The Dáil will go into Committee on Finance. Progress was reported in discussion of the Motion on Vote 53, Universities and Colleges. The sum was £20,750 and £90,050 has been voted on account.
COMMITTEE ON FINANCE. - ESTIMATES FOR PUBLIC SERVICES. UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES.
I desire to refer to the statement made in the Dáil by the President a week or two ago. It may possibly be the case—I do not know —that the part of that statement in which the President told the Dáil that he had skilfully closed the mouths of the representatives of Trinity College for three years, in so far as asking for more is concerned, was the pleasantest to the Deputies of the Dáil. Even though that is the case, and I do not intend to depart from it in any way, I am not going to be pessimistic, like Deputy Magennis, and not hope that after three years I may be able to give vent to what has been pent up for so long and that the Minister for Finance may be there to receive the benefit of the pent-up flood. In the statement which the President made to the Dáil, he said that the arrangement made with Trinity College was accepted by the authorities of Trinity College, and I want to make it quite clear that it was accepted by them not grudgingly, but with appreciation.
They said that they thought, under all the existing circumstances, the Government had made a fair attempt to meet the claims of the College. I supported that, and I do so still, and I want to make it clear that I do so. I will even go further and acknowledge the very patient consideration that the Minister for Finance gave to the claims of the College, and express my belief that if circumstances had been different his reply to that claim would have been very different too. While I am not going to detract from that appreciation in any way, I do think it is important that the Deputies of the Dáil should recognise exactly what the arrangement that has been made means for Trinity College both in its present position and in its future position for the next three years. Realisation is very far from expectation. In 1918 the Commission appointed to go into the affairs of Trinity College recommended that in view of the increased costs of modern University education as compared with what was required some few years ago, an additional revenue of £49,000 was required by the College if it was to carry on its work properly. The British Government, considering that recommendation, made arrangements in a way which I will leave the Deputies of the Dáil to criticise for themselves. It secured, at any rate, to Trinity College £30,000 a year at the expense of somebody else. When the political change came, I am not suggesting that it was not very right and proper for the Irish representatives to say they must have a perfectly free hand in dealing with that suggestion. The net upshot of the arrangement will be this, and we cannot hope it will be more from our point of view: the revenues of the College will not be substantially less than they were in pre-war days. It is quite true, I dare say, that in the existing circumstances the Government could do no more. We shall, I believe, be in the proud position of being the only University in Great Britain and Ireland which for three years will have to subsist upon a revenue not substantially greater than it was in pre-war days.
Deputy Professor Magennis made some references to Trinity College, and I think it is quite clear from the way he made the references that he was not basing his case for the National University upon the treatment that Trinity College had received. If he had been doing so, what I have said would make it clear that he would have no case at all. I do not want to make any comparison. I think it would be a great pity if this subject of University education were approached from the point of view of making comparisons. But I do want to point out that it is very difficult to compare in any way a residential University with a nonresidential University so far as costs of running are concerned. Apart from that, we cannot compare University with University without at the same time taking account of the constituent Colleges. Deputy Professor Magennis referred to the munificent endowment—I use the word sarcastically—of the National University of £10,000 per year. Now, the University of Trinity College, Dublin, has no endowment at all either in the way of revenue or capital. All the endowments are concentrated in its one College. Therefore, you cannot pay attention to the endowment of the National University of £10,000 without at the same time paying attention to the revenues of its Colleges. Whilst I am on that point I think it is necessary to refer to the fact that, as compared with its pre-war revenue, the National University is in the favourable position as compared with us of having its pre-war revenue increased by a statutory grant amounting to £64,000 a year in addition to a nonrecurring grant amounting to £19,000, and to a certain share of other grants— not that I want in the slightest way to minimise the claims which the National University has to further State aid. Their claims are the same as our claims. Both Universities require all the State aid that can be given. The needs of modern Universities are great as compared with their needs even 20 years ago. Deputy Professor Magennis referred to Trinity College as a rich foundation. It may have been so 50 years ago, before my time, but I do not think, if he was aware of the facts, that he would call us a rich foundation now, with our pre-war revenue. As was stated by the University Grants Committee, Universities cannot be financed under modern conditions on anything like the scale which was acceptable in the past. The same quotation goes on to point out what kind of an increasing revenue was required, indicating something like 100 per cent. increase of revenue as being necessary in view of the requirements of modern science. Both our claims are not to be set off against one another, but they are both claims which require, as I have said, all the aid that the State can give if either University is to do the work for the country which is laid out for it to do. Perhaps the Dáil may say, "If you think all this, why on earth did you accept the proposition which was made to you?" I think I used the words before in this Dáil that Rome was not built in a day. The State comes first, and I think we were public-spirited and said to ourselves that when things settle down it will be time enough to press our claims, that we could afford to wait until then to let the Government take up this question in the generous way that I believe they would like to do. We are content to carry on as best we can until that day comes. I do want the Dáil to understand that it simply means that many developments, at any rate, which we would like to carry out for the benefit of University education in the country, and for the benefit of the country, must be delayed until that favourable time arrives.
Mr. FitzGibbon took the Chair at this stage.
