This Estimate, to my mind, is equally important with the Estimate for the Department of Agriculture. With all due deference to the farmer Deputies who, on so many occasions, tell us the agricultural community is the only wealth producing factor in our nation, it is just as well to remember that of equal importance is every worker who applies himself to any other product which adds to the general wealth of the community. That happens not only in agriculture, but also in industry. One of the fears that I have is that in this period we may possibly fail to realise that alongside a correct agricultural policy we also require a correct industrial policy and that it is very necessary we should pay attention to that.
I was somewhat disappointed with the Minister's introductory speech. Possibly there are very good reasons. Since he has taken up office he has had a number of problems falling on his shoulders, not all of his own personal making and not all of the making of the Government with which he is connected. At the same time I think we ought to realise that the time has now certainly come to make it possible, and not merely possible but essential, that we should apply ourselves to this problem of a general national industrial policy. That is why I feel that the question I asked the Taoiseach some time ago, as to the possibility of establishing something in the nature of a national economic council, should be given more attention and examination, to see if more fruitful avenues of development might be opened up. I quite realise that, not only in this House but outside it, there are entirely different views as to the value of planning and forecasting our future line of development but the view that no planning is necessary to my mind is childish, because quite clearly no community, no concern, no deliberative Assembly can carry on its business for a day without trying to see to some extent into the future.
If that is good business or policy for an industrial concern, a firm, or any other body engaged in any human activity, it must be equally so for a nation or community, especially a community placed in our position, where not only have we gone through a period of a certain type of industrial development largely conditioned by the industrial policy of one political Party, but have gone through a period of emergency and now find ourselves not merely in a period of post-war conditions but as many speakers have said in a period prior to the outbreak of war. In conditions of that nature, it is surely desirable not only to evaluate the resources we have both in the way of natural resources and our industrial resources, but to see what the gaps in our defence are and to ascertain what we should do to fill these gaps in the best possible way. That is planning in the ordinary, sensible manner. Surely if we are dealing with a community embracing the whole of our national territory, that type of planning cannot be done by one industrial group. It cannot be done by one Department. It must embrace all the deliberative resources of Government, all the sources of information apart from all the sources of experience and of trained knowledge available to the community. That in effect must be summarised in the form of some natural centre which will collect all the information, analyse it and make it available to the community in general. That is very important at the moment, because of certain views expressed in the Minister's statement and in Deputy Lemass's speech.
May I say, in passing, that while his speech was quite long there was not a word in it to which I could object. We may differ in the point of view which we take in regard to certain matters, but nevertheless I regarded his speech as a notable contribution to the solution of the many difficult problems with which the nation is at present faced. Unlike some of the speeches to which we have been treated recently, notably in the discussion on the Estimate for the Department of Agriculture, which were obviously intended as an effort to make propaganda and Party capital out of the discussion, his speech appeared to be a sincere attempt to deal with the various problems connected with this Estimate as they appeared to him. As I say, while I do not agree with a great many of his views, his example might be profitably followed by many members of his Party just as, possibly, much of the advice which he gave could be considered by many Deputies on this side of the House.
One thing with which I am concerned, apart from the need of trying to understand our general industrial and economic position, is the general insistence on the fact that we must study our immediate situation and try to fill certain gaps in our industrial organisation because of the immediate danger of war. I am no more insensible than any other Party in this country to what is going on outside the country. At the same time I think it well that we should not allow ourselves to be forced into the position that may cost us more than we are in a position to afford. Before there is an outbreak of war one thing sure is that the social and economic conditions conducive to war have got to be there first.
My own opinion at the moment is that although there is a very dangerous situation in the events which we see developing around us, matters have not reached that critical point yet at which war is inevitable. The last war developed out of a very small incident but everyone who studied conditions before that particular incident occurred, knew that the development of economic and social affairs had reached such a point that all that was required was a match to set things alight and the match was provided. In the present situation we have scarcely seen the passage of a period of more than two years since the end of active hostilities and to my mind—I may quite probably be wrong—we have not yet seen the development of a situation in regard to social and economic conditions and the building up of a machine which make possible the outbreak of another war. There is always the possibility that a maniac may break loose but apart from that possibility there has not been that type of development which would render war inevitable.
