We had two statements last night from Deputies on the opposite benches. Deputy O'Sullivan complained that the tax on bread is going to fall on consumers and Deputy Dillon complained in another way. I wonder when will Deputies on the opposite benches come together so that they may have some kind of policy about which they can all complain and not be like the Tower of Babel. They remind me of nothing else. I would have an equal right to claim that the bloated salaries paid to professors and teachers is a tax on learning.
Agricultural Produce (Cereals) Bill, 1935—Committee (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That Section 11 stand part of the Bill."
That is very far away from the price of wheat.
A challenge was thrown down by professors and lawyers that an economic price for wheat to farmers was a fair price——
What is a fair price?
——as that was a tax on bread. I have an equal right to claim that the increase of lawyers' costs from £5 to £25 is a deprivation of justice to the poor.
This section deals with the price of wheat.
I am not going beyond that. That was the complaint we had. We hear Deputies on the opposite benches wailing day after day, and month after month, and the Order Paper is piled up with motions complaining of the position of the farmers while, at the same time, we find these Deputies coming here with complaints, wails and means about every proposition that is brought in to benefit the farming community, or to give them a fair price for their produce. We were on the opposite benches for six or seven years, and we had to listen to the cry that wheat could not be grown by our farmers; that the climate would not let it grow. That was what the ex-Minister for Agriculture said when he was asked about the matter. He said the climate would not let wheat grow here, that it was lunacy to think otherwise, yet 200,000 acres of wheat have been grown this year. I agree with Deputy Belton that the minimum price for the wheat is hardly enough.
It is not an economic price. It is not as high as what is charged by wheat-exporting countries.
It is not as high as the £25 that a lawyer gets for a brief that he does not read.
We do not grow lawyers.
No. The price will leave a fair margin of profit, and it is guaranteed to the farmers. It has increased the acreage from 26,000, when we came into office, to 200,000 acres. It represents £2,000,000 in the farmers' pockets for a market that can be controlled at home. Deputy Dillon in a regular outburst yesterday said that he would not grow wheat and would not grow beet. He need not. I agree that the Deputy has a better opening. He can draw a fiver or a £10 note for looking at a brief for a few minutes. That pays a lot better.
This is quite irrelevant.
Let the Deputy have some consideration for farmers, who are depending on farming for a livelihood. We have heard any amount of these complaints. Lo and behold! we had farmers getting up and complaining about unfortunate consumers who would have to pay more for bread, while three weeks ago we had Deputy Bennett, with his tongue in his cheek, complaining about the price to be fixed for butter. In the Deputy's opinion it was no harm to charge 1/5 per lb. for butter for the benefit of his constituency, but it was a terrible thing to charge consumers for the wheat that was grown. The sooner Deputies opposite stop pulling Johnny-both-ways the better. For nine or ten years tillage farmers who grew wheat paid through the nose for wheat-growing land. They paid on their valuations four or five times more than what was paid in cattle-raising districts. They paid more for wheat-growing land on their valuations and rates. At that time we had a Government here that told the farmers they could grow wheat if they liked at the world market price. That price was £6 a ton in 1926. I know farmers who grew wheat every year, and who on 11 acres had 25 cwt. to the acre, which had to be sold at £6 a ton. It was admitted that it was good millable wheat.
When Deputy Cosgrave and the ex-Minister for Agriculture were in office they did not tell the farmers that they need not pay any more rates because their land was valued as wheat-growing land, and did not tell them that they would provide a market for them. The farmers grew the wheat and on their valuations paid 25/-, 30/- and 35/- an acre, even though the policy of the Government at that time was definitely killing any hope of making the growing of wheat profitable. When this Government came along they fixed a minimum price at which wheat could be grown. As a result the acreage has been increased and the farmers have been guaranteed a price. Despite that we have Deputy Dillon getting up and complaining that it was a terrible thing for these ruffians of farmers to go in and spoil lovely green soil; to care to go into the ranches and to turn up grand bullock land and sow wheat there. For these terrible ruffians to do that is an awful thing but, what about the poor of the country whom lawyers charge a fee of £25?
The Deputy has been told twice by the Chair that certain matters are irrelevant. He will not run counter to the ruling of the Chair and continue his speech.
I will take all classes of consumers about which Deputy Dillon complains in this particular case. I take it that lawyers are bread consumers and cannot get enough of it. However, coming to that point, Deputy Dillon's complaint is that those people, because they tilled the land and because they produced crops on the land, are not to get the cost of production plus a little profit that is guaranteed by the Government here. That is Deputy Dillon's complaint. The people are wiser now, however. The people, whom Deputy Dillon's organisation advised not to grow wheat and the people whom his organisation in Cork county advised last year not to grow beet, have paid for taking that advice in the meantime. They have become good boys this year, however; they have learned their lesson and are growing wheat and beet and they are being guaranteed a minimum price for that wheat in this Bill. I cannot see what argument Deputy Dillon can produce against that. We have the same arguments in regard to everything, but I suggest that Deputies cannot blow hot and cold in this manner. They cannot come here complaining that the Government is ruining the farmers and then, when a Bill is brought in here guaranteeing a minimum price, we cannot have them standing up here and complaining against that price on the ground that it is unfair to the consumer and so on. The man who grows wheat in this country is as much entitled to that minimum price as any industrialist in this country is to the minimum price that he can extract for his produce. It is the very self-same thing, and I hope to see established in this country a minimum price for everything that can be produced here: a minimum price covering the cost of production plus some profit.
Until that is done, the agricultural labourer, about whom Deputy Dillon was complaining and bewailing here last night, will be brought still lower by Deputy Dillon's endeavouring to lower the price of wheat. I hold that nine-tenths of the agricultural labourers in this country, about whom Deputy Dillon was talking last night, are far more competent in their work than any of the hoodoo professors and lawyers such as we have here. It takes a farmer a longer time to learn his job. The farming community are far more competent and deserve more of the community in general than three-fourths of those who talk here about the conditions of the farmers. We hear a lot of talk about them on these lines, but when we see individuals getting up here, having made their own position secure through federations of teachers, federations of lawyers, and federations of every other profession, and talking about the condition of the farming community, we may be pardoned for doubting their sincerity. I am sorry that Deputy Bennett is not here. If he were here I would give him a little bit of advice, because he needs it in this particular connection. As I was saying, when we see this kind of thing carried on here, we do not believe in its sincerity.
A farmer is entitled to the cost of production, plus a profit, for every article he can produce here and, so far as we can, we will see that he gets it. I do not wish to delay the debate, but I could not sit here and listen to the kind of talk going on here from Deputy Professor O'Sullivan and Deputy Dillon without entering that protest against them. They come in here day after day and week after week complaining about the position of the farmers and, at the same time, come in here deliberately to endeavour to kill any hope the farmer has of getting an alternative market or any hope of getting his own market here at home enlarged for him and preserved for him. When one listens to that kind of thing, one wonders at the sincerity of those Deputies opposite who complain about the condition of the farmers. What was the position? We had enormous ranches in Canada and in America sending in wheat here from all over the world.
The whole policy of wheat-growing does not arise on this Bill.
No, Sir, but the price of wheat does, and the price of wheat up to the time the subsidy was introduced was governed by the world prices and the prices of American and Canadian ranchers' wheat. That is what governed the price here. Deputies opposite know as well as I do that it was these Canadian and American ranches——
The matter before the House is the fixing of a minimum price for wheat, and the Deputy must confine himself to that.
Absolutely, Sir. I shall endeavour to confine myself to it, but I am sorry that the Deputies opposite did not confine themselves to it last night.
The Deputy should make no comments, direct or indirect, on the Chair's rulings.
No, Sir, I know that, but——
The price of wheat!
There is one point that I should like to dwell on here, and that is in reference to a complaint that was made here yesterday in regard to the abolition, as they called it, of the subsidy for wheat. I am one of those who always protested against that bounty on wheat. I protested for several reasons. One is that I do not believe in making the farmer a kind of "souper," if you like, in that particular line.
Hear, hear! Or any other self-respecting man in the country.
Yes, and I am sure that when a lawyer has a job he does not wait for six months for his money. It is cash on the nail so far as he is concerned. Evidently Deputy Dillon regrets the fact that the farmer is not prepared to wait from September, when he sells his wheat, until the following January or February, when he only gets half of his money.
I am delighted that Deputy Corry does not want to make "soupers" of the people.
The lawyer takes care to get his money in advance. However, to return to this particular matter, I always protested against that method because I consider that the farmer is entitled to get his cost of production plus a profit, and I consider that there should be no such thing as a bounty or subsidy hanging on to it any more than it should be hanging on to the manufacturer of boots or hanging on to the cost of the manufacture of artificial manures.
You voted against giving it to the pig producers.
Deputy Dillon knows nothing about it any more than he knows anything about anything under the sun. He is a jack of all trades and master of none. That is why I would emphatically protest against any attempt to continue subsidies. I consider that the miller should pay the price, cost of production plus subsidy, and that the consumer should be equally prepared to pay it. And there should be no noise about it, any more than the farmer has a right to protest against the price of artificial manures or the price of home-produced farm machinery or anything else. We are entitled to the same rights as the industrialists and we should get them. We regard it as a right, and any self-respecting farmer looks upon it as a right. I am sure that, when Bills were brought in here for protecting industries, we did not see any indication that the actual cost of, say, a boot or a shoe would be 9/6 and that the buyer of the article would be charged the 9/6 and the State pay a bounty to the boot manufacturer of the extra 5/- or 6/- as the case may be. There has been too much of this thing attached to farmers, and this is one direct attempt to end it and to end it once and for all. I hope that, despite Deputy Dillon's fears and dreads in regard to the wheat question, that we will see a better price for wheat. I hope to see Deputy Dillon and all the other drones like him in this country paying it. It is about time they paid their share of something. That, however, is beside the question. I am glad to see Deputy Bennett arriving now. He came in here three weeks ago, with his tongue in his cheek, and departed from the fold by catching a hold of the tail of my coat and following me into the Lobby to vote for compelling these people——
The Deputy should not repeat himself.
