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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 30 May 1979

Vol. 314 No. 11

Private Members' Business. - Confidence in Government: Motion (Resumed).

The following motion was moved by Deputy Cluskey on Tuesday 29 May 1979:
That Dáil Éireann, gravely concerned about the serious economic mismanagement of the country by the Government, declares that this House and the people of Ireland have no confidence in the Government.
Debate resumed on amendment No. 1:
To delete all words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:
"expresses its satisfaction at the Government's management of the economy".
—(Minister for Fisheries and Forestry.)

We have just seen a very good reason why Dáil Éireann should express no confidence in the Government. On an important Bill involving high legal principles the Government have asked the House to dismiss it as though it is a Fianna Fáil election programme. I ask the Government to be serious. As a senior Member of this House—as it happens, still on the right side of 50—I ask the Government not to insult the Dáil and the people of Ireland by asking the Dáil to endorse the Government's amendment to the motion of no confidence. The amendment is an impertinent one. It asks the Dáil to express its satisfaction at the Government's management of the economy.

That is a sick joke. The Minister for Economic Planning and Development and the Government know there is only a tiny minority of dedicated Fianna Fáil supporters who know anything about the management of economic affairs who today have any confidence in the Government's management of the economy. Even if it was bad management I could understand the amendment, but there is no management at all. There is no Government at all, and that is the almost universal cry of the plain people of Ireland. Quite rightly they are asking why the Government do not govern. They were elected to govern, they did not and they are not governing.

The most tragic aspect of the present national crisis—there is a crisis of unprecedented dimensions—is that the Government do not realise there is any crisis at all. They describe it merely as a problem. There is a problem, but the problem is the Government. It is a problem of the Government's making. When we were in Government, Fianna Fáil spent several years during a real international recession arguing that all we said was untrue, that all that was needed was to elect them to office in order to make Ireland once more a land running with milk and honey for everybody, without any great effort.

I accept there is an international crisis now but it is only one-fifth as serious as that which we experienced. The situation in Ireland today is immeasurably worse. There is a strong irony in Fianna Fáil's European election slogan which asks the people to vote for them in order to have "a strong voice in Europe". Fianna Fáil were given the strongest voice ever for a Government of Ireland but the only time we hear that voice now is complaining that their critics are being unfair to them, particularly complaining that the media critics are not giving them a fair innings. They were given a voice to govern, to put right many of our problems, but all we have had have been feeble indifferent government, Green Papers and White Papers, economic theory that has little relationship to practice. We are now quickly grinding to a halt. The Government should govern or get out.

Yesterday, the Minister for Fisheries and Forestry said that whether we like it or not, whether the people of Ireland like it or not, Fianna Fáil will stay in power during the next two-and-a-half or three years. If that is to be our plight, and the people are angry that it is their plight—they were deluded into bringing that situation about—would the Government please govern and do the things that are necessary, even if they are unpopular? They have enough safeguards and shields for themselves in their massive historically unprecedented majority to save them from the unpopularity that might be theirs if they did the right thing. I have been long enough in politics to want to see the country ruled properly, irrespective of who gets the glory or who gets the blame. I sincerely urge the Government for God's sake to rule properly.

The sad political situation is that the Government are primarily responsible for our difficulties. They have themselves to blame for the woeful industrial situation because they led people to expect things which could not be delivered by our economy, our society. The reason is that the Government have not got a policy. For all their White Papers and Green Papers and talk of planning, we have not got a plan. With great respect to him, the Minister for Economic Planning and Development reads his policies from textbooks that have little association with the real facts of life——

Quote me one textbook.

With the expectations that were given to the people, Fianna Fáil have only themselves to blame for the whole taxation mess we have.

Quote me one textbook that gives the framework for a proposal on full employment.

They are to blame for the fact that we are no longer one nation but two, an urban and a rural one, because the Government by their ineptitude have set town and city against country and vice versa. When we left office we left the economy in the healthiest state it had been in since the foundation of the State. To use the Taoiseach's words, economically there was a sound basis from which to grow, if handled properly. Now the situation is on the verge of disaster, as is indicated by the dangerous depreciation in the value of the Irish £ as against the £ sterling. Fianna Fáil have to their discredit that, for the first time since the Act of Union in 1800, the Irish £ is valued at less than the £ sterling. I believe that is but the beginning of an inevitable trend because we have the highest inflation rate in Europe, the highest rate of Government borrowing in Europe—three times higher than the European average—the worst balance of trade in Europe, which this year will significantly exceed £1,000 million——

The billion pound brain.

We have the worst industrial relations in Europe and therefore we will not have people investing in Ireland. The only reason why we have been able for some years to run a very high imbalance of trade has been because there was massive foreign investment. That was related to good management of the economy. Now, foreign industrialists and would-be investors are worried stiff about investing in Ireland, with the Irish £ sinking like a stone in the ocean, with inflation rampant, with industrial disputes rampant, with everything that should be right going the wrong way. I believe it is not unlikely that in the forseeable future the Irish £ will be worth 90p or 85p and also will be debased against other European currencies. I do not like to be a prophet of doom, but unless the Government begin to govern properly and put into practice what they are preaching that is the inevitable outcome.

Is it not high time that the Government governed? If they want to be preachers they should have joined the Dominicians and become an order of preachers, because that is what they are today. At least the Dominicans with their vows of poverty and other vows of self-denial have never pretended that heaven could ever be reached without sacrifice. Fianna Fáil went the other way and suggested that all was available to people. It sickens me to hear the Minister for Economic Planning and Development going on radio, as he did last Sunday, denouncing people for being selfish, materialistic and not considering the problems of others, when the whole programme which brought him and his colleague into office was based upon an appeal to greed, selfishness and class privilege. What they did not say in public they settled up in private by promising the wealthy the abolition of the wealth tax, although the excuse for the abolition of that tax was that they were encouraging investment. Investment is now trickling off; it is falling.

Let the Deputy quote the figures.

Even those advantaged by the abolition of the wealth tax have no confidence whatsoever in the Government.

