Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 9 Apr 1946

Vol. 100 No. 12

Committee on Finance. - Vote 52—Lands.

Minister for Lands (Mr. Moylan)

I move:—

That a sum not exceeding £750,640 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending the 31st day of March, 1947, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Offices of the Minister for Lands and of the Irish Land Commission (44 and 45 Vict., c. 49, sec. 46, and c. 71, sec. 4; 48 and 49 Vict., c. 73, secs. 17, 18 and 20; 54 and 55 Vict., c. 48; 3 Edw. 7, c. 37; 7 Edw. 7, c. 38 and c. 56; 9 Edw. 7, c. 42; Nos. 27 and 42 of 1923; No. 25 of 1925; No. 11 of 1926; No. 19 of 1927; No. 31 of 1929; No. 11 of 1931; Nos. 33 and 38 of 1933; No. 11 of 1934; No. 41 of 1936; and No. 26 of 1939).

Compared with last year's figure the net Estimate shows an increase of £57,182, of which £54,216 is attributable to the three sub-heads A, B and I, covering respectively, salaries, travelling expenses and estate improvement works.

The increase of £25,046 in sub-head A is due partly to the emergency bonus granted under the Civil Service (Stabilisation of Bonus) regulations, and partly to the provision of £17,000 to cover proposed additions to the staff of the purchase branch and the acquisition and re-sales division.

Travelling expenses under sub-head B are up by £4,000. The gradual improvement in the petrol and tyres situation, coupled with the prospects of filling vacancies in the outdoor staff, holds a promise of increased field activities on the part of our inspectors and surveyors.

The maximum which it is considered can be usefully spent on improvement works while the present shortage of materials continues is £254,800—the amount asked for under sub-head I. Building and constructional work is still restricted by shortage and high prices of materials, and we can only hope to do somewhat better than last year, when we spent £202,000. The increase of £25,170 is therefore based on the doubtful prospect of an immediate, if slight, improvement in the flow of supplies.

There is little need for me to comment on the other items beyond mentioning that sub-head H (3), which is increased by £2,000, is one of four statutory sub-heads (H (1) to H (4)) devoted in the main to the servicing of Land Bonds. The total amount required under these sub-heads is £771,100, considerably more than half of the total net estimate.

In introducing last year's Estimate, I emphasised that the most essential task of the Land Commission was the clearing up of an immense accumulation of arrears arising out of past operations. In this arrear category I placed the 73,000 holdings of tenanted land vested in the Land Commission under the Land Acts, 1923-39, and not yet revested in the tenants, as well as some 15,000 tenanted holdings on the former Congested Districts Board estates; and I drew attention to the absolute necessity of achieving more in the way of output if the tenant-purchasers affected were to be made owners in fee-simple in anything like reasonable time. I am glad to report that during the past year 4,100 holdings in the first class were revested, as against 1,400 in the year 1944-45. Some 520 holdings of tenanted land on the old Congested Districts Board estates were also vested in the tenants —more than doubling the figures for the previous year. These old holdings I should particularly like to see disposed of, but most of them are congested holdings requiring rearrangement, enlargement or improvement before they can be revested.

I also spoke of some 45,000 parcels of untenanted land allotted, but not yet vested in the allottees, title to which, in common sense and equity, apart from the fact that it is our statutory duty to do so, should be given to those who have made good, before land division on an appreciable scale adds to the waiting list. In this respect, also, we have made fair progress, some 2,100 parcels having been vested in allottees during the year as against 558 in 1944-45.

From the point of view of revesting, the slowing-down in the division of land, brought about by circumstances outside the control of the Land Commission, is really an advantage of which I propose fully to avail myself. I am satisfied that a sustained effort to expedite the revesting of holdings, both tenanted and untenanted, is being made: the figures of holdings revested which I have just quoted are the immediate fruit of that effort. But I will not be satisfied until the pace is so accelerated that, by the time normal conditions return and land division and rearrangement of holdings form once more a substantial part of a full Land Commission programme, the Land Commission will have been relieved of much of the arrears with which they are at present so heavily burdened. To that end I am at present negotiating with the Minister for Finance for the additional staff to which I referred when dealing with sub-head A.

I know that most Deputies are more interested in the question of the acquisition and division of land than in the equally important but more or less unseen work of revesting. I anticipate that many will demand to know why, now that most of our staff have been returned, we do not concentrate on that side of our work. The answer is simple: new holdings mean new houses and building materials are not yet forthcoming in quantity. Besides, we are still short of inspectors—some absent on loan and some vacancies unfilled.

Last year, acquisition of fresh land was virtually confined to commitments already undertaken and to areas needed for turbary or afforestation. The area acquired for division came to about 9,000 acres, while roughly 13,000 acres were divided.

The Land Commission have on hands at present some 40,000 acres, more or less, of arable land and pasture suitable for division, apart from 60,000 acres of mountain, moor and bog. The division of these 40,000 acres presents a problem to which priority must be given. A large part of it is in the midland counties and, on paper, is laid out in holdings mainly intended for migrants, local needs on the individual estates concerned having been reasonably satisfied. But for the emergency these holdings would before now have been equipped with buildings and suitable migrants would have been installed. As it happened, the Land Commission were faced with the problem of what to do with the land during the past six years. Originally intended for early division, it had to be tilled or grazed in the interests of the nation's larder and of the national economy and, as continuous cropping tends to exhaust fertility, it is incumbent on the Land Commission to endeavour to dispose of the areas as soon as building materials become available.

Priority will also be given to that part of the lands in hands which, as Mayo Deputies, for instance, will know, is held over to be the basis of complete schemes of rearrangement for some of the large and badly congested western estates. Some of these rearrangement schemes are ready to be put into operation; they are a credit to their originators but, unfortunately, building materials are essential for their execution and without the materials they must stay on paper. Other essentials are agreement between the tenants to accept rearrangement and a sufficiency of inspectors to handle a most intricate job.

I think I have said enough to make the position clear. With conditions as they are I can see no practicable alternative to present policy and it is quite useless for the public, or Deputies on behalf of the public, to urge the Land Commission to acquire fresh land here, there, and everywhere. The Land Commission can do no more than take note for future use of any representations made; they cannot travel beyond their capacity either now or in the future.

The debate on the Land Bill recently before the House will have given Deputies an opportunity of examining one of the post-division tasks of the Land Commission. The placing of the allottees on probation long enough to test their suitability is a precautionary step which experience has shown to be absolutely necessary; at the same time it adds immensely to the duties of the staff.

Let me close on a more cheerful note. The collection arrear for all gales since 1933 as it stood on 1st March last was £352,930—that is to say, only 1.15 per cent. of the total amount collectable. A collection representing 98.85 per cent. of 12 years' annuities is a definite indication of the general prosperity of the farming community and the financial credit of the State.

Mr. Hughes

I have a motion on the Order Paper dealing with the very important question of land division, and I do not want to anticipate that motion. Realising the difficulties in regard to the food requirements of the world, and the likelihood of the requirements of the world in the matter of food not being available for many years, I think we should appreciate that the disposition and the utilisation of land is of paramount importance. When we notice what those nations that attended the Hot Springs Conference were planning to do to provide an adequate diet for all the people of the world, a properly balanced, nutritious diet, I think that the food required to fulfil that programme will be appreciably more than the amount of food that was available in the world pre-war, and will be food of a different character. The protective foods will have to be substantially increased. In our circumstances here, I think our capacity to produce protective foods is obvious. Therefore, I feel that the responsibility of dealing with the disposition of land is a very important one for the Department concerned. I often wonder what exactly is our land policy in that respect. I have been in this Dáil for some time now, and I have never heard a Minister elaborate in detail exactly what our land policy is. I think it is important that we should have a land policy, that we should have a certain goal at which to aim. I think also that it is unfortunate that we have no co-operation between the Department charged with the responsibility of looking after the disposition of land and the Department of Agriculture that is charged with the responsibility of looking after the utilisation of the land.

One of the problems which confront us, so far as stagnation in our production is concerned, must definitely be related to this whole question of land disposition and land utilisation and the selection of people who are to use the land in the national interest. The Minister has indicated recently in the discussion on the Land Bill that he is anxious to ensure that only people will be put on the land who are capable of utilising it properly. That is a step in the right direction. Whatever activities are to take place, so far as the Minister's Department is concerned, in the division and rearrangement of land, I feel that when there is an estate, whether large or small, being divided in a particular locality, the activities of the Land Commission ought to go outside that estate. Their activities ought not to be confined merely to the estate, because we all know that all over the country there are economic difficulties so far as certain holdings are concerned. When we talk about rearrangement, I suggest that we should aim at empowering the Land Commission to go outside the particular estate concerned—possibly they have the power at present; I believe they have—and try to deal with any economic difficulties in that particular neighbourhood. If a man has two small holdings that are not economically placed in relation to each other, that should be taken into account in the division of the particular estate. That could be corrected without any great difficulty. If the Land Commission are to do their job properly, I think that when they are charged with the responsibility of looking after land they ought to deal with the disposition of land generally. If an opportunity occurs to correct an economic difficulty so far as the ordinary tenant farmer is concerned and his position could be improved, it would be not only an advantage to him, but a national advantage as well, because economy in utilisation of land is very important and eventually substantially affects the cost of production.

