I move:—
That Dáil Éireann is of opinion that Old I.R.A. military service pensions should be increased on a par with the increase given to other pensioners of the Republic of Ireland, and that as this increase is overdue it should be retrospective to the operative date of increases to other State pensioners.
In dealing with this motion I feel I have to go back a little in retrospect from a service point of view, to prove what men did from the advent of the Irish Volunteers until the closing date, which is the same date in all the Bills that have been passed for military active service in this House, that is, September, 1923. I feel I have to go back to the days of 1913. In that particular year, a few people—sore heads, cranks and irresponsibles, as they were called at the time—started the Volunteer movement in Dublin, and from there the resurgence permeated throughout most of the 32 counties of Ireland.
It went on to 1914, and those who can remember, who are members of this House, will agree that in the Howth gun-running there was actually active service for men. As a matter of fact, lives were lost as a result of that venture.
We come on to 1915, where you had a certain amount of activity in drilling and in manoeuvres, and where a lot of Volunteers were more or less disemployed from their particular vocations and, as a result, some of them were victimised and lost their positions.
Then we come on to 1916, the year of the Rebellion, which of course was the peak year for that particular period and for some years after. A lot of people who took part in that Rebellion, either under arms or through some other channel of service in the Volunteers which did not necessitate carrying arms, were imprisoned. Some were sentenced to death and the sentences carried out. Some were sentenced to penal servitude. Some members who are present in this House at the moment suffered the hardship of undergoing their sentences in English jails, and some were interned.
We come on then to the release in 1917. There was in 1917 a big reorganisation taking place and you had the Volunteer movement springing up again into activity, "rearing its ugly head in certain places," as was mentioned by some famous reporter for an English paper at the time. As a result of the activities, there was further imprisonment and I am sorry to say some good men lost their lives as a result of hunger strikes they went through in Irish jails.
In 1918 this activity continued and the activity was intensified in the month of March, for a particular reason—there was a threat by the British Government at that time that conscription was going to be enforced in this country. You had some of the people who started from the beginning again very active in the campaign against conscription and as a result of their activity, they were again imprisoned. But conscription was not enforced.
In 1919 a lot of those men were released. In 1920 you had four famous hunger strikes—two here and two in English jails. Numerous Irishmen were prominent in the Volunteer movement—at this time it had become the I.R.A.—and as a result of their activity some of them left these prisons with their health impaired in consequence of the hunger strikes. Some of them went to their Maker very early after that and some of them lived and were as a result chronic invalids for the remainder of their lives.
In 1920 we saw the Black and Tans and the Auxiliaries in this country. We saw the atrocities they committed and the way in which they were met by the I.R.A. in small armed bands operating in various localities. Armed opposition was continuous. Throughout 1920 there were ambushes of great importance from the point of view of the morale of the people of this country and that of the garrison that was trying to impose their will on the people. Fighting was continued until the Truce was signed in July and in 1922 and 1923 we had the civil war.
My reason for mentioning all this is to show that people who ordinarily would have pursued some lucrative avocation lost their careers as a result of their activities and their continuous service. Many of those who took part in the fight instead of holding minor posts as they do to-day might have been enjoying far better conditions if they had taken no part in the movement as it was called.
In 1924 the Cumann na nGaedheal Government decided upon a pensions scheme for men who had served in the National Army. Non-commissioned officers got something like £5 per year for each year of service while officers got pensions from £5 upwards. Those pensions continued until 1934. In the meantime there was a change of Government in 1932 when Fianna Fáil introduced a pensions scheme more or less on the same lines as the 1924 pensions scheme. The assessments, the service and the amount of money allowed were the same. In 1945 there was an amending Act to both the 1924 and 1934 Acts when the same amount of money was allowed and the same service stipulated. In 1949 the inter-Party Government introduced another pensions scheme somewhat on a par with the former schemes.
Nobody can gainsay that from 1913 to 1923 the men in question manned the beárna baoil. When a limited number of volunteers were asked for that number was available. That continued on into the period of the columns.
As a result of that movement and the efforts of those people, the institutions under which we are carrying on here to-day were set up. Every institution that is recognised in the country at the moment was set up as a result of the activities of a band of half-drilled and badly armed men who were ready to sacrifice their lives by fighting against a well-disciplined force during the period 1916 to 1922. Practically all officials in the State and certain people who received pensions for service to another country have had their pensions or salaries increased, except the men who were responsible for the establishment of this State.
Some cynics, either verbally or through the Press, may treat this motion with scorn in the morning and say: "Those fellows are looking for more pensions." Let them be what they are, but the men who earned the pensions are the men who brought the State to the point at which it is at the moment. They are the men who established every institution in this State. Were it not for them, we would probably be bound up in chains to our friends across the water and carrying on directly under the institution of Westminster.
I believe that, no matter how much I may praise those men, I could not praise them enough. It is only now in retrospect that we can realise all they did. They faced a disciplined army, a great number of whose personnel was recruited from men who had gained promotion to the rank of officers by bravery on the field of battle. Half-armed and half-drilled, and with the will to fight and suffer, the men of whom I speak went out to achieve the freedom of Ireland.
Yet every Government, irrespective of what Party happened to be in power, never mentioned an increase in pension for the pensioners under the 1924, 1934, 1945 and the 1949 Acts. Nobody will appreciate more than the Minister himself the hardships which these anomalies involve for veterans who suffered. The Minister was at one time senior officer of the Dublin Brigade. He knew very well what all the men under his command had to go through and what he had to go through himself. I move the adjournment of the debate.