Let the Deputy quote the figures for investment.

Order, please.

The Minister is the greatest fiddler of figures that there ever was in this House. The reality is that now—and I will quote figures—an opinion poll in the magazine Business and Finance showed that nearly 70 per cent of the business people in this country have no confidence in the Government. Never at any stage when we were in office was there such lack of confidence on the part of the business community in the management of the economy and in the control of industrial relations.

I do not know in what fairyland the Government live. They pass in their Mercedes through mountains of rotting refuse in this city and they let that situation develop unconcerned. Industry, the tourist industry in particular, is grinding to a halt because of the postal strike. I am not saying that the way to settle all strikes is to give in to all demands, but the way to have industrial harmony is to explain your difficulties to everybody including the strikers and to negotiate quickly for a settlement. Can one have confidence in a Government where the Minister responsible waits for over three months to make an address to the nation about what he regards as a serious problem of national dimensions? Yet that is what has happened. One of the most essential services in any modern community, a service here affecting 13,000 workers and 3 million people, is the postal service. Yet nothing was done for over a quarter of a year by this Government who have the temerity to ask this House to express confidence in their management of the economy.

It is outrageous. Not even in the Fianna Fáil party rooms would you find today a majority prepared to express confidence in the Government's management of the economy. Yet that party have the audacity to come into the Dáil and ask the Dáil to go on record nationally and internationally as giving its blessing to the worst possible economic and social situation that this country has experienced since the commencement of our independence in 1921. I am appalled that the Government have such temerity. If they had simply voted down the vote of no confidence I would say, "So be it. We know that the figures are there". But they have the audacity to drive their 84 gobbaloons into this House asking them to express confidence in them. It indicates that something is seriously wrong in the Government. They are totally out of touch with the ordinary people of Ireland whom I have had the pleasure of meeting hour after hour over many days in recent weeks. I do not know what we can do about this other than to express our indignation. I do not like to use the words "express our contempt", because that might be regarded as personally offensive. I will simply convey to the Government and the Minister the fact that most of the people of Ireland have nothing but contempt for the worst Government that this country has had to endure since the foundation of our State in 1921.

I will address myself immediately to some of Deputy Ryan's remarks. I recognise that he is a candidate in an election and therefore he has given in to the temptation to indulge in rather colourful language which has very little regard to the facts. His reference to joining an order of preachers reminds me that the convenient way to apply the test of this motion is to go on the biblical injunction that by their fruits you shall know them, and that "not everyone who says ‘Lord, Lord' shall come into my Kingdom". If you want biblical or religious comparisons, let us have them. By the test of performance, contrasting what has been happening to this economy in the last two years with what happened to it during the Coalition period of management, then it is quite clear that this party have every reason to be proud and to expect the House to vote its full confidence in our policy. It is the Opposition parties who have an incredible nerve and gall to come into this House and pretend that they are in any position of moral authority or otherwise to allege that they can do anything to improve that situation. Their own record damns them month after month through their abysmal period of failure. If they now wish to repent their ways and errors of the past let us hear from them what it is they would now do to remedy what they regard hypocritically as an appalling state of affairs. Several times I invited Deputy Ryan to indicate what he would do. He wants us to govern—a nice catchphrase—but it is not clear what he wants us to do. He made some wild allegations about confidence falling off and investment falling off. I invited him to quote any figures to support that and he very modestly declined to do so.

I can continue these examples but another point that I do not wish to let go is that in his opening remarks he was saying that the exhibition we have had in this House was sufficient to merit a vote of no confidence in the Government. Who is responsible for the appalling hypocritical behaviour in this House not only this evening but on numerous occasions during the last week or two? We have them coming in here expressing mock concern for law and order and wanting to preserve standards and uphold procedures. What are they doing? They are deliberately undermining procedures of this House of which they must know—or, if they are so ignorant, about which they can easily find out and have their ignorance remedied. They know there are procedures for raising questions, for having issues debated and so on. Do they resort to any of these procedures, which would be the proper approach of anyone seriously interested in law and order and in strengthening democracy? Not at all. They rush in and out in search of cheap publicity——

That is not so.

——knowing perfectly well that by kicking up a hullabaloo——

In the last Dáil the Minister's side were just as disorderly but they were treated with more tolerance.

Order, please.

Deputies opposite are now coming into this House and speaking of emphasis on law and order and all the rest of it, and by their own example they are condemning themselves.

The Minister's colleagues turned it into a bear pit day in and day out.

I want to take other examples. Apart from kicking up a fuss and having oneself put out of the House in order to secure a headline, there were other recent examples. Last week Deputy Barry, in his great concern for the outcome of the proposed national understanding, took the unusual step of giving a day's notice to the Chair that he proposed to raise that question on the following day. This was no doubt designed to acquire some cheap publicity. On the following day Deputy Barry was told that there would be questions in the House on which this matter would be discussed, but when we arrived at Question Time there was not one single Deputy from the whole of the Fine Gael Party present in the House to voice this great concern about this major national issue. By their fruits we shall know them. Let us judge them by their performance and not by their words. On their performance they ought to hang their heads in shame for many years to come.

We tabled the amendment expressing confidence in the performance of the Government. Deputy Cluskey in moving this motion said that he wanted to list five headings under which our performance was seriously inefficient in order to justify his motion. These were, employment, growth, inflation, taxation and industrial relations. Deputy Cluskey said that all he ever got from me was lectures. Since he is not here at the moment he will not be subjected to one but I must apologise to the Chair and to the House because they will have to endure another lecture and more statistics because since Deputy Cluskey insists on repeating statistics or alleged facts which are wrong and which he ought to know are wrong, I have no alternative but to keep repeating the truth until it is established and reported.

I note that Deputy Cluskey attaches some importance to employment. I wish he had attached the same importance to it when he was a member of the Coalition Government. On the aspect of employment the record is damning for the Coalition period but we are proud of our record. During the Coalition period, as we know, employment fell in most years. Deputy Ryan will tell us that that was because we suffered an international recession.

It was five times worse than the present one and we did better than any other country.

