asked the Minister for Lands and Fisheries when it is intended to divide the Philips Estate, Gaile, Co. Tipperary, amongst the workers on that estate, uneconomic holders and landless men of the district.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Philips Estate (Co. Tipperary).
It is not possible at present to state when the Philips Estate at Gaile will be divided. A scheme for division has not yet been fully completed.
Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that the Commissioners have been operating in that district for the last month or more, asking people to retake this land on the eleven-months system and threatening them that if they do not take it they will clip their wings when the land is being divided? Is he aware that the Commissioners are going to outside areas asking people to give up lands which they hold there and to take land on this estate? I may inform him that we have a Land Settlement Committee there, and that we are not going to allow this kind of thing to happen. We are going to see that people within a two-mile radius will be satisfied before any outsider comes in.
There is no question of bringing in an outsider. The land, I understand, is going to be distributed amongst the uneconomic holders in the district, and the scheme for its division will be ready in the course of the next few months.
Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that the workmen working on this land refused to take over the land last year, and that the last time it was up for auction the Commissioner said it would be divided before the time would come to put it up again, so that the term is now up?