Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Friday, 17 Jul 1942

Vol. 88 No. 8

Private Deputies' Business. - Pig Production—Motion.

Mr. Hughes

I move the following motion, which stands in the names of Deputy Bennett, Deputy MacEoin and myself:—

That Dáil Eireann is of opinion that the failure of the Minister for Agriculture to provide a fair price to pig producers has resulted in an alarming falling off in production, now inadequate for our needs, and which will inevitably fall far below our requirements in the coming months, and considers that in order to stem the decline of this essential industry and encourage maximum production under present difficult conditions more adequate prices should be fixed and guaranteed to operate for a considerable period, with less drastic regulations with regard to maximum and minimum weights in relation to prices.

I regret that provision was not made earlier in this session to give the House an opportunity of discussing this very important matter. Unfortunately, it is coming on at the end of a very long session, at the end of a long week and, one may say, at the end of a long day, and for that reason it possibly may not get the attention that it deserves. However, I suppose we ought to be thankful for small mercies when we have got an opportunity at all of discussing it. We were constrained to put down this motion because of the very grave and alarming position that now confronts this country not only from the point of view of the supply of one of the most essential foods for our people, namely, bacon, but also because of the vital necessity of preserving, as far as lies in our power under the present difficult conditions, one of the most important and valuable branches of Irish agriculture. I feel that all sides of the House will agree with me when I say that the best and most profitable system of agriculture, at all times, is mixed farming.

The marshalling of our resources under efficient methods for the purpose of securing maximum production must be based on one fundamental factor, the preservation of the existing fertility of the land and the building up of that fertility to a higher and still higher degree, so that maximum production shall be secured and maintained. Vital to this consideration, in my opinion, is the feeding of animals on the farm. That is more vital than ever now when we are being called upon to put more and more land under cultivation. Under a system of good husbandry the proper restoration of humus to cultivate the land is through the medium of farmyard manure. The pig, particularly on the smaller farms, plays an important part in the production of the vital raw material necessary for the production of grain and other crops and the succeeding grasses. On the smaller farms 75 per cent. of that valuable and rich manure—pig manure—is produced. Through the pig industry, because of the almost complete absence of artificials, the maximum production of good farmyard manure should be a primary consideration for the Minister's Department. I fear that under the strain of the emergency, the lowering of the fertility of our soil will have very serious reactions on our post-war production. It cannot be too strongly stressed that, side by side with more cultivation, we must have more in-feeding of animals on the farm. That is a matter which, in my opinion, is vital to the best interests of Irish agriculture, and it has not in recent years received the attention that it deserves. We are simply mortgaging our future in agriculture by the exploitation of the soil and by drawing on our greatest capital asset. I do not want to be misunderstood. I am not saying that drawing on that fertility can be avoided under present conditions, but the production of good farmyard manure would greatly help its restoration.

The possibility of prosperity for Irish agriculture is gloomy in the extreme if the views of the Minister for Agriculture are correct. He thinks there is no future for dairying and, with Canadian competition, no future for pigs, and, in fact, he is very dubious about poultry. I want to ask the Minister if he is throwing up the sponge, and if he is not prepared to make any effort to save those great branches of Irish agriculture. For ten years his Party has worked a policy of self-sufficiency. It appears to me to be an extraordinary situation that we, with a population of less than 3,000,000 people, with good arable land that aggregates about 12,000,000 acres, should have any food problem at all at the present time. I do not think we would have that problem if a proper organised effort, with vision and foresight, had been made. The policy that we have pursued has brought about a situation whereby the people of the country can now obtain only about 35 per cent. of their requirements in bacon.

In dealing with this whole matter it might be well to try to get a picture of the pig industry in its true perspective. In 1931 our exports in live pigs, bacon, hams, fresh pork and other pig meat amounted to £4,680,000. Immediately before the war the position was that our export of live pigs had disappeared and that we were exporting about 500,000 cwts. of bacon. With the falling off of imports of essential raw material for the production of bacon, namely, maize and other meals, that export eventually disappeared. In 1940, our weekly killings were about 21,000 pigs. The decrease in production still continued, and in 1941 the average was 15,916 killings per week, or in round figures 16,000 per week. That was the average number of pigs slaughtered in the bacon factories for that year, and represented roughly a reduction of 25 per cent. on the numbers slaughtered in previous years. Those figures continued to fall but not to any alarming extent until about the 1st February, 1942. In the last ten weeks for which I have figures, up to the 4th January, the weekly average of killings was 6,330 pigs. I think that does not represent more than from 35 to 40 per cent. of our requirements. I think the Minister said in the Seanad that at that time it would represent about 83 per cent. of our requirements.

Dr. Ryan

I did not say that. I said the amount of bacon being released for consumption was 83 per cent.

Mr. Hughes

Does that mean that there was some available in cold storage?

Dr. Ryan

Yes.

Mr. Hughes

The quantity in cold storage has now disappeared.

Dr. Ryan

Not altogether—almost.

Mr. Hughes

Almost. Leaving the amount in cold storage out of the picture, because it is only a matter of weeks until that is ended, the present position is that our supply of pigs is from 35 to 40 per cent. of our requirements. I think that is a very gloomy picture when we consider that this has been a very valuable part of Irish agriculture, particularly for the small farmers. In his analysis of agricultural holdings in County Cork, Mr. Murphy points out that on a number of holdings where he made an examination 20 per cent. of the income of the farmers was derived from pig production. In my opinion, in other parts of the country the earning capacity of the farmer from pig production will be far greater than 20 per cent. In Cavan, Leitrim, Monaghan, even in parts of the Minister's own county and in some of the poorer districts of other counties, like North Carlow and parts of Wicklow, the people for many generations have relied on pig production to a far greater extent than Mr. Murphy calculated for Cork—namely, 20 per cent. So that, if a great many of our people relied for their livelihood in the past to a great extent on the production of pigs, some of them on small holdings, I have no doubt, to the extent of 50 per cent. and if that is now disappearing, it is a very serious matter indeed from the point of view of agriculture, apart altogether from the national point of view of the supply of bacon. When you couple with that that the pigs on these holdings were a great medium for the supply of the necessary farmyard manure for the preservation of fertility, we come up against a more serious matter still. If that medium for the production of rich farmyard manure has disappeared on many small holdings, it means that it will have a very serious reaction on the future fertility and productivity of those small holdings from the point of view of supplying an essential food commodity. We have heard of people queuing up for bread. I wonder whether in the next week or so they will be queuing up for bacon. It is an extraordinary thing that in a country that has always been noted for pig production we are now unable to procure a supply of bacon for our people. It is an extraordinary anomaly that such a thing could happen.

The Minister, when referring to this matter in the Seanad, said that the price factor was not the ultimate cause of the decline in pig production and suggested that it was lack of the necessary feeding stuffs. I do not agree with that. Undoubtedly, the lack of feeding stuffs was bound to have a great effect on the number of pigs that we could produce; I concede that to the Minister. But I certainly believe that if the situation was properly handled the pig industry would not have declined to its present level. When you take the figures in the official returns with regard to oats, barley and potatoes and examine the problem from that aspect, you will find that we produced last year 684,000 tons of oats. Of that quantity, 33,250 tons came under the control of the Cereal Distribution Committee, leaving, roughly, 650,000 tons which had not come under their control. We produced 142,000 tons of barley, and 60,000 tons of that went for malting and brewing, leaving 83,000. We produced 3,689,000 tons of potatoes. There was an increase over the previous year of 571,000 tons. Apart from what came within the control of the committee, a considerable quantity of these potatoes was used for human consumption, but I suggest to the Minister that a very substantial proportion of the aggregate was consumed by animals on the farm.

When our economists examine the problem of price and get down to the price of meal mixture, they suggest, as in the report of the Pigs Commission, that it takes 4.10 lbs. of meal to produce 1 lb. of bacon and, I think, 5/5 per cwt. to cover other costs. In other words, to produce bacon profitably, the price of the pig ought to be five times the price of the meal mixture. If the meal mixture costs 24/-, the price of the pig ought to be in the neighbourhood of £6. I agree with that aspect of the matter, but there is another aspect from the farmer's point of view. I think this is what happened, and this is why I disagree with the Minister. Because it was far more profitable to feed cattle last winter, quite a substantial quantity of what was produced on the land, even potatoes, went into the production of store cattle. I know large numbers of farmers who fed potatoes to cattle for the first time last year. I am one of the number. For the first time in my experience I fed to cattle all the potatoes I grew, over and above what I required for poultry and human consumption. If the price of pigs had been more attractive, the potatoes fed to cattle by a great many farmers would have been fed to pigs, and a lot of the grain fed to cattle last year would have been fed to pigs.

It is not sufficient to say that you can get a meal mixture at a certain price and, if you relate the price of bacon to that mixture, and show a margin of profit, that is enough. The farmer is wiser than that, and he decides whether it is more profitable to feed grain and potatoes to cattle or pigs. Last year a vast quantity of that food would be fed to pigs if the price was made attractive. It was found far more profitable to feed it to cattle. We exported as fine a type of store last spring as was ever sent across the Channel. The animals were in excellent condition and they did not reflect any shortage of food. The stores exported last spring were as good as ever went through our ports. Quite a lot of these stores went out and we merely got credit for them. We fed valuable grain and potatoes to these animals and all we got was credit, and that credit may or may not be honoured—that lies in the lap of the gods.

It must not be assumed that I am condemning that situation, or that I suggest we should change the situation and no longer produce cattle for export. I am not suggesting any such thing. I am suggesting that the price of pigs should have been related in some way to the price of the cattle, because that would ensure that the farmer would be satisfied it was a good proposition to earmark some of his home produce for pigs instead of putting practically the whole lot into food for his cattle. I am not saying there would not have been a reduction in the output of bacon, but to a very great extent that reduction could have been counteracted by an examination of the problem and an anticipation of what the farmer was likely to do in the circumstances.

The commission that is responsible for fixing pig prices ought not to ignore all the economic conditions that a farmer is bound to take into account. The farmer has to balance his budget, pay his men and meet his bills. Although his patriotism is at times appealed to here, he cannot afford to be so patriotic. He must produce the things that pay him best. The Minister has a very big responsibility in this matter. I fear the problem was not properly tackled. No foresight was shown in the approach to it. The Minister got fair warning of the decline in the pig population. There has been a steady decline over a long period and some effort should have been made by the Minister to ensure that the industry was not going to be stripped to the very foundation.

The industry has practically disappeared. Not only are the sows cleared out, but the number of boars is declining. It will take considerable organisation to get farmers and others not only to stock sows, but boars as well. The Minister knows quite well that a man who was accustomed to keeping a boar, and has sold the animal, will be reluctant to get another. A man may easily enough get into the keeping of sows, but before a man takes up the maintenance of a boar he wants to be assured that there is some future for the industry and that people generally will be induced to get back into pig production.

In February last the price dropped by 6/- a cwt. Mr. O'Mara of Limerick City, at a public meeting a few weeks ago, described that as a calculated act on the part of the Government. Undoubtedly it was a calculated act to reduce the price of pigs by 6/- a cwt. It was deliberate, in my opinion. I suppose the Minister will tell us he thought that was necessary so that the price of pigs would be made unattractive and that there would be no temptation for farmers to feed wheat to pigs.

