The time remaining to the member in possession, Deputy McQuillan, is 20 minutes, and the time remaining for debate on the motion is two hours and 40 minutes.
Private Members' Business. - Local Authorities (Works) Act—Motion (Resumed).
Debate resumed on the following motion:—
"Dáil Éireann is of the opinion that, as a practical step to stimulate increased production through the improvement of the fertility of our land by badly needed drainage schemes and at the same time help to relieve unemployment in rural areas the necessary moneys to put the Local Authorities (Works) Act into operation should be provided immediately."— (Deputies McQuillan and Dr. Browne.)
Would it be possible for the Minister to say at this stage whether he intends to allow the motion to conclude before the House rises on Friday, whether time will be made available to other Deputies to speak within the time remaining, or is it possible the Minister has decided to make a pronouncement tonight? I should like if the Minister could let us know whether the motion could be finished rather than have it go on until February 10th when the House is to resume. I put that point to the Minister before he speaks himself.
I have little more to say except to emphasise that one of the best pieces of legislation to come from this House in the last 12 years was the Local Authorities (Works) Act. A tremendous amount of good work was carried out throughout the country under this Act as far as drainage is concerned. The farmers, no matter what their political views, welcomed it wholeheartedly. As a matter of fact, some of the greatest supporters of the Fianna Fáil Party were the most enthusiastic supporters of the Act.
It is a mystery to me why the working of such a splendid Act was suspended by the Government, especially in view of the fact that the same Government have so often appealed to the farming community to increase production from the land. The Taoiseach, who was always interested in industrial revival and expansion, declared within the past two years that unless we achieved a tremendous expansion in agricultural production, there was very little hope for the future. He was even prepared to say that the key to our future success as a nation lay in the proper use of the land. I shall not ask whether that was conversion or anything else on the part of the Taoiseach. I am prepared to accept he was completely genuine when he said it was his firm conviction that we had to depend on the land to bring us forward as a nation.
There is very little use in appealing to the farmers and farm workers to increase production if the land itself is covered with water. It is only common sense to say that before you can have more grass, more cultivation of the land and more livestock, you must have the land in a fit state to carry the tillage and the livestock. If farmers see —as many of them in my constituency do—their land constantly flooded, it is most disheartening to have these constant appeals from the Government to increase production. It is frustrating and enraging for the farming community to have these appeals to increase production when they cannot even see their land for nine or 10 months of the year because of flooding.
I have heard the case put forward that money was wasted under the Local Authorities (Works) Act. Again I would ask the Minister to give particulars of where such waste occurred. I can assure him he will find it hard to produce evidence of waste of money in the constituency I represent. The farming community there are accustomed to severe losses over the years because of the flooding of the major rivers, and a good deal of alleviation of distressing conditions was brought about by the Local Authorities (Works) Act. Recently the cleaning of one river—the Crannagh Cross river—was half way through when the working of the Act was suspended. This meant that many farms in the locality were left in a shocking condition because of flooding. I can say without any exaggeration that on occasions the farmers did not see much of their land over 12 months of the year.
I appeal to the Minister to reconsider this matter and restore the moneys so that the good work, which had been going on up to 18 months ago, can be continued. It has been suggested that the Government are not satisfied with the Act itself, as such, and that they are prepared to bring in new legislation to deal with some of the drainage problems that were dealt with under the Local Authorities (Works) Act. I do not care whether or not they bring in new legislation. So far as drainage is concerned, "A rose by any other name" suits me. If the Government feel they will lose face in connection with this Act and wish to change the name of the Act and bring in another one, I shall not mind. I am sure many Deputies will not mind and neither will the farmers. What they want is to get their lands drained so they can get on with the job. I hope the Minister will have a word of encouragement and hope for the farmers all over the country who have been anxiously looking forward to a resumption of work under this Act.
I second the motion.
Would the Minister like to intervene at this stage?
Not particularly.
I have a few points to make in seconding the motion. The Taoiseach has asked us on a number of occasions, with a certain amount of conviction and sincerity, to put forward suggestions for consideration by the Government as to the methods by which he could help to increase employment in the country as a whole and most people have been struck by the open-mindedness with which he has handed out these invitations to everybody in regard to the question of employment. The general feeling is that he really does wish to see employment opportunities increased both in rural Ireland and city areas. Indeed, industry, the trade union movement and local authorities, by means of a circular, have all been asked to make suggestions as to methods by which the Government could increase employment in their various areas.
It seems to me that the proposition in the motion is a particularly good one. It suggests an extension of the Local Authorities (Works) Act, which was introduced by the late Deputy Timothy Murphy, a former Minister for Local Government. It was, I always believed, an excellent piece of legislation because it was reasonably flexible. It gave the local authorities power to carry out minor drainage operations to a certain extent, the removal of obstructions, the widening and deepening of rivers, the building of embankments, the replacement of embankments, and generally served the two purposes of creating opportunities for employment on the one hand and, on the other hand, in rural Ireland, of seeing that the floods that interfere with the working of the land were dealt with and, in city areas, ensuring that the problem arising from flooding as a result of rivers overflowing their banks, as has happened in recent years in the city of Dublin, could be attended to.
