andMr. Cluskey asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he will state who are the main importers of the following: fibre board and other building boards, composite paper or paper in reels or sheets, container board, corrugated paper, crinkled paper in rolls or sheets, boxes, cases, cartons, filling containers, and other paper and paper boards cut to size.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Importers of Paper and Paper Boards.
147.
The only source from which the information sought by the Deputies could be obtained would be the confidential documents filled up for the Revenue Commissioners by importers. These documents are used by the Central Statistics Office in preparing official statistics but it is not the practice of either the Revenue Commissioners or the Central Statistics Office to release information as to the names of individual importers.
Has the Minister's Department no record of the number of firms that participate in this type of business?
We might have available information as to the numbers but not the names. The names are regarded as confidential and are not disclosed to my Department or anybody else by the Central Statistics Office or the Revenue Commissioners.
Why?
The thinking behind it is that, if this information were disclosed, in certain cases people might not be prepared to fill in the forms for the Revenue Commissioners because they would regard disclosure of the information as damaging to them and we would, therefore, fail to get accurate statistics. While I can see the force of this argument, there are many reasons why information of this nature should be available to my Department. It is a difficulty about which I have been concerned and I am trying to devise some method of getting information without breaching the principle I have enunciated.
Would the Minister not agree that the absence of such information precludes the giving of real effect to one of the functions of his Department, that is, to ensure that products are not imported in an unfair manner and the only way to do this is to know the names of the establishments which import the articles?
I am not sure that the difficulty operates in quite the way the Deputy thinks but there is a difficulty in regard to the importation of goods here which could perhaps be supplied from home sources, which I suppose is what the Deputy is getting at.