I do not want to go into the whole question again but it has been questioned very often here whether in fact there was any foundation for the charge that wheat was fed to pigs at any time, or that that was done to any extent. I would put it this way to the Minister—are we going to permit wheat production to overshadow every other branch of agriculture, to the detriment of some of the most important branches of agriculture?

Mr. Dillon

That is the Government policy.

Mr. Hughes

Wheat is a reserved food for human consumption at the present time. It cannot be used for any other purpose. It is the policy of the Government to reserve it absolutely for human consumption, and I suppose the circumstances of the time have forced that policy on us but is it not possible to co-ordinate the different branches of Irish agriculture so that one branch may not be developed to the detriment of the other? That is what happened here. The Government, in their anxiety to ensure the maximum production of wheat in this country, are going to permit the most valuable branches of agriculture to go to the devil, simply to disappear and not worry about them. The only industry that the Government and the Ministry can offer the Irish farmers and Irish agriculturists is the production of wheat. That is their only policy.

Surely the Minister is not going to stand behind the implication that he is unable to find ways and means to ensure that the policy of wheat production will not injure other important branches of Irish agriculture? He must realise that that is a disastrous policy for this country. It is a disastrous policy for Irish agriculture and for the country generally if in our efforts to produce wheat we must allow other important branches of agriculture to disappear.

The Minister acknowledges that the reason why the price of pigs was dropped by 6/- a cwt. last February was in order to safeguard the position with regard to wheat, to remove the temptation to feed wheat to pigs. We talk of the price of pigs dropping from 112/- to 106/-. We also have a grievance with regard to the price arrangement that has been operating for a considerable time and the classification of pigs. We can understand that, before the emergency, we were bound to have a certain classification of pigs because we were catering for an export market that demanded a certain quality, the best quality cuts, and we know that we were exporting the best quality and that the heavier type of pigs were mainly consumed at home. When that market went, was there any useful purpose served in adhering to that classification? I submit there was none whatever. Last January and later, the price for the first and second class grades of live pigs was 83/- and 66/- A 16-stone pig at 83/- is worth £8 6s. and a 17-stone pig at 66/- is worth £7. It means that the farmer who produced an extra stone of bacon had to take £1 6s. less for his pig. Surely there was no justification for that. It could not be justified at any time. We complained in this House time and again that people brought their pigs to a fair and, because the quotas of the local factories were filled, had to bring them home again and in the time that intervened between that date and the time they sold the pigs, the pigs got overweight and the farmer had then to take less for them. The farmer who could not sell his pig when it was 16 stone, and who sold it when it was 17 stone, suffered a reduction of £1 6s. in the price he obtained when he was really supplying an extra stone of bacon.

Even the people that we were supplying with bacon on the export market, the British people, found it desirable to increase their grading since food became scarce owing to the emergency. The Minister probably knows that the grading there is much heavier to-day than it was, and that in fact at any time, but particularly during the emergency, when a man produced a pig heavier than the desirable weight, the most he was penalised was that he had to take the price of a 16-stone pig for his 17-stone pig. That was the most they fined him. In other words, he had to supply a stone of bacon free, whereas here a man is fined £1 6s. for supplying that extra stone of bacon.

We suggest that that grading should be done away with altogether at the present time. It is admitted that it is easier to produce the heavier weight pig. When a pig ceases to grow and is fully developed and has grown the bone, muscle, hair and skin, it is cheaper and easier to put on flesh. That is obvious, but that is all the more reason why we should encourage the production of the heavier type pig during this emergency, when we find it very hard to secure the necessary food for the production of bacon. That grading should be removed altogether. If you like, you could limit it to a 20-stone pig, live weight, or even higher. Some people might desire that the limit should be higher, but I think if you aim at the production of anything from 16 to 20 stone live weight, and if you set the limit at 20 stone, if a man produces a pig heavier than 20 stone, if you want to penalise him for producing an over-heavy pig, he should not be asked to take less than the price of a 20-stone pig, but should simply be fined for the amount of bacon produced over the most desirable weight. In our opinion, the grading should be done away with altogether and, if there is any limitation to be put to the weight of a pig, that limitation should be fixed at a much higher point than it is at present.

I think the Minister referred in the Seanad to the fact that, because the Canadians were supplying very cheap bacon to the British at present, we could not compete. I agree with that. The Canadians, at the very commencement of the war, realised that their normal market in Europe for wheat would to a great extent be cut off, owing to the blockade and the position of the countries which were brought under subjugation by the enemy, and that they would have a huge surplus of wheat and maize. They decided to convert it as far as possible into pigs. They had the foresight to plan for that and they made a deal with the British to supply them with something like 7,000,000 lbs. of bacon per week, at a price with which we could not compete, but at least we should not be in the position of being unable to supply our own requirements.

I go further and say to the Minister that, at all cost, even if it is necessary to subsidise the exportation of bacon, it might be well for us to keep our industry going and to keep the foundation stock in existence so as to be in a position in the post-war period to expand that production. If we let it go now, when the emergency comes to an end, we may find it very difficult, or almost impossible, to build up this industry again. I think it not unlikely that, when the war is over, and with starving people in Europe, the Canadians may revert to their former policy of supplying wheat to Europe and may possibly go out of bacon production to a very great extent. If that happens, we shall get the opportunity again of going back into the market. We should bear that in mind and should plan for that sort of situation developing.

There is also the other aspect that there may be post-war difficulties, so far as the purchasing of our essential, our normal requirements, like tea, oil and coal, is concerned, in that we may not be able to use our sterling assets. Even looking at it from the most favourable point of view, that the Allies may win, it may so happen that the British may not be in a position to permit us to use our sterling assets there. They may insist on trade on an exchange of goods basis, and, if we are faced with a position in which we must secure our imports of essential goods and raw materials for industry on an exchange of goods basis, where are we, if an industry like the pig industry, a valuable industry which was always the medium of exporting goods in exchange for essential imports, disappears? That is an aspect which ought not to be lost sight of.

Reference has been made to the manner in which the bacon curers have been treated and to the recent prosecutions of bacon curers in Cork. I think the bacon curers have been very badly treated, have been scandalously treated in their efforts to keep their industry going and to keep men employed. They were forced to pay a controlled price and they found that, in many instances, they were unable to compete with the market prices offering. We had the position that pork butchers were free to buy bacon at any price. They were not subject to control and they were paying as high as 130/- and 140/- a cwt. Naturally, when the bacon curers went into the market to buy, they were up against that competition, and were unable to compete, if they were to observe the controlled price, and would be unable to secure supplies if they continued to pay the controlled price.

They were faced with a dilemma, and, in their anxiety to keep the industry going, and to keep men employed, they paid more than the controlled price. I do not know that we should be so deeply concerned about that when we appreciate that the price of bacon for consumption was controlled all the time, and, if they were operating within that control in abnormal circumstances like the present, the commission, I think, might have put the telescope to their blind eye. There are many more peculiar things than that happening, and people are permitted to get away with them.

As there are many other Deputies. including Deputy Dillon, anxious to speak on this matter, I do not want to occupy very much more time. I simply want to say that so far as this Party is concerned, we think the control exercised by the Pigs Commission at present serves no useful purpose whatever. In fact, actions taken by that commission in the past have proved disastrous to the pig industry, and notably the reduction in price which took place last February. I suppose we cannot altogether blame the commission for that, because they simply took a direction from the Minister and the Government. The factory quota, of which we have complained here time and time again, and on which the Minister promised to make representations to the commission, was certainly not operated in the interests of the pig industry, and at a time when transport conditions are very difficult, valuable transport and money were wasted in bringing pigs from one factory to another in order to try to maintain this quota. I, and many other people with me, fail to understand why there was so much anxiety about the preservation of that quota. We feel that there is no necessity for the administration of that provision in our present circumstances, or even in the circumstances which have obtained for many months.

In regard to price, the price of pigs in Northern Ireland to-day is about 132/- a cwt. dead-weight, and I personally cannot see that there is any hope of building up this industry again if we do not fix a price approximating to that figure. Our price ought to be at least 130/- a cwt. and we ought to cut out classification. That price ought to be available for any pig, up to a maximum weight, if you want to cut out the heavy pig, although the heavy pig, in view of the shortage of fats at present, might not be at all amiss. We feel that a price of at least 130/- a cwt. should operate in respect of a maximum of 20-stone live-weight and even higher, and we suggest that a long-term price ought to operate now and that if people are to be encouraged to keep pigs, if people are to hold on to the few bones of the industry that are left, the few scws and boars that are left, there should be some hope held out to them or some assurance given that there is some future for the industry. That needs to be done immediately because if the few bones that are left disappear, we shall have nothing to build on.

People are now in desperation not knowing what they should do, whether they should sell out what is left and clear out of the industry altogether. They want to get an assurance now, if they are to remain in the industry, that there is some future and some hope of prosperity and profit in the production of pigs. The Minister ought to make some announcement on that important matter at the earliest possible moment. There should be a long-term price fixed and that price should be adjusted, in my opinion, every six months according as the situation becomes more difficult or less difficult. An announcement during the period ought to cover, in my opinion, 12 months. If there is an announcement of a guaranteed minimum price that price ought to operate for the next 12 months. It might be reviewed in six months time so as to cover a further 12 months. The people then will know where they stand at least for 12 months and they can plan ahead for that 12 months. If that is not done, one great industry that has always been associated with this country in the minds of everybody the world over is going to disappear.

We were talking a short time ago about the conversion of surplus potatoes in four Northern counties and we voted £1,500 for the transport of potatoes from these four pig counties to the alcohol factories. It is an extraordinary situation that that provision had to be made. I assure the Minister that that surplus exists all over the country, that thousands of tons of potatoes have gone rotten on people who were encouraged by Government policy to produce a huge crop of potatoes, many of them without any intention of using these potatoes for animal feeding. Many of these people were not feeders and had no intention of feeding the potatoes. They produced the crop on the understanding that a profitable market would be provided for that crop. They have been sorely and bitterly disappointed. No attempt was made to provide that market. In fact, the market that would have been there, by people buying potatoes for pig feeding, was destroyed by the action of the commission and of the Minister last February when, at a critical period, and after a progressive decline in the numbers of pigs, the price of pigs was reduced by 6/- per cwt.

Deputy Dillon suggested to-day that there should be some limitation set to the purposes for which pigs should be used at present. I think that is a very wise suggestion. In fact, I would go even further. I do not know whether any pigs should be killed at present for pork purposes. Any pigs we have should be converted into bacon. We can do very well without pork. We have plenty of fresh meat substitutes for pork in the way of beef, lamb and mutton. During the present acute shortage of bacon I do not think that for some months to come permission should be given to sell pig flesh as pork. We want a very clear and categorical reply from the Minister on these matters. We want no equivocation. It is a very serious matter for the country. Bacon is an essential, staple food and from the point of our main industry, agriculture, we should know what steps the Government are going to take to preserve this great adjunct to Irish agriculture.

General MacEoin

I formally second the motion.