I think it is quite definite that despite all these recent developments in Europe we can still, with a certain amount of confidence, count on some years yet in which we can live as normal human beings and pursue our normal way of life. That, however, does not mean that the advice given to us to take active measures to prepare for an emergency should not be considered and acted upon but it does mean that if we take measures for building up stocks of raw materials, and if we take them in the atmosphere of being immediately threatened by an outbreak of war, we may commit ourselves to acquiring these stocks at a cost far and above what we would be justified in paying in normal circumstances, whereas if we display a little less anxiety we may be able to achieve the same end at a smaller price to ourselves.
In a discussion on our industrial policy in relation to our needs, we should sit down calmly and try to evaluate as clearly as we can the needs of the present situation. Above all, we should realise as far as practicable that, so far as the man in the street in this country is concerned, our only knowledge and the only basis on which we can evaluate the situation outside this country, is that supplied by what is often the completely distorted picture presented to us by the daily Press. I have never known a period when the reports in the daily Press were less to be relied upon than during the last few years. From that point of view we should, as I say, very carefully study and analyse the present situation.
So far as our internal policy is concerned I do not want to traverse all the ground covered by Deputy Lemass but I do think it necessary to make one comment. Both the Minister in his statements outside the House, and Deputy Lemass here, have stressed the importance of the part played in the development of our national economy by private enterprise. Nobody with any sense of proportion would deny that viewpoint. I do not for a moment forget that we are still living in an economy based on private enterprise and on the profit motive. The only point upon which I wish to join issue is that we should place so much emphasis on that aspect of our economy and concentrate upon it. For a long period Deputy Lemass had a rather socialistic outlook but at a certain point about 1945 he began to deviate to some extent from that and he seemed to pay more regard to the interests of private ownership and private control. I am not going to argue the merits of that policy but it does seem to me that too much emphasis has been placed upon it. My point is that in critical periods we have found time after time that private enterprise does not deliver the goods.
In relation to certain spheres of industrial development, we know from experience that private enterprise will not undertake these tasks and carry them out. The reason given for that by Deputy Lemass is that private enterprise is actuated only by the profit motive. In other fields of industrial activity we require gaps to be filled in our structure, some of which have been attempted by Deputy Lemass. But private enterprise will not carry out the job or take the risk because it is a gamble. It may be that the return is uncertain or not sufficiently high, and so they sit back and wait for somebody else to do it. There are many of those gaps to be filled, such as the development of our power resources and probably of our peat resources, and the development of certain industrial supplies of artificial manure, and possibly even experimental forms of new industries. All these developments are required from the point of view of making us as nearly self-sufficient as we reasonably can expect to be. I believe that is a duty devolving on the Government to take the lead in the case of these particular avenues and not to sit back and wait.
The Minister spoke of the general tariff policy of the Government and gave an indication of his anxiety to have not merely Irish capital coming in but capital from outside the country as well. I welcome his statement that his tariff policy is going to be one designed to encourage the development of Irish industry on the basis of producing goods at a reasonable price, under efficient conditions and with reasonable conditions for the workers employed, but I think something more definite than that is required—that is the intention of using the tariff policy of the Government and the resources of the community to see that a certain line of industrial development is achieved, that a certain impetus is given to it, and that we achieve certain known objects within a certain period of time and not sit back and wait for some gentleman either with Irish or with foreign money to come in and undertake the tasks which are immediately required from the point of view of the welfare of the community.
There was one item that I was glad to hear the Minister mention, and that was with reference to the consideration which is now being given to mineral exploration. In the course of the Budget debate I mentioned that I thought it was not only a pity but that no case could be made for the elimination of the sum of £85,000 from the Estimate. I would urge on the Minister to use whatever influence he can bring to bear to have that money restored, if not for the development and working of the mines at Avoca. My understanding of the way in which the money was to be spent was completely different from the way in which, apparently, it was going to be spent. My understanding was that we had made available a certain sum for the continuation of the working of the Slievardagh coalfields until we had put them in a position in which we could hope to dispose of them commercially, and that this sum of £85,000 was for general mineral exploration. Then it seemed that its expenditure was largely to be concentrated on the development of Avoca. There seems to be a wide divergence of opinion as to whether Avoca is a practical proposition or not. If it is not, is there not a case for spending the £85,000 on what I believe was the original intention—that is, for national mineral explorations on an organised scientific basis. It seems to me to be a pity that in that particular line, on which there is such a general measure of agreement, we should pause even for a moment on the expenditure of even a larger sum than £85,000 on mineral exploration when we realise that quite a long time may elapse before we may be able to bring together such an expert team of research engineers as that which is now available. If we do not utilise their services now they will be scattered and may not be available when required.
