ability. If you do not attract these men or if you do not not offer them prospects which will induce them to stay, you can lose a great deal more than you can possibly save by the small amount by which the salaries would be reduced.
We have pursued that line consistently, and on the debate on the Estimates I think what I said could very easily be demonstrated. It may be that we have social and other services here that would not be in existence if there had been a separate State here for the last hundred years. It may be that in some respects social services were introduced of a kind and on a basis which would not have been adopted for this country. But it is very difficult to make fundamental alterations.
There is a service which is often attacked here and which I, on the contrary, think is a very good service— that is, the National Health Insurance. It is quite possible we would have organised that differently if we had the doing of it ourselves, but the system is here, the whole machine is here, and it is exceedingly difficult and even expensive to alter that. The same applies in various other respects. It may be that we have not the cheapest or most suitable kind of machine; we may not have the sort of machine we would set up if we were doing it afresh. But admitting that, and agreeing to that, it is quite a different thing from setting up a wholly different machine because you are always up against vested interests, rights and claims to compensation, and all sorts of difficulties, the surmounting of which may rob any reform of half its value.
This is a poor country, a country which is suffering very much from the effects of the general economic slump, effects which have mostly hit the agriculturist. There are very difficult financial problems before us. The problems are big enough and serious enough, from the point of view of the whole country, to be faced in a noncontroversial spirit, or at least in a non-propagandist spirit; to be faced solely with a view, not to scoring off anybody, but with a view to suggesting remedies. It does not really serve any purpose at all to talk about an Imperial defence force, and it does not serve any good purpose to suggest, as one Deputy suggested, that if political conditions were different we could do with a police force that would cost only £300,000 a year. There would be some sense in the remark if the Deputy had said that if the political conditions were different we might save £100,000 a year on the police; but when the Deputy talks about reducing the police charges to one-fifth of the present amount, that statement cannot be taken seriously. One-fifth of the present cost of the police force, in view of the increase of motor traffic in cities and towns would hardly do much more than provide police for point duty, let alone for any other purpose. It is difficult to deal with all these problems in a general debate such as this, but we can deal with them seriously and satisfactorily if we set about it in the right manner, on the Estimates. I hope we will be able to commence consideration of the Estimates early this year. I hope that we will be able to give a good deal of time to them and thresh out all the problems that arise. I do not think I would care to say any more at the present stage.
Deputy Lemass asked certain questions which I might have replied to if I were winding up a debate, but I am afraid that those matters would lead us very far from financial questions. The Deputy asks about our policy in regard to partition. He asks us to state whether we were seeking a republic. Now, if the debate had been confined to those matters, perhaps we could have dealt with them. I do not want to go into them particularly now although, perhaps, I might give him a very brief answer. In regard to partition, our belief is that the end of that can only come by consent; that there can be no question of attaining it by either military coercion or coercion of an economic character. It can only come when conditions here have improved so much that it would be an attraction to people who are not in this State to come into a unified Irish State. We believe, furthermore, that that can never come about, not within this generation or perhaps within two generations—I do not know what might happen after a long interval of time—it can never come about within a generation or two without the consent of Great Britain and it can never come about against the opposition of Great Britain.
With regard to the point as to whether we are aiming at the establishment of an Irish Republic, we are not. We believe this country, as a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations, can enjoy greater freedom and greater security than she could outside the British Commonwealth of Nations, and our policy within it is really to remove anomalies that exist in the relationship between the members of it. Several of these anomalies have been removed already as a result of our efforts —I think I may say, mainly as a result of our efforts—and we believe other anomalies can be removed; they are not numerous and they are not important. As I say, perhaps if I went on to that matter, we could start a fresh debate; but Deputy Lemass put those questions and I am just answering him briefly. If his side desire, on some occasion, specially to discuss that matter, it may not be altogether unfruitful to discuss it. Although I have no reluctance to discussing anything that is past—I should hope to discuss it with fairly good temper, without letting my own side down—I do think that so far as we can do it, discussion of future policy and of future action, will be more fruitful and will do more good to the country than a mere raking up of the past.