Mr. Dillon

Let us get this thing clear. The reason the price of pigs is at an uneconomic level is because Dr. Ryan, Minister for Agriculture, recognises that pigs are oats and barley. There is the key to the whole secret. Oats and barley are the feeding stuffs for pigs and, in the situation in which we find ourselves at the present time, the Minister for Agriculture is ready for the sake of the voluntary production of wheat at 50/- per barrel, to ensure that no other cereal will be allowed to compete, in its attractions for the farmer, with wheat at 50/- a barrel. It is for that reason that malting barley is being sold in England at 70/- a barrel while here it is being sold at only 36/-. For identically the same reason, the price of pigs must be kept down to an uneconomic level because if it is not, the farmers will sow barley, crush that barley, feed it to the pigs and sell the pigs at a good price. The brewers then would not get an ounce of barley at 36/- and the acreage under wheat would inevitably dwindle because it would be infinitely more profitable to grow barley and to feed it to pigs. Goodness knows, I have abused the Pigs and Bacon Commission enough in my day but, believe me, the commission have nothing to do with the crisis which confronts us at the present time. The crisis which confronts us at present is due solely to the fact that the Government want wheat grown at 50/- a barrel voluntarily and to do that they have got to make every competing crop unattractive vis-á-vis wheat. Get this now into your heads, because sooner or later you will have to realise it and if you do not realise it soon, it will be too late. There is no escape from that dilemma except to make the growing of wheat compulsory on every farmer with more than a certain acreage in his holding and take control off the price of barley and oats. I say in this House if that is done now, we can get enough wheat off the land of this country to feed the whole population without any imports.

General MacEoin

We are not dealing with the population now; we are dealing with the price of pigs.

Mr. Dillon

Within 12 months we shall have more wheat, oats and barley than are required to feed our people, and sufficient also to maintain a profitable live-stock industry. If you do not do that, you will be faced with a situation in which you will have neither wheat, oats, barley, pigs nor fowl. It is because you will not face that, you are in the difficulty in which you find yourselves at present. There is no reasonable price that can be offered for wheat which will make wheat growing in this country attractive as compared with oats and barley. That is an inescapable fact. You would want to give 100/- a barrel for wheat to make it an attractive crop as against oats or barley if pigs were allowed to reach their ordinary economic level at the present time, and if you pay 100/- a barrel for wheat you will force the price of bread up to a level which no wage earner in this country can afford to pay, thus starting an inflationary spiral the end of which God alone can see. Therefore, we may dismiss from our minds any thought of raising the price of wheat to a level which would make it attractive vis-á-vis oats and barley on an open market. There is no use in wrangling over our different views as to the best way to get wheat for the consuming public of this country prewar. The Government followed a certain line of policy, and we are all now committed to that policy whether we like it or not. Therefore, the only way we can get wheat now is off the land of this country. If we cannot pay a price which will make it an attractive proposition in the ordinary economic sense, we have to place on the land owners of this country an obligation to produce it as part of their duty to the community in consideration of the community's guarantee of their title to the land.

Now, I do not think it is sensible to go down into the congested areas and ask a ten-acre farmer to sow a percentage of his land in wheat, because I think the result of that would be to get an altogether undue proportion of land sown in wheat which would produce no crop at all. But, if you classify the farmers into those with 20 or 30 acres and more on the one hand, and those with less than 20 or 30 acres on the other hand, you can say to the men with 30 acres of land: "You must sow 5 or 10 per cent. of your land in wheat. If you are sensible men you will pick out the best acres of your land and put them under wheat. The vast majority of you will get a reasonably adequate crop, and it will be your duty to turn it over to the Government at 50/- a barrel. There will be a very few amongst you who will get a ridiculously inadequate crop, and the produce of that you will also turn over to the Government at 50/- a barrel. We recognise that that will involve you in certain loss, but there is a war on, and everybody has to do his part."

General MacEoin

On a point of order, might I ask how Deputy Dillon can relate to the motion before the House the speech he is making in regard to the production of wheat?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The motion deals specifically with raising the price to be paid for pigs. Deputy Dillon is rather going into our whole agricultural economy.

Mr. Dillon

Then you say to those men——

General MacEoin

On a point of order, there is another motion with regard to cereals to be taken afterwards.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy MacEoin has raised a point of order. He submits that the Deputy is going beyond the terms of the motion; that this motion deals specifically with the price to be paid for pigs, and nothing else, and that the Deputy is going beyond that and dealing with the whole economy of agriculture. I would ask the Deputy to bring himself to order on this matter of pig prices.

General MacEoin

If the question which Deputy Dillon is raising now is permitted on this particular motion, you are widening the motion very considerably, and dovetailing it with the next motion. Therefore, as seconder of the motion, I reserve my right to speak. If you allow Deputy Dillon to continue on those lines, you are opening a very wide field; there will be more than wheat in it.

Mr. Dillon

Then you say to those farmers——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Would the Deputy then be directed by the Chair in confining himself to the question of the price to be paid for pigs—that more adequate prices should be fixed and guaranteed to operate for a considerable period?

Mr. Dillon

Certainly. Then you will say to those farmers: "Any loss you sustain on the acres reserved for the other purpose can be more than made up by growing oats and barley on a larger acreage than you had originally intended, which oats and barley you can feed to pigs, if you can dispose of it in no other way, in the knowledge that the price obtainable for pigs is at such a level that oats and barley fed to them will pay you far better than they have ever paid you before. There is no limit to the margin of profit you can take. If you were in the habit of sowing ten acres of barley and oats previously, now that you have what you consider the unprofitable burden of wheat production on your shoulders sow 20 acres of oats and barley this year and feed it to pigs. The price of pigs is at a level which makes oats and barley profitable. If you do not want to stop at 20 acres of oats and barley, then sow 50 acres, and feed it to pigs. The sky is the limit. The more pigs you produce, the better pleased we will be. We are going to let pig production go up and up until we have so many pigs in this country that the competition between one producer and another will of itself determine the level of pig prices." All this thing about putting oats into one little division, barley into another division, wheat into another, pigs into another, and then having perhaps a hen in a coop in another division, is all "cod". Anyone who knew anything about farming would not go on with that absurd nonsense. Does anybody imagine that a farmer goes out with one oat in his hand to see who will buy it? He looks at a field of oats as something he will negotiate in its final form. He looks on it as no more than the raw material of his industry. A man making motor cars does not discuss only the price of screws. He is interested in the motor trade——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

And this motion deals only with the price of pigs.

Mr. Dillon

Of course, and does anybody imagine that the motor car manufacturer has no regard for the price of steel? Does anybody imagine that he comes along and says: "Motor cars are what I am interested in. I do not give a damn about the price of steel. I do not give a damn about the price of tyres or anything else that goes into the motor car"? What do you think is put into the pig? Pig? Do you imagine that the pigs in this country are fattened on bacon?

General MacEoin

Or on motor cars?

Mr. Dillon

Pigs are fed on oats and barley, just as the motor car is built with steel. Why can you not get into your heads that the reason why the price of pigs has been beaten down is in order, through pigs, to beat down the price of oats and barley? The Minister for Agriculture does not give a damn about the price of pigs, qua pigs. His concern is to ensure that oats and barley may not be profitably used through the medium of pigs. Until you change that situation you will never get a price for pigs. Why do not Deputies open their eyes to that fact? What is the use of talking about pigs, pigs, pigs, when the Minister's sole concern is to beat down the price of pigs through the fixed price of oats and barley? There is only one way you can get out of that dilemma, and that is the way I have shown you. Every Deputy in this House knows it is the only way to get out of it, but some of those sitting on the Fianna Fáil Benches will not advocate it because they want to save their faces, and some of those sitting on the Fine Gael Benches will not advocate it because they think it is a dangerous policy to say anything adverse to the “Grow More Wheat” campaign. That is foolish. The sensible thing is to face the truth.

Mr. Hughes

Is the Deputy not advocating the compulsory growing of wheat?

Mr. Dillon

The thing is to face the truth. Tell the people that the only basis on which wheat can be produced in this country is by compulsion. Nothing else will get the wheat out of our land. Nothing else will induce the farmers of this country to grow wheat except compulsion.

Mr. Hughes

There are other ways of inducing them to do it.

Mr. Dillon

There is no other way, except a price of 100/- a barrel for wheat as opposed to oats and barley. If you have an open market for oats and barley there is no way of getting them to grow wheat in this country if you do not raise the price. Those are facts, and so long as we go tinkering about trying to make skilful political manoeuvres we will plunge from one disaster into another as we have been doing for the past 12 months. The one basis upon which we can get wheat grown in this country is by compulsion. There is one way in which we can get pig production in this country and that is by making it profitable. If you make the production of barley and oats so infinitely more attractive than wheat can be at anything less than 100/- a barrel, then you will wipe wheat off the face of the country unless there is a statutory obligation on every farmer who has land over a certain acreage to grow it whether he likes it or not. That ought to be done now. Did Deputies hear what the Taoiseach said last night about the schemes he put up, and that the wiseacres said could not be carried out? The Taoiseach said that after ten years' experience he had made up his mind that the only mistake he made was that he did not barge through. The very warriors who say to-day that we could not do things are the very people who are in the black market. I know and every reasonable man knows that if we were living in normal times——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Will the Deputy remember that this motion is supposed to deal with the failure of the Minister for Agriculture to provide a proper price for pigs?

Mr. Dillon

Yes.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The price of pigs is a specific matter and can be discussed on this motion.

Mr. Dillon

Deputy MacEoin has a motion down about cereals and wants to do his stuff. I am sorry if I have jumped his claim, but he will be moving the next motion.

General MacEoin

I can see the case the Deputy is making.

Mr. Dillon

The Deputy will get his chance. This is a scheme to meet the emergency. Of course there will be difficulty and loss but what we want to avoid is acting unjustly towards any individual. The safeguard is to be able to say to him that if he experiences a loss, because of a statutory obligation, there would be a chance to recoup himself in oats, barley and pigs. A man could grow sufficient feeding stuff to fatten 250 pigs on his farm and as a result would be able to produce other crops and get extra output, not only by way of compensation for any loss he would sustain, but in substantial additional benefits which he could never hope to get unless wheat-growing was made compulsory. Pigs at the right price would give a profit. There is no escape from that position. Deputies cannot talk around it and make speeches. These are the facts.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy might keep the two motions distinct. I ask him to do so.

Mr. Dillon

I am telling the House the facts. Deputy MacEoin will get his chance and I am sure he will make a great hand of it. As to the classification of pigs, when we were trading in the London market we could not provide half the bacon it wanted. In Ballaghaderreen, Skibbereen and Kinsale not one customer wants the class of bacon that is wanted on the London market. As a matter of fact our people in rural Ireland like fat bacon. Most of the pigs that are offered for sale now are too thin and would not dress the cabbage. I remember cutting side after side of bacon to have it rejected by a potential customer. If I go to a bacon factory and ask them to send me five or six sides of bacon the price is 170/- per cwt., whatever the weight, but if I drive four pigs to a bacon curer, and one of them is 3 lbs. over the maximum for grade A, a cut of 20/- is made in the price. Is not that so? Let us not stop there. When the four pigs are slaughtered and the heads and hooves are taken off, if I tell the bacon curer that I will take eight sides of bacon he hands me an invoice for 170/- for the four pigs.