Five times worse, measured on what basis? The Deputy is very quick with that figure.

It was five times worse than the level of the economic depression resulting from the current oil difficulties which are not called a crisis.

The current oil difficulties have not had an opportunity to produce their effects yet, so the Deputy has no way of knowing, any more than I, the extent of their impact.

Tourism, for instance, is 50 per cent down this year.

This year has not happened yet.

For God's sake.

I now realise that Deputy o'Donoghue is living historically all the time.

Deputies, please. The Minister has only very limited time.

The Minister posed a question for me.

The Minister is entitled to pose questions but no other Deputy is entitled to answer them at this stage.

Tourism here has not happened yet and the Minister waits until the Whit weekend before fixing——

I was so exasperated on a number of previous occasions when I asked Deputy Ryan questions which he modestly declined to answer that I could not resist asking him another.

Tourists have cancelled their Irish holidays and the Minister says it has not happened yet.

I will return to my main theme. The Deputy is not answering the question.

I am answering so bluntly that the Minister does not like it.

The Minister without interruption, please.

(Interruptions.)

I am talking about inflation and the international crisis.

Employment fell during the Coalition years. The average decline was 4,500 a year. Last year there was an increase of 17,000 which is the greatest increase in any one year since the foundation of the State.

Deputy Sean Lemass said "you always rise on a rising tide".

This year our target was for an even greater increase. Without the difficulties that we are experiencing at the moment, not just the question of oil but also our domestic problems, we would have hoped to achieve an even greater increase. Even if there is a shortfall on our ambitious targets for this year I have no doubt, barring some major unforeseen calamity, that the outturn for this year will record another very substantial increase which will make this year and last year the years that showed the greatest increase in employment in the history of the State for two years in a row.

Employment should be the over-riding objective of economic and social policy at present, just as it should have been but never was an important objective of the Coalition Government because no attempt was ever made to launch employment-generating policies in the wake of the 1973 recession——

That is not true.

Right up to the change of Government, no prospect of any worthwhile improvement in the employment prospects of our young people could be held out. On this crucial indicator of economic and social progress, namely, the development of employment we are proud to be judged on our record because it is undoubtedly infinitely superior to that of the Coalition. Ours is a record of improvement, progress and expansion, and the Coalition's is one of failure and decline.

Fianna Fáil are on an international rising tide.

In that context, Deputy Cluskey tried to dress up his remarks by some curious manipulation of figures. The Deputy referred to the level of unemployment on the live register in July of 1977 and said that there had been only a small fall from then until now, and that emigration was also running at a much higher figure. By adding the emigration and the employment figures the Deputy presumably convinced himself that the overall unemployment level is as great now as it was two years ago, but that is simply not true. That is a curious and wrong mixture of statistics referring to two different things. In his reference to emigration the Deputy appeared to be out of date and did not appear to be interested in the replies to questions he tabled in this House. For some time Deputy Cluskey has been claiming that emigration rose between 1977 and 1978. I could not find any evidence to support that. The only material I could discover was used in reply to the question which he had tabled, and it showed that far from emigration increasing last year it appeared to be the other way around. Although we do not have full, adequate accurate statistics for emigration, the ones used to indicate the trend, namely the figures on net passenger movement, show that in that year up to October 1978 there appeared to have been a net inflow of 16,000. I am not suggesting that when the final record comes to be written for last year it will measure an inflow of 16,000; I am simply saying that on the statistics available so far, there is no basis for alleging that emigration has increased but, on the contrary, if one takes the figures at face value, they point in the opposite direction and show that emigration has tapered off and if anything has reversed.

The Minister of State undertook here to circulate the available figures three weeks ago, and he has not yet done it.

I take it that it is contained in the official record?

It is not contained in the official record. The Minister of State undertook to circulate the figures and I am still waiting for them.

The Minister has limited time and should not be interrupted.

Deputy Cluskey was wrong to try to add together emigration figures and unemployment figures and secondly, the figures he was attempting to add together had no basis that I can discover. The only figures to which we can refer are in relation to what has been happening to employment. They show quite clearly a record increase last year and another very substantial increase this year, which I expect will constitute a further record. So much for employment.

Not surprisingly, this record improvement in employment has been associated with a record improvement in growth. Again in this area Deputy Cluskey seemed to have difficulty in knowing what statistics he wanted to quote. It was not very clear what he was trying to allege. He appeared to imply that the growth rate last year was only about 5½ per cent. I can find no basis for that. It is true that some forecasts earlier on appeared to suggest a figure of just below 6 per cent, and that there are some other bodies which suggest an outturn in the range of 6 to 6½ per cent. However, no final statistics have yet been prepared. On the basis of the information available to me I understand that the material is consistent with the growth rate that we had suggested of 7 per cent. The outturn might well proceed——

I will wager a tenner here publicly that the Minister is wrong.

We can have no betting in the House.

I can only say that the most pessimistic figures which have been——

All right, I will bet a tenner outside that the Minister is wrong.

I will bet the Deputy a tenner that the Central Bank is wrong.

The Minister without interruption. The Chair would like a few tenners at present, but I think we should get away from them.

The Central Bank quoted a figure of 5.8 per cent in their December Bulletin. They have retained a rather coy silence on the 1978 outturn in their report published last week even though the published revised figures for export performance last year are very interesting. They revised their December figure, which had been 12½ per cent, upwards to 14 per cent, which was the figure we were using. They also revised upwards their figure for investment from 12 per cent of an increase last year to 14 per cent, which brings them much closer—our figure is still 15 per cent—but at least they are coming closer to us.

What was the revision of the import figure?

To the best of my knowledge they did not revise their import figure.

They should have, should they not, because the imbalance in trade last year went the wrong way?

No, it did not. The outturn on the balance of payments for last year, for 1978, was very much lower than we had expected at the beginning of the year. Since the Deputy was so quick about quoting White Papers and Green Papers, perhaps he would care to go back and look at the January 1978 White Paper and the outturn for last year when he will see that the outturn was much better than we had expected.

I do not agree.

