Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 22 Feb 1956

Vol. 154 No. 5

Road Transport Bill, 1955—Second Stage.

Minister for Industry and Commerce (Mr. Norton)

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time. The purpose of the Bill is to close a loophole in the Road Transport Acts which was disclosed by a recent decision of the Supreme Court.

The Road Transport Act, 1933, provides that, except in certain exempted areas around the principal ports, no person may carry merchandise for reward by road in a mechanically propelled vehicle unless he is the holder of a merchandise licence. It was accepted up to recently that the Act prohibited the hiring of a vehicle for the carriage of goods.

In a recent case, a lorry owner hired his lorry to a building contractor, on the understanding that the owner was to keep the lorry taxed and insured and was to provide a driver. In practice, he drove the lorry himself, but this did not affect the legal position. The lorry was used for the haulage of sand the property of the building contractor. Both parties were prosecuted for illegal haulage. The defence pleaded that the arrangement between the defendants was a contract for the hire of the lorry and not for the transport of goods. The district justice accepted this defence. The case was brought to the High Court by means of a case stated and the High Court sustained the decision of the district justice. The Attorney-General then brought an appeal to the Supreme Court, but this was dismissed.

The loophole revealed by the Supreme Court's decision would frustrate very substantially the objects of the Road Transport Acts. Anyone who has goods for transport could now hire a vehicle for this purpose even though the vehicle owner is not the holder of a merchandise road transport licence. The vehicle could be hired for any period, long or short. A group of persons or firms could combine together to hire a lorry between them and use it freely for the transport of goods owned by each of them individually. Moreover enforcement of the Acts would become impossible. It would be extremely difficult for the Gardái to obtain satisfactory evidence of cases of illegal haulage, because the parties concerned would claim that the vehicle had been hired by the owner of the goods. If this position were allowed to continue a large proportion of the merchandise road transport business carried on by the public transport concerns (C.I.E., Great Northern Railway Board and other railway companies) and by hauliers licensed under the Road Transport Acts would pass to unlicensed hauliers. The existing organisation of public road transport would be jeopardised and the financial position of the public transport undertakings would be adversely affected.

In recommending this Bill to the House, I should like to emphasise that this is not to be taken as an attempt by the Legislature to overrule the judiciary. I am sure that no Deputy will wish to put that construction on the Bill. The Road Transport Acts were designed to secure certain objects and were framed to give effect to a clearly defined transport policy. It is now revealed that the Acts as drafted and enacted failed to give effect to the intentions underlying them. Until the recent court decision, the Acts were accepted at their face value by all interests concerned. In effect, therefore, the Bill imposes no new restriction or control on transport; it will simply preserve the status quo by making illegal in fact what was hitherto regarded as illegal in practice.

Mr. Lemass

In so far as this Bill is designed to deal with a position created by a decision of the Supreme Court — a decision which gave to certain sections of the Road Transport Act, 1933, as amended by other Acts, an interpretation different from that which the Dáil intended — it cannot be very well opposed. It certainly was the intention of the Dáil in 1933 to provide by that legislation that the carriage of goods for reward on the roads by means of mechanically propelled vehicles should be confined, with certain exceptions as to areas and classification of goods, to licensed hauliers.

The Minister is probably not unaware of the fact that the view has been expressed inside and outside this House that the position resulting from the Supreme Court decision should be allowed to stand, that is, that the breach of the intention of the Legislature in 1933 should not be repaired and that private lorry-owners should be allowed, in accordance with that decision, to hire out themselves and their lorries in the manner stated by the Minister. In my view — and it is the considered view of this Party, which has discussed the matter carefully — if there is a case for the amending of the Road Transport Act, 1933, or a case for the repeal of the Act — which, I think, some people would be prepared to make — then it should be done as a matter of definite policy, following upon a policy decision and not merely allowed to happen because of the accident that the courts found it possible to interpret the Act in a manner different from that which the Dáil had intended.

I think it would be wrong and undignified for the Dáil to allow these Acts to be amended by a side-wind, or to allow the intention of the Act to be set aside by a subterfuge, or to acquiesce in this pretence that, when the owner of a lorry hires out a lorry, with himself as a driver, to somebody else, he is not carrying goods for reward in the sense we intended that phrase to signify when the road transport legislation was being passed.

A communication was circulated to members of the House from an organisation called "The Merchant Lorry Owners' Association". While that communication is, I think, inaccurate in many respects, it does bring to the notice of members of the Dáil certain important questions that arise in connection with our road transport legislation. That circular suggests that the submission of this Bill to the Dáil gives the House an opportunity of discussing what is described as "the nation's road transport problem". I do not know to what extent the Chair would agree that this Bill is an appropriate medium for a discussion of that kind.

Mr. Norton

Surely the Deputy agrees it is not; this Bill is amending one section.

Mr. Lemass

Perhaps something more than that. I certainly do not want to contend that this is a suitable occasion for a comprehensive review of the whole transport situation; but this Bill is something more in the minds of many people than a mere rectification of a position that arose accidentally from a court decision. The contention of this association is that the purpose of the 1933 legislation has failed; that, at any rate, the aims which were then entertained have not been achieved, and they urge that the whole structure and policy of our public transport undertaking should be scrutinised and overhauled.

I think the case against the Minister's suggestion that these questions do not properly arise on this Bill is the argument that the position created by the Supreme Court decision should not be remedied at all. Admittedly, that would negative the policy of the 1933 Act. It would be tantamount, in my view, to a repeal of the Act and I agree that that would be the wrong way to repeal the Act and that, if there is to be a decision to repeal, it should be carried into effect by legislation submitted here and discussed here on its merits. We certainly should not allow the purpose of the 1933 Act to be set aside by the process of permitting people to indulge in this legal fiction that, when they are hiring out their lorries and themselves to somebody else, they are not carrying goods for reward, within the meaning of the legislation.

There are some observations I should like to make in that regard. The Merchant Lorry Owners' Association have in their minds the idea, which is, I think, shared by many of the public, that the aim of the Road Transport Act of 1933 and the purpose of the restrictions imposed by that Act upon the carriage of goods for reward on the road by motor vehicles was solely to preserve the railways. Now, that was not the aim of that legislation, and I can speak with some authority in the matter because I was responsible for framing it and for bringing it to the House; if any Deputy is interested enough to look up the matter, he will find that in the speech in which I submitted the Road Transport Act, 1933, to the House, I made it quite clear that that was not its purpose and that the aim was to provide this country with a nationwide transport service operating by rail or by road, as the public required, a service that would be obliged by law to carry, without discrimination as between persons, or trades, or towns, or ports all goods that were offered for transportation at known terms and at uniform fixed rates.

In so far as the aim of that legislation was to provide that type of transport service, it cannot be said to have failed. It is true that the public services have not, since the war, been able to expand their revenues so as to cover their rapidly mounting costs. But that situation is due to two factors: first of all, to the rapid growth in the number of private goods vehicles in use and that is something which has developed in every country, although its development here was probably accelerated by the number of stoppages through strikes in the transport services some years ago, stoppages which were sometimes brought about at short notice; and the effect of these stoppages was undoubtedly to induce a number of business firms, which were using the public services, to build up their own transport organisations and to use the public services only as a standby or as a supplement to their own service. Secondly, and I think this is the main cause of the difficulty of the public transport undertakings, there was their inability for a variety of reasons to replace the obsolete and uneconomic equipment which they were using. In my view, it is far too soon to decide that the losses which the railway undertakings have been recording are permanent. The process of re-equipping the railways, of giving them new locomotives and carriages and introducing new methods of working is only now in progress. It is certainly far from being completed; and that is why I urge that the fundamental review of our transport problems and difficulties which this association asks for could not properly be undertaken at the present time. I agree that the public will not be willing to maintain the present restrictions on the operation of private lorries on the roads, if the public transport services continue to need substantial subsidies from the taxpayers, or if they prove to be too costly in their operation, or incapable of giving efficient service to the public.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy seems to be widening the debate on this amending Bill.

Mr. Lemass

I do not want to contest the Chair's ruling in that regard, but I think that when the House is faced with the position that the Supreme Court has given a decision, which in fact, nullifies completely the intention of the 1933 Road Transport Act, and the Minister proposes that that decision should be reversed by a further amendment of that Act, the question is whether it is desirable that we should reverse it. I think it is, but I do not think the Minister went far enough in arguing the case against those who, like this Merchant Lorry Owners' Association and quite a number of Deputies, to my knowledge, feel that all the restrictions of that Act are no longer justifiable, are indeed operating to the public detriment at the present time.

I do not intend to go into the merits, or lack of merits, of the proposition that the whole question of public transport should be reviewed. That, in a sense, is irrelevant to the observations I want to make. I was merely contending that the time is not appropriate for such a review; that there is, indeed, no evidence that the public transport undertakings are relying upon the protection which the 1933 Act gave for the purpose of keeping in existence unduly costly or inefficient methods of working or obsolete equipment. Indeed, all the evidence is that they are trying by every means to eliminate their losses. And they should be given a fair chance to succeed.

However, as we are probably confined in this discussion to the consideration of the desirability of maintaining the 1933 Road Transport Act, I want to put forward the view that there is justification for the point of view that the provisions of that Act require examination and, possibly, amendment. That is a matter which Deputies on this side of the House have discussed amongst themselves with some care. When the 1933 Act was introduced, the Act which prohibited the carriage of goods for reward on the roads by motor vehicles, except by licensed hauliers, a great deal of the rural transport of this country was carried out with horses. There was, of course, no restriction placed upon carriage for reward by means of horses. Most Deputies will, I think, agree that the horse is disappearing in rural areas and is rapidly being replaced by the tractor.

A very large number of farmers are now using tractors, station wagons or motor vehicles of one kind or another to do the type of work that was formerly done by the horse. The fact that they are using mechanically propelled vehicles brings them under the Road Transport Acts. That is a situation which was not foreseen in 1933. It was not intended that the public transport undertakings should do that type of transport work in rural areas which was then done by horses, and indeed it was not conceived to be practicable that a nationwide transport organisation could attempt that task.

