Adjournment of Dáil: Motion.

The Tánaiste

I move:

That the Dáil at its rising on 14th December, 1984 do adjourn for the Christmas recess until 2.30 p.m. on Tuesday, 22nd January 1985."

In opening this debate on behalf of the Government I will be dealing with a number of features of the current political and economic situation. The Government have now been in office just two years. In that time there have been successes and disappointments. I propose to talk briefly about these, and later to refer to thrust of Government policy for now and the future.

It is evident that the decade of the eighties is being characterised by a set of circumstances and problems radically different from both the sixties and seventies. Quite apart from questions of ideology relating to preferred political and social choices of different Governments and different parties, the size of the issues to be faced is greater whether in relation to the management of the economy or, indeed, to our very capacity to continue to exercise effective choices over the policies Governments adopt, or to the fact of the alienation of many young people especially in deprived urban areas, or to the continuation of serious difficulties in Northern Ireland, or to the future shape of the European Community in economic, social and political terms.

Tough and unpleasant decisions were taken. The objective was to recreate the conditions whereby economic recovery could occur, to minimise the effects of any deflationary action on growth and employment and to maintain the essential fabric of our public services in health, social welfare, education and other areas. All these aims had to be accommodated in the context of a critical fiscal situation. There was no room for any policies of budgetary expansion — rather many commentators were calling for major public expenditure cuts damaging in the short-term to both equity and employment. These were avoided by deliberate Government choice. Instead, the overall burden of taxation was raised, and adjustments made by that mechanism. Now, however, as the national plan recognises, the overall level of taxation, as distinct from its distribution, has reached its maximum.

In the preparation of the national plan earlier this year the Government were concerned to deal effectively with the economic realities as they existed — the enormous unemployment issue, even though the rate of increase in employment had slowed in 1984 compared with 1983; the growing volume of national resources pre-empted for servicing the national debt; the relatively slow recovery in European markets; the still difficult but improving balance of payments situation; the fact that budgetary targets over the two years 1983 and 1984 were being broadly met; and the good news that manufacturing output and, in particular, exports were growing strongly, while inflation was falling.

At the same time, social issues were of major importance; the need to protect social welfare recipients, the aged, the unemployed, the sick, from the burden of adjustment called for in the rest of the community, to ensure the continuation of social programmes in areas such as housing, health and education while at the same time seeking to ensure greater efficiency in the management and delivery of public services.

The Government's choices on these issues were published in the national plan after a public debate arising from the publication of the National Planning Board's report last spring. I well recognise that not everyone will agree with the choices made or the assumptions taken. However, what I want to stress today, rather than rerun the debate on the plan we had in October, is that the decisions made were taken on a realistic basis, on an honest appraisal of the facts and that the options represent a clear policy direction for three years ahead. That is not to say that the proposals in the plan represent a long term solution to our economic problems on the ills of Irish society generally. Although a significant increase in employment is projected up to 1987, there is no way that an unemployment outcome of the magnitude involved could represent a solution to my party or indeed, I am sure, to the other parties in this House. The task of economic reconstruction, which must be accompanied by social equity, is a task for a decade or more. What is essential is to get the policies and priorities in place that the situation demands in the short term. This will allow the real long term choices for our society to emerge in a rational way and be put to the people at an appropriate time in the years ahead.

It is widely recognised that significant adjustments in our approach to economic and budgetary policy were essential since the eighties began. This process was and is in many respects difficult and unpleasant and has had to be approached in a balanced, rational and humane manner. As far as the elimination of the current budget deficit of 1987 was concerned, it was always the intention to take due regard of prevailing economic conditions and in particular of the importance of achieving economic growth and dealing with unemployment. The Government have not been obsessed with "balancing the books" or "bookkeeping" or with abstruse financial matters, as some critics persist in claiming, rather than dealing with real human problems in our society. This is a travesty of the truth. The Government are concerned with such problems only to the extent necessary to ensure that the Irish people as a whole can continue to exercise choice and discretion on the way we shape our society, to the extent required to prevent control from external sources over the policy decisions that are proper to us as an independent State. These are the realities that must be recognised.

There has been also some discussion in recent times emanating from Opposition Deputies and other sources on the question of the climate for enterprise and the need for more incentives. Government policy has also been criticised as offering little or no hope to our young people and to the community generally or as fostering a type of national self-defeatism in relation to the economy and to issues relating to Northern Ireland.

The Government decisions in the national plan and in other areas do not offer false expectations or bogus remedies. The nation has had enough of cynical opportunist politics that aspire to present as real solutions the mere passing fancies of a political day. Genuine optimism about the future of this country — I believe that the Irish people are capable of mastering all the difficulties in the way — can only be built on solid analyses of where we are, of what the policy options are and of realistic methods of achieving them. This is the case whether one is proposing the politics of the right, the left or the centre. There are many incentives for enterprise, public, co-operative and private — what is required is the careful rebuilding of national self-confidence in a spirit of realism and faith in ourselves that has been the hallmark of the Irish people at different times throughout our history.

The legislation is under preparation at present and the corporation will have key functions in initiating itself new commercial job creating projects and in stimulating projects involving productive employment in the existing public sector, in the development of structurally strong Irish firms and in acting as a State investment company in existing or new private sector enterprises, or in joint ventures with the private or co-operative sectors, particularly in the advanced technology area. Natural resource based industry, the development of food processing, forest products and high technology projects will be of major interest to the corporation.

Mr. Reynolds

This is good stuff. Is this a Rogers essay?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order, please.

The Tánaiste

It will not be a resting place for failed enterprises, private or public, and the Government will be ready to make funds available for commercial projects as and when needed.

As leader of the Labour Party, I believe in a strong, well-organised public sector making its full contribution to the creation and maintenance of jobs. The Labour Party believe in backing that public sector, in defending it from unjust criticism and in supporting it through difficulties. Throughout the history of this Government, that influence is clear and visible. CIE, for instance, will remain in public ownership in spite of the demands of some that it be dismantled and the profitable parts privatised. The Great Southern Hotels were rescued and jobs preserved to the maximum extent.

But we also believe in an efficient public sector. We do not support the notion, now apparently being propounded by Fianna Fáil, that already very hard-pressed taxpayers should dip further into their pockets to pay for very bad management decisions such as in Irish Shipping.

Deputies

Hear, hear.

The Tánaiste

In that context it is important to remember that the issues were not just about adverse trading conditions, or a temporary shortage of capital, or a medium-term downturn in profitability — Irish Shipping represented a fundamental miscalculation and it is that miscalculation that has doomed the company and not any lack of goodwill on the part of the Government.

We really do not have any choice but to learn from the mistakes of the past. That is why those of us who believe in the public sector, even more than those who do not, are entitled to demand performance from that sector. As long as I am in Government the public sector will occupy a central role in the economy.

I want now to turn to certain aspects of the problems relating to the North. I do not wish either to underestimate or overstate the size and scope of the major issues involved with which we are all freshly familiar in the post-Forum context.

Firstly, it is clear that the realities of Northern Ireland are extremely difficult for us, for the British and for the people who live in the community. The only approach to overcoming the bitterness which we have all inherited and for which Britain, of course, bears the heaviest responsibility, was accepted by Mrs. Thatcher when she agreed with the Taoiseach in the post-summit communique "on the need for efforts to diminish the divisions between the two communities in Northern Ireland and to reconcile the two major traditions that exist in the two parts of Ireland".

The British and Irish Governments now agree on the principles which must be respected by any new structures of government if they are to work and to last. The British Prime Minister agrees "on the need for efforts to reconcile the divisions that torment Northern Ireland and that damage this island as a whole". We are now at the most difficult stage of this process. It is to move from a recognition of what is required in terms of principles to devising actual solutions which will work.

The heavy and continuing demands on limited State resources are such that any further investment in the transport area which might lead directly or otherwise to reliance on help from public funds must have sound economic justification.

Another quotation:

In the initial years of the Plan the amount of resources available for the Public Capital Programme will depend directly on the degree of success achieved in reducing the current Budget deficit.

How does one contrast this commitment with the fact that Deputy Haughey is offering to reopen Verolme Dockyard? The cost of this particular promise is at least £40 million per annum, since the only basis at present on which the ships can be built is for the State to order them.

And finally, a quote from that glorious work:

The measures to reduce the budget deficit must therefore fall on expenditure through, for example, transferring the cost of some services now paid for out of either taxation or borrowing to the users of those services.

(Interruptions.)

The Tánaiste

Fianna Fáil had in fact already ensured that this would happen when they left office in 1982, by failing to provide an adequate amount of money for local authority services. Now, despite both their promises and their record in this area, they are promising again to scrap local authority charges, and they cannot even be honest in this promise. They are now maintaining, with a total lack of truth, that the charges they had intended were to supplement existing services, rather than replace existing income. The truth of the matter is — and it is important that everyone understand the depths of their dishonesty — that they were proposing to implement cuts in the local authority subsidy three times as great as the cuts we had to make, and the consequent charges, promised in The Way Forward, would have been three times as high.

One final point in relation to this latest false promise — its cost would be approximately £25 million a year.

Mr. Lenihan

He deserves to be Attorney General after this.

(Interruptions.)

The Tánaiste

Now, let me go back over the size of the figures that have emerged from this rejuvenated Opposition party in the last few weeks — £200 million for Irish Shipping, £312 million for public service pay, £40 million for Verolme, and £25 million for local authority charges. That means that the promises that Fianna Fáil have made and claim to stand over, in the last month or so, amount to £577 million. That must be a record. It means that Fianna Fáil are now making promises at a rate of £10 million a day — it used to be only £30 million a by-election.

(Interruptions.)

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order.

The Tánaiste

Let me say to the Opposition benches that I would be delighted to be in a position to say that all of these promises were realistic, but they are not. So devoid of reality are they that one can only come to the conclusion that Deputy Haughey has seen one too many mirages lately.

If we had that kind of money available to us — when I say "we" I do not mean the Government; I mean the country — we could halve that. We could double pensions, and still have change, but the country does not have that kind of money as Deputy Reynolds knows, and so the country must make choices.

But Fianna Fáil do not want to know about making choices — they never have wanted to know in recent times. Far better to pull the odd stroke here and there, to play at politics as if it were a game of expedience. Deputy Haughey is the man, after all, who in one breath is able to say that he is the only one who can define what the Forum Report means, and in the next can castigate the Government for allegedly abandoning interpretations of that report to which he never subscribed, or had any intention of subscribing.

I was not surprised when Fianna Fáil denigrated the document Building on Reality, because I do not believe they know the meaning of either word. Their vision is something you would find in a hall of mirrors, distorted at every turn by whatever pressure group they wish to reflect.

This, then, is the alternative Government — a party who believe in false hope, generated by false promises. Such a Government would be ill fitted indeed to deal with the problems this country has. They spent two years demonstrating that fact in office, and they have spent the last two demonstrating it in Opposition.

I want before concluding to say a few words in a different capacity, that of Leader of the Labour Party.

I have said many times, in this House and elsewhere, that my party is an independent one, which takes pride in its independence and will always cherish it.

Mr. Harte

Fianna Fáil are some party to talk about revolution.

Mr. Lenihan

We are moving towards a situation in which respect for national institutions is disintegrating and diminishing to an alarming extent. At this time of economic crisis and of disenchantment with all the political and legal procedures of our State, it is nothing short of madness to begin tampering, as the Government are doing, with the legal and judicial system. We are now to have a Bill to provide for the introduction of a five year qualification for a pension scheme in respect of judges. The first beneficiary will be a former Fine Gael Minister who is now Chief Justice but who is to leave shortly for the European Court of Justice.

Mr. Harte

That is a scandalous statement.

Mr. Barrett

(Dún Laoghaire): The Deputy should make that statement outside the House.

Minister for Industry, Trade, Commerce and Tourism (Mr. J. Bruton)

When the Deputy reads the Bill he will find that the facts are not as he is outlining.

Mr. Lenihan

It is proposed to appoint as Attorney General, to replace a Fine Gael Attorney General who is being transposed to Europe, an innocuous junior barrister who at the drop of a hat is being made senior barrister in order to qualify for a job for which his only entitlement has been to write for the Tánaiste facetious scripts such as the one he has just read.

Mr. Harte

Is that not what the Deputy has been doing during all his political life?

Mr. Lenihan

This is the sort of corruption to which Irish public life has descended. I am the one who can stand up here and say loudly and clearly that I was the one who as Minister for Justice appointed the law agent for Chief Justice O'Higgins when he was a candidate for the Presidency. I appointed Mr. William O'Brien Fitzgerald, a strong Fine Gael supporter and then a leading senior counsel at the Bar. I recommended his appointment to a Fianna Fáil Government presided over by the late Mr. Lemass. Mr. O'Brien Fitzgerald was appointed a High Court judge and subsequently a judge of the Supreme Court. I happened to recommend also a former Fine Gael Deputy who is now President of the High Court. I refer to the former Deputy Thomas Finlay. He, too, was appointed to the High Court by a Fianna Fáil Government and he is now a President of the High Court. That is my personal record in regard to matters of this kind.

(Interruptions.)

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order, Deputies, please.

Mr. Lenihan

I look with some dismay on the sort of corruption of power that we are witnessing now. It reminds me of the last days of Nero and some of the sick Roman Emperors. The corruption we are witnessing on the part of a certain Emperor in charge of his little empire is diminishing Irish society. It is batoning the Irish people. The whole House is collapsing. People opposite must listen to their constituents. They must know the enormous stress and trauma that is rampant in Irish life today. Knowing all that, they are doing a grevious wrong in persisting in this naked and obvious corruption of power in regard to Judicial and legal appointments.

Mr. Reynolds

They are only rearranging the deck chairs for themselves on the Titanic.

Mr. Harte

Deputy Lenihan should take it easy. He seems to be about to suffer a heart attack. It may be just as well that Deputy O'Hanlon is at hand.

Mr. Lenihan

I am endeavouring to raise this debate to some sort of decent level but I am not being helped by the people opposite.

(Interruptions.)

Mr. Lenihan

The duty of the Government in difficult times is to raise the morale of the people. They can do that through a policy combination of idealism and practicality. That should be our function here. We are not in a debating society, we are here to represent the majority of the people. We are not helped to perform our function by speeches such as the one we have just heard. It is essential to make credible decisions on a whole range of political, social and economic affairs in order to restore confidence in our democratic institutions. This Government have shown a massive incapacity to make credible decisions and that goes to the hard core of what is wrong with Irish society today.

(Interruptions.)

Mr. Lenihan

The whole question of national credibility is probably too sensitive and subtle a matter to be appreciated by some of the people on the other side of the House. It is a basic psychological factor. Without that understanding there can be no achievement. People base their assessment of the Government on their performance and on the possibilities held out. Under this criteria it is quite clear that this Government fall. It is disgraceful for this Government to continue in power on the basis of the present assessment of the Government by the people at every level. If the Government insist on staying in power we will move towards a revolutionary situation. Young people will become impatient and will want to know how long we can have an impotent and incoherent Government in power.

Political power should not be abused by exercising it in a corrupt manner merely to appoint people to specific jobs. Political power is not a game. Political power is sacred. It has been given by the people to the Members of this House to be exercised responsibly for the good of the people. Political power should not be used to play inter-party games between Fine Gael and Labour. Political power is being abused by this Government.

Mr. Lenihan

Do not be petty, you are a very foolish man.

(Interruptions).

Mr. Lenihan

The collapse of investment that has taken place relates back to the creation of confidence. The net effect of that collapse of investment is that 216,000 people are out of work. That is a conservative figure.

(Interruptions).

Mr. Lenihan

I do not take any joy out of that but it is because nobody is moving money into the country.

(Interruptions).

Mr. Lenihan

There is a complete standstill in regard to investment. Deputy Bruton as the responsible Minister can speak afterwards for the IDA and inform the House of the sort of practical starts with jobs that are taking place and we do not——

This is directly related to the unemployment created by this Government. No police, or security forces, or Army forces, can help if ordinary people, and particularly young people, are stimulated and forced by deliberate Government inaction and by the creation of an unemployment environment, into crime and social disorder. That is happening before everybody's eyes.

(Interruptions).

Mr. Cowen

Deputy Harte is continually interrupting.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Cowen, I am well able to keep order and a young man like you should keep quite.

Mr. Cowen

I may be out of order but do not patronise me. I am an elected representative no matter what age I am.

Mr. Lenihan

The loss of financial credibility which is basic to the functioning of the State is probably the most serious aspect of this whole matter. We are not getting the money from abroad that we should be getting. That has led to the Government being forced to borrow on the home market exchanges. This has let to increased interest rates in order to attract funds from home sources. We have had the rise in bank interest rates which was announced recently.

I may have to take steps. We are trying to have a constructive debate.

Mr. Lenihan

We depend on credibility from the point of view of attracting home investment and outside investment via the IDA. Above all, we depend on it from the point of view of international trade such as was done by Irish Shipping, is being done by Aer Lingus and numerous major private Irish firms. They depend on our credibility for their banking and business transactions. That is fundamental. The Government have seriously dented that credibility which we had since the formation of the State until this disastrous set up started on their way. They started to mistake real politics for cosmetic politics. That is where the real damage was done.

They began to believe their own stories. They began to believe the people who projected them and wrote stories and headlines for them. The unreal became the real. The whole thing became topsy-turvy and slightly crazy. That is far too serious a matter for Ireland now two years on. We saw the final example of the whole collapse of the system initiated by the Government — the system of makebelieve, the system of cosmetics — on our television screens a few weeks ago when the Taoiseach humiliated not just himself but Ireland.

Mr. Harte

He did nothing dishonourable.

Mr. Lenihan

Throughout Britain and Ireland we witnessed the greatest humiliation, and every Irishman felt it. I felt it very strongly even though I am a political opponent. I felt very strongly the shame of that occasion when an Irish leader was just unable to cope. There were many Irish leaders over the years and they were well able to cope. Whatever else could be said about them, and I would go right through all of them of all political persuasions——

Mr. Harte

Do not go too far back.

Mr. Lenihan

——back to Parnell and O'Connell, they were all able to cope. We saw a man some weeks ago who was just not able to cope and who, in his unfortunate humiliation, humiliated all of us. You had that at your own Fine Gael party meeting too.

Mr. H. Byrne

Paddy, he is not the God you thought he was.

Mr. Lenihan

Paddy never thought he was a God.

Mr. Reynolds

Do not defend the indefensible, Paddy.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order please. You have two minutes, Deputy Lenihan.

Mr. Lenihan

Deputy Reynolds has just said: "Do not defend the indefensible". It was an indefensible performance. The political aspect is just disastrous and I will not dwell too much on it. But I believe basically that we should always present our case firmly to the British, maintain our position firmly to them, leave them in no doubt about where we stand.

