I move:—
That a sum not exceeding £36,000,000 be granted on account for or towards defraying the Charges that will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1955, for certain public services, namely:—
£ |
|
1 President's Establishment |
2,500 |
2 Houses of the Oireachtas |
76,000 |
3 Department of the Taoiseach |
9,200 |
4 Central Statistics Office |
34,100 |
5 Comptroller and Auditor General |
11,380 |
6 Office of the Minister for Finance |
58,200 |
7 Office of the Revenue Commissioners |
614,950 |
8 Office of Public Works |
150,000 |
9 Public Works and Buildings |
1,600,000 |
10 Employment and Emergency Schemes |
232,000 |
11 Management of Government Stocks |
36,200 |
12 State Laboratory |
6,800 |
13 Civil Service Commission |
18,500 |
14 An Chomhairle Ealaíon |
6,500 |
15 Commissions and Special Inquiries |
4,400 |
16 Superannuation and Retired Allowances |
271,000 |
17 Rates on Government Property |
10,000 |
18 Secret Service |
2,500 |
19 Expenses under the Electoral Act and the Juries Act |
— |
20 Supplementary Agricultural Grants |
1,300,000 |
21 Law Charges |
39,000 |
22 Universities and Colleges |
270,000 |
23 Miscellaneous Expenses |
6,000 |
24 Stationery Office |
230,000 |
25 Valuation and Boundary Survey |
22,600 |
26 Ordnance Survey |
20,800 |
27 Agriculture |
2,216,000 |
28 Fisheries |
35,700 |
29 Office of the Minister for Justice |
28,400 |
30 Garda Síochána |
1,483,400 |
31 Prisons |
65,170 |
32 District Court |
31,180 |
33 Circuit Court |
41,080 |
34 Supreme Court and High Court of Justice |
31,500 |
35 Land Registry and Registry of Deeds |
32,100 |
36 Public Record Office |
3,110 |
37 Charitable Donations and Bequests |
1,680 |
38 Local Government |
1,796,680 |
39 Office of the Minister for Education |
122,000 |
40 Primary Education |
3,055,000 |
41 Secondary Education |
400,000 |
42 Technical Instruction |
400,000 |
43 Science and Art |
60,000 |
44 Reformatory and Industrial Schools |
115,000 |
45 Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies |
25,000 |
46 National Gallery |
3,460 |
47 Lands |
832,440 |
47 Forestry |
391,000 |
49 Gaeltacht Services |
160,000 |
50 Industry and Commerce |
3,000,000 |
51 Transport and Marine Services |
640,000 |
52 Aviation and Meteorological Services |
137,000 |
53 Industrial and Commercial Property Registration Office |
8,000 |
54 Posts and Telegraphs |
2,600,000 |
55 Wireless Broadcasting |
165,100 |
56 Defence |
2,755,700 |
57 Army Pensions |
491,460 |
58 External Affairs |
135,000 |
59 International Co-operation |
18,400 |
60 Office of the Minister for Social Welfare |
174,350 |
61 Social Insurance |
932,660 |
62 Social Assistance |
5,931,800 |
63 Health |
2,470,000 |
64 Dundrum Asylum |
15,500 |
65 Oifig na Gaeltachta agus na gCeantar gCúng |
2,500 |
66 Tourism |
160,000 |
TOTAL |
£36,000,000 |
The amount of the Vote on Account now asked for is £36,000,000 and the individual items covered by it are set out on the Order Paper. With some exceptions, they represent one-third of the Estimate for each service.
The total of the Estimates for this year at £108,000,000 represents a decrease of £3.36 million on the total provision for the current year, which, however, included a Supplementary Estimate for the National Development Fund of £5,000,000 which is of course a capital expenditure and will be dealt with as a voted capital service. Other supplementary provisions falling into this category were £200,000 for University College, Dublin, and £95,000 in respect of grants for housing to Bord na Móna and £50,000 to Min Fhéir, Teoranta, for capital purposes. Deducting the total of these four items, the amount of the Supplementary Estimates which are chargeable against current revenue of the present financial year comes to £5,731,000.
Of this figure of £5,731,000, £2.4 million is in respect of increases in remuneration of State and local authority employees, arising out of the McKenna Arbitration Award of November, 1952, for which specific provision was made in the Budget, for this year. Further supplementaries, chargeable against current revenue, included an additional £420,000 in relief of rates on agricultural land, a further £193,545 for Army pensions, £186,000 for G.N.R. operating losses, £125,000 more for Garda pensions and £58,500 to Mianraí Teoranta for prospecting. Though this batch, at £983,000, exceeds by £233,000 the budgetary provision of £750,000 for supplementaries, our experience in this regard would have been much more satisfactory than it has been for many years, were it not for two quite unexpected demands which emerged towards the end of last year. The first of these, the Supplementary Estimate for Social Insurance, was before the House a fortnight ago and I need not repeat the statement of the Minister for Social Welfare in regard to it.
The other large supplementary and one which it would have been quite impossible to have foreseen and provided for, is the extra £753,000 required under Vote 50 to subsidise the price of flour and wheaten meal. The gross sum which it is estimated will be required for this purpose is, in fact, £853,000. Savings of £70,000 on other items in the Vote and an increase of £30,000 from sales of turf, reduce it to the net figure which I have mentioned. The gross figure of £853,000 itself reflects not only the increase in the area under wheat but the increased yield which a more scientific agriculture, under a beneficent Providence has given to the Irish farmer. Last year we had an exceptionally bountiful harvest and we have been able to do with much less imported wheat than was anticipated. In terms of economic self-sufficiency this is all to the good but from the Exchequer point of view, it has its disadvantages.
Whether our bread and flour and wheaten meal were made from Irish wheat, or imported wheat, we should have to provide a heavy subsidy to keep the prices of these foodstuffs at their present level. But the rate of subsidy on home-grown wheat is much higher than on the imported article. Accordingly, the better our harvest, the bigger the subsidy. On the other hand, if we were to revert in these dangerous times—let me emphasise that—to the position of almost absolute dependency on imported wheat, such as obtained here in 1931, we should still have to subsidise it very heavily, in order to sell bread and flour at their present prices. Thanks to the subsidy, the cost to the consumer of our bread and flour is far below the economic level, and far below the general level of world prices for these foodstuffs. Our loaf may not be quite the cheapest in the world, but it is among the cheapest. So far as I have been able to ascertain, in all the world only Great Britain, the Six Counties and perhaps Portugal and New Zealand, have a cheaper wheaten loaf.
Before discussing in detail the position for 1954-55, may I utter a word of warning to those who are speculating about next year's Budget on the basis that the Estimates represent an increase of £7.71 million on the figure for the current year? The fact of the matter is, of course, that in May last the Supply Estimates were increased by £2.4 million to give more pay to the Civil Service, the Army, the Gardaí and the teachers; so that the true increase on the bulk Estimates, capital and non-capital, is £5.31 million. Allowing for other adjustments made in the Budget and for items regarded as capital, there is an increase of £4.38 million in non-capital services. Admittedly, this is a substantial sum, but it would be premature and it would be, in fact, futile, in the absence of essential information relating to the Central Fund service and revenue prospects, to frame imaginary budgets on the basis of it alone. Only at Budget time can the situation be fully presented and intelligently discussed.