We, therefore, are of opinion that it would be desirable to amend the Road Transport Acts so as to remove the restriction upon the carriage of goods for reward on the roads in the case of a person whose main means of livelihood is farming and within a reasonable area of the district in which he carries on farming operations. In that way a farmer could carry the goods of his neighbours for reward on the roads as a matter of local convenience.

Mr. A. Barry

I would confine it to a farmer.

Mr. Lemass

Yes, I would confine it to a farmer. There is a very big difference between the type of service which a farmer gives or could give in a rural area to his neighbours and the situation that might develop if you permitted merchants in towns, who own and operate lorries for the purpose of their business, to carry goods for reward when it suited them. That was the main issue which we discussed in 1933. At that time this business of merchants owning lorries, used mainly for the purpose of their own business, occasionally taking goods for reward was the problem of the day. It was that development which was cutting in on the revenues of the public transport services and was creating a situation in which the very existence of the public transport services was in jeopardy.

It is important that there should be in existence throughout the whole country a public transport service that is bound by law to carry everybody's goods at fixed charges without discrimination. The merchant in the town who wants to operate his lorry occasionally for reward is not prepared to accept the obligations of a common carrier. The Act of 1933 placed upon licensed hauliers, common carriers, having got their licence, the obligation not to carry on their road transport business on a discriminatory basis. They were bound by that Act to carry the classes of goods they were licensed to carry upon uniform terms.

If we allow a development to take place under which merchants may occasionally, when it suits them, cut in upon the business available for public hauliers and public transport services, then we are, I think, creating a situation in which these public services will either cease to exist altogether or will require a very heavy subsidy to maintain. Some limited development of that kind might conceivably be permitted but it would have to be so surrounded by restrictions that it would be of very little advantage to merchants. The problem which has arisen is a rural problem mainly and it is a problem which, as I said, was not foreseen in 1933, namely, that the motor vehicle would replace the horse as the means of transportation of the rural community. I can see no disadvantage to the public transport services if we allow the farmer to use his tractor or his station wagon to carry goods for reward for his neighbours, that is to say, within a reasonable mileage radius of his own farm. I do not think that business will ever be of interest or of profit to public transport operators. The removal of the legal restrictions — they are probably not very carefully observed anyway — would appear to be a matter of merely keeping the law in line with the developments that have taken place.

It would, however, be a very different matter to allow merchants the facilities they are seeking, the right to carry goods for reward whenever it suits them and without accepting any obligation to carry goods for everybody or to give uniform treatment to everybody. We cannot have it both ways, have public transport services operating without loss and, at the same time, unrestricted carriage of goods for reward on the roads by private lorry owners. We must make a choice between these two courses and I am quite satisfied in my own mind — and I think most people who will examine the matter will arrive at the same conclusion — that the better choice is to seek to maintain adequate public transport services and adopt whatever measures are deemed to be needed in order to make that possible without subsidy.

Everybody can see the problems created by the present restrictions. They cannot visualise quite as easily the very much more acute problems that would arise if these restrictions were removed and if, as a consequence, the public transport operator, the common carrier, were to disappear from the countryside. The principle of the 1933 Act was just that and I think it should be preserved. I would, however, ask the Minister to consider the amendment of the 1933 Act as I have suggested. It is our intention to put down a motion so that the Dáil will have an opportunity of discussing it. The motion will ask the Dáil to urge the amendement of the Act to enable a person whose principal business is farming to use a mechanically propelled vehicle for the carriage of goods for reward within a limited area.

Most of the arguments which have been advanced to me in favour of not rectifying the Supreme Court decision, of allowing that decision to determine the law for the future, have been based upon that rural problem. My contention is that it is far better to deal with that rural problem in a straightforward way by a proper amendment of the Act than by this back-door method involved in the Supreme Court decision of allowing a person nominally to hire out his lorry and himself instead of charging for the transport services that he gives.

There are probably few matters which have aroused more heated discussion in recent years than these restrictions upon the operation of private lorries. The discussion has been enlarged with the increase in the number of these lorries and while I agree that a stage may come when we may have to reconsider the whole position in that regard, we are not at that stage yet. In my view we certainly will not have reached it until the public transport undertakings have had the opportunity of completing their reorganisation and of showing what they can do, given proper equipment and following the new methods of operation which are being introduced.

The introduction of this Bill gives us an opportunity of pressing that point of view on the Minister. I may say that there was a suggestion amongst Deputies here that the passage of the Bill should be opposed, these Deputies merely desiring, as I understand them, to deal with that particular rural problem to which I have referred. I convinced them that it was undesirable to deal with that situation by that roundabout method and that it was far better to make a straightforward proposition which would set out clearly what the intention was and which would enable the Dáil to consider the matter fully and to impose upon whatever idea emerged from the discussion, whatever modification of the restrictions might be decided upon, safeguards which are still needed if the public transport service is to be maintained properly.

Mr. Finlay

I accept the Minister's statement, which I think is everybody's experience, namely, that the decision of the Supreme Court to the effect that it is not a contravention of the Road Transport Act if a man who owns a lorry, instead of making an agreement to carry goods for a given reward, should hire out himself and the lorry for the same period for the same job and the same price, is not only against what was intended by the Road Transport Act, 1933, but is also contrary to what most people, including the District Courts, believed was the effect of the Act; in other words, not only was it intended by the Dáil in 1933 that that should be prohibited, but people acted on that intention and assumed, up to quite recently, that such subterfuge would not avail them in relation to contravention of the Act.

My concern is that I think the form of this amending Bill, as it is at present, also covers, and for the first time makes illegal, something which had always been considered legal and which certainly was legal under the Road Transport Act, 1933. It is this: Take the case of a man owning his own lorry, having his own employee, say, a farmer with a lorry, a miller with a lorry, or anybody else with a lorry, whose lorry is an integral part of his business. If his lorry is laid up for any reason for a period of four or five weeks as such lorries often are, either after an accident or as a result of some mechanical trouble, up to this, as I know the position, he could hire from his garageman or anyone else willing to hire it to him, a lorry; he could put his employee into that hired lorry and for the four or five weeks could use it to replace his own vehicle which is out of action. I think, from my own experience, that up to this that has been considered as not being a contravention of the Road Transport Act. It certainly is not against any spirit or intention or policy of the Road Transport Act.

I am concerned as to whether or not the effect of Section 2, which of course is the effective section of this Bill, if passed, will mean that when a man's lorry, perhaps his only lorry, is laid up for three or four weeks, he cannot hire from the garage a lorry and drive it himself or get his employee to drive it because, if he does, it will be carriage for reward of his own goods under this Bill. I would like the Minister to consider that.

It is not easy to amend the Act without covering that but it does seem to me that there are two possibilities, one, if you made a provision that such hiring agreement which provided for the driving of the lorry either by the hirer or by a person employed by the hirer who had been so employed for a period of, say, not less than two months before the hiring arrangement, that that would do or, secondly, if you made a provision that a hiring agreement should not be prohibited if the hirer could establish that at the same time a vehicle of similar type, in other words, in the case of a van, a van, and in the case of a lorry, a lorry, and so on, in his possession, was out of action, in other words, was not available to carry goods.

I should like the Minister very carefully to consider either of these two possibilities or any other possibility but I would not like an Act, intended as we intend this Bill now, to prohibit what may be described as a bogus hiring agreement, in other words, a hiring agreement by a man who is really carrying goods for reward, to have the effect of meaning that a man who is using his lorry lawfully for his own purposes should, when his lorry is put out of action, be prohibited from hiring one instead and forced to take public or any other transport. It seems to me that if a man has a lorry and drives it himself or has an employee regularly employed to drive it we should in some way make it lawful for him, when that lorry is put out of action and he has to hire one, to do so without a technical or actual contravention of this Bill.

Mr. Corry

I was wondering in what portion of this little Bill the new squeezes were being imposed until I heard Deputy Finlay. He has given it out here honestly. I do not know whether he will vote for these further restrictions or not.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

Will the Deputy vote against them?

Mr. Corry

I will——

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

The Deputy had better talk to Deputy Lemass.

Mr. Corry

——for every reason. I will give the reasons here openly. In my opinion, as we stand at the moment, the 1933 Transport Act is dead. According to Deputy Lemass it is. But this Bill seeks to reimpose it and seeks to fasten on the community, particularly the rural community, an octopus that is inefficient and incompetent. Every source of revenue, every penny that was in the country or that has come into it has been dragged in to subsidise incompetence and inefficiency. Going back to 1951, I had to fight a pretty tough fight in this House for a period of two or three months when the then Minister for Agriculture refused to pay the subsidy out of the Counterpart Fund for the transport of ground limestone to the Irish Sugar Company. I succeeded in that fight. Deputy Dillon was then Minister and I succeeded in getting that through the House and in getting £30.000 refunded to the farmers of my area. Since then, the Irish Sugar Company have continued to draw that ground limestone and to spread it.

The Irish Sugar Company are doing that job at a price 12½ per cent. less than is paid to C.I.E. for doing the same work. They have drawn roughly 500,000 tons of this ground limestone per year. That means that there is to-day in the Counterpart Fund over £200,000 more than would be in it, if I had not succeeded in the steps I took here. The Irish Sugar Company have saved the Counterpart Fund by drawing those 500,000 tons of limestone each year. The Irish Sugar Company are also a State subsidised body and apparently they lost nothing by charging this lower amount at which C.I.E. are not able to do the work. Why? That is a question I ask, having heard Deputy Lemass say that at the present moment he did not think we should go into the whole question of transport. I say the time is over-ripe for going into it, because in six months or 12 months we will be told that the money earmarked for the lime subsidy has gone.

Mr. Coogan

What has that to do with the Bill?

