Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 21 Nov 1973

Vol. 269 No. 2

Committee on Finance. - Vote 26: Local Government (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That a sum not exceeding £27,853,000 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1974 for the salaries and expenses of the Office of the Minister for Local Government, including grants to Local Authorities, grants and other expenses in connection with housing, and miscellaneous schemes and grants including a grant-in-aid.

—(Minister for Local Government.)

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Before reporting progress last night, I was endeavouring to demonstrate the vital role which the Department of Local Government play in the provision of houses for our people. The provision of housing, as well as being a vital economic factor, is also a social requirement. It can be said that the requirements in this regard at present are colossal. There are many reasons why there is so much strain on the Department in fulfilling this need. One of these is the large number of very old houses that are still in use. A report circulated recently indicates that we have a greater number of old houses than has almost any other European country. Added to this is the growth rate in respect of towns and cities and the general growth in villages. This expansion creates a need for additional housing. There is also the fact that people are marrying younger than in the past.

Because of inadequate housing many young married couples are obliged to live in flats for which they pay exorbitant rents, rents that in some cases would be three or four times the rent of a house and very often the conditions in these flats and rooms are insanitary and unhealthy.

Each of us must accept his part of the great social and moral responsibility that rests with us in regard to the provision of homes for our people. Even if the present Minister achieves the target that he has set, there will still be difficulty in providing the number of houses required. There are between 30,000 and 40,000 people seeking to be housed by local authorities as well as thousands more who are anxious to build houses for themselves. The Government must bear in mind that bad living conditions create discord in a family. The position in regard to flats usually is that once a couple have a baby they are asked to leave and in many cases couples with only one or two children cannot be housed by local authorities because of the extent of the waiting lists. Neither can an arrangement whereby a couple live with the parents of either one be satisfactory.

The very serious problem that is not alone prevalent in Dublin and other cities but in every provincial town in the country is that it is not possible, because of a regulation by landlords, for married couples who wish to have children to stay in flats. The same landlords will permit married couples who do not wish to have children to stay in rooms and flats. It would be wise for the Minister for Local Government and the Department to realise their moral obligations to provide housing for our people so as to remedy this great social evil. This is a responsibility of the Government collectively. I am expressing an opinion shared by many when I say that the lack of proper housing is doing more to restrict the size of families than the Bill of Senator Robinson—indeed ten times over——

An Ceann Comhairle

It is not in order for the Deputy to reflect on Members of the other House.

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

It is worthy of very special note by the Department of Local Government the vital role they can play in the provision of proper houses. They should undertake this in the knowledge of the serious restriction to family growth which can result from lack of proper housing accommodation. If for no other reason than that, it is wrong that so many of our people should have to live in circumstances which prevent them from having the number of children they would wish to have. The regulation of landlords to which I have referred is a serious aspect of our social living and this also must be tackled courageously by the Government.

All of us will appreciate that it is the desire of most young married people to enter completely into the fulfilment of marriage, the real purpose of which is to have families, large families, and this lack of housing is a serious restriction on the fulfilment of marriage obligations. Whatever else we may have, let it be sound defence policy, sound security policy, a sound agricultural policy, the whole kernel of family life, of parish life and of family unity is in the provision of housing. There can be nothing more degrading, there can be no more violent attack on the family as a unit, than bad housing conditions. Lack of proper housing conditions can have a very serious effect on the mentalities and on the standard of behaviour of children. They can see their playmates living in spacious houses with bathrooms and all other modern amenities while they are being treated as third, fifth or tenth rate citizens.

The provision of adequate housing calls for tremendous investment. However, we must appreciate that when we invest in housing we are investing in people. It is people who count in this and every other country. I have seen the most modern piggeries, stables and byres, with running water for livestock and I have seen little children in rooms and flats living in the most outrageous conditions, no credit to this country or to 50 years of native government. That is a situation crying out to be remedied.

How many Deputies realise the importance and the urgency associated with this Vote? The whole fabric of our society can, and will, crumble before our eyes unless there are proper housing conditions for all our people and unless the long lists and queues of persons awaiting rehousing are eliminated.

My views on our membership of the European Economic Community are well known. I readily accept the will and wishes of the vast numbers of our people who decided that membership was the right course to follow. Now that we are a member of the Community we must get all the help we can for our people. I am most anxious to hear from the Minister what opportunities are likely to arise at the Council of Ministers of the EEC for financial aid to assist us tackle the housing problem. Our best efforts are not enough. Our financial resources will not permit us to solve this very great problem. Let us take advantage of some of our wealthy capitalist colleague nations and see what they are prepared to do to assist us in providing houses, and to supplement the sums already mentioned in this Estimate by the Minister. Here again we are only scratching the surface. In every city, town, village and country cross roads there is a demand for housing. Our resources are incapable of meeting the financial demands necessary to solve this problem as we would wish.

The Minister should make a case to his fellow Ministers in the EEC that, in relation to our population, we have a vast number of room dwellers, of flat dwellers, of persons who have no houses and people living in substandard, insanitary houses. These are the problems we would like Europe to share and we look to Europe for generous assistance in raising our housing and living standards.

One section of the Community, thanks to their industry and skill and in part to the building societies, have all the facilities they require, including central heating. In another section of the community small children are obliged to sit around an open grate burning three or four briquettes to heat them. They are living in cold, damp and unpleasant conditions. This is bound to lead to mental disturbance in some form or other in young people.

I plead with the Minister to do something about this. I know I am knocking at an open door, because the Minister has been associated with local authorities for the greater part of his life. He knows the social and housing conditions and the appalling circumstances prevailing for many families. Let us go into Europe on this issue. Let us tell them that we are contributing as much of our resources as we can towards the provision of houses but that it is not enough and that we need their help. We have a slum problem. We have a flat problem. We have a roomkeepers' problem. We have the problem of people with no houses at all. We have a problem of great numbers of our people who are anxious to marry and who would marry but for the lack of proper accommodation. I ask that the wealthy resources of Europe be shared with us to enable us to deal with the appalling and scandalous housing conditions under which so many of our people are obliged to live.

I listened to the former Minister for Local Government speaking last night on the housing record of Fianna Fáil. from it one would imagine that everything had been solved by the wave of a wand and the problem was no longer in existence. The problem of bad insanitary housing and overcrowding is rife today. Bad housing is fertile soil for Communism to flourish in here. It is fertile soil for lawlessness, juvenile delinquency, broken homes and lack of unity in families. It is experienced in many families today. There is a lack of harmony, goodwill and understanding because of the deplorable conditions in which people are obliged to live.

Whatever the future holds for us in Ireland, the family is and always will be the important unit of society. The family, closely linked together in good housing conditions, comprise the parish and, whatever about our big cities, in rural Ireland the parish is looked upon as the unit of society in which all work together and pool their resources. There cannot be parish schools, parish halls, parish communities or parish effort unless there are houses of a good standard in the parish. I hope the urgency of this problem will not be underestimated by the Minister for Local Government. I hope that during the next 12 months there will be an even bigger breakthrough in every county in relation to housing. Most local authorities have prepared or are preparing schemes. They are doing what their financial resources allow them to do but that is insufficient. Our financial resources will never enable us to solve our housing problem. Now that we are in the EEC let Europe help. Europe issued a report some time ago commenting on the fact that there were more houses in Ireland of over 200 years of age than in most European countries. That is an opportunity for us and for the Minister for Local Government to make it known to his colleagues in the Council of Ministers that Ireland has a claim superior to that of any other country in Europe. I hope we will see substantial advances made as a result of our fellow nations assisting us to house our people properly.

I have been a county councillor for over 30 years and chairman of a county council for a number of years. I know that there was a circular issued in which local authorities were advised by the Department to curtail as far as possible the provision of rural cottages. The Minister should see that that circular which was addressed to county managers and housing authorities is withdrawn. Agricultural workers who wish to live near their employment should not be forced to live in towns. It is wrong that so many people, especially those engaged in agriculture, are compelled to live in what are known as group housing schemes convenient to towns and villages. If this is allowed to continue, in years to come there will be no houses to be seen between towns and villages. It will be the death knell of life in rural Ireland.

There is nothing more heartening than to see the nice homes the Land Commission have provided in rural Ireland. The only problem is that there are not enough of them. Local authorities can play a more vital role by providing rural cottages. There are numerous agricultural workers, there are workers employed by Bord na Móna, the ESB, the Office of Public Works. All those people are compelled to live in towns although they wish to live in rural districts. The reasons given for this are (1) economy (2) the problem of rural contractors and (3) the fact that septic tanks are considered undesirable. Surely science has reached a stage where septic tanks can be rendered harmless. The Department should cancel the circular in regard to rural cottages. I am a member of a local authority which is endeavouring to provide as many rural cottages as possible. It is astonishing the number of people who want to live in the country. Surely a citizen should have the right to say where he will live. If work is available and a site for a house, there is a duty on somebody to provide a house for such a citizen.

The former Minister for Local Government mentioned the building societies last night. It is only right that tribute should be paid to these societies for their immense contribution to housing and nothing should be said here that would undermine public confidence in the societies as places where they can invest money with security. I challenge Fianna Fáil that they have availed of an opportunity to make unwarranted attacks in speeches cleverly designed on building societies for the purpose of undermining the confidence which subscribers, particularly small subscribers, have in the building societies. It should go out loud and clear from this House that there is deep appreciation of the building societies' contribution to housing not only in the city but throughout the country. If people have any surplus money for savings or investment, what greater or sounder security is available than a reputable building society such as most of them are? Fianna Fáil references to building societies, I believe, have been designed to create publicity as a result of which subscribers would be afraid to invest in these societies. That is what the Opposition would like to see, a slump in housing, a shortage of money, a restriction by building societies on their contribution to our housing programme.

As members of the National Coalition Government we have a duty to say that we have undertaken a housing programme, that we are all united with the highest ambition to break the back of the colossal housing problem. We want to let it be known from every part of this House that the public need have no fear in giving every possible financial assistance and support to building societies. With my limited knowledge of building societies, I pay my tribute to these societies for their contribution. The intervention of the Minister in regard to putting a ceiling on the amount building societies may lend was timely and right. If I were in his position, I should have done exactly the same thing in the circumstances. When a ceiling of £7,500 was fixed it must be remembered that if Opposition speakers who are criticising the Minister were in office in similar circumstances the ceiling for each borrower would be £6,000. That part of their proposals is on record. Being a man of commonsense and intelligence, the Minister knew building costs were increasing and he would not adhere to the £6,000 limit but fixed a reasonable figure of £7,500.

I am glad steps will soon be taken to remove any restriction in regard to these loans but I would ask the Minister to keep in mind the real purpose for which building societies exist, to assist those who need financial assistance and can offer security in building their own houses. It would be wrong to encourage the building of too many of the £25,000 to £30,000 luxury houses. We must cut our cloth according to the measure and if there are people who want to spend this kind of money in erecting a mini-castle, let them use their own money. Building societies were not designed to assist in building modern, mini-castles for wealthy people.

Mr. O'Connor

They do not get grants for them—or loans.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Not grants, but they have got money from building societies. It is wrong that funds which could be devoted to providing houses priced between £5,000 and £8,500 should instead be spent on building these mini-castles. We cannot tell building societies to whom they should give money but we should make it known that we would like to see their money going to persons building modern, modest homes.

A person who would be building a house in the region of £20,000 to £25,000 would be regarded by the building societies as a very eligible person for a loan. However, such a person would have his own resources, and we must bear in mind the needs of the ordinary white collar worker, many of whom require the assistance of building societies. The money will not be there for these middle class people if there are too many of the other type of borrowers or even building groups who may be speculating in houses.

One of the great dangers to our housing drive is the building speculator. He will grow fatter and the person who is going to live in the house he builds will grow thinner. Nobody wishes to hinder the housing drive. The purchase of land for building has, in many instances fallen into the hands of speculators, and, I hope, not without the full knowledge of the Department of Local Government. There should be some regulations enabling the Department to keep tabs on these speculators.

Land has been acquired by many local authorities for building purposes, and I want to give the Minister for Local Government the benefit of my long years of experience as a member of the local authority and also as a valuer. I believe the last step a local authority want to take in relation to housing is compulsory acquisition. All the resources of the Department should be employed to avoid, as far as possible, acquiring land by compulsion. I wish to tender some advice to the Minister in this connection. Too often we have seen on the files of local authorities valuation reports by engineers. When a person is sick he does not acquaint the local blacksmith. When a person wants teeth drawn he does not go to the local shoemaker; he goes to the dentist. When a person wants an operation he consults the most eminent surgeon within reach; he does not seek the services of the local butcher. When an opinion on the value of property is sought, why do the local authorities consult an engineer instead of a valuer? In this country we have the most prominent and eminent valuers, members of the Irish Institute of Valuers. Many of them have received recognition in various parts of the world as lecturers on valuation. I want to protest against the engineering profession submitting to the Department of Local Government valuations in respect of land, building, or houses. I want to ask the Minister for Local Government, who is an eminent trade unionist himself, to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, to keep the engineering profession at engineering. There are competent valuers in this country, men of integrity and experience, who have gained international recognition in their profession. It is wrong for the engineering profession to allow their members to express opinions on the value of property, when they are not qualified to do it. The Department of Local Government are the worst offenders of all. The sooner they put their own house in order the better. We have excellent engineers. I do not like listening to them giving evidence on the value of property. They are not qualified to do so. They do not know anything about modern valuation techniques.

