On that question I should like to make a few remarks on the Bill as we now find it. I do not wish to detain the House very long and, more particularly, I do not wish to detain the Minister, who had a very trying and difficult morning and who had to take very great pains to be here at three o'clock for the beginning of the Fourth Stage of this Bill. Perhaps I should say for my own part, and I am sure it is the desire of everyone in the House that I should say it, that we appreciate the fact that the Minister went to such trouble to keep his appointment with us here to-day.
With regard to the Bill, it has been discussed for three days in the Seanad and now leaves us exactly as it came to us. It has not been changed by a word, a comma or a full stop. It is a Bill which is not, as the Minister has frequently stated, standard practice. It is a Bill which involves a completely new principle. It is quite different from a Bill with regard to Bord na Móna for the extraction of turf for public purposes or a Bill for the making of electricity for public purposes. It introduces a new principle whereby assistance is given, through a board, to private enterprise in particular areas in the country. In order to assist that private enterprise, enormous power, which has never before been entrusted to any board except for completely public purposes, is given to An Foras Tionscal. Now, that is not standard practice. It is a completely new practice. We are giving enormous powers to a board to assist private enterprise. I know that we are assisting private enterprise in the hope that public good will result, but that, I think, might be said about any assistance given to private enterprise, not only in these areas but in any other area.
Now, in spite of that, it has to be said that we here gave this Bill a very fair reception. It was argued in the other House with some vehemence that the Bill was, in the main, a political device. There is no doubt that, if one were to lay one's mind to it, considerable arguments could be found to support that view, but as far as we are concerned in this House we welcomed the Bill. We took a reasonable view of it—we took the Minister's view of it—and we discussed it in a calm and, we thought, a helpful fashion. As I have said, it is a Bill which involves a completely new principle. It contains, as the Minister himself pointed out, sections from the Electricity Supply Bills, and the Bills dealing with Bord na Móna. They are in it in their entirety.
The Minister's line throughout was that the Bill contained standard provisions which could not be altered. He has taken power to add areas and to make Orders, but he omits from the Bill the standard provision which makes these Orders amenable to the two Houses and makes it possible for either House to annual an Order. The Minister's argument, therefore, amounts to this, that, for certain purposes, the Bill is a standard Bill, but for other purposes, when it suits the Minister, the Bill is not a standard Bill at all. He is like a fellow playing pitch and toss with a penny with two heads on it or two harps; whichever way the penny comes down, the Minister wins.
It is quite clear from the Minister's statement on the Second Stage that he regards this Bill as something very much in the nature of an experiment. His own desire is to play the Bill down as much as possible. It is also clear that the Bill was hastily drafted. Any Bill which is drafted by the process of putting one's hand up to a shelf and picking out a section from another Act and planting it in this Bill is, on the face of it, hastily and far from perfectly drafted. That being so, considerable efforts were made by way of amendments on the Second Stage to improve the Bill, not from a political point of view and not in an endeavour to cramp, confine or crab, so to speak, the Minister, but in order to improve the Bill so that it might the better accomplish the purpose the Minister has in mind.
Despite all these amendments and despite the manner in which they were discussed, the Minister has consistently refused even to consider putting in any of these amendments in any degree, shape or form whatsoever. Despite the admitted difficulties and complexities of the Bill, not one single amendment to it was put down by those who support the Minister. In spite of their desire to assist him and their combined wisdom—perhaps I should say their separate and combined wisdom— not one of them was able to suggest a single amendment which might improve the Bill. In fact, one Senator on the opposite side declared with horror in his voice that not only did he not support a particular amendment but he did not want to amend the Bill in any way. He seemed to regard the idea that he should be taken as wanting to amend this Bill in any way as a grievous political sin.
The Minister had several differing views about this Bill. The measure sets up a board which is to be independent. The truth is, as all of us who have been accustomed to this kind of legislation know, that no matter what one says in debate or what one provides in a Bill, a board appointed by a Minister is never entirely independent. That is one of the problems always inherent in legislation of this kind, not only here but in Great Britain and elsewhere.
We had this problem debated at some length in the Dáil as far back as 1925 when the Electricity Supply Board was started. The question was raised then as to how its operations could be discussed in the Dáil. That problem has not yet been solved. That problem has never been solved in England. It is a difficult problem to solve anywhere. Despite all the protestations to the contrary, there is no such thing as an independent board appointed by a Minister and supplied with public funds.
Again, the Minister with his two-headed penny, had it both ways. Sometimes the Minister's action was of no importance whatsoever because the board was independent; at other times he sought to give all kinds of assurances to the House and to the country as to what the board would or would not do. He was sure, for example, that the board would be reasonable. He was sure the board would not do this; he was sure the board would not do that.
It should be remembered by Senators who are passing this Bill without amendment that this is not a Bill to confer power upon the present Minister for Industry and Commerce. This is a Bill which will go on the Statute Book and confer powers not only on this Government and this Minister for Industry and Commerce, but on successive Governments and other Ministers for Industry and Commerce. It is from that angle and not from the point of view of what we think of this particular Minister or the promises and assurances that he gives, that this particular piece of legislation should be considered. I feel it is quite wrong that we should have in this Bill all these powers, as originally framed and intended for boards carrying out public policy, for a board which will exercise such powers on behalf of private persons who, as the Minister very clearly indicated, will be promoting industries for their own profit.
I do not object to profit. Far from it. This Bill confers all these powers on a board which will exercise them for the purpose of helping private enterprise. Not only will the Minister give them these powers, but he has been quite adamant in not accepting any amendments. He does not like amendments. He does not like lawyers. He does not like courts.
I think he very often does not like Senators. At any rate, he does not like Senators as a body and, in particular, he does not like them when they propose amendments. His reason for not accepting amendments is simply because he does not want to bring this Bill back to the Dáil under any circumstances.
I suggest that, having spent three days discussing this measure in a spirit of co-operation and having failed to make any impression on the Minister, the Minister having behind him a majority prepared to support him in all circumstances without discussion, we are doing a very bad day's work. There is a fantastic, complicated and illusory system of election to this House.