I speak, not to disprove what Deputy Professor Thrift has said, but for other purposes. A school teacher that was trying to instil the rudiments of English composition into a class found particular fault with one of the pupils, who repeatedly used the vulgar form "a'int." Eventually the teacher lost patience, and exclaimed, "How often have I told you that there a'int any such word as a'int." Last evening I spent considerable time in trying to distinguish two institutions that in the public mind are repeatedly confused—the National University of Ireland and it's principal constituent college, University College, Dublin. In one of the principal morning papers—perhaps I ought to name it; I name it with all respect, the "Freeman's Journal"—all that I said is put down to the discredit of the Minister for Education. The onus and the odium of all the mistakes with regard to this institution, fortunately, fall upon him; but as I am instrumental in bringing him into contempt for ignorance of the elementary facts with which he ought to be acquainted, I think it is due to him from me that I should make a further attempt to say what I desire to make clear. The National University of Ireland, according to the newspaper report, has a heavy building debt of over £30,000, a load under which it staggers into inefficiency. The National University of Ireland has no building debt whatever, not even one penny of a building debt, for the best of reasons, that it has no buildings and never had. It occupies offices in Merrion Square—two private houses rented at a yearly rent. The heavy building debt is on University College, Dublin, by virtue of the necessity of creating a building for lecture halls and for scientific research. The building in Earlsfort Terrace is the building which cost £155,251 9s. 3d., although we cut down the buildings as far as the scheme was concerned to what could be built at the time we gave the contract for £68,000, so as to leave us the margin between £68,000 and £110,000—the amount given by a generous British Government for building and equipment— for equipment. I tried to show clearly what is the absolute truth about this matter, that that building debt, for which we are paying £1,750 5s. 6d. interest, is not a thing for which University College ought to be held responsible. It arose inevitably out of war conditions, and is a war debt. Yet we have to approach the bank managers from time to time, explain, beseech, entreat and do all sorts of things that debtors have to do with bankers, and out of our feeble resources pay, when we can, the interest on the overdraft. Now, it is not University College, Dublin, which has an overdraft of £7,000, as the newspapers said. The overdraft of £7,000 is the indebtedness of the National University of Ireland.
Does the Deputy think the Minister for Finance would rely on the newspapers rather than on his statement of yesterday?
I do not believe the Minister for Finance will rely on either statement, as I have had the disadvantage of being a member of a deputation to him recently on behalf of University College, Dublin, and I know the attitude he took up—a resolute and determined attitude. I am trying to reach the public through the Press, because I believe sincerely that if the people of Ireland were aware of the true facts of the situation they would not tolerate its continuance. It is not for the sake of being reported, it is for the sake of the facts being reported, that I am speaking to-day. I believe that this ignorance about the financial situation ought to be dispelled. I am not speaking on behalf of education as education; but, let me add, I tried to expound this doctrine which needs no exposition in any civilised country of the world beyond our shores, that commercial expansion, industrial expansion, all the life material of a nation, depends to-day more particularly upon the scientific laboratories of its Universities. In those centres of research are brought into being the embryo of the future prosperity. I am saying nothing whatever about civilisation, about the spiritual side of life that comes from higher studies. There are two functions in every University College—the function of research and the function of teaching. Research is a costly thing. Every progressive nation to-day has realised that while it puts millions into its submarines and into its big ships of war, and into its militarism, that all that is to protect its commerce and its industry, and that these for their existence and expansion are dependent upon the money it invests in scientific research. That is why all these countries are putting so much money into University Colleges. I gave you the example of Edinburgh University, whose Professor of Chemistry before the war had a salary of £1,750. In 1918 they began to set up a chemical laboratory for 400 students at a cost of £250,000, whereas we were provided with £110,000 with which to build and equip, not a chemical laboratory, but a chemical laboratory, a physical laboratory, a biological laboratory; a physiological and all the other laboratories, and also set up what we have not got— libraries and rooms for ordinary teaching purposes. Deputy Professor Thrift told you of the woeful state financially into which the great rich institution of Trinity College has fallen. I can add to that statement of his that the two great Universities of ancient date, and of apparently unlimited resources, Oxford and Cambridge, had to apply for State assistance at the very same time as Dublin University. A Royal Commission was set up to investigate their claims, just as a Royal Commission was set up in 1918 to investigate the position of Trinity College. The Trinity College Commission recommended that £49,000 per year additional was necessary for it to carry on its great work. Its income, as we calculated it from the returns given to the Trinity College Commission of fifteen or sixteen years ago, was something like £80,000 yearly. Mr. Asquith was President of the Royal Commission that enquired into the position of Oxford and Cambridge. Only a few months ago that Commission reported that a sum of £72,000 yearly would need to be given to these rich Universities. The University of Oxford has 39 colleges and halls in the city of Oxford. It is one of the noted places of the world for exquisite beauty of architecture and for all the outside appearance of wealth of resource for education. Any man who wants to be impressed with the level of civilisation to which England once was able to attain merely need go to Oxford and Cambridge to be impressed for all his life. If Oxford and Cambridge and Dublin University required these additional resources, what about a poor institution like University College, Dublin? I dwell upon it, as it is centred in the same city as Trinity College or Dublin University and the academic rivalry, the friendly emulation for learning is keener between University College. Dublin, and Trinity than it is between Trinity and any of the other colleges of the National University.