A city Deputy has as much interest in this proposition and in the working of the Local Authorities (Works) Act as the rural Deputy in so far as, in the City of Dublin, on a number of occasions, there has been very serious incidence of flooding as a result of the overflowing of the Tolka recently and, on various occasions, of the Dodder and other smaller and larger rivers. The Corporation and the county council, clearly, could use their powers under this Act to provide, first of all, for the clearing of obstructions and the deepening and widening of rivers, thus obviating the flooding which causes great inconvenience, particularly in the winter periods, and the great dislocation of people's lives, which has occurred from time to time in the city area. I would suggest to the Minister that he should encourage the Corporation and the county council to examine carefully and fully the powers which they have vested in them under this Act in order to find out ways in which they could deal with flooding in the city and county areas.
Secondly, of course, as we all know from endless questions that have been put down here to the Taoiseach, in the last few weeks in particular, there is great need for the provision of employment opportunities in the city areas. There are many hundreds of people at the employment exchanges and, approaching Christmas, it is particularly regrettable that that is so. The Minister should indicate to the local authorities that he is willing to consider schemes put forward by them in addition to those which he has already accepted and which are in operation.
The city Deputy is also concerned with the activities under this Act from the fact that one of the troubles which have arisen in the past 30 to 40 years is due to our failure to increase opportunities for employment in rural Ireland to anything like the extent needed. In the first instance, the normal increase in population creates persons who need work and, secondly, the relatively quick advance of mechanisation of agriculture in rural Ireland, particularly in the post-war period, is throwing greater and greater numbers of people from rural Ireland on the employment exchanges and giving them the alternatives of moving into the large towns and cities and, the next step, emigrating.
I understand that the figure given in the Report of the Commission on Emigration is that something like 11,000 to 12,000 persons a year required work or were disemployed each year in rural Ireland. That, plus the 11,000 or 12,000 who are turned out by the schools every year also requiring employment, means that 25,000 or 26,000 people require new jobs each year and, of course, nothing like that number of new jobs are being provided or, so far as we can see from what the Taoiseach has told us, are likely to be provided in the foreseeable future. If we were to look at it from the very selfish point of view of a city or urban Deputy, it is very important from our point of view that every possible opportunity be given to the man living in rural Ireland to live there and, if possible, to find permanent employment in rural Ireland and, in that way, save the tremendous, growing pressure which there is on the very limited amount of opportunities for permanent employment in the city areas and also, of course, where they have qualified, on the relatively few opportunities for relief work, made available in the city areas from time to time.
So, no matter in which form of employment the Minister is interested, whether that concerning rural Ireland or the city areas, it seems to me that the proposition here to provide more moneys for work under the Local Authorities (Works) Act, whether in the city or rural areas, must be of undoubted benefit to the country as a whole.
One of the advantages in this Act, which has always appealed to me, flows from the fact that it can be a form of expenditure of a creative kind, a form of productive capital investment. One of the disabilities under which we suffer as a result of putting all our hopes in a private enterprise economy is that we are completely dependent on the haphazard development of employment opportunities in cities or rural areas, on the whim or wishes of the particular industrialist, factory owner, or businessman, whoever he may be. We cannot direct him to create opportunities for employment in any area where there may be a particularly large number of unemployed persons. We cannot direct him to erect his factory or industry in that area. In fact, we failed completely to offset the great depopulation of the western seaboard, under the Undeveloped Areas Act. I think most people accept that it has failed to serve its particular purpose. We have failed to get private enterprise to provide employment in rural Ireland. We are at the moment engaged in spending a tremendous amount of money in the Shannon estuary for much the same purpose.
The net result is that over the years various local authorities and various Governments have had to restrict their powers and direct the sources of the creation of unemployment to non-productive investment capital which is house building and road building and, to a more limited extent, hospitals and schools which could not really be said to absorb anything but a tiny minority of the people requiring work. Successive Governments have had no alternative but to put money into road building as funds for the local authority and into the building of a tremendous number of houses.
In the early stages, there was a certain amount of social dynamic in the provision of houses. Latterly, as the various politicians began to understand the position, they realised it was really the only effective way of directing opportunities for work to particular areas. I understand from a speech made by the Minister for Transport and Power that we have something like nine times the total road area of most European countries. We have a tremendous number of roads. The position in regard to the roads is so because we have not any other use for the number of people who require work in rural Ireland. Road building has been a nominal relief scheme to a considerable extent. I think it is not unfair to describe it as such. To a certain extent, it could be said that we have overreached in the matter of housebuilding because we are building for a dwindling population.
