Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 6 Nov 1946

Vol. 103 No. 2

Committee on Finance. - Telephone Capital Bill, 1946—Second Stage (Resumed).

Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

Mr. Roddy

The Minister is well aware that there is wholesale dissatisfaction with the telephone facilities provided by his Department. The telephone staffs are, certainly, not to blame for this condition of affairs. They have performed miracles of efficiency with the very inadequate equipment at their command. Invariably, the Minister's reply to complaints was that he could not procure equipment. I am prepared to agree that in the latter stages of the emergency it was impossible to procure telephone equipment but, nevertheless, it was possible to obtain a restricted amount of equipment up to 1941 and it would appear that the Minister or his Department made no effort to procure it. The Minister apparently failed accurately to gauge the situation and did not realise that the emergency would last for so many years. The result of his remissness in this respect is that it would take five or six years at least to bring us to the position that we should normally be in if the emergency had not taken place. In other words, telephone users in Northern Ireland and Great Britain will still be many years ahead of us both in efficiency and in development. I do not see any excuse for the Minister's lack of vision in regard to the provision of telephone equipment. I think the Minister fell down rather badly in his job. It was his duty to see that whatever equipment that was available at that particular period was obtained and that the telephone service was maintained in a higher state of efficiency than it has been during the whole of the emergency period.

This is the third Telephone Capital Bill that has been introduced in a period of ten years. There was a Bill introduced in 1936 which provided for an expenditure of £500,000 on telephone development. There was a Bill introduced in 1938 providing for the expenditure of £1,000,000 on development and I understand there is still an unexpended balance of that money. In this Bill the Minister is asking for a sum of £6,000,000 and, according to his statement, he hopes to spend that money in a period of four or five years. I am quoting from memory but I think his exact words were that he hoped to spend that money in a period of four or five years. If it has taken the Minister so many years to spend £1,500,000, how many years will it take him, at the same rate of progress, to spend £6,000,000? We have no guarantee that the Minister will be able to spend that money in the period he has mentioned and the Minister's words have created uneasiness in the minds of many members of the Dáil. He dilated on the difficulties involved in laying cables and in providing modern and automatic exchanges. He stated that it would take 18 months to build and equip an automatic exchange and that it would take two to three years to lay a cable between Dublin and Cork. On that basis it would take the Minister 15 to 20 years, at least, to spend the £6,000,000 which he asks for in this Bill for the purpose of telephone development. I suggest to the Minister that he should not be bound by the time factor, that it is his duty, in view of the backward state of telephone development in this country, to engage as many engineers and technicians as he can get, to see that they are trained in the special work for which their services are required and to have them set to work in order to compensate for past neglect. The situation, certainly, is urgent and it is necessary that all the men available should be put on to the work which is there to be carried out.

The Minister did not mention supplies in the course of his statement. In 1936, in 1938, and in reply to various questions in the intervening years, his stock reply to complaints about delay in telephone development in various parts of the country was that equipment could not be obtained. I should like to know if the position has altered since the war, if equipment is now freely available and if when construction work is undertaken there will be no interruption due to absence of equipment. By the plans which the Minister has adumbrated, he hopes to treble the number of telephones in use. I submit that the plans for large scale and long range telephone development should have been made, not this year, but ten years ago because it was perfectly obvious that it was only a question of time, and a very short time at that, until the telephone would supplant the telegraph as a means of communication. Development has outpaced the anticipations of the Minister and his Department. The Minister mentioned that it would be necessary to undertake a campaign of propaganda for the purpose of getting more users but, since 1936, the Minister has not been able to keep pace with the demand for the telephone. Why then does he think it necessary at this stage to undertake a propaganda campaign for the purpose of getting more subscribers when he is unable to cater for all the subscribers or to provide reliefs for those who have been anxious to get a service during the past ten years?

The Minister has mentioned that a sum of £10,000,000 is to be spent during the next ten years, I assume, or during the coming years on telephone development. The Minister has asked the Dáil to vote £6,000,000 of that total sum but for how long does the Minister anticipate that this £10,000,000, when it is spent, will make up for past neglect, will modernise the whole telephone system in the country and will anticipate future developments for, say, ten years after the scheme has been completed? It seems to me that any worth-while planning must provide for future developments or anticipate future developments and if the £10,000,000 is intended only to make up for past neglect and to bring the system to the same standard of efficiency as obtains in Great Britain at the present time, I say that is mistaken policy and that the Minister should ask for a larger amount so as to ensure that there will be adequate provision and that the needs of the people for a number of years ahead will be provided for.

It is certainly time the Minister decided definitely to change over to the automatic system. The automatic system has been in operation for about 30 years in the cities and towns and even in rural areas in Great Britain. It has been in operation in Northern Ireland for a number of years. I cannot understand why it has not been brought into the cities and towns of this country earlier. I think the Minister did mention the question of cost on one occasion but in view of all that has happened during the past ten years the question of cost cannot be a very important factor. In any event I am glad that the Minister has decided at last to change over to the automatic system and that exchanges are to be established in suitable centres throughout the country for the purpose of providing modern and up-to-date facilities.

The Minister made one statement which was rather enigmatic. It seemed to contradict what had preceded it. He said he must guard against providing plant too far in advance of being required. Surely if the Minister is planning at all he must plan for future development. What exactly does he mean by the statement that he must guard against providing plant too far in advance of being required? At the present rate of demand it is very unlikely, even if plant is provided slightly ahead of requirement, that it will remain very long unused. It is much more likely to be used up very soon after it has been provided. The Minister should elaborate and explain that statement, as he has created confusion in the minds of some Deputies listening to him.

I want to draw attention especially to the conditions in the telephone exchange in Sligo. By means of a question on two occasions in the Dáil, I tried to elicit some information from the Minister concerning his intentions with regard to that exchange. There is a staff of 14 or 15 working in a small room about 15 feet square—probably less. Representations have been made to the Minister over a period of ten years to have the exchange enlarged and made more adaptable to modern needs. The Minister and his officials promised on numerous occasions that they would build a modern exchange for the people in Sligo. As a result of the very insanitary conditions prevailing in the exchange at the moment, the rate of illness is exceptionally high —probably higher than in any telephone exchange in the whole country. Still the Minister and his officials have taken no definite steps to relieve the very serious situation which exists in Sligo. I want from the Minister now some definite promise that steps will be taken in the very near future for the purpose of providing the telephone staff in Sligo with a suitable place in which to work.

If such conditions prevailed in any private concern or if employees were working in such conditions in any business house in the country, I am perfectly certain that the inspectors of the Department of Industry and Commerce would very soon take action and see that proper conditions were provided for the staffs. It is a scandal that the Minister should be allowed to have members of his staff working under such conditions. I want a guarantee from him that some steps to provide relief will be taken. I sincerely hope that the Minister will carry out his plans quickly, speedily and effectively. The telephone service is certainly in a grave state of disorganisation at present, and urgent steps are necessary if the tempers of the people are to be quietened. The Minister cannot expect the people to be patient with him any longer. They showed extraordinary restraint and patience during the war years, but that patience has reached breaking point now and the Minister must do something to relieve the very grave and serious situation.

Seosamh Ó Cinnéide

Caithfidh mé cuidiú leis an méid atá ráidhte ag an Teachta Ó Rodaigh. I want to support what Deputy Roddy has said.

Séamus Ó Diolún

Shíl mé go raibh tú chun cainnt i nGaedhilg.

Seosamh Ó Cinnéide

I suggest further that the Minister should separate the telephone buildings altogether from the post office and that in each large town there should be a separate telephone exchange with call boxes, as there are in other countries. In certain towns in my constituency the amount of space at the counter and the amount of space for people waiting for telephone calls is inadequate. I understand that in Dublin the Central Telephone Office is situated in Crown Alley and that it is contemplated erecting a newer and bigger building in the city. I suggest that the Minister follow that up and provide telephone buildings in every provincial town, including commodious places with call boxes built all round, where people may go to put through their telephone calls. The ordinary business of stamps, money orders, dog licences and so on could continue to be done at the counters of the post offices.

The experience in my constituency in the Midlands is that, if you go in to make a trunk call to Dublin, Cork or Limerick, you are standing there for anything from an hour to three hours, getting in everybody's way and losing time. If I were asked which is the more important—to use the poles that are coming in for the Electricity Supply Board or the telephone service—I would say to the Government that the poles should be used for the telephones, since all business is being paralysed by the inadequate telephone service. During the emergency, on account of the lack of transport, the people have been doing their business by telephone over the past seven years and have become telephone-minded, so that more and more people are looking for telephones. All this proves the necessity to separate the telephone service from the ordinary business of the Post Office.

