Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 3 Nov 1964

Vol. 212 No. 1

Land Bill, 1963—Committee Stage (Resumed).

Question again proposed: "That section 13 stand part of the Bill."

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

We were dealing some time before the Summer Recess with section 13 of the Bill. I have been wondering, in view of the fact that the Government have adopted the sensible views of the Opposition in relation to other matters, whether, at this stage, the Minister for Lands is prepared to withdraw this dangerous and undesirable section.

It must be noted with particular interest, all during the long Summer Recess, particularly in the speeches made up and down the country by members of the Government, that there was no reference whatever to the Land Bill, or to any individual section thereof, by the Minister. That led me to hope that when the Dáil reassembled, we would have heard from the Minister his decision to withdraw this Bill or, at least, his decision to amend suitably the objectionable sections, such as section 13, with which we are now dealing.

Nevertheless, the Minister for Agriculture saw fit to make a speech dealing with this Land Bill quite recently. I have been wondering whether the Minister for Lands, without wasting the time of the House any further, would be prepared to indicate now at this very late stage whether he, like the Minister for Agriculture, and like other Ministers, has been in recent weeks converted to common sense and intelligence in legislation. This objectionable section is one which I consider to be very dictatorial and one which has been opposed by the agricultural community. It has been opposed by all sections of the people in rural Ireland and by all rural organisations.

The section as it stands, without amendment, will, in my opinion, have very disastrous effects when one considers that it is an interference with the right of ownership of land. It is an interference with the right of any man to do with his land as he wishes, without any outside interference, whether from a Government Department or anyone else. The Fine Gael Party have, and always will maintain their belief in the free right of ownership to one's own land without any interference whatever. Section 13 of this Bill prohibits the sale, transfer, letting or subletting of certain lands without the consent of the Land Commission. More serious still, all dealings in respect of any farm, after inspection by an officer of the Land Commission at the instigation of the Minister, may be frozen for a considerable period. This is where the greatest possible objection must arise, because it is a very drastic interference, an interference with ownership of property, and more particularly, with ownership of land.

God knows, we in this country have a very long tradition of fighting, and fighting successfully, for the right of ownership of land. It is a disastrous and very retrograde step that, having achieved the right of ownership of land and having got for ourselves the right of free rent, fixity of tenure and free sale, by the adoption of section 13 of this Bill, we are now to surrender all that was fought for and won over many long years of struggle. A very serious battle was fought by our forefathers against the landlords in this country. The right of the landlord to the ownership of his tenant's land was challenged and our people became owners of their own land. We now find, under this section, and under other provisions of this Bill, that what was dearly won with great sacrifice in the past is now being surrendered completely and taken from our people.

The vast majority of our people in rural Ireland do not realise the very serious effect which this section will have on the ownership of their property. That is why I feel this House should be generous in the amount of time they give to a very important problem of this nature. Views have been expressed by very responsible organisations who have protested in the strongest manner against section 13 and have made pleas to the Government Party and to the Minister to have it withdrawn. The fact that a senior inspector of the Land Commission can freeze all dealings for one year in very objectionable and, in my opinion, this House should reject this section.

We in the Fine Gael Party propose to fight this section tooth and nail and we propose to divide on it. That is why I say this is too serious a matter for the people of this country, for those who live on the land and particularly those who respect ownership of property to allow to go through without very serious thought. I am sure there must be Fianna Fáil Deputies supporting the Minister in this House on this issue who must know from their experience and from the experience of their constituents that this is a section which is regarded as disastrous.

I want to place this on record: section 13 is objectionable; it is, in my opinion, a section which can be described as ill-advised and ill-conceived. We in the Fine Gael Party propose, after the next general election, to amend the objectionable sections of this Bill should it pass in its present form. It is well that the people should know, and be reinforced in the knowledge, that if the Minister passes this section as it stands, after the next general election, the serious provisions of this and other objectionable sections will be suitably amended so as to give an assurance to the land owners of Ireland that we believe in the rights of the people of Ireland to the ownership of their own property, without any interference from the Minister for Lands or anybody else.

I hope the House will debate at great length the many objections and the serious degree of opposition which come from all sections of the community in regard to this matter. I hope the Minister will accept the commonsense view of those who have advised him against the inclusion of this section in the Bill, that he will see the light and have this disastrous section removed from the Bill.

Mr. P.J. Burke

I have already spoken on this section. Having listened to Deputy Flanagan this evening, I must say that he is not a bit logical if his statement just now made in the House is compared with statements he has already made about the Land Commission allowing foreigners to buy land and then talking about free sale when a foreigner comes in and buys land through an agent, auctioneer or solicitor. They come in here under the 1950 Act. There is free sale and no Minister has any power over the sale of land in this country at the present time because there is no legislation.

I feel very strongly about section 13. I come from the land, from a family, I suppose, that had to struggle for an existence on the land. I have had private discussions with the Minister on this section. The Minister will at no time interfere with the right of any ordinary individual who in an effort to do something to improve his own economy, at some lean time or other has let his land for a time. Those are not the people with whom we are concerned, but we are concerned with people who have let their lands and left the country.