Mr. Corry

If the Deputy went to school or if he learned anything in school, he would know. As I say, we will be told to-morrow or the day after that the lime subsidy has gone. I object to the frittering away of money given by the American Government for the assistance of agriculture by subsidising an inefficient, incompetent body to whom a monopoly has been given in this country. We might just as well have this thing out. I find the amazing thing is that even a private firm starting out as a ground limestone plant has to pay hush money— I cannot call it anything else — to C.I.E. of 12½ per cent. of their charge for every ton of ground limestone they carry in the lorries owned by themselves.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy seems to be going very wide.

Mr. Corry

The Deputy, Sir, is explaining the reasons why, in my opinion, this Bill should not pass through this House.

Mr. Coogan

The Deputy is trying to lime wash himself now.

Mr. Corry

Will the "dope" not go to school? We have got to consider the facts and the effects this Bill would have on the country. I have been credibly informed that C.I.E. have what I might call a police force travelling throughout the country at the moment at the expense of the taxpayers doing this job.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That does not arise on this amending Bill. The Deputy cannot initiate a debate on the whole question of transport in this country; he must confine himself to the subject matter of this amending Bill.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

I understand that the Deputy's point has been raised for the purpose of getting information on a matter which was the subject of a Supreme Court action and I think that we might well discuss it.

Mr. Corry

When C.I.E. officials go to a private haulier or a merchant who is hauling his own goods and tell him that he previously had an eight ton truck doing the work, and now that he has an 11 ton truck on which he will be allowed to carry only eight tons, and when that official threatens that man we all know what happens. C.I.E. officials have also been known to tell private hauliers that they may not work their lorry longer than 11 hours in any one day. Apparently these officials have some power. God knows where they got it. If they got these powers from this House, the empowering measure was passed in blinkers.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Government (Mr. O'Donovan)

It would not have come from Deputy Lemass?

Mr. Corry

The Deputy is not yet out of sucking bottle stage and should conduct himself.

Mr. Lemass

This is 100 per cent. a Dillon scheme.

Mr. Corry

Those are the facts, and I know that a regular scheme of intimidation is being used against people who want to work by those who do not believe in work but who believe the State should pay them for incompetence. Those people have collared more than £200,000 of American Government money over and above what the ordinary hauliers in this country would have charged for the haulage of this ground limestone. That £300,000 has been taken out of the farmers' pockets. Definitely that is so. Those are facts that cannot be contradicted. It is an outrageous state of affairs.

At the moment, I shall not go into the matters to which Deputy Lemass alluded, but we know that if an unfortunate farmer at the present time draws a bag of manure on his tractor to one of his fields and if he has to cross a public road to do so, one of these spies is on top of him and he is prosecuted for not having the proper tax on his tractor. If he goes down to the local well or pump on the side of the road for a churn of water, he is similarly prosecuted. And the money to pay for these intimidations comes out of public funds. If the Minister wants to show good example in this matter, there are other ways in which he can subsidise C.I.E. besides condoning a campaign such as we have seen carried out in the manner I have outlined.

Mr. A. Barry

Is it not a lawful campaign?

Mr. Corry

I cannot understand by what law it is carried out. One thing must be admitted, and that is that a merchant, or manufacturer, or industrialist should be entitled to deliver his own goods to the person to whom he sells them. I am pointing out here that C.I.E., by some means, have intervened in that practice. I take it they do it with Government sanction. The ground limestone manufacturer who produces his limestone has to pay an added charge of 12½ per cent. for each ton he delivers with his own lorry, with his own help, into the farmer's yard. That added charge has to be paid to C.I.E. — for what service, I do not know. It is a scandal and it is just another way in which the Government digs into money which is the property of the agricultural community and with which it was proposed to subsidise the supply of ground limestone to the farmers. I challenge the Minister to get up now — and he has officials to help — and deny any single one of the statements I have made. I know that the Minister for Agriculture sat there in that seat on three occasions in three months and pretended at that time that this matter had all been settled, and I know that it was on the night, the last night, that those people sat there as a Government that I succeeded in extracting — as you would pull a tooth, and a tough tooth at that, out of a hoary old bull — the £30,000 that was robbed from the farmers of my area by that game before, through the activities of C.I.E.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy has already said that.

Mr. Corry

I am suggesting that, since then, £203,000 has been saved to the Counterpart Fund by the fact that the Irish Sugar Company was allowed to haul and deliver that ground limestone. There is altogether £300,000-odd gone by this extraction by C.I.E. of money they were not entitled to. A large portion of this 12½ per cent. was not even earned by C.I.E. in haulage. The actual position of these lorry owners at the present day is that it is C.I.E. who must pay them. They are not paid their subsidy direct from the State as they should be paid. The money is given to C.I.E.; they have to return to C.I.E. the number of tons of lime drawn by their own lorries and they get paid for that less the 12½ per cent. kept by C.I.E. to pay the fellow who did not work at all.

That is something that can only occur in a country like this; I do not believe there is another country in Europe which would stand for it or another agricultural community that would stand for any of those things. That is why I say, in my opinion, as far as this Bill is concerned, we are rid of the octopus to-day — do not put him back on top of us.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

I think there is a great deal of horse sense in many of the things Deputy Corry said——

Mr. Corry

Do not go and do the donkey on it now.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

——with regard to public transport, but I hope he will not think I am being cynical if I express regret that those remarks were not pushed with effective vigour when Deputy Corry and Deputy Lemass were on these benches. Deputy Lemass, I thought, made a very reasoned contribution to this discussion, but coming from Deputy Lemass, many of those remarks and many of his sentiments, I think, can only be described as astounding.

Deputy Lemass was the architect of C.I.E., the architect of the present public transport system in this country, and my recollection is that the Transport Act of 1933, when it was sponsored by Deputy Lemass, was sponsored as being a measure which would give the people of this country cheap and efficient transport. We have, 26 years later, a colleague of Deputy Lemass in the same benches standing up and condemning as an inefficient and incompetent body the transport system which Deputy Lemass created. I trust that Deputy Corry and Deputy Lemass will settle their differences of opinion with regard to C.I.E. themselves.

I do think that Deputy Lemass is probably quite correct when he says that there is a general feeling that some review of the present transport position should be undertaken. The system as created by him was one to give a monopoly in transport to one concern which has since become nationalised. There is a monopoly there at the moment; that monopoly has not, I think — and I think there is general agreement on this — succeeded in giving the people cheap transport, whatever about the question of efficiency which so concerns Deputy Corry. So far as Dublin City dwellers are concerned, we feel with some justification that, on the question of transport, as well as on many other questions, we are expected to carry the entire country on our shoulders.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I am afraid the Deputy is getting away from the Bill before us. We cannot have a discussion on transport policy in such a wide sense.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

I was going to discuss some of Deputy Corry's complaints in that context, but I suppose I had better not. Deputy Corry did complain that if C.I.E. have some of the powers which they are exercising to-day, the Transport Bill of 1933 must have been passed in blinkers. There may be some truth in that, but if so, it is quite unfair for Deputy Corry to charge the present Dáil or the present Minister with having committed any error in that respect. If Deputy Corry or his colleagues wore blinkers in 1933, the man to blame is sitting in the front bench in front of him and now that he has the blinkers off and is prepared to look at the position anew, I, for one, would recommend a new look from Deputy Corry and Deputy Lemass.

Mr. Corry

Have a new look at it yourself and those over there with you.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

There is one danger in this Bill which has been referred to by Deputy Finlay, and while I agree that this Bill should not be opposed at the moment, that it would be wrong to allow the decision of the Oireachtas to be stultified by reason of a slip in draftsmanship or something like that, or by a wider or different interpretation being given to the section as drafted, by the courts, I agree with Deputy Lemass and I think it would be all wrong for the Dáil to sit back and do nothing about it. Consequently, I think the Minister's action in bringing in this Bill and asking the House to pass it is reasonable and one which should be accepted by the House, but I should like to express the hope that an opportunity will be given to the House in the reasonably near future to review the Bill and the future of public transport.

I should like the Minister to deal with the point which has been raised by Deputy Finlay, because it is an important one. If a person, by ill-fortune — a road accident, mechanical trouble or something of that sort — finds that he requires the assistance of a supplementary vehicle, that he requires to replace his particular vehicle for a limited period with another vehicle, I think it has been accepted that there is nothing wrong, nothing contrary either to the spirit or the letter of the Act of 1933, in any such procedure.

I have read Section 2 of this Bill very closely. I do not know whether Deputy Finlay is right or wrong in expressing the view that Section 2 of this Bill will alter that position. If it does, I think the Minister should reconsider the position. In a Bill introduced merely for the purpose of remedying a flaw discovered in the Principal Act, we should not, even accidentally, extend it to catch something that was not intended to be caught by the earlier Act.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

There is only one matter I should like to bring to the notice of the Minister in this discussion regarding public transport and that is the difficulty which our fishermen living in coastal areas experience. Representations were made to the Minister and to the Minister's predecessor time and again by groups of fishermen from West Cork — and from other centres throughout the country, I am sure, as well — seeking a relaxation of these laws, so far as they are concerned.

I, as one thoroughly conversant with the position, am of opinion that these people have a very justifiable claim. At the present time, I have representations from a group of fishermen in the West Cork area, places such as Schull and other such centres, asking that they be given permission to employ the nearest haulage system available for the transportation of fish to the marketing centres. Whilst I agree entirely with the nationalisation of public transport, I believe that private enterprise would meet the needs of these people much better than C.I.E., the public transport company of this country, could

First of all, if these people have one ton of fish in Baltimore this morning, they will have to pay the very same price, according to information supplied to me, to C.I.E. to bring that to Cork as if they had a six-ton lot. You can imagine the difficulty of the man out all night at sea trying to get the fish from the ocean and having to pay a minimum carriage rate of a six-ton lot. On the other hand, he does not know whether he will have a catch or not. It may possibly take him four, five or six hours, or even longer, to get the C.I.E. vehicle to remove the fish, whereas if he were able to employ the nearest transport available, which might be a privately owned lorry, that fish could be brought to the market within a short space of time, possibly one hour.

