Cosgrave, William T.Tuesday, 3 November 1925 |
Dáil Éireann Debate
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CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - INTRODUCTION OF SCHOOL ATTENDANCE BILL.
It is hoped to introduce a Bill dealing with school attendance on or about the 24th November.
I recollect having given that assurance, but circumstances, over which neither the Deputy nor myself had any control, make it necessary to give no further undertaking than that it is hoped to introduc...
Yes, I think I can give you that guarantee.
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - PRICE OF BREAD.
The Department of Industry and Commerce is enquiring into the facts bearing on the present retail price of bread, and the Minister for Industry and Commerce will consider the situation immediately on ...
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - DISCUSSION ON EDUCATION ESTIMATES.
The Estimates of the Department of Education will be brought forward for discussion on Tuesday next on the return of the Minister for Education from London, where he now is. It had been arranged that...
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - IMPORTATION OF LOCOMOTIVE PARTS.
I am informed by the Great Southern Railways Company that they have been able to acquire on very favourable terms locomotive parts which are being assembled at Inchicore. No completed locomotives ha...
I would like to get notice of that question.
I am informed by the Great Southern Railways Company that the value of the engine parts, etc., mentioned by the Deputy, is £34,000. It would require legislation to prevent the Company importing goods...
That is a matter of which I am not aware.
I think the Deputy had better put down a question, and I will undertake to have it answered.
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - RAILWAYS SUPERANNUATION FUND.
I am informed by the Great Southern and Western Railway Company that they are at present engaged on the preparation of a scheme for a Superannuation Fund as required by Section 57 of the Railways Act,...
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - ARMY PENSION CLAIM (KILDARE).
It is longer than 12 months. It is probably 18 months ago.
No. As I understand there were quite a large number of questions which arose out of the matter. There were various explanations given as to the cause of the delay. It can be quite conceived that a m...
This particular scheme has been under consideration since January, and the previous scheme, the amending Bill to the Wounds Pensions Act, has been under consideration for 18 months.
I intervened because I was Minister for Defence at the time, and gave the original undertaking.
I will say that no undue delay will take place, but I cannot undertake to give the precise date.
Yes, and if this Bill were introduced then there would probably be 40,000 claims lodged against the State. The State is not liable morally or otherwise in respect of those 40,000 claims. We are and ...
They suffer only to the extent of delay in having their cases heard and determined. In the matter of the delay, I would say that it is necessary in the interests of the State.
No, but the whole question is being carefully examined.
There has been no undue delay and I would like to repeat that there has been no undue delay. If the Deputy were himself the Executive Council, he would have to explain to the Dáil the very same causes...
CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. - ACCEPTANCE OF IRISH IN PREFERENCE TO FOREIGN TENDERS.
I hope the Deputy does that.
But do you succeed?
I think I could put a case to the Deputy in which as a matter of fact he has not succeeded in doing it.
ORDER OF BUSINESS.
I propose to take to-day items Nos. 2, 3 and 4 on the Order Paper. We do not propose to take item No. 1 (Electricity Supply (Special Powers) Bill, 1925 — Committee). That will be set down for the fir...
If any discussion were to arise that would have to be carried over, it would mean moving the adjournment until to-morrow. But in the ordinary way of setting out business we are not in a position to g...
Not if it arose out of the ordinary business of the House or of the Government, but in the circumstances, being one of the matters concerned with the implementation of the Treaty, it is on a different...
No. I am making a statement; the work is nearing completion — it must necessarily be nearing completion — and I was just saying that the House should extend some consideration to the Minister, having...
The Whips have not made any application to me. If they had done so I would have been able to give them a considerable amount of information. In the absence of the Minister for Industry and Commerce,...
I am prepared to take that this evening, at any time. I said, and I have been informed, that it could be more satisfactorily dealt with if the Minister for Industry and Commerce was present, but I am...
I have stated that I am prepared to deal with it if the Deputy wishes.
That is a matter on which my own judgment must be permitted to guide me. As I said, I am prepared to deal with the matter if the Deputy wishes to raise it. At the same time, I have been told that it...
Certainly.
Yes.
When we are finished with item No. 4 on the Orders of the Day. Order No. 1 discharged, to be taken on Wednesday, November 11th.
SHANNON ELECTRIFICATION SCHEME. - MOTION BY DEPUTY JOHNSON.
I travelled more of Ireland than the Deputy did.
All my life.
I have seldom listened to more contradictory statements than those which have been made here this evening. We have been told that there is bankruptcy, depression, deplorable conditions, and so on, an...
Very good. We have the facts from the Deputy — bankruptcy and profiteering. Which are we to blind ourselves to?
The quibbling, I suggest, comes from the Deputy. The Deputy comes from a district in which agricultural labourers are employed. What the wages are that are paid to agricultural labourers in the distr...
I submit that it is up to the Deputy or the Party he represents to make a case. They have not made a case yet. One statement was made as to the wages that should be paid there. It is the first time...
Is it to set out and see in what way we can get an interpretation of what would be a decent livelihood for a man and his family? Make up the price of cigarettes, make up what is to be sent home, make ...
I do not know what the relevancy is in connection with that particular interjection. The canteen arrangements were inaugurated in order to facilitate the workmen and the contractors, and so that ther...