We are dealing with a rural problem, a very serious national rural problem. I have heard members of the Opposition speak in this House about how denuded rural Ireland has become. Throughout the country the first thing you will be told is about a house closed here and another closed there, the people having left the country. If we are to do anything at all in this matter, we must try to bring holdings up to an economic standard, so that a man, woman, or family, as the case may be, will be able to live on the land. Surely nobody believes that in a democratic country a Minister who has to face his own people—and indeed the present Minister comes from a constituency in which there are a number of uneconomic holdings—will do a thing which will be detrimental to his own people. We had no legislation to deal with this problem, this cancer of the old rental system which should have been settled years ago, and the Minister is very courageous in coming along to grapple with it.

It is all right talking about this, that and the other, but if John Jones wishes to go to America or Australia and leaves his land and does not bother coming back to it, the land is not being used and is let to someone else. Another man, a neighbour of his, will do the same thing. There is a man in the centre with two or three acres who is trying to eke out an existence with conacre land and carry on in this way. This is a national problem. I hold that for a man in this country to survive, and if rural Ireland is to survive, if the country is not to be depopulated altogether, we will have to face up to this position. I have discussed this matter in great detail with the Minister and I am assured that the ordinary decent man or woman who, because of some unforeseen circumstances let his or her land, will not be interfered with.

I know rural Ireland and I know rural county Dublin. In this section we are giving the Minister power to deal with a national problem. I can assure the House that under the amendment to the Land Bill which was introduced here in 1950, no power whatever is given to the Minister to deal with this problem, unless he is prepared to go into limited farms, especially in my area where land is £300, £400 or £500 an acre. How can the Minister deal with that? I am deeply concerned for the welfare of every section of our people, irrespective of class or creed. I would be the first to go to the Minister if he were doing any injustice. I feel section 13 is fair in dealing with the national problem we have to deal with and I ask the Dáil to face up to it.

Mr. Sweetman

I am always amused to hear the concern of Deputy Burke for his people. I am always amused also to see how the Deputy always leaves after having almost wept bitter tears. Deputy Burke and the Minister would have been better advised to shed some of their tears last summer when in discussing an amendment to this section, put down by Deputy Hogan (South Tipperary), we put forward from these benches exactly that which the Minister for Agriculture announced in Loughrea in East Galway last Sunday. I was interested to notice, too, that it was the Minister for Agriculture who made the announcement about the Land Bill, and not the Minister for Lands. It was something to salve the amour propre of the Minister for Agriculture because the new Minister for Justice, appointed today, was slashing the Succession Bill to bits.

The statement in relation to the Succession Bill in some respects was pretty vague, but when Deputy Hogan of South Tipperary put down an amendment in the summer to the effect that every purchase of an agricultural holding by an alien should be subject to the consent of the Land Commission, the Minister for Lands said it was utterly unthinkable anybody should do such a thing, that it was merely some deep-laid Fine Gael plot to put him in a jam, some deep-laid Fine Gael plot to do away with free sale.

Of course, the Minister himself is the person best capable of doing away with that. The fact is that now the Government have come around to the point of view we have been advocating from these benches for a considerable time. The tragedy is—and everybody in Kildare knows just how serious a tragedy—that he is, to an enormous extent, locking the stable door after the horse has gone. The amount of land in Irish hands in my constituency which has now been sold to people who are accustomed to the land values of the continent and were in a position to outbid any Irish person wanting to settle a farm on his son would shock anyone who takes the trouble to go around County Kildare.

One always welcomes a conversion at any time but was there anything significant in the fact that it was the ex-Minister for Justice, now the Minister for Agriculture and lately the promoter of the fragmentation of the Succession Bill, who made the announcement rather than the Minister for Lands, the man in charge of this Bill? It will be rather interesting to find on the Report Stage that we shall have Deputy Michael Moran, the Minister for Lands, introducing a provision diametrically opposed to what Deputy Michael Moran said on the Committee Stage of the same sections. We are used to Fianna Fáil turning around and jumping around, but the drafting of the Minister's introductory statement on the Report Stage amendment will be a matter that will require all the delicacy at the command of those accustomed to couching such phrases in Departmental ways and means.

Apart from all that, this section, taken in conjunction with section 27, puts into the hands of a political Minister the possibility of political tyranny in such a way that it should certainly not be enacted. This section leaves a landowner open to the gravest injustice because even admitting, which I do not, that the Minister was right in what he wanted, the section was so badly drafted in relation to the protection of all landowners concerned that there is grave fear of real injustices being done.

Let me deal with the political end first of all. Anybody who has any experience of land sales in rural Ireland knows very well that the moment any place goes up for auction and it goes out that the Land Commission have inspected it or are about to inspect it an owner has no hope of selling that farm. The price drops by at least 25 per cent of what its value is the moment the story goes out that the farm has been or is about to be inspected by the Land Commission.