The motion deals with the improvement and fertility of the land, and the question of unemployment in rural areas but it does not open up a debate on houses, hospitals and roads.
I am trying to explain that this is the only way in which we can canalise money into the creation of opportunities for work in rural Ireland. We have saturated our demand for houses and we certainly have saturated our demand for roads. Consequently, the only opportunity left for the creation of new work in rural Ireland is by the extension of the moneys made available under the Local Authorities (Works) Act.
The particular advantage of this Act is that it is productive investment, in so far as it makes available land for the growing of crops. It increases the fertility of the land and the output of the land. In that way, it increases the national welfare and wealth generally.
As I said in my opening statement, the Taoiseach made repeated suggestions to Deputies that they should put forward their ideas as to how opportunities for work could be created in rural Ireland. The building of roads is the way largely depended upon at the moment by most rural local authorities. It is non-productive investment. It has also had the effect, as far as I can see, of delaying complete mechanisation. Most local authorities or county councils take the view that if they eliminate road building as a source of employment in rural Ireland by mechanising to the maximum extent possible, they will deprive themselves of the opportunity of finding work for the unemployed in the peak unemployment periods at different times of the year.
If the Minister were to take the view that the money made available to local authorities should be used to the best possible advantage and if he had a choice between road building, having regard to the present stage of development of roads which is very well advanced, and the draining of rivers, the improvement of the land, the increasing of the fertility of the land, which must add to the national wealth, it seems to me that this motion is one which the Minister should readily accept.
The Local Authorities (Works) Act was, in the first instance, a Cork measure. It was brought in by the late Deputy T.J. Murphy, Minister for Local Government, God rest his soul, in view of the experience he gained in the Cork County Council of problems that could not be dealt with under any other legislation. As a matter of fact, when introducing the Bill here, he read letters which I had written to his predecessor, Deputy MacEntee, appealing to him to take steps in the same direction.
Public money is being spent in a far worse manner than the manner in which it was spent under the Local Authorities (Works) Act. I admit there were flaws in it. Like every other Act which passes through this House, experience showed the flaws. I suggest to the Minister that he could rectify those flaws with a very slight amending Bill. The main flaw was that when the river was cleaned, it was allowed go back into its original condition again. That was practically the only flaw I could find in it.
I went to work the moment it went through. In my county council area alone, something like £12,000 or £13,000 was spent in two years. The results are to be seen there up to the present day. We have land reclamation which all Parties in this House are crying for and shouting about. How many times have officials, under the land reclamation scheme, inspected land which needed drainage and then come along and told me that it would be a good job but that the river should be cleaned first and there was nothing to clean the river.
That is true.
There was nothing to clean the river. That is the difficulty we find ourselves in. I saw a scheme upon which £4,000 was spent. There are now something like 150 acres of that land drained and cleaned and giving decent crops—land that was constantly flooded previously.
There is a stretch of land from Ballymacoda into Ballycotton with five rivers flowing through it. I have been hammering in this House at Ministers for Lands, the Office of Public Works, and so on, in an effort to get them to do what should be done for the farmers in that area. I was down there last spring. One unfortunate man told me that he had been preparing for early potatoes. He was a 40-acre man and he had five acres prepared for potatoes but the water was running along the drills and the place was flooded out. He was not able to put in his crop of early potatoes because it was too late by the time the land was free of the flooding, and he lost money as a result. That condition of affairs prevails constantly even on land with a poor law valuation of from 35/- to £2 a statute acre.
I have further cases of land divided by the Land Commission. I had to bring five or six men this year to the rate collector in order to get them a relief of rates. Their land was in such a derelict condition—land of that valuation—that they could do nothing with it. They had to get a relief of rates, which meant a loss of rates revenue to the local authority, and there was a loss of land annuities to the State as well.
I do not think any Act was passed that did so much good for the ordinary farmer in my constituency as this Act. It has been said that it has faults. Almost every Act has needed amendment. I urge the Minister to remedy any defects which he has found in it. I guarantee that, even in his own constituency, he will find plenty of room for spending some of that money, not to talk of other constituencies. I am speaking of what I know and see in the country and from my own experience. There was nothing that could not be done under the Local Authorities (Works) Act.
I remember that our County Surveyor said to me: "You cannot do this" or "You cannot do that" under the Act. I said: "When the Inspector comes from the Department, bring him down my way and we shall have a consultation." He did. Deputies would be amazed at the jobs we were able to do on the roads under the Act. There is a fine tarred and steam-rolled road to my house which was done under the Act. It was examined by officials of the Department of Local Government and by the County Surveyor.