When speaking on the Minister's Estimate some years ago, I remember dealing with the general lay-out of the Post Office services and I stated that it was based on the lay-out of the railways and that there should be a new approach to it. For instance, County Meath is served by the Great Northern Railway and the old telegraph lines run along the railway lines to Navan and Kells and along to Oldcastle.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would the Deputy remember that this is a telephone Bill and confine his remarks, in the main, to telephones?

Seosamh Ó Cinnéide

I will bear that in mind. These telegraph lines are used now for the telephones. If I want to make a call from Castlepollard, about eight miles from Oldcastle, the call has to go on the old Midland Great Western Railway line to Mullingar, then up to Dublin and down on the line constructed on the Great Northern Railway through Navan and then up to Oldcastle. With all due respect, I think I am in order. I advocate that there should be a new approach to the lay-out of telephone lines and that the towns should be linked up. To illustrate my point, I mention the small town of Delvin, which is five statute miles from Collinstown, County Westmeath. Up to recently, if you put a telephone call through from Delvin to Collinstown, it had to go to Mullingar, then up to Dublin and down the whole of County Meath and back into Westmeath. A friend of mine put a call through there some years ago. He waited about an hour in Delvin and then drove to Collinstown and did his business there. Then he went back to Delvin and cancelled the call, which was still being put through. In recent years, the Post Office authorities have linked those places up and now you can get the call through in a reasonable time.

For a long time before I became a member of the House, the late Deputy Shaw advocated year after year the installation of a telephone in the village of Ratoath, County Westmeath. The reply given, year after year, by the Minister, or Parliamentary Secretary, in charge of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs to the late Deputy Shaw was that it would be a physical and technical impossibility to do that. When I became a representative for the County of Westmeath I took up the running, and it was also indicated to me that it would be a physical and technical impossibility to install the telephone at Ratoath. When the emergency came upon us, the officers in the L.D.F. came to me to get access to the telephone in the Garda barracks, I was again met with the same reply. I was brushed aside, but within a fortnight the L.D.F. and the Army had the telephone in in that village. I think there is need to break a lot of this red tape in connection with telephone development. For years the reply was that it was a physical and technical impossibility to get the telephone installed in Ratoath, but as I say, the L.D.F. and the Army were able to get the job done within a fortnight. In my opinion, if there is to be a development of telephone facilities, whether in villages like Ratoath or even smaller ones, then the outlook in the Department of Posts and Telegraphs will have to be different from what it has been during the last 19 or 20 years.

I have been advocating, for quite a long time, a carrier line from Mullingar to Dublin. You have to wait for hours at Mullingar for a call to Dublin. I renew my advocacy for that carrier line on this Bill. Deputy Roddy referred to the smallness of the area in which the operators in the Sligo telephone exchange have to work. The same thing applies to nearly every other provincial town. In Britain, I have seen exchanges not merely in big hotels but in mediumsized hotels. The space in them at the disposal of the operators is much bigger than that at the disposal of operators in a number of our provincial towns. That is another reason why, I think, in the case of these telephone exchanges we should get away from the post office building altogether. I think, the telephone exchange should be in a separate building. I have seen that system in operation in practically every part of Italy. The telephone exchange is always the best building in the place. We should have the same thing here. We should have the telephone exchange in a separate building so that there will be ample public telephone facilities. In conclusion, I want to say that if the choice were left with me as to whether the allocation of the poles and the timber that we get should be for Electricity Supply Board electrical development or for telephone development, I certainly would place the telephone development first.

Mr. M. O'Sullivan

With regard to the Minister's statement in introducing the Bill, while it was certainly very interesting I suggest that it might have been far more comprehensive. If there is one service more than another which is causing a headache to the public it is the telephone service. I can find no indication in the Minister's statement that this trouble is going to be eased immediately. The Minister, in the course of his statement, said that the expenditure under the main headings was estimated to be as follows: new exchanges and buildings, £2,072,000; trunk circuits, £2,400,000; subscribers' circuits, £1,360,000; kiosks and call offices, £275,000; other works, £245,000, giving a total of, roughly, £6,000,000. I suggest to him that his Department, as Deputy Roddy has pointed out, must have, in the years of the emergency, taken advantage of that period to have a comprehensive lay-up plan for the extension of the telephone service. The main interest to the public at the moment is to know when the present position is going to be remedied. Can we have, in regard to that plan, from the Minister or his Department some indication as to whether there are to be selected areas, or whether there shall be certain priorities so far as telephones and kiosks are concerned? We have no indication that the very bad position in Dublin at the moment is going to be rectified, say, within 12 months or two years. What the Minister said was that it was likely that the money would be spent in the next four or five years.

Since I became a member of the House I have been drawing attention to the absence of kiosk facilities in the City of Dublin. The position at the moment is that it is utterly impossible at certain hours to get a call through at some of them. One has to queue up. We have no indication in the Minister's statement when that position will be eased. Can we be told when the materials are likely to be available for the erection of kiosks? Previously, in regard to these the Minister's reply was that cable was the trouble. Will he now tell us whether the cable position has improved? When may we expect to have an addition to the present number of kiosks in Dublin?

Deputy Roddy referred to the Minister's statement in which he said that he anticipated going out on a campaign for public subscribers. I know from experience that the present subscribers feel that they are not getting value from the facilities which are being afforded to them. Naturally they will want to know when that position is going to be eased. As regards this campaign for future subscribers to which the Minister referred, can he tell us the number of houses that are now awaiting a telephone service in the City of Dublin? Would it be possible for him to give that number as well as some indication as to when they will get a service? My complaint in regard to the Minister's statement is that it is not sufficiently detailed. Can we be told something about the lay-up programme which will give an indication to the public as to when the position in Dublin will be eased, and the same with regard to Sligo and other areas? The Minister, in my opinion, has not given sufficient details.

Mr. Dillon

Last evening between half-past five and six o'clock I tried to call Ballaghaderreen which is 117 statute miles from Dublin. I could have driven home and transacted my business in Ballaghaderreen before the telephone call came through. It did come through at 8.30 as a result of repeated remonstrances. The supervisor on two occasions replied that he would call back instantly, but on both occasions he forgot about it, until finally at 8.20 I said that I had an appointment at 8.30, and that I wanted to get the call or else cancel it. A very civil man then got the call for me. I am going to suggest to the House that the present pandemonium in the telephone service, in so far as it is due to inadequate supplies of machinery or equipment, cannot be wholly blamed on the Minister, because the equipment is not to be had. Is lack of equipment the only reason? I do not think it is. I think that lack of trained personnel and the fantastic parsimony of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs in providing trained personnel in their exchanges are very largely responsible for the present situation. I have repeatedly said in this House that it is a very rare exception in dealing with the Department of Posts and Telegraphs to receive anything but courtesy and consideration. In 99 cases out of 100, where you have a complaint or an inquiry to make, whether you are given a satisfactory answer or not, they will be civil—and apologetic where they feel they have put you to an inconvenience. But there are occasions when some wide departures from that customary rule take place. I have invariably felt on such occasions, and have been able to confirm my view on making inquiries afterwards, that I was speaking to somebody who was frightfully overworked and who was driven to the last stage of exasperation by a burden of work quite beyond his or her capacity to bear.

Now, while that state of affairs exists, not hundreds, but thousands, of girls are emigrating to Great Britain to be domestic servants or to become so-called nurses in public health hospitals in England because they cannot get employment in their own country. We are told that we are spending £8,000,000 to £10,000,000 on telephone development but not a single instrument of the additional equipment which we are seeking will be of any value if highly-skilled operatives are not available to work that apparatus. Let the Minister doube or treble the telephone staff. Let us have now a fantastically redundant staff. Let us be able to change the girls on the switchboard far more often that ordinarily we would consider desirable, so that the maximum efficiency of a fresh operative will be available all the time to get the very most out of the inadequate equipment we have at the moment, and so that when adequate equipment is installed we shall have a trained expert staff who can be at once spread over the whole system.

What I apprehend is going to happen is that we are going to wait for the trained staff until the equipment is available and then we shall be told that we have no staff for the equipment. Ten years ago we were told that the trouble was that we had not the staff. Then when we got the staff, we were told that we had not the equipment. Now, when we get the equipment, we shall be told again that we have not the staff. We shall have to wait again for the staff, and I suppose by the time we get the staff the equipment will again be inadequate. We shall be chasing our own tail continually.