I suggest to the Minister that if he has any doubt about what I am saying he should ask all the solicitors practising in County Kildare, all the auctioneers practising in County Kildare, because naturally one speaks here of the area with which one has the most experience. I put it to an auctioneer today that the drop in value was 25 per cent and he told me I was very much underestimating it, that the difficulty would be it might be impossible to get a purchaser at all. If the Land Commission stepped in and purchased the farm afterwards, of course the stamp duty and the costs would be all thrown away because they would not be paid.

Even after a threat of Land Commission proceedings, the position heretofore was one of which the Judicial Commissioner would have to take judicial or semi-judicial notice. What is happening? For the first time since 1923 when we established our own institutions, when the Land Bill of 1923 was passed, the Minister for Lands, a political Minister, is taking to himself the right to decide whether an inspector of the Land Commission shall go in and shall inspect Farm A and Farm B but shall not go in and shall not inspect Farm C. That has always been something reserved to the Lay Commissioners, people who are appointed with rights properly appertaining to semi-judicial appointments, people whose permanency of office gives them rights to make decisions above those of a political Minister.

A political Minister is given the right for the first time to say who will go in on whose land and make an inspection. That is a right being taken away from the Land Commissioners. It is being taken by the Minister to himself. I agree, of course, that the Minister himself will not walk down and go in. That can be done only by a person not below the rank of a senior inspector, but a senior inspector is a servant of the Minister and is bound by the terms of his office, by the terms of his appointment as a civil servant, to carry out the directives given by the Minister to him.

It is perfectly obvious that any Minister could in those circumstances, under section 27, arrange for the commencement of proceedings for the purpose of victimisation, if he wishes, of political opponents. Apart from that, it will be extremely difficult in the future for a political Minister to disregard directions that may come to him from a cumann or other group of his political organisation in a constituency when they say: "Go and get so-and-so's land inspected." Immediately that is done, the owner concerned virtually cannot sell. It is the beginning of Land Commission proceedings; it is the prerequisite of section 13 coming into operation.

That is a wrong power to give to any Minister. It is the beginning of political segregation as between one citizen and another. Except in cases of emergency, it is a type of thing democracy requires should not be done except by those vested with judicial or semi-judicial tenure of office, people who are entitled and able to exercise their judicial or semi-judicial discretion, free and unfettered, on the merits of each individual case.

What happens when the Minister has set out on his progress and says: "There is a list which my senior inspector is to have inspected in that county"? The next thing is that a report is made and a determination reached that proceedings shall be pushed a step further. I do not want to mislead anybody. Pushing all the proceedings a stage further is a matter for the Lay Commissioners but it is obvious, after all that has been done, that the damage to the man's property has already been done and that he has not been able to sell. I believe the purpose of this is to provide that having had the damage done in the way I have indicated, with, then, the threat of the action under section 13, with the freezing of his land for a long period, it will mean that the Land Commission will be able to get that man's farm at substantially less than the value. I believe that will be the effect and I believe it is the designed effect of the joint operation of these sections.

What happens? An order is made under subsection (2) of section 40 of the Land Act, 1923, that the farm at a certain place is one that is going to vest in the Land Commission unless in pursuance of a valid objection. That is done pretty regularly and in what one might call the balance of cases, so that the objection can come up for full hearing and be decided upon. But the damage is done. It is going to be frozen for a year.

Let me take a case I meet pretty often in the course of my profession, a case which, I am sure, the Minister has met pretty often in the course of his profession. A man has a farm, shall we say, of 100 acres. For one reason or another—some type of misfortune— he has found himself in the position of being substantially in debt. His creditors are pressing him all round. He decides that the best way of meeting his obligations is to sell his 100 acres, and having sold it, pay his creditors and then buy a farm of 50 acres and establish himself on that and have adequate working capital for the 50 acres.

Now, under this section, he will not be allowed to do it. Once section 13 comes into operation, he cannot sell. He cannot sell for the period initially introduced in the Bill, for a year, but there is nothing in the Bill to provide that his creditors cannot make him a bankrupt in that year. Although the man desires and is anxious in an honourable way to meet his obligation to pay his debts, to clear them out of the way and to go into a smaller farm and set himself up, there is nothing in this Bill that prevents his creditors, be it a bank or anybody else, from making him a bankrupt and casting upon him all the expenses of that bankruptcy. He is not allowed to realise his assets for the purpose of meeting his debts but there is nothing anywhere to say that the person to whom he owes money is not bound to stop taking him by the throat and there is nothing to say that because the assets cannot be readily realised, in fact he is not to be made a bankrupt and not to be made to suffer all the expenses that might be involved in a court judgment, a judgment mortgage or perhaps even an equity suit to realise a judgment mortgage.

