Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 24 May 1966

Vol. 222 No. 13

Committee on Finance. - Vote 35—Lands (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That a sum not exceeding £3,155,000 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1967, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Offices of the Minister for Lands and of the Irish Land Commission.

—(Minister for Lands.)

Mr. M.P. Murphy

Before progress was reported last week, I had been discussing the purchase of land by land bonds and commenting on the unfairness of such a system. I instanced a particular case in my constituency to indicate clearly to the Minister and the House that the system is one that calls for review. In putting forward this case, I was not in any way indicting the Minister for any neglect of duty or, indeed, for any infringement so far as his office is concerned. I was merely citing a case that called for rectification, among any others of a similar nature there may be. that is the spirit in which I brought forward this particular case. As I mentioned on the previous day I have no doubt the Minister will take steps to rectify the position without delay.

The question of the purchase of land is a very important one because if the schemes envisaged by the Land Commission are to be implemented land must be obtained and it is desirable and essential that the Land Commission should project the best image possible so far as the purchase of land is concerned. The land bonds system is not one that appeals to people who have land for sale. The best way to meet this situation is to pay for land in cash. The 1965 Land Act gives power to buy land for cash other than land sold at public sales. I understand that prior to the 1965 Act only land purchased at public sales could be paid for with cash. Land bonds would be in order if there were not this big element of gambling about them and the people were sure that £100 in land bonds would be equivalent to £100. Mark you, as I mentioned previously in the case I mentioned to the House, this woman was told: "You will be paid in land bonds to the equivalent value of £11,000" which is very different from being told that she was being paid for the holding in £11,000 land bonds.

When this issue of land bonds about which I am talking was created in 1964 there were comments in the House from the Minister and from a number of Deputies about them. These comments are contained in the Official Reports for June 10, 1964, in Volume 210, at columns 1019 to 1029. Everybody was anxious to ensure that land bonds would hold their value and that the people who sold land for land bonds would get as near par as possible. This is what Deputy Sweetman had to say:

It would be desirable if in future issues of land bonds two things were borne in mind in so far as possible. First, it would be utterly impossible to have any goodwill for the Land Commission unless the rate of interest were so fixed that the value of the bonds was slightly over rather than slightly under par.

Here is the Minister's comment in regard to the six per cent series:

This current series, at all events, is satisfactory so far as our experience goes and the prospects for the future of this series appear to me to be good. I am not quite sure— I would not commit myself now— but I do not believe, offhand, that there is power at law to do what Deputy Sweetman has suggested, that is, to have the issue of bonds at a premium or at a discount.

I am taking these quotations at random. In regard to the question of turning bonds into money, we had a further statement from Deputy Sweetman arising from his experience in his profession which is the same as the Minister's:

I do not know whether the Minister has ever had the experience, as I have had, professionally, of getting some of this small issue of land bonds transferred to us in payment for costs in a Land Commission sale. In these small issues, it is very often a matter of waiting for a very long time to get a purchaser if one wants to sell...

That was Deputy Sweetman's experience in regard to land bonds, that it is very difficult to get a purchaser if you want to sell them. This is what we are trying to pay the people with who are selling land.

Mr. Moran

He said small amounts.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

The Minister brought in the question of the element of luck attached to bonds. He referred to the fixed interest security of bonds and then said:

I know this is not the real answer but it is partly the answer at all events, and there is, as the Deputy knows, a draw for land bonds and whoever has these bonds and they come out of the hat and he is lucky enough to get them, gets the full value.

That is a peculiar line-up, that if you are lucky enough and they come out of the hat, you get paid. This is a gambling system and you cannot win. Land bonds are never more than £100, they are never above par, but at the present this particular issue is very much below par. The Minister continued:

I do not know whether the Deputy was lucky in that transaction or not at any time but it is only, of course, a percentage of these people who are lucky enough to get full value for these depreciated bonds.

It is only right and just, so far as this House is concerned, and much as we like to help and co-operate in the purchase of land to relieve congestion, that we should realise our obligation to make this known to the people whose lands are being acquired, either by compulsion or through free sale, because rural people are not conversant with market fluctuations. Land bonds are entirely different from Government stock. When a person buys Government stock, he does so on his own account and he is not forced to do so. It is his duty to acquaint himself beforehand with any risks that are likely to confront him. He knows that there is a likelihood that the stock will drop in value and he takes that risk, having regard to the interest available and so on. He does that with his eyes open but farmers and landowners are not conversant with market fluctuations of bonds. The usual way of approaching the question, so far as my knowledge goes, is that people are told: "We will give you land bonds to the equivalent value of £1,000." If you say to the average landowner that you will pay him in land bonds equivalent in value to £1,000, he will say to you: "What are these land bonds? Can I turn them into cash straightaway?" Invariably he is told: "You will get land bonds to the equivalent value of £1,000." The only interpretations a person can put on that is that the land bonds are worth £1,000.

When the 1964 Land Bond Bill was before the House, the Minister rightly expressed concern that the bonds should be kept at par, or as near to it as possible. The Minister's anticipations in that regard were fulfilled until the summer of 1965 when there was a sharp decline in the value of land bonds. Everybody knows that this restriction of credit commenced during the summer of 1965. As a result there was a limited market for land bonds and they dropped in value by as much as ten per cent. That is a much bigger reduction than the Minister anticipated when these bonds were created in 1964. I am claiming in view of that sharp reduction, coming about without notice, so to speak, there is an obligation on the Minister to step in and compensate the owners of these bonds for the big losses they have suffered.

An Ceann Comhairle

Would that require legislation?

Mr. M.P. Murphy

No, I am not anticipating any legislation. In the 1965 Act the Minister is empowered to pay for land with cash. There is no longer any need to buy land with land bonds. I am sure the Minister can avail of the existing legislation to rectify this position.

The particular case I referred to here the last day is different from the cases that would come under the heading I have just mentioned. I made the claim that as far as this particular west-Cork case is concerned the lands should not have been vested at all in February, 1965, if the title was not in order or if there were some outstanding matters to be cleared up. Then, if they were not vested, the Minister in the meantime had created a new seven per cent land bond issue and this case would come within the scope of that issue. I asked the Minister questions in the House in December, 1965, about the fall in the value of land bonds. He told me he was issuing a new series of land bonds to cover outstanding cases where vesting had not taken place. These land bonds were subsequently issued.

I would like to take up some more time of the House in specifically referring to the case I mentioned here the last day. I feel it incumbent on me as a Deputy for the constituency to press for compensation for Mrs. McCarthy or any other person within the State who finds himself in a similar position. The facts are clear-cut and without contradiction. In view of land requirements for Land Commission work and afforestation in the future, we must project a fair and reasonable image of the Department of Lands. In the course of a letter from the Minister, which I mentioned the last day and which I do not wish to refer to at length again, he gave the reasons for the delay in making the bonds available—the possibility that rates were due to the county council, evidence as to whether lay tithes were payable on the land, letter from the estate duty office for the amount, if any, claimed for death duties and copies of folios to be written up. If there was any difficulty in the title, the Minister or his agents were completely wrong in vesting that land in themselves in February, 1965. They had no legal right to do so. If, on the other hand, all these items had been cleared up or were of little concern and had nothing to do with the vesting of the land, the bonds should have been available to this woman on the date indicated in the letter of 20th February, 1964, which informed her that land bonds representing the purchase money would be put to her credit when possession was taken. It now appears the Department of Lands are making the case that the title was not proved in February, 1965, when the vesting took place. If this matter was not closed in February, 1965, then it would have been delayed and the new issue of seven per cent bonds would have covered the case, which would never have come to this House.

I want to repeat what is actually involved in this. The Land Commission went along to this woman to buy one of the best farms of land in west Cork. On it were innumerable building sites that could have been sold at very high prices. In 1964 or early 1965, there was no mention whatever of the credit squeeze. We never heard anything about it until June, 1965. They went along and more or less indicated to this woman that, whether she liked it or not, they were going to take this land from her and her four children because for two years she had let the land. Then, thinking there was no use going against a Government Department and that whether she liked it or not, she would have to part with the lands, she agreed to take from the Land Commission land bonds to the equivalent value of £11,000. She has herself indicated quite clearly to the Minister that that was the bargain that was struck, land bonds to the value of £11,000.

Now this farm has been taken away from her possession since 1st February, 1965, and that woman and her family have not received one brown penny from the Minister, from the Commission or from anyone else. If the Minister feels she has got too much for it or if he is in any doubt about its value, this woman is quite prepared to call off the deal and keep her farm and let the Minister keep his bonds and his money, as anyone would be who has been waiting for money for more than 16 months.

I do not want to delay in covering ground I covered here last week, but I feel very strongly about this. I want to summarise the matter briefly: first, the bonds have lost in value £1,265; secondly, if this farm had been sold privately, the accrued interest would possibly be another £1,000 on the amount of money, taking the current lending rate of seven per cent into account. Therefore, it is quite true to say that this woman has been out approximately £2,250. Surely the Minister is not going to defend that action here in the House? When he is replying, I hope and expect that he will acknowledge the justification of this woman's claim and compensate her accordingly.

Mr. Moran

I shall give the facts.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I am giving the Minister the facts.

Mr. Moran

I know the facts and the Deputy is not giving them.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

All my statements relative to this matter are completely factual and I take it that the letters from the Minister's Department which I have here are the same facts as the Minister has, that I have not changed or departed from the facts which were given to me.

Mr. Moran

The simple fact is that this woman's solicitor will not give us the title to the land, and the money is lying there for her.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

That is not so. However, if the title was wrong or if the title was not in order in February, 1965, how then did the Land Commission vest the land in themselves? That is what I do not understand as a layman. The Minister as a solicitor has an advantage over me.

Mr. Moran

Because it is the law and because we have got no title to this place at all. I have asked for it and he will not give it to me.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

How did the Land Commission vest the land in themselves on 19th February, 1965, if the title was not in order? That does not happen in private sales.

Mr. Moran

It happens in every single case under the Land Commission procedure.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

What special rights have the Land Commission over and above private individuals? It is no harm for many people up and down the country who may be selling land to the Land Commission to know all the facts and to know the difficulty they may encounter in being paid for it. Let us assume for one moment that the Minister is correct, that he got no title to this land, how did the Land Commission take possession of the land, vest it in themselves and retain it since without paying a penny for it? To my mind, that is not a businesslike way of approaching a question such as this. It is an unfair way, and at the outset I mentioned the grievances of people caught in this credit squeeze of 1965 or caught in the reduction of bonds. I am not making any charge against the Minister. I am stating facts here with a view to getting the position rectified. I feel the Minister is bound morally and I would say—and I am not a legal man—legally to compensate this person. However, I cannot understand how it is that if the title is not in order a body, such as the Land Commission can take over land and vest it in themselves.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy has referred to that at least three times.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I know, but it is a striking point, and here is something that follows it: if the title is not in order or if proper title is not forthcoming, then this person cannot go through with the sale to the Land Commission and the sale should fall through. Is that not the obvious outcome if that is the position?

I have gone into this case in detail in order to bring to the notice of the House and the country the position that obtains in regard to these bonds. I have indicated that the position which obtained last year never obtained before, that is, that in the course of a few months, the value of land bonds reduced by more than ten per cent. That is the main cause of the trouble, and that position never obtained since the land bonds were first created in 1925, that there was such a sharp reduction in so short a time.