The Deputy may not agree but he should check the facts before he speaks again. I specifically asked the Deputy to quote a figure. He tried to claim that there had been a falling-off in investment. I invited him four times to quote any evidence to support it. I cannot find it.

I said investment is falling off and investment now taking place was contracted a year or two years ago.

The Minister should make his own speech without any help from Deputy Ryan.

The Minister was looking for help from me.

He should not. The Minister should make his own speech, please.

I am not looking for help but I will nail the Deputy clearly and continuously on every one of his wild allegations because he and some of his colleagues go outside this House——

I am saying that investment in pensions is falling off.

——and try to imply that I am the one who manipulates figures. What I am doing, when I have the opportunity in the House, is to slowly and carefully read into the record the figures, to show up the Deputy and his party colleagues for being cheap tricksters who indulge in colourful language but never substantiate any of their wild claims. I shall have to press on, Sir, because——

The Minister may be convinced he is right but very few others believe him.

I regret I must ignore the Deputy's interruptions from now on because I am pushed for time.

I have dealt with employment and growth. I have shown that the growth for last year was in the region of 7 per cent, contrasting with a figure of 2¾ per cent a year on average during the Coalition period. This year we had expected that the growth would continue to be somewhere in the region of 6½ per cent. That now looks unduly optimistic because of the impact of the oil supply difficulties as well as domestic problems. But, even allowing for any reduction which may occur as a result of those factors, there is no reason to believe that we will not comfortably head the poll—if I might call it that—for EEC growth this year and indeed also comfortably exceed the growth performance recorded during the Coalition years. Therefore, even in a period of relative difficulty, we still expect to see a very much better growth performance than had been recorded.

Any other EEC country borrowing 12 per cent of GNP would do the same.

It is 10½ per cent, and it is a reduction on last year's borrowing figure. The Deputy should know a lot about it because he presided over the greatest borrowing in this State and, worse still, external borrowing when it was unnecessary.

If Deputy Ryan would allow the Minister make his own speech, we would get on much better.

Inflation was the third point mentioned by Deputy Cluskey. Here again, what does the record show—an average of almost 18 per cent annual inflation during the Coalition period down to about 8 per cent last year? And, despite the adverse impact of higher oil prices this year, we see no danger of returning to anything like the Coalition figures.

Sixteen per cent this year.

Is the Deputy betting another tenner on that?

We see no danger of a return to anything like the Coalition figures. On the question of taxation we committed ourselves quite clearly to a programme of lowering the overall burden of taxation. We campaigned quite clearly on that. We even pointed to the priorities we had in the area of income tax reform. We said we would place the emphasis on improving the income tax position of lower paid workers, especially married workers, because we thought they constituted desirable social priorities.

The figures are reflected in the performance since then. The tax-free allowance for married people has been more than doubled in two years, in contrast to the miserable 20 per cent increase in the last two budgets of the Coalition. We spelled out those priorities quite clearly. In addition, we have gone ahead with the other tax changes we promised at the time. I would remind the House that two years ago we were told that none of these things was possible, that the country could not afford any of them. Indeed, at the time I would not blame a lot of people for feeling that way because, if Deputy Ryan wants to talk about business confidence, he should go back and look at the last detailed survey taken of business confidence at the end of 1976, beginning of 1977, when he will find it showed an appalling lack of confidence in the future prospects for the Irish economy throughout the whole business sector.

Of course, that feeling of gloom and doom ran among young people, evident in their lack of confidence of any opportunity of job prospects and so on. Indeed that lack of confidence was reflected in the titles of some of the conferences which used to be held. I recall a couple of years ago that an Irish Management Institute annual conference in Killarney was entitled simply "Survival"—it was reduced to just that—whereas now we are talking about "Performance", which I think was the title for their conference this year. Most of the speakers at that conference this year were stressing the opportunities, the dynamic pace of progress, the way in which they envisaged Ireland being able to move ahead in this and ensuing years. Therefore, there has been a total turn around on the part of a leading sector of the economy.

Lest the House might think that I am concerned only with what the business sector thinks and with what management thinks, I might point out also—I am moving on because I must move on quickly to the fifth theme, the industrial relations theme which was raised by Deputy Cluskey—yes, there are problems in that area. We have sought to bring about an understanding of the way in which change must occur in this country over the next few years. We spent a considerable degree of time in very substantial, complex discussions with leaders of the Irish trade union movement. The leadership of that trade union movement quite clearly did not share the sort of views being enunciated from the Opposition benches, because they did not feel that there was this lack of confidence, this divisive social approach or anything else. Some of their documents—endorsed, incidentally, by special conferences of the trade union movement as a whole—recognised and welcomed the commitment this Government had made to promoting increased employment. They recognised and welcomed some of the other positive changes which had been made to deal with some of the problems of inflation.

In passing I want to emphasise that the notion that we were implying that all available money had to be channelled into financing economic growth and that nothing would be available for improving the position of social welfare recipients is simply not true. The facts show that the real improvement in social welfare benefits during the Coalition period was of the order of 2 per cent in the year in real terms whereas last year the increase was something over 6 per cent in real terms. We expect that figure to be repeated, if not exceeded, this year. However one does the sums the record of actual performance quite clearly demonstrates the superior results which have been achieved by Fianna Fáil in Government.

I could go on to deal with many other things but, regretfully, I will have to confine myself to summarising that on each of the five indicators which were taken in Deputy Cluskey's motion—presumably we must give him credit for choosing the grounds most favourable to himself and his party—as the test of performance and the justification for his motion, he fails because there was never a commitment to any worthwhile positive policies from the Coalition. They tried to sweep that problem under the carpet. There was never an adequate performance in growth. There was an attempt to deliberately ignore inflation as a problem or to say that the choice was between growth and inflation. There was also the lack of any real, genuine improvement in social welfare benefits and no attempt at any worthwhile improvement in reducing the heavy burden of taxation on lower paid workers. If I can single out one reason for some of the present tensions and difficulties I believe it would be associated, first of all, with a general problem, a tension that arises from any period of sustained inflation.

