When children first start going to school, if they have not been taught their ABC at home before going to school, the first thing they learn is their letters and, having learned their letters, they then in a short time learn to read short phrases. They improve and eventually they read anything they can get hold of. It makes no impression on their minds because they do not understand what they are reading but on every possible occasion they trot out what they read. Being children, they try to impress their hearers by pretending they know what they are reading. My mind went back to schooldays when I listened to Deputy Dowling trotting out figures which, apparently, did not mean one damn thing to him because he did not understand them. Someone gave him a book and said: "Go in and read this." This was a sensible debate until Deputy Dowling rose and it is a pity that it should be impaired now by the introduction of irrelevancies.
I am glad the Minister for Labour and Social Welfare is present because he is a key figure in this whole muddle. I am sure he is not very proud of the situation in which he finds himself. He is a very decent man and I am sure he is as perturbed and embarrassed by the inaction of his Government as everybody else in the country must be. The debate started off with the Taoiseach and some of his Ministers trying to put across that there was no crisis. no problem and no need to take any special measures. The Anglo-Irish Free Trade Area Agreement was not doing anything to spoil the unblemished record and so on, and so on. Even as recently as a week ago we had the Taoiseach at a Fianna Fáil meeting saying there was no crisis and that was repeated here in this House by members of his Government speaking in this debate; in fact, the argument was that the crisis was one which had been created by the Labour Party and, to a lesser extent, by Fine Gael. The Labour Party had wished thousands and thousands out of their jobs. Deputy Joe Dowling in the little bit of what he said that I could understand said that even by this debate we were creating further unemployment.
Let us put the blame now fairly and squarely where it belongs and that is on the shoulders of this Fianna Fáil Government. We were used to a Government controlled by a strong Taoiseach—first of all, Eamon de Valera and then Seán Lemass. Both of these gentlemen in their time had one characteristic which helped them very considerably: they made up their own minds and they had a policy and they insisted on that policy being carried out. Unfortunately, when Deputy Jack Lynch arrived, we had a different set of figures. We had a Taoiseach who was not prepared to "carry the can" himself and who passed responsibility for everything on to his Ministers. They were, in fact, paid to carry that responsibility but they had never had to carry that responsibility before. Then a few calamities struck his Government and he finished up with a rather mediocre type of Government and, when the weight came on them, they started to crack and very soon they fell apart. The result is that 80,000 of our people are now unemployed because of a poor Government, a poor Cabinet and an irresponsible attitude by that Government and that Cabinet to a crisis which has been building up, not this week, or last week, or the week before, but for months past. We could see it. Fine Gael could see it. Fianna Fáil could not see it. Even now they cannot see it. They say these people are not unemployed and there is no crisis.
Dr. Kieran Kennedy, Director of the Institute for Economic and Social Research, said that the economy was in a state of deflation. I assume he is a highly intelligent man and knows what he is talking about. He replaced Dr. Fogarty and Dr. Geary, both of whom had a tremendous reputation. I assume that, when he made that statement, he was stating a fact. Why is the economy in a state of deflation? This deflation is the direct result of the Budget introduced here last year by the present Minister for Finance, Deputy George Colley. Deputy Colley when he introduced that Budget said that he had pared Estimates—those were his own words—in order to keep down expenditure and having pared the Estimates he was very proud of the figure he presented to this House. Since then we have had the situation in which a few months ago £20 million was injected into the economy and a further £50 million was mentioned here yesterday.
So much for his paring of Estimates. His Budget failed badly. He made this mistake: apparently he was under the impression that even if unemployment was created as a result of paring the Estimates it would cause moderation in prices. But all we need to do is look at Britain where unemployment is soaring to the one million mark and ask has there been a reduction in prices as a result. Of course not; nor here either. We knew for quite a time that the unemployment situation was worsening but the Minister for Finance until very late last year was not prepared to face the fact that this was so. He applied a 40 years old economic theory to running the country. Apparently at the back of his mind he had the idea that a pool of unemployment—a phrase used by Fianna Fáil—was useful because it would contain wage demands and keep prices down. Now he knows otherwise. The trade unionists and particularly union officials who were responsible for seeing the agreements through, proved to be very responsible and national wage agreements were made and adhered to despite the fact that the Government did not keep their end of the bargain. The Government made no effort to hold prices at the level at which they were when the agreement was made and the agreement was made particularly on the basis that prices would be held. They were not held and also unemployment was growing. This reminds me of the doctor who makes a wrong diagnosis and the patient dies. Dr. George Colley made the wrong diagnosis and the patient is rapidly dying now. The working class people are suffering most.