With money that might have been provided under the Act in the past five or six years, we could have had far more production in East Cork. There were plans. There is land there soggy with water. It has been soggy with water over a long period. It could have been drained. If the Minister cares to consult the Department dealing with land reclamation he will see the number of reports from inspectors which say that this job or that job would be a good job but the river must be cleaned first. That type of report is made by men paid by the State to examine schemes. Unfortunate men with 20, 30 and 40 acres, waiting for drainage, must turn their backs on their hopes for the moment because their land cannot be attended to until the river is first cleaned.
Unanimous appeals have been made to the Minister's Department by the Cork County Council in this connection. On at least six occasions, four or five different parties were unanimous on the value of this Act and in their approval of it. I appeal to the Minister to introduce whatever amendments are required to enable the Act to be put into operation once more, to the benefit of all concerned, because of the good work that can be accomplished under it.
There is very little use in cleaning a river if, in three years' time, that river needs to be attended to again. Sometimes a river silts up again very quickly. It is a fault in the Act if nobody is made responsible for seeing that the river is kept clean but the fault could be remedied by a few lines. If the Minister is too busy to do it, I will bring in an amendment myself. It is urgently required. I appeal to the Minister to do it as quickly as possible.
I agree fully with this motion. The purposes that brought the Local Authorities (Works) Act into being in the first instance were (1) to bridge the gap between arterial drainage and the small drainage jobs occasionally done by the Special Employment Schemes Office and (2) to give employment at a period of the year when things are slack in rural areas. I agree with every word the last speaker said in support of this motion but I do not find myself 100 per cent. in agreement with him that there are flaws in the Act. The only flaw in it is that it is left open to the Government of the day to withhold money and thus paralyse the whole functioning of the Act.
The principle of maintaining watercourses once they have been cleaned under the Act is admirable. I know the works that were carried out in my county in 1949 and 1950. I see them every day. They are still in perfect condition although there has been no maintenance since. I believe they will not require cleaning or deepening inside the next 20 or 30 years. At the same time, I should like to see some provision for the annual maintenance of such works. However, even with that, the Local Authorities (Works) Act was of wonderful benefit from the very beginning. The first inter-Party Government introduced it. It was significant that each time Fianna Fáil came into power, their first action was to clip down the annual grants to something less than one-third or almost a quarter and then to wipe them out altogether. They did not make any grant available at all. I do not want to develop any heat or bitterness but I want to impress on the Minister— there should be little need to impress it on him—the urgency of the need for restoring the grants under the Act.
I remember the first time the inter-Party Government took office, the land reclamation scheme was introduced by Deputy Dillon. In many cases, there were perfectly good tracts of land belonging to small farmers which could not be dealt with under that scheme simply because the outfall was not drained or the river was choked. The Local Authorities (Works) Act was brought in to help out that scheme for drainage jobs which were not covered by the scheme and which the scheme was not properly equipped to do. The scheme had not the funds and it is doubtful if the staff was available. Much excellent work was done apart from that and there is no harm in mentioning the employment it gave.
We have the highest rate of emigration of any country in the world and the reason is the lack of employment at home. Boys and girls who go to England, America, Canada or Australia do not go simply for a change of climate but to make their time and not to waste their lives sitting idly at home. The Minister may think the employment given during the winter months would not make many young people stay at home but most of them would be employed on the holdings or farms of their fathers or mothers during the spring and summer months. It is the lack of employment in the three or four winter months which drives the young people off the small holdings. If savings have to be made, they should be made in some direction other than cutting down on a very useful job of work giving much needed employment at home.
I was astonished when I read some of the figures connected with the administration of the Local Authorities (Works) Act. The first county I turn to is my own. In 1949-50, we gave £55,404 to the Mayo County Council. In 1950-51, we gave £75,976; in 1951-52, Fianna Fáil returned to office and the figure dropped from £75,000 to £48,800. The next year, it was again cut in half and came down to £23,903. In 1953-54, Fianna Fáil were in office and they reduced the figure to £14,458. We came back to office the following year and it climbed steadily up to £26,000 from £14,000, and when Fianna Fáil came into office in 1957, the curtain was rung down on that useful Act.
Let us turn to Roscommon, Deputy McQuillan's constituency. In 1949-50, £28,105 was spent; in 1950-51 the figure was £49,349; 1951-52, the figure was down from £49,000 to £33,000; in 1952-53, that £33,000 dwindled to £15,591; and in 1953-54, it came down to £10,000. It went up again until it reached £25,884. I could give the figures for Galway and other counties. Some people have alleged, and it is very hard to blame them, that the enmity of the Government to the land reclamation scheme was due to the fact that it was an innovation of the first inter-Party Government. If such is the case, I do not see much hope for the country, regardless of the rise or fall of Governments. That all good works which emanate from any Government are to be abandoned by other Governments, for that reason is a system and a precedent that should not be adopted and must get the hatchet in the neck. That is a bad line of policy to follow.