If we are to survey the situation, and if the Minister is looking into the future and making up his mind what the Land Commission are to do under his guidance in the coming years, I feel that in dealing with an estate, the Land Commission ought to try to correct any difficulties there are in the particular neighbourhood, because it is the only opportunity they will ever have to correct difficulties of that sort. I suggest, therefore, that the Land Commission should avail of every opportunity to deal with matters of that sort.

With the change in the methods of using land in other countries, and with the tendency to increased mechanisation in this country, I think that the Minister, in the division of estates, especially big estates, ought to try to encourage co-operation. As a matter of fact, I think he could actually start to help people whom he is settling on the land to work co-operatively in the way of having a machinery centre and utilising that machinery in their own interests. We all know that a great deal of the failure that has occurred in connection with people settled on what are supposed to be economic holdings is due to the difficulty of maintaining sufficient equipment to work the holding. For instance, on a holding of 20 or 25 acres, it is extermely difficult for a tenant to maintain a pair of horses. It would scarcely be economic for him to have all the equipment necessary to work the holding efficiently. If we continue in connection with our policy of land division to settle people on rather small holdings, I think the Minister cannot look forward to any great measure of success unless we attend to the problem of equipping people to use their land properly. That can be done only by ensuring that they will co-operate and that the modern equipment necessary to expedite work on the farm is available to them at a reasonable charge. It would not be difficult to do it. I suggest to the Minister that he should look into the matter. We should be, at least, experimenting in that respect. When we were discussing the Land Bill, the Minister told us of the number of failures that had occurred and we know the powers he sought, and got, in the Land Bill. Surely, the Minister should concern himself with ascertaining what is responsible for the large number of failures and why it is necessary for him to take those exceptional powers to dispossess people who were placed on the land. He should satisfy himself as to whether they are given a fair chance and whether the means at their disposal for working the land are sufficient. I do not think that they are. The Minister and his Department should ensure that the people settled on the land get a fair chance.

The Minister has told us that he proposes to deal with the land at present in the hands of the Land Commission before acquiring any considerable area of new land. I think that that is absolutely sound. The Minister mentioned the considerable amount of land in the hands of the Land Commission. Some of it has been in their hands for many years. I believe that some of it was acquired by the old Congested Districts Board and has not yet been rearranged. That is not very creditable or desirable. The Minister rightly mentioned another aspect of this important problem—that land in the hands of the Land Commission, has, in order to comply with the compulsory tillage Order, to be let in conacre year after year. If the Land Commission are to be the arbiters on the question whether a tenant is using good husbandry or not, they themselves should set a good example. If a person claims to be a judge in a particular matter, he should not be an offender in that respect himself. The Land Commission claim to be judges of what is good husbandry. At the same time, they are responsible for the very worst form of husbandry, because a great deal of land has been abused during the emergency and its fertility lowered because of continuous cropping. That is most unfair and unfortunate so far as the incoming tenant is concerned. Practical farmers know very well that fertility is not restored to land in a year or two years. Incoming tenants on lands which have been abused in that fashion have to face a great handicap. They have to restore to the land something which is very valuable and which has been destroyed by the policy pursued. I am glad that the Minister has made up his mind to deal with the arrears of land division. That is essential. This House should be very strong in its criticism of any abuse of the land, especially by a Department of State.

On that question of the acquisition of land, the practice of the Land Commission was to serve a resumption notice on the owner of land, and let that resumption notice lie for many years before the land was acquired. That practice is very bad and unsound. A resumption notice means to the owner of the land that his period of occupation is to be short. Obviously, the owner or occupier will take all he can out of the land while the going is good. I know of one or two cases in which land has been abused and its fertility has deteriorated because the owner realised that his interest would continue only for a few short years. In all cases where resumption notices are in operation, the question whether the Land Commission will take the land over or not should be determined at the earliest moment. The Minister mentioned that there were 40,000 acres of land in the Midlands still to be dealt with, and that plans for its division had already been prepared with a view to settling migrants on it, after local needs had been dealt with. I want to stress that qualification. I do not think that the people of Kildare or Meath have any objection to providing land for people living under congested conditions in the West, but it is grossly unfair to pass over the claims of some of the local people who have small holdings and are capable of using land. Their ancestors may have been evicted from the particular estate about to be divided. They know that their chances of getting land in the future will be very remote if their claims are not attended to at the time of division. It is grossly unfair to local interests that the claims of people in the area should not be even examined. We know that that has taken place both in North Kildare and in County Meath. A number of estates were, before the emergency, settled with 100 per cent. migrants and local interests were ignored. That has given rise to bitter feelings—with a good deal of justification. Let the Minister bring in migrants by all means when dealing with these 40,000 acres of which he speaks, but let him make sure that the claims of local people are carefully examined. If local people who have a claim show that they are capable of using the land, they should be provided for.

I am glad that the figures given by the Minister regarding the vesting of land showed some increase. Even with the increase indicated, it would take many years to deal with the whole question of vesting. The primary purpose of the Land Commission, when first set up, was to deal with this question of vesting. In the past 20 years, very slow progress has been made so far as vesting is concerned, and that is a disgrace. It is the right of the tenants to be made the real owners of their property. That responsibility was placed on the Land Commission many years ago, and nothing can be offered as an excuse for their failure. The problem is still there.

The amount of land that has been vested is not anything like 50 per cent. of the total. I do not want to minimise the difficulty. I know it is rather an involved matter which requires a good deal of examination, as the Land Commission must be satisfied that everything is in order before a holding is vested. I think the Minister is anxious to attend to this problem. I understand that the staff dealing with the matter has been increased, and I hope it will be increased still further, because even the increase the Minister indicated this evening would not be anything like sufficient to deal with the matter in a reasonable period. The Minister, in regard to sub-head I, told us that the building and construction work is still restricted, and I suppose it is likely to remain restricted for a considerable period. The difficulty of getting timber especially is very great, but there is a good deal of work to be done and more money should be spent under that sub-head.

One of the things I could never understand is the policy behind the method adopted in the selection of tenants. I think we ought to aim at having the best possible machine so far as the selection of tenants is concerned. We must realise that there is only a limited amount of land available for division and the Minister's aim should be to select tenants who are best qualified to use that land, especially tenants whose existing holdings are uneconomic. I think that the Government's policy in recent years has come round to a large extent to that object. In the early years of the Fianna Fáil Government a good many landless men got land and a great many of them proved to be failures. I think the Minister has made it perfectly clear on more than one occasion recently that his anxiety is to solve the problem of uneconomic holdings. I think he would almost go so far as to say that land should be provided exclusively for the solution of the prolem of the uneconomic holding.

At all events, in the division of estates, the aim should be to use the land mainly to provide allotments for uneconomic holdings in the district. It is only in the event of failure to select tenants from that category that we should give land to landless men because, as I have said, experience has shown that very few of the landless men have proved a success in these holdings. Very few of them were in a position to work the land; very few of them had the necessary capital, equipment or stock. I feel that the present method of selecting tenants—sending down an inspector to go round as a sort of detective through the district to ask Paddy Murphy what he thought about John Ryan as a tenant, and encouraging neighbours to tell lies about one another—is all wrong. However, I have a motion on the Order Paper in relation to this matter and I do not want to anticipate the debate that will take place on that motion.

The Minister told us that the bulk of the increase in the Estimate, about £57,000 odd, is due to the increase on the cost of living bonus. There is also an increase in the amount of travelling expenses of £4,000. I suppose that means that there are more inspectors on the road. I do not think there is very much change in the other sub-heads. The Minister has already indicated that the principal increases occurred in sub-heads A and B. Sub-head A is up by about £25,000, and sub-head B by about £4,000. I should like the Minister to tell us whether the increase under sub-head B means that the staff down the country has been increased.

Captain Giles

The debate on the Land Bill a few weeks ago has more or less superseded this debate because practically everything that could be said in regard to land division was said on that Bill. I was glad that the Minister had the pleasing information for those tenants who have had their land for the past 15 or 16 years that they were going at last to be vested. That has been a burning question with most of us for quite a long time. I am glad that the Minister is going to tackle it and that he hopes that inside 12 months these allottees will be in a position to call the land their own and to deal with it as they would like to deal with it. Before land division starts, on a new scale, I should like to see a general review of the principles governing land division so that we shall be able to see the errors of our ways in the past and take such steps as are necessary to climinate these errors in future. I think one of the first questions calling for examination is whether we are satisfied that we are not creating new agricultural slums in the cottages which are being built on small holdings in the Midlands. I think that is a matter that will seriously affect the future prosperity of the agricultural population if we do not give it the necessary consideration now. In my county, which is one of the most important from an agricultural point of view in the country, we have had a number of new colonies started in recent years. The cottages on these colonies may look very well at the moment when times are good, when money is flowing freely around the country and the tenants are doing fairly well. I do not think, however, that we shall always be in the happy position of getting good prices for everything we have to sell and these tenants will be severely tested when the bad times come. Will a tenant with a holding of 25 statute acres be able to make good in such times and, if not, what will happen in these colonies? That is one of the matters which I should like the Minister to review before we decide to go on creating new colonies and expecting people to live on holdings of 21 or 25 acres. I know there is not enough land to go around but, at the same time, what is the use of creating agricultural slums?