I wish to pay tribute to the chief arbitrator, Mr. McCarthy, who has conducted inquiries in regard to compulsory acquisition in a most competent manner. He has inquired about compulsory acquisition for good roadmaking, road widening and house building. His work is of the highest standard and his integrity beyond doubt. He considers all evidence submitted to him.

Compulsory acquisition should be a last resort. County managers should be guided by valuers instead of by engineers. Much time spent on arbitration proceedings would be saved if this was done. When I was involved in arbitration proceedings I ensured that a qualified valuer was there to express his opinion. This is particularly important in regard to the fixing of prices for property compulsorily acquired. Great injustice can be done to property owners who live near towns or cities. They may not be given the market value for their property.

It is wrong to take property from an unwilling owner without paying full market value.

There is still private ownership in this country. I hope that someone in this House will always defend private ownership. The rights of private ownership must be safeguarded. If one's property is to be acquired for housing, road widening, roadmaking, a speed track or a highway, there is a bounden duty on the State to pay full market value for such property. New roads and speedways by-passing towns and villages will be built in the future. The bureaucrats should not think that in order to implement their grandiose schemes they can deal unjustly with private individuals. The rights of the individual must be defended.

The Department of Local Government should be guided by competent valuers. They should be realistic and avoid confiscating property without paying proper compensation at full market value. The national necessity must be a qualification in the taking-over of property. Great care should be taken to ensure that private owners will not suffer any injustices. This will not happen if the Department of Local Government and local authorities are guided by competent men who know the value of land and of house property and the trends of marketing at home and abroad. They should be able to foresee the value of property in advance. The should be able to judge supply and demand. Valuations are usually affected by supply and demand. All this is foreign to people in other professions. The Department of Local Government or the local authorities will be guilty of grave injustice in relation to confiscation of private property from citizens if they do not fulfil their obligation to pay the full market value.

I must again express my appreciation of the work of the chief arbitrator. He is always impartial and fair on the evidence before him. If we are going to embark on a ten-year programme of road widening we should consider the rights of the individual. Let us respect ownership. Let us not try to embark on the bureaucratic idea that "work must go on; let us take all before us regardless of who owns it". We must be prepared to pay the full market value for what we acquire. I regret to say that I had grave reservations in relation to the payment by the State for some small properties that were acquired compulsorily.

The Minister is likely to experience much unrest if he embarks on a comprehensive dual-carriageway scheme. Our roads were not constructed to cater for the large continental carriers that are now travelling throughout the country. Road widening and construction call for investment of a kind that the resources of this country are not either capable or competent of supplying. We all know how much it costs to widen even one mile of roadway. However, in this area the Minister has an opportunity of delving into the pockets of the Community because if Europe wish to have us as partners they must be prepared to help us financially. Not only is much road development required to cater for the huge carriers from the Continent but also to cater for the tourists that we hope will come here.

If any Deputy comes from a constituency in which a town is to be bypassed I wish to assure him that he need have no fears in respect of the future. I admit that I am a convert to the by-passing of towns. Some 15 years ago when there was the first mention of by-passing the town of Portlaoise, I opposed very strongly that idea on the grounds that business would be lost to the town by reason of people not passing through it. However, my fears were proved groundless because business and industry in the town have benefited greatly as a result of the by-passing. The construction of the new road opened up a whole new area of development. It is now much easier for people to carry out their business in the town. There is not the traffic obstruction on the streets that there was in the past and we all know that it is almost impossible to stop off to transact business when one finds oneself in a long line of traffic.

The task facing the Minister in dealing with the appalling traffic situation on our roads is a gigantic one. Where lies the answer? The volume of traffic has increased greatly and it is now almost impossible to travel through some of our towns. Local authorities are not doing their work in regard to the provision of proper traffic facilities. I had occasion recently to criticise the appalling traffic regulations that exist in Tullamore. I asked that traffic lights be provided at Hayes' Corner, which is a four-cross road.

I do not know what that section of the Department have been doing in regard to traffic speeds in our provincial towns. The Garda have been doing the best possible job but their efforts are not good enough unless they have proper facilities and it is up to local authorities to provide these. They are not doing so. All provincial towns should have traffic lights as well as proper street markings and adequate parking facilities. The car parks which are available in some towns are most inconvenient. It is also important to have warning signs, particularly at hospital and school entrances.

As well, the Department should be more alert to the need to provide greater instruction in these matters in schools. We have many excellent gardaí who are capable of giving such instruction and who will be available to do so now, as we hope, that their numbers will be vastly increased. Groups of senior pupils in larger schools would be more than anxious to help in this matter. At this point I should like to pay tribute to the UDC and the people of Carlow where a group have been established to take care of matters of this kind. I am sure there are similar groups in other towns but the Department of Local Government, in liaison with the Garda, should encourage the formation of such groups in all reasonably sized towns throughout the country.

I welcome sincerely the Minister's expressed intention to ask planning authorities to be liberal towards planning appeals. In some cases in which planning permission was refused by local authorities it seemed to me to be entirely daft. In other cases where planning permission was granted I could not understand why.

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I welcome this move by the Minister to consult the local authorities and I ask for a greater degree of liberalisation in the granting of planning permission. Refusal of planning permission can be a great injustice on citizens concerned. I appreciate that engineers have their own reasons for refusing permission. They may have the safety of the community in mind and they do not encourage what county managers call ribbon-building or building on certain main roads. However, I have known instances of planning permission being refused and I have seen consequent grave injustices done. Therefore, the Minister is right to call in planning officers from the various counties. Many of them might like to hear themselves talk.

If a person wants to build himself a house, if the site is not on a hairpin bend on a main road and if he has no alternative site, in my opinion planning permission should be given. We know that the exercise of proper care on entry and exit will be foremost in the minds of occupants of new houses. I have seen instances in the past where planning permission was refused in respect of a site but on the site changing hands planning permission was given in respect of the same property.

On the main Dublin-Cork-Limerick Road an application was made for planning permission for a filling station. This was refused. The site changed hands. It was bought by an influential oil company. They made application for planning permission and it was granted. I cannot understand this. Why should an individual be refused and an oil company be accepted?

Mr. Tully

Possibly the Deputy could guess why.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

On that site a filling station was erected.

Mr. Andrews

The Deputy's pals are in positions now.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

On the edge of a busy and progressive town a new opening was created on to a speedway and planning permission for another filling station, only yards away, was granted. It is obvious that the law as it stands created grave injustice to the original owner who, in good faith, parted with his property believing that when he could not get planning permission nobody else could either. How mistaken he was. The planning permission business is a racket.

Mr. Tully

That was before March last.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Yes.

Mr. Coughlan

And for a long time before that.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

For a very long time. The sooner the Minister introduces changes the better.

In my local authority the officials and manager refused planning permission where the councillors felt it should have been granted. We resorted to section 4 of the City and County Management Act and passed a resolution to give planning permission. We did that more than once. There must be something wrong when every councillor was unanimous that a certain application for planning permission should be granted but the engineer or manager said no and permission was refused. We have found that the easiest, the quickest and the handiest way to deal with this was to resort to section 4 of the City and County Management Act, put down a resolution, get the required number of councillors to sign it and have it passed. I trust that when the Minister calls these planning experts to Dublin he will tell them that they must be reasonable. They have not been reasonable. If they had been, the number of appeals with which the Department of Local Government is busily dealing would be much smaller. These experts do not use their intelligence or wisdom which assisted them to obtain their qualifications. I have seen too many cases refused which should have been granted. Too many cases of planning permission were surrounded by suspiction. Since the change of Government a greater element of justice and fair play seems to have been introduced. Until Deputy Tully took office there was no confidence in planning permission. This has changed.

The merits of a case are now considered, not who the individual is or whom he knows. The sooner the Minister convenes this conference of experts the better. Members of local authorities are fast losing patience when dealing with the officers in various planning offices. I cannot see anything wrong with building a house on a main road provided there are guarantees of safety. When I say a "main road" I do not mean the main Dublin-Cork-Limerick road, but secondary and county roads. I cannot understand planning permission being refused where there have always been gateways.

In my area a young man was given permission to build a bungalow on part of the vested cottage plot of his parents. He built his bungalow but he could not get permission to have his own entrance. The basis of the planning permission was that he could only enter through the entrance to his parents' cottage. Has anyone ever heard anything more ridiculous? What happens if the existing cottage is sold? How will he get into his bungalow? The contractors made a gap as an entrance but under the threat of legal proceedings the gap was closed by wire, hedge and fence. Why grant planning permission unless he could have his own entrance? He cannot get in or out because his bungalow is on the main road.

Dr. Gibbons

He wants a helicopter.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

There is no evidence of intelligence or common sense when a man gets permission to build a house but is refused permission to provide an entrance to it. If the Minister requires details of the particular case, they will be readily forthcoming from Laois County Council. I do not know whether the aggrieved citizen has the right at this stage to make application for permission to provide a gate but if something is not done very soon Laois County Council will have to resort to section 4 of the City and County Management Act again. Members of local authorities are encouraged to hear that the Minister for Local Government is to embark on discussions with those engaged on planning.

Last night Deputy Molloy dealt with the Water Safety Association, swimming pools and waterways. The provision of swimming pools has been a great help but it is difficult to understand the vast investment of public moneys in swimming pools in areas convenient to the seaside when inland districts have no swimming facilities. The provision of a big swimming pool in a seaside resort does not make sense to the man or woman in the midlands. I am glad to say that the only swimming pool in Ireland that is paying its way at the moment is the one in Portlaoise. Wherever there is a swimming pool, emphasis should be placed on life saving and diving. I do not know how my end will come but I am convinced that I will never be drowned. I am not a swimmer. I advocate swimming and I like to see it but two things I keep away from are deep water and electricity. I know nothing about electricity and I will not tamper with it. Therefore, the prospects of my being electrocuted are rather remote. My prospects of being drowned are remote too. As many swimming pools as funds will permit should be provided in inland areas. Life saving facilities are available in maritime counties but those facilities are not available inland. One cannot swim in rivers or in canals because of pollution and other dangers. Therefore, facilities for training young people in water safety and life saving are not there. The Minister when planning his programme of swimming pools for the future should give consideration to the midland area.

I should like to refer to the difficulties experienced by some local authorities which would like to accelerate housing. The first difficulty is lack of competition for contracts. There is a lack of small contractors and a lack of tradesmen. There is a tremendous shortage of painters, plasterers, plumbers and carpenters. The best efforts of local authorities and of the Minister will not readily solve that problem. Every day in the newspapers one sees advertisements by building contractors for tradesmen offering attractive rates of pay. I want to know what the Department of Local Government are doing, what the trade unions are doing, what the Department of Labour are doing, whether the Minister for Local Government is in touch with his colleagues, the Minister for Labour and the Minister for Education or whoever may be responsible for career guidance. What will happen in years to come when all our young people can be described as white collar workers? Nobody wants to be a carpenter, a plumber, a plasterer, a bricklayer, a stonemason. Surely some propaganda should be undertaken by the Department of Local Government.

I am not at all satisfied that AnCO would be the proper authority to undertake a programme of this kind but the possibilities must be made known, such as the wage brackets available for tradesmen of a very good standard. The number of building schemes that are held up because there are no qualified painters, carpenters or plasterers available is amazing.

The Minister should make an effort to encourage the tradesmen who went to England to come back by giving them income tax allowances for a period of, say, three to five years after their return, on satisfying the inspector of taxes that they have recently returned from England as tradesmen to take up employment here. We must offer some encouragement if we are to get them back to assist in the housing drive now in progress and which cannot be expedited and completed in their absence. They will not come unless there is some incentive. Many of them went to England because the income tax inspectors chased them out of the country with the PAYE system. They can escape that in Britain because that country is so big that they can go from place to place. Many of them change their names and give a variety of addresses. They can do that in Britain but not here. They will not work for nothing. Income tax has driven more people out of the country than can be imagined. They were not allowed to work overtime and could not take work as contractors anxious to finish schemes wanted them to do. Therefore, the Minister must face the dual problem of the contractors and the tradesmen if the work is to progress.

