Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 1 Mar 1933

Vol. 46 No. 2

Supplementary and Additional Estimates. - Vote No. 55—Land Commission.

Minister for Finance (Mr. MacEntee)

I move:—

Go ndeontar suim bhreise ná raghaidh thar £48,635 chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá de Mhárta, 1933, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí Oifig Choimisiún Talmhan na hEireann (44 agus 45 Vict., c. 49, a. 46, agus c. 71, a. 4; 48 agus 49 Vict., c. 73; a. 17, 18 agus 20; 53 agus 54 Vict., c. 49, a. 2; 54 agus 55 Vict., c. 48; 3 Edw. 7, c. 37; 7 Edw. 7, c. 38 agus c. 56; 9 Edw. 7, c. 42; Uimh. 27 agus Uimh. 42 de 1923; Uimh. 25 de 1925; Uimh. 11 de 1926; Uimh. 19 de 1927; Uimh. 31 de 1929, agus Uimh. 11 de 1931).

That a supplementary sum not exceeding £48,635 be granted to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1933, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Irish Land Commission (44 and 45 Vict., c. 49, s. 46, and c. 71, s. 4; 48 and 49 Vict. c. 73, s. s. 17, 18 and 20; 53 and 54 Vict., c. 49, s. 2; 54 and 55 Vict., c. 48; 3 Edw. 7, c. 37; 7 Edw. 7, c. 38, and c. 56; 9 Edw. 7, c. 42; Nos. 27 and 42 of 1923; 25 of 1925; 11 of 1926; 19 of 1927; 31 of 1929, and 11 of 1931).

This Estimate will be defended, if necessary, by the Minister for Lands and Fisheries.

Mr. McGilligan

This is an advance to meet a deficiency. How does the deficiency arise?

Mr. Aiken (for Minister for Lands and Fisheries)

There were three cases of excess payments under the Purchase Acts. There was a big decrease in the collections from different allotees of tenanted land. A big deficiency arose in income from untenanted land. There was an estimated deficiency, at the close of the financial year, of £93,000, an increase of £83,000 over the amount provided when the Estimates were going through last year. These, of course, will be treated with the other land annuity payments. They were not pressed for. They are going to be funded over a period of 50 years. While there is a bigger decrease this year, these amounts will be treated the same as the other land annuity payments. They will be funded and paid over a period of 50 years. The Supplementary Estimate is not for as much as £93,000. There were savings made on other sub-heads which brought the total asked for down to £48,000.

Mr. Roddy

Will any portion of this money be recouped eventually to the Land Commission?

Mr. Aiken

It will.

Mr. Roddy

What amount of money will be recouped?

Mr. Aiken

The whole of it.

Mr. Roddy

It is usual under this sub-head to show a number of items.

Mr. Aiken

I should have said that 50 per cent. of most of this will be recouped to the Land Commission. The whole of certain portions will be recouped. There are grazing rents and all that included.

Mr. Roddy

Has the Minister not worked out the figures? It is usual, in introducing a Supplementary Estimate of this kind, to divide up the losses under different headings. Losses have been incurred in the past in the case of grazing lettings and so forth under this sub-head. The figure I want to get from the Minister is that of the amount lost in respect of untenanted land and the amount of money the Land Commission had to pay for annuities for the period between the gale day and the dividend day. That is usually included under the sub-head and I should like the Minister to distinguish between the figures.

Mr. Aiken

I have not the figures by me. If the Deputy wants them, I can get them.

Mr. Roddy

I suggest that this Estimate be left over until the Minister for Lands and Fisheries is present, so that we can discuss it intelligently and in detail.

Mr. Aiken

It is not worth while to go to all that trouble to get that particular figure. The Dáil is getting the essential figures to enable it to arrive at a decision whether it will give this money or not. I think it is quite unreasonable for the Deputy to ask for all these details.

Mr. Roddy

The Dáil is certainly entitled to details. This figure is abnormal. The normal figure provided under this sub-head is £10,000. When the Minister comes before the Dáil with an Estimate which increases that figure to £83,000, surely the Dáil is entitled to some information as to the increase. The Minister does not supply the Dáil with any details whatever. I realise that the Minister for Defence may not have had an opportunity to master the details of this Estimate. He is deputising for another Minister but I am quite prepared to agree to the Estimate being left over until the Minister for Lands and Fisheries is present.

Mr. Aiken

The Deputy has been told the reason for the big increase. He can easily understand himself the reason for the big increase. When the Estimate was going through originally, a sum of £10,000 was provided to meet deficiencies which would normally accrue. Since then, there was a complete change of policy in connection with the collection of land annuities and the amount in arrear has naturally become very much larger. The normal amount of £10,000 increased to about £93,000.