I would ask the Minister to review that position fully. Suppose we have a period of depression in the next five, six or even ten years, and that these holdings are vested, if a man finds that he cannot make a living out of his holding, he will put it up for sale and get out. We do not want that to happen. I saw that happen on an estate within the last 25 years. It occurred in the case of the Browne estate outside of Trim. Of the ten or 12 allottees who got holdings on it, I do not think that there are more than three of the original men there to-day. One man did very well. He was the herd. He was a thrifty, hard-working man, and, thanks to his energy, he has bought up practically half that estate, and is a well-to-do man to-day. That, of course, is bound to bring us back to the ranching system again. That sort of thing is bound to happen if, in the first instance, you do not give a man a holding large enough to enable him to rear his family on. He ought to be in a position to be able to do that in bad times as well as in good times.

I live in the County Meath, and I am satisfied that no man who has to live by the land alone can live out of 25 acres. The Minister will reply to me that the migrants there are doing very well. I agree, but so is everybody else who wants to work his land. Everybody who has land to-day is doing fairly well. They are all making a little money. What I want to tell the Minister is this, that while the migrants there are making good, and are working hard, they are not making their living solely out of the land. I am sure he will agree with me on that. Large numbers of their young men and women go across to England, where they earn good money. Portion of it goes to the payment of rents and rates. The fact that it is coming into the country is all to the good. There is no use in anybody saying, however, that the migrants there are living solely out of the land, because they are not.

In connection with the colonies that we have in Meath, I want to put this point to the Minister; I think it is a bad thing to have them isolated. Groups of migrants are brought from Mayo, Clare or Kerry. You may have 20 or 30 families. A colony is formed, and that group of people is more or less isolated from the people of the county. The tendency is to create a feeling of mistrust between the migrants and the people of Meath. The two peoples do not mix. The Meath people look on them as a blight, and they look on the Meath people as bounders. If the Department has to make colonies in Meath, then let there be a mixture of Meath and Kildare people with people from Mayo, Kerry and Clare. The House seemed to be alarmed at the conditions in Meath as I described them here some time ago. Deputies need not be alarmed.

The conditions there are bad, with fighting going on from publichouse to dance hall. It is a shame to see what happens there. I believe myself that the cause of it all is that no attempt is made to have a blending of the Meath men with those from Kerry and other counties. The Meath man may say to the Kerry man: "What brought you up here to get land that should be given to us?" The other man replies that his people were driven off the land 100 years ago. That is how fights start. They fight from dance hall to dance hall, in publichouses and in public places.

The people in Meath have no objection to the migrants coming there if a good, decent type is brought. I must say that during the last seven or eight years the Department has concentrated on bringing a good, manly type of migrant to the county. My advice to the Department is that if we are to have more colonies in Meath, then some effort should be made to mix the people of Meath with the migrants. That is the only way in which we will get rid of this bitterness, all the fighting and squabbling that goes on. We are all Irishmen, and we all like the other fellow if e can. It is all a "cod" to say that colonies of Irish speakers have been put there who will help to bring back the Irish language. What I find is that the people who come there from the West and South are doing their level best to learn good English. The young people say that is their ambition, so they will be able to go across to England and earn their living. There are several people in my locality at the present time who are waiting for their passports to go to Britain. The fact is that in Meath at the present time the whole ambition of these people is to get to the other side so that they may be able to get quick money. They do not want to work in Ireland. I agree that in the case of some of them, when they make good money on the other side, they come back and marry into a neighbour's farm.

In connection with the division of land in Meath and in other parts of the Midlands, I want to suggest to the Minister that I think it would be far better, instead of giving an allottee a horse or a cow, to give him a good farm of land and £200 in cash. With this money he could buy a cow or a horse if he wanted one, or a mowing machine. There is no use in the Land Commission forcing a cow or a plough on a man who wants something else. Give him the £200 in cash and 30 acres of land, and see to it that he spends that money wisely. Some of the horses that have been given to those allottees were most unsuitable. The Land Commission paid up to £60 and £65 for some of them. In fact, they purchased half-thoroughbreds that cost £70 and £75.

What is the use in giving a half-thoroughbred to an unfortunate man who has hardly ever yoked an ass to a car in his life? When a man like that takes out a half-bred horse, he soon finds himself on the roadside with the horse kicking sky-high. A veterinary surgeon told me that he is out practically night and day attending the horses given to some of these allottees. The horses get caught in the barbed wire and injure themselves badly. I have known of cases where good horses that cost £70 or £80 had to be sold within a fortnight by the migrant for a £5 note. In other cases the horses had to be destroyed. That is why I suggest that the £200 in cash should be given to an allottee with a fairly good farm of 30, 35 or 40 acres. If that were done, those people would make good farmers. The British did that when they were here. I do not mention that with the intention of suggesting that everything the British did here was right. But they did that in the case of some land that they divided before we got our freedom, and that method proved satisfactory.

There is another point that I want to bring to the Minister's notice, and it is that these allottees have no place in which to store the grain that they grow. They are given a little stable or shed for a horse and a couple of cows. What they need most of all is accommodation for the storing of grain. At present they have to put it in a room in the house, but after a week or so it begins to sprout. The result is that they have to dispose of it to the nearest merchant as quickly as possible and at whatever price they are offered. It would be of great advantage to them if they could hold the grain until such time as a reasonable price was to be obtained. If the Land Commission is not prepared to put up a loft for the allottee it should at least allow him to spend an additional £5 in having the walls of the shed raised a yard higher. I say to many of these new allottees: "Get it specially built; the Land Commission will not build the walls high enough for you to put in a loft. Go to your contractor and tell him that you are prepared to put up so much money to have the roof raised four feet." The Land Commission engineer almost always agrees and says he is glad to see these allottees putting up a little of their own money for the out-offices.

It is most essential that every allottee should have a grain loft, because it is not possible to store wheat, oats or barley on the ground floor. It must be stored up high on a good wooden floor. When sowing time comes around, all these allottees have to rush to the merchants to buy grain at huge prices and in many cases they get the same grain as they sold earlier at low prices. It will cost the Land Commission very little to do what I suggest. The aim of the Land Commission is to make a holding a good holding, and the only way to do it is by giving the allottee a chance, by giving him a good loft. With regard to the fencing of holdings, nearly everybody who came up to Meath got a pair of piers and a gate, but the Meath people who got farms in most cases got neither piers nor gates, and I urge the Minister to see to it that, when a man gets a new house and a holding, he will at least get a pair of piers and a gate. He is certainly entitled to it. Let there be no discrimination.

After 25 years of land division, we find that the majority of our little holdings are fast deteriorating, and I defy contradiction of that statement. It is easy to understand why that should be so. The land of Meath was formerly the richest in Europe. It would grease your boots to walk through it, but, with these small uneconomic holdings, people can feed only small stock. The hardest animals in the world are young live stock who take the bone out of the land, and the small allottee cannot get manure enough to replace it, with the result that the land is deteriorating year after year. It is all due to the fact that these men have not got enough land, and so can have no rotation. If a man with 25 acres wants to work on an economic basis, he must keep two horses and three cows. If he does so, he will be able to keep very little more, whereas if he had 30 to 35 Irish acres, he would be able to close off part of his holding during the winter and have it in good trim for 1st April for putting his cows and young stock out. At present nearly all these allottees are trying to put in all the stock they can, and I do not blame them. It is the only way they can make their holdings pay, but the result is that they have more stock on the holdings in winter than they can hold and the animals are deep in mud, from October to April. The land does not get the smallest chance to get into condition. The land is fast deteriorating, and that is why I ask the Minister to review the position, with a view to seeing whether he can make the holdings a little bigger, and so enable men to close off ten acres or so and give it a chance of getting into condition for two or three months. It would make a vast difference to the economy of the men on these holdings. These men are able to produce only small scraggy store cattle and are never able to turn them out for fairs or markets in proper fettle. The result is that the bigger man buys these cattle at scrap prices and brings them to his rich lands, possibly across the road, where they immediately start to thrive and he doubles his money on every bullock he buys.

Our small people will never be able to get on their feet if we continue this policy of giving them small holdings. As one who lives in their midst and who has a small holding, I know what I am talking about. I want to see the policy stopped, because these men in bad times will never make good, and as fast as these little holdings can be sold, they will be sold when depression comes along. There is nothing else for them to do. Even in good times, these men are put to the pin of their collar to make good, and if they have from six to nine children, they have livings which are amongst the most miserable in Europe. I do not suggest that the man with five or six sons up to 18 years of age has a miserable time. He is able to make good because he has not got to pay any wages. The sons perhaps get half a crown at the end of the week, but the man with a young family has a hell of a job. The fact is that that man is in rags. I know that the small, uneconomic farmer is one of the most miserable creatures, with never a day's comfort. When the farm is beginning to get on its feet, that unfortunate man dies. He may leave a little behind for his children, but during his lifetime he will have had no comfort.