I do not know what the Minister would think of every local authority having its own direct labour unit. There is an interesting file in his Department from the time when the late Deputy Davern was Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Local Government and I was Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture and Deputy Tom O'Higgins was Minister for Health. We had a consultation with Laois County Council in connection with a direct labour housing scheme in Rathdowney. I think we were advised against the course by officers of the Department but the late Deputy Davern insisted that a direct labour scheme be established and one of the best-designed and most economic housing schemes in the county resulted. I hope every county in Ireland will have its own direct labour scheme. Councils can recruit staff in advance. The Minister should consult with the Minister for Finance with a view to providing an income tax concession as an incentive to get back the tradesmen who have been such a loss to the construction industry. These men are needed to train apprentices and to complete schemes already undertaken.

I think the Minister's Department should assist small contractors who find difficulty in getting suitable bonds to satisfy local authorities and banks and who may need guidance and financial accommodation until a scheme is completed. Most of them are afraid of tendering for a local authority contract because a percentage of the money, known as retention money, is held for a period by the local authority. Meanwhile, these small contractors must meet the cost of materials, timber, sand and cement, paint and roofing and cannot carry on in business without some financial support. That can be provided by enabling them to draw from some bank an amount equivalent to the retention money so that they can get supplies to undertake further jobs. These men have a reasonable case and an effort should be made to provide them with a better way of working. They are a great asset to the country and I should not like to see any of them going out of business since we need them now more than ever.

I must compliment the Minister and the Department on the fact that the Government have substantially increased the amounts made available to each local authority for house purchase loans and supplementary grants. This has been long overdue; it was neglected by the Minister's predecessors and it will be a great advantage in the future.

I want to refer to differential rents.

I want to compliment the Minister for Local Government on the manner in which he considered the points raised by NATO. It was in contrast to the approach of his predecessor who would neither talk about, nor consider, the many problems and grievances which the tenants of council houses have had. It is because these grievances were genuine that an organisation known at NATO sprang up and gained such wide support. I have known of vast housing estates in my own constituency, in Birr, Tullamore, Portlaoise, and Portarlington, where rent problems confront the people. The differential system was unjust, unrealistic and unworkable and was a severe hardship on the heads of households.

I am glad that one of the promises which the Government made before the election—that a fair system of differential rents for local authority tenants would be introduced—has been honoured, and that after negotiations and consultations with the National Association of Tenants' Organisations, the Minister introduced an agreed scheme that reduced most differential rents. One would imagine that, if such a scheme was introduced by the Minister that has benefited thousands of local authority tenants, there would have been at least one voice from Fianna Fáil to say: "You were right. Thanks very much." We did not hear it yet. I hope somebody who is in that party will see the justice and the reasonableness of the Minister's action in relation to these tenants.

During the period of office of Deputy Molloy there was chaos in every city and town in Ireland in relation to council house rents. The country was completely gripped by rent strikes. If the change of Government was responsible for nothing else but bringing an end to that situation, the change of Government has undoubtedly justified itself. I have seen the benefits of the new scheme with its various allowances. I could never understand why overtime, bonuses, children's allowances, the pensions of aged parents, all have to be bulked together for the purpose of striking the rent of the house. The system was unfair in regard to the deductions that were made. If a person had two or three members of the family working, or if he was doing additional work himself at weekends, all this was taken into consideration. I am glad that the problems of the tenants were at least listened to by the Minister for Local Government, but he did more than that: he made a genuine effort to solve them. Listening to Deputy Molloy one would think that the Minister for Local Government had been all his lifetime in the Department. What did he expect after a period of five or six months? The Minister is Minister for Local Government, not a magician.

Therefore the points raised by Deputy Molloy in criticism of the Minister were not alone unreasonable but unwarranted, particularly having regard to the benefits the Minister has bestowed on the tenants of council houses in accordance with the undertaking of the National Coalition before the last general election. These tenants now realise that there was sincerity behind the undertaking given by the National Coalition, and they have the assurance that their problems will always be given a fair hearing.

I hope the county managers throughout the country will administer the differential rent scheme fairly and in accordance with the Minister's wishes. If there are any cases which the Department feel are being dealt with unreasonably by the county managers, I hope the Minister will be prepared to intervene and see that the tenants get the benefit of any doubts that exist. In many cases the interpretation of the regulations by the county manager and by the tenants will be at variance and this may cause confusion to the tenants. Therefore, an officer of the Minister's Department should be fully aware of the Minister's feeling in this regard and any tenant aggrieved about the assessment of his rent should at least have the right to communicate with the Department so as to ensure that his rent is in accordance with the allowances that have been announced and circulated to county managers.

Mr. Tully

He has that right.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I am glad he has that right and I am sure the tenants will use it. At the end of July the Minister for Local Government introduced new terms for the sale of local authority houses to tenants. This meant a saving of hundreds of pounds as compared with such sales under the Minister's predecessor. This reflects the anxiety of the Minister for Local Government to help these people. He has considered the requests of the tenants. The tenants can now benefit. They can see that the benefits are the reward for a display of courage which resulted in the changing of the Government at the last general election. Pensions for retired Civil Servants, Local Government officials and others have improved as a result of the change.

I wish to deal now with motor taxation. We must have the dearest motoring in the world. The Minister for Local Government is responsible for the allocation of the funds from such taxation. The local authority offices are used for collecting motor taxation. This can be most unsatisfactory. At the beginning of a quarter the accommodation in most of the tax offices is not adequate to give the motorist the service he requires. The Minister must ensure that these offices are staffed sufficiently to ensure that the motorist when paying his high taxation is given the service to which he is entitled.

A report was circulated over the past few days, it concerns a new approach to building a national road system. It is a study document prepared by the Civil Engineering Contractors' Association. This document has reached the hands of every public representative recently. It is interesting. There are many references in it to the Minister for Local Government. In its introduction it is stated that the civil contractors have an interest in advocating changes. Their case against the present system is based on the weight of independent evidence rather than on the arguments or consideration derived from sectional interests.

These people make a case for the setting up of a roads authority. They say that at the present time most of the 31 local authorities—Dublin Corporation being the main exception—carry out work of road construction on a piecemeal basis. They refer to certain recommendations made in 1968. There was a report from An Foras Forbartha on the administration of the arterial road programme and another report on maintenance. They dealt with slightly different aspects of the problem. Both reports came to similar conclusions in their recommendations. They concluded that road usage would be doubled within 20 years. They also concluded that, on the basis of the 1968 revenue accruing to the Road Fund, the amount available for arterial road construction would be barely sufficient to correct the deficiencies at present day prices. This is without considering Dublin, which is a major problem in itself. They suggested that a central roads authority should be set up and that contractors should contract to build roads, and that they should compete for these contracts. The report also said, lest it should be felt that the changes they were proposing would cause hardship to the 15,000 road workers employed by the direct labour departments of the local authorities, that the local authorities would continue to be responsible for local roads and in particular for repair and maintenance work on such roads.

This would mean that at least 50 per cent of the workers would still be required by the local authorities and the other 50 per cent would undoubtedly be absorbed by the expanding civil engineering industry, where they would probably earn more money. The Minister for Local Government should say something about this report. He may only have it for the past few days. If these people wish to carry out road construction work under contract, what is to be the position in relation to the pensions and superannuation of the 15,000 road workers throughout the country? What guarantee can these workers have that their interests will be protected? There is no point in telling them that 50 per cent of them will be absorbed by the civil engineering authority while the remainder will be employed on road maintenance work. What would be the position in respect of the 50 per cent who would be transferring their allegiance from the county councils to the engineering construction grouping? Will their pensions and superannuation rights be transferred with them?

It is my opinion that local authorities will be very slow to embark on a scheme of this kind without having a thorough examination of all these aspects. My support for this proposal would be influenced mainly by the question of the safeguarding of the rights of the workers concerned. These are people who have given good and loyal service down through the years. I have no wish for any grandiose scheme designed in such a way as to benefit the Civil Engineering Contractors' Association at the expense of the worsening of the employment position of 15,000 road workers. It is hardly necessary for me to ask the Minister to exercise great care in relation to this matter. The civil engineering contractors are looking after their own interests. As businessmen it is only right that they would do so, but this should not mean the dumping on the scrap heap of any of the workmen.

Local authorities have reduced their complement of road workers. That should not have happened, but the situation will be much worse if the idea of a national road system is implemented as proposed. I can only express the hope that, in the event of change, local authorities will be consulted and that there will be provision for the safeguarding of pensions and superannuation rights of the workers. Those responsible for compiling the report made no reference to that aspect. No doubt the road workers, through their trade union, will have the report examined. I have no wish to act hastily, but if I thought that the implementation of the proposed system would result in any of the workers in my area becoming redundant, I would reject the report out of hand. In due course I expect to hear from the Minister as to his views on the matter.

Regarding the present dispute involving engineers in some local authorities, I appeal to the Minister to use his influence with the ICTU to have the dispute settled satisfactorily. This dispute is responsible for a considerable hold up in local improvements schemes, in road work, repairs to cottages and in a general slowing down of the activities of the county councils concerned.

I am aware that the Minister is slow to intervene in a trade union dispute. To that extent, perhaps he is wise; but the dispute in question is one between two trade unions, both of which are affiliated to the ICTU, and this body should explore every avenue possible in an effort to have the difficulties solved. I appreciate that congress must be very busy at the moment, but the dispute I am speaking of is very important and should be dealt with speedily.

I am not happy in so far as the allocation of amenity grants is concerned. Much useful work has been executed with the help of this scheme, but I do not think that there is enough money available to do all that is required. Such work as the repair of river embankments, improvements to play grounds and the provision of pathways to beauty spots cannot be carried out unless a substantial amount of money is made available.

We are only scratching the surface in relation to this matter. There is a huge volume of work to be undertaken under the amenity grants scheme. I want to demonstrate this by citing to the Minister one case in my own area. Laois County Council sought a grant of £19,883 for amenity works but only £4,000 was made available.

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Included in the proposals of the Laois County Council was the provision of a community centre at Ballyfin and I shall quote the letter from the Minister, dated 31st July, 1973:

I wish to refer to your representations on behalf of Very Rev. J. Moran, PP, Parochial House, Ballyfin, in connection with an amenity grant for the provision of a community centre at Ballyfin. The position in this case is that Laois County Council submitted five schemes to my Department which they hoped to carry out with amenity grant assistance in 1973-74. The estimated cost of the schemes was £48,000. On the grant sought, £19,883, a block allocation of £4,000 was made to the council. The Ballyfin community centre proposal was included in their list of schemes. The administration of the new amenity grants scheme, which was brought into operation last year, was devolved on the local authorities and the decision within the limited finances available as to what projects could be assisted and the amount of assistance to be given in any case is a matter for the appropriate local authorities. I would suggest that Fr. Moran contacts the county council.

That is exactly what Fr. Moran did, but it did not improve his financial situation in relation to the building of the community centre. It has been constructed. It is one of the finest in the country.

Ballyfin is an extremely poor parish on the slopes of Slieve Bloom. There has been a rapidly declining population. This centre could not even have been contemplated were it not for the introduction of the amenity grants scheme. The people of the parish, in the typical community spirit that has always prevailed in Ballyfin, came together and had the centre erected on the foolish assumption that funds would be readily available from the Department. One can imagine their astonishment, gathered together in the new centre, when they heard of the situation and considered how the contractors and the others to whom they were indebted could be met. They had been told that block grants amounting to £4,000 had been made available to the county council who had, of course, other demands on that money.

As I have said, the population of Ballyfin has dwindled and there cannot be any hope, even in the far off future, of any worthwhile contribution being made from the parish fund. There are the maintenance of the parish schools, church reconstruction and maintenance and the overhauling of the parochial house. All of these have meant a very serious financial strain on the people, who would never have embarked on a programme of this kind if it were not for the expectation of receiving substantial moneys from the Department.

May I plead with the Minister on behalf of Fr. Moran and his enterprising, if not sufficiently far seeing, committee, for some financial assistance by way of a special allocation to Laois County Council to assist towards the cost of the Ballyfin community centre? The whole matter has been most embarrassing for the county council members and for Deputies, particularly the one who lives in the Ballyfin locality. I urge on the Minister to treat this case with the utmost sympathy, bearing in mind the strain on the people of Ballyfin.

I do not intend to walk Fr. Moran in to the Minister without giving prior notice. But it is no harm for the Minister to know that it will not be too long until he meets him. Having built a community centre, Fr. Moran now finds himself expecting the money to be forthcoming. Reading the conditions, suitably drafted by the Minister's predecessor who was in office at the time of the application, he felt that a community centre was an amenity and should qualify for a grant. He applied on the understanding that the outlined qualifications submitted to the council by Deputy Molloy would immediately qualify him for the money to build the centre. The centre is built and there is no money to meet the cost. That is why I hope that an effort will be made to assist in this regard.

