Deputy Cunningham gave notice of his intention to raise a matter on the Adjournment, namely, the decisions or conclusions reached by the Minister for Industry and Commerce in respect of large imports of shirts.
Adjournment Debate: Shirt Imports.
At Question Time today I asked the Taoiseach to indicate the quantity of shirts imported (a) from Korea and (b) from other third countries in the first quarter of 1975. Incidentally, when I tabled the question it was directed to the Minister for Industry and Commerce but, as it was a statistical matter, it was put in the Taoiseach's group of questions. The reply I got with regard to imports from Korea for the first three months of this year was 67,000 shirts. There was no indication whether this referred to dozens of shirts or to 67,000 shirts.
It referred to shirts.
I was told the number imported from other third countries was 110,000. In a supplementary question I asked what action was being taken to curb what is generally regarded as the dumping of textiles, especially shirts, and I was told that was a matter for the Minister for Industry and Commerce. I asked the Parliamentary Secretary who was replying on behalf of the Taoiseach if he would get this information but, as I was dissatisfied with the replies to my supplementary questions, I decided to raise the matter on the Adjournment. I understand the subject matter of the Adjournment now becomes "the decisions or conclusions reached by the Minister for Industry and Commerce in respect of large imports of shirts".
This matter was brought before the House on many occasions during 1974 when the problem developed into one of some magnitude. These imports affected the constituency I represent where there are a dozen or more shirt manufacturing concerns whose products in the main are exported but who sell a fraction on the home market. During 1974 there were redundancies, short-time working and closures in the industry due principally to these visible, direct imports of shirts.
The figures I was given today do not represent indirect imports from third countries because imports from third countries are taking place in Britain and they are exported to this country. I do not know the actual figures but it is not uncommon to find on shirts imported from Britain a small label stating they were made in Hong Kong. The same situation applies to other areas also. Therefore, the figures I was given do not represent the full quota of shirts imported from outside the EEC. The situation is an alarming one for my constituency and for the shirt manufacturing industry generally.
As a result of questions and motions during the year we elicited from the Minister that he had taken up the matter with the EEC Commission and that representatives of the EEC visited this country with regard to shirt and footwear imports. However, we were not given a final statement regarding decisions arrived at, actions taken or the result of such actions or decisions. The situation as I see it is that two out of every three shirts worn in this country are imported from Korea and other third countries. This situation is causing problems for our manufacturers and workers.
I should like to know from the Minister if the provisions regarding dumping legislation are being invoked or if duties are being imposed. Is it the intention of the Minister to impose such duties? We see countries in the EEC putting up protective barriers in respect of certain commodities, notwithstanding the fact that there are provisions with regard to free trade. Our country is weak economically and we should be able at least to erect some barriers, whether by way of duty or by the invocation of the provisions of the dumping legislation.
I asked for this adjournment debate because I mentioned this subject during two discussions about a month ago when I indicated to the Minister that at Alexandra Quay in Dublin container loads of Korean shirts and others were being unloaded this year despite all the negotiations the EEC had. The main problem is that the Minister is not doing anything about this. My information is that these Korean shirts are being landed at Alexandra Quay at 25p each and are being sold by retailers at £1.50 each and in some cases £2. It would be interesting to find how much the Minister for Finance is getting by way of VAT from these container loads of shirts landed at 25p each and retailed at £1.50 to £2.
The Minister must explain this to shirt factory workers, to the producers of shirts who have been doing a good job of work during the years catering for the home market and for a fairly large export market. This is a duty not only of the Minister but of the entire Government. What is the score as of today? What will happen in the future? I appeal to the Minister to take definite action.
I want briefly to support the case made by Deputy Cunningham. I assume the Minister will tell us about some form of voluntary agreement he got recently with the South Korean Government in relation to the export by them to this country of cheap textiles. Apparently the agreement was arrived at some months ago but we never have been very clear on the details. The Minister referred more than once to it. It appears to have been of little or no use during the quarter ended 31st March, in which 67,000 cheap shirts were imported from South Korea alone, not taking into account imports of 110,000 cheap shirts from other third countries. There were also indirect imports through Britain and elsewhere of similar garments from third countries.
We are rapidly approaching a situation in which each adult male in the community purchases one of these shirts per annum. In these circumstances it is understandable that all shirt factories in the country are in difficulties, not just those in Donegal mentioned by Deputy Cunningham, but those in Dublin and elsewhere. The unanimous views of the workers in those factories is that they are up against unfair competition. The shirts can be made in Korea and other such countries at a tiny fraction of the cost it takes to make them here. Even though it is within the power of the Minister to limit or possibly to prohibit altogether in one way or another these imports, he has refused to do so.
I interject to say that is uninformed and wrong.
If similar steps were taken in similar circumstances by at least two other EEC member countries——
Would the Deputy amplify that?
The Minister is aware of that.
He is not.
Italy took serious steps in the past year to——
To rectify a balance of payments crisis under an article of the Treaty making provision for that.