I should like to put this poser to the Minister. This is a very unusual motion or, at least, this motion aims at a very unusual and good job of work. I throw down this challenge to the Minister: If it comes to a vote at the conclusion of the time allowed for this motion, will he give a free vote to the House? Will he take the Whips off his own Party, and will the Whips be taken off the other Parties, and Deputies allowed to vote according to their consciences? That was asked for in respect of the referendum and other recent measures, but it is much more necessary now. That is a fair poser to put to the Minister and one he should find difficulty in turning down.
I conclude by saying that the Local Authorities (Works) Act was the means of carrying out of some of the most useful and most necessary work in this country. The Minister comes from a rural constituency and he should not have much difficulty in realising how useful and good it was. There were perhaps faults in administration, but there is no instrument that human beings can devise that will be perfect. The Local Authorities (Works) Act may have had its flaws but it would have been possible to remedy them. I cannot see many flaws of any kind, except the bitterness the then Opposition engendered by prejudice against it. As it stands today, it is a simple Act which gives power to carry out works. If my recollection is correct, there is an unusual power in Section 4 that any local authority, after giving due notice, can enter on land to carry out drainage work.
We know of many cases where small rivers pass through several farmers' lands and one farmer's land might be left high and dry and his problem might be a shortage of water rather than a deluge. We often found in such cases that a selfish type of farmer might say: "No; I will not allow you to do that work because it will not benefit me." The Local Authorities (Works) Act overrode that objection. Having served due notice, there was power to enter. If that farmer was aggrieved or if he felt there was damage to his land or property by reason of the execution of the work, the court was available to him and the Department was liable to pay him compensation.
The Minister would be doing one of the best jobs of his career as Minister for Local Government if he insisted on the Minister for Finance giving the necessary money to bring that Act back into operation.
My reason for intervening in this debate is that when this matter came up today, the Leader of the Opposition said he would like to hear what I had to say about this motion. The reason, I expect, that he wished me to intervene was that I sponsored a motion similar to this at the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis recently; but I want to make it clear that the resolution which came before the Ard Fheis from my constituency in North Galway, from the Fianna Fáil Dáil ceantair, at a meeting at which I was present, asked the Government to introduce the Local Authorities (Works) Act with the condition that when the work was completed, provision would be made for maintenance.
Most Deputies who have spoken so far tonight—except Deputy Blowick— have agreed that one of the big flaws in the Act was that there was no provision for maintenance. I have seen good work done in my constituency under this Act, but, unfortunately, because that provision was not there, the work carried out, the useful and good work carried out at the beginning, is being negatived now that the main drains have begun to become clogged up. If that provision for maintenance were included, I would agree thoroughly with this motion. I wanted to make that matter very clear and I would support this motion only on that condition, that some provision such as that would be included.
Deputy Corry hit the nail on the head when he said that under this Act, as we experienced it, we could do almost anything. As I said, I have seen good work and bad work done in County Galway. The good work was that which Deputy McQuillan has in mind in this motion, that is, work to stimulate increased production. I agree with Deputies who say that you may have four or five farmers waiting to carry out a scheme of land reclamation on their lands—I have seen this in my own constituency—and the land project inspector comes out with a scheme for them. He hands it to them but says: "You cannot go ahead with it until this main drain is cleaned."
At one end of my constituency we have the Corrib arterial drainage scheme in operation. We see good work being done under that scheme, where a proper survey has been carried out, with everything planned and all the snags foreseen and where land reclamation and work on the main drains are going ahead. But at my own end of the constituency which borders on the River Suck—I am on one side of it and Deputy McQuillan is on the other—we see hundreds of acres flooded. A scheme such as this, if it could be amended, or if some other scheme could be introduced, would make a good job of it, and would undoubtedly relieve the flooding on these lands. I should not like to see any of the money spent on roads, as Deputy Corry said. That was done in Galway in the initial stages and it was money sent down the drain. As years went by, the work became more selective— whether the direction came from the top or not, I do not know—and it was diverted into more productive channels.
I consider that arterial drainage is a proper scheme. The big snag is that you will never get smaller rivers done under that scheme for years and years to come. Therefore, we shall require some in the intervening years and if we could get this priority scheme for arterial drainage changed, it would help. At present schemes costing over £100,000 get priority and then there are those from £25,000 up to £100,000. This motion deals with those under £25,000 down to £1,000 and less. If we could get the Board of Works to bring these smaller schemes up on the priority list, particularly in view of the fact that drainage plans under the land project are held up owing to the main drains not being cleaned, it would help and would benefit production. It would also give employment, a matter mentioned in this motion.
As I say, my reason for intervening was that I was asked, or challenged, if you like, to intervene, but I want to make it clear that the motion I sponsored contained that provision, that there should be maintenance.
Is the Deputy in favour of this motion?
I think I have made my position clear.