I will not dwell too much on sanitary services. I take a very poor view of local authorities who have their medical officers and sanitary and health inspectors threatening or instituting legal proceedings against people who have not proper sanitary arrangements in their business houses, shops or places where the public assemble, whether it be private residences, boarding houses or hotels, at a time when there are thousands of local authority houses in this country which have no sanitary accommodation whatever. The local authorities should be obliged to put their own houses in order before they can quote law for private citizens.

If every town and village in Ireland were to be provided with up-to-date water and sewerage schemes, the demand on all the local authorities could not possibly be met from our financial resources. I repeat my plea to the Minister that, if any money can be got from European funds to augment the amount contributed by local and national taxation, it should be used to bring a proper standard of hygiene, by way of proper water and sewerage facilities, to small towns and villages. Every large provincial town has expanded. Every large town has had houses privately built or built by the local authorities on its outskirts. Most of our sewerage schemes were designed for the 1936-45 period and are out of date completely so far as catering for the present standard of demand is concerned.

Industries hesitate to come to certain provincial towns because there is no guarantee of a proper water supply. In Laois we had great difficulty getting a supplemented supply to accommodate Denny's bacon factory at Mountmellick. That had to be done if the bacon factory were to operate economically. When an industrialist make inquiries about the location of his industry one of the first queries he addresses to the promoter is: "What are the water, sewerage and sanitary accommodation like?"

If the Minister were serious in his endeavours to improve the general situation in the country we would have a survey based not on 1936-45 standards but he would present to this House the cost of plans to improve the existing inadequate water and sewerage schemes throughout the country. The pumping apparatus is outdated. The discharge apparatus is outdated. The filtering arrangement for the sewerage schemes is outdated. This can be done when the Minister is dealing with the pollution of our streams and rivers. A very large sum is required for this purpose. One is wasting the time of this House talking about doing this work piecemeal. We are part of a large wealthy European Community. We are a very new member. Do we intend to remain the backward pauper? I hope not. As we are members of the Community, our rich partners will have to share some of their surplus riches to assist us to develop to the fullest extent our water and sanitary services.

In certain towns the sewerage schemes are a disgrace and the water supply is insufficient. There is no pressure on the water. Industrial development is prevented because of this lack. A fantastic amount of money will be required to remedy this. In our wildest dreams we could never vote enough money in two or three Estimates to cover it. It will take a number of years. Who will be alive to see the end of it unless this problem is tackled bravely and courageously with substantial funds made available from abroad? If not we will be backward again in so far as sewerage and water facilities are concerned. I repeat that one of the great handicaps to industrial promotion is the lack of readily available water.

With regard to the provision of proper water and sewerage schemes I have a further observation to make. I should like to refer to the quality of pipe used in our sewerage schemes with the approval, and the blessing, of the Department of Local Government. In 1912 a Royal Commission in Sydney, Australia, investigated the failure of several hundred miles of sewerage piping. That Royal Commission reported that one of the reasons this sewerage scheme had failed was that certain acids from the sewage soaked through the pipes. The pipes became porous and the ground closed in. It was decided that for future sewerage schemes earthenware glazed pipes would be used.

The earthenware pipe may be considered dearer than any other type of pipe but it should be remembered that they do not allow acid from the sewage in the event of the pipe not being 100 per cent full to seep through and cause decay or make the pipes porous. An earthenware pipe containing sewage will not collapse. That is more than can be said for the other pipes used in sewerage schemes. I cannot understand the attitude of the Department of Local Government in matters like this, penny wise and pound foolish. Apparently, they must use the inferior article to save twopence halfpenny instead of spending an extra shilling for the good article and getting the full benefit and wear out of it.

That is why there have been numerous failures in various activities in this country. These have occurred because of cheeseparing, knocking off six pence here and a shilling there. In the village of Crinkle, outside Birr, a sewerage scheme is in progress. This scheme was discussed at a meeting in the local parochial hall on Monday night. I attended that meeting and I learned that, for the sake of £6,000, a number of houses are being left out. I asked the county engineer at that meeting if these people could be included. He informed me there would be no trouble including these people but he needed a further £6,000.

Proposals for this scheme have been sanctioned and work is at present in progress, but, for the sake of £6,000, a good and worthwhile scheme is being destroyed. Penny wise and pound foolish again. I have asked the Minister to send an engineer from the Department to enter into immediate consultations with the Offaly county engineer to ensure that these people are included in the scheme and that the extra money is provided. The sum of £3,000 is required from the Department and the other £3,000 will be put up by the ratepayers of the county. It is a tragedy that such a good scheme is to be destroyed for the sake of £6,000. I recommend to the Minister that he provide this money for this scheme.

Returning to the question of the failure to use earthenware pipes, I should like to ask the Minister why these pipes are not used in sewerage schemes in the country. So far I have failed to obtain an explanation for this from anybody. Earthenware pipes which were used at the time of the Roman Empire have been unearthed in recent excavations in Rome city. These pipes are in as good condition as they were on the day they were put down. That is some life for an earthenware pipe.

Earthenware pipes, particularly the glazed ones, for a sewerage scheme cannot be beaten but for some unknown reason the consulting engineers and the engineering section of the Department of Local Government are not enthusiastic about using them. One does not have to be a qualified engineer to know the standard of the earthenware compared with any of the other types, plastic or concrete, being used in such schemes. I have raised this matter with the Department of Local Government and I have been informed that when they are advertising for contractors the specifications provide for different kinds of pipes. Naturally enough, the stoneware pipe is somewhat dearer than the other pipes but I should like to make a plea for the use of more stoneware pipes in our sewerage schemes. These pipes should be used if we want to have lasting schemes and if we want to get good return for the money put into such schemes.

In my constituency one of the most outstanding firms in the country is involved in the manufacture of these stoneware pipes. On 23rd November, 1972 I asked the Minister for Local Government—I am sure it was Deputy Molloy who answered because the answer given resembles him very much —if he would permit Laois County Council to use stoneware pipes manufactured by a company in County Laois in all sewerage schemes and extensions in the county in view of the fact that these pipes are manufactured in the county and that the industry is passing through a difficult time and requires orders to keep existing staff in employment in an area where no other employment is available; and if he would make a statement on the matter. Deputy Molloy, in his reply, informed me that local authorities have a free choice in the selection of types of pipe to be used in public sewerage schemes provided such pipes comply with the prescribed quality standard and that there is no significant difference in cost between the pipes selected and other available pipes of comparable standard.

Did anybody ever hear such a wriggle of an answer as that? Local authorities were free to have any type of pipe they wished provided the standard was right and that there was no significant difference in cost. In this case the stoneware pipes are of a superior nature but there is a slight difference in cost. However, these pipes last and are guaranteed. A serious effort should be made to utilise these pipes in sewerage schemes in the country. I venture to say that there will not be any failure in a sewerage scheme in which stoneware pipes are used, whether manufactured by Fleming's Fireclays of The Swan or by any other firm.

Is it not ridiculous to see firms manufacturing stoneware sewerage pipes and to see other types of pipes being used in sewerage schemes in competition with stoneware pipes, while at the same time, there is redundancy in the factory and there is no market for the pipes they are producing? Sewerage schemes are going on and locally manufactured pipes are not being used. Local employment is provided by this firm and a substantial amount of money has been paid in lorry, car and van taxation and in rates. A substantial investment has been made in this outstanding private enterprise and yet the demand for their sewerage pipes is extremely limited. There should be a change of policy on the type of pipes used in our sewerage schemes, particularly where extensions are being carried out, as they are in most of our large provincial towns.

It is hardly necessary to refer to the high standard of these pipes. The sooner we realise the importance of the quality and the permanence of glazed stoneware pipes for sewerage, the better. How that is to be drummed into the heads of the engineers in the Custom House I do not know. I hope there is no question of preferential treatment being given to those who manufacture other types of pipes. My experience is that the investment will not be as sound as it would be if glazed stoneware pipes were used. I ask the Minister to consider the necessity for using proper pipes in those schemes and I recommend glazed stoneware pipes for this purpose.

That brings me to the huge programme which must be undertaken in regard to water and sewerage. I am sure that most local authorities have submitted their proposals and that the planning and execution of the major water and sewerage schemes are in hand. Most of the detailed work which is usually carried out in the Custom House should be allowed to be completed at local authority level. Correspondence, exchanges of views between consultants and engineers, and between the Custom House and the local authorities, eat up quite an amount of time.

Mr. Andrews

I wonder, Sir, could we have a House to listen to this marathon?

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present: House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Before I was interrupted I was dealing with the necessity for the completion, as soon as possible, of the detailed planning for major water and sewerage schemes, bearing in mind that this cannot be done in haste or within a very short time. The Minister might seriously consider allowing the engineering staffs of the local authorities to complete all works at local authority level until they reach the stage when contract documents have to be examined. If this were done, much of the valuable time which has been wasted could be put to better use. In the world in which we live time is money. Most of us are anxious to utilise every second of our time. Valuable time has been lost in the preparation of major schemes. These difficulties can be eliminated and the way in which to eliminate them is by giving authority for the completion of these major schemes to the local authorities until the point of sanction is reached. The time saved could be put to productive use.

In designing water and sewerage schemes provision should be made for any industrial expansion likely to take place in our provincial towns over the next 25 years. Water and sewerage schemes should be planned on the basis of likely future expansion. Consultations with the regional industrial organisations and the IDA are essential if these schemes are to be designed to meet the industrial demands of the future. We are all agreed on the need for large-scale major schemes. If we want to attract overseas industrialists the bait for which they fall is proper water and sanitary facilities.

I compliment the Department on the valuable and useful work undertaken in rural Ireland in relation to group water supply schemes. Some tens of thousands of holdings are still awaiting supply. The original intention was to bring piped water into every home. I remember the late Deputy Willie O'Donnell of South Tipperary standing up here about 30 years ago and declaring that he wanted piped water brought to the most remote homes and every Deputy rocked with laughter at the idea. Deputy O'Donnell was a very farseeing man. He was very keen on the development of group water schemes. During the years in which I was Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture an officer of that Department, Mr. O'Loan, was absolutely dedicated to the idea of piped water in every part of the country. It was the foresight and courage of people like these which led to the eventual implementation of group water supply schemes.

These schemes should be free of interference from the Custom House. The officials in the Custom House dealing with the schemes have been most helpful and very courteous but, if there is less interference from the Custom House, time will be saved and these vital schemes will be expedited. Piped water is now a necessity. There should be piped water in every home in the country. This amenity can no longer be denied. Great work has been done under the group water schemes, but these schemes are still in their infancy. We want these schemes encouraged, expedited, developed, extended and expanded. EEC funds could be used to promote these schemes.

The planning authorities have drawn up development plans in most areas. Here I would like to pay tribute to the assistance given by the experts in the Department of Local Government to the local planning authorities. My county was one of the first to complete development plans and the Department expressed appreciation for this. We are very fortunate in having in the county an outstanding engineer. I would advise Deputies who may be alarmed about the bypassing of large provincial towns not to be worried. This may well open up completely new areas and increased business can be secured.

I am not happy with the progress of the Department of Local Government with regard to water pollution. We have very valuable waterways here but sufficient work has not been done on them. About 12 months ago I stood by a river in my constituency and inquired from a constituent why the river was flowing red. He replied that it was Monday evening and that they were killing pigs in the bacon factory. For a considerable stretch of the river every possible precaution has been taken by the bacon factory and, in fact, they have the most up-to-date equipment to ensure that the effluent is not injurious to public health. Notwithstanding this fact, arrangements should have been made to ensure that the effluent is piped a certain distance away from the town. In my area the local residents registered protests and the local authority undertook to have a filtering apparatus provided. The odour has disappeared now but it is completely wrong that the river should flow red when pigs are slaughtered in the bacon factory. I appreciate there may not be any damage caused to fish in the river, but industrial concerns should arrange to have effluent piped a certain distance to ensure that a nuisance is not created for nearby residents.

The local authority of which I am a member is taking all possible steps to eliminate pollution, but the problem is an enormous one and we are merely scratching the surface. Substantial sums of money are necessary and we should be able to fall back on our friends in Europe to assist us in this work. One may wonder how helpless we are when we have to call on them for support for every project, but as we are now a member of the EEC we are entitled to their support. If there is a surplus of wealth in these countries it should be divided to ensure that we get our share to make our country more prosperous. Water and air pollution are matters that should be tackled urgently, particularly in industrial areas, and I am glad the Department of Local Government are aware of the necessity for serious action in this matter.

I would ask the Minister to give some thought to the matter of planning for leisure. Since our entry into Europe we have become more materialistic; in many ways we are becoming more like the people in the United States. Soon people will not have time to bid each other the time of day. Everyone is trying to fit 36 hours work into 24 hours; people seem to be working later and, a healthy sign, they seem to start work at an earlier hour. When I was in Copenhagen I was astonished to see children going to school at 6.50 a.m. and the staff in my hotel were busy serving breakfast at 6.30 a.m. or 6.45 a.m. They regarded this as quite ordinary. I do not know if we will ever reach the stage when we will be breakfasting at 6.30 a.m. —I hope not. I hope that, whatever else changes, we will not change our way of life. If we were to try to cram the work of 36 hours into 24 hours, life would not be worth living.

