I have every intention of continuing. Even the constituency I represent, the dormant, affluent suburb of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, could be regarded as having such a landscape, although I shall have some sharp comments to make about that and its problems later on.
One is very conscious also that there are many areas where the very poor quality of Irish housing is evident. There are many thousands of homes which have not even got such an elementary facility as a piped water supply. I do not have to tell the Minister that. The Buchanan Report tells us that in the rural areas in 1966 only four out of every ten houses had a piped water supply as against 97 per cent of all houses in towns. The report also said that much progress had been made and that the cost of extending piped services presented formidable problems, as it does. Anybody looking down on Ireland would say: "Fair enough, five out of every ten homes have got the elementary human facility of a piped water supply and sanitary facility."
If one looks at the urban areas one sees sprawling estates with no environmental harmoney. One sees, ringing each one of our cities, a patchwork of identical ticky-tacky industrial and housing estates with drab urban centres, particularly in Dublin. Limerick has an urban centre which is only now slowly coming out of the trough of general depression in that city and, indeed, parts of Cork up to quite recently were in a slum and tenement condition.
Therefore, it is fitting that we in the Labour and Opposition benches, while we have congratulated the Minister on an exceptionally fine opening statement, should point out to him that our desire is to see the standard of Irish life raised to a far higher and more civilised level. I appreciate that this will cost a great deal of money and require a great deal of long-term urban planning but this is what a Department of Local Government and its Estimate is all about. We must ask ourselves how do we go about this task. It is my opinion—and I do not think this is divine inspiration, it is a fairly universal opinion round the country particularly among rural Deputies and councillors—that the local government system itself seems not to be in a position to adapt itself to the new demands now being made upon it for the future development of the national economy and for the expansion of the social services and of the health services, many of them administered within the traditional framework of the Department of Local Government.
This is one aspect in which I would strongly fault the Minister in relation to his speech. It is regrettable that in a speech which ran to 70 pages there was not one mention of the Taoiseach's indication that there would be a recasting of ministerial responsibility in respect of physical planning and development, apart from a vague indication that this is in the pipeline. We are entering the 70s and it is time the Government made up their minds. There is a strongly held belief throughout the country that we need a more progressive and meaningful system of local government, not just the Department of Local Government, for the development of a more democratic system of government. It is time that we took a sharp look at the whole system of local government. It may not be particularly fashionable with some Deputies, indeed it may be that some members of my own Party may not agree, but at least we do not have a hard-line policy attitude of total intransigence in these matters such as one finds within Fianna Fáil where the front bench speaks and the rest of the Party stay silent for five years, but I feel it is time we changed the whole system of local government based on the old inheritance of the British colonial system of the last century. It is very deficient in many important respects and at county council level, at urban council level, at town commission level, it does not have the necessary dynamism to cope with the major problems of housing, planning, development, pollution, urban renewal, conservation and so on, the massive problems facing local government on a regional and general basis. I, therefore, suggest to the House that it is time we considered development on a regionalisation basis. I know it is not particularly fashionable. I know that Deputies Boland and Colley are suffering from an eternal throb and a lot of old hat. They require the old-fashioned style republic of having a town council in every commissioner's area while at the same time maintaining a virtual oligarchy in their Departments.
This is the kind of thinking we find, if one would classify it as thinking. The Department of Industry and Commerce want a factory in every town but they end up without a factory in the country. Bearing in mind that the health services have been finally and irrevocably reconstituted on a regional system of administration, the Minister should indicate to us in his reply that the local government system in general will be realigned and reclassed accordingly. It is appalling that though we have this regional system in respect of the health services we have something different in regard to local government generally and a national departmental administration system in respect of unemployment and social welfare.
I strongly suggest to the Minister to get rid of the confusion there is at the moment. He has spoken about re-organising the road services on a national general basis. We have proposed reconstitution of his entire Department in regard to replanning. We have had proposals on replanning in the Buchanan Report and we have recommendations by the Devlin Committee. Earlier today we passed the new Health Act which will be administered on a regional basis. Yet the Minister sits quietly by not sure of the kind of Santa Claus he will finish up as.