When I see Deputies shedding crocodile tears about the bacon curers I have to laugh. When I hear that the poor bacon curers are only anxious to keep their men at work, and that they are running around the country and spending their money trying to get pigs to keep the poor fellows employed I am inclined to laugh. I know these tough boys. There is nothing soft about them. It is not love for the workmen that makes them trot around the country trying to get pigs. As Deputy Hughes referred to the quota system being in operation I will tell a story about a certain firm in Waterford that could not fill the quota, and that with tears made strong representations about poor workmen being idle and that it wanted pigs to keep these men employed. The firm went to the Bacon Board and said that there were pigs within reach of Waterford that could be transferred. The tears then dried up and the boys in Waterford said that they had a factory in Sligo and that they would send the pigs there. The workmen in Waterford were then forgotten, but others became indignant and demanded as a right that they should get the pigs. They got them. All the solicitude and the crocodile tears about the poor unemployed part-time workers in Waterford vanished, but there was no relaxation of the solicitude to get a profit of £1 per pig for the shareholders of the bacon combine concerned. Do not talk to me about breaking of hearts over the unemployed workmen. I know these people too long. A large part of the misfortunes which afflict the bacon and pig industry to-day are directly due to the activities of the bacon curers for the past ten years. A great deal of the present misfortunes has been brought upon it by their utter folly. It is for us to clean up the mess as best we can. I do not go as far as Deputy Hughes in suggesting that grading should be done away with, on the grounds that it is wrong to produce heavy pigs. I do not think we should encourage the production of bacon heavier than 20 stone.

Mr. Hughes

I said that.

Mr. Dillon

We agree on that. I remember the time when pigs were brought to fairs when they were as big as young donkeys. Once a pig has reached maturity and begins to grow as big as a young donkey he has to be maintained on the ration. Therefore, it would be reasonable to consider fixing 20 stone as the outside limit at which a pig would be received in a bacon factory, and beyond that weight a severe penalty would be levied.

Mr. Hughes

Does the Deputy not agree that if a pig of 22 stone is offered, and if the price paid is only on 20 stone, that would be sufficient penalty?

Mr. Dillon

I would not care to give an opinion off-hand. I think there is a good deal in the suggestion of Deputy Hughes, but without mature reflection I would not offer an opinion.

I should not care to decide that finally until I had thought it over. I have the greatest respect for Deputy Hughes' perspicacity but, surely, he has not allowed himself to be bulldosed by Fianna Fáil propaganda. I was consternated to hear Deputy Hughes say that we could not compete with Canada in the production of pigs. If we cannot compete with Canada——

Mr. Hughes

At 90/-

Mr. Dillon

I am talking of postwar.

Mr. Hughes

I was talking of the present time.

Mr. Dillon

The Deputy said that we might find ourselves after the war in a situation in which we would be in hopeless competition with Canada.

Mr. Hughes

I said that Canada would probably go out of production, to a great extent, after the war.

Mr. Dillon

And we can get in?

Mr. Hughes

Yes.

Mr. Dillon

Then Deputy Hughes and I agree. It is customary for Fianna Fáil to tell us that this branch or that branch of agriculture is finished. That is so, if this country is to endure the blight of Fianna Fáil. That blight is sufficient to finish anything, not to mention agriculture. But, common sense prevailing, we can produce pigs in competition with any country in the world. I do not care to what level the price of pigs goes; let me import the raw material of pig-feeding, and I will produce pigs in Ireland in competition with any country in the world. But there is no use in asking farmers to produce pigs in competition with the United States if the farmers there are paying 20 cents per bushel for corn and we are paying 8/- a cwt. for barley. What is wrong in importing the raw materials of agriculture any more than importing the raw materials of paper, of boots or of any other industry?

Post-war, I look forward with confidence to bringing in as much cheap feeding stuff for live stock as is requisite, converting that into the product for which this country has been famous and exporting it with profit to the producers and with advantage to the community. To those who talk about competition from other countries, I say that, given the same opportunities, we can meet and beat them in the British market wherever and whenever they show themselves. Let us not accept the ludicrous Fianna Fáil imbecility of protesting that we are able to do nothing that other countries can do, that we are unable to do the things which we have been doing in past years better and more cheaply than other countries could. That doctrine is all nonsense. The Irish people, saddled with the blight of Fianna Fáil, are paralysed and hamstrung, but give them a good Government, an Irish Government, a Government solicitous for its own people and not for the political follies of the leaders of its Party, a Government concerned with the interest only of our own people, and we shall beat our competitors as we beat them before.

Telescope these two motions. There you will find the key to your difficulties. If you imagine that you are going to get Fianna Fáil to do anything effective to meet this situation before disaster overtakes this country, you are living in a fool's paradise. They have not the perspicacity to do so and, if they had, they have not the moral courage. Unfortunately, they prefer to preserve the Fianna Fáil face to doing their duty to the community as a whole. Nevertheless, it does serve a useful purpose to lay down lines on which effective reform can proceed, because, sooner or later, this Oireachtas will have to take the matter into its own hands and, despite the present Minister for Agriculture, do that which is necessary to secure an abundance of goods for consumption at home and for export abroad. Until we do what I suggest, far from having that abundance we ought to have and always had, we shall find ourselves confronted with something approximating to famine.

Let me conclude with this note of warning: I suppose I am free to say that the output of pigs will, inevitably, be affected by the output of potatoes. As sure as we are in this House, we are faced with a drop of at least 20 per cent. in the yield of potatoes in the coming autumn. Make your calculations in that knowledge, because that factor has got to be faced. That is nobody's fault. Weather conditions have operated, or some circumstance the precise nature of which I do not know has operated, over wide areas, to reduce the yield of the potato crop by about 20 per cent. Let us get that clear in our minds, find ways and means to achieve the purpose of this resolution and thus secure an adequate price for pigs and abundant provision for everybody in this country.

Mr. Bennett

As has been mentioned, it is a pity that we should come to discuss this resolution at the eleventh hour of the last day of a long session. The matter is, however, so important and the facts so intimately concern practically every section of the community that it was encumbent on us to discuss the subject here before we adjourned for a fairly long period. This shortage in pig production affects practically every section of the community — producers, consumers, bacon manufacturers and their workers. We have to consider what the causes of the shortage are and what action might be taken to improve the position. The scarcity of feeding stuffs has, I grant, been the chief cause of the immediate reduction in the production of pigs, if I may use the word "immediate" as referring to the past 12 months or so. Long before we had this aspect of the situation, there was, however, a gradual diminution in the production of pigs for other reasons than the scarcity of food. Deputy Dillon, in the closing portion of his speech, referred to the Pigs and Bacon Marketing Board and suggested that the board was culpable. In another portion of his speech, he whitewashed them. I say, as I said from the start, that the institution of the Pigs and Bacon Marketing Board was inimical to the interests of the producers. It seemed to me that the investing of a body such as the curers with the powers given to them by that Act, with practically no representation of the producers or consumers, would inevitably result in their arranging conditions and prices to suit their own ends. So they did, and I do not blame them. With the institution of that board came a downward course in the pig-producing industry.

Recent occurrences have strengthened the fears I held at that period and have held ever since. They more than strengthen the case I made against the board on many occasions here. In a recent court case, a prominent curer giving evidence on oath said, in regard to this particular matter, that he was paying more than the fixed price. In addition, he said that, openly and with impunity, he had paid more than the fixed price for a matter of six or seven years. The six or seven years coincided with the period of existence of the Pigs and Bacon Marketing Board. This particular gentleman was a member of that board for the greater portion of that period, and was responsible with others for fixing fair conditions and prices, as between the bacon curers and the producers, with fair consideration for the consumer. I praise his honesty, although, perhaps, I blame his discretion. He openly admits that, for seven years, he has paid more than the fixed market price arranged by the board. If that is not conclusive proof that an unfair price was being fixed by the board—unfair to the producer or to the consumer, or perhaps unfair to both—no evidence that anybody could produce could prove it.

Since then, we have had other bacon curers, in other parts of Ireland, brought up for paying more than the fixed price. The defence is that they are paying it to get pigs and so keep workers in operation. Perhaps that is true, but I have my suspicions. Like Deputy Dillon, I do not really credit that there can be such a number of people so philanthropically desirous of expending their time and money in providing work for others. I hope there is, but I do not credit it. I do not believe these particular gentlemen are the philanthropists that they expect us to believe they are. If they are at the moment giving more than they can reasonably be expected to afford for bacon, it is only an admission that the profits they have reaped in the last seven years were more than they should have been, and that they are now making restitution to somebody.

I said at the beginning that we have to consider the causes of the decline. I said that the matter of feeding has aggravated the position, and that it is extremely difficult to find a solution. The real culprit is the Pigs and Bacon Board, and unless and until that board is eliminated—horse, foot and artillery —there will be no resurrection of the pig industry in this country. I said that one of the greatest injuries from which the industry has suffered is the gradual elimination of the cottage producer. Pig rearing was not always a profitable industry for the cottage producer, but through pure Irish conservatism he clung to it, in ill times and good times. It was his particular method of saving, and whether it was profitable or not, it helped himself and his wife to put together a few pounds for the rainy day. He was accustomed to raise his pig and sell it in the local market, unhampered by regulations and control, classes, prices and grades; he could enter into a bargain with a buyer, irrespective of weight and condition; and it was a source of pride on his part to make a good bargain. He resented being compelled to adopt another practice later, and go into the factory with his pig, deliver it there without knowing what he would get for it, and be presented later with a docket describing the condition, grade, and weight, and the price he would get. Not every man—certainly not the small man—would put up with those particular conditions. They ceased to produce, and it is questionable whether we will ever get them back gain.

An analysis of the production of pigs in the past shows that the cottage producer provided the big proportion of the pigs killed. It was not always the large producer who filled the factories. In the elimination of the very small cottage producer lies, more or less, the great reduction in the last few years. As I said on another occasion in this House, it is rare, in travelling through the country nowadays to see two pigs in a labourer's house or small cottage. When the county councils were building houses, provision was made, in many cases, for a piggery, as it was believed that the cottager would rear pigs. They are not doing so now, and the piggeries probably never will be used for that industry, as we have killed it.

We must ask ourselves what we must do to bring it back. First of all, we must get rid of the Pigs and Bacon Board. To some extent, it has got rid of itself, as the evidence of the gentleman I mentioned has damned it, if anything could damn it. The admission by other curers that they are now prepared to pay more than the fixed price for pigs, and charge nothing extra to the consumer, is an admission that it is not an appropriate price—or else they are greater philanthropists than ever existed before in this industry. They are stretching the credulity of the people rather far, and I, for one, will take that statement with a grain of salt.

I suggest that the first thing the Minister should do is to wipe out this board—horse, foot and artillery—and then see what should be done to deal with the position. I suggest something on the lines of Deputy Hughes' proposals—that we should provide for a fairly long-term reasonable price. When I say that, I do not mean that we should arrange a price for a month, and then review it. I mean that the Minister himself, without the board at all, through his own Department, should fix an economic price for six or 12 months ahead.