Now, the County Councils understand very well what it means as regards agriculture to have it based upon scientific education. They understand the needs in roadmaking for surveyors and engineers, and they understand the value for their administration purposes of educated men in their membership. The General Council of the County Councils only a month ago unanimously passed a strong resolution in favour of a further State grant to relieve the necessities of the University Colleges, more particularly University College, Dublin. Now, there is one side of education—physical education—for which Trinity College ministers in a very remarkable degree. For that purpose University College, Dublin, is only able to provide fields rented out at Terenure. Where are our students housed? The vast majority of the students that come to Dublin live in wretched lodgings in the streets and the by-ways of the South Circular Road. I do not dwell upon details of that sort, because the public imagination would take hold of that fact and would imagine, because of the material poverty, the type of the education to be had in University College, Dublin, was equally inferior. But that is the misery of the situation.
We have a staff of Professors, year after year, by good-will and devotion, giving their services for inferior remuneration, providing at smaller fees than are charged elsewhere higher education for 1,300 students, with very little pension to look forward to, and no regard either for the service they have given to the nation or any consideration for their own future. We have that as a sore in the body educational. It is miserable to stand up here always pleading for money.
I think I must relieve the Deputy now. He has had a considerable time upon this Estimate, and he has now spoken for more than a quarter of an hour.
I would like in a few words to endorse the statement made by Deputy Thrift, that while Trinity College is sadly disappointed at the amount of the grant, still they recognise that, in the circumstances, the Government has treated them very fairly, and they have accepted it distinctly with gratitude. It is a sad thing, however, to contemplate that as far as the finances of Trinity College are concerned we will be in a worse position for the next three years than before the War, so that there must be a curtailment of work, and a distinct stoppage of the extension of equipment and laboratory work to which we were looking forward. But we distinctly look forward, in the next three years, to a change in the attitude of the Government towards us, because we hope the State will be in a more flourishing position than at present, and we will look forward at the end of three years to getting a grant that will put us in a position which I think Trinity College deserves.
There is another aspect of this University question which I would just like to raise. I am sure it will excite Deputy Magennis to make even a more eloquent speech this time in defence. I want just to draw attention to what seems to me to be a rather noticeable failure on the part of the University or the University Colleges and their staffs to influence the public life of the cities outside their ordinary collegiate duties. I have in mind the work of some of the other Universities in extending University Education of a more popular kind, and I think that some of the desires of the Minister himself and of the representatives of the Universities could be attained if they would take a more active part in stimulating or generating a desire for the advancement in education in a wider sense the average man and woman who know nothing at all about Universities.
Now, there are in every community a considerable number of men and women who are not able to take the keen, close interest in University activities that the more fortunately situated are, who are reachable by such means as extension lectures, tutorial classes, and the like. In the Universities in some places they actually take the initiative in organising this kind of work, and while there have been difficulties in this country, and while attempts have been made, as a matter of fact, and failed, nevertheless it occurs to me that the duty falls upon the Universities to help to popularise these and to make the people feel that Universities are really playing a part in their lives and in the civic activities surrounding them. I know where the staffs are too small for the work to be done that the opportunities are very limited, and that it is asking men and women professors to do more than it is possible for them to do sometimes. Nevertheless that excuse is not a sufficient one to account for the failure of the Universities to enter into the common life of the non-University public.
The University extension movement created a tremendous change in the public life of England. It has had several offshoots, to which the Workers' Educational Association and, indirectly, the Labour Colleges, Correspondence Schools and other activities of that kind can all trace their origin. The plan of popular lectures, discussions, excursions and visits to places of interest, historical and archaeological and the like, under the guidance of a competent Professor who can speak not only learnedly but interestingly, would have, and has had, a tremendous influence upon the civic life of the community where that has been accomplished and carried through. I suggest, for the consideration of those who represent the Universities, that that is an aspect of the matter which would deserve their consideration, and, while I would not like to go so far as to say that the Vote should be reduced, or that some of these grants should be withheld until the Universities have risen to their opportunities in that respect, I would suggest it is well worth their consideration; and that before many months have passed they should take the initiative, and see if anything of that kind could be done in the cities where their Colleges are, and perhaps in other towns as well.
Now, I want to ask the Minister to put matters right in respect to a more sordid question. It is alleged that University College, Cork, is paying salaries to substitute Professors at the same time that it is continuing to pay the salaries of Professors who are now doing other duties, and are drawing pay on account of their other duties. I am asking the question, and I do it because I want the Minister, if possible, to say that it is quite inaccurate and unfounded. The late representative of the Saorstát in Washington was due to receive a sum of £2,100 out of this year's Estimate, and the assertion is made that he continues to draw his regular College salary, and that at the same time a substitute, another Professor, is also paid for doing the work which the representative in America is paid for. In the case of the Professor of History in University College, Cork, it is also alleged that he is in a similar position; that, while drawing his pay as a Professor of History in that College, he is also drawing a salary in respect of a high post in the Army, and that another Professor is doing his work in the College, and is also paid out of College funds. These statements are made on good authority, and it is said that they are statements of fact which cannot be controverted. If they are facts I think something wrong has been done. If they are not true, then I am hoping that the Minister responsible will be able to give an emphatic denial to these allegations.
