Amendments Nos 1 and 2 are cognate.
Committee on Finance. - National Stud Bill, 1945—Committee.
Section 1 to 6, inclusive, put and agreed to.
SECTION 7.
I move amendment No. 1, standing in Deputy Cosgrave's name and my own:—
At the end of sub-section (1) to add the following words "and such leases shall be made only to the company and to no other person or persons."
I cannot see any reason why the Minister should have power to lease any part of the stud farm to anyone other than the people who are going to control and operate the national stud. I wonder would the Minister give any reason as to why he is taking that particular power? I might say that if at the moment there is a lease, or any part of the land let on the 11-months' system, that will hold until the contract expires, but once the present contract expires I do not see why the Minister should have any further power to lease any part of the national stud farm to anybody other than the company.
I do not know whether legally it could be covered as easily as Deputy Hughes has suggested in his concluding remarks. That is the difficulty we have at the moment. First of all, generally speaking, there is provision in Section 29 of the Act for winding up the company. In that case, I suppose we will have to lease to somebody else. I admit that in that case we may come to the Dáil again for further legislation; so I do not want to make a strong point of that. The other point is that, as I mentioned on the Second Reading of the Bill, there is a man who occupies a small part of the estate, at a rent of £4 10s. per annum. He had rented this part from the British Government before we got possession. He is an old employee. There is also a second employee who has a cottage. I am not clear as to the legal position yet—I have not been advised —but I think it is possible that in making the lease to the company we may have to exempt these. If possible, I would lease the whole lot to the company and let those people become tenants of the company.
Quite.
If that were legally possible I would do it. I should not like to say it is possible, because I would have to come to the Dáil to amend the Bill if that proved incorrect. I just give the undertaking that that is my intention.
The Minister gives the undertaking that it is not the intention to lease to anyone else?
The intention is to lease the whole lot to the company.
It is not the intention to break up the farm?
Oh, no.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
That will hold for the next amendment also.
Yes.
Question proposed: "That Section 7 stand part of the Bill."
Why specify a five-year period there? How long has the existing lease to go—the lease to which the Minister referred?
I am not sure about that. If the lease is for more than five years it must come before the Dáil.
Does that mean that the present lease is not for more than five years?
Is the Deputy referring to the lease held by those subtenants?
Yes.
As far as I understand it, they have the ordinary tenancy, I suppose from year to year, the understanding being, of course, that they would be left there for life.
Is there much land involved?
Only seven acres in the one case, and only a garden in the other.
Question put and agreed to.
Amendment No. 2 not moved.
Sections 8 to 12, inclusive, put and agreed to.
SECTION 13.
I moved amendment No. 3:—
In sub-section (2), before paragraph (d), to insert the following paragraph:—
"the Articles shall provide that for the purposes of constituting the company, the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horse Owners' Association of Ireland shall select and provide a panel of 12 persons who are in the opinion of the Association persons suitable to act as directors of the company and appointments to the Board shall only be made from this panel.
For the purpose of filling any vacancy or vacancies that may arise from time to time the Association shall submit a panel of three names for each such vacancy and the responsible Minister shall select a person or persons from the panel to fill such vacancy or vacancies.
It is our anxiety to ensure that the people who are going to benefit from this national stud will take some active share in its control and operation, and will accept some responsibility at all events for the direction of the company. We feel that the democratic way of doing it is that those people should get the opportunity of helping the Minister to constitute the board. In this amendment we suggest that the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horse Owners' Association of Ireland should provide a panel of 12 persons who in their opinion are suitable to act as directors of the company, and that the board shall be appointed by the Minister from that panel. I feel that that will give this very important association a direct interest in the matter. It will give them an opportunity of selecting the best material possible, while providing the Minister with a substantial number from which to pick his board, whether it is three or five. I think it is most desirable that people who are conversant with and engaged in horse breeding, and who know the qualifications necessary for the proper conduct of this stud, should be given that opportunity. They feel that they should have a hand in the selection of the board. In addition, they may select some people about whom the Minister and his advisers may not have heard. I have no doubt that there will be found on the panel very useful material so far as the constitution of the board is concerned. I hope the Minister will accept the amendment.
I should like to support this amendment. I think the Minister agrees that this association is one which has done a lot of good work both from the point of view of providing a complete roll of all the people engaged in the bloodstock trade and from the point of view of assisting bloodstock owners and breeders when selling horses both here and abroad. The association facilities foreign buyers, who come over here, in getting in touch with the various breeders. If they want a particular type of animal or want information about a breeder or his stock, they are able to procure that information from the Bloodstock Breeders' Association. In fact, I read at least one foreword to the Bloodstock Breeders' Report signed by the Minister. I think he signed a couple of others, but the report they brought out last year was very full, and in every way a most creditable production.
While I do not want to advert to the objections which we raised on the Second Stage concerning the type of company envisaged in the Bill, I think the Minister should give us some indication—so far he has not done so—of the type of people he has in mind for the Board. I think, on a Bill of this kind, we ought to get some such indication. At any rate, I think the Minister should say that a representative association, such as the Bloodstock Breeders' Association, will be consulted. Practically all bloodstock breeders are members of it. If all of them are not members, the vast majority are, and there is no reason why they should not all be members. It is not an association which has any axe to grind, or which operates specifically for one area of the country. There is also, I believe, a west of Ireland or south and west of Ireland bloodstock breeders' or horse owners' association, and if this amendment does not cover them it will be easy to redraft it for that purpose. In the case of a Bill of this kind, the prime consideration is to procure suitable personnel to administer the affairs of the company. As far as I can see, you could not get any more suitable personnel than is to be found among the members of that association.
Deputy Cosgrave said that I did not give any indication of who the members of the board might be, or of what type of members it might be composed. Deputies know from the Bill that it is the Minister for Finance who appoints the directors, after consultation with the Minister for Agriculture. I have not discussed the matter with the Minister for Finance, but I am quite sure he will agree with me that the board should be composed of men who know everything that is to be known about the breeding of thoroughbreds. That is the business that will have to be done in that particular place. It is another thing, however, to say that in appointing members to the board we must take recommendations from the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horse Owners' Association. Deputy Cosgrave was quite right in saying that I have every admiration for the work done by the members of that association. The principle that has been followed so far, where a Minister has the appointment of directors of a board of this kind, is that he must have the best and the widest possible choice. If we were to agree to this amendment and if, by any chance, both the Minister for Finance and myself came to the conclusion that one particular man was one of the best men in the country to be appointed on the board, and suppose he was not on the list sent up by this association, well, we would be very disappointed. If things did not go well, we probably might think that if our particular nominee had been on the board things would be much better. I think that the Minister should have the widest possible choice. I do not think it would be right to limit his choice by making him take members from any particular panel or organisation. The same sort of argument could be put up in regard to many other Bills that come before the House. You have associations of different kinds, and yet we do not limit the Minister's choice in such matters. You had a similar provision in Bills dealing with the Electricity Supply Board and with the Central Bank. The bankers sent up a panel in regard to the appointment of certain members on the Bank Board.
Why not accept the amendment even with regard to part of this board?
The bankers did that, I suppose, because they were a little bit apprehensive that the board of the Central Bank, which would have so much dealings with them, might be composed of men who were altogether hostile. In the case of this Bill I do not think anybody could possibly claim that you are going to have a board set up that will be hostile in any way to this particular association, to its interests or to private interests either, because it will be put there for the purpose for which this association is in existence, namely, to help horse breeding and especially the breeding of thoroughbreds.
Would the Minister agree that the association, which is a very representative body, should have some representation on the board?
We are not suggesting that the board would be hostile to horse breeding. It would be ridiculous to suggest that. What we are claiming is that, without this amendment, the association will not get the type of representation that it otherwise would get. After all, the association embraces the vast majority of horse breeders in the country, and we suggest that this is the democratic way of appointing members to the board. The board will have control of the national stud, whose object is to serve the horse breeders of the country. In view of that we think it is reasonable that the association should have some say in the selection and control of the board. We want to limit the Minister's power to select members for the board. We have no guarantee as to where he is going to draw his material from. It may be that some of his material would not be representative at all, and that all the members of the board might be drawn from an area close to the city here— from the Curragh and the County Kildare.
I would remind the Minister that horse breeding is a very extensive and very important branch of agriculture, and that the majority of the members of the Horse-breeders' Association come from the horse-breeding counties in the south. I think it is unreasonable for him to suggest that the Minister for Finance should have the widest possible choice. This association has a very large membership, and is in a much better position to select material for the board than the Minister for Finance. What does he know about the personnel that is available throughout the country? I think that on the Second Reading of the Bill the Minister himself admitted that the Minister for Finance will possibly have to rely, to a very great extent, on the Civil Service for advice as to the personnel. Where you have a fine organisation like this representing the particular interests that are involved, why should you not make use of it, and say to the members of it: "Give me the material that you think is suitable for the board that is going to control the national stud, which, I hope, will be of great benefit to the horse-breeding industry that you are engaged in; I want you to give me the very best material. Give me a panel from which I can select directors"? That, surely, would be the democratic way of doing it. If we want to get away from that principle, and if we give the Minister absolute power to make his own selection, then we are only giving lip service to democracy. The Minister for Finance will have a very wide choice if he uses an organisation such as this in making his selections. We are not suggesting that the Minister should be confined to the number that he would select from the panel sent up by the association. He can pick a certain number from the panel. I think that if the Minister wants to do this thing properly he should make use of an efficient organisation such as this. Its business is to look after the interests of a large body of horse-breeders. It has the machinery there, and that ought to be availed of in the setting up of a board of this kind.