Even though you have a new audience.
An absolutely new audience. I am endeavouring to convince Deputies opposite—and I am sure that it is the purpose of this Dáil to convince Opposition Deputies that we are right. I have already convinced Deputy Minch, I think, who became converted yesterday to the true fold in relation to this matter. I succeeded in converting Deputy Bennett in relation to butter and, after all, as a farmer, even if he is only a kind of a farmer, he should have the interests of the agricultural community at heart. I should like to appeal to him, as representing a rural constituency and representing farmers here, because some number of the deluded farmers voted for him, to stand in with the rest of the farmers in this country and just as the rest of the farmers and the farmers' representatives here succeeded in getting him a price for his butter which he approved of, because he voted for the Bill, he should help the tillage farmers of this country who work with their hands, with their brains and with the plough to get at least the cost of production for their wheat.
He should help to do that by voting with us instead of talking about the unfortunate consumer for whom he has all sympathy to-day in the matter of bread, but for whom he had no sympathy last week in their having to pay 1/5 for butter. He did not care a hang if they never got bread so long as they buttered it, but you cannot use the butter without the bread or the bread without the butter. Combine the two articles and give us a hand in getting a fair price for them.
He wants cheap bread so that they will eat a lot of butter.
He wants cheap bread with dear butter.
When did he say that, by the way?
The whole world is not contained in that little constituency of Co. Limerick, or in that portion of it that is dairying. We have got into a large portion of Limerick with the plough, and there are many good fields of wheat grown in the county, as I saw last week. I must congratulate the Limerick farmers on becoming converted so quickly. We saw a lot of good wheat grown there and Deputy Bennett should remember that these are constituents of his who are growing wheat and he should give them a hand in securing a fair price. He should not come in here to talk about the unfortunate consumers whom he compelled to buy butter at 1/5 last week. If he had no sympathy for them last week, he cannot have so much sympathy for them now. These consumers whom he talks about are the gentlemen who work in factories and for whom we are providing work in factories and whom the farmers are paying a little extra in the price of artificial manures, farm machinery and other things of that description in order to keep them in those factories. I am sure that the gentlemen who produce the farm machinery and the artificial manures will not sell them under the cost of production, but we do not hear any wail about the farmers who have to buy the machinery and the artificial manures. I think that those for whom we found employment in the manufacture of these articles ought to have no complaint whatever about paying a little extra for their bread in order that we may be able to keep the farmers going as well. I suggest that you advise all your farmers to grow more wheat. They will grow it whether you like it or not and you might as well be in the swim. Give them advice; coax them along; and show them good example by voting for this. After all, a £2,000,000 market for the farmers is just as important as the butter market——
Get back to the price.
I hope I will have the Deputy with me later on when we are squeezing out a little better price, but, for the present, let us at least see that we collar this price and let us get it with the help of Deputy Bennett. I advise Deputy Bennett—and I give him this advice honestly and as one farmer to another—that the less he has to do with Deputy Mulcahy, who advised him to vote against the butter proposal——
The price of wheat.
——and with Deputy Dillon. and Deputy O'Sullivan who are now advising him to vote against the wheat proposal, the better. None of them is a farmer and none of them knows one bit about farming. They would not know a heifer from a bullock in the morning and I honestly believe that I could see them milking a bull if I went into a stall. I would appeal to Deputy Bennett to help his brother farmers in this matter by going into the Lobby and voting for this section. Let him show them a lead and show that the farmers of this country can stick together in seeing that a fair price is got for our produce.
Would I be in order, Sir, in discussing the whole wheat policy of the Government? I crave your indulgence for discussing the section.
The Deputy has already spoken, but is entitled to speak again in Committee.
I am aware of that.
All the farmers are entitled to speak twice.
I wish some of them would discuss the section.
Did you not discuss it last night?
I did and not one on the Government side, including the Minister, discussed it. They discussed everything else except the section or this Bill or how it effects a change. Not one of them discussed the change that this Bill effects. They discussed everything else except that. We have listened to Deputy Corry who did bring in two arguments, with which I will deal in a moment, that referred to the section. I admit that in that he is differentiated from the other members who have spoken in favour of the section because he did, in these two arguments, drop into referring to the section we are discussing. What we are discussing is a certain change which this section brings about in the present system. Speaking on this last night, I was very careful to confine myself exclusively to what this section purports to do or— shall I put it a little more correctly— enables the Minister to do because the one thing it does not do is to give him, in addition to any power he has at present, any additional power to give a fair price to the farmers. He has that power at present. There is nothing at all in the legislation, as it stands under the present system of financing wheat, that precludes the Minister from giving any price he likes for the wheat higher than the 23/6 and higher even than 30/- if he wishes to do so. That is his power at present and the present section does not add one iota to that power. Therefore, so far as this Bill and this section are concerned, the question as to whether or not the farmers ought to get fair prices simply does not arise. That power is there at the present moment, and the present section does not give any additional power to the Minister in that respect. Everybody will agree that if the farmers are induced, by the Government policy, to grow wheat, they should get a fair and economic price for it. So far as the actual price mentioned in the Schedule to which this section refers is concerned, we do not think that price is an economic one, and we never thought it economic in this respect, but I suggest that that is irrelevant to the merits of the present section. What does the present section purport to do? I admit—it is a purely debating point on the part of the Minister, as he acknowledged himself—that it does not take away the power of still granting the bounty. What it does is a different thing. It enables the Minister to get out of that obligation of granting a bounty from the taxes, and enables him to put indirectly on to the price of bread the figure that is necessary to reach even the appearance of an economic price for the farmer. That is what it does. This Bill or this section does not add an extra halfpenny or even an extra farthing to the price that the farmer can get for his wheat.
Is it not the price on delivery? Is not that what it means?
I did not quite follow what the Deputy said. Would he mind repeating it?
The price of the wheat is given on delivery, and that is a big difference.
Might I refer the Deputy to the Second Reading debate on the Bill. His remark was relevant to this particular section we are now dealing with. It is one of the few relevant remarks from that side of the House, and, therefore, I will deal with it. The Deputy will remember one of the principal advantages which the Minister claimed for this particular Bill. This is the operative section so far as that is concerned; it is, therefore, perfectly relevant here, and the Deputy's interruption was relevant— not to my argument at the moment but to the general section. One of the principal advantages claimed by the Minister is that he will now immediately give the full price to the farmer. That is the point which the Deputy is making, is it not?
Yes.
I asked the Minister definitely on the Second Reading whether he had not that power at present.
Dr. Ryan
No.
And whether the powers in this Bill were necessary for that change, that is, to give the full price immediately, and the Minister said "No."
Dr. Ryan
I did not.
What I said was: He has not made it quite clear whether, without putting a tax on bread, without the machinery of this Bill that could not be done under the subsidy system; that is, could not the price immediately be given? The Minister said it could.
Dr. Ryan
Yes, but not without legislation.
Very good. Without this particular form of helping wheat it could be given. What I want to make out is that putting a tax on bread, as the Minister is now doing, is not necessary for the immediate payment to the farmer. He could do it under the subsidy system.
Dr. Ryan
I stated last night that whether or not the Minister for Finance in his Budget decided to pass this on to the consumer, this Bill would come in.
I am not saying what the Minister would do; he may have other reasons. I am dealing with this particular argument at the present moment, namely, that without this method of putting a charge on bread, the price could be immediately paid to the farmer. I gathered that from column 507 of last week's Official Debates.
Dr. Ryan
It could be given, of course, by legislation.
Why not legislate? My whole point is that, so far as the main advantage of this Bill is concerned, there was no necessity to tax the bread of the people.
Dr. Ryan
That is a different question.
But that is the question I am discussing. I think that what I said last night along these lines was perfectly relevant to the section, and if the Minister would listen he would know that that is the main question in which I am interested in regard to this particular section, and it is this section we are discussing. I kept away from anything which was in the slightest way irrelevant. Therefore, the main advantage of this Bill to the farmer, on the confession of the Minister on the Second Reading and repeated just now, could be got— under legislation if necessary—without taxing the bread of the people in the way in which this Bill taxes it. That is the point I want to make in answer to Deputy Victory. It is giving the Minister this substitute power; he made it quite clear that he intends to use it, and that so far as he was concerned, at all events, the policy of helping wheat that was in force up to the present is dead. Theoretically, that power—to help by subsidy—still exists, but the power which the Minister intends to use is the power that he has under this particular section. That, as I say, is an amending Bill. It does not at all deal with the question as to whether wheat growing is a proper economic proposition for this country.
Or it should not.
Or it should not.
The country decided that.
Very good. I presume I am not in order——
The Deputy is quite in order.
——in going into a discussion on the wheat policy.
Keep in order, now.
I would ask you, Sir, to restrain the Deputy. It is impossible, both when he is making a speech and when he is "silent," to follow a serious train of argument. The farmer is not likely to get, and will not get, a halfpenny more under this system than he would get otherwise. All that is necessary to help the farmer could be done without doing what the Minister and the Government propose to do now—namely, tax the bread of the people.