The first thing we must take into account—I throw it out tentatively— would be complete realignment of the local government system on a regional basis as outlined in the new Health Act. By that I do not mean that the local authorities themselves would be abolished. If there is one way of getting rid of the kind of professionalism which is so resented throughout the country, whereby everybody is crucifying Dublin all the time as being responsible for the sole administration of the country, it is by passing down power to the regions of the country, particularly to the west and south. The only way to get rid of this national complex which we have is to develop regional local government on a more effective basis. I, therefore, suggest that the Minister might try to do this. I know we are to have a White Paper on the structure of local government. This would not mean that the existing borough corporations—Dublin, Dún Laoghaire, Waterford, Limerick and so on—would be abolished. I simply mean that there would be greater devolution of regional services. Beyond that, I do not wish to develop this theme unduly. I do, of course, urge on the Minister to consult closely with the trade unions concerned. There has been a great deal of nonsense talked about participatory democracy and then we get a White Paper from the Minister, drafted by the officers of his Department, involving no changes.
The Minister should consult widely and generally. The proposals in the Radcliffe Report on the metropolitan regional concept have received considerable support in Britain, notably within the British Labour Party. They have been welcomed by many councillors and Members of Parliament and consideration is being given to them.
Having made these points. I want to deal with another phenomenon which we tend to ignore very much in our discussions here. It is the failure in the country and in Dublin to appreciate that a great deal of our housing and planning problems and urban renewal problems, particularly those that have come about in the greater Dublin area, are not entirely the fault of the Minister. We have not been altogether fair in our criticisms of the Minister. It is a fact that in Dublin we have had quite a phenomenal growth in population. Although I am not in any way congratulatory to the Minister, it must be put on record that the population of Dublin city and Dún Laoghaire, including their environs, has increased from 640,000 in 1959 to 780,000 in 1969, an increase of 22 per cent. In the same period, the population of the other cities and towns has increased from 930,000 to 977,000, a mere increase of 4 per cent. It is only in that demographic context that one can try to come to grips with the problem. The trouble is that the Minister has failed to face up to the housing problem or to come to grips with it in the Dublin area and Fianna Fáil can be faulted that they have not come to grips with the problem. They seem to give the impression that they are almost ashamed of what has happened. I get this feeling particularly when I meet Deputy Boland in by-elections in the country—a reluctance to admit that he lives and works in Dublin.
Migration has continued and the greater Dublin area has developed a dynamism and now comprises 800,000 people. On that basis we certainly have a problem to come to grips with. I urge the Minister, since they did not do it originally, to try to come to grips with the Wright Report and the general recommendations contained therein. The report recommended a central planning agency for the whole of the Dublin region. We must realise that had we done certain things, by and large we could have solved some of the serious problems in Dublin in relation to urban renewal, housing, major planning developments and so on; in relation to consumer expenditure in the supermarkets and right down the line; the major problems of health; placing of hospitals, and so forth—all of them within the infrastructure of the greater Dublin region itself.
The second point in that regard I want to make—and faulting the Government—is, of course, the cursory and in my opinion, rather disgraceful comments made by the Minister. I exempt his departmental staff. I am aware of some of the happenings, in terms of attitude, within the Cabinet. I refer to the quite disgraceful passing-by in his statement on the Buchanan Report.
I do not claim to be a particular advocate of regionalism, as such. However, I suggest to the Minister that this kind of cavalier attitude on his part towards the Buchanan Report is uncalled for. For example, in page 47 of his brief, the Minister refers to proposals—proposals of cost, and so on; various evaluations, perhaps, due to take place. This is a report which is now well-published, which is available to the Government and which has been on the Cabinet agenda month after month and on which no decision has emerged. Nevertheless, the Minister says:
...the Government is not in a position to say whether or not, or to what extent, the recommendations in the Buchanan Report might be relevant in such a programme.
Whatever that means. It is, I think, a kind of polite, Civil Service jargon interpreting the indecision of their own Minister. They, being exempt, are trying to comfort him within the vocabulary of a Minister's speech. Indeed, I think it is fair to say that at least the Minister did put in his speech what Buchanan generally proposed. He said, on page 45:
Having considered alternative extremes and various in-between courses reflecting different degrees of concentration and dispersal the consultants recommended, first, that there should be a special expansion programme for the Cork and Limerick areas as counters to Dublin and to improve the country's international capacity to attract industry and absorb migration. Secondly, they recommended that a special measure of expansion should be promoted in six regional centres to exploit regional potential. Thirdly, in areas remote from these centres, the consultants envisaged that local growth centres would be designated and a concentrated effort made to develop commercial, administrative and industrial services in them for the surrounding areas.