To begin with the last item first, no Minister is entitled to interfere with any of the University Colleges, and I pray that that may ever be the case; that in any development in this country the autonomy of the University Colleges shall be preserved. Interference of this kind has been protested against firmly, and with manifest success, in England and Scotland. At the time when the Treasury was being drawn upon for munificent support, the Chancellor of the Exchequer in England, in giving the additional support, himself declared that in no circumstances would he tolerate interference with the autonomy of University institutions. If there is anything wrong in the administration of the Colleges I do not dispute the right of anyone to raise a question about it in the Dáil, in so far as it is to the Vote of the Dáil that these institutions owe their annual income.
Now, as regards University College, Dublin, which is the only one of the three constituent Colleges for whose internal administration I can speak, we have lent to the service of the State the Minister for Education, who draws not one cent. of salary from University College, Dublin. We have lent also to the service of the Dáil its distinguished Chairman, who is one of our assistants to the Professor of French, and he receives not one penny from University College during the period of his services here. Another of our assistant Professors was lent to the administration of the State to be the Secretary of our representative in London, and from the moment that he left he received nothing from our fund. Therefore, our withers are unwrung in so far as the Dublin College is concerned. On the other point, Deputy Johnson hesitated to move a reduction of the Vote. That reminded me of the old surgery where the surgeon, even though the patient might be suffering from anæmia, applied the usual treatment of bleeding. Naturally an able man like Deputy Johnson, sympathetic as he is with educational development, would hesitate to recommend bleeding the College for whose anæmic condition I have been speaking so much at large.
I want to correct a misapprehension. Because Trinity College, with its magnificent architecture and its superb college park, standing in the middle of the city, is associated in the public mind of Ireland with University Institutions, there is an impression that Universities are for the rich. A palace is for a king, a castle is for a nobleman, and a university, which resembles these housings, in point of architecture and environment, is supposed to be of the palatial character associated with the privileged classes. So, from year to year, the belief grows and is spread that all that the University ministers to is the upper classes, just as the little noisome, noxious, ill-ventilated hut is for the children of the poor— for the working classes. That is the national school; this fine building, with its costly equipment, is for the children of the rich. However that might have been true—though, indeed, it never was true—however, there might have been the semblance of truth attaching to it— it is certainly not true to-day. It is not true of Trinity College any more than it is true of University College, Galway, the poorest in point of material resources of our Constituent Colleges. There is a great deal to be said in favour of bringing the University to the door of those who cannot go to the door of the University, by University extension. But, before I speak of that, I should like to say to Deputy Johnson that he must not allow himself to be deceived into imagining that the life of the people is not touched beneficially by the operations of University Colleges, even though the adult is not coming into University Colleges. Because—and this is a thing which it would require hours to expound, and I have only seconds at my disposal—education, like religion, or, if you prefer the opposite illustration—like irreligion, Deputy Figgis suggests—I was going to say epidemics or diseases—spreads, and operates in the most mysterious way over inconceivably wide areas. Education of the higher type acts not merely upon teachers who, in their turn, teach others in other schools, but it operates through journalism, through writers who are educated, through the public speaker, and through a thousand channels. It is notorious in the history of civic development, that the presence of a University in a city means an uplifting and a raising of the general life, in the best sense of the word "life," in the community. Still I do hold, with Deputy Johnson, that it is very desirable to have University extension lectures. University College, Cork, devoted a good deal of energy to evening lectures for the people, and before the National University existed the old University College—the College of the Royal University—had afternoon lectures as one of its great features. They were very widely attended, and I myself, as a Fellow of the Royal University—and the only Fellow—lectured every evening, except Saturday, for eleven years, for two and a half hours—Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, for eleven years, until it turned my hair white. The Minister for Finance calculated my age at sixty, on one occasion, deceived by my white hairs. Before I was twenty-one the grey was beginning to appear; no wonder it should become absolutely white, teaching in the poor buildings of the old University College in Stephen's Green, night after night, for eleven years. I am proud to say that some of the best graduates of the Royal University came out of those evening classes. We have re-instituted these evening classes in the University College of the National University. How many people attend? There are some people who have got an ignorant idea that they must have a University degree, as if the having of a degree were everything, and having attended lectures, and having their thought directed into certain channels, and opportunities provided for them for completing their studies, were naught. Because we cannot permit the duplication of lectures by the University Professors at night, so as to qualify those who attend the night classes for degrees, the public will not come to them, which demonstrates that what the public want is the degree, which is naught in comparison. They do not want the education. The reason why we have not the University extension lectures on a wider scale in University College, Dublin, is because we have not the money. Deputy Johnson does not realise, perhaps, that we have not got the staff for the ordinary purposes, because we cannot pay the salaries. We set up a Faculty of Commerce to train students in Business Methods, Accountancy, Banking and Commercial Law, to fit them for commercial enterprises. That costs us a great amount of money. That was not a Faculty of the older Universities. We have also Engineering; we have Medicine; we have one of the largest medical schools in Europe, from the point of view of numbers; but, as I pointed out last evening, we cannot house those students, we cannot provide them even with lecture halls. The Professor of Anatomy has to duplicate, and sometimes triplicate, his lectures. Instead of one lecture being heard in the lecture hall at once, he has to divide his class into sets and take them set by set. So hampered, limited and restricted in that way, it is very, very difficult for us to do those things which we would like to do. However, I am grateful to Deputy Johnson for his support. Even when he indicates a development towards a new line of work he is helpful, because he has accentuated this unhappy fact that the work that the Colleges—more particularly our College in Dublin—can do for the nation is frustrated by the narrowness of their resources.