The Minister, in his argument against this type of representation on the board, referred to the example of the Electricity Supply Board which, of course, is totally different from the board that we are speaking of now. The members of the Electricity Supply Board have a very technical job to do. Only a small number of people in the country know anything about electrical development or kindred activities.
There is really no analogy between it and the horse-breeding industry, in which there is a large number of bloodstock breeders and bloodstock owners who have a full knowledge of every aspect of this question. I can give the Minister a case which is more or less analogous, that is the recently established Racing Board, where the directors were taken, and had to be taken under the Act, from the Turf Club or from the National Hunt Steeplechase Committee. In that way the Minister for Finance bound himself to the personnel, if not to the nominees, of the Turf Club and the National Hunt Steeplechase Committee. Not alone did he bind himself, but he ensured that they would have a majority of one on the board. I think if there is any case at all to be made for consulting interests in establishing boards of this kind, this is a case where it may be made strongly.
The Minister says he has no doubt that the Minister for Finance will act on good information and on the best advice. It is not unreasonable to ask, what advice is he going to get or who has he that will advise him as to the most suitable personnel for a board of this kind other than the Minister for Agriculture and, while the Minister's advice may be good, will it be better or even as good as the advice or recommendations of the Bloodstock Breeders' Association? If there is not a case to make for selecting the entire board from the Bloodstock Breeders' Association, at any rate they should be guaranteed one representative on it. Will the Minister meet us in that respect? I certainly strongly put forward the case that an association of this kind, which is concerned with every aspect of bloodstock breeding and which draws its members from both large and small owners from all parts of the country, and which is representing their interests adequately so far as is possible in the short time they have been working, should be consulted and should be given some representation.
Unfortunately, I was not in the House when this Bill was being debated on Second Reading but I have read the report of the debates. County Tipperary is interested in the matter of horse breeding. There is a gentleman practising as a veterinary surgeon in County Tipperary. He is invited to Newmarket every month in his capacity as veterinary surgeon and as a great consultant on breeding. I do not know if this man would like to serve on the board or not. I will give the Minister his name in confidence. Within five miles of where I live we bred three Grand National winners.
The Deputy must come down to amendment No. 3.
Yes. Just to show that I have more than a passing interest in it, I mentioned this gentleman's name. His name has not been mentioned.
No such name has been mentioned on this amendment.
Five or six names were suggested but I am sure that this gentleman's name has not been mentioned. I will give it to the Minister in confidence. We do know something about horse breeding in Tipperary and perhaps I would have unburdened myself on it on the Second Stage. It is the limestone soil of Tipperary, Limerick and Meath that has produced the best horses. The great gift of this stud has been made to the nation.
Really, the Deputy must deal with amendment No. 3 on the Order Paper which suggests a certain method of setting up a panel. There is nothing else before the Committee at present.
Nothing else. Quite right. I will give the gentleman's name to the Minister in confidence and there is no man in Ireland who knows more about breeding or whom it would be better to consult.
It appears from discussions in the Dáil recently that we are getting a very cock-eyed view of what democracy means. Surely whatever the Dáil decides is democracy and, if the majority of the Dáil vote down Deputy Hughes, that is the essence of democracy. What else is democracy?
Is that a new conception of democracy?
That is a new conception of democracy.
Is it? Is Deputy Hughes's view democracy? Does Deputy Cosgrave think that that is new too? Does he think that the majority of the Dáil is not democracy?
Not at all.
The majority of the Dáil has no rights at all. Whatever Deputy Hughes says is democracy and the majority has no rights whatever. That is a new form of democracy we are listening to now. I think whatever the Dáil decides is democracy and, if the majority of the Dáil decides that the Minister should make the appointment, that is the essence of democracy, and that is the end of it. I do not see how it can be decided otherwise.
I agree it is the only way to decide.
Who objected to letting them decide? No one has objected.
It was said that if the Minister was permitted to appoint these directors it was doing away with democracy.
Yes.
I say that if the majority of the Dáil say it, it is democracy, and that is all right. It can be argued, of course, that the circumstances in the Electricity Supply Board are different from the national stud. Naturally, because electricity is different from horses. But, whatever example one may give, the same thing may be said. The Racing Board, for instance, was quoted by somebody else. Perhaps the Racing Board is analogous in some ways and, under that Act, the Minister had to appoint six members of the Turf Club and the National Hunt Steeplechase Committee, but he was not bound to accept any panel from these particular organisations. He had to appoint members of these organisations. The reason for that was fairly obvious. Just as I mentioned before about the Central Bank, the business was interlocked. This Racing Board was taking over certain executive functions, if you like, in racecourses and the whole government of racecourses. It was quite obvious that there should be a certain amount of co-ordination between the old bodies and the new and it was laid down, therefore, that there should be certain members from these organisations.
I think this is quite a different case. I do not think the Minister should be limited in his choice. On the other hand, from what I know of the membership of that particular association, I think it would be difficult for the Minister to avoid taking members of it, even if he tried, because practically every breeder in the country and every authority on thoroughbred horse breeding is a member of that association. That is as far as I know. At the same time, I do not think we should be limited in our choice. Very awkward positions might arise, if there was any misunderstanding as between the association and the directors of this company. For instance, if this association were dissatisfied with the way things were going it might be possible that they would expel the directors of this company from their association, and make it impossible to carry on. Therefore, I think the Bill should be left as it is.
I realise that the Blood-stock Breeders' Association is very representative and that there is a possibility that their members would be selected as members of this board, apart from the association altogether, but I had in mind that, it being such an important body, it should be represented on the national stud board. That is the point I wanted to make.
The Minister knows my views on the constitution of this body. The Minister's idea is that we should set up an autonomous body not responsible to this House for any of its actions and that is the issue between us. We are very vigorously opposed to the idea of an autonomous body to deal with State property and particularly with the national stud. The Vocational Commission has already condemned very vigorously—as did the Banking Commission before that—the constitution of autonomous bodies to control the national property and not responsible to this House or to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Committee of Public Accounts for the expenditure of State funds.
Notwithstanding the condemnation of those two commissions set up by the Government, we have the worst example of all of the application of this principle of a State company in this particular case. One may talk about the Electricity Supply Board and the Turf Board, but none of them is so wide open to corruption as this company may be thrown open. The operations of the company will be cloaked and no Deputy will be able to raise a matter by way of Parliamentary Question or motion. The Electricity Supply Board generates and supplies current to everyone, and there is no great danger of corruption there, but in this case we are setting up a national stud board which will provide sires for selected mares all over the country. This company has to make the selection on the basis of a mare having won three or four races, but even so, it will be making a selection between three or four neighbours. It possibly will be releasing stud fillies for racing purposes, to return to the stud for breeding purposes, and they may select fillies to lease to sire horses in any part of the country. Whether we approve or disapprove of the action of the company, we get no opportunity, the moment this board is set up, to question the policy, the efficiency or the honesty of the company.
The Deputy has tabled some amendments dealing with that matter.
But I do not know whether the Minister is going to accept those amendments or not. In various amendments set down here to this Bill, we have tried to ensure that the national stud will be operated honestly and efficiently. I represent an important horse-breeding constituency— County Kildare. When we talk about corruption we must not forget that horse racing is very often associated with that word. That is all the more reason why we should be particularly careful to eliminate corruption, wirepulling and political influence as far as it is humanly possible to do so in connection with this company. I say, emphatically, that if the Minister sticks to his proposals, he is leaving this company wide open to the worst possible form of corruption, and it is inevitable that corruption will occur,
The Minister has not told us what is wrong in asking the representative organisation that is there to put up to the Minister for Finance or himself a panel from which the board will be selected. Why should the board be hand-picked by the Minister for Finance, who knows nothing about the material available in the country for the personnel of the national stud board? Surely the proper procedure is to ask an organisation that is truly representative of the horse-breeding interests to put up a panel to the responsible Minister and let him pick the board? There is no use in talking about analogies between this board and the Electricity Supply Board, as there is no analogy whatever between the operations of the two boards. I warn the Minister to be particularly careful, if he is to avoid corruption in this case.
I wonder if the Minister realises the outcry that attended the operations of this stud when it was run by the British. They had a habit of leasing fillies—particularly fillies, because they sold the colts—to one particular owner. The owner died subsequently and there was very considerable fuss and a good deal of dissatisfaction, which they got out of by leasing the horses afterwards to the King. They had that easy way out of it, but we have no easy way to silence criticism.
Why not send them to the President?
He may not take them.
That would hardly have the same effect as in the other case. That is an indication to the Minister of the possibility of corruption. This stud was run, according to public opinion at the time, quite efficiently and honestly, and it was only when they discovered the manner in which the leases were made and the way in which the whole business was run that they realised what was going on.
The Minister argues that the board is solely concerned with running the stud, whereas the other boards he mentioned had interests affected, they being other banks in the case of the Central Bank. That was the very reason why the members of the Racing Board were drawn from the Turf Club and from the National Hunt Stewards —in order that they would have adequate representation. The Minister asks what would happen if the association differed with the company, if it would force him to scrap the whole business. What happens if the Racing Board disagrees with the Turf Club? Can the Turf Club refuse to allow the Racing Board to continue? If there is representation from the associated banks, in the case of the Central Bank, because their interests are affected, there is a stronger case here, as you have rival concerns competing with private individuals. Surely, if these people are affected by the operation of this company they should not be forced into less favourable circumstances, but should have the right to representation on the board.
I could not think of anybody to recommend the Minister for Finance to put on this board who is not a member of that organisation.
Then the Minister might as well accept this.
