I move:
That the Seanad is of opinion that the Executive Council should take all practicable steps to foster the development of home industries through a co-ordinated policy of inter-Commonwealth trade.
As this matter is one which is beyond Party, I want to be as impartial as the animal that proved so venerated and sacred during the late disturbances, that is the Irish bull. I do not claim this veneration but I claim that this is more than a Party matter and beyond Party. Hitherto it has been thought that Great Britain could not retaliate on us for any sentiments or opinions held in this country because she could not tax her own food, but already that position is completely altered. Not alone will the food be taxed but there is in Great Britain already one of the most astounding co-operative mergers that has ever existed in any part of the world, that is to say, the Home and Colonial, the Maypole Dairy, the Meadow Dairy and Lipton's. Immense grocery distributing organisations have been merged in one. That is of such importance that not alone can it make a market for a country but it can always by reaction control the price of the produce in that country, somewhat in the same way as Armour was able to control the price of cattle in the Argentine through being a monopolist and the sole avenue towards a market. The proposed synthesis of the Commonwealth in England or this co-operative store in which the British market is about to be cornered has been interpreted by some people to be an onslaught on our tariff wall, an attempt to break down the advantage we have by being able to tax and to raise a tariff against goods for the protection of the resources of this country. But it is no such thing as an onslaught on our tariff wall. It is rather an invitation and an opportunity for us to increase the tariff, and to protect our market; in other words, although it may seem ludicrous, even to protect the British Empire, because there are certain countries sending many millions of foodstuffs into this country and taking practically nothing from us. For instance, the Argentine has put all our farmers in the position of competing with a prairie. It sends annually into Ireland about 2½ millions worth of produce and takes £22,000 out of the country in produce. Half of that is from Cork, from Ford's. Ford, excellent though he may be as a wage payer, is, after all, a magnificent but itinerant tinker. He is not a native product of Ireland and Cork quite possibly could be left in the position Belfast was left in, if Ford took his folding factory and went away, because I believe it is in sections and could go out any moment. We therefore see the market that she has. She sends in wheat, barley, maize and other things into this country. If we impose a tax as insuperable as the United States has put against Europe, against Argentine products, we would be then in a position whereby the surplus Canadian wheat could be dealt with and taken advantage of by this country because it is very plain to people that the writing is on the wall.
England is about to tax its food. It has been proved that countries where corn is protected have a cheaper loaf than the countries where free trade is in practice. While England had a sea trade—in other words, while it had a monopoly of the carrying trade of the oceans— it was possible to have free trade. In other words, it took its tariffs on the sea. It has no longer that monopoly. It will be very advantageous to it to trade with the ends of the earth—with New Zealand and Australia—provided the produce sent into the British market is carried in British bottoms. I need not go into the monopoly the ships have. Already they are spending a million on the advertising of the produce of New Zealand and Australia, and I must say, also, of Ireland. It is being done very impartially, but Britain is about, not so much to tax food, as to select the sources of food, and very possibly when these sources are linked up there will be no appreciable increase in food, just as in France and Germany there is no appreciable increase in bread. To us, who have practically the sole market in Great Britain, this is of more importance than to any other country in the world, because there is a very great prize offered to us, who have practically the monopoly of the fresh meat trade of Great Britain. I need not bore you with figures, but these are the prices and values of exports from Ireland into Great Britain:—Poultry, £850,000; eggs, £3,000,000; butter, £4,000,000; cattle, £13,500,000; sheep and lambs, £1,400,000; pigs, £2,000,000; pig products, that is, bacon, £4,000,000. That is about £30,000,000. Do we send to any other country anything equivalent to that? Of course, we do not. But on the other hand, we are taking in, with no compensatory business to this country, many things which are rivals to our chief market. If it came about that at this next Conference, of which statements have been made by responsible British Ministers that they intend to bring the whole question up, we were, in return for our co-operation, no longer to compete with or to have as our competitors Holland, Denmark, or the Argentine, that would be a prize which would be absolutely without parallel.
The future of the country would be endowed in such a way that we cannot imagine what prosperity would accrue, because as long as we are to have a market the less competition in that market the better, Apparently it is an axiom that that is desirable. If our Ministers go to the Imperial Conference with a view to getting every advantage they can out of the Imperial connection one thing that is necessary for doing that is really a matter of sentiment. It is a matter of acknowledging more frankly than at present people seem to do that Imperial connection. You cannot sell a man a bullock and give him a black eye at the same time. Though some of our extremists who have furthest removed themselves from reality have told the farmers of Ireland many things—many fairy tales —there is one thing that no political party dare tell the farmer, and that is to forbid him to sell his produce to the British Empire. Whether you call the Irish market England or the British Empire matters nothing. It is merely a matter of a source of wealth, and to benefit by the getting of a monopoly in this market means helping our home products. There are many other ways in which farmers have been helped in countries where farming was at a disadvantage —freight reduction and other ways— but I think the first way to help the farmer is to arrange that the British Empire take off the stranglehold over transport. At present there is great dissatisfaction with this method of transport, which is practically a monopoly, and in return for one monopoly we ought to get another one. I think we are paying a sufficient price to deserve a monopoly against Holland and Denmark in the British meat trade.
It has been an extraordinary problem to me why England has not raised its own poultry and eggs. That is the one vulnerable part of our trade in which competition could hit us. Land is got so cheap around London, and de-rating has given such advantages to the farmers that poultry, chicken and egg farms are quite easy to run. Already around Essex, where these small poultry farmers have co-operative transport, a very large proportion of the daily egg supply of London has been captured as against China, Denmark and Russia. In the last two or three years, on account of the Minister for Agriculture's excellent rules, this country has made astonishing progress in the markets around Manchester and Leeds for poultry, eggs and butter. Butter is one of our most important products, and the butter and egg trade is naturally dependent, to some extent, on facilities for transport. I think the only return at present we are asked to make is fully to realise the opportunity which we may gain and to be frank enough to alter the sentiment towards our customer.
I have very little more to say in the matter. Statistics are not necessary. Anyone can get them. I will only confuse myself and the House if I give you any more. The chief advantage to be got out of the British connection is this British monopoly for our oxen. After that follows the other produce. If this picture were to confront us it would not be very comforting; that is, if Belfast were in the co-operative store of nations, or whatever we like to call it, and we were left out. It would then restore itself to the position which it has hitherto nourished Upon. We would be, with a complete turnstile on our produce, at the mercy of a little corner of the country. All that can be altered, I think, by an alteration in the sentiment. Instead of this being misinterpreted as an insidious attempt to lower the tariffs which we so hardly won, it can be interpreted, I submit, as an opportunity to increase, to the exclusion of all non-productive clients of ours, our produce, and to concentrate on what is, as far as anybody can see, on account of our geographical position and the fact that the Continent feeds itself, our only source of wealth.