I accept that, and I am here to make their case and defend them. Deputy Sheehan is one of the few speakers who showed an understanding of the real implications of the Bill. The Bill in its present form will mark the deathknell of one of the oldest traditions in Dublin city, the tradition of Molly Malone, the street trader. While those who support the Bill will argue that it is designed to regulate the large scale trader in profitable merchandise, its immediate effect will be to crush the weak and vulnerable street traders, the women with their stalls and prams, particularly in Dublin city, who sell fruit and vegetables, cheap jewellery, newspapers and other items with very low profit margins.
If this Bill made even the slightest attempt to differentiate between the traditional stallholder/street trader and the big operators, it might have some sense of fair play and validity. The fact that there is no distinction in this regard makes the Bill a most oppressive measure which will have serious social consequences for the hardest working sections of some of the poorest communities in the State, particularly in the inner city areas of Dublin. If the Bill becomes law, many of the most decent people struggling to supplement inadequate social welfare payments will be driven into a poverty trap. The media reports on the Bill already caused great distress, particularly to elderly women, widows and pensioners who firmly believe that it will force them out of a traditional way of life handed down to them by their mothers and grandmothers. The Moore Street stallholders, the heart of street trading in Dublin, believe it will destroy the long-standing selling of fruit and vegetables and will result in their street being taken over by a more profitable high-tech, business dominated activity.
Last Christmas Arnott's senior management attempted to displace the traditional Christmas street sellers in Henry Street. The big city stores have tried for years to get rid of the Christmas street traders and, having failed, they attempted to take over the street and expand their operations onto the footpath in an unashamed and outrageous manner, unconcerned with the effects on the families they displaced, who have depended on Christmas street trading for years to supplement very low incomes. Big stores failed on that occasion due to the efforts of a small group of city councillors, including myself. On several occasions the affluent businesses in Grafton Street tried to get rid of the few women flower sellers there. This Bill is part of that strategy. It serves the interests of big business in Dublin city and completely ignores the rights and social circumstances of those families and individuals who eke out a living on the streets of Dublin.
One of the principal provisions in the Bill is that before a trader can obtain or renew a street trader's licence a tax clearance certificate must be produced. The elderly women in Moore Street who spent their lives dealing in pennies and shillings, running up and down to the markets, are in no position to keep accounts, invoices and receipts, not to talk of employing accountants. This is simply not practical for most women stallholders and street traders. It is bureaucratic ineptitude and is out of touch with the realities of trying to earn a living selling cabbages or apples from a stall on the side of the street.
The Minister said that the Department of Finance will make suitable arrangements to ensure that no casual trader is refused a tax clearance certificate, but are the Minister's assurances worth the paper they are written on? I very much doubt it. The Bill, once enacted, will oblige the unfortunate street trader to do precisely the same as the other categories who require tax clearance certificates to obtain licences. When I contacted the Revenue Commissioners I was told that the only categories so obliged are publicans, restaurant owners, petrol-fuel suppliers, road haulage contractors and bookies, big, profitable businesses who employ accountants and other professional services. The Minister is proposing to force women in Moore Street who sell sprouts to do the same.
This Bill is a farce. There can be no comparison between lucrative business operations and casual street traders and stallholders. The Bill is seriously flawed because it does not attempt to differentiate between large scale traders and traditional stallholders, who are worlds apart. This Bill will drive the poorer street trader who sells low cost perishable goods out of business. How many times have Members argued that workers on very low incomes have little or no incentive to stay at work, that they are better off on social welfare? This Bill will send out the message that one is better off doing nothing than trying to supplement one's income from street trading. The people of Moore Street are not saying they will not pay their fair share; they are saying they want to be left as they are, that they have already put more into the economy than they will ever get out of it. The Government should tax the rich, the property speculators, the big financial companies and big farmers. Instead, it gives tax incentives and tax amnesties to the rich and greedy in society and is attempting to strangle the poor with excessive, draconian measures such as this Bill.