All I am asking is that the Deputy should say "yes" or "no".
Each Deputy should be allowed make his own speech.
First of all, I should like to sympathise with the Minister because really I do not think it is the Minister's duty to take this motion. The Minister is merely a type of conduit pipe through which money passes from Finance to a certain source. Unfortunately, under the Local Authorities (Works) Act, it is to the Department of Local Government it goes and if this conduit has now clogged up, I do not think the present Minister or any Minister for Local Government should be blamed for it.
Why have the Act then?
It is the Minister for Finance who makes the money available to the Minister for Local Government, to implement the Act. Deputy Corry made a very reasonable speech on this motion. I do not wish to quote Deputy McQuillan, or Deputy Dr. Browne, because they are the sponsors of this motion, but Deputy Corry, who is a Government supporter, made a reasonable speech. We have heard Deputy McQuillan who represents a rural constituency; we heard Deputy Browne; we heard Deputy Corry who is a Government supporter; and we heard Deputy Blowick, a farmers' representative. We also heard Deputy Kitt and all are in favour of the motion. I cannot understand why it should not be accepted by the House.
The debate has been on a very high level. No political slogans were used and I hope they will not be used. Certainly I shall not endeavour to do so. I think it was Deputy Corry who explained why a colleague from Cork, then a Minister, Deputy Murphy, introduced the Bill and eventually succeeded in piloting it through this House and the Upper House. It was to bridge that area, or that land, if you wish, between where the land project applied and where the local authority worked in. Only the other day, I came across the Minister's reply to a letter pointing out, in the case of some minor drainage scheme between Tipperary and Limerick, that it was not the function of his Department, that it was a scheme—I do not remember the name of it—which should be administered under the Local Authorities (Works) Act, but unfortunately the local authority had no money available under that Act. It was a very good scheme and I think Deputy Kitt and Deputy Corry, members of the Government Party, made a very good case for it. Deputy Kitt's only objection to Deputy McQuillan's motion was that no provision was made for maintenance.
I should like to refer the Minister and the House to the Act which says— I quote from Section 2 (1)
This Section applies to the following local authorities ...
and it goes on to describe the corporations and county councils and says:
(2) Where a local authority to whom this section applies are of opinion that—
(a) any land owned by them, ...
I refrain from quoting subsection 2 (b) but it then goes on to say:
...any land owned by them ... has sustained or is likely to sustain damage from flooding, landslide, subsidence or any similar occurrence, the local authority may execute such works ...
In my opinion there is nothing there to prevent recurring works being done on a particular job. If the local authority see that this land owned by them has sustained or is likely to sustain damage from flooding they may drain it. If they think that next year or the year afterwards it is likely to sustain such damage they may drain it again. That is my interpretation of the situation as a lawyer.
I do not say it is maintenance. I know there is a subsection preventing maintenance but, from my legal knowledge, on the interpretation of the Section I believe a local authority could have recurring expenditure on the drainage of land likely to sustain damage. Really, that is maintenance. I speak subject to the correction of the Minister and, possibly, his legal advisers but this is something that has never been considered and is worth considering because everybody from the Government, the main Opposition and the various other Parties here are in favour of the Act but they all fight shy of maintenance. I think this should be tested.
At the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis, I think it was Deputy Kitt or his constituents who sponsored a motion which was carried unanimously. I believe if the question were left to a free vote of the House—I do not want to be acrimonious in any way—it would still be carried. I know the Minister is in favour of the Act because I can quote his views on it speaking in Donegal County Council. I know he was a Deputy then and I have sympathy for him—
Go ahead and quote them.
I do not want to be personal. I understand the Minister's position and I could possibly find myself in the same position. The only clog is finance: there is that clog in the conduit or pipe line but it is unfortunate that the Minister for Local Government should find himself in that position. I think the Minister for Finance should be here to explain the position.
Deputy Blowick gave figures. When this Act was first introduced in 1949 by a predecessor of the present Minister, Deputy Murphy from Cork, go ndéanaidh Dia trócaire ar a anam, it was welcomed by all Parties. There was much suspicion on the part of the then Opposition, the present Government. All they could do was cast suspicion; they did not oppose the measure. I am not going to quote, but in reply to a question put by Deputy Lindsay today we got certain figures circulated showing the expenditure under the Act through the years.
I shall just quote for my own county; I have not had an opportunity of totting the figures. In the first year, 1949-50, £59,384 was expended in my county. That is a lot of money to have spent during the winter months when unemployment was rampant. That was the first year. In the second year we got £78,727, in 1950-51. There was a change of Government in the following year and the Party who did not vote against the Local Authorities (Works) Act but who cast suspicion on it saw the benefits of it, I suspect, but thought they should play it down. They did that by decreasing the Vote with the result that in 1951-52 we got only £50,587 in my county. In 1952-53, when Fianna Fáil were in office, we had only £24,541 spent, less than 30 per cent. of the amount in the previous year. In their third year in office, we dropped to £12,941, approximately one-fifth of the amount spent by the first inter-Party Government in the first year and one-sixth of the amount spent by them in the second year. In 1954-55 we began to step up again with the second inter-Party Government in power and we spent £13,654. There was a further step up in 1955-56 to £29,872. Then, when the present Government were back in office in 1956-57 the amount was £19,888.