Donnchadh O Briain

What should the price be?

General MacEoin

Does the Deputy feed pigs?

Mr. Bennett

Make it a good price. Necessity knows no law—in finance or anything else. The country wants bacon more now than at any period since we formed a Government here.

We have been told by various people that there are no fats. There is no margarine, and the ordinary housewife in Dublin finds it difficult to cook her food, and if bacon goes out, with the rest of the fats, where will these people be? Bacon is a necessity for the people of this country at the present time, and we have got to produce it, at whatever trouble it may entail on the producers, and on the Government to assist them. I suggest that the price to be paid must be such as will make the production of pigs economic and will encourage the producer. Deputy O Briain can put the price as high as he likes, and I shall not say no. Is that a fair challenge?

Donnchadh O Briain

Yes.

Mr. Bennett

I will leave the fixing of a fair price to Deputy O Briain because I believe that he is as much interested in the production of pigs as I am, and if the Minister is satisfied with that I am satisfied too, but I do not think the Minister is going to leave it to Deputy O Briain or to me to fix a fair price. However, the Minister has got to consider the question of what is a fair price. I have suggested 150/- or 160/- a head for 12 months. You can then see what will happen at the end of 12 months, and can review the price every six months afterwards. At any rate, some prospect should be held out to the producer that, when he has produced and fattened the pig, he will get a certain price for it: that he will know what he is going to get, and not be subject to these changes, at short notice, by the Pigs and Bacon Board, as to classes, grades, weights and so on.

Somebody said that there are three classes of pigs now, but in the early days there were two. First, you had classes 1, 2 and 3 for weights, but there was another, that is forgotten, but which we should remember because it nearly killed the industry. You had classes graded up and down for the pig itself as to quality, and then, when the pig went into the factory and was killed, it was graded also according to three qualities. A short experience of that procedure served to eliminate one of these. It is not dead yet in one respect, but as far as quality is concerned, it died two or three years ago. I remember having an argument with an inspector of the Department of Agriculture in connection with this very matter. He was trying to impress on people the necessity to grow pigs, and then he went on to talk about weights and grades of pigs. I asked him: "What, in the name of goodness"—as Deputy Dillon would say—"is the idea of having this business of three different classes of pigs? I never saw three classes or grades of bacon." He replied that he did not know, but a week or two afterwards I saw that, so far as the grade or quality was concerned, it had been wiped out.

I suggest that we should eliminate all these hampering restrictions on the production of pigs. Whatever about them when we had an export trade, and when the country to which we exported needed some particular class of pig, there is no necessity for it now when we want to produce pigs for our own people. Let us get away from what Deputy Dillon would term "codology", and fix such a price as will induce the producers to provide pigs. It would have the effect, perhaps, in addition, of providing the quantity of tillage that the Government and the people of the country require in order to produce food for the human population, and if there is a fair and satisfactory price arranged, it would probably pay the farmer to put in an additional acre or half-acre of tillage to provide food for the pigs.

The position of the bacon curers has been mentioned in connection with the factory workers. Now, I have as much sympathy with the factory workers as has anybody in this country, and so far as keeping the bacon factories open is concerned I would go as far as any other Deputy, but do not let us be faced with this trash that the bacon curers are prepared to pay an altogether uneconomic price in order to keep the workers going. They are not. They are prepared to pay that price, because it is going to pay them, and if they are admitting now that they can pay a higher price than that fixed by the board, without increasing the price to the consumer, then, in the name of goodness, let them do so, and do not be hauling them into court if, as a result of what they are doing, they are encouraging production. With those few suggestions, I think we ought to leave the matter in the Minister's hands, hoping that before this House meets again he will have made some attempt to solve what, I admit, is a very difficult proposition.

Mr. Fagan

This is a very important motion for the farmers and pig producers in the country. The position with regard to the pig industry in this country is that the people are getting out of the feeding of pigs, and I should like to review some of the causes of that. One of the chief causes, I think, is the uncertainty of prices. People, when they are buying young sucking pigs, are not certain of the price they will get when the pigs come to be sold. You have farmers giving £3 and £4 for sucking pigs, as they did last September and in the previous year, but when they came to sell these pigs later on, they found that there was a very small margin of profit, a margin of only £1 or £2. That has been going on for the last three or four years, and it is that uncertainty of prices that discourages farmers from producing pigs. They pay so much, and there is not a sufficient margin of profit when they come to sell. They have to feed the pig for four or five months, or six or seven months, and £1 or £2 is not enough of a margin of profit when one considers the present cost of feeding-stuffs.

Another thing that tends to discourage production of pigs is the giving of a high price for low-weight pigs, because when you encourage people to sell pigs at a low weight, it means that they have to pack them up with feeding, which is very costly at the present time, so as to get them in a certain condition for sale at that weight, whereas, if you had a price fixed for a high-weight pig, the farmer or producer could carry on the pig during its growing stage at a much cheaper cost. I remember that when we used to feed pigs—I used to feed them myself and we always had ten or 15 pigs—they were let out on the grass during the summer and got practically nothing else. Plenty of farmers kept herds of pigs and fed them in that way during the summer months, and the pigs matured during those months at a low cost. Then they were taken in, packed up with feeding, and ready for sale in a couple of months. In other words, there were only a couple of months during which their feeding cost was high. This scheme of giving a high price for the low-weight pig has done away with that sort of pig. I know—and Deputy Dillon said the same thing—that the ordinary people in the rural districts do not want this light pig. In fact, it is a rarity. What the ordinary people in the country want is a good, fat bit of bacon, to bring home, to put on the pan, and fry it for the breakfast, and grease the bread with it, and they fry it for dinner and supper also. That is done away with, and they have no fats now. This scarcity of pigs, in fact, is having reactions with regard to sheep in the country, because at the present time, if you go into any country butcher's shop, you will find that he is getting more and more sale for the fat old ewe. The country butchers sell a number of ewes at the present time, and that is the reason that ewes are now at a high price and getting scarce.

Pigs are getting scarce because the poor people in the rural districts, instead of buying bacon, are going into the butchers' shops in the country towns and buying this fat mutton. They bring it home and, by rendering it down on the pan, have it for their breakfast, dinner and supper. It is really a waste of food to be killing ten or 12-stone pigs. Farmers would not think of doing that when they want bacon for their own use. They will not kill a pig unless it is at least 20-stone dead-weight. I kill three or four pigs in the year and they are all up to that weight. They can be converted into yellow, fat bacon which becomes quite firm. It is lovely to eat. Bacon is being sold in the shops to-day and, when it is put on the pan, you will not get enough grease from it to cover an egg. The reason why many farmers are going out of pigs is because it is too costly to finish them at a certain weight so as to get the controlled price. If they were allowed to run the pigs in a certain way, to feed them on raw food for four or five months as they developed, and were then put on good food when being finished, production costs would be lowered and the quantity of bacon available would be increased three times. What is causing the scarcity of it is that the Government are encouraging the payment of high prices for pigs of low weight. The English Government are doing the opposite. They are giving the high price for the heavy pigs because they maintain that it is a waste of food to be killing pigs of low weight. They maintain that their system leads to a saving of food and is the better one for the nation.

Another thing that has led to the present situation is the uncertainty with regard to prices. In November and December last farmers paid high prices for young pigs, and when they came to sell them in February last they were faced with an Order made by the Pigs Marketing Board reducing the price of bacon by 8/- or 10/- a cwt. If the Government want to increase pig production they must fix a good price for pigs and there must not be any uncertainty about it. It should cover at least a period of 12 months. The present price of 110/- per cwt. is not an economic one. It represents about 1/- per lb. for bacon, but if you go into the shops you find that bacon is 2/10 per lb. That leaves too big a margin between what the producer gets and what the retailer is paid for selling the bacon over the counter. If the Government would make an Order that pigs should be up to 20-stone dead weight when offered for sale, and if a decent price were fixed for them at that weight, thousands and thousands of pigs would be produced. If the people were satisfied that pig production was going to be a paying proposition they would produce. I suggest to the Minister that he should fix a price for heavy pigs. If he does that it will encourage people to produce heavy pigs.

I think that the bacon curers should be compelled to alter their present method of curing bacon. If they did the bacon would not be so sweet to eat. The bacon they are curing at present, if not consumed within a week, will go bad. When farmers kill a pig they cure the bacon in such a way that it keeps for five or six months. The bacon curers should be compelled to do the same. If they are, there will not be so much food going to waste.

General MacEoin

This debate has ranged over a wide field. I notice that the Minister seems to be very anxious to get up to reply to us. This motion expresses the opinion that the failure of the Minister to provide a fair price to pig producers has resulted in an alarming falling off in production. That point was lost sight of by many speakers. Earlier in the debate I tried to keep the motion within that limit but, apparently, I failed to do that.

An Ceann Comhairle

Now?

General MacEoin

I am not going to go into that point or into all the arguments that have been made. I want to say a few things about the motion on the Order Paper. I heard Deputy Dillon talk about wheat and beet and several other things. I do not propose to answer him at this stage. I would like you, Sir, to take note that, if Deputy Dillon puts down a motion about beet or wheat, it will be discussed in this House.

An Ceann Comhairle

That is a matter for the Chair.

General MacEoin

He was allowed great latitude by the Chair. I will leave it at that. This motion affects farmers, cottiers and labourers, in fact every person in the country. It deals with the price of pigs and nothing else. We have put it down with the object of seeing that whoever produces a pig will get a fair price for his labour. Those of us who are associated with this motion are satisfied that we are not getting a fair price for the pigs we produce on our farms.

The Minister has established a Pigs and Bacon Commission. They know as much about the matter as John Brown knows about producing wheat—I will leave it at that. Here are the facts. I have fed my pigs. I want to sell them in the Longford fair or in the fair of Mullingar. I have got to the stage that I must sell my pigs for the price that I can get for them. I have to pay my annuity. The Land Commission will not give me much time and will send out their notices. I cannot sell my pigs and, therefore, I cannot pay my rates, I cannot pay my annuity, and I am left high and dry. I have to bring them home. I know there are bacon curers such as McCarrons of Cavan, O'Maras of Limerick, Dennys and so on. I have to take my hat in my hand and go to one of those bacon curers and say: "I have five pigs here to sell, will you have them?" He says: "No, our quota is full; we cannot take any pigs from you." I say: "What will I do with them?" and he says: "I do not know what you will do with them, but you can bring them back in a week's time or a fortnight's time." I have to bring the pigs home again and continue to feed them. Then the Pigs and Bacon Commission send out a notification that they will send representatives to a certain fair to buy the pigs or, alternately, they send down an order to some bacon curers that they must buy the pigs that I had brought in to them before but which they would not buy. That leaves me in the state of mind that I say to myself: "What is the use of my feeding pigs?" The result is that the pig population to-day is not sufficient even to meet our own requirements.