Mr. Harte

What were you doing for the last 50 years?

Mr. Lenihan

In particular we stand by the conclusion of the Forum report and we are respected. I have met so many British people, I have met British Prime Ministers and party leaders and Ministers all over the years and they respect us when we state our position. But the day you start giddy goating around and do not state your position, that is the time you lose respect. Your Taoiseach has lost respect and the Taoiseach of this country has lost respect as far as the British Government are concerned, as far as the international community is concerned and as far as Ireland is concerned. It is very important to recognise this basic fact.

Mr. Lenihan

This is old debating society nonsense now.

Mr. J. Bruton

I should like, if I may, Sir, to say how we intend to continue to develop our industrial base——

The core is that of giving native Irish people the tools to create the jobs themselves and make profits in so doing.

Mr. H. Byrne

Is that why Clover Meats was closed?

Mr. J. Bruton

I should like to tell the House what we are doing as far as that is concerned. First of all we are providing one place where anybody from any region who has an idea about creating a project can obtain all the advice he or she needs. The position to date has been that many people go to the IDA for one thing. They find then that they need advice on exports when they must go to Dublin to the CTT. Or perhaps one needs premises and one has to go to Limerick to SFADCo. After that perhaps one needs research done on one's project and one must go to the IIRS in Dublin. Such a prospective industrialist almost has to be as expert as is a civil servant in the Department of Industry to know one's way around all the schemes supposed to be available in order to help one. That is not the way to do business. People with an industrial project want to get all the advice together in one place and quickly.

(Interruptions.)

Mr. J. Bruton

We have taken a decision that in every one of the eight regions there will be one office where all of those agencies would have personnel available, on the one corridor, one room after the other——

Mr. Lenihan

Fair enough, that is sensible.

Mr. J. Bruton

——so that anybody who has an industrial project or idea will be able to get all the advice they need there in one place.

(Interruptions).

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Would Deputies please cease interruption?

Mr. J. Bruton

The next thing we are doing is that we also recognise that while foreign industrialists have the opportunity of selling their products quite easily because most of them have developed a brand name and have already researched their product and sell all over the world, a native Irish firm endeavouring to break into the export markets and to expand does not have a ready market or does not have a ready-made technology.

Mr. Lenihan

That is fair enough.

Mr. J. Bruton

What are we doing about that? For the first time this year we are introducing a whole new range of schemes to help Irish exporters to export, market research grants that did not exist before.

Mr. Daly

The Minister's Government took the money from CTT.

Mr. J. Bruton

There will also be loan guarantee schemes for exporters that did not exist before. These are being introduced by this Government to help Irish exporters to create jobs. We recognise also that while foreign firms have access to technology — probably having developed it at their home research bases — native Irish firms do not have it. So, again, for the first time this Government are giving research grants that were never available before to Irish industry to acquire technology abroad. Therefore, rather than bringing technology into Ireland to be used by foreign industrialists, when much of the profits are sent back home to the foreign parent, we are giving Irish people the opportunity to buy the technology abroad so that in using it here the profits can remain here.

I should like to tell Deputy Lenihan, in hard figures, how well the Minister for Agriculture did in comparison with the other member states of Europe with which he was competing. The figures I shall now quote on the record will show the House how good a Minister for Agriculture we have and how well he negotiated on our behalf——

(Interruptions).

Mr. D. Gallagher

Tell that to the IFA. What about Libya?

Is the Minister for the National Development Corporation?

Mr. J. Bruton

I should like to talk about the measures the Government are adopting to deal with the long term unemployment problem. We have one of the highest rates of long term unemployed among our total unemployed in Europe. We have well above the average among our unemployed people who have been unemployed for more than a year. Oddly enough, and this may be surprising, in comparative terms we have a relatively lower number of people under 25 who are unemployed as a proportion of our total unemployed. Our really big problem — and this is recognised clearly in the Building on Reality document — is among the long term unemployed.

I should like to outline what the Government are doing about the long term unemployed. We are providing an enterprise allowance scheme to give these people an opportunity to get off the dole, set up their own business and restore their dignity. We recognise that many unemployed people are in that condition because they did not get adequate training or the skills they have are no longer demanded in the market place. We are providing, through the alternates scheme, an opportunity for those people to combine training with work so that they can restore their dignity and ability to sell what they have to offer. Through the social employment scheme we are offering an opportunity to those people to do something useful for their community. Rather than paying people to do nothing we will be paying people to do something. These people will then have dignity and pride in themselves. Their neighbours will have pride in them because they will be doing something useful rather than simply queueing up. That is an important step forward.

We also recognise that for many of the unemployed a lack of a basic education was a major part of the reason for their being in that condition in the first place. We are launching a major adult education programme as part of an attack on adult illiteracy. There are many people — Deputy Tunney, a teacher, will be aware of this — who left our school system without being able to read. It is no wonder that such people are unemployed. The Government, through their adult education programme, are launching a major attack on adult illiteracy to give these people the basic ability which is so necessary for having employment in this climate.

Through the introduction of the family income supplement and the child benefit scheme, which will not discriminate between those at work and those on social welfare, the incentive to work for many of the unemployed will be greatly enhanced. At the same time we will be giving major benefits to those with families who need help most. I listened with some lack of surprise to Deputy Lenihan referring to interest rates. I should like to tell the House why interest rates are as high as they are. They are high because the Government have to borrow too much. That has to be done mostly to repay debts incurred by the party opposite when in Government.

Mr. McLoughlin

Who appointed Connolly? The Deputy should tell us about that.

Mr. Tunney

It is not my intention to direct my remarks at any Member other than the occupant of the Chair and I hope I will have the protection of the Chair from any interruptions, helpful or unhelpful, by Deputy McLoughlin or any Member. I try not to interrupt or insult anybody and I am not going to take that from the Deputy, or anybody else, while I am endeavouring to collect my thoughts. If the Deputy has any contribution to make in regard to the appointment of his party's nominee for Attorney General, the House is open to him. I will listen patiently to him while he makes the case why the Taoiseach abrogated his responsibilities and passed them to the Tánaiste, Deputy Spring.

The Constitution requires that the President appoint the Attorney General on the nomination of the Taoiseach. We will see ample evidence of that if we examine the appointments to that office since the establishment of the State. It has been the fashion to appoint a person who has gained a certain reputation in that field. It has also been the custom to appoint a man or a lady who has certain sympathies towards the political party to which the Taoiseach belongs. I see nothing wrong with that. We all know that, whatever means is adopted to make it appear otherwise, the person who nominated the new Attorney General is not the Taoiseach but the Tánaiste, Deputy Spring. These are the facts and nobody can deny them. The public who have been reading the papers for the last few days or weeks know there was bartering about the appointment of the Attorney General. We knew there was internal squabbling within the Labour Party as to whether the appointment should go to a lady or a gentleman but the Labour Party, in typical chivalrous fashion, appointed a gentleman. I am not concerned about that but I am concerned about the Taoiseach abrogating his constitutional responsibility. Any Taoiseach who does that is not worthy to hold that high office. I want to draw the attention of the House to difficulties which might arise in the very near future.

Mr. McLoughlin

Send him to America, as happened with Mr. Connolly.

Acting Chairman (Mr. Farrelly)

Allow Deputy Tunney to continue without interruption.

Mr. Tunney

Under the Constitution if the Attorney General does not interpret the wishes of the Taoiseach or his party the Government can ask for his resignation. What is going to happen in the new year if the Taoiseach wants advice on the new laws from the — I do not want to make little of the office — cuckoo Attorney General? Will the Taoiseach have the power to ask for his resignation or must he go to the Tánaiste, to the Labour Party, to Deputy Mervyn Taylor or Senator Mary Robinson to ask permission for the resignation of the man holding this office? A Taoiseach who would put himself in that position is not worthy to hold that office and nobody in this House can say otherwise.

We hear a lot of clap trap about commitments to policies and plans. It was nauseating to hear the Minister with responsibility for creating employment telling us about these plans while there are over 200,000 people unemployed. Two years ago I heard him baying across the House telling us that when unemployment went beyond 100,000 the Government should get out of office. Now there are 215,000 recorded unemployed and a further 5,000 or 6,000 could be taken into account if the Minister for Education had not been given a certain sum of money to encourage people to stay at school.

I am making a case for the resignation of the Taoiseach. On top of all the disasters facing this country we have a Taoiseach who can take European Presidents and tell them how to solve their wine lake problems. This matter was given top priority at a time when there is poverty and deprivation of a kind never seen before in this country. He who has his eyes on the stars never sees what is at his feet — and sometimes he does not want to.

In a political, not a personal, sense I want to castigate the Taoiseach. Some months ago his Government decided it was necessary to introduce a mini budget. They met and made all the arrangements for the introduction of that unpopular measure. We heard the Minister, Deputy Bruton, talk about doing the unpopular thing. What can one expect from a Taoiseach with a reputation for being forthright, brave and honest? One imagines he would have had the courage to announce that mini budget, but what did he do? He arranged for the mini budget to be announced by civil servants while he was in Europe. This is a Taoiseach, who according to the Minister, Deputy Bruton, is ever ready to do the unpopular thing. When the pressure came from within his own and other parties, what did he do? In some telepathic way he contacted the poor, unfortunate Tánaiste and had him make the unpopular announcement. Perhaps it was at that stage that the bartering for the appointment of the Attorney General started; I do not know. Perhaps that was the time when his indebtedness to the Tánaiste started; I do not know. But these are the facts. That situation cannot and should not be condoned.

There is another appointment I would like to mention, the European Commissioner. I had the pleasure of knowing the former Attorney General and I have nothing against him, but the nature of the office is such that ideally it should go to a politician. The Attorney General, Mr. Sutherland, made a slight unsuccessful attempt at politics but, apart from that, his involvement was in the legal field which may have been of some assistance to him in his office. I am concerned that there did not exist between the Taoiseach and that great politician Mark Clinton, and that capable politician Richie Ryan, a certain understanding because the Taoiseach was prepared to forego what should have been a proper, more understandable and welcome appointment, one that would satisfy his own scenario and which would affect the two gentlemen to whom I have referred. I mention them because of the fact that it would not have brought upon the Taoiseach the unwelcome situation of having a by-election. He would not do that, but for some unknown reason he affronts politicians so that he could make this other appointment — not for the best reasons.

The Taoiseach since his entry into politics has paraded himself as the person who would not be associated with or tolerate anything which would not be above board. He is aware that his Minister for Defence gave an assurance in respect of an appointment in County Kildare that everything that was traditional, proper and correct regarding appointments had been followed. I was happy to accept the assurance of the Minister but on the following day we had the appalling and startling announcement that the Minister for Finance had interfered in the fashion mentioned by this side of the House and that the person appointed would not have been appointed were it not for the fact that he had the political qualification which was regarded as essential. I am not talking about the imaginary jobs to which Deputy Bruton referred; I am talking about jobs and appointments that were made. I do not see any way in which I can exonerate the Taoiseach or withdraw my request to him earlier on. He is not fit to act as Taoiseach any more.

Some four months ago the country was treated to a rather exciting presentation of circumstances under which the Taoiseach had prepared a paper which would destroy the myth that the Famine had killed the Irish language. As one who has some slight interest in the Irish language I was rather taken aback, because in studies I have done I have never seen it stated that the Famine had killed the Irish language. I have my own views as to what might have been the cause, and I realised that the Taoiseach was applying himself to looking into the tragic happenings of the last century to discover reasons why the Irish language had been killed. However, in his position as Taoiseach, and notwithstanding the requirements that exist that Irish is the first official language of this House, he appointed a Ceann Comhairle whose knowledge of Irish, as he admitted, was not of the kind which would make it comfortable for him to discharge his duties in the Irish language. Having said that, I should like to pay as great a compliment as I can to the Ceann Comhairle for the manner in which he has applied himself to redressing the inadequacy which he had on taking up the appointment. It was not because of promptings from the Taoiseach but because of his own sensitivity to what is necessary that he has applied himself to mastering the language so that he will be able to discharge his duties. I am castigating the Taoiseach who initially appointed somebody who did not have the capacity to conduct the affairs of the House in Irish.

If we are looking for reasons for what might militate against the advancement of the Irish language, another important appointment was that of Cathaoirleach of the Seanad. A great man was appointed to that position, but he admits that his capacity to discharge his duties through the medium of the Irish language is not wonderful. We all know that the development of the Irish language depends to a large extent on the exhortations, examples and policies of the Department of Education. What do we get in respect of those appointments? The Minister for Education, on her own admission, has very little knowledge of Irish. Her Minister of State, on his own admission, has a working knowledge of the language but is not all that happy about carrying out the duties of that office through the medium of the Irish language. I do not mention those appointments to reflect on the four personalities in question because they are people for whom I have the highest regard. I mention them to demonstrate the unreasonable attitude of the Taoiseach, who will search and waste his and everybody else's time going back a century to find a reason which militated against the Irish language. However, when he is in a position to help the advancement of the language he does the opposite.

I now come to the appalling picture which we all saw on television when the Taoiseach of this great country addressed his audience in a fashion that made his most ardent admirer feel embarrassed. I felt embarrassed when he made one point. I listened to the Prime Minister from the adjoining island say that the essence of her discussions with the Taoiseach was the matter of restoring stability to Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom. If an Irish Taoiseach is prepared to waste his time with any British Prime Minister doing nothing other than admitting to her that Northern Ireland was his function in respect of providing protection for her squatting in that part of our island, he is not interpreting the wishes, tradition or feelings of the Irish people. I hope he is not interpreting the feelings of the Fine Gael or Labour Parties either. Those are some of the points which occurred to me as reasons why I would be justified in appealing to the Taoiseach to step aside. We would hope there could emerge from some quarter a Taoiseach who would bring leadership, forthrightness, courage and determination to the Irish people in the present appalling times. We would not then have a Taoiseach who would make a mockery of our Constitution. Think of the insensitivity of the proposed legislation to provide pensions, when there are so many underprivileged families here. I referred last week to the refusal in my own constituency of the Minister for Social Welfare to withdraw the decision of the health board to take two allowances from an unfortunate, newly-married man confined to a wheelchair. He was left dependent on his new, young wife. The Government have nothing better to do than to apply themselves to providing very attractive pensions for judges. To say the least, it is nauseating. Whether it be in pubs, on the streets, at shop corners, today there is abroad a degree of cynicism and depression never before experienced in this great nation.

The Minister for Industry, Trade, Commerce and Tourism, Deputy Bruton, illustrates the extraordinary removal of members of the Government from the facts. He addressed me on my knowledge of the incidence of illiteracy in adults, which exists. But there is also an incidence of illiteracy among those attending our primary schools. As a Junior Minister I referred to the extraordinary situation where those who contribute most to the educational pool get least out of it, that the rest of us were contributing four-fifths of the cost of the education of all our university graduates. The dentist, the doctor and the legal man, having availed of these opportunities, showed their thanks to the public by charging them for every time they would speak to them. At the same time, in our primary schools the children of the PAYE worker who are dependent solely on this form of education, had a student-teacher ratio of one to 35 or 40. There was no provision for remedial teaching.

I have been making representations to the present Minister for Education in respect of some of the schools in my area. We are talking about equality of education, but it would be necessary to adjust the whole scheme so that there would be a more favourable student-teacher ratio where there is a need for the provision of remedial teachers. I was told no, that the same criteria which apply to good, upper income, middle class areas apply to those. Some children's education can be complemented and supplemented by their parents who have — I was going to say nothing else to do — who have the facility for this, as against the offspring of those who are unemployed, or who have broken marriages, or the like. The Minister's interpretation of equality in education is to expose both these classes to the same system. She talks about job creation education but six months ago a caretaker in one of the primary schools in my area opted for some other employment and the headmaster and the board of management could not get permission from her to appoint a successor. Minister Bruton is telling me of his exploits in Hong Kong, New York, Los Angeles, all over the world, looking for somebody who would create a job or give employment in this country, yet I cannot get our Minister for Education to provide a salary for a caretaker in that primary school catering for 560 students. The unfortunate headmaster and board of management and staff have to run bingo and think up all forms of fund raising to provide for that essential service. The only concern of Minister Bruton is that more money be provided for adult education. I agree that it should be provided, but our first concern should be with primary education. If we have education at primary level, we will not have illiteracy manifesting itself at adult level.

Minister Bruton, in my opinion, was uncharacteristically insulting to this side of the House. He is a great man for the plans and the policies. When I followed him as Junior Minister at the Department of Education, there was nothing else before me but a plan which that Minister who was then Junior Minister for Education, had prepared. This referred to youth policies and organisations. He had spent four years preparing that plan, but during that time he had allowed the whole youth scheme to become a helpless orphan. In fact, there was no youth scheme at all. The first thing I had to do was to appeal to the then Minister for Finance, the late George Colley, to give me a sum of money so that all the youth organisations would not disappear. For the previous four years we had this great Minister for plans and research and visits to Hong Kong and elsewhere. He had prepared a plan which made lovely reading but brought no results. I am afraid that all of the plans he had to reduce unemployment will be the same. While he is talking about employment, unemployment is the fact of the day. When he can come into this House and bay across to us that he has reduced unemployment to a figure below at least 100,000 then I shall give some credence to what he has to say.

The Minister without interruption, please.

Mr. Kavanagh

We were returned by the people to this House even if by an accident of birth or whatever we are not as qualified as the Deputy is in that area. I thought the Deputy's contribution was unfortunate.

As the time at my disposal is limited I intend to confine my remarks to current developments of importance with in my own area of Ministerial responsibility. Firstly, I would like to advert briefly to the token Supplementary Estimate which the House is being asked to vote for my Department.

The sum of £62,000, under subhead S, is required to pay gratuities to the former chairman and certain former ordinary members of An Bord Pleanála which are payable under the scheme entitled "An Bord Pleanála (Chairman and Members) (Superannuation) Scheme, 1984", which was made in accordance with the provisions of section 9 of the Local Government (Planning and Development) Act, 1983 and laid before each House of the Oireachtas on 15 February, 1984.

The amount of £86,000 for subhead U (Miscellaneous Services) is required to meet costs awarded in July 1981 against the Minister for the Environment in Circuit Court proceedings. These are in connection with a Water Rights Provisional Order made by the Minister in June 1980 under the Water Supplies Act, 1942, relating to the Carlow north regional water supply scheme. The circumstances of this case were exceptional in that the Minister was joined as a party in the Circuit Court proceedings. Although the court upheld the provisional order, all the petitioners' costs and those of the county council were awarded against the Minister.

