§ "That a sum, not exceeding £120,788, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1909, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of Agriculture and other Industries and Technical Instruction for Ireland, and of the services administered by that Department, including sundry Grants in Aid."
§ Resolution read a second time.
§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
§ MR. JOYCE (Limerick)called attention to the question of the preservation of inland fishing in Ireland, especially 1376 salmon fishing. He did not suggest that the Agricultural Department ought to look after this, because no doubt to them it was a question of money, but the salmon fishing was not looked after as it should be by the Imperial Parliament. The whole question of salmon and trout fishing should be gone into in a much larger way than hitherto, and money which would be returned twenty-fold should be expended on this most important branch of the industries of Ireland. To his own knowledge salmon fishing on the Shannon had greatly declined. Why, he did not know. The river was not polluted with a great amount of sewage, and the fishermen were pretty closely watched, so there could not be much poaching. The fact remained that the salmon were going back, and fishermen who could get a good living twenty years ago were now almost starving. He believed in a close time for the preservation of fish, but the fish should be preserved in a proper manner. It was quite another thing to see these poor fishermen hunted and harried as if they were not Christians. Last winter three poor fishermen were brought before the magistrates for poaching and the two magistrates were divided in opinion. One said he thought the case had not been proved, the other thought it had. The consequence was that no rule was made and the unfortunate men were summoned again. On the second occasion there were three magistrates on the Bench, and the case was dismissed. Then the case came before the County Court Judge, as good a Judge as they could have in any county and a favourite with all classes, and he, on the evidence of the water bailiff, reversed the acquittal of the magistrates and imposed a fine of something like £20 on these men, who at that time could not pay twenty pence. Consequently, they had to go to gaol, and in mid winter. The people felt so much for their families that a collection was made, the fine paid, and the men taken out of prison. There was something which was not right in the way in which the fishery regulations were carried out in Ireland. The fishermen had no faith in the Board of Conservators for the reason that they had no direct representation on it. He brought in a Bill last year and the year before.
§ SIR F. BANBURY (City of London)asked, on a point of order, if the hon. Member was in order. It would require 1377 legislation to alter the constitution of the Board of Conservators.
THE DEPUTY CHAIRMANsaid the hon. Member was referring to a fact that he had brought in a Bill himself. He must not deal with legislative matters, but with questions of administration.
§ MR. JOYCEsaid he was only making a passing allusion to his Bill. The Board of Conservators was not at all so constituted that the people had confidence in the way it carried out the conservation of the rivers. He therefore appealed to the Vice-President to see that something was done in his Bill to remedy the present state of things and that the poor fishermen had an opportunity of earning their hard livelihood. Last night hon. Members were speaking on behalf of navvies, but he did not think any navvy worked as hard as fishermen, whose work was the most laborious he knew. They had to pull long distances in all weathers on the I Shannon, because a great company owned miles of the river, and it was not, he thought, watched as closely as they were. The Vice-President and his Department might appeal to the House to widen their powers to enable them to foster the fish in the river by the creation of more hatcheries and to watch where the fish was poached in the most open and flagrant manner. At the end of the season the fish got up into the small by-rivers, some of which were only six or eight feet wide at the most; and boys and servants with pitchforks destroyed millions of the ova that would otherwise ripen and become perfect fish. He had drawn attention to this before and had advocated that barriers of some kind should be put at certain times of the season at the mouths of by-rivers and that water bailiffs should go to the rivers and watch this kind of poaching. This was a very important matter, and he hoped the Department would pay proper attention to it. If they did so, they would not have the fish becoming less and less in quantities every year and the fishermen emigrating because there was not a good living to be made. He knew that where there were thirty boats with three men in each twenty years ago, there were not ten now on the same stretch of river. Something might and could be done. If water bailiffs were authorised and made to do their work 1378 properly in these by-rivers, there would be more done for the preservation of salmon and trout than by having steamers running in the tidal waters hunting and harrassing fishermen. He hoped the Vice-President, when he introduced his Bill, would pay some attention to the matter. He hoped also that some provision would be introduced to enable the workingmen to enjoy a day's fishing. Sunday was a favourite day in Ireland for workingmen to enjoy a day's fishing with rod and line. They got out into the fresh air and amused themselves and caught very little fish; and he hoped the Vice-President would introduce a clause in his Salmon Fishery Bill providing for a free day per week on all waters. The men who used to fish in the Shannon had had the right taken away by someone who claimed the water, but legislation would change that, and he would give the hon. Gentleman every assistance in his power. It would be a means of recreation to great numbers of people; it would not injure the fish in any way, and no owner of any fishing would suffer by it. These three considerations he thought should induce the hon. Gentleman, with the assistance of the House, to give effect to a clause dealing with the matter in his Bill. If he did, his name would be handed down to posterity in Ireland, and the chances were that he would have a monument on the Shannon.