It was said by successive Ministers, particularly in the past six months, that the Anglo-Irish Free Trade Area Agreement had no bearing on growing unemployment. Last night we had a grudging admission by the Tánaiste followed by a more forthright admission by the Minister for Industry and Commerce that it had caused some unemployment but had only cost about 1,000 jobs—just like that. Apart from the fact that they are only a couple of thousand out it is an admission that something has gone wrong. These jobs had been disappearing over a period, very much more than 1,000 of them, and only very recently the Government decided to act. They increased by 50 per cent the tariff on certain imported goods. They did not do so until the country was flooded with British goods. An extraordinary thing happened here. Despite all we hear about buying Irish and the need for, and responsibility on Irish people to buy home products, when people began buying British goods they got a taste for foreign goods and began looking for Italian and French goods. At present one can go to any shop, even in a relatively small town, and find a selection of British and continental wares for sale. Apparently this does not worry the Government; it is only ordinary working people who are losing jobs, or so they think. But the position has gone so far that very many more than those employed in the factories are beginning to suffer. If the money is not circulating shops in the area suffer; then all the businesses suffer and around the ring it goes until eventually even the agricultural community will feel the loss of the earnings of the workers concerned.
The economics practised by the Government can only be described as lunacy. One reason I say this is that in a town in my constituency approximately 140 people were employed in a furniture factory at an average wage of about £25 a week. That factory closed. I believe a temporary injection of a substantial sum, perhaps, £60,000 or £70,000 by loan could have kept that factory going. It had been in existence over 40 years. It was modern and could have been saved and much could have been done by the employees to ensure not only a continuing of the home market but also of the export market in which the factory was engaged.
What happened? The 140 workers laid off first got redundancy pay and since they had long service had to get substantial amounts. Since the management knew the facts they gave six weeks notice so that approximately £35,000 or £40,000 went on redundancy pay. The State lost £2 per person per week in stamps, another £14,000, and approximately £15,000 per year was being paid by those workers in income tax. There was also the loss in turnover and wholesale taxes. Then the State, having lost that amount, estimated at about £200,000 in a period of 12 months, pays unemployment benefit to the people concerned and even at an average of £10 per week—it is much more than that in many cases because the workers were entitled to 50 per cent of their wages for a long period—it means that there was a loss in all of possibly £250,000 in a 12-month period. The loss of production represents a loss to the State and there was a loss of earning capacity and buying power amongst those concerned. We end up with no factory and the State suffering a net loss.
I wonder did the Minister for Finance ever hear of cost benefit analysis. Has any effort been made to find out if the closing of a factory could be more costly to the State than subsidising it to some extent to keep it going? I believe a partial solution to this problem must be for the State to set up some type of co-ordinating committee or department that would be able to tell the Department of Social Welfare that a factory is closing down and will result in a substantial net loss to the State and show that by means of a grant or loan at the proper time that factory could be kept going and the workers kept in employment.
An extraordinary thing is that not only does this happen in private enterprise, of which Fianna Fáil seems so proud, but it has been happening in State employment also. It is bad enough to have private employers whose only motive is profit laying people off in order to save their own pockets and to hell with the economy, but we have the State laying off men in the Forestry Division and the Board of Works and anywhere else they had employees. The State paid off these workers to save a few paltry pounds. Those concerned lost employment and income and the State lost their income tax and the cost of insurance stamps and eventually, even in that case, a net loss accrued to the State. Fianna Fáil do not care and they have failed to realise that it is their responsibility to see to it that the country is run properly. They just sit back and say: "There is no crisis, there is no unemployment." The sooner they realise that this will not be taken from them any longer the better it will be for them.
When the late Seán Lemass was sitting on this side of the House he said that the way to gauge whether a government were doing their job properly was to look at the number of people employed and the number unemployed and there you had the answer. The present Taoiseach has a different answer. He tells us: "Look at England." The unemployed are committing the cardinal crime of not emigrating. It is being asked why they do not emigrate because if they did this they would not be entered on the unemployment register here. Did anyone ever hear such a ridiculous statement from a Taoiseach? It is utterly stupid to point to the number of people who have not emigrated.