Deputy Kitt and Deputy Corry, who speak for the Government Party, agree with the Act. The only fault they find with it is possibly one of interpretation which could be very easily clarified. Personally I think maintenance could be brought in under Section 2 (2) (b).
It would be pretty expensive maintenance.
No. If the Deputy will read it, he will see that it says "... where a local authority are of opinion." The local authority must be "of opinion".
"Any land owned by them, or any permanent construction which was constructed by them or which they are required by law to maintain." That is the snag.
Is it not very fair?
"Land owned by them"—that is the snag.
Have we ever explored that? Have we ever looked at it? I have heard no person yet say one word against the Act, and I think we should be very grateful to Deputy McQuillan, and Deputy Dr. Browne for introducing this motion. If there is the fault that Deputy MacCarthy points out, by a one page Bill we can amend it. I am certain that if we are worried about maintenance there will be agreement on all sides of the House to include maintenance in the provisions of the Act. I think that is really what is worrying Deputy MacCarthy and, if it is, would the Deputy say so? Perhaps Deputy Kitt might answer the question. If the answer is that it is, I am sure the Deputies moving the motion would have no objection to amending it to meet that point. Would Deputy MacCarthy answer the question—if the Act is amended to include maintenance would he agree to the motion?
I am not voting for the motion in its present terms.
That is what we are up against.
I am not voting for it.
Would Deputy Kitt say if we included maintenance, by an amendment of the Act, would he vote for the motion?
Why should he?
Would Deputy Loughman confine himself to his chemistry, and leave the farmers to myself and the schoolmasters?
I have made my speech.
And where is the Deputy getting?
Cross-examination.
I am not much good at that, unfortunately. I was hoping we might have agreement and that we might finish this term, on such a night as this, by being unanimous about amending the Act.
Perhaps Deputy O'Donnell would put his query to the Minister?
I do not think it would be fair. I do not think I should question the Minister. He is the conduit pipe line from Finance, but I see a more open pipe line has arrived in the Chamber. We have that minor 4", or 2", pipe line through the Board of Works.
The Deputy will not leave a drop of water in Donegal.
I shall not speak at length. I shall leave the Deputy at least ten minutes to speak.
Deputy O'Donnell can turn on the tap any time.
I am being serious in saying that I have heard no opposition to the motion other than the question of maintenance.
There are many other reasons.
I am referring to Deputies who have spoken. There may be many other reasons, but I certainly commit the Fine Gael Party to support this motion. I presume Deputy Corry spoke for his Party, and it was Deputy Kitt who said they were worried about maintenance. If we get a little bit of legal interpretation of that section we might meet him, so I respectfully suggest that the motion should be accepted by the House.
I do not wish to delay the House but I should like to mention that the figures given by Deputy O'Donnell in relation to Donegal equally apply, though in different proportions, to County Cork.
I can give them if the Deputy wishes to have them.
I do not wish to delay the House beyond saying that naturally the Labour Deputies support the motion. Deputy MacCarthy may, or may not, be worried about the question of legal interpretation in regard to maintenance, but our biggest worry may be divided into two heads—the loss of employment affecting road workers in County Cork, and the valuable work that still remains to be done there. It is well known that since 1949, in the various years when money was provided in Cork under the Local Authorities (Works) Act, very valuable work was done in different parts of the county.
I do know that members of the present Government, when showing opposition to the Act, said that work was not carried out in a satisfactory manner in other counties. That may, or may not, be the case. I do not know, but if these Ministers wish to complain about the unsatisfactory supervision of work by local engineers in these counties, that surely must be a matter between the Ministers and the officials. Where Cork is concerned, no hand of condemnation was ever lifted by any member of Fianna Fáil in relation to the work carried out by the workers and supervised by the engineers. The tragedy is that since these schemes have been slowed up it has automatically meant that grave unemployment exists during winter periods.
Up to 1949 there were three months each year, January, February and March, when the men working for Cork County Council unfortunately had many periods of unemployment but, with the introduction of this Act, that ceased to be the case. Men were satisfied, even though it was not the best thing in the world to have to work in some rivers in winter time, to do the work, and they made it quite clear they much preferred to work on schemes under the Local Authorities (Works) Act than go to the unemployment exchanges to draw a few shillings dole. Are we to go back on that now when we know that schemes carried out under the Act were successful in the past?
