Two or three years ago, an Act was passed by the Oireachtas which contemplated that the University College, Galway, should gradually become a college in which all the staff would be competent to give instruction in Irish and in which the greater part of the instruction would gradually be given in Irish. I would just like to express the hope that the Minister and the Cabinet generally will bear in mind the importance of doing all that can be done to speed up that particular work. Provision was made in that Act for an increase in the University College grant of £2,000 annually by means of Orders for the purpose of providing additional facilities for giving instruction through Irish. I think that Orders have been made increasing the grant up to the present by a sum of £1,500. There is still a small amount that can be used to assist the College in this way, therefore. There is power under the Universities Act for the Minister to give additional grants, although some years ago when University Finance was overhauled, these various extra statutory grants were consolidated in a fixed sum. I think that in general the position should be that as far as possible the colleges should have a fixed sum and the question of these extra grants kept low. In the case of Galway where a change is to be effected, I think that the Minister should not hesitate, where he thinks it desirable, to give an increased sum in order that this transformation in the college should take place.
Personally, as I said recently in the House, I regard the Gaelicisation of Galway city as the thing that is going to decide whether or not the language can be preserved. I feel that if we cannot Gaelicise one town—and there is no town certainly so suitable as Galway—there is little hope of preserving the language. Galway is a small town, and the university, if it were Gaelicised, could exercise a great deal more influence in that town than even a bigger college with a more numerous student body could exercise over a bigger town. I feel little doubt that in a city like Galway, with 46 per cent. of its people already knowing Irish, if its college were Gaelicised the schools in the whole district would be very greatly influenced indeed. The students living in the town, and going about the town, would have a great deal of influence on the opinion of the people and their attitude towards the language. I believe that in fact if the college could be Gaelicised it would result in the Gaelicisation of the city.
Now I believe that that cannot be done in any sort of a reasonable time without monetary assistance from the Government. I am not advocating that money should be too readily granted, or that money should, as it were, be thrown away in the matter, but I do feel that the Government should make it clear to the college authorities that any reasonable and genuine steps taken for the Gaelicisation of the college will be helped by the Government with the financial assistance necessary. I think that the Government should make it clear that if there are very good people, who are masters of Irish and good in their own subjects, available for appointment to the staff of the college, it would be made by the Government financially possible for the college to create posts in which these people could be employed, that is posts that are reasonably necessary or useful in the college. In that the Government should also make it possible in case a very good man appears who can lecture through Irish and who is very good in his subject to make special arrangements for, say, the retirement on extra pension of those who are already there, so that the teaching work of the college may as soon as possible be put into Irish. The Government should also make it possible, in case a college decides to do its work through Irish, that there will be additional scholarships and other facilities available, so as to prevent an undue number of good students being thrown away.
I should like the Minister to say that, if the college will prove that it needs it, and if the college will do the work that we all desire it should do, the Government would not hesitate to increase the annual grant to the college by, say, another £10,000. That may seem a relatively big sum. It is not very large, compared with the total amount that we are spending on universities, and if it were to result in the Gaelicisation of the college it would be a trivial sum, having regard to the results that might be achieved by it. I should like, therefore, as I said, to press on the Minister that he should intimate that he is not confining any additional help that may be given to the remaining £500 that is provided in the statute, but that he is prepared to assist the college to go further, if the college is prepared to go further, along similar lines, and to do it as soon as possible.