§ MR. DILLON (Mayo, E.)said he wished to endorse the view put forward by the hon. Member for Limerick. There could not be a second opinion as to the salmon fisheries of Ireland being an extremely valuable asset. These fisheries had become depleted to an alarming extent during recent years. His own object in rising to speak was to draw the attention of the House to the extraordinary contrast between the tone and character of the present discussion and that on May 21st, with the discussions on a previous occasion when a very violent attack was made upon the Vice-President of the Irish Board of Agriculture, on the ground that he had overthrown or undone the work of his predecessor. In one respect he had undone the work of his predecessor, and that was to the great advantage of the House. The last time, three years ago, when this Vote was discussed in the House, a Motion was made from those 1379 benches to reduce the salary of the Vice-President, and the whole body of the Irish Members voted in favour of the Motion and every speech that came from those benches was an attack on the whole policy of the Department. To-night there was no attack on the policy of the Department. Since the hon. Member for South Tyrone had taken charge of it he had been working in harmony with the public feeling of Ireland. The criticism that came from those benches was friendly. Many of them desired to urge certain aspects of his work upon him, but between them and him there was nothing but kindly feeling and sympathy, and there was no idea of moving any reduction in this salary or attacking the present administration in a hostile spirit. The hon. Member for North Derry had attacked the Vice-President in violent language and he had been assailed in Ireland when the first took this Department, and the Liberal party were assailed for putting him in his present position on the ground that they were making the Department political. But that was exactly the re verse of what the present Government had done. They on those benches had ground to complain and attacked the Department in the past because the administration of the late Vice-President had turned the Department into a vast political machine and had the entire funds and enormous influence of the Department not primarily for the promotion of the proper objects for which it was founded, but for the purpose of attacking the Nationalist Party. In the old days when the Department was first founded, they promised to give it every possible fair play, but they found that instead of being used as an organisation for the social improvement of Ireland and the promotion of her industries it was being used as a political machine, and they were obliged to criticise its proceedings in a hostile spirit. It was impossible for the Department to conduct its work in Ireland with any prospect of success so long as it was carried on in a spirit hostile to the Nationalist Party. The first essential for the head of this Department was to secure the confidence of the Irish people and to convince all sections that the administration was free from political bias. In his opinion the present Vice-President carried on his administration in that spirit, and it was for that reason 1380 that the character of their debates had totally altered. The questions now were no longer political but practical. He did not intend to dwell at any length upon it, but desired to say one or two words upon the general scope of the work. He had always contended that the Department had too much placed upon it. It had to look after the fisheries, agriculture, and Irish exports and imports it was supposed to promote industries, to take control of technical education, to watch cattle disease; it had control of the National Library and the School of Art in Dublin, the Glasnevin Botanical Gardens, the Museum in Dublin, the College of Science in Dublin; in fact he did not believe there ever was a Department which had such varied and multitudinous duties to perform. It had had too much to do and the corollary of that was that its funds were deficient. But while making that criticism he had to say that since the hon. Gentleman had taken charge of it he had done a great deal of good, and had worked in harmony with the people, and that whatever criticism came from those benches was not conceived in any hostile spirit, but rather in a spirit of co-operation, urging the Department to fresh exertions. He wished further to say something on the question of afforestation. It was a sad fact that Ireland, which used to be described in ancient times as the island of woods and forests, and was covered with fine trees, as might be seen from the passage in Froude's "History of the English in Ireland in the Eighteenth Century," should be in that respect so greatly changed. Now, it was a fact that in vast; districts known to him, where for miles and miles there had been magnificent forests, there was not a tree to be seen, with the result that the climate of the country had changed, that great tracts had been turned into waste and bog, owing to the absence of sheltering timber. The destruction of the forests had caused great damage in the west of Ireland. The woods and forests of Ireland were gradually disappearing and the country was becoming almost treeless. Those who were in the habit of visiting Ireland were struck with the difference in the aspect of the country as contrasted with what it used to be. Nevertheless there still remained on some great estates in Ireland and on some of the landlords desmesnes magnificent woods and 1381 forests. The danger was that in transferring the land to the tenants, the first thing the landlord did was to sell the woods to timber merchants, and Ireland in its scenery was being ruined by the destruction of these woods when they were getting ready for the sale of the estates. He knew of one part of the country where some of the roads used to be shaded with magnificent trees, and since the land had been sold those trees had been cut down and carted off. This was a matter of absolute urgency, because with the change of ownership the process of destruction was going on in all directions. In the course of the next ten or fifteen years timber would probably rise in price to double its present value, because the timber