As I said at the start, I know that there are other speakers anxious to take part in this debate and I wish to co-operate with them. However, one obvious thing I must say, is that we see this as the one way in which the Government can co-operate and help local authorities to provide work. Deputy Corry must realise his position in that respect. In 1949 he went out of his way to help to co-operate with the then Government in having various schemes introduced, schemes which gave so much employment. Surely time cannot change so much the opinions of members on the other side of the House? If, in the past, they were so anxious to create employment in Cork during the winter period, they must be equally anxious now to see a continuation of work under the Act. If there is any sincerity in what the Deputies from Cork have said at meetings of Cork County Council, they will find themselves in the lobbies with the proposers of this motion when it comes to a division, and will vote to give added employment in the slack period of the year to workers in Cork, and thus help to complete the important works still waiting to be completed there, due to the fact that for some years back there has been a slowing down because of the decrease in the amount of finance made available.
In reply to the general tone of the debate on the motion as put forward to-night, let me say straight away that the Government are fully alive to the necessity for increased agricultural production, and realise very fully the important part that may be played in such an increase by proper drainage planning, arterial drainage generally, and schemes for the smaller river catchments throughout the country. If anyone should doubt the Government's concern and their being fully alive to the situation, and giving a full and proper place to the importance of drainage in our national economy, I surely need only point to the fact of the recent five year drainage programme that has been outlined and which is now, in fact, in operation under the Arterial Drainage Act.
That five-year programme, as those concerned well know, provides for an increasing expenditure on this very important national work, an expenditure which will reach £700,000 by 1961-62 and which will show at that stage an increase of 60 per cent. as compared with the expenditure before the five-year programme now under way was initiated by the present Government. In the current year's Vote there is no less than £1,000,000 to be expended on this expanded programme. Furthermore, under the land project a sum of upwards of £2,000,000 has been earmarked in this year also for the drainage and development of agricultural land. I call Deputies' minds to the fact that we are not in any way overlooking the importance of drainage in our national economy. Far from forgetting drainage, we have in fact taken positive steps to do something more, and to do that something more more speedily than work was being done when we took office.
There is, of course, the argument advanced by those who support this motion that the greater the expenditure on drainage the greater will be the increase in productivity. But there is a limit to the extent to which expenditure on drainage will produce a proportionate return. It is not enough for local authorities to pass resolutions or to make protests, as the case may be, advocating the reintroduction of 100 per cent. Local Authorities (Works) Act grants. I appreciate the general anxiety of county councils to have these grants restored to them, grants which they enjoyed for some few years in the not too distant past. I appreciate their concern from the point of view of the employment they could give were they getting these grants in their 100 per cent. form. County councillors are scarcely the best judges in relation to these schemes. The expenditure of large sums—and the sums spent under the L.A.W.A. were large—is a major question and a matter of national economics rather than something to be decided in a local council. Such expenditure is a major concern to any Government and must form part of major policy decisions.
As a Government, we have then to consider the merits and the results obtained from this large expenditure in the past as compared with the competing demands of what can be considered more directly productive schemes and directly productive purposes. While I appreciate the anxiety of local authorities in these matters, I think it only fair they should realise that this is a major question of national economics and one to be considered, because of the large sums involved, by the Government as a whole.
Between 1949-59 no less than £7,500,000 approximately was given by way of 100 per cent. grants under the L.A.W.A. by successive Governments. Of this £7,500,000 roughly half was spent on road protection. Indeed, as Deputy Corry told us tonight, it was spent not only on road protection but also on tar spraying. Deputy Corry was making an excellent case for the motion until he blew the top off it by his admission that practically anything could be done under the L.A.W.A. If it needed condemnation, then that is the roundest condemnation from the point of view of the expenditure of public money. Deputy Corry told us about the road that was tar sprayed to his own door. He maintained that was done by having a consultation with some inspector, or other, and the local engineer, who queried the wisdom and the authority of doing the work under the L.A.W.A.
Regardless of all that, the fact remains that about half was spent on road protection. The other half was spent on drainage. Only a small fraction was spent on effective and lasting works. No doubt there were some good schemes. I have had an examination carried out in the Department of Local Government, and so I talk now with knowledge, and not through the medium of rumour, suggestion, or any ill-will towards the Act itself or towards those who sponsor it. The proportion of economic and durable works done under the drainage side of the L.A.W.A. was so small a fraction of the whole as not to justify the expenditure of £7,500,000. The records are there for everyone to see. It is quite true that the failures were not the fault of local authorities but were rather due to the difficulties and complexities of drainage problems. Those difficulties and complexities grow larger once one leaves the realm of field drainage. Indeed, local authority engineers and officials would be the first to submit that they do not pretend to be experts, and in this sphere experts and skilled men are required if a proper and permanent job is to be done after a proper and sufficient survey.
Debate adjourned.
The Dáil adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 10th December, 1959.