The £1,000 sought for subhead E4 relates to the new £5,000 housing grant scheme for local authority tenants which was announced in the national plan. The scheme will cover certain tenants and tenant-purchasers who vacate local authority houses and build or purchase houses for their own occupation. Grant applications are processed by local authorities. The scheme operates with effect from 2 October, 1984 but no grants will mature for payment until the new year. Provision has been made in the Department's Estimates for 1985 to fund the new grant scheme which has already evoked considerable interest. Full statutory backing for this grant will be sought in a new Housing Bill which I hope to introduce in the coming session. Its inclusion in the Supplementary Estimate is of a technical nature to enable grants maturing for payment early in 1985 to be paid prior to the approval of my Department's 1985 Estimate.

The net amount sought in the Supplementary Estimate is, however, only a token £1,000 since £148,000 will be met from savings on subhead E6 — the Rent Tribunal. These savings arise primarily because of a lower than anticipated volume of work in the year and the fact that the tribunal did not as a consequence take up new accommodation.

The provisions for my Department in 1985, as shown in the recently published Estimates and public capital programme, are in accordance with the overall scheme of the national plan. Considering the constraints imposed by the overall fiscal strategy, which I believe to be a well balanced one, and the rigorous scrutiny to which spending programmes were generally subjected by the Government, my Department's provisions can in general be regarded as satisfactory. Next year's capital allocations to my Department, at £632 million, are 6 per cent up on this year's likely outturn. As regards current expenditure, the total Environment provision of £578 million shows an increase of almost 9 per cent.

In recent years environmental problems have been attracting increased attention at local, national and international level. Within the European Community a significant package of proposals has been presented by the Commission during the last year to deal with different aspects of the air pollution problem and I am happy that the Council of Environment Ministers at a meeting in Brussels last week, chaired by me, reached agreement on a number of these.

Agreement was reached on the difficult and controversial issue of lead in petrol. This is a major achievement on both health and environmental grounds. Its implementation will lead to a significant reduction of the level of lead in air and in the environment in general, especially in urban areas.

The Environment Council also made decisions on guidelines for a Community approach to the further reduction of vehicle emissions and agreed a proposal on air quality standards for nitrogen dioxide. In addition, the Council decided to establish an experimental information system on the state of the environment, with acid depositions one of the priority areas to be studied.

Lastly, the Council formally adopted a directive on the transfrontier shipment of hazardous wastes which are exported for final disposal. All of these measures are in accordance with the aims set out in the Community's third environment action programme. The agreement reached last week on these important proposals for the protection of the environment is a substantial achievement for the Irish Presidency of the European Communities.

The subject of air pollution here at home, and especially in Dublin, has been debated in this House and in the Seanad recently and has received considerable press coverage. It is true that air quality in our capital city, particularly the level of smoke, is now a greater cause for concern than in the past. There has been a deterioration, due largely to rapid urbanisation, together with a significant increase in the use of solid fuel within the domestic sector. There are also localised pockets of severe air pollution caused by industry which is unsuitably located.

I wish to emphasise my concern for existing air quality and my determination that it be improved. However, there is no easy solution. Comprehensive policies will have to be devised and action taken aimed at tackling the problem on a number of fronts. In particular, such policies will have to recognise the central role which the greater use of natural gas can play by replacing oil and solid fuels for all purposes, commercial, industrial and domestic. Work will be carried out by my Department, in consultation with the Department of Energy, in relation to the options available with a view to devising appropriate solutions as soon as possible.

On the legislative side, I am aware that the existing controls in regard to air pollution generally are in need of amendment to take account of present conditions and EC requirements. Work on preparing the necessary legislation is in hands in my Department and I hope that this will be completed next year.

The subject of local government reorganisation is one which has received much attention over the past year. It has also been the subject of much comment and speculation in the media. I have explained on various occasions the process which is in hand in this matter. I will confine myself on this occasion to confirming a few points. Reform in the local government system remains a high priority on the Government agenda. At this stage various reform possibilities have been prepared in my Department for consideration by the Government following detailed study in the light of the submissions which were made by various interests, notably the representative local government organisations. The stage has now been reached at which I would expect that definitive Government decisions can be taken in the near future so that the process of reform can be set in train. The basic aims are to strengthen the local government system, to make it more effective in promoting the welfare of local communities and as efficient as possible in the delivery of the services for which it has responsibility.

No one would deny that local government reforms, if they are to be effective, must be accompanied by corresponding reforms on the financial side. The farm tax announced in the national plan is an important step on the road to the greater financial independence of local authorities. My Department are at present working on the legislation that will be necessary to implement the farm tax. I hope to bring this legislation before the House in the next session so that the tax can be introduced in 1986 as proposed in the plan. I am open to the possibility of further changes which would be effective in strengthening local authority financing and in redressing the imbalance between central and local funding of current services, and this subject will continue to have attention in the period ahead.

While on this subject I want to refer to the statement recently attributed to Deputy Molloy speaking on behalf of Fianna Fáil who, we are told, are going to find it possible to repeal the Local Government (Financial Provisions) (No. 2) Act, 1983, and to introduce "new radical legislation" which apparently will greatly reduce the need for local authority charges. It is interesting to compare this newly contrived promise with the following extract from The Way Forward published just two years ago: I quote from page 96, paragraph 2 of that document;

In view of the increasing investment in sanitary services, it will be necessary to consider imposing realistic charges both on individual users of sanitary services and developers so as to recoup part of the cost. This matter will be examined in the context of legislation to empower local authorities to charge for services generally.

On this whole question Fianna Fáil are trying to have it both ways. I think the people are entitled to know where they really stand. If charges are to be abolished where do Fianna Fáil propose that the £50 million now accruing to local authorities from them will come from? Would they increase the rates of PAYE or VAT? Alternatively, do they propose cutbacks in employment, services or road maintenance? How would Deputy Molloy square this with his incessant demands for more expenditure on county roads especially in Galway?

The increased concern at Government and at local authority level to continue the improvement of the fire service is reflected in the vastly increased resources now being devoted to it. In terms of manpower, 43 new local authority posts have been sanctioned since 1982 by my Department for fire prevention work and Dublin Corporation now have a staff of 19 officers engaged full-time on fire prevention duties. Increased staffing levels generally have enabled the number of fire safety inspections carried out on premises to be increased greatly. Provisional figures available for 1983 show that 14,000 fire safety inspections were carried out compared to 7,800 in 1980, reflecting the new emphasis on fire prevention.

Spending by local authorities on the fire service has grown rapidly in recent years and is now in the region of £40 million. There has been notable progress in the construction of new fire stations and the purchase of fire-fighting equipment as a result of the increased capital made available by the Government. The provision of £7.5 million for capital spending on fire services this year is three times the 1981 level. Eighty new fire appliances and other modern equipment have been purchased and over 30 stations have been built or reconstructed since 1978. Fifteen new projects are at present in course of construction at Bray, Blanchardstown, Bantry, Carrick-on-Suir, Cappoquin, Clonmel, Dunmore East, Ennistymon, Leixlip, Limerick city, Midleton, Tinahely, Tullow, Westport and the O'Brien Institute at Marino. In addition this year loan finance was made available for the purchase of 21 new fire appliances and other emergency equipment. The year also saw the completion of new and improved fire brigade facilities at five locations, including new stations at Athlone and Phibsboro.

We can look forward to a continuance of this remarkable progress in the years ahead. Next year alone the Government are making available £10.24 million for fire service capital purposes and in the period of the national plan it is projected that capital expenditure on the fire service will total £33.5 million. These will enable a further 50 fire stations to be constructed together with the purchase of the necessary new equipment.

The Fire Services Council were set up last year with a wide range of functions, particularly in the matters of training, education related to fire safety, the preparation of standards, guidelines and codes of practice. In the short time since the council were established they have made remarkable progress particularly in the area of training. The council have a programme of 15 central training courses this year and a further 20 are planned for 1985. In order to avail of the most up-to-date expertise and facilities, many of these courses are being run in the UK and in Denmark. These courses are in addition to the on-going training being carried out locally by individual fire authorities. I have asked the council to review overall training needs and facilities and in particular to examine the question of establishing a national fire service training centre. An international consultant has been engaged and has reported to the council on this question and I am looking forward to the council's recommendations.

I should mention here that Dublin Corporation are providing a very extensive training facility at the O'Brien Institute in Marino. My Department are making necessary capital funds available for the reconstruction and other works and I would like to take this opportunity to compliment the corporation for undertaking this major investment. The training centre is already in use and I am sure will lead to a significant improvement in the level of skills and effectiveness of the staff of our largest fire authority. A number of third level courses in fire engineering have already been held and others are being organised. The Fire Services Council are examining the means of providing a full programme for fire safety engineering courses at third level. Education and training are interlinked and both will be tackled in an integrated manner so that the best results can be achieved.

My Department are now finalising extensive guidelines and a draft model plan for issue to local authorities to assist them in planning to cope with large scale emergencies, such as major fires or explosions.

I have already indicated that I intend to bring before the House in the coming session a new Housing Bill. This will be a major item of legislation which will validate many housing schemes introduced in recent years and also set up new arrangements for the provision, letting and management of local authority housing, in accordance with the commitment given in paragraph 5.88 of the national plan. A major purpose of the new legislation will be to provide statutory recognition of the housing needs of particular categories of persons including the homeless, the aged, the disabled, travellers and single parent families.

This time last year, in contributing to the Adjournment Debate, I commented upon the encouraging performance in 1983 of the local authority house building programme. Building activity under this programme in the current year has expanded further with the result that completions will be significantly higher than in 1983, probably in the region of 7,000 houses. This increased level of activity has also had considerable impact on the employment generated by the programme, with the latest available figures showing that average monthly employment this year has exceeded 6,800, which compares very favourably with the monthly average of 6,400 last year.

The Government's objective for the local authority housing programme, as set out in the national plan, is to provide accommodation for 9,000 households annually. This will be achieved by building a minimum of 6,000 houses and by seeking to ensure that a further 3,000 houses from existing local authority stock are available for reletting each year. The net effect is that about 27,000 households who are in need of housing will be accommodated by local authorities over the period of the plan.

In 1984 it is estimated that the rental income on over 100,000 local authority dewllings will be some £30 million less than the costs of maintaining and managing the housing stock and will make no contribution at all towards the cost of providing the houses. The average Exchequer subsidy towards the cost of providing each new local authority house is now about £85 a week whereas the average rent payable by new tenants is £11 weekly. However, while rent reviews are essential if we are to be able to maintain an adequate building programme for those in need, I can assure the House that the principle of income-related rents will continue to apply so that the burden on those with low incomes and those with large families can be minimised. Negotiations with the National Association of Tenants Organisations on the terms of a new rents scheme are at present in progress. I am hopeful that the discussions will lead to a scheme that will strike the right balance between the need to increase the rental income of local authorities and the ability of the tenants to pay.

Under another new scheme announced in the national plan, capital allocations, subsidisable at rates of up to 80 per cent, will be made available to local authorities to assist them in funding major works of a structural nature to rented dwellings in certain housing schemes which were built in the late sixties and early seventies under low cost housing arrangements. These disastrous arrangements left us a legacy of poor housing, discontented tenants and, now, much extra expense on remedial works. Certain remedial works to older houses will also come within the terms of the new scheme. Capital for the scheme will be subject to some limitations and depending on the number of applications received, it may be necessary to deal with proposals on a priority basis related to need. The arrangements I have outlined will extend to any tenant purchase houses in such schemes but the subsidy for these houses will meet 40 per cent of the loan charges and tenant purchasers will be required to meet half the costs of the work to their houses by way of a lump sum or an increased or extended annuity payment. I have been very much aware from my work in my constituency of the acute need for special measures to upgrade some of the schemes in question. I am especially pleased that the Government saw fit to accept the proposals that I put forward for this purpose.

On the private housing side I am glad to report that the level of demand for the £1,000 grant and the mortgage subsidy continues to be quite buoyant. I have recently increased the 1984 provision for new house grants to £11.5 million by transferring half a million pounds within the Vote to facilitate the payment of grants falling due and to avoid delays to applicants. Under the mortgage subsidy's scheme, 30,000 claims costing £20 million are being processed this year.

The Housing Finance Agency have experienced an unprecedented demand for loans in 1984 and as a result I have recently authorised increases in their capital allocation for 1984 totalling £9 million, bringing the total provision to £72 million. The local authority loan scheme also continues to play an important role in providing mortgage finance for those on lower incomes who benefit from the fixed interest rate. The continued importance of this scheme is reflected in the provision of £88 million in the 1985 Public Capital Programme. The impact of the increases in the loan and income limits which became effective in February last is now being seen in a much increased level of approvals. In the six months to 30 September 1984 approvals amounted to more than £38 million compared with £27 million in the preceding six months.

The availability of mortgage finance is a vital factor affecting both the housing programme and the building industry generally. I am pleased to say that in 1984 the amount made available for the purchase and construction of private housing through the commercial lending agencies such as the building societies, banks and insurance companies and from public sources, through the local authority and Housing Finance Agency loan schemes, has been satisfactory. It is likely that the total of £563 million advanced by the main lending agencies in 1983 will be exceeded in the present year. The building societies' share of these record advances in 1984 will be of the order of £400 million.

The recent increases in interest rates announced by the associated banks led to speculation about a possible increase in building society mortgage rates. I met with representatives of the Irish Building Societies Association on 4 December and expressed to them my concern about the additional burden which such an increase would impose on existing borrowers and about the implications for the housing programme, the building industry generally and potential house purchasers. I welcome the announcement this week by the association that the major building societies have decided not to increase interest rates for the present but to keep the situation under review. This will be good news indeed for house purchasers as well as for the other interests I have mentioned. It not only postpones an increase but gives some grounds for hope that, depending on interest rate trends and the inflow of funds to societies in the immediate future, it may be possible to avoid any increase in mortgage rates altogether.

One aspect of the national plan which received an almost universal welcome was the decision to substantially increase State investment in road construction in the period 1985 to 1987. The allocation for road improvements in 1984 is £101.65 million. This will increase to £125 million in 1985, £140 million in 1986 and £155 million in 1987 — a total expenditure programme of £420 million under the plan.

The last few weeks have also seen the publication of the study on the Newry-Dundalk Road, which was jointly commissioned by the Irish and United Kingdom Governments. The study, which was jointly undertaken by An Foras Forbartha and the UK Transport and Roads Research Laboratory, recommended the construction of a new road between Balbriggan, County Louth, and Killeen Bridge, County Armagh, through Glendooey and linking up with the proposed western by-pass of Dundalk. On 28 November I discussed the report with Mr. Chris Patten, MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary responsible for the Northern Ireland Department of the Environment, and we accepted the consultant's technical and environmental appraisal of the road link. We also decided that further information on financial and technical issues, including cost sharing, would be considered before the end of the year.

For many years the Governments have been asked to indicate medium term expenditure provisions in order to facilitate planning for the future. I think we have been able to do this with our Capital Programme.

It is now just a year since I became Minister for the Environment. My Department carry responsibility for some very large public spending programmes and for a very broad range of functions which in one way or another affect the lives of all citizens. It is difficult to make spectacular progress at once across such a broad spectrum of Government but I am satisfied that the past year has been one in which my Department have got down to tackling some of the fundamental problems involved. On the whole, it has been a period of solid achievement. In some areas the fruits of our endeavours are already manifest — for example, in some of the provisions of the national plan. In other areas solid groundwork has been laid for much needed reforms.

Mr. Wilson

In his speech the Tánaiste said:

Unfortunately we have seen in recent weeks plenty of apparent concessions or benefits floated off by Fianna Fáil without any analysis of the consequences or costs in other areas.

This sentiment was repeated also by the Minister for Industry, Trade, Commerce and Tourism during his blustery speech. In addition, the journalists who back up this Government are floating that idea, the idea of lack of care in projections emanating from Fianna Fáil.

In the years 1973 to 1977, as Opposition spokesman, I was conscious of the importance of not making promises, of not indulging in the forecasting of activities which could not be delivered on because such a procedure debases the whole political scene, the whole business of politics. Consequently, I find it difficult to have to hark back to the time when people who are now members of the Government, and in particular the Taoiseach, were present on every rent-a-crowd occasion when Fianna Fáil were in office, whether it was on housing, on preserving Georgian Dublin, running around with students or helping trade unions to picket. Indeed, Deputy Michael O'Leary, then a Member of the Labour Party now of the Fine Gael Party, was seen parading up and down outside a Fianna Fáil Minister's office on an ordinary picket. It comes ill from those people, many of whose statements are farcical, to state that this is an exercise that Fianna Fáil indulges in and in which Fine Gael, the sea green incorruptibles, never indulged. We had all kinds of promises from Fine Gael and Labour. It is two years tomorrow since the joint programme was supposed to come on the scene. In it a fundamental reform of the social welfare taxation system with redistributive effects was to be undertaken. The most recent issue of Iris Oifigiúil, giving the receipts and issues on 7 December 1984, indicates that the present Minister for Finance has taken £269 million more than he had taken at this time last year. This does not give a picture of the whole year. It just says that on 7 December of this year, which is well into the year, that was the case. On the income levy the Minister took £33 million extra, on VAT he took £173 million extra, on taxation on motor vehicles, even though the motor trade is at an all time low, he extracted from the unfortunate motorists £14 million more than he was able to get in 1983. With all the farcical claims about financial rectitude we should take note of the fact that the issues of December 7 1984 when compared with the receipts was £1 billion, £528 million more.

The Tánaiste when speaking said that there was no prejudice in the present Government against the public sector. He said: "The Government is not anti-public sector, in ideological terms or otherwise". I do not agree with that statement and the Tánaiste in his heart knows that it is not true. The Labour Party have no antipathy to the public sector, but Fine Gael definitely have and are showing it, and it is the policy of Fine Gael that is being made effective. The spokesmanship for which I am responsible deals to a great extent with the public sector and it is through a minute and close examination of what is being done and not done and of what is being said and not said that I have come to the conclusion that the Ministers who are responsible for the various semi-State bodies are being manipulated and pulled by the Grand Sultan of the new Right. We have a representative of the new Right, the Grand Sultan sitting before us this evening.

Mr. Dukes

Grand Vizier.

Mr. Wilson

I prefer to use the word "Sultan" because the broad vowel has a certain solidity. The Labour Party document commits them to a fair and redistributive tax system. Of course they are committed, but they have not the say of a dog in the Government. I have just told what is actually happening with regard to income tax, VAT and the income levy. The extra money is coming from the areas which Labour claims to represent and is supposed to stand up for.

In the Joint Fine Gael/Labour Programme for Government, December 1982, we have practically the same commitment:

Following completion of the work of the Commission on Taxation, a fundamental reform of the taxation and social welfare system with re-distributive effects will be undertaken with a view to its implementation within the lifetime of the Government.

For God's sake, who said there is any life in the Government? Have we seen any life in the Government? It is two years tomorrow since they took over, and all these grand promises are on the record and sweet damn all has been done about any of them. That same document also says:

Proportion of tax derived from P.A.Y.E. on Wages and Salaries to be reduced.