During the early years of the period of office of the Coalition Government they tried to tell the House and the people that there was a painful choice to be made between maintaining employment on the one hand, and curbing inflation on the other and that if you tried to curb inflation you would have to worsen unemployment. That is simply not true and we campaigned against it. We have been trying to demonstrate how important it is to reduce unemployment and reduce inflation since we came into office.

(Interruptions.)

The Minister has only a few minutes. He should be allowed to speak without interruptions.

Any period of severe inflation and severe fluctuations in the rate of inflation generates a great degree of social unrest, instability and uncertainty because it stands a lot of traditional behaviour on its head. Whereas during a period of price stability it becomes normal for prudent people to save for tomorrow and we tend to look askance at anyone who borrows too heavily, we know that in periods of severe inflation this position can be reversed and it is the heavier borrowers who can end up the gainers at the end of the day and the prudent savers who can have their savings wiped out.

Those kind of tensions and problems take a while to resolve and overcome. The specific problem which aggravated it in the case of the transition from the Coalition to the Fianna Fáil Government was that in 1977, presumably because they were facing up to an election period—I do not know how they succeeded in doing it and it is the one area where I might ask them to lend me the recipe—they succeeded in persuading the trade unions to accept a 9 per cent pay rise in a year when inflation was 14 per cent, in other words, to voluntarily accept a pay agreement which would cut the real living standards of workers by 5 per cent.

That was the inheritance we had and that was why there were so many tensions which had to be worked out and resolved. When the changeover came, when we were able to demonstrate that there was no need for the gloom and doom of the Coalition years, when we were able to show that living standards could rise and that our people could start talking in terms of a better tomorrow, that they could talk in terms of providing jobs for their young people, then, naturally, workers said: "Why do we have to agree to this sacrifice and this belt tightening? Surely that was all unnecessary?". We have been showing that it was unnecessary, that there is scope for improving the living standards of all. We have to manage the difficult transition from that period of Coalition gloom and doom into a period of sustained, reasonable progress.

The message should be that while we can afford improvements it has to be at a sustainable pace of 4 per cent to 5 per cent a year and not talk in extravagant terms of 40 per cent or other gains. For those reasons I have absolutely no doubt that when the history of this country comes to be written, much less the record of our two respective Governments, the people of Ireland will see clearly why they were right to express their confidence in Fianna Fáil in Government.

I bet a tenner that the two of us will not be around then.

I hope it is not a betting shop tonight.

I listened patiently to what I describe as a lecture in economics. I am no economist but I believe I am in touch with the ordinary people in my constituency. I believe, no matter what kind of a lecture the Minister, Professor O'Donoghue, comes into the House to give me as a representative of the Labour Party, he will not convince the ordinary working people and the ordinary business people in my constituency that his Government are doing a good job.

I have spoken to many people in the constituency of Leinster during the last few weeks. I am convinced that the vast majority of them believe that this is the worst and most inept Government that has been in power since the foundation of the State. People I have met throughout the new constituency of Leinster have given me many reasons for this. They have given me the reasons why I should support this motion of no confidence in the Government.

I do not write speeches nor go into statistics, but I know how the people feel about the Government of the day, no matter what kind it is. An economist may take five or six years to develop a theory. Most people give a new Government taking office a period of honeymoon to adjust to the policies they want to put forward. Fianna Fáil in every debate in the House since they took office have been talking about the performance of the Coalition Government. Fianna Fáil have been in office for longer periods than any other party. I have seen many Fianna Fáil Governments since I first entered this House and there is no doubt in my mind that this is the worst Government I have ever seen.

I say that for the following reasons. The Minister claims that the unemployment situation has improved beyond all recognition. Two years ago Fianna Fáil, and principally the Minister for Economic Planning and Development, put across the message to all young people that there would be plenty of jobs. That has not happened. Let the Minister and everybody else be honest with the ordinary people and let them know that the kind of jobs they produced for our young people did not last very long—some of them less than three weeks. They set up a youth employment team which was disbanded recently. I do not think the Minister or anyone else can point to anything they achieved.

Fianna Fáil gave the impression that they were going to do all sorts of things in regard to youth services and youth associations and that they were going to run school buses to take our young people to functions in the evening. Most people now realise that that was a lot of eye wash and political propaganda.

Two years ago many prominent Fianna Fáil people went around with a thing called a "shopping bag" which principally contained items of food. A woman in my constituency told me that when the present Taoiseach, as leader of the Opposition, was on a tour of my constituency he went into a supermarket. This lady had a pound of butter in her hand and said to him "What do you think of the price of that?" At that time it was around 50p a pound. He said that if Fianna Fáil were put into office he would do something about it, and they certainly did. Butter is around 70p a pound now.

When Fianna Fáil were talking about the shopping basket they did not tell the people that they were going to remove part of the subsidies from food, which were a help to the housewife in particular and to people depending on social welfare payments. In my opinion that was one of the most unsocial things that could have been done by any Government. The ordinary working people, especially the poorer people, remember that act which was done just after Christmas. They did not even have the decency to wait for the budget to do it. The subsidy on cheese, which was becoming the poor man's meat, had been removed earlier.

No matter what figures the Minister produces there was a 17.9 per cent increase in the price of food last year. If he is proud of that he should think again and get his feet back on the ground like the ordinary people. He boasts about the 12 per cent increase given to social welfare recipients. He claims that that is great and is a real benefit, but most of the money these people get is spent on food. I cannot see how a 12 per cent or even a 15 per cent increase in social welfare will pay for a 17 per cent increase in the price of food. I am separating food from other items.

The people now realise that they were codded by the Fianna Fáil Party at the last election. There were several items in the manifesto which looked good on paper but which did not turn out the same way. The car tax was removed. Everyone was delighted. As a matter of fact it was probably the master stroke which won them the election. I compliment the Minister for thinking of it. It is all right to do away with a tax which is used for certain purposes, provided it is replaced by some other means.

