The Dáil Eireann Loans and Funds Act, 1924, empowers the Minister for Finance to cause to be prepared an authentic register of subscribers to the Internal Loan and to prescribe the conditions and evidence upon which any person claiming to be a subscriber to the Internal Loan may be entered in the register. The Act further provides for the issue to every subscriber, whose name is entered in the register prepared under the Act, of a certificate enabling the subscriber to obtain repayment on or after the 1st June, 1927, at the rate of 28/- for every £ subscribed.
In February and March, 1925, a public notice was inserted in the Dublin and provincial Press inviting applications for repayment from persons claiming to have subscribed to the loan. Formal minutes were issued by me on the 19th December, 1925; 15th October, 1926, and 30th March, 1927, in pursuance of Section 4 of the Dáil Eireann Loans and Funds Act, 1924, prescribing conditions and evidence upon which persons claiming to have subscribed should be entered in the register. The effect of the first-mentioned minute is that the name of any person (whether the original subscriber or his legal personal representative) who submitted an application in writing before the 31st March, 1925, and furnished particulars corresponding with entries in the records of the Department of Finance, might be entered in the authentic register. The minute of the 15th October, 1926, waived the condition as to the time-limit for lodging applications. The minute of the 30th March, 1927, primarily covers cases in which there is no record of the subscription in the Department of Finance and enables me to authorise the entry of such cases in the authentic register, with a view to the issue of a Savings Certificate, where I am satisfied that the evidence produced is sufficient to warrant that course.
The total number of subscribers is estimated to be approximately 140,000, but, owing to the circumstances in which the Loan was raised, only 120,000 names are recorded in the primary register, which was compiled at the time the Loan was raised or almost immediately afterwards. Efforts are being made to obtain particulars from collectors where such particulars have not yet been furnished, but in many cases the original collectors are not now available, while in others difficulty arises from the fact that the lists received cannot be reconciled with the individual applications received from the area in question. Sometimes even conflicting lists are received in respect of subscriptions in a particular area. In accordance with the conditions originally laid down and promulgated in the public notice referred to above, subscribers were required to lodge their applications not later than the 31st March, 1925. Only 35,200 applications, however, were received by that date, and I subsequently decided, for the time being at any rate, to waive the time limit. No further time limit for making applications has yet been fixed. Repayment has, up to the present, been authorised in 70,615 cases, representing approximately £342,000, including principal and interest.
The amount still outstanding (including principal and interest) is approximately £188,000. I am confident that by the end of the present financial year repayment will have been authorised in all cases in which particulars of the subscription are recorded in my Department, and application has been made for repayment, and also in cases in which, though the particulars were not recorded, satisfactory evidence in support of the claim has been submitted to the Department of Finance. In certain cases, however, considerable correspondence and investigation may be entailed by reason of the fact that sufficient evidence in support of the claim is not forthcoming. The situation is further complicated by the fact that applications are being received in large numbers from persons who subscribed to various funds for national purposes about the time that the Loan was raised and who now think they are entitled to obtain repayment.
Requests are frequently received in the Department of Finance for lists showing the names and addresses of subscribers and amounts subscribed in particular areas, but there are serious objections to furnishing lists of that kind. It should particularly be borne in mind that owing to the circumstances in which the Dáil Eireann (Internal) Loan was raised, the fact that the Department of Finance has not, through the payment of periodical dividends or otherwise, been kept in touch with individual subscribers and the imperfections generally of the records which have been compiled, it is essential to insist that individual subscribers should apply in writing for repayment. It is equally essential, in the interests of the subscribers themselves as well as in the interests of the Exchequer, that the Department of Finance should not take any step which would facilitate fraud.
There may be several persons bearing the same name in any particular locality and if lists of subscriptions were furnished there would obviously be grave danger that claims might be submitted from persons other than the actual subscriber who would be in a position, as the result of the furnishing of lists, to submit full particulars of the subscriptions in respect of which they apply. This risk would, in fact, arise even in cases in which there were not persons bearing the same name, and the possibility of substantiating a claim would be increased in cases in which the original subscriber died or emigrated since the loan was raised. It may be stated here that a number of claims have already been submitted which there is every reason to suspect, and in at least one case a prosecution has been ordered.
Finally, it must be recognised that if a list were furnished to one person in respect of a particular area it would frequently be found that others could with equal justice claim to be furnished with a copy of the same list, and it is obvious that the making of lists of this kind in large numbers would seriously retard the progress which is being made with the task of authorising repayment of subscribers generally.