I am hopeful that the Minister will give fair and just consideration to the facts of this case as I have set them out here. I have no doubt that if he does so, he will come to only one conclusion, that this is a justifiable case. Once he comes to that conclusion, he is bound to take action on it and, similarly, if there are any other such cases existing, as I am sure there are in other parts of the country, the Minister is obliged to take the same action in regard to them. I believe that no member here could stand up and say it was wrong for the Minister or for the Land Commission to take that action.

If the Land Commission are to succeed in their work—and I do not think they can succeed in reaching the target that has been set for them of providing our uneconomic holders with economic holdings of from 40 to 45 acres—we must consider how the land is to be provided. How could land be secured to provide the big number of uneconomic holders with the requisite amount of land, when possibly more than 60 per cent or almost two out of every three holdings can be deemed to be uneconomic? To do so you would have to take at least one-third of the holdings and divide them among the neighbouring landowners in order to bring them up to the target mark set by the Land Commission.

There are great demands on the Land Commission at the present time. For a variety of reasons, sentimental and otherwise, people were reluctant to avail of the exchange of holdings schemes some years ago. That position no longer obtains. Ther are in many parts of this country—in West Cork we have a substantial number of uneconomic holdings — people clamouring to the Land Commission to provide them with an exchange of holding. They are anxious to leave because their present holdings are not economic. I know well that of the number of applications which will be approved, at least twenty times that number will be rejected. In my estimation, at the present time, and taking my own locality into account the Land Commission are not catering for one in 20 of the applications they get —applications from people who fully comply with all the qualifications for exchange of holdings. It is only natural that the number of applications should grow and grow sharply, because undoubtedly the number of holders who have been transferred from West Cork did very well indeed. There is no doubt about that. I visited some of the holdings to which they were transferred and, indeed, they have every reason to be grateful to the Land Commission. They got holdings in every way far superior to those they left and, in my opinion, some of these holdings are, in value, at least ten times as great as the holdings they gave to the Land Commission. It is of course a great advantage to those people to be removed from an uneconomic holding and put into a sound economic one with a dwellinghouse and a suitable range of outhouses.

It would, indeed, be a great blessing if we could do that for the thousands of applicants we have but, unfortunately we cannot do so. We cannot do it, no matter how much we would like to because we have not the resources. Therefore, I entirely agree with the efforts the Land Commission are making, in so far as they can, to transfer people from uneconomic to economic districts. The farms they leave behind them help, to some extent, in making the neighbouring holdings economic.

I know there is a big outcry in so far as some people are concerned— both in Church and State—against the flight from the land, and against this transfer of people from the uneconomic districts. Some people feel it is inadvisable to reduce still further the population of these districts but, having regard to all the circumstances, I certainly could not blame any farmer, who was lucky enough to have his application for a Land Commission holding approved, for leaving the particular uneconomic district and transferring to another where an economic holding will be available to him.

On this question I should like the Minister to indicate clearly to the House what essential qualifications are taken into account in approving applications for exchange of holdings. The number of applications must be very big in proportion to the number allowed. What are the qualifications? Is everything fair and above board or, as some of his Party would give people to understand, are applications based on political qualifications? I am not sure that is the case. I am not saying it is the case but I am saying that some of his own people give applicants to understand that unless their applications come under favourable notice to the Land Commission they have no hope of being approved. I am sure the Minister will kill that assertion because it is unfair to the Land Commission inspectors who have a big and difficult job to do. They have to work under political patronage whether they like it or not. I am mentioning it as a matter of public interest and as a matter with which I hope the Minister will deal when replying because I am not satisfied, despite all that has been said, that there are any grounds for this assertion. I attribute it more to a small party down in the country trying to get kudos for something without justification. I am not taking it too seriously but I should like the Minister to refer to it in his reply.

I should like to comment for a few minutes under Subhead 1. The reason I do so arises from an interjection of Deputy Kitt on the last day That I was against creating additional employment. The only additional employment I mentioned at the time, in the Minister's two Votes, was that the inspectorate staff had been increased. But what do we find? We find that the pattern which prevails in other Departments so far as redundancy is concerned, redundancy of the ordinary manual worker, is also to be found in this Estimate on Lands. The Minister indicates the importance of works covered by Subhead I which he says include:

... the erection of dwellinghouses and out-offices; the provision of access roads; fencing and drainage; provision of water supply for domestic and stock requirements; turbary development; repair and maintenance of embankments.

He goes on to say:

Subhead I is invariably a popular debating sector in the Lands Vote. Last year, the amount provided under Subhead I was £900,000 ...

This has come down this year by, I understand, approximately £295,000. As far as employment is concerned, it is a very important sector of that particular Vote because we are told in the Minister's statement that employment was given to some 630 men. Therefore, I am assuming, when there is a reduction of more than 30 per cent in this particular Subhead, that more than 250 men will lose their employment as a result. It is something which should concern all Members of this House very deeply that under one Subhead alone, the probability is that at least 250 men will lose employment. If Deputy Kitt were here, I would say to him that so far as employment is concerned under this Estimate, the picture is not a very rosy one.

Looking through the Estimate, I see a sum of £45,000 to buy land in 1966 on a national basis. What in the name of heaven does the Minister think he would get for £45,000? About 14 or 15 small holdings at £3,000 each. To say in the national Parliament that we are allocating a sum of £45,000 to buy holdings is a good one.

Mr. Moran

As I said to Deputy Flanagan, the Deputy is forgetting the man's own holding is purchased from him by the Land Commission. That is in addition to the price of his own holding.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

The Minister is making £45,000 available to people who sell their own holdings to the Land Commission——

Mr. Moran

And buy a new one for themselves.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

The Minister will agree that the number of people who will benefit by this scheme will be very limited indeed.

Mr. Moran

This is starting a new scheme.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

There is another matter to which I should like to refer while I am dealing with lands. When the Land Commission acquire land it should be divided without undue delay. On 2nd February, 1966, the Minister gave me particulars of holdings in the hands of the Land Commission in County Cork. We find that the Land Commission have had one place with 63 acres since 1st February, 1961. In the second place they have had 155 acres since 20th March, 1962. In the third case they have had 324 acres since 5th December, 1962. In the fourth case they have had 87 acres since 13th May, 1963, and so on.

What is the need for holding on to that land and letting it out in grazing for a number of years after it has been acquired by the Land Commission? Why not divide it there and then? It is bought for subdivision among local congested holders, and why keep them in suspense for up to three years on average, before dividing the land? I said during previous debates on the Minister's Estimate that land could be divided inside four or five months, or half a year at the longest. I have advocated that the best way to divide land is for the inspector, when his recommendations are available, to call together all the landowners who are interested in the division and explain to them publicly what his recommendations are.

I also feel that more power should be vested in the local inspector—the man going around and meeting these people and with a knowledge of the position—than is vested in him at present. His answer now is: "I did all I could. The only power I have is to make recommendations to Dublin. Unless the Dublin people approve what I have recommended I have no power."

Mr. O'Hara

He would be foolish to say anything else.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I think Irish people are very reasonable. Subdivision can give rise to to a number of difficulties but I am a firm believer in calling all the people together and having the Land Commission inspector announce what his recommendations are.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

He would want a fast car.

Mr. Moran

He would want to increase his insurance.

Mr. P.J. Burke

Let the Deputy make his speech.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I am most grateful to Deputy Burke for his kindly intervention and if I may depart from the debate for a moment I hope he enjoyed himself at Kinsale recently.

Mr. P.J. Burke

It was very good.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I think better division would result if the type of scheme I have advocated were implemented. The inspector could possibly get the co-operation of four or five farmers who would benefit, to hand over some of their own lands for resettlement. If there were four farmers who would benefit by a particular holding being acquired, and if there was a system whereby five holdings could be handed over to the Land Commission, all the land could be divided into five different allotments. That would lead to an adjustment of boundaries.

We all know how mixed land can create difficulties amongst neighbours. There have been law cases about trespass. These are factors the Land Commission should take into account, and do away with rights of user, and boreens, and so on, which lead to friction, and have lead to friction in rural Ireland down through the years. It is pleasing to note that the present generation are more sensible and that we do not have as many law cases as we have had in the past over this difficulty of mixed land.

It is a primary function of the Land Commission to try to make holdings as compact as possible. They should co-operate with the local people who are anxious to draw new boundary lines. The Minister seems to think that this is ridiculous but I am a firm believer in my assertion that the best way to divide land is to bring together all the local people and have the inspector speak to them in his official capacity as an agent of the Land Commission, a body set up to be independent and impartial and to act fairly and impartially towards all applicants. I do not see any danger so far as the inspector is concerned if that could be brought about.

I do not think there is any need for me to delay any longer on the Lands side of the Estimate. As I mentioned, the Minister had his own difficulties. He has had to be content with a reduction of £259,000. I am sure he made the best effort possible to impress on the Government and the Minister for Finance that the Estimate should be held at the same figure as last year, but due to the shortage of capital and the times in which we live, he had to be satisfied with this reduction. I do not want to go back on the land bonds again but I am sure the Minister will tell us in his closing statement that land bonds will be in plentiful supply to offset the reduction so far as land purchase is concerned.

When we come to deal with the Second Estimate, unfortunately we find the position is very black and the outcome is anything but rosy. The Minister said:

Turning to the Forestry Vote there is a nett decrease of £204,200 in the amount being provided as compared with the Vote for 1965-66.

That sum of £204,200 is a significant percentage decrease in the Estimate because you must take side by side with this reduction of £204,200, the position that obtains at the present, that is, that costs of all kinds are increasing and naturally forestry workers will be getting an increase. I am sure the increase will be dated from 1st April, that is, covering the current year, so taking into account the decline of £204,200 in the Estimate, together with the increased cost in all Departments, and an increase in the wages bill, there is bound to be a big reduction in the turnover of that seccreasin tion of the Minister's Department in the current year.

I must give credit to the Minister for making no secret of this. He tells us the reduction will be big. Later on in his statement, he states that he must reduce the acreage for planting this year by more than 5,000. The plantable target for this year is the lowest for a number of years. It stands at 20,000 acres. The last available figures we had from the Forestry Department show that the output stood at 25,935 so here is a reduction of almost 6,000 acres against the year ending 31st March, 1964, in the area to be planted.

I believe the Minister should not have allowed that position to arise. I know very well the money problems which the Government have at present but taking into account the fact that this reduction will have its effect, and possibly to a greater extent than indicated by the Minister, on employment in the Department, I believe the Minister had a justifiable case to put before the Minister for Finance and the Government as to why there should not be a reduction in the Forestry Estimate. Forestry in many parts of this country is giving good employment, even though the wage rates are not high. Unfortunately, forestry workers, in comparison with what people in other much softer jobs are earning, are getting very poor wages. Forestry workers have to be out in wind and weather. They have a hard and difficult job to do and in most cases they are working on a piecework basis. Their average earnings are not more than £9 a week.

We all agree that a wage of £9 at present is scarcely sufficient for a single man, not to mind a man with a wife and family to support. I am sure the statistics available to the Minister indicate that on an average forestry workers do not earn more than £9 weekly. The Minister must agree that with increased costs that is a very small wage indeed. I would say at this stage that there is undoubtedly an obligation on the Minister to address himself to this question of the wages of forestry workers. I am sure that if he does so, he will be satisfied that they are entitled to an increase. I am sure they will not be looking for an increase retrospective to 1963 or 1964. They would be satisfied if they got the increase possibly from 1st January, 1966.