On paper it appears that the grants being made to county councils from the road fund have been replaced. By a very clever manipulation in road grants they were increased in name but in the majority of cases there has been an actual reduction. Almost unnoticed we passed in the new Value-Added Tax Act a section which brought county councils under VAT. My county council got a 10 per cent increase in road grants but £155,000 is taken back into the Government coffers by way of VAT. This means that with rising costs there is no increase in the road grant, as the state of our roads shows. Anybody driving through our country sees potholes because the maintenance money allowed by the Government to replace the money raised by way of rates and the road fund is not sufficient. There are potholes that would break cars' axles—a claim has been made against my own county council for such an accident.

Anybody going through the country will realise that the Government have not replaced the taxes they removed. County councils, county managers and road overseers are being blamed for the state of the roads. The Government played cute and the people do not seem to be blaming them. I know this because I have been among the people. I am a candidate for the local elections and have been on the county council. The public's attitude is that the county council are responsible for the state of the roads. They never think that the money for road maintenance has been drastically cut to cover up a gimmick which was introduced at the whim of the Minister sitting in this House to win votes in the last general election.

If the Deputy looks at the figures he will see we are spending a lot more on roads than the Coalition did.

Yes, a lot more but buying a lot less. I did not interrupt the Minister. I sat here and listened to a lecture from him but I did not interrupt him.

Deputy Bermingham is in possession.

And I intend to stay in possession.

I was simply asking that the truth be recorded.

It costs more now to fill a hole than it did——

Deputy Bermingham is still in possession.

He knows that well. He wants us to dig holes and fill them again. We are used to that kind of talk. Did he not suggest that some years ago?

I said I would prefer to see people working.

When the Minister first came into this House I told him I hoped he would be able to fulfil his promises, but unfortunately he has not. I do not believe for one moment that he could go to my constituency and tell anyone he had solved the unemployment problem, which is what he has been trying to tell us tonight.

I did not say I had solved it.

I can tell you you have not solved it. You can go to my town and tell the people how you solved it, and they will tell you about the timber industry——

Deputy Bermingham, through the Chair please, and no interruptions.

——and the shocking way the Government have treated the workers in my town. Since the foundation of the State we have put millions into forestry. I have been told here many times that the Government could not set up a State industry which would use this timber. That was said by various Governments, I admit. It was suggested by a Government Deputy that a State industry be set up to deal with forestry products now coming on stream, but we have no timber industry to deal with these products. We had an industry in Munster Chipboard and another in Irish Board Mills Limited in my town where 180 people were employed. Despite so-called efforts by the present Government that industry was allowed to close and the employees are on the streets. Yet timber products are coming in from Northern Ireland, and because they are subsidised they are able to out-price our smaller sawmills. There is no major industry to deal with forest products now coming on stream.

That is the kind of Government we are asked to have confidence in. I certainly have no confidence in them. If I said otherwise I should be betraying the workers in the forestry plant who are now laid off and on the dole. The Minister for Industry, Commerce and Energy tells us that he is going to build an advance factory in that town to employ these workers—probably it will come when they are dead. We have no industry to go into that advance factory so far. When we went to the Minister he told us about an industry that was coming into a town 23 miles away. That was quite a good answer for him and might make good reading, but for anybody knowing the circumstances and condition of the people who worked in that industry it would not be much good. We have the result of neglect by not only the present Fianna Fáil Government but by previous Governments since the State was founded.

Hear, hear.

For the Deputy's information, most of them were Fianna Fáil Governments, and they completely neglected to build up any industrial wing of the Forestry Department. They meant to produce forest products which would be used by private enterprise if there was any profit in it; if there was no profit these closed down and sold off at a sacrifice price to suppliers in Northern Ireland.

The so-called Government opposite gave private enterprise in that industry almost £1 million to put in their pockets and then close the doors and go away. The little investigation that went into that matter is the talk of my town. There was no effort, as suggested by a Deputy on the Government side, to start a State industry for the forestry this State planted and grew. That is no reason why any of us should have confidence in the crew that are ruling.

There was a bald statement in the Fianna Fáil manifesto to the effect that we would process all our food. I was very glad to see a political party put that statement in a manifesto. Have they done anything? I challenge whoever replies to the debate to tell me by letter or otherwise if they have done anything to implement that promise. In Tuam? I did not see that yet and I do not think I will. However, I think there has been total failure in that area.

We were promised, and the promise was implemented by the previous Government, that there would be an interdepartmental committee on land structure. This Government have had the report for months past, and suggestions as to how the problem should be tackled, but there is no movement. We are told by the present Minister for Agriculture, who I believe is a very moral man who would not tell lies, that he will have the headings of a Bill ready by the end of the year and that it will be introduced in the next year. I fear that a few speculators, a few companies and very large farmers will own all the agricultural land by that time. The Minister's land structure policy, if he has one—I doubt it very much—will be irrelevant in Leinster anyway. I do not think it will be relevant even in Kerry where I know that a German company bought 700 acres without saying "by your leave" to the Land Commission.

I do not believe that the Minister and the Fianna Fáil Party are serious about tackling the land structure problem. They have had years to prove otherwise but they have not done so. I can say with authority that they have sent new instructions to the Land Commission which finish once and for all land acquisition as we have known it.

That is true. I know it well. I challenge the Minister for Agriculture to deny that he has made regulations for the Land Commission which will end land acquisition as we have known it. That is well known, and I do not need to elaborate on it.

Lack of good relations between Government Departments, their Ministers and the workers and the trade unions is making us a laughing stock of Europe. It is unbelievable that we should have three months of a post office strike. Some businesses, to my knowledge, have actually closed because of lack of communications. I will produce proof of that if the Government need it. These were small businesses which were not able to put people on the road either to collect debts or take orders. The Minister's answer for three months was that it was not his concern. Then he made a statement and apparently he broke confidence during negotiations to make that statement. He had three months to make it but according to the Post Office Workers' Union he has broken confidence. If any private employer whose workers were in dispute for three months had refused to talk to those workers what would any of us say about it? Here we have a Minister who is talking about rules and regulations which have been the damnation of industrial relations in the Post Office over the years. He says he is precluded from talking to them.