That is what one would call an elementary, rational, coherent and constructive assimilation of the massive work that went into this report and the various appendices which had been made available. Yet the Minister, the Taoiseach, notably Deputy Colley, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, who wants his weaving-shed in every town and village, cannot make up their minds. As a result, I would strongly suggest to the Minister that regional economic development in this country is being seriously impeded by that kind of obscurantist thinking within the Cabinet itself. I think, therefore, there is a good deal of fault to be found with the Government in failing to make up their mind in that matter.
Having placed the initial aspects on record, I want to go on to the housing section of the Minister's statement. I want to start off by congratulating the Minister on that section. I know it is very fashionable in this House generally to denounce Deputy Boland, the Minister for Local Government—in that respect, he is his own worst enemy in terms of defending himself —in respect of the housing record of the Government. I think it must be placed generally on record that, by and large, there has been continuous development of new house-building in the country. Where the Labour Party and where I am quite sure the Opposition parties strongly differ from the Minister is that it is not, as yet, by any manner of means, as massive and as great in development as we want. I think this in fact is the issue. It is not a question of bandying across the Dáil Chamber or in any municipal authority statements such as "You built so many houses in 1957". Quite frankly, I was 20 years of age then and completely unfamiliar with the gyrations of the various Ministers for Local Government at that time.
There is the reality of the number of new dwellings completed: in 1966-67, 11,000; 1967-68, 12,000; 1968-69, 13,000 and 1969-70, 14,000. That is the data issued by the Department of Local Government, housing administration section, in January, 1970, the latest general information available. Here are the figures for the number of "starts", dwellings begun or authorised, in terms of information available: 1968-69, 14,400 roughly, starts begun or authorised; 1969-70, a total of up to some 17,000. I would be politically dishonest if I did not admit that those figures for housing development are impressive. I do not think we should be unduly preoccupied on the Opposition side of the House in saying that this is not so. However, in terms of what is needed, in terms of meeting the explosion in the Dublin area, in terms of meeting a basic human need —ranking only second to food in this country—then the record is just not good enough.
We in the Opposition benches wish to assure the Minister that even his best efforts will not go unrecognised on our part but most certainly we shall keep lighting a fire under him to make sure he does even better in future. This is the purpose of politics. Therefore, I would point out to the Minister, taking the figures I mentioned there of 12,000, 13,000, 14,000 houses—that, on page 9 of his own White Paper Housing in the Seventies, he states, in effect, that, by the mid-1970s, “if the projections for losses of dwellings and for increases in the number of households materialise, needs will be nationally about 15,000 to 17,000 houses a year”. The population in 1971 will provide a check on these projections. Therefore, we can say that the Minister, at this point of time, is running 3,000, 4,000, maybe 5,000 houses short in terms of meeting the country's general requirements.
This has also been commented on by a number of economists. There is one particular quotation which I should like to place on record from Michael Greene of the Federation of Builders, perhaps an unduly carping comment in some respects but nevertheless true in terms of its analysis. He stated, for example, that in 1946 our stock of dwellings in the country was 662,000. By 1961 this had increased to only 676,000 despite the fact that 128,000 new dwellings were completed in the period. He stated that the small increase of 2.1 per cent can be accounted for only by the fact that many of the houses built contributed to the replacement of the existing stock of dwellings. He further stated that if a similar rate of stock replacement is assumed for the period 1962-69 then the net addition to the stock of dwellings has only been in the order of 11,000. Considering, he said, that in 1961 75 per cent of our dwellings were pre-World War II and 58 per cent were pre-World War I, the problem of replacement of the stock of houses, not to mind increasing it, is most likely to become even greater. I certainly concur with this view.
With the growth in the marriage rate, with the increase generally in the population, we will still have, at the current rate of expansion, a rather serious and very difficult housing problem. One aspect of this matter irritates me. It is what I call the political statistical aspect—the bland tossing across the Chamber of "5,000 people in Dublin need houses", or 7,000, or 10,000, and there is very little consideration generally for the number of families and people directly involved. I know it is a mere statistical point but one has got to examine it to appreciate the full dimensions of the housing problem generally.