Mr. Roddy

Can the Minister assure me that the additional expenditure has been incurred merely by the fact that the Land Commission had to provide money for the purpose of paying the annuities not received from the period between the gale day and the dividend day in cases vested under the Land Act, 1931? If the Minister will give me that assurance, I shall be quite satisfied.

Mr. Aiken

That is not so. That is only portion of the amount.

Mr. Roddy

I am not satisfied with the information I have got.

Mr. McGilligan

I asked the first question on this Estimate and I cannot say that I am in possession of very much more information. I did not ask what the amount of the deficiency was, because I had that information before me. But that is all the information the Minister has given us. What I wanted to know was how the deficiency arose. In his second attempted explanation, the Minister said it arose because there had been a change of policy. Why? We are told that, when the original Estimate was going through, it was estimated that only £10,000 would be required to meet deficiencies likely to occur in income from untenanted land purchased under these 1923-31 Land Acts. Now, that sum of £10,000 has increased to this big figure because we are told there has been a change of policy? Why? When that policy was first mentioned, I am not certain that the word "treason" was not applied to it. People were, at all events, threatened that they would be put in jail for asking that this policy should be put in operation. The Minister thinks it is a proper way to treat this House merely to say that there has been a change of policy. What necessitated the change? I think that that is clear. The realisation came that certain people could not pay. But, again, why? Why was that accepted late as a fact—a fact which was staring the Government in the face right from the moment the economic war started. This is an advance. Taken in the ordinary way, there would appear to be an Exchequer charge—something to be borne out of the fruits of ordinary taxation, however that taxation is to be raised. Yet, we are told that there is a Suspense Account. Is it not possible to use that money for this purpose? Is the money going to be so used? We are told it is there at the moment; that there is a nest-egg of something over four millions. Yet we are asked, in order to meet something due owing to the change of policy, this change having occurred owing to the economic war, to vote something out of the Exchequer. When is the nest-egg going to be used? We are told that there is four millions awaiting distribution yet we are asked to vote this additional £48,635 out of taxation.

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy is now trying to appear much more innocent than he really is. He know, as every member of the Government does, and as the more experienced Deputies here know, that merely because the House is asked to sanction expenditure for certain purposes, it does not necessarily imply that the whole of the amount for which sanction is asked will be spent; and it certainly does not imply that the whole of that expenditure is to be met out of taxation. His other point is; why was not the necessity for this Supplementary Estimate foreseen? If the Deputy will throw his mind back to the circumstances in which the original Estimates were introduced into the Dáil he will recollect that, in submitting them, the Government stressed the point that the Estimates had been prepared by our predecessors, and that they had not time to revise the final figures and that consequently a certain amount of revision and possibly some Supplementary Estimates might have to be introduced into the Dáil as soon as the Government policy had time to shape itself into operation. Even then it would not possibly have been necessary to introduce a Supplementary Estimate, in the way it has been introduced at this moment, if it had not been for the attitude which the Opposition took up in regard to this question. If we had the support which we were entitled to expect from Deputies opposite during the past 12 months we would have been in a position, I hope, at any rate, to have laid before the House definite proposals for dealing with the whole question of land purchase instead of having to make, what, after all, is temporary provision pending the period when these proposals will be definitely formulated and the House will be asked to make provision in regard to them. The point I wish again to recapitulate and stress is that it does not at all follow that because an estimate is introduced into the House, and because the House gives the necessary final authority to expend money, the whole of that money will be expended and that that expenditure will have to be met out of taxation.

Mr. McGilligan

My question has not been answered. The Minister for Finance told us when these Estimates were first going through this deficiency was not foreseen, and that was because the Estimates were drawn by the Minister's predecessor and that the Minister did not foresee the deficiency in this and the other bunch of Supplementary Estimates; but he has had a fair amount of time since to make up his mind and to estimate the deficiency to be made up. He tells us that when the present Government's policy is properly outlined and formulated we will have their Estimates but what we were promised was not an addition but a reduction. The Minister has forgotten his two millions reduction.

Mr. MacEntee

With four-and-a-half millions in hand.

Mr. McGilligan

And four-and-a-half millions of increase. He now tells us that if he had had time we would not have had these Supplementary Estimates and that they would have been in his original Estimates. We will see when the Budget makes its appearance. He will then no longer have the excuse he makes now. Again we have the further comment that the money is not necessarily going to be spent because it is voted. Nobody suggested that, but when the Government asks for £83,000, reduced to £48,000 as between this and the financial year, we feel that they should have some appreciation of the amount that they are going to spend. Why are they taking this sum out of taxation? Why not break in on the nest egg? What about the four millions cash held out as a glittering prize to the people? £48,000 is a small sum out of £4,000,000 to be distributed.

