asked the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures if he will state whether any instructions have been issued by him or from the Censor's Department for the examination at the present time of letters or postal packets posted by persons in Éire for delivery to persons in Éire, and if so, if he will say under what authority any such instructions have been issued and for what purpose.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Examination of Letters.
Article 17 of the Emer-Powers Order 1939 empowers a Minister to make provision by order for securing that postal packets of any such description as may be specified in such order shall be detained and produced for censorship. In point of fact no inland correspondence has been opened by the Censorship except possibly in an isolated case where an inland letter may have found its way to the Censorship in error as a result of a mis-sort.
The Minister then is in a position to deny that half-a-dozen people are specially employed at the sorting office for the purpose of discovering and photographing internal correspondence? That is not true?
I have given the Deputy the information that no inland correspondence has been censored.
I ask further is it a fact that a special staff has been established in the sorting office for the purpose of dealing with internal correspondence?
No. There is no censorship of inland correspondence.