What is the necessity for the amendment? We do not know in what way that organisation, which is a new organisation, may turn out in three or four years' time. Deputy Hughes has talked about the necessity for honesty and straight dealing and I quite agree with him, but I do not think this amendment will give any more assurance on that point. It will be quite possible to get four or five honest men who know a good deal about horse racing and breeding. The Deputy will realise that and admit that it is one of the big considerations the Minister will have in mind in appointing the board. The Minister will try to get men who will not be influenced by bribery or anything of that kind, but who will be straight and honest with horse breeders in general.
While I am altogether in sympathy with the movers of the amendment, from my own point of view I can see one fault in it. I believe that when the Minister comes to select the board it will be almost impossible to constitute it without selecting someone from the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horseowners' Association of Ireland. I cannot see that he can select the board without having some members of that association on it. To that extent he will have to meet, in part, the wishes of Deputy Hughes and Deputy Cosgrave and, indeed, all of us who sit on these benches. However, in the drafting of the amendment I feel they drafted it too conservatively. As the amendment stands, it would be tantamount to handing over control of the board to the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horseowners' Association. That may be a good thing or it may not. If the Minister had originally proposed that the company was to be handed over to the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horse-owners' Association, probably there would have been a controversy about it and it might have been argued that it would have been better to have an open board than a board consisting of members of any existing body.
That is the one danger I see in the amendment and I would like Deputy Hughes and Deputy Cosgrave to see if they could not arrange a wider amendment. This present amendment would be tantamount to giving the Bloodstock Breeders' and Horse-owners' Association complete control of the company, because the Minister would have no option but to select persons suggested by them. There may be people outside this body who are very competent in this particular direction of bloodstock breeding and other activities. While I am in entire sympathy with the views expressed by Deputy Hughes and Deputy Cosgrave, that this body should have a say in the matter, I should like them to consider the point to which I have referred. It would be impossible for the Minister to omit asking representatives of this body to be members of the board when he is picking the directors; it would be imperative on him to select some of them. I think he should have power to select persons from outside.
I am prepared to meet the Minister to the extent that he might apply it to 50 per cent. of the personnel.
I should like to put it to the Deputy that dealing with the Turf Club is a different matter. The Turf Club has been there for years and years. It consists of a certain number of persons and there are very strict rules. But this other is a new organisation and it has been in existence for only four or five years. I hope the organisation will go ahead. I think it is doing very good work. But we do not know what may happen in the next five years. It may be split into sections or it may not have all these members that it now has.
Would not the Minister help the organisation very much by adopting this principle?
I do not know. I was looking through the membership and I do not think anybody appointing the board could avoid putting on some members.
Amendment put and negatived.
Amendment No. 4, which, in the form in which it is drafted, would impose a charge on public funds, is out of order. Deputy Hughes has, however, submitted a redraft which is acceptable and which he will read to the House. Amendments Nos. 5, 6 and 7 gave me food for considerable thought. The intention of the Bill is to from a State-sponsored company which is to be largely autonomous in regard to its activities within its statutory functions. Amendments Nos. 6 and 7 are designed to make the company subject to the control of the Minister who will, in turn, be answerable to Parliament for the company's activities. A very important technical point of order arises for consideration, namely, whether the autonomy of the company is not a major principle which should be deemed to have been affirmed on the Second Reading and, if so deemed, whether those amendments are not inadmissible. There is much to be said in favour of that point of view. Against that, however, the Bill provides that all the directors of the company are appointed by and removable by the Minister for Finance, after consultation with the Minister for Agriculture, so that factually, if not specifically, those Ministers will be in a position to exert influence over the company's activities.
I incline to the view that amendments seeking to make the Minister for Agriculture responsible to the Oireachtas for the policy of the company are in order, and, while I am dubious about amendments making the Minister responsible to the Oireachtas for the conduct of the company's affairs, if that should imply responsibility for the details of administration, I have decided rather reluctantly to admit those amendments, fully conscious of the fact that my present action may be cited against me on future occasions.
Amendment No. 4 not moved.
I move amendment No. 4A:—
In sub-section (2), to delete paragraph (d), and substitute therefor the following new paragraph:—
"the said Articles shall provide that the chairman and other directors of the company shall be remunerated only to the extent of actual out of pocket expenses incurred by them in connection with the business of the company."
I take it that in the ordinary way this company will employ a manager and to a very great extent the responsibility of running the national stud will rest on his shoulders. He will have to be a man fully qualified for that position and the board will meet occasionally to supervise his work and see that the national stud is properly and efficiently, run—run according to their ideas—and that their policy is operated and applied. For that reason, I feel—rather, Deputy Cosgrave and I feel—that there is no necessity to have on the board directors who are paid a salary, or directors' fees. I think there are sufficient public-spirited men in this country who are most anxious to give service on a board of this sort and who are keenly interested in the live-stock or the bloodstock industries. They are men experienced in every possible way. I suggest that the very best material will be got on a voluntary basis. Men who are prepared to serve on a voluntary basis will give the best service. It is for that reason we put down this amendment.
The argument put up by Deputy Hughes could equally well apply to other companies. Undoubtedly the person who is prepared to serve for love rather than for pay is likely to be the best person. The same applies to every public company. I do not see why an exception should be made in the case of this company to the position in other State owned companies. In all State companies the directors are paid, except in the case of the Racing Board, the members of which are not paid. In companies managing ordinary businesses like the beet company and other companies the directors are paid. I do not see why we should make an exception here.
The argument used by Deputy Hughes could be used to the effect that no directors of any of these companies should get fees. I think that would be unfair. There will be a good deal of work in this company, even outside meetings of the board of directors, because directors of this stud will have to keep themselves well informed with regard to horses, form, and the breeding industry. If they do their business well I take it that they will do a good deal of reading in reference to horse breeding generally, and there will be other work, possibly visiting places where certain mares may be under discussion to see whether they should get nominations. There is just as good a case for the payment of directors in this company as for the payment of directors on other boards. I think it would be very unfair to have a provision such as is suggested by the amendment in the Bill. I have not considered the matter, but the likely time and labour that will be involved in becoming a member of the board has to be considered. We must also keep in mind the fact that it is a comparatively small concern, and that the total amount that will be paid as directors' fees will be small.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Question proposed: "That Section 13 stand part of the Bill."
I think this is the most important section in the Bill, as the running of the stud will depend on the articles of association. It occurred to me to put in an amendment to this section, but as it would be difficult to deal with it, I prefer to raise the matter now, and to draw the Minister's attention to it. The desire of the majority of Deputies is that the national stud should be run on lines that would be of greatest benefit to small breeders. Every step that can be taken in that direction should be taken, and the best way to do that would be for the Minister to insert in the articles of association something which would make it imperative on the board to give paramount consideration to the claims of small breeders. I am perfectly satisfied to leave it to the discretion of the Minister, if he assures the House that he will see that a provision is inserted making it obligatory on the directors of the company to give foremost consideration to small breeders. It might be something on lines that I suggested on the Second Reading, that the majority, or whatever proportion the Minister wishes, of the nominations for particular sires would be allotted to small breeders, and provision made for the retention of fillies reared in the stud for transfer amongst small breeders. I will be satisfied if the Minister will make provision of some sort making it obligatory on the company to look on the stud as being instituted by this House to help small rather than rich breeders.
When that matter arose, I had no hesitation in saying that, in the direction to be given to the company, special consideration will be given to small breeders. I am not yet in a position to say in what way we can do that. Deputy Bennett suggested that the majority of the nominations for the best stallions should be given to small breeders. That might be a dangerous regulation, because, as I mentioned on the Second Reading, we might find ourselves in the position that more than half should be given large breeders who get better value and better foals. Generally, I can assure the House that special consideration should be given the small breeders.
The Minister realises that with wealthy breeders the question of fees is a small item.
That is true.
If the normal fee of a sire is £300, I suggest that the national stud might have a fee of £100.
That has to be considered also when there is competition.
I would prefer that it should be considered from another viewpoint, that the stud should be made pay. It might not be possible to make it pay with small breeders. As to the suggestion that the fees will be high, I am satisfied that the Minister will safeguard the position, so that rich breeders who get nominations will pay the fees that the services of the sire would command in the open market. It is my opinion that rich breeders, in so far as they get nominations, should at least pay the fees that they would pay for similar sires in ordinary circumstances, and, in fact, would make some return to the State for the money expended and the loss incurred because of the fees charged to small breeders.
While everybody realises that both large and small owners are necessary for blood-stock breeding, many breeders with large capital have combined into syndicates and own first-class horses. There may be two or three large syndicates, and they allot amongst themselves whatever number of mares they want for a sire, and, as a quid pro quo, grant to another syndicate whatever facilities they are offering for the remaining services.
Now, the small stud owners can never compete with them. While they might be able to compete, or might be willing to sacrifice the actual expenditure, they are not able to get a nomination because, first of all, they are limited by the number they have for themselves, and then they give the others to a syndicate or to a number of large breeders. For that reason, I think the Minister should give protection to the small breeders. It is not entirely a monetary question, although the matter of finance enters into it, but there is the question of getting inside the syndicate.
I quite agree, but I think the Deputy will admit that we cannot deal with that situation at the moment. However, we will give preference to the small breeders.
Sections 13 to 16, inclusive, put and agreed to.
Has the Minister any idea of the number of sires being kept for the purpose?
It does not come under Section 16.
This section deals with the issue of share capital of the company.
Well, how many would come under it in the heyday of the business?
That matter does not come under this section.
Sections 17 to 24, inclusive, put and agreed to.
With regard to Section 24, is the Minister satisfied with the financial provisions there?
Yes, I think they are all right.
SECTION 25.
The following amendments were on the Order Paper in the names of Deputies James Hughes and Liam Cosgrave:—
5. In line 27, sub-section (5), to delete the word "activities" and substitute the words "policy, activities and decisions".