When representations are made to the Minister, as they were made by the Skibbereen and Baltimore Harbour Board, the answer is that C.I.E. can provide these facilities. Of course, C.I.E. has given this information to the Minister. It may seem right to view the matter from the theoretical angle, but, in practice, it is completely out of place. Having regard to the nature of the commodity involved, that is to say, fish, it may possibly happen that, if there is a delay in bringing it to the market, it may deteriorate. It may not be in time to make a particular market on days such as fast days, Fridays and others.

I would ask the present Minister, a man who has deeply interested himself in these people, whether they are wage earners or self employed fishermen, to review the whole position as far as the fishermen and transport are concerned. These men are being placed under the greatest difficulties. I feel sure that many of the Minister's civil servant advisers do not know anything about these people, or are not conversant with their difficulties. I avail of the Transport Bill to bring that particular matter to the notice of the Minister in the most forcible manner I can.

I ask him, when he gets these representations from these groups of fishermen round the coastal areas, to deal with each of them on its merits, and if he finds the merits warrant it in any particular case, he should grant them permission to use whatever haulage is locally available. In doing that, he will not be acting in any way detrimental to the interests of C.I.E. I feel sure that the revenue C.I.E. would get from the haulage of fish would not be so great and would not interfere to any appreciable extent with their general economy.

I conclude by asking the Minister to take note of the few remarks I made so far as the haulage of fish is concerned and to deal in a more lenient and sympathetic way in future with the representations he will get from those bodies of fishermen around the coast than they have been dealt with, both by the present Minister and his predecessor during the past number of years. I am sorry to have to tell the Minister that many of them are dissatisfied with his Department. They claim they never got any sympathy when they put their grievances to it. I would ask the Minister to change that policy.

Mr. J. Brennan

Possibly this Bill does not provide scope for a comprehensive debate on the problem of transport, but, on the other hand, if a Deputy were to oppose this particular legislation, it would mean that the whole purpose of the 1933 Act would be set aside and, therefore, a full dress debate on public transport in this country could, and would, be justified. The fact that a Deputy is not opposing it should not limit the scope of the debate.

All of us have views with regard to transport problems, but I do not appreciate the attitude of Deputies who are prepared in this case to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. The 1933 Act is a very controversial one, and, in regard to any Act of that kind, one must tread on somebody's corns. The Deputies on the Government side of the House now seem to take a pride in condemning the Act which was introduced by Deputy Lemass and, at the same time, refuse to advocate its repeal in any substantial manner.

The last speaker said he was totally in agreement with the nationalisation of transport and he went on to advocate the transfer of a great bulk of that transport to private hauliers. We would want to be clear in the House in regard to our thinking and our attitude with regard to this particular matter. There is one point upon which every Deputy in this House must be agreed and that is the point made by Deputy Lemass, that we must have public transport and we must have some company committed legally to the haulage of merchandise in this country. If we are to have such a company, we must see that it is given a reasonable chance of commercial success. Those are the facts we must face. It is easy for a Deputy to get up in this House and play a little towards every little section of the community for the purpose of ingratiating himself with those sections. We must face the fundamental fact that we have got to have a company charged with public transport and, having such, it must be given a reasonable chance of commercial success.

I agree with Deputy Lemass that, while advocating support for this particular section, we must have regard to the fact that public transport in this country has not yet reached the stage where we can pronounce final judgment on it. There is a transitionary stage at the moment, in which public transport is trying to conform with modern methods, which we hope will ultimately lead to economies and to a state where those public transport companies will be able to finance themselves without any subvention from the Exchequer. That time has not yet arrived but sufficient experience has been gained in the past years to teach us that certain anomalies have crept in which would justify some review, at an early date, of the whole public transport system.

One instance has been referred to by Deputy Lemass. That is where the tractor or other mechanically propelled vehicle has been replacing the farm horse. That change justifies some review of public transport in this country. Those of us from rural areas feel that position very much and we feel that any change in the present transport system which would do away with that anomaly would not result in any loss to any public transport concern. We have an instance in Donegal where a few cwt. of certified seed potatoes arrive at a railway station for distribution to farmers. One farmer pulls out his tractor to bring home a few bags of the seed and all his neighbours ask him to bring home a few bags to them. Of course he is entitled to charge them a few shillings for that if he wishes. The present position of the transport code makes it an offence for that farmer to do so and that is a situation which calls for an immediate remedy.

As to whether the system should be further reviewed with regard to the carriage of perishable commodities, such as fish, is another matter but all of us have had occasion, time and again, in this House to take up the question of the private haulier, and to approach the Minister for Industry and Commerce with regard to anomalies. I think the whole question of the private haulier requires very deep consideration. The private hauliers are seeking now that we should not set aside this position and that we should allow the position to remain as the High Court decided it should be, in other words, to let the Act go into disuse. I do not think that at this stage the time is opportune for action of that kind. To allow the position to remain as it is at present would be tantamount to repealing the 1933 Act in its entirety. I do not think that any Deputy wishes that we should allow that to happen.

Those Deputies who have spoken from the other side of the House took the opportunity of pinpointing the enactment of this matter on Deputy Lemass but they did not indicate whether their Party, stood for the repeal of the Act or whether they were in favour of retaining it. Now that this opportunity has presented itself to the Government and that they have chosen to repair the breach in the Act we can only take it that they, too, are agreed that the public transport legislation of 1933 must stand.

The Minister will probably give us some indication when replying as to what he thinks about reviewing the legislation at a later stage. So far no Deputy from that side of the House has given us any indication of their intentions. We are completely agreed, with regard to the transport of farm produce, that the carriage of commodities which were originally carried by horse drawn vehicles should be allowed free passage without any interference from this House. We claim that we should be allowed that particular privilege in the rural areas. People in a rural area like Donegal have a special claim in that regard. We have a very limited rail service which we are determined to hold.

Acting-Chairman (Mr. Sheldon)

That question does not arise at the moment.

Mr. Brennan

While that rail service is the life line of our transport in the country, we are definitely experiencing considerable difficulty with regard to the transport of farm produce into the rural areas which are so inadequately served by the rail service at the present time. Those people who are entirely in favour of private haulage perhaps do not visualise the position of the small trader and businessman. He is well served by the present transport system. It is very easy for a large trader to engage a lorry from a public transport company but a small trader who has to get a few packages of goods weekly or twice a week will not be so well served by the private haulier.

Then there is the question of the return of empties which never was a profitable business for any transport system. The railway company will deliver the goods and are bound to transport the empties back to their destination at a cheap and unprofitable rate. That is the type of transport which private hauliers do not like and which the public companies are compelled by law to carry out. It is an essential part of any commercial transport in this country but it is one of the smaller things which indicate the indispensability of public transport.

I would be content to hear the Minister indicate here to-day that he would be prepared to go on the lines suggested by Deputy Lemass and give us an opportunity, at an early date, to review the entire transport position with a view to making some changes to meet the needs of the farmers. It cannot very well be argued that that will in any way depreciate or take from the income of the present transport system. It is a service, so to speak, from field to road. It is only right that a farmer with a tractor in his own field or yard should be allowed to use the public road without hindrance, if he needs to use it for a short distance.

I think that every Deputy and, I hope, the Minister will agree that an amendment of the present legislation would effectively bring about that situation. Then, in the course of time, when the present public transport companies have had sufficient opportunity to bring about the complete modernisation of the system — the management and actual haulage and traction system — we should be in a position to say whether or not the public transport system of this country has failed. Until such time, we are not in a position to condemn the present public transport system.

I realise that the country cannot continue to give subsidies to railways indefinitely, but, with the will to tackle it, there is a way out. That way out will not be found by condemning the Transport Act of 1933 and at the same time retaining it and advocating that a little bit be taken off here and there, which would only make it more unprofitable still.

Mr. A. Barry

I think the Chair should be congratulated on allowing this debate to extend somewhat beyond the narrow limits of the Bill because it seems to be an opportunity for discussion which all sides of the House welcome. I find myself in agreement with practically every person who has spoken so far in this debate and I say that, although I do admire the new strides that C.I.E. have taken. Personally, I do not use any other type of transport and I have said here before that I think all Deputies should be compelled to use C.I.E. transport for their public work.

The most important thing to-day, so far, has been the dramatic admission by Deputy Lemass that our transport legislation has not proved eminently successful. There is, indeed, every case to be made — while giving him what he wants to-day — for asking the Minister to undertake an examination of the progress that has been made as regards our transport system and whether a failure has taken place. I am interested in Deputy Lemass's proposal that a carrier with an agricultural professional label should be permitted to operate. I do not, perhaps, quite get his point there. I should have thought that the very small type of local carrier would be a desirable enough and a sufficient enough development. I am not quite sure what Deputy Lemass is getting at there and I wish he would elaborate on it.

Deputy Corry has been saying — and, indeed, not whispering it but saying it very loudly — that there is a great deal of complaint about the dictatorial way in which C.I.E. intervene in the matter of the lime distributing scheme and in the beet sugar industry. I have always tended to suspect that Deputy Corry's indignation is for public consumption; perhaps I am wrong. It is very hard to believe that such boiling indignation could have remained unchecked, without boiling over, for 23 years.

In my view, the House should give the Minister what he asks for to-day, but we should ask him to give us an undertaking that there will be an examination by a committee or by his Department or by a public commission into our entire transport system.

Mr. Allen

The recent decision of the Supreme Court has given the House an opportunity, to a limited extent, of reviewing the existing transport legislation and all that it means to the country. This Bill has enabled some members of the House to give their views on the matter and to state whether or not they feel there is need for some change.

I am not one of those Deputies who believe that any piece of legislation passed through this House — no matter what Government sponsored it and irrespective of the length of time it has been in operation — is sacrosanct and should not be changed or altered in any way. If, in the course of years, certain legislation is found not to be flexible enough, or not to serve the needs of the people in all directions, I feel that the House, the Minister and the Government should never hesitate to come here with amending legislation or to set on foot investigations to discover how the transport system, or any other system set up by legislation here, was affecting the life and industry of the people.

