Quite a lot of the debate that went on for the last hour was more relevant to section 15. It is interesting that the Minister has admitted to the Dáil that it was only as a result of reading the newspapers that he was aware of the circular that went out from his Department regarding the terms of an agreement with a banking institution regarding telephone connections. It is a disturbing admission. From my experience it was unusual for the Department to go ahead with a circular to the staff of post offices and other sections of the Department. It is an interesting insight into the activities of the Department at the moment. The Minister should be concerned about the circular. It looks an authentic document. It is framed in the standard way and it was sent out in the Minister's name. Now the Minister denies the existence of the details in this document and says he does not agree with them. The Minister should carry out a detailed examination in the Department to find out why this document was sent out. My experience was that the Secretary of the Department and the staff would not send out a document like this without the Minister's approval or the approval of the Ministers of State of which there are two. The Minister's admission clarifies the issue. It also exonerates me from the blame the Minister initially placed on me for disclosing this information.
As Opposition spokesman I was entitled to query the scheme. I did not attack the whole idea of having a scheme. I queried the reasoning behind dealing with one particular institution without giving an opportunity for other organisations to compete. I did not attack the concept of some sort of scheme to assist the consumer in the connection of his telephone. I welcome the Minister's statement that he is proposing to bring forward a scheme which would be of benefit to the consumers and to the Department. The idea of assisting subscribers and applicants for telephones is worthwhile. A more worked out scheme and a better interest rate would be more appropriate. The whole situation should be reviewed.
Section 15 (1) reads:
(a) charges for services are kept at the minimum rates consistent with meeting approved financial targets, and
(b) revenues of the company are not less than sufficient to—
(i) meet all charges properly chargeable to revenue account (including depreciation of assets and proper allocation to general reserve) taking one year with another.
The difficulty in the Department was that the advance payment system is practically statutory at the moment and the arrangement for paying in advance for three and four years, depending on the distance from the work involved, is something that has arisen over the years. The general philosophy behind that was that if a person paid the advance rental he would not propose to take out the system in a short time. It was protecting the Department from the high installation costs involved in overhead wiring and erection of poles. In some cases that reached three years, advance rental and the connection charge would be £586. The actual installation cost would be £540.70. That is a lot of money to pay in advance for a system. The Minister will have to look at the situation but it will be over to An Bord Telecom in the ultimate to provide a service.
In Government we encouraged the provision of meters. I believe they should be provided to the consumer without any charge or at a minimum charge. What worries me is that the meters will not be taken as evidence by the Department. Even though the Department will approve and arrange for their installation —they are being produced in Dublin and their production is providing much needed employment — the Department will not accept the reading as proof. The Minister should encourage the idea that the meter be accepted as evidence that the account was accurate. The thing that annoys most people is that if you make a telephone call from, say, this House through the operator to a manual exchange you will find that after completing the call and if you are trying to ring somebody a few minutes later the operator may say to you: "Have you finished this call?" One is presumably being charged for that, even though the call was terminated some minutes earlier. That is happening. I have no doubt about it. It is creating many difficulties.
I was assured that, when you made a local call from a private telephone, under no circumstances could the meter be activated to record it as a long distance call. I was never fully satisfied about that. Very senior people in the Department will assure you from the advice given to them by the technical people that the meters are stored and are available in the exchanges, that the meters are photographed and the information is sent to Dublin to be dealt with and to have the accounts send down. Like any other instrument the meter can go wrong. A meter may be faulty. There is very little admission from the Department that they detected a faulty meter. The general public are concerned that some meters can be faulty. From my own experience I believe that some local calls could activate the mechanism which would record a longer time or a longer distance. Those are the two areas where the greatest difficulty arises.
There are also major abuses of the system. One abuse is accepting a reverse telephone call at a telephone box in a bar or a public place. You can arrange for a long distance call to be put through from Britain or elsewhere to a number in a public place. I realise that when you ring from a telephone kiosk a light comes on in the telephone exchange which indicates to the telephone operator that the call is from a kiosk or a telephone with a coinbox attached. This has created a certain amount of fraud. A reverse call is made to a prearranged destination at a prearranged time in a public bar or lounge or hotel. The person answers the call and accepts the charges. It is very difficult to eliminate that type of fraud. Many people who have public telephones have this difficulty. We will have to try to eliminate the problem.
When a person rings an operator and asks for a number the operator should ring back. I am told by the Department that the amount of fraud in this area would not justify the operator ringing back. I was told that the operator will ring back once in every ten calls coming through. You can credit a call to another number in your area. That is happening all the time. A person will know the number of his public representative or another well known number. He rings the operator and books a call to Dublin. He gives the number of his neighbour or somebody else and that is what is recorded. If the operator asked the person to put down the telephone and rang him back that would eliminate that problem. When I was in the Department I suggested that the operator should have the responsibility of ringing back and checking on all calls made. This has given rise to many complaints in my experience. Some years ago the operator rang back and checked. An Bord Telecom will have to give priority treatment to this area.
Deputy Reynolds said the accounting system should be decentralised. This is very important. The Minister should indicate to An Bord Telecom that there should be total decentralisation of the telephone accounts system. This would give the consumer an opportunity to query his account locally. When I was Minister of State I queried a telephone account on 14 December 1982, the last day we were in Government. I asked the Department to investigate this account. I put down a question in the Dáil this week about that account. I do not know what the reply was, but it took six or seven months before I received a response to a representation I made as an outgoing Minister of State.
In the GPO the accounts section are absolutely bogged down. They are overworked and frustrated. I compliment the section in the Department who take the calls from consumers in Dublin. They have a very difficult existence. Mr. O'Reilly was dealing with that section when I was in the Department and he had a great deal of patience. I compliment him publicly on the way he handled queries from the public. On a few occasions I took calls myself from angry consumers and it is a very difficult task to appease a consumer who has a major difficulty. His telephone may have been out of order for two or three months. The officials in that section have a great deal to contend with. They provide a grant service for the consumers who take out their frustrations on these officials. They really let go at them. These people are the frontline of the Department work under great strain.
If Bord Telecom are to work efficiently and effectively they must tackle this area as a matter of priority. This illustrates the reason behind the setting up of two boards. With new dynamic leadership and with a dynamic chief executive eager and willing and ready to get going when this legislation is passed Bord Telecom will eliminate these problems. Former Ministers had to worry about constituency problems and the other problems with which Deputies and Ministers have to concern themselves.