That is the attitude of the Government in whom we are asked to pass a vote of confidence. I have no confidence in that type of administration. The Minister should go and talk to the Post Office Workers' Union and not talk in whispers to someone else who might talk to them. Everyone knows that the people working in the Post Office are reasonable decent people. The POWU have been in existence for 50 years and this is the first time there has been an official strike. There may have been minor strikes but this is the first major confrontation. It is a shame that the Minister will not sit down and talk to them.

The most crucial problem at present concerns fuel. The Minister said a few weeks ago there was no shortage and that there was panic buying. The ordinary man in the street knew there was a shortage of petrol and heating oil. A couple of weeks ago the Minister realised there was a shortage. The price of petrol went up but that did not solve the problem. Another increase is now being sought and will probably be granted. The Minister seems amazed that there is still a shortage. My town is roughly 40 miles from Dublin and the people there drive to the city to work and home again in the evenings, but because of the opening hours of the garages they now have no chance of getting petrol. The garages are closed in the morning when they are leaving home and again when they return in the evening and they have little prospect of getting petrol elsewhere. The Minister should make some regulations regarding rationing so that people would know what amount of petrol they could get. I spent three hours yesterday waiting for petrol.

They cannot post out the ration books.

Ration books cannot be posted because the Minister will not talk to the Post Office workers. There is no shortage of petrol for people who can go from one garage to another and queue for hours because they do not have to work. The thousands of manhours lost by queuing must be a matter of serious concern to the Government.

There is no doubt in the minds of the people I have met throughout Leinster that this is a right-wing Tory Government, the worst ever Government in the history of this country. Kildare County Council sought £889,000 to build houses. Housing is one of the most urgent problems in Kildare. We got only £135,000 and this means that people living in caravans and hovels cannot expect county council houses in the coming year in County Kildare. That is the message from the Government. The wealth tax would have brought in £25 million. The Government had the money to give back to those who do not need it but they have no money to reduce the old age pension age or to build houses for those unable to build their own. If that is not right-wing Tory government, I do not know what is.

The Government have every reason to be ashamed of the record in prices, housing and, in south Kildare, employment. They have the audacity to ask us to approve of the way they have handled the economy. They have the cheek for anything. The people will give them notice to quit and anyone who was ever a tenant knows what that means. They will be given notice on 7 June and the people will carry out the final evictions when the Government give us the opportunity of having a general election.

They say that people get the Government they deserve, but I am not sure that statement is correct in the present instance. It would be unfair to the character of the Irish people to say they deserve this administration. Surely the worst of all possible Governments must be that in which the Cabinet or Executive appear to be incompetent in most areas of serious concern and yet are supported day in and day out by an automatic fixed majority of Deputies. Surely that must be the worst of all possible Governments. They have a majority which protects a Cabinet in which many of the personnel appear to be totally incompetent.

Surely these must be ideal conditions for a Cabinet to lose all contact with reality. That marks the present Government. Those who devised that accurate estimate of how to win an election—the manifesto which segmented the electorate market with such devastating effect on the previous administration—these close observers of the grass roots now protected in Cabinet by their massive majority have in the past two years grown complacent and no longer understand or know reality. So the Taoiseach arrives at Dublin Airport from Athens and declares "We are not going to bend" in regard to the Post Office dispute. So we have the Minister for Fisheries and Forestry, that seer of troubled economic waters, a man known for his frankness, admitting that the Republic is headed for very serious economic troubles. Of course there was the unmistakable touch of the Minister for Fisheries and Forestry in this honest admission. He said we are headed for troubled waters precisely because we have been so successful. So heady has been the experience of prosperity brought into being by such talent in the Cabinet as the Minister for Economic Planning and Development that we are now in economic trouble. One does not know where the Minister for Fisheries is heading but certainly it is not in the direction of reality.

I belonged at one time to an administration which in a very difficult period attempted to legislate and change things for the better. That administration was assailed by many external formidable factors which militated against the success of economic policies here at home, policies based on redistribution of resources and expansion of employment.

The people who are now over there did not make any allowance for those external conditions. The Minister for Economic Planning and Development would be repaid if he were to read those debates and see the leeway that was offered, the charity that was given, the impartiality that marked the speeches of our adversaries in that period of severe recession, and compared them with the present Opposition. He should compare the daily attacks then made on national agreements achieved by that Government in such difficult periods with the support now being given from these benches to the national understanding. If he compares the two he will understand more the success that marked his party's ascent to office and their total decline and incompetence in office.

Of course, there have been good Fianna Fáil Governments. I was a Member of the House when the late Seán Lemass was Taoiseach, when he led an excellent Fianna Fáil Government between 1961 and 1965. Of course Seán Lemass was a man larger than his party. He was imbued with a passionate concern for the advancement of his country. The present Taoiseach is a personable, popular man, a good mixer, but he does not have the courage to sack incompetent members of his Cabinet, and sackings are what are called for. I will not name names, but there are people in this Cabinet who are not worthy of the back benches of a government party. Because there will not be a chance of a popular testing of this Government until 1982, or until 1985 if they have sense, we are in the hands meanwhile of an executive protected by a majority of 20 and presided over by a Taoiseach, popular and personable, with such a tender respect for the consciences of his colleagues that he can draw up new rules for voting procedures within that party. He is the Taoiseach and that is the Cabinet we are being ruled by, and I say that if that Taoiseach was acting up to the full dimensions of his office as Deputy Lemass would have done——

The Deputy is in no position to draw up rules—a former Minister for Labour picketing outside a Government office.

I know the Minister for Economic Planning and Development is new to the hurly-burly of politics and that present events are upsetting him. For a number of years he had looked at the political scene but now he finds himself in a ship on fire. It is uncomfortable and hot, and some reputations will suffer. I know this Minister well enough to know that he has a conscience, and one of the reputations that will suffer most grievously will be his. The obvious duty of the Taoiseach now is either a reshuffle or, to put it more charitably, a request to some of his colleagues to go into the back benches to join some of the majority of 20 that he has.