I think it would have been a much straighter proposition, and the country would have known definitely where it was, if the Minister for Finance had come in and openly and plainly put a tax on bread. The Deputy grins at that; he does not like it. I quite agree with him. He would grin a lot if they did it, in the same way as he did not like some of the other taxes which they put on. You are concealing this tax, and you object to putting it on openly. That is what I object to in this Bill; you are putting a tax on the bread of the people and trying to hide it. The Minister last night seemed to object to its being called a tax, but it is pure indulgence in subtlety to think that you are doing anything else. It would have been much straighter and more above-board if the Minister for Finance came into this House and said, "The Government in the present year requires £350,000," or whatever the sum is, "in order to help wheat growing; we will put a tax on bread for that." That is what you are doing under this Bill. When I made that statement last night it was applauded by Deputy Donnelly. When I said that the tax on bread would ultimately mean, according to the Minister, £1,500,000 per annum, and that it probably would amount to more according to the other figures given by the Minister, I again got "hear, hear" from Deputy Donnelly. Let it be quite clearly understood that this is a tax on bread. Just as you have a tax on tea and sugar in order to carry on the necessary Departments of the State, and in order to carry on what the Government claim are social services, here is a thing which, according to your policy, you consider necessary to carry on. It would have been much clearer to the people, and a much straighter course, openly to put a tax on bread.
The Minister objected last night to the phrase "concealed taxes" and pretended that there is no concealment about it. The objection displayed a short time ago on the opposite benches, when I mentioned this tax on bread, shows that there is a desire to conceal the real purpose of the section. The real purpose of the section is to enable the Government to get out of doing the unpopular thing, and to enable them to put a tax on bread while pretending they are not doing it. That is what the Government is doing. The Minister who objected to the phrase "concealed taxes," then began to discuss the suggestions from this side that if this had to be done it ought to be done out of revenue. "Imagine," he said, "all those things done out of revenue, until finally there would be £4,000,000 or £5,000,000 put on." I think that is the figure which the Minister mentioned.
I will not take responsibility for that, but I think £4,000,000 or £5,000,000 is the sum he mentioned as being put on in that way. So far as the people of this country are concerned, they are paying it either in the amount they are paying for their bread or will pay for the bread after this legislation is enacted, or through whatever system of taxes is put on to meet the charges. You may call it a levy or a tax, but the unfortunate individual in this country pays it. Yet the Minister was aghast that it should be paid out of revenue—it would be too open.
I suggest the only thing that arises for serious consideration here is whether the bread is a proper article to tax in order to help wheat growing. That is the only point at issue. So far as this section indicates a change in the existing position, it has as one of its advantages the quicker payment of the farmer. Deputy Corry has been accused of many things in this House, but subtlety is not one of the things that I have heard very often thrown at him. Well, I can do it to-day. According to him it is wrong for the farmer to receive a subsidy, but because he carried out the national policy it is no harm for him to get the same money indirectly through a tax on bread. That is a piece of subtlety that is beyond me. In the one case it is souperism—that is the phrase he used.
The farmer is certainly entitled if he grows wheat, especially at the instigation of the Government, to get a fair economic price for it. There is no disputing that. There has always been a difference of opinion as to what the proper price was. The Minister taunted us last night that we did insist a couple of years ago on a higher price as being an economic price. Therefore, when we repeat to-day that if the farmer must grow wheat he must get a proper economic price, there is no change of attitude there.
But that is not the issue that is before us at the present moment. The issue is whether this is the proper method of doing it; in other words, whether bread is the proper article to tax in order to subsidise wheat. I hold that is the whole issue at stake in this particular section. It is not a question of the economic price for the farmer or the value of wheat growing. That has got nothing to do with the main purpose of the Bill, of which this is one of the most crucial sections. The real question is the concealed tax on bread and that is our principal objection to this section. We feel that the thing could be done in a way that would not be open to that objection. I can imagine many things being taxed, but I think the taxing of bread is the lowest level to which the Government has fallen in its efforts to get money to help its policy. I think I have indicated clearly the grounds of our objection to this section of the Bill.
I would like to deal with the point Deputy O'Sullivan has put up and to make a personal explanation. I did not allude to the subsidy as souperism. The Deputy said that I called it souperism. I called all subsidies souperism. That is just a point of personal explanation in regard to Deputy O'Sullivan's allegation. No amount of argument from Deputy O'Sullivan is going to fool the ordinary farmer. The Deputy's attitude from 1923 to 1932 was that the farmer who grows wheat must sell it at the world price and is not entitled to an economic price. When tariffs on industrial products were introduced, we had no suggestion from Deputies opposite that that matter should be dealt with by subsidies. In the case of artificial manures——
You backed that up.
I would back it up again in the morning and I would back up anything that gives employment here. We are not going to have Deputy O'Sullivan blowing hot and cold, saying at one moment that the farmers are badly off and in the next moment, when the farmer is getting the cost of production for his produce, saying it means a tax on bread. The farmer is entitled to the home market for everything he can produce. He is entitled to the cost of production. Deputy O'Sullivan protests against that farmer getting the cost of production directly. Under the subsidy system the farmer was paid in September a portion of the money for the wheat. If he was lucky, the following January or February he got the other quarter and perhaps in many cases he had to wait for it until May or June. This Bill fixes the price that the miller must pay directly for the wheat. It abolishes the subsidy system and I am glad to see the subsidy system abolished, even in wheat. The farmer should get the cost of production in his home market without any bounty or subsidy or anything else to keep it up. The sooner we get out of that, the sooner we will get away from the sneers of Deputy Dillon and the rest of them that we are pauperising and souperising the farmers. That is what Deputy Dillon has called this system that the Minister is now abolishing. This bounty is a souperising thing—that is Deputy Dillon's argument always—but we are now getting away from that.
We are seeing that the cost of production of wheat is going to be paid direct by the consumer. In my opinion, we, the farmers, are entitled to the cost of production for all that we can produce on our land. We are entitled to be paid that by the consumer. It is just as well to be straight on that matter. We might equally well say that it is very wrong for the teacher to expect a salary for, after all, he is only imparting learning to the young children and he should not charge for that. We are as equally entitled to payment for what we produce. It is all very well for the Deputy to say that the farmer should not get his cost of production for his wheat, but we will see that the farmer will get his cost of production. I am glad that under the subsidy system we have increased the production of wheat from 26,000 acres to 200,000 acres. We have provided the farmers with a market worth £2,000,000 to them and no argument can change that. A few years ago we had 26,000 acres of wheat grown at £6 a ton but we are going to have 200,000 acres at 23/6 a sack——
The Deputy should not——
We are seeing to it that the farmer——
The Deputy must not attempt to shout down the Chair. The Deputy should not repeat himself. He has repeated himself three times on this occasion and is now proceeding to repeat what he said on his first intervention.
I do not want to go over it. Repetition does not help the argument in any way. I just wanted to get this point—what we are doing in this particular section is to abolish the subsidy and to see that the farmer will get the full price of his wheat direct when he sells it, and let the consumer pay. We have no apology to offer for making the consumer pay the cost of production to the farmer for his wheat any more than we have sympathy for asking anybody else to pay the cost of production. The farmer is entitled to the cost of production and the sooner that gets home to the minds of the professional people in the country the sooner we will get down to bedrock.
I am puzzled at the opposition to this section. I am more puzzled still at the kind of arguments that are being used against it. Yesterday, in the course of the debate here, on the question of an inquiry into some gold-mining stunt, somebody suggested that it was a matter that should be discussed in a non-Party atmosphere. I think Section 11 should be discussed away from politics altogether. I am going to do it anyway, and I am going to give my vote on my economic opinion and on my outlook on wheat growing on this section. Perhaps the section is not the very section I would frame if I had authority for doing it but it approximates nearer than anything else I have seen or that has been suggested. Consequently, I will vote for it as the best way out.
Deputy J.M. O'Sullivan has been hammering home that this is a tax on bread. It is nothing of the kind. It is only paying an economic price for a necessary article of human consumption. I noticed that statements were made yesterday that it was giving a subsidy to wheat land and the question was asked what was it doing for mountain land. When one takes an acre of wheat land away from the cattle grazing one increases the economic value of the land left. That is sticking out. I cannot term the opposition to this section as anything beyond this—retaining for the wheat dumpers of the world this country as a free dumping ground for the surplus wheat on hands and the carry overs of the wheat-exporting countries of the world. The price purported to be fixed by this section will be around 23/- or 24/- per barrel. Before the wheat position became acute; before over-production began to show its effects in 1926 or 1927 the price of wheat was 11.06s. per cwt. That would be about 27/- to 28/- a barrel. I take it that that was an economic price, that is 2/- or 3/- higher than the price proposed to be fixed by this section. Now, if you had not dumping, the people of this country would have to pay more for their bread than they will have to pay if this section becomes operative. What is the objection to that? I am quoting from the Economist of the 8th of the present month:—
"Since long before even the world economic conference in London in 1933, the world's agricultural representatives have demanded measures to raise the price of wheat."
Then the article goes on and talks about other matters. The world is trying to raise the price of wheat.
There are three things operating in the matter of wheat. Amongst the wheat-consuming countries there is less consumption in the last ten or 12 years. New areas, the open spaces of the world, are being developed for wheat production and new countries have developed agricultural nationalism. The importing wheat-countries of the world in 1926 produced 999,000,000 bushels of wheat. In 1928, they produced 1,102,000,000 bushels of wheat; in 1932-33, 1,358,000,000 bushels; in 1933-34, 1,440,000,000 bushels and in 1934-35, 1,350,000,000 bushels, while the exporting countries were shrinking. The exporting countries have now 310,000,000 bushels of wheat on hands—surplus stock, and they would have more than that only for the drought of last year. They are looking for a dump for that wheat. Voting against this section is giving them the dump for that. It is not a question of voting for a tax on bread. It would take too long to elaborate in the course of a debate on the section all this material. Deputy Dillon said yesterday that he is going to let himself go on the Agriculture Estimate. If he leaves himself go on the wheat estimate, I hope I will be here——
There will be more there.