Many people in rural Ireland, despite the smallness of forestry workers' wages, are very happy to have that work, because they do not have to emigrate. It is a regrettable feature of the Minister's statement that he had to indicate that there will and must be a reduction in the number of workers employed. I had a letter two weeks ago from three workers who had been employed for nine or ten years on the West Cork afforestation scheme who got notice that their services were no longer required. I want to make a special appeal here to the Minister that if, as a result of the reduction in money and the squeeze that is being put on the Minister by the Government and the Minister for Finance the number of workers must be reduced, cognisance should be taken of the service of those old-established employees of the Forestry Department. It is completely out of place to say to such old-established workers that we now have no further use for their services and they must go. That is wrong. If there is to be some cutting down, it should be done under some other head and if at all possible those long-standing employees of the Department should be continued in employment.

The Minister stated that there must be unemployment because we have not enough money to employ the 5,000 workers we had last year and some workers must of necessity be let go. If that position obtains, the best way, in fairness, to meet that situation is to say that the last man in is the first man out. If he does that, those old-established employees will still remain in their jobs.

On the question of the acquisition of land for afforestation, the Minister told us he purchased 21,645 acres last year. That was more than enough to meet his requirements, having regard to the marked reduction in planting. He told us that expenditure during the year totalled £115,822 and covered the purchase of 486 individual lots.

He went on:

The productive area acquired was only slightly over 18,000 acres and was, I regret to say, the lowest annual intake of productive lands since 1956-57. Experience during the past year shows increasing difficulty in maintaining an adequate intake of plantable land and the prospects of improvement in the current year are not so bright.

Since the days when Deputy Blowick was Minister for Lands, I have been warning the Department in this respect and the position obtains more so today than ever before. The Department do not pay a reasonable price for land for afforestation purposes. The payment made last year was at the rate of £5 7 per acre. In present day money values there is no justification for paying such a low price. It is no wonder there is such difficulty in obtaining land.

It may be asserted that some of the land is located in remote districts, but taking into account that the land could be utilised for sheep grazing and for the grazing of certain types of cattle, there is no justification for an average price of £5 7 per acre, no matter to what use the farmers would put the land. Surely the land would be worth more to them utilised in any other way than selling it to the Department at the average price paid last year? Neither is there justification for imposing a limit of £10 per acre on the price that may be paid for land for afforestation. The Department's agents, I understand, may not pay more than £10 per acre. Am I correct? Would the Minister mind answering me?

Mr. Moran

I should prefer to answer the Deputy generally when I am replying.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

The Minister may not be sure. This limit of £10 per acre should be removed. It may be said that the Minister's agents are doing a good job in this respect and that they deserve commendation. I suppose their job is to buy up land for afforestation as cheaply as they can get it but unfortunately what is happening is that much of the land the Department have purchased came from farmers in difficult financial circumstances. They were forced, through lack of funds, to sell portion of their land to the Department in order to acquire some capital to develop the remainder of their holdings. That has happened in numerous cases.

The number of people who will do that is decreasing and consequently in the future the Minister will find it more difficult to acquire land for afforestation. From my knowledge of a number of transactions between the Minister and landowners throughout the country, the Minister has come out well. He has got the land in most cases for what, in my opinion, was less than the market value. I am not finding fault with this in any respect. It is the job of his officials to get the land as cheaply as possible, but, as I have said, they have got the land in many cases from people forced by circumstances to sell.

Now, Sir, there should be a reasonable income from a sale of timber by the Department. A number of earlier plantations are maturing and one would think that there should be a sizeable income from them. I do not think the Minister mentioned last year's income in his statement. I understood that the income to the Department from sales from plantations reached the £¾ million mark two years ago and possibly it should be in or around the £1 million mark now.

The desirability of processing that timber, if at all possible, in the area where it is grown was mentioned by Deputy Flanagan. That would be an added advantage in so far as employment is concerned and possibly it would be processed as cheaply there as, if not more cheaply than in the city or large urban districts. That is a matter the Minister should keep in mind. At the present time I think the Department sell the growing timber to buyers on the spot and as a result there is little or no local employment in the felling or haulage of that timber because these buyers bring in their own men from cities and towns. Therefore, the employment for local workers is negligible.

Before I conclude on the forestry question, there is a question which has not been resolved so far. It relates to extending the five day week to the winter months. Seeing that other workers have it all the year round, I think that, if at all possible, it should be extended to the forestry workers to cover the full year.

In conclusion, I should like to impress on the Minister again that my remarks here on land bonds and all they entail were a factual appraisal of the position and I am reminding the Minister, before I resume my seat, to treat the particular case I cited, and any other similar cases, fairly and sympathetically. I am in no way indicting the Minister or holding him responsible for the position obtaining. But seeing that it has obtained and seeing that something that never happened before happened in 1965, so far as the depreciation of land bonds is concerned, I leave it to the Minister's bounden duty to see to the position and rectify it, when he has satisfied himself, as no doubt he will, of the justice of the claim I have made here. I do not think there is any point in labouring the matter further and I do hope the Minister will accept my criticism of the system of buying land by land bonds in the spirit in which I put it forward: that it is something which I considered essential to bring to the notice of the House and the Minister with a view to improving the general picture so far as land bonds are concerned and with a view to projecting a more favourable image of land bonds and the purchase of land through land bonds to the general public and particularly to the many people who may be selling land to the Land Commission in the immediate future.

Land bonds have not projected a favourable image. There is too much of a gamble attached to them and we should not ask our people, when they are buying land bonds, to take a gamble so far as the fluctuation of prices of land bonds are concerned. If we have no liquid cash to meet the purchase of our land requirements and if we are to continue buying land through the medium of land bonds, there is an obligation on us to ensure that the price of the bonds does not fluctuate. I should like to put that forcibly and strongly to the Minister and I have no doubt that when the Minister is replying, I shall be fully satisfied that he is taking proper steps to meet the situation.

Mr. Kitt

I put down three questions on Wednesday, 4th May, 1966, to the Minister for Lands about the division of an estate in my locality. I gave notice to the Ceann Comhairle that I would raise the matter on the Adjournment because I was not satisfied with the reply I received to my questions. The Ceann Comhairle said he would communicate with me later and he did so. Members of his staff came to me and I found that I would have been limited to certain aspects by raising the matter on the Adjournment either on that night or the following week.

In view of the fact that the Land Commission Estimate was coming up, I said I would leave it for discussion on the Estimate because the Ceann Comhairle advised me that I would have more scope in raising the matter then. It is in deference to the wishes of the Ceann Comhairle and his office that I have left the matter until now.

I do not wish to go over the whole matter again but the questions I put down are as follows. The first one is that I

asked the Minister for Lands if the policy of the Land Commission of late, as operated by the Land Commission Office, Galway, is to grant the tenants with the highest valuation adjoining an estate the greatest additions of land and those with small valuations and small holdings very small additions or none at all, as happened in the division of the former holding of Mr. Eddie Loughnane, Ballyara, Menlough, Ballinasloe, County Galway, and other similar holdings which were recently divided in East Galway.

Question No. 15 in column 1213 of the Official Report of the 4th May, 1966, was to ask

the Minister for Lands if he will state, as regards the division of the former holding of Mr. Eddie Loughnane, Ballyara, Menlough, Ballinasloe, County Galway, by the Land Commission, the names of the allottees granted additions, the land valuations of each allottee prior to the division, and the Land Commission estimate of the value of the allotment granted to each of the allottees.

I put great value on the third part of my question;

the Land Commission estimate of the value of the allotment granted to each of the allottees

as well as the land valuations of each tenant and the number of acres they got. I can appreciate that 1,000 acres of a mountain can be given to a tenant and that it will be only worth, say, 1/-or 6d per acre, whereas five or six acres of good land would be much better value. That is why I wanted that particular part of my question answered.

The third question was:

to ask the Minister for Lands if he will state, as regards the division of the former holding of Mr. Eddie Loughnane, Ballyara, Menlough, Ballinasloe, County Galway by the Land Commission, why two of the tenants adjoining the estate, namely Mrs. Mary Fahey and Tom Bellew, did not get additions even though their valuations were much smaller than those of other tenants who got substantial divisions on this holding.

The Minister replied at length giving the valuations, which I knew myself, and which showed that my question was correct. The tenant with the highest valuation of £27 3s got 21 acres and the tenant with the lowest valuation, a married man with five or six children, of £17 16s only got six acres. In other words, the man with the highest valuation as you come down the ladder got the largest amount of land and the man with the lowest valuation got the smallest amount of land and so on until you came down to nothing.

It was the most stupid division ever made, to my mind. In this locality all the tenants were on the perimeter of this estate. They were taking conacre on it from the former owners and some of them from the Land Commission since they acquired it a few years ago. The division was just across the road from them and one man who got nothing at all was actually on the estate. A schoolboy would have divided it by giving a division to each one across the road. Mrs. Fahey's son who had land taken for six cattle got nothing at all; he is in the NFA and in the dairy business but is not married yet. Mrs. Fahey has another son married with three children. Mrs. Fahey's unmarried son was, in fact, about to buy the land but for the common good, he decided he would let the Land Commission take it because he was sure he would get some of it.

There is another widow living half a mile away with her son and they gave her an allotment and Mrs. Fahey and her son were knocked out of it. It was divided on 20th January, 1966. I went in to the Galway office of the Land Commission the following Monday or Tuesday and brought Mrs. Fahey's son with me—that was before there was ever a stake or fence put down—to protest against what everybody said was an unjust division.

The Dáil had adjourned, but the week after we met, towards the end of January, I went to the Minister's office with my colleagues, Deputies Carty and Millar, and we pointed this out again. We were supposed to hear something about it but, so far as I am concerned, I have heard nothing. I decided on 3rd March, 1966, to write, and I wrote five letters of which I kept copies. When the Minister answered my questions, I quoted my letters and during the exchanges which followed the Minister's reply in column 1215, I said that I wrote to the two Land Commissioners, to the Secretary of the Land Commission, to the Chief Inspector and to the Deputy Chief Inspector. One letter was addressed to the Secretary of the Land Commission, who is also a Commissioner, one to the Commissioner, who is a Roscommon man and, being from the west, I thought he might look into it, one to the chief inspector and one to the deputy chief inspector, whom the Minister appointed over the west. The letter was written on 3rd March. It reads as follows:

I wish to protest in the strongest possible manner against the unjust division of the former holding of Eddie Loughnane, Ballyara, Menlough, Ballinasloe, County Galway, by the Land Commission.

It has shocked the public conscience in the locality and all faith in the Land Commission has been lost in the area as a result.

I enclose list of land valuations of the tenants surrounding it who got allotments and you will see that the tenant, John Collins, with the highest land valuation, £27. 3. 0., got the highest addition and the tenant with the lowest land valuation, Patrick Ryan, a married man with a young family, got the smallest addition, 5¾ acres.

The Minister said six. He did not get a full six because he signed for five acres, three roods and 20 perches. That is what he told me.

To make matters worse, the two tenants with the second lowest valuation got nothing at all, one Tom Bellew, whose lands are actually nearing it, land valuation £19 13. 0., and the other, Mrs. Mary Fahy and her son, Thomas, land valuation £18 2. 0., and who had land taken on it from the original owner, E. Loughnane, and who were in fact going to buy a portion of it from him prior to the Land Commission acquiring it but didn't do so for the common good. Furthermore, Mrs. Fahy and her son, Thomas, had it taken in grazing from the Land Commission since it was acquired and now they have been evicted by the Land Commission and got no addition whatsoever and although he is a member of the NFA and has six cows grazing on it some of which he must now sell. The portion across the road from their house has been allotted to another widow and her son, Mrs. Mary Lally, who has been brought in from over ½ mile away and who already had a good holding with the land valuation of £21 10.0.