reserves from America and other countries were gradually becoming exhausted. Consequently, in the not very distant future, the woods of Ireland and of this country would undoubtedly become a very valuable asset. In France the fuel of the poor was timber from the wastage of the woods, and they got all their fuel in that way. One of the great consolations to the poor people of Ireland in past years had been that there was a plentiful supply of turf which they used for fuel, but in many districts that, privilege was now passing away because the bogs were being cut out, and where ever that occurred in Ireland the hardship on the poor was exceedingly great. In some country districts in Ireland coal was now 35s. a ton, and of course the poor people could not buy it. The result was that where turf was scarce the hardship endured by the poor people was exceedingly great. This scarcity of fuel was a thing likely to spread in the next few years, and if no provision of the kind which had been suggested in this debate was made it would be very difficult for the poor people to get fuel of any kind. That evil might be considerably alleviated by a proper conservation of the woods, which would provide an abundance of cheap fuel at an extremely moderate rate and bring it within the reach of the poor. That was a consideration which, apart from the other reasons put forward in favour of the preservation of the woods and forests of Ireland, had appealed very strongly to him. For those reasons he desired strongly to support his hon. friend in the appeal which he had made for the preservation of the woods of Ireland.
§ MR. TOMKINSONsaid that there were millions of acres of land in Ireland well adapted for the plantation of trees There were many ways in which the production of timber was an enormous advantage to any country. He was not at all disposed to praise other countries at the expense of his own, but he thought they did these things very much better abroad. In the Duchy of Baden the Government had carried out the work of afforestation systematically, and with advantage to the people. One half of the Duchy was covered with forests, and there were in the country many manufactories of wooden goods of all kinds. He was quite sure that the proposal as to afforestation was one which everyone would desire to support.
§ MR. MOONEY (Newry)said the Vice-President of the Board of Agriculture might be called the Poo-bah of Ireland, for the matters of which his Department had charge were very varied. The hon. Gentleman was responsible for agriculture, the College of Science in Dublin, the Botanical Gardens in Dublin, the Veterinary College, the National Museum, fisheries, railway transit, and piers. In fact he hardly knew what the hon. Gentleman was not responsible for. He quite agreed with what the hon. Member for East Mayo had said about the change which had come over the policy of this Department. Since the present Vice-President came into office he had taken considerable trouble to bring the Department more into touch with national sentiment in Ireland, with the result that it had now more chance of succeeding than it had ever had since it was founded. He wished to ask if there was no provision made in the Vote for the Veterinary College in Dublin. The head of the college was a man distinguished in his profession, and he had thrown himself whole-heartedly into the work of promoting the success of the institution. It was one of the few Departments in Ireland that was paying its way. The number of students was larger than could be accommodated, and applications had been made over and over again for increased accommodation. He admitted that the hon. Gentleman had tried to meet them. The present accommodation being insufficient, a good many students who would otherwise go there went to Glasgow and other places. Not only did 1383 the veterinary college lose the fees which would have accrued to it from these students, but Dublin lost what would have been paid there for board and lodging. He wished to know whether arrangements had been made to provide the necessary accommodation. Last year the hon. Gentleman was pressed over and over again to take steps for the carrying out of the intentions of this House in regard to certain piers in Ireland. The hon. Gentleman attempted to carry out the wishes of the House and of the Irish Members, but he was blocked in his endeavours by the action of the Irish Board of Works, which was responsible for a good deal of evil in Ireland. What did the hon. Gentleman intend to do in this matter? At present fishermen could not earn their living owing to the dangerous condition of the harbours round the coast. In fact, it was more dangerous in a storm to be in some of the harbours than to be in the open sea. How was it intended to meet the objection of the Board of Works to the scheme proposed last year? The description given by the hon. Member for East Mayo in regard to forestry in Ireland was in no way exaggerated. During the Cromwellian and other periods in Ireland instructions were given for the destruction of forests, and time after time, as the reports to be found in Irish history showed, hundreds of acres of the ancient forests were destroyed at a time. The question of reafforestation was engaging attention all over Europe. The hon. Gentleman appointed a Departmental Committee to consider this question. He himself regretted the appointment of that Committee. He regretted the appointment of this Departmental Committee the less, because it had made a most conclusive Report in regard to reafforestation, which it would be advisable for hon. Members to read. He did not know whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer had read it, but he was sure that, short as was the time the right hon. Gentleman had been in his present office, he had begun to see that they were always asking for too much for Ireland. The curious thing about this Committee was that, unlike other Committees upstairs, they started their Recommendations by saying that there was no necessity for creating a new Board in Ireland. That was good, for the fewer Boards they had in Ireland the better. They had too 1384 many already. The Report went on to say that the existing Board of Agriculture had power to deal with forestry. In