I have no doubt whatever that any solicitor who examines this section and the manner in which it is drawn and the effect it will have will say that under this section and its operation, many people who are really solvent are nevertheless going to be made bankrupts and have all the costs of such bankruptcy put upon them, even though at the end of the period, when the freezing comes off, and the land is acquired by the Land Commission, on the one hand, or when the Land Commission say they do not want it, on the other hand, and he is able to sell it, it is found that he has quite ample funds to meet his obligations.

That is a real danger and one that will undoubtedly arise if this section goes through with its existing provisions and it is one that creates a type of injustice which should not be permitted.

There is another type of injustice which is perpetrated by this section. Once a notice has been given under section 40, subsection (2) of the Land Act 1923, which is the basis for section 13, a person is not allowed even to transfer the farm to his son. The son may be willing and anxious to get married, may have found a suitable girl, may have decided that he wants to set up home on that farm and the owner concerned may be perfectly happy to give it to him, to set him up in it. But, under this section, during the freezing period provided by the section, the wedding bells cannot ring and nothing can be done to set up that member of the farmer's family on a farm of his own. What justification can there be for that? The Minister alleges that it is because by transferring a farm to his son a man would be dodging proceedings. That can perfectly well be dealt with in another way, as the Minister knows very well.

This is just the soft, easy way of the administrative bureaucrat, the soft, easy way, administratively, to get everything, as the Land Commission want, in their own maw, regardless of the injustice it may create, regardless of the fact that the procedure they are adumbrating and introducing can be used as political tyranny, regardless of the fact that it may and will result in certain people, inherently solvent, being forced into the bankruptcy court or into taking an arrangement of creditors under the bankruptcy rules because the Minister has frozen their assets and at the same time the debts that are due by them are not frozen.

When the Land Acts were introduced, there was wise and proper drafting then. A mortgagee was not entitled to take the owner of the land through the courts during the course of the Land Commission proceedings. The mortgagee was going to be paid out of the lands. There is no such provision here to save a man being hounded in costs through the courts because the Land Commission—not he —have decided that they want to take the easy way of freezing administratively this land so that they can take their own time about deciding what they want to do. That is obviously unjust. It is obviously unfair when you ally it with the powers the Minister is taking to himself for the first time in section 27 to ensure that there will not be a sale in practice, not in theory, but in practice as everyone knows in the country. Then, the joint operation of these is tyranny which should be resisted.

Mr. Tully

Before the Dáil recessed, this section was being discussed and I think at that time I made it clear that as far as the Labour Party were concerned we had not the same point of view on this section as Fine Gael. There are, I suppose, dangers in practically every section of every Bill that goes through a House if they are incorrectly used, but the position about this section is that I understand it has been introduced to stop something which those of us who have been in close touch with the rural community are aware is a grave abuse, that is, the action of people who as soon as they hear that a Land Commission inspector has appeared in the district immediately rush to sell their land. If this section does successfully deal with that type of person, then it will have the support of the Labour Party in this House.

There are dangers, perhaps, in it. It may be that the Minister is attempting to crush a nut with a steamroller but it does appear as if even the NFA who are opposed to it can see the necessity to do something about this particular principle. There are not very many big farms in any constituency that are likely to pass into the hands of either the Land Commission or a foreigner at the present time—the foreigners have collected most of them already—but it is true that of those farms that are likely to be sold, if the Land Commission inspect the farm, this section will not interfere with the normal working of the farm. If there is a reason why it must be urgently disposed of, this section gives the Land Commission the right to deal with this matter urgently. Personally, I have not been convinced by the arguments put forward by Fine Gael that a wrong is being done in including this. Far from it. I honestly believe it is high time some Government introduced a section in a Bill which would prevent this racket of selling farms immediately the Land Commission appear and thereby making it much more difficult for the Land Commission to acquire the farm.

Deputy Sweetman referred to the person whose land would be devalued because of this action by the Land Commission. I assume—and some of his colleagues can correct me if I am wrong—he is talking about the fellow I have just been describing, the fellow who when he sees the Land Commission inspectors around, decides to sell his farm. Naturally, it will be devalued if the person who is buying it knows the Land Commission inspector is likely to come and take it off him subsequently, but is there anything wrong with that? If the Land Commission desire to take over a farm, they have the right to do so. It is a most important thing that land should be made available to the Land Commission when it is not being properly used and that it should be given to those who will use it properly. That is the big difference between the approach of Fine Gael and the approach of the Labour Party on this section.

I do not know whether the Minister has changed his mind but the Government seem to have changed their minds and the Minister for Agriculture has made it clear he has changed his mind about the question of foreigners buying land. Let me say, however, that the original amendment which was put in by members of the Labour Party was defeated after a very strong speech by the Minister. In fact when the amendment was put in, it included the three points which I understand are at present being considered by the Government in their amendment: the purchase of land by non-nationals, the right of the non-national to keep some land around a big house which he purchases, and the right of a non-national to get arable land for the purpose of starting an industry.