The Deputy discussed the canteen arrangement and, as Deputy Johnson criticised it, I presume that I am entitled to mention it also. I did not interrupt Deputy Johnson. I made one single interruption...
I presume that I am entitled to keep the flag of my country as high as I can. Was I to say that we were faced with bankruptcy, that we had profiteering, and that the people were discontented because ...
I can tell the Deputy that I have seen harder work done on the Continent for less wages than is done in this country.
Theirs is, I believe, an older civilisation than ours. Let us come back to this matter. In the first place, a certain wage has got to be fixed. That will be admitted. Is it to be fixed in relation ...
That is a case then that might reasonably be put to the Ministry of Industry and Commerce if that be the case.
Let us examine the case of the road workers. They are living away from their work and their wages are from 35/- to 36/- a week. That is the wage paid in this neighbourhood. They, I understand, are ...
The Government have done nothing of the sort. They have examined the rates of wages, as between the employers and the employed in that area, and they have submitted these figures, and until a week o...
The contractors fixed the wages after consultation.
We got the information that I have stated concerning the rate of wages paid in the different districts.
I should like to correct that. I should have said that they were fixed by the contractor after he got this particular information. I understood that Deputy Morrissey stated that the Government fixed...
Do I understand that what the Deputy wants is the information about 26/- per week being the standard rate in certain districts? Is that the information he requires?
I do not know whether that information was verbal, or whether it was put in writing; but if it is available I will undertake to have it placed upon the Table.
Yes. It is not, I think, up to this point a case in which the Government should interfere where public works are being carried out. It is a case of the normal working of supply and demand. I unders...
For work in the rural areas.
We are at cross-purposes, I am afraid.
Yes, workers to the number of 6,000 have applied.
I can give the Deputy the details. On the first day fourteen hundred applied, in the second week sixteen hundred, and since that a balance of two thousand one hundred, or three thousand have applied.
To this extent only, that it is alleged it is an unfair wage and a sweating wage, and that men cannot be got at this starvation wage, and when we compare it with the rates paid in the area surrounding...
I suppose he is not. Supposing I accepted what the Deputy says, the position I have to face is that the people from Donegal and the people from Ardnacrusha and its neighbourhood have applied for thi...
We did not often ask for it, and if we did we had very good ground for asking for it, and as far as that is concerned, we were all in the same boat with regard to sacrifice. No one made more sacrifice...
Who are going to pay the high wages — the men earning 25/- and 26/- a week and the men who have broken time on a wage of 35/- or 36/- a week? Are they the people we are to salt for this — bankrupt fa...
The Deputy said that bankruptcy was facing us all through the country. I took his statement as a most depressing one, and if he corrects it now, I shall be very glad——
I am very glad to hear that. I do not want to score any debating points against the Deputy. Nobody reads these depressing statements with more disgust or concern than I do. I am sure the Deputy nev...
My own impression about the most discreditable thing is the noise about this matter and the fact that we are going to be faced with opposition although on the facts of the case there is a good case fo...
I suppose the Deputy will not say that the railways are in a prosperous condition at the present time.
Mention another.
I can give the Deputy more information on that.
No; that is not my information. My information is that they are prepared to see the union in question, but they reserve the right to see, also, the representatives of other unions.
I did not answer that question because it was involved in the other question that agricultural labourers were paid a lower rate than this rate offered. I did not go into the question whether or not t...
The Deputy will admit that that question is a poser.
I made a distinction between the city and the county.
I made a distinction and left out the city.
Are these workers paid for broken time?
Do I take it that the Deputy says that rates paid in Leix and Offaly are higher than those for the Shannon work, and that there is no deduction for broken time through causes such as bad weather?
Supposing X is the wage in Leix and Offaly, and a worker is one day short in the week, does he get 5/6ths of the week's wages?
That is not the point. If he is not at work because of a wet day is he paid?
It is not clear to me.
The pay of a private in the Army is 2/6 a day.
The pay of a private soldier joining the Army and not getting into any grade is 2/6. It is not fair to compare the higher grade in one case with the lower grade in another case. For instance, it mig...
I would like to subject that to examination.
If the Deputy is comparing something that transpired 12 months ago with what is the practice to-day it is a totally different matter. It is apparently meant to score and to get in something that is ou...
I cannot accept the figures. I admit that the Deputy puts them in good faith.
SHANNON ELECTRIFICATION SCHEME. - ADJOURNMENT OF THE DÁIL.
I move that the Dáil adjourn until Wednesday, November 11th.
I suggest that that question should be put to the Minister for Industry and Commerce when he returns. An opportunity would be afforded to have the matter discussed some day next week. That would mea...
I do not think it would be possible to give time next week. I would consider the matter for the following week if the Deputy would repeat the question.
I think they will not lose in their importance or in the manner of dealing with them by remaining over for another week.
I observe, with great pleasure, that there is great unanimity in the part of the Farmers' Party here.
I would be much impressed if I discovered the same unanimity amongst the members of a larger party in this House. I have heard with great sympathy that the Farmers' Party has made arrangements for se...
Yes, I believe so, but I believe that anxiety will not reach any greater degree of temperature within the next week. Question put.
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