Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 28 Nov 1940

Vol. 81 No. 6

Committee on Finance. - Means Test for Unemployment Assistance—Motion.

Mr. Hickey

I move:—

That, in view of the great hardship inflicted on applicants for unemployment assistance in receipt of small pensions attributable to military service or superannuation from trade union funds by the rigidity of the existing means test, this House requests the Government to submit to it proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week possessed by an applicant otherwise qualified to receive unemployment assistance.

I hope that while we are discussing this motion we will have our minds free from all thoughts of parties, political or otherwise. I am trying to put before the Minister some of the many reasons for doing something in this matter. I may mention there are three classes of applicants for unemployment assistance that I have in mind: Men who are in receipt of pensions from the Irish Government; men who are in receipt of military pensions from the British Government or from the American Army or Navy, as the case may be, and men who are in receipt of superannuation allowance from their different trades unions. I want to say that, first of all, I am dealing with our own people who are in receipt of small pensions, and I have in mind men who have families of six, seven and eight children, and I have in mind one or two men who have even as many as ten children.The maximum amount that they receive from unemployment assistance is 23/-, that is, for the cities, and 14/- for the country towns. Some of those men have got pensions varying from 8/- to anything up to 12/- or 13/-. For the first 1/- out of that 8/-, 10/- or 13/-, as the case may be, that he has, there is 1/- not counted. The remaining amount is deducted from his unemployment benefit. We have also the cases of men in receipt of pensions from the British Government, and we have one or two men in my own city who have a pension from the American Government.They are rather small pensions, but since they have got them they have married and settled down in life and have families. I know of cases where men have been offered 1/- a week and they have refused to continue signing at the labour exchange for it.

There is a double disadvantage. There is such a thing as work on relief schemes throughout the year, and when men are recruited from the labour exchange the men who are drawing the greatest amount from the labour exchange are the men who are employed. You will find that the man who may have eight or nine children, who has 8/- or 9/- pension from this State or the British Government, is only drawing 10/- or 12/- from the labour exchange, and you will find that he is never considered for employment because he is not drawing the big amount, up to 23/-, from the unemployment assistance fund. Then we have the very regrettable position—it is somewhat different to the others—of the man who is in receipt of superannuation from his trade union, superannuation for which he has paid dearly, having contributed possibly over a period of 30 or 35 years. When he reaches 60 years of age he is superannuated, not being considered fit for active participation in the labour market. If he is in receipt of 6/- or 10/- from his organisation, that amount is deducted from the benefit he will receive through the labour exchange.

I hope in the discussion of this matter that no Deputy will regard it from the point of view of taking any political advantage from it. These cases that we are setting out to remedy are very exceptional cases. Last year there was brought to my notice the case of a man in Dublin who took part in the fight for freedom in 1916, who was, in fact, engaged in the attack on Dublin Castle. That man had a big family but they settled down eventually and then he and his wife were left together. He was receiving 13/6 by way of unemployment assistance. He was then awarded a pension. This necessitated a visit to the labour exchange and there he discovered that all he would be entitled to get in the way of assistance, by reason of the pension award, was 6d. a week. That is actually on the records of the labour exchange. That man never went to the trouble of collecting the 6d. a week.

I have in mind a number of cases in the Cork area where men became entitled to unemployment assistance of only 2/- a week by reason of the fact that the pensions they had been awarded for military service were taken into consideration in the course of the means test. I should like to quote one other case. It is the case of a man with ten children. He was in receipt of a pension of 12/- a week from the British Government and he is drawing 11/- from the labour exchange in Cork. The labour exchange officials have instructions that, when they are sending men out on relief schemes, the men drawing the greatest amount of unemployment assistance are to be sent out first. The man in this case is not given an opportunity of doing work on relief schemes until all the others on the list are employed.

One could quote many cases pointing to the disadvantages in the case of men of that type when the means test is applied. I could instance cases from Midleton, Fermoy and Mallow where individuals have pensions of 12/-, 13/- and 14/- a week from the British Government.They are not registered in the labour exchange because they find that no purpose is served by registering.They are not entitled to be sent out on relief schemes when they are not drawing unemployment assistance.

We have this fact to bear in mind, that the benefit itself is rather meagre, altogether inadequate at a time like the present. People find that the food that could be bought for 23/- six or seven years ago could not be bought to-day for 40/-. We really believe that where men are in receipt of pensions, granted to them for what they did in the fight for the freedom of this country, there should not be a means test applied and it is with a view to getting agreement on that that we have mentioned the sum of 20/-. If we are prepared to give money towards military defence we should also be prepared to help the men who have done so much to bring about freedom in this country and we can help them materially by relieving them of this means test. I hope every Deputy, irrespective of Party, will give this motion the support that it so richly deserves.

Mr. Hurley

I formally second the motion. Deputy Hickey has explained its purposes very clearly. Nobody can claim that even the maximum amount which is allowed under the Unemployment Assistance Act is sufficient for a man with a wife and five children. The amount in the cities is 23/- and outside the cities it is only 14/-. That meagre sum is supposed to keep a man and his wife and five children in good health. Nobody can say that at the present time such a sum is in any way adequate. Definitely there is hardship inflicted on people who are in receipt of pensions attributable to military service or superannuation from trade union funds when these pensions are taken into account in the means test. Taking such pensions into account really amounts to a process of levelling down instead of levelling up.