I am not saying the Minister is behind this measure — I do not know whether he is — I am saying he should withdraw, defer or amend the Bill to prevent what I have referred to from happening. There is no doubt that big business has been campaigning for this measure for many years, but it is surely an outrage and a great shame that it is the Labour Party, in coalition with Fianna Fáil, who is bringing in this measure at the behest of a wealthy business class. I appeal to the Minister not to put this Bill to a vote but to withdraw it, or at least adjourn further consideration of it until it can be reintroduced in a more acceptable form.
Street traders, many of whom voted for the Labour Party in the last general election, were not even paid the courtesy of being consulted when the Bill was being drafted. Instead they were met by the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, Deputy Quinn, and told their fate, whether or not they liked it. It is significant that in his lengthy introductory speech the Minister never once referred to his visit to Moore Street.
I understand that the Minister for Finance met Moore Street stallholders early this morning but the Casual Traders' Association of Ireland was not consulted when the Bill was being drafted, despite assurances from the Department of Enterprise and Employment that its views would be taken into account. The association points out that the Bill goes too far in providing that a casual trader can only work after obtaining a tax clearance certificate. What other sections of workers are denied the right to work in this manner? Contrast this with the tax amnesties for the very wealthy who have defrauded the State for years.
The provision that the local authority must report the names and addresses of the holders of casual trading licences to the Department of Social Welfare is tantamount to casting a slur on hard working people. The implication of this provision is clear: it amounts to placing these traders under suspicion until such time as they prove they are innocent. Farmers who receive grants and special payments are not simiarly investigated prior to payment. Will the Minister outline the other categories of licence holders to which this requirement applies?
Contrast this with the reply of the Minister for Justice to Parliamentary Question No. 109 of 8 February 1994 in which I asked if there was liaison between her Department, the Department of Social Welfare and the Revenue Commissioners regarding known drug dealers who are purchasing houses, new cars and other such items while continuing to claim social welfare benefits. The Minister replied that all information given to the Garda or which comes to its notice during the course of a criminal investigation is confidential and that a conviction is a matter of public record to which all State agencies have access. The position is clear — there is no obligation to report the activities of a convicted drug pusher to the Department of Social Welfare; his record is available should the Department wish to investigate him. Under this Bill the names and addresses of street traders must be reported to the Department of Social Welfare. If that does not show a farcical element in the Bill I do not know what does.
Street trading in Dublin city is a way of life. Elderly widows and pensioners are now living in fear that if they help out at a stall for a few hours, as they have since they were children, they will lose their entitlements. The Bill is causing unnecessary distress to these people. Its measures are seriously discriminatory, could be unconstitutinal and will kill a way of life. The Labour Party will have been instrumental in destroying the most traditional lifestyle of the working class people of Dublin city.
Furthermore draconian provisions are directed against those victims of the 1980 Casual Trading Act who, even though they have licences from the Department of Enterprise and Employment, are deemed to be illegal because they have no designated trading spots and are, therefore, refused permits by the local authority. These people, mainly women, who have spent their lives working as casual street traders were excluded under the 1980 Act because they were not organised and were unaware of the implications of the Act; they were ignored and denied designated spots from which to trade.
In Dublin the illegal street trader is usually a woman who has sold goods on the street for decades and who is refused a trading pitch because big businesses in the city do not want stallholders operating on the streets. When Dublin Corporation and the city council attempted to designate pitches, the city centre business organisation orchestrated campaigns against them. When the corporation refused to be intimidated in designating Cole's Lane off Henry Street, big businesses appealed the democratic decision of the city council before the courts. After a delay of several years, the courts upheld the corporation's proposals. As a result, a dozen or so elderly women now have a refuge from the police vans and Store Street Garda Station.