I think it would be suicidal not to come to a decision immediately to make that £85,000 again available as well as to indicate that that is a type of activity that we propose to encourage and develop as widely as we possibly can. Sooner or later we will have to make up our minds that it is on the basis of such knowledge as we can acquire in regard to the natural resources we have in the country that we can build and get to understand what we may have to seek from outside.
Reference has already been made to the timber fuel which is lying in the Phænix Park. I do not want to follow Deputy Lemass on that. I think he is aware that we could have ceased buying timber much earlier than we did this year. The problem that we are faced with now is that we have the timber there. I do want to suggest to the Minister, and I am speaking now from my own knowledge, that he should take the bull by the horns and go to the Department of Finance and tell them that this timber has to be got rid of, and that the longer it is left there the greater the loss is going to be. We know, of course, that the Department of Finance usually takes a long time to make up its mind on matters of this kind. I think that, if the timber is allowed to remain there for a much longer period, the problem will probably solve itself, and that in the end there will be very little left but heaps of dust. What we have there at the moment is timber fuel, and it could be disposed of at a price which would be within the capacity of the poorest sections of the people in Dublin to-day. It would be not only a good financial policy to do that, but it would also be good social policy to dispose of the timber fuel in that way than wait until, as I have said, it cannot be disposed of. If a decision is not come to quickly the problem will solve itself.
Deputy Lemass spoke of the air services. I would be very slow to suggest for the moment that the air services should not be developed. It is correct to say that, in Aer Lingus, we have on the Dublin-London route what is generally regarded as one of the most profitable lines in civil aviation operating in Europe to-day. Why is it, in view of that, that we have been launched in the present mess? It is not merely a question of the buying of the Vikings or of the preparation or development of flights to the Continent and having them discontinued that is involved. The mess has been there all along, and sooner or later somebody will have to step in and clear it up. Anybody who has had dealings with the company knows that you have there tier upon tier of administrators dealing even with simple trade union questions. You find it hard to discover who is the person that has responsibility. My belief is that one of the difficulties is that the company has been operating on a Civil Service basis. One of the peculiar answers made to one of our people when we talked about this question of overloading on the administrative side was that, in fact, they were short-handed because they had not yet reached full establishment strength. That seems to me to be an indication of the kind of organisation we have to deal with.
While I am fully in favour of maintaining Aer Lingus as far as cross-Channel and Continental flights are concerned, it seems to me that if the services are to be maintained and if we are to retain such advantages as we have there, we must insist that immediate steps be taken in inquire into the whole operation of the company from the ground up. For too long we have allowed it to operate in this way and we have had one of two peculiar instances of what is going on. We should have this inquiry, not from the point of view of economy or of proving that this type of air policy was wrong but from the point of view that the company is started and of expanding the air policy we are committed to. As far as the transatlantic air service is concerned, I want to be quite frank in saying that at the time when Deputy Lemass, as Minister, introduced this Estimate, I did not express any opinion against it. I was not convinced by him that he was correct, yet I did not feel that I knew enough about the question to stand up and argue on points of which I was not convinced. We are going to see, I think, as far as profitable first-class passenger traffic is concerned, a by-passing of this country in the transatlantic route. I have yet to see in any of the arguments which have been so far adduced that there is more than the remotest possibility that the amount of money that we must commit ourselves to, both for the actual operation of the planes and their maintenance and the money invested in the development of aerodromes with all modern conveniences is warranted under present conditions.