I should like to comment on one or two points the Taoiseach made in his speech. On a number of occasions I have said that Fianna Fáil are masters of the half truth. They are the best people I know to say something which, while it cannot be pointed out as being a deliberate lie, if one goes close enough into the matter it can be found to be half true. Of course, we can be told that there are two ways of looking at it. I should like to put another way of looking at some of the things the Taoiseach said yesterday.
The Taoiseach spoke about the necessity to reduce the size of pay increases and he suggested, as did the Tánaiste in his speech yesterday, that the cause of the trouble was that workers were looking for too much for what they are doing. As I have pointed out already, the workers have shown a tremendous restraint and have honoured their guarantees. It is an example I would recommend to the Government that, for a change, they might honour their guarantees.
The Taoiseach said that the level of employment showed little change from 1970. Later in the day we heard the Minister for Industry and Commerce boasting about 8,000 additional jobs that had been created in industry. Both the Taoiseach and other Government spokesmen, and particularly Deputy Colley outside this House, time and again have attempted to prove that a man or woman engaged in agriculture who becomes unemployed is not an unemployed person. The sooner it seeps through the brains of these gentlemen that whether a person is working in agriculture or industry if he loses his job he is unemployed the better it will be.
The Taoiseach said that the 77,801 who are unemployed were not all looking for work and he proceeded to slip in the half-truth. He said about 5,000 of them were over 65 years. No one knows better than the Minister who is present now, Deputy Brennan, that the 5,000 people referred to by the Taoiseach are on retirement pensions, they are over 65 years, and therefore do not appear on the unemployment register. The Taoiseach would be well advised to stick to the full truth because we can check on these figures and we know a little about how they are compiled. In the Adjournment Debate before Christmas the Taoiseach mentioned that there were between 4,000 and 5,000 people who were receiving retirement pensions. Those people do not appear on the unemployment register and anyone over 65 years who is signing for unemployment benefit or assistance is doing so because he wants a job.
The Taoiseach spoke about 11,000 farmers and their relatives and he suggested that these people are not unemployed. Have they full-time jobs, because if they have they should not be drawing unemployment benefit. I know that Fianna Fáil, in an effort to buy votes on the western seaboard some years ago, introduced a system which allowed these people to draw unemployment assistance while they worked their own farms. At the same time the Government deprived people with families of assistance. I know of a man who had 15 children and who lived in the midlands: a few years ago he was refused benefit although he had been charged for insurance stamps. Either people are unemployed or they are not. May I point out to the Taoiseach that the figures he gave were in respect of last year and if we have a comparison with this year it is obvious that these people are unemployed and he must accept that fact.
The Taoiseach referred to young married women who were signing for benefit. The Minister for Labour, who has just left the House, complained here when answering a question I put to him that even in his own constituency married women whom he thought were entitled to draw benefit were refused it because of the way some official worked the slide rule they operate with regard to unemployment benefit. Nobody signs at the employment exchange unless they are looking for a job. Accepting insurance stamps from people and then refusing to meet the commitments is a dishonest practice which should be stopped.
The Taoiseach spoke about the chronically unemployed—the unemployable. The Tánaiste went further and told us that in a survey carried out in Britain it was found that 46 per cent of those who were signing for unemployment benefit were people who were unable to work. In view of the fact that the number of people signing here for unemployment benefit as distinct from assistance is about 42,000, surely neither the Taoiseach nor the Tánaiste would suggest that the percentage shown in Britain applies to this country. They should check their figures before they trot them out in this House; if they do not, somebody else will.
If there are people who are unemployed because of illness or age or who suffered the heartbreak of going year after year to a labour exchange looking for the job that was not there, we should put these people into a special category and give them disability assistance and take them off the exchange books. Either these people are there or they are not. If they are there, it is legitimate to count them.
Redundancy has been mentioned and it has been suggested that even if there have been 8,000 redundancies it is not too bad because the people concerned are getting paid. What good is redundancy pay to a person of 50 or 60 years who has lost his job? Such a person knows that when he goes home with his insurance card and with the few pounds of redundancy pay he will never see a day's work again if this Government remain in power.
