In another eventful week, perhaps the most significant information to come out was the fact that our inflation rate is now at 5.2 per cent and rising. It has been many years since we had inflation of that order and it is beginning to have an effect, not least on the Partnership wage agreement. It seems to have crept up quietly and taken the Government unawares, even though all the signs were there for some time.
We are now hearing talk of price control again. The Government is also being asked to encourage genuine competition in the market place on a wider scale and Drapier believes that this, rather than price controls, may well provide the better long-term solution.
It is worth remembering the introduction for the first time of competition in air fares in the mid-1980s to realise how genuine competition can transform a whole market place to the benefit of the consumer. We see billboards nowadays advertising flights to England for about one-tenth of what the fare was 15 years ago. The economy has benefited hugely from this by an upsurge in air travel and individual travellers now have opportunities which never existed before.
One area where there definitely is no competition is in the trade of publicans. Drapier is disappointed that the Intoxicating Liquor Bill at present before the Dail does so little to encourage competition. In Dublin, particularly, there is a grave shortage of pubs which never compete because they never have to. They just keep putting up prices. The Minister for Justice, John O'Donoghue, had an opportunity to open up the market by bringing in much less restrictive laws for the sale of drink but he failed to do so under the usual behind-the-scenes pressure from the publicans' lobby to which he, like most of his predecessors, succumbed.
Drapier finds it hard to understand why the State dispenses licences in such limited numbers for pubs and taxis. The public demand is not met and as a result the licences acquire an exorbitant, if artificial, value. The population is rising rapidly, especially in Dublin, and Government policy and legislation should reflect and satisfy the needs that this rise creates. The abnormal weakness of the consumer lobby in Ireland is underlined by a situation like this, where, in Drapier's experience, deputies will frequently respond much more readily to the demands of vested interests than to the demand of the obvious public good.
Without doubt, the worst inflationary pressure afflicting people today is the cost of housing, where prices have become astronomical even by international standards. The Government made another attempt this week to respond to that situation by the introduction on Thursday of new measures relating to stamp duty designed to help first-time buyers of more modest houses and to penalise speculators and investors who buy houses and apartments, sometimes by the dozen.
While the Government may think that it is doing its best, the fact is that, at most, stamp duty constitutes only one part of the problem. Hoarding of land and profiteering by builders, as well as delays in planning, all contribute to a serious difficulty. So does the reluctance of most Irish people to live in apartments or flats as is the norm abroad.
Again builders and speculators constitute a formidable, if only partially visible, lobby to preserve the status quo from which they have benefited so enormously. A coherent and effective consumer lobby might in the long term be more useful in meeting the needs of consumers, as against the needs of profiteers, than any legislation.
We continue to have minor changes in personnel in here. Drapier did not see newly independent deputy Liam Lawlor around this week, so presumably Fianna Fail and the Government are going to have to do without his support. Denis Foley's period of suspension is not yet up so he can't attend or vote. Helen Keogh's prolonged period of public doubt finally came to an end when she decided to join Fine Gael. While this was undoubtedly a blow for the Progressive Democrats, the fact that Keogh is in the Seanad means that it has no real effect on the Government's position. The position in the Dail is otherwise, where every deputy's vote is vital and where, in any event, the real power is exercised.
What is interesting about the Keogh defection, which seems to be without precedent, is that she is an appointed senator. She does not owe her position to any electorate, however limited. She was apparently invited by Mary Harney to do the decent thing and to resign her seat. This she has refused to do.
This raises the question of whether somebody who is appointed to the Seanad on the understanding that she takes the Government whip, should remain there when she jumps ship, and now takes the Opposition whip against the Taoiseach and the party leader who appointed her. It is not of great practical political importance in present circumstances, but it makes Keogh vulnerable and raises serious queries about her credibility.
The House is now facing into its busiest period of the year with prolonged sittings and no doubt a liberal use of the guillotine to try to clear the legislative backlog, which includes a new Finance Bill to deal with housing. Sometimes the quality of this rushed legislation can be doubtful but to one degree or another it is the same every year.
As we approach the summer recess the dominant question here this year is, "Will we be back?" Drapier believes the answer to that may lie in the various tribunals and other inquiries which will continue until the end of July and resume sometime in September and which will presumably throw up a full quota of shocks to the system between now and then.
Drapier's best advice is not to be surprised by surprises.