I yield to no Deputy in appreciation of certain work which has been done by the Universities, but I am rather surprised that Deputy Gorey has not risen on this occasion to ask, as he asked in connection with the National teachers, whether we are getting value for the money that is being spent on University education in this country. I do think that the Dáil and the general opinion of the country would support any plea for money to be spent on University education if it is quite plainly understood that the country is getting value for the money that is being spent on it. But I submit that the course of University education in the past in Trinity College, and even in the National University to some extent, has been to prepare persons for emigration rather than to fit their education to the work of this country. I would put this question: What have the Universities done for agriculture in Ireland? After all, agriculture is the basis of the economic position of the country, and one may well ask, in that respect, what have the Universities done? I think it must be admitted that very little has been done. I know that something has been tried in University College, Cork. But, speaking generally, what have the Universities done to improve the education of the ordinary people of the country? What have they done in scientific research, and what can the ordinary person learn from the Universities in Ireland, and from the men associated with them, of the resources of the country and how to develop them practically? I do think that for the money that is being spent at present or for any increased expenditure—I would heartily support a proposal that the Universities should get an increase—we should get certain practical returns in the direction of the development of the country. Instead of turning the minds of so many University students—very capable men and very learned men as some of them have proved when they went abroad—the Universities should turn the minds of their students to their own country. In that very connection the Government itself has had to take back to Ireland from England its technical adviser on certain subjects.
It is quite time that the Universities should turn the minds of their students to the development of this country. What Deputy Professor Magennis has said, that a University and University education have a certain leavening effect, is quite correct. But I think it would have been more true of the situation as it is in Ireland if he had said it should have a leavening effect here. He mentioned, for instance, the influence which it has had on journalism. He should have said the influence which it should have had on journalism in this country, because, judging by the ordinary daily paper that we get, I think everybody will admit that there is very little evidence of University education in what we are compelled to read in the newspapers in this country at the present time. I submit that that leavening which should come from the presence of Universities can only be obtained when the general trend of the Universities is towards an interest in the affairs of the country. The fact that the Universities have been divorced from the general life of the country is, in my opinion, because the general trend of education was not towards the life of the country. I do not mean exactly in the case of extension lectures or anything of that description; but in scientific education and agricultural education, and so forth, the trend of mind of those interested in the Universities, and of the men of education in the Universities, has not been towards development in this country, but towards development elsewhere. That is really the cause of the divorce to which I have alluded. After all, the University Extension Lectures appeal only to a certain class and to a limited number of persons. If the Universities are to take their proper place, as they should take it, in educating the men who will be the leaders of this country politically, scientifically, agriculturally, in journalism, and in every sphere of life, as the Universities in other countries do, then the minds of the men in the Universities themselves must be turned towards this country and towards its development. It must not be their policy, as it was the policy of many of the Secondary schools, to prepare students to take places in England or America or other countries. The duty of the Universities and the duty of the other schools is to turn the minds of men to Ireland alone, and to the development of Ireland agriculturally and otherwise. I think it will be admitted that the amount of money included in this Estimate is a very small amount to spend on University education. If the case is really put up that the Universities are worth the money, I feel perfectly certain the Dáil and the country generally will endorse an increased Vote for education.
I think the Deputy who has just spoken would learn much if he took part in the inner life of a University and saw something of the work that has to be done in the ordinary University by the Professor or Lecturer at the present time. You are offering too little and asking too much. You cannot expect a University understaffed, as our Universities are at present, to conduct at once the work of teaching and the work of research. I would gladly see every University in this country conducting research in the widest, most generous and most liberal way. But it is really impossible. Professors to-day with large classes, frequently duplicating their lectures, are physically incapable of devoting such spare time as they have got— and I do not know where they get the spare time, except they take it out of their sleeping hours—to research. A certain amount of research is done. But, again, as Deputy Professor Magennis said, it is a question of money. Can you give increased-staffs to the Universities? At present they are understaffed. As regards the college which I have the honour to represent, Deputy de Roiste suggested that we educate our students largely for export. Perhaps that is so in regard to certain professions. They did not find an opening in this country. I hope—in fact, I am confident—that that will be changed in the future. There was a suggestion that Trinity College does not take an interest in the well-being and in the national aims of this country. That I controvert, and I controvert it very strongly.