With regard to the new Land Bill, I was sorry that it had to be introduced, but I know that the Minister had no alternative. There are a vast number of men who could have made good, but did not, and there are other men who could have made good but for the fact that the hand of God was against them. I know one man who, within a month of getting his farm, lost all his stock through a fire, but I am glad to say he is getting on his feet again. I know another man with a large family whose wife was taken from him and who was left in a miserable condition. Another man has been in bad health for the past ten years and will never be able to make good. I ask the Land Commission to be lenient with these people, to judge each case on its own merits. I do not, however, ask them to be lenient with the "buckos" who got a new house and a farm and who will not live in them, who in many cases have set the houses and live perhaps in a labourer's cottage. These are fiends who deserve everything. These men are doing more harm to County Meath than anything else. It is easy for the Land Commission to tell me: "So-and-so got a new house and a farm and never lived in it and why should any other Meath man get a farm?" and to say that they will bring them from the North, South and West and show the Meath people how to work the land, but that is not fair because the fact is that many of these people who got land never should have got it. It is a disgrace that these men should have got new houses and farms valued at £1,200 for which they had no respect.

I have in mind the Gore Estate, Dunshaughlin, where cattle taken in on the 11 months' system from the big ranchers were allowed to roam around, smashing glass in windows, tearing the doors off the houses and leaving the place in a dirty condition. If you saw the condition of the place, you would not sleep a night afterwards. Six or seven houses were allowed to go derelict. These "buckos" would not live in them and would not even put a fence around the houses and they still hold the land. If they do not mend their ways, I hope the Land Commission will give them the order of the boot as quickly as possible.

I have every sympathy with the unfortunate tenant who got into difficult circumstances. There are many like that. Forty or 50 of the new tenants in County Meath may find themselves at the pin of their collar to keep their holdings, under the new Land Bill. I ask the Minister to take each on his circumstances and to have his inspectors visit the parish priest of the area, who knows the circumstances in every case from A to Z. Many of those who may be evicted under the new Land Bill are the unfortunate victims of circumstances and would have made good if they could. It is not their fault. I know that we did give land to men who never had a shilling. That type of man will never make good, as he has not the inclination in the first place and has not the land spirit in the second place. Such men never care whether they rise or fall. Even if some of them fall and rise in the morning they do not continue and they say that the moment they are vested they will cash in and get out. I know many of them who are waiting to be vested in order to get out. Even so, I would rather see them vested and let them get out, so that some thrifty lad may come in and make good.

I agree with Deputy Hughes, who mentioned that when dividing a large estate one should go outside the scope of a mile-and-a-half. There are many small farms which have ten acres at the home, five acres further on and perhaps five more further away. It is a most wasteful position and it is not economic. They have to do a little farming here and a little farming there. Such men should be able to say: "I have three little holdings and will give them up for a full estate." Their case should be considered. The first thing we want in land division is economic holdings—to make uneconomic holdings economic. There are many little farmers in my own area who could be put on those estates and who would do work which would have a lasting effect.

I again stress the point I started on, that if you are making new colonies you must see that you mix the Meath people and the other people so that there will be friendship. It should not be as it is at present, with the migrant's son on one side of the road and the Meath people on the other side of the road, at the church gates, with no friendship between them. There is no reason why they should not be friendly. As it is, if there is a charity dance being run, you find they come together. But then, when there are three or four pints exchanged between them, you find them quarrelling with one another. It is all over the land.

If the Minister does not believe me, let him go down to any part of County Meath and see what is wrong. Things do not all appear in the papers, but enough appears in the papers to alarm the people. The migrants were rushed in too quickly and too secretly. No one was told anything about it. All we knew was that charabancs and buses came to the town of Navan and the people were left there at the hotels. The hotels were told to have so many dinners ready for so-and-so, and so the migrants were brought down to the colonies. If the word were carried beforehand, instead of doing it in secret, there would be much better results. The Meath people said: "We are not going to have these people in here; we want the land of Meath for the people of Meath." I do not stand for that. Let the land be divided four square between us all.

I believe the problem of congestion has been there not for hundreds of years but for thousands of years. I would ask the Minister, in relieving congestion, to go back to Mr. Hogan's policy and see that some of the big estates in the West—as big as in Meath, and bigger—are taken over. One could give such people a farm of 80 acres in Meath, which would be as good as 300 acres in the West; and the estate in the West could be divided, instead of bringing hundreds of smaller fry up to Meath. I do not want to stop migration, but why should not that policy be adopted? We have Lord Adare and Lord So-and-So, with 5,000 and 6,000 acres. Why leave them in that position? Why not take that land and give them an estate near Dublin or in Meath of 80 or 100 acres? That would mean keeping the population in the West and making it economic. I think the old system is good, but should be worked more in conjunction with present migration. If you keep the present system going, two or three parishes in Mayo would be able to send enough to flood the whole of Meath. The large estates in the West should be tackled first and, if that is not sufficient, one can try the other system. Do not be studding Meath with isolated colonies, which are only breeding hatred and discontent. We are happy to live with the migrants and work with them, and they wish to do the same, but things are bad and they are left isolated. If the Minister can set that right, a big bone of contention will be taken away.

Mr. Commons

This debate started on the same lines as that on the Land Bill about three or four weeks ago, and probably will follow on much the same lines. I look forward with hope to the assurance from the Minister that in the years to come a faster move will be made to straighten up affairs not only in relation to the land that is in the Land Commission but also in the matter of the acquisition of new land for division. No matter how fast the Land Commission may move in my constituency, we still would have people left out, who will have to wait a long time. For that reason, no matter at what speed the work is done, I could not say I would be satisfied. Nevertheless, I have not the slightest doubt the Land Commission and the Minister have a thorough understanding of the position.

Once a man gets an economic holding and is established on it, he is automatically of benefit to the State. If he is on an uneconomic holding, he can be of no benefit, as on account of it he can always lay a claim to the dole or some sort of assistance from the Government. Therefore, if a man who is willing to work land can be given sufficient to provide food for this country—and food is one thing for which the world is crying out and, by all appearances, will be crying out for, for a long while—he can make his contribution to an increase in the production of agricultural goods.

It is bad to do too much looking back and I admit it is better to look forward. I wonder if there ever will be a genuine and honest effort in the post-war period. If I thought there would be, I would not add another dozen words to this debate, but would rely on the old saying: "Wait and see." As Deputies on this side of the House have said, one must give good criticism, as it is the one thing that counts. It might help to stir up a Department that is pretty lax. I think the Minister himself, in introducing the Estimates, admitted that, when he mentioned to Deputies from Mayo that their representations were being looked into and that they would definitely get the consideration they should get. He also said that most Deputies were interested in the acquisition of land more than anything else. He is perfectly right there. Even though 45,000 acres may be on the hands of the Land Commission, which we have almost a guarantee will be dealt with within the next year or two, there is a lot more that can be acquired. Some estates can be acquired definitely without much trouble, though in other cases there may be a tough struggle.

When things are balanced one against the other, we know that the citizen has certain rights and cannot be dispossessed of his land, because it has been vested in him and is his property. The big landlord and rancher cannot be thrown out, as that would be a move towards totalitarianism. He must be handled in just the same way as the smaller tenant in order to get the parcel of land from him. Therefore, under the present system of land division, there will always be a very slow movement in the acquisition of land. Representations have been made. I think I can safely say that I have made as many representations, or almost as many, for the few months I have been here, as any other Deputy. Every question that I have put down, with one exception, has been addressed to the Minister for Lands. From that alone he can understand that land division and land troubles are the chief sources of worry in the area I represent.

The position that has been created there is that people, for 30 or 40 years, since the Congested Districts Board was inaugurated, have been looking forward to the time when they would get a holding. Two generations have passed, and still nothing has been done for those people in the way of land division. The position now is that they have almost given up hope. I have made representations on their behalf, and the people there asked me what answer I got. All I can say is that if I make representations to the Land Commission, I get a short note of acknowledgment, and if I make them to the Minister, he replies that my representations have been noted, and will be looked into as soon as possible. That expression "as soon as possible" has become a sort of joke as far as County Mayo is concerned. I sincerely hope that in the coming year something will be done.

Deputy Giles has touched upon a point that is indeed very interesting. He said that in Mayo there are big farms. Undoubtedly there are very many big farms, perhaps not altogether of the same magnitude as farms in the Midlands, but they are nevertheless big enough to attract the attention of the Land Commission. If the Minister will listen to representations, I can assure him that for the next year I can every week draw his attention to one or other of the big farms of land which could be taken over by the Land Commission and distributed among the people who are uneconomic holders, if not in the immediate locality, then in the vicinity, and these uneconomic holders could be migrated to the big farms in Mayo at a lesser cost than to holdings in the Midlands. Deputy Giles said it would be better to transfer the owners of the big farms in Mayo to the Midlands, and it would be less expensive. I admit candidly that he is right, and I think the Minister will agree with me that it would be easier to move out one substantial landholder from Mayo and redistribute his land among the uneconomic holders and landless men there than it would be to migrate five or six or seven of the tenants to midland holdings.