I do not mind who brings in the amendment. If the Minister brings it in and therefore ensures that Government support is behind it, I shall be glad to see him do so. I am glad that even at the eleventh hour, the Government realise that a terrible wrong has been done to the people through the number of non-nationals who have been allowed to secure the best land in this country.

Mr. Clinton

Deputy Tully, when speaking on this amendment, deplored the depopulation of rural Ireland that is taking place under this Government and he held the view that if section 13 went through as it stands, this trend would likely be reversed or at least that it would enable the Government to keep more people in rural Ireland. My view is that if this section goes through in its present form, there will be more people leaving rural Ireland.

One of the things that keep people in their holdings is the pride of absolute ownership. No worthwhile case has been made for section 13. I should like to ask Deputy Tully if the owner of an industry or a factory was not using the industry or the factory to the satisfaction of some people, would he say that industry or factory should be taken over or is there any legislation proposed to do it? It is property the same as land and it can very often give much more employment than land and a great deal of production. However, we are here deliberately discriminating against the owners of land.

One of the points made in favour of this section is that it was intended to prevent the purchase of land by foreigners. We know that is a matter that can be dealt with in the way suggested by the Minister for Agriculture when he made his recent announcement in Galway. The Minister for Lands would be well advised to follow his example at least in one respect, that is, to listen to what the rural community have to say about this section. It is not wanted by the people in rural Ireland. The volume of opinion is definitely against it.

I should like to ask the Minister where has the demand come from or where does the necessity arise for this section. If the proposal mentioned is put through as announced by the new Minister for Agriculture, as seems now to be the intention of the Government, then where is the necessity for section 13? It is unnecessary and an unwanted piece of legislation which is opposed by everybody I meet in rural Ireland.

Minister for Lands (Mr. Moran)

Without section 13, this Bill would be completely useless. Section 13 is an enabling section for the Land Commission to take urgent action when required. I do not quite understand the Fine Gael attitude on this section as expressed by Deputy Sweetman. When they talk about congested areas, I should like to know whether it is purely lip service for public show because section 13 is one of the effective ways, the most effective way I can devise, at all events, to deal with this problem and to give the Land Commission the necessary legal teeth to take quick action.

There is no Deputy I know of representing a rural constituency who has not come across all these cases where the vulnerable owner jumps the gun immediately the Land Commission under their present procedure serve what we call a section 40 notice. That owner immediately proceeds to get rid of his land before the Land Commission have the opportunity of acquiring it for the relief of congestion. It is to deal with that problem, the problem with which Deputy Tully is obviously familiar, that this section is there.

In connection with the provision of 12 months under this section, I want to repeat what I said previously in discussing this section and the amendments before the House, that is, that I am not tied to the 12 months as the period for freezing. I have already indicated that, in my view, that could be reduced, but this is designed to meet the wishes of Deputies. Anything less would, I think, possibly make the section ineffective. I am, however, considering reducing the freezing period before the Report Stage. If it were reduced to six instead of 12 months, I think it would be a reasonable provision.

Deputies speak here about being concerned for the rural community and state there is no demand for this section. I suggest these Deputies are out of touch with the rural community. The NFA said in a recent letter to me : "We appreciate the necessity of empowering the Land Commission to take prompt and effective action in certain circumstances but we consider that the Land Commission prohibition under this section on transfer letting and subletting should be limited to one month." I can understand differences of opinion in relation to the time limit. That is a debatable matter but anyone who professes to be concerned for the relief of congestion must accept this section; otherwise, we are simply wasting our time discussing this Bill since this section is designed to enable the Land Commission to take effective action.

In every debate here on Land Commission affairs, Deputies have always complained about the slowness of the Land Commission, their failure to operate satisfactorily and their failure to come in quickly where there are lands for sale and acquire those lands for the relief of congestion. Since I became Minister, I have heard that complaint made. As a Deputy, I, on many occasions, complained about the failure of the Land Commission to take effective action. Here, we are giving the Land Commission the necessary powers to take effective action, to move in quickly where lands are needed for the relief of congestion. If we are really concerned here to deal effectively with this problem, then section 13 is a must, in my view, in our circumstances.

With regard to the allegations about the devaluation of land by Deputy Sweetman, this section does not prohibit sales of land. Its purpose is to enable the Land Commission to control undesirable sales. The law provides, as Deputy Sweetman well knows, that the market value of the land must be paid. If the bankrupt owner about whom Deputy Sweetman talked is dissatisfied, he has his appeal to the Appeal Tribunal and he is entitled to get what the court decides is the full market value of his holding.

The suggestion that this section is designed to enable the Land Commission to get cheap land is obviously incorrect. After the passage of this Bill, the price of land will be determined in the same way as it has been determined up to the enactment of this piece of legislation. I would ask Deputies to keep that fact in mind and, keeping it in mind, I ask what is wrong with the Land Commission having the power to take over land that is for sale, land that is needed for the relief of congestion, so long as the owner gets the full market value? I see nothing wrong with that proposition. I cannot understand the objection of Fine Gael Deputies to this section. I am quite satisfied there is no hope of making an effective inroad in order to relieve congestion unless the Land Commission get powers of this kind, power to move in quickly and power to acquire the land so badly needed to remedy this grave social problem.