The country will be for the growing of wheat.
You will find that out sooner than you expect.
There were 11,000 voters in Galway against it.
Yes, but these 11,000 did not vote against the growing of wheat though they have changed on other matters. Every farmer in the County Dublin voted for the Deputy's Party, and I can say without fear of contradiction that I am voicing the opinions of every farmer in the Co. Dublin—and if anyone wants to test it I will meet him on any public platform in Dublin, Galway or Donegal before an agricultural audience—is in favour of the growing of wheat. I am not speaking politics. I am speaking economics, and that is what appeals to the country. I know that 60 per cent. of the Deputy's own supporters would vote for this section.
I wonder would the Ceann Comhairle let us debate the question of wheat?
I gave expression to these sentiments and opinions on the Second Reading, and I am prepared to debate them now with any Deputy, or any man in Ireland, in this House or outside it. The proposal in this section, as I see and understand it, is to pay an economic price for wheat to produce flour. There is no use going into fantastic figures. The most we will produce will be about 25 per cent. of our requirements. I would say, as a rough shot, that amongst the wheat-growing countries that would be a small percentage of their requirements, but no wheat-growing country or European country is growing less at the present time, perhaps with the exception of England. If it is good economics for European countries and for Canada, the Argentine, New Zealand and Australia to grow their own wheat, and see that their citizens pay an economic price for that wheat, what is wrong with our doing the same? The alternative is: "Do not grow wheat at all." Surely in opposing this section it cannot be the intention of any member of this House to want to offer an uneconomic price for wheat. I do not think that Deputy Dillon or Deputy O'Leary or any other Deputy is animated by such a sentiment as that. But before we reached this section we were committed to the growing of wheat, and unless we are to go back to what we did before, we have no option except to vote for an economic price.
It has been mentioned that the subsidy was souperism. That was afterwards more or less withdrawn. But I have no hesitation in saying that it is souperism—a price for producing an article that is uneconomic. If I were growing wheat I would rather have this arrangement than any subsidy. If growing for a market at home, saturation would not be reached unless we have 700,000 or 800,000 acres. The question was put yesterday: what are we going to do with the surplus? That will look after itself. When we get to the stage that we are growing a surplus the laws of supply and demand will regulate matters. If 100,000 acres is enough and we grow 150,000 there will be contraction in price.
And we can burn the 50,000.
At the beginning I quoted from a statement of mine made at an agricultural conference held in 1928. I then advocated the growing of wheat that would give us a percentage of home-grown wheat, and I put that as high as 15 per cent., but the percentage will settle itself. The Minister will find if he examines the statistics of the average yield he can estimate what the percentage of the total requirements of home-grown produce would fill the bill and he can fix his percentage in advance. If the percentage be 15, and if the Minister made an Order that there must be 15 per cent. of Irish wheat in the flour turned out here, the farmers can compete for that 15 per cent. There would be machinery available to see that the miller used not less than 15 per cent. of Irish wheat while the Order ran, and that would automatically fix the price. If I had authority I would fix no price. I would fix the percentage, and I would let the farmers compete. Then there would be no souperism. At the present time a farmer cannot wear a new suit of clothes but his neighbours will tell him that he got it from the State in the nature of subsidies. Give the people a chance so that a man can wear his new suit without being taunted with souperism and the dole. I think that would be a distinct advance on the policy of subsidy which is not good enough.
The whole policy of growing wheat is to protect this market, and to give agricultural producers a chance, and to protect this country from being a dumping-ground for the produce of the ranching countries. It is not a tax on bread—nothing of the kind. The price offered here is not up to the cost of production. I threw out a challenge yesterday on this matter. I feel very sensitive in connection with this whole thing, because I represent a city constituency in this Dáil and a working class area in the Corporation. I do not want to be taunted with taxing the bread of the people. If that taunt is thrown at me I shall be well able to defend myself. This is a quid pro quo. The farmer is buying his boots and clothes and farm machinery produced by city workers, and he has to pay a higher price for that particular produce. Where is the injustice, then, in asking the city worker to pay more for the farmer's produce?
Then it is a tax on bread.
It is a case of nothing for nothing.
Or tax for tax.
Or help for help.
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.
The Deputy has a very peculiar mentality. I am extremely sorry there is not a full opportunity of debating this matter now. I might ask —and then I shall pass away from it— what on earth can we produce in this country? We object to paying more for home-grown wheat. Why not for boots?
Because our cattle trade is taken away from us.
I am with you there, but I do not want to mix up the economic war with everything. I do not want to have it for breakfast, dinner and tea.
You cannot get away from it.
Order!
I went into this matter as far as anybody, but I cannot deal with everybody, and I must cry a halt some time. I am supporting this section obviously not on political grounds but, right or wrong, on the economic faith which I hold. The only fault I find is that we are not going far enough. In present circumstances, if we are to continue this little help for agriculture the guinea a week that Deputy Dillon mentioned will have to be paid and the economic war will be thrown in. But the country has voted for that. Deputy Dillon did a great service to democracy last week and the week before. He voted against a certain proposal and I voted against it, but if we are going to march in a democratic way and to assist the farmer to fight the effects of the economic war——
Let us hear no more of it now.
I am not going to deal with the economic war in any case. I am only explaining the circumstances in which we were placed. The farmer is asked to grow wheat on terms, and if these terms are rejected it cannot be grown. Then the farmer, so to speak, has nothing in his mouth. What can he grow or do that will bring him in cash? I feel, a Chinn Comhairle, that this debate is too circumscribed to proceed further.
Deputy Belton has forgotten the old adage that "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." It is no use describing this proposal by any group of polysyllabic words. It can well be described monosyllabically —it is a tax on bread. The Deputy admits that money has to be raised in order to provide an economic price for wheat.
I do not.
The Deputy admits that a higher price has to be paid for wheat grown in this country than is paid for wheat grown abroad, in order that our people may have an economic price for what they produce.
A higher price has to be paid for Irish grown wheat than for the surplus foreign wheat which is dumped here.
He can employ as many polysyllabic words as he likes, but it all boils down to this: that you are going to pay more money for the wheat grown in Ireland.
No higher than is paid in Canada for wheat grown in Canada.
That does not matter. Would the Deputy clarify his mind on the question? In order to carry out what seems to the Deputy a highly desirable reform in economic policy, money must be got from somewhere, either from the taxpayer, the farmer or somebody else. The Deputy says the farmer must get an economic price, and I agree. Then in order to pay that economic price we must produce the money from somewhere. Either it must be given by way of bounty or else given by the miller and passed on to the consumers of bread. This section is designed——
There is nothing in it saying that it must be passed on to the consumer.
Section 11 is designed to make it possible for the Minister for Agriculture to remove the burden of the subsidy from the central Exchequer and to transfer it to the shoulders of consumers of bread.
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy is wrong.
The Minister says it is wrong. It is nevertheless unquestionably true.
That is an argument on the Finance Bill, but not on this section.
Surely the Deputy will agree with me that the purpose of the section is to transfer the burden from the Exchequer to the consumer? It relieves the Exchequer of £300,000. We are to pay 23/6 for the wheat and the £300,000 must come from somewhere.
That is not the fault of agriculture.
Not at all, but it is going to come from the consumers of bread. My point, and the point made by Deputy Professor O'Sullivan, is that if you are going to raise money for purposes which apparently have been deemed proper by the elected Parliament of the people, you must make up your mind as to what section of the community you are going to take that money from. Deputy Professor O'Sullivan and I say that if the people desire this agricultural policy, it should be financed out of the Exchequer and the general burden of taxation apportioned as Dáil Eireann shall see fit. The Minister for Agriculture apparently sees that the people would not stand for the taxation necessary to finance this policy. We must, therefore, conceal it by putting it into the price of bread and by turning the baker and the miller into tax-gatherers. We say that, by doing that, you are restricting the impact of this taxation to the poorest section of the community, because the poorer a person is, the larger bread bulks in his daily ration. The richer a man is, the further away he is from the borderline of destitution, the less bread you find on his table.
I was proceeding up towards Temple Street, a couple of days ago, and I found myself walking beside a child going home to a tenement room in Temple Street with an oilcloth bag in his hand. We got into a chat and in the course of the conversation I asked him what he had in the bag. He said he had four 2-lb. loaves which he was bringing home to his mother, brothers and sisters to eat in their tenement room. It occurred to me that we were engaged in the pious purpose of exacting from that tenement family a tax of approximately 4d.—at least 4d.—on the contents of that bag. Those are the facts and you cannot get away from them. I am sure that many Fianna Fáil Deputies feel just as uncomfortable as I do about it. It is shocking that we should turn to these people, who are put to the pin of their collar to keep body and soul together, and ask them to contribute to the public purse, to the Exchequer. It is that which makes a bread tax so nauseating to responsible men in this country and every country in the world.
Every country does it.
That is the situation as it is at the moment. Deputy Belton will agree that 23/6 is not an economic price for wheat. If you pay the agricultural labourer what he is paid in Cheshire, 33/- a week and a free house——
I am paying more.
Then the Deputy is to be complimented. In Leix-Offaly 21/- is being paid.
And in Scotland 18/-.