I should like to hear from the Minister what he proposes to do about this motion, keeping in mind what I have said. I go out with my pigs to a fair or market and I can get a certain price for them, but it will not pay my production costs. There is no use in my producing pigs if I do not get paid for their production. The Minister has made these Orders. I am perfectly satisfied that he has not consulted a single person who knows anything about the matter. He has consulted his civil servants. I would suggest to the Minister that there are strong supporters of the Fianna Fáil Party, such as the O'Maras of Limerick, whom he could consult as to the best thing to do and that then he would make no mistake. I would go further and suggest that there are Deputies from Monaghan from whom he could get the facts and that as a result he would be able to keep pig production at a very high standard.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy Hughes in his speech gave as one of the reasons why pigs were decreasing in number that it paid better last winter to feed cattle than pigs. I am only just putting that on record for the moment. I think we can pass away from it. I hope when the question of cattle comes up on some future occasion Deputy Hughes will stick to that statement.

Mr. Hughes

I will. Cattle paid well last winter. I would remind the Minister that I said store cattle.

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy suggested that meal at 24/- per cwt., taking five cwts. of meal, would mean 120/- for every cwt. of meat. Of course you can take that if you wish, but I do not think that we can afford to have a farmer sell his oats and have all the middlemen's profits come out of that oats before it goes to another farmer. Obviously, there must be some big profits to some middlemen if it is costing the feeding farmer 24/- per cwt. In my opinion, there is no use in trying to make a price for pigs that will enable that purchasing farmer to feed pigs on a profitable basis.

Mr. Hughes

I said meal mixture.

Dr. Ryan

We have to take the sort of mixture the farmer himself would have, that is the farmer who produces his own feeding stuffs. If you take a combined mixture like I myself feed to pigs, and also several other farmers whom I know——

General MacEoin

Did you feed them?

Dr. Ryan

Often.

General MacEoin

When?

Dr. Ryan

Deputy MacEoin said I did not consult anybody. I will guarantee that I have fed more pigs during the last four or five years than any of the Deputies on the opposite side who have spoken.

General MacEoin

I will take you up.

Dr. Ryan

What is more, I bought all the meal required for them during that period. I kept strict accounts in connection with these pigs and I made a profit on pigs during the last four or five years. Take a mixture something like this: 2 cwt. of oats, 8 cwt. of potatoes, and half a cwt. of meat-meal—I cannot make that much. less than half a cwt. If you like, you may add two gallons of skimmed milk per week and then take oats at 15/- a cwt., which would give a very fair return to a farmer growing the oats himself, and potatoes at 5/- a cwt., which would also be a very good return, and the meat-meal at the ordinary market price, say 12/- a half cwt. With the skimmed milk at 1½d. a gallon, that works out at 86/- for the ration, and that ration will produce 1 cwt. of meat.

That is a fair sort of ration to take if we are going to have pig production under present circumstances, when it is so important to have enough grain for human needs, and when it is obvious we can only feed pigs on odds and ends around the farm-a little oats and potatoes, and so on. On that ration the present price is not unreasonable. I am now merely arguing against Deputies opposite, when they say that farmers are losing on pigs at the moment.

The next point made by Deputy Hughes is one with which I agree to a certain extent. It is the point about grading. I do not agree with Deputy Bennett, who says, in a very off-hand way, that the whole pig industry has been ruined through grading, and particularly through quality grading. At the time grading was introduced we were setting out to compete against a very serious rival in the foreign market. Everyone knows that the Danes built up very big business for bacon in the British market by producing a uniform side.

General MacEoin

What the O'Maras of Limerick taught them.

Dr. Ryan

They were putting out sides to order, and it has been pointed out to me by Deputies on the Opposition benches, as well as by others, that pre-war, if a wholesaler went into a Liverpool store and said: "I want 1 cwt. sides of bacon exactly uniform and of 52 or 56 lbs. weight, with so much lean and so much fat," he could get them, because the Danes were catering for that market. We had to set out here, if we wanted to recapture that market, to try not only to get our farmers to bring into the market pigs of a certain weight, but to breed a certain type of pig. That was necessary at that time.

Mr. Hughes

I concede that.

Dr. Ryan

At the present time it is not so important, but I think Deputies will agree that we cannot drop it altogether. I remember Deputies on the Opposition benches suggesting that we should not slacken on our inspection of eggs and butter, even though England, at a time like this, might be prepared to take whatever we would send her, as in the last war; they suggested we should carry on and keep up a strict supervision, so that when the war is over we will be able to compete in the foreign market.

When, therefore, I advocate that we should keep some control over those things, I am looking to the future with some hope. Deputies opposite accuse me of having no hope for the future. If I had no hope, and if I were convinced we could never get back to the British market again, I would say: "What is the use of all this control? Let the factories do as they wish; let the farmers get back to the old, undesirable types of sows; let them produce fat and lean pigs and do as they like, because it does not matter." But we must keep in mind the possibility that we may be looking for a foreign market when the emergency is over.

I agree with Deputy Hughes on one point which I have examined recently. That is the point where the pig goes from one grade to another. At the present time the first grade ends at 1: 2: 7. If the farmer happens to sell the pig at 1: 2: 6 he gets a certain amount of money, but if the animal goes to 1: 2: 8 he gets less. I have examined that position to see if it would be possible to do as Deputy Hughes suggests; that is to say, that if the pig goes into the next grade, at least the farmer will not get less than if it was 1: 2: 7. There is some legal difficulty and I am having the matter examined. I shall try to get over that difficulty if at all possible.

Deputy Hughes and Deputy Dillon appeared to agree that there is some necessity for stopping pigs at a certain weight. They spoke as if there was no necessity for the fat pig. The Pigs and Bacon Commission stop at 14 stones dead, and Deputy Hughes stops at 16 stones dead. The commission are examining this point about grading and I am sure they will consider it from the point of view of certain Deputies who spoke here to-day. We might go higher on the grades and not victimise a person whose pig is between 14 and 16 stones. We might give a little more encouragement to that type of pig.

Deputy Hughes seemed to be somewhat inconsistent on one point, but perhaps I did not catch properly what he said. He attacked the commission on the grounds of wasting valuable transport in bringing pigs from one centre to another. Suppose one factory gets too many pigs, the excess over the quota should properly be transferred to the factory which may not get enough. I felt that there might be a waste of transport and, even though there was a legal obligation on the commission to adopt a certain course, I felt that they might get over the difficulty and not have the pigs transferred in that way. As a matter of fact, they did do something like that: they more or less agreed that they would leave the pigs at the factory by enlarging the quota somewhat. Deputy Hughes says that we treated certain factories scandalously.

Mr. Hughes

I did not say that. I said you were treating the curers badly by prosecuting them and bringing them to court.

Dr. Ryan

The commission brought these curers to court because they went far afield for their pigs and were paying greater prices than they should pay; otherwise they would not get the pigs to go a long distance. If you have a factory that goes outside the ordinary radius for pigs and goes into another factory's territory and pays higher prices, is it not obvious that transport difficulties arise? In view of the transport difficulty, I think the commission were quite right in trying to make factories stick to their own areas and not go outside them, and that, after all, is what they were doing.

General MacEoin

That is the point I am at. The farmer was there and had his pigs at the fair.

Dr. Ryan

That is a point we must come to, I suppose. The point raised by Deputy MacEoin perhaps arises there. Deputy MacEoin raised the case that has often been raised here before, that a farmer goes to the factory and says he has pigs for sale and wants to sell them to-morrow or the next day because he wants the money, and the factory says they cannot take them because their quota is filled but to come back the next week or the week after and they will take them. Deputy MacEoin wants to know what that man can do. In practice—I think I have mentioned it here at least a dozen times—whenever the Pigs and Bacon Commission have been got in touch with they have always got over that difficulty by telling the farmer to bring them in and they would direct the factory to take them.

Donnchadh O Briain

That is true.

General MacEoin

I am a farmer down in Longford—where am I going to bring them to?

Dr. Ryan

The farmer in Longford is a long way from the factory but whatever factory he was in the habit of bringing his pigs to he can still bring them there and if he is refused there he can go to the Pigs and Bacon Commission representative who is at the factory, tell him his story, and he can get in touch with the factory. What did the farmer do before the Pigs and Bacon Commission was set up?

General MacEoin

He could bring them to the fair and sell them at any price he could get.

Dr. Ryan

What happened was that the bacon factories said: "We cannot take your pigs at your price. We are getting too many pigs. We will take them at £1 a head less." That is what happened.

General MacEoin

He could sell them anyhow.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy MacEoin said a few foolish things in the course of his speech and I had the forbearance not to interrupt him. Deputy Hughes raised another point to which I must refer. He said that there was a surplus of potatoes which might be fed to pigs and he said that farmers who grew potatoes on appeal from the Government had now, some of them a big surplus of potatoes on hands and had no market for them and were disappointed. Perhaps I am not right in thinking that Deputy Hughes wanted to bring blame on the Government for that, but I do not think he has any right to do that because I defy Deputy Hughes to take up any local or daily paper dealing with what I said to the farmers when I was going through the country that does not show that on every occasion I said to farmers that they ought to grow more potatoes, that if they were not wanted for human food they were a great stand-by for animal feeding. I think it is asking too much if Deputies want the Government to regulate all these things. The farmer will make up his own mind. The great majority of farmers do make up their own minds as to what they will do with their stuff and they do not want the Government interfering at every turn. If a farmer has potatoes on hand, he makes up his own mind early in the season how he is going to dispose of them.

Mr. Bennett

And he was ready to sell them in February and would not be allowed.

Dr. Ryan

I am talking of potatoes. Deputy Bennett wanted to make the Pigs and Bacon Commission responsible for everything and he made the most popular speech that any uninformed Deputy could make for ignorant farmers and the Deputy did not attempt to do anything better.

Mr. Bennett

It was true, anyway— every word of it.

Dr. Ryan

I have a note of what was said. If pigs were dear, Deputy Dillon says, farmers would grow barley to feed pigs.

General MacEoin

Keep to Deputy Bennett.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy Bennett comes after Deputy Dillon. If pigs were dear, Deputy Dillon says, farmers would grow barley to feed it to the pigs and give none to the brewers. I do not want to dwell on Deputy Dillon's scheme for more than one moment. I shall just deal with one aspect of it. He says we should make wheat compulsory and then let them grow all the oats and barley they like and feed whatever pigs and cattle they like with it and have no control whatever on either pigs or grain. What would be the result? If there was a very high price for pigs, we would get more than we want and the surplus would have to be sold on the British market for 131/- a cwt. That would be no great encouragement to pig producers or barley growers. Deputy Dillon has an idea that he can solve this problem in a very simple way.

General MacEoin

The names to the motion are James Hughes, George Bennett and Seán MacEoin.

Dr. Ryan

The one objection that I see to this scheme is that I believe, if that were done, the first thing that might happen would be that farmers might feed their wheat to pigs. Of course, I know the members of the Opposition do not agree that any farmer did that at all. I do not say that it was done on a large scale.

Mr. Hughes

I said "not extensively".

Mr. Fagan

Did the Minister not mention wheatmeal in his ration for pigs?

Dr. Ryan

No; oats and potatoes. I did mention meat-meal. I say that if there was a very high price for pigs and if the farmer was compelled to grow wheat he might feed some of that wheat to the pigs. So that we would have to go a bit further in compulsory wheat growing and have compulsory collection of the wheat. I am not saying at all that I am against compulsory wheat growing. It may come to that but I say it is not as simple as Deputy Dillon makes it out to be.