If we take the lowest possible figure for Dublin, 5,000 families on the general application list—a figure that has been mentioned so often that it has become accepted whether it is correct or not—and if we say each family consists of four persons, this means that in the Dublin Corporation area there are 20,000 persons in need of housing as defined under the Act. In the Dún Laoghaire area which I represent there are 450 families on the housing approved list; this means there are 1,800 people, on the basis of four per family which is the minimum figure, in urgent need of housing. In County Dublin the Minister has admitted that the record is rather disappointing. There are—and I am quoting the Minister—1,400 families on the approved housing list and, again on the basis of four per family, we get a figure of 5,600 persons in need of housing. On a very simple statistical exercise there are at least between 28,000 and 35,000 persons in the greater Dublin area in urgent need of housing and I would stress that I am using data provided by the Minister's own Department.
While one must recognise the growth there has been in housing in Dublin, nevertheless, the dimension of the current serious problem is something which the Minister has tended to ignore on a number of occasions even if it is only on a political defensive basis that he does not want to be caught out. If he admitted the true situation as he did in respect of Dublin County Council we would all have a far greater respect and understanding of the problem. Though we see a prob- lem in the dimension of between 28,000 and 35,000 people in need of housing, it is only when those of us who are in public life, the social workers, the housing staff of various local authorities, the engineering staffs on the local authorities who must inspect housing conditions, as well as the clergy who are continuously making representations to relieve the critical situation that exists, have to witness the appalling family frustrations that one becomes quite irate about the general situation.
It is time we stopped the pretence of having a very Christian concern for the housing situation. I have met many families where internal family dissension and frustration exist; where husband and wife do not live together because there is no room for them to do so; where there is a high infant mortality rate arising from such housing conditions; where problem families exist because there is overcrowding and so on and where we have what can only be classified as rent exploitation particularly in respect of flats. It is only when one comes into first-hand contact with these conditions that one appreciates that our scale of social priorities must be rather cockeyed.
When I witness in the greater Dublin area the fact that money is never scarce for office blocks; never scarce for exotic supermarkets in our suburban areas; never scarce for the plush hotels of whatever political complexion you want in terms of their erection; when money is not in the least scarce for the large supergarages erected throughout the country, one begins to realise that the social priorities in terms of revolution of attitudes of the present Government are rather sparse and the social conscience is rather marginal in terms of general impact. Should the Minister care to take a morning off I will bring him to his own constituency—from Shankill to Dundrum, to South County Dublin; I shall bring him to Dún Laoghaire, to Rembrandt House in Monkstown; I shall bring him to No. 2 Crosthwaite Park, a tenement slum in Dún Laoghaire, and I will introduce him to some of the housing conditions in that constituency which would certainly stir the conscience of his party if it does not stir the consciences of the local authorities themselves. I would strongly urge the Minister to be frank with us in his reaction to these comments.
There is one aspect on which I should like to congratulate the Minister— and it is only fitting that it be placed on record—and that is his deep and very laudable concern as a Member of the Cabinet for the integration of the itinerants into the community. The very obvious personal concern of the Minister in this respect must be placed on record. Having regard to the statements made by him, and particularly his adamant attitude that a Government Department or a voluntary committee cannot make proper arrangements for the education of the children of such families unless they have a permanent place to stay, we can say that whatever about housing in general as far as the itinerants are concerned the Minister's heart is in the right place and he has my admiration and thanks for his attitude in this respect. I support him in his condemnation and denouncement, and as he classifies it "a grave dereliction of duty", on the part of those local authorities who have not yet provided sites to cater for the needs of itinerants in their areas despite the very generous financial assistance offered by the Minister's Department.
Passing to the aspect relating to building societies the Minister was a little coy and unduly quiet in relation to his proposals affecting building societies. The Minister did point out that these societies enjoy certain arrangements in regard to income tax and dividends payable by them which makes investment with them quite attractive. He went on further and said the public had a right to expect that the concessions the building societies enjoy will be used in the interests of the community. It was for this reason that the Minister announced last June that the Government proposed to review present taxation arrangements with a view to favouring societies who invest their funds in the way most likely to help our housing programme, that is, those societies who invest not less than 90 per cent of their total advances for house purchase loans not exceeding £6,000 or any other sum that the Minister for Local Government may fix from time to time. The Minister stated that the review was in progress and that it was intended it would also deal with the associated question of the societies' infrastructure.