It may be argued that the means test applies all round, but I think a case can be made for the people who are entitled to pensions in Éire, given by the Irish Government, or British pensions.There are some very pathetic cases among the Irishmen who have done their part in the fight for the freedom of this country. Unfortunately, many of them find themselves denied the right of employment, the right to support their wives and families. Surely such men are entitled to some consideration for the service they have rendered the country. It is a curious anomaly that in the cases where pensions have been awarded for military service, the amount of the pension is taken into account when the means test is applied. Surely that pension should be looked upon as a tribute from the nation, as something untouchable so far as any calculation in regard to means is concerned. I have heard of cases of very severe hardship caused by the means test. As Deputy Hickey pointed out, it is a double-edged weapon, because it also deprives the recipient of a pension of any chance of getting employment on relief works, which are a pretty common feature of our whole social structure.

I think this motion is very opportune because, together with the increasing cost of living, the question of tackling the amount given for unemployment assistance must engage the attention of the Government. Nobody can say that the maximum amounts of 23/- and 14/- for the cities and the rural areas, which have been in operation under this Act for a number of years, are adequate. They were regarded, I maintain, as bearing some relation to the cost of living at that time, but they do not in any way bear any relation to the cost of living now. There is no denying that fact.

While this may not strictly be in accordance with the terms of the motion, I should like to draw the Government's attention to the fact that the whole position of people who are receiving unemployment assistance must be reviewed in the light of existing circumstances. I think one of the first things that could be done, and it should not cause any great difficulty to the Government, is that people who have deservedly become entitled to pensions should not have such pensions taken into account when they are in the unfortunate position of having to receive unemployment assistance.

The terms of the motion are very modest. It stipulates an amount of 20/- which should not be taken into account in the means test. I think that is reasonable. I hope the Minister will favourably consider the motion and enquire into the possibility of implementing its terms. I think the House will have done a good day's work if it can succeed in persuading the Minister to do that. The motion is a very simple one. It is one that does not require any flights of oratory to commend it to any reasonable man, and I know the Minister is a reasonable man. He is a man who understands the position of the unfortunate unemployed who have to exist on these very meagre and miserable amounts. As the motion is a reasonable one, I put it to the Minister that the Government should be agreeable to prepare and submit the necessary proposal to the House. I second the motion.

Mr. MacEntee

I do not think that the mover and seconder of the motion have really adverted to the true significance of it. It asks the Government to submit to the House proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week possessed by an applicant otherwise qualified to receive unemployment assistance.

Mr. Hickey

Received by way of military pension.

Mr. MacEntee

There is no reservation to that effect here but, just to make sure, I shall read from the Order Paper:

"This House requests the Government to submit to it proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week possessed by an applicant otherwise qualified to receive unemployment assistance."

Mr. Hickey

Why not read the whole of it?

Mr. MacEntee

I shall tell you what the sponsors of this motion are asking the Government to submit to the House. It does not matter how speciously they may dress up that request. It does not matter whether they wrap the green flag around it and talk about Army pensions or trade union superannuations as a sort of sugar to coat the pill. In fact, what this motion contains is a request to submit to the House proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week. What is the present position? That first of all, no person can receive a qualification certificate who has a reasonable, assured income—I think that would be a fair interpretation of the terms of the statute—not exceeding £39 per annum in certain areas, or £52 per annum in the county boroughs or in the borough of Dun Laoghaire. The proposal contained in this motion would at once wipe away that limitation, because if we are to exclude from the calculation means, the first 20/- per week of an assured income which a person enjoys, we immediately have to add that £52 per annum to the £52 qualification limit in respect of residents in the county boroughs and the borough of Dun Laoghaire and to the £39 qualification limit in respect of persons resident outside these borough areas. We should then find that a person who had means not exceeding £104 per year in the county boroughs and the associated borough, or £91 a year in a rural area, would receive a qualification certificate which would entitle him to draw unemployment assistance—unemployment assistance which would be paid to him as a result of taxation which would inevitably and unavoidably have to be levied upon the agricultural labourer whose income, when he was at work, would not exceed 30/- per week and who, upon that 30/- per week would have to support himself and his family.

I think the mere recital of that fact shows how ill-considered this motion is, that we should immediately say that in certain circumstances a person living in a rural area who has means to the extent of £91 per annum, if by any chance these means were to be diminished, would be entitled to draw unemployment assistance. I put it this way; if his means were to fall below £91 per annum and if he happened to be unemployed and have no other source of income, and his family were large enough, he would be entitled to draw unemployment assistance, and this in a country whose primary industry finds it difficult to pay 30/- a week to the agricultural labourer. That is what is in the motion.

Now, one might say the question of raising the exemption limit for means might still have some justification if we were to come to the conclusion that it would be possible for the community as a whole to support men who were unable to find work on a higher level than the community does at the moment. If there is anything to be said for that, it certainly is not said in this motion. Deputy Hickey asked me to have regard to the first part of the motion, to the preamble. Here is what the preamble says:—

That, in view of the great hardship inflicted on applicants for unemployment assistance in receipt of small pensions attributable to military service or superannuation from trade union funds by the rigidity of the existing means test, this House requests the Government to submit to it proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week possessed by an applicant otherwise qualified to receive unemployment assistance.