I cannot understand what has happened and I am awaiting an explanation in the matter and, failing to get same, I'll have to raise it in Leinster House, which I intend to do if I have to have a Question down every week from now until the summer recess.

Awaiting a reply as soon as possible.

Sincerely yours,

Michael Kitt.

Five copies of that letter were sent to the five people I have mentioned. There must be a hierarchy of orders in the Land Commission. From the Deputy Chief Inspector, I got the following reply on 14th March, a fortnight afterwards.

A Theachta, a chara,

I wish to acknowledge receipt of your communication of the 3rd instant regarding the division of the Loughnane Estate at Ballyara, Menlough, Ballinasloe, and to state that the matter has been noted for such consideration as is possible.

Mise, le meas,

R.A. Tarpey,

Deputy Chief Inspector.

Mr. O'Hara

There is not much fat in that one.

Mr. Kitt

At least he had the courtesy to reply even after a fortnight. I wrote my letter on 3rd March. The silence was broken for the second time on 15th April, 1966.

Dear Mr. Kitt,

I have your letter dated 3rd March, 1966, and enclosure concerning the above estate. In reply I may say that the matters you mention have been noted.

The delay in acknowledging your letter is regretted; it was due to my absence abroad.

Yours sincerely,

T. O'Sullivan,

Chief Inspector.

I do not know what colonies we have abroad. I do not know if the Chief Inspector was out dividing land, or what he was doing. Perhaps he was looking after our migrants abroad. I would be much better pleased if he or the Deputy Chief Inspector would come down to my constituency and investigate this unjust division of land. I tabled a question about this. I have written letters. I received replies from the Deputy Chief Inspector and from the Chief Inspector. From the rest the silence of the tomb. I did not even get an acknowledgment. Perhaps they, too, were abroad looking after our migrants. Perhaps the Minister has not given them enough staff to enable them to reply to Deputies from the west of Ireland who are looking after the interests of their constituents. I have not been abroad very often but on the few occasions on which I have I have ensured that my constituents' letters are answered and that my work is looked after and I am neither half nor a quarter as well paid as these officials. If they have not got enough staff, the Minister should provide it for them.

I protest in the strongest possible manner, and I am speaking now on behalf of every Deputy, against the way in which I was treated. I got two replies; one took a fortnight and the other six weeks. From the rest the silence of the tomb. I have a suspicion that it is not a question of shortage of staff. I have a suspicion—it is more than a suspicion—that they have no answer to give me. The only answer they could give is the one I have requested—a sworn inquiry or a thorough investigation into the division of this estate. It is the talk of the place. Everyone is asking why does someone not come down and look into it.

I mentioned that one man got 21 acres and another got six. I said the six might be as good as the 21. But I asked here what value the Land Commission put on each allotment and the Minister got over his difficulty very nicelv indeed. He did not give me the exact figures, but I happen to know them. I will put them on the records. The people who got the allotments know them. It is a simple sum to work out from the Minister's reply. The average value per acre of these two allotments is estimated to be about 40 per cent of the average value of the other allotments. Let us take the six acres, the lowest allotment, at £100 per acre; the person who got that got £600 worth of land. If the 21 acres is worth 40 per cent, as the Minister stated here, on an average, he has got 21 times 40, which is £840. Therefore the man with the highest valuation and with the biggest farm already gets 21 acres worth £840 and the man with the lowest valuation gets six acres worth £600, assuming that it is, as the Minister stated in his reply, sub-standard land. But it is all the one field. There are only 89 acres in it. Anybody could make eight or nine equal divisions of it and there would not be a question about it.

I do not want to deny anyone anything but I cannot understand why the man with the highest valuation should have got £840 worth instead of only £200 or £300 worth and I demand that there will be a thorough investigation into this and the land be redivided justly and fairly. The Minister may say that, once the division has taken place, it is finished and done with. I raised the matter here before in relation to a holding of land which was divided in Bohill, Ballyforan, Ballinasloe, County Galway, and I was nearly ruled out of order. Maybe I did go a bit outside the rules of order. I did not know them as well then as I do now. But we had the same Minister for Lands and I kept raising this matter week after week and I proved satisfactorily that the land had been unfairly divided.

That land was redivided. People who had not got additions the first time were given them on the subsequent redivision. What was done before can be done again. It took me nearly 12 months, but it was done. There was a controversy in the newspapers and I nearly lost my health. But I fought it and I shall fight this until justice is done. This is not an isolated case. The same thing has happened in Newbridge, Ballinasloe, with the same inspector. It has happened in the Gilmore Estate, Moylough. It has happened in Clonbrock. Deputy Millar had a question about a man who got 80 acres of land, a man who also had a shop. But Deputy Millar did not pursue it. It has happened in Tiaquin. They gave on old IRA man and his son two or three acres. He had the lowest valuation in the place. That seems to be the pattern.

I think it is laid down in our Constitution that we should try to put as many families as possible on the land. That is what the people of the Land League fought for. Our Constitution, too, which was enacted by the Irish people, specifies that we should put as many families on the land as possible. However, that will not happen if the Land Commission continue to act as they have been acting in my constituency of East Galway. They are making the rich richer and some of the poor a little better off and leaving some of them as they are.

I want to protest, and I think I have done it now, in the strongest possible manner about the division of this estate—and that was my principal reason in intervening in this debate. I shall leave other matters to other Deputies. When I asked permission to raise this matter on the Adjournment I said I would avail of the opportunity provided by this Estimate to make my protest. I hope that the investigation and the inquiry I have sought will be undertaken and I think I am entitled to it in view of the replies I have read out here from the Land Commission and all the trouble I have gone to since 20th January last in an endeavour to ensure some semblance of fair play for these people. I think I have now proved my case to the satisfaction of this House.

I raised some political matter in this connection the last day but I am leaving that out now completely for the simple reason that, on justice and on the figures alone which I have quoted here, I think it will be obvious to everybody that a grave injustice has been done in the division of this estate and the same pattern is followed in the other instances I mentioned. I asked if that was the policy of the Land Commission and the Minister has not given me a satisfactory reply about it. I believe that, according to our Constitution, we should put as many families as possible on the land. We should bring up the smaller people to the proper standards first. People with higher valuations should get the lesser increases. The matter should be evened out in a fair and equitable way.

I want to compliment the Minister on the acquisition of a good amount of land and particularly on the arrangement he made with the Auctioneers' Association. I believe that that was one of the reasons he got a good amount of land into the land pool for division in my constituency. We had a few big estates like the Smith estate which was recently divided and the big estate in Ballyglunin and they contributed to a large extent to the land pool and helped to relieve congestion in East Galway.

The Minister had this to say, in the course of his speech:

Special emphasis will be given to the direct allotment of additional land to bring smallholders up to the current family farm standard. The provision of buildings does not generally arise in these cases and the usual range of estate improvements works—roads, fences and drains—will be carried through as far as practicable.

An estate was divided in Fohenagh, the Clonbrock estate, linking the parish of Fohenagh and the parish of Caltra. Some new houses are being erected. I should like, in passing, to congratulate the Land Commission on the improved new buildings they are now putting up. As usual, however, the job was not completed so far as the road going through that estate is concerned. In the former division of this estate, they built a road from the Caltra side in through Pallas. From the Fohenagh side, they have made it to connect with the other. They have made the fences all right to make the road but the road is not there: nothing is there but a green field. They compensated the person who gave the field to make that road.

The Galway County Council, of which I am a member, have always taken over these roads that are constructed under the Rural Improvements Scheme or the Land Commission, and so on, when they are put into reasonable repair. In this case, the road would serve houses on both sides of the estate. It would be a short cut for going to fairs, Mass, and so on. However, there is one spot in the middle which is left unfinished and now it is nobody's baby. When they started the job at all, the Land Commission should have finished it. It would have given employment and resulted in useful work but the Land Commission spoiled it all by not completing the job. I appeal to them to finish this road on that estate so that we in the Galway County Council will be able to take it over and maintain it.

With these remarks, I shall conclude. Having proved successfully the injustice in relation to the estate I mentioned, I trust we shall have the inquiry which I have sought and that this estate will be redivided fairly and justly.

Mr. McLaughlin

I heard another Deputy speak about land bonds. I think it only right for me to mention here that there are many people worried about this question of land bonds when it comes to disposing of a plot of land or even a big farm. I might say that most people today ask: "How do these land bonds work out? Do we get money for our farm or have we to wait? What is the interest, and so forth?" It is easy to believe that people will sell their land to anybody before they will go bargaining with the Land Commission, not knowing how they will finish up and not knowing when they will get their money. That is one aspect, I think, in relation to which the Land Commission should follow the same pattern as the Forestry Section as far as paying for land taken over is concerned. Every Deputy has had that experience. People come to me for advice and, as I have said before, they will do anything before they will go to the Land Commission. They will get rid of their land and try to sneak away quietly without anybody knowing anything about it. Perhaps they will pay off a debt and go to England and have no delays attached to the disposal of the holding.

There is another problem also with which I am quite familiar in my own area. As a matter of fact, I have gone to the Land Commission and corresponded with them, I suppose, five or six times within the past 18 months in relation to it. I have in mind an aged farmer who lived on his own and then sold his farm, after long and careful consideration, to the Land Commission. The Land Commission took over the farm and have set it. He dare not put a beast in on it but still he has not got any money. I was at a meeting of a pensions committee and that poor man was more than glad to find out that he qualified for a pension. He asked me to contact the Department of Social Welfare so that they would let him have his pension book as soon as possible, as he needed it. It is very hard that a person up to 70 years of age whose farm has been taken over must look for an old age pension book to keep him because he dare not put a beast in on the farm or let it but must wait until the Land Commission have everything straightened out. I would sincerely ask the Minister to try to cut down on such delay and to give such people the attention they deserve.

I remember that, when I first came into Dáil Éireann, I had before me the case of a man who had cycled 20 miles to see me because, although he had sold his farm to the Land Commission, he had not got his money for it. This type of thing should not happen in 1966. As public men, it is a fact that if we did not get our cheques for two months we should be inquiring about the delay. Surely people who lived and worked all their lives on their farms, and then sold them to the Land Commission, are more than anxious to get their money? It should happen in the same way as in the case of the Forestry Section—pay the money when the job is done. A sum of £45,000 allotted, along with the price received sometimes for land taken over by the Land Commission, in the light of the present price of land, is a very limited sum for the purpose of enabling the Land Commission to buy land to enable people to be moved to better areas. When administration costs and so on are deducted, it is insignificant and until we get away from that figure, we shall make no progress.

Much has been said and written, and there have been long debates here, on the subject of land. I suppose one of the longest debates in the House was the debate on the Land Bill. I meet many people in the course of my work who ask what has the Land Bill meant. I may be wrong but I tell them that I cannot see any change as a result of it. I have come across hundreds of people who have seen a plot of land with the people who own it in England or America or in the occupation of people aged 70, 75 or 80. These are the plots of land we were convinced would be taken over under the Land Act and given to deserving persons that want land and have homes nearby.

I know of these because I put hundreds of these cases through my hands all along the sea coast in the west where we have very small uneconomic holdings. In many cases, half the people are gone and the holdings are rented for many years. In order to give land to people who are anxious to get additional land and who are continually approaching TDs and other public men, the Minister and the Land Commission should move more quickly and let the people see something being done to relieve congestion. I have no hesitation in saying that if such people do not get this land, they will move out as they cannot live in their present holdings with costs soaring each year. These matters should be considered, and if action is possible under the Land Act, the Commission should make a beginning there, where there are nice plots of land and these are pointed out and it is recommended to the Land Commission by local representatives that something should be done.