I welcome that statement on the part of the Minister because we have tended to underestimate the general growth of building societies. After 33 years of fairly intensive growth, the country's five big building societies have assets of almost £60 million in the State and, if one is to judge by their rate of growth during the past 20 years, there can be no doubt but that by the end of the 1970s their assets will exceed the £100 million mark. Therefore, it is only right and proper that the State should have a sharp look at the role of these societies. In many respects they should be made accountable to the public, just as they should be made more responsive to the social needs of the community so that some of the nonsense which is heard from their spokesmen from time to time in relation to the activities of the Department of Local Government might be disregarded.
I wish the Minister would be less cautious in his attitude towards them because, after all, there are four years in which to write off the electoral storms. If the Opposition Parties are buttered up with donations from the directors of the building societies for the next general election campaign or for any other campaign that may develop—I can assure the House that the contributions to our party from that direction were rather sparse—I am quite sure that the Minister would be well able to recover his points over four years. Should the Minister introduce these regulations as a matter of urgency I have no doubt that he would have the support of every Deputy on this side of the House. I have been appalled at the cavalier treatment by the building societies of house purchasers and borrowers. I have had many letters from constituents, particularly in the dormitory suburb area of Dún Laghaire-Rathdown where there have been bitter complaints about the attitude of building societies in relation to interest rate changes. The time is long overdue for the Minister to take action on interest rates.
A further aspect with which I should like to deal in relation to new houses is one for which I am not quite certain that there is ministerial responsibility but, nevertheless, one which is part of the housing costs generally: legal charges. While the Minister for Justice may be involved in the legal end, I would urge the Minister for Local Government to work very closely with the Minister for Justice on the question of legal charges for the building of new houses. It is a disgrace that the State has not acted in the common good and with much greater vehemence in this matter. It is wrong that the Minister for Local Government should urge greater productivity in the construction industry, that the Taoiseach should urge trade unionists to accept a seven per cent ceiling on wage rounds and that the Minister for Finance should impose rigid credit restrictions while a legal operator can collect his fee of two per cent irrespective of the growth in the cost of housing, that he can collect his legal fees on what I would consider a restrictive basis—a basis which, in my opinion, means that he is skimming the cream off the inflation in the cost of housing generally. The fact that the Minister for Justice happens to be a solicitor should not inhibit the Minister for Local Government in any way in making representations to him on this matter.
There is also the question of auctioneers' fees. This is an element of housing costs over which the State should exercise some control. If the Government wish to have a judicial inquiry—I understand the current one is costing more than £200,000—and if they wish to spend money in a better setting, they could have an impartial judicial inquiry into legal charges in respect of auctioneers' charges with relation to house sale and purchase as well as having an inquiry into the development and growth of ground rents.
These are three areas in respect of house property where a very searching and useful piece of public investigation might be carried out. I am certain that an investigation of this nature would yield more interesting results than some of the investigations being carried out at the moment.
Likewise, within the local authority system there should be a statutory formula available for a standardised legal procedure in respect of the vesting of property. This could reduce substantially the exploitation of home owners by those who cash in on the various aspects of house ownership.
I consider the Minister to be rather partisan in his statement in regard to differential rents. In his speech the Minister said:
Those who call for the "abolition" of the differential rent system and favour the charging of fixed rents are, in fact, arguing that old age pensioners, widows and other persons on low incomes should only qualify for the same subsidies, and thus pay the same rents, as those who are fortunate enough to be earning good incomes. This clearly would be unjust.
How wonderful is the Minister's insight into the differential rents system. It is hardly necessary for me to comment on this kind of elementary statement on the social responsibility of wage and salary earners. As the Minister is aware, there is no general call for the abolition of the differential rents system and, indeed, the Minister goes on to say:
...In this sense, those who argue against income-related rents are arguing against the building of houses for many people who so badly need them.
This is what I would call the kind of elementary political propaganda which the Minister could usefully have left out of his speech. He knows that it was only put in for that purpose and as a general blind to the fact that there are considerable administrative difficulties of an understandable nature in the administration of any differential rent system. I should like to see the Minister getting his Dáil pay cheque on the 1st March and being told that in relation to 1969 he got slightly more than he should have got and that therefore he will have so much docked or else he will not get any pay in the following March. In this computerised age it should not be beyond the competence of the Department of Local Government and the Dublin Corporation to devise some reviewing system for differential rents so that no one family will suddenly find themselves with an amazing accumulation of arrears and be put out on the side of the street with all the social problems involved.