Since this debate started, I have dealt in detail with the other subsections. Since 1923 it has been the law that where a letting is made for a period of over one year, such a letting is void without the consent of the Land Commission. The provision in this section is not, therefore, new. The other provisions are necessary to stop fragmentation of land by subdivision without the consent of the Land Commission.

Reference was made to the intention of the Government to add an additional section dealing with the sale of land to non-nationals. When we come to that, I shall deal with it specifically, but I should like to point out now that, contrary to what Deputy Sweetman has said, I have on many occasions informed the House that sales to non-nationals are under very close official scrutiny. We have this register for the purpose of keeping track of these sales. Should it appear at any time that further action ought to be taken, the Government will take it. As the Minister for Agriculture has said, while we have all heard different stories and rumours about the law being evaded, we have not got any official proof that that is so. I have invited Deputies from time to time, if they knew of any cases in which the 25 per cent stamp duty was being evaded, to get in touch with me. I have no official proof that the law is being evaded.

It has been suggested to me by different bodies, including the NFA, that it would be more desirable if there were direct control on the sale of land by the Land Commission instead of a control by the Revenue Commissioners. It may be that some have found a method of evading the law. It may be that, notwithstanding the penal provisions in the Finance Act, some are prepared to risk imprisonment even by making false declarations. I have no proof that this is so but it has been alleged by many Deputies in this House —although, as I said, they have not given me any specific case to show that the law is being evaded. At all events, the amendment the Government have decided to introduce in this Bill will for the future put the Land Commission in the position of giving or refusing their consent to the sale of land to non-nationals.

Deputy Sweetman talks about the depreciation in the value of land by virtue of the Land Commission, as he suggests, coming in and inspecting it. I do not know what he will have to say on the new provision that I propose to introduce. At all events, I do not accept the suggestion that land is devalued by virtue of the fact that the Land Commission look at it in this day and age. There was considerable opposition from solicitors and auctioneers dealing with the Land Commission up to a year or two ago when the rules were changed and auctioneers were allowed the commission they would get in the course of their business from other people. The opposition to the Land Commission acquiring land on a voluntary basis has largely disappeared since that particular rule has been changed. Since then, from the experience I have had, I can say that we are receiving much more co-operation in getting land on a voluntary basis from auctioneers in the course of their business.

There was, too, the feeling amongst the legal profession that if the Land Commission got involved in taking over a holding, or in the sale of a holding, it was very difficult to get matters concluded with them. That has largely disappeared because we have new rules that will enable solicitors in rural Ireland to deal effectively with the Land Commission without employing agents or others in this city to operate for them. As a result of both changes we can expect to get more co-operation from those concerned when dealing with land throughout the country.

From the point of view of making an effective impact in relation to the relief of congestion this section is essential if we are to eliminate all the complaints we have had from time to time from Deputies about the slowness of the Land Commission in taking over land that is for sale. I shall deal with section 27 when the House reaches it but, indeed, without this section, and without section 27, this Bill would simply be useless. I am satisfied that with this section we are closing a gap that was wide open as far as landowners who were vulnerable were concerned. This section, and, indeed, all the other sections in the Bill, have to be wide in their scope if we are to deal with the problem as we see it.

Every Deputy knows quite well that most of these powers are not designed to deal with the ordinary landowner at all. They are designed to deal with what I call the vulnerable owner, that is, the man who has either gone away altogether from his land or is not using the proper methods of husbandry. It is very seldom in these days that we have an appeal in the Land Commission on anything except a question of price. The vast majority of appeals are mainly concerned with the question of land values and it is now very rarely that a case is brought on the basis that the owner wants to hold his land. This in turn is an indication of the type of place that the Land Commission are endeavouring to acquire for the relief of congestion. Invariably they are cases where the owner is either a non-resident or such a bad land user that he does not consider that under the existing law he would have a hope of beating the Land Commission in the courts. That is the type of person with which this section is designed to deal and, as I stated, unless we have this section we will make no more progress than has been made in dealing with the very urgent land slum problem which we have in the congested areas.

Mr. Clinton

The Minister did not refer to Deputy Sweetman's fear of giving civil servants, who are responsible to the Minister, the power of inspection and deciding on land that should be acquired. That is a very dangerous provision in this section and one on which I should like to hear the Minister comment. Many people will not feel safe on their holdings unless they happen to be very well known supporters of the Government in power at the time. That is something that should be removed from this most undesirable section. The Minister referred again to the fact that land is not devalued by reason of the Land Commission's interest in its acquisition. If that is so, why do so many people run away from the Land Commission as possible buyers of their holdings? Why are they rushing to sell as secretly as they can? The Land Commission's money should be as good as the money from any other purchaser. I think that the Land Commission pays in cash or if they do not pay in cash, their bonds are now of some value, which they were not heretofore.

