As the Minister stated, the House and the country have been for a long time expecting this Bill. It is over three years since the Dáil by a resolution urged that such a measure should be brought in at the first available opportunity, and I suppose we must take it from the Government that this is the first available opportunity. As he has stated, I do not think there will be any difference of opinion as to the general principles involved in this measure. From all sides of the House a call has gone forth repeatedly for the introduction of a Bill of this kind. At the same time I think it advisable that some remarks should be made on the main features of the Bill by the various parties, because this will help us in framing suitable amendments later on. Some of the Deputies spoke as if it were a pity that such a measure had to be introduced, and as if it indicated some national neglect on the part of parents that such a measure of compulsion should be necessary, but the fact is that compulsory school attendance is the law of the land in practically every civilised country. At all events I know of none in which there is not compulsory school attendance. It is only a question of the measure of its effectiveness. With regard to the position in Ireland, we had it briefly stated by the Minister in his introductory speech. We have had, or are supposed to have had, a compulsory school attendance law since 1892, but that Act was not mandatory, and in many cases it was not enforced, and often when it was put into operation it failed in its object.
The whole result of such legislation as we have had up to the present was summed up in the figures the Minister gave with regard to the present attendance at the schools. He told us that, taking everything into account, it is quite safe to say that 40 children out of every 100 of school-going age were at home from school every day. That is the position. That is what we understand by a 60 per cent. attendance at schools. Nothing further should be necessary to condemn the legislation we have had up to the present, and to show the necessity for a measure of this kind. The Minister might have gone further, and said that if such places as Dublin and Cork, and generally the towns mentioned in the schedule were taken out, the figures would be very much worse for other parts of the country; for in Dublin and Cork for the last two or three years a comparatively high percentage has been obtained, which shows that in the rural areas the percentage is very much lower than would be indicated by the general figure mentioned by the Minister. With regard to the Bill, there are one or two other matters to which grave objection must be taken. In the first place, the upper age limit is fixed at 14. I think that is entirely too low, and I hope before the Bill leaves the Dáil the age will be changed.
I throw out the suggestion to the Ministry that this measure should not in any way be regarded as a party measure, and that he would on all amendments or motions, leave it, and make it plain that it is so, to a free vote of the Dáil as to what changes should be made in the Bill in Committee. When compulsion was first introduced 33 years ago the age limit was fixed at 14, and now in 1925 we are introducing a compulsory school attendance measure, and are leaving the age at what it was fixed in 1892. I do not know whether the Ministry, or the Minister, made any inquiries as to the position in other countries with regard to the age limit. In these matters we have been too much inclined in the past to look at what was done in England, and taking example by that. It is well known that in educational matters England is one of the least progressive countries in the world. In England in their Act of 1918, while they have not actually made a higher age limit than 14 mandatory, they have given permission to local authorities, who have a lot to say in educational matters there, to make the age compulsory up to 15 in some cases, and in certain circumstances even up to 18. Powers are given to the Board of Education in England in the Act of 1918 to have education compulsory in certain circumstances up to the age of 18. But in other countries we have the same. In Canada for instance, in two of the provinces, Alberta and Manitoba, the minimum leaving age is fixed at 15. In New Brunswick and Nova Scotia it is 16; in Ontario it is 18; in 34 States of the United States of America it is 16, in 4 of these States it is 17 and in 2 it is 18. In South Africa the age is 16, in 6 Cantons of Switzerland the age is 15, and in 3 it is 16; in Greece the age is 16, in Norway it is 15, in Serbia it is 15, and in Germany it is 18. There are continuation schools in Germany in which the attendance is compulsory from 14 to 18. In France the school leaving age is 16, and in the Saorstát it is 14. Must we always linger behind?
I suggest that the Minister and the Ministry should give this question their earnest attention, and if their view is that it is not feasible at the moment, to raise the age limit beyond 14, they should certainly take powers in the Bill, as has been done in the British Acts, to raise the age by a simple order later on. In other words, it would be only a question of administration until the age could be increased beyond what it is at the present time. There is, as Deputy Mulcahy has said, that gap between 14 and 16. Sixteen is the general age at which children enter employment. That is the time when children require most attention. That is the time, I believe, at which the greatest educational effort should be made, and the greatest educational advantage could be reaped proportionately by the child. He has reached the age of 14, an age at which he is able to appreciate better than in his earlier years the advantages of education, and it is well known that it is during these years that the children who can attend, benefit much more than they did at any time up to the age of 14. I do hope, therefore, that the Dáil will agree to increase the age which is set forth in this Bill.
Now, there is another point to which I wish to refer. It is on the matter of these special exemptions which are set forth in Section 4. I think there is no necessity whatsoever for these exemptions. In sub-sections (3) and (4) of Section 4, these exemptions are set forth. Now, the position at the moment is this: that there are altogether some 250 possible school days, leaving out Saturdays and Sundays. Of these 250 days, 40 days, or eight school weeks, are to be taken as vacation. There are Church holidays, bank holidays, in some cases fair days and special days, election days and other days of that kind that make up for at least 20 school days. In any case the number of days required under the regulations during which the school should be opened in the normal way is 200 days. Of late years, since the special Irish course came to be adopted, scarcely any school is open 200 days. Now, my contention is, if you take that into account and take also the provision in the first portion, sub-section (1) of Section 4, which provides that a child may be absent if there is reasonable excuse, you will find that you are cutting down the child's school life very considerably by inserting these exemptions and giving these twenty extra days.