I would have thought that, with our balance of payments very much on the wrong side of £300 million per annum, our situation in that regard is very little short of a crisis condition, and with unemployment running at its present rate the whole position of our general economy is little short of that situation. There is provision in the Treaty of Rome for meeting a situation in which an industry or industries run into serious difficulties, as this particular industry has run into as a result of these imports. The EEC have made it perfectly clear that it is not up to them in the first instance to take the necessary measures to put a stop to it——
The Deputy is making that up without any validation. He is saying the first thing that comes into his head without any documentation.
We have seen national governments in the past year or so taking steps to protect their industries and their workers and we are asking that the workers who are affected in this and many other industries should be assured that steps will be taken. The making of voluntary agreements with Korea has proved to be of no value whatever. The efforts by the EEC Commission as a whole to make agreements with those countries are of little value to us, to the smaller and weaker states in the Community, whose problems are generally much greater.
It is a bit much to expect the EEC Commission representing the whole Community to try to make agreements with third countries if only one or two countries are affected as regards particular industries. We have no indication that similar industries in some of the EEC countries are affected by the level of employment and redundancies that have applied here in the past 12 months in shirt factories and other industries throughout the country. With the figures we got today in relation to imports, I am afraid it is clear that the situation is likely to continue without hope for a change unless the Minister takes some steps to cut down on the huge figure of imports which we had for the quarter up to the end of March.
I think I have time to make a point which I made to the Minister already. Under the terms of the Anglo-Irish Free Trade Area Agreement there is specific provision that in a case where imports are seriously affecting a home industry we can apply to take protective measures. Why this has not been imposed when there were ample time and grounds to do so I cannot understand.
I want to hurry because I have a lot to say. Deputy Cunningham made a serious and reasonable speech but I thought Deputy O'Malley was a perfect example of the sort of half-baked inadequate Opposition we are seeing so much of. I will give a couple of examples—I do not propose to waste a lot of time on what Deputy O'Malley said because the half-baked attitude of my opposite number for Industry and Commerce does not merit it.
First, he said, and I quote, "We were never very clear on the details of the Korean agreement". I do not know what one has to do but perhaps it would be too much to expect the Opposition spokesman for Industry and Commerce to read the newspapers for 1st March. He went on to reveal his knowledge of the workings of the Community when he said it was a bit much to expect the Commission to make arrangements with third countries. The Commission is the legally empowered organ to make trading arrangements with third countries and it defends that right against nation states with very great vigour. If the Deputy had the faintest knowledge or would bother to acquaint himself even a little——
If the Minister is finished sneering perhaps he would answer the question he was asked and deal with the serious situation which exists.
More lengthy sneering is not warranted by the foolishness of what Deputy O'Malley said but he ought to do his homework a little more.
That is not a reply.
(Interruptions.)
Order.
It was Deputy O'Malley who, after a reasonable speech from Deputy Cunningham, introduced this foolishness and sneering into the debate.
I want to talk about the issues in question. First, I will talk about South Korea. Under the multi-fibre agreement of the GATT negotiations were continuing through 1974 to make arrangements between the whole Community and South Korea. It was obvious to us, as the autumn of 1974 wore on, that the target dateline of 1st January, 1975, would not be met. We, therefore, invoked the emergency procedures of the multi-fibre agreement of the GATT in November, 1974. We were the first country so to do. As a result of that intervention we obtained the agreement with South Korea which was set out in the notice of 1st March which Deputy O'Malley did not see.
And resulted in this.
I have a limited amount of time. I refer the Deputy to that agreement because, if he will pay the country, the Parliament and myself the compliment of reading it, he will find the dates to which it refers. That is the result of the intervention in regard to Korea. We were the first country so to invoke it and we got a result. The general multi-fibre agreement of the GATT between the whole Community and Korea will come in at a later date, but because of the slowness of negotiations it did not come in in time to help us and we got an emergency arrangement.
When will it come in and what will be the effect of it?
It is aimed at the second half of 1975 now. It was aimed at January 1st, 1975. The effect will be to limit Korean imports in regard to guidelines which were related to the imports in 1974. Again I would beg Deputies to familiarise themselves with the history of the GATT negotiations and with the history of efforts to liberalise trade in the world because, as a trading nation with 30 per cent of our GNP and more being exported and many more shirts being exported than imported, we must not lightheratedly interfere with free trading arrangements from which we benefit more than we lose. There is a serious kernel in this. I would beg people to study the history of the GATT and understand it a little. We have benefited from this development of free trade in general.
In regard to dumping, the mechanism with An Coimisiún Dumpála is that they can initiate investigations or they can be requested by the Minister to initiate investigations. On 10th January of this year at my instigation they initiated a dumping investigation. Deputies again would be aware, if they would familiarise themselves with the international rules on this, that if you initiate an investigation and then find that your own dumping commission, having to operate internationally agreed rules, cannot demonstrate dumping, then your last position is certainly no better than your first and may be worse. That investigation is proceeding at my instigation. We started on January 10th. The Deputies never make reference to it, perhaps because they do not know about it but let me——
That is why we are asking our Minister for Industry and Commerce to tell us.