Now consider what we do find as the justification for this request that we should raise the exemption limit? That there are people who are in receipt of an assured income, people who have an income which is not dependent at the moment, and in their present circumstances, upon their own toil and their own exertions, that they derive this income in the form of a pension or in the form of superannuation. In either case it is quite clear that whether they get an income in the form of a pension or in the form of superannuation, at any rate it is a much steadier income, a much more reliable income, a much more assured income than the majority of the people have who have to earn their bread from day to day and who have no pension or no superannuation to support or help them to fight the battle of life. What we are asked here is this: that, out of consideration for the case of those people who are in receipt of an assured income, we should proceed to impose at once a burden on the community which would, I believe, increase by perhaps some 25 or 30 per cent., or even more, the present cost of unemployment assistance.

Mr. Hickey

Are you serious?

Mr. MacEntee

I give the figure of 25 or 30 per cent. with the utmost reserve, because I am satisfied that, if it were fully investigated, it would be very much more.

Mr. Davin

Would that apply to the military service pensions side of it?

Mr. MacEntee

It applies to the motion that we are now discussing. Now the beauty of that particular motion is this: that, for once, those who have put down a motion of this type on the Order Paper have seen the conclusion to which they would inevitably be driven if their premises were to be accepted. They have realised that if you were to propose to exempt the income enjoyed as a pension by any individual in this State from the calculation of means, you would inevitably, out of sheer natural justice, be compelled to extend to the rest of the population the consideration extended to the pensioner. But, of course, if you did that, then, by reason of the mentality behind this motion the State would be in no better position than it is at present, because in due course we should have the hard case of the pensioner trotted out again, only instead of it being a pensioner who has, say, £52 a year, it would now be that of a pensioner who had £104 a year. Again, we should have Deputy Hickey and Deputy Hurley pointing out to the House the sad plight of these poor men who have a pension of £104 a year and who yet, when they go to the labour exchange, cannot draw unemployment assistance.

Mr. Hickey

Try to be serious.

Mr. MacEntee

A motion would then be put down saying: "In view of the great hardship inflicted on applicants for unemployment assistance in receipt of small pensions attributable to military service or superannuation from trade union funds by the rigidity of the existing means test, this House requests the Government to submit to it proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 40/- per week," because we should have to have exemptions in respect of 40/- a week in order to deal with the case of a pensioner who did happen to have £104 per annum. And so we go round in that sort of vicious circle. Every time a concession was made ostensibly to meet the case which is made in this motion, we would widen the circle of injustice. When we had exempted £52 from the calculation of means, we should then be told about the case of the poor man who had £104 of a pension and so on, and we should have to go round the whole vicious circle again.

Mr. Davin

What has £104 to do with this motion, Sir?

An Ceann Comhairle

The Minister is quite in order.

Mr. Hickey

We expect him to be a little more serious.

Mr. MacEntee

It is quite clear that those who sponsored this motion have not yet realised what unemployment assistance means?

Mr. Hickey

We do realise it well.

Mr. MacEntee

It means this. If a person is in need, provided he is in such need that, either by the work of his own hands or because he is in receipt of some other income, he does not possess £52 a year, if he lives in a county borough, then that is prima facie evidence that he is entitled, if he is out of work, to get some assistance at the expense of the community. Mind you, anything he does get does not come like manna from Heaven. It is given at the expense of the community.

Mr. D. Morrissey

That is a very profound thought.

Mr. MacEntee

It has to be provided out of taxation. I know of course that small matters like taxation do not trouble Deputy Morrissey except at Budget time, nor do they trouble the Labour Party except when it becomes necessary to impose taxes on tea, sugar, or tobacco——

Mr. Hickey

We appreciate who pays the taxes.

Mr. MacEntee

——even, as has been known, when it has become necessary to increase the rate of income tax. It is only then that this question of taxation and the burden upon the Exchequer becomes of any importance to certain persons in this House. But it is of importance in this connection, because, if we were to accept this motion, the inevitable consequence would be an increase in the burden of taxation. An increase in the burden of taxation to benefit whom? Not to benefit the man who lives from hand to mouth day after day, the man who has no other resources except his own strength and such opportunities for employment such as may offer, the man who, if he has not any job, cannot look forward to any money whatever coming into the house. We are to do this to benefit the person who has some assurance that, however great his need may be, there is going to be something coming into the household to enable him to meet it. If he happens to be a person who enjoys an Army pension, that pension is already being provided for him by the State. It it is of such an amount, as Deputy Hickey said, as to disqualify him from receiving unemployment assistance, surely that person is in a very much better position than another who may be, perhaps, his next door neighbour and who does not even get 15/-.

Mr. D. Morrissey

The Minister referred to the amount that would disqualify him. Will he tell us what the amount is? He does not know.

Mr. MacEntee

It will depend on the particular circumstances of a person's case. The Deputy knows as well as I do that any person living in a county borough is not entitled to a qualification certificate if his means exceed £52 per annum.

Mr. D. Morrissey

That is in the county borough. Will the Minister talk about the rest of the country?

Mr. MacEntee

If he happens to live outside a county borough, if his means exceed £39 a year—and there are any amount of people in the rural areas who would consider themselves very well off if they had an income in the form of a pension of £39 a year—would consider themselves tolerably well off if they had that assured income.

Mr. Hickey

How can we reconcile our consciences to that at all?