It is quite easy, as Deputy Sir James Craig mentioned, for schools to arrange their vacation to fit in with the spring work and the harvest work. The Easter vacation is generally given and generally coincides with the time of putting in the crops. There is generally a ten or twelve school-day vacation given at Easter. The summer vacation is generally given at the time when the work is busiest on the farm. I believe that in this matter of setting out these exemptions in the Bill we are cutting across the Convention which the Dáil has ratified, the Convention concerning the age for admission of children to employment in agriculture. The first article of that Convention which has been ratified by the Oireachtas states:—
"Children under the age of fourteen years may not be employed on work in any public or private agricultural undertaking or in any branch thereof, save outside the hours fixed for school attendance. If they are employed outside the hours of school attendance, the employment shall not be such as to prejudice their attendance at school."
That article definitely states that they shall not be employed on work on any private or public agricultural undertaking save outside the hours fixed for school attendance. The second article, on which, no doubt, the Minister will rely if he stands over this exemption, states:—
"For the purpose of practical vocational instruction the periods of the hours of school attendance may be so arranged as to permit of the employment of school-children at light agricultural work, and in particular light agricultural work connected with the harvest; provided such employment shall not reduce the period of school attendance to less than eight months."
Whatever eight months may mean there—whether eight months means eight school months or eight calendar months or eight months made up of school weeks. Apart from that it is clearly indicated, however, that the work on which they may be engaged will be work for the purpose of practical vocational instruction. That clearly indicates not merely working indiscriminately everywhere and anywhere, but working under the supervision of some instructors, some technical instructors, possibly agricultural instructors, some school organisation in any case which is for the purpose of practical vocational instruction.
I maintain that the insertion of this sub-section giving these special exemptions is contrary to the spirit, and even to the letter, of the Convention, which has been agreed to by the Dáil in regard to the employment of children. In the British Act of Parliament there are no exemptions. There is a clear cut in that Act, taking away whatever exemptions were given in the previous Acts, and there is no employment of children allowed under the age of 14 years, under any condition or circumstance. In some countries exemptions are given for work of this nature much on the lines of this Bill. But they are very few, and in no circumstance whatsoever in any country so far as I can discover, is there an exemption at such a low age as 10 years. Twelve is the very lowest age at which exemptions are given, and the majority of countries give no such exemptions. There are none in England. There is no exemption in Denmark, a country to which we often look for an example; none in Sweden or Norway, and none in 22 Cantons of Switzerland. No exemptions are allowed in Australia or in South Africa. In the United States there are no exemptions allowed in a considerable number of States, and in those States in which exemption is given the age is 12, and a certificate must be given that the child has reached a certain stage of efficiency before any exemption is given. I do hope therefore that the Minister will see his way to delete, or agree to the deletion of this special sub-section giving these exemptions, because I maintain that the conditions here, where our school week consists of five days, are different to those in other countries. That is not the case in the countries in which exemptions are given, and where there are closings for holidays, for vacations and so forth. These are quite sufficient to meet the case. These already leave the child's school year sufficiently short without putting in these special exemptions here. I know that, of course, it may be argued, and quite possibly will be argued, that a child of ten can be very useful at busy times on the farm. That will be argued, and it would be just on a line, but to a lesser degree, with the arguments that were put up in the early days of the last century in Lancashire where the children worked in the mills at a very young age and where their parents were extremely anxious that they should continue at work.
But public opinion agreed that it was wrong that children of that age should be so engaged, and that it was better that they should be at school at that age, and that a sacrifice would have to be made by the parents in the interests of the children and in the interests of the community as a whole. I do not know that there is anything else that I want to refer to except some small points which would be matters to be dealt with in the Committee Stage. I do hope that in these two points in any case, the Bill will be altered before it leaves the Dáil. I would like to say one word on what is possibly one of the chief features of the Bill and which may be regarded as one of its principles. That is the idea of introducing the Gárda Síochána as the enforcing authority in the rural areas. There is nothing in the Bill of which I am so convinced as of the necessity that this innovation should be made that the Gárda Síochána should be employed to enforce school attendance. The history of the school attendance committees, the rural committees especially, is set forth in the results which they have achieved, and we know what they are. But the position was just that where Committees were set up they generally had no finance. They were not able to employ a whole-time officer. If they did employ a whole-time officer, his salary would come altogether too heavy on the rates, especially on the rural areas. So we find that whole-time officers were not employed in the vast majority of cases. Then the type of man that was employed was generally an insurance agent or a local pensioner, or a rate collector perhaps, or somebody of that kind. We can quite well understand the difficulty such a person would have in bringing prosecutions against people on whom he would be calling the next day for an insurance policy or something of that kind. There is one case on record where the local publican was appointed as school attendance officer. I do not think that it could be argued that a man of that type would be particularly anxious to bring prosecutions against his customers.