Instead, we are writing to Dublin and getting back stereotyped replies saying the man has applied or has not applied, that his case will be investigated in conjunction with those of other applicants. That is all we hear unless we make further representations on behalf of these people. That is the position in my constituency where many farms are small and uneconomic and there is a crying need for a rapid change if people are to be encouraged to stay. If action is not taken soon, many homes will close owing to the present position which weather conditions are not improving. I sincerely ask the Minister and the Land Commission to check on this situation themselves.

Many holdings we bring to the notice of the Land Commission have been let for ten, 20 or 30 years, or are lying idle. In fairness to the Land Commission, it must be said that they have realised that holdings previously provided in some cases were too small and now they are giving holdings of 40, 45 or 50 acres. As my colleague, Deputy Kitt, said, we come across cases of the Land Commission dividing a substantial holding and giving a man with 45 acres another 12 or 14, while side by side with him is a hardworking, industrious farmer who perhaps has built a new house and good byres and who has only 22 or 23 acres. That is very unfair because the man who has built up a good holding and held out so long on 22 acres should get another 12 or 14 acres, if he is to have any hope, leaving the man with 40 acres as he is. The Land Commission should be very cautious in such cases of putting the man with 40 acres against the man with 22 acres.

The Forestry Division find it hard to get land at present but they can blame themselves for that. They can go five or six times to strike a deal with a farmer or widow and young family. I think that is unfair in the case of people anxious to dispose of their small holdings. If the forestry business is as profitable and productive as we are told it will be, there should be no question of going to a house to see what the owner will do and then having to go back to Merrion Street to see if you can bridge the gap between what John Brown wants and what the Department are prepared to give for the farm. Some of the land is poor but generally it is good land, and where it will give good forestry, there should be no quibbling over £50 or £80. Its acquisition will mean more employment and the land will be drained and so on. The people leaving it must seek perhaps another farm and at £7 or £8 an acre, what can they get? We should be fair to them as in most cases people who sell to the Forestry Division are the people who are unable to hold out on an uneconomic farm. I hope the Minister will take note of that and of the other points I have mentioned.

Mr. James Tully

In this debate we have had a most extraordinary divergence of views from all sides of the House. I compliment Deputy Kitt on having the courage to say some of the things he said here tonight, even if I did not entirely agree with him as to the people against whom he directed his barbs.

One of the mistakes we make in discussing this Estimate is that we tend to pick individuals and blame them for something that goes wrong. After many years, I have been converted to the idea that it is the system that is wrong. If Deputy Kitt considers it extraordinary that somebody in his constituency got land to which he was not entitled, while people who were entitled to land did not get it, he should come with me to Meath where down through the years the same thing has happened again and again and again. For a considerable period, I was under the impression that individuals in the Department, for some reason of their own, had decided that that should be done. I am now perfectly convinced that there is something wrong with the system under which the officials work. If there were not something wrong and if there were not some direction, Land Commission officials would not carry on in the same unfair way for generation after generation.

This is quite a common story in Meath: A farm is being divided. There may be a number of small farmers in the vicinity who have been taking grassland or tillage on that farm over a number of years. There may be a number of workers who had worked on the farm and were dismissed when the farmer decided to sell the farm and who, therefore, do not come under the blanket of being employees of the farmer, entitled to consideration for either a holding or compensation. There may be a number of local people who, though having no land, have been attemping to build up a dairy herd or take tillage land. One would think that when the farm was being divided first consideration would be given to these people. Some of them, apparently by accident, do get a portion of land but most of them get neither an addition to a holding not a portion of the estate if they have no land.

There is one case where a man had taken grass for a herd which he had built up over a number of years, although he had no land of his own. One farm on which he had been taking grass was taken over and divided. He got none of it. He moved to a second farm. The same thing happened. This year, he moved to a third farm and the Land Commission again put his stock out on the road and gave land to other people but gave none to him. The man was, to all intents and purposes, a dairy farmer, living by his industry. Yet, the Land Commission decided that he was not entitled to land. I put down a number of questions to the Minister for Lands on this occasion and on other occasions where something similar happened near Navan. I can cite dozens of such cases.

I do not know how the Minister reached the conclusion but he said that a man who made his living through taking grassland and building up a dairy herd was not a farmer. He should tell some of the boys who were outside the gate last week and who were in that position that they were not farmers. I do not think the Minister for Agriculture would agree with him. Whether he would agree with them or not, is another matter. However, I do not think he would agree with the Minister for Lands that they were not farmers. In my opinion, they are not only farmers but are industrious farmers. The man I have in mind was able to rear a large family. Yet, when land was being divided, not only in the case of one farm but in the case of three farms, he was told he was not entitled to land as he was not a farmer. This is the sort of thing which does not do any good for the name of the Land Commission. It is obviously the system that is wrong because the same pattern has been followed down through the years.

There is another question which I have mentioned so often in the House that I am sure it is a waste of time to mention it again, that is, the question of the local versus the migrant. The Minister for Lands has told me again and again in this House that he considers that I am anti-migrant. I want to assure him, as I did before, that when migrants come into my constituency we always make them welcome but we do not want to see any more coming, nor do the migrants who have come there over the years. They are the first people to say that there is not enough land to go around, that they do not want any more people to come in. The people who come in after a couple of years say exactly the same thing. They are right. A person who is living on an uneconomic holding or a person who has no land and wants a portion of land does not like to see more people coming and taking land which he had hoped to get, leaving him in the same position as he was in before the farm was divided.

There is another aspect which should not be forgotten. It is a matter affecting the whole area if ten or 12 families come to an area where there is not sufficient work available for young persons, where the only employment available is taken up by those already living in the area. The new arrivals must emigrate. Somebody must emigrate, because there are not sufficient jobs to go around. I do not intend to dwell too long on this matter tonight because I have spoken on it many times over the past 12 or 14 years.

I will admit that over the past 12 months more cottiers seem to be getting portions of land—very small portions—than was the practice for a number of years. I welcome this. A man who has a job and is able to get some land so that he can keep at least one cow and grow vegetables for himself and his family is usually fairly selfreliant and does pretty well. Everybody does not seem to be able to get a portion of land that is being divided. Unfortunately, there are too many exceptions.

Deputy McLaughlin referred to the Land Act not being operative. The only portion of the Land Act that I find is operative is that part which allows the Land Commission to reverse the decision taken by the Fianna Fáil Government in the early 1930s when they swept the country on the basis that they would halve the land annuities. They halved the land annuities for migrants and people who work on the land only. If the local people are lucky enough to get a portion of land they must pay the full annuity. What effect has this on land division? It means that in some cases a local man who got a farm had to pay up to £8 15.0. per acre annuity in addition to rates while migrants who come into the area would have to pay £4 7.6. The Minister may not believe this—I pointed it out when the Land Bill was going through the House— it tends to create bitterness between neighbours. Nobody can see the justice in the case of two farmers living side by side, that one has to pay twice as much as the other by way of annuity. There is no sense or reason in it. It is the one thing in particular which should have been left out of the Land Bill.

I was interested to hear Deputy McLaughlin talking about the old age pensioner who could not get paid for land he had given to the Land Commission. I wonder at that. I always understood that the Land Commission paid reasonably punctually even if they did pay in land bonds which are not exactly as good as cash but nearly as good if you get enough of them.

The Minister made a slight reference in his opening speech to old age pensioners. Perhaps he would comment when concluding as to the number of old age pensioners the Land Commission have found prepared to avail of the arrangement provided in the Land Act whereby they can give their farm to the Land Commission and draw a kind of pension or annuity. I would be very interested to know how successful that scheme has been because it is one of the things which I thought would not work and I am wondering whether or not it has worked.

At present the Land Commission hold a lot of land in Meath. I do not know why they have held it for so many years. The Minister said that he proposed to increase the number of inspectors so that land can be disposed of more quickly. I hope he will be successful because if there is local agitation about a farm, the people who have carried on that agitation for a number of years, because the farm was not being used properly, and in most cases was being let on the 11 month system, can see no difference in the original owner letting it and the Land Commission letting it. It does not make sense that the Land Commission should acquire a farm and let it over a number of years. I suggested to the Minister that the reason was that they were making some money and collecting back some of the money they had paid for the farm but he assured me that that was not so. As a matter of fact, he said that in many cases they were losing money on it. If they are, then the Land Commission must be bigger fools than I take them to be. There does not seem to be any reason why they should continue losing money, if that is the case.

From time to time many of us bring to the notice of the Land Commission farms which in the opinion of local people are not being used properly, namely, by non-resident owners, and very often by people who advertised those farms for sale or who have indicated that they propose to sell the farms. When we write to the Land Commission about these, we get a prompt reply and that is all. Usually the acknowledgement takes the form, not of "Dear Mr. Kitt", as the Fianna Fáil Deputy got, but of "Dear Deputy" or "Dear Sir, the Land Commission have no arrangements made to acquire this farm but following your letter inquiries are being made." It is something to that effect. I have a number of such cases and in all of them the farms were subsequently sold.

There was one glaring case where a farm of 37 acres, which had been let to a number of local smallholders over a number of years, was sold to two old brothers who owned 200 acres of land. One of them was 78 and the other was 84 years of age. Months later when I made a second inquiry as to why the Land Commission had not done something about this farm, despite the fact that I had brought it to their notice, I received a reply that the Land Commission did not propose to do anything about this farm and it had been sold. In my second letter I had informed them that it had been sold. If the Land Act contains a provision, then the Minister is aware that it does contain that provision. The Land Commission have authority to acquire farms that are going on the market and which are not being used properly and for which there is a local demand. Surely there is no excuse whatever, except one, for the Land Commission not acquiring such farms. I should like the Minister to tell us if that is the one reason, that is, that the Land Commission have not got the money to buy the farms. If it is, then I should be glad if the Minister would say so so that we would know where we stand. It appears that we wasted our time when the Land Bill was passing through the House if that section is not to be applied.

This is not an isolated case: I know of dozens of them. There were at least half a dozen which I brought to the notice of the Land Commission. It may be that the Land Commission inspectorate are not sufficiently numerous to look at those farms in time, but surely if adequate notice is given, it should be possible for somebody to go to the auctioneer—and I usually give the name of the auctioneer—in charge of the sale and find out what is happening. I do not think it is good enough to send an acknowledgement and to leave it at that. I wonder if a file is being kept on these things? I wonder if a file is also being kept in regard to recommendations about people who apply for land? Indeed, one of the complaints that I get from people who apply for portions of land is in regard to what they call a little bit of Irish. They get a small, very thin piece of paper which is not even in an envelope and which is pasted together and which does not convey very much to them.

Mr. O'Hara

That is the social welfare one.

Mr. James Tully

That may be so. It looks like it, but it does not mean much to them. If a Deputy writes in, he gets the stereotyped form to which Deputy Kitt referred. I believe the Land Commission should be above politics. I believe that neither the Minister nor any Deputy or Senator should have any right to tell the Land Commission to whom land should be given. I believe also that Deputies and Senators have a right to make recommendations that a person is of good character and would, in their opinion, be suitable for a holding of land. When that is done such people should be interviewed by one of the inspectors when a farm is being divided.

That is not always done. I think that the person who sends out the letter engages in two movements, one when he put the letter into the envelope and the other, when he puts the Deputy's letter into the wastepaper basket. These are the only actions that take place. I have never been able to find out that the matter goes any further. Perhaps I am wronging the officials. Perhaps it would be impossible to find a building large enough to take all the recommendations sent into the Land Commission. That could be the reason. The present system is not perfect but perhaps there is nothing perfect in this world.