6. At the end of sub-section (5) to add the following words:—"and shall be responsible to him for the proper and efficient conduct of its business."
7. Before sub-section (6) to insert a new sub-section as follows:—
The Minister shall at all times be responsible to both Houses of the Oireachtas for the policy of the company and the conduct of its affairs.
I move amendment No. 5.—
In line 27, sub-section (5), to delete the word "activities" and substitute the words "policy, activities and decisions".
I suggest, Sir, that we should discuss all the amendments to this section together.
Yes— amendments Nos. 5, 6 and 7.
According to the section, the company is responsible only for its activities. Now, while that word, possibly, may cover the words that we have put in in the amendments, we suggest that the company should be responsible to the Minister for its policy, activities and decisions and for the proper and efficient conduct of its business, and the final amendment, No. 7, says that the Minister shall at all times be responsible to both Houses of the Oireachtas for the policy of the company and the conduct of its affairs. This House is the final authority so far as the administration of the affairs of this country is concerned, and we suggest that the House should not abrogate its powers and confer them on a private company—a nominal or autonomous company, which is not responsible to this House. In conection with the administration of this national stud, or of national affairs of any kind in this country, we think that the responsibility for the conduct of those affairs, and the control and authority over them, should rest in the House of the Oireachtas. We believe that that is fundamental to the proper administration of such affairs, and the amendments on the Order Paper are designed to ensure that that control remains vested in this House.
A moment ago, we discussed the question of fees, how mares are to be selected, how small owners or breeders will get preference over big owners, or why syndicates and big or powerful owners, in some cases, should be entitled to the same treatment as the small farmer or breeder down the country. These are matters of vital importance from the point of view of policy, which ought to be discussed from time to time in this House, and if members of the House are dissatisfied with the policy pursued by the company, they should be entitled to have the matter raised in this House. I think it would be an extraordinary action on the part of the House to hand over its control and authority to three or four men to operate a company according to their own ideas. If we once constitute this company—a nominal private company—to look after an important piece of national property, to administer a national stud in the interests of an important branch of agriculture, it appears to me to be an extraordinary proposal that this House could no longer discuss the policy, activities or decisions of that company with regard to its affairs, and we want to ensure that the control and authority that rightly belong to this House, and are rightly vested in this House, should still belong there. That is the reason for these amendments. I do not see why an autonomous company outside this House should be given these powers, and I feel that in connection with the particular business that pertains to a national stud, such as the selection of mares, the leasing of mares, and all that sort of thing, we should be particularly careful to reserve the control of that matter here, and that we should have the right to question the policy, activities and decisions of the company, particularly in regard to the administration of its affairs.
I should like to support this amendment, because I think that most Deputies realise that one of the most important aspects of public administration is to ensure that the Dáil will have full power and control over the expenditure of public money. One of the most effective methods by which the Dáil ensures that these powers are implemented is, first of all, that any Department of State that is associated with any company like this is answerable to this House and, subsequently, answerable to the Committee of Public Accounts. As this particular section is framed, with the exception of whatever information the Minister may look for, the company can run amok so far as expenditure is concerned.
It is bad at any time for a company, and particularly a company that is dealing with public moneys, such as this, to have complete autonomy so far as expenditure is concerned, but this is a company which is associated with a business which, if it does not lend itself to corruption, exactly, certainly can lend itself to all kinds of undesirable practices. I have already instanced the kind of scandalous activities that went on in the past, the manner in which fillies were leased, and the resulting complete public distrust that afterwards attended the activities of that stud. I am quite sure that the Minister does not want that to happen in this case. Now, I do not want to be understood as imputing unworthy motives to the Minister, but it must be remembered that he has a number of other very important duties to attend to, and a company of this kind could not be effectively administered by a Minister who has a number of other duties to attend to, in my opinion, and who has not a close and detailed knowledge, and could not be expected to have a close and detailed knowledge, of the activities of such a concern as this. We strenuously oppose the idea that a company of this kind should be set up and should be entirely free from any effective control by the Dáil. We consider that all this company's affairs, but especially its accounts, should be not only laid on the Table of the House but subjected to the scrutiny of the Comptroller and Auditor-General and examined by the Committee of Public Accounts.
I understand that amendments Nos. 5, 6 and 7 are being taken together. As regards amendment No. 5, I am advised that what it is sought to achieve is already achieved by the provision in the Bill. If Deputies would prefer to have their own words inserted, I have no objection. With regard to amendments Nos. 6 and 7, I do not want to enter into the arguments again because I should be only going back on the Second Reading debate. We debated fully whether this company should be independent of criticism in the Dáil. I still adhere to the attitude I adopted on the Second Reading, and I shall ask the House to vote against amendments Nos. 6 and 7.
Amendment No. 5 agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 6 and 7.
It is becoming the practice in this House to say that a matter has been discussed on a previous occasion, and that it is not necessary to say more about it. Of course, we cannot make a Minister say more. But it is right, when amendments Nos. 6 and 7 are before the House, that Deputies should call to mind what these amendments are designed to do. I presided over the Public Accounts Committee for seven years. Deputy Cosgrave is now presiding over that committee. Deputies on that committee represent themselves and their colleagues as watching over the public finances on behalf of the House. When they sign their report and present it to the House, as I recently did, Deputies are entitled to assume that every relevant matter in regard to the expenditure of public money has been carefully examined, and that, if there is any impropriety or misuse of public money, that committee will draw attention to it, invite the Minister for Finance to exercise his powers, and, in the event of his failing to do what the committee considers necessary for the proper protection of public funds, the House expects that the chairman of that committee will come before the House, ask for a day on which the report can be discussed, and raise on the floor of the House the impropriety which has transpired in the course of taking evidence at that committee. Since Fianna Fáil came into office, a very remarkable development has begun to manifest itself. When Fianna Fáil first came into this House, they were like wasps on the Public Accounts Committee. They raised every conceivable question that they could think of at that committee. They made every allegation that they could conceive, and they used that committee as a forum from which to attack the Government of the day. We all remember that there used to be streamer headlines in the papers when the Report of the Public Accounts Committee would be published, setting out to advantage the wild and whirling allegations that had been made. Of course, the more wild and whirling they were, the more publicity they got. Then Fianna Fáil came into office and the chairmanship of that committee passed to the Opposition. That is the usual convention.
I think that Deputies will agree that, for the past 13 years, the Reports of the Public Accounts Committee have been sober, unemotional and unsensational documents. There have been occasions on which grave exception has had to be taken to certain procedure. There have been occasions on which the Minister for Finance has had to intervene and take certain measures. There have been occasions on which the committee differed from the Minister for Finance, each Party adhering to its own view. But on no occasion was any extravagant or wild allegation made. One would imagine that, with all that before their eyes, the Government of the day, far from desiring to withhold information from the committee run on those lines, would be anxious to avail of the services of that committee and of the Comptroller and Auditor General to watch over the expenditure of public money, because Deputies must readily realise, when they peruse the Estimate of the Minister for Agriculture, that no individual could conceivably give to every item of expenditure for which he is responsible, in a big Government Department his personal attention. He has to depend very largely on the large mechanism of his Department to give effect to the general policy he has laid down. But, far from welcoming the sober surveillance of the Committee of Public Accounts, Fianna Fáil Ministers have more and more tended to bring in Bills designed to avoid the control of the Committee of Public Accounts.
So far as I am aware, the first piece of legislation which did effectively avoid the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Committee of Public Accounts was the Electricity Supply Act, introduced by Deputy Patrick McGilligan. When that Bill was brought in, Fianna Fáil was not in the House at all. They were out chasing the Republic over the daisies. When they came in, they used to deliver philippics in this House about the awful iniquity of allowing the Electricity Supply Board to handle public money without submission of their accounts and particulars of all they did to the vigilant eye of Deputy Seán MacEntee, who was then chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. Then, they themselves came into office. We had the Irish Shipping Bill; we had the Alcohol Bill; we have this Bill and we had half a dozen other Bills, all of which were designed to set up semi-autonomous companies to which Dáil Éireann was asked to pass over large sums of public money. Having passed the money over, Dáil Éireann was told to keep its nose out of the business. What happens as a result of that? An Estimate comes before the House for, say, £250,000, and we pass it, whereupon the Department of Finance issues a cheque in favour of that company for that sum. If the Comptroller and Auditor General asks the company what it did with the money, he is told to mind his business, that his sole responsibility is to see that they got the money and, after that, to shut his trap.
If the Committee of Public Accounts or any Deputy on the Committee of Public Accounts asks a question about it and Deputy Cosgrave or I am in the Chair, we are obliged to tell him to shut his trap, that it is a matter of accounting and that he must not inquire into it. We are obliged to instruct the accounting officer not to answer the question or deal with the matter further. The only relevant question a Deputy can ask the accounting officer when he appears before the Committee of Public Accounts is "Did you pay over the money?" and when he says: "Yes, I did", that is day-day. That is the last you will ever hear of it. So far as I know they could take that money and kindle their pipes with it, and there is no public officer in this country has a right to inquire why, when, or where. It is like the birth of the Republic—shrouded in mystery. Does the House want that?