This apprehension of mine is not just conjured up in my own mind because I remember the present Minister for Posts and Telegraphs saying in this House that it was the policy of his Department to wait for a public demand before public money was spent in providing means to satisfy it. That is simply crazy. The aim of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs should be to keep ten years ahead of an existing demand steadily. I do not know what telephone facilities are available in Italy now but when I knew them, they were very bad. You were presented with an instrument which looked like a cross between a child's bugle and a Victorian lady's trumpet. You spent half the day shouting "Allo" and getting no comprehensive reply. I should be long sorry to see either the French or the Italian system held up as the criterion for this country but the British system, at least before the war, was reasonably efficient. The best system of which I had experience was the American system. I remember when in America taking up a telephone in Chicago and telling them that I wanted to speak to Big Bill Dillon, who was on holiday in Florida. They asked me if I could give them his address, and I told them that I could not. All I could tell them was that he was staying at some hotel in Florida on holidays. They said: "Very well, we shall ring you back when we get Mr. Dillon". They rang me up in about 35 minutes' time having searched every hotel in Florida until they found the person I wanted. They rang up every holiday resort along the Florida coast until they located him and then called me and said: "Here is Mr. Dillon for you". They have this additional attraction, that if a lady picks up a telephone and says: "My husband is in Florida, will you get me in touch with him?", before putting the husband in communication with her, after having found him, they will ask him: "Are you in the hotel where you said you were going to?" That is service. If he says: "No, I am not", they will ring back and apologise to the lady who called them and say: "We cannot find him". That is service.

I recognise that we should be somewhat ambitious if, in the early future, we were to aspire to that degree of service owing to the comparatively small number of instruments which will be employed within any foreseeable time in this country, but if the telephone system were run by a private corporation, that is the kind of service people would get, because that corporation would know that unless it kept its service up to the highest standard, the system would be perhaps given over to the State. Once the State gets control, then the consumer can take what is given to him and, if he does not like it, he can lump it. I put it to the Minister that at this moment there is an acute scarcity of trained personnel in the telephone system in this country.

Mr. Little

There is no scarcity of personnel.

Mr. Dillon

If there is no scarcity of personnel, why is it that if you ring "0" or "31," it takes three to seven minutes to get a reply, and if you complain to the superintendent, you are told: "We are overwhelmed with calls and we have not got the apparatus or the staff"?

Mr. Little

It is the apparatus and the space that are lacking.

Mr. Dillon

I am told that the staff are unable to cope with incoming calls. Suppose you ring "31," you hear the bell ringing in the central exchange and you stand there listening for anything from three to seven minutes without a reply. You then ring "30," which I think is telegrams. That usually answers fairly quickly. Generally, when you ring "O," you hear the bell ringing, but you never get the engaged ring. Somewhere in the exchange the instrument is ringing, but there seems to be no one to answer your call. I have been told by the Minister's Department that that difficulty is due to shortage of staff. I want to know if the Minister believes that he has sufficient staff to deal with the equipment which he hopes to have at a reasonably early date?

Now, I want to put this suggestion. Deputy Kennedy has referred to a telephone call that went down the Midland Great Western Railway to Dublin and up the Great Northern Railway line, back to Meath. He did not say whether, when he was making his call, he could hear half the railway porters, signalmen and stationmasters at all the railway stations down the Midland line and up the Great Northern line discussing what had become of a certain wagon or asking: "Have you any pigs on the train to-night?" In the midst of the most romantic conversations, conducted on the telephone line, you are likely to have a male voice introduced to know if someone had taken the dung out of the wagon that was on the siding yesterday. This, I understand, is due to some difficulty which arises through the lines which carry the telephone conversations of this country being closely approximated to the lines of the railway company's private telephone, and so you get this strange interchange of messages across the line, and frequently one has to discuss one's business on a background of complicated argument between the signalman at Mullingar and the stationmaster at Kilfree Junction as to whether the wagon which the signalman said had gone down the line had, in fact, gone down the line or not.

I want to make a simple practical suggestion for the abolition of the perennial persecution which people in rural Ireland have to suffer when they use the telephone. At present, if you make a trunk call from many country towns, there may be five separate connections in the process of linking you up with the other subscriber, and the facility with which you can talk depends on the effectiveness with which each of the five operators drives the plug home in the board over which he particularly presides. You have to go through a whole series of small post offices and I want to make the suggestion that all subscribers in the Ballaghaderreen district should be connected up with the Ballaghaderreen post office—that is necessary in order to permit the making of local calls— and that Ballaghaderreen should then be connected direct with some county centre, which county centre should in turn be connected direct with the national exchange.

That procedure seems perfectly simple to me and perfectly obvious, because it means, in addition to reducing the number of connections necessary to link up two rural subscribers, that there are very few places in the system where a bottleneck can grow up. The only place where you can get a bottleneck is at the county centre or the exchange in Dublin, and provided these are kept wide open, with abundant equipment, one may reasonably expect to have an efficient service throughout the country. I speak of the Ballaghaderreen situation because I know it peculiarly well. The service between Ballaghaderreen and Sligo is bad, but, when you get through to Sligo, pandemonium reigns, because into Sligo is pouring Donegal, Sligo, North Roscommon and parts of North Mayo, and once you get into that maelstrom, you may throw your hat at it.

It does not matter what additional lines are provided from Sligo to Dublin. The Sligo exchange simply cannot handle the traffic it is trying to handle. If all the towns in Roscommon were routed down to Roscommon, if all the towns in Mayo were routed to the appropriate town in Mayo and all the towns in Sligo to the appropriate town in Sligo, we could proceed at once to resolve the difficulties where they manifest themselves, but if the present system goes on, as I see it, we will be engaged in an interminable system of patchwork. I would much rather see the Post Office embarking now on a complete new network, designed on some coherent plan such as I suggest, with the intention of abandoning the existing network as soon as the new network is fit to function and using the present equipment for running repairs on the new system as the necessity arises.

I said at the beginning that it is not reasonable to blame the Minister for shortages in service resulting from the world shortage of equipment, and, if that were the sole explanation, I think we should have to acquit him of any guilt; but it is not. I charge that this Minister, by his own ineptitude and incompetence, failed to take reasonable precautions in the years before the war to anticipate the demand which any school-child knew was waiting around the corner. I charge further that the Minister, well knowing that, as part of a future programme of development, a new exchange was required in the City of Dublin, directed proceedings to be instituted to secure a situation in which that exchange would be built and equipped. Now I propose to tell the House the story of the negotiations which began in 1932 and which continued in 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936, 1937, 1938, 1939, 1940 and 1941. At the end of that period what had been achieved by three Departments?—the removal of seven barrows of bricks from one derelict site, a site which was derelict in 1931 and which was still derelict in 1941.

In case any Deputy doubts this story, it is here in a Government publication, the Report of the Committee of Public Accounts for the years 1938-39, Appendix 7. I may say that this is a matter which came up annually at the Committee of Public Accounts, and eventually, in despair, I suggested that some responsible officer of the Post Office should sharpen his pencil and set down at his leisure, in black and white, what happened to create the grotesque situation with which we found ourselves confronted in the year for which these accounts came under review. This is what he wrote with regard to the St. Andrew Street, Dublin, post office site:

"For a great number of years, the accommodation in the College Green Post Office has been inadequate; there is no means of extending it and the cost of complete rebuilding would be prohibitive. The Department of Posts and Telegraphs had therefore been seeking alternative premises in the vicinity. About 1932, the Department discovered that a suitable site in St. Andrew Street was on the market but before they could acquire it the Agricultural Credit Corporation leased the site from the Dublin Borough Council."

Remember that the Agricultural Credit Corporation is a quasi-Government Department. They jumped the site and that knocked the breath out of the Post Office.

Mr. Little

I do not see how this arises on this Bill.

Mr. Dillon

Well, you will.

Mr. Little

The Deputy is going back to 1932.

Mr. Dillon

That is the astonishing part of it. It is still going on. Is it not still going on? Are you not still at it?

Mr. Little

Does the Deputy mean that the Post Office is still going on? It is.

Mr. Dillon

Is this site not still vacant and are you not still mustering up your strength to build on it? Have you started to build on it?

Mr. Little

Where are the supplies?

Mr. Dillon

Are you not going to build on the site?

Mr. Little

Where are the supplies? The acquiring of the site is dead and done with these many years.

Mr. Norton

We got seven handcarts of bricks out of it.

Mr. Little

That is just what we expected to hear.

Mr. Dillon

It is recorded here with great triumph that, after nine years' effort, they got these bricks out and there is mutual congratulation between the three Government Departments. The breath was knocked out of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs when the Agricultural Credit Corporation got the jump on them. Now I return to the report, which continues:

"The Department later entered into negotiations with the corporation with a view to the provision of post office accommodation on the ground floor of a building which the corporation proposed to erect. The rent demanded was, however, regarded as too high and this scheme and an alternative one, by which the Department would pay the capital cost of part of the building and a smaller rent, both fell through.

As a result of further negotiations a fresh scheme was put forward to and sanctioned by the Minister for Finance on 15th June, 1934...."

What I have read out is the result of two years' labour.

