asked the Taoiseach the estimated figures to date for the year 1978 for our net emigration.

15.

asked the Taoiseach if he will provide an estimate of the total number of people who emigrated from this country over the past year.

With the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, I propose to take Questions Nos. 14 and 15 together. The only reliable estimates of migration flows are those for net migration compiled for intercensal periods by relating successive population figures to data for births and deaths in the same periods.

A crude indicator of the annual trend of net migration is provided by the figures for net passenger movement by sea and air. While these figures have shown the correct direction of the net migration flow and provided a reasonable estimate of its general order of magnitude, it should be borne in mind that they have yielded significantly different aggregates when compared with the more accurate estimates for some past intercensal periods based on population counts.

In the 12-month period ending in February 1978 there was a net outward balance for seat and air passengers of 11,000. The 12-month period ending February is considered to reflect best the trend in net migration as seasonal and tourist passenger traffic is lowest at that time of the year.

May I take it from that reply that the figure we can take as a reasonable figure for emigration is 11,000? Further can we take it that the majority of this figure of 11,000 can reasonably be added to the existing unemployment figure? Further can we take it that this figure brings the unemployment figure to something in the region of 100,000, or over, probably the highest in the history of the State? Under the leadership of the Taoiseach, Deputy Lynch, this is an achievement about which a few minutes ago he showed himself to be so proud.

The Deputy's conclusions should not be drawn at all in that way.

Did the Minister say the most accurate assessment could be made by compiling the figures from February to February?

Yes.

In view of that, which I accept to be true, I wonder why the Minister for Economic Planning and Development in a statement to the papers two days ago used April to April? Was it for the purpose of trying to distort the emigration figure?

April 1 has a significant meaning.

As I explained in the reply, the only statistics available for the period in question are those relating to air and sea passenger movement. These are useful only as an indicator of the trend of emigration or immigration and cannot be taken as a close guide to the actual level of either.

So it is probably more.

A comparison between the figures for net emigration derived from the census returns of 1966 and 1971 and the natural increase in population in that period show that the estimated net emigration figure for the period was 54,000, while the figure for net outward air and sea passenger movement was 88,200 in the same period. If it is assumed that this relationship held for the year ended February 1978, the estimated figure for net emigration would be close to 7,000 for that year.

Will the Minister of State accept that the reason why the February figures are used is that the figures for the year ending in April are distorted by variations in the date of Easter? That is why they are not used by any reputable statistician, economist or other person, or even indeed politician, as a measure of emigration? Secondly, will the Minister accept that the figures he gives for net outbound passenger movement show a rising trend over the past 12 months since Fianna Fáil took office?

The first thing the figures show and the first thing this element of doubt establishes is that it was a stupid and ill-considered decision taken by the previous Government not to have a census taken in 1976.

Answer the question.

We are at a desperate loss for that census.

The Minister said, and I think correctly, that these figures are better as a measure of trend rather than as a precise indication of magnitude. I ask him what is the trend, and is it not the case that these figures show a rising trend of emigration over the past 12 months? Could we have a straight answer to a straight question?

Yes.

Thank you.

I should like to use this occasion to ask the Minister of State——

Deputy Blaney is asking a question.

Might I ask the Taoiseach or the Minister of State whether this trend, whether it be 7,000, 11,000 or whatever it may be, does not further indicate that, with the high level of unemployment on the western seaboard, the movement from there both internal and external would be at least double the figures shown in the trend? What will the Government do about this?

I could not accept the point made in the first part of the Deputy's question.

It is pretty definite.

Could I ask the Minister of State whether the Central Statistics Office are permitted to be adventurous in regard to getting information on largescale social features like emigration? In other words, would it be within the permission of the CSO to see whether some of the British agencies which might be expected to run up against Irish emigrants might provide information which would supplement——

This supplementary is not related to the question.

This is not a contentious question. I am trying to inquire whether the CSO——

The Chair is not concerned about whether it is contentious. It does not arise. It is a separate question.

It arises directly out of the question about emigration.

The Chair has ruled that it is a separate question.

I want to know whether the CSO can go a bit further than the factors they now look at in order to get something more reliable, for example——

A census.

——the kind of information which the British social services, or health services, or insurance services might be able to provide if politely asked. I made that suggestion to the Minister for Economic Planning and Development six months ago and I will be waiting to ask him about it when the times comes.

Are the British Government to do what the previous Government did not do?

The British Government have to find the jobs the Taoiseach promised to get. That is the point.

Question No. 16. We have had quite a number of supplementary questions.

Does the Minister agree that the emigration figure of 11,000 he mentioned is uncomfortably close to the reputed reduction in the registered unemployed? Have the Government any plans other than emigration to reduce the real unemployment figure?

That is certainly raising a different matter.