I move:—
Go ndeontar suim Bhreise ná raghaidh thar £10 chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh Márta, 1934, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí Oifig an Aire Tionnscail agus Tráchtála, maraon le Coiste Comhairlitheach na Rátaí, agus Ildeontaisí i gCabhair.
That a Supplementary sum not exceeding £10 be granted to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending 31st March, 1934, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Industry and Commerce, including the Rates Advisory Committee and sundry Grants-in-Aid.
It is proposed to ask the Dáil to vote a Supplementary Estimate of £10 for the Department of Industry and Commerce. The amount required, in fact, is £8,754, but savings on other subheads are estimated, and the total additional amount required is £10. There are two main purposes for which this money is required. The first is the establishment in Saorstát Eireann of an industrial research council. Within recent years rapid progress has been made in other countries in the encouragement and organisation of industrial research. In some cases special departments of State have been established, and in others the work is centred in the Department of Trade and Commerce. There is, however, in this country, no co-ordinated effort to direct the scientific investigation of industrial problems. A few of the larger concerns maintain their own research establishment, and the Royal Dublin Society, the universities and the county councils have taken some practical interest in the encouragement of work of that nature. There is, however, no central body charged with the responsibility of co-ordinating the results of those various efforts. Under the estimate for miscellaneous expenses, there is a provision of £650 for research grants to students, but I understand that scientific industrial research is not undertaken by students who receive those grants. In some countries, such as Canada, research work in connection with industrial problems is conducted by the same organisation that carries out research work for the improvement of agricultural conditions. It is not intended here, however, to interfere with the existing practice by which certain sums borne on the Vote for the Department of Agriculture are utilised for research work in connection with agriculture. The industrial problems of this State make it necessary that an intelligently planned system of industrial research must be initiated, and must form a definite part of the Government's programme. Under ordinary circumstances the cost of such research work would be borne by those engaged in industrial enterprise, but in existing conditions in the Saorstát it is regarded as inevitable that the Government should take the initiative and should provide from public funds the expenditure involved.
It is proposed to set up an industrial research council, composed of persons who, because of their association with the universities or with industry, are in a position to bring specialised knowledge to bear upon the country's problems, to act in an advisory capacity to the Government and direct certain activities which I will outline. The research council will be financed by an annual vote in the Dáil. We have invited certain persons to act upon the council and have received their assent. Membership of the council is honorary. Those who become members will receive only necessary travelling and incidental expenses in connection with the work of the council. We have asked Mr. Laurence J. Kettle to act as chairman, and the membership will include the following:—Dr. Kenneth Bailey, Professor J. Bayley Butler, Professor Lillon, John J. Dowling, Esq., M.A., of University College, Dublin; Dr. Drumm, D. Feighery, Sir John P. Griffith, Professor Hackett, Mr. T. Hallissey, Dr. H. Kennedy, Dr. T.A. McLoughlin, Mr. T.J. Monaghan, Professor John J. Nolan, Professor T.J. Nolan, Mr. Thomas O'Keeffe Kinsella, Mr. John O'Neill, Professor A. O'Rahilly, Professor O'Reilly, Professor Pierce Purcell, Professor Rickworth, Miss Phyllis Ryan, Professor Taylor and Comdt. J.F. Kinneen, of the Department of Defence. The council will have a permanent secretary, a small staff, and a library. The secretary and the staff will be recruited from the existing service. The functions of the council will relate to the following activities: first of all, intelligence; the study and recording of the results of scientific industrial investigation in other countries and their bearing upon Saorstát industries, and the bringing to the attention of the Government and interested industrial parties of the results of such investigations as appear to have a direct bearing on the industrial situation in the Saorstát; secondly, special investigations; that is arranging for the carrying out of special investigations either at the request of the Government or on the initiative of the council, directed to the development of Saorstát resources; a specialised study of the more extensive use of native materials in the home industries, and the making of reports following these investigations; also the organisation of research work in connection with the establishment of new industries or the extension of existing industries in the Saorstát and research work in connection with the improvement of technical processes and methods of production. In addition, it is proposed to have the council advise the Government on the granting of financial assistance to Saorstát inventors, whose investigations appear to the council to be likely to have beneficial national results. In addition to these activities, the council will arrange, at the request of particular industrialists and, subject to payment by them, for the carrying out of particular investigations into the utilisation of waste products, improvements of technical processes and so forth. It is proposed also to secure the advice of this council upon the most effective method of utilising the money provided under the Miscellaneous Vote for research scholarships.
It is anticipated that the total annual cost of the council will not exceed £5,500, including £1,000 for the secretariat; £1,000 for records, including a technical library; £2,500 for special investigations; £500 for aids to inventors, and £500 travelling expenses to members of the Council. The amount which we can provide for industrial research work is, of course, very small in comparison with the huge sums spent on similar work in other countries, but we are satisfied that it is desirable to start the establishment of any such research organisation on a small scale, and that, even when started on that small scale, it will be possible for it to do very useful work in the co-ordination of efforts at present being made and in pursuing, with a view to commercial exploitation, certain investigations which have been undertaken in recent years on the initiative of individuals associated either with the Universities or with particular industries.
The second main item covered by this Vote is the provision of £8,000 in connection with the production of industrial alcohol in the Saorstát. Some time ago the Government adverted to the fact that in a large number of continental countries, legislation required the compulsory admixture with petrol offered for sale for transport purposes of industrial alcohol produced within those countries. Having regard to that fact, we examined the possibility and the advisability of initiating the production of industrial alcohol here, with a view to its utilisation in a similar manner. These investigations, while they brought in a considerable amount of information, were not, however, in any sense, conclusive. Industrial alcohol is made, or can be made, from a number of agricultural products— from beet, from potatoes, from cereals, and it can also be made from peat. There can be no question that it is possible for us to grow in this country the products from which the alcohol is made and the processes of distillation, as practised in other countries are, of course, well beyond the experimental stage. Our problem did not relate to the possibility of growing the products or the utilisation of the processes, but to the extent to which these could be done in this country with anything like the same efficiency and the same cost as elsewhere. It was decided finally that we should undertake, under Government auspices, and not in any sense as a commercial proposition, an experimental development. It was provisionally fixed that that experimental development should take the form of the establishment, in a particular part of the country, of a number of small distilleries utilising potatoes as their raw material and producing about 120,000 gallons of industrial alcohol in the year and centring around a central refinery to which the spirit produced in the distilleries would be brought for the finishing processes.
It is clear, of course, that a development upon that scale alone will not involve any substantial dislocation in the petrol business, nor will it involve any very great heavy expenditure. The annual consumption of petrol in this country is about 40 million gallons and the total production of alcohol from this experimental development, taking into account the quantity of it that might be sold for industrial processes in the ordinary way, and for which industrial alcohol is now imported, would not exceed 500,000 or 600,000 gallons, or slightly less than 2 per cent. of the petrol used for fuel purposes. In so far as we have been able to arrive at conclusive estimates, the cost of erecting the five small distilleries and the central refinery should not exceed £100,000 and may be less. The distilleries would utilise approximately 25,000 tons of potatoes in the course of the campaign.