Do I have to comment? God save the mark. The Minister for Finance is driving more and more into PAYE, into VAT and into the income levy to get money from the people who are supposed to benefit from this grand programme.

It is a pity we have such a short time because the second anniversary of the coming to power of this Government would be a suitable occasion to go through this programme with a fine comb to let the country see exactly what was promised and what was not delivered on. The half hour is not sufficient to do that, but it should be done. It should be brought to the attention of the people who were fooled by both Fine Gael and Labour. I find it interesting and reminiscent of biblical times to read in the document that

A Fine Gael Government whose record has shown that they tell the truth, regardless of unpopularity; are prepared to act, regardless of whether this may threaten their Party interest; and are consistent in their approach.

The need is to ensure that the standards of political life are not only raised, but seen to be raised to a level compatible with our people's expectations concerning their political leaders.

Is there not a story about the man who went up in the synagogue and said "Thanks be to God that I am not like the rest of men, sinners" and is there not a story comprising part of that same story about the poor man, a publican, who stayed down at the back and asked pardon for his sins and he was justified and the pharisee was not? Anybody that would read those two paragraphs would have to think of the pharisee and the publican, the pharisee who promised everything and did nothing and the poor old publican who had made his mistakes. The tax gatherer, of course, made his mistakes. He inflicted himself upon the people as others are doing, but he repented. That is out of the Fine Gael document and the Fine Gael Party should take note of that and learn from it.

Deputy Bruton came in here with a mighty bluster and rodomontade. He was like the west wind blowing into this House hoping, I suppose, that with a stentorian voice and loud words rolling out of him he would conceal the weakness of his case. He talked abut employment. I have just checked the figures of the unemployed when this Government took office two years ago and I checked the most recent figure. The figure is 216,000. There was talk about the construction industry. Of those, 43,381 were construction workers with skills of various kinds waiting to be put to work that is needed for the development of the country. Neither Deputy Bruton nor his colleagues succeeded in doing anything about that.

He boasted about an increase in productivity. It is true. There has been a remarkable increase in productivity and in exports mainly in the electronics industries established by Fianna Fáil and in the chemical industry as well. As I said when we were debating Building on Reality, I agree with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions that that is not enough. It is the oldest saying at least since the time of Goldsmith, that where wealth accumulates and men decay you are not solving any economic problem.

I have responsibility as a spokesman in the area of many semi-State bodies. Where is the Minister for Communications? They seek him here, they seek him there, but he cannot be seen. He is not here in the mornings. I do not know where he is. He is there to do the bidding of the Grand Sultan of the New Right when it comes to saying Aer Lingus will get no more money, or Aer Rianta will get no more money, and Irish Shipping must be liquidated.

I will not take up the time of the House too long on that liquidation. It was a scandalous, cowardly act on the part of the Government. They should have addressed themselves to the maintenance of a strategic Irish fleet in the tradition of Irish Shipping. Having a liquidator is not a policy. He is useful to hide behind when questions are asked in the House: "I am gagged by the liquidator."

The country is being gagged by a whole concatenation of liquidators from Donegal to Cork, but that is not the way to face the economic problems we have at the moment. The Government should address themselves to the provision of a strategic fleet. It is not sound economics, when Moneypoint starts to generate electricity from coal below in County Clare, to pay foreign ships to bring the coal in there. It is not sound educationally and I will have an opportunity later tonight to raise the matter of the people who, with ambition in their hearts, were training to serve on Irish ships in the future.

I am appealing to the Government, but I am afraid I am appealing to deaf ears, to address the problem of a strategic fleet and to think of major business which will be available, such as the Moneypoint business, in the very near future. We will be paying others for stoking our electricity generators, and this is nothing short of a scandal. I fully advocated sloughing off the dreadful mistakes made in the Far East and I am talking about a different scene altogether when I am talking about a strategic Irish fleet.

I want to put this on record. For the 15 to 16 years Irish Shipping were making a profit, this House voted and paid £481,580,000 to CIE, another semi-State body. That is not updated to take account of inflation which would drive it up much further. The liquidator is picked up in the communal arms of the Government and shaken at me every time I ask a question about Irish Shipping. I hope the Government are addressing themselves to the problem of the Irish Continental Line to maintain it as a profitable business, which it is, and one that we should have.

Mr. Dukes

If the Deputy is gagged, God help us.

Mr. Wilson

I will come to the B & I later. The treatment given to Irish Shipping is worth noting. The quick liquidation of that company will rebound to the discredit of this Government. Where is the Minister for Communications? Will somebody find him for me? They seek him here, they seek him there, like the Scarlet Pimpernel.

The Dublin Transport Authority Bill was promised to us before Christmas. I had sent the heads of the Bill to the parliamentary draftsman and the Attorney General's office before 14 December 1982. In that Bill we were to have a Dublin transport plan, a traffic transport plan. We were to have a budget and an education bureau similar to the one in the Department of Health to deal with traffic planning and policy, to deal with traffic management, to improve the provision of school transport, to deal with energy conservation. The Minister for Energy would link into that. They were to encourage the use of public transport to prevent traffic snarls and pollution. They were to study work patterns so that something could be done to relieve traffic congestion. Where is the Minister for Communications? Where is the Bill?

CIE are to be divided up into three sections, I gather, with an umbrella company. This was announced with a flourish of oboes or trumpets. Again we have no word about the legislation. If the Dublin Transport Authority were established by statute the Dublin city services could be linked into it. That would be a logical thing to do. It was envisaged in the heads of the Bill I sent to the Attorney General's office that CIE would provide a service for the Dublin Transport Authority which would be in total control of it.

Private motorbus owners paraded around the city a week ago blocking traffic and protesting in an orderly and legal manner. They have not been able to get near the Minister for Communications. They too are asking where is the Minister for Communications. They do not know where they may fit in or may not fit into the new legislation with regard to CIE.

I am glad the DART is such a success. The Minister for Communications said in this House that, had he been Minister at the time, he would not have embarked on it. It is a tribute to Deputy Faulkner who had the idea and pushed it through against considerable opposition within and without his own parliamentary party. It is a great success. The Minister for Communications had no bother at all in celebrating its inauguration. Nor had the Taoiseach, who drove the train. When he was being interviewed afterwards and some reporter whose job it was to ask an awkward question said: "What about the money that is needed for roads in the west of Ireland?" Immediately the Taoiseach said: "Of course it was the Fianna Fáil Government who introduced the whole thing." Sin was all right if you could get publicity out of it. Do not commit it, but if you can get publicity that is all right. I do not think that is a worthy stance for the Taoiseach of the country.

What is the position with regard to B & I? I came into this House 24 hours before we were rushed in to hear of the killing off of Irish Shipping. I came in here and tried to get some information from the Taoiseach and I was ruled out of order. Twenty-four hours later this thing happened. I am asking, through you, a Cheann Comhairle, the Minister for Communications what is his policy on the B & I. There are dark rumours that he is not going to support it, that he is not going to back it. I want to know, the B & I want to know and the public and the taxpayers want to know what exactly his policy is in regard to the B & I company. Could we have information about the present position?

I was also promised before Christmas a Bill to liberalise road transport. The recess begins tomorrow. We have no Bill. Where is the Minister for Communications? What has happened to him? Has he run to earth? There are young men, entrepreneurs, risk takers with a few bob who want to buy a truck. They will pay £6,000, £7,000 or £8,000 for a plate. If the Bill was introduced tomorrow and put through this House that money would be money thrown away. They do not know what to do. This is crying out for legislative action so that there can be law enforcement in that area where there are particular problems as of now.

Aer Lingus. Again the pashas and beys and the Grand Sultan himself of the New Right have pushed the Minister for Communications out front to say: "No support for Aer Lingus from the Government. Fly away at the planes lads, do not come to us for comfort". Aer Lingus, in a very difficult time, are showing a profit. I want to put it on the record that my own particular view of semi-State bodies is that we should demand the highest standard of commercial action from them. I make no bones about that when you are planning ahead in an area where you are going to spend between £300 million and £500 million and you do not know whether you will even get a Government guarantee for borrowing, because the language would do credit to the Oracle at Delphi. I mean the Oracle in the days when the Oracle was declining because the Oracle gave straight out opinions when it was at its best. But it said: "Ibis redibis nun quam peribis in armis” which could mean: “You will go, you will return, you will never perish in arms” or “You will go, you will never return, you will perish in arms”. I would invite anybody who has time tonight to read what the Minister said about Aer Lingus. You would not know whether he was going to refuse equity or give equity, whether he was going to refuse or give guarantees for borrowing. He is using an oracular style to indicate that he is carrying, like a pigeon, the message from the New Right.

I am glad to see Aer Lingus making a profit. It is a miniscule profit compared with what they will need to replace their Boeings but the point is they are making a profit and this is not the time to try to knock them down.

On page 18 of this famous document it says:

Finally the need to re-establish the working relationship with the British Government——

No doubt about it.

Mr. Dukes

The main economic policy event of this session was the presentation of the national plan, Building on Reality which was published a week before the resumption of the House and has been debated twice in this House, once in the context of a debate for which the Government made time available and which we were very anxious to have. It was debated once after that in a different kind of way in the course of a debate on a Private Members' Motion put down by Fianna Fáil. The House agreed, on the occasion of the first debate, that that national plan represents, in our circumstances, a fair and balanced approach to the problems with which we shall have to deal over the next three years.

Of course Fianna Fáil having failed to make their point in the course of that debate, as they were bound to do — since really they did not have a point to make — then, in a fit of pique, put down a Private Members' Motion inviting the House to rescind its original vote approving the national plan, when they suffered the same fate on that second occasion. Thanks to the Opposition the national plan has been approved not once but twice within a short period of time in this House.

The measures in that plan are designed to strike a fair balance between a series of objectives, all of them shared by Members of this House, and shared in a very general way by the whole community. It is not difficult to outline here the objectives we all share. I think I could say without any fear of contradiction from the other side of the House that all of us in this House want to reduce unemployment, we want to increase the total number of people gainfully at work in jobs that will last. We all, perhaps some of us in slightly different ways, share a concern to protect the disadvantaged in our society. We want to protect them economically, to protect them socially and, for many, we want to protect them medically. The people I have in mind are those who are poor, the ill, the old or the handicapped. Every Member of this House would wish to play his or her part in protecting those people from the difficulties they encounter every day in the course of their lives.

We could also agree all around this House on the need to provide services for our growing population. Members of the House are well aware that we have the youngest population in Europe, that we have the fastest growing population in what is loosely called the western world. They need educational services, health services, training services, placement services, a whole range of services that we would all wish, as legislators and indeed as parents ourselves, to make available to them at a level that we would wish to see increase year by year in order to render those services available more efficiently. But we would like to give to the succeeding generation a greater range of services and benefits than we have had ourselves. There are many of us in this House — I acknowledge it very readily — who have been very fortunate, who have been well served by those who went before us.

There is no disagreement in this House on the need to provide for a social infrastructure that will meet the requirements of that young and growing population, that will meet the requirements of a population having to cope with the difficulties on the economic side that we meet and have been meeting increasingly since 1979. Neither would there be any disagreement on the need to provide an adequate level of economic infrastructure so that we could facilitate and support economic activity here with a view to improving the general wellbeing and, above all, increasing the total level of employment.

I know there would be universal agreement in this House on the desirability of reducing the burden of taxation whether we speak of personal taxation or of indirect taxation. So far there would be unanimous agreement in principle all around this House that those are the objectives to which we would attach most importance. I am speaking in the context of economic and social policy. There are, of course, a great many other things on which we would get agreement right around this House, but I shall concentrate on those I have mentioned as constituting the hard core of our objectives in terms of economic and social policy.

What resources have we got that we can apply to achieving those objectives? What means have we at our disposal for bringing about the results we want to achieve? More specifically, what resources are at the State's command to be deployed in fulfilling the State's role in relation to those objectives? In summary, we can say that there are two kinds of resources. The first kind are those that we ourselves decide to make available for all of these purposes through our tax contributions, the amount which we, as taxpayers, as wage earners, as consumers, are prepared to part with in order to finance all of those desirable services, the provision of means to implement those objectives on which we all agree. That is one kind of resource available to us. Another kind of resource comes from the amount of borrowing, domestic and foreign, that we can carry out with confidence in our ability to service and repay the relevant debts. As far as taxation is concerned the Government take the view — and that has been clearly set out in the national plan — that we should not increase the overall burden of taxation; there is general agreement on that view. I do not think it would take me long to detail all of the reasons Members of this House would agree with that proposition. But we have taken that view and it is part of our national plan, as one of its basic points, that we should not increase the overall burden of taxation.

We might then look at the other kind of resource I have just mentioned, which is borrowing. Debt servicing now absorbs a third of our tax revenue. Therefore we cannot simply add up those two sets of resources in order to calculate how much there is at our disposal to bring about the desired results. As I have said, debt servicing absorbs a third of our total tax revenues, which means that those of us who are contributing through the tax system start off behind in the game because not all our contributions will be available to do the things we want to do this year or next year; no, a third of it has to go in servicing existing debts. That highlights one essential feature of borrowing which is not often given the attention it deserves but which is one to which we need to pay a great deal more attention in the future because it will present us with a problem, that is, that borrowing is deferred taxation. It limits our ability to use current resources to resolve our present problems. If we look at it in that way we could find ready agreement in this House that we do not want to see the level of preemption of our tax revenue resources increase beyond its present level.

If we take the view that there should be no limits to our borrowing what we are saying quite simply is that we should look with equanimity at the cost of our debt servicing increasing from its present level of one third, but if we do not pay attention to this our debt servicing burden will be an increasing problem. That is one of the reasons for our policy in these matters, and it has been amply demonstrated not only here but in many other countries. It is a matter we must remember and take to heart. Otherwise we will find ourselves with a gradually diminishing capacity to deal with the problems facing us.

When we look at this complex of problems — expenditure, investment, taxation and borrowing — it becomes very clear that we need to restore order to our public finance in order to restore our ability to use our resources usefully and efficiently. That is a basic fundamental and the only valid reason for wanting to restore a degree of order to our public finances. It has nothing to do with abstract bookkeeping so that we will see that the books are tidy at the end of the year.

The Opposition have put across the message that the restoration of order to the public finances is carried out for bookkeeping reasons, as it is called. I would have to say that the Opposition are acting irresponsibly because they are perpetuating a myth that there is no need to have order in the public finances, that there is no need to get expenditure and borrowing under control. If we are to take them at their word they are saying it does not matter. The answer is that next year or in five years we will find fewer and fewer of the resources we provide ourselves will be available to solve the problems of that year and more and more will be taken up with the results of what we do this year to solve this year's problems.

We cannot continue to put that kind of mortgage on our future resources, because as far back as 1979 we saw the effects of that kind of policy on the ability any Government have to deal constructtively and immediately with the problems that face us. The approach taken by the Opposition can only induce people, as it has induced the Opposition, to create a situation which would be even worse than the state at which we started.

It is platitudinous to say that we will never be able to do all the things we should like to do, but from the way the Opposition have been acting in the debate on our economic policy during the last two years it seems we must repeat it fairly often in the House. We will never be able to do all we should like to do and we must therefore choose and fix priorities. That is what government is about; that is what the application and the exercise of power are about. I was not particularly surprised, but a bit saddened, to hear Deputy Lenihan earlier today engaging in what Deputy Wilson calls rodomontade on this subject without referring to what the use of power should be for and what the process of government is about.

The making of choices and the fixing of priorities are what our national plan is about. I do not think it would be any harm to summarise just how this fits in with our concern and what kind of choices have to be made. We have recognised in the plan that measures aimed at achieving substantial improvements in output and employment must be set in the medium term. We must look further than the end of the present year because we need a longer time scale, first to fix our policy guidelines and then to give them time to work and to examine their effects and effectiveness in achieving their objectives.

In the plan, the Government have acknowledged that unemployment is the most serious problem facing us, particularly among the young, the old and the long term unemployed. As a central objective of the plan, we deliberately set out to increase employment and to halt and reverse the upward trend in unemployment. The policy measures in the plan are clearly designed to achieve that during the period.

The plan acknowledges the reality of the employment position and that increases in the number of traditional jobs in industry and services will not be sufficient to meet the growth in our labour force in the next few years. That is why we provided for special employment schemes for the long term unemployed. When those schemes reach their full annual potential they will cater each year for 12,500 applicants. The plan states that economic recovery and therefore recovery in sustainable employment are being severely constrained by the state of the public finances. The benefit of the economic growth is being dissipated by national debt servicing charges which are absorbing an increasing percentage of national output and taxation. The measures in the plan aim to deal with that during the period.

The plan aims to continue the process which we started in the middle of 1981 of reducing public borrowing in order to restore balance to public finances and to stabilise debt interest as a share of national output. The Government realise that in spite of the urgent need to reduce Exchequer borrowing it would be unrealistic to expect that the gap could be closed by reliance on increased taxation. We have provided that during the period of the plan there will be no increase in the overall level of taxation. Though some individual taxes will have to be increased and perhaps some new tax measures will have to be introduced, though the scope is extremely limited, any changes of that nature would be counterbalanced by relief of taxation elsewhere, because the Government regard it as being important that the overall burden of taxation should remain at its present level.

It would have been very nice to have produced a plan foreshadowing an overall reduction in the burden of taxation, and though Deputies opposite may not believe it I doubt if there are many in the House who would be happier than I to be looking forward to a reduction in the overall burden of taxation. But when we balance the requirements that would create with the others I mentioned earlier it would have been downright irresponsible to make a proposal of that kind or to embark on that path.

This stabilisation of the overall tax burden in itself is a major advance in view of the rapid rise in the burden of taxation in recent years and the difficult budgetary situation facing the Government. One of the key factors in increasing the level of sustainable employment would be the improvement of our competitive position. The plan emphasises competitiveness as a key element to improving the job prospects of our young people and those who are now employed. In that connection it is clear that labour costs are a most significant element of industrial costs. It we are to improve job prospects there is no way out of it but to recognise that disproportionate increases in labour costs must be avoided. By that I mean disproportionate increases in costs here compared to those in our competitor countries.

The relation of the overall pay objectives we have set out in our plan will bring about an improvement in our unit wage costs. That, together with the expected increase in the level of productivity, will put us first of all in an improved position to compete with our trading partners and, more importantly, in a position to begin to realise further expansion in employment here. No matter which way one approaches that problem one will find that one comes up with the same answer at the end of the day. The only way we are going to provide extra employment is to be in a position to gain a bigger share of the markets whether for goods or services, whether at home or abroad. The only way we are going to do that is to make a better product or provide a better service cheaper than the competition. All the elements of our policy must point in that direction. It is an old fashioned, very traditional but nevertheless true and relevant approach to expanding employment possibilities.