There can be no doubt in anybody's mind that if the majority of the community were consulted in regard to this matter they would express satisfaction at the recent decision of the Supreme Court. Since the passing of the legislation 23 or 24 years ago, and especially with the growth of motor transport, there has been a considerable grievance among many sections of our community that that legislation was too restrictive. It was held that it was preventing many sections of our community from doing their business in the way they would like to do it themselves and in the way they felt it was in the best interests of the community to do their business.

The restrictions imposed on the hiring of vehicles or the carrying of goods in motor vehicles for neighbours, and so forth, under the Road Transport Act, 1933, have, without doubt, injured and hindered many sections of the community over the years to a smaller or a greater extent. After 23 years of trial and error, there is a clear viewpoint amongst many sections of the community to the effect that the present law might be altered to the betterment of the community. I feel we would all be in agreement that if improvements can be made in any direction they should be made. The fact that this House originally made the laws under which our public transport system operates at the moment should not mean that, if any of the laws have been found to be too onerous or too restrictive on any section of the community, they should not be altered. I am of that opinion myself.

I confess that for many years I believed some alteration along those lines was required. I do not agree at all that the Transport Act has served the purpose it was originally designed to serve. The public transport service has failed to retain its biggest source of revenue during the last 20 years. Apart altogether from the restrictions put on other people, the public transport service has lost important revenues from the transport of goods, despite restrictive legislation. The millionaire oil companies have taken almost all their work from public transport. Surely that was one service to which public transport was entitled? These millionaire oil companies now have fleets of 40-ton and 50-ton lorries operating on narrow country roads, roads which are really unsuitable for such traffic; and other transport is restricted on these roads because of the operation of these enormous vehicles.

We are reputed to have one of the largest breweries in the world. Within the last couple of years, that brewery has put its own tankers on the highways, carrying stout and porter all over the country. That brewery has left public transport altogether. The real complaint, of course, comes from the agricultural community, in the main; public transport has failed to serve the needs of that community to a considerable extent. Public transport is not available to farmers within nine or ten miles of fairs and markets. Of course, it could never be made available to them, and I do not blame public transport because such a service would be altogether uneconomic. It would be uneconomic to have public transport utilised for the carriage of stock to fairs and markets, for the carriage of manure, grain and all the other things for which the farmer requires transport.

Deputy M. P. Murphy mentioned an instance in which public transport failed to serve our fishermen. Fishing, as a whole, has been badly served by public transport and that lack of service has been detrimental to our fishery interests. I had some personal experience of that down in Kylemore in Wexford; it was only after the greatest possible pressure had been exerted on the Minister's Department that a group of fishermen, who bought their own lorry on a co-operative basis, succeeded in getting authority to carry the combined effort of several fishing boats to the market. I do not blame the Minister for that, or anyone else. The law was restrictive. It has been relaxed—whether legally or not, I do not know — in order to provide these fishermen with a transport plate so that they can carry their fish to market. Agitation had gone on for a considerable period before that authority was granted. Agitation is still going on in other ports, but so far without success.

After 23 or 24 years' operation, clear evidence is available, if the Minister wishes to make investigation, that public transport has proved ineffective and has failed to serve the community. I urge the Minister, as Deputy Lemass urged him, to set up some kind of tribunal to investigate immediately and to amend the law in whatever direction it should be amended, in the interests of the community. Since the end of the war, farmers have become completely mechanised. The horse is a thing of the past. One never sees a horse on the road nowadays, even in the most backward areas. Formerly, the farmer did all his transport through the medium of the horse. The small farmer cannot travel the roads now with a horse; he has been pushed off because of motor transport — lorries, buses, private cars, vans and so forth. Apart altogether from that, the roads are now too slippery for horse traffic. Therefore, the farmers require the service of a motor vehicle and the only way many of them can get that service is from some neighbour. I think they should be entitled to take the service of that neighbour, if the neighbour is prepared to give it at a reasonable cost for the transport of sheep, cattle, pigs, corn, manure, or any other purpose. Public transport has failed to serve that need. There is no blame to public transport for that, because such a service would be uneconomic. The farming community should, therefore, be allowed to organise themselves in order to serve themselves. This House must legislate in the interests of the community as a whole and hold the scales of justice evenly as between all sections of the community.

When the 1933 Act was passed, the total number of motor vehicles on the roads was not very big. To-day, 30 times that number are using our roads. Every merchant has his own lorries. Some merchants draw wheat a dis tance of 150 miles in their own lorries. Many of the sources of revenue available to public transport 23 or 25 years ago have been lost to public transport to-day. Oil, coal, corn, manure, stout, and porter have all slipped from the hands of public transport. Side by side with that, while public transport was losing all that, the community at large was taxed to maintain public transport. I do not say there is no need for a limited public transport service, but I firmly believe there was no necessity for C.I.E. to have a monopoly of road transport at all.

Acting-Chairman (Mr. Sheldon)

The Deputy must not widen the debate any more. The Deputy has been given a lot of liberty as it is.

Mr. Allen

I am just giving that opinion without widening it too much. I am sorry if I am taking advantage of the Bill to go outside the scope of the debate. I was just going to say that I believe that that was the cause of public transport's biggest loss. I have no proof of that, but I believe it. Now public transport is entitled to carry passengers. I do not think anyone would disagree with that, and they have proved most successful in doing that. If they confine their activities to that, operate only in cities and towns and allow the rural community to look after themselves in the way they think best with the transport that is available to them, I think it would be best for the community.

I agree that the House should make the laws of this country and that it is the House that should alter them if necessary. Although the decision of the Supreme Court may be welcome in the country, the House would be wise to close that gap and change the law into whatever direction they think best. I agree with Deputy Lemass and other Deputies that that is the proper way of dealing with the matter. I hope the Minister will consider this whole matter of transport for the rural community in the remote places outside the cities and towns and allow them an opportunity of developing their business in whatever way they think best for themselves.

Mr. McQuillan

On a point of order. With your permission, I want to give notice that I wish to raise on the Adjournment the subject matter of Question No. 24 on to-day's Order Paper.

Dr. Esmonde

The fact that it is necessary to introduce this legislation to counteract a ruling of the Supreme Court appears to me to be sufficient evidence that the transport of this country is not in a satisfactory state. If C.I.E. found it necessary— and I presume they did — to press for legislation so that other people may be prevented from transporting goods and materials in rural Ireland, in spite of the fact that C.I.E. have had a virtual monopoly in the country for 23 years, it shows they have not been able to provide for the public the service which they should have been able to provide.

We are in the position that we must support this legislation introduced to-day because C.I.E. is an accomplished fact; it is a vested interest. We owe a duty to the public to maintain our transport services. We find ourselves faced with the fact that this country is losing a sum of money annually. I suppose the purpose of this legislation really is to enable them to grasp all the traffic they possibly can on the roads and keep everybody else out. I am not putting any blame on those who created the situation because one cannot foresee the changes that may take place in a country or in the world— for instance, the change over from horse transport to mechanisation — but the fact is that had the situation existed in this country, whereby road transport services were carried out by private enterprise, with different companies in opposition to one another, I feel satisfied that you would have a better state of affairs than you have to-day. I would like to appeal to the Minister — I can see the Chair looking anxiously at me lest I should transgress the Rules of Order but many other Deputies have travelled over a fairly wide field — to give us an opportunity in the near future of discussing legislation in relation to road transport, in fact, in relation to transport in Ireland as a whole.

I do not suppose there is a single Deputy in this House who is satisfied with the present situation. We cannot be, because each and every one of us is continually receiving complaints. I whole-heartedly agree with what Deputy Murphy said in relation to the transport of fish. Every district in Ireland is dependent for public transport, particularly the rural district, on C.I.E. and it is often very difficult to procure that transport. Deputy Murphy made a very good case in regard to fish. Fish is a perishable foodstuff which has to be moved forthwith. The fishermen do not know how much fish they will have until they land it or if they will have any fish. The same condition of affairs obtains in my own constituency. The fishermen must wait until they land the fish before they can make arrangements to procure a lorry. It is not easy to procure a C.I.E. lorry in rural Ireland. It is the same in regard to transport for agricultural produce. One makes application through the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who is the only source of approach, and one always gets the same reply, that the transport of this country is in the hands of the C.I.E., that the situation in the particular area has been investigated and that there is adequate transport in this district.

I should like to state categorically that, so far as my own constituency is concerned and every other constituency, as long as this monopoly has been in existence there has not been and there never will be proper transport in rural Ireland. Until there is opposition to the existing company or until you liberalise the transport — and it is nothing unusual to ask for that because the transport is liberalised in other countries — there will be no improvement. It is simply in Ireland alone —where we have C.I.E foisted on us and we have to swallow it hook, line and sinker — that this state of affairs prevails. I should like again to protest in this respect and to ask the Minister to let us have in the near future a full-dress debate on transport, a debate which will be welcomed not only by every Deputy in this House but by every citizen in the State.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I cannot agree with the sentiments expressed by the last speaker. If the Minister for Industry and Commerce took that view in 1933 I suppose we would have hardly a railway in Ireland to-day.

Dr. Esmonde

I was speaking about road transport.

Mr. P.J. Burke

It would have had its repercussions on the railway.

Acting-Chairman (Mr. Sheldon)

Would Deputies speak about the Bill?

Mr. Norton

Why should they start to do it now, seeing that they have not been speaking about it since 3.30 p.m.?

Mr. P.J. Burke

We have heard a great deal of talk for and against C.I.E. There is one thing this House must recognise — that were it not for the 1933 Act, dealing with transport and particularly establishing a public transport company, we would be a good deal worse off to-day. I hold it is essential to have a public transport company. While I hold that view I have very strong views regarding the method adopted in each area in relation to public transport. In rural Ireland, for example, a change has come about since the Act of 1933; the horse has gone and the tractor has taken its place. If we interfere with the tractors, we are interfering with the mode of transport that superseded the horse. Interference of that sort is interference with the private lives of farmers.