I realise that there is not enough of land in Mayo to go around. A former Minister for Lands, the late Mr. Hogan, said that the main worry is that there is not enough land. All the same, it is surprising the amount of land there is and the amount that could be added through reclamation and drainage. Only to-day I was reading an article in a paper which I found most interesting. It described what the monks in Cappoquin have done on a barren mountain there. Would it not be possible, under Government supervision, to do the same type of thing elsewhere? I admit that it would not bear fruit for five, or perhaps ten years, but in the long run it would prove its worth.

In this country we are blessed in one way and cursed in another. We are blessed in that we do not suffer from erosion. We have a moist climate which keeps erosion down. Of course, we have instances of it, but not an awful lot. There are millions of acres that could be reclaimed and added to our national wealth if a serious effort were made. I think it is time to move in that direction after so many years of native Government. Let us hope that we will have something better in the future. Let us from now onwards move in the direction of reclaiming more territory. The Minister mentioned that there was no land division worth talking about since the emergency. He gave one genuine excuse, that there were no building materials available for housing. Nobody can contradict him there. But how about localities where there is no necessity to erect buildings and where there is land that could be taken over and divided? I asked a question some time ago on that subject and I was informed by the local tenants that one estate was over 30 years in the hands both of the Congested Districts Board and the Land Commission. Why could not that estate be rearranged? Of course, there is always an answer; it is very easy to give an answer behind which one can hide.

It may be that the amount of land left is not sufficient to satisfy the needs of the people and, after being parcelled out, you would still have the trouble of rearranging the area because holdings still there would be uneconomic. But there are plenty of other areas, and I have first-hand information about them because I live right in the centre of them, where land could be acquired and there would not be one penny of expense on the Government with regard to building materials.

All that is necessary is to make the fences. The greatest distance people would have to travel to an addition of land would be, at the outside, three-quarters of a mile, and nobody will say that that is long. There are three or four farms in my neighbourhood which could easily satisfy a large part of the county; yet no effort has been made to acquire and divide it. The land struggle has been carried on for so long that the people have lost hope, and I am afraid they have every reason for losing hope.

I must refer to the abuse of land that is held by the Land Commission and that is let in conacre. We dwelt on this subject in a debate some time ago. Any sensible farmer who works a farm, big or small, knows that the land that has to bear two crops of wheat, or perhaps three crops of oats, will lose its fertility unless it is well manured. If he does not have a root crop of some description his land will definitely deteriorate; nothing can prevent it deteriorating unless a certain amount of yard manure is distributed over it, so as to bring back its fertility and put into it the heart it possessed before it was broken up.

What is going to happen under the Land Commission in cases like that, where land will, perhaps, be divided within the next few years? It will take five or six years' hard work, at the expense of the tenants, to restore such land to any kind of fertility. It must be admitted that the land produced the food during the emergency, and that if anything was to bear the burden, it was better that the land should do so. When uneconomic holders are willing to take land, they would clear it, they would look after it, and see that it was brought back to fertility. I do not think the Minister can make any excuse for not taking action in cases like that. The Minister was genuine when he talked about building and migration having to be undertaken. Nobody can contradict him there. But, on the other side of the ledger, he must admit that there is something wrong. There is some fine land on the Ashford estate in Cong. I was informed on a recent visit that that estate is going to be turned over to the Forestry Department, and that some of the finest arable land to be found in Mayo is to be planted with trees. Is that fair in an island where land is so valuable? I hope the Minister will take steps, if such is the case, to see that that is stopped, and that the estate will not be given to the forestry section for planting.

Within the last three weeks the Land Commission divided a farm which they held in my locality. I do not know whether political influence was used but one thing is certain, that people of both political Parties, on holdings with valuations from £2 to £3 got none of that land, while others on holdings with valuations of £6 or £7 got 15, 16 or 17 statute acres. I do not know what is going to happen to those who were left out in the cold. Will they be provided for at some future date, and will they have to wait long before getting land? Will their cases be looked into when land is available in other parts of the county or will they be migrated? I was speaking to some of these people last week. One man told me that his valuation was £2 3s. 0d. and that he had not been given any land. What is going to be done in cases like that? In an area between Castlebar and Westport, which is a very congested one, a farm of 500 acres was recently purchased. Some of it was mountainy, some of it boggy and some of it arable land, but, on the whole, it would be a very valuable gift to the people in that locality if they had it. If the Land Commission will negotiate with him the owner is willing, if he gets a reasonable holding in the Midlands, to hand over the 500 acres within ten days. Nothing should stop a settlement of the land question in that area within 12 months or even before next November. The needs of the local tenants could be settled in that way without any ill-feeling towards those who have land and without troubling the Land Commission. I ask the Minister to take a note of that case. If he wants further particulars I shall give them to him, to see if anything can be done. I want to see how genuine the effort to settle the land question is, and what steps are going to be taken during the coming year.

Reference was made in a recent debate on the Land Bill to the question of allowing outsiders to buy up tracts of land. When replying the Minister stated that he would allow anybody who had money to buy land. Everybody agrees that a farmer with two sons, if he was able to put up the money, should be allowed to buy a holding for one of them, as that would mean so much less expense on the Land Commission and so much less expense on the State. Nevertheless, I consider that nobody should be allowed to buy beyond a certain maximum acreage. No matter who he may be, nobody should be allowed to buy more than 50 acres in the Midlands, especially in a country like this where land is so valuable, and where the question is so acute. Balancing one thing with another, and in view of the recent debate, one has grave doubts as to what effort will be made in the coming year to solve the land question.

We must look at the problem cautiously, because people have suffered for quite a long while and they have had wonderful patience waiting to get land. The law had to be broken. I do not deny that I broke it myself in an effort to get land. I drove cattle and I knocked down fences. I broke the law in every way that it could be broken in the effort to get what the people were entitled to get. I am not a bit ashamed of that. I think it is more shame for the Land Commission to have forced people to do such things. I think the Land Commission is to blame and not the people.

I stated that we should not look back but when, remembering what happened 25 years ago, we know that land division was handled pretty smartly then for a few years, and that many big estate owners, some of them descendants of Cromwell who were here, moved out when the Irish Republican Army came along on their heels, I only wish that that could have continued and that some of those people were kept out. That would have saved the Land Commission and Deputies much worry. Unfortunately it did not, and we have fallen back into a worse system of land division than we had under the English Government and the Congested Districts Board. We find ourselves now almost as far from a land settlement as we were 100 years ago. The present Minister took over the Department of Lands at a time when it was, I admit, hard to make a big move towards settling the land question. We give him credit, at least up to a point, that he had to shoulder responsibility when it was difficult to do anything. Now he has no excuse, and I hope that when the Vote for the Department of Lands is moved in this House next year, instead of having to criticise him I will be able to say to him: "If you did not do everything that I or other Deputies from Mayo wanted you to do, you did what you possibly could; you made a man's effort to right the affairs that have been crying out as a scandal and shame in this country for such a long time."

Mr. McMenamin

The first thing to which I wish to refer is the speech that has been made by the last speaker. One was rather amazed to hear such a speech here and further amazed that, holding the views he apparently holds and having done the things that he has admitted he has done, he has come into this House. Surely in a country where the agrarian tradition is so deep-rooted, anyone with a sense of responsibility would avoid making a speech of that kind, particularly when everybody is desirous that the best that can be done with the limited amount of land available should be done. The suggestion, that he approves of an illegal body taking control of the question of land division in this country and disposing of the duties of the Land Commission seems to me, to put it mildly, to be an outrage. I could not let such a speech pass.

Mr. Commons

The I.R.A. were not illegal in 1920. That is what I talked about.

Mr. Corry

They were, I think.

Mr. Coogan

I am afraid they were.

Mr. McMenamin

I want to refer to the last paragraph of the Minister's statement where, with reference to the collection of the arrears of land annuities, he patted himself on the back. I am not so disposed to pat him on the back in that matter. In answer to a Parliamentary Question to-day the Minister told me the amount of outstanding arrears of uncollected annuities on the 1st March was £352,922. The House will observe, of course, that the outstanding arrears refer to the uncollected arrears of the halved land annuities, which were halved under the 1933 Act. They are standing at, approximately, between £300,000 to £400,000. The Minister, of course, said the collection, representing 98.8 per cent. of 12 years' annuities, is a definite indication of the general prosperity of the farming community and the financial credit of the State. In 1930, everybody who was then interested in the affairs and the economy of this country will recall that the world was passing through the greatest slump in history which particularly affected the primary producers, that is, the farming community. On a final examination of the accounts of the Land Commission on 31st July, 1931, on the full annuities then due, there was outstanding £299,446. Remember, that was in the middle of the greatest slump ever experienced by the agricultural industry. There was only £299,446 outstanding of uncollected land annuities in respect of twice the sum, that is to say, the undivided land annuities. To-day the Minister referred to the fact that it is to the credit of the State that that sum of £300,000 odd is outstanding on the halved land annuities. That does not impress me at all. It is far from impressing me. It does not impress me that the agricultural industry can be prosperous if there is between £300,000 and £400,000 outstanding in respect of the halved land annuities.