Mr. MacEntee

The Deputy's conscience need not be troubled about that at all, because it is not a matter of conscience, it is a matter of opinion, and I am saying—and the Deputy must know it, and any Deputy who has any knowledge of the position in the countryside must know it as well as I do —that most people there would regard themselves as tolerably well off if they had an assured income of £39 per annum coming into the house day in and day out——

Mr. Hickey

That is not the Deputy's opinion at all.

Mr. MacEntee

——because that £39 per year would be over and above what they can earn for themselves and, as I say, the generality of persons in that position in our rural areas are rightly regarded by themselves and by their neighbours as being much more comfortably circumstanced than the majority of people. Of course, they might not attain the Deputy's high standards in this matter, but I am thinking of the ordinary common level of the people, and I do say that so far as the majority of the people of this country are concerned, people with that pension per annum are sometimes looked upon with envy, and the Deputy knows that. He knows it as well as I do, but his proposal is to single out these men and, over and above the assured income which they enjoy, whether from the State or from their trade unions, give them privileges which are denied to the rest of the community.

Now, I do not think that, according to any canon of democracy or of fair play or of equity that I ever heard of, a proposal of that sort could be justified, yet that is the proposal contained here.(Interruptions.) I must protest, Sir, at the manner in which the sponsors of this motion are treating the House. They are not allowing me to discuss the motion either lucidly or coherently, or even intelligently. I know that I am discussing it intelligently but they will not hear me and by their interruptions are making it almost impossible for me to develop my argument.

Mr. Morrissey

It is not much to restrain the Minister from doing that. It is a natural restraint and there is no necessity for the Opposition to aid.

Mr. MacEntee

No, but at any rate I suppose it would facilitate the debate on this question, if Deputies want to take it seriously, if they did allow me to develop my argument.

Mr. Morrissey

Do not always be acting the playboy.

Mr. MacEntee

I am not posing as a saint, any more than Deputy Morrissey—and I do not suppose he pretends to be a saint—but I certainly did not interrupt Deputy Hickey or Deputy Hurley on this occasion.

Mr. Hickey

We gave you no occasion for it.

Mr. Davin

That is very unfair to Deputy Hurley, I suggest.

Mr. Hurley

I did not interrupt.

Mr. Morrissey

Do not be listening to him.

Mr. MacEntee

Are these remarks of Deputy Morrissey's, Sir, in order?

An Ceann Comhairle

Those remarks were not audible to the Chair, but, in any case, the Minister should be heard without interruption.

Mr. Morrissey

I am sorry, Sir.

Mr. MacEntee

I was saying, Sir, that we had to understand the basis of the Unemployment Assistance Act and the fundamental theory that underlies it, and that is that the State is only entitled to take part of the earnings of its citizens to relieve the less fortunate sections of the community if those sections are in want, and that imposes upon the State the duty of determining what is the extent to which that assistance can be provided. It has, first of all, to set up a norm and say that, where a person has an assured income in excess of a certain figure, he will ipso facto be taken to be not in such need that the State would be justified in coming to another person, perhaps only a little better circumstanced than the first, and saying: “You must contribute to the support of your neighbour.”Accordingly, the only way in which that can be done is, as I have said, by fixing some limit of means so that a person who possesses anything over and above it will not be entitled to receive unemployment assistance. That limit has been fixed, as I already told the House, at £52 per annum in respect of those who live in the county boroughs. and the borough of Dun Laoghaire, and £39 per annum in respect of those who live outside those areas. Now, it does not matter in what form the income accrues to the person: whether it comes to him as a pension, whether it comes to him in the form of profits, whether it comes to him as income from investments, or whether it comes to him as a result of his savings—any person who has that assured income, according to our statutes, is not qualified to receive unemployment assistance. I submit that the House must have regard to that fact, and that it cannot say—and that is what this motion does ask us to do —that any person who has an assured income is going to be treated in exactly the same way as we would treat a person who has nothing whatsoever to fall back upon; and that a man who is already deriving an income from the State in the form of a pension, or deriving an income from an investment in his trade union superannuation fund, is going to be treated differently from the rest.

Moreover, if you were once to accept that principle you could not stand there. You would have to say that the man who, instead of contributing to his trade union funds in order to provide for his old age, invested his savings in Savings Certificates and ultimately in, say, National Loan or Corporation Stock, would have to be put in exactly the same category as the man who makes an investment in a superannuation fund, and you could not limit it, having gone even as far as that—having gone to the stage in which you say "We are going to disregard any income which may have been derived from an investment in National Loan, in Government Stocks or Corporation Stocks"—having gone to that extent you could not stop there, because then the plea would be raised immediately "Oh, any man who puts his money into an Irish industry is rendering as great service to the community as the man who invested his money in Government Stocks or Corporation Stocks or who put it into a trade union superannuation fund." Therefore the man who had made an investment in an ordinary business undertaking and who, as a result of that investment, was drawing an income of £52 per year, would be entitled to receive a qualification certificate along with the rest, and, if the burden of his dependants was such, would be entitled to draw unemployment assistance. Where were we going to stop?

Mr. Morrissey

The Minister would qualify himself.