the Report of that Department for 1906, which was the last issued, it was stated that the number of acres planted with trees in Ireland had decreased, compared with the previous year. The number of trees felled was 883,700, and that of these 407,000 were used for propping purposes. That meant that these trees were immature, and should not have been cut down. In Switzerland the woods were national property, and the State derived considerable profits from them. The owners of the land had certain rights in the woods on their properties, and a landowner had told him that the system was that, where an owner was entitled to cut down a certain number of trees, for every tree so cut down he had to plant three. The result was that the forests in Switzerland were rapidly increasing, and so was the revenue derived from them by the State. There was a paragraph in the Report of the Board of Agriculture which stated that there were something like 1,000,000 acres of land in Ireland which could not be used for any other purpose than tree-planting. The Report went on to say that owing to State action in the past the woods in Ireland had never been properly looked after, and that the country had been devastated of its forests. The State was now largely becoming the landowner, and it was therefore their duty to plant trees and encourage reafforestation. This was not a question of asking the Chancellor of the Exchequer for money the expenditure of which would not be productive. The scheme submitted in the Report showed that if the money asked for was properly spent in reafforestation it would be productive of very good interest. It was estimated that the expense of a national scheme of afforestation, including the cost of the land, would range from £44,525 per annum to £32,000 over five different periods, and that eventually the forests would yield 4½ per cent. on the capital invested. It had been a subject of complaint from the Irish benches that the Commissioner of Woods and Forests drew annually large sums by way of quit rents and Crown rents, and it was said that in England and Scotland the quit rents and Crown rents were reinvested in lands for the benefit of the 1385 public. It was further stated in the Report that in the year under review the amount of quit rents and Crown rents in Ireland was something like £60,000, and when one of the witnesses who represented the Woods and Forests Department was asked how the money was spent for the benefit of Ireland, he said that £13,000 had been devoted to the purchase and development of woods and forests in Scotland. He did not think that such a policy was in accordance with the recommendations; of the Board of Agriculture, or that it would be satisfactory to the public that large sums of money should be drawn from Ireland to be spent on afforestation in Scotland. Had the right hon. Gentleman considered this Report, and if he had, would he give some assurance that when the Vice-President approached him on the subject, if he was not able to give the money they asked for, at least he would arrange some scheme with the Crown Office by which the money now drawn out and spent upon woods and forests should be spent on the woods and forests of Ireland? That was a desirable thing and would do an immense amount of good. They were not asking for a fresh grant, but simply that money derived from Ireland should be spent for Ireland in Ireland. He hoped when the hon. Gentleman came to reply he would say in the words of the late Prime Minister that he had been a sturdy beggar, and that the money which was derived from Ireland should be spent in Ireland.
§ THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. T. W. RUSSELL,) Tyrone, S.said it was only twelve months since he became Vice-President of the Department, and this was the third debate that had taken place on its work during that period. He remembered the time when Irish Members—he himself among them—constantly complained that the work of the Department was never reviewed, for the reason that there was no one to represent it in the House of Commons and to reply to any question. At all events that mischief had been cured. With regard to the question of forestry, he was extremely glad they had the advantage of the presence of the Chancellor of the Ex- 1386 chequer, for this was a question of money. It was not a question of expenditure in the direct sense, but more a question of investment than anything else. The question of afforestation had been made urgent by the action of the State itself, and not by the action of anybody in Ireland, and a condition of things had been brought about which needed instant attention. Under the Act of 1903, the Estates Commissioners were buying estates all over the country, and having bought them were under the necessity of disposing of the timber. In the case of two estates, one in Tipperary with timber worth £5,600, and one in county Wexford with timber worth £6,000, the Department had purchased the timber to prevent its being cut down; but they could not afford to carry out this experiment all over the country. Besides the danger of timber being cut down, wasteland suitable for planting was being sold. He supposed he was violating all official precedent in inviting the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to this question, involving no large expenditure on the Treasury, but a most urgent matter. With regard to fisheries, the hon. Member for Limerick pleaded for one day's free rod-fishing for the people of the country. He thought there was a good deal of free fishing. He certainly would not pledge himself to any such provision in the Bill under consideration by his Department. He admitted that the whole fisheries of Ireland were in a lamentable position. The Department, when created, received £10,000 for the purposes of the fishing industry, and they could not do very much with that amount of money. The whole question of the fisheries of Ireland must be inquired into. The fishing industry was declining all over the country, and unless something was done it would go out of existence. There was a Bill in preparation, and there were points in the hon. Member for Limerick's speech which they would be able to deal with, but he asked his hon. friend to shut off the free fishing.