Some years ago, while the gestation of the Republic was going on, we set up a commission known as the Vocational Organisation Commission. The Taoiseach took it under his own wing and provided a special building for it. He gave it a telephone number and asked the Bishop of Galway to accept the Chair. He asked men of all political and religious persuasions and beliefs to sit on that committee. We had men on that commission from the Protestant Bishop to Jim Larkin. They sat hatching a scheme of vocational organisation for this country until we were all sick of looking at them. When the country had forgotten that they were in existence, there emerged a monumental report. I do not suppose many of the Fianna Fáil Deputies read that report. They said: "Let de Valera read it, whatever he says about it, goes with us", but I ask those Deputies who did read the report: do they remember the most outstanding recommendation that was in it, one that had reference to the everyday life of our people, the one agreed recommendation that they said should be put into effect here and now, whether we decided on a general vocational organisation of society or not? That was that an end should be put to the practice of setting up semi-autonomous corporations to which public moneys would be passed without supervision of any kind by the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
There may be some Deputies in this House who are inclined to say to themselves: "What is the use of having a Comptroller and Auditor-General looking into these matters, because after all he is a civil servant and he will not readily hold up the Government of which he is a servant to public odium by denouncing their practices"? Deputies who would say that would be quite mistaken. The Comptroller and Auditor-General is an officer of the Constitution. He stands outside the Government, independent of the Government, and holds his office virtually by a tenure analogous to that of a High Court judge. He cannot be removed from office except by a resolution of this House and for cause stated. So that no matter in whose Department an impropriety may occur, the Comptroller and Auditor-General is in a position to note it, to comment upon it and to demand that this House should be acquainted with the nature of the misfeasance and that adequate steps be taken to put it right. The Vocational Organisation Commission says that that is a valuable safeguard, not only for the Treasury but for public morality. They say: "We see in these companies the possibility of very grave abuses developing". I think they went so far as to say that they were not altogether satisfied that abuses or quasi-abuses had not begun to manifest themselves. They certainly said that this system was well calculated to give rise to very serious abuses.
They were told by Ministers of State that their report was slovenly, that it was ignorant, that it was based on misconceptions that could have been corrected by five minutes' conversation on the telephone with the appropriate Department. I do not blame Ministers for saying that after reading the report. It was only natural that they should say that, but do Deputies in this House believe that that was a slovenly report, based on misconception, designed to enshrine falsehoods which could have been corrected by a conversation on the telephone with the relevant Department?
Will the Deputy come back to the specific amendment?
This is the amendment. I want to bring this into line with the principles laid down in the report of the Commission on Vocational Organisation.
The Deputy is making a Second Reading speech on the Bill.
I am making an appropriate relevant speech to these two amendments. I want to make it clear that this point was well debated on the Second Stage and that we fixed the Minister with notice that the necessary amendments would be put down.
The issue was decided on the Second Stage.
Hold your horses. If I put down a substantive amendment relating to the principle of the Bill for this stage without giving due notice on the Second Stage, I would have been told that I should have raised the matter then and I would have been asked: "Why did you not take the precaution necessary to permit you to put down an amendment?" We warned the Minister that this principle regarding the formation of this company was not being decided. The principle decided on on Second Stage was that we wanted a national stud. In any case, we made the point on the Second Stage that we all wanted a national stud but we did not want to have this company spending our money——
The report of the Vocational Organisation Commission is far away from the national stud.
So it is, but in this particular case it assists us to be ready in the stable to make a frantic effort to close the stable door before the horse is gone. The Minister's proposal is that we should be restricted rigorously to closing the door long after the hide and the hair of the horse have gone. That is the purpose of this amendment, to provide this House with a hasp that will keep the horse inside. The purpose of the Minister's plan is to provide the company with a general licence to decamp with the horse and the four shoes whenever he feels inclined to do so. That is the purpose of these two amendments.
Here is one of the first Bills introduced since the report of the Vocational Commission was published. The Minister cannot say that his attention was not fully directed to that on the Second Stage. It was. He complains now that it was too fully directed to it. Here is the Minister coming before us simply because he says it is more convenient to propose to leave this company out of the jurisdiction of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, the constitutional officer appointed for the very purpose we have in mind. What is to prevent this company going out to spend £100,000 on a jennet? If they do, is there any Deputy in this House who can get up and say: "I saw Martin McDonagh buy that jennet for 13/9, and he sold it to the national stud for £100,000."
What is to prevent the national stud employing the money which we are giving them in buying a mule? If they do, no Deputy can dare refer to the fact. If any member of the Public Accounts Committee says he saw the mule, Deputy Cosgrave will have to say: "That is not a matter of account; you cannot refer to it". And though the Deputy asks: "Is it argued that Dáil Eireann voted £250,000 to the national stud to buy mules?", Deputy Cosgrave must reply: "That is not a matter of account and you cannot inquire into it," and unless and until the Minister for Agriculture changes the law, the matter cannot be discussed in Dáil Eireann at all.
Is that not so? Some Deputies are tossing their heads and saying: "Nonsense. Can you not raise it on the next Agricultural Estimate which comes before the House? There will be a sum of £250,000 for the national stud and you can then raise it?" But not a bit of it. The Minister will make exactly the same answer as the Minister for Industry and Commerce makes in regard to Irish Shipping or the Tourist Board. He will say: "I am not going to discuss their business in the House. The House has decided that this matter must be left in the absolute discretion of the board appointed and there can be no interference". He will go on to say: "I want to remind Deputies that the gentlemen who have accepted appointments on this board are very sensitive men, men who are not accustomed to the low, dirty trade of politics. They are high-up gentlemen and if anyone talked about them in Dáil Eireann, they would all quit and leave us, and we would not be able to get on at all." But the same gentlemen will take mighty good care that they will be well paid for every hour's work they do. Sensitive and all as they are, they will not be too sensitive for that.
I think we can find in this country a body of men who are not so sensitive, but, if we cannot, there is an alternative plan. We can avail of the services of the sensitive creatures, the delicate highly-bred racehorses who are going to advise us in this matter. They need not be drawn into it at all. If we appoint a director and authorise him to have an advisory council, on the clear understanding that the decisions must be his and that he must answer for them to the Minister, that lets the sensitive gentlemen out. Nobody need ever know what advice the sensitive boys give to the director.
The decisions will be the director's; he will be responsible to the Minister; and the Minister will be responsible to us. What conceivable objection is there to a plan of that kind, or does the Minister say that it is desirable that public moneys should habitually be handed over to these bodies and the House denied the opportunity of ever investigating what has become of them? If the House is going to admit that principle in connection with this Bill, where are we to draw the line?
It is a very handy way from the Minister's point of view. It exonerates him for ever from having to follow the debate on his Estimate. I wish Deputies knew the rounds to which Ministers will go to open extra sub-heads in their Estimates in the currency of the financial year, in order to make some payment with Ministry of Finance sanction, so that they will not be required to bring in a Supplementary Estimate and face debate in the House on the particular payment they want to make. If Deputies could realise how Ministers hate answering to this House in respect of expenditure for which they are responsible, they would understand the passion which Ministers have for semi-autonomous corporations to whom they can pass the public money and trust to God.
How many corporations of this kind are we going to have? Is every form of public activity to be taken out of the hands of civil servants and passed over to semi-autonomous companies? Some Deputies imagine that semi-autonomous companies mean bodies of persons who are not civil servants. Nothing could be further from the truth. Usually, you will find on the board of a semi-autonomous company a civil servant, but he has this advantage, that he is no longer acting as a civil servant and so is not answerable to this House and to the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
I know of two cases which I can call to mind at once: one is Irish Shipping, presided over by the Secretary of the Department of Industry and Commerce, and the other is the Irish Flourmillers' Committee—what might properly be described as the gang that divides up the spoils—which is also presided over by the Secretary of the Department of Industry and Commerce, but not as Secretary of that Department. No one may pursue him into that hallowed sanctum. When he goes in there, he sheds the raiment of the civil servant and becomes an amorphous being whose exact nature nobody knows. The Public Accounts Committee cannot follow him in there and the Comptroller and Auditor-General cannot follow him in there. The only person who ever makes contact with him in there is the Minister, and what he hears is on the q.t.
How many more of this kind of company are we to have? Are we advancing to the position in which all public affairs will be conducted by companies of that kind, and in which the only function Dáil Eireann will have will be to provide the dough and look pleasant? I do not look forward with any anticipation to any such arrangement. If this Dáil is a Parliament at all, it will learn from the experience of other Parliaments and will realise that the day it lets go control of the money, it might as well shut up shop. The last control which a Parliament in modern times has over the Executive is its power to refuse supply. The last control a Parliament has from day to day is its power to question a Minister as to his plans, his intentions and his past Acts when he comes to ask Parliament for money. If we lose that power, we lose all our effective power.
Useful as is the Parliamentary Question, it is comparatively impotent beside the power of control, the power to debate supply. On a Parliamentary Question, the Minister always has the last word. In a debate on the question of supply, the Opposition gets at least an opportunity of speaking so formidable a word that the Minister's prerogative of reply is incapable of burying. What we are deciding on this amendment is whether the power of control, the power to control supply, is to be maintained or not. If we are prepared to abandon that control in regard to this stud, no logical reason can be advanced why we should not abandon it in respect of every other activity of government in due course.
I am quite satisfied that, far from adding to the list of semi-autonomous companies at present in existence, we ought deliberately to seek to limit it. We ought not only to vote resolutely against this proposal, but we should bring effective pressure to bear on the Government to abandon all analogous companies, and restore to Parliament the right which it is meant to have, and the right which people believe it has, that is, to control public expenditure and to ascertain from time to time how the money it has voted, the money it has taxed the people to raise, has been used, so that from time to time it can reconsider whether it is right and just to raise the taxes in order to get that money again and again for the purpose alleged.
At present, if we give money to this stud, we do not know from year to year how it will be used, but we are going to impose taxes on our people in order to get it. I think that is wrong and every conscientious Deputy must know that it is wrong. How many Deputies on the Fianna Fáil benches will get up and defend it? There are seven of them there watching the public purse. Is there any one of the seven who will get up and defend this system of autonomous companies not answerable to Dáil Éireann on its merits, or will they all sit silent like the mules?