"under which the site would be transferred to the Department in return for reimbursement of the corporation outgoings, including cost of clearing the site, architect's fees for building plans, rent, etc., the entire building to be erected by the Board of Works and the Department to lease accommodation to the corporation—the possibility of the Industrial Credit Company also renting accommodation to be explored.

Plans were prepared by the Office of Works accordingly, and the Agricultural Credit Corporation agreed to lease from the Department of Posts and Telegraphs the first and second floors and half the basement at a rent of £1,450 per annum (the accommodation and the rent to be divided between the Agricultural Credit Corporation and the Industrial Credit Company)."

I ask the House to note this. The great solicitude of the Department was to call the lame, the halt and the blind to share the costs of this business and to rent accommodation in the building, afraid they would not be able to fill it. Before I reach the end of this story they discover that the building is not big enough for themselves, and they try to break out of these agreements:

"The detailed scheme was sanctioned by the Minister for Finance on 15th June, 1935, and the initial steps regarding the transfer of the site were taken—the Agricultural Credit Corporation being asked to give a definite assurance that the Corporation and the Industrial Credit Company would enter into lease as described. The Industrial Credit Company, however, withdrew from the arrangement and the Agricultural Credit Corporation undertook by letter dated 23rd March, 1936, full responsibility for the rent, etc., of the entire upper floors on the conditions that they would be granted permission to sub-let any rooms not required for their immediate use, and that the building would be ready for occupation within two years."

They arrived at that important stage four years after the business began.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I should like to point out to the Deputy that this Bill deals with telephonic development, not general Post Office work.

Mr. Dillon

That is the funny part of it. In the heel of the hunt they discovered that this building was to be a telephone exchange and they proceeded to evict everyone, but the tenants would not go and they were eventually mulcted in a heavy sum:

"The Dublin Borough Council gave their approval to the transfer of the site and consented to an extension of the building period up to 25th March, 1939. The legal formalities were proceeded with and the deed of assignment from the Agricultural Credit Corporation was completed in June, 1937."

They were getting on famously now.

"The deed did not contain any stipulation as regards the renting by the Agricultural Credit Corporation of accommodation in the building.

It had been intended to commence work on the building as soon as the site was legally transferred to the Department, but owing to a dispute in the building trade progress was delayed. The Agricultural Credit Corporation then gave notice that they intended to withdraw from their agreement, on the grounds it was not possible to have the accommodation available for occupation by March, 1938, and that, as their existing accommodation was inadequate, it was necessary to make alternative arrangements without delay."

At this stage, the whole position was again reported to the Department of Finance by the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. It was then clear that if buildings were erected on the St. Andrew Street site the whole of them could be utilised for Post Office purposes, and, in fact, were definitely needed for accommodation for Post Office services. In the view of the Minister for Finance no purpose would have been served by requiring the corporation to keep to their bargain to take up accommodation in the new building. The only question which then remained for settlement was whether, in releasing the corporation from their bargain, any fine or other consideration should not be expected of them."

Accordingly the Minister consented to certain concessions. That only brings the House to 1939. At this stage, the Secretary of the Department takes the field. I shall quote further——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Does the Deputy intend to go over all these reports?

Mr. Dillon

Have I said a word so far that does not relate to the St. Andrew Street site on which the new telephone exchange was to be built?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I asked if the Deputy intends to read all the reports.

Mr. Dillon

Only such as are relevant. I spent seven years as Chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts dealing with it, not seven minutes which I am asking the House to spend. The Secretary, Mr. O'Hegarty, appeared before the Committee of Public Accounts on May 6th, 1943. He said that as far as he could see, Mr. McGrath,. the Comptroller and Auditor-General, had a bee in his bonnet about this matter. "I tried to explain this," said Mr. O'Hegarty, "year after year to Mr. McGrath but he still has a bee in his bonnet about it." On being pressed, Mr. O'Hegarty said that he had brought Mr. Blake with him who was head of the building section of the Post Office and that he would be better able to explain than Mr. O'Hegarty was. Mr. Blake then took up the story. I have brought the House up to 1939. Mr. Blake said:

"We did not get this site for telephone purposes until July, 1939. Plans of this nature take from 12 to 15 months to prepare, and after that it would take from 20 to 21 months to build a structure of this kind. The man in the street looks at buildings and says to himself that one building is like another. The weight-carrying capacity of an ordinary building is 70 lbs. to 100 lbs. per foot superficial. In this case we would have switchboards on the second floor, the weight of which would be 1,700 lbs. per six feet, apart from other materials and live weight."

He then goes into a series of technical details and winds up by saying that plans were with the Board of Works to erect a building in reinforced concrete. Mr. O'Hegarty is asked: "Are you going to start the building now?" and he replies, "Yes."

Mr. Little

That was before the war.

Mr. Dillon

It was not before the war. Who said it was before the war? Do you say it was?

Mr. Little

It must have been.

Mr. Dillon

You think it ought to be. I will read it out to you.

Mr. Little

The only thing that held us up were supplies.

Mr. Dillon

Deputy Benson, at Question 156, said:

"Mr. Connolly informed us that the plans were not with his Department yet. Last year Mr. O'Hegarty was asked if plans had been prepared, and the answer was ‘No.' Mr. Connolly says the Board of Works are handling them at the moment. I also asked last year, ‘If there was any prospect of building being undertaken at the moment,' and Mr. O'Hegarty replied: ‘Not at the moment, I think, because tenders have to be sought and received. The plans had to be recast to provide for reinforced concrete instead of steel, as steel cannot be got.' I then remarked: ‘But it is proposed to go ahead with the building and not wait until the war is over,' and Mr. O'Hegarty answered: ‘Yes'."

Do you deny that?

Mr. Little

It is a question of supplies—that is all.

Mr. Dillon

The Minister says: "It is a question of supplies—that is all." Fourteen years have elapsed since they made up their minds that they would like to build on the St. Andrew Street site. There were seven years spent chopping logic with the Dublin Corporation, the Agricultural Credit Corporation, and the Industrial Credit Corporation, trying to lure them into the building. There were two years spent throwing them out again. Then they discover that they cannot get any supplies, so they get the wheelbarrow, remove several barrels of bricks, and then they have a mutual admiration party saying: "Is not that wonderful?" All I am afraid of is that they will start some similar transaction again and, by the time they get around to building the telephone exchange, the capital of Ireland will be moved to Tara or Athlone and they will find they have built it in the wrong place. I would like to know from the Minister now has he got the final plans? I would like to know from him if the plans have been approved and if the tenders are out. I see them building cinemas in Mullingar and in other towns all over the country.

Mr. Coogan

Dún Laoghaire.

Mr. Dillon

I see them erecting numerous buildings which incorporate considerable quantities of steel and I want to know from the Minister if he has been as hot off the mark as he wishes this House to believe? Did he at any stage during the war make up his mind, if they could not build this building during the war, to complete the plans so that the moment the supplies again become available they could put the building out to tender and put it under construction on the first priority, on the ground that this is the bottleneck of bottlenecks? As long as that building is not erected, no effective work can be done to provide the community with a reasonable standard of efficiency in the telephone service.

It is not because a shortage of supplies has made it hard to run the telephones at the present time that I indict the Minister. It is because he has been lazy, lazy in not making his Department do its duty during the ten years before the war. It is because he thinks it is good enough now to shrug his shoulders or give impudence when his Department is criticised here and imagine that is an adequate reply to the charges which lie against him. It is because he is lazy now and thinks it is good enough to shrug his shoulders and say: "It is a matter of supplies." It is not a matter of supplies. It is a matter of contemptible incompetence on the part of the Minister responsible.

There are people going around this country and, because they are soft and agreeable and pleasant, you cannot say anything about them other than: "He is a decent poor fellow." We all know the Minister is a decent poor fellow; we all know he is an agreeable person; we all know it is no agreeable assignment to use strong language about him; but the plain fact is that he is bone lazy and he always was and that is at the root of the troubles in the Post Office. Let him do one of two things. Let him turn over a new leaf and make the people in the Department work, as he should; make them realise that the programme which the community demands should be completed within a reasonable time, and he is quite competent to do that if he wants to do his work, or else he should fulfil the prognostications of the Irish Times and go out and become an ambassador in Paris, Berlin or Rome. But it is intolerable that the whole community should be held up indefinitely simply because the Minister thinks his responsibilities can be discharged by shrugging his shoulders and saying: “It is a matter of supplies.” It is not a matter of supplies. It is a matter of one Minister not doing his work, not trying to get done what ought to be done. If he was one-tenth as solicitous in getting telephones into the homes of the people and into business houses as he is in getting nominees of the Fianna Fáil clubs into the sub-post offices, we would not be in the position in which we are at the present time.