§ MR. T. W. RUSSELLsaid the hon. Member for Newry had raised the question of the technical college. Under the Act of 1899 the Department was 1387 authorised to give £10,000 for the college. It had bestowed upon it £10,800 so that the Department had done rather better. In regard to the veterinary college, they again wanted more money. In 1899, the Department were authorised by Parliament to give £15,000 for building that college, and they had given £26,650. They had bettered their instructions, and had given an endowment of £200 a year for research purposes. The college was doing good work, and he thought it had a great future before it. Of course, they could not make bricks without straw, but they had done all they could with the money at their disposal to make it an effective institution, and he was glad to say it was effective and was doing good work. He had introduced a Bill again which would enable county councils to give more money to repair piers than at present, and also enable the Department to do more. He hoped the Bill would get through.
§ MR. T. W. RUSSELLsaid the piers would be vested in the county councils, and the Board of Works would be shut out. Then he was asked when the Report of the Department would be published. It was a little late, but the Secretary of the Department had been presiding over the Forestry Committee, and a great deal of his time had been occupied on that Committee. That was the reason of any delay. It was now ready, and he hoped it would be presented in the course of a few days. The hon. Member for East Mayo had said something about the Department itself. He was much obliged to him for the way in which he had spoken of it. He did not want to say more, because he had not been long enough at the Department to speak authoritatively about it on some points, but his predecessor, whatever might be said of him, had undoubtedly done a great work in establishing the Department. It was a tremendous work to undertake, and the constitution of the Department was in many respects admirable. There was a Board of twelve and a Council of 103, and it was a perfectly independent body. He only wished that some other Departments in Ireland 1388 had the same freedom. After close observation of the Department's work, he could say that it was bearing fruit. Agricultural education was a slow matter, but he was glad to say that the improvement had been such that the exports in 1906 of the produce of a small agricultural industry was of the value of £9,500,000. which was more than equal to the value of the cattle trade which was the greatest agricultural industry in Ireland. The flax industry was growing, 10,000 more acres having been devoted to it during the last three years. In the County of Cork, where the flax industry had practically died out, the mills were being repaired, and the industry was being encouraged. Thus the education of the past few years was beginning to tell; people were beginning to take pains; and he had hopes that as time went on, the condition of the industry would get better and better.
§ MR. GWYNN (Galway)said he should like to associate himself with what had been said by his hon. friend with regard to the change in the Department. There was no man in Ireland who had a greater admiration for Sir Horace Plunkett's personality and work, but at the same time he thought the Government made a great mistake when they asked him to continue in office and that Sir Horace Plunkett made a greater mistake when he accepted that proposal. The Department itself was, after all, the true monument to Sir Horace Plunkett, and he rejoiced that it was really becoming what he desired it to be. It had already been said that there was an enormous number of subjects covered by the Department, and a great many of them appealed to him very intimately and keenly. If the Vice-President could see his way to grant a free day's fishing on all waters, he should certainly spend the Sundays in his own constituency, because within the neighbourhood of the Bridge of Galway there were more salmon to be found than in any part of the world. His experience was that where they had free fishing at certain times they did not as a rule have poaching. Free fishing did no harm, such as was done by the poacher with weapons of destruction, like pitchforks. He, therefore, thought that if anything could be 1389 done to increase the area of free fishing, it would really make for the improvement of the fishing in Ireland. He wished, also, to press upon the hon. Member some considerations in regard to sea-fishing.
§ And, it being Eleven of the clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
§ Debate to be resumed upon Monday next.