On the last occasion that this Bill was before the House I dealt with its benefits from a general point of view, and I wish now to refer to the fact that £7,000,000 is to be spent when the scheme is undertaken. The financing of the scheme is of importance, because if £7,000,000 is to be borrowed, then we will have to pay back that money. Who will pay it back? Are we to tax the people by imposing on them a rate that they will not be able to pay? Are we going to impose further taxation on top of the burden that already exists? Where will the money come from? I assume that it will be necessary to incur indebtedness in order to run this scheme. If that is so, I do not hope for good results. Farmers in my constituency have been demanding drainage in their districts for many years. The Cumann na nGaedheal Government in 1927 introduced a big scheme of drainage affecting Leix, Offaly and Kildare. There is no doubt that that scheme was a good one. When I was a schoolboy I remember the streets of Mountmellick being flooded, as a result of which it was impossible to get from Dublin to Portarlington, Monasterevan, Portlaoighise and other places. The Barrow drainage scheme was a good one but it did not do all that the farmers in the affected areas expected. Section 27 of this Bill concerns the Barrow drainage district.
I am glad that the Parliamentary Secretary was able to announce that the Government thought it fitting to take into consideration in this legislation the position of hard-working farmers in the Barrow drainage district. I am also glad to say that that section in this Bill will be welcomed by them inasmuch as it appears that there will be a considerable reduction in the demands for rates made on them, and that these will be made a county-at-large charge.
I go further and ask the Parliamentary Secretary to say if it would be possible to introduce an amendment to the Bill, which would take into account the fact that the Barrow drainage rate was struck for a period of 35 years, and that it has been in existence for six years. That rate has not been paid because the farmers concerned were unable to meet it. There is now going to be a great measure of relief for them, as the rate is to be a county-at-large charge. Would it be possible for the Parliamentary Secretary to introduce a clause wiping out drainage rates due for the past six years? I think that suggestion is worthy of consideration. If it was wrong to impose a rate that was to exist for the next 29 years, surely it must have been wrong to impose it for the last six years. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to see if it is possible to amend the Bill, so that the Barrow drainage rate would be wiped out, and to give the county councils concerned authority to refund amounts already paid. That rate was an unjust one and farmers were unable to pay it. The Government, as well as public representatives of all Parties, joined in the present emergency in an appeal for the production of more food. Every Deputy has on some occasion appealed to farmers to get into the front line of defence by securing the country against starvation, and the farmers have gallantly risen to the occasion.
I ask for special consideration under this Bill for farmers in Leix, Offaly and Kildare. Their case has been given consideration by the establishment of the Barrow drainage district, but I wish the Parliamentary Secretary to go a little further, and in the name of the Government, to have drainage arrears that are outstanding for the past six years wiped out, and where they were paid have the money refunded. Some years ago I submitted a memorandum to the Drainage Commission suggesting that it would be well if drainage schemes were made a national charge. I received an acknowledgment from the commission intimating that the matter was receiving attention. I am glad to see that the Government are about to undertake this drainage scheme, and that it will be financed and controlled by the central drainage authority. I should like to know where the labour to carry out the work will be secured and what wages will be paid. At present, on various employment schemes sponsored by the Board of Works, on drainage, roads and turf, the wages paid are such that ordinary workers could not exist upon them. When this scheme is embarked upon I wonder if the workers are to be paid the mean wages that some of them are now trying to exist upon. I hope that no worker will be employed at a wage less than £3 10s. 0d. a week because, in view of the high cost of living, it would be impossible to exist on less. As I am not satisfied that workers employed by the Board of Works in the past were properly remunerated I hope that they will now get a satisfactory wage.
One Deputy stated that there would be reams of correspondence with the Board of Works from all parts about the undertaking of new schemes. While I am open to contradiction, I suggest that no part of the country requires drainage worse than the midlands. When learning geography at school the first thing the schoolmaster told us was that Ireland was formed in the shape of a saucer, with mountains around the coasts and then the valleys.