We have a Government Party who years ago stated that people over 40 years of age could not apply for a permanent job in State employment, even as a labourer. That has now been taken up by private enterprise and the position is that people who reach 50 years of age have no hope on earth of being re-employed. These people suffer tremendous heartbreak when they are forced to go home and tell their wives and families that they have lost their jobs, that they have no hope of getting other jobs and that they may have to emigrate. Then the Taoiseach tells us that, of course, they are not doing this, they are not emigrating now. However, it will be all right because when we enter the EEC they can go to Germany, Holland or some place else where there may be jobs available for them.
What about the break-up of family life as a result of all this? Nobody seems to worry, most certainly the Government do not worry. However, the Labour Party, whose main job it is to see to it that the ordinary people get a fair deal, will do everything in their power to prevent that from happening. We will do everything we can to put Fianna Fáil out of office. It is long overdue.
The Taoiseach spoke about retraining. Would someone tell me if any effort has been made to retrain anyone? Where has this retraining taken place? At the present time in my constituency work is commencing on the biggest mine in Europe, perhaps in the world. One would think that with so many people unemployed this would provide an opportunity for training people to take up well-paid jobs within the next two, three or four years, jobs which possibly they could hold for the rest of their lives. What is happening? This has not been suggested. Neither the educational authorities, nor the Department of Labour, nor anybody else, suggested that any effort should be made to train people for this work. When the time comes they will go in as unskilled labourers and bit by bit they will pick up the skills that are needed and, perhaps, in four or five years time they will be able to earn as much as they could earn at the start if they were properly trained. Is this not the Government's responsibility? Apparently they just do not care. They are not unemployed yet.
We must make sure that employment is made available for those who are prepared to accept it. The Taoiseach suggested yesterday—and at first I thought I did not hear him aright— that an extra £50 million was being made available. He said that next year's capital programme was being brought forward and that the figure to be made available as from now was £240 million. Is this some trick-of-the-loop for which Fianna Fáil are famous? Is he telling us that the money which is now being made available will be available for a period of 15 months? Is he telling us that from now on the money will be spent and that later on, if the money happens to run out, that is just too bad? Is he telling us that the schemes which have been in the Department of Local Government, the Department of Health and the Office of Public Works, some of them for a year and some of them for two years, will be undertaken immediately and that money will be made available for housing schemes in, for example, Athboy in my own constituency? Is he telling us that the sewerage and water schemes—for example, in Mornington in my own area, in Navan and all over the country—will be undertaken? Will the money be made available for schemes that are already planned, or will we have the trick which has been played on these people so often of saying: "The money is there. We will sanction the scheme," and six months later they are still considering whether they will allow a loan to be arranged for the purpose of carrying out the work?
Is the Taoiseach saying to us that any local authority who apply for money for a scheme which they are ready to start can have that money? If he is, let him say so. Let us have no more shilly-shallying. The situation is similar with regard to schools and hospitals. Many improvements and additions are urgently required. Are we being told that the money is now available and that work can start on them? We should be told these things. We do not want a situation to arise in which in six months time the officials of the Departments will be sitting around discussing whether they will sanction payment for the jobs which should be started now. They will not be started and everybody in the Department will be hoping that the fact that sanction was promised will be forgotten and somewhere towards the end of next year the money might be spent if the Government are still in office. I should like definite assurances on those matters and I think we are entitled to them.
There has been criticism by a number of people, and particularly by the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste, about what the Taoiseach called the scare stories of the Labour Party. I want to put this on record. Is it not a fact that because of the pressure which the Labour Party put on the Taoiseach and the Government, this debate is taking place? Is it not taking place because we insisted that these matters should be discussed here? We read in the papers that a reprieve has been granted, even for a month in some cases, to workers who were to be laid off. Must the credit for that not go to the people who requested a debate here and particularly to the Leader of the Labour Party, Deputy Corish, who insisted that it should take place? I do not want to take from the Fine Gael proposals because they were equally interested. The only people who did not seem to be interested were the Government. I hope they will be interested when the debate finishes.
There is one aspect of the reprieves I have just mentioned on which I should like some information. We have been criticising and condemning the fact that the Government do not seem to have made any arrangements for what they call fire-brigade action for the industry that is likely to fail. As far as I understand it, the instructions issued many years ago by the Fianna Fáil Minister for Finance, and repeated at intervals since, that those who are responsible for doling out grants or loans from the State must do so in a most conservative way, and that the profitability of a company is the first thing to be taken into consideration, are still in force. I want to know if there has been any change in those instructions. Has there been any suggestion that the question of the social good of continued employment in an industry should get priority?