While I agree with having cross-Channel and Continental services, there is a gamble involved in the transatlantic services and we have not got any guarantee that this country will not be by-passed as least as far as first-class passenger traffic is concerned. It happened with regard to steamships, and the technical development of aeroplanes will leave us in the same condition. We will find ourselves committed to large capital expenditure as well as current expenditure from year to year and the opportunity will be denied to us of reaping the benefit of the money we have invested.
Reference has already been made to our shipping needs and to shipbuilding. I do not want to dwell upon this point but I would urge the Minister not to allow us to make the same mistake as we made before the last war of neglecting to provide ourselves with merchant shipping until we were bled white later in the emergency in order to obtain ships to keep our lifelines open. If countries like Norway, Sweden and Denmark which are not countries with any colonial possessions, merely ordinary homelands confined to their own shores, can maintain, not merely merchant fleets from the point of view of their national needs, but from the point of view of commercial profits, surely we can do the same. Our needs of shipping services, both deep sea and coastal, are as great as the needs of any nation in Europe. We have already got the nucleus of a fleet and this should be maintained and built up.
In addition to our deep-sea and coastal needs, there is the point which has been made by Deputy Lemass that the two shipbuilding yards here must not be allowed again to go down, and they are near it at the present time. We should maintain them, not merely by seeing that they have a measure of repair work, but by seeing that they are given actual Government encouragement as far as shipbuilding is concerned. It is a mistake not to have looked into the possibility of having them build some ships, even ships of smaller tonnage for Irish Shipping, and the fact that some of the ships which were put on our lines lately were not built in the Dublin yard was a very grievous mistake and one which we should bear in mind in future.
Another point I wish to refer to is that I am sorry the Minister did not refer in his speech to the question of price control. It seems to me that this is one of the vital subjects upon which we must have some guidance, guidance of an immediate character, both from the Minister and from the Government as a whole. Tied up with price control, we have the thorny question of industrial efficiency. The fact that there were different views on different sides of the House regarding the Industrial Efficiency Bill is no reason why we should not realise that it is a problem we have to tackle and that we should find the means of tackling it. We need price control because we have not found the means of relating prices to production costs.
It is a very peculiar thing that since the Budget speech of the Minister for Finance, advertisements have been appearing on all the papers from the leading drapers protesting their innocence and explaining how they kept within the strict confines of the law in the matter of excess profits. It is also a peculiar thing that there has been a host, a regular flood, of sales all over the city. I am maybe too innocent, but I believe that prices at sales are marked down, although sometimes I may have my suspicions. It is a very peculiar thing that at the time when we have had so much talk and so much comment and references to the matter by the Minister for Finance, we should suddenly find this slashing of prices all round. It cannot be entirely accidental. We require price control although recent developments may be the aftereffects of the emergency.
From the point of view of internal policy and of industrial policy, if we are to encourage entrepreneurs and manufacturers to produce and to establish industries, if we are to enable them to enter into the earning of profits, profits should be made available to them and a guarantee of the willingness of the community to carry the costs of helping to provide them, but we must have the machinery to keep a check on the business. It does not necessarily mean that it should be a harsh check or a strict check, but it must be an effective check. We must not deal with prices in terms of the money charged by the retailer to the consumer but in relation to efficiency. I do not see how this Government, any more than the previous Government can side-step the responsibility of providing the machinery to deal with price control as such and with efficiency from the point of view of the burden that is being carried by the community in order to build up industry, and at the same time provide the opportunity for profits to be made by those who invested money in industrial development.
We have had repeated appeals to all sections of our workers, agricultural workers and industrial workers, to give of their best efforts to increase production. There is, I think, a gradually broadening realisation among workers that this involves something more than an effort on the part of employers to pull a fast one on them or to put one over on them. They are beginning to realise that they have an interest themselves in increasing production, but the obstacles in the way are tremendous. It is not merely a question of brute strength or of pouring out a little more sweat, but it requires the application of brains, technical skill and experience. The only way in which the application of these particular qualities can be carried out is by having some access on the part of the workers to the managerial sphere of industry. The claim for some voice in the management that we hear from the workers is not a case of, as it were, pushing a door, but the logical outcome of the demand which has been made on them by the Government and industrialists. If industrialists want increased co-operation from their workers and an effort to increase production, if the workers are given the opportunity of utilising their knowledge and their experience at the council table, it might be the best way of achieving that increased production. What do we find? We find that, when this very mild suggestion is made, the Federation of Irish Manufacturers gets up on its hind legs and tells us that under no condition will they agree to labour having any say in management, while, at the same time, they go into conferences with the representatives of the workers and appeal to them to co-operate in increasing production. Surely the whole thing is farcical and sooner or later we will have to have some policy laid down in the matter.