It is consistent with the refusal to furnish such lists to refuse also to reply to the direct question. "Is the name of A. B. on the list on the primary register of subscribers?" At the same time it is less objectionable to reply to such an inquiry than to furnish a list of subscribers with particulars of their subscriptions. If the subscriber concerned has applied for repayment before the inquiry is made, his application will be dealt with in the ordinary way, and if his name is on the primary register it does not matter whether an inquirer is so informed or not. If his name is not on the register he will generally be informed in a very short time by the Department of Finance that there is no record of his subscription, and he will be asked to furnish any evidence he can, such as a receipt, a paid cheque or a statement from the collector in support of his application. If, on the other hand, the subscriber has not applied before the inquiry is made he gains nothing by being informed that his name is or is not on the list of subscribers. The fact that an inquiry is made about A. B. in particular justifies, prima facie, an assumption that A. B. has subscribed to the loan, and obviously he ought to apply for repayment whether his name is on the primary register or not. The important point, of course, is that no information should be given as to what amount is recorded in the register as the subscription of A. B. and this information cannot in any circumstances be given.
It is, perhaps, convenient to take this opportunity of saying that Deputies have recently begun to make it a practice to make inquiries by personal application at the Department of Finance or by way of Parliamentary Question, about large batches of individual cases. The Department is naturally anxious to furnish Deputies with the fullest information consistently with the considerations indicated above, but Deputies must recognise that inquiries of this kind about large numbers of individual cases divert the energies of the staff from their normal duties and thus delay the work of repayment generally, while accomplishing little for individuals on whose behalf the inquiries are made. All claims are being dealt with as expeditiously as possible, and it is accordingly suggested that Deputies should in future restrict their inquiries to an absolute minimum. Special attention can always be given to a particular case in which it is alleged that the delay in authorising repayment has been unduly prolonged or is entailing hardship, but it must not be overlooked that subscribers themselves are in some measure responsible for the delay in making repayment by reason of their failure to send in their applications when originally invited to do so by public notice. I would suggest, also, that Deputies should make their inquiries about Dáil Loan subscriptions by letters addressed to me or to my Department rather than by Parliamentary Question or by personal application. No useful purpose can be served by making inquiries about cases in which no application has been made for repayment, as application must be made in writing by any person claiming to be entitled to repayment. In general, I think that inquiries by Deputies should be confined to ascertaining the progress made towards authorising repayment in individual cases which, by reason of hardship or exceptional circumstances, appear to merit special investigation. I may say that in any case in which particulars are furnished, in support of an application which corresponds with the particulars on record in the Department of Finance, the period which elapses before payment is authorised does not normally exceed two months. In cases, however, in which inquiries are necessary the delay entailed must depend largely on the promptitude with which applicants reply to the inquiries addressed to them and the nature of the replies received. As a matter of administrative convenience in the Department of Finance and the Department of Posts and Telegraphs the practice has been adopted of authorising payment in batches of cases numbering from 2,000 to 6,000 at intervals of about two months.
In certain cases subscriptions were collected for the Loan, but full particulars of the names of the subscribers and the amounts individually subscribed were not furnished to the Dáil Department of Finance. These cases present some difficulty, and it is obvious that applications for repayment in cases where there is no record of the subscription must be carefully scrutinised. In general, however, the subscriber in such a case should be in a position to produce satisfactory evidence, whether in the form of a receipt from a local collector or otherwise, and a considerable number of applications have, in fact, already been admitted on the strength of such evidence. It has been suggested that a tribunal might be established to deal with applications in this particular category, but it does not appear that such a tribunal is at present necessary. The existing machinery is sufficient to enable the Department of Finance to deal with all applications so far as can be foreseen, but if the necessity for taking any special measures to complete the task of repayment should hereafter become apparent the question of establishing a tribunal, or taking other appropriate steps, will be considered as and when the occasion seems to require. It has been suggested that in cases in which repayment has not already been authorised, interest on the amount of the subscription should be allowed as from the 1st June, 1927, to the date of repayment. In reply to this, however, it must be urged that in most of the cases which would be affected by this suggestion application for repayment was not made when such applications were invited. The delay on the part of the subscribers concerned has, in fact, proved a source of considerable embarrassment to the Department of Finance, and there would be no justification for making the Exchequer liable for additional interest in cases in which the delay was the responsibility of the subscribers themselves. There may be a small proportion of cases in which, as a matter of equity, there would be ground for the admission of a claim to interest, but the number of such cases is comparatively very small, and their examination and the calculation of the appropriate amount of interest would inevitably retard to some extent the task of repaying subscribers generally. Moreover, legislation would be necessary to enable the Department of Finance to make any payment beyond that provided for in the Dáil Eireann Loans and Funds Act, 1924, and, while the possibility of framing such legislation is not entirely ruled out, it is felt that at present, at any rate, there is not sufficient justification for promoting it.
