I should like to ask the Minister whether he would not adopt some kind of formula that would give the House confidence that proposals of this kind have been fully examined and that information of a particular kind had been collected and was being given to the House because, as Deputy Morrissey says, the cost of living is extraordinarily high. I see that the tendency, in Great Britain at any rate, is for the cost of manufactured articles to go even still higher. There seems to be a prospect that manufactured articles and a number of commodities that will be required here will increase in cost in the immediate future rather than decline. Something, apparently, happened in October last which required the putting on of a duty of this kind, but the Minister has not told us anything about it and, if this duty is required, it is unfair to the Minister's proposition and to the industry itself not to give the facts fully to Parliament, so that we will be persuaded that the tariff is necessary.
The Minister says there are 75 employed in this industry. He has given no information as to the amount of gelatine or glue or size turned out annually; he has given no indication as to the wages bill, or as to the amount of any of these commodities that was imported in 1945, before the Order was made imposing a duty, or since then. These, surely, are matters that are available and I suggest it should be easy to adopt a formula for giving a certain kind of information to the House in every case where an Order of this kind is being made. It is an extraordinary method of putting a tariff on a commodity like this. We get five pages of a printed Order in English and Irish and a couple of pages of a Bill and out of the whole of that amount of printing we get practically no information. The Minister's statement is not helpful either.
If we are to have any kind of economic development we must have additional industrial development. The basis of that industrial development may be an extension of our agricultural industry, but it is a well known fact that as far as employment is concerned thousands of men have been lost to the agricultural industry during recent years and even a very great development will hardly bring back into employment in agriculture as many men as have left it during the last ten or 12 years. If we are to have increased employment in the country we must depend upon industrial development to bring it about and we shall have to secure that the industrial development that will take place will have a fair chance of public support, and whatever advantages we give to persons initiating industrial development we must fully understand what these advantages are and how necessary they are.
I think it is an occasion, being the first of this kind, when we might review the considerations that were reviewed in the past when the Tariff Commission set about the examination of an application for the imposition of a tariff in order to report on whether a tariff of the kind applied for should be given. I will direct the attention of Deputies to the reports of the Tariff Commission in the past to give, as it were, a kind of outline of thought that might be brought to bear upon what we are doing. It could be simplified and brought up to date in accordance with the modern ideas of the desirability of developing industries here for social or other purposes and in accordance with the desirability of developing in every possible way a condition of full employment.
Under the old Tariff Commission procedure a report was made in every particular case on ten points. The first point was: "The efficiency, extent and relative importance of the industry in respect of which the application is made, the amount of capital invested therein, the number of persons employed therein, the total annual value of the goods produced by the said industry and the cost of production of such goods in Saorstát Éireann as compared with such cost in other countries." The second point reported on was: "The cost, efficiency, conditions of labour, and rates of wages in Saorstát Éireann in the industry in respect of which the application is made as compared with such cost, efficiency, conditions and rates in other countries." The third point reported on was: "The effect which the granting in whole or in part of the concessions asked for in the application would be likely to have on the several matters mentioned in Paragraph 1 of the Schedule"—that is, the efficiency, extent and relative importance of the industry, the amount of employment it would give and the total value of the goods produced.
The fourth point reported on was: "The effect which the granting, in whole or in part, of the concessions asked for in the application would be likely to have on other trades and industries in Saorstát Eireann." The fifth point was: "The effect which the granting in whole or in part of the concessions asked for in the application would be likely to have on the consumers of goods produced by the industry in respect of which the application is made and on the cost of living." The sixth point was: "The effect which the granting in whole or in part of the concessions asked for in the application would be likely to have on the public revenues of Saorstát Eireann." The seventh point was: "The prospects, if any, which the industry in respect of which the application is made has of establishing itself eventually on a permanent basis without the continued aid of a customs duty or with a modification of such a duty after a period."
The eighth point was: "The minimum amount of customs duty which would probably be necessary for the successful conduct in Saorstát Eireann of the industry in respect of which the application is made." The ninth point was: "To what extent, if at all, the competition from imported goods to which the industry in respect of which the application is made, is exposed, is unfair by reason of currency depreciation, or the grant of subsidies or bounties in the country in which such goods are manufactured." The tenth point was: "Such other economic, industrial, and administrative aspects of the application as appear to the commission to be relevant to the determination of the merits and demerits of the application."
That gives a fairly full background of thought, when considering the granting of tariffs for the purpose of systematically and thoroughly developing staple industries. It was pointed out, and was accepted, that the system was unwieldy in its application, and that a case could be made for taking decisions with less publicity, so that in the beginning of the establishment of an industry there will not be dumping of any kind. The whole sequence of thought in the report is sound. Even in paragraph 10 there are such considerations as the desirability of establishing an industry that might raise the cost of living, whether it was from the point of view of full employment or otherwise. All these considerations are in the plan that has been sketched out. Where under emergency or other provisions, use is made of the Emergency Imposition of Duties Act to put tariffs on in respect of particular commodities, it should be possible to have a formula by which a certain amount of statistical information would be available to the Dáil, and certain ordered reasons given as to the effect on unemployment, or the effect on other industries that a tariff would be expected to have. I recommend very earnestly to the Minister, when dealing with matters in this particular way in future, that he would approach the situation in the spirit in which we ask him, and that systematic information will be given to the Dáil.
Paragraph 6 gives the Minister for Finance, after consultation with the Minister for Industry and Commerce, power, through the Revenue Commissioners, subject to certain stated conditions, to import without duty any of these commodities. I should like to know whether the Minister can give information as to the extent to which these commodities have been imported without payment of duty. Is it the intention that the company making these commodities at the present time will be allowed to import ad lib without payment of duty, but that other persons wishing to import them will have to pay duty? In that way is the proposal affected by the application of Section 15 of the Financial Agreement with the United Kingdom, 1938, or is the agreement with the United Kingdom in active operation at the present time?