In his statement the Minister refers to the scarcity of land. He indicates that the Dublin city and county authorities and the Dún Laoghaire borough authority had acquired at 31st March, 1969, a reserve of sites for nearly 30,000 private and local authority dwellings, that a number of sites had already been made available to private builders and that steps were in train to release more sites in the coming months. There must therefore be some 3,000 to 4,000 acres of land in the possession of these authorities and there is no reason why this land should not be developed as quickly as possible in order to alleviate the housing problem in the greater Dublin area.
In regard to the scarcity of land the Minister says that he is trying to find some means whereby speculation in scarce serviced land would be discouraged and the increase in the value of land, attributable to the provision of services and the designation of land for development by planning authorities to meet the needs of the community, would be recouped to the benefit of the community and not be turned to private profit. The Minister knows this speculation has been on a big scale. Admittedly, credit restrictions have put a stop to it. He says the problem is very complex, that the obvious solution of bringing all such land into public ownership would present serious constitutional, financial and administrative problems. We are aware of all these considerations. He says that other measures to deal with the problems were being studied. Could I ask the Minister what other measures are being studied? Some of the land speculators are closely associated with his own party and some of them closely associated with one of the Opposition parties, and I do not think we should be unduly sensitive about that. It is high time the Minister introduced, as was introduced in Britain, a land development tax which brought in something like £1 million in the first year and will bring in double that in the current year. Admittedly it has not been the glorious success in Britain that everybody thought it would be because of the tremendous legal and administrative difficulties involved in such a tax, but it would curb the sharks of Dublin who have made substantial capital gains through the purchase and sale of land on the open market with virtually no State control and tacit acceptance on the part of the Government.
I would support the Minister's statement in regard to homes for the elderly. It is disgraceful that provision for elderly persons has not been effectively encouraged in our local authorities. I suppose some local authorities feel the people are so old anyway that by such time as they would get suitable accommodation from the local authorities they might not be in a position to vote at the next election for the members concerned. The grant schemes should be more fully publicised by the Minister so that the old folks associations, parish organisations and so on throughout the country would know what financial assistance was available. This would be welcomed by old people living out their days in substandard dwellings throughout the country.
The Minister says in his statement that he intends to provide an increase of £50 in the State grant for smaller houses and that the local authorities may pay an additional amount up to £50 to persons eligible for supplementary grants. The Minister must be living in dreamland if he thinks £50 is an adequate sum for this purpose. The builders would not be impressed by it. The Minister should at least double that sum.
I congratulate the Minister on his approval of 17 different types of houses. I understand he has five other types under consideration at present. I share his concern about the cost of building and the length of time it takes. Houses built under Continental systems take from three to six months in some cases and six to nine months in most cases and if we were to adopt a more industrialised system of component unit building we would be able to build houses at a faster rate. The Minister should keep a sharp eye on local authorities and the various Government Departments because there can be no excuse for the lengthy delays which occur especially when demand for houses is so great.
If industrialised building and the greater use of component units is to be of any benefit to building houses more quickly the possibility of craftsmen being trained to carry out a range of operations must be examined. I realise I am treading on rather sensitive ground here but it is time we faced up to the realities of modern construction techniques and practices. In the wet fixing area of bricklayers, plasterers, masons and tilers I am sure one general craftsman would be capable of doing these four jobs. The situation is developing where bricklayers now do tiling work and more trade unions will have to develop an effective system of dual training in the construction industry. Such a system would provide an industry which is very short of craftsmen with qualified men.
I should like to refer to some points made by Deputy Dowling during his three hour speech. I want to stress that I am not making them in a by-election setting. He referred to the Dublin south-west region in a very laudable sense and I would like to take issue with him on this point. I do not think the Dublin south-west region is a model of town planning or a model of industrial estate planning and housing development. We can learn very many lessons from this region. There are about 200 manufacturing and distributing enterprises of various sizes between Tallaght and Chapelizod. In spite of that there are deficiencies in the telephone services; there are transport problems for the workers living in Ballymun and working out in Tallaght as well as for those working in the Chapelizod area; there are also problems relating to sewage and other effluents; and there are problems relating to planning, particularly in regard to the construction and extension of roads. These are all relatively small problems but anyone approaching Dublin from that direction sees one of the worst eyesores, in terms of industrial-cum-housing-cum-social planning, of any capital city in Europe. There is an inadequate finish to the area in terms of work still to be done by Dublin County Council and Dublin Corporation. There are monstrous advertising hoardings and petrol stations which make the area unsightly. The Government's policies in relation to town planning and industrial estates are no credit to them in south-west Dublin although I do welcome the employment and housing in the area.