Mr. MacEntee

The position would be precisely as is stated in the motion. I have said that the one thing that distinguishes this motion from preceding motions of the type which have been on the Order Paper is that its sponsors, at any rate on this occasion, have been able to draw the logical conclusion from their premises: that once you proceed to exempt one section of the community from the means test in a greater or lesser degree, then you will have to exempt all sections of the community in the same degree——

Mr. Davin

Have you not already done that?

Mr. MacEntee

——and that, as I say, was ultimately going to impose a much greater burden on the community than it at present has to bear in respect of unemployment assistance.

That is what the result of this motion, if we accept it, is going to be. We have an Agricultural Wages Board on which there are representatives of farmers and agricultural workers. Having met and searchingly considered the position, they found that the highest level which they were justified in fixing as the basic agricultural wage, whether for a single man or a married man, was 30/- a week. If this motion were to be carried, exempting the first 20/- per week in calculating the rate of unemployment assistance which applicants might be entitled to, the first result of that exemption would be this, that a person who was in receipt of an income of almost £91 a year—again I must emphasise this, an assured income— might in certain circumstances be entitled to draw unemployment assistance. Perhaps I should make the figure of £91, £89 or £90 a year.

Mr. D. Morrissey

It does not matter.

Mr. MacEntee

It does not make any difference, because the real kernel of my argument is this, that you could have living in a country area a person who, without raising a finger, could have an assured income of £90 a year, and he, if his dependents were numerous enough, would be entitled to unemployment assistance, if not working.

Mr. D. Morrissey

No, that is nonsense.

Mr. MacEntee

Under this motion he could. He would be entitled, if not working, to unemployment assistance, whereas the Agricultural Wages Board, having considered the position of our agricultural industry, the burdens it has to contend with, and the competition it has to meet, has said that the highest rate it could set up, with justice to all concerned, as a basic wage for agriculture, was only 30/- a week. Accordingly, we would be in this position, that we would have an agricultural labourer, working 56 hours a week, earning £78 a year, and have side by side with him, or in the next house or cottage, another worker with an assured income of £90 a year, who would be entitled under the terms of the motion to draw unemployment benefit. I think the motion ill-considered, I think it unjustifiable, and I think the House should reject it.

Mr. D. Morrissey

It is rather deplorable that a Minister, who is Minister for Industry and Commerce, and who, by virtue of holding that office, is responsible mainly for dealing with unemployment and for conditions of employment, should have displayed on this motion, and in the circumstances of the present day, a flippant, fantastic, and nonsensical attitude right through his speech. The Minister never thought it worth his while to deal with the motion. He talked the most fantastic nonsense and made the most absurd statements I ever heard in this House, and goodness knows that is saying something. It was typical of the Minister's attitude in this House, particularly in regard to unemployment. The Minister convinced the House of one thing, that notwithstanding the fact that he is in office as Minister for Industry and Commerce for a considerable time, and that this motion has been on the Order Paper for a considerable time, he is not conversant with the most elementary figures relating either to the means test or to the payment of unemployment assistance.

So that he may not commit the same mistake again in this House, I suggest that when the Official Report of his speech is available, he should submit it to some of the principal officials in the Employment Division of his Department and get them to correct it. It is deplorable that the Minister should display such ignorance on such an important matter, and that he should seek to cloak that ignorance by the flippant and cynical attitude he adopted. He talked of people with an assured income. We were told that some of the unemployed, who have an assured income of as low as two shillings a week, are people to be envied, and envied even by those in constant employment.

Mr. MacEntee

I said that any person with a pension of £90 a year was to be envied.

Mr. Morrissey

The Minister was talking all the time of people with assured incomes of £104, £92 and £90 a year, and I say he was deliberately trying to mislead the House. He never once referred to the lower incomes of persons having £10, £12, £14 and £16 a year, which is of no advantage to them in relation either to getting unemployment assistance or employment.It is a decided disadvantage.The Minister spoke all the time as if the people concerned were in receipt of at least £52 in county boroughs and of not less than £39 in rural areas. The Minister knows that that has no relation to the facts. Is he aware that because certain men have pensions, either from the Irish Government or from the British Government, in respect of military service, of 4/-, 5/-, 6/- or 7/- a week, they do not bother to sign at the labour exchanges because there is no possible chance of getting employment on Government schemes when so many people are signing who have not even 4/- a week? Is the Minister aware that because they are in receipt of small pensions, for the greater part of the year these pensions are not only their assured income, as he calls it, but their sole income?

Would the Minister turn his attention to that aspect of the problem? Would he try to make himself conversant with those facts before coming in, in the cynical way he has done, to lecture people here in the House who not only know the conditions laid down by the State for the granting of unemployment assistance and unemployment insurance benefit and so on, but who are much more conversant than the Minister himself with regard to the actual conditions under which these people are trying to carry on. I have found it said, in relation to certain people in this House, that when they are put into certain positions one does not expect them to know their job immediately.They have got to learn their job. But when one comes in here and has to listen to a certain Minister of State who has held Ministerial office for almost ten years, one is forced to realise, if one is to take their speeches for what they are worth at all, that they know less about their particular jobs than they did nearly ten years ago, and then one begins to lose all hope that any inroads are going to be made upon this great problem of unemployment.The Minister sees fit to be flippant about it—flippant about the problem that is facing us to-day. Notwithstanding the fact that almost 27,000 men have gone out of ordinary civil life into the Army since the crisis began, our figures to-day show 107,000 unemployed.