I am informed that the rate for agricultural wages in Great Britain is 20/- per week, all found, and 33/- per week with free housing accommodation, the labouring man purchasing his own food. At 23/6 per barrel the agricultural labourer is to be paid 21/-. So far as my knowledge of the farmers of that part of the country goes, they have never been slave-drivers. They have always paid what they could pay. What I am warning the House of is that once you get well away on the wheat-growing experiment, the labourers producing this crop are going to become, indirectly, employees of the Government, because the Government, by fixing a minimum price for wheat, is going to control their wages. No Government and no Oireachtas in the world could stand for a weekly wage of 21/- for a married agricultural labourer with a family. Sooner or later this House is going to be forced to compel every Minister to insist that at least a minimum wage of 30/- will be paid to every common labourer working under the Board of Works or any other Government Department. When that stage is reached naturally an irresistible case will be made for compelling the farmers, who are to receive this minimum price, to pay their agricultural labourers 30/- per week. When you arrive at that stage it is not 4d. that you will levy on the bag of bread that the child carries home to the tenement family, but 8d. or 10d. upon it.
It is better than to be out of work.
I ask you if that levy is to be made that it shall be furnished out of the Exchequer and that this House will face the responsibility of apportioning it amongst the community as is just and fair, and not collect it from those who are struggling with adversity and destitution.
Is not bread consumed by everybody?
Everybody knows it is not. Every social worker you meet, every student of social subjects will tell you that the lower the social standard of the people falls, the greater the consumption of bread throughout the State. The lower a man's economic position becomes, the larger does bread bulk in his daily diet; the further removed he is from want, the less bread features in his daily diet. I think even Deputy Mrs. Concannon will agree with me on that. Deputy Mrs. Concannon, with the winning naïveté which is no small part of her irresistible charm, admitted yesterday that the attitude of the Fianna Fáil Party was that you would go on raising the price of wheat and contemporaneously raising the price of bread to finance it until the glorious time would come that you would raise the price of wheat so high that there will be a surplus of wheat, and then we would provide free bread for everybody and finance the higher price of wheat out of the 2d. we get from the bread. That is the kind of outlook that there is on those benches. Deputy Belton here to-day says it has been argued that if we raise the price of wheat sufficiently high the day will come when there will be a surplus. Let that day, he says, take care of itself.
On a point of explanation. I said nothing of the kind. I said that the ordinary operation of the economic law would look after that surplus; that when the producer found he had not a market for what he was producing he would curtail production.
There is going to be a fixed minimum price for wheat. What is going to happen is what happened in France. The Minister is going to fix a price of 23/6 now. But we hear Deputy Belton rumbling already. He says that is not an economic price. As I pointed out last night in the House. Deputy Belton when contesting the next election will contest it on the price of wheat. He will go out as the candidate standing for an additional price for wheat. He will be the candidate standing for a fair price for wheat. Somebody will say: "What is that fair price to be?" Deputy Belton will say "30/-." Then Deputy Donnelly will go up to Upper Mount Street and say: "Deputy Belton is rampaging in North Dublin for a price of 30/- for wheat; that means ruin if we do not face it." A very solemn meeting will be held, and the President will convince himself that the public interest demands that he should remain as President and that the price of wheat should be 35/- a barrel. Deputy Donnelly will be sent out then to proclaim that the price of wheat is to be 35/- per barrel. No doubt the Labour Party will then take the hustings and declare that they stand for the rights of the working man, and that 40/- per barrel is the smallest sum that will yield a decent living wage to the agricultural community.
That is on the official records from yesterday.
Dr. Ryan
The very same words.
The Deputy should not repeat himself.
I am not doing so, Sir.
The Chair accepts the word of the Deputy.
I wish to modify my assurance, Sir. It has been sought to rebut my arguments, and I am now putting them in another form to convince the persons who seek to rebut them. If you raise the price of wheat sufficiently high the whole country will grow wheat, and then the time will come when there will be a surplus of wheat, and that surplus will have to be disposed of somehow.
How?
You will have to dispose of it as France disposed of it, by taxing the community in order to finance the sale of that surplus wheat in London for one-third of the price which we paid in Ireland.
That is the price the Deputy wants to give for wheat now— the price of the dumped French surplus.
The Chair will not permit a discussion now as to the desirability of growing wheat at all. I have often described the whole thing as a fraudulent swindle, but I will not elaborate that now. I look forward to the Vote for Agriculture to explain its fraudulency and its swindle character. I am only discussing now what the section permits me to discuss, and that is what the burden of this is going to be, and where the burden is going to fall. I object to it even in its present form, on account of its incidence on the poorer section of the community. I warn the House that if they submit to a system of raising this money such as is adumbrated here that, great as is the burden now on the poorer section of the community, it will be infinitely greater as political pressure is brought to bear on the Minister to boost up the price of wheat, just as we heard from Deputy Belton and Deputy Corry. The wind is already beginning to blow, and that is why I am trying to warn Deputies of what they are walking into. When they walk into it, and commit themselves to it, it will be too late.
No political Party in the country will resist the pressure of the people who are growing wheat. There will be so many growing wheat at an inflated price that the unfortunate consumer will be exploited to the last degree. Eventually you will have, as in France, some extreme political crisis, and a joint Government will say: "To blazes with this whole experiment; whether you like it or not the price of wheat has to come down," and in the process of arriving at that stage inestimable damage will have been done, oceans of money lost which could be profitably employed, and the poorer section of the community are going to suffer. I should like to make a last despairing attempt to awake members of the Fianna Fáil Party to the criminal folly of what they are doing. The object of providing an economic price for wheat is, of course, to enable the farmer to get the most he can out of his land. We are fixing the price at 23/6 and we say: "To grow wheat at that price you will get the best yield out of the land that a man can reasonably expect to get." Suppose you have two varieties of wheat, and one variety will give you 20 barrels per statute acre.
Twenty barrels the Irish acre.
I agree. A ton to the statute acre was the figure mentioned by the Minister as the average yield last year. Take another variety which will give 25 cwts. to the statute acre, if such a variety were in existence. Surely Deputy Belton and the Minister will advise the farmers to grow the 25 cwt. variety.
That is my speech on the Second Reading.
That is sensible. It is said that a price of 23/6 will give a fair return. I would say to them: "Grow a variety of other crops, which I do not want to particularise; feed them to live stock, and then, with the money you get for that produce of the soil, buy 25 cwt. of wheat, and after you have bought it you will have a £5 note left." Is not that a better way? Will not farmers get more out of the land in that way than if they simply grow a crop which will only give 25 cwt. of wheat? I am asking them to grow a crop which will not only produce out of every statute acre 25 cwt. of wheat but, over and above that, a comfortable sum of money in hand with which to buy boots, shoes and clothes from Irish factories.
On a point of order. If this debate is going to develop into one on general agricultural policy, I will have to ask permission to be allowed to speak again in order to cover a wider field.
What I adumbrate is a far more important element than the actual element of yield, because the moment a farmer is making a profit out of a statute acre of land there devolves upon him an absolute obligation to pay a just wage to his labourers. That ought to be a first charge out of the profit that he makes. But no farmer making a fair profit out of his land would be justified if he only paid an agricultural wage of 21/- a week. Until you put the farmers of the country in a position that they are able to earn a profit out of their land, you cannot hope to raise the level of agricultural wages. That is the real object that we ought to have in mind in fixing an economic price.
For what?
For wheat. I am not trying to wriggle out of any obligation in regard to order, and I have gone so far only to prove that what is going to happen is, that heavy as the burden is now, and restricted as its incidence is going to be, as time passes the inevitable result of this legislation is going to be that the burden will grow heavier and heavier, and that this House will have virtually no control over it until a critical situation develops. Even then, it will be extremely difficult for any political Government to control the situation which it will have to face. The Government will have to resort to some such expedient as was resorted to in France when very grave difficulties and hardships fell on the persons who were growing wheat as a result of the Government's exhortations. The same results will follow here. I am not very hopeful of convincing the members of the Fianna Fáil Party, but it is right that someone should warn them as to where they are going. It is right that someone should protest against something which every decent democratic country in the world has resisted heretofore, namely, a tax on bread, and those countries have resisted that because it is the most inequitable, unjust and oppressive tax that any Parliament could enact.
The Deputy insinuated that in the countries where Governments have protected the home market for the home producer of wheat, by giving him a fair price on the home market, crises were produced. I invite the Deputy to mention one country where such a thing occurred.
The Minister to conclude.
Dr. Ryan
To use Deputy Dillon's own words, it is nauseating and disgusting, as the Deputy himself said about something else, to have to listen day after day to this political claptrap from him. Seemingly, the Deputy cannot discuss any question without bringing his low political mind into it to see what advantage he can get out of any particular point he makes. He repeated here this afternoon, almost word for word, the speech that he made last night. Surely he did not do that for our benefit because we were not a bit impressed by what he said last night any more than we are now. The only reason that I can think the Deputy had for repeating last night's speech is that there may be different people in the strangers' gallery to-day. There is neither rhyme nor reason in the arguments that he uses, nothing except political claptrap.
A showman.
Dr. Ryan
Yes. I might remind Deputies that the debate on this section has occupied much longer time than the debate on the Second Reading of the Bill. Of course, that is due to the fact that when the Second Reading of the Bill was taken Deputy Dillon was down in Galway doing a great deal of harm to his own Party.
What about the 11,000?
Dr. Ryan
I am sure that these small consolations are very welcome to the Party opposite at the present time.
We could throw you another 11,000 and still beat you.
Dr. Ryan
Deputy Dillon was not here for the Second Reading of the Bill and the debate on it ran in a more or less non-political way. The Second Reading was passed without a division because Deputies opposite looked upon this as an economic question, and, with the exception of Deputy Bennett, did not try to make any great political capital out of it. Now we have the position that when Deputy Dillon comes back to the House, with that political mind of his which he cannot escape from, he seeks to make all the capital he can out of this Bill and he divides the House not only on the Money Resolution but on the sections in Committee. He talks about the tax on bread. I do not know what is going to become of Deputy Dillon, although I have a fair idea.
The Minister is breaking his heart thinking about me.