It is essential that the Department of Local Government give the lead on the proper planning of leisure. In our provincial towns we should have well-laid out parks and playgrounds and we should incorporate green areas in the design of all housing schemes. The public should be educated regarding the proper use of leisure time, so that part of every day can be occupied in recreational activity. There have been many medical reports regarding the high incidence of heart failure among young people. This disease, together with cancer, seems to account for most of the deaths of comparatively young people. The factor mainly responsible is pressure on people. The demand on our time is greater and we are trying to do more than we can each day. If we are to survive at all, it is absolutely essential that we have sufficient planning for leisure and that substantial sums are made available for recreational facilities.

I want to pay a special tribute to a body of whose existence I was rather critical at one stage, An Foras Forbartha. I was critical until I saw some of their work. They have carried out some very interesting surveys which have been a great help to local authorities. I should like to place on record my appreciation of the valuable contribution which An Foras Forbartha have made. They may think their work is not appreciated but it is and has been appreciated. Their surveys and reports are a great headline on which local authorities can safely rely.

A most regrettable situation has arisen in many countries in regard to the fire service. It is regrettable that any conflict should exist between the Department of Local Government and the fire service. This service is of vital importance to the community. The Minister is a man of courage with an intimate knowledge of trade union activities. He should endeavour to ensure that any disputes between local authorities and the fire service are settled forthwith. I do not know what is the general trend of the demand of the various fire brigades but I want to say, and I want it to go on record, that the fire fighting people are trained, highly efficient and have given local authorities excellent service. It takes trained and skilled personnel to deal with fire emergencies. By having active fire units, tens of thousands of pounds worth can be saved. It would be very regrettable if any section of the fire fighting service were to go on strike. One might say the fire brigade people would never be so callous as to go on strike in the midst of a fire but there are loyalties and there is comradeship and there are trade union principles. Local authorities are fully aware of the high standards of efficiency of fire brigades in all our towns and cities. If there is a misunderstanding or a dispute at any level, I appeal to the Minister to get it settled, to call in the County Managers' Association, which seems to be an extraordinarily influential body, and tell the county managers that whatever dispute exists must be settled and to put a time limit on it. I know the value of those engaged in the fire service in my constituency. There is no dispute between the members of the local authorities and the fire brigade personnel. If there are technical people either on the administrative side of the local authorities or in the Custom House who are preventing a settlement of any dispute, real or imaginary, on the part of those engaged in the fire service, it should be settled. I do not think we pay sufficient tribute to those engaged in fire fighting. In every part of the country we have excellent personnel and the fire service, coupled with civil defence, has made people feel rather secure.

Is it not extraordinary how little publicity has been given to the dangers of fire? Arrangements should soon be made or a law passed to ensure that there is a check-up on the electrical wiring of every house every five years. It is amazing the number of fires that have been caused by defective wiring and nothing has been done about it. Defective wiring can cause the loss of tens of thousands of pounds worth of factory premises, business premises, a whole street of buildings. Most of the houses that were wired for electricity 20 years ago are probably in a dangerous condition today.

Dr. O'Connell

What are the ESB doing about it?

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

That is what I would like to ask. Perhaps the Minister can have some form of an inquiry into the ESB. They are getting very substantial overhead charges and are charging very high rates for electricity. They should have a staff to advise the public on the wiring of their houses.

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I was referring to the necessity for some safety precautions in regard to wiring of houses so as to ensure that the fire hazard would be overcome. I suggested that a committee of safety and standards be established so that anybody with a complaint about wiring could make that complaint to the committee as a safeguard against fire. The concern of the ESB is to give the connection, provide the current and draw the cash but if we are serious about safeguarding against fire we must know the dangers and be able to tell the public of the necessary precautions. Many of us have seen the awful disasters that have taken place as a result of fire occurring, in some cases due to carelessness or neglect and in other cases through no fault of anyone. This House should place a legal obligation on the ESB to accept full responsibility for guaranteeing safety and for overseeing proper standards in regard to the wiring of premises whether private residences, factories of businesses so as to safeguard against fire. The matter of wiring and rewiring is vitally important. The wiring in most of the premises that were wired some years ago is now in an unsatisfactory condition and likely to present a fire hazard.

The Minister said that over 700 itinerant families had been accommodated at camping sites or in houses but that very many were still to be dealt with. We all have a great deal of sympathy with the itinerants but there has been much hypocrisy associated with this subject; everybody wants to house the itinerants but nobody wants to live near them. Everybody wants to see them get everything that is going, such as proper housing and other facilities, but nobody wants them living near them. There are different types of itinerants. In my area we are endeavouring to complete a site on which it is proposed to construct a number of houses for itinerants. Recently, action had to be taken to prevent a town being completely taken over by itinerants. Itinerants are very welcome and will be helped and housed as long as they conduct themselves but they should be taught to be part and parcel of a community. They cannot be allowed to break down fences and park animals in a public street or roadway.

Mr. Lalor

Or beside a Deputy's house.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

Or to deal in the Deputy's shop. The Deputy does not hesitate about taking their money.

Mr. Lalor

The man with an MA degree in hypocrisy——

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

The Deputy likes to see them going into his shop. He has great sympathy for them but he does not give them anything for nothing.

(Interruptions.)

Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I was dealing with the question of housing itinerants and I recommend very strongly that the Department of Local Government review their whole attitude to this matter. If these people want to be housed and to be part and parcel of the community, well and good. However, when a person who has been living a roaming life and has not had the experience of being a captive in a house, is suddenly put within the four walls of a house instead of being in the wide open spaces to which he is accustomed, it is a big change in living standards for him and many of them are not prepared for it. It is, therefore, wrong that they should be forced to take up residence in selected districts.

This has caused a problem in my own district. The influx of itinerants reached such a stage that the townspeople were being challenged, and the right of the guards to enforce the law was also being challenged. They arrived in town at night in such large numbers that the general public were afraid to go about their business. Eventually, the townspeople could not take any more of it. They had to safeguard their property, which was being trespassed without justification. Until we educate these people, until they are in a position to appreciate a house, trying to house them is a futile exercise. I pity the conditions which children living in caravans by the side of the road have to endure, but seemingly the itinerants do not see anything wrong with it. They seem to be quite hardened to the elements, and many of them would resent the idea of being taken off the roads and put into houses. If they want their freedom, give them their freedom. As long as they conduct themselves, mind their business and keep the law, there is no reason why they cannot be highly respected and assisted by the community. However, if they feel they can take over a town or a village that is another day's work.

Seven hundred families seem to have been accommodated. It is a good thing to accommodate them and give them whatever facilities that can be made available for them, provided they show some appreciation and understanding. Valuable and useful work has been undertaken in this regard, and, whatever our views may be, there is no reason why anyone should throw cold water on it. I would much prefer to see the long waiting list of housing applicants in my constituency dealt with, and if there are any houses left over, then look after the people of the travelling class. The natives of the district must come first, and I would ask the Minister seriously not to spoil good housing schemes through the good intentions of others. The itinerants would be happier to be housed among themselves. For that reason, the whole question of their resettlement should be reviewed.

Under the local improvements scheme many applications have come from various parts of the country seeking improvements to accommodation and bog roads and the execution of minor drainage works for the benefit of groups of landowners. This is the old scheme, the rural improvements scheme and the minor employments scheme, for which a contribution must now be paid. In most counties there is such a demand for the scheme that the money is not readily available to meet it. Where a contribution has been made, an effort should be made to find the money to carry out the schemes. County councils should be instructed forthwith, to take over, for future maintenance, works that have been satisfactorily completed under the local improvements scheme.

The local improvements scheme is a good scheme. It has won the admiration of the general public and of the members of local authorities. More funds should be made available so that schemes which are already in county engineers' offices may be completed satisfactorily.

I would again appeal to the Minister for Local Government to restore the Local Authorities (Works) Act, which was scrapped by Fianna Fáil. Under that Act, drainage and other valuable work which was essential to the survival of people in many parts of rural Ireland, was carried out. The Local Authorities (Works) Act should be restored particularly so far as drainage is concerned. Many minor drainage schemes were financed and administered by local authorities, and I know the benefits and advantages that accrued to many of our midland areas through the operation of that scheme. The Minister should examine this matter again.

I am dissatisfied with the driving tests. I am not quite sure what is wrong. A person must pass a driving test before he gets a driving licence. The testers are highly qualified. They know their job and have a high standard of integrity. I do not know why certain people have failed their tests. I am inclined to think there may be a racket somewhere to get in money. Very few people pass their driving tests on the first examination. They pass after two or three attempts.

The driving schools teach people to drive accurately. I know of an Army driver, who also drove a bus in England, and who had received testimonials for safe and careful driving in Britain, but who failed his test here. What standards are expected here? This Army man was a first-class driver. A person who fails cannot appeal; he must do the test again. The whole system of driver-testing needs overhaul. I have known of people with a great knowledge of the rules of the road and of the running of cars who failed their tests. Some of the schools of driving will not allow their students to apply for the test until they themselves have carried out rigid examinations of their driving on the roads. The people who are failing the applicants may be doing so for the purpose of making it known in the Custom House that they are strict, conscientious people who have been responsible for bringing extra money to the Custom House. If that is so, it is a serious matter.

The system is not airtight. I do not doubt the integrity of the testers but I do not understand why so many people fail to make the grade. I am suspicious about the whole thing. The Minister should devise a system under which three different people would carry out the examination and if an applicant was successful with two out of the three testers his licence should be granted. A single tester will not pass everybody on one particular day. The applicants may not be getting a fair crack of the whip. More testing staff should be recruited. A tester and two assistants could carry out the necessary tests in an area on a particular day. The applicants would have a better chance of obtaining their licences if they were examined by three testers and passed by two of them.

The present system needs examination. Too many good drivers have been rejected. The Minister should look at this problem during the next year. A person might be unfortunate because of the weather on the day of the test. He might be tested in a downpour of rain when driving is more difficult than it is on a calm, sunny day.

Mr. R. Barry

The test might be carried out on a day when a market was being held in the town.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I wish to refer to the testing of vehicles and to the deplorable, horrifying death rate on our roads. Are we going to experience for the remainder of our lives the spectacle of people being killed on our roads? Recently a young family was left without parents. The consequences are terrifying. I have been a member of this House for 32 years. When driving home at night I have come across the most horrible sights on the Dublin-Cork-Limerick road as a result of accidents. The Garda are doing everything they can in this regard, but there is not a sufficient number in the force. It would need to be trebled. Is it the position that many drivers are using cars which have bald tyres? Are there trucks on the road that are a danger to other road users? What is being done in relation to the parking without proper illumination of tractors and lorries on the roadside? There are not sufficient gardaí to deal with all these problems. No one should be allowed use a vehicle that is not roadworthy. Perhaps what we need is a regulation whereby vehicles would be tested once, if not twice, a year for roadworthiness.

In endeavouring to cut down on the number of accidents the first task is to rid the road of the drunken driver. This is an area for consultation between the Minister for Local Government and the Minister for Justice, but something must be done without further delay in an effort to prevent many more serious accidents occurring. Far too many people are losing their lives on our roads; and, regardless of whether these are parents or children, the loss is as great in one case as in another. The importance of a rigid examination of tyres and brakes cannot be overemphasised and drivers must be made aware of the dangers of speeding.

We can only conclude that our roads are not adequate for the volume of traffic they must carry, but at the same time many accidents would be avoided if every driver exercised more care and understanding in relation to his fellow motorists. It is difficult to bring young people to this realisation; but anybody who is not prepared to obey the rules of the road must bear the consequences of his folly.

We are told that An Foras Forbartha have been keeping the situation under constant review since the introduction in 1969 of the 60 miles per hour maximum speed limit. I wonder whether the number of serious accidents that have occurred since 1969 has been greater or fewer than the number which occurred in the previous three-year period. It would be interesting to have this information. I fail to understand why the accident rate is so high despite the speed limit.

Another factor in the accident rate is the failure of drivers to dim their lights when approaching other cars. The problem in this regard is that it is very difficult to have people guilty of this offence brought to justice because of the problem of detection. While such a driver may be the cause of another being involved in an accident, the chances are that he will get away safely. From my experience of driving on the Dublin-Cork-Limerick road at night I can say that the number of drivers who observe the regulation in respect of dimming is very small. When these cases are brought before district justices they tend to give the benefit of the doubt to the accused, but there will have to be more rigidity in this regard if there is to be any attempt at reducing the number of accidents. The situation has reached such alarming proportions that it is tantamount to a war. Expressions of regret are of little use to a family left without the breadwinner or to a woman left without her husband. We all have responsibility in this matter but the main responsibility rests with selfish users of the road, people who think of no one but themselves. None of us has the right to take a life but there is no easier or quicker way to do so than through neglect on the roads, of which we see so much these days.