Farmers are not the biggest culprits as far as public transport is concerned. My colleague, Deputy Allen, referred to the various public companies who do not support C.I.E. We must be reasonable in all legislation. We are here to do the work as best we can and to be as just as we can. We must take into consideration what is in the public interest and we must be impartial and just.

Deputy Murphy gave some of his experiences. I have had the same experience in County Dublin. Take the fishing village of Loughshinny. Sometimes boats cannot get into Loughshinny and have to go to Skerries. Fishermen do not know in advance the amount of fish they will land. If they need a lorry to transport the catch and if they have to depend on C.I.E. they may not be able to get a lorry until the following morning and the delay might mean that they would lose the market. If they were to arrange for a C.I.E. lorry to be there always when they would land the fish, considerable expense would be entailed. They might not have any fish. In view of all these considerations the Loughshinny fishermen decided to get a lorry of their own. They could use the lorry legally in Loughshinny but when they went to Skerries they were outside the 15 mile limit. The man who was driving the lorry was prosecuted. While I am all for public transport, I maintain that this is unjust to the fisherman. If they had to depend solely on public transport they could not operate their industry economically. Fishing is a struggling industry. It has its ups and downs, good weeks and bad weeks.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

We are not discussing fishing.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I know that. I am only mentioning it with reference to the Bill. I know I am slightly out of order. Experience has shown that very often legislation has to be amended and, as Deputy Lemass said, it is time, possibly, that the Transport Act should be reviewed.

I do wish to stress the two points I have made. While supporting public transport, I want the cases of farmers and fishermen to be considered. I make a special plea on behalf of these two sections of the community. If they had to depend on public transport absolutely, they would not be able to operate economically. We must be fair to these people. The only way to be fair to them is to bring in amending legislation.

Mr. Cunningham

The patching-up of the Transport Act will still leave a very great problem to be solved in rural districts. In rural areas a very serious problem has arisen as a result of the change in methods of transport since the passing of the Act. The remedy for that problem should be sought now. The farming community and others must employ public transport to do the hundred and one transport jobs which require to be done on individual farms. That system entails extra expense and is responsible for increasing the cost of production. When farm produce has to be transported by this method, which is the only legal method open to farmers, it adds enormously to the cost of their produce and to consumer costs.

The same applies to other food-producing industries, especially to the fishing industry. The public generally have to pay for a system of transport of farm produce which is entirely unsuited for the purpose and which is most uneconomic.

For that reason I would suggest an overhaul of the Transport Act with a view to enabling farmers, fishermen and other food producers to use their own transport, their neighbour's transport or co-operative transport. If the co-operative movement were developed in this country to the stage that has been reached in other countries the present transport problems would not arise. If there were co-operative societies inclusive of farmers and fishermen, they could have their own private transport within these societies but, unfortunately, the co-operative movement has not developed in this country; the farmer is an independent individual.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The co-operative movement may not be discussed on this Bill.

Mr. Cunningham

I am trying to show that the need to employ public transport would not arise if we had this co-operative movement on a wider basis. We have not that widespread system and, therefore, it is necessary to amend existing transport legislation because of the fact that the farmer is independent and is not easily led into the idea of co-operating with a body of neighbours in a locality. He may co-operate with one or two. It is for that reason that this change is urgently required if we are to keep down the cost of farm produce, fish, etc. I can quote examples where the enforced use of public transport is adding immensely to farmers' costs.

Some time ago I brought to the notice of the then Minister the position that existed in regard to the transport of potatoes to the Carndonagh alcohol factory. We had there a number of farmers trying to use whatever tractors were available to transport potatoes a couple of miles or less to the factory. Of course, the railway company objected and the result was that a railway lorry had to come a distance of 20 miles in some cases to draw potatoes a mile or two from the farmers' fields to the factory. Situations like that are being repeated in every rural area in Ireland because we have a Transport Act which did meet the situation in existence when it was passed but which does not meet the situation that exists to-day in rural Ireland.

It would benefit the majority of our people, whether consumers or producers, if this facility were given to them. It does not mean a wholesale slaughter of existing legislation; all it would require is that farmers and others who have tractors or small vans, as some farmers have, or jeeps, would be allowed to use them for the haulage of farm produce for themselves and for any neighbours who would want to avail of that speedy method of transport which could be acquired within a matter of hours rather than have to go booking a vehicle, which takes maybe a week to book, and which might carry seven tons, whereas the load that is required to be hauled is only about half a ton or, at most, a few tons.

I am suggesting that the matter be remedied by an amendment of the transport legislation. Public transport companies, both C.I.E. and others, would be glad to get rid of this necessity, imposed on them by law, of picking up a ton here and a half ton somewhere else. We should give the people of the country the facilities that an amendment of the Act would entail. This Bill seals up a loophole in the Act and, mind you, it is a pretty narrow loophole at that. The fact that such a large number of people avail of the opportunity of using whatever loophole there is, since it was discovered, suggests that the legislation needs to be remedied. If there were no hardships and if there was not a grave demand for an alteration we would not have had such a large number of people, especially a large section of the farming community, taking advantage of that loophole to get more efficient transport for their produce. That is proof enough that the passing of this measure, while it solves a problem as far as the Act is concerned, does not do justice and does not help a large section of the people.

It may be a good thing to have some guarantee that a company or companies are legally bound to transport merchandise for the public. That, I think, is necessary. Somebody must take responsibility for the public transport of merchandise and of passengers and I think everybody in the House agrees that the Government must have some say in that. We could still have that and I maintain we could have a more efficient transport system if we allowed the other problem to be solved in the way that the people wish it to be solved—by allowing tractors, vans, jeeps and small lorries to operate for the benefit of farmers for the transport of their produce. I should like to hear the Minister indicate what his intention is in this respect. I know there is a feeling on this side of the House that it is very necessary to do that—to remove this bottleneck hindering both consumers and producers.

Seosamh Ó Cinnéide

Ar an mBille seo ba mhaith liom tagairt a dheanamh do daoine spesialta atá i gcruaidh cás fé láthair. So far as this Bill goes to safeguard the national transport of the country, I am in full agreement with it. I believe that it is very essential to safeguard the main arteries of transport for our people and that we should not in any way let a higgledy-piggledy competition arise, with everybody for himself and the devil take the hindmost. We had an example of that immediately after the war when cars were not so plentiful and every farmer's son looked for a hackney plate. The ordinary man in the town, who had to earn his living and support his family by driving a taxi or hackney car, was driven into poverty by these farmers' sons having discs on their cars driving to every football match and meeting.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That would not arise on this Bill.

Mr. Kennedy

I am only indicating that in so far as this Bill safeguards national transport, I am supporting it, and I will come to the particular point I have in mind. This Bill is entitled an Act to amend the Road Transport Act, 1933, in relation to the carriage of merchandise in hired vehicles. Section 1 says that in this Act "the Principal Act" means the Road Transport Act, 1933 (No. 8 of 1933) as amended by the Road Transport Act, 1934, and so on. The principle behind all these Acts and this Bill is to safeguard the railways and all pertaining thereto.

As we knew the railways in our young days, the goods train came in— let us take a typical example—to the town where I lived. There were floats stationed there, and they carried goods to Granard, Castlepollard, Coole and other places. These men got plates. All the legislation which followed the Transport Act of 1933 safeguarded C.I.E. and the railways, but left these carriers in the same position as they were in in 1933. They got a plate to carry merchandise within a certain radius, say, 30 miles, and which enabled them to purchase a lorry weighing two and a half tons. Since then, the horse has disappeared and these men are supposed to convey in that two and a half ton lorry to the railways, cattle, sheep, pigs, oats and everything else. There is nothing to allow them to purchase a lorry that will carry five tons or seven tons or ten tons.

I put it to the Minister that when he is safeguarding the main transport industry of the country these people, who were part and parcel and an essential arm of that industry, should be seen after. They should be enabled to buy a bigger lorry and the radius of their service should be extended, because if the Minister is to safeguard C.I.E., these necessary auxiliaries to it, who were there when it was the G.S.R., the M.G.W.R. and everything else, should be rescued from the unenviable position in which they are now. I got up to support the Bill in so far as it safeguards the industry, and to make war, if the Minister desires to make war, on a competition which would drive half the people into poverty, smash our transport system, and do no good in the end.

In making that case in support of the Bill I want to make a plea for these forgotten men whose grandfathers went with horses and cars to the railway, whose fathers went with lorries, and who are now in a very hard plight. Let the Minister take them into account, raise the tonnage they can convey, and extend the radius of their operations, and he will be doing a good day's service for the transport of this country.

Mr. Killilea

I am afraid the last speaker has drawn me to my feet. I also find myself in the position of supporting the effort to keep the main transport company of this country in existence. I am afraid however that when the original Act was being introduced here, many things could not be taken into consideration, because the positions then and now are entirely different. This Act has to be amended because of the fact that a certain man claimed to be hauling sand from his own sandpit; a whole legal argument arose and was fought in the different courts. At the time the original Act was introduced in 1933 there was no such thing in existence as haulage from sandpits in this country in the form which has since arisen. That was done then by horse and cart occasionally.

A man who had a sandpit of his own was in a position to take his horse, and deliver his gravel wherever he liked. I remember we fought in every county council, when C.I.E. started, to prevent them trying to confine transport to within four miles radius of a particular job to horse-cart traffic. To-day we find the position that, if a man has a sandpit and is to supply gravel to a local authority, he has to get a C.I.E. lorry, because it is nearly impossible to get a local lorry with a plate to carry out haulage. That immediately involves the county council in additional expense, and perhaps the sandpit is uneconomic. There are many other things involved, and the county council says: "We must have a central gravel pit and should deliver from that." I think the day is at hand when we should have an entirely new Transport Act.