Mr. Byrne

The Minister told us he has a long waiting list. I should like to know, when materials are available, what form of priority will be given. I have in mind the new housing areas in the City of Dublin that are without an adequate telephone service. They are also without an adequate bus service, without proper lighting facilities and without the shelters that were promised them. Are the new residential areas in Drumcondra, Killester, Donnycarney, Kimmage, Crumlin, Cabra West and Cabra to be left aside and not given adequate facilities? These new areas have no facilities whatsoever and they are being treated with a kind of indifference. I should like the Minister to see that the new shopping centres are given proper facilities. Traders are making every effort to provide for the people in these added areas. I should like an assurance that the new shopping centres will be given a priority and that they will get all the services they require.

I have read a lot and written a lot about the cattle market area—the North Circular Road, Glasnevin, Phibsborough and Cabra. If anybody in that area applies for a telephone for business purposes he gets a reply to the effect that the cables are overloaded. That is no proper answer for people who are anxious to carry on business. That is a most important area, not alone for Dublin but for the whole country. Telephone services are necessary there not alone for the people in the area but for the use of people who come from England and from the country districts around Dublin to sell or purchase cattle.

I will not attempt to follow the line adopted by Deputy Dillon. I have no complaints to make. I find that, if I have to ring up the Department, any little grievance that may be mentioned is removed within the shortest possible period. So far as courtesy is concerned, I can say I get nothing but courtesy, no matter what Department I come in contact with. I have no fault to find with the Department, but if the speech of Deputy Dillon will encourage the Minister to use a little driving force it will be all to the good.

We are told that the cables are overloaded. I hope the position in that respect will be improved and that the people who want telephones will get them. I am particularly anxious that the new housing areas around Dublin will not be neglected much longer.

If you talk about the inadequate bus service, you are told that there are no materials. For seven years, that has been the excuse. If you ask why weather shelters are not put up, as promised, you are told that there are no materials. There is the same excuse in the case of lighting facilities. It is a good thing that Deputy Dillon took the line he did—not in the way of making an attack on the Minister's Department. I think that he accepted the statement of the Minister and his officials that the materials are not available but what are the Government doing to make them available? Is it not possible for the Minister to cross to the other side or for the Government to send representatives to see what could be done in the way of getting materials? Deputy Dillon said that they were told that the difficulty in connection with the building of a telephone depot was scarcity of steel. Three weeks ago, I was on an inspection committee which visited the North Wall. There we saw 400 tons of steel girders and iron girders being unloaded for the Electricity Supply Board. They came from some continental area. If the Electricity Supply Board has the initiative to send out men and place orders, why cannot the Government do likewise? The supplies they would obtain could be allocated to the various Departments and to the transport and lighting services which I mentioned and the Government should see that Dublin, on account of its big population, gets a reasonable share. I support the case made by other speakers for kiosks. There should be more telephone kiosks in the City and County of Dublin, particularly when lighting facilities are insufficient. If an accident takes place or a purse is snatched, we are told that there was no light in the area and no telephone kiosk by which the Gárdaí could be called. I hope that the few words of encouragement I have given the Minister and those given him by Deputy Dillon will have good results.

Mr. Norton

I welcome this Bill if it is intended to be a serious and comprehensive effort to face up to the serious telephone problems which confront not only the Post Office but the whole country. Such a Bill is long overdue. The intentions behind the Bill, as indicated by the Minister, should have been given effect long before the emergency, instead of as a post-war effort. There is no doubt about the necessity for improving the telephone service and developing it. There is no doubt about the necessity of providing those who operate the service with the means of serving the public properly. Deputy Dillon, Deputy Byrne and others may talk about the inadequacy of telephone exchanges and equipment, but, to realise the conditions in which the staffs are herded, one should really go into some of the telephone exchanges in the country. Many of them are simply appalling. It is an exaggeration to describe them as exchanges. That is a euphemism for a miserable, little, overcrowded and badly-ventilated room in many cases. The Minister does not know anything about this at all. If he were to go on a tour of what are described as telephone exchanges, he would have his eyes opened and he would realise that his speech is about ten years out of date. The Minister should go down to Claremorris or Sligo or Ennis or Waterford. These are only a few examples of the frightfully bad telephone exchange position throughout the country.

If the Minister and some of the people responsible at a high level for telephone policy could only see the places which masquerade as telephone exchanges in the country, they would be ashamed to be associated with them. Many of these exchanges were built when the telephone directory was little more than a pocket diary. Has the Minister the telephone directory for 1900? If not, somebody in his Department should show him one and tell him the telephone statistics for 1900. He will then see how completely the telephone service has outgrown the clothes in which it was first wrapped. The service has expanded completely beyond the capacity of the Post Office for adjustment. The telephone directory is now a very substantial volume, indicative of a rapidly expanding service. Yet, the Post Office continues to deal with it in the manner indicated by the correspondence which Deputy Dillon read. Deputy Dillon's statement of the way the Post Office deals with this business is no exaggeration at all. The Deputy may have embroidered his remarks with some expletives and adjectives but, if the embroidery is stripped off, then Deputy Dillon's description of the leisurely, easy-going approach to the question of building is undoubtedly as indicated in the correspondence which he read.

The Minister knows that it is almost impossible to get anything in the way of definiteness from the Post Office. If you ask them whether they propose to carry out any structural work, they will say that they hope to do so but they never state definitely when they will commence or when they will finish. The remarks by Deputy Dillon typify the whole attitude of the Post Office as regards the provision of proper buildings for the transaction of the business committed to its care. Is it any wonder that there are frequent complaints of delay so far as the telephone service is concerned? The whole position has got so bad that the Post Office is stumbling towards the acceptance of the position that delay is inevitable. They realise that, while the service has grown, they have not been able, for reasons within their own control, to provide adequate buildings and equipment to meet the increased demand. Many of the irritated subscribers give vent to their irritation by making complaint to the telephonist, as if the telephonist was responsible for the management of the exchanges. Many of those irritated subscribers think that the telephonist is reading an interesting book or knitting and that that is all that prevents her from promptly putting through their call. The truth is that the telephonists are being asked to carry a load which it is impossible for them to carry satisfactorily and efficiently with the equipment at present available to them. When the public blame the telephonist they should remember that the telephonist is as much a victim of the short-sighted policy of the Post Office as they are. The Minister in introducing this Bill told us that the intention is to provide a large number of new circuits, junctions, lines and improved buildings but he did not tell us when it is hoped that this work will be undertaken. Can he give us any indication as to what the achievements will be in one year or five years hence? The Minister remembers that recently an Arterial Drainage Bill was introduced in this House and when the Bill was being finally passed we were told that the work would not be undertaken for a very considerable time and that in fact it would take seven years to get the machinery together and 28 years before the job of draining the country was completed. I hope this Bill is not a twin brother of the Arterial Drainage Bill. I hope that something satisfactory will be done towards the development of the telephone service.

I want to bring the Minister back to the position of the telephone service in Dublin. The present telephone service in Dublin is unsatisfactory because the Post Office has not been able to measure up to the problem before it. It was not able to do that when there was an abundance of building material available and when equipment could be obtained very much cheaper than present-day costs. The central telephone exchange, that is, the Exchequer Street Exchange, is utterly unsatisfactory from the point of view of the chief telephone exchange in the capital city. The place is overcrowded and there is no attempt in that building, which is merely a converted building, to measure up to what a telephone exchange in the capital city ought to be. I have seen telephone exchanges in other countries, and what purports to be our central telephone exchange has no claim whatever to be ranked in the same category. I have seen large telephone exchanges in other cities and they are all well ahead of what is our central telephone exchange. The Minister will probably say that we have in mind building a new exchange in St. Andrew Street but a telephone service cannot be run on intentions or good hopes. There will never be a satisfactory service in Dublin until a proper exchange is erected on the St. Andrew Street site.

The Minister gives himself credit for intending to build that exchange with the utmost expedition but there is always something in the way. The Minister is bursting to build that exchange but something prevents him. Ought not the Minister to tell the Government that the erection of an exchange at St. Andrew Street is much more essential from the point of view of the national needs than the erection of cinemas in various parts of the country, and ought not he be able to convince the Government that the provision of this telephone exchange ought to take priority over many of the luxury buildings which are being put up? In so far as I agree with Deputy Dillon's comments, I agree with Deputy Dillon that the Minister is on the bottom rung of the ladder so far as pushing forward the claims of his Department are concerned. During the war a Department of Industry and Commerce building was erected across the street—a magnificent building.