General MacEoin

No.

Dr. Ryan

And there might be other difficulties arising. Certainly, what Deputy Dillon says, that whatever the farmers lose on the wheat crop they can make up in pigs, would not hold because, if every farmer in the country is going to lose as much as Deputy Dillon makes out on the wheat crop, every farmer in the country cannot make up on pigs because we would never consume all the bacon; we would have more pigs than we could use and the surplus would have to go on to the British market at 131/- a cwt. Deputy Dillon says, when the war is over, let us import all the feeding stuffs free and we will compete against any country in the world. I do not know whether we could or not. After all, it takes 5 cwt. of meal to make 1 cwt. of bacon. That means really that we would have to get five shiploads of maize from Canada against Canada's one shipload of bacon going into the British market. I think, if we had to pay for five ships against Canada's one, we would not be in a very good position to compete against Canada in that particular matter. I do not see very much good in a sort of machinery being set up in this country, having nothing whatever to do with agriculture, for the import of maize, to be fed to pigs, the pigs going to the British market and our having to pay a subsidy on that. If it is not linked up with our agriculture in some way it is not very much good to us.

Deputy Dillon talks about the members of this Party as being a lot of lunatics and imbeciles. I think there are 70 or 80 members of this Party and I am reminded of the old story of the woman who, when she saw the regiment pass by said: "They are all out of step but my Johnny."

General MacEoin

We have heard that story two or three times already.

Dr. Ryan

It applies in this particular instance.

Donnchadh O Briain

Very apposite.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy Bennett blames the Pigs Marketing Board for everything. If Deputy Bennett would look up the figures he will see that from the first year that the Pigs Marketing Board was set up, until 1941—there is a change now, I admit—the position improved. After all, the only way you can judge is by the balance of trade— whatever we got for our pigs and bacon exported less whatever bacon we imported. Taking that figure it went up every year from 1934 to 1941.

General MacEoin

Who said so?

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy can look at the figures in the library if he wants to.

General MacEoin

Who are the judges?

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy can look up the figures of imports and exports. I am not going to be the judge at all.

General MacEoin

There is only one judge, and that is the farmer.

Dr. Ryan

Is the farmer the Deputy is speaking for the sole judge, or the farmers that the rest of us are speaking for? We are not going to be ruled entirely by the few farmers in County Longford that support Deputy MacEoin.

General MacEoin

Take the farmers of Wexford.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy MacEoin got his chance of making a speech, and he did not do very much with it. Now he does not want anybody else to speak. The only thing in his favour that I see is that Deputy Dillon attacked him to-day.

General MacEoin

It is not a bad line.

Dr. Ryan

I say it is in the Deputy's favour. Deputy Bennett blames the board, but I ask Deputy Bennett to get the abstract of statistics for every year from 1934 to 1941—I do not ask him to take my figures—and he will see there that the balance of trade so far as bacon is concerned, improved every year. That is a record if you like, for the Pigs and Bacon Board. He wants to give the impression that that board ruined the trade, but the figures do not prove that it is ruined.

Mr. Bennett

What about their prices?

Dr. Ryan

Their prices were much better than they had been previously.

Mr. Bennett

Were they fair as between the producer, the consumer and themselves? That is the crucial point.

Dr. Ryan

Of course they were, because if the prices were not fair, the producers would have gone out of production. The fact that they went into production shows that the prices were fair.

Mr. Bennett

How is it that the curers paid higher prices if they were fair?

Dr. Ryan

I do not know what Deputy Bennett would want to feed pigs. He may look for a bigger profit than the ordinary hardworking farmer would look for, but the hardworking farmer I speak for was satisfied, as was proved by the fact that he went more and more into production. The fact that he did so——

General MacEoin

And got no profit.

Dr. Ryan

Surely he does not go into production to a greater extent, if he is losing?

Mr. Bennett

My point is that he did not get all that the board said that he could get, all that was there for him.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Every Deputy got an opportunity to speak on this motion and the Minister ought to be heard without interruption.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy Bennett can go to the library and look up the figures, but he is not satisfied, and he wants to make another point now.

Mr. Bennett

I made that point before.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Minister is in possession.

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy will not admit the facts. He talks about the cottier not being able to sell his pigs as he used to. He made a ridiculous point in that respect. Who stopped him?

General MacEoin

The Government.

Dr. Ryan

How?

General MacEoin

In relation to the man who bought them.

Dr. Ryan

The Deputy does not know what he is talking about. If he knew anything about the subject, the Deputy would know that any producer is free to sell his pigs wherever he likes.

General MacEoin

To whom he likes?

Dr. Ryan

Yes.

General MacEoin

At any price he likes?

Dr. Ryan

At any price he likes.

General MacEoin

And if they are bought, what happens then? The man goes into court.

Dr. Ryan

The person who sells them to the factory must get the published price, whatever it may be, but what became of the buyer which the cottier whom Deputy Bennett talks about had before 1934?

Mr. Bennett

He is not there.

Dr. Ryan

Why?

Mr. Bennett

Because of the Minister's regulations and conditions.

Dr. Ryan

No regulation interfered with him. If Deputy Bennett can quote any regulation which interfered with him, I am prepared to admit that I am wrong. The Deputy, however, makes a point which may be read in a local paper by farmers in Limerick who do not know what the law is or what the regulations are and who will say that Deputy Bennett is a great man; but, in fact, Deputy Bennett is talking a lot of rubbish.

General MacEoin

Is it not a fact that certain pig-curing factories were prosecuted within the last fortnight for paying a price higher than the price fixed by the board?

Dr. Ryan

That is right, and I have already dealt with that point.

General MacEoin

Is that a free market?

Dr. Ryan

What has that got to do with a free market? The only suggestion from the opposite side is that we should fix a price of 150/- or 160/-.

Mr. Hughes

No. I mentioned a figure of 130/-.

Dr. Ryan

I did not hear the Deputy say that. That is a more reasonable figure.

Mr. Hughes

I said the figure should approximate to the Northern Ireland price.

Donnchadh O Briain

Deputy Bennett said 160/-.

Mr. Bennett

Deputy Bennett did not suggest any price. He left that to Deputy Hughes.

Donnchadh O Briain

The Deputy said 160/-. It has been set down in the official records.

Dr. Ryan

Deputy Bennett would not like to name a figure below what the Pigs and Bacon Board would fix later on. I think that was his anxiety. What is really the cause of this decline? I propose to say what I think about it and if any Deputy disagrees with me as I go along, let him tell me where the fallacy is. The first point is that any small pig offered is bought— it is not brought home. The price of the small pig depends on demand. If small pigs are plentiful, they come down in price, and, if they are scarce, they go up in price. On what does demand in respect of small pigs depend? It depends on the supply of feeding stuffs the farmer may have on hands to feed these pigs, and on the number of small pigs offered. The price of small pigs for the last 18 months has been very good. I have returns which are gathered every week from fairs all over Ireland, and the price has never been below 45/- for pigs 12 weeks old and it has frequently been up to 65/-. This very good price was probably due to a scarcity of small pigs rather than a surplus of feeding stuffs, but at any rate the prices were very good.

The further point is obvious that every small pig offered at a fair was bought and put into fattening, so that there could not be any more pigs put into fattening no matter what the price was for the last three or four months. Whoever had feeding got these pigs and put them into fattening. Therefore, within recent months anyway, whatever we might think about a long-term policy, the numbers of fat pigs had very little to do with the number offered on the market. If we want to get an increase in pigs, the way we must start is by encouraging the farmers to breed sows. You must commence there; you cannot commence anywhere else. What is it that influences the farmer to put his sows to service? In my opinion, it is the number of small pigs. That is the big factor which influences him, and also if he has the feeding—otherwise he cannot do it. The price of small pigs, as I say, was very good since the beginning of last year but, in spite of that, the number of sow services went down every month as compared with the same month in the previous year. That was the position, although the price for small pigs was good. I think we might stop there and say that there must have been something to prevent the farmer from sending his sow to the boar. It was not the price of the small pig. The only thing preventing him from doing so was the uncertainty with regard to feeding stuffs. That was the big factor.

General MacEoin

No; the uncertainty of prices when he wanted to sell.

Dr. Ryan

The price of small pigs was very good all the time. Let us take the price of fat pigs to see what influence that had. The price of fat pigs was raised five times from the beginning of the war down to February, 1942, and every month during the period in which the price of fat pigs was going up, sow services were going down so that in fact the raising of the price of fat pigs had no good influence in increasing the number of pigs. In fact, the number of pigs was going to the boar was going down every month. The first reduction in the price of bacon pigs since the war started was in February, 1942. A rather peculiar feature, although I do not claim it is connected with the reduction in the price, was that the next month, March, was the first month for two years where sow services increased as compared with the corresponding month of the previous year. I am not asking Deputies to believe that that was due to the reduction in the price of pigs, but it is a rather peculiar thing that the price of fat pigs was reduced in February, and that the first time there was any increase in sow services since the war started was in March. That increase has been going on since. Now, the fact is that we are short of bacon and I think we have to face the fact that we are short of bacon because we have no feeding to give pigs. Some farmers may have a surplus of potatoes, but I do not know of any farmer who has oats and barley to spare to feed to animals. That we did not breed so many pigs may be entirely attributed to the fact that we had no feeding stuffs for them.

Coming back to the question of sow services, we get these figures from the country and though they are not complete, they are a very reliable index of how things are going. If we place the same reliance on these figures as we did in the past I think we may look forward to an improvement in the position in September. There should be more pigs offered to the factories by that time and there will be a fair number of pigs available until after Christmas. We should at least have enough bacon for home consumption at that time, but then supplies will fall again during the spring months and we may not look for another improvement until we reach the corresponding period next year.

Mr. Fagan

Do the records show whether the sow services increased at the same period in previous years?

Dr. Ryan

No; they were going down practically since the war started. That, I think, was due to the fear of not having feeding stuffs and the price of fat pigs did not influence the situation in any way. I think it is due to the fact that farmers had greater hopes of the coming harvest that they began to put sows back to service in March and the number is still on the increase. If we could guarantee that we would have enough feeding stuffs for the coming winter, I think the number would increase still further, but that is a thing we cannot guarantee. Every Deputy has the figures in regard to the area under barley, wheat and oats. We must make sure, first of all, that we have enough wheat for human consumption. We cannot have a scarcity of bread above all things. We must also have enough seed for the coming year and, if possible, carry over a small amount of wheat to the following year. If we could cut out imports it would be a great thing as it would leave shipping free for the transport of other commodities including farm requisites. After that there would be no objection I am sure to anybody using grain for pig feeding.

I think, as I say, the situation is on the up-grade. We are passing through a rather bad month at present as far as bacon supplies are concerned. That shortage is likely to continue for the month of August. After that, we shall not be so badly off until, say, February or March, when we shall have another three months when supplies will be just as bad as they are at the moment. For the month of June we had 83 per cent. of the consumption in June of last year. For the present month we have 60 per cent. and for the next month it will be down to 50 per cent. Probably it will improve from that on. That is the position at the moment. If however, we overshoot the mark, and produce too many pigs, we shall get a very poor return for them on the British market.