The Minister should stop acting in a kind of Gilbert and Sullivan fashion about the city commissioner of Dublin Corporation. He should accept the responsibility for appointing him and report accordingly to this House. He should at least be frank about the situation otherwise this codacting will go on for the next four years. Having been critical of the Minister's decision to abolish the city council I must confess that had I been one of the councillors I would not have voted for self-immolation at that point in time. The Minister rather cleverly walked them into it. While the councillors showed a justifiable reaction in respect of the excessive rates increase for 1968 they fell into the trap neatly laid by the Minister, Deputy Boland. I am quite sure that councillors will not fall into the trap of dissolving themselves in future.
In view of the continuous charges on the part of the Minister that there is a coalition operating in Dublin County Council, may I assure him that since I came to Dublin 14 years ago I have heard nothing but the coalition between Paddy Burke and Mark Clinton? I can assure the Minister that the coalition exists between the Fine Gael Party and the Fianna Fáil Party on Dublin County Council and is there to be seen in all its manifestations from the annual rigging of the election of chairman to the rotation of the office. If one wants to be honest one might as well say that that is the coalition that is in operation. Deputy Tunney confirmed that this evening and he has more intimate involvement with Dublin and the county council than I have had in recent years. It is important to have the record right.
I want to comment briefly on the question of pollution. The Minister's statement is rather sparse and ineffective. There was an attempt made by the Labour Party as far back as 1929 to deal with this problem when the late Senator Tom Johnson introduced in the Seanad the Town and Rural Amenities Bill, which was passed by the Seanad but, when it got to the Dáil, the Government said that they were preparing their own Bill, and they finally did so in 1933 or 1934. The Labour Party most certainly have been very conscious of the need to preserve the environment. In that respect the Labour Party have been to the fore. While An Foras Forbartha has done very good work in relation to conservation and in the development plans produced by it and the various studies they have carried out, in no other field has there been more sharply shown up the need to rationalise the work of An Foras and the Department.
I am not quite sure what kind of power politics go on between An Foras and the Department. I am quite certain that there is a great deal of joint empire building going on. I should like to get to the bottom of it. An Foras is in a vaccum in respect of a good deal of its work that is costing a good deal of money. Generally speaking, the work it has done to date deserves the height of praise and support but in such matters as pollution there should be greater co-ordination between An Foras, the Institute of Industrial Research and Standards and the Department. The Department have a good deal to answer for.
I should like to comment in a very careful manner on the relationship between the Department and the alleged prospect of pollution arising from the establishment of a smelter industry. The Minister made no reference to this major matter but did say quite recently in reply to a question that I had down that under the Smelting Act, 1968, smelting of ore or ore concentrates requires a licence from the Minister for Industry and Commerce and that such licence may include such conditions as the Minister for Industry and Commerce thinks proper and specifies in the licence. I would strongly urge on the Minister that there should be a formal, contractual and, if necessary, statutory obligation entered into between the Department or, with the consent of the Department, the local authority in Cork, and the smelter authorities, so as to ensure that no pollution could possibly arise. There is need for caution. There is need to prevent fall-out. In such a major and far-reaching development, it is not just good enough to lay down planning permission conditions. There is need for a more rigorous form of control. I have no doubt that the Smelter Corporation of Ireland will fall into line. I have not the slightest doubt that if the smelter industry comes, it will go to Cork. I am rather amused by some of the red herrings that have been produced with regard to Limerick. To the best of my knowledge, it is reasonably certain that it will be based in Cork. A study has been made by the scientific personnel in UCC. Any such group has every right to do this, even though the companies concerned may react to criticism which justifiably may be made. If the criticism is proved wrong, so much the better in the public interest. It is very necessary that before any smelter is set up, means of monitoring dangerous fall-out should be established. At least, the people in Cork are now fully aware of the circumstances.
One could offer congratulations in respect of the comprehensive articles by Val Dorgan published by the Cork Examiner. If the Cork Examiner published more feature articles of that kind, it would improve its general content and many more of us would decide to read the paper. That article outlined the need for safety measures and care. The Government and the Minister seem to be acting rather tardily and rather ineffectually.