We are watching.
I am waiting for the Deputy to speak. Deputy Moran has murmured something softly. He could not be persuaded to stand up now on his two hind legs and talk?
It is sufficient to have one operating at the moment.
Deputy Moran is a lawyer. He is a solicitor, a man accustomed to handling moneys, accustomed to insisting that the persons who handle them will render an account to him as to how they use them, a man accustomed to using surveillance and insisting upon an account being rendered. Will he not come to our aid and tell the Minister for Agriculture, from his experience, how necessary it is to insist that moneys for which one is trustee will be properly accounted for? I have no doubt that if he sets the good example the other six Deputies present will do their part as well, and tell us, when they are trustees of public money, do they believe they have discharged the obligations of their trust by just handing the money away in lumps and trusting to God that it will all come out in the washing. Come now; the whole seven cannot be dumb. Let us give them a chance.
When I read the proposals in the National Stud Bill, and when I realised that the Minister's idea was to provide another nominal company, to add one more nominal, semi-autonomous company to the list of companies already there, I put down a Parliamentary Question to the Minister for Finance. I think it might be of some interest to the House to know the information I got with regard to those companies. I want to ask the House whether it is prepared to add one more nominal company to this list. I asked the Minister for Finance:
"If he will state in relation to all companies set up by the State the following particulars in each case (a) the total capital; (b) the amount of State funds subscribed; (c) the number, salaries and names of State appointed directors and the number otherwise appointed; (d) the amount of capital prescribed by legislation to be subscribed by State appointed directors; (e) where a civil servant is so appointed, particulars regarding his director's fee, and other such fees, and his Civil Service salary and allowances; (f) whether the finances of the company are accounted for to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Committee of Public Accounts; and (g) whether any Minister of State is responsible to Dáil Eireann for the proper conduct of such company."
The reply I got was: "The particulars requested are given in the following statement." The first company was Aer-Rianta, Teoranta. The authorised capital there is £500,000, and the amount issued and paid up is £117,011. That is all paid up by the State. There are four directors, who are paid £300 each. Two of the directors are civil servants, the salary and bonus in one case being £1,500 and £292 16s. 0d., respectively, and in the other case £1,000 and £322 3s. 0d., respectively. No accounts are submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and no Minister is responsible to the Oireachtas for the proper conduct of the affairs of the company.
Aer Lingus, Teoranta, has an authorised capital of £100,000; £80,000 is subscribed by Aer-Rianta, and the directors are the same as for Aer-Rianta. The accounts have not to be submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General or the Public Accounts Committee, and the Minister is not responsible to this House. The Agricultural Credit Corporation has £1,000,000 authorised capital. The amount of State funds subscribed is £292,118. There are three directors, Messrs. Barton, Quirke and Walsh. The remuneration of the directors is £800, £300 and £300 per annum, respectively. There is no legislative provision as to the amount of capital to be subscribed to any of those companies by the State appointed directors. In this case, none of the directors is a civil servant, and the accounts have not to be submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Comhlucht Siúicre, Éireann, Teoranta, has £2,000,000 authorised capital, and the amount of State funds subscribed is £500,000. There are four directors, Messrs Cahill, Lalor, Odlum and O'Mahony. The remuneration of the directors is £300 each. No director is a civil servant. The accounts are not submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General or the Public Accounts Committee and no Minister is responsible to this House for the conduct of the company's affairs. The Dairy Disposal Company has an authorised capital of £10.
A fine old veteran.
There are three directors, with remuneration of £200, £100 and £100, per annum, respectively. The three directors are civil servants, and their Civil Service salaries and bonus are, respectively: £1,200 and £321 17s.; £600 and £277 3s.; and £700 and £294 2s. The accounts are not audited by the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Flax Development Board has £5 authorised capital. There are three directors, whose remuneration is £500, £100 and £100 per annum, respectively. One of the directors is a civil servant. His salary is £680, with a bonus of £304 11s. The Industrial Credit Company has an authorised capital of £5,000,000. The amount subscribed by the State is £804,517. There are three directors, Messrs. Colbert, Kettle and O'Reilly. The directors' remuneration is £1,600, £300 and £300, per annum, respectively. None of the directors is a civil servant. Irish Shipping, Limited, has an authorised capital of £200,000, issued and paid up. The amount contributed by the State is £101,993. There are six directors, Messrs. Leydon, Flynn, Gordon, Roycroft, Stafford and Hallinan. Remuneration at the rate of £500 per annum was fixed for the non-civil servant directors. Of these directors one has accepted remuneration from 1st July, 1945. Messrs. Leydon and Flynn are civil servants. The company has no responsibility to the Comptroller and Auditor-General.
Mianraí, Teoranta, has £200 authorised capital. The amount contributed by the State is £200. There are seven directors. The amount of capital prescribed by legislation to be subscribed by the State-appointed directors is one share. None of the directors is a civil servant, and the accounts are not submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General. Monarchana Alcóil na hÉireann, Teoranta, has £500,000 authorised capital, and the amount subscribed from State funds is £275,756. There are two directors, whose remuneration is £100 and £1,200, per annum, respectively. One director is a civil servant, on a salary of £900 plus £316 bonus. Finally, there is the Turf Development Board, with an authorised capital of £10. There are four directors, Messrs. Barton, Andrews, O'Rahilly and Quirke. Their remuneration is £150, £200, £100 and £100, per annum, respectively. None of those companies is responsible to the House. That is a list of 11 nominal companies, to which we are now adding one more. Deputy Dillon has dealt with the matter very effectively.
The Vocational Organisation Commission that was set up by the Government, apart altogether from its recommendations regarding vocational organisation in this country, made one recommendation which they felt should be implemented immediately, namely, that it was time to depart from this whole system of the Dáil voting substantial capital sums of money to be put into semi-autonomous companies that were not responsible to the Comptroller and Auditor-General, to the Public Accounts Committee or to this House. Notwithstanding the strong recommendation made by a body of people set up by the Government itself, the Government completely ignored the recommendation and on the first opportunity they had of departing from that system are now setting up this company as they have set up other companies. We take very strong exception to that proposal. The amendment has been put down for the purpose of retaining the power of control that should properly be vested in this House. It is for the House now to decide.
Deputy Dillon runs away with himself, as we all know, because he has that unfortunate trait of being very eloquent without having very much to say. There was no reason whatever why Deputy Dillon should, for instance, say that the Public Accounts Committee has been going on a more even keel or has been taking a lower key since he became chairman.
I did not say any such thing.
The Deputy said that when Fianna Fáil were in opposition there was nothing but scare headlines in the newspapers in regard to the reports of that committee. When we came in here I was Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee in the first year, and I guarantee that if anybody looks up the report of the committee he will find that it did not give rise to scare headlines any more than did the report that Deputy Dillon has brought in from time to time as Chairman. Certainly, there was not any great rhetoric in our reports such as Deputy Dillon has treated us to on occasions in regard to the Public Accounts Committee.
That is why you were put off and some other fellow was put on to make a row.
That is why I say the Deputy has no regard for the truth. He does not know the difference between the truth and the other thing. He also said that Ministers go hunting around for new sub-heads so as to avoid coming to the Dáil with a Supplementary Estimate. The Deputy knows very well that a Minister cannot make a new sub-head during the year and that he must come to the Dáil.
He can.
The Deputy must allow the Minister to speak.
The Deputy knows that very well. If not he was most incompetent to be Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee for 13 years. He knows very well that a Minister cannot make a sub-head without coming to the Dáil with a Supplementary Estimate. He should know that after his 13 years on the Public Accounts Committee. Deputies have heard what he said. I said here on the Second Reading of the Bill that it was not advisable to have the activities of this company open to public discussion here or open to discussion at all. Will not every Deputy agree with me in this, that if the unfortunate director of that stud bought a wrong horse—he might pay £100,000 for a horse that proved to be no good, and everyone knows that such a thing may happen —that in order to score off us Deputy Dillon would come in here and say that he had bought a mule.
Did the Minister read my Second Reading speech?
Everybody knows that in order to get a laugh Deputy Dillon would come in here and say that the man had paid £100,000 for a mule. If Deputies like him cannot conduct themselves, then, naturally, we will have to get a company to manage this particular stud. It is the only way it can be run. It is the only way in which a director of a stud like this can carry on. He could not possibly carry on if his actions were to be dealt with in this Dáil as Deputies, like Deputy Dillon, would deal with them. Every Deputy knows it could not be done.
I want to follow up the Minister on that. The Minister says that, if the director made a mistake I would be the first to come into the Dáil and charge him with incompetence, and say that he had paid too much money for a horse that did not turn out well. That is the allegation. I direct the Minister's attention to the Official Debates, Column 1796, Volume 97, No. 7. On the Second Reading of the Bill I said:
"We would make an egregious mistake if, when we are setting Tully Stud on foot, we excluded from our minds the possibility of going to the very top price necessary in order to get the very best blood that could be purchased. I know this much about horse breeding. Sometimes, a man may pay £70,000 or £80,000 for an untried sire, believing that on its breeding and performance its progeny ought to be superb, only to discover that, in fact, its progeny is practically worthless. That is one of the risks of breeding. There is the great danger that, in a State-controlled or State-managed institution of that kind, its director will not dare take that kind of risk, lest furious criticism, founded on false ideas, should assail him. Therefore, in passing a Bill of this kind—
Now, remember, this is Deputy Dillon talking on the Second Stage.
—we should boldly face the fact that, if a stud of this character is to be operated successfully at all, the director of it should have the assurance that, provided he uses reasonable prudence, fault will never be found with him for making the kind of mistake that no man conceivably could have avoided making when he bought a sire horse in the hope that he was securing for the breeders of this country quite exceptional blood."