It is still true, however, to say that if the owner of the land has a choice the last customer he wants is the Land Commission and, therefore, he must be convinced that the Land Commission are the worst possible buyers. If the Land Commission were competitor purchasers of land, and if that could be proved, there would be no difficulty whatever in getting voluntary offers of land. As purchasers, the Land Commission are as free to go into the market to buy land as anybody else. If they eliminate the foreign competition—that is something I believe should be eliminated and for which we should have introduced legislation long ago—then if they are not going to give less than the market value of the farm they should be able to go in and purchase it. If a man has a holding, he should be entitled to get the real market value of that holding, which is what it can fetch on the open market.

Mr. P. Hogan

(South Tipperary): I was very pleased to hear that the difficulties between the Bar Association and the Land Commission, whether technical or monetary, have been resolved to the satisfaction of the Minister. I am sure the Minister is even more pleased than I am. He tells us this section is of paramount importance to the Bill—that, in fact, it will not be a Bill without it. He says this is an enabling section to allow speedy action by the Land Commission, the speedy action he maintains is essential to counteract the action of certain land owners who, in his words, are prepared to “jump the gun” once they get any intimation that the Land Commission are likely to move in.

If the Land Commission are prepared to give the market value for land, why are these people so anxious to "jump the gun"? Surely there must be some difficulty? Is it because they are compelled to take all or a large amount of Land Bonds instead of cash? If that is the reason, it should be rectified. There is no point pretending they are getting the market value for land if they feel they are being paid in a form of currency which, to them, is unpalatable or something they do not like. I cannot understand why the Land Commission could not be as good a customer as anybody else. If we accept the notion, in practice as well as in theory, that land owners are entitled to get the market value of their land, surely they are entitled to get it in the currency which they would get if they would put the land up for public auction?

Obviously there is some difficulty. I suggest to the Minister that, if he would address himself to correcting that difficulty in the farmers' minds— and which apparently had been in the minds of the auctioneers and lawyers but which now has been smoothed out —he might make his avowed purpose of acquiring land to deal with congestion a little more easy. Deputy Clinton put his finger on it when he said that if we eliminated the foreign buyer, to whom, in most cases, the 25 per cent means nothing, and let the Land Commission go in as an open competitor the same as any other buyer, we would overcome some of the difficulties of land owners who fear the Land Commission and who are prepared, as the Minister says, to "jump the gun" to avoid them.

The Minister quoted the NFA leaflet in which the NFA recognise the necessity of the Land Commission taking over land in certain circumstances. While we on this side listen to the Minister's specious arguments, we are worried about what the "certain circumstances" may be. The Minister told us of two of them. He told us this appeal is addressed to the bad farmer and the absent farmer. Because of the operation of section 13 with section 27, we are worried that it might also be extended to the Fine Gael farmer, in view of the unusual powers the Minister is taking under section 27 by which one of his officers may move in. We feel these two sections place in the hands of the Minister an instrument which may operate like a pincer for political purposes. I am sure the Minister will reject any suggestion of this nature, but he cannot blame us and he cannot blame the many land owners throughout the country if they feel some such movement may be put into operation against them. Even when it is not done, it will be suspected in many cases.

The Minister has taken a very regressive step in departing from established land practice and introducing section 27. It is that section which makes section 13 so particularly objectionable. It is not so much section 13 itself as when it is considered in the context of section 27. I would ask the Minister to tell us why he thinks farmers are so prepared to "jump the gun" if everything is as perfect as he would give us to understand.

Mr. S. Flanagan

I do not wish to say a great deal, except that it appears to me that the speakers immediately before me have an outlook completely different from mine. Fine Gael are either interested in the relief of congestion or they are not. If they are interested in relieving congestion, they should look at my part of the country where congestion is so acute. I do not accept that Deputy Clinton and Deputy Hogan from their constituencies have any real, practical knowledge of what actually happens in areas such as mine. Furthermore, they are doing a disservice to the public by continuing to spread around the idea that the Land Commission is not a good buyer. Because Land Bonds nowadays achieve parity with cash, the average person in the west of Ireland is not now anything like as reluctant to offer his land to the Commission as he was a couple of years ago. It is doing a public disservice to spread it abroad that the Land Commission's money is not now as good as that of anybody else, because in fact it is. I would hope and believe that in future whatever Government are here will take steps to ensure that Land Bonds represent their actual market value. It is on the basis that that does happen now and will continue to happen in the future that I base my argument that Deputy Hogan and Deputy Clinton are doing a disservice to the public by adopting their present approach.

I can say from my experience as a practising lawyer in a congested area that the number of holdings of land which I offer to the Land Commission for voluntary acquisition has increased ten-fold in the past few years, since the owners realised that the Land Commission were paying the equivalent of cash.