In regard to the whole question of land division, I believe that the Land Commission will have to consider again the whole question of providing cow plots, particularly in County Meath. If small holders and landless men are not able to get portions of land, they should be given cow plots in the area. It is no answer to say that many years ago cow plots were provided in that county and that they just did not work out. Some of them did and many of them did not. The main reason why some of them did not work was that the worst portions of land in the district were given as cow plots. If the Minister wants to challenge that, I will produce the evidence any time he likes. I would not like to see my cow being put on that land and I do not think the Minister would either. For that reason, if the system is changed and the Minister decides that it should be policy that a plot of good land with water and shelter, which can be obtained on most estates, is given where there is a demand for it, it might solve the problem for those who have no land and who are anxious to find somewhere other than the long acre for the cow or two which they may own.

I am glad to know that the Minister has found that the bonus system in Land Commission work and in forestry has been working out well. It is another proof that if workers are given some encouragement, they will be prepared to give a fair return. The wages paid are pretty low and the basic wage is lower in most areas than the county council wage. The basic wage in most parts of the country of £7 15s is too low. I know that with effect from 1st April, it goes up to £8 15s and that is still very much below the local county council rate. Some effort should be made to bring them up. The bonus is something they earn over and above the basic rate and for which they have to work extra hard. If the bonus system is giving the results the Minister says, the people earning it deserve more consideration. It is no answer to say they are earning extra on bonus and should be satisfied with what is the lowest basic rate for a labourer in this country. The same thing applies to the Forestry Division. I believe the workers there are also earning their money.

I am anxious to know whether we are ever going to have some type of appeals tribunal to which the claims of these workers can be referred. The Minister may say we have no complaint on that score because the workers got the ninth round and will be getting the tenth round. But that is simply wages. I am sorry to have to repeat again that in February, 1965 at least one of the trade unions representing the workers interviewed officials both of the Forestry Division and the Land Commission to discuss the question of a pension scheme and of a sick pay scheme. Almost every month since that we have got the reply that the matter is still under consideration. Last June in this House the Minister told me it was under consideration. He gave me the same reply in December and in February and April of this year. There is only one answer to this and that is the establishment of some board or committee to which matters of this kind can be referred.

If these workers had the right to take their case to the Labour Court the matter would have been settled over 12 months ago. The State are doing something very mean. They are taking advantage of the fact that these workers have no redress. All they can do is go back to the officials and get the same reply: that the matter will be considered. They are thereby depriving them of something which almost every other worker in the country is now getting. Somebody suggested—I think it was the Minister or one of his colleagues—that an Interdepartmental Committee are dealing with this matter and that the Land Commission, the Department of Agriculture and the Board of Works could not deal with these matters in isolation. The same claims are before each of the Departments. Surely if such a committee exists it should not be too much of a strain on their time to discuss this matter and say either yes or no?

I know it will be trotted out now that because of the financial situation they are unable to find the extra money to deal with this matter. But the case for this was made before the financial situation got bad. As a matter of fact, it was made before the last general election, and everybody knows how good conditions in the country were just before the last general election! The matter should be dealt with on that basis rather than on the basis that we are now in a bad financial position and, therefore, unable to meet our moral obligations.

I am rather disturbed that the Forestry Vote has been reduced by £204,200. This is reflected, of course, in the employment position. A few weeks ago I had a question down to the Minister asking him for the number of forestry workers employed on each Saturday in April for the last five years. The Minister, fairly enough, said employment statistics were not kept on a daily basis but he would circulate the information I required from 6th April, 1962, to 15th April, 1966. He left out the 22nd and 29th April. Obviously, the figures were not available. What strikes me as peculiar is that the number employed on the 15th April, 1966, in the forests is almost 500 fewer than the number on 16th April, 1965, and almost 1,000 fewer than on 12th April, 1963. I would hazard a guess that we could add another 500 at least to that figure as having been laid off in the last month because any of us who have anything to do with forestry workers are aware that there has been a lay-off practically all over the country and in some cases in forests where men had not been laid off for many years.

I am not blaming the officials—in particular, I am not blaming the local foresters—because they can do nothing about it. It is true that the Department have not got as much money this year as they require to keep their labouring staff in employment. It is just too bad that when there is a shortage of cash the first fellow who must feel the pinch is the man earning a bare pittance at the very bottom of the ladder. This is the sort of thinking we find all over the country. This is the sort of thinking which has resulted in so many people being out on the streets on strikes in this country at present. The man at the bottom realises that, unless he can get something on which to live while there is work for him, as soon as there is a scarcity of money he will be the first to have his head roll.

We have this situation that the Forestry Division are laying off men because they want to save the £7 15s. per week these men were earning, and earning hard. I do not blame the Minister. I suppose the Minister fought as hard as he could to get as much money as possible for his Department. That is the business of Ministers. But that is very little use to the man who finds that after years of good service he is simply told—not that there is a job waiting round the corner for which he will be trained, as we were led to believe by the Parliamentary Secretary, Deputy Flanagan, some time ago or not that he will be laid off for a week or even a few months and that he can draw unemployment benefit before he gets a job at the end of the year— he is simply told he is gone and that is it. It is just too bad that this system should still operate. It is hard to encourage people to give of their best output if they know there is somebody waiting around the corner with a pencil to tick off their names and hand them their cards if money looks like becoming scarce anywhere in the country.

The whole system of employment in both the Land Commission and the Forestry Division and in any other Government Department at that level needs revision. The Minister must know from his own constituency, apart from what he has heard in this House, that the time is long overdue for the introduction of some type of commission or committee on which the men and his Department could be represented in order to iron out these matters rather than merely a statement from the Minister and his officials that the matter is under consideration and that is as far as they can go.

I am disappointed that this Government have now taken the decision to reduce the planting to 20,000 acres per year. We had great blowing of trumpets when it went up to 25,000 acres. We were told it was proposed to keep the figure at that level. Now that we are beginning to get some return from the forests on the sale of trees I felt the Government would be far seeing enough to ensure that there would be a continual expansion of planting. Apparently the Government have taken a shortsighted view of this and have decided to reduce the number of acres planted. This must ultimately result in a substantial reduction in the number of people employed in the forest.

I am quite sure the question of acquiring land for afforestation is a problem. I am also aware that the Forestry Division have had numerous offers of land and that for one reason or another, the acquiring of that land is being held up. Again, might I ask the Minister if he would say if finance has anything to do with it? Is his programme as far as the purchase of land in reserve is concerned being impeded because he has not got the necessary money to buy it? If that is so, it is not this generation that will suffer but generations to come. The only hope is to keep expanding the planting. If we cannot do that, then we shall soon see the end of the afforestation programme of which this country and this House were so proud.

Mr. Geoghegan

We have heard on both sides of the House a lot of criticism of our Land Commission officials but one must look at the good points as well. I come from an area where there has been a great deal of distribution of small holdings. I must say the officials in my city have done an excellent job of work in resettling and redistributing quite a number of holdings in the West, making them more compact, and dividing up properly the amount of land available amongst the tenants. I feel they are entitled to whatever few words of praise I might say here for doing so. Much progress has been made down through the years in the resettlement and redistribution of these lands, and it has been a step in the right direction. You will come across cases from time to time where delays have taken place but the officials cannot be blamed for it, as some people seem to think. There may be just one person or two who would hold up a whole townland in the distribution of land.

In regard to the rearrangement of holdings, and especially where people have to be rehoused, there may be standard houses constructed to a standard plan, very nice houses with every facility. There will be the odd case where the father or mother, perhaps the son and his wife with maybe eight to ten children are living in that house, and it is too small to accommodate all those people. I understand that there is a lot of delay in altering the plan so as to suit that family or preparing a new house plan for them. I would sincerely ask the Minister to look at cases of that sort.

There will also be cases where people will give up their little old house in order to facilitate their neighbours and are awaiting sanction for a new house with perhaps two rooms and a kitchen in which they hope to live for the rest of their lives. Strange as it may seem—I do not know if it is a coincidence—I had a case on my hands for quite a long time and just before the Minister came in here tonight, I had a phone call to say that the case has not been solved so far and that no preparations have been made. This person, who is without a house at the moment, living in with neighbours, perhaps changing about from place to place, was good enough to facilitate the Land Commission officials by giving up his home which went in with another holding so as to straighten out the holding. It is wrong that that person should be left waiting. I do not want to mention any names in this House. I have taken the matter up with the Department, and with the office in Galway. So far, no information has come from the Land Commission here in Dublin. I shall give the name to the Minister and his Department and I ask him to hurry up this case.

On this occasion we are dealing with the Estimate for Lands and the Estimate for Forestry together. It would be no harm for the Minister's Department to consider the case where the Forestry Division takes over tracts of mountains for the planting of trees. This is a very good thing and very essential, but, at the same time, if there are good turbary rights there, the Minister would want to take a very careful look at it to ensure that in taking over the land there is turbary left aside for the people of that area. In certain parts of the West, turbary is a very scarce commodity and, as the Minister knows well, there are places in my constituency where people have to travel as much as 18 miles each way to get turbary. Where the Minister is taking over these places for forestry, he should fence off the deepest part so as to keep people in full supply of turbary while they are there.

There is another point which I raised last year and which I shall keep raising as long as I am here, that is, where tracts of land for plantation are taken over, the first thing the Department should do before planting a tree is to burn out any dens or coverts for foxes that may be there. The way foxes are carrying on at the moment, especially in the West, the housewife will not have a hen and the farmer will not have a sheep. They seem to be dragging the young lambs and killing them. I feel that any such dens should be burned out.

A fire is dangerous in areas where you have plantations. We are told by the Minister's Department to be careful about kindling fires near a plantation. I know his Department cut and clear away a path right round to, say, six, eight or, maybe ten feet but knowing the heather and the way it lies, on a breezy day, eight to ten feet is nothing. I have seen the heather when it goes on fire; it just rolls up into a little ball—a hare would not keep up with it—and travels even across wide rivers of maybe ten to 15 feet, depending on the breeze. If a survey has not been made of lakes, especially those near young forests, it would be a good thing to make one and find out the possibilities of a brigade being able to put out a fire or being able to deal with it. Certainly putting a trench around it may have a little effect. What happens is this: in springtime, the heather grows and then in winter, it withers away, turns white, and is as light as a piece of paper but before the young heather grows up it can do a terrible lot of destruction if it goes on fire.

I did not intend to intervene in this debate except to put those few points. I feel the Land Commission officials have a very trying job and taking it as a whole—mind you, I have as many dealings with them as anybody coming from an area like mine — we should give them credit. It is up to us to pay them a tribute for what they have tried to do. When they are called upon to help, they certainly do it.

Mr. Corish

The Deputy must have got on better than Deputy Kitt.

Mr. Geoghegan

I certainly must say I have pride in the staff in Galway and I feel the Minister should know that.

Mr. O'Hara

I have, on more than one occasion, spoken on this Estimate in this House and on all occasions I have paid tribute to the Land Commission inspectors and officials for the work they have done. We do not always hear tributes paid to them. Everybody should appreciate that they have a very difficult task. Like the Minister, who is a Mayoman, I who come from a congested area appreciate the very difficult task they have because the work they are trying to do is certainly difficult in every way. We are dealing with a generation of people who have been told about the harm done by the landlords of old, lands which were grabbed from them, given to neighbours and so forth. That, in itself, has created a bitterness and strong feeling about those holdings, particularly in the west of Ireland, and in other parts of the country as well.