I assure the Chair that I am on the verge of conclusion. I am left with one selfish point. It affects me but it also affects every other Deputy in the House. It is the compilation of the register of electors, my bible and a most important volume for any public representative. Its compilation before the past few general elections, local elections and referenda has been a disgrace. The Minister seriously will have to get down to the job of seeing that the compilation of the list of electors is taken more seriously by the local authorities.

I have known people who had votes in every election in the past 30 years but who in my area in the last general election were told when they presented themselves at the polling booths that they were not on the register. I have known of people who were dead and whose names had been removed but whose names were reentered later. I know of ten to 12 year olds whose names were on the register. Its compilation has been most unsatisfactory. There will have to be a more frequent check to see that it is kept up-to-date. I cannot understand how a person three months dead can be marked off and a person 18 months dead can be left on.

It seems to me there is no Departmental supervision of local authorities in this respect. The responsibility should be placed fairly and squarely on one person in each local authority or electoral area. It is no use blaming the county council staffs or county registrars. I do not know who does the job of compilation in areas where rates are paid into offices but I know that rate collectors are conscientious, dependable and industrious people. They are paid as rate collectors not as compilers of electors' lists. I submit that every local authority should have a single officer solely responsible full-time for the register of electors which is too serious a document to be allowed to fall into inaccuracies. Every Deputy who comes into this House, every member of every local authority in the country, every member of the Government, is elected on that list. The register of electors for my constituency in the last general election was a farce and as a result a large number of people in the Mountmellick area who always had votes were not allowed to vote on that occasion.

Mr. Nolan

That is why we lost a seat.

Mr. O.J. Flanagan

I hope the Minister will fix responsibility in respect of each local authority for the accuracy of the register of electors. The Minister will agree it is a document that should be as near as possible to perfection. Neither am I satisfied with the annual reviews of the register. As I have said, every area should have a single officer on whom responsibility would fall for the accuracy of the register. What is everybody's business is nobody's business.

One other point I should like to raise is the matter of the Department's responsibility for audits of local authority accounts, whether they be health boards, county councils, drainage boards or town commissioners. I appeal to the Minister to have the audit section of his Department so increased that such audits will not be left undone for two, three or four years. It puts local bodies in a most embarrassing position when at the end of two or three years they are confronted with miscalculations or inaccurate entries made some years earlier. Local authority books should be audited every 12 months.

There should be sufficient audit staff in the Custom House to ensure the efficient running of local authorities. A person looking after a business will ask himself if he is losing or making money and how the balance sheet stands. It is vitally important to know where one stands financially. Good housekeeping in local government is vital also. Therefore I would ask the Minister to extend the audit section of his Department so that local authorities may enjoy the services to which they are entitled. Most county managers are anxious that that should be done. In my opinion, frequent audits can lead to better administration of local authorities.

Will there be any further reports from McKinsey? Have his services been terminated by the Department? If not, might I recommend the dismissal of McKinsey and everybody connected with him. They are a very reputable firm. They submitted very detailed reports, but their views are not in accordance with what is traditional in Ireland. A report conveying to us what has succeeded or failed in the United States, Canada or Britain will not improve circumstances here.

A substantial amount of money has been paid to these consultants for the preparation of miscellaneous reports. I have more confidence in the Minister's views than I have in all the McKinsey reports put together. Men with practical local government experience can convey in a report a vast amount of commonsense and intelligence, qualities which seem to be lacking in many of the McKinsey reports I read. Local government administration in Ireland was foreign to them. They knew nothing about the close contact between the people and the councillor, between the councillor and the Member of Parliament and between the Member of Parliament and the Government.

"Local government" is the expression. There is no point trying to deceive ourselves into believing that local government can be run efficiently from national headquarters. It cannot. It must be local. Local government cannot be run by a pooling of community interests irrespective of the wishes of the people anxious to elect their spokesmen. I urge the Minister to be slow and cautious in so far as reports of this nature are concerned. The best report he can act upon is his own experience of public life. There is a lesson to be learned by every Member when he looks back on the mistakes he made or the victories he gained in the past. Experience is the best teacher. Most of us learned our lessons the hard way. We are proud of this. In this way we will have a true democracy functioning here with a lessening of bureaucratic rule and the giving of new life and growth to the voice of the people in local authorities.

Would the Minister consider giving new functions to the smaller urban councils and town commissioners, such as responsibility for pollution regulations? This would give members a renewed and increased interest in their work. These bodies may be small and insignificant, but they play a role in their locality. There existence is traditional. The Minister has a difficult job. He is accused of failures which may have taken place in his Department before he took office. If the Opposition are fair in this debate they will judge the Minister on his record and performance from the 14th March. It is from that date that he is responsible to the House for the Department of Local Government. No Member can point a finger at one blunder made from that date. We can point our fingers, and point them gladly and cheerfully, at advances along the road to progress which led to the restoration of confidence of the public in local government. We must instil in the rank and file of the public confidence in and respect for those in local government. Unless we do this, we are deceiving ourselves. Local government is what we make it. We can serve the public by giving the benefit of the services we can place at their disposal. We must realise that the Minister is handicapped by lack of funds.

The Minister should endeavour, in so far as it lies in his power, to see that the local government revival which we have seen in the past six months continues. Within the next 12 to 18 months the Minister can, and will, be helpful in getting a substantial allocation of funds from Europe to help us implement and bring to a complete realisation the improvement and betterment of everything connected with local government and the people of this country. We are all in this together; we are all ratepayers and taxpayers and we are all seeking the best possible service and the best value we can for the money we invest in local government.

Because we are all in this together we want to achieve our most ambitious targets. No Department holds out such hope for ambitious targets as the Department of Local Government because it is so closely connected with every man, woman and child in the country. Let us hope that the coming year will be one of further achievements and that this time next year we will be able to comment on a year of steady progress in true administration of local government.

Mr. Callanan

I can assure the House that I will not ask them to listen to me for six hours. The suggestions I will make will be constructive. Having listened to the Minister the only fault I could find was that he neglected to pay a compliment to the man who was in his office before him and who laid the foundations for this progress. Many of the schemes, and other matters, referred to by the Minister—and I do not disagree with any of them—were started by the Minister's predecessor.

The Minister has mentioned, and Deputy Flanagan has spoken at length on, the whole question of local government which is one of the most important Ministries in the State. However, having listened to Deputy Flanagan for six hours nobody would have to be convinced that we have had a good Government because he pointed out all the outstanding achievements of the past Government. Deputy Flanagan spoke of the great need for housing. There is a need for more houses because we have a progressive country. There is plenty of employment in the country, people are marrying young and we had good government. The moment one reaches the stage where no houses are required the country is stagnant and no progress is made.

It is very hard to keep up with the housing situation because, as Deputy Flanagan has stated, a strain was put on the Department by the fact that people had good jobs and were marrying young. I agree with Deputy Flanagan that we should look for some EEC assistance towards the cost of providing more houses. With the limited resources at the command of this Department, it is only fair to state, they have done great work. The Estimates every year have increased considerably. The cost of the ordinary local authority house has also increased. Deputy Flanagan estimated that this increase was in the region of £300, but I believe that £750 is a more realistic figure. Irrespective of what party is in power it is vitally important that the amount of money allocated for the housing programme is increased. Deputy Flanagan's remarks in relation to this proved that we had a Government in power who did all they could in regard to houses.

There was a difference of opinion between the present Minister and the ex-Minister in relation to figures, but if houses were started the grants will have to be paid out. One thing that surprised me in relation to housing was that the amount of the grant for new houses in rural or urban areas was not increased. The grant for the erection of a house in a rural area is still under £1,000. A man in a rural area who has to connect to the ESB would have to pay almost the entire grant for this connection. For that reason the grant is practically useless. In my view grants for private housing should be doubled to meet the increase in the cost of building materials. Reconstruction grants have been increased, but nothing has been done about grants for new houses.

I have a number of views which I wish to express in relation to the working of the Department of Local Government and I should like to make it clear that they are my personal views. I do not believe in criticising because this is a continuation of the good work that was started in the Department of Local Government under a Fianna Fáil Administration and it is my view that the present Minister intends to carry on this good work.

The Minister has announced that he has asked planning authorities to take a more liberal view of planning applications. In this regard I should like to mention that the former Minister sent a circular to the local authorities to this effect. I agree 100 per cent with the Minister, and his predecessor, in this regard because we were planned out of it by planning authorities in recent years. I have seen applications being turned down because houses were "out of character". If everything is in character in this country we are no longer an attraction to anybody. I love to see houses out of character. No one is a better judge of the type of house he wants than the person who is about to live in it. He should not be told how to paint it either.

I have also seen applications refused because it is felt the houses interfere with amenities. In my county an applicant who submitted plans for the erection of a number of bungalows on the coast road was refused permission to build. The plot of land upon which he proposed to build the bungalows was separated from the coast road by a line of trees. I am against interfering with a view of a coast but there are cases where the erection of houses would not interfere with such a view. There is nothing growing on that plot of land now but nettles and thistles and everybody will agree that they are a poor amenity.

I do not know what the Minister meant by his statement. I do not know whether you could or could not build. I am against the indiscriminate erection of septic tanks without any control.

Mr. Tully

No one suggested that.

Mr. Callanan

If ten people build houses beside a major road, if it is well shouldered, and if the gates are well in from the road, they will have a perfect view coming out. Cars must come out on to the major roads. If they are going with the traffic, ten cars might get out together. If the houses are built on by-roads it would take the ten cars nearly half an hour to get out on the road.

At one time if you applied for planning permission an official came out to see you. He did not tell you when he would be out to see you. I would not expect him to say: "I will accommodate you", but he could tell you what time he would be there. The previous Minister changed that. The county councils are the planning authorities but, once they put something down in writing the interpretation is at the county manager's discretion. I suggest that, if a majority of a local authority say that planning permission should be granted, that should be the end of it. County managers disagree on section 4. Some of them say that section 4 must be sanctioned by the Minister before it can be operated. In any planning arrangements from now on, I should like to see something that would give more authority to the people whose plan it is supposed to be.

Deputy Flanagan spent a long time pleading on behalf of people living in flats and the unfortunate poor who want to be housed. He also spent a long time telling us about people who were not getting enough money for land compulsorily acquired. I should like to own land which is being acquired near some towns and cities. People are being fairly well paid for that land. Outside of land which is bought by local authorities, I object to planning consultants zoning land around villages. The minute you zone land you drive up the price. I believe that if I go to Mr. X to buy a plot I should be able to buy it subject to my getting planning permission. I make a price. If I get planning permission it is OK and if I do not the deal is off. This man should not have outline planning permission or should not have his land zoned as suitable for building when he is selling it to me because I have to pay double the price for the site.

At the moment the planners would nearly tell you how to paint your house. They tell you that such and such a house is out of character. Provided he builds it where it does not interfere with anybody else, nobody is a better judge of the type of house he wants to build than the person who will live in it. The less interference the better. There is too much interference in the building of houses in rural Ireland.

I do not want to delay the House but I want to make it clear that the previous Minister for Local Government sat beside me on Galway County Council and no man argued more with officials than he did on the question of officialdom interfering in planning. He sent down a directive that they should take a more liberal view of the interpretation of planning. There should be some provision in the Planning Act as to who will take the final decision on planning. If it is supposed to be a county council plan, the county council should have the final say. Mr. Flanagan mentioned the question of housing itinerants.

An Ceann Comhairle

Deputy Flanagan.

Mr. Callanan

I apologise. We all agree that it is not a question of whether the father or the mother wants to be housed. The only way to get itinerants integrated into the community is by getting the children to go to school. A lot of lip service is paid to this problem. When I hear people talking about the settlement of itinerants I feel like asking them: "Will you give a site near your own place?" People will settle them everywhere except at their own back doors. A good job has been done by the Department in relation to itinerants. Perhaps it might be a good idea to settle one itinerant family in each parish. Some have been settled in communities and that has worked quite well. The settlement in Loughrea has worked very well but in some cases settlements have not been so successful.

The local improvements scheme is an excellent scheme and I endorse everything Deputy Flanagan said about it. There is a backlog but it is not the first time there has been a backlog. There is not enough money in the scheme. Minor schemes are sent down to the local authority and major schemes are held by the Board of Works. There is a maximum grant per farm and, if a scheme exceeds the maximum grant, it is simply out. These schemes are run in conjunction with the land project and I have known of a case where the local inspector made every effort to bring a scheme within the maximum grant but the land project people would not agree with the type of drain and the estimate was upped by a few thousand pounds and that put the scheme outside the maximum grant. The result is the scheme is nobody's baby at the moment. There is no intermediate scheme. It is not big enough to be in the Board of Works and too expensive to be in the LIS. I would ask the Minister to have a look at the maximum grant per farm in view of increased costs and increase the grant pro rata.