I agree with the Minister that considerable progress has been made in these directions by making concessions to the auctioneers, or, to rephrase that, by giving the auctioneers the fees to which they are entitled. Some progress has also been made towards streamlining the legal process. I do not accept that there is not still room for improvement in regard to the latter item, and I still think some simpler formula could be adopted. There is still some unnecessary delay but it is not unreasonable delay, and it is not such as would make any practical difference between the length of time it takes to investigate and pass a title in an ordinary private transaction and one between an individual and the legal department of the Land Commission.

Therefore, if Fine Gael would like to see congestion cured, or at least alleviated, in the west of Ireland, and if they do not accept that you must step in quickly when land becomes available, by what other means do Fine Gael suggest that the Land Commission can effectively speed up the relief of congestion? If we have a state of affairs where certain districts are left not much better off in 1964 than they were in 1934, by what method would they suggest that position should be remedied? It is still a fact that a large number of congested areas—mostly on the west coast of Ireland—are not much better off now than they were in 1934 in the matter of relief of congestion. Some are better off as a result of emigration —forced emigration and voluntary emigration—but they are not a great deal better off through the activities of the Land Commission, because the Land Commission have found it impossible in many instances to obtain enough land to put through any practical relief arrangements, and because in other cases the Land Commission have not been able to acquire the land they wanted in those areas by reason of the fact that when the owners put land up for sale they sold it by private treaty and sold it to persons who already had too much land. That is the sort of thing that must be stopped if any effective system of relief of congestion is ever to be attained in the west of Ireland.

We must remember that while Deputies from the richer parts of the country are speaking at length here, more and more land which might otherwise be acquired by the Land Commission is going into the hands of the bigger and better-off people. If Deputies want to do a real service to the people they will implement this Bill, and this section in particular, as quickly as they can and give us who live on a valuation of £1, £2 or £3 a chance, rather than standing up here and, from the lofty eminence of enormous holdings and vast riches, telling us in the poorer areas how we should behave ourselves and what steps should be taken to see that the people have a proper way of living. Most of the speeches were made by people who have a proper way of living and I suggest we have heard enough.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

There are three questions which I want seriously to ask the Minister relating to the points raised by Deputy Sweetman. I do not know whether the Minister tactfully avoided answering Deputy Sweetman or whether it was too embarrassing for him to go into detail. Every Deputy on this side of the House knows that congestion is a great problem and that it is a great problem in the west, in the south and in many pockets in the midlands. We know there is a problem of congestion in counties like Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal. It is the intention, the ambition and the desire of Fine Gael to contribute in no small way towards the solution of that problem in a commonsense manner and not by resorting to a law which will deprive the people of the rights of ownership of land. There are many ways in which the Land Commission can acquire large pools of land for the relief of congestion without resorting to the prohibition of sale, the prohibition of lettings and the prohibition of transfer of land.

Deputy Sweetman very correctly pointed out the difficulties and the distresses this section will cause in years to come. If this section is passed there is nothing to prevent the Minister from linking it with section 27 which gives him the authority—not the Land Commissioners, not the Lay Commissioners but the Minister as the political head of the Department—to send an officer to inspect any holding. I put it to the Minister that assuming any group of supporters of the Minister's Party, or of any Minister's Party, desire to make a petition for reasons known only locally that their neighbour's land be inspected and frozen for a period of 12 months—which the Minister has generously agreed to reduce to six months—the market value of that land will be reduced overnight. When a Land Commission inspector walks a farm it is generally expected that they are about to acquire it for division, and no one will be encouraged to enter into the public market to purchase it, with the result that the Land Commission can take it at their own price. They can take it at their own price if there is no competition in the local market for it.

If section 27 is passed—and it goes hand in hand with section 13 which we are now debating—I venture to say that the Minister, or any Minister occupying that office, will be faced with the distasteful problem of having to receive deputations and carry out inspections of land at the instance of political pressure groups. That is a power which no Minister and no Party should have. It should be left to an independent decision as it is now. The Land Commission should have the same right to administer the land laws as the courts have to administer our laws. Here we are saying for the first time that the Minister, or any Minister, can use this section to further his own political Party interests. He can comply with the wishes and requests of his own political Party organisation by carrying out inspections ad lib. on every farm he wants to and I venture to say, knowing the Fianna Fáil Party as I do, that if they get this power they will concentrate on inspecting the farms of Fine Gael supporters and others who disagree with them. That is why I am afraid of vesting this power in the hands of any Fianna Fáil Minster. He has not made any effort to deal with the possible abuse by any Minister of the powers which he has taken upon himself in this section. It is something which will not have an easy passage in so far as this side of the House is concerned.

In the course of his address this afternoon, the Minister pointed out that the Minister for Agriculture spoke in Loughrea last Sunday. Before the Summer Recess the Minister for Lands did not open his mouth about this new section and gave no inkling of its introduction. On the contrary, he spoke in this House before the Summer Recess and said that the purchase of land by aliens and non-nationals was not a problem.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.