I have just given a brief review of the main elements in our plan. We went about making that plan in a particular way. At the beginning we looked at what the likely course of the economy was going to be over the period of the plan. We estimated what amount of resources were likely to be available and we tailored the policies to suit those resources. I cannot think of a more logical or sane way of going about building a plan. There are other ways a plan can be drawn up. They were tried before and did not work. What has been the stance of the Opposition on the plan? They voted against it twice and I must assume that they voted against the idea of fixing priorities, voted against the idea of making choices and voted against the idea of making balanced policies. Not only did they vote against it twice but——

Mr. Wilson

Give the people a chance to vote.

Mr. Dukes

——they did not put any alternative proposals forward. At no time in the last two years have the Opposition ever put forward an alternative set of proposals. Why?

Mr. Wilson

That is a sucker punch.

Mr. Dukes

They are attached to the same objectives as us. They want to make the same type of progress as we do but they are not prepared to make choices.

Tomás Mac Giolla

Before we adjourn for the Christmas recess it is worth recalling what successive Governments have done in recent years during the Christmas or summer recesses announcing unpopular measures, some of which should have been properly brought before this House and debated. During the first recess after this Government was formed after the November 1982 general election, they chose Christmas Eve to announce the introduction of charges for school transport and so ended free school transport for many families. Just after Christmas they announced increases in bus and rail fares. Nothing surprising in that. During the 1983 summer recess they introduced the mini budget and announced the postponement of the family income supplement scheme. Last Christmas Eve they announced the postponement of the local elections and a couple of days earlier they announced a further annual increase in CIE bus fares. The August weekend 1984 they announced the famous halving of the food subsidies just as the Taoiseach was heading off for his holidays. This was done by an Administration which talked a great deal about open Government, letting everybody know what was happening and what their policies were.

This Coalition Government were following a precedent set by the Fianna Fáil Government. During the August bank holiday week-end in 1982 the Fianna Fáil Government did a complete about turn on their economic policy and adopted the monetarist policy which this Government have followed ever since. The Fianna Fáil Government announced a mini budget which involved cuts of £120 million and introduced the public service pay freeze. In that they were breaking an agreement which existed with the trade unions.

What can we expect this Christmas? The increases in rail and bus fares look like becoming as much a part of Christmas as the turkey and the plum pudding. Will there be a further postponement of the local elections for a further year? Will hospital closures be announced over Christmas? Already some hospitals have had to close wards. Will there be a liquidation of another State company? Whatever it is, we can be certain the Government will not let this opportunity pass without announcing some bad news or dramatic new measures they have in mind.

Whatever they do in the recess, it must be said that they did very little during this session. Anybody who looks back will be unable to recall any solid legislation coming into the House during the last session. We can remember things like the liquidation of Irish Shipping or the Bill which we rushed through last Tuesday due to the Central Bank strike and a few odds and ends like that, but this Government have been very short of legislation. Last week they were searching for documents to put before the House because there was no legislation to offer. Today there was nothing to do from 12 o'clock to 2.30 p.m. There was no legislation before the House and no initiative from the Government. It is not as if they did not have plenty to do.

They should look at their joint programme for Government announced two years ago. They do not have to look at basic issues like tax reform or things which would cost money. They should look at smaller issues which would save money. Yet the Government have done nothing about them. For instance, the legislation to make changes in company law was according to the then Minister Deputy Cluskey, supposed to be at a very advanced stage in October 1983. This legislation was to end the abuse of the company law system where companies were going bust leaving creditors and employees unpaid, and then being free to set up another company and start the cycle all over again. This very important legislation would not cost the Government anything. What is the explanation for not bringing in the legislation to change company law? Do some powerful personages want the unjust company law system to remain as it is?

Another recommendation in the joint programme was to take immediate action to bring an end to compensation loopholes in the planning acts. Every local authority want this. They know these loopholes are costing them a fortune and are forcing them to accept planning decisions they do not want to accept, but if they refuse they will have to pay compensation. This is very important legislation. What is preventing the Government from introducing it? Neither party have explained why they cannot close these loopholes and give local authorities the power to make planning decisions without having to pay compensation to a speculator who puts up a proposal to force the planning authority either to give planning permission or to pay compensation.

Another item in the joint programme was the anti-poverty plan. If this plan was needed two years ago, it is needed ten times more today. The Minister for Industry, Trade, Commerce and Tourism said today that we have the highest number in long-term unemployment of any EC country. What does "long-term unemployment" mean? It means unemployment benefit has ended and these people are on unemployment assistance. It is estimated that almost two-thirds of our unemployed are receiving assistance and therefore on the poverty line. But where is the Government's anti-poverty plan? This plan sounded great when it was announced and both parties agreed to it, but neither has done anything about it.

Something else promised in the joint programme but which was not introduced — the Government cannot plead they did not have the time to do something about it, because we had very little to do this session — was the compilation of a public register of private rented accommodation. Such a register would be very important because it would force landlords to register and those who at present do not pay tax would be caught in the tax net. These people are screwing the last penny out of their tenants and in many cases the taxpayer is supporting the landlord through subsidies. Nothing has been done about a public register of rented accommodation.

Another item announced in the joint programme for government was changing the fee per item system in the GMS to a capitation system. That has not been implemented although it would save the taxpayer money. All these measures would not have cost anything, would have brought in money in some areas, saved it in others and introduced a just system into our legislation. The Government have given no intimation or explanation as to why they are unable to bring in simple measures which would be of great benefit at no cost to the Exchequer.

The disastrous effects of the Government's economic policies have left the people reeling and unable to comprehend what is happening. They have lost faith in the Taoiseach and the Government and their lack of hope for the future has brought their morale to a very low ebb. The Taoiseach's failure to face up to Mrs. Thatcher has lowered morale even further, and although the Government may well hang on for another year or more, they will not save their credibility. The longer they stay, the more damage they will do to themselves and the country. This feeling is widespread at present, and it is time that people looked carefully at the alternative. Fianna Fáil, in recent months, have been attempting to present themselves as the voice of the workers and the unemployed. They have been making overtures to the leadership of the trade union movement.

From some of their statements, one gets the impression that Fianna Fáil had never been in Government much less that they were in power for over 40 of the last 60 years and, therefore, have contributed in that proportion to the economic crisis. Workers and trade unionists would do well to contrast what Fianna Fáil say in opposition to what they do in Government. Fianna Fáil claim that they will put the country back to work, but they always made this claim in opposition. The numbers out of work have increased consistently, no matter what Government were in power, since 1973, and there is nothing to suggest that this will be different when there is a change of Government from Coalition to Fianna Fáil.

The economic policies of Fianna Fáil and the Coalition are almost identical, as most people now realise. For instance, Fianna Fáil are now criticising the Government on their policy on public service pay, but Fianna Fáil preached a theory of pay restraint in their document The Way Forward. It was a Fianna Fáil administration which withheld the second phase of the public service pay agreement in August 1982 during the summer recess. Workers can draw little comfort from the industrial relations record of Fianna Fáil. Some of us can remember that it was a Fianna Fáil Government who left postal workers on strike for many months in 1979. They forced nurses to go on strike in 1980 and in 1969 they sent ESB workers to jail. The credibility gap is wide in many areas. They now say they are against water charges because of great public opposition to them. Yet Fianna Fáil were the first to propose charges for local services.

They also now say they are against the health cuts but, just before the last General Election in 1982, they made major cuts in the health service which was one of the causes of their downfall. Fianna Fáil now proclaim themselves as the champions of civil liberties but they enacted the Forcible Entry Act which is now used to jail people fighting for the right to work when they occupy premises which close down. Fianna Fáil also introduced and later amended the Offences Against the State Act which is today being used to prosecute people in County Kildare who have refused to pay their water rates. As they are being charged, under this Act, ACRA, the residents association, are thereby being described as subversive for organising a campaign against water charges. The contrast between what is said in opposition and done in Government has become the norm for Fianna Fáil and the Coalition. It is this kind of political double standard which has left so many of our people, especially the young, so cynical and disillusioned in regard to politics. Many of them are alienated, which is undermining their faith in democracy and the democratic system.

It would be very interesting to know what Fianna Fáil said the other day in their discussions with ICTU in regard to the Congress document, Confronting the Jobs Crisis. How could Deputy Haughey stand by The Way Forward and, at the same time, support the Congress plan because the Fianna Fáil document says that the growth in the size of the public service and, consequently, in its cost must be reversed whereas the Congress document says that not enough resources are devoted to the public service? The Fianna Fáil document says that it is intended that the annual allocation to education from 1984-87 will be the same as it was in 1983. The Congress document says that there can be no cutback in overall public expenditure measures in real terms in the area of education. The Fianna Fáil document says that the emphasis will be on reducing the degree of State support for public housing whereas the Congress document says that there is an urgent need for an increase in the proportion of houses provided by local authorities and they call for the setting up of a State construction company.

Workers should not be duped by Fianna Fáil, who do not provide alternative policies to the Coalition. They are just different faces carrying out the same anti-working class policies. The Workers' Party have consistently demonstrated their commitment to working people and have pointed to the clear alternative policies which can rapidly lead to full employment. We have consistently supported the ICTU position on legislation which has come before this House, most recently in regard to the protection of employees in cases of insolvency. We put down an amendment to cover people working 18 hours or less who are not covered in the Bill. A number of Labour Deputies supported the amendment in their contributions to the debate but Fianna Fáil did not give us any support. Of course, when we called for a vote nobody supported us.

When Deputy Bertie Ahern was interviewed on television following his appointment as Front Bench spokesman on Labour, he said that he saw his job as defending the interests of the working class. He used the term six or eight times, and he saw himself as working closely with the trade union movement. Records show that not much credence can be placed on that statement.

While we expected little from the present Government in the way of economic reform, there was a widespread belief, following the November 1982 election, that a Government led by Deputy Garret Fitzgerald, who had a strong liberal image, and which featured a strong Labour Party participation, would at least be a reforming Government, a reforming administration in social matters. In fact, the performance of this Government on social issues has been abysmal. Deputy FitzGerald has since 1981 led Governments for two periods, one a short period of about six months and now a two year period. Any honest observer would have to admit that the earlier Coalition Government led by the arch-conservative, Deputy Liam Cosgrave, delivered more in the way of social reforms than this supposedly reformist Government have done.

Practically none of the social reforms promised in the Joint Programme for Government has been acted upon. There is still no family planning Bill despite statements by the Minister for Health and Social Welfare, Deputy Desmond, as far back as June last that the Bill would be published in a matter of weeks. The Government have failed to take any action on divorce and marital reform and have been content to divert the whole area to the Oireachtas Joint Committee, the deadline for which has been extended on three separate occasions, the last being only ten days ago. Nothing has been done on the question of illegitimacy and we are still awaiting even one of the long promised Children Bills, of which there are supposed to be three. The only significant social initiative taken by this Government has been the Criminal Justice Bill.

The contrast between the Taoiseach's constitutional crusade speech of a couple of years back and his legislative inaction since means one of two things. It could mean that he was never serious about the crusade in the first place and that it was simply used as a vehicle to gain publicity — and it did gain widespread publicity. That is one possibility. The other — and probably more likely — is that the Taoiseach was sincere in his intentions at the time but has since lacked the guts to confront those of his own party who do not share his vision of a non-sectarian, secular state which he advocated at that time and therefore he has thrown out these principles which he enunciated, probably sincerely, in the face of the opposition within his own party.

There would be no better way for me to end than by a question, of which I will give the source. The source is the speech of the Tánaiste, Deputy Spring, at the opening of this Adjournment Debate. He said:

Alienation is a human problem, and it consists in depriving people of a sense of hope, a sense of confidence in their system of Government and a sense of security.

That is how he described alienation, but he was describing it in the context of Northern Ireland. I submit that, in the context of the State down here now, there is no better definition of the term "alienation" than that which the Tánaiste has given — depriving people of a sense of hope, a sense of confidence in their system of Government and a sense of security. I submit that people are deprived of that.

Acting Chairman (Mr. Allen)

Deputy Taylor, there is an arrangement that you will share your half hour with Deputy Manning.

Mr. Taylor

Yes, I shall have 15 minutes.

The last speaker nominated a number of differentials between the policies of the Fianna Fáil Party and those of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions as published in their most recent document. I agree with the contrasts which he gave. I would perhaps just add one more to his list, which is that the Irish Congress of Trade Unions document advocates equity in taxation and, more specifically, a reasonable system of capital taxation, including a wealth tax, whereas the Fianna Fáil Party, as we know, went about abolishing the wealth tax which was brought in by a Coalition Government in the period 1973 to 1977.

This idea that the Fianna Fáil Party are at one with the Congress of Trade Unions, or union views, has no credence whatsoever. That is part of the apology of the Fianna Fáil Party for opposition, which, as was pointed out in an article in a paper of this morning, consists simply in agreeing with all the demands that are put to them. If people want an increase in wages or salaries, they go to the Fianna Fáil Party. Agreed. If people want reduced taxation, they go to the Fianna Fáil Party. Agreed. If people want water apology for opposition with which we have been faced for the last two years. I regret that, because there is no doubt that the country needs a strong opposition. It needs a constructive opposition. It is regrettable that that has not been forthcoming so far.

We are a small country. Our resources are limited and few and it is therefore essential that such resources as we have, limited as they are, in the field of revenue and natural resources be used very, very carefully and to the best advantage. Have we been doing that over the years? In very many respects, we have not. We have been raising large sums of money by taxation and raising large sums of money through borrowing, both at home and abroad. We have been following the policy which successive Governments have followed, which must surely be well discredited by now, of pouring millions of pounds of this taxed and borrowed money into capital intensive industries which have the effect of cutting out people from jobs. The so-called modernisation grant under which millions of pounds are given to these mostly foreign firms to come in and re-equip, as it is put, has the effect of increasing our dole queues. This has been a very major factor in the ruthless and relentless increase in our unemployment figures. The money that has been poured into the foreign firms has produced nothing like the return that one should have expected from it. It has resulted in blackholes in the economy. The only benefit the country has from these foreign firms coming in to set up their industries here with enormous financial backing is the amount of wages that they pay to their Irish employees. They bring in with them, and use our money to buy, the most modern equipment, computer controlled, which use very, very few people to operate them. The wages return that we get from this source is minimal in the extreme.

What do we do to encourage labour? Quite the reverse. We tax labour through the PRSI system instead of directing our money to native enterprise using native labour in larger numbers. If the money was used to that end it would be a worthwhile change in direction. It has been signalled by different Governments from time to time but never taken up. We have tended to take the easy road and rely on foreign enterprise to come in and do the job for us. Why have successive Governments not undertaken the task and said "we will do this our way using our money and people who have expertise in different areas"?

We rely to a large extent on the expertise of our very expensive Civil Service. It is unfortunate that many of the major decisions, costing hundreds of thousands of pounds, have proved to be wrong and disastrous. I refer to one in particular which admittedly affects my constituency, but that is not the primary reason I introduce it here. It was the decision to provide the CIE DART system in the way it was done. The country went to enormous expense to provide this rail facility. It was provided on the north-south axis running in a north-south direction servicing areas which, relatively speaking, are sparsely populated. In west county Dublin the Government have planned for the building of three new major towns, each with a population of approximately 100,000. In my constituency is the town of Tallaght with a population fast approaching 100,000 people who are concentrated in one area. The people on the north-south axis are not, on the whole, people who require to use public transport. I know there are exceptions but, by and large, they are people who use motorcars.

Is it any wonder that despite the enormous capital investment that was made this infrastructure will not pull its weight or achieve the use that that degree of expenditure warrants? The people living in Tallaght have been abandoned without any rail link which would literally transform their lives. There is not even an adequate bus service provided for them. Such bus service as is provided is at a price which many of them cannot afford, and that is without this latest bus fare increase. One unemployed person told me it cost him 50p each way from where he lives in Tallaght to travel to Tallaght village let alone travel to Dublin.

This lack of foresight makes me wonder about the value of the expertise we employ for many of these important decisions. To come along then and increase the cost of bus fares is something that leaves me at an utter loss. It is counterproductive and means people are discouraged from using the service, and the income to be derived by CIE from fare collection will reduce. Would it not be better to maintain or reduce prices? This would increase the amount of money coming in to CIE. If an efficient, fast and cheap service was provided there is no doubt but that CIE would treble their number of customers. Far from losing money they would end up with a greater income.

The idea of setting up a new town with a population of 100,000 and leaving them without a rail link is appalling. I appeal at this stage — I intend to do it again and again — for that decision to be reconsidered and for a rail link of some form to be provided into the three new towns in County Dublin. We have teams of workers who would be ready, willing and able to construct that rail link. I am talking about the people who worked on the DART project and who now have no work to do. Would it not make great sense to put those people to work at what they are able to do so well: provide a rail link which would discourage the use of cars which in turn would contribute to a reduction of the appalling air pollution problem we read about in the Dublin area recently as a result of petrol and other pollutants?

If a proper public transport service, both rail and road, was provided it would make a major contribution to many facets of life in the Dublin area. If electric trains are exceptionally expensive surely a rail link using some other form of power could be provided at a lower cost. I am disappointed that in the national plan it is indicated that there will be no major expenditure in the foreseeable future on rail expansion.

In the course of his address Deputy Wilson referred with some degree of scorn and ridicule to the new right, as he called it, as though Fianna Fáil by some stretch of the imagination has some form of left wing ideology behind it. That is an idea I find utterly ridiculous when one looks at their record and at what they did in 1977. They are about to repeat that performance. All the indications are there. We have the promises about the abolition of water rates, the reduction of taxation here, more employment there and so on. The people received a message in 1977. I am fully confident that they will not fall into the same trap a second time.

Mr. Manning

In this debate I intend to address one of the main preoccupations of the last year, and that is the question of Northern Ireland. At no time since the foundation of the State has there been such a gulf between the two sides of the House as to what the right policy should be, and never in the past 60 years has the policy of the Government been so emphatically the correct policy as it is today. It gives me no pleasure to say that never in the last 60 years has the Opposition policy on Northern Ireland been so dangerous, wrong and opportunistic as is their policy today.