I want to say in conclusion that we have all these things under active consideration. In my opinion there are three different questions involved. There is the immediate question of making the best use of the pigs and bacon we have. That is a matter about which we shall have to do something in the very near future, that is to say, to see that the pigs are distributed as equitably as possible, taking into account the difficulties of transport, etc., amongst the factories, and that the factories in turn will distribute their bacon as equitably as possible amongst wholesalers and retailers, giving a preference, if you like, to the country consumer. That is the immediate problem. It is being considered at the moment, and we hope that we may be in a position to make a statement in reference to it in the course of a week or two. The second thing is that we should as far as possible try to produce enough bacon for ourselves while the war lasts. If we were sure that feeding-stuffs would be available, we could do that. I am a little bit hesitant about encouraging pig production even yet. We have the acreage all right, but some people fear that the oat crop and the barley crop will not be as good as last year in some parts of the country. Deputy Dillon has stated that in certain parts of the country the potato crops will not be as good. We want to see how the crops will turn out before we can definitely say to the people that they should go ahead and produce more pigs. As soon as possible we shall take a decision on that. Lastly, we are trying at the same time to make the best shot we can at what is going to be the post-war position.

General MacEoin

Is it only a shot?

Dr. Ryan

That is as much as anybody can do. We are having the position examined as well as the likely position of other agricultural products when the war is over. I should like to put it to Deputies that we should not take any step in the way of doing away entirely with grading or doing away with the Livestock Breeding Act, as it applies to pigs. We want to keep all these regulations in force so that, if there is a market when the war is over, we shall be in a position to take the best advantage of it.

Mr. Hughes

There are a few matters with reference to Deputy Dillon's speech to which I should like to refer. Unfortunately — I think deliberately and of malice aforethought—he telescoped the two motions into one because he was anxious to get away from the House and anxious, probably, to go home after a busy week. He talked a lot about wheat, oats and barley. I have a great admiration for Deputy Dillon's power of expressing his ideas. I think he is gifted in that way. I think there is no Deputy in the House capable of doing it better than he. He is capable of pontificating in a very dogmatic fashion, and possibly to those who are ignorant of the facts with which he is dealing, he may sound convincing. But he certainly did not convince me, and it appears that he did not convince the Minister, when he talked about a free market for oats and barley. I object to control possibly as much as Deputy Dillon. Because we believe in freedom —we talk enough about freedom in this House—we all object to control, but. under present conditions, when we control in one direction we must regiment in another. Here is the position in a nutshell, and to my mind it is the most effective answer to Deputy Dillon.

He asked that the control be taken off oats and barley. That might work out all right if you could keep out the speculators, the gamblers, but the moment you say that there is a good supply of oats and barley in the country, that it is required for human and animal food, and that there are no means of importing any substitutes such as maize, the man who is anxious to speculate and to make money out of that situation will immediately jump in and corner all the oats and barley he can get. A number of those individuals might do that, and corner a considerable quantity of our supplies of oats and barley. Then they could simply sit on top of that heap of oats and barley until somebody came along begging for supplies. That sort of speculation would simply force the price up until it would hit the ceiling. In order to prevent that, you must have some control. You must put some ceiling on, so that the price cannot go beyond that level. In present circumstances, I think any reasonable Deputy must agree to that.

Deputy Dillon, too, talked about the compulsory growing of wheat, but I think we had better leave that matter over until we come to the other motion. He talked about the price of barley. Evidently, he does not know the history of barley growing in England in the last couple of years. I know he is aware that the price of barley, at the end of this season, went as high as £7 or £8 a barrel, £16 a quarter, but there were reasons which contributed to that; it was not that the British Government fixed that price. It was because in the previous year the British Government, realising the shipping problems and the necessity for supplying that vital food, wheat, concentrated on wheat production and ignored the supply of barley for their essential purposes, mainly for stimulants. Early this year there was a growing shortage of stimulants and certain of the defence services were kicking up a row. The naval authorities said that men could not be expected to face the perils of the sea without stimulants, and that stimulants would have to be supplied at all costs.

The result was that any barley which was available in any part of England was bid for, and those high prices were offered—as much as £7 and £8 a barrel. This year, the British Ministry have fixed the price of barley at £3 10s. per barrel, but there is a controlled acreage. The acreage is limited. If a man is permitted to grow a certain acreage of barley, side by side with that he must grow a certain acreage of wheat. His acreage is controlled by local committees. However, I think that too is a matter which we might more profitably discuss on the other motion, with your permission.

The Minister, in replying to the speeches that were made on this motion, at one time got very hot under the collar. I do not think there was any justification for that. We came in here to assist him in a very difficult situation; to point out, as it is our duty to point out, that a very valuable industry is rapidly disappearing, and that something should be done about it. The one point with which the motion specifically deals, that is the question of price, was not in fact referred to by the Minister at all. I am sorry that he kept away from it. I do not know whether it was deliberate on his part; he probably overlooked it. He did deal with many other aspects of the problem. He dealt with a certain feed, a mixture of 2 cwts. of oats. 8 cwts. of potatoes, 1/2 cwt. of meat-meal, with some skimmed milk. I think he said that that worked out at about 80/-.

Dr. Ryan

86/- for the whole lot.

Mr. Hughes

He went on to show that that was profitable; that you could feed pigs profitably on that mixture. I went to some trouble to point out to the Minister that, in dealing with a mixture for pig-feeding purposes, you cannot ignore the fact that it is profitable to feed cattle at the present time, store cattle particularly. The Minister thought he had caught me out when I mentioned cattle, but I specifically referred to store cattle. The Minister knows that there is a big difference between the price of stores and the price of fat cattle. Nobody can deny that there is some money in cattle. The fact that cattle are so profitable is the salvation of our people at the present time. The fact that their price is attractive induced a great many people to feed them last winter. I gave figures for our production of oats and potatoes, and I asked the Minister what became of the surplus which was not used for human food. It did not go to pigs. With the exception of the surpluses of potatoes that are here and there through the country at the present time, the bulk of that must have gone to cattle. The Minister must concede that point.

Dr. Ryan

Of course, our oats always did go to cattle. It never went to pigs.

Mr. Hughes

Mind you, we have a big increase in oats this year. I am sorry that Deputy Fagan—a man who has more experience than I have of the cattle trade—is not here. I firmly believe that we exported better stores this year than ever we did before, for that very reason—that the people were attracted to feeding them. They saw that there was more profit in that line than in feeding pigs. I do not come from a very great pig producing county, but we do feed a fair amount of pigs there. I know people who would have 15 or 20 pigs in the ordinary way, and who went out of pig production altogether, and the food which they would have fed to those pigs was evidently fed to cattle. The grain and potatoes were fed to cattle. I can assure the Minister that that is the case. As far as my experience goes, that is the position.

Dr. Ryan

That is right. I am not disagreeing with that at all.

Mr. Hughes

That, undoubtedly, happened. If the price of pigs had been a bit more attractive, I say there is no doubt that a certain quantity of that food would have been fed to pigs.

Dr. Ryan

We had not the pigs.

Mr. Hughes

The Minister said a good deal about sow services, yet notwithstanding the fact that there were three or four increases in price over a period it did not influence the numbers that went to service.

Dr. Ryan

That is right.

Mr. Hughes

Deductions could be drawn from that. In the first place the increases had no reactions on pig production. The people did not react to the increases at the time because there was no long term price and no assurance from the Minister or from the commission that that price would operate for a period. We have been urging that for a long time, and I think the Minister is coming round to the view that there must be a guarantee over a long period so that people in the pig business will have an assurance that if they expand production they are safe for 12 months. We suggest that there should be a revision of price every six months, and that that price should operate for 12 months. In my view there is a different explanation for the increased sow services in March even though the price dropped in February. The position became alarming in March, and the whole country knew that there was going to be an acute shortage of pigs, as we had not sufficient bacon for home requirements. Intelligent farmers then decided to get into pig production because it would pay. Pigs were bound to be profitable. We had not enough bacon for our requirements, and none for export. It would be profitable to put sows to service because young pigs were bound to command a better price.

Dr. Ryan

That was not the position. We had more bacon than we wanted in March.

Mr. Hughes

I had a Parliamentary question about the pig position in March, and the Minister gave figures which were published. These figures were studied by the people. I am sure the Minister will credit farmers with a fair amount of intelligence in these matters.

Dr. Ryan

There is probably a good deal in what the Deputy is saying, but in February curers were pressing to be allowed to export bacon because there was so much bacon on hands. At the time there was a lot of bacon here.

Mr. Hughes

The obvious reason why more sows went to service was that people began to appreciate that the business was going to be profitable. The right time to go into any business is when supplies are getting scarce. Unfortunately long before the outbreak of war we had numbers of people who went in and out of pig production periodically. They try to chip in when prices are high, and go out when prices are low.

That was bad for the industry and we should discourage it. However, that attitude is there still and people are chipping in because they know that there is an acute shortage and that bacon is going to command an attractive price. As the Minister pointed out, despite four or five increases in price the decline of the industry continues. It is an extraordinary situation that for the first time in two years there was an increase in the number of sow services immediately after a drop of 6/- in the price. The obvious explanation is that people began to realise, owing to the acute shortage of pigs and bacon, that the industry was now going to be profitable.

Dr. Ryan

The price of pigs did not influence the position so much.

Mr. Hughes

The psychology from the farmer's point of view is that no matter what happened the price would be good because bacon would be scarce.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

As it is now 6.45 I must put the question.

Mr. Hughes

I thought we agreed to continue later.

Dr. Ryan

If the Deputy wishes he might be permitted to continue for another five minutes.

Mr. Hughes

We are in agreement on many things, doing away with grading to a great extent, and that we must have a maximum weight as distinct from heavy pigs. It is only a difference of a stone one way or the other. If 18 stone or 19-stone live-weight was fixed the man who produced animals above that weight should be penalised. The fairest way would be that he should lose on whatever was produced in excess of that weight.

General MacEoin

That would not be fair.

Dr. Ryan

I do not want the Deputy to misunderstand what I said. I think I would favour two or three grades but that they should be very close together as regards price. I would not victimise a man whose pigs were just about the weight.

Mr. Hughes

The Minister did not tell us whether he proposed to permit pork butchers to operate.

Dr. Ryan

That is a matter I should like to consider. It would be a very big job to stop it.

Mr. Hughes

The Minister dealt with the balance of trade improving every year after 1934, taking imports and exports into account.

Dr. Ryan

That is right.

Mr. Hughes

The Minister ignored one item, the extraordinary fact that the consumption of bacon fell considerably over that period. The consumption of bacon in 1931 was 825,844 cwts., and in 1937, 567,822 cwts. The Minister need not talk about balancing imports with exports. He is beginning to appreciate the gravity of this question. Although no attempt has been made to stem the decline in the industry it is good news that the tide is just beginning to turn. It is beginning to turn, because every farmer with business foresight appreciates this fact, that no matter what control is there, there must be good times coming for pig producers owing to the acute shortage of bacon.

Dr. Ryan

If he has the feeding.

Question put and negatived.