Could the Minister be allowed to make his own speech? He has just about five minutes left.
So far we have got absolutely no information of any kind except patronising lectures.
Let us hear him out.
Patronising is too good for the Deputy opposite. It is a waste of time even doing that with him.
I want to refer to the low-cost quotas which apply to 16 countries. This is a catch-all mechanism which did not catch Korea because at the time that those low-cost quotas were initially introduced Korea was not a significant exporter. It came on the scene later. The 16 countries are Japan, Czechoslovakia, Roumania, India, Malaysia, Macao, People's Republic of China, Hungary, Hong Kong, Taiwan (Formosa), Bulgaria, Poland, East Germany, Pakistan, Yugoslavia, USSR. The point here is that the catch-all quota for all of those countries, except Korea, is the value of £100,000 and that low-cost quota system, effectively excludes, except for evasions which I will talk about in a moment, all of the products from those countries. The £100,000 is a nominal amount for that number of countries. That system exists, is operated and will continue to the end of 1977. That relates to countries other than the Community where we have free trade and other than Korea which was not a significant exporter when that system was introduced. That is an effective system which is working very well.
It is known that there is evasion of this to some extent and about that we have done two things. In November, again at my instigation—the Revenue Commissioners carry on a normal amount of investigation of all the import documentation—we urged them to intensify that control, the scrutiny of documents, to see that there was no cheating, no putting things in from other sources. I am happy to say, and to place my thanks on record, that there was a very substantially increased vigilance by the Revenue Commissioners to see that products of places like Hong Kong and the other countries I named were not coming in in irregular ways. There is also, of course, a provision in the agreement with South Korea, the details of which were published in the newspapers on 1st March, which sets out the mechanism for dealing with the passage of things from South Korea into the Community and then into Ireland, a mechanism directly between the Koreans and ourselves, that will minimise those illegalities.
I am also in a position to say, and this is new information, that a formal surveillance scheme, in addition to the increased surveillance of the Revenue Commissioners, requiring a licence will be in operation in the very near future. I have obtained the necessary mechanism to do that.
In regard to the AIFTA agreement which Deputy Brennan mentioned, we have approached the British. I spoke to Peter Shore informally in January. We had a formal meeting on 21st February. We pushed our side of it as hard as we possibly could. Deputy Brennan suggested that that mechanism could be invoked easily. We tried to invoke it to the limit and in regard to the UK we got nowhere. That mechanism was an illusory one when we tried to use it. We did try to use it informally in January and formally in February.
I have recorded decisions about Korea, decisions about the other 16 countries and the low-cost quotas, decisions about tightening the Revenue Commissioners' surveillance, decisions about a licensing system which will give us a very up-to-date control, decisions about reference to An Coimisiún Dumpála. All of these are specific actions to the very limit of what is permitted under our Accession Treaty which was so injudiciously and lightheartedly recommended by Deputies across the House, without any consideration for the potential damages of which we are now suffering one, because we are functioning to the limit of the possible. Again they have been making allegations about what other countries have done. I would beg them to go to some neutral source like Keesing's Contemporary Archives and find out what actually happened under what Articles of the Treaty and see if they are really urging us to do the same thing and if they think it is to our advantage to do the same thing.
I have enumerated the decisions. I have heard no suggestions except vague ones which evaporate when analysed. I have been asked for conclusions and I will offer some. When I look at the figures, both for volume and value, I find that we export and are continuing to export much more than we import in shirts. Deputy Cunningham referred to his constituency where I know there is a concentration of shirt industries, but he said himself that they export most of their production to England. Does he want to invoke, for the people he is concerned about, retaliation from Britain, because that is a real danger?
They are not exporting now.
I am informed that there is one factory in Donegal which has gone back to a five-day week and which is exporting. He knows that the backbone of the Donegal shirt industry is exports.
How many shirts do we export to Korea?
We do not export any to Korea.
What have we to lose then? We are not complaining about imports from England.
If the Deputy would do his homework a little he might find a legal mechanism under the Accession Treaty that would work but until he has done that homework —and he has demonstrated that he has not started to do it yet—I do not think he has the right to make those sorts of suggestions. That is too light-hearted and facile to be serious. There are desperate dangers to provoking a trade war——
With Korea? What can we lose by provoking one with Korea?
The Deputy should do his homework and try to understand the legal mechanisms. There is potentially much greater damage to us by tipping off a trade war with countries to which we export. We are functioning under the legal mechanisms of the Treaty. We are functioning in areas of decision in the five ways I have indicated, most of which Deputies on the other side seem to be unaware of. I will certainly entertain serious suggestions of practical legal alternatives or things that we are not doing but I have not heard them. I heard a serious speech from Deputy Cunningham and I share his concern. I undertake to investigate and to act on practical suggestions but I cannot and do not take seriously the wide-swinging, unanalysed, sweeping suggestions for instant solutions which are simply illegal under mechanisms negotiated by the Opposition.
The Dáil adjourned at 11.03 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 23rd April, 1975.