Since the Chequers summit there has been a sustained, aggressive and unscrupulous campaign aimed at conveying the impression that the Chequers summit was a failure. I say most emphatically that it was not. The press conference afterwards may have been, but after hours of hard, tough bargaining one of the essential elements in the Forum Report was accepted and written in to the communique, that is the recognition of the right of the Nationalist community in Northern Ireland to the political expression of a distinctive nationalist identity. It was written into the communique. That was the first time that this has been done in the past 60 years. Following this the way was and is clear for further developments leading to real and lasting progress. This point was accepted readily and generously by the hard minded but well informed independent observers of the Anglo-Irish scene. The Washington Post spoke of the progress made as being encouraging. The Philadelphia Inquirer saw what happened as positive. The well informed and friendly The Guardian and the Financial Times drew a very clear distinction between the reality of the Summit and the rhetoric of the press conference. What happened back here? The ink was dry long before it was possible to get any sort of considered response. A howling orchestra of hysterical, destructive and savage criticism was unleashed from the side opposite without any regard whatever for the consequences of this irresponsible reaction or for the boost which such a reaction gave to those who have abjured the constitutional way, the Provisional IRA. That stream of mindless, anti-national abuse continued in language of bitterness which would have shamed the Civil War generation. Truly in that shameful reaction Ireland's difficulty was Fianna Fáil's opportunity and Fianna Fáil used the occasion shamelessly, mindless of the consequences of the damage they were inflicting on the country.

Let us look at the facts of Northern Ireland policy today. Let us look first at the Forum Report. It has been very well said that the Forum Report was a historic, hopeful, seminal document, and so it was, but that report was barely launched before we witnessed an attempt, breathtaking in its brazenness and effrontery, by Deputy Haughey to hijack that report when deliberately and cynically, knowing full well what he was doing, he focussed on one option, one section of the report, that section in which all parties expressed their preference for a unitary state. It was his insistence that this be the only message of the Forum, the only and inevitable solution. Never before has there been such a brazen, breathtaking, active effrontery as that attempt, which has done great damage to the whole workings of the Forum, to hijack this valuable document. In the following month we heard the varying degrees of the shrillness and crudeness of the drum-like repetition of what is now no more than a sick slogan, but it is a dangerous slogan and a dangerous approach because it ignores the other detailed, factual lessons of the Forum Report.

We have heard very little and we have no emphasis from Fianna Fáil on the economic realities uncovered by the Forum or the hard-nosed assessments made in document after document about the cost in £s and in taxes that the people here could be asked to pay to sustain a unitary state. The figures are there, the cost is staggering, but our ability and our willingness to pay that price find no place in the rhetoric of the party opposite. Nor do we hear very much from the party opposite of their willingness to face up to the constitutional changes, the changes in law and in attitude which will be part of the unitary, secular, pluralist state which Fianna Fáil say is on offer if only we go looking for it. In every test case where a change must be made, where there is talk of a change, Fianna Fáil have been tried and found wanting because these changes take courage and could cost votes.

Do we hear anything from the side opposite about the views and convictions of our fellow Irishmen, the Unionists of Northern Ireland who came down to the Forum and told us, courteously and firmly but loudly and clearly, that they will have no part of a unitary state, they will fight to the death to prevent it? We have not heard one single idea from the people across the floor as to how their opposition can be overcome or how they can be persuaded. Apart from the televison programme of Deputy Tunney we have seen little or no contact with these people. They have become the forgotten people of this country as far as the party opposite are concerned.

Fianna Fáil, and their deputy leader in particular, talk about this great round table around which we will all sit. He talks about how generous Unionists will find Fianna Fáil when the day comes when we can construct this great unitary state; but — ask any member of the SDLP and you will be told very clearly — we have not had one single idea from the party opposite as to how we are going to get the Unionists around this mythical round table, nor will the party opposite, in their cuteness specify one item that they are prepared to change in the discussions which take place when we sit around this mytical round table. We are not told how we are going to get Unionists there, what we will talk about when we get them there or what is on offer.

This might not be serious if it were simply a debate, but we are talking about the reality of life and death and the future of Northern Ireland. This House owes it to itself to be very clear about the full implications of Fianna Fáil's position here. They are saying and saying again to the Unionists, "You are coming into our unitary state whether you want to or not." That is only a very short step from the position expressed recently at Ógra Fianna Fáil at Malahide by a young lady, an officer of the Ógra and never repudiated by that party. She said, "If the Unionists do not like that they can go back to where they came from." To put it even more crudely, in a celebrated interview in the Evening Herald Deputy Ned O'Keeffe on 8 October said about the Unionists “We have already leaned over too far backwards to please them.” It said that Deputy O'Keeffe is opposed to any further compromises or concessions to the Protestants and Unionists whom he wants as part of Irish Unity. In the language of Deputy O'Keeffe “If the Protestants do not like it they can lump it.” This is the language of Wolfe Tone, of generous fairminded republicanism. Good man, Ned. At least we know where you stand on this. It is manifestly clear even to the party opposite that there is no Unionist consent to a unitary state and there will not be. If we get our unitary state about which we have heard so much in drum-like repetitions, it will be by coercion and it will mean a repetition of all the mistakes that have been made by the British in Northern Ireland in these past 60 years on a greater, more horrific scale and it will be a sure fire recipe for civil strife and instability. Yet what do we find? Fianna Fáil, louder, more insistently, mindlessly keep up their clamour for something which cannot be obtained at this time in our history.

The members of Fianna Fáil should be very clear about what they are doing. They are committing a great disservice to the decent, long suffering constitutional Nationalists of Northern Ireland, because on the one hand they rule out interim possibilities which could improve greatly the conditions under which those people live and which could be the basis for peace and reconciliation in Northern Ireland. That is more important than anything else at present. They are ruling out the possibility of better relations between the two parts of this island and between Ireland and Britain, they are doing it in the comfort of their republican recesses, and the further away the louder the voice.

On the other hand, by setting a target, the unitary state, which cannot be obtained by constitutional means in the foreseeable future, they are deliberately and inexorably strengthening the position of those who have ruled out constitutional means and see the only way forward through the bomb and the bullet. The consequence of their policy is to create a world of fantasy and make-believe within which the Unionists are threatened and the constitutional Nationalists isolated, and the logic of its failure is to strengthen the case of the Provisional IRA.

In recent times the voices opposite have become more strident and extreme, and one wonders how much of the reasonableness, the sanity and the decency of Jack Lynch's Northern policy remains or has he, too, with Deputy O'Malley and Senator Eoin Ryan, become a non-person consigned to some island limbo? It is a very long way from the patriotic and peaceful approach of Jack Lynch to the views of Deputy Ned O'Keeffe as reported in the Evening Herald of 8 October. According to Deputy O'Keeffe there is no difference between the Old IRA and Provisional IRA except that the Provisionals' guns are more sophisticated. Since then Deputy O'Keeffe has been promoted. His views have not been repudiated. They would have been in Jack Lynch's time.

By contrast with all this we can judge the approach of this Government. Our Minister for Foreign Affairs has won the confidence and respect of the Nationalist minority in Northern Ireland in a way that no Minister in the past has done. This is because he has spoken truthfully and honestly on their behalf. He has done so with courage and persistence, and most of all what he has had to say has been dictated solely and exclusively out of concern for the real interests of the Northern nationalist people and not in the interest of political expediency down here. The people of the North know that. They know that so far as the Minister for Foreign Affairs and this Government are concerned, their trust will be honoured. The approach of the Government and of the Taoiseach especially has been based fully and honestly on the analysis provided in the Forum report. Their one concern is to make progress towards structures. It does not matter what shape these structures take, whether they be federal, joint authority or otherwise so long as they provide clear and just government, so long as they are structures which bring full freedom to all the people of Northern Ireland and help towards peace and reconciliation. We in this party will work tirelessly towards that end. Neither short term political unpopularity nor loud braying from the Opposition will hinder us in that aim. I am proud of our Government's record of commitment on Northern Ireland. I am proud especially of their honesty, their courage and their realism. What is absent most of all from the opposition is any sense of realism in their politics on Northern Ireland. I defy any Deputy opposite to say that he is proud of his party's approach to Northern Ireland in terms of courage, realism or honesty.

Mr. M. Brennan

We can be proud of our achievements in Europe.

Dr. Woods

I have no hesitation in offering such a statement to Deputy Manning. I am very proud of our party and of our continuing policy on Northern Ireland. There is some element of hypocrisy in the Deputy coming here and making a statement like that. However I admire him for his courage. It is the policy of Fianna Fáil that has run through consistent and constant and on which the Nationalists in the North know they can rely continuously. I note that Deputy Manning did not say the Nationalists could rely on the Taoiseach. He said they could rely on the Minister for Foreign Affairs

Mr. Manning

I meant the Government.

Dr. Woods

I was tempted to intervene during the Deputy's speech also but I refrained from doing so.

I intend concentrating first on the whole matter of crime. There has been a tremendous upsurge in crime in recent times. A certain amount of fire brigade action has been taken to deal with this situation but I am calling here tonight for a comprehensive action programme to combat crime. Fire brigade action will not solve the present problem. As soon as one area is tackled the criminals shift their operations to a neighbouring community or county. There is some evidence that the overall level of crime is not increasing but the present unprecedent incidence of crime and vandalism is far too high. There were 103,000 recorded crimes in 1983.

The sense of security of citizens and particularly of the elderly has been shattered by recent events. The public need to know that there is an effective police force to protect them and they need to see that force on a regular basis within the community areas. Enough is known about the problem now for the Minister to ensure that an effective programme is undertaken by the Garda without delay. Some elements that I consider should be included in this programme are as follows: first, there is a duty on the Government to provide the manpower and restore overtime where this is required. Many Garda superintendents have been hamstrung by the Minister's across-the-board overtime cutbacks. It is time for the Minister to review that policy and to ensure that overtime is available in areas where it is greatly needed.

Secondly, the Minister should discard the ill-conceived rural rationalisation programme and instead maintain a Garda presence in rural districts. The traditional very low level of crime in rural areas was due to a strong sense of community and obvious presence of friendly and effective members of the Garda. Demands in the cities of a fire brigade nature must not be allowed to cause a reduction in the stability and security of rural areas. I pointed during the year to this danger. From the end of last year rural Deputies had been expressing their concern about the withdrawal of a police presence from some of the smaller rural areas on the basis of the rationalisation programme which was under way and also with the introduction of the little green man we talked about earlier. Sadly the chickens have come home to roost. The foolishness of this approach has been demonstrated clearly by the widespread panic experienced in country areas in the past week or two.

Thirdly, the Minister should accelerate the introduction of neighbourhood and community watch systems and reorganise the approach to policing in order to provide for community policing. This would involve more gardaí on the beat, intensive neighbourhood policing, police clinics at shopping centres and in blocks of flats and local community areas.

There are many steps that could be taken, and these should be taken now. We all know of areas throughout the community where such steps should be applied. It is time that management got on with that job.

Fourthly, I suggest the introduction of a crash training course in modern methods of community policing for senior Garda personnel. Knowledge and experience of these methods is now sufficient to allow for their adoption on a wide and uniform basis throughout the country. I meet many senior members of the Garda who are not aware of what has been happening. They are not aware of the pilot studies or of developments that have taken place in the past year. It is time for a uniform approach to be adopted in these matters so that methods which are proving successful in the areas in which they are being tried can be put into operation.

Fifthly, I suggest that gardaí be freed from routine duties so that they can do the job in the community for which they were trained. This can be done by way of management making other provisions for such matters as the collection of statistics and signing on for the dole. Garda stations could still be used in these matters but there is a need to make arrangements of a simpler nature to carry out the work. Management could make provision also to reduce the amount of time gardaí spend in the courts, for example, by introducing written statements where matters are agreed. That is possible now within the terms of the Bill we passed during the year. It is a change that should be implemented immediately because it would have a major effect. I have been given an indication that the saving in that area could be up to £10 million. This is the reality of putting some of these measures into operation. The ideas are there but they are not being put into practice.

Sixthly, I suggest that the Government's reduced target of 11,400 gardaí be abandoned and that instead the Fianna Fáil target of 12,000 be implemented. The Coalition's pledge on coming into Office was that Garda numbers would be in keeping with the Fianna Fáil plan but the shortfall as outlined in the national plan means that superintendents throughout the country are short of members to this extent.

My seventh point is that more civil servants be introduced to the Garda force to undertake routine administrative work within Garda stations. This is long overdue. It would free gardaí for Garda work and for in-service training programmes. There is a whole area of work assigned to the Garda which is not in keeping with their special training. These extra duties leave them with less time for the work they are trained to do and most prevents them from finding time for in-service training. At present civilians are not being replaced because of the embargo on recruitment in the Civil Service with the result that the Garda must bear an increased burden of typing and other duties.

My next suggestion is that the National Community Development Agency who were established with a £2.25 million budget in 1982 by Fianna Fáil and who were scuttled by the Coalition should be restored. This agency would promote a necessary community response which must accompany any new approach by the Garda. The importance of voluntary agencies was emphasised by the recent attacks on elderly people, as was the need for organised community support and involvement. We can do something about the level of crime. The fact that more gardaí were appointed is having an effect but a much greater effect is possible if the management is applied to the numbers of gardaí available at the moment and they are given an opportunity to get on with the job.

The Courts (Supplemental Provisions) (Amendment) Bill, 1984 introduced by the Minister for justice was put before us and it looked as if it was going to be pushed through at the end of the session. We were quite surprised at this Bill because it has some unusual features, one being that it has no explanatory memorandum. This Bill was introduced very quietly without a fanfare and without a memorandum. We made it quite clear that we will not agree to it being rushed through the House. It is a Bill that will need time for debate and very likely substantial amendments will be made to it. The introduction now of this Bill shows how out of touch with reality are the Government. It is being introduced when the public service are being asked to tighten their belts, when the unemployed are being asked to accept an extremely poor situation where their increases are less than inflation and they are not being given a double week this Christmas and when CIE and other workers have to accept paltry pensions. The Government have come along with these proposals to arrange for special pensions and benefits in addition to pensions. Already three trade union leaders have described the proposals as outrageous and scandalous.

I am opposed to the Minister taking power to confer benefits on members of the Judiciary without the normal requirement of coming before the House. By including a provision that it must be put before the House the Government are accepting the control of the House. The proposals being put forward by the Minister on behalf of the Government represent a serious erosion of the independence of the judiciary and will give rise to serious argument and debate. These regulations provide for the Minister to confer superannuation benefits. That relates not only to a superannuation scheme but also to a golden handshake or gratuity to any judge who voluntarily vacates his office after five years service. There is a provision for retrospection in the legislation. The legislation provides for the Minister to bring the regulations into effect on a date prior to the date on which they are made. The Bill also says that the regulations need only be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas after they are made. This Bill also deals with regulations for the Master of the High Court, the Taxation Master and the County Registrar. Those regulations all have to come before the House.

as soon as may be after it is made and, if a resolution annulling the regulations is passed by either such House within the next twenty-one days on which that House has sat after the regulation is laid before it, the regulation shall be annulled accordingly,

In other words as far as those officials are concerned the House will have control in that a regulation may be annulled if the House considers it necessary but as far as the judge is concerned there is no control. This is a very sinister development.

We have always supported an independent Judiciary. We have always been prepared to take any action regarded as necessary, in support of the Judiciary. This sort of arrangement must be clearly open and above board. This measure provides the potential for corruption. In the future the Minister could ask the judge carrying out an inquiry for a suitable report and say that he will arrange a handsome golden handshake. Under this legislation the Minister will have the power to make that arrangement and then to lay it on the table of the House and the House will have no opportunity to take action on it.

I should like to refer to some of the other questions involved here. We oppose the provisions giving increased pensions on voluntary retirement after five years in order to prevent the accumulation of pensions especially where the purpose of retirement is to take another post or employment, rather than on the grounds of age, ill-health or some other usual ground.

During the course of the year a great deal of time was spent on the Criminal Justice Bill. It was introduced in October 1983 and finally passed a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately, that Bill is now a toothless tiger. The powers the Minister said he wanted for the Garda, the powers which the Garda said they need so badly, are suspended. Why are they left in suspense? Because they must await the introduction of a complaints procedure and regulations for the safeguarding of persons while in custody.

At the beginning of the year and, indeed, back in October of last year, we told the Government there was an absolute need for a complaints procedure and for safeguards in conjunction with the Bill. If the Minister were sincere and really wanted to give the Garda the powers they say they need in present circumstances, he should have put the two measures before the House and let them be debated in parallel. It might have been easier for everyone, including the President, in looking at the Bill subsequently if they could see the safeguards in the Bill. However, that was not done. For whatever reason the Minister did not manage to do it during the year, notwithstanding the fact that we provided him with a complaints procedure fully worked out which he could add to or take from.

At the end of the year the Minister still has no complaints procedure. We provided him with a long list of safeguards which would suit the regulations. The net effect is that the Bill has gone through with the main powers suspended until the Minister can bring in his complaints procedure and regulations. This must be a disappointment for the Garda. It is a sad failure to achieve the objectives the Minister had in mind in presenting the Bill to the House.

Recently we had the report on the Mountjoy disturbance. I asked a question about it. Unfortunately these matters take a long time to come before the House unless they are taken for written reply. I regard the report as very disappointing, largely because the conclusion did not represent the body of the statements given throughout the report, and concentrated on one aspect only. This made me question the whole basis of the conclusion. The report provides valuable reading about what really happened in the disturbance in November 1983 and shows quite clearly that essentially it was an industrial relations problem which suffered from lack of attention by the Minister and the management. That is spelled out quite clearly in the report. It is not carried into the conclusion.

It is also quite clear that the inquiry would have benefited from oral clarification by the parties who made submissions. There was no oral clarification. There were written submissions only. I found that quite extraordinary. It highlights the fact that the prison governor went on leave on Wednesday 2 November, the same day as the new escorts were introduced. It points to the intervention of the Department of Justice at a critical stage on Saturday between 2 p.m. and 2.30 p.m. when they prevented the acting governor from explaining the Minister's withdrawal or suspension of the circular to the prison officers.

It also confirms that the Minister knew from Thursday about the industrial action but went away to his normal, routine engagements and constituency clinics. The conclusion was incomplete and unbalanced, given the facts established in the report itself. As a report it seems to be quite factual, but the conclusion does not relate to the report even as the report was presented. For anyone interested in what really happened, a reading of the full report is very valuable, but a reading of the conclusion would be quite misleading.

I was disappointed that in the inquiry which we eventually succeeded in getting into the Kerry babies case the Minister refused to include any recommendations. We welcome the establishment of the facts of the case, but we are very disappointed that the Minister has not required the judge who will conduct the inquiry to present his recommendations on the treatment of people in custody and the conduct of investigations which would have been particularly valuable. I find it hard to understand why the Minister excluded that specifically, especially when the last two major inquiries included that provision.

We have not time to go into many aspect of crime and justice. I should like to thank publicly the members of the Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism for their input and for their very valuable contribution which are clearly evident in the various reports. Five reports have now been presented and laid before the House. Another will be ready very shortly. I would like to thank the staff of the House who helped us with that task and the members from all sides who were also very helpful in the work of that committee. It has been very valuable.