I have a question down to the Minister about roads. There is a road in my county going into a pig fattening station. It is used by hundreds of farmers bringing in young pigs and bringing out maize. It is regarded as a private road by the LIS. A road like this is definitely a public utility road.

Mr. Tully

What is the name of the road?

Mr. Callanan

The number is stated in the question I have down. It is in Ballyshrule in Galway.

Mr. Tully

The question may not come until next week.

Mr. Callanan

It may not. Our official says it is a private road. The county council think it should be within the ambit of the scheme because of the numbers using it.

Mr. Tully

How long is it with the Department?

Mr. Callanan

Not very long. I had a letter last week to the effect that it is not sanctioned yet.

Mr. Tully

It was not in before the change of Government, was it?

Mr. Callanan

Oh, no.

Mr. Tully

It was not a case of its being considered fit for sanction only when the change of Government occurred.

Mr. Callanan

That I could not say. I know the application went for sanction.

Mr. Tully

If the Deputy is correct in what he says I would imagine it is a road that should be sanctioned.

Mr. Callanan

That is my view, too. It should come within the ambit of the scheme. Deputy Flanagan spoke about amenity grants. He said his county was not getting enough grants The former Minister was the first to start these grants. They are very important and very valuable and very good work has been done in my county with these grants.

I endorse what Deputy Flanagan said about water and sewerage for towns and villages, but resources are limited. If we get something from the European Social Fund for this kind of work it will be a good thing.

Mr. Tully

We have asked for it anyway.

Mr. Callanan

Fair enough. Water and sewerage are of vital importance. Excellent work has been done by the Department in regard to group water schemes. I think these schemes should be handed over to the local authority. At the moment the local authority engineer need not look at a group water scheme since it is purely a local government matter. The local authority have agreed that if the schemes are up to a certain standard they will take them over and maintain them, if that is in accord with the wishes of the group. Our engineer turned down one scheme as not suitable. He was not, of course, obliged to have anything to do with it. I would like to see these schemes handed over to the local authorities. If these bodies are to take them over and maintain them they are the people who should see that they are properly carried out.

Mr. Tully

We are hoping to do that, but not in the way the Deputy suggests. We will do it provided the local authority are prepared to take them over.

Mr. Callanan

Any sensible local authority would be prepared to do that. We have agreed in principle to do it. I tabled a motion on one occasion in my local authority to the effect that we should appoint an engineer over group schemes. The demand for these schemes is enormous. They should be supervised by the local engineer. There was just one engineer from Local Government looking after these group schemes until a second was appointed in our county about 12 months ago. Even a superman would have difficulty in supervising all the schemes.

Deputy Flanagan referred to driving tests. There is something to be said for a second tester. Difficulties can arise. The test may be carried out on a wet day or on a day on which there is a fair or mart. There is something to be said for examining into this whole question of driving tests.

Deputy Flanagan also mentioned the register of electors. He said rate collectors are not paid for doing the work but I think they are paid some amount.

Deputy Flanagan referred to deaths on the major roads and spoke about the speed limit. We should face the fact that people travel at speeds of 80 miles per hour although 60 m.p.h. is the limit. One night when I was travelling from Dublin I was stopped by the Garda for doing 62 m.p.h. Many other cars passed me but they were lucky they were not stopped by the Garda. Anyone who travels on the major roads knows that people do 80 m.p.h. but it often happens that the people who are doing barely more than 60 m.p.h. are the ones who are caught. Perhaps it might be more realistic to put a speed limit of 65 m.p.h. and I would ask the Minister to consider this matter.

The Minister issued a circular recently in connection with electors in county council areas. The proposal was to consider only the numbers of the electors without increasing the number of councillors. In my county we sent a recommendation that was not based on population; on that basis a majority of the county council would be in Galway city. I admit that is an exaggeration, but one area in County Galway would lose two councillors and we considered rural areas should be given more attention. Nowadays the trend is towards the cities and towns. Much of the blame must be laid on the officials whose policy it has been to house people in the towns. Deputy Flanagan referred to the fact that many of the people are not allowed to build in their own areas. In my area many people do part-time farming and work in industrial estates in Galway. They would like to build houses in their own areas——

Mr. Tully

I will do everything I can to help them.

Mr. Callanan

I thank the Minister. It is completely wrong to deprive them of the means to build in their own areas. At present people living on small farms find it very difficult to survive. In my area many of them drive 30 miles to Galway city to work on the industrial estate but they would like to build houses in their own areas. The conditions obtaining in the cities and towns are entirely different from those in rural areas, and as the Minister is a rural Deputy he must be aware of that.

I would ask the Minister to give serious consideration to the matter of grants. Any amount less than £1,000 is of little help. There have been many questions in the House regarding the amounts charged by the ESB for connections to the electricity supply. The amounts demanded by the ESB absorb much of the grant that is paid and I would ask the Minister to consider this serious problem.

I wish the Minister well in his Department. He has a responsible office and he has given us a comprehensive statement. I sat with the previous Minister on the Galway County Council and I know his attitude in connection with planning and other matters. Deputy Flanagan spoke about Tullamore and the number of houses erected there and the same situation obtains throughout the country. In a progressive country there will always be a housing problem. Our country is developing at a rapid rate and this is to the credit of all. I hope the Minister will continue the good work that has been done by the Department of Local Government to date and I wish him well in his task.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries (Mr. M.P. Murphy)

I was very interested in listening to Deputy Callanan's contribution because it was rather unusual as far as I am concerned although I have been present for many years for debates on local government matters. Deputy Callanan made a reasoned case and I agree with much of what he said. I am sure he meant to be constructive in his comments on planning and other matters and I saw that he got a sympathetic and understanding hearing from the Minister. That is as it should be.

However, for Deputy Callanan's information, as he was not here for discussions on previous Estimates for Local Government, the position was quite different then. I can tell the Deputy that when some of my colleagues on the Opposition benches and myself contributed to the debates generally we were treated with contempt by the Minister's predecessors——

Mr. Moore

That is not true.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

It is true. It is a statement of fact. The need for me to participate in this debate is not as pressing as it was in the past because 28th February was a memorable day. On that day the Irish people changed the situation in the country—a change that was long overdue, particularly with regard to local government. Fortunately not only did the change bring about the National Coalition Government but, so far as local government is concerned, the Irish people—I say this without endeavouring to throw bouquets at my colleague of long standing, Deputy Tully—are most fortunate in having a man such as Deputy Tully in charge of this exceptionally important ministry at present.

The Minister, by virtue of his qualifications, his understanding of the people's needs, his service on local authorities and his down-to-earth approach on local government is, to my mind, the man best fitted in this House for the ministry he holds. I was quite pleased to hear Deputy Callanan, a member of the Opposition, giving honour where honour is due. I do not want to go back on the past, particularly when some ex-Ministers are no longer with us, but I believe that, no matter who occupies the office of Minister for Local Government, he should sit down, as Deputy Tully is doing, and listen to the views of all the elected representatives irrespective of party. Every Member of this House is elected by a group of people and his views are entitled to consideration whether he is on the Government side or the Opposition side. Unless we establish that kind of system here debates on Estimates are of little value. I am not being political when I say, as a Member of the House since 1951, that this is the most notable change in the House since the National Coalition Government took office last March. I referred to this in the course of a contribution on a previous Estimate. I reiterate that view now.

The Department of Local Government covers a very wide and a most interesting field. It deals with local administration, with the housing of our people, with planning and the environment, with water and sewerage, with local improvement schemes, with fire brigades and all the other things listed in great detail by Deputy Flanagan. One of my reasons for contributing to this debate is to deal with perhaps not the most important item but one that is exceptionally important—planning. I have addressed myself to this question in the House since the Planning Acts were enacted and I have made representations with little effect both here and on the local council.

One of the most refreshing documents that has emanated from any Department in recent times is a circular, dated 13th November, 1973, headed "Planning Control Problems" sent to the various local authorities by the Minister for Local Government. I have gleaned from various Press reports that this document has been welcomed by almost all local authorities and by almost all members of councils. It was welcomed, because here was a Minister sending along proposals regarding this vital question which were more or less the proposals which the ordinary county councillor had in his own mind. Here was something on which he or she had been making recommendations to the Department of Local Government in years gone by with little effect.

There is no need to quote from this circular for the record of the House because it has been well publicised in the press and it is in the hands of all members of local authorities. Heretofore the main activity at planning meetings of local authorities was a development officer telling council members what they could not do. We cannot build a house along a national primary road or adjacent to a national primary road. We cannot build a house adjacent to a national secondary road. We cannot build a house that interferes with the landscape of the area. We cannot build a house here, there and almost everywhere. One was at one's wits end to know where one could actually build a house. I know that emphasis was placed by the planning authorities up to the change of Government on the desirability of building houses within built-up areas. This was referred to quite effectively by Deputy Callanan. On this question I think Deputy Callanan shares my view that we should not force a man into a town or village to build a house costing £6,000 plus if he prefers to live a mile outside the town. They were the orders from the Custom House and they were the orders that were being implemented by local authorities.

I believe firmly that we must have planning and we must have planning direction by a central authority such as the Department of Local Government. Executive officers of county councils are charged with carrying out Department policy and, as we know, both the previous and the present plans were drawn up mainly by the executive staffs of the councils, not by the members. The members were supposed to formulate plans and go into all the details involved but I am sure the position in Galway or in any other county was no different from that in Cork where the plan was mainly drawn up in accordance with the dictation of the Department—of course, the members had to approve of it. I should like to illustrate what I mean by dictation.

Deputy Tully's predecessor issued a directive regarding the building of a house on a national primary or secondary road or with an entrance from such a road, irrespective of whether the road was 100 feet wide or not. I have not the directive now but I can be corrected if I am wrong. The directive told local authorities that unless they excluded the building of houses adjacent to national primary and secondary roads they were likely to suffer as regards grants for the improvement of such roads. On the one hand council members were told that their function and obligation was to draw up a plan; on the other hand they got this directive telling them that unless they did it in the Department's way they would be punished financially.

I should like to deal further with the desirability of building houses adjacent to or with entrances from a national primary route, not to mention a national secondary route. We are told how dangerous it is to life and limb and to the travelling public to allow people to build along these routes. We must bear in mind that a house costs £6,000 plus. To find that sum most people have to get a loan from the local authority or a building society or rely on years of work and industry. Surely a man and wife building a house have the right to say what is a suitable location and unless it can be proved that location interferes with the common good or with the community, in my opinion neither the Department nor the local authority have the right to say: "You cannot build there." This was the dictation of the Department: "Unless you do what you are told we will squeeze you financially."

If the Leas-Cheann Comhairle were to build a house, I am sure he would like to locate it where there would be access to the road and where it would be likely to hold its market value. But what were you supposed to do, build it along a side road, perhaps a by-road nine or ten feet wide, scarcely wide enough for a lorry? You were not to mind those travelling on the by-road: there was no hazard there. I suppose if one of them were killed it would not count as much as the man travelling, as Deputy Callanan said, at 80 miles an hour from Cork to Dublin or even on a narrower road from Dublin to Galway or on another national primary or secondary road.

I maintained in this House previously and in Cork County Council when we discussed this matter that the hazard to life was made much greater by forcing people to build houses with entrances from side roads of 19 feet or 11 feet wide as is happening at present because people are forced to build houses on such roads. I cannot understand that attitude but that is given as an excuse as to why you are not allowed to build adjacent to or with an entrance from a national primary or secondary road or, indeed, a main road that is not even so designated. One is told the Department is worried in case life would be lost or in case undue restraint would be placed on users of such public highways.

Take the larger national primary and secondary roads. On most of them there are yellow lines with wide margins inside them. I maintain that on the greater part of such roads there is no hazard in the case of a vehicle easing on to the main road. It is the duty and obligation under the law of the man coming on to the main road to take proper precautions. I see no difficulty for any driver in easing his vehicle on to the main road without being a hazard or a hindrance to other drivers using the main road. I can see the opposite. Would any of us be likely to exercise more care and diligence—which we should exercise at all times—when driving along the narrow, twisty road of ten, 11 or 12 feet wide? The risk is much higher than when one is driving from, say, Cork to Dublin. I am very pleased that this matter is adverted to in the circular of 12th November issued by the Department of Local Government.