I wonder if the Minister could tell us of a single post office building that was erected during his period as Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. So far as I can recollect there has not been a single one. There certainly has not been one over £1,000. When it comes to providing essential services it seems to me the Minister is at the end of the queue and, by the time the Minister makes up his mind to look for something for the Post Office, it has all gone and then the Government use on the Minister the same kind of argument as Mother Hubbard used on the dog. I suggest to the Minister that he ought to wake up and realise that, whether he likes it or not, the public hold him responsible for the provision of a first-class public service and that therefore he ought to insist that in the matter of equipment and of buildings he has as good a right to be heard at the Cabinet meetings as other Ministers. There is one thing he ought to say in any case and he ought to say it soon, that is, that, so far, the others have been getting away with what they like and that unfortunately he always seems to have a fork when the Cabinet are giving away soup.

In regard to the question of the organisation within the Post Office Department for the erection of telephone buildings, I have complained and I want again to complain that the Post Office have not the first notion of how to start in so far as the erection of post office buildings is concerned and appear to become completely ineffective in having proper buildings provided for the transaction of post office work. The building section in the Minister's Department is the most hopelessly staffed section of the Department. I should like the Minister personally to look into this matter of the staff that is in the building section. If he does, he will realise that an urban council charged with the erection of a few houses now and again probably has a much better technical staff than there is in the building section of his Department. I do not blame the people there. I sympathise with them. I pity them. They are trying to implement a building policy without adequate staff and without a single technician.

Deputy Dillon quoted a statement made by the officer in charge of the building section before the Public Accounts Committee in which a great deal of technical language was used as to the capacity of buildings to bear certain weights and pressures. Deputy Dillon apparently did not know that the officer who was using that language was not in fact a qualified technician from the standpoint of being an engineer or an architect. It is true that he has acquired qualifications as a result of long association with building work but equally it is true that the Post Office, in what is described as a building section, have not a draughtsman, an architect, an engineer or any kind of craftsman. There is not a single person there that has ever served an apprenticeship to any type of building work. That is the building section of the Post Office Department. If one deliberately set out to make a mess of the section he could not do it so successfully. That is the position in the building section. I think there are only four or five officers in the place, and while they may have got one or two more since I last complained about this matter, the place is appallingly understaffed, starved for staff and starved for technicians. It is, no wonder that there are unsatisfactory post offices and telephone exchanges throughout the country when that is the situation in the Minister's own office.

Apparently, the Minister cannot be induced to take a sufficiently deep interest in the matter to remedy a situation of that kind. I wonder when he is going to wake up over this whole business and provide a proper building section in the Department, staffed by technicians, staffed by people who know what building operations are, by people with some imagination as to what the future development of the Post Office service in its various branches is likely to be. While an improvement in that particular section should help in the production of buildings more speedily and in a more satisfactory type of building, the Minister ought to try to think more deeply even than that. The Post Office is a very essential service and if it is to cater satisfactorily for the needs of the people, it must have within itself the authority and the powers of control necessary to such a nation wide service.

At present, before the Post Office can expend any money, they must get sanction from the Department of Finance and, when they have got that sanction, they have to ask the Board of Works to look at the scheme and see if they can carry it out. Between the Post Office, the Department of Finance and the Board of Works, there is an endless stream of correspondence which goes on and on and on. If anybody wants you to provide a satisfactory service, you cannot do it by circulating a file from the Post Office to the Department of Finance, then to the Board of Works and then back to the Post Office. People dealing with correspondence in that way finally get the impression that the file is the important thing and not the subject matter of the file. It seems to me that the main concern is to keep the file right, to keep it properly minuted and, so long as the file is right and there is no evidence of any delay, you can keep up this circulation process and it does not matter much what the file is about. That is not the way to provide a satisfactory service.

The Minister should do a bit of deep thinking about this whole position and stake his claim with the Department of Finance and the Government—and he has some rights with the Government, though he may feel he has none with the Department of Finance. He ought to stake the claim that the Post Office should be given some autonomy, some sense of independence, some freedom from the rigidity of financial control which operates to-day. If the Post Office, as a widespread service, wants to give the public the best possible service, it ought to be able to provide that service of its own volition, within wide degrees of economy and ought to be able to provide, within its own Department, the necessary sections—such as building and equipment sections—for the purpose of implementing its intentions in providing improved services. The present control which the Department of Finance exercises over the Post Office is a stranglehold control.

I venture to say that if a world-famous vocalist arrived here to-morrow morning and offered to sing a few songs from Radio Éireann for 2/6 each, someone would have to write to the Department of Finance to get sanction, to see whether the man might be allowed to sing them at 2/6 a time. Again, if you suggest that a female duty should be made a male duty, as it would be done better in that way, they say "Yes", but they have to go to Finance to see whether a female job can be converted into a male one. That is the state of affairs in the national Post Office service, or a service which masquerades as one; that is the control which, apparently, the Post Office has not sufficient energy even to try to shake off. It may not be easy, but at least someone should make an effort to shake off that type of control. So far, I do not know whether the Minister has done anything in the matter. If he has, it has been conspicuously unsuccessful. I suggest to him that, in view of the new and wider services which the Post Office is taking into its administration, there should be a greater measure of autonomy there and that he should try to get out of the muzzle and handcuffs in which he is at present.

The Minister should tell the Government and the Department of Finance that his Department is so far-flung and has such widely-spread services that it is essential to have a measure of control to enable it to administer those services much more efficiently and much more effectively than it is doing to-day. So far, I do not know whether the Minister has even stumbled across that notion. Someone should do it and make an effort to get the Post Office the control which it needs. If that control were passed to the Post Office, as it has passed in a very large measure to the British Post Office, the public would get speedier decisions and a more satisfactory service as well.

In connection with the telephone administration, I want to deal with the staffing of the telephone services. Quite frankly, I have never been able to understand why the Post Office huckstered with staff so much. It has not distinguished itself in the provision of sufficient telephone staff in Dublin. I can see that the service has been improved a good deal lately, although there is still much leeway to be made up. Yet, if you tell the Post Office that there is an insufficient staff in the Telephone Exchange, the reply is: "Very well, we will recruit six temporary people"; and it seems to take so long to recruit them that, by the time they have been appointed, it is not six but three times six that are needed. Then, when there is complaint, they have another look: "We recruited six recently and, if the position is still very bad, we will look for another six." This miserable huckstering practice in the provision of staff goes on, until one gets the impression that the Post Office do not want the telephone service to develop and have got themselves into a rut, in which they say: "Why are the public using the telephone so much and giving us so much trouble to provide more staff?"

Anyone dealing with a commercial undertaking similar to the Post Office would probably welcome circumstances in which it was necessary to increase the staff, but when you approach the Post Office and say that the staff is insufficient, there is one defence: "Do we really need more staff? Why do we need them? Can we not do with a certain number of people and manage in a particular way?" They forget that this is a national service which ought to be operated on the basis of making a generous allowance where staffing requirements are concerned. In respect of the telephone service, that is a particularly desirable policy, as anyone who was ever inside the service would realise at once that telephone operating is a very onerous, a very fatiguing and a very nerve-racking operation, and that, if the best is to be got out of the service, it will not be got by working the staff under such conditions.

If this service were a losing service, the Minister might plead that in defence of a niggardly staff policy, but the fact of the matter is that, according to the last commercial accounts, the Post Office is making a surplus of £250,000 per year. I suggest, therefore, that the way is clear for the implementation of an enlightened telephone policy, by the provision of decent wages for the staff, by extending to the staff decent conditions of employment and by recognising frankly that the character of telephone operating work is so nerve-racking and fatiguing that the staff employed on it ought to have the most ideal conditions so far as the Post Office can ensure them, especially since it has got a surplus of a quarter million pounds per year on the telephone service.

With respect to the wages which it pays to its telephone staff, whether for day time or for day and night attendance, the Post Office has nothing to plume itself on. The wage scales ought to be very much better, having regard to the importance of the work, and to the fact that a large measure of the surplus which is available at the moment is got by employing staff at wages and under conditions which are in need of urgent improvement. With respect to the employment in the grade known as night and Sunday telephone attendance, I think the Post Office ought to be thoroughly ashamed of itself. I have never seen in my whole life such a huckstering and miserable mentality as that which the Post Office displays when it comes to employing night and Sunday staff on telephone attendance work in provincial offices. With regard to that particular service, the Post Office has such regard for the Constitution and the Encyclicals that it advertises for people to do the job at the lowest possible price and gives the job on a bargaining basis. If people will present themselves to do the job for such and such a rate, the attitude of the Post Office—one of the organs that one would imagine would have some respect for decent conditions and for decent concepts of life—is this: "Very well, we will take the lowest bidder," and it takes the lowest bidder in a matter of that kind. All that is done by a telephone Department which is making a surplus of over a quarter million pounds per year. I think that the Post Office ought to be ashamed of itself so far as the wage rates it pays for night and Sunday telephone attendance are concerned. I think the Minister might well try to exonerate himself from the responsibility which devolves on him in this matter by making some personal inquiries into the low standards of remuneration paid to those people, especially having regard to the hours during which they work and try to pay them a wage that will not oblige him to hang his head when the amount of it is mentioned.