I hate referring to individual firms here but in Dennys in Waterford notice was issued without any consultation. Have the Government any plans to provide employment for those workers who have now got a reprieve of one month? Can the 300 workers in Dennys be assured that the Government are attempting to find alternative employment for them, or is this reprieve intended to get them over the evil day until this debate is over in the hope that everybody will then forget it? Unlike other parts of the country where there might be some prospects of employment even in a couple of years time, I cannot see 300 workers finding re-employment in Waterford unless a big effort is made and unless the money is made available to reemploy them.
The Government have the old capitalist notion that the profit motive is the prime objective and that if a firm make a profit they are entitled to live, and that if a firm do not make a profit, and are just ticking over, even if they are keeping a substantial number of people in employment, they must die. This seems to be the Government's attitude. I suggest that they should change that attitude as quickly as possible. Rethinking on their role is definitely needed in the Department of Finance. I cannot see any way of getting out of the morass in which we are at present except by making a lot of money available to ensure that industries that have been giving big employment and whose social benefit to the country is tremendous are enabled to remain in existence. If they cannot it is the responsibility of the State to take them over, to give adequate compensation to those who own them, and keep them in existence because otherwise we will have continuing unemployment.
Lest I forget it, yesterday afternoon when the Taoiseach was saying 5,000 people were unemployed last December, and almost the same figure the previous year, he conveniently forgot the extra 9,000 who had gone on to the register in the previous year. He did not want anyone to remember that. I should like to remind him of it now. In addition to the 5,000 there are 9,000 more. Can he explain those figures away as glibly? Indeed, with regard to any plans which the Government may have for industry, I have grave doubts as to whether they are really serious at all.
To take rationalisation, for instance, we had guarantees that no unemployment or redundancy would result from rationalisation. While we all favour rationalisation, it must be said that the people who gave those guarantees had no idea what they were talking about. Certainly, these people were not prepared to stand over what was happening. We know that so far as creameries are concerned rationalisation will be responsible for the loss of 500 jobs during the next 12 months, that in the flour mills it will be responsible for the loss of 100 jobs, and that in the fertiliser industry it will be responsible for the loss of 200 jobs.
Regarding fertilisers, I might say that, despite the fact that Albatros have 50,000 tons in stock, a licence for the importation of 9,000 tons was granted during the past week. Is that the way the Government intend living up to their responsibilities? Is that what they mean when they talk about guaranteeing further employment? Apparently all that is at the back of their minds is the question of expediency—how to get out of an awkward corner at a particular time and while so doing to help their friends. The question of issuing licences is one that will have to be investigated since apparently there is "something rotten in the State of Denmark".
The Government give the ordinary people of the country credit for much less intelligence than they actually have. I meet many people and, unlike Government Ministers, the people I associate with are those who live in labourers' cottages, as they are called, or those who live on small farms— people, perhaps, who do not live in what could be described as very nice housing conditions. When I talk to these people I am amazed at how much they know. Ten or 15 years ago the propaganda meted out to them might have been accepted but that situation no longer exists and people realise what is happening. I warn Fianna Fáil that, unless they make a definite effort to improve the present situation, not only will they be defeated at the next election but many of them will never be heard of again.
No matter what happens now, it is the responsibility of the Government to find employment quickly. The Taoiseach told us glibly yesterday again that an extra 3,000 people would be recruited to the Garda and the Army. This is the first time I have ever heard of any Government offering recruitment to the Army as a solution to the problem of unemployment, although one country which shall remain nameless at one time solved her unemployment problem by introducing compulsory military service for everybody less than a certain age. Is that the suggestion here? I was surprised that the Taoiseach did not give a breakdown of the 3,000 and tell us exactly how many people are to be taken into each force. I am aware that extra gardaí are needed urgently but I would suggest that if the available gardaí were not employed to such an extent on the protection of blackleg lorries from Northern Ireland who come to this part of the country and strikebreak, more gardaí would be available for ordinary duties. I should like to know, too, if the Government have forgotten completely what is happening with regard to tourism. The amount being made available for tourism at present is about £4 million. The industry earns for us about £100 million. Can anybody suggest seriously that an investment of £4 million so as to earn £100 million is a reasonable investment?