Mr. MacEntee

Wait and see.

Mr. McGilligan

I am afraid it will be like the new estimates; there will be little to see when we wait. We are told that there is £4,000,000 in cash in the Suspense Account.

Mr. MacEntee

Four-and-a-half millions here in this country.

Mr. McGilligan

Four-and-a-half millions real cash—real money no part of it broken in upon—ready for distribution. How much of it will the banks take on the Exchequer borrowings and how much will be left for the people waiting for relief out of the four-and-a-half millions?

Mr. MacEntee

How much of it would there be in this country if the Deputy, instead of being where he is in Opposition, was here on the Government Benches?

Mr. McGilligan

What deficiency would there be in the payment to people under the Acts 1923 to 1931? And what about the wave of unemployment and the 24/- a week relief schemes? We have, got no answer why the Government persist in taking this £48,000 from the Exchequer when we are told that there is £4,000,000 in cash in the Suspense Account waiting to be distributed.

Mr. Roddy

I am still waiting for an answer from the Minister. I asked for details and the Minister, so far, has not supplied any. I want to know from the Minister under what particular heads these losses have been incurred. This Estimate is to make up the deficiency in the income from untenanted lands purchased under the Acts of 1923 to 1931. I know that when the Minister takes land, before he is ready to proceed to distribution, it may be necessary to incur loss but it was always the policy of the Land Commission to reduce these losses to the lowest point. Am I to assume that this huge loss is entirely attributable to the fact that the Land Commission has taken possession of a big area of land and has not distributed it, and that by taking it over they assume responsibility for rates, loss of grazing rights and so on?

Mr. Aiken

I told the Deputy that I had not the details here, but that if he put down a question I would look into it. I told him also that the principal amount in this was due to the non-collection of the amounts due from the people who have been allotted untenanted land. In the ordinary course every year there is a deficiency in the Land Commission which arises from three things: first, rent payable by allottees; second, the making up of two months interest from the gale day to the dividend day; and third, the difficulty in letting temporarily grazing land acquired. The nearest I can go to it now is that, of the £93,000, not more than £2,000 to £3,000 is due to the two months interest between the gale day and dividend day. The rest of it is due to the moneys not being collected.

Mr. Roddy

In other words, I am to take it that out of a figure of £83,455 only £2,000 to £3,000 will be recouped subsequently to the Land Commission? There will be a net loss of somewhere about £82,000 to be made good by the general body of taxpayers?

Mr. Aiken

That is not so. That £2,000 to £3,000 will be recouped in full. The £83,000 will come under the ordinary fund. The whole of it will be recouped over a period of fifty years. These arrears will be funded and will be repayable over fifty years.

Mr. Roddy

Am I to assume that £81,000 of this amount represents the annuities on untenanted lands? Surely there were other losses? You had to pay rates? What amount does that represent? Those are items I would like to get from the Minister. I suggest a postponement of the discussion on this Estimate until the Acting-Minister or the Minister himself is in a position to supply us with the information.

Mr. Aiken

The Deputy knows per fectly well that the information he is asking for is comparatively unimportant. Those normal deficiencies are accounted for in the £10,000 for which he has heard the Dáil being asked to meet an Estimate. They were all included in that £10,000 and I take it when he was arriving at that Estimate he knew what the normal thing would be. Apart from that £10,000 of the normal deficiencies was the abnormal situation which arose when the Land Commission were instructed not to press for annuities. That is the reason for this Estimate.

Mr. Roddy

The Minister knows perfectly well that it was always customary in introducing a Supplementary Estimate to supply to the Dáil details of that Estimate. Those details were supplied under various heads. I know it is quite possible for the officials of his Department to supply him with those details. The Minister suggests that this is a comparatively unimportant matter, but it is certainly not unimportant to the Dáil to realise that the loss under this particular heading increased from £10,000 to £83,000 in a period of less than twelve months. That is surely not an unimportant matter. The Dáil is entitled to know how the loss occurred and for what reasons the loss has been incurred. I think in fairness the Minister should agree to a postponement of this discussion until we are in a position to get those details, when this Estimate can be discussed intelligently. If the Minister himself were present I should raise many other points on this particular Estimate. I naturally hesitate to raise the points now because I understand that the Acting-Minister has not had an opportunity for preparing his brief even for this Estimate and he has not had an opportunity of mastering the details. I think in fairness to the Dáil the discussion should be postponed until a later date.

Question put, and declared carried.