The suggestion that the State and the Government should give a lead by affording representation on semi-State bodies to representatives of the workers is one way in which we can take the first step. I personally agree that to put on to the board of a semi-State company a direct representative of the workers actually engaged in that industry will create very great difficulties, not merely from the point of view of the board of directors, but from the point of view of the union from which that person comes and of the individual himself, but I cannot see why representatives should not be put on these boards from the point of view of workers as a whole as part of the community. We already put certain people on these boards and I take it for granted that some of these are appointed because of their financial knowledge, others because of their administrative knowledge and still others because of their industrial knowledge. At the same time each of them in himself represents to some extent a particular section of the community and makes a certain contribution to it. Why, therefore, should we not have a representative of the workers, of either hand or brain, engaged in industry as a whole on these bodies?
One of the difficulties I see, and one of the defects in these semi-State bodies, is the failure to realise that they are not going to get efficiency and not going to put these companies on a paying basis merely by dealing with figures and technical matters and ignoring completely the human element. My experience is, and I am being quite frank, that in respect of the ordinary workers engaged by these bodies, more consideration and more human feeling is shown by the private employer than by these impersonal boards which we have set up.
That, in my view, is the cause of a great deal of the difficulty. We have already got it in an acute form in some of our semi-State bodies, even to the extent of actual labour disputes. We have it particularly bad at times in our air services and there should be no need of it, because, if these are communally-owned enterprises which are run for the benefit of the community and which are answerable to the House, there is no reason why we should not be able to establish better human relationships between those we appoint to managerial posts and the workers carrying on the enterprise, than the individual employer who is dependent on his ability for maintaining his own personal position and the position of his company and extracting profits out of the labour of his employees.
Reference has been made to our transport position. I do not want to dwell on it, but I suggest that, in the inquiry at present being carried on, we might have regard to one simple fact which, so far as I know, all the inquiries carried on with regard to our rail and road problem have forgotten, that is, that, in our rail system, we have ordinary men, men who work with their hands or men engaged in managerial or technical activities, who could give us a lot of very valuable advice not merely on how to run railways but on how to avoid running them in the way in which they have been run in the past few years. I suggest that the railway expert who has been brought over from England should be advised that he will get a great deal of very valuable information, not by calling in those who are apparently what might be called the front for our railway monopoly or road system, but by going behind the scenes and making direct contact with the men who have to carry on the system 24 hours a day and who know that, in recent years, the rail system here has been run into the ground not by a competing privately-owned system on the roads but by those running the rail system who have had a road mentality.
I feel that so far as transport is concerned, we have to make up our minds with regard to it, just as we do with regard to posts and telegraphs. It is a public service and if we are to have it, we must do without many other things. One of these things is the facility of the private individual to take the cream of the public transport system when it suits him at a very cheap rate, and, at the same time, run his own private system on the paying loads, the big loads, and always be able to call, in an emergency, on the reserves which have to be made available by a public company. I agree with Deputy Lemass that changing the name does not mean anything and the question of whether we nationalise transport or not will not solve the problem, but one thing will, that is, unlike both the British Labour Government and Deputy Lemass when putting the Transport Bill through the House, making up our minds to take our courage in our hands and deciding that if are to have an efficient transport system it must be all-embracing and that we cannot allow exceptions. Otherwise, we will have no transport system and will continue to have that very grave industrial problem in front of us.
So far as the Labour Court is concerned, I think the time has come to discuss not major amendments of the Act but the actual experience we have gained in operating this machinery. The Minister should inquire into it because it is he who will have to take the initiative in calling the bodies together and letting them exchange opinions, with a view to finding out what are the difficulties in the administration and utilisation of the machinery and how we can improve it in the light of the experience gained in the two years we have been using it.