We can pass over what has happened in the last four or five years, because during that period the Department were not in a position to do very much, and it strikes one as rather obvious that they may not be in a position to do very much in the immediate future owing to the shortage of supplies of building materials. The first thing to consider is the question of policy in regard to land division. Deputy Hughes referred to co-operation between allottees. Deputy Giles followed that. For 14 to 15 years I have been pleading in this House that these farms are too small, that a farm of 22 acres, having to bear the overhead charges on land of the character that is allotted, leaves no surplus to maintain a man and his wife and family. Anyone who knows anything about land will agree that you have to put all the equipment of a reasonably sized farm, say 50 to 60 acres, on a farm of 20 to 22 acres. It seems indefensible to allot farms of 22 acres on which the allottee is expected to keep two horses and to maintain them during the year. That item alone destroys whatever little capacity a farm of 22 acres has to keep live stock in the form of cattle, calves and sheep. I was struck by Deputy Giles' approach to this matter. He approached it in another way, that such a farm did not leave any possibility of leaving ten, 12 or 15 acres to get a rest during the winter months, which could then be used for the grazing of cattle and sheep. On a 20-acre farm, the greatest part of it is tramped black during the winter months and, in April and May, when it should be ready for the grazing of cattle, when house feeding is ended, it is as bare as a board.

Now that the war is over and when, I hope, we are entering on a new era of peace and ultimate prosperity, I again urge that the question should be reconsidered of taking a group of farms of not less than 40 acres and, if possible, 50 acres, and giving them to a group of allottees and allowing them, we will say, ten or 15 years, to see how it will work out and to compare that with the 20-acre farm. Surely there can be no damage done there. Knowing what small farms of land are, having been born and reared in a district of small farms, I am convinced that a farm of 22 acres, even of the best land in the country, cannot economically maintain a man and his wife and family, after providing the overhead charges on it. This divided land has a high valuation and high rents and high rates. These outgoings will take away any surplus which may be left.

I expect that there is a modicum of truth in what Deputy Giles said, that while there is apparently considerable prosperity in those areas now, it is not due to money being made out of 22 acres of land, but to money earned in Great Britain by the boys and girls who are sending it home. If the parents got what would pay the rent and rates it would mean a great easing of the burden. It would go a long way to ease the economic pressure on a 22-acre farm.

I submit that damage has been done by the policy which has been pursued. I have stated time and again, and I repeat it, that we are only wasting public money and creating new congested problems so long as we pursue this policy of allotting 22-acre farms to people. But, when they are placed on a farm of that size, a co-operative movement should be developed amongst them so that the overhead charges may be reduced to the minimum. Every Deputy who knows anything about land knows that it would take the entire cereal crops of 20 acres of land to feed two horses throughout the year, if they are to be kept alive at all. Having placed these people on these holdings, we should do all we can to assist them to make a real success of them. One of the ways in which we can be of great assistance to them is by developing a co-operative movement so as to reduce the overhead charges. The main overhead charges are the rent and rates which present a very serious problem. In order to work these small farms they have to maintain two horses. It is quite easy to criticism these people. I heard a lot of criticism of them during the debate on the Land Bill. I did not agree with much of what I heard on that occasion. If a man with a wife and a family of six or eight children is working one of these farms, with no money coming in, and the rent and rates having to be paid before there is a penny left for the family, it must be an exceedingly difficult job for him to carry on, seeing that he has to maintain a pair of horses to plough and to till the arable part of it.

Seeing that the Minister has some 40,000 acres of land for division, I think it would be worth his while considering the giving of larger farms of land. In every other country in the world where Governments have undertaken this job, farms of 50 acres of land are allotted. Deputy Giles talks about the fertility of Meath, which I do not question. But the Pontine Marshes in Italy, being quasi-slob land, must be land of high fertility and the farms allotted there were all 50-acre farms. Surely all these other countries cannot be wrong. In my opinion, they are obviously and patently right and we are obviously and patently wrong.

With reference to these 40,000 acres of land which await division, the Minister says it is arable or pasture land and that, owing to the exigencies of the emergency, it could not be allotted and has been let in conacre for tillage. I wish the House to note that. The House has first passed a Land Bill under which people can be evicted if they do not carry on their holdings according to what has been decided is good husbandry. I should like the Minister to tell us if the portion of the 40,000 acres which was fit for cultivation has been cultivated for the last six years. If so, has he insisted that the arable part of it which was cultivated was manured in rotation, that it was not persistently kept in cereals without any farmyard manures being applied? That raises a very vital question. Poor people who are hungry for land will jump at these holdings when they are being allotted, not knowing the snag that is in front of them. If the land has been under cereals for six years without being manured, it will be practically useless. When these people have worked these holdings and rotated them in tillage, it will take a period of 20 years to bring them back to any sort of decent fertility again. If the land has been in cereals for the six years, I suggest to the Minister that, in order to be honest with these allottees, he should make provision for giving them fertilisers and manures in order to bring the land back as soon as possible to a reasonable state of fertility. I think the House will not grumble at that, and certainly I will not. If the land has been worn out by six years' growth of cereals, it would be a grave injustice to leave these people under the impression that the State was coming to their aid by giving them farms costing about £1,000. Normally, £1,000 would buy a farm of 50 or 60 acres of arable land. It would be a great tragedy if we led these people to believe that they were getting 22 acres of good arable land if, in fact, it has been worn out by continuous cropping.

From the figures the Minister has given us, I do not see any hope of the land of the country being vested in our time. According to the Minister's figures, there are 129,000 parcels of land of all kinds—congested district, estate lands, tenant farmers' lands and allottees' lands—to be vested. At the rate we are proceeding, our generation will have passed away before that will have been done. I do not know what the snag is; perhaps the staff is too small. Having undertaken the duty of purchasing the land and vesting it in tenants, we should put up the money to provide the necessary staff so as to make the people freeholders.

Non-vesting means that there is a clog on the title, which depreciates the value of the land in the event of sale. There are 129,000 parcels of land to be vested, and the maximum capacity of the Department is about 4,000 vesting orders in the year. That is not a bright prospect. If the question is one of staff, then, unless the Minister makes a substantial addition to the staff, I do not see how he hopes the task to be completed in his lifetime, or even in the lifetime of his successor. One is at a loss to appreciate the reasons why the process is so slow. The minute engineering and mapping of an estate is, of course, slow work, but it should not be so slow as all that. Down through the years, farms have been changed by giving corners away and taking in other corners. I suppose that that presents considerable difficulties, but the difficulties should not be so enormous as to cause this slow rate of progress. Having tackled this problem, we should throw off our coats and create whatever machinery is necessary to complete the work. The land should be vested in these people, and they should be given the title to which they have a right.

Mr. Cafferky

The increased estimate for travelling expenses over last year's figures—£4,000—is surprising. I understood that the Land Commission was less active last year, and for the past few years, than in any other year since the outbreak of war. Why this increase? I can hardly accept the Minister's explanation, that it is due to the cost of petrol and increased transport charges. The land question is a very burning question, and I agree with everything that has been said by my friend, Deputy Commons, who represents the same constituency as I. Although Deputy McMenamin comes from a different part of the country. he must be aware that Deputy Commons was not encouraging law-breakers or inciting law-breakers to go out and do things they should not do. I wonder if he is aware that, in County Mayo and other counties, the Land Commission have never divided land until after the law was broken by the tenants— at least, that is so in many instances. I am sure the Minister is well aware of that. If not, his inspectors are.

I am sure Deputy McMenamin is well aware that it is quite true that people, before they got any satisfaction not only from this Minister but from any Minister in the past or present Government, have had to break the law and that it was necessary to bring strong police forces there to try to protect the individual who occupied the holding. Eventually, the Minister had to give way to the agitation of those people, with whom, I am sure, Deputy McMenamin would agree—those who forced the gentleman who owned the holding or estate to leave. But he left only under certain circumstances. He was well compensated before he left.

We do not encourage or ask any group of citizens to break the law. Only in the final analysis, when the Minister and the Land Commission refuse to listen to our representations, when the Minister and the Land Commission refuse to do their duty, then force can only be met by force and stubbornness by stubbornness. When the Land Commission and the Minister are going to be stubborn and refuse to give land to the tenants who are entitled to it, then the tenants must take the law into their own hands. That is what has been happening in my memory and, I suppose, in the memory of my parents, from the days of Davitt down to the present moment, and on the same scale. That is happening. It has happened even in the past few weeks in County Roscommon. It happened within a stone-throw of my own house —on Brooklawn farm. What did they do there? They allowed the Brooklawn farm to be sold to a gentleman who won the sweep in America. After he bought it, there was an agitation. Men were sent to Sligo gaol and, when they were let out after doing their sentence, they compensated the gentleman who bought the land and divided it. That is what Deputy Commons has been talking about.

Deputy Commons has not encouraged lawlessness or disorder. He has pointed out that any lawlessness or disorder that has come about is due to the inefficiency and the laziness of the Land Commission and the Minister over that Department. We have, in County Mayo, at least 20 different estates of from 50 to, perhaps, 1,000 acres and we believe that that land should be divided amongst the tenants who would work it and take more out of it than some of the gentlemen who own it at present. We also believe that the lands in the various counties of the Midlands which are in the hands of certain gentlemen should be divided. In my travels by rail and road, I have never yet seen a decent haggard in one of these places. I want to tell Deputy Giles that. I judge a farmer's ability when I go into his place about October and see his haggard—his stocks of hay and corn and so forth. If they are not there, I come to the conclusion that he is not a farmer.