Another consideration is the fact that quite recently the Minister himself has helped to run through this Act, because when a certain individual applied to have the unladen weight of his lorry increased, where there were a number of similar types of lorries, the Minister agreed in his case and the applications of the others were turned down. I cannot understand why that should have been done, unless it was through the particular influence of a certain individual in this House. If we find that the position is that an individual can have the unladen weight increased by the Minister, surely a case can be made for a new Transport Act altogether. That is one reason why I will not be fully satisfied with the amendment of this Act.

Deputy Barry asked a few minutes ago: "why confine this to farmers?" There is a reason that can be advanced from the farming community as to why they should be entitled to have their haulage of their live stock taken to fairs and markets, because there is no such thing as a C.I.E. lorry convenient to most of them to go out in the middle of the night or at three or four o'clock in the morning when they have to send their stock to a fair or market. Again, if the farmer was to take a C.I.E. lorry to take cattle or sheep to a fair even ten miles away, the cost of that would take a lot of profit away from the farming community, while if he gets it done by a local contractor or private lorry he can get it at a very economic price.

The question of examining this Transport Act and having a new one drafted is a very important one, and must be considered immediately. There are a number of reasons why we should have a new Transport Act in view of the modern tendency in transport and the development of the transportation of different commodities so far as the farming community is concerned anyway. Again, C.I.E. themselves have shown reason why there should be an amendment. In each beet factory they go out and hire lorries, and the lorries they hire are the ones that are in open competition with them in the market square every day in the week, the ones that are driving them out of business. This year, I had to take up a certain matter with C.I.E.——

Mr. Norton

This has nothing to do with this Bill.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I am afraid the Deputy is getting away from the Bill before the House.

Mr. Killilea

I am speaking about this, because it is part of the Minister's amendment.

Mr. Norton

No; it is not. You are speaking about the 1933 Act and this is an amendment of it, in one narrow respect.

Mr. Killilea

And the one narrow respect is dealing with private lorries that are hauling for hire, to cut them out.

Mr. Norton

It is completely opposite to the point you are talking about. It is what you are saying in reverse.

Mr. Killilea

I know it is the reverse. I am saying that if the lorries hired by C.I.E. to-day were allowed to ply privately to the particular factories hauling beet for the farmers of this country, the farmers would have their beet taken to the factories for about 25 per cent. less than what it is costing them at the moment.

Mr. Norton

The 1933 Act prevented them doing that.

Mr. Killilea

That is right, but the 1933 Act never intended to let C.I.E. go out and hire lorries wholesale all over the country during the period of time they were doing it under that Act.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy is going wide of the Bill. He will get another opportunity of raising the matter he is referring to.

Mr. Killilea

Very well. I am raising these things to show that the present transport system needs an overhaul more than anything I know to bring it into line with the modern trend of traffic.

Mr. MacCarthy

Although the amendment now proposed by the Minister arose from a weakness established in law in the existing Transport Acts, it has provided an opening for co-operation which would be of advantage in the outlying rural areas and, to my mind, it is questionable whether the closing of that gap now might not cause more trouble and inconvenience to the rural community than leaving the present situation to continue until the whole question can be re-examined fully.

The present system whereby people in outlying rural communities have to send long distances for big lorries when they have only small loads to carry makes the whole thing very cumbersome and very expensive, whereas if they were allowed to use their neighbours' lorries for these small loads and on what may be very limited occasions, I think it would not interfere at all with the main operation of the Transport Act. Taking the point that the Minister for Finance mentioned a while ago — that we must have regard to the conditions of employment, wages and hours of duty — we could provide very inexpensive transport, if all these things were to be disregarded, but one of the main things under the Transport Act is to have proper conditions of service and proper remuneration for the people engaged in it. If it were to provide a cut-throat system, I would not for a moment say anything in its favour, but I do feel that in our outlying rural communities this opening provided in the Act only allows the farmers a certain scope for co-operation on the very limited occasions that they need it.

The danger, of course, is that advantage would be taken of it to make it apply more generally and perhaps cut across the whole idea of a transport system and I presume that is the reason why the Minister is taking this course of action now. I think if we allow it to continue until the matter is re-examined, it would be the wisest course to take. At any rate, it would be the one I would advocate.

Mr. J. Lynch

I wish to make only one small point, and it arises out of an experience which I had as Parliamentary Secretary just before the last change of Government. It arises out of the remarks made by Deputy Murphy during the course of this debate with reference to the transport of catches of fish from small centres to the Sea Fisheries marketing depots. It appears that, at one centre of which I was made aware, there was an arrangement whereby local fishermen, having landed a catch at the pier, sent a message to the local merchant who had a lorry, and he transported the catch to the marketing depot, ten to 15 miles distant. As a result of the law as it now stands, the local merchant was prevented by the Gardaí from carrying on that transport system and, because of that, many catches were lost on land. The marketing of them was lost to the fishermen because they were unable to get a vehicle licensed to carry merchandise for hire, or were unable to contact a C.I.E. lorry.

If the Minister could conceive some system by which an ad hoc licence might be given to a local merchant, limited to the carrying of a particular catch as soon as it landed on the pier, a licence which perhaps might be issued by the local Garda sergeant, it would help to relieve the hardship that invariably exists, particularly where fishermen are concerned. They often come in and their catch might be carried on the carrier of a bicycle; on the other hand, it might be of such proportions as would require a vehicle such as a lorry to transport it ten, 15 or even more miles to the marketing depot. This is only a suggestion I am throwing out to the Minister. It might be worthy of his consideration.

Mr. Norton

Although this Bill has very limited intent, the discussion has travelled over a very wide area. A number of Deputies discussed the virtues of private transport as against public transport. The question of how fish is to be carried and by whom was also discussed, and what we should do for those ancestors of ours who had at one time found a livelihood by the carriage of merchandise by horse-and cart and who were displaced by the efflux of time and the inauguration of mechanically hauled merchandise.

I do not propose to follow a number of the points which were raised because they seem to me to be quite outside the scope of the Bill, except perhaps to touch on them so far as they affect the Bill or affect the request that has been made that some opening should be provided for discussing some amendments which are now considered necessary in the 1933 Act. Some Deputies spoke as if I were responsible for the 1933 Act and preventing amendment of it. Some Deputies spoke as if the problem of the disappearing horse only arose in the past 18 months. Might I take this opportunity of reminding those Deputies that the Party opposite were in office for 18 years after the 1933 Act was passed and in every one of these 18 years, they could have amended that Act in any way they desired? Having failed to make any amendment in the 1933 Act in the manner they now desire during that period, they come along this evening and say: "What are you doing about the 1933 Act? Why do you not amend it? Why do you not read it this way? Why do you not read it that way?" Surely the Deputies who spoke in that kind of way and had that kind of slant have something to reprove themselves for in not having taken steps during the 18 years they were in office——

Mr. Lemass

Surely this childish argument should be dropped at some time.

Mr. Norton

I can understand the annoyance of Deputy Lemass at having to listen to these carping criticisms.

Mr. Lemass

The world did not stand still when Fianna Fáil left office. We admit that.

Mr. Norton

It got better.

Mr. Lemass

Go on from there.

Mr. Norton

The problem is that you thought it did stand still.

Mr. Lemass

Well, it did not. We are agreed on that.

Mr. Norton

That is another revelation that has descended upon you in the past 18 months. I can understand Deputy Lemass getting annoyed by all the Deputies getting up and saying that such and such was wrong with the 1933 Act; that such and such should never have happened under the 1933 Act. They asked when were we going to amend the 1933 Act; what were we going to do with the 1933 Act; were we going to do something they could not get done in the 18 years they were in office after the 1933 Act was passed?

What should one do with the 1933 Act after listening to the views presented this evening? Half a dozen different views came from the benches opposite and a variety of views was expressed around the House. If we were to amend the 1933 Act, it would not be plain sailing. There are certain vested interests built up under the 1933 Act, some of which are affected by this Bill.

The main purpose of the 1933 Act was to amend the chaotic transport organisation, or so-called organisation, of the day, to bring to an end, as a result, the cut-throat competition of that period, and to provide a coordinated system of public transport for the community generally. Since 1933, the Act has been interpreted in a particular way. Recently, in the manner I indicated in my introductory speech, the courts took a different view of a particular section of the Act. As a result of the court decision in that respect, it is clear to me, as it is to Deputy Lemass, that the courts have not given effect to the intentions underlying the 1933 Act, when it was enacted by the Oireachtas. The simple purpose of this Bill is to put the 1933 Act back where it was intended it should be placed by the Legislature when the Bill was enacted 23 years ago.

I think it is desirable to do that for a number of reasons. In the first place, if every person were permitted to buy a lorry and to hire himself and the lorry out to anybody who wanted it, that would only have one result so far as C.I.E. is concerned. People might hire lorries on a H.P. arrangement and would try to get any price they could operating the lorry themselves as driver. Long hours would be worked at low rates of pay. That would bring to an end the whole road freight service operated by C.I.E. to-day.

Any such move in on C.I.E. of that character would not only reproduce the chaos which the 1933 Act was intended to eradicate, but it would, in addition, send to the employment exchange those people who now get employment from the C.I.E. road freight department and who are paid reasonable rates of wages — certainly rates of wages regulated by trade union conditions. Does anybody want to go back to the chaos of 1933? Does anybody want to have the cut-throat competition of 1933? Does anybody want to go back to the diabolic hours and wages of 1933 in the then privately operated road transport system? I will certainly never be responsible for producing in this House a Bill which is even remotely likely to create the conditions of 1933. We got rid of them and we should now continue to operate a road transport policy which has the appearance of continuity and which will not change when a Government changes, a policy the people can understand and one that gives our road operators and rail operators a chance of knowing where they stand, too.

But if this gap were not closed in the law as now interpreted by the courts, a most serious situation would arise. There are in this country a considerable number of licensed hauliers who have bought their lorries and operated them for a long number of years. They have an interest in the lorry and the lorry is their mainstay. If these people have to meet the competition of anybody not now in possession of a merchandise licence who would buy a lorry and hire out a lorry, then these licensed hauliers who were a feature of the 1933 Act would be driven to the wall as well, and firms now operating successfully and on a well-organised pattern in the category of licensed hauliers would be driven to the wall.