Deputy de Roiste asked what did the Universities do for agriculture. As long as I have been connected with Trinity College we have been struggling to get money for agriculture. We had a Professor—my first pupil—in the Agricultural School, Professor Barnes, and now he is a distinguished member of the service of which the Minister for Agriculture is head. But, again, we wanted money for research there. We wanted money to continue that Professorship. We could not expect to get another person as self-sacrificing as the first Professor, to give up all his time for a miserable sum of, I think, £150 a year. As regards Extension Lectures, that is the ambition of every University—to get into touch with its countrymen as widely as it can. We have struggled to do so, but again we are short of funds, and we find it very difficult to carry on our ordinary work. Every year we have had lectures, but it is very hard to get men who have been working all day to work again the best part of the evening. They have to prepare their lectures, and there is a lot of clerical work connected with the duties of their Chairs. Until we can enlarge the staff of our Universities I do not see how we can carry on our Extension Lectures on any very wide scale. I would gladly see it done. For the last few years we have had in Trinity College a Summer Course for special bodies like the National School teachers, but that means that we have had to employ special lecturers. We can only do that in a limited way. I am really only endorsing the views of Professor Magennis. He put the case very clearly before you. I do not think that the country is not getting value for the money expended on University education; in fact, knowing the subject from the inside, I think it is getting surprisingly good value. I can only speak for Trinity College. I know one Professor of Trinity College who is doing the work done by eleven men in Oxford. We have to duplicate Chairs, Lectureships, Readerships, and until we can enlarge our staff—I am sure the same applies in the National University—I do not think we can undertake any great, fine schemes of Extension Lectures such as I, together with Deputy Johnson, heartily desire.
Deputy Magennis called attention yesterday to the fact that in any properly organised system of education the University should be the centre and the foundation, and that it was a fallacy to think that in educational organisation we begin at the bottom, at the lower type of school, and build up to the university. I agree thoroughly. I agree that it is at the top, at the university, we should begin, but if that is to be the test of the soundness of a scheme of education, then our system of education must be held to be most imperfect, for there is no proper connection between the universities and the other schools, especially the National Schools, which cater for the vast majority of the children. When, some years ago, an agitation was being carried on here for the establishment of a National University, one of the strongest arguments used was the necessity for such a university, in order to train the teachers who would be engaged in the ordinary schools. I think it was the late eminent Bishop of Limerick, Most Rev. Dr. O'Dwyer, who made great use of that argument, in the course, I think, of his evidence before the Commission which sat before the National University was instituted. To the ordinary man it seems a strange thing that our universities train our doctors, engineers and commercial men, but that they make no proper provision for the training of our teachers. This matter has been agitated for some considerable time, and representations have been made by people who think that this should be one of the chief functions of a university, and recently a scheme was agreed upon between the representatives of the teaching body and the Senate of the National University. In order, however, to have that scheme put into operation, the consent and the co-operation of the Government was, and is, necessary. Some months ago the Government were approached as to the possibility of putting this agreed scheme into operation, and I would be glad to know from the Minister for Education what are the intentions of his Department with regard to this particular question, and what progress has been made, if any, towards putting into operation this scheme.
During the course of this debate several references have been made to the advisability and the necessity of bringing the university into closer touch with the people. I suggest that this is one of the ways, one of the chief ways, whereby the benefits of a university can be brought right down to all the people, not directly, but indirectly. Some people who give only superficial thought to this matter may say: "Oh, well, the man or woman who teaches what Deputy Gorey would call A, B, C, D, does not want the benefit of a University training." To that I can only answer that all who have given the matter deep thought and grave consideration are agreed that it is in these very grades and in these very classes in the elementary department of our schools that the highest form of training is necessary. I do strongly urge on the Government the necessity for initiating a scheme whereby the benefits of the university will come, in this way, indirectly to all the people.
Deputy O'Connell is, no doubt, aware that such a scheme as he has been speaking about has been working for two years in the most promising way in Trinity College, Dublin, in connection with a certain number of primary school teachers in training.
Yes, I should say I am glad to acknowledge what Deputy Thrift has said, though it is not exactly such a scheme as I have been speaking of. Some provision is made by Trinity College, undoubtedly, in connection with one of the training colleges, and while it is something, it is not exactly the same class of scheme as I was referring to when I spoke of the scheme which was agreed upon between the Senate of the National University and the teaching body.
I think it will be agreed that Deputy Professor Magennis has done a very great service, not only to the Universities and to the Dáil, but to the country, in raising the matter in the way in which he has done. It is not the first time that this subject has been raised by him here, and one would like to feel that it would be the last time, because it should achieve the purpose that he had in mind in ventilating this matter, if this question could now be settled finally. I think it could, and I think it lies in the power of the Minister for Education, when he comes to deal with this Vote—which has assumed now the magnitude of a national peril, not only in this, but in other countries, and which is receiving attention in other countries—to indicate the lines on which it is his intention, and the intention of his Department, to have such an inquiry made into the whole case of the needs of Universities in Ireland, with a view to meeting that need, in order that the Universities may be enabled to fill that place in the national life which the Universities themselves desire more than any others.