Deputy Murphy spoke here this evening and we all know they have that problem in West Cork and in other counties. For that reason, living in a congested area myself, I appreciate the difficulties. Generally speaking, I appreciate that down through the years the Land Commission have done a lot of useful work. They have cleared up a lot of rural slums in different areas and improved the lot of many smallholders, migrated people from the mountainous regions to the midlands, nearer to the eastern counties or wherever good land was available. In that way they have done a lot of useful work all down through the years. There is a lot more to be done, however, and, there again, we will have to rely on these Land Commission officials to carry on the good work. I know many of those inspectors personally and from conversations I had with them from time to time, I discovered that the majority of them are sons of farmers themselves. They have a good knowledge and experience of the work and, by and large, they are doing the best they can.

It is, therefore, a cause for regret on this occasion that we find a Mayoborn Minister in the difficult position, as are other Ministers due to the difficulties of the time, of having to cut down on his Estimate. I know at least one other Minister for Lands came from Mayo; in fact, two former Ministers came from Mayo, and I am sure they were faced with the same problem. When a Minister for Lands goes to a Minister for Finance looking for money, he is told, quite naturally: "You will not get all that", and the argument has to go on backstage, I suppose. But the truth is that no Minister for Lands, in my opinion, down through the years ever got the money he really needed to do the work he would like to do even reasonably efficiently. I have known some other Ministers. I know the present Minister and I think he is as enthusiastic as anybody else to improve the lot of the people amongst whom he lives. But there is a problem: money is hard to come by; the bulk of Land Commission salaries had to be increased; the cost of land has gone up; the cost of house building has gone up very considerably and so, too, has the cost of cow byres and other farm buildings which the Land Commission are trying to provide for migrants. The amount of money being made available is not being brought into line with those increases.

I can foresee a situation in which there will be less land re-arrangement, less migration of smallholders from the west and other counties because of that money scarcity. It is really bad news that we have run into such difficult times, particularly when so many people today are leaving the land, and it is so hard to encourage farmers' sons today to stay on the land when they see their neighbours in other employment — perhaps county council employment—with a 40 hour week, and getting increases in their pay packets, and so forth. I do not grudge those increases, particularly to the small men, but it is hard to keep young people on the land. If the Land Commission and the Minister are not in a position to help them to the extent that they could in the past —and it seems to me quite certain they will not be able to help them to that extent—that is very bad news, particularly for the people in the west of Ireland.

On a previous occasion, I addressed a question to the Taoiseach asking him if he was aware of the committee known as the Defence of the West Committee which was taking a very deep and serious interest in trying to do something to prevent the west of Ireland from bleeding to death. On this committee, there are bishops and churchmen of various denominations. The Taoiseach told me that if I waited for the various Estimates to be brought in, I would then know what the Government proposed to do to remedy the situation. Here we have an example of what the Government are doing in connection with these vital matters of land acquisition, land division and the migration of people from congested areas. If this is an example of what the Government are doing, there are bad times ahead for these people.

I have with me a cutting from one of yesterday's daily papers. I think it is the Irish Independent. In it the Bishop of Cork and Ross, the Most Reverend Dr. Lucey, is reported as referring to the fact that 10,000 Irish farmers are being liquidated a year. That statement coming from a responsible Irish bishop should alarm this House and country. It is shocking that in 1966, a Catholic bishop should have to make such a statement about Irish agriculture, which everyone must admit is our main industry. It is a true statement and that is the true position.

The Minister's Estimate, far from being more generous, and far from putting more money at his disposal to try to remedy that situation, is cut down. It is one of the most important Estimates that comes before the House, particularly in relation to the problem with which the Minister is concerned and with which I am concerned, the problem in Mayo. In the past the Land Commission gave a rather smaller acreage of land to people with whom they were dealing either in the matter of migration or fixing them up at local level where land was available at local level, due, perhaps, to some neighbours being migrated. The acreage in many cases was around 25 or 30, but due to the change in the whole outlook of farming and in the view of the Land Commission themselves—because they have increased the acreage and brought it up to around 40 to 45 acres—many people who got holdings in the past are now looking for another ten or 15 acres to bring them up to an economic level. That applies not only to the west of Ireland but also to the eastern counties where some migrants, as they are called, have settled down. In any re-arrangement proceedings that are undertaken, these people should be considered by the Land Commission for increased acreage to bring their holdings to an economic level, to bring them in line with their neighbours and with people who have been migrated in more recent times.

There was much criticism, and rightly so, of the length of time the Land Commission hold land which they require for the relief of congestion. I have given this matter some study because I know instances where land was held by the Land Commission for ten or 12 years after acquistion. I think in rare cases it was held up to 15 or 20 years. Judging by the prices the Land Commission get at auctions, this must be a profitable line of business for the Land Commission to engage in. I have been told in the past when I made inquiries into this matter that that policy was pursued with a view to reducing the rent to the incoming tenant. I know it would be bad policy to impose on an incoming tenant a rent which would break his back from the word `go'.

There should be other means of reducing these rents than by letting the land in conacre, with a consequent deterioration of the land, because we all know that the person who takes conacre is not very worried about how he farms the land. Some other means should be found of getting an economic rent than making use of these funds for the purpose of reducing rents or putting money into the national Exchequer. That is a very wrong policy. The Minister should get around it. He should see to it that the holdings of land in the possession of the Land Commission are made available to tenants within a matter of six to 12 months, or two years at most.

The Land Commission cannot divide land unless they have land in the pool to divide, any more than I could divide sweets if I had not sweets to divide. They have to start the process of acquisition and it can be difficult. Deputy Murphy spoke at length this evening, as he did on previous occasions, on the question of purchasing or attempting to purchase land with land bonds. Deputy McLaughlin mentioned this matter briefly also. We all know that people regard the Land Commission as the worst customers who can show up to purchase their land, because they feel they will not get money for the land. Consequently, they dread them. The Land Commission have a very bad public image in that regard. If the Minister and the Department want to discourage people from surrendering land needed for the purpose of creating a greater pool of land for division, I know of no better way of doing so than by continuing to offer bonds for land. We know the people dread them.

I was a member of this House some years ago when a colleague of mine was sitting over there as Minister. That problem came up and I spoke on it. Down through the years that policy has been pursued. We know people who had land taken from them compulsorily or by voluntary acquisition. Many of those people lost heavily on it. We are known as a Christian country. Our standards are Christian and in accordance with Christian principles but if that is not Communistic, I do not know what it is. It certainly is not in accordance with Christian principles to deprive those people of a good price for their holdings. I do not intend to refer to the case dealt with by Deputy Murphy but the Minister knows that injustice has been done to people by the purchase of land through the land bond system. I would ask the Minister to try to devise some better method of purchase.

It is unfair and unjust to deprive those people of a just price for their land and the system deprives the Department of many offers of land that would normally come to them. In the west of Ireland, many people have emigrated to England and these will never return. Their holdings, very many of which have nice slated bungalows, with hot and cold water, toilet facilities and other facilities installed are lying idle. There are stables and cowbyres for which this State and the Irish taxpayers paid money. Those houses are now derelict. I believe that if the Land Commission communicated with some of those people who are in England or other places and offered them cash for their land, they would get it. It is easy to get the addresses of those people — the rate collector usually has them. I do not know how they are obtained but the rate collector is able to get them.

Some of those people are living in London, Birmingham, Manchester and even the USA. If the Land Commission got in touch with them and told them they were paying cash for their holdings, they could obtain them. I do not believe in their compulsory acquisition at all. It is our own people we are dealing with and it is not very nice to go after them and say they must hand up their land. Some of those people had to leave this country through no fault of their own. I have no doubt, as I say, that if the Land Commission got in touch with those people, particularly those from the west of Ireland, and said they were willing to pay cash for the land, it would be given up to them. It is a pity to see the slated bungalows on these holdings falling into ruin because of neglect.

When families who lived on some of those holdings grow up, they either come to Dublin or emigrate to some other cities outside the country. They do not want to go back. They get accustomed to city life, the large pay packets, amusements and so forth. They find they would not have these at home and there are many of those holdings which would come into the Land Commission if they paid cash for them.

We all know that a gentleman named Mr. Mongey has been appointed recently to look after the interests of the west. Some people, including myself, have been critical of this service being carried out with regard to the west. I was critical of that appointment because many members of the Mayo County Council and I have pointed out many things which can be done to improve the lot of the western farmers. I should like to make this point to the Minister. I know that the duties of this gentleman are not relevant on this Vote but I should like to say if this man does not get some good co-operation from the Department of Lands, it will be a very gloomy prospect. When we speak of small holdings, I want to say that although we have many small holdings in the west of Ireland, there are also some of them in Meath.

Mr. James Tully

There are lots of them. I wish others west of the Shannon would realise that.

Mr. O'Hara

There are some small holdings in Meath but not many. I have met some of the people on these small holdings. The small holding problem is a very serious one. It is impossible for those people to borrow money from any source by reason of the fact that their holdings are small and uneconomic. That is another very important reason why the Minister, as far as he can, should acquire land, pay cash for it and bring those small holdings up to a reasonable standard so that the people can go into their bank managers and get money on loan.

Some of those people are living on small holdings of £15 or £20 valuation. If those people were able to borrow money, they would be creditworthy. I fully appreciate that in the west of Ireland many people migrate from Achill, Erris and Foxford up to Meath and this is a very costly thing. It must take £6,000 or £7,000 to migrate one family. That is quite a costly item but when you consider the amount of good it does, we are getting value for the money spent. Many of those people go to places like Cork and other places in the south and east of the country and they are a great benefit to the community in those areas. They become very good citizens when they get an opportunity to do so.

With regard to forestry, I regret that this Estimate is cut down drastically and that the planting programme, of which we were so proud, is being reduced. It is just too bad. I looked forward to the day when it would be possible to expand our planting programme. During 1948 to 1951, the Government of the day thought fit to enlist the support of Mr. Cameron, of Canadian nationality, to go into the whole question of forestry here. He told them the best ways to expand and advance forestry schemes in Ireland. He suggested two separate schemes of forestry. His report is available, probably in the Oireachtas Library and elsewhere. It was advice tendered to the Government at the time. Some Deputies may think he was living in the moon but I am firmly convinced that if we could make the money available to implement his recommendations we would be working in the right direction. Mr. Cameron made a thorough survey of our soil conditions and our employment position in relation to land usage and commented very intelligently on the whole position. I should like to go on record as advocating that the recommendations he made be implemented, particularly in relation to what he called a social scheme of forestry.

We have a commercial scheme. We grow good quality timber in the main and with the passing of time I am confident that this timber will be very useful, together with our other natural resources, in getting us out of our economic difficulties. People sometimes ask me if we have anything in this country. I tell them, of course, that we have timber coming on as well as crops in the ground which we hope to harvest. I look at the time when forestry will be a big help in solving our economic difficulties. I suggest that the Minister use his imagination and his drive to get on to the social side of forestry as recommended by Mr. Cameron. This would provide work for people who have to emigrate.

It may be argued that we have not got money at the present time to do this. I suggest that a start should be made in the west, even in a small way. Mr. Cameron's idea was not to worry too much with the quality of the timber. He suggested we should put some kind of tree in the ground and that it would restore the soil balance so that later better quality, commercial timber could be produced. He pointed out that because of neglect throughout the years our soil conditions had gone out of balance. I cannot argue the point in a technical way but I agree with him that if we engaged in the social scheme of forestry it would be good business for the future.