I want to see, and I think the House wants to see, an efficient and well-managed telephone service provided. I think everybody realises that it is an essential service, and one capable of bringing a considerable measure of convenience and comfort into the lives of the people. But, if we are to have that well-managed and efficient service, then we ought to recognise at once that there is need for an enlightened outlook so far as the provision of adequate staff is concerned, the provision of satisfactory buildings, and extending to the staff conditions which will ensure that they can co-operate to the fullest in the provision of the most efficient service that the Post Office can provide. I have got the feeling, in regard to the telephone service, that it is a kind of unwanted child so far as the Post Office is concerned. It has been the last acquisition by the Post Office. The Post Office was originally a Post Office Department. It later became a Department of Posts and Telegraphs. The acquisition of telephone activities came later. I have always felt that the Post Office mind has never measured up the fact that it is now the foster-father of the telephone service. This latest addition to its service seems to have had a cramping and crippling effect upon it. If the Post Office is going to provide a satisfactory telephone service for the country, then I think it will have to shed that mentality, and will have to recognise that the telephone service is one of the natural children of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. It will have to get away from the unwanted child philosophy, and recognise that if telephone development is to be encouraged until it becomes an efficient service, the Post Office must adopt new methods, more comprehensive methods, and it must see that telephone development gets as good a chance as other aspects of the work done by the Department of Posts and Telegraphs.

Mr. Moran

So far as this measure represents a departure from the attitude adopted previously, not by the Minister but by the chiefs in the Department, I welcome it. I remember that for quite a long time, when application was made for facilities in some rural areas, one was told that they would not be justified because of the number of people who might avail of them. I was glad to hear the Minister say that under this Bill it is proposed to extend the telephone service to some country post offices. On that question, I want the Minister to go much further. I think that in many ways the telephone service is as important as rural electrification. I think that to a large extent the telephone service should be looked upon as a social service—one to provide amenities for the people in the rural areas. I want the Minister to adopt this attitude, that in future he will endeavour to cater for the isolated rural areas irrespective of whether or not there is a post office in them. The people living in isolated areas, in mountainous areas along the western seaboard, some of them ten and 20 miles from the nearest town, should, in my opinion, be provided with telephone facilities so that they will be able to get medical assistance, to call the priest or to get a veterinary surgeon if they want one. They should be placed in as favourable a position as the people living nearer the towns. The attitude of the Minister should be, irrespective of the question of cost, to provide them with the amenities that I speak of.

We hear a lot of talk from time to time in this House about people flying from the land, as well as on the question of the lack of amenities in the rural areas. The Minister could go a long way towards correcting that situation by providing telephone facilities in isolated areas. I do not know how much there is in the argument that this Bill should have been introduced a long time ago. I have the feeling that possibly we were not ready for a measure of this kind until recent years, because of the fact that the number of people who took advantage of the existing telephone system was comparatively few when a comparison was made with other countries. The fact now is that the telephone has become a necessity for businessmen and others. It has also become a necessity from a social point of view. It is essential that this service should be available to the people.

On the question of priorities, I would ask the Minister when he comes to carry out operations under this Bill to give them a rural bias, and to cater for those parts of the country where the people are crying out for this service. It can be said that the people in the cities and towns have at least a skeleton service. I know many areas in the country, in my own constituency in fact, where people have been agitating for a telephone service for a number of years. I should like to see those people given a priority when the scheme under his Bill comes to be operated. It will be useless to say in ten or 15 years' time that we have depopulated rural areas if we fail now to give to the people in the countryside the benefits which other sections of the community, living in towns, enjoy.

I think that a rather narrow conception of its responsibilities is being taken by the Minister's Department in its attitude towards the telephone service in the country. The Department ought to visualise the day, and work and plan for the day, when each and every rural household, each and every farmer, will be in a position to connect with the telephone service if he wants to do so. The aim of the Minister should be to provide a telephone service in every village in the country. I have the feeling that possibly one of the reasons why the telephone has come into such popular use in the United States is that you have various types of concerns competing against one another in running that service. I have the feeling that if we had private concerns in control of the telephone service in this country, and competing against one another, we possibly would have advanced much further than we have under the control of the Department. I think the Minister should visualise the day when the people of the country will insist on getting the same facilities as their brethren in the towns and the Department should accordingly plan for the time when each and every citizen, no matter how isolated his homestead may be, will be in a position to avail of this service.

There is just one other matter which I want to bring to the notice of the Minister. Viewed from the point of view of popularising the service, I consider that the rentals are too high. They may be quite all right for a large business concern or for the ordinary professional man in the country who uses the telephone service, but I think that in order to popularise it and in particular to make the service available, in so far as it is possible to make it available for the rural community, there should be a specially reduced rate in rentals for the rural community. The more isolated an area is, the more reasonable the charges should be so as to encourage the rural community to make use of this new service. In other words, I should like the Minister to give a completely rural bias to his plans for the proposed changes. The Minister or his advisers may suggest that this would not be economic or that it could not be done, but I think that if the service were made available at a cheaper rate, as time went on, you would have a very much larger number of people anxious to avail of it.

I believe that if you brought the telephone within reach of the ordinary working man and the farmer, so that they could avail of it for shopping and for the carrying out of ordinary transactions in the country, the number of telephone users would increase tenfold. The way to popularise the service is to make it cheap for the people. I believe that if the rentals were cheaper a very much larger percentage of the population would avail of it. I do not know what proportion of the £250,000 profit made on the Department is attributable to the profits made on the telephone service, but I feel that the rentals charged at the moment are out of all proportion to what people, for whom I want the Minister to cater, should be called upon to pay. I want the Minister to extend the telephone service to the rural areas, to the working man and the small farmer throughout the country, and to dissociate his mind, in so far as he can, from any question of finance in this matter because I think this service is as much a social service, in so far as it caters for the people of the country generally, as the rural electrification scheme. I should like the Minister to bear in mind particularly the question of priority for isolated areas so that a start can be made in districts that are crying out for this service.

Mr. McMenamin

Deputy Dillon has referred to the really grave matter that is involved in this discussion. I want to confirm the Deputy's statements, though not necessarily in the language he used. He said that he had been seven years on the Committee of Public Accounts, when they were dealing with the matter of providing a central telephone exchange in the city. I had the misfortune to spend ten years on that Committee, and the manner in which this question was dealt with was one of the reasons that compelled me to retire from the Committee. Nobody entrusted with the duty of assigning responsibility for these matters would tolerate the way in which the observations of the Committee were dealt with. It is a long, sad and discreditable story. Deputy Norton says that he pities and sympathises with the Minister. I neither sympathise with nor pity him.

Mr. Norton

Go easy now. I did not say either one thing or the other.

Mr. McMenamin

No effort was made to inaugurate an effective telephone system when it was obvious that the telegraph system had failed. Obviously the telegraph system throughout the world was on the dead line and was looked upon as antiquated. According as it declined, the charges for telegrams were increased until ultimately nobody would touch them at all. Then we had the future distinctly marked out for us as to what road we were going to travel. The delay described by Deputy Dillon in regard to the scheme was utterly indefensible. The site at St. Andrew Street was clear at a time when material was cheaper than it had been at any period for 50 years. Then there was this hugger-mugger between two outside bodies and the Department with the result that the whole scheme was held up. In my opinion nobody but the Department of Posts and Telegraphs should have any say in this matter. I should like to hear from the Minister now when he is going to initiate the construction of this building. We hope that the lay-out of the exchange will be a credit to the Department, not only in the matter of the efficiency of its technical staff but in the matter of the pay and conditions of those recruited to the Department to bring this service to the country.

Let us not forget that efficiency and expedition will be demanded of the people in the exchanges, and that we will not get them, unless we provide for these people the very best conditions and pay possible. I understand that a large number of these employees are recruited on a temporary basis and paid some meagre, paltry wage which would not meet the charges for board and lodging which obtain at present in Dublin. I do not mind whether the Department makes a profit or not, but if the public demand service—and they must get it—they should be asked to pay for it. They should not get it on the basis of slave labour and slave conditions. I ask the Minister to see to it that a restaurant and rest-rooms for the workers will be provided in the new building and also that there will be a recasting of the conditions under which girls have to work.

I do not normally poke my nose into matters like this, but girls tell me that the long hours and poor pay lead to a breakdown in health. I regard that as immoral. The first people with a claim on these profits referred to by Deputy Norton are those who do the work and make the profit possible, and if these services are to be provided, the House will willingly vote the money necessary to give the employees the conditions and pay which will ensure a good service, because the service will never be efficient unless those who provide it enjoy the best conditions of service and pay. Expedition is the very essence of the service and there should be no "humming" or "hawing" about providing the necessary money. We should embark on a whole-hog policy of giving a first-class service and the House and the country must appreciate that it can be given only by people enjoying the best possible conditions.