It has been very significant to note in the debate on this Estimate how every speaker, dealing with the matter from different points of view, have all converged on that central question. Deputy de Roiste stated there was some evident gulf between university life and national life. If there be that gulf it is a gulf that exists not at the will of the Universities, which desire only to bridge it. I was very much struck by a remark by Deputy Magennis, in which he stated that it was never the case that the Universities were the habitat merely of the rich. That is historically true, and it leads to a further reflection that, I believe, is proper to a consideration of this kind. It is this, that in the past in all countries it is the Universities that have been poor in funds that have not extended their benefits to the people at large. It is the Universities in the past in England, France and other countries that have been rich, even at times when University education was held to be a perquisite of the rich, that made some effort ahead of their time to reach those who might be helped by their more fortunate position to have University education extended to them. I think that is a matter which it is proper for us to remember at this moment, and for this reason, if University education is to have the influence and effect such as it should have over the country at large, then in the case of the Universities at the present their present impoverished condition will have to be attended to. In England since the war, as we were reminded, and as is a matter of public knowledge, a Special Commission was appointed to go into the whole question. I think we have had what I might call a glut of Commissions, and we could easily dispense with Commissions in that sense in the future, but some form of inquiry is very evidently necessary if we are to be saved from the position of having a slender Vote of this kind brought before the Dáil and subsequent Dála year after year, and the same complaints made, and the same discussions proceeding without getting some definite conclusion to what is everywhere admitted to be an evil. This can only be done by some special, prompt inquiry, such as the Minister could set forth either by agreement with the Dáil or, I believe, under a minute of his own hand. I suggest that the question Deputy Professor Magennis has raised is one of such importance not merely to the Universities and the national life through the Universities, through the functions that the Universities should have in that life, that the best thing that could be done to summarise all that has been said here would be if the Minister could see his way to give an assurance that it is his intention to make special inquiry into this matter in order that a special allocation of funds might be available in the future to remedy this evil. I have no desire to go into contentious matters, but I have been contrasting this Vote with the Vote a few pages later on—the Vote for the Army. Obviously the Vote for the Army, now that peace has come, is going to be a Vote that will diminish from year to year, from month to month. From week to week, much less from month to month, it will be decreasing, and one would like to feel that it would be a celebration of that stability of the State which has been brought about if the University grant could be increased, I will not say in an inverse ratio to the other decrease, but in some happy and necessary degree in order that the University might be able to do that which they themselves desire to do more than any others, and that is to give opportunities to all persons, no matter how poor, in order that they may, if I might quote the words of the English poet, be enabled to have "Not merely joy, but education, in the commonality spread."
I envy the position of Deputies in various parts of the Dáil who can stand up here freely to advocate the claims of university education, to point out the utterly inadequate resources that are at present at the command of our university institutions. It would be very pleasant, in a sense—at all events, more pleasant for me—to stand alongside of Deputy Magennis and Deputy O'Connell and the other Deputies who have spoken and to raise my voice in chorus with theirs asking for more liberal—not more liberal, but more rational—treatment of university education. I should like to see all the benches filled when the opportunity would come to me to speak out my mind freely on this matter. I should like to see representatives of labour, representatives of practical agriculture, and the representatives of practical politics, all here in order that they might hear, if not how eloquently, at all events, how forcibly, I might be able to present the case that has been both eloquently and forcibly presented, apparently to me, by others. There is a prejudice, and it has found expression, perhaps in a more humorous way than any other way, in this Dáil, the prejudice against the man with the university education, and even in a more concentrated form against the university professor. I think once or twice a smile has broken into audibility here when allusions have been made to university professors. If a university professor, or any other highly educated man, is not a practical man, it is because he is not well enough educated.
There is certainly no reason in the world why education should unfit a man for public duty or public responsibility. To begin with, take the point or aspect of the subject raised by the Deputy who spoke last. He put it to me that I should produce some plan to meet the needs and to institute some inquiry. Now, these university institutions are manned by men who have been carefully and elaborately chosen for the purpose of carrying them on. It is because that choice has been made on certain lines that these institutions are, and it is generally conceded they ought to be, autonomous institutions. They are capable of doing their own work, and capable of bringing about their own desirable development if they are provided with the necessary resources. And this question of how to meet the need, and this question of instituting inquiry, ought, therefore, to boil itself down to the simple question of providing those institutions with the necessary resources. If not, if there is anything wrong in these institutions, if those who direct their operations are not competent, why then the criticism should be directed in that quarter. But it has not been alleged that they are not competent, nor has it been alleged that they are unwilling. I, from my experience, believe that they are both competent and willing to do the best they can do in the interests of the whole nation. It is not to be supposed for a moment, that those who engaged in teaching in the Universities are unwilling to extend their teaching to any extent. They are not only willing, but they are eager. If you put it on the lowest possible motives, the man who teaches, and who believes he is capable of teaching, and has something worth teaching, if he had not anything else but his personal vanity, would desire to have an audience for his teaching. If he had something more than his personal vanity, a zeal for knowledge and for the propagation of knowledge, he would be always willing to agree to give his teaching freely to any audience that would care to have recourse to him.