It may be 20 or 30 years before we could hope to see the results of such a scheme but we would reap the harvest in giving employment to people who otherwise would have to emigrate. I, therefore, repeat my request to the Minister to read this report if he has not already done so and to try to implement at least some of the recommendations.

The Minister has told us that our plantable acreage is down to 20,000 this year. I am afraid it will drop below that figure later. I feel sure the Minister this year did not wish to shock the country by telling us he expects the acreage to fall to 15,000. I sincerely hope he will reach the 20,000 figure and will not have to tell the House later that he does not find it possible to do so.

I am not quite clear what the position is in regard to acquisition because, like the Land Commission question with which I dealt a while ago, you cannot divide land until you have it on hand. Similarly, you cannot plant trees on land you have not got. I wonder is there a slowing down on the acquisition side. Has the pool of land for forestry purposes shrunk or what is the problem there? If it has, it is very serious because you must have a certain ratio between what you plant and the acquisition pool, that is, the pool of land you have on hand.

There is a lot of planning ahead involved in forestry. One does not just rush out and start sticking down trees here and there at a certain time of the year. Drainage, fencing and other works have to be undertaken, and there is the question of acquiring the land. There is also the question of mountain commonage. That question was dealt with on a previous occasion by one of the Minister's predecessors. I know all the problems were not perhaps ironed out and I can well imagine that even yet the problem of acquiring mountain ranches of the type of land suitable for forestry can be difficult. There may be 15, 20 or even 50 tenants concerned. Out of 20 people, you may have 15 with you and five pulling against you, and the five delay the operation.

There is also a question of title. Title can be difficult to establish in relation to these mountain regions. There is trespass of some of these places from time to time and somebody may come along and remind you that he is the owner and tell you to get off about your business. When Department officials come along and see that somebody has an interest in the land, it can be difficult enough to deal with.

Deputy McLaughlin made the point that there is too much bidding when an inspector comes along and inspects a certain area. We know our people in the west of Ireland are bargain-makers. If they ask £100, they expect to get £90. The forestry people are aware that it has been a tradition with those people to ask a higher price than they really are inclined to take. The Land Commission should take into account that even those mountain regions have more value to-day than they had down through the years and that the purchasing power of money has dropped seriously.

We know how important is the goodwill of the local people where a forestry scheme is established. Deputy Geoghegan has stressed that point. Whatever the forestry people do, they should make very sure to have the goodwill of the people in those regions in which they plant forests. There is a sure way of getting that goodwill, that is, by being reasonably generous and straightforward with the people. If after ten or 15 years somebody wants to get his own back and late one night throws a match into a forest, it is difficult to put a finger on the amount of damage that might be done by that single act. We have national schools in most of those regions and teachers and parents should educate their children in the matter of keeping matches or fires away from such places. I think our own people would have enough intelligence not to do anything like that; but we should try from the first day to get all the goodwill we can, and the Minister and his Department should be more generous in the matter of prices.

There are still vast areas of land in the west of Ireland suitable for forestry, and for nothing else. From time to time, I hear from my constituents that they have communicated with the Forestry Division but that prices have not been finalised, that title is clear and that six months or 12 months, or two years ago somebody from the Forestry Division called on them but they have not heard from the Forestry people since. I think in that regard that the good offices of somebody local—not necessarily a member of the Dáil, or the county council for that matter, but a priest or teacher—could be availed of with a view to hammering out a bargain between the Forestry Division on the one hand and the person selling the land on the other. Time is ticking away in the matter of acquiring land and it is important that we should try to increase the acreage in the pool of land for forestry.

I know of a few specific cases, and I have another case in mind but I do not think it would be of particular interest to the Forestry people as a large area for a big plantation. It is outside Swinford and actually in the Minister's own territory—Mitfield. I know the land is not first-class and would not be regarded as high-grade. In this case the Forestry official, who was quite nice about it, pointed out, what I already knew, that it was not a first-class piece of ground. There are a number of plots made up of five, eight or ten acres. At the same time, I think that special consideration should be given to areas like that and, although it may not seem to have a great value from the commercial point of view, if the acquisition of land for planting had the effect of providing local employment, it would be worth a lot.

The local parish priest and many others are very anxious to see something started, even something small. It may be possible to implement in that area the scheme recommended by Mr. Cameron, a Canadian expert, that forestry in a small way would provide work for ten or 15 people by way of fencing and drainage. The scheme as recommended by this expert should be tried out in order to see what the prospects are.

Again, I say it came as a shock to many people in the west of Ireland to hear that there is a slowing down in Land Commission activity and in the Forestry Division. It came as bad news and I, as a Member of this House, want to say that it should be quite in order for Deputies to make recommendations to the Land Commission regarding holdings of land that may be divided in their particular areas. I am not afraid to go on the records of this House as having told everybody who came to me in connection with land problems that the matter of land division, and so on, is a matter for the Land Commission and that we as Deputies are powerless. If we made recommendations, the Land Commission would no doubt look into them and examine their merits and after that they would have full power to deal with them. The Minister has not that power; he has not assumed it under any Land Act, and the Government are afraid to take it.

I have always pointed out to people that there are three Deputies in my constituency and that it is quite on the cards that while a group sit down in my room telling me how to divide this land, there is another group talking to Deputy Calleary 20 miles away and making a different case, and in a day or two perhaps somebody else will speak to the other Deputy about it. So, if three different Deputies are talking about dividing the land, how can the Land Commission do their work? It should be made clear to the people outside that we have responsible officials. I am quite satisfied that the officials in Ballina, and indeed in the Castlebar area, are responsible men, and so, too, are the Forestry men. Very often they work hours when they should not be working—until 8 or 9 o'clock at night out in remote areas. It should be made clear to the people that Deputies can make their recommedations and that they can do as Deputy Kitt did here—raise matters in the House by way of question or on the Estimate as he and Deputy M. P. Murphy did.

To conclude, I should like to say that it is bad news for the people in the Minister's constituency and in my constituency that this Vote had to be cut. It will cause more and more unemployment and more and more people will leave the western regions, and I do not know where the whole thing will end. At the present time, it is certainly the case that homes are closing down in areas where families were brought up in reasonable prosperity with a reasonably good standard of living. It is regrettable and I am sure the Minister regrets that he had to come to this House and relate this bad news.

Minister for Lands (Mr. Moran)

I do not know how far I shall get in the time at my disposal tonight. There are a few matters I should like to pursue. They are matters of priority arising out of this debate, particularly a few matters raised by Deputy M. P. Murphy involving in principle the question of payment in land bonds, which was also raised by Deputy O'Hara and others.

Let me preface my remarks by saying that I do not regard all my geese as swans. There are officials in my Department who are human and who may make mistakes from time to time. I can also say that I accept what Deputy M. P. Murphy has said about the matter he raised and which he said in good faith, that he does not want to indict me and is going on some story which he has been told. I know when he hears what I have to say that certainly if he had any legal training, he would retract many of the insinuations and allegations he has made. In view of the allegations made, I have to go into the facts in connection with this particular incident rather extensively. Difficulty may arise if a matter like this gets out of hand by way of publicity without any presentation of the facts.

First of all, let me deal with land bonds in general. There have been issues of land bonds under different laws down through the years. There are 3½ per cent land bonds, four per cent land bonds, five per cent land bonds, and so on. Many of these issues are still there. Land bonds are a fixed interest bearing security, the same as thousands of other securities, and land bonds fluctuate the same as any other type of bond or any other type of debenture. As money gets dear, as it has in present circumstances, and as those in the private sector, companies and so forth, look for money and are prepared to pay 7 per cent or 7½ per cent or 8 per cent for money, that is bound to depreciate the price of a fixed interest security, be it a land bond or any other type of bond carrying an interest rate of 5 per cent or 4½ per cent, or less. You have a situation then in which the industrial giants, like the Dunlop Rubber Company or Imperial Chemical Industries, offer 7¼ per cent or 7½ per cent for money. Overnight that devalues the price of fixed interest securities which are paying less interest.

Again—perhaps Deputy Murphy is not familiar with this—land bonds are issued on the basis that, if you have £100 worth, you get your full £100 even though on the open market you might only get £68. However, forget about land bonds for the moment. Think of other fixed interest securities. Perhaps ten years ago, five years ago, or even six months ago, you put your money into some fixed interest security which looked good. Perhaps the interest rate was six per cent. Overnight some new issue may be floated carrying an interest rate of 7 or 7¼ per cent and you find immediately that your £100, if you turn it into cash, is worth only £80. The same is true of land bonds.

Another misconception under which some Deputies labour is that people hold land bonds for all time. They do no such thing. Deputy Murphy quoted Deputy Sweetman in a former debate when he challenged me to say that I knew from my professional experience that, where we get paid in land bonds the costs in land actions, we find it very difficult to get rid of the bonds if they are in small amounts. That is quite true. It is equally true in relation to any small holding or any small investment. It is very difficult to get rid of it unless one's broker is prepared to wait until a number of other smallholders come on the market to enable him to sell a reasonable block. What happens with land bonds is that the land owner immediately sends them to his broker and cashes them. That happens in 99 out of 100 cases. In the one case the person is probably not greatly concerned about getting an income. Well-off people find that an interest rate of six per cent suits them and they hold on. The 99 convert immediately into cash. That is the normal practice and those about whom the Deputy was arguing are those who purchase these on the Stock Exchange for the purpose of the income they will get out of them. If there is a new issue of something else which pays a higher dividend at a time when money is dear, these people find that, while their income is safe, their capital has depreciated.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

They are different from the vendor. They are speculators. They take a risk.

Mr. Moran

I come now to this particular case and I want to say at once that the sole author of this woman's misfortune was her legal adviser.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

I think the Minister is most unfair.

Mr. Moran

I will give chapter and verse because I cannot permit this allegation to go uncorrected. While everything in the legal section of the Land Commission is not perfect, if ever there was a case in which there should be no reason for complaint this is it. If ever there was a case in which there were the softest ruling with regard to title this is it. Those rulings were issued within three weeks of possession being taken by the Land Commission. This was a voluntary case. The proceedings started on a compulsory basis but agreement was reached with the owner in her solicitor's office. She agreed there to take £11,000 in land bonds. Deputy Murphy has no business telling the House this unfortunate woman did not know a land bond from a hole in the ground. She was sitting beside an experienced solicitor and it was in his office this deal was made. Let Deputy Murphy not try to create the impression that her solicitor did not fully explain to her what land bonds were. At the time she could not give possession because the lands were let for a year or two ahead. But the agreement was made then. There was an interval of six or seven months and, immediately the agreement was made, the letter quoted by the Deputy was sent to this lady suggesting that she could proceed in the meantime to prove her title in anticipation of possession being given.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

Why did the Land Commission vest the land if the title was not in order?

Mr. Moran

The Land Commission vest the land in every single instance when possession is taken.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

Why were the bonds not made available to Mrs. McCarthy then?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Murphy has already spoken at length and he should now allow the Minister to make his statement.

Mr. Moran

I will not allow the Deputy to get away with this. In common legal practice—I shall leave the Land Commission out of it—the purchase money is lodged in the joint names of the solicitors concerned until the title is investigated and possession given. It is the fixed practice of the Land Commission to vest the lands when they get possession in order that the vendor may get the benefit of the interest on the land bonds. In this case, contrary to what the Deputy has alleged here, this woman's money has been drawing interest. The interest is piling up since the date the lands were vested and since she got possession. Her solicitor has failed to discharge four simple rulings on title. He has discharged one, and all through the period the money has been lying there, drawing interest. The solicitor concerned will not discharge the rulings on title.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Wednesday, 25th May, 1966.