Dr. Ryan
I will leave the Deputy to the mercy of the people. Deputy Dillon talks about the poor little boy going up Upper Temple Street with the four loaves in his hands, and says he will have to pay an extra 4d. because of the legislation we are passing here. What does the 4d. amount to? Fifteen shillings a sack on flour represents 4d. on four 2 lb. leaves. Does Deputy Dillon hold that this particular section is going to increase the cost of wheat by that amount? The Deputy says that we are paying 23/- per barrel for wheat, but that when the price is 30/- the increase in the price of bread will be not 4d. but 8d. or 10d. Statements of that kind give one an idea of the type of exaggeration that Deputy Dillon indulges in when putting forward his arguments here.
Did not the Minister for Industry and Commerce admit that to be the difference between the price of flour here and in Great Britain?
Dr. Ryan
Not 8d. or 10d. on 8 lb. of bread.
What I said was an increase of 4d.
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy then talked about what would happen when the bidding started between Deputy Belton and Deputy Donnelly. He said the price would go up to 30/-. But, I ask, what about Deputy Cosgrave, the biggest puffer of all? What would he offer? If you want a real puffer, get Deputy Cosgrave in because nothing will stop him, especially if there is an election coming on.
Is this a non-political speech?
Dr. Ryan
Yes. This is a speech pointing out the justice and truth of this. I never made a claim that this section was going to confer any benefit on the farmer. Despite what Deputy O'Sullivan may say, I never made the claim that the farmer would get any benefit under this Bill. The only thing that he will get under it is immediate payment. When he delivers his wheat he will get his 23/-, whereas at present he gets 17/- at first and 6/- later. Deputy O'Sullivan spent a lot of time trying to rebut an argument that was supposed to have been used by me, that the farmer was going to get a lot of benefit out of this section. The only claim I made was that the farmer would get immediate payment for his wheat. That is all that this section proposes to give him.
Does the Minister seriously deny that, when he was discussing this Bill with the millers last January, he arranged with them to increase the price of flour by 6d. per sack every fortnight, until they had increased it by about 17/- a sack, so as to conceal the impact of the transfer of the subsidy from the Exchequer to the price of flour?
Dr. Ryan
There was not a single word said to that effect between the millers and myself.
Has not the price of flour been steadily increased?
Dr. Ryan
The Deputy is now withdrawing from what he said a moment ago. I ask him to stick to what he said, that I discussed the price of flour with the millers. I never discussed the price of flour with them. There is about the same amount of truth in what the Deputy has just said as there is in many of the other allegations he makes. The statement that he has just made is an absolute untruth.
Does the Minister mean to say that his Department never suggested to them that the price of flour should be gradually increased?
Dr. Ryan
We never made any suggestion of the kind to the millers. We never discussed the price of flour at all with the millers.
I am very glad to have the Minister's denial, and I unreservedly withdraw my allegation in view of what the Minister has said.
Dr. Ryan
That is all right and we will leave it at that. As I was saying, the only benefit that the farmer will get under this section is immediate payment for his wheat. On the question of price, some Deputies say that the farmer is not getting enough and some say that he is—I do not know. The only way in which that question can be judged in the future is when we discover whether we can get wheat grown at that price. If we cannot, then I suppose we will have to give more. There is a consultative council composed of millers, dealers and farmers. That council has been consulted about the price. We have got general agreement at that council that this is a good price to offer, at least for the moment, and gives a sufficient profit to the grower. But, as I have said, that is not going to be the test. The test is going to be: can we get all the wheat that we want grown at that price? If we cannot, then we will have to give a fuller price. It is only a matter of opinion. One Deputy says he should get 30/- and another says he should get 35/-. None of these opinions is based on any sort of scientific formula. Costings are very difficult in one item of agricultural production. I was told that I objected to this charge being referred to as a concealed tax. What I object to is the statement that I tried to conceal it as a tax. I pointed out on Second Reading that the price of Irish-grown wheat would be passed on to the flour miller and the baker and would be borne by the consumer. I pointed out clearly that the consumer would bear the price of Irish-grown wheat in future and that there would be no subsidy out of taxation. I did not try to conceal that. Whether you call it a tax, a subsidy or an economic price for bread does not, I think, matter much. Whatever you call it, the consumer is going to bear it in future.
On the other hand, if this Bill is passed, there will be no trouble in having a bounty paid, if necessary, to the flour miller in the future. It would be paid direct to the flour miller and the farmer would get the full price for his wheat on delivery. If we were going to continue the subsidy, we would pay it to the flour miller-instead of to the farmer. But that can be done by a Supplementary Estimate. No legislation would be necessary. All any Government would have to do would be to bring in a Supplementary Estimate giving so much a barrel on wheat and the subsidy would be paid out to the flour miller. It has been suggested by Deputy O'Sullivan that it would be fairer to put a tax on bread and give the subsidy as before. Let any sensible Deputy examine that proposition. Where would you collect the tax off bread? Some flour goes to householders and some to bakers. You would have to take the tax at the flour mill and you would have to give the subsidy at the flour mill. What would be thought of any Government which would bring in a proposal that a tax be collected from the flour mill, passed through the revenue to me and then to the Minister for Finance and that that money should be passed back to me again and on to the flour millers by way of subsidy? Every Deputy knows that that procedure would be absolutely ridiculous. That proposal merely proves what I have already said, that nearly all these arguments have been used for political purposes and for no other reason. It appears to me extraordinary that Deputies should propose to divide on this section after allowing the Bill through on Second Reading without a division. Not only that, but Deputies divided on the Money Resolution, which is a most unusual thing. It has hardly ever been known to have a division on a Money Resolution unless the Opposition is out for obstruction.
Surely the Minister remembers himself and his Party voting against Money Resolutions when they were in Opposition?
Dr. Ryan
When we were out to do everything possible to defeat a Bill, but we preceded that by voting against the Second Reading. The Opposition did not do that on this occasion.
Look up the records.
Dr. Ryan
I am quite certain that we never divided against any clause unless we had divided against the Second Reading. This shows a change of attitude on the part of the Opposition. They allowed the Bill through on Second Reading, and now they come along with the strongest opposition. They voted almost unanimously against the Money Resolution, and now they propose to vote against this section.
Question put.
The Committee divided: Tá, 54; Níl, 33.
Tá
- Aiken, Frank.
- Bartley, Gerald.
- Belton, Patrick.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Bourke, Daniel.
- Brady, Brian.
- Breathnach, Cormac.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Carty, Frank.
- Cleary, Mícheál.
- Concannon, Helena.
- Corry, Martin John.
- Crowley, Fred Hugh.
- Crowley, Timothy.
- Derrig, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Doherty, Hugh.
- Donnelly, Eamon.
- Dowdall, Thomas P.
- Flynn, John.
- Flynn, Stephen.
- Fogarty, Andrew.
- Gibbons, Seán.
- Goulding, John.
- Hales, Thomas.
- Harris, Thomas.
- Kehoe, Patrick.
- Kelly, James Patrick.
- Kelly, Thomas.
- Kissane, Eamonn.
- Lemass, Seán F.
- Little, Patrick John.
- Lynch, James B.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Maguire, Ben.
- Moane, Edward.
- Moore, Séamus.
- Moylan, Seán.
- Murphy, Patrick Stephen.
- O'Briain, Donnchadh.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- Pearse, Margaret Mary.
- Rice, Edward.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Martin.
- Sheridan, Michael.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Traynor, Oscar.
- Victory, James.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Francis C.
Níl
- Bennett, George Cecil.
- Bourke, Séamus.
- Burke, James Michael.
- Coburn, James.
- Corish, Richard.
- Curran, Richard.
- Daly, Patrick.
- Desmond, William.
- Dillon, James M.
- Dockrell, Henry Morgan.
- Esmonde, Osmond Grattan.
- Everett, James.
- Holohan, Richard.
- Keating, John.
- Keyes, Michael.
- Lynch, Finian.
- MacDermot, Frank.
- McFadden, Michael Og.
- McGovern, Patrick.
- McMenamin, Daniel.
- Morrisroe, James.
- Morrissey, Daniel.
- Nally, Martin.
- Norton, William.
- O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
- O'Leary, Daniel.
- O'Mahony, The.
- O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
- Pattison, James P.
- Reidy, James.
- Rogers, Patrick James.
- Thrift, William Edward.
- Wall, Nicholas.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith: Níl: Deputies Bennett and O'Leary.
Question declared carried.
Section 12 agreed to.
Question proposed: "That Section 13 stand part of the Bill."
Does the Minister fear any evasion or how does he intend to enforce the minimum price? The minimum price will be paid by the miller according to the quality. I intended to raise this question on the previous section, but I can deal with it on this one. The quality of the wheat is determined by a certain instrument prescribed by the Minister according to certain regulations laid down. Who will actually decide the quality? Is it the miller? Will there be any check? Coming to the question of evasion, the Minister may remember that a minimum price was fixed for cattle. I have heard complaints—and I have no doubt the Minister has heard them—that that price was not always realised. Has he any guarantee that even if he fixes a minimum price the farmer is bound to get that price? I admit that if the miller does not pay the minimum price he will make himself amenable to penalties. What will the method be to discover whether there has been evasion? There is a question of a reasonable price for transport and other things which will undoubtedly open roads to evasion. Perhaps the Minister would clear up these points on this section.
When the Minister comes to clear up these points—I understand that complaints have been made—and I have no doubt made to the Minister —that a very grave difficulty arises about the condition of wheat as to cleanliness. Has the Minister considered it practicable to prescribe the maximum percentage of foreign matter that may be in the wheat, in order that it may be millable within the meaning of this legislation? Does he think it practicable to sample wheat and to ascertain the quantity of foreign matter in it?