That is what Deputy Dillon said on the Second Stage, and the Minister who was listening to Deputy Dillon saying it prayed to God that Deputy Dillon would not have a copy of the Official Report in his bag, and thought he would get away with what he has now said to the House. But, unfortunately for him, Deputy Dillon did have a copy of the Official Report in his bag, and he has given the Minister day, date, line and column of the original of what he said. Is not that true? Look at his face getting red now. There may be some doubt, seeing that the Minister cannot remember from Thursday to Wednesday what I said in Dáil Eireann, that he may have forgotten what the Vocational Commission said about companies of this kind. Here is what it said four months ago.
The Deputy need not go back on that again. I think it is out of order.
How do you know it is out of order?
It is out of order in relation to this specific amendment.
I am trying to take out of this proposal the very element that brings it within the criticism of the Vocational Organisation Report.
The Deputy has dealt with that already.
I am going to deal with it again, by your leave.
I think once was enough to do so.
After the Minister saying that he could not remember to-day what I said last Thursday.
Repetition is not permitted by the Chair.
I am not going to repeat a word that I spoke before on this. Every word of this is new. Surely, I am entitled to give the source of my authority.
You gave your authority for what you said, and we accept it.
The Minister did not accept it.
I did not deny it. I admit that the Deputy made a sensible speech on the Second Reading of the Bill. I also admit that he would be capable of saying of that unfortunate man—the director—that it was a mule he bought. Everybody knows that.
The Deputy's statement was accepted.
Surely, you are not going to deny me the right of reading to the House the opinions expressed by the Vocational Organisation Commission on companies such as the company now proposed.
Repetition cannot be tolerated by the Chair. We have accepted the substance as being correct.
Who has accepted it?
The Chair has accepted it.
The Chair does not matter. The Chair has no vote at all. I am talking to the Minister, whom I am trying to convert.
The Deputy will talk to the Chair and will be ruled by the Chair.
Most emphatically, but I claim the right to refer here to the class of company envisaged by this Bill, which we are trying to alter by these amendments into a desirable kind of organisation. Have I the right to do that?
You have done it, very effectively, as far as I may express an opinion.
Am I not entitled——
I rule that that is repetition and as such is out of order.
How can you rule it when you do not know what I am going to say?
I know very well what the Deputy is after.
How do you know what I am going to say?
Chair.
I will hear the Deputy.
That is fair enough.
But the Deputy will have to obey the Chair. If it is not relevant, the Deputy will obey the Chair.
Unquestionably. The Chair heard Deputy Hughes refer at length to the Dairy Disposal Company as that kind of body strictly analogous to this. Is not that so? The Minister admits that if we set up the stud under the terms set out in this Bill, without Deputy Hughes' and Deputy Cosgrave's amendment, it will have an organisation analogous to that of the Dairy Disposal Company. Is not that so? I say it is so, and I have been dealing with the Dairy Disposal Company for 17 years.
I have been dealing with it for 13 years.
We know that only too well. The Report of the Vocational Organisation Commission says—paragraph 486:—
"The Dairy Disposal Company, Limited, was incorporated as a private company in 1927, without statutory authority. Certain functions discharged by it were validated by the Creamery Act, 1928. It was founded for the purpose of acquiring certain proprietary creameries which were producing uneconomic conditions in the industry. The intention was—"
Mark what the intention was—
"—The intention was to close such of the creameries as were redundant and to dispose of the remainder to co-operative societies. The company is a nominal one, solely responsible to the Minister for Agriculture. It is entirely dependent on the State for its finances, which are issued with the sanction of the Ministers for Finance and Agriculture. Its accounts are not submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and are not subject to parliamentary revision."
What has the Dairy Disposal Company to do with the Stud Bill?
That Dairy Disposal Company is identical in its constitution with the Tully Stud Farm Company which it is proposed to set up under this Bill, and the Dairy Disposal Company, having been set up by Parliament, with the consent of the Creamery Act, 1928, to purchase creameries for the purpose of conveying them to co-operative societies, in 1928, still has creameries, and if any Deputy gets up to argue in this House that it ought not to have the creameries, he will be told to mind his business and if the Public Accounts Committee tries to pursue the matter further than to ascertain did the Dairy Disposal Company get the money that they stipulated for, they will be told that it is none of their business. It took three or four years to persuade the Dairy Disposal Company to render any accounts to the Public Accounts Committee at all. The constitution of this Stud Company is going to be identical with the Dairy Disposal Company, and I have read to the House what the Vocational Commission say about that company.
How are we, who know what these bodies are like, to communicate to the House what impartial observers have found such bodies to be, if we do not tell them and give them the reference for the written word describing what these impartial observers have seen? Remember, we cannot find these things out. Nobody in this State had the right to call in the Dairy Disposal Company and to cross-question it, until the Vocational Commission was set on foot and, before I finish with this, I will show the House that in certain cases where autonomous companies of this kind were brought before the commission, there came a point when they told the commission to go to blazes, that they would give them no more information, and there was nothing the commission could do about it. They had to prepare their report on the basis of the information they could extract but there was no power in that commission or in anybody else to get the necessary information to determine whether this company was operating well or not.
"The company is a nominal one, solely responsible to the Minister for Agriculture. It is entirely dependent on the State for its finances, which are issued with the sanction of the Ministers for Finance and Agriculture. Its accounts are not submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor-General and are not subject to parliamentary revision. The directors are three civil servants, appointed by the Minister for Agriculture. Their salaries are borne on the Departmental Vote, and thus their emoluments do not depend upon the ability and success of their conduct of the affairs of the company. Much criticism has been directed at this body——"
Mark this—
"—because it has abandoned the original policy of disposing of the acquired properties to co-operative societies and has continued operating them in at least partial competition with the latter and has actually built new creameries."
What guarantee have we, if we set up the national stud on exactly the same basis, that they will not set up an ancillary factory to manufacture ladies' bonnets and, if they do, who has the right to question them? This Dairy Disposal Company was set up to dispose of creameries. Now they have begun to build them.
"The chairman of the company is an official entitled the controller of creamery development. It is certainly extraordinary if the director of a commercial concern is endowed with governmental authority to control the business of its competitors. Only a consolidated balance sheet has been issued by the company to show the results of its working, and it is impossible to say whether any of the units are being worked at a loss."
Listen well to this—
"Information on this matter was sought from witnesses by the commission and was refused."
And was refused.
On instructions of the Minister.
When those officers of the Minister's Department went before this commission, does anyone in this House imagine that they refused to answer the Bishop of Galway's questions without asking the Minister for Agriculture: "Will it be O.K. with you if I tell them to go to blazes?"?
That is not in the report, I suppose, Deputy?
No, but I hope it will be in the report of the proceedings of this House, Sir. The Minister himself refused even to give the commission, desirous of making a report to his own Government, the information which the commission said was necessary about just such an autonomous company as we are now asked to set on foot. Is the Dáil going to set up another of these companies in the face of that fact and in the face of all the report—paragraphs 487, 488, 489, 490, 491, 492, 493, 494, 495—Irish Steel Limited—God bless the mark—not to speak of Comhlucht Lorgtha agus Forbartha Mianraí, Teoranta—that was the company that was established to find coal in one of Deputy Neil Blaney's constituent's back yards; I believe it has now been amalgamated with Comhlucht Gual-Láthrach Shliabh-Árdachadh, Teoranta, that is going to find coal in South Tipperary? None of these companies is ever going to answer to Dáil Éireann for the racket. None of these companies is going to answer to Dáil Éireann for a penny of the public money they have got, Neither will the Tully Stud Company, unless we pass these amendments.
Is money so flush in this country that we can afford to pass it out to all and sundry to do what they like with it? Are Deputies satisfied that all the moneys they have given companies of this kind have been prudently and economically spent? We have been passing out very substantial sums to the Irish Tourist Association.
The Irish Tourist Board.
I can never find out which and I can never find out which spends the most money. The Irish Tourist Board. We are lashing out money to that board on a magnificent scale. Maybe, like the Republic, it is on the way, but, as yet, have we got very flattering results for the amount of money we have given and yet—I think the Chair will confirm what I say —I cannot ask the Minister for Industry and Commerce a question about that. All our function in regard to that was to find the money and, having found it, never mention their name again because no one in this House has to answer for how the money is spent, no one need ever account for a penny so far as the people who vote the money are concerned.
Do Deputies want a similar situation in regard to the Tully Stud or do they want to be entitled to get up here and ask the Minister why certain persons are being excluded from the amenities provided by that stud while others get them? You all know that some of the foremost breeders in this country and Great Britain have been excluded from access to the best sires in Great Britain because small bodies of men have formed syndicates to keep the nominations for these sires for themselves.
Now, we are told we are to have an autonomous body. We do not know who will be on that body, but once it comes into existence we may not criticise its constitution, we may not question its status. Suppose to-morrow any Deputy in this House receives a complaint from a constituent that he has a good brood mare and he wants to avail of the services of a particular sire in the Tully Stud and that he is informed that he will not be let have it on any terms.
Suppose he comes to one of us and says: "I happen to know that these services are being distributed on a favouritism basis, that only the friends of the directors of this company are allowed to bring their brood mares," what will any of us do? If he is a member of the Fianna Fáil Party, he may be able to bring pressure to bear on the Minister for Agriculture, but suppose he has no means of doing that, what can he do? It is true that he may go to the Minister for Agriculture and, if he can carry conviction to the Minister's mind, the Minister may act. Whether he has any right to act or not, I think is doubtful, but he may make representations.