I could go on to labour the charges made against the Minister by Deputy Dillon—and it was right and proper for Deputy Dillon to refer to them in order that we may see where we have failed in the past and where reform is necessary in the future—but I do not believe in inquests. The effect of the delay in providing a better service will be to prevent people from becoming telephone-minded. I spend a couple of months each year in the country and I have gone into post offices, which shall be nameless, and have had to wait an hour and two hours before getting a call through. Surely the Minister must appreciate that in this busy world, people will not be satisfied to wait an hour or two hours for a call.

It is ridiculous that in the case of urgent calls for doctors or ambulances —cases in which an urgent operation may be required—over a distance of 20 miles should involve a delay of an hour or two hours. Steps to remedy that situation will have to be taken as quickly as possible, if the public are not to be turned against the telephone. If this money is to produce results, it is essential that we should make the people telephone-minded at once. There are technical difficulties which give rise to these delays and apparently, at the moment, the defence is lack of equipment, but the Minister will see that it is futile to invest a very large sum of money if we so sour the public that they will not bother about the service.

With regard to charges, I have said here before that the popularity of this new undertaking will depend ultimately on the price and I regard the present scale of charges as far too high. The rates for extensions are far too high and the rentals also are too high. Deputy Moran spoke of getting a telephone into the working-man's home. What a world Deputy Moran is living in if he thinks the working man could afford a telephone on the basis of the present charges for installation and rental! We will never popularise the telephone on the basis of these charges, and I suggest it would be a good investment to do what commercial undertakings do, that is, to sell at a loss at the beginning in order to gain in the future. We should take a long view and should make sacrifices in the matter of charges, knowing full well that ultimately the Post Office and the State will gain.

The Minister can spread this system through the country and can put up these exchanges, but a return on the money invested can be got only by giving an efficient and cheap service, because nothing is ever really popular unless it is reasonably cheap. On the basis of the present charges for installation and rental, nobody but people with money, middle-class people, will be able to afford the installation and rental charges, plus the charge for calls.

I would ask the Minister to turn over a new leaf. I would ask that this telephone exchange be tackled at once. That eye-sore has been in St. Andrew Street for the last 14 years. The Public Accounts Committee have been dealing with it. Ground rents have been paid and yet there has been all this fiddling with it. Not a brick has been laid yet. A first-class job ought to be made of it. I cannot see how the Minister can have any defence in connection with it. In Kildare Street, the Minister for Industry and Commerce put up one of the finest buildings in this island in a fraction of the time. That building was not thought of when the St. Andrew Street site was acquired.

I wish again to reiterate that unless you give an efficient and cheap service you cannot achieve success. That is the cardinal element in a successful business. The Minister also should not forget that in order to get that he will have to give his employees good working conditions and good pay. There should be no cheeseparing, because bad pay and bad conditions of service will mean inefficient work. You cannot get efficient work out of people serving under these conditions. I understand young girls are taken in at about 30/- per week. I am not positive about that and there may be some bonus given; but, if that be true it is really a scandal to ask any decent man's daughter to live in this city on 35/- or 37/- a week, considering the cost of board and lodging, clothes, etc. It is indefensible and, so far as I am concerned, I want to dissociate myself from it. If that is obtaining now, I hope that an end will be put to it at once.

Mr. Little

First of all, I want to enter on the records of the House a protest against the extraordinary way in which this debate has been allowed to be conducted. There were questions raised here about matters which occurred between 1932 and 1938, matters which should never have been allowed to be discussed on the Bill at all. That was followed up by a display of bad temper and of personal abuse both of the Minister and of the Department, which, coming from a person of the breed of Dillon, was surprising. I am not going to follow that line or answer him on the same plane in which he spoke.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Minister's stricture on the Chair is duly noted.

Mr. Little

Turning to the debate itself, I quite realise the difficulty which Deputies had in dealing with the difference between discussing matters which should be discussed on the Estimates and what should be discussed on this Bill, which was the only matter before the House. The object of this Bill is to devote £6,000,000 to a very large extension of the telephone service in the country. I do not think that at this stage I should enter into any details on the matters raised. Deputies know perfectly well that the staff of the telephone department are always willing and ready to give full information and as adequate a service as can be given under the present conditions. Undoubtedly, the telephone service is labouring under very grave difficulties. It has manifold difficulties because of the fact that supplies were completely absent during the six years of the war, while at the same time the telephone appetite has developed in this country. People have become telephone-minded. We all welcome the progress and the vitality shown by the people, not merely in the cities but throughout the country. We say, however, that the best we can do is to spend ultimately £10,000,000. I should like to spend that £10,000,000 in ten years; but, having regard to the elaborate amount of plant which has to be imported and the enormous mileage of main trunk and side lines which has to be put down, all that is going to take a very considerable time.

Planning is well ahead. The staff has to be increased. We are going to increase our staff by 1,000. That includes people at headquarters and people in all the exchanges that will be spread all over the country. We are going to increase the number of private subscribers' lines from, we hope, 31,000 to at least 100,000. Probably the number of people who will be looking for telephones will hardly reach 100,000, but we cannot supply them if we do not apply for them. In the meantime, we expect that it will take us about 18 months to deal with arrears arising out of the war. There are, I think, about 1,700 in the area of Dublin and about 4,000 in the whole country. Then again we are going to put telephones into every post office in the country.

Mr. McMenamin

When?

Mr. Little

We will have to take them in a certain order of priority, because we must take the ones where the population is larger first. But we hope to spread it throughout the country. We should be able to do it in from seven and a half to ten years. We aimed at five years, but I am afraid that that is asking for more than can possibly be done. Beyond that, I ought not to go into details. We want to spread out in the rural areas as widely as possible and we propose to reduce the rates of charges. Some charges were made during the war which, we admit, were prohibitive. There was no use looking for more business during the war period. Now it is different. We want to go out and get as many subscribers as we can. Someone made reference to the fact that I was faced with a certain limitation in regard to putting the telephone into areas where it would not be used. Naturally enough, we must deal with the most populous areas first, the areas where it will bring us in a proper return. People advocate that we should be almost extravagant in the expenditure of money. We have always to have regard to the taxpayer. Deputy McMenamin would be the first to feel the criticism of his farmer supporters, if we were to be too extravagant and spend too much of the taxpayer's money. The profits from the telephone service, which constitute the favourable balance in the balance sheet, are not made out of the general public. If you were to take away the services given to the other departments for which we get credit, you would take away our whole balance of profit.

Mr. McMenamin

Is it not all the one Department?

Mr. Little

Yes; but the money is ultimately coming out of the taxpayer's pocket and we have to have regard to that. Now we are to have this £6,000,000. I hope to be able to spend the whole of the £10,000,000 on this service and to see it spread as widely as possible. Beyond making these general remarks, I do not think that I should go into details. We are always prepared to deal with individual cases and, when we are asked about any particular matter, to give answers. There will be plenty of opportunities on the Estimate to raise all these grievances.

We hope to have the Andrew Street premises commenced next year. One could not expect a building like that, which will contain elaborate machinery and the floors of which will have to bear a tremendous weight, to be erected in a short period. Its construction will take a considerable time. I think Mr. Black's answer, as given in the records, was quite adequate, having regard to the difficulties of the time and the impossibility of getting steel and, subsequently, reinforced concrete. We have to remember the enormous weight which will be placed on the different floors in the building.

I do not feel that the criticisms that were made were at all fair to the Department, having regard to all the difficulties. Some of the criticisms would appear to have been drawn by my original statement. If I wished, perhaps the best way to answer those criticisms would be to quote what I said in my original statement. In the circumstances, however, I do not think I need go any further. The important thing is to get this Bill through, to get the money and to get on with the work. The Department can be judged on the results which we hope to achieve within the next five years and in the later stages when we complete the work. I would like to end on this note. I feel the attack made on my Department has been most unfair in view of the extremely excellent, expert work which the officials have put through their hands.

Mr. McMenamin

The Minister said it would take ten years to complete the installation of telephones. Does the Minister not see that that will be a very serious matter? The people in all parts of the country have an equal right to have telephones installed. In ten years the whole world will have changed. Surely it should be possible for the Minister to double his efforts and complete the telephone installations in a shorter period?

Mr. Little

We expect to meet the demand in a much shorter period. Like the Deputy, I am anxious to speed up the work as much as possible. A lot depends on the amount of material that will be available. We shall do everything we can to expedite installations.

Question put and agreed to.