Dr. Ryan
There was correspondence with some millers on that point as to what is "clean" and "merchantable," because these words occur in the definition of millable wheat in the regulations issued. We have not yet concluded that correspondence because it is not a matter that arises under the Bill but occurs under the regulations. It is extremely difficult to have any rule giving a definition of millable wheat. No country has been able to do that, as far as I know. You must use the words "merchantable" and "clean," and these are extremely difficult words to define. In the end it really comes down to a process of bargaining between the seller and the miller, if the miller says it is not good wheat, and not worth as much as another sample, and if the seller says it is. We have tried to fix up an instrument which is referred to as the bushel measure. It is admitted by millers, dealers and others interested that, on the whole, the bushel is the fairest basis we could adopt. They have all agreed that the bushel weight will give the greatest justice in any legal check we could possibly lay down. Now the bushelling will be done by the miller or the dealer, as the case may be; in other words, the buyer. Naturally, however, if the farmer wishes it, the bushelling will be done in his presence. I do not know if that is sufficient check, but there is this to be said also. Deputy O'Sullivan, for instance, mentioned the minimum price for cattle. I think the situation here is different, however. We fix a quota for the amount of wheat the millers must take, so that in the aggregate the millers must take all the wheat of the country and, accordingly, they will not be in a position to have an unnecessary dispute with the grower. They will be in the position of looking for their quota, and they will be anxious, naturally, to take any wheat that is reasonably good wheat. In that way, the seller is in as good a case here as the buyer, because the buyer is in the position that he must get it. Deputy O'Sullivan wanted to know if there was any question of appeal. I do not think there could be.
That was not my point exactly.
Dr. Ryan
We are trying to put the seller into a strong position with regard to his wheat.
The instrument to which the Minister refers is equally controllable, and it is easy to see what it means. Is it a question of weighing largely?
Dr. Ryan
Yes.
What I mean is that the ordinary farmer can know precisely to what class the wheat belongs?
Dr. Ryan
It is a matter of a direct reading.
There is another matter to which I should like to refer, and that is the question of the minimum price. Certain minimum prices are referred to here in the Schedule, varying from 22/6 to 24/-, and other prices according to the date. Can the Minister ensure that that will be paid in practice: that there will be no sort of paying back of earnest money, or some peculiar methods of computing reasonable costs on transit and so on?
Dr. Ryan
I forgot to deal with that point. However, as I said before, I think the seller is going to be in a strong position, in so far as he can say to the miller that he must take his wheat eventually and that, therefore, he can afford to hold out for the minimum price. At least, we have had a couple of years' experience of this kind of thing, not in regard to this particular matter, but where they were working on the bushel system, and I think there were no great complaints about it. Of course, under this Bill we shall be able to tighten the regulations so as to see that the bushelling is done in a fairer and more open way. With regard to the costs of transport, the miller must pay the price at the nearest railway station or port, and the only thing he can charge on is where he takes it actually from the haggard.
The farmer has his remedy in that case because he can find out the charge beforehand, and if he thinks it too high, he can deliver his wheat to the station.
Sections 13 and 14 agreed to.
SECTION 15.
Dr. Ryan
I move amendment No. 3:—
At the end of the section to add a new sub-section as follows:—
The Minister shall so exercise the power conferred on him by sub-section (1) of this section that no holder of a milling licence in respect of a mill shall be required by virtue of a compulsory sale order or orders to purchase in all in any cereal year an amount of home-grown millable wheat exceeding one-fourth of one per cent. of the home-grown wheat quota for such mill for such cereal year.
With regard to this section, Sir, I think I mentioned on Second Reading that, no matter what percentage we might fix—let us suppose 20¼ per cent. —we are likely to have some odd lots of wheat left on the hands of certain farmers after all the millers have taken their percentage. The purpose of this is to meet the difficulty in connection with these odd lots and to enable the Minister to serve an Order on a miller to take so much from a farmer. Some of the millers thought that, as this section was drafted, it was possible for the Minister to serve notice on them to take an unlimited quantity. The amendment is designed to cover that. We cannot compel any miller to take more than a quarter per cent. of his share of the national percentage of these odd lots.
Amendment No. 3 agreed to.
Section 15, as amended, agreed to.
SECTION 16.
(3) If any person acts in contravention of this section, such person shall be guilty of an offence under this Act and shall be liable on summary conviction thereof to the penalties mentioned in Part 1 of the Second Schedule to this Act.
Dr. Ryan
I move amendment No. 4:—
In sub-section (3), line 5, to delete the word "Act" and substitute the word "section."
Amendments Nos. 4 and 5 are only correcting amendments.
Amendment No. 4 agreed to.
Dr. Ryan
I move amendment No. 5:—
In sub-section (3), line 7, to delete the word "Second" and substitute the word "First."
Amendment No. 5 agreed to.
Question proposed: "That Section 16 stand part of the Bill."
On the section, Sir. The section purports to restrict a licensed miller in the re-sale of wheat. I suppose that the object of that is to prevent profiteering in wheat. Is it the Minister's intention to extend that restraint to wheat dealers in order to prevent profiteering in wheat by dealers?
Dr. Ryan
The object is not exactly to prevent profiteering but to compel the miller to mill the wheat. If any miller did buy, for instance, some most inferior kind of Irish wheat in order to get it rather cheap, thinking that he might afterwards pass it on for some other purpose, it is designed here to prevent that happening.
Suppose a wheat dealer goes into the market in October and November in order to make a corner in home-grown wheat, and the Minister has made a Quota Order on the basis of the total production of wheat; what would happen in that case? The millers then go out to buy their wheat and they find that wheat is not to be had at the minimum price. The dealer then comes out and says: "Well, you want wheat and I have got it, but my price is 33/-." The Minister himself has said that it is his object not to enable any miller to say that he could not get wheat at a reasonable price or to offer that as his excuse for being unable to fall in with the Quota Order. The Minister has so drafted the quota section that he can compel the miller to go and get his wheat somewhere and at the best price he can get it at. There is room here for an abuse which would injure not only the miller but the producer of wheat as well, and I think the Minister ought to consider whether he should not furnish himself with some kind of machinery whereby he could check profiteering operations of that character by middlemen standing between the producer and the miller.
Dr. Ryan
I think the Deputy will find that Section 11, sub-section (4) meets his point. The sub-section says: "whenever during any sale year... the Executive Council are satisfied that home-grown millable wheat is being withheld from the market by growers or registered wheat dealers generally, the Executive Council may by Order reduce the minimum price," and so on.
Very good.
Section 16, as amended, agreed to.
Sections 17 and 18 agreed to.
Is the Minister in a position to give the House any information as to the terms which the Minister for Finance proposes to sanction in regard to these loans?
Dr. Ryan
The Minister for Finance has proposed to the millers—I do not know if it is final—that he will be prepared to lend money at 5½ per cent., repayable in five years. I said on the Second Reading of the Bill that we did not want to make this money too attractive because we should prefer the millers to go to their own banks and get the money if possible. I know that some further negotiation is taking place in regard to that offer but I think that is the offer that has been made.
My information is that the Minister for Finance has offered to lend this money for five years at five and a half per cent., secured, not only on the new storing and drying plant to be erected, but also on the personal security of the millers themselves, and that, in fact, the Minister requires a first charge on all the property, which most of the millers would not be in a position to give. In addition to that, they feel that there is no obvious explanation for the Minister's refusal to extend the period of repayment to a period longer than five years. I suggest to the Minister for Agriculture that, as he wants to push this scheme through, it is very necessary that he should have the mills properly equipped so as to give the scheme the best possible chance of succeeding. I, therefore, suggest that he ought to make the strongest possible representations to the Minister for Finance that as most of these milling companies are solvent, he should go as far as he could to meet them (1) in the term over which they will be allowed to repay the loan; and (2) in the extent of the mortgage he would require to secure the money.
The probability of any serious loss accruing is extremely remote, but very grave inconvenience and delay might result from the Department of Finance proving too stiff in this matter, as a number of the millers might find it impossible to get financial accommodation with the banks and would have to consider floating issues on the stock market in order to get the necessary money to carry out the developments that will be required by the Bill.
Dr. Ryan
I think the Deputy will agree that the Minister for Finance should lay down conditions that would ensure security for any loan he might issue. As I said, these are the terms offered by the Minister for Finance. I am not sure that they might not be varied in some way or other, following negotiation, but, at any rate, the interest will not be varied and I think we would need to look for the best possible security for the loan. No bank, so far as I know, will advance the full cost of a building on the security of that building alone. They will require something more as security.
Will the Minister be prepared to say that he will press the Minister for Finance to extend the period for repayment?
Dr. Ryan
I think that request has come from the millers.
Will the Minister undertake to support that request?
Dr. Ryan
I should not like to say that straight off.
But the Minister would favourably consider an application to support it?
Dr. Ryan
Yes.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 20.
Where—
(1) seed wheat was during the period of 12 months commencing on the 1st day of August, 1934, sold on credit by a person (in this section referred to as the merchant) to another person (in this section referred to as the farmer), and
(2) the farmer on the occasion of such sale signed a document whereby he
(i) admitted that a specified sum (in this section referred to as the debt) was due by him to the merchant for such seed wheat, and
(ii) undertook to sow the said seed wheat during the said period, and
(iii) authorised the Minister to pay to the merchant the debt out of any wheat bounty payable to him in respect of the produce of such seed wheat, and
(iv) agreed that if no wheat bounty became payable to him in respect of such produce that the debt should be payable by him to the merchant, and (3) the farmer sowed the said seed wheat in pursuance of the said undertaking, and the crop, the produce of such sowing, is millable wheat.