Taxation, the burden that unemployment assistance has put upon the people, is undoubtedly a burden, but I am not going to follow the Minister in the line he took—though, if I did, I could say quite a lot upon the problem of work or maintenance, and maintenance was not measured by the Minister in shillings per week at that time. Taxation is a great burden on the taxpayers of this country, and it is a greater burden to-day than ever it was, because of the other burdens that we are compelled, through the circumstances in which we live to-day, to place on the people. Does the Minister think that he is helping the people to relieve themselves of that burden, or of any part of it, by the way in which he spoke this afternoon? Does he think that he is going to get applied to this great problem that help, assistance and co-operation from every part of the House that is being given in relation to the other great problem facing the country? Has the Minister yet realised that, even with all he may do, granted that he gives of his very best to this problem, he alone, or even the Government alone, are not going to solve it?

It is a great burden, and let me tell the Minister that a great part of this burden on the people, through the payment of unemployment assistance, was put upon them by the present Government themselves deliberately, and a great part of the money was paid and is being paid, not for economic reasons but for political reasons. Unemployment assistance is being extended to people for whom it was never intended and for whom it was never claimed. That is, perhaps, the first time that that has been said in this House.

The Taoiseach

It would be interesting to hear that developed.

Mr. Morrissey

Does the Taoiseach want me to develop it?

The Taoiseach

I would very much like the Deputy to develop it.

Mr. Morrissey

Would the Taoiseach say that he is not even aware of the fact——

The Taoiseach

I would like to hear it developed: it would be very interesting.

Mr. Morrissey

I am sure the Taoiseach thinks that I am committing a political blunder of the first magnitude.

The Taoiseach

No; I am just very interested.

Mr. Morrissey

I am saying here now, publicly and deliberately, that the payment of unemployment assistance was extended into areas in this country where it was never asked for by anybody, never sought, and that it was paid to people who were never intended to be classed, and never were classed, as unemployed workers.

The Taoiseach

I cannot understand yet what the Deputy is even driving at.

Mr. Morrissey

If the language I have used is not clear enough——

The Taoiseach

It is very suggestive, but not enough so to let anybody understand what the Deputy is dealing with.

Mr. Morrissey

I do not think that I have ever been accused of finesse in the use of language, either inside or outside the House.

The Taoiseach

Where are the areas? When you make a law, you have to make it of a general character and, in the very nature of things, quite a large number of people benefit who were never intended to benefit. If the Deputy can point out classes who are receiving unemployment benefit without necessity, he is doing a very great service of which we would be very glad.

Mr. Morrissey

As a matter of fact, the Taoiseach need not appeal to me at all for that information. He can get it from the Department, and the Department have proved that conclusively over the past few years.

The Taoiseach

Then the Deputy——

Mr. Morrissey

Will the Taoiseach let me finish? They have proved it in this way: after paying unemployment assistance for a certain length of time, they began issuing period Orders and they assumed that people were at work, whether they were at work or not, and those period orders covered periods which lengthened from year to year, until the position to-day is that they are assumed to be at work for roughly nine months of the year, and for the other three months they are assumed to be unemployed. The Taoiseach may take that as a little evidence of the position.

Further, I am prepared to fight here as hard as any man in this House for such assistance as can possibly be given by the State to the man who is genuinely unemployed and who cannot get work. I am not standing here and do not stand, either inside or outside the House, for the man who is not in need of assistance or who can get work and will not accept it. That is a stand I have always taken and, unfortunately, I have had to speak more often than any other member of this House, and certainly over a longer period in the House, on this question of unemployment.That is the position. The Minister may consider it useful, but I do not consider it useful, to come here and talk, as the Minister has talked, about £104 or £91 or £52 a year.

The real problem sought to be met by this motion is the problem of the man who has a few shillings a week either as an ex-British Army pensioner or an ex-National Army pensioner or a few shillings a week from a friendly society or a trade union. Let me assure the Minister that, in actual practice, far from that few shillings a week being an advantage to a particular man, it is a decided disadvantage.By virtue of the fact that he is in receipt of that, he is the last man in any labour exchange who will be sent out to work on any scheme started under Government auspices.

Mr. MacEntee

That is nonsense.

Mr. Morrissey

It must be, by virtue of the regulations. Does not the Minister himself know that if there are a number of married men with dependents on a list, the men with the most dependents and the men in receipt of the highest amount of assistance must be sent out first?

Mr. Hickey

That is right.

Mr. MacEntee

That has been amended in some regards.

Mr. Morrissey

Unfortunately, the position is that there are so many men with dependents signing at the labour exchange that, except in very rare schemes or in very large schemes where a large number of men are employed, the men with a few shillings a week are never reached.

Mr. MacEntee

May I interrupt for a moment. I am sure the Deputy would like to know the position in that regard. It is quite true that, in the beginning, the work on relief schemes was rather strictly confined, if I might put it so, to those who were assumed to be in receipt of allowances in unemployment assistance at the higher rate—to those at the top of the list. But the position since is that, to meet representations which have been made, the Office of Public Works has adopted a scheme by which, in all urban road schemes and in many rural road schemes, each batch of workers is replaced by another until all the recipients of unemployment assistance— except those entitled to very small weekly amounts—are given a turn under the scheme.