That is my answer to Deputy Johnson with regard to the Extension lectures. It is my answer in part to Deputy O'Connell with regard to the training of teachers, and to Deputy de Róiste with regard to the teaching of agriculture and other subjects of the kind. Those who can teach, as a rule, wish only for the opportunity of teaching, and the business of the public, and the business of the State is to provide them with that opportunity. Now we cannot blink the material facts, the real facts. The evil is there. It has been eloquently exposed; everyone recognises it. Why is it there? A year and a half ago there were high hopes, I think, on every side that this country was going to enter upon a period in which the resources which it possesses, the resources which were then at its command, would be used for the public benefit, for the National benefit, for progress, for advancement, for raising the confidence of people of this country in themselves, and for raising their name and their reputation in the world. A calamity befel us. I think really a large part of that calamity was due to defective education. When I see the justifications that are put forward for it, I am sure it was based on defective education.
But there is the state of the case. The resources of the country have been wasted, the credit of the country has been impaired, and I am now in the unhappy position of being at once an advocate, not for liberal, but for rational treatment of education, and at the same time bound to stand up for what I think is the imperative need of this country at present, that is to see the establishment of its finances and of its credit, on a sound footing. It is a terrible difficulty and a painful difficulty. I am perfectly certain that for me, who have to regard it here, speaking on one aspect, and for those who have spoken, who have to regard it in one aspect, if it is painful to us, it is ten times more painful to the Minister for Finance, who, from morning till night is compelled to face that in one hundred aspects. A foolish idea entered into people's minds that this Government and this Ministry could be shaken by attacking the resources and the credit of the country. Now, any person with any acquaintance with politics would know that a Government and a Ministry could go on so long as it had the means in its hands to defend itself; but that cruel blow that was struck went to the heart of the country. It was not a blow against the Ministers. It was not really a blow against a political policy. It was not a blow against a particular political state of things, but a blow struck direct against the most profound interests and against the future of the country. And that we have to repair. There is no prospect of right and rational treatment of education, University education, or any other branch of education, except that prospect be founded on a sound financial condition and a sound condition of credit for the country.
I cannot escape from that. I am bound to state it, and everyone who has any interest in education, I trust, will have that view of the case, and those facts of the case always in mind. The best thing we can do for the future of education here in Ireland is in every way we can to build up the resources of the country. I hope that the representatives of practical agriculture will bear that in mind; I am sure they will. I hope the representatives of Labour will bear it in mind. I do not enter for a moment into the controversies, sometimes taking a physical form, that we read about in the papers between one agricultural interest in Ireland and another, and between one economic interest in Ireland and another; but I do say those conflicts increase these difficulties. I think it is in controvertible that those controversies, when they take a form holding up in any way the development of the resources of the country, increase those difficulties and increase them, especially at this difficult time, enormously. Many other points were brought forward, and, I think, in most cases the points that were brought forward by one Deputy were met in the excellent statement made by some other Deputy.
Two particular matters were raised, one with regard to what the Universities are doing for agriculture and for the benefit of the country generally and not for external countries, and the other with regard to the training of teachers. It is unfortunate, but it is the fact generally, that the application of University work and University research to the great industry of agriculture, the greatest of all industries, is very, very far behind-hand not only in Ireland but, I think, everywhere.
I think Universities are only at the beginning, and they have not yet found the way to do what undoubtedly they will find the way to do—to exercise a beneficial influence on that great industry of agriculture. I hope the agriculturists here will have faith in them and that they will recognise that just as the Universities can benefit engineering and chemistry and all those other practical economic pursuits, so also they can benefit agriculture, and confer very great benefits on agriculture. As regards the mould of education as to whether it benefits this country or not, it has been my conviction for a long time that the best way to secure that education will be beneficial to the country, and that those who are educated in our Irish institutions will devote their energies afterwards to the benefit of the country is to give them an education containing elements which will make them more keenly interested in Ireland than in any other country in the world. That has been my own particular aim in the matter of education for years. I know I have often been met in the past with the argument that the teaching of the Irish language, or the teaching of a subject which I myself teach when I am free to teach, Irish history, are not subjects of great economic importance. I say they are subjects of profound economic importance to this country, because an education which implants in those who receive it a deep and affectionate interest in this country is of supreme importance, and the things which characteristically and distinctively belong to it cannot fail to produce a generation and generations of students who will be devoted heart and soul to the interests of the country.
With regard to the training of teachers and Government co-operation, I will repeat what has been impressed on you so often: that our Universities are autonomous and that Government co-operation can only take the form of approving of the schemes which they adopt, and providing the additional expenses which such schemes would incur. I quite agree that one of the principal duties of Universities—perhaps the greatest of all duties of Universities— is to provide teaching material, to provide trained teachers. It does not necessarily mean that all the special work of training special teachers for special occupations must be done by Universities, but it does mean that the Universities throughout must have in view the teaching profession, and the interests of the teaching profession and the benefit and the improvement of the teaching profession, and I do hold that the Universities can and ought to take——