I move :—
That, in view of the steep increase in rates on agricultural land, the high cost of labour and the reduction in live stock prices, Dáil Éireann is of opinion that a substantial increase should be made by the Government in the present agricultural grant for the further relief of rates on agricultural land.
When I first put down this motion about a year ago conditions were entirely different from what they are to-day. Had I been able to prophesy at that time what conditions would be like to-day I would perhaps have felt inclined to give this motion much wider scope because I would have had to take into consideration conditions as they present themselves to us in the agricultural industry as it stands and refer to the immense destruction that has been caused to crops all over the country due to the inclemency of the weather. I do not intend to cover that ground now.
Every year at about this time the Dáil is asked to consider a Bill entitled Rates on Agricultural Land (Relief) Bill. I think about this time 12 months we discussed such a measure. It is the object of that measure to provide for the relief of rates on agricultural land. First of all, we have the primary allowance on agricultural land; at one time we got a supplementary allowance. Now we are getting an employment allowance.
Let me say at the outset that politics should be entirely divorced from the question of rates. All over this country vast sums of money are being spent every year. I do not impute malice to either local government officials or public representatives, but there is definitely an unfair levy of taxation in relation to agricultural land. Let us examine this question of the agricultural industry. Taking the broad view of it let us consider for a moment our national income. The total income derived from the land is about one-third of the national income; the amount of rates collected from the land represents 75 per cent. of the total amount of rates.
Obviously, the agricultural industry is being treated unfairly. We all remember last year, when this Bill was being re-enacted, the Minister for Local Government at that time proposed to make some alterations. He succeeded in dropping the supplementary allowance and substituting an employment allowance. First of all, in May, 1953, he circularised the county councils that a £13 allowance was to be made for every man employed on an agricultural holding. That did not meet with the approval of the country. A couple of by-elections took place subsequently and on the results of these by-elections the Minister changed his mind and increased the agricultural allowance to £17. At that time, 1953, when we were discussing this measure, the change was vigorously opposed by many members who now occupy ministerial positions in the present Government. I remember Deputy Dillon, on the First Stage of that Bill, in 1953, asking the Minister for Local Government was that the Bill that would deprive the farmers of £250,000. Later in the debate figures were produced by men who now occupy ministerial positions, showing the disastrous results that would accrue from any changes in that Bill, from the dropping of the supplementary grant and its replacement by the employment allowance. One Deputy who is now a Minister went to the trouble of giving a list of the losses that might be suffered by each county. I think he gave the whole Twenty-Six Counties and showed the loss each county would suffer by the substitution of the employment grant for the supplementary allowance. He estimated that the losses would cost the country something in the neighbourhood of £220,000 a year.
I know that any words I say to-night in support of this motion are not falling on deaf ears. I know that the Minister for Agriculture, Deputy Dillon, when he spoke on this measure a year ago said that the farmers were being treated very badly and that he was here to defend the farmers and to get an increase of this agricultural grant. I also know that the present Minister for Finance, when he spoke on this Bill last year, said that a grave injustice was being done to the agricultural community by depriving them of £220,000, to which they should be entitled. Therefore I know my words are not falling on deaf ears.
It has been said in this House by a former Minister for Finance that taxation rests very lightly on the land. I do not agree with that. Very few Deputies on the Government side of the House will agree with that statement. That phrase was used against the Fianna Fail Party during the election, at every crossroad, at every church gate, to show that it was the intention—if it was not the expressed intention it was the implied intention of the Minister for Finance at that time to impose some form of taxation on the land when he said that taxation rests lightly on the land. The statement must have induced the former Minister for Local Government to interfere to such an extent in the grants for relief of rates on agricultural land that he made an attempt to deprive the farmers of this country in 1953 of something in the neighbourhood of £400,000 by the employment allowance.
The tendency in this country since we got native Government is to shift the burden of taxation from Central Government to local government. I happen to be a member of a local authority in Roscommon. I know that local authorities are responsible for quite a lot of expenditure which must be found from the rates but which should be financed by the Central Government. We are now responsible for supplementary housing grants, for supplementary blind pensions, to a certain extent for the financing of vocational education, for expenditure under the Diseases of Animals Act and the Milk and Dairies Act, for the erection of courthouses and for the impact which will come on the rates in the coming year for the implementation of the various provisions of the Health Act.
For that reason I think it is now time that the Government should step into the breach and increase these grants because, bad as we now are, the rates will become such an intolerable burden that the farmers will be unable to pay them.
In discussing the measure in 1953, various items were suggested which might to some extent relieve the rates on agricultural land. It was suggested that an allowance should be made for the employment of female labour on the land. That is quite reasonable, because quite a number of females are employed on the land and do very good work. They should be included in the category of workers in respect of whom there is relief of rates. Relief should also be given in respect of part-time workers on the land. The fact that an employee of a farmer may leave his employment after the first few months of the year and that the farmer has to employ another man militates harshly against the farmer, who has to forfeit the allowance. That is a hardship which should be rectified.
It is extraordinary that in a few short years rates have jumped abnormally. I did not realise that the rates had stepped up so quickly during my time in public life until I made inquiries in County Roscommon and discovered that in the year 1945-46 the rate in the £ was 14/8 and gradually increased every year until, in 1954-55, the rate is 34/4 in the £, an increase in eight years of something in the neighbourhood of 135 per cent. With the able assistance of Deputy McQuillan we may look forward to a reduction in rates in the coming year.