Again, the question of cut-throat competition would arise, in my view, if we did not close the gap created by the court decision so that, from the point of view of the licensed hauliers, who were a feature of the 1933 Act, and from the point of view of the railway company, and with a view to maintaining order in our own transport organisation, I think an amendment of the 1933 Act is necessary in order to maintain the position which was believed to exist until the recent court decision.

Deputy Esmonde made what I can only describe as an all-out attack on C.I.E. He thought it could not be abolished quickly enough. He made two statements which, I think, are so far removed from the facts that he ought to get the correct information as soon as possible. He said that C.I.E. had a virtual monopoly for the past 20 years and that, in his view, the remedy was to have as many privately owned companies as possible, leaving them all to compete, and in that way you would get order and organisation in the transport business and reasonably cheap transport as well.

What are the facts about the C.I.E. monopoly? In 1933, there were 8,400 commercial goods vehicles on the road and in 1954, there were 37,000. I have not got the figures for 1955, but if they follow the usual tendency, they go up by 4,000 a year. Commercial road vehicles increased in number from 8,400 in 1933 to 37,000 in 1954. C.I.E. not only had to compete with the 8,400 which were in existence in 1933, but with the additional 29,000 which have come on the road since then, and to say that C.I.E. had a virtual monopoly when new lorries were coming on the road at the rate of 4,000 a year——

Dr. Esmonde

These lorries are not free to transport anything they want to.

Mr. Norton

These lorries are commercial goods vehicles and they have not been bought as ornaments.

Dr. Esmonde

They are not allowed to haul goods for anybody.

Mr. Norton

Is it not clear that the lorries were bought to haul goods which, if the lorries were not available, would be hauled by C.I.E. road service or by the railways?

Dr. Esmonde

Does the Minister suggest that anybody who owns a lorry is allowed to haul goods on the same terms as C.I.E.?

Mr. Norton

No. I am not suggesting that at all. What I am saying is——

Dr. Esmonde

C.I.E. has a controlling monopoly. That is a perfectly fair statement.

Mr. Norton

C.I.E. has no controlling monopoly, so far as these 37,000 lorries are concerned. In the main, they are owned by people who are transporting goods in their own lorries now, goods which, if we had not these lorries, would probably be transported by C.I.E. More and more of these lorries are being used every year. C.I.E. would now be much better off if the number was 8,000, as it was in 1933, instead of 37,000 as it is to-day. I think that one of the Bills we put through this House provided for knocking the 26 companies, at that time in existence, into one because it was recognised at the time that this multiplicity of companies could not give the country a national transport system. Some of them had as many directors as they had railway engines.

The question of the transport of fish has been raised. I know that there has been in the Department an attitude that additional merchandise licences cannot be given where C.I.E. is willing to provide alternative transport. I think that, generally speaking, that policy is reasonable enough. However, representations were made to my predecessor and to me with a view to easing off in the case of fish. I know that fish is a perishable commodity and that a fisherman does not know what type of transport he will need until he lands his fish, and that he does not know whether he will have fish or not to transport until he hauls in his nets. The representation made to me that the transport being supplied by C.I.E. was not always suitable was a reasonable one, particularly where the lorry was not based on the village where the fish was landed.

When the merits of the representations made by the Kilmore Quay Co-Operative Association were brought to my notice, I had investigations made, and I came to the conclusion that this co-operative effort by the local association should be recognised, and a licence was issued to them to transport the fish in their own lorry.

Mr. Lemass

Why did they need a licence? The association could always operate a lorry without a licence.

Mr. Norton

No. The society did not own the fish. They had taken the fish from the boat, but it was the fishermen's fish until it was sold, and could only be transported by the fishermen. I gave the society a licence in order that the fish could be marketed more quickly and without loss.

Similar representations were made to me with regard to Bantry and again I issued a licence for the transport of the fish in order to improve the marketability of the fish. I directed the Department to consider individual applications for licences in respect of fish on their merits. Where the merits were substantial, the applications were to be granted.

Mr. Coogan

How do these applications apply to Galway?

Mr. Norton

All I can tell the Deputy is that I will give him an undertaking that any application will be considered on its merits. If the Department thinks that there is any merit in the circumstances of Galway fish, the application will be considered sympathetically.

Mr. Coogan

Is the Minister aware that C.I.E. must get eight hours' notice before they can get a lorry available to transport fish? Sometimes boats cannot make a tide and sometimes they have to come in with half a catch in order to meet the lorry.

Mr. Norton

These are some of the difficulties which give a special complexion to the question of the licences. If there is merit in the Galway application it will be considered sympathetically.

Deputy Finlay raised the question of the position of a man whose lorry is undergoing repairs or cannot be used because of damage. As I understand the position, it is that he is not at present, under the law as it stands, permitted in law to replace the lorry which is not serviceable. While that is the law in the matter, everybody, including the Garda Síochána, recognised that if a man's lorry is out of action, no objection was taken to his hiring another lorry of approximately the same tonnage and using it until such time as his own lorry was repaired. It may be that this amendment of the law now puts the position back where it was believed to be before the recent court judgment. I do not think, in fact, that any difficulty will arise where a lorry is substituted for another one in such circumstances. In fact, although the law since 1933 was that one lorry could not be substituted for another, the actual substitution did not present any difficulty or give rise to any problems.

Mr. Lemass

The Minister is now talking about licensed hauliers. Deputy Finlay was talking about private merchants.

Mr. Norton

I am referring to the case where a person has a lorry for use. No difficulties arose where a merchant found it necessary, while one lorry was being repaired, to substitute another lorry for it. In fact, the substitution took place and nothing happened. Similarly, as I understand the position, where a person had a lorry recognised for the transport of goods, if that lorry was out of action, undergoing repair or damaged, it could not be substituted, but notwithstanding that, no administrative difficulty ever arose in the matter. If there is any great feeling in the House that the matter should be corrected, I would, if I were amending the Bill at a later stage here, or in the Seanad, be prepared to see if an amendment could be introduced to meet the situation and clarify the position. I am telling the House, at the same time, that, in fact, no real difficulty has ever arisen in the substituting of another vehicle for one which was undergoing repairs.

Mr. Lemass

A difficulty may arise now because of the phraseology which is introduced in this Bill.

Mr. Norton

This pretty well puts it back as it was. Unless there is flexibility on the part of the Garda authorities you just might run into difficulties of that kind. It would be my desire that the Gardaí should not raise any administrative difficulties in a case of that kind, but it may be desirable that the law should not rest on the flexibility of an individual police officer. If that is the desire of the House, I would be willing——

Mr. Lemass

It would have to be specific — that a person who was the registered owner could hire another lorry when his vehicle was out of action for repairs.

Mr. Norton

We got on for 23 years without any difficulty arising. There is always the possibility that it might arise. Any new interpretation by the courts might induce them to do what they did after 23 years in the case of a similar section in another Bill. At all events, I will have a look at it between now and the Committee Stage here, or in the Seanad.

On the general question of a review of the 1933 Act, I think no impetuosity which a Deputy may feel towards the progress or lack of progress, as he sees it, of C.I.E. ought induce us to make changes in our transport code which are calculated to bring more uneasiness and uncertainty into the method of dealing with our transport problem. In the main, the 1933 Act has worked reasonably well. It is true that the habits of the people have changed substantially since that Act was passed. One can even say that the pattern is likely to change, still more so, away from the 1933 conditions. You must remember, however, that any amendment of the 1933 Act which, for example, is going to allow more people into the haulage business, to impact on existing hauliers, is going to be harmful to those who have to make a livelihood now out of the carrying of merchandise for reward. If you permit farmers now to haul commodities which are at present hauled by the railway company, you are taking more traffic from the railway company. You may also import an element of unfair competition inasmuch as if you permit farmers to haul goods, while paying only an agricultural tax in respect of their vehicle in competition with firms paying full tax, trade union rates of wages and observing trade union agreements generally, you may at that point cause considerable unemployment for those who are at present employed in our transport company.

Mr. Lemass

A farmer's transport should be deemed to be a horse for the purposes of the Road Transport Act.

Mr. Norton

If Deputy Lemass were talking now to the Deputies sitting behind him, I could understand him. The case made by some of the Deputies sitting behind him is much wider.

Mr. Lemass

I know, but there is a new situation. The tractor has replaced the horse.

Mr. Norton

If we were dealing only with a tractor, it would be different. What, for instance, about beet? What about taking some cattle back from the market when the farmer is near the beet factory?

Mr. Lemass

A very limited radius.

Mr. Norton

Deputies sitting behind Deputy Lemass travelled much farther than he. I think C.I.E. itself ought to be glad to get rid of what at times must be an irritating and expensive requirement, namely, having to have a lorry at a farmer's gate, on demand, to carry a particular quantity of merchandise, perhaps not a very long distance. Getting away from all that detailed administration must, I think, have a beneficial effect on their organisation generally. I think it is better for a national transport company, as it were, to keep on the main road of public transport and not to get into the boreens and laneways of transport; leave that to some other kind of organisation. It may well be that the test of what the transport vehicle should be is the tractor. Obviously, that has advantages over permitting the farmer to use a lorry, even on a neighbourly or co-operative basis. I will undertake to have that matter examined specially to see to what extent it is possible and practicable to bring about an arrangement of that kind without impairing the finances of the railway company to any serious extent or impacting unfairly on other people.

If, as well, the House desires a discussion on the general question of transport, I should be glad to agree, although it is a bad time of the year to do so now on a private member's motion as we shall be dealing with financial business next month. If there is any desire to have the matter examined by any means other than a motion here, I would be willing, if Deputy Lemass is interested, to examine any suggestions which he cares to make in that field as well or, if he is satisfied at this stage, I am willing to examine the tractor proposition and then we can look at it in the light of what the examination throws up.

For the reasons which I gave at the outset, I ask the House to give this Bill a Second Reading.

Question put and agreed to.

Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 29th February, 1956.