I listened to the Tánaiste this morning. At page 3 of his speech he described his position very well when he said that all these lofty aims of jobs and health services, social welfare, education and other areas had to be accommodated in the context of the financial situation. If you ever want to know whether you are following the monetarist or the Thatcherite line there it is spelled out in the Tánaiste's statement. They have to be accommodated. There is no room for any policies of this nature. That is what is wrong at the moment. We are trying to accommodate everything within, we are not looking out and looking to the future. This is a bankrupt Government, a Government of poverty and hopelessness. Never have so many been unemployed, never was poverty so widespread, never has a Government had so little to offer because they are setting their targets so low in terms of the real potential and opportunities of this country. Added to that, this Government are being identified as the Government of patronage at a rate that has never been seen in the past. If you want to know, ask around the corridors and you will find that the level of patronage this Government is involved in far exceeds anything any Government were ever involved in in the past. We have seen the merit or lack of merit of this Government. The sooner the Government go back to the country the better. The people have no confidence in the Government. The Government must accept the fact that the people have no confidence in them. They cannot just cling on and let the country go down the tube. They should be manly and accept that the people of the country have no confidence in them. This is a bankrupt Government and, tragically for the young people and the unemployed, this presents a hopeless situation. I hope that in the new year we will see some improvement preferably by a change of Government and, if not, then by a change of policy on the part of this Government.

It is Christmas and I would like to wish the Ceann Comhairle and the staff of the House a Happy Christmas and every blessing in the New Year. To those we have opposed on the other side of the House during the year I would like to say that we are only doing our duty as we feel we have to do. There is never anything personal in the opposition we provide.

An Ceann Comhairle

I understand that Deputy Michael Bell and Deputy Michael Begley are dividing the next half hour.

Mr. Bell

I would like to join with Deputy Woods in wishing you and the staff a very Happy Christmas. Deputy Woods finished on a very nice note. It is a pity we do not have the spirit of Christmas more often in the House. It would appear to me, from the two years I have been here that the Opposition, whatever opposition they happen to be, spend most of the time promising everything and then when they get into Government spend most of the time giving reasons why they cannot deliver on the promises they made. I would suggest that is the reason why many people in the country are losing faith in the politicians and in politics generally, apart from the serious unemployment situation.

We talk about unemployment at this stage as if it were inevitable that unemployment will increase and yet we hear very little attempts being made to put forward positive policies that will help to deal effectively with that. The ICTU in its document Confronting the Jobs Crisis has made a very serious attempt to put on paper what they believe to be the way forward on the jobs front. It is ironical that the Fianna Fáil delegation that went to ICTU agreed entirely with the document. The ICTU are meeting various other political parties and it appears that so far everybody seems to be agreeing with the ICTU document. It will be very interesting to see how many parties make a serious attempt to apply the policies contained in that document.

In my own constituency and in the Border area generally we have lost thousands of jobs. The Minister for Finance and the Government made a small contribution recently by reducing the price of spirits, but beer, electrical goods and petrol are still at the higher levels of VAT and there remains a very substantial gap between the prices north and south. People continue to flood across the Border in their thousands. It is not possible, and it never will be possible, to man that Border effectively to curtail to any degree the level of smuggling that is taking place. In Newry recently and in other towns there were bomb threats, shootings, killings and explosions and still the people continue to flood in, coming even from Cork by bus, leaving Cork city at 6 o'clock in the morning. It is a crazy situation, and still the Government of the day cannot see, and indeed the previous Government could not see, where we are going in this regard. We talk about black holes. This is surely the biggest black hole of all time. There are millions of pounds per week going across the Border. It would be very interesting if the Minister for Finance would be prepared to reduce VAT on electrical goods and excise duty on beer and petrol even on a trial basis. There are thousands of jobs involved. There have been thousands of jobs lost and they can only be replaced if something positive is done about that. Everybody now realises this any yet we do not seem to be able to do anything about it. This what I cannot understand about politics.

I would like to refer to taxation and link that with public service pay. I cannot accept that there should be any interference in the negotiation procedures or the arbitration and conciliation machinery within the public service. It would be most unfortunate if we allowed ourselves to get into a confrontation situation with the public service, because if we do we will lose out and in my opinion the very basis of democracy will suffer on this one. We are heading in that direction. If we appoint arbitrators and have labour courts we should be prepared to accept their findings after reasonable discussion and negotiation.

The Government of the day have said "How can we pay these increases in public service pay?" The answer, I think, is that we can pay reasonable public service pay awards if we put in a much more effective taxation collection system to start with. We could pay reasonable public service pay awards had we a much more effective taxation collection system. At present there are outstanding millions of pounds in rates, health levies, car tax, even the collection of dog licences — which have dropped by something like 50 per cent — even the dogs are gone to the dogs as far as taxation is concerned. There are arrears of taxation on the part of the self-employed, the business community, companies in the industrial field, of hundreds of millions of pounds. We have a lengthy appeals system which, in some cases, can take a year to resolve, when taxation moneys due lie around virtually for years before they are effectively collected, by which time many companies will have gone out of business, have changed companies, or engaged in some form of tax dodge or other. Rarely are they ever pursued effectively. For example, how many people go to jail for avoiding tax? What types of fines are applied to offenders? There is the minimum of fines levelled on those found guilty. Yet if an itinerant woman went into a supermarket and stole a bag of goods she would probably get a month in jail while these people can get away with thousands of pounds and, in some cases not be fined at all. They are allowed lengthy periods in which to pay when they have deprived the Government of the day of moneys due to them.

I do not accept that the money is not there for the payment of public service pay increases. That argument is not sustainable. The level of staff in the various sections of the Revenue Commissioners dealing with tax collection has been restricted and is not effectively organised. Indeed the whole system of tax collection has gone out of control, is cumbersome and non-effective. The only people effectively taxed are those on the PAYE system where moneys are deducted on a weekly or monthly basis. Even then, in many cases, it may not be returned and the people who have paid that tax will not know until perhaps a year later that it has not been paid on their behalf. Others who are effectively taxed are those old people in receipt of old age pensions or small industrial pensions. They are taxed at source. Old men and women on small retirement pensions — who are few and far between — effectively are taxed on £15 a week pension which means that they are taxed on their old age or widow's pensions. That is the only place within the taxation system that tax deduction is effectively done. Of course the other section is the public sector because nobody there can ever get away with not paying tax. To maintain that it would cost X amount of money to fund a public service pay award is not correct. Whatever increase may follow the hearings at present taking place, it should be remembered that certainly 50 per cent of the balance will go back to the Exchequer in one form or another. Therefore it is not true to contend that if an award is to cost £100 million, that will be the effective outcome. Its probable outcome will be less than £25 million when one takes the total taxation system into consideration. I should hate to see the Government fall on that issue. But I would have to have it recorded that I and my Labour Party colleagues are very strong on that position. The Government, particularly the Cabinet, should think very carefully before saying no to an arbitration, Labour Court award or whatever within the State or semi-State sector.

Much bad medicine has been dealt us, a lot of it necessary, some unnecessary, but we now await the administration of some good medicine. What I have been advocating since I came into this House is the implementation of a national pay-related scheme. Although there was brief reference to it in the course of the debate on the national plan there has not been, as yet, any positive commitment on the part of the Government as to when it would be introduced or what form it would take. The Minister of State present deals with a very important sector of our community, the under-privileged, under her portfolio. I am satisfied that the implementation of such a national pay-related pension scheme would eliminate much of the poverty for people like widows and old age pensioners, particularly in the female sector, when women find they must live on pittances when their husbands die and they are left without any pension. It should be remembered that the vast majority of industrial and commercial workers have no pension scheme and must rely on the old age pension. I would ask the Minister of State to use whatever influence she can on her party colleagues in this respect. I shall do likewise with mine in order to get home the message that this should be one of the priorities of this Government's term of office.

I welcome the announcement by the Tánaiste that, after ten years, we shall have a National Development Corporation. That will not constitute the cure for all our economic ills but it will help in co-ordinating economic planning, hopefully placing the responsibility, particularly in relation to the job situation, in the hands of people with the expertise, skill and dynamism to get us out of this dreadful situation with regard to jobs. Time should be spent dealing with the subject of jobs in this House and in committees thereof, because all of the problems referred to by many Opposition spokesmen relate directly or indirectly to the jobs crisis. Had we less unemployment we would not have the same taxation problem, the same social welfare problem, we would be able to afford much of the social welfare legislation needed and to which this Government were committed in their joint programme.

I join Deputy Woods in wishing you, Sir, the compliments of the season and thanking your for your co-operation in the past year.

Mr. Begley

Usually adjournment debates are a sort of ritual dance but, on this occasion, that is not so because the credibility of the Opposition——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy has until three minutes past nine.

Mr. Begley

On this occasion it is the credibility of the Opposition that is at stake.

Some weeks ago we published our national plan for the next three years Building on Reality. The credibility of the main Opposition party becomes starker by the hour. One would have thought they would have learned a lesson from the squandermania of their 1977 manifesto — that this country was more or less Tír na nÓg and that under every rainbow there was to be found a pot of gold. It would appear that the Opposition Party learned nothing from history. Deputy Haughey took over the Fianna Fáil Party in December 1979. He made his famous television speech some time in January 1980 and, to paraphrase him, he more or less disowned Deputies O'Donoghue and Jack Lynch's manifesto, contending that the country could not go on as it was going, that belts must be tightened and the nation's finances put right. I wonder where that Deputy Haughey has gone? Shortly afterwards, in June 1981, there was a general election when the Coalition came to power and, in January 1982, went out of power because they put the country before the Government or parties. Then Fianna Fáil were elected to power and, in March 1982, they took over. We had then the sorry spectacle of a Government going down on their knees paying homage to Deputy Gregory. I wonder what would the late Eamon de Valera or Seán Lemass say were they still alive and knew what was happening. Deputy Gregory was going to get millions of pounds for the Dublin inner city area. The media never had it so good. Deputies Gregory and Haughey, in that order, were running the country, according to the media. RTE had them on every current affairs and pop programme. To top that we had Deputy Gene Fitzgerald, when Minister for Finance, presenting a budget which was so exact and correct that he had the money spent early in July, a remarkable achievement even by Cork standards.

We had a general election. Fianna Fáil lost. The Coalition parties had told the people beforehand that we had no gimmicks and no promises, that all we had was sincere government, putting the country first. One would have thought Fianna Fáil would have learned from that experience. They did not. Week in, week out since then they have had Private Members' motions here. Let us look at their programme of Private Members' motion, each one costing millions of pounds: 26.1.82, agricultural policy moved by Deputy Lenihan; 2.2.83, closure of a railway line, Deputy H. Byrne; 16.2.83, school transport services, Deputy H. Byrne; 23.2.83, Cork-Pembroke ferry service, Deputy Gene Fitzgerald; 9.3.83, price of petrol and oil products, Deputy Flynn; 23.3.83, farming development, Deputy Michael Noonan (Limerick West); 20.4.83, charges for job applications in the public service, Deputy Gene Fitzgerald; 4.5.83, fruit processing industry, Deputy Noonan again; 24.5.83, school transport, Deputy O'Rourke; 25.5.83, the construction industry, Deputy Molloy; 1.6.83, Verolme Cork Dockyard, Deputy Gene Fitzgerald; 29.6.83, closure of Tuam sugar factory, again Deputy Noonan; 9.11.83, maternity facilities at Bantry Hospital, Deputy O'Hanlon; 16.11.83, Clondalkin Paper Mills reopening, Deputy Lenihan; 1.2.84, general medical services, Deputy O'Hanlon; 4.4.84, Irish fishing industry; we then had a motion on Verolme Dockyard.

What did that cost? It did not end there. Last Monday Deputy Molloy said he would do away with the service charges with a stroke of the pen. When Deputy Ray Burke was Minister for the Environment he mooted the service charges at a county managers' meeting in Kilkenny.

Mr. Cowen

The county managers have the power now. They run the counties.

Mr. Begley

Mr. Hyland

It was £100 million.

Mr. Begley

Let us hope there is nothing more sinster than that in it, because that is a country not very famous for recognising democracy. It is more famous for undermining democracies.

Mr. Cowen

What about the £40 million lost in Brussels through the milk super-levy?

Mr. Begley

Deputy Cowen is a decent man. I have only three minutes left and I wish everyone here a happy Christmas. I should like to take this opportunity to appeal to the Fianna Fáil Party, with all the sincerity I can command, to respect the democratic institutions of the State, to do away with the gimmicks, to forget the promises to every Tom, Dick and Harry who is looking for something, to restore credibility in politicians by telling the people what is in the kitty. If they do that the people outside the House will have respect for the democratic system.

An Ceann Comhairle

I understand that Deputies Hyland and Séamus Brennan are sharing the time alloted for the next speaker.

Mr. Hyland

Deputies contributing to the debate from all sides will be conscious of the very serious economic difficulties facing the nation. Indeed, there are some who will say that this is not a time for political point scoring, although the Tánaiste's contribution this morning was laden with political overtones and lacked any type of real positive input. In fact, he used political tactics for the purpose of disguising his failure and that of his Government to introduce a worth-while economic development programme in the last two years. I was present for that speech and I was present later for the contribution of the Minister for Finance, who treated us to one of his eloquent lectures in economic theory, emphasising the word theory. In his own way he made a better case against himself than I could. He must now acknowledge that his economic theories have failed. It is obvious that after two years he is unable to distinguish between theory and practice. It was interesting to hear his academic lecture, but it is sad to record his performance in his efforts to implement those theoretical practices.

After two years in office we are fairly entitled to put the Government on trial. The House, on behalf of the people, is entitled to analyse their performance and deliver the verdict that the people would deliver if given an opportunity. It is expecting too much from Government Deputies to ask them to join in pronouncing the only verdict the House can credibly give on Government performance. That verdict, inevitably, would have to be one of guilty. The Government are guilty of failing to discharge their duty, guilty of misleading the people into thinking that somehow or other a Coalition of Fine Gael and Labour has some magic formula for dealing with the country's economic ills. They sold that idea under a false guise which they called credibility. That veil of credibility has long since vanished and the people who wore it have been exposed as they try to explain the reasons for their failures in the last two years.

Government is about managing the economic affairs of the nation. It is about developing our resources for the purpose of creating employment. It is about providing for the socially deprived in society and about providing adequate protection and security for our citizens, especially the elderly. Government is also about furthering the cause of our aspirations to see a peaceful and united Ireland. How has this administration fared under those headings? After two years it would not be unfair or unkind to suggest that the self-styled Government of national reconstruction has turned out to be a Government of national destruction buried in the debris of their own making which, tragically, is reflected in the growing level of unemployment, factory closures and a depressed agricultural industry.

Members will agree that there is a total undermining of public confidence leading to a lack of investment. People who would normally invest in our economy run scared from the threat of a penal tax system and the fear of a liquidator if they run into the slightest economic difficulty. We had the national embarrassment arising from the recent Summit which, tragically, was exposed to the nation on our television screens. Members of the Government have been pathetic in their performance individually. Collectively they have been a disaster and are a threat to the future economic development of the nation. They should take note immediately of what is happening around them, have the courage to admit their failure and leave it to the people to decide their future.

A few hours ago I heard the Minister for Finance say that the House on two occasions by a majority vote had endorsed the national plan. If the Minister takes satisfaction from the political achievement I do not begrudge him that pleasure.

Mr. O'Toole

That is democracy.

Mr. Hyland

It is democracy, but the ultimate in democracy is the opportunity people have to express their view in the ballot box in a general election. I have no doubt what the people would say about the Government if they were given that opportunity. Even at this late stage the Government must have got the message that government is not simply an economic exercise in accountancy but rather a technique in management which calls for judgement, vision and a belief in our future. The Government lack vision and hope. Their failure to recognise the plight of the victims of their maladministration is frightening to many people. The Minister for Finance informed us tonight that he took great pleasure from his administration in the last two years. Was it pleasure in seeing 216,000 people unemployed, pleasure in seeing education fees increased, pleasure at presiding over the removal of food subsidies, pleasure at encouraging and bringing about an economic position that forced factories to close their doors, pleasure at the cutback in the health services which at this time finds many of our hospitals totally under-staffed and incapable of providing the level of services needed, or pleasure at watching the liquidation day after day of our many industries large and small? That is the Administration which the Minister for Finance, Deputy Dukes, told us he took great pleasure in presiding over.

Politics is the art of the possible, but this Government have made it the art of the impossible because they have failed to reach any objective or target they set themselves. The fact is that the Taoiseach and his Cabinet have lost the confidence of the people, and expecially the young people who at the last election were prepared to give them a chance. Now these young people know to their grief that this Government are planning for unemployment rather than creating jobs for those very talented young people.

I regret that my time is limited, but in the few minutes left I would like to refer to a few specific areas of economic development, in particular agriculture. The outcome of Ireland's negotiations on the milk super-levy was a total disaster. No recognition was given of the fact that this country had not developed agriculturally to the same level as our European competitors. We heard the Agricultural Institute predict tonight that farm incomes would decline in 1985 as a direct result of the imposition of the milk super-levy. What can one say about the Government's disgraceful performance in relation to the calculations of the 1983 milk output for Ireland? That miscalculation, on top of the imposition of the super-levy, will cost Irish farmers and workers in the agri-business many millions of pounds.

Reference was made to the Libyan negotiations which were so successfully conducted by the leader of this party when the present Minister for Agriculture was unable to negotiate on behalf of this nation. What situation would we be in if, following the disastrous super-levy negotiations, we were faced with the closing of the only viable agricultural enterprise left, that is, our livestock exports?

I would like to have time to talk about the disadvantaged areas. When we left Government the Minister of State, the late Deputy Cowan, charged with responsibility for disadvantaged areas, had advanced that cause as far as possible, but we now find from the information coming from Brussels that there is no application on record to have any area of this country designated as severely disadvantaged. If we wanted any evidence of this Government's commitment to the disadvantaged areas one need only examine the Estimates and one will see that no provision has been made in 1985 for any area of this country to be included in the disadvantaged areas scheme.

I regret my time is limited, but I am anxious to share it with my colleague, Deputy Brennan.

Mr. S. Brennan

I thank Deputy Hyland for sharing his time with me. Nineteen eighty-four was the year of opportunity. The international rate of growth in the world at large was very exciting. We held the Presidency of the EC and we engaged in the New Ireland Forum. At the end of 1984 it is time to take stock and ask ourselves if we used these opportunities to deal with the real cancer in our society today, that is, unemployment. We are almost half way through the decade and the House will agree that the challenges which face this country are greater than they have been for many decades and on the basis of the policies as I see them, they will grow more acute unless there is a radical shift in policies.

I want to refer to the Programme for Government published in 1982. It said that the unemployment situation with 170,000 unemployed, 50,000 under 25 years of age, required firm and decisive action. Of course it did. The latest figures are 218,500, an increase of 50,000 since the Government took office, 66,000 are under the age of 25, an increase of 16,000 in two years, and 84,000 people have been unemployed for more than one year. The consequences of this are very hard to describe. They are disillusionment, emigration and poverty.