Captain Giles

You did not pass through Meath.

Mr. Cafferky

I mentioned the Midlands. I did not mention Meath. I think that Meath is not in the Midlands, according to what I learned when going to the national school. The Minister has constantly informed Deputy Blowick, Deputy Commons, myself and other Deputies from all sides that the cause of the slowness in the Land Commission is the lack of material for houses. As Deputy Commons pointed out, many holdings for which no houses are required could be divided. But they have not been divided. We want to know why they have not been divided during the past five or six years, and given to men who would not only work them, but would take care that the body and heart of the land would be maintained.

Deputy McMenamin wants to know whether a rotation of crops is being carried out in this land. Surely he is not so innocent as to think that a man who takes conacre is going to keep the heart and body in the land? He is taking it only for what he can get out of it, and if he thinks he can get a crop out of it without using stable manure or other fertilisers, he is going to get that crop out of it. Deputy McMenamin should know that people are not so foolish as to worry about the body or the heart of land which does not belong to them, or to which they have no permanent claim. In my county there are something like 6,000 acres in the hands of the Land Commission, some of it for the past 30 years, and people are continually renting that land as conacre and paying a very high rent for it. How is it that for the past 14 years under this Government, or for the past 23 years under two native Governments, this land has not been allocated? I do not accept your promises at all. Your promises are so much hot air as far as I am concerned, and I can prove it. For instance, there was the lack of foresight shown by the present Government in failing to have a sufficient stock of materials for house construction in the emergency through which we have just passed. They failed to foresee the war, and they failed to have a sufficient stock of timber and other necessary materials, not perishable goods, but goods that would last for years and years, which they could have utilised during the war. It may be an excuse for you——

Acting-Chairman (Cormac Breathnach)

The Deputy should address the Chair.

Mr. Cafferky

It may be an excuse for the Minister to tell us that the delay in the division of land is due to the lack of materials for house construction and that it is no use giving a man 30 acres of land, if he has not a roof over his head but that lack of materials is due to the lack of foresight on the part of the Government. Even allowing for the lack of foresight and for the lack of materials that have held up the division of land, why is it that where no houses are needed, the Minister and his Department did not take the necessary steps to have land allocated? How is it that the Land Commission is allowing holdings in congested areas on which the owners do not reside, holdings from which people emigrated 20 or 30 years ago and to which they are never going to come back, to be put up for sale, although the adjoining tenants are agitating to have the lands taken over and divided by the Land Commission? How is that the Land Commission is allowing other tenants to come in and buy that land, thus adding to the problem of congestion?

We will take, for example, an area in which there are 20 or 30 holdings, each holding having only about five or six acres of arable land. A certain lady left one of these holdings 20 years ago, and went to America. All her relatives are now dead, and she intends to sell the property. The tenants in that area offered that lady the market price of the holding so that it might be allocated amongst the adjoining tenants. The Minister and the Land Commission refuse to assist in that but they will allow some outside person to come in and buy that holding, thereby adding to the congestion in the district. While permitting that, they are migrating other tenants in order to relieve congestion in the district.

Does that not look foolish? On the one hand you remove a tenant to make way for the redistribution of his land to relieve congestion, and on the other hand you allow another person to come in and buy a holding which is for sale in the district. The Minister may not believe me but I shall give him the details of a case in my own area. The Land Commission references are:— A.&R. (F) 40290/45. Estate I.L.C. (Sir J. P. Brabazon), County Mayo: C.D.B. 100. Record No. C.D.B. 9714, Holding of Martin Walsh (formerly John Walsh, Junior), Rental No. 282, in the townland of Derrygay. This communication from a firm of solicitors to the tenants concerned came into my possession a few hours ago:—

"The following is our report on the steps in connection with the application to the Land Commission for resumption of above holding with a view to having the holding divided and we have made our report as brief and concise as possible. On the 21st February, 1940, we wrote the Irish Land Commission on behalf of Michael Joseph Egan, Thomas Devine and yourself (Patrick Moran) stating that the above holding of John Walsh (Junior), comprising about 30 statute acres, had been vacant for some years since the death of the tenant; that a Mrs. Mary McDevitt, a daughter of the deceased tenant, who is residing in the U.S.A., was seeking to have the holding sold to persons living in England; that the holding was worth about £120 and each of you would be prepared to provide £20 in cash towards the purchase money if the Land Commission would assist in providing the remainder or if the Land Commission would acquire such holding and distribute it in equal shares amongst the three of you. We pointed out that the three of you were suffering considerable hardship by having such wretchedly poor holdings to live on and that the Land Commission were at the time dealing with the migration of one tenant in the same townland of Derrygay to relieve the acute congestion which existed there.

The following particulars were given of your circumstances:—

(1) Michael Joseph Egan, of Derrygay, Kiltimagh, tenant of land comprised in Collection No. 5761, Section 23, Land Act, 1931, lands of Derrygay, half-yearly revised annual sum 9/10, Poor Law Valuation of land £2 5s. 0d., of buildings 5/-. He has only about four statute acres of arable land, the remainder thereof is rough grazing and bog. He is aged about 40 years and has his father and sister living with him on the holding.

(2) Thomas Devine, of Derrygay, Kiltimagh, tenant of land comprised in Collection No. 5759, Section 23, Land Act, 1931, lands of Derrygay, half-yearly revised annual sum of 10/10, Poor Law Valuation of land £2 15s. 0d., of buildings 5/-. He has only about four statute acres, the remainder of his holding being rough grazing and bog. He is a married man residing with his wife and has six children, five of them being sons from nine to twenty-two years of age. All the sons are living in the holding.

(3) Patrick Moran, of Derryool, Kilkelly, the occupier of the holding comprised in Receivable Order No. 94/1167, County Mayo, lands of Derryool, Estate C.D.B. (Dillon), Poor Law Valuation on land £5, on buildings 5/-. He has only about five acres of arable land, the remainder is either waste or rough grazing. He is married, resides with his wife and two young children, also has his aged father-in-law and mother-in-law living on the holding with him."

Letters of reminder were sent to the Land Commission on the 4th and 23rd April, 1940. In May, 1940, an inspection was made by the Land Commission. Several further letters were written to the Land Commission.

In the issue of the Connaught Telegraph of 22nd February, 1941, the following report appeared:—

"Mr. Martin M. Nally, T.D. (Fine Gael, South Mayo), in Dáil Eireann, asked the Minister for Lands (Mr. T. Derrig), if he is aware that acute congestion exists on the Brabazon estate, Derrygay, Kiltimagh, County Mayo; that the poor law valuations of Michael J. Egan, Thomas Devine and Patrick Moran, tenants on the said estate, are £2 15s. 0d., £3 and £3 5s. 0d. respectively, and if he will state what steps, if any, are being taken by the Land Commission to acquire the vacant holding of John Walsh, Junior, on the Brabazon estate (Congested Districts Board No. 100, Column No. 5760/09), lands of Derrygay, near Kiltimagh, County Mayo, for relief of existing congestion."

The Minister (Mr. Derrig), in his reply, said:—

"The Land Commission is aware of the congestion existing in the townland of Derrygay on the estate of General J. P. Brabazon (Congested Districts Board 100), and proceedings are being instituted to resume the holding of the late John Walsh (Junior), for relief of congestion."

Many further letters and calls were made on the Land Commission without result, and on the 22nd November, 1945, the Land Commission wrote as follows:—

"I am desired by the Land Commission to refer to your letter of the 12th instant in which you inquire on behalf of Messrs M. J. Egan, P. Devine and O. Moran, tenants of holdings on above estate, whatever it is proposed to take steps towards the resumption of the adjoining holding of Martin Walsh (formerly John Walsh, Junior) Rental No. 282, in the townland of Derrygay. I am to state that a notice of intention to resume this holding was published on 16th February, 1943, and that having considered the circumstances of the case the commissioners on 4th May, 1944, decided to grant the petition which had been lodged on behalf of tenant against the proposed resumption. Permission to sell the holding to Mr. Martin Walsh (Tom) without prejudice to the exercise by the Land Commission of their powers...."

Deputies can see from these statements that the Land Commission have not got any policy for the removal of congestion. What greater chance would the Minister for Lands or the Land Commission have got than the opportunity which presented itself in that case to relieve congestion? I accept these statements as true. The Department of Lands removed one tenant out of the townland of Derrygay for what purpose? Because acute congestion existed there. You have small holdings and small valuations which are not sufficient to enable the people to eke out a livelihood on them. If the tenants had to depend solely on them, every one of them would be beggared. They would have to go out and beg but for the fact that members of their families emigrated to England for a period of six months every year in order to supplement what was got out of these little parcels of land. Notwithstanding the fact that the Land Commission have gone to considerable expense to migrate tenants to the Midlands and to other areas where they were able to provide better holdings, they have turned around now and allowed an outsider, as we would call him in our part of the country, to come in and purchase a holding which has become vacant in the same village, although, according to the former Minister for Lands, who is now Minister for Education, the Land Commission were taking steps for resumption there. They have given no explanation as to why they dropped resumption and allowed this person, known as Mr. Walsh (Tom), who has been residing in England, to purchase the holding. I have nothing against Mr. Walsh, but what I am against is the idea of allowing any man, even if he were my own brother, into an area to help to increase congestion when the aim should be to relieve it. The Minister had a golden opportunity of doing that. If he had waited until two or more had been migrated, he could have had these holdings redivided and reallocated amongst the remaining tenants.