Mr. Morrissey

As a matter of fact, that proves my case conclusively. By virtue of the fact that they are in receipt of a small pension they are necessarily in receipt of the smallest amount of unemployment assistance.

Mr. MacEntee

But the Deputy was talking of men with 4/- per week. That is approximately £10 a year.

Mr. Morrissey

I was a little more elastic than the Minister, as I said from 4/- to 7/- or 8/- a week. I am not confining it to that. I am saying that those are the people who are most concerned.The Minister should remember that the number of people with means, coming up to the figures that he mentioned, who are claiming or receiving unemployment assistance, is so infinitesimal as not to be worth talking about. Let me assure him—and this is not said for the purpose of making any point other than stating a fact— that we have here hundreds, if not a few thousand men, in the position of not being even registered at the unemployment exchanges, first because they are not entitled to assistance, or, if they are, the amount is only 1/-, 2/- or 3/-. They are put in that position because of the operation of this means test. I do not want to be personal on this, but I do want to say that I have to complain of the Minister's approach to any motion introduced in this House dealing with unemployment. I have had to make the same complaint in regard to the Minister's predecessor. The Minister's approach to the motion was not helpful, either from his own point of view or from the Government point of view. It was not a helpful way to approach a problem such as this.

I know it is easy to say—it has been said very often in this House both by speakers for the present Government and for the previous Government—that motions dealing with unemployment are introduced merely for vote catching and political purposes. Now, that is not so. Deputies who live in small country towns, as well as those representing cities, have day after day the unpleasant experience of people coming to them and asking them if there is any chance of getting a job, for a recommendation and so on. Some of the finest types of men we have in the country are obliged to do that. Through no fault of their own they are unable to get work. I am sure the Minister and the Taoiseach will admit that, when the rates of unemployment assistance were originally fixed, no one would think of contending that these were anything more than the minimum which this country could afford. Since then the purchasing power of these weekly amounts has been reduced by anything from 25 to 50 per cent. I do not think any one will deny that. The position of those unemployed people is a terribly hard and difficult one. If they were not helped out by the good citizens who, in various organisations, devote themselves to charitable work, their position would be a desperate one. I know that many of them walk ten and 12 miles a day after signing in the labour exchange for the purpose of catching rabbits, so as to try to supplement the small amounts they are receiving. If they did not do that their position would be an appalling one. The position is so grave that it would be criminal for me or for any other member of the House to approach this problem on any other line than a serious line, or to deal with it in any way other than with a genuine desire to help to have the problem, if not solved, at least relieved in so far as the Government and this House can do it.

Mr. Hickey

When listening to the verbal fireworks of the Minister for Industry and Commerce this evening one found it very difficult to remain patient, because of all the unnecessary things he introduced when speaking to the motion. He talked about men drawing £104 a year, of others having an assured income of £94 and of people with money to invest in industry, in National Loan and in corporation stock. I think that, when speaking to the motion, I made myself perfectly clear. I had three classes of people in mind. The first, men who had given service to this country and who are getting small pensions; secondly, men who had served in the British Army and had gone through the last Great War who are getting pensions of 10/-, 15/-, or 18/-, a week, and, thirdly, some few people who have small pensions from the American Army or Navy.

None of these has an assured income, except the small weekly amounts which I have referred to. What I had in mind was that this means test should not be applied to people whose income does not exceed 20/- a week. I think one would not be going too far in saying that it was not honest for the Minister, on a motion of this kind, to bring in the cases that he did, people with incomes of £94 a year or £104 a year. The people I had in mind are unemployed. They have no visible means except a small military pension.

Another class I had in mind is that composed of men who had been members of a trade union ever since they were apprentices, covering a period of say, 30 or 40 years. They were superannuated out of their trade union at the age of 60, and may be getting 10/- or 8/- a week. When they sign at the labour exchange, with the exception of about 1/-, the remainder of their superannuation is taken into account. In their case I stressed the point that during all the years they were members of a trade union they had paid their weekly contributions so as to ensure that when they retired they would have this superannuation. I fail to see why the Minister should have rambled off and dealt with people who, as he said, have money to invest in war loans, corporation stock and industries. The Minister thinks that it would be a terrible thing to concede what we are asking in this motion. What I am at a loss to know is this: why is it that it is only in the case of the unemployed and the workers generally that this means test is so rigidly applied? It is nothing new to hear of men having big pensions running into three figures. It does not matter what their assured incomes are. They are able to become directors of companies, or they may have thousands of pounds invested in National Loan or in Government stocks. What about a means test in their case?

The Minister talked about taxation. I am quite conscious as to who is paying taxation. If the Minister will look up the official figure published by his own Department, he will find that the people who are supposed to be paying taxation, super-tax, corporation profits tax, and so on, are just as wealthy to-day as they were ten years ago. Why? I am going to suggest that it is because they have so much money in war loans and in corporation stocks that it all ultimately comes back to them again. I do not claim to have any superior knowledge of the affairs of the country, but I regret that the Minister, because of the responsible position he holds, should have treated this motion in the flippant way he did.