A section of the community not often discussed, because it is not fashionable to do so, is the new middle class poor. Information available to me from banking institutions indicates a serious level of white collar poverty which is endemic in Irish society. Many of my constituents are suffering from this problem. The Society of Saint Vincent de Paul are helping people to pay mortgages. They did not do that five or ten years ago. Families I know had to sell their cars and their houses. That might not sound like poverty but it is a dangerous undermining of society. I would like to draw the attention of the House to that type of poverty which is creeping into Irish society. Most of these middle class families are in enforced indebtedness which, unfortunately, the taxation system makes it very difficult for them to start paying off. It is a vicious circle. Most middle class homes today wake up with the dread of an envelope in the hallway from the Bank of Ireland, AIB or some other bank asking them to come and see the manager because of their overdraft. The difficulties experienced by middle class families are frightening, but never before were they brought to the attention of Dáil Éireann in this very specific way. There is, of course, a greater poverty which we have to discuss often in the House. We must ask ourselves whether we are better off than we were two or even ten years ago. More importantly, we must ask ourselves in what direction we go to get out of it.

There is no point at this stage in rambling and ranting about the difficulties facing us. We must put them in perspective and get the country back on the rails. The Commission on Taxation pointed out that our taxation system is muddled, complicated and inefficient and anybody looking at the system objectively would have to agree. The number of people paying above the standard rate today is now 40 per cent. A decade ago only 1 per cent paid above the standard rate. In Britain, 5 per cent. pay above the standard rate which is much the same as here. A major area of new policies must be in the taxation area to get it back into line and to sort out the complicated system. I have called many times for taxation reform to be introduced on a time-table basis.

Since the PRSI system was introduced in full in 1979, the maximum employers' contribution has increased by 68 per cent in real terms. The maximum employees' contribution has increased by 140 per cent in real terms. Those figures, added to the taxation figures, add up to a frightening taxation regime. It is not just the responsibility of this or previous Governments. We are facing great difficulties, and the politicians will not be thanked by this or succeeding generations if we do not get our act together.

The Minister for Finance holds the reins of power and the people will decide whether that should be changed. He has the honour of trying to come to grips with the problem and to stem the tide, because if it is not tackled in the next five years there will be little left to fight about in Dáil Éireann as there will be a decreasing barrel of wealth and jobs, increasing emigration and disillusionment, more white collar poverty and a general abandonment of the objectives we are trying to achieve. We look to employers to create jobs, but what employer is interested in paying £1,000 per annum in tax on the average industrial wage of £7,000 or £8,000? It means that an employer with 100 people in his factory would have to pay £100,000 in PRSI. He would be crazy to open a factory under those conditions as, before he opened his doors, he would have to pay out £100,000. What kind of policy in this? What kind of country is it? What kind of madness makes the Government tax jobs so highly? A much smarter approach would be to tax the employer less for every employee he takes on rather than the other way around. I cannot see the sense of continuing this measure. Between the contributions of employer and employee, PRSI accounts for 21 per cent of all salaries before allowances are deducted. Any attempt to understand the system must start by looking at PRSI under a magnifying glass. We must tackle the problem creatively, and the Minister for Finance should take his courage in both hands and slash that contribution. He would get it back, because we are paying £12 million every week in unemployment assistance. If the contributions were halved, I bet my bottom dollar that the Minister would benefit. The alternative is disastrous, and it is not enough to say that the Department of Finance need cash flow. That is not the correct approach.

I am disappointed in the national plan because it does not provide a basis for turning the constraints which face us into challenges and opportunities. Does the Minister know that foreign indebtedness in December 1982 was £5 billion? Twelve months later, it was £7 billion and 12 months later again it was £8 billion. That does not take into account the reports of the semi-State bodies which put a further £2 billion on those figures. Our external debt is now 70 per cent of GNP. In 1979 it was 22 per cent. Is anybody listening to these figures? Does anybody know or care about the mess we are in or about the heritage which we are handing on to our children? Every politician in this House should admit honestly and openly that our nation is facing difficulties, and they should produce realistic proposals to solve the problems.

I have called for tax reform. In a speech in Cork in September 1984, the Tánaiste said that tax reform, especially reducing the burden of tax carried by workers on full PAYE, is a major priority of the Government and that any national, economic and social plan which fails to address inadequacies in the tax system is not worth the paper it is written on. If he meant that the plan is not worth the paper it is written on because it does not include tax reform, I agree with him.

I wanted to put forward proposals in regard to specific measures, but I do not have much time left. We must reform the taxation system and realise that we cannot continue to have public spending at 65 per cent of GNP when in 1970 it was 30 per cent of GNP. It is about 40 per cent in the UK and in the USA it is about 30 per cent. We must also sort out the semi-State companies to make sure that they are the creators of wealth and not consumers of wealth. Their debt has risen from £1.5 billion to £4.5 billion in five years. Let us settle the Central Bank dispute by using section 18 of the Industrial Relations Act which is available if the Government choose to use it. We should realise that we can fight among ourselves but the country must earn its keep and the only way to do that is by earning revenue abroad. We have less than one quarter of 1 per cent of all the world markets at present. If we offered incentives to our companies and young people we could double that figure, which would transform the country. When we talk about equality, I do not mean the kind of equality that makes us equally poor but that which gives people incentives and initiative and shows them that they can make money in this country and provide employment for themselves.

Let us concentrate on new companies, small companies, service industries and realise that most of the jobs that have been created in the United States and in England in the past few years have been created in such small companies with less than 100 employees each. Let us sort out and make efficient the institution of Dáil Éireann, about which we have been talking for a long time. To take it to the end of this century, this country needs a modern, professional, efficient Legislature. We have not really got down to that yet. We are still operating the old system.

Minister for Fisheries and Forestry (Mr. O'Toole)

First, this kind of debate offers the opportunity to us all to air our views and to take stock of what has gone on over the past year — in our case over the past two years since we came into Government. I must compliment Deputy Séamus Brennan on being his usual constructive self. He is a man who does not throw stones or lay blame unless he is sure as to where the stone should be thrown or the blame should be laid. He has given us in 15 minutes a very comprehensive view of the difficulties facing us. He has also given us, albeit in a very truncated form, the philosophy necessary to get us out of these difficulties. I wish we could hear more of these speeches and that we all together could see to it that we get ourselves out of our present problems.

I cannot help but think of something which I read last week about a survey carried out in the United States concerning the second four years of the Reagan régime. In the survey, many people expressed a pessimism and a degree of worry. What 70 per cent of them did was express the view that it was time for practical patriotism, that they must hang together and co-operate in getting their country back on the rails. What is needed here is something along the same lines— practical patriotism, and I am not talking about flag waving. I am talking about a common sense approach. Criticism when it is necessary, but let that criticism be constructive.

We have published a plan which is a national plan. It has been voted on in this House and through this House by a majority. As I told Deputy Hyland, that is the system under which we operate, that is democracy. In that economic plan, whether we like to admit it or not, is the road back to economic recovery. It charts the way forward for our people. It charts the road to economic independence. We were going down that slope of economic dependence which, if continued, would lead to other people in other places deciding our destiny. They would decide for us where to spend, where to cut and whom to cut. That is what we must avoid at all costs. At that stage we have lost both our economic independence and our independence to act in the way in which we want to act and in which our people wish us to act.

The plan has been criticised for its lack of optimism. It has been said that the targets were set too low. In many cases such criticism springs from lack of understanding of the depths of the problems that face us. In as much as that is the case, I would accept that type of criticism emanating from that kind of source as being sincere, albeit made in ignorance. However, I must say that the criticism emanating from some of the benches opposite, from the very day on which this plan came to light, falls into a somewhat different category. It cannot be said to be rooted in ignorance. To me, it is opposing for the sake of opposition. It is malicious, it is misleading and absolutely irresponsible. This plan, despite the fact that it has been voted on in this House and passed, has been waved aside as being irrelevant, as meaning nothing. Yet I stand here as a member of a Government and say that it is a plan to which we must look for our economic salvation over the next three years. At least, credit must be given to us that we have had the courage to take this problem by the scruff of the neck and put on paper details of expenditure and allocation in the different subheads in all Departments over the next three years. In that plan we have put down these figures, we have set targets that we feel in the present circumstances are realistic and achievable.

The criticism emanating from some of the Fianna Fáil benches, and in particular from their front bench, is made without mention of an alternative. There is no plan on the far side of the House. Do I assume therefore that the plan, or alternative, to which they point, is The Way Forward? If it is, that should be said. It should be admitted by the people who make those criticisms. If it is The Way Forward, it must also be said that some questions should be raised in relation to that document, because when we assumed office two years ago we had a unique opportunity to scrutinise that plan, to examine its proposals and its financial provisions. We found that, while there were laudable elements within that plan and while there were political and economic decisions put down on paper, there was a serious shortfall in the financial provisions that should have been made to coincide with the political decisions in that plan. I shudder to think what would have happened if Fianna Fáil had been asked to implement that plan, as they said they would. Where was the shortfall to come from? There was no provision made for that shortfall, which was well in excess of £100 million.

We in Government have to deal with reality. We have set targets which are realistic and which we hope we can achieve. We must live in a real world, not in an airy, fairy world. We must make policy decisions that have a price tag. We must provide for the money to pay that price. We must know from where and when the necessary funds are to come. We cannot indulge in ephemeral fancies, in promises or financial somersaults such as we have seen only in the past week — indeed, a series of them — when Fianna Fáil got their tails up in the media and we have found the arrogance breaking through in the form of demands for immediate relief in the taxation burden. The following day we had a proposal to abolish water charges and restructure local authorities, implying that restructuring would bring about adequate financial resources. We have seen the acceptance of public service pay demands. We have heard demands to repeal, revoke and reject policies and decisions made by the Government without a shred of evidence as to where the money to meet these promises is to come from.

Earlier today the Tánaiste calculated roughly and conservatively that Fianna Fáil to date have promised in excess of £500 million extra in expenditure without any concrete proposals as to where the money is to come from. While all these promises are being made, day after day as a Government we are dragged in here and criticised for cutbacks in public expenditure. It does not take any degree of economic expertise to know that if you call for reliefs for the taxpayer and at the same time call for extra expenditure there is something radically wrong. Such a proposal does not work, and we have had experience of how it does not work. We inherited an economic quagmire and the ripples of that quagmire are still lapping on our economic shores.

How, for example, do Fianna Fáil view the attitude of the public at present? Their estimation of the public's intelligence must be very low. They are insulting the public's intelligence by the way they are dishing out this erroneous false economic theory day in day out. I am quite sure the people will not fall for that again.

Deputy Brennan made the point that we were severely burdened by our tax regime. Of course we are, and in the past year every Minister has, at some time or other, made a public statement to the effect that direct and indirect taxation is much too high. It is a disincentive to job creation, and Deputy Brennan is quite right in stating that. He is also quite right to state that today we have a new poor. We all know of people who five years ago would not fall into the category of needing help from agencies who give alms. The reason we have that position is that we found an economic morass two years ago and there is a price to be paid for applying the brakes. If we did not apply them the only people we could look to to keep going would be the same people we say today are overburdened, and that is the taxpayer. We may borrow money, but if we do that the loan must be serviced and again we have to go back to the taxpayer to service it either by direct input through increased personal taxation or indirect input by increased customs and excise duties or VAT or by increased PRSI contributions. These are the only sources known to us.

We have been living beyond our means. That has become a cliché. In a famous television speech made at the beginning of his period as Taoiseach, Deputy Haughey made the very same statement. People felt he was telling the truth and expected him to take appropriate action. What happened? No effort was made by him or the Government to apply the brakes and avoid the situation we find ourselves in today. As everyone knows, we must apply the brakes gently or we will find ourselves thrown through the windscreen. In order to avoid a sudden deflation we applied the brakes gently, but even that is a painful exercise.

The approach by the Government to seek financial rectitude has been described as an approach which is cold, lacks compassion and is monetarist. Various other adjectives have been applied also. If anyone can tell me how to give painlessly the kind of medicine that needs to be given I would very glad to talk to that person.

Deputy Hyland asserted that we were indulging in magic formulae. That is a new allegation. The one thing we cannot be accused of is dealing in magic formulae. There is no such thing. We have repeatedly stated that but there are still people in the House who through their utterances would seem to suggest that there are magic formulae and easy and soft options and that if we wait long enough money will fall off the trees. It is as if we can get £500 million by a wave of the hand. That is the kind of irresponsible, irrelevant utterance we hear from many on the far side of the House. We are not dealing in magic formulae but in reality.

We should not dwell on the reasons for our present difficulties except to remind people that there are good reasons for the actions we must take. It would be remiss of me if I did not, as I have done very briefly, outline the reasons for the line we are taking now. It gives us no pleasure to do this. However, we are saying that we have now produced a plan and I see no reason why it should not be implemented because the assumptions on which it is based we feel are sound assumptions and the only reason for not implementing this plan and reaching these targets would be if the whole world economy turned upside down — and I do not think that that will happen. The assumptions made are reasonable and are based on sound advice which in turn is based on the retrospective ideas of people who have seen this kind of thing happen previously.

We have a tax regime which is a great burden on our economy and on our people. Deputy Brennan is quite right in stating that the semi-State bodies should be creators of wealth and not consumers of wealth, yet we have a howl of derision in the House at the whole idea of Government looking askance at any semi-State body, or indeed any body in which the State has any shareholding, when we have doubts about their performance. Let me say that I was involved in this House and dragged in here over a period of a few months——

Mr. P. Gallagher

It is the expert talking.

Mr. O'Toole

——last year in relation to a certain company in which the State had in excess of a 60 per cent holding and the Government decided in that case to wind up that company. We succeeded very quickly in having that company replaced. That new company is now viable and operating successfully in the market place without any State subsidy whatever apart from the normal capital grants available to any company in this country producing a commodity. That is the kind of company we need, a company prepared to go out and get its markets and prove its viability in the market place. The day has long gone when the taxpayer should be asked to prop up companies whose performance leaves much to be desired and whose attitude in many cases is one of total contempt for the very people who provide the life-blood of that company, the taxpayers. Until these companies realise that they are there to create wealth and not consume it some of them will fall by the wayside, and I do not think anybody should make an apology for saying that.

I would like to deal briefly with a few matters in relation to my own Departments. Regarding forestry, let me say that I have seen in the two years I have been in office one million cubic meters of timber sold in 1983 producing £9.9 million income to the coffers of the State. This year so far up to mid-November I have seen 906,000 cubic meters sold at £12.1 million. That is a 20 per cent increase in value terms over last year. Now we have two pulpwood using facilities in this country to which we have committed the vast bulk of our pulpwood, and I would hope that these will go from strength to strength. There are signs that they will provide the kind of utilisation of our pulpwood that is needed badly, that is by adding value to it and exporting the final product.

We have been engaged in developing our forests, and in relation to that I have seen £1.5 million spent in 1983 in roadworks through forests and £1.3 million spent this year up to last month for the same purpose. We feel the need to provide the infrastructure for developing industry where we will have doubled our output of timber by the end of this decade, and that is only six years away.

We must prepare now for it, and that is being done.

In relation to fisheries, I have seen exports for example, open to Egypt both last year and this year, and exports this year open to Nigeria and, through the efforts of the Minister of State, exports of herring to Poland. These are achievements in the face of very severe competition from other countries whose fisheries have been seen to be developed far beyond ours. I have seen the value of exports rise. In 1981 we exported to the value of £54 million. In 1983 that increased to the value of £84 million, which is the latest figure I have. That is an increase of over 50 per cent in value terms of our fish exports.

Maidir leis an nGaeltacht tá áthas orm go raibh an Teach seo sásta glacadh leis an tairiscint go gcuirfí coiste Oireachtais ar bun le leathnú a dhéanamh ar úsáid na Gaeilge sa Teach seo agus sa Seanad. Bhí díospóireacht an-mhaith sa Seanad i rith na bliana agus sa Dáil cúpla mí ó shin. Maidin inné aontaíodh an tairiscint agus tá súil agam go mbeidh an coiste á bhunú roimh an Nollaig. Tá a lán le déanamh agus is é an fáth go bhfuil an coiste seo á bhunú ná, tá súil agam, go dtabharfaidh sé dea-shampla do mhuintir na tíre. Ceann de na gearáin atá le cloisteáil ar fud na tíre nuair atá tú ag iarraidh ar dhaoine níos mó Gaeilge a labhairt ná go ndeireann siad "Cen fáth nach bhfuil sibh féin ag labhairt na Gaeilge; sibhse na daoine a thugann dea-shampla; sibhse na daoine a bhíonn sna páipéir chuile lá agus is sibhse na daoine atá in ann dea-shampla a thabhairt agus í a labhairt sa Dáil agus sa Seanad." Tá sé sin ina áit, agus tá me cinnte go mbeidh tacaíocht le fáil ó chuile thaobh den Teach i ngeall ar an chomhchoiste seo a bhunú.

D'fhógraigh mé an tseachtain seo caite go mbeadh breis airgid le fáil i mbliana do mhná tí a choinníonn páistí a théann go dtí an Ghaeltacht le Gaeilge a fhoghlaim. Seo scéim eile atá á coinneáil ar siúl ag an Roinn, mar ceapann siad go bhfuil an-tairbhe ag baint leis an scéim seo toisc go gcuireann sé labhairt na Gaeilge ar chumas páistí óga nach bhfuil an Ghaeilge acu ach mar ábhar scoile. Feiceann siad don chéad uair Gaeilge á úsáid mar theanga teaghlaigh i gnáth shaoil an duine ó mhaidin go hoíche. Tá sé seo le feiceáil ag na gasúir agus na cailíní seo a théann go dtí an Ghaeltacht agus spreagann sé iad agus tugann sé tuiscint nua dóibh ar an Ghaeilge mar theanga agus úsáid na teanga sin sa ghnáth shaoil. Ardaíodh an t-airgead atá ag dul do na mná tí sa scéim sin.

Chomh maith leis sin rinneadh athbhreithniú ar na comharchumainn a bhí i dtrioblóid i rith na bliana agus chuir mé os cionn £30,000 ar fáil le cuidiú leis na comharchumainn a bhí i dtrioblóid. Faoin am seo tá súil agam go bhfuil ceacht foghlamtha ag cuid acu. Cuireadh coiste ar bun. Chuaigh siad i gcomhairle leis na comharchumainn agus leis na bainisteoirí ansin agus leis na comhaltaí. Cuireadh moltaí os a gcomhair agus ghlac siad leo.

Debate adjourned.

Dáil Éireann díospóireacht - Thursday, 13 Dec 1984