I do not see that the Land Commission are making any genuine effort to relieve congestion and have land allocated amongst people in need of it. I can assure Deputy McMenamin that no one on these benches has ever encouraged lawlessness or disorder. I also want to assure him that if the Land Commission and the Minister for Lands refuse to do their duty there is only one way out, and that is that the Irish tenant farmer, living on an uneconomic, congested, miserable holding must voice his opinions in the form of a protest. The only way we can make that protest is by carrying out the age-old tradition of driving cattle, and in that way bringing to the notice of the Minister that the ordinary civil law must take proceedings against the people who drive the cattle. True to that tradition, we in the West of Ireland have forced the Land Commission time and time again to take active steps to have holdings allocated and divided amongst tenants in congested areas. If within the next 12 months the Land Commission shows any signs of being genuinely prepared to take steps for the allocation of the lands that have been in their hands for a number of years in County Mayo, and that they are willing to migrate tenants to counties where there is land available for them, then we will give the Land Commission every encouragement. Instead of making speeches here and criticising, we will clap the Minister on the back and tell him that he has this Party behind him.

The Minister said a few days ago in Limerick that he had to depend on his own Party for constructive criticism. Will he admit now that he has not to depend on the Government Party for constructive criticism? He is listening to constructive criticism now, and has been listening to it since he became a Minister—since we came into the House. Time and again we have requested him to take the initiative in the allocation and division of land. I myself was reared on a holding of 32 acres, about ten acres of which is semi-reclaimed arable land. When the Dáil was up I spent three weeks working on it in order to add my quota to the food production effort of the country. If we had a decent holding we would be able to do much better. My father, who is not the worst-off man there, lives at Carrowbeg in the Barony of Costello, between Swinford and Kilkelly.

I am sure the Minister knows the locality well. He has often driven through it during by-election, and other election, campaigns. We on these benches have a real genuine grievance when we stand up here. It is sometimes said that we deliver tirades in this House and indulge in unspecified generalities. We have good reason for delivering tirades and speeches of the kind. It is not because we find any pleasure in denouncing the Government or in denouncing the Land Commission, but because we are called upon by our constituents to do so. We were elected to do our duty to our constituents, and intend to vindicate their rights as long as we are in this House. We shall continue to do so until we get some recompense for them from the Government and from the Minister. That recompense will have to be in the form of migration or in the allocation of land to them.

Some Deputies said that a 25-acre farm is not large enough, and that a man would want at least 50 acres. I agree that 25 acres is a small farm, but I can assure Deputy Giles that there are many men in my county who would be jolly glad to have 25 acres of good arable land.

Captain Giles

Where do you sell your cattle?

Mr. Cafferky

We sell them to the jobbers.

Captain Giles

From Meath?

Mr. Cafferky

We do not ask them where they come from. Quite a number of them come from the Six Counties. I can assure Deputy Giles that my dad would feel very satisfied if he had 25 acres of good arable land. He reared a family of nine or ten of us on the holding that he has, and did it through hard work. His eldest son was 18 years before ever my dad went to England. He worked the land with a loy and a spade. He had no plough. I know that my dad, and hundreds and thousands of other honourable men like him in the County Mayo, would be well satisfied if they had 25 acres of good arable land. They would be prepared to work it. Of course, if they could get 50 acres it would please them better still. A good portion of the land they have is reclaimed land, reclaimed in much the same way as a lot of the land in Italy was reclaimed under Mussolini's régime from 1929 onwards.

The rundale system is a system which the Minister should take steps to abolish. I have some sympathy with the Minister in this respect, but I might not have that sympathy if I had not learned a lesson of late. The Minister's Department for the past few months has been trying to settle the rundale system in the Midfield area. I cannot give the names of the estates, but I expect the Minister knows them. The inspectors there have failed to satisfy some tenants and I think the reason for their failure is the fact that they set out to re-divide the land before they had removed a few more tenants. If they had removed three more, it would have been possible to settle the question. I went down there myself with Mr. Mullany, a Land Commission inspector from Kerry, who did everything possible to settle it. He made as good a fist of the re-division as was possible, but the tenants were not satisfied.

We did everything possible to get the tenants to accept a settlement, with a promise from me that I would ask the Minister to agree that, if at a future date they wanted to migrate, he would give them land elsewhere; but they were not satisfied because they had come to the conclusion that some tenants had got more arable land than others. It would have been impossible for a Land Commission inspector to divide equally the arable land available because it was nearly all situated in one area, but he did as well as he could. The whole crux has arisen because several other tenants were not migrated beforehand. If three or four more had been migrated, the question could be settled much more easily, and I can see no hope of settling the problem in that area until the Minister encourages three or four more to migrate at the earliest possible moment.

The rundale system is one which has many drawbacks. The tenant farmer cannot take advantage of the farm improvements scheme and cannot put into his piece of land the skill and enthusiasm required for reclamation or for putting body into it. He has to keep children from school to herd cattle because it is, so to speak, no man's land. There are many other drawbacks to the system, and I urge the Minister to do everything possible to have it abolished in County Mayo, both north and south, because it is a disgrace that, in 1946, after almost a quarter of a century under a native Government, and certainly after 20 years of good settled government— leaving out the first three years—we have progressed so very little in the matter of the division of land, the reclamation of land and the removal of the rundale system which exists in my county.

When the Minister's Department are putting up out-offices, they should include a granary for corn. The one thing from which the small farmer suffers is the want of a loft to keep his corn dry and safe, so that he can take it to market when he thinks the best prices are going for it. If he has to put it in a damp barn or on a damp concrete floor, the corn will become blue-mouldy, but if there is attached to his dwelling-house on the estates to which these men are migrated a loft sufficiently large and high for the farmer to store his corn, the difficulty would be solved. It is not always possible to have bags, but even if you have bags and they are placed in a damp barn, the corn will rot. I suggest that the Minister should consider that point and that when he is removing a tenant from the West—or even a man in Meath, or from the West or South of Ireland—and giving him a holding of land, a building such as I describe should be provided to enable him to keep his corn dry and safe.

I want to say to the Minister that I have no faith at all in his promise. I cannot believe that he is prepared to take the necessary steps, in view of all the setbacks and failures we have had. I will wait until this time next year and see what steps the Minister will then have taken, so far as my constituency is concerned. If we see that the Minister is making a genuine effort, he will have the support of this Party who, according to him, never offer constructive criticism. We all know that we say lots of things at cross-roads or at conventions. That is Party politics, but the Minister knows that he gets very little assistance from his own Party. Deputy Corry, I think, is the only man who gets up now and again to give him and the Minister for Agriculture "the works", and it is leading the people astray for a man in such a very important position as Minister for Lands to try to convince them that the Opposition in Dáil Eireann is not capable of helping or advising the Government, or of offering constructive criticism. Have we not done that to-day? Have we not hauled him over the coals for his failure and his lack of policy? It is all very well for him to smile. I wonder would he smile down in Mayo.

Mr. Moylan

I can smile anywhere.

Mr. Cafferky

I doubt it, and I think the Minister knows it, but I will not go any further with that. The Minister will find in us, as a Party, men who are prepared to give him every assistance, but he will find in us men who will constantly attack and expose if he does not do his duty to this House and to the country as Minister for Lands. That is what we are here for and we are not going to apologise to any Deputy—or any group or any Party— who accuse us of inciting or encouraging lawlessness or disorder. That is the last thing we desire to do—it is not our policy—but if the Minister fails to do his duty and there is no other road open to us, we have to take the inevitable step, which we do not desire to take, that is, to lead the tenants, to help them to fight their battles and to get from the Land Commission the rights due to them, not to-day or yesterday but for the past 50 years.

Mr. Corry

I do not envy any Minister for Lands in this country because the position here is that there is not enough land to go around. The Minister has said he has 40,000 acres for division. I wonder, if those 40,000 acres were divided up amongst the "jokers" from Mayo with the four acres, would they be satisfied? I do not believe they would. Nobody can tell me that the man living on four acres of arable land with a valuation of £2 5s. 0d. is knocking out a livelihood, nor do I believe that anyone in the House could say he is.

Mr. Cafferky

With sleeves up and hard work.

Mr. Corry

I do not want to enter into——

Mr. Cafferky

Personalities?

Mr. Corry

——an argument with Deputies, but when I hear Deputies speaking about the rightful demands of the man with four acres in Mayo to be brought down and given a farm in Meath or anywhere else, I want to ask who called the fellow with four acres a farmer?

Mr. Cafferky

The best farmers and the best agricultural labourers in the Thirty-Two Counties.

Mr. Corry

These men never lived on the land and never lived off the land.

Mr. Cafferky

They are far better farmers than any farmer in the Midlands.

Mr. Corry

We have to come down to business some time. I move to report progress.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.