In the fifteenth week of the postal strike the Taoiseach said "We are not going to bend". He said Deputy Faulkner would be making a factual statement in repiy to what he described as a non-factual statement made by the POWU. That was after 15 weeks of a postal strike which had been paralysing the communications system of a member state of the EEC. We had negotiation by television, by Ministerial broadcasts, with promises by the Taoiseach that there would be further factual statements.

What kind of State do they think they are running? In the national television network system are we to be treated to a weekly broadcast and a recorrection of factual errors for the remainder of this summer while the tourists go up and down the country with vouchers provided by the Government, and the natives, who can afford to remain at home, presumably travelling within the boundaries of their areas on bicycles listening to how good things are from the local prophets with propaganda provided by Mount Street?

I do not underestimate the difficulties of running a modern government. It is no longer an easy matter to run any modern country, but by any of the criteria of a government doing their job, this administration must be faulted. There were more strikes in the first half of this year in the Government's area of responsibility than throughout the whole of last year. That is the type of industrial relations we have. If they would take advice from such a sinister quarter, I would suggest that they listen to the advice of the president of the largest union in the country who spoke yesterday evening about the possibility of rescuing some elements of the national understanding. I endorse his remarks. After the unions had rejected the national understanding I suggested an initiative should be taken by the Government, if it is not asking too much of this Government for an initiative in any matter. I asked them to attempt to salvage some of the positive elements of the national understanding.

In the few minutes I have left I will simply say that we see a Government who claim they are competent because they have fulfilled some of the easier monetary promises of the manifesto but who are failing to run the country—in industrial relations, in management of the energy crisis. I am not saying the energy crisis was invented by the Government, but their management of it, their way of dealing with it and their lack of preparation for it have been sadly lacking. They are a Government who have declared over and over again their commitment to full employment, yet we see more unemployment. I predict that, in conditions of the EMS, before the end of this year we will be in severe balance of payments difficulties, that the Irish £ will be in difficulties vis-à-vis other European currencies. I predict that inflation will be more than 14 per cent before the end of this year.

They are my gloomy predictions tonight, and unless the Taoiseach acts like a Taoiseach and removes some of the rather incompetent people he has in his Government there is a despairing outlook for this country in the next two or three years while we are waiting for a general election.

Amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 67; Níl, 46.

Tá.

  • Ahern, Bertie.
  • Ahern, Kit.
  • Allen, Lorcan.
  • Andrews, David.
  • Andrews, Niall.
  • Barrett, Sylvester.
  • Brady, Gerard.
  • Brady, Vincent.
  • Briscoe, Ben.
  • Browne, Seán.
  • Burke, Raphael P.
  • Callanan, John.
  • Calleary, Seán.
  • Cogan, Barry.
  • Colley, George.
  • Collins, Gerard.
  • Conaghan, Hugh.
  • Cowen, Bernard.
  • Daly, Brendan.
  • de Valera, Vivion.
  • Doherty, Seán.
  • Fahey, Jackie.
  • Farrell, Joe.
  • Faulkner, Pádraig.
  • Filgate, Eddie.
  • Fitzgerald, Gene.
  • Fitzpatrick, Tom
  • (Dublin South-Central).
  • Fitzsimons, James N.
  • Flynn, Pádraig.
  • Gallagher, Dennis.
  • Geoghegan-Quinn, Máire.
  • Gibbons, Jim.
  • Haughey, Charles J.
  • Herbert, Michael.
  • Hussey, Thomas.
  • Keegan, Seán.
  • Kenneally, William.
  • Killeen, Tim.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Lalor, Patrick J.
  • Lawlor, Liam.
  • Lemass, Eileen.
  • Lenihan, Brian.
  • Leonard, Jimmy.
  • Leonard, Tom.
  • Leyden, Terry.
  • Loughnane, William.
  • McCreevy, Charlie.
  • McEllistrim, Thomas.
  • Meaney, Tom.
  • Molloy, Robert.
  • Moore, Seán.
  • Morley, P.J.
  • Murphy, Ciarán P.
  • Noonan, Michael.
  • O'Donoghue, Martin.
  • O'Hanlon, Rory.
  • O'Leary, John.
  • O'Malley, Desmond.
  • Reynolds, Albert.
  • Smith, Michael.
  • Tunney, Jim.
  • Walsh, Joe.
  • Walsh, Seán.
  • Wilson, John P.
  • Woods, Michael J.
  • Wyse, Pearse.

Níl.

  • Barry, Peter.
  • Barry, Richard.
  • Begley, Michael.
  • Belton, Luke.
  • Bermingham, Joseph.
  • Boland, John.
  • Bruton, John.
  • Burke, Joan.
  • Byrne, Hugh.
  • Clinton, Mark.
  • Cluskey, Frank.
  • Conlan, John F.
  • Corish, Brendan.
  • Cosgrave, Liam.
  • Cosgrave, Michael J.
  • Creed, Donal.
  • Deasy, Martin A.
  • Desmond, Barry.
  • Desmond, Eileen.
  • Donegan, Patrick S.
  • Ryan, John J.
  • Ryan, Richie.
  • Spring, Dan.
  • Taylor, Frank.
  • Enright, Thomas W.
  • Fitzpatrick, Tom
  • (Cavan-Monaghan).
  • Harte, Patrick D.
  • Hegarty, Paddy.
  • Horgan, John.
  • Kavanagh, Liam.
  • Kelly, John.
  • Lipper, Mick.
  • McMahon, Larry.
  • Mannion, John M.
  • Mitchell, Jim.
  • O'Brien, Fergus.
  • O'Brien, William.
  • O'Connell, John.
  • O'Donnell, Tom.
  • O'Keeffe, Jim.
  • O'Leary, Michael.
  • Pattison, Séamus.
  • Quinn, Ruairí.
  • Timmins, Godfrey.
  • Treacy, Seán.
  • Tully, James.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies P. Lalor and Briscoe; Níl, Deputies Creed and Horgan.
Amendment declared carried.
Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.
The Dáil adjourned at 8.45 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 31 May 1979.
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