This country is an island with hundreds of miles of sea coast and we pride ourselves on its advantages for tourism which none of us would belittle but in the southern part of the country and, indeed, up into the part of the country where Deputy Callanan lives. and in Mayo and Donegal there are acres and acres of farmland that was never of any benefit to its owners or very little benefit. As a result of the barrenness of the land, many of the people who lived there when standards were much lower than they are today had to move to Britain or America, or at least had to move out from such barren districts. In such districts away back 100 years ago, or possibly 50 years ago, there were groups of little houses where people were trying to eke out a meagre livelihood from their holdings. However, the pressure was too hard and many such hamlets— they would be called derelict houses now—had to be abandoned, with the consequent loss in population.

In recent years there is a change about. People are anxious to come home. We are living in a more affluent society, and people who own such land are getting exceptionally high prices for it. I am not referring merely to land at our sea coast; indeed I am referring to land, in many instances, on the landward side of the road, near sea routes, down around West Cork, taking the three peninsulas, the peninsula where I live myself, Sheep's Head, Mizen Head and Berehaven.

Here is the importance of planning so far as the descendants of these landowners, at least those who remain, are concerned. Let us say Deputy Seán Moore comes down from Dublin and meets one of these landowners and offers him a sum for a barren piece of land. He thinks it is a nice place to build a house, offers the landowner a four-figure sum, as has been offered in many instances, £1,000 subject to planning, but no planning is forthcoming. The owner of that piece of land, usually a small, uneconomic farmer, cannot do business. What would £1,000 do for such a person? And it is not one person that is involved but hundreds. One thousand pounds would change his life from improverishment to affluence. If he could sell a second site for £1,000 look at what that would do for him; it would give him a chance of educating his family. There is no use in saying that education is free; you must have a little money. In these isolated places secondary schools are not so adjacent.

However, the local authorities and the Department say "No". That piece of land is to be left for the enjoyment of some fellow who comes over from England, France, or America. If the piece of land is by the sea, the State will say: "You cannot accept the offer of £1,000 or £2,000 for the sale of this as a housing site. We would like to have people coming and paying money to our hotels and so on to visit this lovely, unspoiled area. All Europe is supposed to be spoiled now. This area is not and it attracts visitors." In such circumstances, it is my view that the State should pay him. That piece of rock is no good to its owner and if the State feels it should preserve it, then there is a question of compensation.

Mr. Moore

He could be compensated, of course.

Mr. M.P. Murphy

Seldom if ever has compensation been paid under the Act; at least I was unable to exert any influence in that way. Such restricted methods applied, possibly with some justification, not only to our seashore but also to land far removed from the seashore and, as I said earlier, to the landward side of the road. Ribbon development was not allowed, and if you wanted to build a house the local authority said: "You may not build a mile or two from the town. Unless your circumstances are special, you build a house in the nearest village."

I have not the slightest doubt that a change is desirable and necessary. I am as much a preservationist or a conservationist, whichever is the more appropriate term, and I am just as interested in environment as some of the people here who make a great deal of noise through the Press and other sources, and they lose nothing. I said this before, and I repeat: it is all right for people when they travel around the country on a holiday. They can usually travel over land, and there is nobody telling them to get out. All Irish people, particularly owners of that kind of land, are all only too anxious to accommodate people. However, as regards some of the people who are crying about this and who are saying: "They should not get permission; they should not be allowed to do what they like with their own land; that is the nation's right", if you trespassed on their land, if you walked inside their garden, I would not be surprised— and I know of instances where such statements have been made—if the nearest Garda station was told that there was a prowler or a trespasser within their premises. It is all right when they go down the country. We do not grudge them their visit, but you cannot dictate to them. They lay down the law.

What I am saying is to some extent a repeat of what Deputy Callanan said a while ago. I gave an instance of a person travelling from Durrus to Sheep's Head, taking in the north side of Glengariff and the Kerry Road. The land is well below the road level. There is no hindrance of view. In my opinion properly landscaped houses built to a high standard would in no way interfere with the view. Such houses are an addition. We are all complaining about our population being depleted. We cannot increase the population in such areas unless we give permission for house building. There is an income from each house built. The occupiers pay rates. They pay for the site. They spend money locally. This all helps the local economy. Areas which have been denuded of population need assistance.

It is no good for one to have 100 acres and to spend his time looking at the rocks. You will not collect an income from the rocks. A man does not like to be told by the local authority that he cannot do as he wishes with his land. People voted for the right of free sale. There should be a better approach from the Department of Local Government and from the local authorities to this question of planning.

I have been a member of a local authority. If a man applies to Cork County Council for planning approval for a particular building and if that approval is rejected the applicant should be entitled to be given the reasons why the rejection decision was made. He is not given such reasons at present. He gets a piece of paper with a summary saying, for instance, "the site intereferes with the landscaping of the area". Often trivial excuses are given. Surely an applicant is entitled to get the reports of the county council officers. Usually a report is made by a local assistant engineer. A further report is made by the chief assistant county engineer who deals with housing, sanitary arrangements and roads. There is also a report from the development officer or the planning officer. Finally, the county manager will make a report and a decision will be made by him. The whole process has been dealt with by five or six officials. Any man whose application is turned down should be given the full file. The Local Government official should be able to stand over the case which he has made against the application. If a case is heard by a district justice in a court a man is questioned and knows the case against him. His opponent knows the case he has made. They can go to the appeal court because they know the facts which have been disclosed in court. In the case of planning applications the facts are not given to the applicants. They are told "It is a secret document". Justice must not only be done; it must be seen to be done. I have spent many hours discussing this in Cork. I know as much as anybody in Ireland about it.

I was chairman of Cork County Council on a number of occasions. By virtue of being chairman I was able to read the files and reports made on applications. I was able to assess summaries in cases of rejected appeals. I am hopeful that Deputy Tully will change the regulations. The right should be given to objectors and to applicants to know what is in the file. The people should know why their applications are turned down. Some people get advice from legal men. This is costly. These men do not know any more than what was in the summary. This Government should change the position. There is nothing in law to preclude a county manager from giving information to applicants. The Minister should issue a directive making it mandatory on a local authority to give such information. The summary gives the position from the point of view of the Department's officials.

A number of planning applications await attention in the Department. Some of them are awaiting decisions for years. An appeal, when lodged, went to the Custom House. In some cases unless pressure—maybe political pressure—was used the appeal got lost. The Minister and his Parliamentary Secretary had difficulty in digging up and unearthing all the files that were awaiting decisions in the Custom House.

I take this opportunity to mention a matter of extreme importance to the area I represent. I refer to the project mooted for Bantry by an American concern. If it were possible to do so, we would develop our own resources. Unfortunately that is not the position and, consequently, we welcomed the American company in the belief that their activities would be of much benefit to the area. When this company attended at a public relations meeting in Bantry the explanations they gave of their project were acceptable to us. The amount of capital involved then was £55 million—the type of money that would be hard to come by in an area such as West Cork. Therefore, we were willing to give every consideration to the company.

However, the project has been and, perhaps, will continue to be the subject matter of newspaper correspondence by reason of controversy begun by groups that I shall not refer to by name. These groups have expressed concern for the amenities of the area and have said that the project would ruin our shoreline, that it would be a major disadvantage to West Cork and to Bantry in particular. Those people are entitled to express their opinion and they have been listened to by Cork County Council. The planning application for the project was given careful consideration by the members of the county council who, in their wisdom, approved the application but with certain conditions. Then those groups to which I have referred objected to permission being granted.

The matter has been with the Department now for some time, and I appreciate that it is for them to give their decision in the light of the reports and recommendations before them. But, having said that, I have no hesitation in asserting now, as I have asserted many times in the past, that the decision of the Cork County Council should be upheld so that the work on this project can go ahead. Industrial development is needed all over the country. Of course we would prefer to engage in this activity ourselves, but when this is not possible we must be prepared to allow in people from outside who are willing to invest the capital required. Extensive industrial development is bound to have some adverse affects on an area in so far as privacy, et cetera is concerned, but these are more than compensated for by the increased prosperity that such development creates.

It is reckoned that the project I am speaking of would involve the employment of between 2,000 and 2,500 workers for a period of 18 months, that is, the period of its construction and, thereafter, 400 permanent employees. It will be seen, then, that the case in favour of granting approval outweighs by far the objections put forward by certain groups. I hope that within a reasonable time the Department of Local Government will issue a Press release upholding the county councils' recommendation and that, consequently, West Cork will be humming with activity very shortly.

In the course of his contribution Deputy Callanan drew attention to the difficulties of buying sites and said prices in many cases were exceptionally high. That, of course, is true because of restrictive planning laws which have resulted in sites that have been approved by local authorities being more costly than they otherwise would be. If planning were not so restricted and if a person was likely to get planning permission for a site in a particular area which would be suitable for house building, the acquisition of that site would cost less. I agree on that point with the previous speaker.

The provision of adequate housing is of exceptional importance but I shall leave that over for the present and move on to the part of the Minister's brief which deals with water and sewerage schemes. Deputy O. J. Flanagan told us that 30 years ago the late Deputy O'Donnell was the first to make a case here for the provision of piped water in every house. That was a very sound statement at that time, but unfortunately people did not give the required attention to the desirability of having piped water supplies in every house and proper sanitary facilities. At that time it was very easy to provide such amenities from the point of view of cost and the plentiful supply of labour that was available.

We in the House, the Department and the local authorities are obliged to ensure that as far as possible piped water will be extended to every house in the land. It is an essential because without piped water there cannot be sanitary facilities. Although I know such a programme is very burdensome from the financial viewpoint, at the same time one cannot say a country or a nation has been properly developed until these amenities are available to all households. From what I know of our new brothers in western Europe, these facilities are available in almost all houses.

Extension of water supplies has been hindered to a great extent by lack of finance. My local authority, and I am sure all county councils in Ireland, had planned water schemes and could have had them implemented years ago if funds had been available. The question put by local authorities to the Department is "How much money can you give us?" Now, fortunately, we have a most considerate Minister and Government who are mindful of the desirability to provide this much-needed facility and I have no doubt that embodied in this Estimate is a very much increased amount which. taking all circumstances into account, is as much as can be provided at the present time.

Still on the subject of water, Deputy O.J. Flanagan stunned me earlier— possibly he was correct in relation to his own area—when he told us how fruitful group water schemes were in Offaly and Laois. Group water schemes in my part of the country could be described as being complete failures. In most cases where local contributions were collected from potential beneficiaries, where the schemes were supposedly got under way, there were so many frustrating delays that they had to be abandoned. That is my progress report in regard to these schemes in my constituency. What would the elected members of local authorities do in such situations? The natural thing for them to do would be to invite the Department's representative in the area to discuss the schemes with them. Incidentally, as far as Cork is concerned, the Department's representative is located in a city office, central enough to every part of the county. However, what did our late lamented Member of this House, Mr. Kevin Boland, do when he was Minister for Local Government? He said: "No I will not allow that inspector to meet the members of the local authority. We will not allow our inspectors to meet members of local authorities. The only person he will meet is a bureaucrat." That was Mr. Boland's idea of democracy. That is what he thought of local authorities. I had little respect for him as Minister for Local Government.

Then along comes Deputy Molloy and we in local authorities were positive that regulation would be changed. What did that democrat, who lectured us on democracy for more than an hour the other night, do? He upheld the decision of the previous Minister. In correspondence with the local authorities he said that he would not allow the group water scheme inspectors to attend local authority meetings to discuss the position of the group water scheme with elected members. That is why little head way was made, why so much frustration existed and so many schemes were abandoned. Several people formed groups. They considered this the best and cheapest way to get their own source of supply but they did not get reasonable help from the Department.

The Minister should remove from the regulations the preclusion of water scheme personnel, particularly engineers, from meeting elected members of local authorities. This explains why so many smaller schemes, serving five, six, eight or ten families, made no headway in County Cork. I was pleased to hear Deputy Flanagan say that headway had been made in other places.

One of the biggest problems facing the Minister is housing. We realise and appreciate that a decent house is the first essential for any family. Every Member would like to see each family accommodated in a structurally good house. Unfortunately, some people cannot provide a house for their families from their own resources. They must lean on public funds to help them. I agree with this. If, through no fault of their own, people are unable to bear the burden of providing a house, public funds should come to their resue and help provide that essential. Many people who have been waiting for local authority houses for many years are frustrated by the delay. Under the Minister's direction drastic changes are being implemented. The first is the provision of additional money. I will give the actual figures later.

One of the first pronouncements made by the Minister, subsequent to taking office, was on housing. This is a very important question, particularly in Dublin, which has a population of approximately 850,000. This was one of the first areas examined by the Department. Under the Minister's direction the people of Dublin can look forward to houses being built as quickly as possible. People in towns and villages throughout the country who have not homes can look forward to similar help. Local authorities are anxious to build houses for necessitous applicants. That is as it should be. They have an obligation to provide houses for those who cannot do so from their own resources. There is also an obligation on those who can provide houses with the aid of grants or loans to do so.

Progress reported; Committee to sit again.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.30 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 22nd November, 1973.