It was not a helpful way to face up to it, or to the case of people who are very hard pressed. I think they should have been shown some consideration. I hope no one will take it that there is any political tinge about this motion. I quoted the cases of men with big families who have only 10/- or 12/- a week pension from this Government as ex-I.R.A. men, as well as the cases of British ex-service men who went through the last war. They have since settled down here. Many of them are rearing big families and all they have is a pension of 10/- or 12/- a week. They have been unemployed for a number of years. The Minister taunted me and said that I do not understand what unemployment assistance means. I claim to know more about it than the Minister does, and for this reason: that when unemployment assistance was introduced there were very few people without some visible means as compared with the present time. They were then employed and had stamps to fall back upon. There are hundreds and thousands of men who have not got stamps to their credit for years, and they are generally unemployed, and very often they are even thrown off the list of recipients of unemployment assistance because of their failure to get employment, because they are not genuinely seeking work.

I pointed out to the Minister that those men who had that pension of 10/- a week and who were in receipt of 11/- a week from the labour exchange to support a wife and five or more children are scarcely ever called on for relief work for the reason that the labour exchanges have orders that the men who are to be sent on relief work are the men drawing the largest amount from the labour exchange. I know of an ex-I.R.A. man in the City of Dublin who was offered 6d. a week for himself and his wife because he drew a pension of something like 13/- or 14/- and he and his wife were getting 13/6 from the labour exchange, and he was to sign six days a week for that. I know men in Cork who are expected to walk to the labour exchange and stand in a queue to sign six days a week for 2/- a week—ex-I.R.A. men and British ex-service men. Their pensions are 14/- or 12/- a week and all they can draw is 2/-, with the result that they have refused to register, and they are not registered, and are consequently handicapped in getting relief work. In the case of a man who entered a trade union years ago and paid a certain amount all through the years in order to get a small sum of superannuation, the amount he draws should not count against him, if, at the age of 60 or 58, he is unemployed and he should not be deprived of whatever he can get from the labour exchange.

I have put these points to the Minister and to the House, and I hope the House will look on it as applying only to men who are unemployed and who are in receipt of these military pensions.It is not fair to talk about the man in the country with the assured income. The Minister says that if he has £52 a year, he can get the other £40, and still qualify for unemployment assistance. Does the Minister not know that the man with £1 a week in the city cannot qualify at all for unemployment assistance, and that the man with 14/- a week in a country town will not get anything at all?

Mr. MacEntee

But the Deputy would enable him to do so.

Mr. Hickey

If the Deputy's motion were passed, he could have 20/- a week in a country town and 14/- on top of it. That is all his income could be to keep a wife and five or more children. If he were in the city all he could have is 20/- and 23/- for himself, his wife and five children. That is only when he is unemployed. The sufferings of the unemployed are too serious to be trifled with, and the Minister was alarmed at the irresponsible way the community was being treated by people like me. I wonder are they, and I wonder if the Minister has such concern for the community as I have. Who are the community? Are not our 108,000 people on the live register part of the community as well as the people paying super-tax and excess profits tax? I wonder which of the two are more worthy of consideration? I agree with Deputy Morrissey that speeches of this kind are very dangerous, if people should come to read them. I am not talking lightly of what I know to be the position in the country. There is too much smugness, too much complacency, about the position of the unemployed and their dependents, and I am afraid that, some fine day, we shall wake up and find out where we are. We will then know who talked sense in this House and who showed indifference towards the community. I hope the House will agree to the motion in the spirit in which I have moved it.

Question put.

The Dáil divided: Tá, 13; Níl, 59.

Tá

• Cole, John J.
• Corish, Richard.
• Davin, William.
• Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
• Hickey, James.
• Hurley, Jeremiah.
• Keating, John.
• Keyes, Michael.
• McMenamin, Daniel.
• Morrissey, Daniel.
• Nally, Martin.
• Norton, William.
• Pattison, James P.

Níl

• Aiken, Frank.
• Allen, Denis.
• Bartley, Gerald.
• Beegan, Patrick.
• Boland, Gerald.
• Bourke, Dan.
• Brady, Seán.
• Breen, Daniel.
• Breslin, Cormac.
• Briscoe, Robert.
• Buckley, Seán.
• Carty, Frank.
• Childers, Erskine H.
• Cleary, Mícheál.
• Cooney, Eamonn.
• Corry, Martin J.
• Crowley, Tadhg.
• Derrig, Thomas.
• De Valera, Eamon.
• Flynn, John.
• Flynn, Stephen.
• Friel, John.
• Gorry, Patrick J.
• Harris, Thomas.
• Hogan, Daniel.
• Humphreys, Francis.
• Kelly, James P.
• Kelly, Thomas.
• Kennedy, Michael J.
• Killilea, Mark.
• Lemass, Seán F.
• Little, Patrick J.
• Loughman, Francis.
• Lynch, James B.
• McCann, John.
• McDevitt, Henry A.
• MacEntee, Seán.
• Meaney, Cornelius.
• Moran, Michael.
• Morrissey, Michael.
• Moylan, Seán.
• Mullen, Thomas.
• Munnelly, John.
• O Briain, Donnchadh.
• O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
• O'Grady, Seán.
• O'Loghlen, Peter J.
• O'Reilly, Matthew.
• O'Sullivan, Ted.
• Rice, Brigid M.
• Ruttledge, Patrick J.
• Ryan, James.
• Ryan, Martin.
• Sheridan, Michael.
• Smith, Patrick.
• Traynor, Oscar.
• Walsh, Laurence J.
• Walsh, Richard.
• Ward, Conn.

Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Corish and Davin; Níl: Deputies Smith and S. Brady. Motion declared lost.