Dr. Ryan
I move amendment No. 6:—
In page 11, to delete line 24, and substitute the following.—"is millable wheat, and
(4) the Minister has advanced to the merchant any moneys on account of the debt."
This section deals with the seed wheat loan scheme. I think I explained it on Second Reading, but it might be no harm to deal with the section for a few moments. We had a scheme whereby a merchant, who gave seed wheat on credit to a farmer and who got the farmer to authorise the Minister for Agriculture to pay out of his bounty, when it became due, whatever sum he owed the merchant, sent that authorisation on and the Minister for Agriculture paid the merchant what was due. As a matter of fact, we paid something like 50 per cent. or 60 per cent. in advance and the remainder when the bounty became payable to each individual grower, but where an individual grower did not receive a bounty, the Minister was not liable to the seed merchant. The seed merchants, of course, entered into an arrangement with certain growers in respect of the 1934 crop. If this Bill goes through, there is no means of collecting what is due to the seed merchant and this section, therefore, was put in to enable the Minister for Agriculture to take a lien, as it were, on the crop and serve notice on the particular farmer to sell to a particular dealer and to serve notice on the dealer to pay the price to the Minister, who will pay the seed merchant what was due to him.
Three conditions are set out as the section stands—that the seed was sold on credit; that the farmer undertook to authorise the Minister for Agriculture to pay the seed merchant out of his bounty; and that the farmer sold the seed wheat in pursuance of the said undertaking. These three conditions might be fulfilled, and yet I think we should not be liable in a certain case which I will cite. There is a certain case I know of in which a merchant actually got 50 per cent. on the seed when selling to the farmer and then sent to us to cover him for the remainder. We would not do that. The Department thinks that the seed merchant has done fairly well in the course of ordinary trade and that he would not have done anything better than getting one half down and the remaining half when the crop is sold. We do not think we should give any further guarantee in such a case. In that particular case all the conditions in the section would have been fulfilled and, accordingly, I want to insert this fourth condition, that the Minister had advanced to the merchant any moneys on account of the debt. As I have already said, where a merchant gives full credit and gives the seed without any cash, the Department has during the last two years given him half payment in advance. This particular man has collected half payment himself from the purchasers, and I think his case should not be covered. This amendment is designed to bring about that position.
Amendment agreed to.
Question proposed: "That Section 20, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
This is the section which provides that the Minister will pay part of the cost of the seed-wheat to those who distribute it to the farmers. Has the Minister's attention been drawn to the fact that a very considerable number of registered seed distributors have been selling winter wheat to farmers in the months of February and March, and inducing those farmers to sow winter wheat when spring wheat ought to be sown? Has his attention been drawn to the fact that a good deal of wheat failed and never came to maturity for that reason, and, if it has, has he considered taking steps to penalise the seed distributor who, having winter wheat left on his hands, fobbed it off on the farmer as spring wheat and induced him to sow it when it was too late for sowing such wheat and involved the farmer in the heavy losses of a crop failure?
Dr. Ryan
So far as the Department can possibly do so, they advise farmers to get a written guarantee with their seed. No doubt, it is not so easy to reach farmers in every case with these bills, advertisements and posters and, possibly, some farmers did not receive that warning. A number of them, however, did, and a good number did ask for a guarantee that the seed was of the spring variety. Where they had an understanding or a guarantee of that kind, they have an action against the merchant. We also went further in that we advised merchants to get some guarantee in respect of wheat imported from whomever they might be buying their wheat, because seed wheat mostly comes from England, and a number of them, I believe, did get such guarantees. In one particular case, in which a lot of the seed failed, there was a definite guarantee given that the seed was all right. In that case they have an action, of course, against the person from whom they imported. I think that in most cases, at any rate, the farmer is all right. He will be compensated if he has gone about the matter in a legal way, and got the wheat under guarantee. Where there is no guarantee, I do not know exactly where they stand legally. Perhaps I should not express an opinion on it, because I do not know the law. I do not know what we can do in regard to that matter. We have no power, as far as I know. It is power which, perhaps, we ought to have, and in regard to which we will probably bring in legislation. I think we should have more power over the seed merchants; with our present powers I think we can do nothing. It is a matter between the farmer and the merchant, and in turn, between the merchant and the person from whom he imported.
There is one thing which the Minister can do—a very effective thing—and that is where it is brought to his attention that a seed merchant had supplied a farmer with winter wheat in spring, and that in respect of that transaction he had got one of those orders on the Minister which has just been described, the Minister could refuse to pay the merchant and hand the money back to the farmer saying: "You have been made a fool of." Of course, the trouble is that if the farmer had been made a fool of he would not have been entitled to the bounty, because he would not have any wheat to sell, so I agree with the Minister that unless he gets legislation passed by the House giving him some control over seed merchants, he has little remedy against them. I suggest that he ought to seriously consider the registration of seed merchants, and the requiring of a certain standard of excellence to be maintained by persons who import seed.
That legislation would, of course, be general legislation?
Dr. Ryan
Yes: It would not relate to wheat alone.
Would not the Minister consider prohibiting the import of wheat into this country except under the guarantees which he has described?
Dr. Ryan
That is a good suggestion. I shall certainly consider it.
Let the Minister get no false sense of security. Deputy Curran may not see the snag in this matter. Let me give an example. A country merchant buys winter wheat in anticipation of a big demand. He cannot sell it; he does not get as big a demand as he thought he would get, and he keeps the surplus in the background. Now, he gets in a stock of spring wheat. Before he brings the spring wheat forward he brings forward the butt of his winter wheat stock, and sells that first. That is where the principal abuse lies. That is the abuse that will have to be got after. Do not let any false sense of security be acquired through prohibiting the import of wheat, because I believe there is very little abuse there. When you are dealing with a big seed merchant it will not be worth his while consciously to do a dishonest thing of that type. It is the small man, to whom the loss of a sack of wheat is a very big thing, who is tempted to pass it off for something which it is not.
My suggestion was that whether it was spring or winter wheat it should not be allowed to be imported into this country without a guarantee.
I wish to support Deputy Curran's suggestion. It should be obligatory on seed merchants to supply only guaranteed and tested seeds to farmers. I know of one district in my constituency which is very badly hit this year owing to "dud" seed. The crop is going to be an absolute failure on hundreds of acres of land. That is a very serious thing for those people, although it does not occur in many parts of the country— perhaps in not more than two or three in the Free State. In order to safeguard the wheat growers from having seed like this given to them by merchants in whom they have confidence, I would support the suggestion that none but tested and guaranteed seed should be allowed to be sold by the merchants to the wheat growers of the country.
The Minister can rest assured that any legislation which he may bring in to control the seed merchants dealing in any cereals, whether it be wheat, barley or oats, will be welcomed by the trade. It is quite true that those who have established a reputation for themselves with the farmers for having first-class seed only, always send their samples to the Department of Agriculture for a test, and they get a germination of at least 98 per cent. The report comes back that the seed is free from smut and such diseases as are an absolute calamity. Of course, there are certain limits beyond which seed merchants, even of the highest standard, cannot go. They cannot guarantee that the crop will grow. No seed merchant can do that, because there may be certain diseases in the ground, or some other pest which may interfere with the crop. The sending to the Department of samples of what is being sold should be insisted on, and would be welcomed by all in the trade.
Section 20, as amended, put and agreed to.
SECTION 21.
Question proposed: "That Section 21 stand part of the Bill."
There is just one point which, although it is a general one, I think may be raised here. The Minister has, in the short space of the last couple of years, produced what I call nearly a code in this particular matter. If he looks at the section he will find at least three Acts, and this is the fourth. I raise the matter here because it may as well be raised on this section as on any other, but if he looks through this Bill he will find plenty of other instances of it. He will find plenty of registration by reference, and penalties by reference. With those four Acts re-enacting, partially repealing and temporarily repealing one another, I wonder whether the ordinary businessman can know where he is in regard to all those regulations. Would it be possible to avoid all this unnecessary legislation by reference? I know that from the Minister's point of view there is a lot to be said for it in the matter of convenience, but I can easily understand the ordinary businessman in the country not knowing quite where he is, and I wonder whether the Minister might not issue a kind of official codification of his four Acts. I am not now asking him to codify the four Acts-and bring in a new Bill, but to issue an official codification in order that people can really know where they are. All this legislation, amending legislation, reamending legislation, and now amending reamending legislation is, as I think the Minister will acknowledge, calculated to cause a considerable amount of confusion and difficulty in the mind of the ordinary businessman.
Dr. Ryan
I do agree with the Deputy to a great extent, and I think that if we believed we were finished with this cereals legislation we would codify it.
I am not asking the Minister to be so optimistic.
Dr. Ryan
When the Bills begin to be less frequent we might codify them. The businessman is dealing mostly with regulations, and has very little to do with the Acts. It is with the regulations issued afterwards that he has to deal.
What a glorious commentary on Dáil Eireann! The Minister reassures us that the citizens of this State are really not concerned with the legislation of this House at all. The legislation of this House has really one purpose only, and that is to deliver the citizen bound hand and foot into the hands of the civil servants, and they deal with them. All the citizen need do, according to the Minister, is refer to the regulations. Those statutes do not affect him at all. Where are we going? Surely, the time is rapidly arriving when we can pass a law empowering the Minister for Industry and Commerce to make such regulations as he thinks desirable for the public welfare.
Dr. Ryan
That is the first good idea the Deputy has had.
That is really where we are heading at the present time, and that is really what the Minister for Industry and Commerce particularly would consider to be a highly desirable programme of legislation for any given session of Dáil Eireann.
Sections 21 to 26, inclusive, the First, Second and Third Schedules and the Title, agreed to.
Bill reported with amendments
Report Stage fixed for Wednesday, 3rd July.