I want to congratulate the Minister on his obvious interest in road safety and on the work his Department have done in introducing more effective safety measures. I wish to refer in particular to the blood test regulations. Under the law, it is now an offence to drive or to attempt to drive or to be in charge of a car while the level of alcohol in the blood exceeds 125 milligrammes. The legislation provides for breath, blood and urine tests. Unfortunately, for reasons which are very well known, the operation of these provisions has received a temporary setback. I would suggest to the Minister that within six months he should provide for a reduction in the level of alcohol. Experience in Britain following the introduction of the Road Safety Act and information available from the British Medical Association and available generally in Europe, would suggest that a reasonable case can be made, without hysteria, for a reduction, certainly, to 100 milligrammes.
I may not be very popular for suggesting that there might be a tightening in that regard. I appreciate that the Minister has left it rather loose but I would remind him of a very well-known report and the events which led up to the Road Safety Act, 1967, in Britain. If I may just put this on record I think the Minister will subsequently appreciate the attitude in "The Drinking Driver", a report of a special committee of the British Medical Association, published as far back as 1965. A tremendous amount of work was done since then.
The report says that there was in 1965 adequate scientific evidence to support legislation making it an offence in Britain for a person with a blood alcohol concentration in excess of 80 mg/100 ml to drive a motor vehicle on the public highway. Certainly that is rather disquieting. It also referred to some previous reports which showed that at 60 mg/100ml drivers are twice as likely to be responsible for causing an accident; at 100 mg/100 ml six to seven times as likely, and at 150 mg/ 100 ml 25 times as likely, when compared with drivers having less than 10 mg/100ml in their blood. Some of the evidence given recently following on the 1965 report in Britain might show the necessity for a review. I am not saying it is necessary now but I have no doubt that the Minister should have another look at it towards the end of 1970.
The number of car owners in my constituency is very great. I do not think it is unfair to say that if one drives on the Bray Road on a Friday between the hours of 11 o'clock and 2 o'clock in the morning—and I have had to do so on many occasions—one virtually takes one's life in one's hands. There is the current mess in relation to the breathalyser. It has got off to a peculiarly inauspicious start. The Minister is responsible for this legislation and I would urge him to keep it under sharp review. He has my general sympathy in trying to resolve the impasse but no doubt the breathalyser will be back in full operation again.
It should be pointed out to the House that the British Minister for Transport reviewed the first two years of its operation and said that for the first year after the introduction of the drinking and driving legislation casualties fell by ten per cent, in the second year these gains virtually held, and the total number of casualties was ten per cent lower than the year before the legislation came into force. The British Minister went on to say—and this was a rather interesting statement made last December—that if anybody wanted further proof they had, since 1966, had post-mortem figures of the blood alcohol level of drivers who died within 12 hours of a road accident and before the Act no less than 28 per cent were found to be above the level of 80 milligrammes but since the Act this figure has fallen to 15 per cent. It was still of course much too high. Nevertheless the figures were better. On the basis of those figures alone it can be said that in Britain the legislation is working rather effectively. I would urge the Minister to try to compile some statistics of the blood alcohol concentration in serious accidents on the roads. I am sure that if we had that for fatal accidents in the case of drivers who died within 12 hours of road accidents some of the figures would prove rather frightening.
I have not had the opportunity due to the time factor to develop some other points. I should like to ask the Minister a final question. Is it his intention to revise the internal system in his Department relating to planning appeals? Even within the confines of the current legislation it should be possible for the Minister to be more forthcoming publicly in relation to such appeals. It is noticeable that the number of appeals received by the Minister showed a substantial increase and went up from 1,229 in 1966-67 to 1,897 in 1968-69.
I want to assure the Minister that in political circles—and perhaps here he may be his own worst enemy in terms of sharp reaction and in terms of general attitudes—there is a great deal of disquiet at the manner in which some appeals are heard, not by the departmental staff but by himself: at the final decisions and at the delays which can arise and give rise to political allegations from time to time. It would lead to a healthy administration of the Planning and Development Act if some public statement were made and was not just available to public representatives if they write in for it. Reports on appeals upheld and appeals disallowed should be available to the press and there should be much more information elaborating the grounds for such decisions. This would allay many of the fears which are felt. I do not particularly support the idea of sending off these appeals to a "clatter" of lawyers sitting in a general appeals court. This may be part of the Fine Gael policy but I do not think it would solve anything and it would probably cost a fortune, like the current tribunal which is costing £200,000 and sitting for weeks on end.