It is only reasonable to say that if the Minister is to leave his office open to any Deputy who has a fancied grievance, he will not have time to do any other work for himself. Let me be clear on this. The Minister does not particularly appreciate my intervention in the debate. I do not want to make any reflection on the integrity of the Minister. That does not arise. But it is manifestly impossible for him to sit in his office and hear the fancied complaints of every Deputy in the House. We all know we receive a great many complaints, some of which are well founded, while others are unfounded. We cannot expect the Minister for Agriculture to sift them all.
So long as the Tully Stud director knows that if legitimate ground for complaint is given a debate can be initiated in this House, then the director will take very good care to ensure that no such legitimate ground is given. Deputies should remember that the uses of the power of debate in this House are not only apparent when they are being used, but the uses of such power are very often most effective in terrorem. If anybody knows that in the event of his doing some wrong his wrong-doing will be made the subject of debate here, in 99 per cent. of the cases he will refrain from wrong-doing. But suppose somebody knows he can do wrong and is immune from public criticism, then the temptation to do wrong becomes very much stronger.
I am arguing for decent, clean, open administration in this State. I think the quotation I gave to-day from the speech which the Minister had so rapidly forgotten makes it perfectly clear that even those who appear to the Minister to be the most unreasonable Deputies will fully appreciate the ordinary difficulties that must confront the director of the stud in his day-to-day work. There will be no captious criticism, no unreasonable demands made, but those responsible for the operating of the stud will realise that unless they are prepared to do their best and to do justice, their conduct will be called in question in the House. Is that a desirable thing? We have 12 Fianna Fáil Deputies here now. I could not get one of them to their feet——
The Deputy is repeating himself. He has referred to the number already.
On the last occasion there were 7 and now we have 12.
The Committee is dealing with an amendment.
I am trying to extract from the ranks of Fianna Fáil some expression of their views.
The Deputy might give his own views.
I am exhorting them to give us the benefit of their opinion, but my exhortations fall on deaf ears, if not on dumb tongues. However, I do not despair that we will draw some of them into loquacity.
We are not impressed by the example set by you. We are sick listening to you.
There is one of them now. Seas suas.
I am wondering if the Minister will see his way, not exactly to compromise on these amendments, but to provide in the Bill something that will meet the views of the Opposition—those who are supporting these amendments. I have been a Deputy for a considerable number of years and I am very jealous of the rights of Parliament. I do not like to see them filched from us. I have a feeling that if this Bill passes in the form in which it has been introduced, it will be an invasion of the rights of Parliament. I feel that the Minister is cutting clean across the Constitution. It must be remembered that our Committee of Public Accounts was really taken over from the Mother of Parliaments, as it has come to be known. It was in the British Parliament that the idea of a Committee of Public Accounts was introduced for the first time. Large numbers of the general public, including many supporters of the Fianna Fáil Party, do not know what are the functions of the Committee of Public Accounts. It is because of this widespread ignorance that the Fianna Fáil Party are out to get away with matters of this kind and invade further the rights of Parliament, not to speak of the rights of the common people.
Resolutions were passed by various county councils, county committees, and other local bodies—I remember that on many of them Fianna Fáil had a majority—calling attention to the managerial system and declaring that it was taking powers from the people. Here is a case where the Parliament is taking away powers from the Committee of Public Accounts. I was a member of the committee for years, and the procedure was, and still is, to have a member of the Opposition in the chair. The various members who were interested in the country's finances were permitted to ask questions of the accounting officer for each Department. The accounting officer was the principal witness, and there was one such officer for each Department, whether it was the Department of Local Government and Public Health, the Department of Defence, or any of the other Departments of State. Any member of the committee was entitled to ask the accounting officer in what way public money was spent in each Department, and he could also comment on the remarks of the Comptroller and Auditor-General. I used to regard the Comptroller and Auditor-General as a buffer between the State and the spendthrifts of the various Departments.
Over a long period of years we had a very fine system in operation in connection with the Committee of Public Accounts. I am very grieved to learn that that system is about to be abolished by this Bill. I suggest it is very necessary to have that position restored. I think the Minister, perhaps unwittingly, destroyed, or attempted to destroy, that system in another measure relating to the disposal of the creameries. If he perpetuates that policy under this Bill, then it is goodbye to democratic institutions here. I regard the Committee of Public Accounts and the Committee on Procedure and Privileges as the most important bodies set up by this House. Under the first committee, we have access to the accounting officers of the various Departments and they can be cross-examined freely. We will endanger that position unless these amendments are passed, or unless the Minister is prepared to meet the principle of the amendments in some way. He need not use the exact phraseology of the amendments as they appear on the paper, but at least he can adopt the spirit of the amendments and preserve the right of this Parliament to do the things it is entitled to do.
I ask the Minister not to invade the rights of Parliament. The tendency appears to be to get further and further away from the people. The tendency seems to be to set up a bureaucracy in this country. If the members of the Fianna Fáil Party, the back benchers, were allowed to exercise freedom of thought in this matter, I believe they would go into the lobby in favour of these amendments. But they will not be allowed to exercise their freedom of conscience or action. On one occasion I think they were referred to as dumb, driven cattle. Instead of following their own consciences they will walk into the lobby and vote as they are directed.
I would like the Minister to consider what effect this will have on the general public. Is he prepared to embark further on a policy which seeks to take away the rights of the common people, because that is what it amounts to? We represent the common people and we are entitled on the Committee of Public Accounts to question accounting officers as to how public money is spent. We must know, too, when the Comptroller and Auditor-General makes comments on important incidents which concern the public very intimately. We have had to inquire from time to time about petty larcenies and pilfering in various Departments and we got satisfactory explanations. We were told that those things did occur without the knowledge of certain officials, but that precautionary measures had been taken so as to avoid further incidents of that nature. I do not want to go too closely into the conversations we had at the meetings of the Committee of Public Accounts. I regard what took place at those meetings as strictly confidential.
I have the feeling, and it is shared by a good many people in this country, that we are establishing a bureaucracy. I do not blame the civil servant; he is paid for doing his job. But, as Deputy Dillon pointed out, the Comptroller and Auditor-General is not a civil servant. His appointment is provided for under our Constitution. He cannot be rapped on the knuckles, even by Ministers. He is responsible to this House. Are we going to negative all that we were told would be done under our Constitution?
We are told that the rights and privileges of public representatives are being filched from us every day, and it is the Minister's colleagues who are complaining most. I took up a certain attitude in relation to county management and I found myself frequently in the minority, but the Minister's supporters, the members of the rank and file throughout the country, are now condemning the Fianna Fáil Government for the way they do things, and yet members of the Fianna Fáil Party come here and vote on amendments of this character against their consciences and against the wishes of the people who sent them here. I sincerely hope the Minister will find some way out, some via media so as to meet the idea behind these amendments. Let us see, at any rate, that the rights and privileges of the House are maintained and that there will be no further invasion of the rights of the Committee of Public Accounts.
Amendment put.
The Committee divided: Tá, 32; Níl, 50.
Tá
- Anthony, Richard S.
- Beirne, John.
- Bennett, George C.
- Blowick, Joseph.
- Browne, Patrick.
- Byrne, Alfred.
- Cafferky, Dominick.
- Coburn, James.
- Coogan, Eamonn.
- Corish, Richard.
- Cosgrave, Liam.
- Davin, William.
- Dillon, James.
- Dockrell, Henry M.
- Dockrell, Maurice E.
- Doyle, Peader S.
- Everett, James.
- Flanagan, Oliver J.
- Hughes, James.
- Keating, John.
- MacEoin, Seán.
- McGilligan, Patrick.
- McMenamin, Daniel.
- Mulcahy, Richard.
- O'Donnell, William F.
- O'Leary, John.
- O'Reilly, Patrick.
- O'Reilly, Thomas.
- Redmond, Bridget M.
- Reynolds, Mary.
- Sheldon, William A.W.
- Spring, Daniel.
Níl
- Aiken, Frank.
- Allen, Denis.
- Bartley, Gerald.
- Beegan, Patrick.
- Blaney, Neal.
- Boland, Gerald.
- Brady, Seán.
- Breen, Daniel.
- Brennan, Thomas.
- Briscoe, Robert.
- Burke, Patrick (Co. Dublin).
- Butler, Bernard.
- Colbert, Michael.
- Colley, Harry.
- Derrigh, Thomas.
- De Valera, Eamon.
- Flynn, Stephen.
- Furlong, Walter.
- Gorry, Patrick J.
- Hilliard, Michael.
- Humphreys, Francis.
- Kennedy, Michael J.
- Killilea, Mark.
- Kilroy, James.
- Kissane, Earmon.
- Little, Patrick J.
- Loughman, Frank.
- Lynch, James B.
- McCann, John.
- MacEntee, Seán.
- Moran, Michael.
- Morrissey, Michael.
- Moylan, Seán.
- O'Briain, Donnchadh.
- O'Cléirigh, Micheál.
- O'Connor, John S.
- O'Grady, Seán.
- O'Reilly, Matthew.
- O'Rourke, Daniel.
- Rice, Bridget M.
- Ruttledge, Patrick J.
- Ryan, James.
- Ryan, Robert.
- Sheridan, Michael.
- Smith, Patrick.
- Traynor, Oscar.
- Ua Donnchadha, Dómhnall.
- Walsh, Laurence.
- Walsh, Richard.
- Ward, Conn.
Tellers:— Tá: Deputies Doyle and Bennett; Níl: Deputies Kissane and Kennedy.
Amendment declared negatived.
Amendment No. 7 not moved.
Section 25, as amended, and Sections 26 to 31 and the Title agreed to.
Bill reported with amendments.
Report Stage ordered for Friday, July 13th.