The Bill is a further product of the influence of big business on Fianna Fáil and the Labour Party. It is shameful that a Labour Minister should do the dirty work of the business class and bully the poorest of our people off the streets of their city, which will be the effect of this Bill. In a city where drug pushers sell drugs openly and unhindered on the streets, it is appallingly unjust that women who sell apples and flowers, including the red roses associated with the Labour Party, should be bundled into Garda vans, have their flowers scattered in the gutter and be humiliated in Garda stations, the District Court and Mountjoy prison. It is little wonder that the drug problem and the level of crime in Dublin is out of control.
If this degrading humiliation was not enough the Minister has proposed new initiatives which will further humiliate Dublin women street traders. Section 13 (1), (2) and (3) provides that the flowers and produce of street traders can be confiscated by gardaí and only those traders who can afford to pay for the costs of confiscation, transport to the Garda station and administration can have their flowers returned to them. Traders who cannot afford to pay these costs will lose their livelihoods for the following few days. Who cares about this? Such is the reality behind the Bill.
Under section 15 (1) (a) and (b) a street trader who is brought to court can be fined from £1,000 to £10,000 and £500 a day thereafter and-or six months imprisonment for following in the tradition of her family and forebears. I am sure we will be told that these are maximum fines which will not apply to flower sellers. That is what we were told about the maximum fine of £500 under the 1980 Act, yet it was applied to flower sellers. When flower sellers could not afford to pay this fine they were sent to Mountjoy Prison. The same will happen under this Bill.
These fines are far more severe than the fines imposed for the possession of drugs. Under the Misuse of Drugs Act, 1984, the maximum fine on summary conviction for a first offence is £300 while the maximum fine on conviction on indictment is £1,000 while under this Bill the maximum fine which can ge imposed on a street trader is £10,000 or, on summary conviction, £1,000.
The Minister has seen fit to retain the harshest aspect of the 1980 Act under which a person who sells apples, etc. without a permit can be denied a licence for five years. This provision is so harsh that its constitutionality was challenged in the Supreme Court. It is noteworthy that when Dublin Corporation finally got the permission of the courts to designate Cole's Lane for street trading it was unable to allocate spaces, as established elderly women traders, whom corporation officals knew were most entitled to the spaces, all had convictions for illegal street trading. The corporation waited a number of years before allocating the spaces to ensure that the most deserving and longest serving women traders could occupy the spaces.
Under this harsh measure a woman trader who has paid two fines of £5 — the judge may have been in a good mood — will be effectively denied her livelihood for a further five years. If any thought had been put into this measure it might have been amended so that a licence would be withheld for one or two years in cases where two or more maximum fines had been applied. I am not necessarily advocating such an amendment as once people are convicted and fined a further penalty should not be imposed.
The only just way to regulate casual trading in Dublin city is to assess the number of genuine traditional street traders and provide a small number of trading pitches on each shopping street to cater for them. This could be done, but it would require the good will of the business community in particular. The Minister should tell the business community that this problem must be resolved and that it cannot be resolved by driving women off the streets of this city into prison, which seems to be the intention in this Bill. If the Minister is prepared to set this Bill aside he could obtain the agreement of members of the business community in the city and resolve this problem amicably once and for all.
The tax clearance certificate requirement for traders such as the stall holders in Moore Street must be abolished. It is simply farcical to expect women to change their lifestyles in that manner. It would be of considerable help in alleviating poverty in the city and would remove any need for the appalling waste of Garda resources whose manpower and time is spent out of all proportion on this activity. It is a public scandal that Garda resources are wasted on chasing women and bundling them into vans for selling apples and flowers when we have such a serious crime problem in Dublin city. It is on this problem that the bulk of Garda resources from Store Street Garda Station and other city centre Garda stations is spent. Legal pitches could be provided for the genuine traditional street trader and would be far more effective in eliminating illegal trading than the draconian measures in this Bill.
I appeal to the Minister to reconsider the implications of this Bill and to consult the various interests involved, the stall holders, the so-called "illegal" street traders, traditional women who are as entitled to a pitch as anybody else, and the business people who have attempted for so long to destroy the livelihood of these women, to come up with a solution to the serious problem confronting women street traders, before proceeding with any new casual trading Bill.
